My very first adventure in writing about comics (as well as my first piece to be weblished at MSNBC.com) was about the return of Opus the Penguin to the Sunday funnies, in the form of a ficticious interview with the beloved waterfowl. This resulted in minimal fame or fortune but many more opportunities to write for the site’s Entertainment section AND an exchange of emails with Berkeley “Don’t Call Me Berk” Breathed that remained the closest I’d ever come to a Legendary Newspaper Cartoonist until Diesel Sweeties got syndicated and I glommed onto a third-teir position in rstevens’ entourage.

Naturally for a cartoonist whose career began back when there was still some hope for the medium we call krispy kleenex, his attitude toward web-based comicking has been at times described as (a) reticence, (b) reluctance, (c) avoidance, (d) abhorrence or (e) run-away-screaming-like-a-little-girl-ance. After much delay, he finally accepted a place at the comics.com portal last year, but his is the last Sunday comic to be updated, always after all the krispy kleenex have been dropped in all the bushes.

But now, Breathed has made a deal for the latest opus of Opus to appear at Salon.com, alongside Carol Lay’s WayLay, Ruben Bolling’s Tom the Dancing Bug and Tom Tomorrow’s This Modern World, home of another comic penguin.
Along with the announcement comes a non-fictitious interview with the comicker, containing some fascinating stuff:

1: He thankfully puts to rest the rumor that he might consider killing off his trademark character.
2: He sadly puts to rest the rumors that there may be an Opus Movie in the next umpteen years
3: He astutely assesses the satirical value of the current Administration
4: He offers a piece of obvious advice to would-be kid-lit authors: “If you write it, draw it”
5: He explains WHY he doesn’t want you to call him “Berk”.

But he doesn’t explain the incredible break with continuity in the latest comic with his “Bloom County” character of Binkley returned to child size three years after it was revealed that he had grown up, experienced ‘a disastrous first kiss’ and become a Tibetan eunuch monk.