Thought For The Day: June 2008

Monday, June 30, 2008

Thought For The Day: 6.30.08

Today our family had Mom's Memorial Picnic. We had lots and lots of Pecos Bill's BBQ with beans and slaw and jello and chocolate milk. It was absolutely a feast of guilty pleasures.

Somewhere in the middle of the day I realized what a glutton I was being (but then it's hard to control yourself with that ham just sitting there calling your name) and out popped this cartoon.

I had a great day today at the parks. It was great to spend so much time with my noisy, chaotic, terminally procrastinated, beautiful family and I'd like to believe mom would have had a great time too, if she were more than a box of ashes anyway...

Thursday, June 26, 2008

June Birthdays: 6.26.08

Yes, it has been 5 days since my last cartoon posting. Please accept my humble apologies. I've had a busy week since I last drew. I'll try not to have such a big gap between postings again.

This cartoon is for my oldest and youngest sisters who both had birthdays this week. I love you both, see you this Saturday.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Thought For The Week: 6.23.08

This is Farley. The only person who has ever seen Farley is Lucy. He is Shamus' owner (term applied very loosely). Shamus and Farley actually are a separate comic from the Thought For The Day cartoons, but he will make cameo appearances every now and then.

Here's another full color one. This one took me almost 7 hours. I love the full color, but it REALLY slows me down. You're probably not going to see another full color 'toon for a while. Soak up the goodness now...

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Thought For The Day: 6.18.08

I ran into a spider web tonight out on my patio. ...shudder...

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Thought For The Day: 6.17.08

When the power of positive thinking eludes you...

This stupid little cartoon has been floating around in my head for a week now. I had to draw it, if anything, just to get it out of the way.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Thought For The Day: 6.14.08

I think this might be my favorite TFTD ever. This is the third time I've redrawn it. This time, I've finally realized my true vision for this thought (see the two different originals in my Picasa WebGallery).

FYI, if you click on the smaller 'toon above it will take you to a full size version so you can see the details better ;P

Friday, June 13, 2008

Thought For The Day: 6.13.08

Kinda like when you found out Santa Claus isn't real, huh?

Sunday, June 8, 2008

Dedicated To Mom's Memory: 6.8.08

Mom passed away this week, she loved Shamus and hated waking up so...

Shamus' Thoughts For The Day started as a way to brighten Mom's day when she came home from work. She worked the evening shift for a while when I was a kid, she wouldn't get home until midnight-1 am. I started leaving these for her on her spot at the table, sometimes with a chocolate treat. She collected them for me, I will eventually reproduce that whole collection.

If you're "family", please leave a comment.

Sunday, June 1, 2008

Thought For The Week: 06.01.08

Please don't be confused by the date of posting vs the title vs the copyright date. I've been drawing them for three weeks and so the date in the title reflects the week starting date that the thought was for. The copyright date is the date I've finished drawing the 'toon digitally. And the posting date is the date I actually posted the drawing.

And none of these dates are going to be in order. I'm just making this stuff up as I go folks.

Enjoy.

What is Thought For The Day?

Bio:
Thought For The Day is the name of this cartoon strip.
The main character is Shamus. He's a cat that basically sits behind his wall and spouts philosophical nonsense. He's not especially wise. He's mostly silly. But he believes in his "wisdom" and loves sharing it with the world.

I've been drawing Shamus since the early 80's. He was mostly drawn on the back of note pads. My Mom worked the evening shifts and would not get home until midnight or later. I would leave Thoughts for her to give her something to smile about when she got home.

She saved a lot of them, some will be reproduced here.

While the strip is called Thought For The Day there are all kinds of variations that I've done over the years.

..Thought For The Week is probably going to be my "Sunday" version. I'll do those in full color and try to put something extra into them.

..Thought For The Month will be used in calendars I plan to publish starting with 2009 (I'll have these ready for purchase in November '08). You probably won't see these online until after the new year has started.

..Other special Thoughts, such as the Thought For A Lifetime that I drew in Mom's memory, will appear occasionally (and maybe by request?).

How To Use This Blog:
While the blog format is a good format to display daily cartoons like this, I find it's not the easiest format to look at a collection or body of work. As time passes the volume of cartoons here will be scattered across months of content.

--Finding past Thoughts:
The main page will contain only the most recent 12 Thoughts.
Use the "Post Archive" list to view all the posts for a particular month. Click on the name of the month you wish to review.

--Reading the Thoughts:
Click on the name of the post, right above the cartoon, to go to a single page of that Thought. This makes reading the comments posted by my sister, Robin, easier to read.
Click on the actual cartoon to go to a full-size view of the cartoon without the text of the post.

--Please Comment:
I love it when people leave comments on my cartoons. Not just 'cause I value your feedback, but I also like to know who's looking and what they think. Thanks for leaving comments.

--You Want Some?
This whole project only just began in late May 2008. I'm working on integrating the ability to buy Thoughts as prints, t-shirts, magnets, postcards, calendars, etc. I also don't see this blog as the permanent home for these Thoughts. Expect lots of changes in the future, but please stick with me.
If you have bookmarked this blog (or plan to) please use the new address I just set up. Instead of going to shamusthoughts.blogspot.com please go to shamusthoughts.com.

This way, when I change the site to another place your link will still bring you here.

Thanks for coming by. Hope you come back soon!

Please Respect My Content:

All artwork displayed on this website is the original creation and property of Russell O'niel Cooney, copyright is indicated, signed and dated on each image.
Please do not duplicate or distribute, for profit or intent of benefit, this content without my written permission. Reproduction of images in their entirety for personal enjoyment is allowed.
I'll be setting up an ecommerce store so these can be purchased as prints, shirts or other (as of yet undecided) media at some time in the future. Please check back later for purchasing options if you are still interested.
Thank you for respecting my work and my rights.
Have a great day.

Thought For The Day