Category: Rats!

Confession time. I sucked at dating in college. As in, I could never seem to get a date. I had one jerk boyfriend my freshman year who dumped me after he graduated. After that, I didn’t date again until my senior year. The person I dated then ended up being the person I married, and am still married to several years later. In fact, if you include our time dating, we’ve been together 20 years. Not bad for someone who sucked at dating in college, huh?

I think the reason why I did so poorly on the dating scene was that I was not cool. I’m still not cool, in case you’re wondering, but I don’t give a damn anymore. That’s the nice thing about being in your forties, married and having kids. You don’t have to worry about crap like that any more.

Having said all that, I was never too short to see over the steering wheel of my car. My roommate on the other hand… man, was she ever short!

Enjoy your week!

I pulled out this cartoon this morning and laughed. Not because of the punch line, which I do think was pretty funny, but because of the background I drew. The “Oni-Kitty” and cockroach posters are shout-outs to some civilian friends of mine. Denise and Telf (whom I would later share an apartment with for a year, post-college) had this really evil cat named Truffles. Truffles only seemed to like Denise and absolutely loathed everyone else, as I recall. Except for my boyfriend/future husband Michael. For some reason, Truffles really, really liked Michael, especially when she was in heat. That only made her more evil in my eyes of course. So we called her Oni-Kitty, which meant devil cat. Oni is a Japanese term for demon or devil, and Denise and Telf and I spent a lot of time with the Virginia Tech Anime Society, so it was only natural we pick label Truffles with an anime nomiker. Evil, evil cat, I swear.

The cockroach poster was a salute to one of my best friends, Joelle, who was working on her master’s degree in entomology at Virginia Tech. She was writing her thesis on something to do with blattella germanica, or the German cockroach. For fun, Joelle would sometimes take a Madagascar cockroach from the entomology department out for a walk. Madagascar cockroaches are HUGE, and all Joelle had to do was glue a bit of string to the back of one for a leash. Oh, these cockroaches also make a weird hissing noise if you poke them. We always called the cockroach Pookie, just to be cute.

So I drew cartoons about Truffles the evil Oni-Kitty and Pookie the cockroach, and I had forgotten all about that until I saw this week’s cartoon. I’m still chuckling over it. Joelle, Telf and Denise, wherever you are, I hope you guys are doing well 😉

Actually, she does look macho. All women in uniform do, but when you slap ’em in a set of cadet greys, the effect is even more pronounced.

My apologies for not putting this week’s Rats! up yesterday. I was going to do it, but I had a podcast to finish and then Pixie’s preschool called me to tell me she was sick, and you know she was sick because she turned down a cupcake at lunch, and then I had some graphics commissions to finish because I’m leaving today for the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, and did I mention we’re down to one car because my car is in the shop so the Hubster and I have had to play car tag all week so he could get to work and I could pick up the kids from school? It’s been an interesting week, to say the least.

Anyway, about women in uniform. I was always amazed at the reaction I’d get anytime people who knew me as a cadet, and later as an officer, saw me in civilian clothes. They’d just sort of freak out and say things like, “Oh my god! You have hair!” And I’d be like, “No duh! I have to braid it and put it up everyday before I get into uniform!” And they’d be like, “But seriously! You have all this HAIR!” I looked so different in civilian clothes that I actually got asked out on a date by one of my NCOs at a reserve unit function one time. The moment he realized who I was, he ran away screaming. I’m still not sure if I should have taken that as a complement or not.

I had a lot of hair back then. It came all the way down to the middle of my back, and it was very thick. And red. I love Miss Clairol. Now it’s still thick and red, but not quite as long. I cut a lot of it off after having the second child. It was just too much to deal with when I had a collicky baby on my hands. I’m growing it back again though, so maybe I’ll be able to braid it again come this summer. That would be nice.

As I mentioned earlier, I’ll be at the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, and I’ll be wearing my supercool “Fear Me!” t-shirt. You can still get a “Fear Me!” t-shirt at Zazzle.com and all the profits from the shirt will continue to go to DonorsChoose.org. (BTW, they’re having a $5 off all shirts sale for Halloween, so BUY NOW!). Buy a t-shirt for that strong, macho woman in your life, and do something good while you’re at it!

After having been such a downer last week, ranting about the ills of alcohol and under-aged drinking, I must confess this week that I did end up at some parties I never should have been at. I still say, “Don’t drink!” But hey, I’m not completely innocent in that department myself. Not that I ever drank before the age of 21, but like I said, I went to some rather… interesting parties.

Not much major going on this week, except for getting ready for the March To Keep Fear Alive! I don’t know how many folks from Virginia Tech plan to head up to DC on 30 October, but me and mine will certainly be there. If you go up there, be on the look out for a woman with horns, demon wings, and a killer smile. No seriously, my smile has caused people to die in fright. Aaaaaaand, I’ll also be wearing my “Fear Me!” t-shirt, which you can also buy from Zazzle.com. Profits from the shirt sales go straight to DonorsChoose.org. So if you’re a strong, scary woman or if you know a strong, scary woman, buy a shirt and do something good while you’re at it.

Oh freshmen, beware of parties. I know you guys think you know how to party, but trust me, things can go very wrong very fast, especially if you con someone into buying your underage butt some alcohol.

I don’t mean to be a downer here, but the fact is during my time at Virginia Tech, I saw quite a few freshmen (and sophomores and juniors and seniors and even super-seniors) get so drunk at parties, they pretty much devolved into brain-dead protoplasm, and I never could understand the point of that. For starters, is it really all that fun to be so drunk that you cannot put one foot in front of the other and thus must spend all night face down on the floor? Or else spend the next 24 hours puking your guts out into the toilet? I’ve seen seen freshman puke so hard they nearly turned themselves inside out, and once I saw one of my buds pass out and nearly fall right out an open window on the fifth floor of the dorm. Not funny guys. Not funny at all.

My dad used to always say, “Before you go drinking, count the money in your wallet and put a bucket beside your bed. The next morning, check your wallet and see how much you spent. Then check the contents of the bucket. That’s what you bought.”

Maybe it’s just because I can’t really drink. I’ve been told I have the metabolism of a gerbil. I get buzzed off a single drink, and I mean I get really tipsy, but then ten minutes later, it’s completely over. I don’t even need the bucket to tell me that what I spent to be tipsy for 10 lousy minutes was really not worth the money.

But you college kids will go do what you want to do anyway. Just remember what your Auntie Helen says. Before you party, check your wallet and put the bucket beside your bed. And DON’T FORGET YOUR DESIGNATED DRIVER!!!!!! That way you’ll be sure to survive long enough to see what you bought the next day. Hope you like what you paid for.

One final note, I am attending the March to Keep Fear Alive on 30 October, and in honor of the occasion I am selling t-shirts for charity at Zazzle.com. The “Fear Me” t-shirt says…

It’s perfect for that strong, smart, scary woman in your life, and all the profits go to DonorsChoose.org. So buy a shirt of make a donation directly to a good cause. Thank you for your support!

I’m not sure if this was yet another cartoon drawn at the request of the general’s secretaries, or if this was simply my response to having gotten so many requests from them to draw something funny based on particular events. I suspect the latter. I got a lot of requests from them to draw cartoons about things that I don’t think were necessarily funny, but because they were the general’s secretaries, I sort of had to do it anyway.

Again, these were very nice ladies. I just felt a little… pressured, I guess.

I’ve been getting a lot of feedback, both from former cadets and current cadets. Thank you all for the emails and the comments on the blog. I don’t always respond as quickly as I should, I’m afraid. Life is a bit hectic between work, kids, and other stuff, so I tend to get behind in my emails. I do read all the comments I get however, and I really, really appreciate them. So thank you! If you haven’t heard back from me yet, you will… sometime… in the future…

This cartoon was the result of yet another request by the secretaries for the Commandant of Cadets. Apparently, General Musser had run over a tree stump that morning, and for some reason this was hysterically funny. I’m not sure. I just recall I was once again summoned to the Commandant’s office and told about the tree stump incident and then asked if I could use it in for the “Rats!” comics. So here ya go.

Honestly, I loved the ladies who worked in General Musser’s office. They were always very nice to me, and they certainly kept me on my toes with their requests. I just hope I made them laugh with what I drew.

This is also one of those cartoons that my cats got into while it was in storage. They really tore this one up. Fortunately, I had made a photocopy of this one at some point and saved it. I was able to scan that in for this week’s episode. The original is in really bad shape. But what can I say. My cats were always a bit vicious with their criticism of my work.

Ah, yes, I created an arcing storyline for the comic. Mick was a representation of a lot of people I met during my freshman year, all of whom said, “Why the hell would you want to do that?!” every time I explained that I had to be up at 5:30AM most mornings for VTCC activities. I don’t think I ever really gave them a good explanation back then, but if asked now, I would say… um, I’ll get back to you on that one.

Seriously, I am not a morning person. I hate waking up and feeling all groggy and half-dead. And then to have to throw on a uniform, drag down to the company area, and sound the call for BRC on top of that? Ugh. Worse was having to get up at oh-dark-thrity to walk all the way across campus on a freezing winter morning to run stadium steps with the Army ROTC group. I swore when I graduated that I would never get up early again for anything. So these days I’m usually up by 5AM.

Yeah, you laugh, but just you wait. If you’re in the VTCC, your days of getting up at the ass-crack of dawn are just starting, pal. One day you too will be old and still dragging your butt out of bed, wishing that someone would come along and invent the personal-use caffeine IV. We’ll see how hard you laugh then 😉

I have to be honest. Neither the main character of “Rats!” nor I were ever very brave. I recall being scared to death through most of my freshman year, and those feelings of “Oh my god, any second now I’m going to totally screw things up!” did not really diminish until some years after I graduated from college. Nowadays, of course, very little scares me. I survived so many terrifying things in college and the Reserves that nothing I come across really phazes me anymore. But back when I was a freshman cadet? If you said “Boo!” to me, I’d probably squeak and run away.

So Irwin Rat is really a reflection of me, complete with all my neuroses, except he’s male and has a lot less hair than I did. Like Irwin, I did run into some interesting people at Virginia Tech, outside the VTCC. Back then, it was a little uncommon to meet folks who sported purple mohawks and multiple body piercings. These days that seems so de rigueur. But back in the late 1980s, it was pretty freaky, especially for a small town girl like myself. I did eventually loosen up, however, and I made friends with all sorts of people, and these days I contemplate getting a purple mohawk of my own. Because now that I’m older, I’m more into scaring the crap out of other people than being scared by them 😉

I think someone told me last year that Schultz dining hall was being closed down. That’s kind of sad in a way. I ate a lot of meals there, more than a few of them while sitting at attention, trying hard not to laugh at the person sitting at attention across from me. How are you new rats doing so far this year, by the way?

I don’t think I went to Schultz dining hall for dinner my first Mil Ball, but I don’t really recall. I do remember that I went with one of my buds from Kilo Company (I was in Hotel Company). His name was Scott, but danged if I can remember his last name now. We were friends and decided to go together. I remember I had a black semi-formal dress, nice but not too fancy, and Scott wore a his uniform with mess jacket of course. He probably got me a corsage and I probably got him a boutonniere, but beyond that, I don’t recall much of the evening. I have a picture somewhere of the two of us from that night, but am not sure where it is. Nor am I sure where Scott is these days. Sad to say, I’ve lost track of all my buds, but that’s how it goes. We graduate, ship off to our various military or civilian lives, get married, have kids, etc., etc., etc. In fact, there’s only one person I see with any regularity from my days at Virginia Tech, and that’s my husband (who was not a cadet, by the way).

Speaking of my husband, as I write this on Monday night (in preparation for posting on Thursday morning), he’s downstairs watching Virginia Tech play against Boise. I am no fan of football, but even I can understand at this point that the game is not going well for the Hokies. I hope you rats are prepared to cheer your team onto victory at the home games. Because back in my day, we didn’t get weekend pass if the team didn’t win!

Go Hokies!