Career Damage

Two notes this week:

1) At the top of the email, there is now a big honking “ Subscribe Here” button. If you received a message as an email forward and you want to get more, please hit the button to sign up. Remember, anyone can read the email or the blog, but only people who sign up are eligible to win original art. (And please mention the person who forwarded you the email when you sign up, because that person gets an extra contest entry.)

2) Here's the best story I've heard about this book since I started this project: I was at a birthday party last week, attended by no less than Rob Brown, model for Part-Time Dog and actor extrordinaire (www.dysfunctionaltheatre.org).

I told him that he should be proud. The mailing list was up to about 1,400 people, and I was getting new members every week. He told me that he had been forwarding it to friends, colleagues, everybody, and everybody was enjoying it – except his mother. “Your mother?” I asked. “Yeah,” he said. “She kind it looked it over, read it through a couple of times, and then turned around and asked me, 'Rob, explain to me again how this is helping your career.'”

Mrs. Brown: I got nothing. But I will at least publicize that Rob's troupe, the Dysfunctional Theatre Company, is having a fall Fundraiser at Deacon Brodie's on 370 West 46th Street on Thursday, October 1st and that everybody who loves new theater in New York should come. It is apparently the very, very least I can do.

More soon, promise. In the meantime, keep sending in dog photos (thanks to all of those I got this week!!), write me emails, make some comments on the blog, read the story so far or check out seltzerstudio.com.

Open publication

The Core of the Dilemma

So last week I got ahead of myself, and, having drawn a mess of doggies and a new page of the book, I sent off an email with a picture of the doggies that also had a link to a PDF of the book so far. That PDF included the image above. So those readers who checked out the link – passionate, dedicated readers, (therefore) thin, good-looking readers – have already read this page. But other readers – less passionate, less dedicated, (and also quite possibly, but not necessarily) thin, good-looking readers – have not. How to resolve this dilemma, to bring in new material for some without leaving out the rest?

Stepping in to save the day is Rob Brown, model for the Part-Time Dog and also actor for New York's own Dysfunctional Theatre, which just staged an extrememly well-received revival of Arsenic and Old Lace. Rob played Mortimer, the role played by Cary Grant in the movie version. Those of you who haven't seen the movie really should – it's great, and you won't be able to see Rob in the production, because it ended its run last week. However, you can amuse yourself by reading the glowing reviews and see actual photos of the Part-Time Dog his own self in these articles from New York Press, Off-Off-Online, New York Theatre.com, and Backstage. Then check out the Dysfunctional Theatre's website to keep an eye out for the next production. (I would have sent these links around earlier, but Rob didn't send them to me until last week, confirming that Rob's destiny is definitely on the stage and not in, say, PR.)

Next up, a new page, with more dog pictures. In the meantime, keep sending in dog photos (thanks to all of those I got this week!), write me emails, make some comments on the blog or read the story so far.