unordinary

The convention has ended, and I have rehydrated. For a few months I’ve been dressing like a paint-covered transient to the point that elderly women have offered me money for sandwiches, so it was a disorienting experience to dress up and suddenly have random strangers want to take my picture. I’m pretty sure I was making a really confused face in every one.

I really enjoyed the Humor in Graphic Novels panel. I went to see Peter Bagge and Nicholas Gurewitz talk. There was an argument about what is offensive, and where/if lines should be drawn when making jokes. It seemed like the argument forced the conversation into deeper territory than it might have gone, and there were lots of funny off the cuff responses.

I also went to Awesome-con and the nice man who raises the roof gave me a free combover.

raise your roof

And while wandering around the floor in a daze I ran across some other cartoonists I admire. I couldn’t think of anything to say and I don’t really like autographs, so I awkwardly shoved my camera at someone and apologized repeatedly.

They were very polite in response. They are probably used to dealing with awkward nerds at conventions.

There were many other delightful panels that I’ll feel like I am unnecessarily name-dropping if I just list them. My vision of the future in the Welcome to the Future Panel was unexpectedly overpopulated, and a lot of the discussion revolved around how it is optimistic to assume a future containing humans. HMM.

I am always overwhelmed by the scale of the advertising that goes into the show. Although I know it is relatively cheap for large companies to give away boxes of free samples or put movie posters on the sides of buildings compared to airing nationwide television campaigns, seeing the piles of postcards, flyers, temporary tattoos, and other freshly-printed debris that covers the street during the convention is a more concrete and literal symbol of waste.

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It was good to see some friends and be giddy at a few artists I admire. Now I’m excited to read new mini-comics and oversleep a little before getting back to work.