As fun as Kurt Dinse’s work is, he’s at his finest when he’s on his own book, ONE YEAR IN INDIANA. Conrad Lant is a very intelligent heavy metal vocalist, but somehow he has found himself homeless after his most recent tour. In an act of desperation, he moves in with a friend who is going to a university in Indiana. Disaster and hijinks ensue.
This time, we come upon our booze-addled hero on a night of heavy drinking in a college town, where every day has a glorious, cheap drink special. (Ah, the glory days. The best is “Wednesday: Pile of change gets you drunk!”) However, even that’s not good enough for Conrad, who is officially broke. He looks for a job and manages to find a few occupations an unmotivated rock could perform, but they’re not too permanent. He wants something with staying power, and a temp agency finds him something. However, they need the dreaded piss test from him.
A piss test he is guaranteed to fail.
What is a man to do? Well, his friend takes him to a head shop to get some kind of potion that promises to cover up any trace of weed in his system. That’s where Dinse’s true genius shines through, depicting places like this. “Good lord, it looks like Janis Joplin threw up down here,” Conrad says upon seeing the head shop. “Smells like it, too,” he adds. And in another moment of startling insight, he says, “The most treasured secrets of life can be found behind a filthy Wonder Woman bed sheet.”
The best part, though, is when the owner of the head shop goes over his legal spiel, clarifying that everything sold in his store is above board, and these products are all used for enjoying tobacco. Gotta’ love the hypocrisy some people have to live with as a result of government interference.
To say nothing of Dinse’s description of the Big Three Jobs: auto assembly, parts and assembly, and construction. (That last one’s the best.)
Does Conrad get what he wants? Read the book and find out. As always, it’s worth your time. You might even learn something from some of Dinse’s asides between the panels. Entertainment and education, folks. The best package you can get.
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