No one can say I give up easily.  Still harboring the belief that Cholly and her friends were destined for comic success (regardless of syndicate opinions) I decided to tweak "The Epic of Cholly" and resubmit it.  This time I scrapped the college angle and put Cholly in a high school setting.  In this version we got to see a lot more of Auntie Bijou but saw a lot less of Hokum, who became a background character.  Gossamyr was given greater attention, but was relieved of her position as a newspaper editor.  Gunk figured more prominently in the strip and I added a bunny nemesis for Auntie Bijou.  Other than that, most of the ideas used in the old Cholly strip remained the same.  My biggest concern was that my strip was now too reminiscent of "Luann", but Greg Evans assured me that there was plenty of room for strips about high school students and that comparisons were inevitable.  While the syndicates had a smattering of praise for this comic, it still wasn't enough to get it published.  However, I wasn't ready to call it quits.