We're at Pittsburgh Comicon! Tonite was the Luchador Ent. Pre-Con Party. We had about 30-40 people show up, and it was another tremendous success! This year we had blank white plastic plates for guests to draw on. So many are soooo amazing!!! A big THANK YOU! goes out to everyone that attended, and helped with the plates for the Make-A-Wish Foundation Charity Auction!!!

Tomorrow is Day 1, and we will be selling the kids first comic! While setting up the Booth with Space Monkey Comics Mike Wood and Luchador Ent. Al Dorantes, Bethany actually sold her first copy!!! So she has a good start on the weekend!!!

It was great seeing great friends again, and making new friends with first time attendees! There are few problems here and there, but that's to predicted with the change of venue, but luckily next year the con goes back to April, and the old Radisson Hotel will be reopened!

We look forward to the start of the convention, and hope everyone can make it out and buy some comics!

I'll post another update tomorrow!

Next weekend is the Pittsburgh Comicon, and besides hosting Stan Lee, along with many other great creators, it will also mark the first appearance as guests, my daughters Paige & Bethany! Bethany decided she wanted to put out a comic featuring a character she's been drawing for years in her sketchbook, Skipper: The Overweight Bunny!


 


She enlisted her older sister to help ink and write, and the rest is now in the books! So with the help of my good friend Al Dorantes of Luchador Enterprises, their first comic will be debuting at the Pittsburgh Comicon, where they have practically grown up the last 14 years we've been attending! The kids will be signing and sketching at the Luchador Ent. booth..so drop by and say "HI!" And also check out the great titles from Luchador, many of which are made just for kids!!!

And speaking of Luchador Enterprises...

This will also mark the 3rd year they host the After Set-Up Party, an annual event that costs nothing to attend, but does help to raise money for the convention charity, Make-A-Wish! Last year Al brought blank white hats for the attending guests to do artwork on, and everyone did such a terrific job, the hats brought in almost $3000 at the Make-A-Wish auction!!!

This year the party will be held at the Holiday Inn, 2750 Mosside Blvd, in Monroeville! It will be from 9 pm to 12 am, and all food and beverage is on Luchador! Only thing is, you must RSVP so we know to have enough for everybody!!!

Last years party pics can be found in my "Pics" section, as well as some of the hats that were done at the party!

So hoepfully we'll see you at the Pittsburgh Comiconnext week! And feel free to buy some of our comics...and those from many of our friends and colleagues too!!!

Take care!!!

Last night, we started off my vacation with a trip to the Clearfield County Fair. The whole family was excited to see Alice Cooper live...but not as excited as I was!!!

First we started the day going to St. Mary's to visit Krystal's family. Her brother Darryl and his wife Lisa just had a baby boy (Nolan) and we wanted to make sure to get up there and visit. The baby was adorable, and the girls just didn't want to put him down! I'll be uploading photos into the "Family Pics" section later tonite.

We then went out to lunch with Kry's mom, and stopped by to visit her Grandmother as well. It was great seeing evryone and we hope to get back up there again soon!

Then we headed to Clearfield for the Fair, and the Alice Cooper concert!!!

We got to the fair and walked around a bit, played some games, and the kids went on a couple of rides. Krystal won two knives at the ring toss, and a dragon figurine at the "Bigfoot" game (it had a 'wall' that moves back & forth and pushes tokens out). We even ran into our good friends Al & Jen, who we lost touch with when we moved. We'll definately be staying in contact with them from now on! We went to the livestock pavilions and checked out the bunnies and horses (Beth loves animals!!!) and got some food, then proceeded to the grandstands for the concert!

We weren't sure how good our seats were going to be, but when we got there, we had middle of the grandstands, just shy left of center stage. Luckily we were under the roof, since there was a brief downpour before the show started.

When the school bell sounded, the show began, as the curtain dropped and Alice went into "School's Out" to kick off the show! The band sounded really great, and Alice was the best I've ever seen (But it was only the 3rd stop of the "Theatre of Death" tour).

He belted out the hits, the standards, and even a few songs I haven't heard him do in concert for years ("Guilty" and Nurse Rozetta" to name two!). But what was really great was the fact he was "killed" onstage 4 times!!! They guillotine'd him, stabbed him with a giant syringe, hung him (which is the one way I"ve never seen live!) and a new one I"ve never seen before, stuffing him in a box and ramming spikes thru him! he also did something I hadn't seen since the late 80's, when he took a mic stand and rammed it THRU on of his roadies, and propped the guy up laying over on it, with the rest sticking out his back! And I have to say again, he moved and sounded amazing, and the band was at the top of their game!!!

One other thing of note...there was a woman in her late 40's/early 50's sitting in front of us, who was totally appalled by the show! She was wincing and making faces at the lyrics, and when he stabbed the roadie she almost had a coronary! She kept looking around like "I can't believe people are enjoying this!" and I had to laugh, because I couldn't believe she came to this, and had no idea what to expect! Hilarious!!! But I will say, by the 2/3 mark, she started getting into it a little bit!

Alice payed for almost 2 hours, and ended the show with a "School's Out" encore! Paige and I hung around the stage after the show for a bit, hoping to see Alice and maybe get a picture or autograph, but they said he he had 2 or 3 radio interviews to do, as well as meet-&-greets with sponsors and such, and wouldn't be coming out there. So we met up with Krys and beth (still at the "Bigfoot" game!) and played a bit, then took off so we could get home by 1 AM. I had to take Krys back to Easton for work early in the morning, so we called it a night and went right to bed.

Everyone was extremely impressed with the show, and I have to say it;s the best Alice Cooper show I've been to yet! Bethany even had me put together an Alice playlist for her iPod tonite!! And Paige I knew would enjoy the show, but she really rocked out!!! Krystal also said it's the best concert she's ever been to!

All in all a very good way to start my vacation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thursday we head out to Reading/Easton to stay overnight so we can take Krys to a special meeting she has Friday morning. While she's there, the girls and I are going to Hawk Mountain and hike around, then hopefully we'll all meet up with my Grandfather that evening. Then it's back to the hotel, and Saturday morning we're HEADING TO ATLANTIC CITY!!!!!!!!!!

The girls have never been to the ocean before, so this should be a great weekend! Their first real concert, and then the beach!!! And the best thing is, we get to do it all together!!! With Krys working 4 1/2 hours a way, +55 hours a week, we don't get to do alot together, so I think that alone is what makes the next week the BEST!!!!!

I have posted pictures of the concert HERE.

Paige recorded some video on her camera, and I'll be posting that later tonite as well!! But here'a a quick tid-bit...

Alice Sings "I Never Cry" While Preparing To Die"



Hope everyone is having some fun, however you can!!!

Later!!!

 

 


 

Last year, I started working on a comic story, involving two young guys at the San Diego Comicon, who get in the midst of a zombie invasion, and because of the crowds at SDCC, don't realize what they're into. Throughout the story, many different zombie archetypes are explored, since both guys are huge comic/sci-fi/pop culture geeks. I called it "Conventional Zombies."

Now it looks like if I ever get it to print, it will look like I've copied it...

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/Movies/07/22/comic.con.zombies/index.html

Oh well...

Remembering them at their best...

Actor David Carradine is dead. Thoughts and prayers go out to his friends and family.

About a year ago, a cat showed up at our door, hungry and wanting attention. The kids fed him and named him Seymour. He stayed outside, and would come and go, and I guess you could say he's become our "adopted" pet. Over the winter, with it being so cold, we started letting him in the house. He would cuddle and we kept him in until it warmed up or he drove us nuts wanting to go out. Then he started bringing back "trophies" of his hunts, mostly baby bunnies and birds, and we would watch him chase groundhogs out of our yard. He often came back bruised and scratched up, with a chunk out of his ears here and there. He's a scapper, and a tough cat.

Well, yesterday I went to go out, and Seymour was laying in our foray like he does when he wants to come in and eat. Only this time, he didn't jump down from the shelf  where he likes to perch. He just looked at me and meowed, which seemed really strange. I went over to pet him, and noticed a huge patch of blood on his right front shoulder area, and saw he had a giant chunk taken out.
Paige was in tears. Seymour is pretty much "her" cat. I said the fact he had to jump up there, and just that he came back, was good signs he would be okay. Krystal called the animal hospital, and they took him in quickly.

After checking it out, seems he was bitten by something, either a big dog, a bear, or another animal. Whatever bit him tho' was big! After surgery to repair some torn muscle and tissue, he is back home tonite. Like I said, he's a scrapper! He has a tube sticking out for drainage, and he won't be able to walk as well as he did before, but it looks like he'll pull through just fine.

We always joked about his "other" family (if he has one), since he would spend days with us, and if they worried when he wouldn't show up. But since he is an outdoor cat, we figure they're used to it. But I wonder how they'll react if he shows up after being gone a few months (since we're not allowed to let him out for awhile) with lots of stitches and a limp. And the fact that while he was in, we had him neutered.

But at least Seymour is well, and Paige is relieved.

Today, our cat Angel died. She had been sick for the past few months, and the vet had said there was nothing we could do. She passed peacefully this evening with Paige & Beth watching over her, knowing she was loved and would be missed. Angel was tiny cat, who was a bit sickly when we got her over a year ago. But she rebounded after a few weeks, and became a loving member of our family. She would play with us and the other cats, and while never really purring much, still showed affection and would curl up on our beds and want attention. We will miss her very much.