Those of you (poor bastards all) who have been around The Exclusive Blog at Panzo.org since the very beginning may well remember the early attempt that was made at "mascotting" the blog.

Both of you know the story behind Panzo.org and the mistakenly-heard "Panzo The Dancing Bear" and, indeed, a dancing bear was our first attempt at having a mascot.

Miss Significantly Other drew the first PTDB from my idea of a bear in a tutu. I scanned the line drawing and took it into Adobe Illustrator, cleaned up the lines and added color fills.

PTDB became the logo mascot for TEBaP.o, gracing the backs of t-shirts as well as the site itself.

Then one day, someone pointed out to me that a "bear" in a tutu might be construed as being a bit gay-culturish. "Bears" are big, hairy gay men. Tutus are, well, pretty damn girly.

So PTDB bid everyone a hasty "so-long" and waddled off into the sunset.

The original PTDB wasn't the only one, however. I thought both of you would like to see PTDB's evolution.

The first prototype bear I drew myself in Illustrator.

Hey, I'm no artist (obviously) but I did a credible job imbuing this bear with a sense of playful freedom which is, as you know, the hallmark of TEBaP.o.

I thought he looked just fine but Miss SO deemed him "too anime".

I don't know what's wrong with that but, as I do too often, I deferred to her.

The second prototype bear was cribbed from a clip art site. I thought he looked a little drunk - a good thing - but I also thought he was missing...something. So I added "something" and christened him "Hungee Bear".

Hungee didn't really look right to me, though. Giant penises are humorous and he was funny enough but I had doubts whether anyone would want to wear a well-endowed bear on their person. I finally decided against Hungee but here he is, like Rasputin, well hung and well-preserved..

My next brainstorm was almost the winner.

The next and final prototype mascot for TEBaP.o was "Beer Belly Bear". What a beaut! He too was culled from the web (back in those days, copyrights hadn't been invented yet) and colored in Illustrator.

Damn near perfect, was BB Bear. Posed on the proper posture for enjoying TEBaP.o, unashamed of a body built by years of libation and greasy food, and just tousled enough to be "cute".

Unfortunately, word of BB Bear leaked out to the general press and a campaign was started by Iris Bigelow of Muncie, Indiana to curb the use of giant-stomached cartoon animals as web site mascots. People for The Ethical Treatment of Cartoon Animals (PETCA) stepped into the fray and I quietly shut down production of the BB Bear product line.

So, there you have it. A short trip down Nostalgia Avenue in the annals of The Exclusive Blog at Panzo.org.