"Everybody Loves Raymond"

Not long after the post where I reminisced about two "old" friends - and fellow cartoonists - from art school, Will Finn and Ray McAnallen, and had mentioned that I've lost track of Ray over the years... I got an email from (guess who?), Ray! It seems about the same time I was heading down Memory Lane, he felt compelled to go for a stroll up from the other end. He had Googled me and "Earth Pig"... found us both at "Blank Fields" and was, I am sure, much surprised to see his face of some thirty-years ago staring back at him! God bless the Internet! Ray is indeed a big creative director, out St. Louis way, for a big ad agency.


A few more pictures I just unearthed after tonight's dinner. The top is of Ray (left) and myself. The next is of Ray, Will and me... along with cartooning instructor, Bob Sallows. Bob was also the director of education of the Visual Communication's department. With a cartoonist as president of the Art Institute of Pittsburgh (the aforementioned John Johns) and here with another cartoonist as director of education, guys like Will, Ray and I were in seventh heaven in the latter half of the 70's. Ray was quick to explain in his recent email that it was Bob Sallows that he hit in the face with a pie, not John Johns. And here I've gone all these years remembering wrongly! Anyway, if I can trust my memory, we also had Fran Ford and a gentleman named Reynolds as cartooning instructors.

The bottom picture is of me and Will. In it I have on a t-shirt that I had made up... that read, "Will Fan Finn Club". I didn't want Will to feel slighted. After Ray had hit John Johns... er, I mean, Bob Sallows in the face with that pie, Ray was on everyone's sh*t list. Maybe fellow students wished that they had thought of it first themselves or the teachers were afraid they were next, I don't know. But Ray was uncharacteristically somber. So to make him feel better - and to let everyone know I had Ray's back - I had a t-shirt done that read, "Ray McAnallen Fan Club".

It might have cheered Ray up some, but it caused quite a few of the instructors to avoid me for a while.

But it was worth it.

Anyways, I've come across an old course catalog, from AiP... with a great picture of John Johns. I gotta hit the proverbial hay, but will be sure to post that soon...