(151) Murphy's Manor - Get a Good Look

Back in what cruising days I had -- long past by the time I drew this strip -- eye contact was a technique in which I was woefully inept. I have stories that even today I am too embarrassed to tell.

(150) Murphy's Manor - Sitting on a Park Bench Watching all the Boys Go By

I conceived Jeff as somebody with much greater social and sexual skills than I had. Even so I had to conclude that sitting on a park bench waiting for something to happen was a waste of time - - unless you brought a good book to read.

Remember I was writing for a bar crowd. Or at least what I thought a bar crowd wanted, namely somebody to spend the night with. I now wonder if I misjudged them. Maybe a certain part of the bar crowd just wanted to hang out with their friends and dance.

On the other hand, I remember once meeting a guy who claimed to have had sex with several thousand men. Assuming he wasn't lying, I wonder how he did it. Back rooms at the baths?

The subtitle I selected for this strip recalls very heterosexual Frank Loesser song. Maybe I wasn't so far off base for men in their twenties of any stripe.

(149) Murphy's Manor - Off Duty

Murphy's Manor ran in a lot bar papers. A certain number of strips about gay bars were inevitable and appropriate. But this coming from somebody who didn't really like gay bars.

My material was based on what I knew or heard about Toledo gay bars - - the seedier ones were reputedly run by the Mob and overrun by hustlers. True? Well, Rapping Paper (a fount of innuendo and gossip) has some evidence of it.

So what was a hustler, but normal employee you would expect to find in a gay bar?

(148) Murphy's Manor - A Domestic Lesbian Moment

See? Meg isn't always the Political Heavy. When she tries,  she can be quite silly.

Quick, what's the name of her lady friend? The previous mayor whom Meg just defeated in an election?

(147) Murphy's Manor - Effective Cruising Curriculum

Who wants to cruise effectively? Everybody!

Effective cruising turned out to be one of the early series of continued  Murphy's Manor strips. The problem with cruising is that it's not part of the 8th grade curriculum.

At least not formally.

(146) Murphy's Manor - Effective Cruising

Cruising everything with three legs. Normally Jeff doesn't try that hard to be clever.

Lots of personal history in  this strip. At the time I had a new job that involved bicycle route planning, and there was a lot of emphasis on safe cycling. A popular book on the subject was called Effective Cycling. I simply borrowed the term to apply to bar technique. 

The ironic part is that Sid is addressing Jeff as if he were total kludge in the bar. Whereas Jeff is actually rather skilled. The total kludge Sid was addressing was me. 

So here I am sitting home alone on a Saturday night drawing comic strips about cruising effectively  rather than cruising the bar myself.

The good part is that by this time I had met John and no longer had any temptation to go out at the bars.

(145) Murphy's Manor - Drag is Relative

The Sparkle Spinsters characters from the stories I drew for the Cruse / Triptow issues of Gay Comix. Inspired as a gay version of Gilbert Shelton's Freak Brothers (I.e. into living the lifestyle to the hilt), "Duchess" Duvall Capet was the self-appointed leader, and a character who often appeared solo. 

The other two "spinsters" were Lee who was butch (and hot). And Vernon, who was not. How fem was Vernon? He could turn Monday night football into a swish-fest. On him a football Jersey looks like a tu-tu. He wears a football helmet like a tiara. In the 1980s it was part of gay Midwest culture.

If I were inventing the Sparkle Spinsters today? How about ...

1. Drama Queen -- not effeminate so much as melodramatic. In love with books, CDs, and movies and always looking for camera angles.
2. LGBT Activist -- lives, eats, and breathes gay politics every minute. This could be Andrew Paszko, whom we have not met yet.
3. Bar Bunny -- hey, not everything has changed since the 1980s.