Two rookie crash test dummies sit in an orange car attempting to make sense of an instructional book on crash testing.

I had planned to do the last of the Twelve Days of Christmas this month, but I need to put some more thought into the drawings. There are days twelve and nine remaining and having relatively high numbers, they are going to take a bit of time to do. I will put them on the back burner for the moment and hopefully complete them a little closer to Christmas. Until then, I shall resume with the non-Christmas merriment.

This one was inspired by another cartoon I saw showing a guy passed out at his desk on top of a “Breathing for Dummies” book. It got me thinking about dummies themselves and how they might benefit from the multitudes of books published for them. Crash test dummies were an obvious choice.

I figured perhaps the novice dummies might have a learning aid for their collective vocation of crash testing and this cartoon is the result. The book title is a bit obscured by the steering wheel and driver seat dummy’s hand, but it should be identifiable as “Crash Testing for Dummies”.

I tried to make the dummies as non-expressive as possible, maybe with a hint of alarm at what might be in store for them. I added to the dumminess of the situation by having them attempt to make sense of the book while holding it upside-down.

I realised after I had finished that it might have been nice to have had some blurry landscape in the background as implied motion. This would have given the impression that they were learning the skill of crash testing by reading an upside-down book while driving, thus building on their dumminess. I may revisit this drawing some time and make these changes.

I’m not sure how this will go in the Zazzle marketplace. It may be rejected because there is a recognisable (book) brand in the drawing, in which case I will need to change the book title, font and colours. Perhaps it will be ok because the title is sufficiently obscured.

Rookie Crash Test Dummies Alternative

Rookie Crash Test Dummies Alternative

Update: Zazzle didn’t accept the image. I spent a bit of time changing what I thought was the problem, and tried again (see image to the left). It was not accepted a second time. This item will not be available from Zazzle, however it did lead to a new spot the difference.

Updated Update: Zazzle reconsidered their decision and allowed the image, though the book title had to be changed once more.