July 2003

Comic-Con Article and Photos
My friend and colleague Pinguino has posted Pinguino’s ComiCon Adventure. She’s got pictures too!

Beachtime, Familytime
So yesterday was a whirlwind of going to the beach at Coronado (bodysurfing!) and hanging out with my family. I’m very glad I took the first days of this week off—it gives me more time with my parents and sister. It’s a great week.

My grandparents have a tetherball pole. Leah and I played tetherball yesterday. It was very competitive. To spare any bad feelings, I’ll not communicate who won. But we’re the same height, and vaguely similarly physiques, and it was a good match.

On the housing front, Leah and I got a new place. It’s closer to downtown. We’ll move in late next month. I’m excited.

What a Weekend
It was a long and rewarding Sunday. Leah and I looked at some houses yesterday to rent, and have a good line on two of them. So that’s up in the air. I helped Leah take some pictures of garbage for North Magazine. Then we went to Comic-Con. And then we went to a signing and talk by Patricia Santana, author of Motorcycle Ride on the Sea of Tranquility, put on by the great writer’s group WritersMonthly.us. She was an appealing and engaging speaker.

This morning I’m cleaning and listening to Bruce Sterling on NPR from January. He’s talking about the future. And he’s charming, funny, and insightful as usual.

At the moment I’m just trying to clean up my room after a busy weekend.

Things I Have Learned At San Diego Comic-Con So Far
Lynne Naylor makes some spiffy cute girly art.

Dean Yeagle is an older fellow who does some great work as well.

The Mighty Heroes is the name of the cartoon featuring a bunch of peculiar goofy super-heories I remember as a kid.

TwoMorrows Publishing does a nice job with their books (like Mark Evanier’s collected columns) and magazines (especially Comic Book Artist). I picked up The Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore, which is good so far.

This book: Concept Design, is impressive but prohibitively expensive (to me). It reminds me of Syd Mead, pioneering visual futurist, but it’s by multiple artists.

Bud Plant Comic Art rocks.

SQP sells lots of pinup art.

Comic Book: The Movie looks wild. (But not in a Girls Gone Wild way)

PMBQ studios does some really cute and appealing anime.

I saw a line of pinups signed “Baron”—turns out these large (paintings? prints? posters?) were by one Baron van Lind. They’re in an older style, and seem almost pre-aged to me.

BoltGallery.com—these guys are NUTS! The obsessive level of craftsmanship and detail mark these guys as masters of welded sculpture. They have an amazing one of a battle droid.

I’ll have more to say about the very talented and very nice Ronny Vardy

R Stevens, of Diesel Sweeties, too.

I watched some footage (abut 5 whole minutes) of a CG Appleseed movie that looked really cool. All action, mind you, but it looked great.

That was Thursday and Friday. More today. Yesterday was BEACH PARTY DAY with my family. It rocked. But Leah got sunburned (or is that spelled sunburnt)... oh, either spelling is okay. (sunburnt | sunburned)

Up up and away!

Excelsior!

Onward!

Tomorrow?
Teen Titans starts tomorrow?—it seems like I should have seen something about this at Con…

Woke Up
Con again yesterday. Awesome. Ronny Vardy has a site! Met the guy who does Diesel Sweeties. Saw my co-workers on their lunch break, and found out someone else reads this blog (thank goodness for my discretion!). Bought some new comic book boxes. Then came home, and went to family dinner with Leah. It was really great! Today: beach party with the whole family, including my sister, who will have arrived in the middle of last night!

More later.

Bad Boys 2 Sounds Astonishingly Bad

The rest of Bad Boys II, which runs on for an unfathomable, unforgivable 2-1/2 hours, is like being cornered by a drunkard at a party who insistson yelling unfunny jokes in your ear, complete with sound effects. In the past, Bay’s movies sent you out of the theater feeling like you had been beaten up. Bad Boys II is the first one, though, to send you home thoroughly depressed.

California Community Colleges in Peril?
Support Your Community Colleges: Check: Save Our Schools, and Keep The Doors Open!

(via Steve E)

Back
Unbelievably tired now that I’m back from comicon.

Coolness: there’s a killer pic on San Diego Blog from a 1970s Con

Let me chill. Will I blog now, or at the end of Con.

Dunno. Too tired to think.

Comic-Con To Go!
So today is Comic-Con. I’m leaving real soon, and it should be rad.

You can talk about it over on San Diego Blog if ya want.

I see my favorite comics blog, The Comics Journal’s Journalista! is taking a hiatus while Con is on. That site (Journlista I mean) keeps up with comics news better than anybody. As an addition, it has COMPREHENSIVE (all caps) links out to great comics blogs, news sites, message boards, and individual people in comics with blogs. Rad!

I don’t read him, but Wil Weaton is going, I was turned onto this fact by a Shawn of Textamerica.

TextAmerica, incidentally, has set up a San Diego Comic-Con Moblog—whether and how much it will be used, I have no idea. I don’t (yet) have a mobile camera. But I dig the concept like crazy.

I’m going to the con with zero expectations. I’ve only glanced at the program, and will decide what to see when I get there.

It’s possible I’ll see some people I know, notably Kynn, Daniel. Now that I have a cell phone that coordination will be much easier. You can call my regular number—619-516-4550 and leave a message if you want me to call you back on my cell. Just in case you’re interested in getting together at Con this weekend.

One other thing, I won’t be attending Saturday, as far as I know. I have a big beach party to go to. Well, I may attend late in the day, but no guarantees.

Otherewise, I should be there for maximum time today, Friday, and Sunday.

In other news, Leah and I think we found a nice place to live last night. Won’t be till mid-August. But it feels good to have a first and second choice.

Okay, off to Con! Geek out!