El Alacrán
‘Twas my birthday yesterday and as a gift my lovely girlfriend created this incredible portrait of the Strang Institute’s favorite mascot, Bijou! I’m sure to tout Azucena’s incredible works of artistry more in the future (especially once we get her a website up and running). This piece is water soluble crayon on slate and perfectly depicts Bijou’s personality – she owns the place. El Alacrán, by the way, is Spanish for the scorpion.
In the fable of the Scorpion and the Turtle, the Turtle carries the Scorpion across a river on the promise he won’t sting her. When he does anyway, dooming them both, the Scorpion responds to the Turtle’s cries of “Why” with, “Because it’s my nature.” Such as it is with Bijou. Still, she’s an amazing and smart dog. If ever there was a candidate for canines with self-awareness, she would be it.
Note: I probably won’t have a comic update for tomorrow due to deadlines, birthdays, and other equally important events. I will, however, post something! Ellie, Jeff, and Muffin will return on Monday. Thanks!
If you want to be specific, “alacrán” is a particularly venomous scorpion; one touch of the stinger gives enough poison to kill a horse. The fact that they call such an adorable-looking dog this is really, really scary
Azucena’s art has a lot of influences found in Mexican culture, like Lotería, a game similar to Bingo. The game has a series of cards with images on them, one of which is El alacrán. She’ll take the word and put her own interpretive spin on the meaning. Bijou isn’t poisonous, but she’s certainly been known to have a prickly attitude when it comes to other dogs especially. She can be sweet, but you can see the gears turning, and trouble brewing, behind those adorable eyes!