April 20, 2011

     Today was Easter. Not the I'm-behind-but-catching-up April 19th sketch date, or the posting-wee-hours-officially-now-the-25th posting date, but April 24th Easter Sunday - So in honor of Easter and of renewal (and since I already have two rabbits sketched), I've sketched a bilby. Not a realistic bilby, but an Easter bilby... a sort of children's cartoon bilby... although the real fellow looks at least as odd. 
     I heard somewhere (NPR?) that some Australians were attempting to ditch the Easter bunny in favor of the Easter Bilby because of the ecological depredations the rabbit - an introduced species - causes in Australia. I looked up bilbies and they look like a cross between a rabbit (sorry, but they do), a tiny kangaroo and a snowman (the carrot nose). Their coat colors are wonky, they begin and end with a pink tip, and the weirdness doesn't end with their outside. They are marsupials with backwards pockets because they dig burrows (think about it) which are, by the way, spiral, they eat a great deal of dirt, and... well, read about them! 
     Oh - and they are exactly the kind of goofy-cute that should catch on... but wouldn't you expect that from an old bandicoot?