I met with my friend Peggy Jo van den Berg to create a painting for another friend, former Orlando Mayor Carl T. Langford at a Perkins in Mount Dora.

Here Peggy Jo is with the final painting.

I love when this happens: 3 friends who have never met, Dick Daniels, Ken Culotta and Peggy Jo van den Berg. We all had a good time at Perkins!

Here is a tremendous Robert McGinnis book cover I picked up Wednesday. Below is a closer look.

Made a book stop Wednesday and found a couple neat bookcovers. Here’s one by Tom Ryan. Ryan gets credit on the back cover of the book. In a way it almost looks like the one fellow is about to drop his pants. Nevertheless a really nice painting.

I do wonder who Tom Ryan is. There is the cartoonist who drew the comic strip ‘Tumbleweeds’. Then there is Tom Ryan, western painter, who has the website you’ll see if you click on this sentence. Hmmm…

I attended the Orlando Remembered meeting Wednesday morning. Above is a sketch of Peggy Jo van den Berg. Below is a sketch of member, and fellow artist, Ellen Smith.

Above is our Orlando Remembered Chairman, Robert Serros, and our permanent Secretary, Grace Chewning.

On September 4th during my trip to Lakeland to shore up the National Cartoonists Society – Florida Chapter meeting we were putting together, I went to my friend at the Lakeland SPCA to get materials for goodie bags. I came out with those and a cat. I adopted an 8 year kitty that I’m naming Zora after Zora Neale Hurston. That’s her above.

The comic strip, Beetle Bailey, turned 60 years old today and some cartoonists on Facebook drew their version of Beetle. Here’s mine.

I drew this at Reececliff Restaurant in Lakeland, Florida, while lunching with my friend, Jeremy Buchanon.

During my two mile hike today found these guys popping out of the ground.

Here are eight books read since June 21st’s update:

1) The Empty Copper Sea: I know I read this book a few decades ago, but it sure read as a stranger to me. A good, simple story with a lot less of the typical adventure of a Travis McGee book. It read almost more like a prologue.

2) Totch – Another book I’ve read in the past, but only parts. This is by far the best book I’ve read of the 30 or so I have so far about the Everglades. it is one of the finest non-fiction books I’ve read about Florida over all. It contains a very well told family journey.

3) The Green Ripper – One of MacDonalds swipes at religious thought, though not as grim as ‘One More Sunday’, though more people die in this one. A fast moving story that ends a bit abruptly and unbelievably. Though more adventure thrillers today are written this way.

4) The Seminoles of Florida – A very good history of the Seminoles. Well written and very complete, unlike similar efforts to chronicle the Seminoles.

5) The Last Patriot – A good adventure that is more believable than The Green Ripper. A lot of background information make the total a bit hard to know where you are at any one time.

6) The Florida Seminoles and the New Deal – Author Kersey sure knows his stuff. This is a very well done book with lots of insight and explanation.

7) Scarecrow – The fastest most unbelievable books I’ve ever read. It’s really more science fiction than grounded in reality. There’s a good plot underneath, but the non-stop action is insane. One big plus is that you never know who lives or dies is the book.

Pioneering in the Everglades – This book was a personally written book for the author’s children. So, I’ll excure the poor writing and badly cobbled together vignettes of living in South Florida. Otherwise, there are some very nifty nuggets tucked inside the pages.

Here’s Marnie and Pedro! I usually draw folks while they’re talking and I miss a big smile like his shown above. But then I would’ve missed his love of superheroes (Especially Green Lantern and NOT Rob Liefeld!).