Anyone could identify with the human aspect of the characters.

My two biggest influences are Archie comics and Dennis the Menace.

I had always shown childhood as something difficult, something you want to get the hell out of, but now I wanted to do a story that was the opposite, about that moment in time when you're in that world of discovery, doing what you want to do. That fleeting moment when you're in your zone.

I used to get people criticizing me for drawing so many women with gorgeous idealized bodies, but I pointed out that I draw a lot of men with muscular bodies, washboard abs, and enormous wangs, and they never got criticized. So those criticisms have stopped.

I'm basically stubborn. If anyone disapproved of my being influenced by comics, I simply ignored them.

I've known gay people - men and women - since I was a young person. To me it's just naturalistic and realistic to portray gay characters in a humanistic light. As a young man, I knew enough gay people as people not to fear them. On the other side of the coin, I like to irritate conservatives and homophobes.

I grew up when comics were only sold in food markets and news stands, so the direct market is vital to me. The best way to make it stronger is if everybody buys my comics in multiple copies before they buy any others.