How to T.P.

The fifth 52 Comic Challenge: Draw a "how to" comic.

Anybody that knows me knows how much I love t.p.ing. To reiterate my strip's first panel, t.p.ing is the easiest, most effective, most harmless pranks you can pull; it creates an instant, annoying impression, but it doesn't leave any lasting effects. At least, not when my friends and I did it. Our arsenal was simple, almost environmental: toilet paper, forks, Q-tips, and water guns. Around the Fourth of July, we once "forked" someone's yard with American flag toothpicks. Sometimes, we'd sprinkle birdseed in someone's gravel -- so the circle of life could continue. We never egged. No silly string, except for that One Terrible Time. I'm still not sure if Chris peed in the gas tank that one night, but if he did, I don't condone it. If we wanted to leave a calling card, we printed one out, or used shaving cream . . . easy to wash away, and sometimes pleasantly fragrant. We'd even leave you the rest of the can.

Regarding the comic itself, it's one I've wanted to draw for a long time: me t.p.ing, plain and simple, partially inspired by an episode of my friends' and my short-lived public access TV show Dumbfounded. My how-to guide is an intended three pages; the first, establishing motive and the importance of "the pre-job drive-by" may never reach fruition . . . for this installment, anyway. These challenges, provided by Young American Comics, have been particularly fulfilling creatively. I've resolved to accomplish at least every other week's, which strikes me as a realistic goal for one that has never produced comic strips for public consumption ever before.

Like t.p.ing, you have to start slow. Then, before you know it, eight rolls in a friend's yard turns into 100 in your Spanish teacher's. That I have some experience with.

Addendum: Looking at the two pages together, drawn nearly a week apart, I realize that the caricature of me from page 1, panel 1 is vastly different in style and attitude than the one on page 2, panel 1. So goes self-parody, I suppose.