From a certain point of view

Does anyone remember what ever Happened to Jabba the Hut? Before anyone get's on my case about spelling Hut with one 't'instead of two, let me tell you a story.

It was a long time ago, in a state far, far away. The year was 1983 and I was in grade school giving a Show and Tell presentation of the newest Star Wars film: REVENGE of the Jedi. I had a little poster that I had drawn up of the characters. There was Luke and Leia and Chewie (wasn't sure what was going to happen to Han since we saw him last in The Empire Strikes Back) and some new characters, such as Admiral Ackbar (who was a mail-away figure at the time and not Da Admiral, as we would come to know him). Oh, and there was Jabba the Hut. Or at least what I thought was Jabba the Hut.

A little background: Jabba actually made several appearances in the Classic Marvel Comics Star Wars series. He was a tall, skinny green weasel looking guy in a red jumpsuit, he spoke English (or Basic to you SW fans keeping score at home). When I was drawing his visage onto my hand-crafted display, I used this as a reference, not knowing that 3 years earlier, George Lucas and co. were making the infamous gangster into a giant slug-like behemoth who ruled over a gallery of equally bizarre critters, including a little laughing lizard and a suck-up named Bib Fortuna. Oh, and they added an extra 't' to the end of his name, making him 'the Hutt'.

Imagine my surprise when I finally saw this on the big screen. At first I was somewhat dismayed that this Jabba didn't match the earlier apperance of the same character (mainly because the kids in my class teased me about the mistake). But that feeling quickly passed and now, when someone mentions the Huttese speaking don, I always think of that big Muppet.

So, what is the point of this little tale? I just want to remind my fellow fans that if a grade school kid can be happy with a discrepency of this scale, then it should be very easy for an adult to do the same.

ROCK THE WIZARD WORLD

I have a small cassette cabinet that I saw at a pawn shop a few years ago; it was impossible to resist. On the front of it is handpainted "ROCK THE WIZARD WORLD" with lightning bolts and various bits around it to really drive the point home. On the back of it is a stretch of scotch tape with a sliver of paper (the tape essentially laminates it to the wood) that has some dots and dashes on it. It could be Morse code, but it's more fun to let it be a mystery. The paper, to add to the mystery, is face down.

I think of it whenever I ponder convention tables. We go to the Wizard World Chicago con every year (it's that magic combination of large and close), dating from when it was the Chicago Comicon. We have done Artist Alley tables there for most of that time, although 2 years in particular we did small press booths.

The tables in Artist Alley would be familiar to anyone--it's the same eight-footer used for everything from cons to bake sales all over. Designing a presence at one isn't so hard--you've got books, right? Put those on there. Tell them who you are. If you stand back and look at a good table design, you can appreciate much about a book and its creator(s). Now stick that table in a room with a hundred or so others just like it. Ouch.

I've seen a lot of tables, but only a few attempts to fundamentally change the space. It's a tough nut; no ceiling, in most cases no wall behind. There's that table. People are milling around with a thousand yard stare on, their faraway look masking a very sensitive bubble of personal space that many folks will guard with their very dignity. Some walk very quickly, hoping to scan tables before rousing the table to their presence; others block attempts at communication, looking down at the table at all times; some will accelerate away if the table recognizes their presence. These aren't unwarranted responses.

Last year I went to Book Expo America in Chicago, and let me tell you that is a convention. All the big book publishers are there; the Expo is mainly for wholesale book buyers, but also bookstore owners and librarians. No "general public" allowed. You have to own a store, work in the book industry, be an author, something. They also have their equivalent of Artist's Alley there. It's curtained off, tables are a grand and you enter at your peril. These folks have the same problem as Artist's Alley; they have a table (and to their advantage, a solid curtain on three sides) and traffic that mostly doesn't know who they are.

These authors and smaller publishers will pounce on you if you enter their domain. There was a a lot of money spent of decor and layout, although the one I remember best is the lady dressed as an angel in the middle of the aisle asking folks if the wanted to be touched by an angel, sugar. She reeled folks in with that touch and took them right over to the table with the angel book. She wasn't annoying; she move and spoke with supreme confidence, not arrogance (the familiar "buy my book or you're a jerk" m.o. being a good example of that; or there was the supremely annoying guy we had as a table neighbor once who noisily deflated balloons when people walked by to get their attention--that cleared the whole aisle fast). Okay, I'm wandering.

Point was that the Expo's version of Artist's Alley, while initially frightening, was actually a very welcoming place. There weren't people throwing bits of old meat in baggies at people, people who think abuse is the way to sell anything you'd want to read, or even a hint of the carnival barker drone. They'll go after you, but if you rebuff them, it's fine. It was refreshing, really.

But no matter how well you prepare, sometimes your neighbors can flat sabotage your whole area. Last year a couple table pirates selling silk roses and quasi-goth art perched next door to us and acted like they'd never been out of the house before. They knocked over other people's displays and cackled at their own genius. Years before, Carter had to goon a jerk that positioned himself in front of our floor display to hand out flyers. Urgh.

Anyways, we're pondering our own table layout this year, making some changes. So I think about the ROCK THE WIZARD WORLD cabinet, and the little piece of paper on the back that I can't see with a message on it that I'm not sure I want to decode.

Guh...erm...weh...

Running on a tiny amount of sleep today. Sentences may wander fruitlessly winding ware and inkling fair. Erm. Ok. One burst of coherence, then back to work.

LEAP YEARS is formatted and awaiting approval by the author. Once that's set, printing begins. LOST IN THE WASH scripting took a good leap forward as a dust devil played through and revealed a lovely structure just aching to be used.

There's a deep, gnawing void in the center of my being today. It's my coffee pouch, and it's barking for a refill. Must fetch.

Chicago

Did the whirlwind tour of Hyde Park this weekend. You pass through a pretty dodgy area to get there, let me tell ya. On the way back, though, I had to laugh--on the side of a building in the dodgy area was a billboard for Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Playing GTA already makes me blink a little when I look at a street full of cars, but this looked like a re-enactment.

Got to wander the U of Chicago campus a bit, get a little exercise. Very nice.

I now have LEAP YEARS sitting on my computer, about half-formatted. All the news from me for a few days will be about that. It will definitely be out in April. Huzzah!

Say it again

So, is my judgement impaired when I like a movie where Scarlett Johansson says stuff to a character named Carter in that film? I saw "In Good Company" this weekend and liked it. I'm not going to get into the plot, but in the film her character dates someone named Carter (first name). There's a lot of dialogue that has her saying that name, my name. Does this mean that I'm morally decayed enough that I will get the DVD and make Mp3 files to play when my computer turns on, my cell phone rings or my robot bride .....

uh, anyway, Happy Easter and have a good week...

Reality TV

This thing has to end.

I mean, all trends, all things, for that matter, end, right?

When are people going to stop settling for forced, compressed, totally scripted nonsense to take the place of going outside for a walk or pulling a good book off the shelf or rolling up their sleeves and creating something of their very own?

These makeover shows are the embodiment of American short-attention-span-disoder, and pander directly to the vain, mean-spirited shallowness to which the capable intellect is by design obliged to offer as much resistance as possible. "You look sooo great now! (now that we've destroyed you and replaced you with our you)".

Home redecorating? Monster motorcycles? Island survival (without the relevant Lord Of The Flies context or consequence)? Mobster wives and their spoiled thug children? Televised poker.
T E L E V I S E D P O K E R.

Take my feeding tube out now, I have to get back to making comics.

Drop that sirloin, varlet!

Went to the House of Lords, a themed restaurant/bar in a Best Western styled after the age of castles and kings. Had a little moat that smelled exactly like an indoor pool. It had a wheel that turned through it and folks have been dropping pennies down there for a while. I threw in a penny and wished for a good dinner.

It wasn't bad at all. Got a piece of beef, made nice. Had an ice cream cocktail of Irish creme and butterscotch that made me glad they weren't too readily available. I could be a bum lying in the gutter begging for a cherry and a scoop of vanilla for my Aqua Velva. Hanna was sitting next to me, so the waitress brought it with two straws, which is cute in a barfly sort of way.

Over the bar was a window to below water level in the motel pool. This sort of thing works in Miami Beach, but in a Best Western, let's face it, all you're gonna see is kids. Sitting at the bar boozing up and watching the lower half of kids flail around has gotta feel wrong to even the worst babysitter.

Bonus decor option: shelves of Reader's Digest Condensed Books.

A couple of drunk patrons outside the motel entrance calling out to us "Hey, when's the jousting competition?" If we were or even dressed like Creative Anachronists, it would merely be a dumb remark; but we're street clothes kinda folks.
"Definitely after Happy Hour," I said to myself.

Other news: the catalogs are here and ready for shipping. We're sending them free to librarians and retailers (full details at www.candlelightpress.com/catalog.htm). If you're a librarian or retailer, use the link to drop us a line. Citizens can get them from us at conventions for a mere five dollars. A bargain!

Snow

Winter made another desperate ploy to stick around with a little bit of the white stuff this morning. Nice try, Lao Che! I'm not a big fan of snow (mainly the driving on it part) but it was very pretty to look at, like a postcard or something. I like the changing of the seasons and it makes me glad I live here in Iowa.

Anyway, work progresses. And The Sky Turned White will be done before tax time (April). Then I can do the full tilt cha cha on MIV3. Working out Pearl and the 4th right now. We should be seeing the Candle Light catalog today sometime, something that all sentient lifeforms should be looking forward to. Check out the website for information about it.

On the Stuff I Care About front, I just heard the Thomas Hayden Church (the guy from Sideways and Lowell on tv's Wings) will be the bad guy in Spiderman 3! It's good news that they are getting a non-traditional comic type, but it's even better news that it means that Venom won't be the bad guy! I can't stand that black-suited doofus. Sure, he's cool in a videogame, but that's about it. I'm hoping that THC will be the Scorpion or Sandman. Cool.

So, don't worry about the shovels. Go out and have a snowball fight.

LEAP YEARS nears completion; my ear hurts

I got to read the uncorrected proof of Ian Bennett's LEAP YEARS last night and enjoyed it immensely. We're all looking forward to having this book out as soon as possible. Other than that, had a lovely dinner at the Bennett home.

My ear's doing one of those little tickles that makes you blow your tubes every little bit. Bleh.

Feel like I could sleep another twelve hours. That could be because I spent Sunday on the couch with Hanna, watching an EXTREME MAKEOVER: Home Edition marathon. Behold the power of Sears! Jer and David snickered about it, but it was a great way to get a baseline reading of generous human behavior (yeah, I know they're getting paid, famous, whatever--some people are rich and famous for acting like jackasses, too); I plan to steer a steady course straight away from this baseline for LOST IN THE WASH. Good to pause occasionally and check the stars on your journey. Anyways, one lazy day sometimes creates another.

Am staring at medical journal articles, arranging data in my head. Sometimes research waits to make its presence felt. This one's going to the wire.

Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!

Well, another weekend draws to a close. As I write this, the circus that is the national media is bump'n and tilt'n away with the latest celebotainments! Will the white lady who read a substandard self-help book to overcome her terminal brain disorder be able to find her missing white son/daughter? I don't give a flying F. Tell me the facts ONCE and move on please. There are 300 million of us in this country and I think it only fair that we each get a shot as bawling in front of Nancy Larry Grace King.

But not so seriously, I should be talking about stuff that matters to me instead of worrying about the decay of my land. I'm still working on MIV3 and Sky Turned White. Nothing new there.

Read a passel of new books this week. Got an issue of the Ultimates finally. Pretty cool. Broke my self-imposed rule about no more Dark Horse Star Wars comics. Long story short: I had given up reading the DH run of SW, mainly because it was turning into a non-fun continuity fest. But I broke down and got the General Grevious comic. It wasn't so bad, mainly because it featured a character that seemed more in tune with the spirit of the Original Trilogy. GG has kind of klunky name, but he is a bad motorscooter. Can't wait to see Clone Wars Volume 2 premiering Monday night on Cartoon Network. Anyway, that's all for now. Keep your dials set to stun.

Couldn't be what I'm really thinking, is it?

Am thinking a lot about form today. I'm thinking lots about form this day. Form's catchin' a lot o'thought from me t'day. Today, form doesn't want for a bit of cogitation.

It's story time again, where the voices are talking, the scenes are sketched, but the course of events, the meaning, the symbolism have to gel before I stop writing on napkins and call-in sheets. Point of view calls out for a decision or two and if I can stop pondering the advantages of front-load to side-load washers I'm sure I can sort out the prosthetics issue.

It's the calm before the storm. Ideas circle and I'm calling out "Red! No, black! Put it on black!" and the croupier says "We require a number as well." Someone says "Banco" and I know I'm pretty far afield from what I should be thinking about. The casino seems messy, but it's just my head, you know? My head's handing out comps to the high rollers, the characters that are definitely gonna be there, and I don't even know if they're destined to make it back to the bus alive when their stake's gone.

The characters have that smug look like they'll be fine; roughed up a little, sure, that's the game John plays. Pure malice says "Wipe that stupid smile off your faces; I haven't even begun with you lot yet." Am I waiting for the ball to drop? Or is the ball waiting for a decision?

I'm gonna have a cookie. Then we'll see who gets out of here when the comps dry up.

O'Thursday

Are you wearing green today? Are you going to eat or drink anything green today? What? No, you say? Why not? Come on. Why the heck not? Pinches for you!

O'kay, just kidding. I'm not really gonna pinch you. But I do want to talk about the color green. It can represent many things to many people, but for now, let's talk about what it really means: money. The White House announced that they want Paul Wolfoshitz to be the new head of the World Bank. Yes, the same Paul Wolfoshitz that helped bring us the wonders of Iraqi liberation is now on the fast track to becoming more powerful on the world stage, handing out crippling loans to emerging countires. Oh, yippee! Keep pushing for the end of humanity, neo con!

I'm watching Star Trek: First Contact last night (the last great Trek flick). There's a point in the film when Lilly, a woman from the 21 century, asks Picard about how much the Enterprise costs. He tells her that there is no money in the future, something that I have always giggled about. No money in the future! HAHA! Deep down in side, however, I envy this fictional world where humanity's driving force isn't the satiation of material greed, but the pursuit for greater good. Man, that's real science fiction there.

Well, there was good news this week: the Incredibles came out on DVD!! Hot damn! If there were ever a film for superhero fans to embrace, this is it. And yet...not many have. Oh, sure, to smart people, it's a gift from the gods, but to the denizens of Dark Geekdom, it is an abberation! "Who dares make a greater superhero flick than Daredevil?!" they howl. Man, it's priceless to hear them biatch! No, I'm sorry FF, you had a chance to be a great film. Instead, the guy who made "Taxi" (2004) is going to offer up another wretched and under cooked cinema. I'd rather watch Roger Corman's FF than go to this. Ugh. They could have had Payton Reed....sigh.

Every Time I Get Out, They Pull Me Back In!

I was flipping through the Wizard (I have no defense) Edge supplement the other day and something got my curitosity up. They talked about a book called DEAD @ 17 and that the book's creator was from a town "two hours north of Amarillo". Having lived in Perryton, Texas, I immediately wondered if that was it. Turns out, it is. I lived in Perryton for a few years in the 80s, and graduated the High School there. Josh is more than a few years younger than me, so we didn't end up knowing one another.

But it makes the head spin, really. The entire time I lived in Perryton, you couldn't buy a comic anywhere; one grocery store (The old United supermarket, before they built the new one) very occasionally put out a few. You'd have to find them in down south in Pampa or up in Liberal, Kansas. During the time I lived in Perryton, I re-read old comics I had from before my family moved there, but I didn't get any new ones. Then when I went to college at TTU in 1987, I walked into Star Comics and asked what I'd missed. Sid Deavors (as great a comics/sci-fi retailer as you'd ever find) looked at me for a minute and realized I wasn't kidding. "I'm from Perryton; we just don't have comics," I said. He went over to a rack and handed me WATCHMEN, NINJA HIGH SCHOOL and DARK KNIGHT RETURNS ("Oh," I said about the last. "This is by the RONIN guy."). He led me back in, and I haven't left.

So the fact that a comics-less town (this may have changed, but I doubt it) in the middle of nowhere produced two fellows who now make comics/graphic novels is your curious thought of the day. Hey, did they build a McDonald's? Look at that, willya.

Catalog Day! And more about my teeth than you want to know...

Jer called me at work to say the new catalog proof had arrived and that it looks very good. So we'll be getting a batch of those in and right back out the door again.

I have to also mention that I now have the coolest dentist ever. He's undoing a lot of bad memories of uncomfortable hours in "the chair". Back in Texas, I had the kind of dentist who funny-gassed your ass into the fifth dimension so he wouldn't have to listen to you, or watch you flail. I felt like an U.N.C.L.E. agent with all the gassing. Spent a lot of time outside myself with that guy.

More recently I got going with a new dentist here in Iowa, let's call her the Pirate. Everything went well until (no exaggeration) in the middle of a root canal she tells me she's going to whiten the tooth. She does and suddenly my bill is a hundred or so bucks higher than the detailed estimate I was given before the procedure. After arguing with the receptionist for 10 minutes about it (I'm drooling like a crazy person to boot), she says "just see if insurance will pay it". Head thumping, I go home and sleep it off. First thing when I got up, I called my insurance company and the State Board of Dental Examiners. Couple days later, I get a letter of apology and the charge removed. The Pirate returned to her cove, looking for easier pickings.

Then on Hanna's recommendation I went to her dentist and he's great. Just saw him today for a checkup (this is why he's on my mind here). He reminds me of Robert Ridgely, the late actor--same look, same voice, same easygoing manner. No gas, just careful, competent work. No gas is a good thing, actually--I can just picture sliding off into the fifth dimension and hearing "Jack says you've got a great big c*ck" instead of "open wider, please."

Anyways, big box of catalogs next week. If you're a librarian or retailer and want to see what the deal is with Candle Light Press, pop over to this page to see how you can get one of your very own. Nobody quotes Boogie Nights in it, swear.

Look, the sun......

All better now. Full night sleep, bright sunny morning, and GOOD NEWS ON THE REVIEW FRONT!

John Ira again got compared to Alan Moore, and I was fortunate enough to again be mentioned in the same sentence with my Art God Almighty, Steve Rude (I was totally just like, three or four words away from him, like that close. You shoulda been there. )

Anyway, ray of sunshine. Gotta get back to work now.

JDog out.

(trundles off to studio, whistling "76 Trombones" unabashedly)

New Review!

Amos Simien over at Silver Bullet Comic Books had this to say about THE FAIRER SEX: A Tale of Shades and Angels Vol 1:

Not only is it the best work to date from small publisher Candle Light Press, The Fairer Sex also marks a substantial leap in the storytelling abilities of writer John Ira Thomas and illustrator Jeremy Smith, not that they were bad. However, this is their most accessible work to date, and is certain evidence that their fictional world has gelled into something substantial and self-sustaining. They're really ready to let their readers own this universe the way readers buy into their favorite stories.

Read the whole review here.

Snarl...hissssssssss........

I saw an elephant's foot blown apart by a landmine this morning. On tv.

Last night I saw a guy crushed between two killer whales, and a grizzly bear ramming into a station wagon.

Last week, a couple of chimps ripped some guy's nuts off and bit his nose clean off his face.

The animal revolt is in the air. I feel it, and I am not just kidding here. I am not saying they are going to rise up in some sort of insurrection tomorrow or something. It's more of a feeling, a hunch. To put it in animal terms, there's a SMELL in the air. I think they are tired of being treated the way we treat them. I think they see us doing little or nothing to repair the damage we have done to the planet, and might take the task up themselves. In nature, change usually happens kind of gradually. Kind of slow. Slow, like the kind of slow mankind has no patience or attention spans for.

I like animals. I like them more than I like most people, to be honest. I have family and loved ones and probably about a couple dozen friends, and I love them first. But then it is just animals, and trees and rivers and moutains and shit. They don't love me back (except maybe my cats, Zazu and Noodles) but I don't need them to. I just want to know that they're there, and that I am leaving them alone, and that they have a clean and safe place to eat and reproduce and live life.

I don't blame them one bit for getting mad and crossing the line with people. I think more of it is going to happen. It is too bad people and kids and stuff will get hurt. If we would learn our lesson and figure out how to live IN the world, WITH the world instead of ON TOP OF EVERYTHING, maybe no one would have to get hurt.

I wish people would just stop once and a while and look outside, look around. You don't have to go on some friggin' nature hike or anything, don't have to go scuba diving, or wrestle a bear...just go about your usual human shit with your eyes occasionally darting to and fro, taking in the scene. It's pretty cool, and a lot of people are flat out missing it. You see it for a while, and you won't remember NOT looking at it.

'Cause I guarantee THEY are watching us. THEY have no choice.


dig my mood, huh? jeez. tired.

Lurking in the Law Library

Ran to the Law Library at lunch today. Good exercise, really. 15 minutes walk each way, and with references in hand, ten minutes photocopying and I'm back in time for a burger. Convert 10 minutes of stupid questions about where things were into photocopy time and it's a great way to spend lunch. My file cabinet is already dreading this development.

When I got home, my copy of THE TALENT SHOW was on the table. Whee! A recording of a 6/21/1981 talent show makes for pure gold.

Research Day

Ah, Sunday morning. Got my research stack in front of me: a stack of articles on near-drowning. Time to get rolling in earnest on LOST IN THE WASH, to be drawn by Will Grant. Now that the catalog's basically done (new proof coming this week) and DUB TRUB 2 is out, I can get back to writing. There's still LEAP YEARS to assemble, but that won't be for a bit yet.

Oh, gotta finish reading the book above. The things I do for art.

Saturday

Coach C here in sunny Denver. It's about 70 degrees and windy. Some snow tomorrow. Going to go see Robots tonight and catch the Ep 3 trailer with the bro. His girlfriend told me that she loves the comics of mine that he has. Gave him DT2, the exclusive FALLEN MESA shirt and he was jazzed. Gas is about $2.21 a gallon here. Wheeee!!!! Get the deals while you can!

Started work on MIV3 and DT9 (the final installment!). Other than that, not much else, just taking in the sights and relaxing with a margarita. So, I will log in again soon and give the low down on the hoe down. Peace in!

BOING!

It is definitely time for me to get back on my bike and start riding to work again.

Tonight, at my paying job, I had an embarassing moment. In the restroom, I was fastening my pants when "KaPOW!" the button shoots off. To add insult to injury, I was in a closed stall, so the button ricocheted off the stall wall and PINGed me right in the forehead. My belt is currently holding things together.

Sitting at my drawing desk doesn't do much to burn off this gut, either. C'mon spring! Time to ride!

Gambler's Guts

I've been absorbing the life of Robert Evans lately. Taking things exactly backwards, I watched the great doco "The Kid Stays in The Picture", then nabbed the audiobook off Audible.com, and now I have a hardback of the book next to my bed. Evans narrated the documentary and read his own audiobook; he sounds like Elmer Fudd at 60 with half a bottle of absinthe in him. I can't get enough of it.

The fabulous accident of learning the details of Evans' life: moving from documentary to the sorta kinda unabridged audiobook to the book, the story gets seedier and seedier. I'm skimming past oft-heard passages and am slammed to a halt by the jarring presence of "new" text. "The property is king," Evans often says. He stresses reading the whole text instead of a synopsis. Discovering new text in folds and creases of this tale in this manner isn't what he meant by that, but it's a heck of a way to come to a greater understanding of the man.

It's more like how you actually get to know a person; you learn the basics (name, job, place of birth), then you start to hear their stories. Then after you get to know them a while and they tell the same stories a few times, more details emerge, ah, then you get to know them. Love 'em or hate 'em, you know 'em. Not easy, but not bad, either.

Back to work..

So the catalog proof came, and we liked it, and we changed a couple of little things, and we sent it off again and now it's done and out there and overwith. If you are a retailer or a librarian, check it out at www.candlelightpress.com . You can have one sent to your store or library. If you're not a retailer or librarian, you can buy one out-of-hand from us at conventions... and have a peek at our site anyway. Lots of cool stuff, wierd comics made out here in I-oway.

But now my mind is at peace (relatively) and I can hunker down and plug away at the second volume of our crime thriller, The Fairer Sex: A Tale of Shades & Angels (written by my main man John Ira Thomas). The women of Freedom City, TX, are stirred up by a crazed vigilante Mary Madonna gunning down men at an accelerating pace, all in the name of love for the Night Angel. Night Angel is freaking out, the cops are hurrying to figure this out before the morgue freezers fill up, and the Fearsome Shade is rigging the game, again. At about 250 pages, I have my work cut out for me. Expect it late this year. Volume one is out now, though. Go get it. Sometime in '06 we'll release a complete volume, nice-n-fat.

Gotta get back to inking, okay? byebye.

An Admission

Hi. My name is John and I'm a book and record addict. I've been one since fifth grade, when I got my SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN LP. I listened to it constantly. I took it to Show and Tell. I still have it. It's been supplanted by a copy I bought later in life--the old one's about worn out.

I mention this because I just got a disc in the mail with the THOR and SPIDER-MAN Golden Records on it. These were full-cast recordings where they just read straight out of the comic. They even read the covers aloud. They're also the hardest superhero records to get short of some obscure 78, I guess. These are gems because they came out in the mid-60s and included special reprints of the issues. The only difference I can tell from the original books is that they don't have a cover price. Reprints of comics tend not to be nearly as valuable as the first printing, but we're talking about Amazing Spider-Man #1, Journey Into Mystery #83, Fantastic Four #1 and Avengers #4--"not nearly as valuable" doesn't mean cheap. Even without the comics, the records have been pretty pricey. Still, I was able to nab the Avengers record without the comics for a mere ten bucks at last year's Wizard World Chicago, and now with the recordings of ASM and JIM, I'm feeling pretty good about quieting my record jones until I hear of some forgotten spandex audio.

Fun realization: comics sound bizarre read aloud. Read one out loud to yourself and see how it goes. Better yet, tape it.

And then there were three

...you just walk right in and look around. Since blogs are stream of consciousness, I figure starting with an ellipse is the way to go. Today we're waiting for the "why candle light?" proof to turn up. It's the end-result of a couple solid months of work, distilling and arranging elements of all our books (including a few that aren't out yet) into a catalog. It's been a real labor of love, what with all the odd little bits and ideas that kept creeping into it as we went along. I'm rooting for the delivery guy today, esp. with the snow.

Hey there....JDog in da house

I assume I am doing this right. This is Jeremy Smith. I draw comics for Candle Light Press. Just got off work and am stating my existence here. Stay tuned for future developments. --JDog

Wednesday

Greetings and welcome to the Creators on Demand blog. Right now JT is trying to hang the J-Men poster that Jerdog framed for him. It's an original, not one of these new issues that just came out. Watching Die Another Day on TMC. That's the one that's got Rachel in it.

Anyway, new comics came out today. I got one of the X-titles. Haven't read it yet. Will do so soon. Going to get back to work on "And the Sky Turned White" so I can have it done before Ep3 and Hitchhikers Guide comes out.

So, take care all. Be good and enjoy what you can.