In my capacity as a fill-in editorial cartoonist for the Toronto Star I thought I'd do the above cartoon as a local treat.

They don't call today Simcoe day around these parts of the Golden Horseshoe. In Hamilton it's just known as Civic Day. They might as well just do what they do in the U.K. and call a day like this one a Bank holiday Monday. Actually, two provinces and one territory do not recognize it at all, and five other provinces do not oblige employers to offer holiday pay on this day, thus making it a civic holiday in the legal sense.

There's not much information about the August holiday Monday on the Internet. I woke up Saturday morning to CBC radio chit chat and it seems all of the trivia about the holiday came from Craig Martlatt's very informative website. In other parts of the province there are different names for today's holiday:

1869 - Toronto City Council originated a midsummer holiday for a "day of recreation".

1871 - A Bank Holiday was established by the House of Commons in England. Sir John Lubbock declared that Toronto in Canada had found an August holiday "advisable and satisfactory."

1875 - Perhaps after the precedent set by Sir John Lubbock, Toronto City Council fixed the first Monday in August as a Civic Holiday.

1968 - Toronto City Council officially called the civic holiday "Simcoe Day" after Major-General John Graves Simcoe, who was appointed the first Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada on September 12th, 1791. He convened the first Legislative Assembly and established York (now Toronto) as the capital of the province. One of his crowning achievements was to begin the phasing out of slavery in Upper Canada, which officially ended in 1810 – 23 years before it was abolished in the British Empire and 55 years before the Emancipation Proclamation in the United States.

1980 - Burlington celebrates the holiday as "Joseph Brant Day." Joseph Brant was a Mohawk Chief who became known for his treaty negotiations and loyalty to the British.

1982 - The City of Brantford adopted a policy that stated that the civic holiday be named "Founders' Day". Each year, the Brantford Heritage Committee submits a report to City Council with the name or organization that is to be recognized on that day.

1983 - Oshawa City Council passed a resolution to recognize the holiday as "McLaughlin Day" in honour of the late Colonel R.S. McLaughlin, who brought General Motors to Oshawa. See Parkwood Estate and Oshawa - still motoring after 75 years.

1996 - The City of Ottawa passed a by-law proclaiming the Civic Holiday as "Colonel By Day". John By (1779-1836) was a British Lieutenant-Colonel and military engineer. His most noteworthy achievement was the building of the Rideau Canal and Bytown (now Ottawa) was named after him.

1998 - Sarnia City Council passed a resolution declaring the holiday "Alexander Mackenzie Day". The Honourable Alexander Mackenzie was Canada's second Prime Minister from 1873-1878.

1999 - The Town of Cobourg proclaimed the holiday as "James Cockburn Day". James Cockburn was a father of Confederation and represented the riding of Northumberland West in the Legislative Assembly of Canada, 1861-67.

I'm surprised Hamilton hasn't renamed this day. In time I'll bet there'll be a number of potential candidates: Lincoln Alexander, Sheila Copps, Bob Morrow...Boris Brott Day... Elizabeth Bagshaw day... uggh. Been down this road before.

I've always been fascinated by maps. When I was a kid I declared to anyone who would listen that when I grew up I was going to work as a "mapmaker". To train myself I would copy maps out of atlases and try to squeeze as many place names and geographic features as possible. Then I later found out that the correct name for "map making" was "cartography" and that in order to become a cartographer you had to be a whiz in mathematics. Knowing myself to be one of world's worst math students on record I knew my dream of drawings maps for a living would never pan out.

Cartoonists have followed in the steps of previous generations who have found amusement in combining satire with maps. So I can only admire them as an observer. Some examples of maps be found of Great Britain, France, Italy, Ireland, Germany, Spain and Portugal, and Denmark. The latter 6 are the inspiration of William Harvey, an English satirist working in the 1860's. Upon their first publication, the artist described these maps as "humorous outlines of various countries, with an introduction and descriptive lines," intended to make geography enjoyable and accessible to children. By today's standards, some of these pictures might appear stereotypical, and even slightly offensive. However, at the time, they were quite popular, and they reflect the contemporary conceptions (or misconceptions) of these countries. (source). Here are my maps drawn in the past 6 or so years, inspired by the works of artists like William Harvey:

 

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What compels so many to hit the drive thru on the hottest day of the year to order to get their usual fix of boiling hot coffee? This doesn't just include people driving in their air-conditioned cars to their air-conditioned offices, but people just like the guys I depicted in today's cartoon. Sweaty people who you see lounging all over the place, strolling with cup in hand, or even riding their bike one handed while holding their coffee in the other.

Jack, a colleague of mine at work always goes across the road for a coffee between 11 and 12. He asks if I ever want anything brought back knowing I'll just say no thanks. Yesterday I reminded him that it was 35°C with a humidity level making it feel like it was 55°C. That still didn't faze him. He still felt compelled to cross over the baking hot tarmac of Main Street for his habitual need for coffee. Mind you, he doesn't go to closest Tim Horton's to grab his coffee, he goes further to the Fortinos supermarket where he spends a few extra cents for their "gourmet" coffee. I respect that. He's not like the other sheep who flock to Tim Horton's on the hottest day of the year to satisfy their addiction to what Tim Horton's calls coffee, especially at roll up the rim season.

I like coffee, but I like good coffee, and I like it strong. I don't need 8 cups of coffee like some people do to get through the day, and often it will be days or weeks between the occasions when I have a coffee. Most of the time, I grind the beans and brew my own rather than plonk down $1.25 to have it served in a brown cup. When I do splurge and buy a coffee I go for the the flowery sounding ones that usually end with 'accio' with cream and real sugar. I usually part with a 5 dollar bill when I order a good coffee, and it won't have a Tim Horton's logo on the cup. Yeah, I'm a real coffee snob, but you won't be seeing me downing one when it's 35°C out... especially a Tim Horton's coffee...not like the 35 million other Canadian Tim Horton's coffee addicts.

Nay, I'm addicted to something else:

Oh look, you may be saying to yourself, MacKay's using THE OLD cardboard cut-out cliche to illustrate when a person in real life hasn't been seen or heard from very much. I can hear the groans in my head.

I've compiled a list of familliar and overused metaphors, cliches, images and repetitive editorial cartoons gags. Cartoonists ought to strive to avoid borrowing from the list, but sometimes its lure is irresistable. I'm guilty as much as the next cartoonist of utilizing ideas from the list. A great cartoon is only great if it's imaginative and fresh. The first idea is probably the most overused concept, commonly played out by cartoonists after famous people die. It is: THE OLD...Arriving at the Pearly Gates Editorial Cartoon. (This came up at a recent cartoonists convention and someone suggested that during a lifetime, cartoonists should carry a punch card enabling them to draw only 7 "Arriving at the Pearly Gates" cartoons throughout their career.)

Here are some more. Please feel free suggest new ones through the comment box to add your own to the list.

THE OLD...Puzzle with a missing piece(s) editorial cartoon.
THE OLD...Painting oneself in a corner cartoon.
THE OLD...Walking the plank cartoon.
THE OLD...Large fish eating the medium-sized fish eating the small fish gag.
THE OLD...Things proceeding as slow as a snail/turtle gag cartoon.
THE OLD...Image of a beaver representing Canada.
THE OLD...Image of Uncle Sam representing America.
THE OLD...Donkey and Elephant representing the political parties in the U.S.
THE OLD...Corporate logo incorporated in a cartoon gag (i.e. Olympic rings for wheels on a tank. Bush choking on an Pretzel in the shape of the Enron logo.)
THE OLD...Manipulation of a flag, national symbol, coat of arms, etc
THE OLD...Sinking Ship cartoon.
THE OLD...Hear no evil. See no evil. Speak no evil cartoon.
THE OLD...Combination of two unrelated current events.
THE OLD...Loon on a Canadian dollar drowning/choking/spashing during currency fluctuations cartoon.
THE OLD...Ostrich head buried in the sand gag.
THE OLD...Taxpayer being held upsidedown with money falling out
THE OLD...Blind justice statue editorial cartoon.
THE OLD...Incorporating popular cartoon characters iE: Homer Simpson, Mr. McGoo, Peanut's characters, etc. in an editorial cartoon.
THE OLD...Adding irony/humour to illustrations of famous photographs editorial cartoon (ie: the Hindenburg blowing up)
THE OLD...Dividing a continent/country up and pointing to different regions with satirical names gag.
THE OLD...naughty pupil writing lines on a chaulkboard cartoon.
THE OLD..."kick me" sign on the backside of a politician gag.
THE OLD...Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden image.
THE OLD...finger in the dike cartoon.
THE OLD...New arrivals to hell cartoon
THE OLD...labyrinthe image to convey, timelines, bureaucracy, etc.
THE OLD...target plastered on a person image marking imminent firing, defeat, death, etc.
THE OLD...circling vultures image to convey the same thing as painted on targets
THE OLD PIG...representing gluttony
THE OLD...peace dove altered to convey no chance of peace

*** Update (Aug. 8, 2006) *** Well, it seems somebody didn't care that it took an old cliche to get the point across...

*** Update (Nov. 3, 2006) Jeff Parker, editorial cartoonist at Florida Today comments on common cartoon cliches in his blog.

I've done a lot of Dalton McGuinty cartoons in the last 5 years. Joining a assortment of galleries devoted to such people as Stephen Harper, Paul Martin, Jean Chretien, and Sheila Copps, I introduce a new chronology of cartoons devoted to Ontario's Premier:

More Galleries of assorted subjects are found on my Galleries Page.