Saturday, November 03, 2007

This, That, Paddywhack, Give That Cat a Bone

Just wrapped up my part of a roundhouse discussion with Tim Lucas, Kim Newman and Shane Dallmann about Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino's Grindhouse for an upcoming issue of Video Watchdog, and more work on the Christopher Golden/Hank Wagner book on my amigo Neil Gaiman, which I'll be sharing some co-author credit on. Thanks to Chris's busy schedule, I'll be the one joining Hank in a couple of weeks for a weekend visit/interview session with Neil, too, which I'm greatly looking forward to. Haven't seen Neil face-to-face for quite a stretch, though we've stayed in touch over the years.

That said, the Center for Cartoon Studies is keeping me busy, too, and oh, the folks I've met and get to work with, primary among them the incredible CCSers themselves -- man, I love seeing/reading their comics! Anyhoot, a lively week is ahead: CCS hosts Lynda Barry this week, who's coming in and giving a full two-day intensive workshop for the students. Whew! I'll be dining with Lynda and alumni Colleen Frakes Monday night, which should be big fun. Marge and I are having breakfast with Colleen and her partner and fellow alumni Jon-Mikel Gates this AM, just socializing; life is good.

Fellow CCSer (and among the school's funding co-founders) Peter Money is making his own waves with his new tome, Che, and as a publisher with exiled Arab poet Sinan Antoon's The Baghdad Blues.
  • Peter's latest poetry/publishing venture landed a piece in Time Magazine -- kudos to Sinan and to Peter!

  • As for last Saturday's White River Junction Halloween Parade, in which CCS figured mightily, Main Street Museum's David Fairbanks Ford just shared these links with us all hereabouts, sporting photos from the parade shot and posted by Matt Bucy and Dennis Grady,
  • here and
  • here. Enjoy!


  • And, for your Saturday AM amusement, CCS freshman Jeff Mumm shared this link with us all, and you might dig it, too: a venue for reworked Garfield strips, sans Garfield's dialogue.

  • As Jeff put it, "There's a fun strip called "Arbuckle" in which cartoonists send in comics based on Garfield strips, removing the dialogue by Garfield (to see the world through Jon's eyes, considering that it's canon that he doesn't understand what Garfield says) and rendering it in whatever style they deem appropriate. I did one a couple years ago and thought it might be fun if people wanted to do a strip for it or even just to read through it a bit, because it's a pretty funny concept. Because really, who doesn't like making fun of Garfield?"

    Check it out; click backwards from the lead page strip using the little arrows beneath it, and read the source Garfield strip for each via the link. Consider it a morning laxative, folks, if nothing else...

    Have a great Saturday, one and all...

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    3 Comments:

    Blogger James Robert Smith said...

    Augh! Injury to the eye material! I hate that stuff! (Blind in one eye, fading eyesight in the "good" one.)

    Neil Gaiman's an interesting fellow. Looks like he may finally have a hit film on his hands with BEOWULF. All luck to him. I recall the grand days of GENIE, the old internet gathering place for writer types, and Mr. Gaiman was quite active there and always friendly. He came close to landing me a set of Eno's OBLIQUE STRATEGIES by giving me Eno's email address (or forwarding mine to Eno...I forget which). At that time, OBLIQUE STRATEGIES was out of print but Brian Eno was good enough to write me back and he tried to find me a set but was unable to lay his hands on one. A couple years later it was back in print and I bought a copy (revised, 5th edition).

    11/03/2007  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Any chance of bringing Neil to the Upper Valley for a visit? I'd toss two coins to the Ferryman for that event (granted, each coin would have a string glued to them like the ones I use on old cartoon soda machines).

    I'd bake him a pie of his choice.*


    *Four and twenty blackbirds not included. Restrictions apply. See offer for details. Pie void in CA, GA, HA, LO, and AMPTP. All rights reserved, all wrongs righted.

    11/04/2007  
    Blogger SRBissette said...

    Neil's a grand fellow, really, honestly, folks. It'll be great to see him again, and Blair, rest assured, if I can ever convince Neil to visit me in VT again (he visited my first wife Marlene and Maia and Danny and me waaaaaaay back when), I'll do it. Only time will tell...

    11/04/2007  

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