Category: Digital Neighbors

September 6, 2004 /

So Modern Humor Authority posted a second issue, which I guess means they really do intend to have a web presence. It’s still weird to me to think that Kris Straub didn’t invent MHA and its frontman–or rather, that they’re based on a real human and his magazine, instead of Scott McCloud and his ouevre. But that’s the way it is.

MHA itself is pretty obviously ripe for ridicule (read the AppleGeeks review and see for yourself), but they seem to tolerate it well, since they knew about the Checkerboard Nightmare parody and still stayed in contact with Kris. That’s the impression I got, anyway. It kind of makes me want to put together some kind of parody ezine, like a massive satire of all review publications, but I don’t know. That kind of thing is getting a little played out.

July 26, 2004 /
  • Gave away what, 60 copies of HONOR? Something like that. Two of them I traded for other ashcans (Yeperynye and The Last Sane Cowgirl), which I totally count as sales. And every copy given away was to somebody whose work I (or Will or Stephen) really respect, which is a worthwhile transaction, in my opinion.
  • Left my hat at Preview Night. Never got it back.
  • Got to meet a lot of cool people from the online.
  • Cool people I met from the online all had a curious need to run off to important, distant engagements within seconds of meeting me. Either I smell bad or I’m Creepy Interweb Fan, or (probably) both.
  • Had a really good time with Monica, Will, Stephen and Maria. And Stephen’s lady Erin, at whose residence we crashed, is maybe the coolest person on the whole planet.
  • Ran out of plane-ticket money and was unable to visit Leonard and Sumana. That was a pretty stupid mistake, and I feel really bad about it. Hopefully, a post-student-loan trip is in the works.
  • Tycho and Gabe were the coolest, most professional people at the whole freaking Con.
  • Speaking of Tycho and Gabe, I had one of the world’s most random encounters: passing by their booth, I recognized Paul Mattingly, a great guy who was in Richmond Children’s Theatre with me a billion years ago and who now works as a Klingon and Second City understudy (!) in Vegas. I literally hadn’t seen him in over a decade. He even has a site, The Famous Paul, though I understand that’s mostly a placeholder for the moment.
  • Getting to California by train was interesting, right enough, and I’m glad we tried it. but the people who work for Amtrak seem unhappy and unhelpful and it’s very bumpy. I think I’ll pretty much be flying from here on out.
  • I thought about taking a whole bunch of stuff to get signed, but eventually decided against it. I had a better idea. Thanks to the unlined pocket Moleskine my family got me for my birthday, I now possess what can only be referred to as

    The Greatest

    SKETCHBOOK

    Ever In The History Of Time

    which basically means I win.

I managed to take a whole roll of film, which is good, considering I frequently manage to wish I had a camera while holding one. Probably more updates after I get that developed, but considering I still haven’t posted the pics from my San Francisco trip in February, one shouldn’t hold one’s breath.

July 16, 2004 /

In two days we’ll be on our way to Alton, and thence to California; I’ll finally be meeting Stephen and Erin and Kris, and a great host of other humans, not to mention buying a great many new comics. And I’ll get to see Leonard and Sumana again! And it’ll be my first cross-country trip on a train! I EXPLODE WITH AWESOMENESS!

It’s strange to think that we’ve been planning this for almost an entire year; I was investigating possible trip companions and talking about prices with Stephen before the last Comic Con was over. My enthusiasm for the trip has yet to diminish even a whit, despite the fact that I’m desperately behind on… The Secret Project.

Which Will already talked about, so I guess I can too. He, Lisa, Stephen and I are putting together an ashcan comic to sell to or throw at Con attendees–something we’ve also been planning for a long time. It’s only natural that I’m not done yet, and will probably be up all night tonight finishing my section. We investigated printing prices (Kinko’s, et cetera), then ended up buying a totally sweet laser printer and an extra high-capacity cartridge for less than it would have cost to get it done at a shop. We’re going to bind it ourselves and sell it cheap, and I’ll probably put at least my section up on this “web site” once I get back and have time. I’m drawing my part based on Stephen’s script, which is a new and interesting experience for me, and I hope I get it right.

June 14, 2004 /

After two years, Sean is about to come back to the US from his time teaching music as a Jesuit volunteer in a Nicaraguan village. I’ve been reading his journal continuously for about three years now; he’s a funny and intimate writer, and I’ve tried to incorporate some of his observational style into my own voice.

I’ve known one (other) Jesuit volunteer teacher in real life, and I feel like I know Sean, in a way. Neither has exactly been entirely gung-ho about the program, but if my own personal sample is any indication, it attracts some pretty incredible people. I wonder if I could do what they did, and if I would. Or will.

A trombonist in a brass-punk band called the Golden Showers

June 10, 2004 /

“One day I won’t put up with you. It’ll just be over. Where will you sleep?”

“You’ll always have to put up with me. I’ll be throwing things at you in the old folk’s home, knocking big wads of oily tinfoil right off your head. If you haven’t merged with the network by then in dork ecstasy.”

In my increasingly desperate search for materiél to scan between bouts of whanging my head against cryptic SQL procedures, I have finally committed myself to reading that old sawhorse of Sumana’s: Ftrain, residence of Paul Ford’s multiple personas and weird-category-structure Mecca. I mean, I’ve read it before, but as of today I’m reading larger chunks and really trying to grok its navigation. And it’s good. “Scott Rahin’s” columns are a quick favorite; they remind me of the amiable hate-fest that is a fact of life between certain members of the Nightlight Press Community and myself.

Been using that ol’ blockquote a lot here lately.

May 9, 2004 /

Maria and I were discussing the increasingly esoteric and convoluted nature of spam, just now, including the fact that much of bulk email no longer serves a discernible purpose. I frequently receive spam from nonsense names, advertising nothing, free of hyperlinks or parsible sentences.

I pointed out that one reason it’s gotten so complicated is the constant, high-speed arms race between spammer and anti-spam software vendor; as new regular expressions are devised and new efforts made to beat them, whole fields of technique can be created and discarded in a week. And then Maria said something that chilled me to my very bones.

“What if,” she said, “the vendors are putting spam out there just to keep selling their software?”

I’m terrified, now, that she might be right.

Anyway, read Spam As Folk Art.

April 27, 2004 /

I’ve been meaning to post both of these things forever. First, even though Jon and Amanda abandoned their blogs, they do have a homey little site now. It’s even got Lucy’s cell number on it! Watch out for those “for a good time” calls, Lucy.

Second, Mister Munson found my posts about him and wrote me! He seems like he’s having a great time, especially in his new science fiction class; as part of that, he says he finally taught Ender’s Game, which I badgered him to do for about half of my junior year of high school. I’m pretty sure that means I win. Or really, that they win.

This makes two people I know (Sumana being the other) who have taught a sci-fi literature class. I’ve never even had the opportunity to take one! Injustice!