Talk about your one-sided conversation!

I would like to formally introduce myself. My name is Stephanie and I also "contribute" to this blog. And when I say "contribute," I mean I read it when Rachelle says she's updated it. I have had every intention of posting, about a variety of things, but I don't have a scanner, and that really puts a cramp in my style. But they didn't have scanners in the old days, and they still lived. If you call that living.

You know what else they didn't have in the old days? Alternate universes, or Frank Miller, or Pop Tarts... I could go on. They instead made up for it with an abundance of weekly strips written and drawn by George Herriman, titled Krazy + Ignatz. This is my favourite comic, and the writing is incredible (the mixture of slang and phonetic spelling built the foundation for my obsession with cat language, and interpretation). Despite the basic scenario of every strip being comprised of a mouse named Ignatz hurling a brick at Krazy Kat's head (who always interprets this as an act of love), this comic, that ran for roughly 30 years starting in 1913, is amazingly inventive and sweet.

The best thing about this comic (to me) is the fact that it is never confirmed if Krazy is a male or female. Every other character in the comic has a gender, but not Krazy. Ignatz is a boy, he loves/hates Krazy, Officer Pupp is a boy and he totally loves Krazy. Krazy is gender-neutral and he/she loves Ignatz. Krazy is referred to as both a female and male in the comic's run, and because of Geo. Herriman's astounding intellegence, I refuse to believe that it is an oversight. I think it's a delicate social commentary that I am too thick to understand. It's very complicated.

One of the most uplifting moments in my short-lived telemarketing career came when I placed a number of calls to kiwi farmers in Coconino County (this is where the comic is set, you see), and got to talk to a number of natives about the status of Krazy Kat there, most of them had heard of the comic, and even when I pulled some guy's chain by asking if he was Officer Pupp, everyone had a cheerful manner about them.

In the background, I swear I could hear the hollow thud of a freshly baked adobe brick hitting an unfortunate kat's kranium. You know what I'm talkin' about?