Evan Dorkin

The First Milk & Cheese Drawing

Added 2023-10-08 22:59:02 +0000 UTC

From 1986, I believe. Drawn on a napkin while waiting for food in a Mexican restaurant in NYC, after seeing bands at CBGB's. I was drunk, which is where the alcohol connection probably comes from in the later comics.

I don't know what led me to draw these two things. I usually drew Huevos Rancheros on napkins, a band of eggs with guns. And some other dumb in-jokes my friends and I shared while in diners, restaurants and waiting for movies to begin. But I guess drawing food while waiting for food makes some sort of sense.

My good friend Brian David-Marshall sometimes took my napkin drawings home , from Dave's Pot Belly or The Corner Bistro or wherever we ended up after doing something in Manhattan (Gray's Papaya wasn't good for napkin drawings, no tables or chairs there). He has this napkin drawing framed in his home office. It's amazing that this drawing sparked my career in many ways, and that Brian actually kept the damned thing.

If it was up to me I'd scan it for potential print, clean it up and ditch the napkin. I absolutely hate this drawing. Not only is it badly drawn, but there are food stains on it. I cannot abide that. It bothers me to no end. I shudder to look at this napkin, despite it being an artifact commemorating an important moment in my dumbass life. I always tell Brian to burn it. I'm serious. He won't burn it.

I wonder how I got home that night.