Shameless Begging! Original Artwork Up For Grabs!
(I originally posted this on my MySpace page and I thought it couldn't hurt to post it here as well)
Okay, Brian K. Vaughan begged for an iPhone on his blog(and got one!), so I thought I'd put the word out for something I want but probably won't be able to get my hands on--way less expensive than an iPhone, though--don't worry. Specifically, if anyone reading who's going to the San Diego Comic Con can pick up one of Michael Golden's Exclusive San Diego sketchbooks for me, I'll give you a free page of original comic art. I'll send a list of what I have to whomever gets their hands on a sketchbook, and we can work out a trade. Thanks!
--C

Remembrance of Comic Cons Past
The San Diego ComicCon (SDCC) will begin this Wednesday. And I'm not overly excited about it, because I'm not going. And maybe this year would have been a good year to go because of The Simpsons Movie coming out the same week, but nevertheless, I'm not going.

I haven't been since the year I got married which was September of 2002, and from what I hear it has grown to epic proportions this year. They sold out. One of the biggest conventions in the world is sold out. You can't go to the door and say "Hi, I would like a ticket please" because they have none to give. Amazing, and I like what that says about the climate of acceptance for geeky endeavors.

It isn't that I haven't been because I didn't enjoy it. It is just a major time and financial committment. The hotel and airfare are pricey. And even if I got to tag along if chris was a guest, there is still the time committment and you cannot leave there without dropping some serious cash. There are too many dealers to make it a frugal affair. Having always gone with Chris my admission badge has been free, but that is a drop in the bucket.

It is also a 5-6 day show. And while you feel like you can miss some days of other shows, you never want to miss a day of San Diego. No matter what day it is, there is a panel you want to go to. Panels at San Diego are great because often they have free promotional stuff. I still have my Harvey Birdman Attorney At Law wall clock!

So many of my friends are going and everyone has been asking us if we will be at San Diego. But we're not going. Getting to San Diego also takes a lot of planning. You practically have to reserve your room for next year while checking out of the hotel this year. And we've had lots of other things we wanted to do this year.

And of course I am out of vacation time. I'm sure we'll think about it for next year, that is unless we decide to go to England again or someplace else that isn't work related for Chris.

So to Sean, Neil, Jeff, Kurt, and to everyone else who is going, I hope you have a blast. Try and grab some cool free stuff for me, willya? Stay away from the pretzels in the convention hall and if Pat and Oscar's is still there, eat a breadstick for me. And to all the pros, don't work too hard.

We'll catch it again some other year. What should those of us who remained home do to make our weekend super geeky too? I think I'll attack my way too large stack of unread comics while listening to my out of print and bootleg soundtracks.
--X

For my part this week while not attending the country's biggest geekapalooza, I'll get some work done in the nice quiet privacy of my own studio, read the heck out of my copy of Modern Masters: Michael Golden(hopefully), and share the following bunch of photos from past San Diego shows...

Ah! One of the things I love most about comic conventions: Stormtroopers in anachronistic situations!

Doing time in artists alley, 2001... I love seeing all my long-distance friends, meeting cool fans, selling artwork, and talking comics. It's grueling work sometimes, though--lots of missed lunches and sore backs. Just look at Karl's posture! Oh, yeah--for the record, going down the table from nearest to farthest we have me, Brian Stelfreeze, Karl Story, Georges Jeanty, and Cully Hamner

Xan attending a panel, one of the cool things she does while I'm in artists alley. I think this one is the Cartoon Network Adult Swim panel in 2002

Me and Karl at the Adult Swim panel...I have the dreaded thousand yard stare going...too much artists alley time...

One thing that makes San Diego stand out from other conventions(besides its enormity and crowdedness) is the huge number and diversity of actors and musicians in attendance. Over the years, we've met or rubbed shoulders with everyone from Kevin Smith to Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo. Stephen Root has browsed through my pile of artwork, my brother was Jason Mewes' chaperone one year(!), and in 2002 Xan even got to be in a movie being made by Mark Hamill. Above is Xan meeting Maurice LaMarche, voice of The Brain(as in "Pinky and the...") and Kif from Futurama.

In 2001 my friend Gary and I met the lovely and awfully nice Erin Gray, who starred in Buck Rogers In The 25th Century back when we were 13 or so...

Another cool thing that one sees more often at the San Diego Comic Con than anywhere else are the dealers room displays of original movie and TV props like the Batmobile (above) and one of Yoda's little puppet hands below...

...and finally, the after-show dinners with other comic creators are always a highlight. We get to put down the pens and pencils, stretch our legs, and unwind at last. In this photo below from 2001, you'll find (among others) my friends Gary and Hiroshi, Brian Stelfreeze, and Cully Hamner

--C

Return Trip
Mom, Dad and the grandkids stopped overnight on the way back home after their marathon three week road trip out West. Dad and I tried to wear the grandkids out with a walk around the neighborhood after dinner(didn't work). Xan's parents came over later, and while the grown-ups talked downstairs, I doled out geeky toys(Star Trek communicators and a Doctor Who sonic screwdriver) and took the kids up to our "music room" so they could play and dance and jump around until they finally collapsed from exhaustion a couple of hours later. It sounds like everyone had fun, and we were happy to host them all on their final night away from home!
Shannon, Brittany & Aaron: getting crazy in the music room


Don't ask me...


Shannon plays with the off-screen Jess-Belle


The energy finally runs out!

--C

Comic Book Update
Here are a couple of upcoming covers for Midnighter(in pencilled form, of course). Also, Wildstorm/DC Comics just announced a trade paperback collection of the first six Midnighter comics will be published in late November. I hope to have a few available at my table at Mid-Ohio Con on Thanksgiving weekend.


--C

Pez Part 2

Just thought I'd add some other Pez photos of my weirder, or "non traditional" dispensers. But the weirdest thing about my collection is that I don't like Pez candy. I agree that this is odd, but I saw an episode of "Unwrapped" about a guy who doesn't eat peanuts, yet has the largest private collection of Mr. Peanut items. I'm sure there are more of us.

I also open them as I'm not much of an "original packaging" collector, since if I buy it, I want to mess with it. I also find the actual item looks a lot nicer on display than the package. I sometimes save the blister pack cards, because the graphics are usually specific to that line of dispenser. They also have fun little puzzles on the back like mazes, word searches or connect the dots. Pez also comes in generic little bags, and they can turn around or get hidden by the little paper inside that has the games on it.

Also, there is candy in the packages which can turn into powder and make the packaging cloudy. And, while some people collect candy packs, I think old candy lying around for decades is a little gross. And while Pez can survive a little bit of water, cardboard and candy cannot.

Besides, the earliest dispensers came in clear cello bags, so Pez started as an out of package collectible. I also didn't start the collection as a way to retire by eventually selling them. As a collector and packrat, I don't start a collection unless I plan to will it away.

This is a Pez-a-saur. This little car will dispense candy if you push down on it. The candy pops up from a hole in the rumble seat. This is the only one of these I have seen besides a Peter Pez who is the Pez mascot. I don't have too many Peter Pez items because he is a clown.


All of my NASCAR Pez are from my dad. He's very supportive of my collection and has been instrumental in it's growth. I'm always so touched when he picks up Pez for me, and if he winds up buying me something I have, I keep the one he gave me and sell or swap the other one.

This is my favortite in the line of Pez lunchboxes, and is one of the few Pez things I have that isn't a dispenser. My other non dispenser items include that pineapple bank, a mini puzzle, a Pez-A-Saur flashlight, and some floaty pens. This was a Christmas gift from my friend Troy and yes, it has a Thermos. I also collect lunchboxes.

These are pens that dispense Pez. Again, these are gifts from Dad. He also gave me my Marvin the Martian candy hander which is battery operated. Well, it CAN be battery operated, if there are batteries in it.

--X

Since my birthday post about the Creature From The Black Lagoon, people have asked me about the rest of my Pez Collection. Today, I bought some more shelving and now have most of it on display so I thought I would finally take some photos! This isn't the entire collection, since I have a few things that I haven't found a good way to display yet. The NASCAR cars, the Pez-A-Saur car, and my Pez Pens have proven difficult to display in a way that satisfies me, and my Pez spaceman lunchbox is with the other lunchboxes. It has a thermos and is super cool. I also don't keep the holiday dispensers in with the main collection since we use them as holiday decorations. But this is most of it! I'll post the holiday photos when the holiday is upon us. I may post some other images later, or on my MySpace page later.

For some reason Blogger isn't putting the photos in the order I would like, and I am not in the mood to deal with the HTML code to make it happen.

These are my Muppet Giant Pez, standing guard over my Henson book collection. The Doozer is plush, not Pez.

And of course, the Star Wars Giant Pez. They all play the Star Wars theme when you tilt back the heads, except for the shiny C3PO which speaks dialogue. The Death Star lights up, making it my favorite, even though it is just a ball.

These are the rest of the Giants, plus the recent "box sets"-Elvis, of course (70s Elvis is the best as it has a lot of detail on the collar), Orange County Choppers and the Crystal Hello Kitty collection. Not really all that into the Crystal Pez, but I liked this one. There are 2 Homer's because one talks, one doesn't. The Marge talks, and so does the Alligator. The Spider-Man plays the Spider-Man theme, and the Lost in Space robot is my favorite of all the Giant Pez. The Pineapple is actually a coin bank. It is a reproduction of a very rare line of dispensers from the 70s.

I keep the Yoda Pez with the Yoda collection. Chris and I of course like to tell people that we collect "Yodas n'shit" when they see this collection. Yes, that is a copy of "April Fools Day" there on the DVD shelf.

These photos are of the main collection. It is hard to get the whole thing in one image because the shelving is on the walls at the bottom of the stairway. Since it is in the corner and to back up far enough to get it all in one shot would mean moving the refrigerator, I just took separate photos.


--X

Sprouse Family Visit
My parents just began a road trip across a pretty big chunk of the country, with many stops in the Midwest. They're bringing their grandkids along, and this weekend they all stayed with us on their first stopover in the Midwest. I caught up with Mom & Dad, while Xan and the kids had all kinds of Nintendo fun.

Wii party!

Jess-Belle inspecting the luggage

Wii boxing wears the kids out before bedtime

Jess-Belle and Grandpa taking a snooze...

sort of a companion photo to the one from last Christmas with Xan's dad

--C

Recent Photos

Xan with Vala, friend Sara's new baby girl, in Kettering, OH. She's quite the little squirmy wormy, always kicking and talking and just can't seem to wait to use her body to it's maximum potential.

Lazy Sunday. Sometimes, just watching the cat sleep is enough to put me to sleep.

The 35th Annual Columbus ComFest at Goodale Park, a good time as usual. Especially the chicken nachos with Jose Madrid salsa! Taken with my phone's camera since I forgot my "real" camera...kind of looks like a pin-hole photograph to me...
--C & X

Work Update

It's been quite a while since I posted any work news, so I thought I'd update anyone who cares about such things.

The Spirit story I did with Walter Simonson hit the stands today--go get it--The Spirit #7 from DC Comics! The Jordi Bernet story in that issue is pretty cool also. This particular project was a real challenge--Walter wrote more story than any human being could fit into 8 pages, and I always try to give the writer everything they've written, so it was tough! I got most of it in there, and I'm pretty proud of it...pretty happy to have gotten the chance to work with Walter also, as he's one of my major influences and an amazingly nice guy to boot.

Currently, I'm working on another Midnighter story arc. Keith Giffen is our new writer. I worked with Keith back at the beginning of my career, drawing various Justice League and Legion Of Super-Heroes books he plotted. Here's a design I did for a new recurring character Keith created for Midnighter...

I'll be a guest at two more upcoming comic conventions: Fan Expo 2007 in Toronto, August 24-26, and the Baltimore Comic-Con , September 8-9. Xan and I hope to see some of you at one or the other!

--C

Happy Father's Day, Dad!

I know it's late, but anyone who knows me shouldn't be too surprised...anyway, here's a photo to commemorate the occasion. This is another old India slide, featuring my Dad in New Delhi, sometime in 1969 or 1970. He's dressed a lot like I dress now...weird...

Happy Father's Day! See you soon!

--C

Happy Birthday, Mike!

In honor of my brother's birthday today, here are
some more ancient Sprouse family slides...

Okay, I was going to make fun of Mike's clothes here, but then I
noticed my own horribly-clad legs over on the right side of the photo...
Anyway, this is Mike playing with our Lhasa Apso Tashi in our house
in New Dheli, India, ca. 1971


Above: Mike with his cat Fluffy, again in India.


That's Mike(on the right) and myself with our haul from Harrod's toy
department, in our cabin aboard the QEII, somewhere in the Atlantic
Ocean between the UK and The US on our way home from India


The fashion crimes continue Stateside, ca. 1972...no idea what
we're up to here, but I'm sure it falls under the category "no good..."

Hope you have a good one, bro! See you in a few
months in Baltimore.
--C

Quick Update
A quick post this time around...Friends Shelley and Mark visited at the end of May. We enjoyed some sushi and other treats at a local karaoke bar and took a road trip to Jungle Jim's for some fun food shopping. Later, Xan and I implemented our long-discussed but never acted upon plan to see more movies. We've missed so many in the last few years--I think we'd only been to one single film in the theater so far this year, and that feels like a crime. It can get expensive, sure, but I love seeing films on the big screen! We saw and GREATLY enjoyed Hot Fuzz, a send-up of cop shows/movies by the Shaun of the Dead people, and 28 Weeks Later, a sequel to 28 Days Later that we were both worried was going to be awful.
-C

Today's picture theme seems to be "People sitting next to
unusual plastic things." First up is a shot of friends Shelley and Mark
in front of a giant fiberglass banana outside Jungle Jim's


Next we have a shot of Xan in the lobby of our local cineplex,
cozying up to her second-favorite family

Don't even pretend, Eddie!

Super cool sketch of Tom Strong by Michael Golden


Xan and the man who puts the "Pop" in Snap, Crackle and Pop, Eddie Deezen


The lovely Dale Arden from the De Laurentiis Flash Gordon, Melody Anderson


Xan with Michael Gross. I should have asked if he has an UZI4U license plate!


Chris hasn't been a guest at the Motor City Comicon held in Novi, Michigan for a few years now, but we still go up every year as fans. It is a fun convention and always has great guests. This year, I was really excited because Eddie Deezen was there. Why? Because Eddie Deezen rules.

Eddie Deezen of course was in Grease, 1941, was Pop on the Rice Krispies commericals, and starred with the late great Wendy Jo Sperber in I Want To Hold Your Hand. He was also in a movie called Laserblast which was the experiment in what may be my favorite MST3K episodes. Which I asked him about, and he was cool with. I recommend everyone watch Grease tonight so you can all see Deezen hit Sid Caeser in the face with a pie.

We also met Melody Anderson, who played Dale Arden in the 1980s Flash Gordon, which is one of our favorite movies. She was incredibly sweet and talked to us for quite a while and seemed to like that we were total Flash Gordon geeks. She was nice and called us "Real fans" instead of "Freaks". She signed our poster "Go Flash Go!" We are very excited. Hopefully excited enough to finally hang it up on the wall, along with everything else we keep meaning to hang. If anyone has any motivation they can spare, please email us with a pickup time. Or even better for us, a dropoff time.

Also a super nice guy was Michael Gross. I loved Family Ties as a kid, then grew up to adore any and all things Tremors. Did anyone watch Tremors The Series? If so, then you know my feeling of loss and how odd it was that it was cancelled but that show where Shannen Doherty helped people scare their friends stayed on for like 2 more seasons. If not, shame on you! Anyway, he was a pleasure to meet. And I know what you are thinking, and the answer is no, I was a good girl and didn't bring up his appearance in Cool As Ice, the screen debut of one Robert Van Winkle.

Corin Nemec and Jonathan Frakes were there, but we sadly missed them. Perhaps next time. I seem to be at the same convention as Corin Nemec all the time, but I never seem to get the chance to talk to him. Maybe he could tell me why the hell Parker Lewis Can't Lose is not out on DVD yet.

We spent some time talking with Columbus pals Andy Bennet and Dave Aikins, who we oddly never seem to see when we are in Columbus. It is the same deal with Star Wars artist Joe Corroney. He lives like 10 minutes away, and we mainly see him at conventions in other states. We need to call people more often. We also got to hang out with Michael Golden and Renee Witterstaeter, but they live in Connecticut and New York, so conventions are our only real chance to hang with them. Chris was put on the Michael Golden sketch list while at October's Motor City Comicon. The resulting glory of said arrangement is that Tom Strong sketch you see posted here. We were glad to be able to pick it up from him rather than depend on a shipper to deliver it to us. So help me if that had been left on the porch in the rain...

Surprisingly, we didn't purchase much from the dealer tables. I forgot my database to check while flipping through back issues (yes, I have a database) so I didn't want to risk buying something I already have, since I have done that a shameful amount of times. I was also hoping for a Rancor, but no such luck. Oh well, the August show in Toronto is coming up soon (in August, of course!) and then Baltimore is not far behind. More aquisitions and brushes with greatness to follow for sure. After all, Malcolm McDowell is slated to be in Toronto, as well as Sean Astin. I am sure to have more stories of me embarrassingly gushing.
--X

Tintin

Here's a link to a story over at Newsarama.com about a Tintin movie that's in the works, with Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg directing and producing. Sounded interesting until I got to the part about the movie being done completely in computer animation. Ugh. I am most definitely not a fan of computer animated cartoon films--every character and object ends up looking like a shiny plastic/vinyl toy--which was entirely appropriate and successful in Toy Story, but just ended up looking weird in other movies. While I've enjoyed other Pixar and Pixar-like movies(I loved The Incredibles), I always felt like they were done as computer animated films just because someone could do them that way, and not that they should have been done that way. The Tintin people claim they want to use 3-D computer animation to retain the feel and look of the comic...Does that sound a little contradictory to anyone but me? It'll work if they use computer animation the way they do in small doses on Futurama, or in the bizarrely repulsive yet fascinating The Drinky Crow Show that just aired last weekend on Adult Swim which is entirely computer-generated. On these two TV series the animation still retains a hand-drawn look. If the Tintin people go for a typical Pixar-ish look for their film, it most definitely won't retain the feel of the series. Frankly, if they're not going to animate it traditionally and retain the look of Herge's drawings, then they may as well just hire actors and film it. After all, Christopher Reeve's Superman looked nothing like a Curt Swan drawing, and the movie Batmen bear no resemblance to their printed counterparts, yet Superman worked fine in film, and some of the Batman movies were okay(I'm not talking about the writing here--just the look of the world and characters when translated to live-action film).

Rant over. Captain Negative signing off!

--C

Birthday Booty

Okay, my new photo? That was one of my birthday presents! My holy grail of Pez collecting, the Creature from the Black Lagoon! I cried when I saw it, as I have wanted this for like a decade. Chris gave me 30 other Pez, one for each year, and they are all great. Japanese mini Nintendo, Ultraman, frogs, a Jungle Book set, the Crazy Animals (all European releases) an E.T., MGM set (Tom, Jerry, Droopy, Spike) and an Earth from the Planet series. We are getting ready to go out so I can get more shelving for my new Pez. I collect Pez. Just in case you haven't been to my house. Because I collect Pez, this is like the best gift ever. Seriously. I can't believe I actually have a Creature! I am like a little kid, I won't put it down. If it weren't so delicate, I would probably sleep with it.


That last bit was written on my acutal birthday. It is now a couple of weeks later and I still cannot believe Chris got me a Creature! Since he is so old (The Creature was not manufactured after the 1960s except as The Fishman which really doesn't hold a candle to the Creature and the glory of his pearlescent stem. Sorry, no more Pez history lesson!) he does not have the usual "feet" that you see on Pez dispensers these days. The feet make them easier to stand up, and the ones without feet topple easily. So instead of displaying him on my Pez shelves, I put him in a shadowbox with a Creature From The Black Lagoon movie poster. It looks super cool, and he is well protected. Like I said, for me, he is the holy grail of Pez collecting.

As well as opening mad cool presents on my birthday, my friend Shelley came for a quick visit on her way to see her family in Southern Ohio. She arrived around 10 the night of my birthday, then we spent the next day just hanging out, record shopping, our usual. My gift from her was the Criterion edition of Slacker, which is fantastic. I always forget how good that movie is until I see it again. Some people swear by Dazed and Confused, I am a Slacker follower. Both are Richard Linklatter, so you really can't go wrong either way.

Shelley left to see her family Friday afternoon, and Friday night was the traditional Spaghetti Warehouse dinner with my parents and Juice. I went there with my oldest dear dear friend Lydia the year I turned 9, and we have been going ever since. Presents from Mom and Dad included an iTunes gift card and cash. Still deciding how to use the gift card, but the cash is gone. Spent on an eye massager and a Wii. More on the Wii later.

The weekend following the Thursday that was my birthday was S.P.A.C.E., the Small Press and Alternative Comics Expo. For those of you who have never been, think like APE or SPX or MOCCA. For those of you who still have no idea what I mean, it is a comic convention for independant comics and self publishers, web comics, the indie scene of comics. Always fun, and I always get a lot of fun new stuff. My friends Steve and Bret (the old roomies) came from Chicacgo for the event. Steve does an amazing self published comic called Saki the Panda, which can be checked out at www.myspace.com/awkward____pause. That's 4 underscores, or you can find him on my friends page as Pandaman. Bret's girlfriend Crystal also does a comic called Lucille Brawl which she was selling at the show. I had not met her until she came out here for S.P.A.C.E. and I just loved her. She's also on MySpace as Lucille Brawl. Her roommates Cassie and Evey (I think I spelled those right!) also came along, and we all hung at my house Saturday night and went to the convention (hung over, all of us) Sunday. I once again spent Sunday reading comics. All in all, a fantastic birthday week. And I didn't even mention my carrot birthday cake. Those bakers at Whole Foods, they do some nice work.

--X

(Reprinted with Kind permission from Xan's MySpace page)

Busy Month, Part 2: Toronto

Toronto's CN Tower, No. 2 in our tour of North America's
Space Needles

Shortly after our return from Seattle, we packed up and headed to the airport again, this time for a trip to Toronto. This was the first time either of us had actually been to Canada. Unfortunately I had convention duties at the Toronto Comicon a few hours after we checked into the hotel, so the photos above and below showing some of the unusual architecture around the hotel document pretty much all of what I saw of Toronto and Canada this trip. I won't complain, however, because the convention was another nicely run and very successful affair and everyone I met--both fans and organizers--treated Xan and myself very well! Since I spent the entire weekend hunched over a clipboard sketching again(except for a wonderful dinner Saturday night), I'll turn this blog over to Xan, who actually got out and saw some of the city/countryside thanks to friends Sara and Henning.
--C

Hey all, Xan here, finally writing about our Toronto trip! As Chris mentioned, this was the first trip to Canada for both of us. Which is pretty shameful for me, considering I live and grew up in Ohio. Anyway, for leaving the country, it was pretty painless. The Columbus Internation Airport can pretty much call itself "International" only because AirCanada flies out of it, so our flight was mercifully a straight shot with no connections. The down side to that was that both going into and coming home from Canada, we were on a prop plane. I had never been on such a small plane before. There were so few people that our one flight attendant just took drink orders and walked a few feet back to the drink station to prepare them as a drink cart was a bit pointless on such a small aircraft. And my opinion of prop planes? Loud. Not just white noise loud like a jet can be, but loud and you vibrate. It was very Indiana Jones. I kept picturing a little red line tracing our path from Columbus to Toronro.

The organizers of the Toronto Comicon were nice enough to provide us limo service from the airport to the hotel, so getting to the hotel was even less painless than getting into Canada. They gave us travel vouchers, and when we showed ours to the limo driver he said "Everything's cool" and took our bags and got us on our way. And I have to say we could not have had a more stereotypical welcome into the country. Not only did we drive by a Molson bottling plant, but we swear, the air smelled of bacon once we got off the plan. We just looked at each other and said "Canada really does have the bacony stink of Canada!" (see "The Final Sacrifice" episode of MST3K for more information on the bacony stink of Canada)

Our hotel was right by pretty much every touristy thing in downtown Toronto. It was within walking distance of the convention center, right below the CN Tower and had rooms overlooking the stadium where the Toronto Blue Jays play. So there was plenty of food and souvenir shopping. I'm still working on my box of maple fudge! The gift shop of the CN Tower was as far as we got. No way in hell were we going up in that thing. No way in hell, I don't care if it is the world's tallest structure. That means it is high up. No way.

After a quick lunch and unpacking session, I called my friend Henning who I learned conveniently works in downtown Toronto and could come pick me up. So Chris went to the con (where he says he was swamped from the second he got to his table! I am so proud of him!) and I went with Henning to Markham, a suburb about 30-40 minutes outside of Toronto depending on traffic. He lives there with his wife, who is my friend Sara that I met in the 1st grade. Her blog is One Blue Tree that you can check out by clicking our link. She has photos of what it is like up in the CN Tower, if you are curious.

At the time I went to their house in Markham, Sara was pregnant with who we now know as her daughter Vala. We hoped she would arrive while I was there, that way I could stay home with their 2 year old son Gavin (who I love) and their dog Bonnie. But alas, Vala waited another 2 weeks before she arrived, so I spent Friday night hanging out with Sara, Gavin and Henning, and Sara's very active pregant belly. They took me to this fantastic restaraunt called Firefly, which was this odd Chinese Russian fusion that was amazingly tasty. More Chinese than Russian, but all the dinners came with an order of borscht, and beef stroganof was on the menu. We then went back to their lovely townhouse filled with even lovlier furniture and inspired by our restaraunt, we watched Serenity outtakes and geeked out until we fell asleep. The usual for me and Sara.

The next day, Sara and Henning piled Gavin and Bonnie into the car to drive me back to the hotel. They took me the long way so I could see some of the countryside. That part of Canada is very similar to the American midwest. Very urban, but if you drive a bit and pass the suburbs, you are way out into the country.

They dropped me at the hotel, and I went up to the room to shower and get ready for the convention. I got dressed, watched a little bit of King Kong, then made my way to the convention to meet up with Chris. The convention was small (I started calling it the appetizer convention since Toronto holds the 3rd largest comicon in North America in August) but was quite fun. I of course spent my day shopping while Chris was pretty much at his table the whole time. This being his first time in Canada, it was a whole new group of fans for him, all of whom were great. After the con on Saturday, the organizers took a bunch of us out for Italian, and I am kicking myself because I forget the name of the place. We ate, drank, hung out with other comic creators (I finally got to talk to Kevin Nowlan for more than 3 seconds) and had a generally good time. Needless to say, we were pretty bushed when we got back to the hotel.

Sunday was more convention, but we had to leave a few hours early to make our flight home. But it was still fun as all get out and we were so glad we were able to go. Thanks again Amat for inviting us, and thank you Tiz for putting a word in for Chris. We owe you guys-you are the best.

The trip home was again loud but uneventful, which is my favorite kind of air travel. My mom and dad picked us up from the airport, and Mom had food waiting for us, which was so great as we were so tired. And, since I pretty much had the rest of the week off for my birthday, I could just veg all Sunday night and Monday because Mom had bought meatloaf and pizza. So Sunday night we spent reading all the comics and books we bought, eating meatloaf and watching The Simpsons. Really, the perfect way to wind down from a convention, and the perfect way to start a week of birthday decadence!
--X

Our hotel(at right) with a sculpture celebrating
25 years of baseball in Toronto in the foreground


Giant woodpeckers threaten the convention
center(left) and Xan(center)


Young Gavin does his best Count Dracula impression


Sara and Gavin await the arrival of baby #2;
note bunny suit at left