Be it my girlish enthusiasm or some sort of simpleton mindset I have but I get so excited about the smallest, silliest things.  Recently I started working out with my friend Courtney and my husband, Jim the Tolerable, who acts as our trainer.  We have been hitting the gym since just before Thanksgiving and are still hard at it.  In our inexperience with the gym we would kid that we did not know if we are supposed to shout slogans at each other, grunt or slam the weights.  So, we would quietly say to one another,

“Feel the burn.”

“Hate the weight.”

“Keep goin’ maggot.”

For some reason the last slogan stuck with us.  We were calling each other maggots at least 3 times a work out.  Finally, we began to call ourselves “Team Maggot.”  The deal was sealed when Courtney got all of us T-shirts for Christmas with “Team Maggot” embroidered on them.

Jim added to the unity of our group by creating a website/blog.  It is still under construction but you can check it out at www.teammaggot.com Oddly enough that domain name was available.

Like any great team I decided we needed a great mascot.  It obviously had to be a maggot but how in the world can you make a maggot look cool, cute, and approachable?  Well, he started out simply as a vision in my mind.  Then on New Years Eve I sat down at around 4:30 am and began sketching my idea down.  In my inebriated state, I did my best to get the vision I had in my mind transferred to paper.  Here is what he looked like:

A nameless maggot

Then I decided this job called for a professional.  I Goggled “Freelance cartoon artists” and found www.guru.com.  Awesome website chalked full of all sorts of artists from sculptors, to painters, to screenplay writers, to cartoonist and everything in between.  I put my job out there.  Within 12 hours I had 8 bids!  How flippin’ awesome is that?  Is it just me or the idea that some chick in po-dunk Indiana who has this idea for a maggot could hire someone out of Indonesia, Russia, India, New Jersey, or Illinois.  I went with a Midwesterner such as myself out of Quincy, Illinois.  We worked together and I think he understood my sense of humor about it all and my desire not to spend a lot of money.  For $30 I got a true artistic creation and got to see my idea come to life.

The team has decided to name him “Killa.”

A star is born

I have had so much fun creating him I sort of have a mother-like sense of pride when I see his cheesy smile.  His gestation only took 3 days total but that is about how long it takes for a maggot to be born in any backyard trashcan.  Jus keepin’ it real.