Saturday, July 31, 2004

Another one of my San Diego 2000 sketches. This one was late in the book, late in the last day, with only four pages left to fill. The sketch was perfect, reminding me of the excellent Elseworld tale he tackled. Judge for yourself.

AQUAMAN
Mike McKone
23 July 2000
(permission to post given 26 April 2004 through Art Shotton)
BLUELINE ORIGINAL ARTWORK

by Tegan at 9:57 PM Seattle time - Permalink

DC: The New Frontier #5: If I said that this issue is my favorite of this series so far, how many people will roll their eyes and say "of course"? Hey, I like the series and all, but having Aquaman show up just made it so much better for me. After all, Artie has to be doing something in this universe, and the nature of the baddie only makes his involvement very likely. I could've used a lot more of him, of course, but I certainly like the ambiguity of his appearance. Oh yeah, and the rest of the book was pretty good too. I like the developing J'onn bit more than most. And quite the cliffhanger. I'm looking forward to the next issue with a lot more anticipation now.

JLA: Another Nail #3: This is going to read much better all at once. I already enjoyed this issue more than the first two as far as the story goes. The art has been incredible all along. Any story that tries to contain the entire DCU is going to be a hard read, but I'm afraid at times this one was a little harder than it should have been.

DC Presents: Hawkman #1: I guess I just don't like tribute stories that read like tibute stories. The first story felt forced to me. The second one flowed more naturally and I enjoyed it more, but these have almost all been misses for me so far. Perhaps I set my standards too high.

Amazing Spider-Man #69/510: I suppose if I knew a little tiny bit more about Peter Parker's history, I would know the answer to this question: (spoilers)Are they his children?(end spoilers) Even though I'm not certain, I'm definitely shocked by the revelation. Again, the art still isn't working for me. As I get used to it I'm sure I'll like it more, but I miss Romita. Anyway, this one is worth a look.

Still to review: Conan, Usagi Yojimbo, Powers, and Samurai Executioner.

by Tegan at 6:39 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Hey, that's not a blue moon! This is. We've been using the wrong definition for many years... So today isn't actually a Blue Moon, although it's the second full moon in a month. The next real Blue Moon won't be until August of next year (that would be August 19th 2005). I suppose we could call today a Modern Blue Moon.

Losing Track of What You Love, a commentary on comics.

Hey, did someone just read Hench, or was that pure original? Man, I need to find a job. Something I can do. Something without a long commute. Too bad nobody is willing to pay me for blogging. Still, I'm glad I'm not henching...

Ian is still writing con reports. Follow his links within the notes to go back and start at the beginning.

As long as I'm going on about comics, I'll post again my very short and constantly getting shorter want list of solo Aquaman stories. I'm down to only nineteen missing tales from these books: More Fun #79, Adventure #129, 131, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 141, 142, 145, 148, 151, 171, 176, 177, 178, 179, 184.

My feelings on the new Doctor Who series closely follow Legomancer's feelings. There is a part of me that will not believe we have a new Doctor Who series until I see it on my TV screen.

by Tegan at 1:46 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Friday, July 30, 2004

Classic Illustrated Jr #535: The Wizard of Oz: There are some significant changes to the story from both the movie and (I think) the book. That's all to the good, though, as a child reading this may well want to get the book to see what the real story is all about. It's a fun little version, not the best I've ever seen, but fun.

JLA #102: While it's a touching enough story, put in a series of stories about the Justice League failing it seems already too depressing. I don't want to read a bunch of tales of how members of the League screw up. That's not why I read comic books. Taken on its own merits, there are some nice bits in here, including the reaction of Wally. Still, this story arc just makes me ask "why?"

Green Lantern #179: Um. It was ok, I guess. I'm not sure I'm impressed. John Stewart looks completely wrong to me, maybe I've been watching Justice League too much. And Kyle's reactions are actions all seem off for his character. Overall... no, not impressed.

Still to review: Conan, Usagi Yojimbo, DC Presents Hawkman, The New Frontier, Another Nail, Amazing Spider-Man, Powers, and Samurai Executioner.

by Tegan at 9:53 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Here's the post in which I attempt to include everything I forgot to mention before about the trip.

The drive was long... when we checked the odometer driving into Pacific Grove, we discovered that we'd traveled almost exactly 1000 miles. The odometer was on 999.7 or something, about to turn over. Going home was the same, it was 997.6 when I checked it after unloading the car. We did take a couple of side trips, including getting lost in San Jose, but in the grand scheme of things the side trips weren't much. Our guessimates as to how much gas we would need (six refills of the tank) and approximate cost were pretty close.

Speaking of side trips... we visited all three state capitals along the route:

Olympia was easy, the capital is right off the freeway (you can see the capital dome from the freeway). The exit practically goes right to the visitors center, so you don't have to drive around town at all.

Salem was a bit more difficult. First off, we didn't realize the capital building didn't have a dome. Second off, it was far enough away from the freeway that it was a bit of a drive to get there. On the other hand, the signage was very good, and once we figured out what we were looking at was indeed the capital building and not just some building with a statue on top, everything was much cooler.

Sacramento was the hardest. I went to mapquest and got directions... or at least I thought I had gotten directions. As it turned out, the directions were wrong, and sent us to a marina instead. After a confused short drive, we stopped at a gas station and bought a map. Luckily, we were very near to the real location and didn't have too much trouble getting there once we actually knew where it was. Getting a picture of it was also difficult, as was walking around in the heat. We're from Seattle, where 70 degrees F is hot. So imagine our discomfort walking around in 103 degrees. Then there were the trees! Gorgeous trees all over... completely blocking any possibility of getting a good picture of the dome. Eventually I found a decent spot and got this shot, which includes some orange trees, the first I'd ever seen. I will also mention that the sky was blue... the angle of the sun makes it look washed out. Getting the shot we actually came to get was even more difficult, but eventually we managed.

Another side trip was to Gilroy. If you know the significance of Gilroy California, raise your hand! That's right, Gilroy, home to the Garlic Festival, which was going on while we were there. We didn't go to the festival, as it was almost over by the time we stopped by, but we did stop at The Garlic Shoppe for a special treat. I wanted to try out garlic ice cream. We were given samples of a garlic blue cheese butter (I just want to mention that I don't like blue cheese, but this butter was quite good), and we bought little tubs of garlic vanilla ice cream and garlic chocolate ice cream, then sat out at their picnic table and traded off while we ate. It was surprisingly good. I think it would be better to try it when you aren't in the middle of garlic country, surrounded by the smell of garlic, but it was still good. We also bought a small bottle of garlic steak sauce. If you drive through Gilroy on 101, be sure to open your windows just north of town. That's where the garlic smell is strongest and best.

I've been badgered for a picture of Eric and myself. At the moment, I'm not inclined to take my own picture. For one thing, I always blink. Always. I have yet to take a self-portrait in which I don't blink. For another, I'm not entirely pleased with my appearance at the moment. I am trying to lose weight, and once I'm down just a few pounds I'll start to feel much better about myself. Still, here's an image of Eric and some Oogaboos at the costume contest last Saturday. Eric is the one on the left. Gina, our friend who went to the DNC as a delegate, is next to him. Next to her is Betsy, who rocks, and Lynn, who is simply awesome. As you see, they are all wearing their "Jo" costumes, and giving out produce from their Oogaboo trees from baskets, or in Eric's case the Shanower lunchbox.

Regarding the Winchester Mystery House: I don't think I mentioned that the house has 160 rooms, including 13 bathrooms. It's a BIG house, sprawling across the land, now in the middle of a heavily developed area. If anyone has a copy of that old episode of Ripley's Believe It Or Not that mentioned the house, I would very much like to see it again.

I mentioned that we went on the tours, but I don't think I explained them. There are three tours. The first is the basic tour. It gets you into the house where you are guided carefully around while the aspects of the house are explained to you. I think Eric and I got lucky with the tour guide, as she was simply dynamite.

The second tour is the Behind the Scenes tour, which takes you first around the grounds where things like the fact that the place was still a working farm is explained. The Behind the Scenes tour also has a very short sojourn into the basement of the building, where you have to wear a hardhat and watch your head. It's very dark down there, but the ex-tour guide who was still with our group mentioned that glow-in-the-dark arrows had been put up to help people who got lost find their way out. I also noticed that in the mansion itself there were arrows on the floor in some places, almost worn away. The ex-tour guide told me that those were from the days when there had been no tour guides, and people could do self-directed tours through the house. Apparently, during those early tours, a lot of vandalism took place completely destroying some of the unique features of many rooms.

The Behind the Scenes tour has an age limit, no children under 13 or so allowed. If you take a child, be sure to call ahead and make sure of the age limit. It's also the tour I'm least likely to do again. I would love to return to the house, but going Behind the Scenes once was enough for me. If I did go on it again, it would be to get pictures of certain things, like the ex-tour guide who was with us.

The two tours together took about 2 1/2 hours, with a short break in between.

The third tour is the Garden Tour, and it's not only self-directed, it's free. You can walk around the building and listen to the pre-recorded bits about each of the areas all you want. When you enter, you are given a map of the grounds that shows to the Garden Tour route. Some of the places we stopped at on the Behind the Scenes tour were also on the Garden Tour.

In addition, there is a huge gift shop, a cafe, an arcade, and two small museums featuring Winchester products. The brochure claims that the house receives no government money at all, so they really want you to spend a few dollars while you are there.

If you intend to visit from out of town, there are really good deals through local hotels. Eric and I got a package deal from the Holiday Inn Express near the airport, which is clear across town from the Mystery House, admittedly, but when you've driven as far as we did just to get down there, clear across town isn't that far at all. And they had wireless internet service... I can't turn my nose up at that. All the package deals include just the regular tour, but it's easy to upgrade when you get to the Mystery House if you want the BtS tour too. They also offer night tours on Friday the 13th and near Halloween. I would be very tempted to go on one of those if I was in San Jose during that time.

I also didn't mention the statuary in the garden. In front of the house there are many statues, including the deer I posted. The deer is probably my favorite. There are also little statues and bits of statues elsewhere on the grounds. You sometimes stumble across them. I may post more of them in later Random Thoughts posts.

Let's see... is there anything else I wanted to say? I think I mentioned that we drove almost 700 miles the first day, Thursday, in about 11 1/2 hours. We made it from Bothell to Red Bluff, which is south of Redding. The next day we made good time to San Jose, but got completely lost looking for the entrance to the airport. Eventually we found it and picked up Karyl. The drive to Asilomar from San Jose isn't bad at all, and we made it well before the convention opened.

This was the forty-first Winkie Convention, celebrating 100 years of "The Marvelous Land of Oz" & Humor in Oz. The first night included a cool "show and tell" bit, in which Eric read the e-mail from a woman who wanted help naming her child using an Oz name. I'm sure Eric can give you all the gory details... Another cool program was on Saturday night, when Jory Mason, the granddaughter (or great granddaughter) or John R Neill, one of the illustrators of Oz, presented a talk about him. It was fascinating. There was also a fascinating talk about reading programs in the United States that was enough to make a reader like myself want to single-handedly revamp the educational system. As is often the case, most of the talks were interesting to me despite my general non-interest in Oz. The convention is certainly a cool one for any Oz fan to attend. The Oz Club could use more folks attending... the next Winkie convention will be July 8 - July 10, 2005 at Asilomar, according to the Asilomar calendar.

I've already told you about the treasure hunt, but did I tell you about the jogger who was trying to get through a crowd of a dozen or so Asilomar deer? The deer are protected, and thus are completely unafraid of humans. The jogger waved his arms, yelled, but the deer didn't move. He eventually got through, but the person telling us the story giggled as she described his utter exasperation.

Another fun little thing I noticed was this lovely fake owl on the window of a hotel room near ours in San Jose. Apparently they have a bird problem there. Fake owls are generally put up to scare other birds away.

Well, I'm sure I've still forgotten something, but I'll not worry about it at the moment. I hope you've enjoyed my trip blogging. I really enjoyed the trip.

by Tegan at 11:30 AM Seattle time - Permalink

• Weight = X-3
  
• Change From Last Week = +2
  
• Met Exercise Goal? No
  Goal was fifteen minutes a day (walk/bike/swim) at least six days.
  
• Current Exercise Goal = fifteen minutes a day (walk/bike/swim) at least six days.
  
• Kept food diary? No

My only excuse is that I was on the road, and it's really hard to keep everything up while on the road. This week should be much more productive. Wish me luck.

by Tegan at 8:59 AM Seattle time - Permalink

Thursday, July 29, 2004

Yeah, I do comic reviews here too...

Superman: Birthright #12: And... Superman saves the day with a big assist from Lois. Nice touch right at the end, too. Overall, though, I still don't like the art style and the plot isn't original enough to overcome.

Futurama #18: Huh. That was actually pretty good. Even if you aren't a Futurama fan (like, oh, me) there are lots of little touches that make this one worth giving a go. Not to mention the useful explanations of everything from Cubert. A surprisingly fun little story.

A Bunch of Baboons: This is an extremely late Free Comic from Free Comic Book Day. It just hit our store this week. Had it come out on time, I might have been more willing to give it a fair shake, as I was reading a bunch of stuff that week that I normally wouldn't read. This week, though, I gave it a flip through and didn't enjoy it much. With a book like this, timing is important.

Avengers #85/500: A thoroughly confusing tale that rips apart everything I knew about the Avengers in one fell swoop. I'm glad I didn't buy it for myself.

DC Comics/2000 AD Preview #1: Nice little free book that gives us American readers a quick introduction to some of the books DC is bringing across the pond. For a sampler, this is quite excellent. It gives a good taste of what each comic is like, and makes me slightly curious about a couple of them. If you are at all interested in the 2000 AD books, this is one to get your hands on.

Still to review: Conan, Usagi Yojimbo, DC Presents Hawkman, The New Frontier, Green Lantern, Another Nail, JLA, Amazing Spider-Man, Powers, Samurai Executioner, and the reprint of the Classic Illustrated Jr Wizard of Oz.

by Tegan at 9:39 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Ok. For the one or two of you who haven't heard of the Winchester Mystery House, here's the lowdown: Sarah Winchester, heiress of the Winchester Rifle fortune (to the tune of $1000 a day) moved to San Jose in 1884. She had lost her husband and her only child already, and it is said that she was convinced by an occultist that she would lose her own life unless she built a house for the restless spirits of those killed by Winchester guns. The house would be continually added to, and construction must never stop. And it never did while Sarah was alive. For 38 years, the house was constantly being remodeled and added to, until Sarah Winchester's death in 1922.

I first heard of the Mystery House on the old Ripley's Believe It Or Not TV show (the one from the 1980's). From that moment I wanted to visit the place. But I was just a child at the time and the opportunity didn't seem likely to ever come. Now, many years later, I've finally gone to the house, taken the full tour (both the regular and behind the scenes tours) and now I have my own impression of the place. So, here are my thoughts on the Mansion:

Really really short response: I want one.

Slightly longer response: There are some definite oddities, but at its core the house is a gorgeous Victorian Mansion with virtually every aspect of Victorian architecture represented somewhere. It's a beautiful house that would be an adventure to live in, if only because finding your way around might be difficult.

And my long response: We got there first thing Monday morning for the first tour of the day. The tour guide was a wonderful ex-schoolteacher who made the rules very clear, and was able to easily explain everything we were seeing in a schoolteacher way. We also had an ex-tour guide on our tour with us, who knew the route and was trying to get pictures of certain aspects of the house. I noticed her taking pictures of hinges and doorhandles along the way, and when I inspected what she was taking pictures of, I realized just how detailed everything in the house was.

This first picture is of one of the oddities in the house. Very early into the tour the guide directed us to a staircase and suggested we look up past the rope. I stuck the camera in and got a shot. This is the famous stairway to nowhere, which goes right up into a ceiling:

It's not quite the most odd of the features in the house, but it is a bit strange to have a perfectly normal stairway turn a corner and suddenly go up into nothing.

Now some folks would have you believe that this is because Sarah wanted to confuse ghosts. I think it was more an artefact of how she was building and designing the home. She was a very intelligent woman, and she would sit down in her "seance room" and draw up plans. Although she took suggestions, she did not take criticism. If an employee thought something was screwed up, the employee had to be willing to do it Sarah's way anyway, while possibly offering that another way might be better. When a section wasn't done to her plans, she had it ripped out completely and redone. She was constantly adding on to the house, which was originally a small farmhouse. And she also was constantly remodelling. It's a wonder that the place was at all coherant. She was designing her house piecemeal, and that's how it looks.

This is not to say that there were no bits of the supernatural in the place. Sarah Winchester was very fond of the number "13", and it appears all over the place in various patterns. There's even a chandelier that had twelve candles in it when she bought it that she modified so it would have a 13th. She also liked spider webs. In one section of the house a whole bunch of unused windows were stored. I took a picture of one of them, that you can see to the side here, that had both a spider web and thirteen incorporated into it.

Another oddity of the house are the "easy riser" stairs. However, their explanation is far more logical than just about anything else. Sarah suffered from arthritis (I think) later in life and couldn't walk up normal sized steps. She had a number of staircases put in that wind around and are VERY small (my shoulders brushed the sides of the walls) with steps that she could handle in her illness. She was a very small woman, and some of the doorways were made to her size, as were the stairs we went up. When I mentioned how tight the staircases were, the tour guide laughed loudly and told me that a group of sumo wrestlers from Japan had made it up the staircase, so she wasn't worried about anyone in our group.

While many people have reported seeing/hearing/smelling ghosts in the house, I felt nothing. Well, that's not quite true. I felt, if anything, a sense of peace and rest. If there were ghosts in the house, they were long gone and appeased by the time I visited. What I felt in the house was a sense of whimsy, and maybe even a little bit of a wicked sense of humor from the woman long dead who built the place. To me, a lot of the more odd bits of the house seemed like a deliberate poke at the beliefs of the time. I suspect that if I were to take one of the Friday the 13th night tours that a feeling of ghosts could be conjured up, but during the day there was nothing, not even down under the house where we went on the behind the scenes tour.

A couple of my digital pictures have "ghost orbs" in them. I've seen websites where people claim that these are photographic proof of ghosts. I've also seen websites that explain them away through a variety of reasonings, all of them intelligent. I tend to not believe that orbs are ghosts... I like to think that I'm sensitive enough to such things that if a ghost were in the room I'd feel it. But if it makes anyone feel cool, two of the photos in this entry have "ghost orbs", one on the stair to nowhere and the other of the coal chute. Going back through the pictures, those appear to be the only two I got.

One reason I might have felt nothing might be from our short visit to Sarah's Seance Room. I put it in quotation marks before, because it didn't look like much of a seance place to me. More of a secret clubhouse. Look at the picture here, taken from the room. The room looked down on the kitchens... so Sarah could go into her private room and watch the servants! I'm sorry, but that just doesn't seem terribly supernatural to me. The room also had a secret exit, through a doorway that looked like a cupboard. Very much like a little clubhouse!

Let's see... a couple of earthquake facts...

The house was originally seven stories tall, but the towers collapsed in earthquakes. It's now four stories.

During the 1906 earthquake, Sarah was trapped in her room because the walls shifted enough to jam the doors. She never stayed in the front of the house after that, and had 30 rooms boarded up.

The house is on a floating foundation, which allows it to weather earthquakes better than many modern buildings. In addition, when she added a section to the house, she usually just had the workers build right over the outside wall (there was a spot in the unfinished ballroom where you could see it, but it wasn't something I thought to get a picture of) so each section isn't firmly connected to the bit next to it, also allowing more movement during an earthquake, and thus less damage.

Another cool spot was the window in the floor. Thanks to going on the behind the scenes tour, we got to see it from above and below.

The house has three elevators, including one Otis elevator. And yes, Otis didn't make residential elevators. The woman was rich, I'm sure she paid an awful lot to get them to install one in her home. None of the elevators are used now, and they sit on whatever floor they were last on.

A lot of people, when they talk about the Mystery House, talk about the door to nowhere. Well, here it is:

And here's a wider shot so you understand why it's considered an oddity:

Another item of note in the house, which I'm afraid I didn't get a picture of, was the original linoleum installed in one hallway. The tour guide pointed it out to us, and told us the guy who sold it to Sarah Winchester swore it would last forever. It still looked pretty good, if slightly ragged around the edges. The guide then pointed to the next hallway over and said, "This linoleum was installed four years ago." It looked the same, in some places considerably worse. The guide mentioned all the feet that have trod the hall since 1922... yeah, that salesman wasn't kidding, was he?

When we went through the house, the tour guide pointed out this window, the most expensive window in the house which was specifically designed to create beautiful patterns when sunlight hit it, poorly placed so that no sunlight would ever get through to it.

This is a strange wall decoration that had some function. For her time, Sarah Winchester was very advanced. She used the most modern building techniques and was constantly updating to the latest technology. She had an impressive call system installed so she always had a servant at the touch of a button. And she paid well. Apparently her workers got twice the going rate of the surrounding area. A good job if you could keep your mouth shut and not criticize the boss.

Here's an image of the coal chute as seen from below (where we all were wearing hardhats):

And above, from the garden:

Here's one of the spider-web windows from the outside. She also liked daisies, and there is a room decorated with daisy designs.

Here's the front door. Legend has it that only three people ever used it. Sarah herself, and the two workmen who put it up. It was installed shortly before the 1906 earthquake (if I understood the tour guides) and after the earthquake she boarded up the entire front of the house, including the front doors.

This last image is from the front garden. The deer is apparently original and was around in Sarah's time, but the bush behind it is an in-joke by the modern gardeners for the benefit of the folks who have been on the tour.

Some more thoughts on the house: It was a working farm, even with all the construction constantly going on. Sarah still grew plums and other fruits and sold them all over. In fact, Winchester prunes were sold in Europe. Again, the farmhands got paid very well, so working for the funny lady was not a hardship. Upon her death, Sarah didn't mention the house at all but left all the furniture to her niece. She also provided nice sums of money for a number of her servants in her will, which they found in her safe along with two locks of hair and newspaper clippings. The locks of hair were from her husband and her daughter, the clippings were about their deaths.

It's a funny thing, but after many years of being silent, there is now construction going on constantly in the Winchester house. All of it is restoration and preservation, but it's happening almost non-stop like it did in Sarah's time. While we were there I saw mostly painters, but there were also workers in the garden repairing items. Perhaps that is why the house felt so happy.

by Tegan at 3:53 PM Seattle time - Permalink

The highway signs in California now have milepost numbers on them, making it a whole lot easier to give directions... if anyone knew what the numbers were. But the change seems to be fairly recent, if the look of the signs is any indication, and no directions we got had exit numbers. Anyone from California know when the change was made?

Speaking of mileposts and exits, according to the last exit on I-5 in California, I-5 runs about 796 miles from start to finish in California, and 308 miles in Oregon. More useless trivia for you.

When you go to Asilomar, you see this sign right at the entrance:

We looked and looked for Mountain Lions, but we only saw one candidate the entire time we were there. That particular wildcat wandered around searching for people to come and pet it and posing for anyone with a camera. I swear the beastie must be former Hollywood:

What else to tell you about? You've already seen my picture of Aquaman on the Asilomar beach. I also snagged a few pictures of the flowers on the sides of the paths. I'll post those later, as I need Random Thought images. You know it's traditional to post pictures of flowers.

I didn't take many images in the dealers room. Just enough to show that Eric was indeed selling the books he promised to sell (note to Eric: you don't have to volunteer). I also got a good picture of a special creation by Eric's co-author Karyl Carlson:

Yes, it's a FLYING SOCK MONKEY!!!!! If you want to get a Karyl Creation, contact her through her website or my husband's site for her dolls. Be sure to mention me. If I refer enough people to her, it'll make me feel better about her giving me the Flying Sock Monkey for free...

Ok. Next post about the weekend will cover the Winchester Mystery House, so I'd better get the images ready. This may take awhile.

by Tegan at 8:53 AM Seattle time - Permalink

Wednesday, July 28, 2004

I'm slowly slowly slowly catching up on comics blogs. I'm sure I'll miss a few really cool bits despite my best efforts. Let's start with Grant Morrison, whose interview is mentioned on many blogs but I got it originally from Fanboy Rampage. In the interview, Morrison covers the new JLA book, complete with an image that includes Aquaman. Great, another strange series that I have to get...

Peter David takes it on the arm for the CBLDF. Personally, I would have asked for more than $1000. Anyway, from Neil's Blog, here's a link to pictures of the deed.

Franklin's Findings lets us know that the Batman Begins Trailer is now on-line. Yippee.

Variety's Bags and Boards has a lot of convention coverage. I'm not even going to try to link to each note. Just go read the whole thing.

Erin the Comic Queen manages to shame me by getting her review of Previews up before I even started writing mine. *sigh*

Miraclo Miles points us to Cassini's picture of a moon of Saturn, no, it's not a space station.

I finally got to hear Jeff Parker's audio reports from Comicon. Very cool. Hard to understand in places, but very cool.

ICv2 reports that FCBD 2005 might be either May 7th or June 18th. Both choices are better than July 4th weekend. Link via Thought Balloons.

Also via Thought Balloons, The Eisner Awards.

The Greedo Assassination Conspiracy Page. Yeah, just how did Greedo manage to miss Han Solo from less than a meter away? Via Four Color Meat and Fish.

Near Mint Heroes is linkblogging again. Don't miss it.

Johnny B draws Doctor Strange. I'm also curious as to when his book is coming out (I didn't miss it, did I?). It's a children's book called Pumpkins on the Vine.

You must read Brill's Comic-con Report. Heck, Mark Evanier linked to him, that's how good it is! I gather his backpack was a bit heavy...

Scott at Polite Dissent revisits Aquaman. Yep. The biological changes would be more than mere gills. I find the Atlantis Chronicles depiction of a slow change much more plausible than the overnight jump caused by a massive infusion of sea water seen in the current book. But then, suspension of disbelief is a big requirement for Aquaman comics, unless you look on it as pure fantasy. I think that's why a lot of writers go for the "magic" crutch.

Scott also has a great post about one of my favorite sub-genres.

The Comics Waiting Room also has some good Comic-con reports. And Comics Ate My Brain. Go read.

Post-Crisis covers the Bendis Board problems. I agree, a dark day indeed.

Very very odd, but terribly cool, is the Top Screen Scientist Vote. Many thanks to Budgie's Squawks for the link.

Budgie also links to Stained Glass Superheroes. If I were much richer, I'd commission an Aquaman one.

I watched a bit of the Rollcall of the 2004 Democratic Convention. Mainly because one of our friends who was down at the Oz convention in Asilomar was a delegate for Utah. Sure enough, we saw her when Utah came up.

Do not trust e-voting. This article has some incidents which might be innocent, but sure sound like vote fraud to me:

At around 8:50, Soubirous’s campaign manager, Brian Floyd, received a call from an election observer in Temecula informing him that the vote count had been stopped – apparently by Registrar Mischelle Townsend herself. The reason was not made clear. So Floyd and another Soubirous campaigner named Art Cassel jumped into a car and drove to Townsend’s office to investigate. Sure enough, the counting area appeared to be near-deserted. But then they noticed two men huddled at one of the vote tabulation computers.

Via Metafilter. Again, if you vote on a computer that doesn't give you a paper copy (whether it is to keep or to deposit in a lockbox), you might as well not be voting. Demand a paper ballot when you vote. E-voting cannot be trusted in the United States.

If you live in the Seattle area, remember to bring your camera and go to the Ballard Locks on Sunday, August 1st, at 1 pm for a peaceful (and perfectly legal) protest against the abuse of Ian Spiers and Homeland Security laws.

This picture (from Nancy's Garden) doesn't do justice to the beauty of these little guys, who pop up through the cracks in the paving and show up in the most unexpected spots:

by Tegan at 10:30 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Seaguy #3: As Chubby might have said, "Da fug?" I might say, "some very cool ideas in search of a story." Well... it's confusing. I'll give it that. And the art is simply gorgeous. That too. I think I know what happened, but I'm not convinced I know what the writer intended. For the art alone, then, this gets a mild recommendation. I've read better stories, if not stranger ones.

Demo #8: This one is hard. Really hard. I'm not sure if my initial reaction is going to be enough to write about. Partly because my initial reaction is NOT something I'm inclined to share. If I have one quibble with the story itself, it's the reaction of Nick. Picking up the tape, searching through a drawer in the same room to find a walkman to play it on... it seems unlikely to me for a variety of reasons. The rest of it I can follow along ok, but that seems just too much. I guess I have one other question: Jess made the tape, but did she know what would happen when Nick played it? I had a strong reaction to this story, but I think I'll probably just sit out of any discussion on it.

Ursula: Wow. I wasn't convinced by the solicit. I wasn't even convinced by the high praise from other bloggers looking forward to it. No, what convinced me to try it was Fábio Moon bothering to come to my blog and telling me I would enjoy it. He was right. I really enjoyed it. It's a very different kind of book, with enchanting characters and an amazing if slightly abstruse narrative. Anyone with a bit of romance in the heart will enjoy it, whether they are a child or an adult. As for the artwork... WOW. This is fantastic! Clean art, very strong storytelling, good design. Everything I like in my art. So go snag a copy and take a look. Right now, if you have the time. Once you've read it, come back here and tell me what you think. This is one of those instant classics, in my opinion. I'd like to hear your opinion on this one.

Reviews for this week: Conan, Usagi Yojimbo, DC Presents Hawkman, The New Frontier, Green Lantern, Another Nail, Birthright, JLA, Amazing Spider-Man, Powers, Futurama, Samurai Executioner, and the reprint of the Classic Illustrated Jr Wizard of Oz.

by Tegan at 2:52 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Sunday at the con is always the most quiet time. Things are dying down as people are too worn out to party anymore. While the Winkies are not generally party animals, Sunday tends to be the same at their convention.

Eric and I started the day with a nice walk down to breakfast. Usually, at Asilomar, you get your food cafeteria-style, but the servers assigned to our dining area were bored so they brought those of us who got there early our food. It was really nice of them. I have to mention... the folks who work at Asilomar are some of the nicest people you could want to meet. I'm going to mention an exception, but please don't judge the whole place by that person. The hotel staff there is just wonderful.

After breakfast Eric and I went down to the beach, which is a short walk from the dining hall, and took a few pictures. While they are part of another project I'm working on, one picture came out so well I just have to share it:

I'm quite pleased with that one, and it's not even the best shot I got during that session.

After the photo shoot we wandered back up to the Winkie area and hung around talking with people. There we learned the sad fate of the annual Treasure Hunt, which suffered a premature and somewhat embarrassing end.

The annual Treasure Hunt is the big Sunday activity at the Winkie convention. Oz items are secreted around the grounds near the Forum building that the convention uses, and adults and kids go hunting for them. In years past, most everyone participated, but recently it has become more of a kids' program. The Hollisters were in charge this year, and planned to change that, big time. They had worked hard on the items for the Hunt, coming up with some really clever visual puns. They knew that everyone would want to participate just to figure out what each item meant.

At 1 am Sunday morning, after the late night events had ended, the Hollisters went out to hide the items.

They had a good chunk put out when the park ranger arrived. See, Asilomar is a conference center, but it's also a state park. And recently a new ranger was assigned to the park who is a real stickler for rules. The Hollisters had gotten permission... from the hotel staff. But the park ranger had technical jurisdiction over the area the Hollisters were using, and came down hard on them. She threatened them with fines and jail time, and insisted that they pick up every item. When one of them pointed out the two huge bags of garbage that they had picked up just to get the area prepped for the hunt, she relented a little. However, a hunt of any kind was out of the question. They had to pick up every item.

It was late, it was dark, they'd almost been finished. They pleaded with her to allow them to wait until morning, and she sort of agreed. Sort of, as in, "I'll start picking up stuff, and anything left in the morning you can get. I'm confiscating all the stuff I pick up." Well over half was gone by morning, found and removed by the ranger.

Angry and dismayed, the Hollisters considered trying to hide their remaining items in a more acceptable place, but when they broached the subject, the ranger told them the only acceptable place was inside the main Forum building. They gave up. The only Sunday morning activity was thus canceled.

Later in the morning, a couple of the hotel staff brought back the confiscated items, having snuck them from the rangers office. They mentioned that a few folks already thought of the new ranger as the Wicked Witch, now everyone was saying it because she'd disrupted the activities of one of the staffs' favorite groups. The Winkies, on the other hand, started calling the ranger "Mombi", which is the name of the witch in the book that is celebrating its centennial this year, The Marvelous Land of Oz.

Now, to be absolutely fair to the ranger, she had a point. The area the Hollisters were using for the Treasure Hunt was protected state land. There was a safety issue, too... namely poison oak and ground wasps. When Peter announced at the general closing meeting why the Hunt had been canceled, the few people who hadn't already heard were not entirely surprised, but everyone was disappointed.

Ok, that's enough for the moment. There's much more to come, including the rest of the convention and our Monday morning visit to the Winchester Mansion.

by Tegan at 10:15 AM Seattle time - Permalink

Tuesday, July 27, 2004

Been writing these... posting them has been a problem. Here's some more:

Outsiders #14: It started out fairly confusing, as a book that has to pick up from a cliffhanger often does, but it worked itself into an ok little story after all. Jade and Dick's conversation at the end was a good start towards addressing the major flaw in the book, so overall I'm hoping for the best.

DC Presents: Green Lantern #1: Oh boy. How do I write a criticism of the first story without coming off as sour grapes? It just seemed overly... stupid... like it was trying too hard to be funny. It was cute, but none of the jokes seemed to work. Anyway, the second story was decent, if overly melodramatic. I'm not really enjoying these "tributes" overall. They're ok, but I've seen more losers than winners out of the first few.

Smallville #9: Fun split story for the comic section, and the guides are very nice. I like seeing a guide to the novels, as I'm pretty sure I will never read them. A nice package, but it felt a bit skimpy this time, perhaps because of the extra "guide" pages.

Birds of Prey #70: Nasty cult... yeah, yeah... based in Oregon... yeah, yeah... good guys have to stop it... whatever. Except for the first few pages, which featured an entirely different plot, this book did nothing for me. I would have happily read an entire book about the subject of the first few pages... but the main plot is boring.

Still to review: Seaguy, Demo, and Ursula.

by Tegan at 10:48 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Home sweet home. Yesterday morning we did the Winchester Mystery House (and I'll be blogging about that soon, with pictures!) and then we visited the capitol in Sacraitsfrigginghotheremento. We made it all the way to Medford Oregon by nightfall, then took it easy coming home today.

The trip from Bothell to Asilomar is about 1000 miles... so over the last few days hubby-Eric and I have traveled about 2000 miles. In addition, we visited the capitols of the three west coast states in Olympia, Salem, and Sacramento.

Now we have to hope we'll have the money to do the trip again next year... I know that I would like to go, and with the timing of the conventions working out perfectly, we would love to go to both the Winkie Convention and the San Diego Comicon next year. I hope we can scrape together the money to afford it, because it would be one heckuva trip. And yes, it is one we've done before. In 2001.

by Tegan at 6:58 PM Seattle time - Permalink

Monday, July 26, 2004

We're in San Jose, one of the most confusing towns ever to drive in. We have detailed directions on how to get to the Mystery House this morning, though, and detailed directions on how to get to Sacramento from there. After Sacramento, it's up I-5 as fast as we can go until we get home. If I miss a day of blogging, it will be tomorrow, as I'll be on the road most of the day.

by Tegan at 6:53 AM Seattle time - Permalink

Sunday, July 25, 2004

Asilomar is beautiful.

by Tegan at 8:53 AM Seattle time - Permalink