Today—August 28, 2010—is the first ever International Read Comics in Public Day. Coinciding with the birthday of legendary comics artist Jack “The King” Kirby, the event was created by Brian Heater and Sarah Morean of The Daily Cross Hatch and encourages people to make themselves visible to the general populace while enjoying some sequential storytelling. Here’s a bit more information from the official Read Comics in Public Day Web site…
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Last year, I had the pleasure—and honor—of utilizing my luxuriant upper lip to help combat men’s cancer by raising funds and raising awareness about men’s health as a participant in Movember—the month formerly known as November during which men grow moustaches as a visual aid to help with the aforementioned fund raising for men’s cancer research. I helped to raise, alongside my compatriot Matthew Lubicky, over $1,100 for the cause! It was a good effort and the testicles and prostates of the world are a little bit safer for it.
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Back in May, after substituting Wheat Thins for a more substantial lunch due to extreme busy-ness, I began a conversation on Twitter about crackers. My hypothesis: While the Wheat Thin might not be the best cracker in the world, it is undoubtedly the most addictive—in a good way, of course. Surprisingly, many of my followers on Twitter are—apparently—avid cracker fans and I was soon defending my position against suggestions like Cheez-Its (Too heavy!), Triscuits (Too hearty!), Pita Chips (They’re chips!) and Chicken in a Biskit (Too rich!). Make no mistake, all the suggestions I received were for tasty snacks and delicious crackers, but few—if any—rise to the level of addictiveness that Wheat Thins achieve.
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I went to my first San Diego Comic-Con three weeks ago. Long story short, it was a work-filled, more or less sleepless, alcohol-infused 6-day bender of nerdiness. Long story even shorter, I had a blast.
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I really should have realized this before, and it’s kind of a little thing, but I just noticed that my name appears in every Dark Horse comic book. In the company colophon featured in each Horsepower letters column, my name is listed alphabetically under the marketing department header.
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Last year, I drew a cartoon for my buddy Josh Wigler as he worked vigorously to prepare for Comic-Con International in San Diego. Josh used that cartooned image of himself for his Twitter icon up until last week… when he asked me to doodle him up a new face to run alongside his tweets. Busy with Comic-Con prep work for Dark Horse myself, not to mention I needed to do laundry and other assorted chores in preparation of a week away from home, I still wanted to keep the tradition going and doodled up this new image while washing my unmentionables.
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I love newspaper comic strips. A day’s compilation of strips in a each paper may only elicit a few chuckles, but I really enjoy reading the funnies. Maybe it’s a fascination due to an odd nostalgia for a time I never lived through or maybe it’s as close as I’ll ever get to time-travel by reading syndicated humor that’s been running for decades in a nearly irrelevant medium. Maybe it’s the oddly meditative and familiar aspect of it, like watching a movie you’ve seen twenty times and finding it provides a kind of inexplicable comfort. I don’t know that I could fully explain why I enjoy the funnies, maybe it’s because they’re just fun. I don’t know.
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People who read the previous post about a truly excellent piece of artwork I commissioned will undoubtedly remember the man responsible for it, Mr. Dan Hipp. In the aforementioned post, I posited that the number of additional fun gags in the commission could only be due to Señor Hipp being “far more rad than I expected.” Well, that hypothesis has been proven true again!
Today, over on his blog, Hipp posted a version of the commission splashed with glorious digital colors. This treat is most definitely the icing on a wonderful commission experience.
Groove-tastic art by Dan Hipp.
Thanks again, Dan!
For those who’ve never been to a comic book convention, one of the coolest hobbies you can pick up while attending them is getting yourself a sketchbook, bringing it around to a multitude of artists and having them draw their takes on some hero, character or theme. During my time at Wizard, I had a chance to ogle some of the coolest sketchbooks one could ever hope to view. Dave Paggi’s Lockjaw and Calvin and Hobbes sketchbooks were the collections of con doodles that first made me drool enviously and laugh hysterically. Matt Powell’s Saturday Morning’s Awesome sketchbook and Sean Collins’ “I wish I’d had a chance to see it in person” David Bowie sketchbook helped convince me that I had to get one of my own going.
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Over the past two years, I’ve worked two different full-time jobs, dabbled in the field of freelance journalism and collected unemployment. In those same two years, I’ve lived in three different states, pulled a U-Haul from coast to coast, raised over $1,200 with a friend and a moustache to help fight men’s cancer and shook hands with Edward James Olmos. It’s been a crazy period of my life to say the least. Thankfully, I’ve been lucky enough to have had one amazing and gorgeous constant to carry me through it all: my beautiful girlfriend Jessi.
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