Date: Thu, 11 Jul 1996 01:54:48 -0700 (PDT)
From: Lionel English <[Lionel English] at [sdsu.edu]>
Subject: San Diego (long) (was: Historias del Con?)

At 08:39 AM 7/11/96 +0100, | a | c | w | wrote:
>Where are the San Diego Comic-Con war stories? The sweat-fisted tales of
>sex, drugs and comics? Donde estan?! Did we forget to send a delegation?
>Who won the Eisners? (Or the Harveys--I always mix them up.) Doesn't
>anybody care anymore?!

Well...no war stories, but in brief:

Thursday:
Visited the small press area.  Met and talked (very briefly) with Joe
Chiapetta and Jessica Abel.  Bought a Silly Daddy collection (which I've
already misplaced -- must be with the downstairs loot) and an _Artbabe_ #4.

Attended two panels.  First was "4th of July CBLDF Presents Popular Arts and
the 1st Amendment."  After a mercifully brief preamble by Frank Miller, we
were treated to a wonderful hour-long speech by ACLU president Nadine
Strossen, with a 15~20 minute Q&A follow-up.  Strossen seemed very
up-to-date on most of the CBLDF cases she talked about and was asked about.
Second was a Dave McKean spotlight.  Consisted mostly of Dave working his
way through a slide-show presentation of his work; minimal Q&A.  Mildly
entertaining, but not very informative.

Shortly after this panel, as we (me and Joelle, my SO) were wandering the
floor, we stumbled upon the Dreamhaven Books booth and there on there table
were _Cages_ #'s 2, 3 & 4 -- the precise issues we've been looking for since
*last* year's con, when we started our _Cages_ hunt.  _Cages_ is now at the
top of both our reading lists for this summer.

Also stopped by the MOJO booth and said hi to Rick Klaw.  Bought the
Blueberry book, and eyed the anniversary edition of _Behold the Man_ enviously.

Panels I would like to have attended:  "A Tribute to Kirk [sic] Swan"
(didn't catch this till I saw a sign informing me that the Curt Swan tribute
had been moved from an hour from now to an hour ago); and "Spotlight on
Donna Barr" (about whom I know virtually nothing).

After the exhibit hall closed down I got together with the Legion crowd for
the San Diego Legion dinner.  ObComix: tyg was there.

After dinner we caught the end of the 4th of July party at the convention
center.  Got home after 2.

Friday:
Got to the con too late for the Jerry Siegel tribute.  *Barely* caught the
Moebius signing at MOJO (Rick cut the line off after the guy immediately
behind us).  Came away with a wonderful sketch and dedication.

Skipped several panels, but made sure to catch S.R. Bissette's abbreviated
"Journeys Into Fear."  It ran longer than it was scheduled (almost three
hours), but shorter than what Charles and Gene have reported they'd
experienced (4 1/2 hours?).  He mentioned that he has been discussing the
possibiblty of turning the material into a book with someone (Underwood?).
Excellent show.

Friday night were the Eisner's.  Someone (Jeff Mason) has posted the results
to Usenet, perhaps someone else can repost them here.  While accepting an
Eisner for _Batman & Robin Adventure_ Ty Templeton broke the news about Mike
Parobek's passing for those of us who hadn't heard.  We left the Eisner's
early to catch...

...the pros vs. fans Trivia Match.  Which didn't start till after the
Eisner's ended, because Kurt Busiek had to stay and pick up an award or two.
Tyg, David Goldfarb, Greg "elmo" Morrow and two others whose names I didn't
catch lost to Len Wein, Roger Stern, Mark Waid, and Kurt Busiek; 190-170.
Topic was Silver Age comics.

Later, we caught the end of the post-Eisner's party.  Got home around 3.

Saturday:
Caught the end of the Golden Age panel; with Ric Estrada, Harry Lampert(?),
Shelly Moldoff, Gil Kane, Julius Schwartz (who didn't really get a chance to
speak), and several others.  Lots of great anecdotes.

Friday afternoon Joelle's sister had met and talked with Bryan Talbot; she
brought her copy of _The Tale of One Bad Rat_ today and Joelle and I agreed
to get it signed for her because she was too shy to bother him again.  He
did a nice little sketch of Rat for her.

We also managed to finally find David Lapham at his booth.  He signed our
copy of _Stray Bullets_ Vol 1 (or whatever it's called) and included a nice
little sketch of Joey from #1.

I want to interject here that as someone who always feels like I'd be
imposing to ask someone for a sketch, I'm glad that so many creators
volunteered them when signing their works.  I'm still amazed at how easy
Moebius made the sketch of Blueberry seem, and how quickly it took shape on
the page.

After lunch, we walked in late to the "Gays In Comics" panel.  It was
interesting (though not as much so as last year's -- though my opinion may
have been influenced from coming in late), but I don't have anything to report.

Saturday night was the Masquerade.  We attended this two years ago and
enjoyed it, but skipped it last year.  In hindsight, we probably should have
skipped it this year.  Though there were several fun moments, there weren't
enough of them to make up for the amount of time we spent there.

Afterwards we hit the Universal Pictures Monster Bash, which wrapped up
early at shortly past 12:00.  Got home by 1:30.

Sunday:
Got to the con in time to find out that the Silver Age panel had been
cancelled.  Spent most of the day on the floor in the dealer booths,
finishing up from Friday.  Highlights of my finds:  a bunch of 70's MoKF and
Defenders, some Legion related stuff from between their _Action_ run and
their _Superboy_ run, and (ObComix:) a copy of _Footrot Flats_, _It's All
True!_, and the first volume of Barefoot Gen in softcover.

Finally found Rob Walton's table back in the small press are and pounced on
the first four issues of _Ragmop_, which I was desperate to find after
laughing hysterically through the fifth and sixth issues over the past month
or two.

After the hall closed, we ran into some net folk in the lobby.  Kynn
Bartlett informed us that there was going to be a gathering over at the Baja
Brewery across the street and invited us to drop by.  When we got there,
Kynn of course wasn't there.  We recognized several people from the Legion
dinner, but had to sit at the end of the table with the people we didn't
know.  Pete Coogan and the Thousand-Named Glenn dropped in as most everyone
was finishing up; Joelle and I stayed for a bit and had a pleasant
conversation with them while they ate and everyone else left.

Pete, Glenn, and a couple of late comers headed off to crash the Graphitti
party afterwards; while Joelle and I were waylaid outside the Spaghetti
Factory by a couple of her coworkers.  We got home before 10, and crashed.

        Lionel

.....................................................................
Lionel English                     [l--gl--h] at [mail.sdsu.edu]
San Diego, CA               finger [L--on--l] at [ph.sdsu.edu] for more info
.....................................................................
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
          Albert Einstein

"Reality is whatever refuses to go away when I stop believing in it. "
          -Philip K. Dick