I have returned from my wedding/honeymoon epic with a new dedication to doing some serious drawing. I've done almost four new pages since I've been back. I am determined to have a collected Gabagool! book out to debut at MoCCA in June. I feel really good about it, the current stuff is coming out quite nicely.

Thought more about the whole "People who live in the dark space between the sink and the bath-tub" children's book. I think it will be about a family who moves from some other dank place in the bathroom (maybe the hole in the back of the medicine cabinet that leads inside the walls that we didscovered a few weeks ago when we had plumbing issues) to the space between the sink and the tub. They move there for the improved opportunities, and the kids do really well there, but have issues with their parents, who like all immigrants want to maintain the ways of the old country. I dunno, we'll see...

Ring update: I am used to wearing it. I like it, it makes me feel "adult".

I'm kind of intimidated about starting up my blogging again after such a long break. So much happened - too much to wrap up in any quick way. It was pretty fucking awesome though...

For now, here's a new Gabagool! #5 review

In the midst of a very not-relaxing week - I've felt all frazzled and awful since saturday. So much to do. It's no fun at all. In about 45 minutes though I will leave work and not come back for about 17 days, so that's pretty sweet. I am very much looking forward to the time off. Then, in about 48 hours I'll be on my way to the Temple to get all married off.

Had a panic attack last night when I put my ring on and couldn't get it off again. It came off eventually, but took much coercing. I took it back to the Diamond Lady today to see if they could make it bigger, but she told me not to. She had me put it on and then told me to relax my finger. It came off a lot better once I did that.

I don't think the above episode is some kind of metaphor for my feelings about getting hitched though - I think it reflects more on me just be unused to wearing jewelry of any kind, and having a phobia of rings getting stuck on my fingers. I know how it goes, the ring fits now - but ten years from now when I weigh an extra 60 pounds the ring is going to be stuck to me as my fatty fingers grow around it like trees do when you tie something around them. Then, if I ever do manage to wrench it off from around my porky digits, they will be all mis-shapen and deformed. I've seen it happen, I know how it goes.

Maybe I just need to get used to it. I have never worn much jewelry - a girl in high school once got me a gold wrist chain that had Ich liebe Dich engraved on the inside (we were in German class together); and I briefly had pierced ears - but aside from that I usually don't accessorize. I don't even wear a watch. The way I find out the time is by asking Aliza to check her cell-phone. She never gets tired of that...

One week from now I will be staying at my parents house, spending quality time with distant relatives, and preparing myself for The Big Day. One week and two days from now, I will be sitting on a beach in Mexico doing nothing except drinking and chilling.

Aliza, in her concern for my pale skin, has arranged for us to borrow a beach tent from some friends to take with us. From what I gather, it's a large-ish tent that opens in the front, so that I can sit in it and still feel like I'm on the beach. I like the idea of sitting in it with the front all zipped up so I am entirely enclosed. Aliza can sit next to my tent, so that it seems like we are still together, even though I will be cocooned up in my little hide-away. I am told there are little windows on the side so I can talk to Aliza, and a little mail-box like slot where she can pass me food and drink. If I can come back from Mexico even paler than I am now, then the honeymoon will have been a success...

Aliza is lucky - she can tan, she will be able to take full advantage of all the sunshine in November.

Excellent review of Gabagool!'s # 1 -3 on the Comics Journal web site today. It's the second review down.

I caught the tail end of the debates between all seventeen Democratic hopefuls the other day. The only bits I heard were a part where each candidate defends him or herself against their biggest criticisms, and the part where they get to sum up their platforms in a minute or less. It was hard for me to keep track of everybody, since it was radio and not TV, so I was only able to really form an opinion about the people who I already knew about.

Al Sharpton: You know what? I like Al Sharpton. He gave the best speech in both segments. He was rousing and inspiring, and he made me want to vote for him. I have at least two friends who splutter with rage whenever you try and talk about Al Sharpton as a serious candidate, and I feel bad for them, because they're really just victims of a media which tells us to think Al Sharpton is a buffoon no matter what he says or does. I think he is a smart man, and he probably spoke the most honestly and earnestly about anything, but it doesn't matter because he's got funny hair. Oh, and also, he's black. Next candidate please -

General Wesley Clark: I liked him before he threw his hat into the ring. I was very impressed with a segment I saw of him talking on the Bill Maher show. I was a little let down with what I heard on the debate because he sounded like a broken record repeating that he served in the military. One exchange I remember went like this:

Moderator: Wesley Clark, what do you think?

Clark: Well, when I was in the military I learned about running things and making a plan. The military taught me how to be a leader. I was in the military.

Very insightful General.

Don't get me wrong, I probably like Wesley Clark the best in terms of somebody who might actually win, I was just a little let down that he seemed to be pandering. I can just imagine his publicity people telling him to emphasize his military service. People love the military, so he brings it up every chance he gets. Reminds me of Arnold's campaign a few weeks back - ignore the issues, don't forget to mention that you were in True Lies.

I wish this wedding was here already. It's still almost two weeks away, and I am just ready to get to it at this point. We've been engaged for almost exactly a year now, it's quite a long time. I would really like to have something else to have hanging over my head for a change. Like trying to find a new apartment or something.

Had final meeting with the Rabbi. He's a nice guy. Both him and the Cantor are very friendly, and have both helped me feel comfortable with everything. Now I need my final meeting with the DJ, and we're done.

The wedding comic was finished yesterday. We're calling it "With this ring..." which sounds a little corny, but makes sense with the story which is about us trying to buy the rings and discussing our various options and disagreeing with each other. It's probably sickeningly cute, but that's fine. Our gift to the people who came to our wedding is a small glimpse into the world that Aliza and I share. People probably don't want to stay there (we are too adorable to stomach...) but they'll have an idea of how it is in our little shared microcosm.

New review of Gabagool!'s # 1-3 here

I had my haircut on wednesday. Paid an outrageous sum for it. It looks pretty good, and it's my wedding hair, so I guess I can justify the cost, but when I look at it from my friend Alex's point of view it's very upsetting. My haircut cost me 20 Heroclix booster packs! That's not even the worst - my shoes cost me 44 boosters. Well, if nothing else, I am going to look like a million bucks on my Big Day - or 368 Heroclix booster packs - once all is said and done...

It's interesting to me that the small press comics world seems to operate on a seasonal basis. The conventions start up in February or March (depending on if you go to/count APE, or if you start the season with SPACE in Ohio) and then end in September. This leaves us cartoonists a good 4 or 5 months of downtime in between. A time when we can cosy up to our drawing tables and actually try to produce something - instead of living life on the road all the time like a bunch of rock stars.

However, there is a new convention this year in Las Vegas at the beginning of November. Alex is going (the lucky bastard) to see how it is. Could it be that the season is going to be extended now, and Vegas will become the new Mecca for the small press? That would be cool, I liked Las Vegas the one time I went there. It would be a good destination.

My brother, sister-in-law, and nephew came up to the city for dinner on saturday. We went to some hole-in-the-wall Indian place on 6th street, where there are a million Indian food places all lined up in a row. It was really nice - my nephew is a little terror, but I had a great time playing with him and trying to keep him quiet. I was really glad they all came up to hang out.

At one point the subject of my old dog came up, and someone asked whatever happened to him. I used to have a Brittany Spaniel called Spanky who was a little shit of a dog that wouldn't behave and destroyed everything (like my nephew does now). He lived with me and an old girlfriend, and when we split up the dog went with her. It was her punishment for being such a crap girlfriend.

A few years later I got a cat who was also very bad. His name was Kevyn, and he had thumbs, and I taught him to attack and bite. I got rid of him too eventually, because I wasn't able to have cats in the apartment I was moving into. I missed him too, but he wound up living with my sister, so even though I don't see him much he's still in the family.

The joke seems to be that I shouldn't be allowed to have kids - since I'll teach them to be bad, and then give them away once they become inconvenient. The first part is probably true - I get a kick out of misbehaviour, but I would hope the second one would be something I'd prove people wrong about. On the other hand - I do enjoy living in the city, and we all know how hard it is to find an apartment big enough for a family here...

In other news: Wedding comic is close to done. It came out real good I think. Bought some fly shoes for The Big Day. They are Paul Smith shoes, they go well with my Paul Smith suit. I don't know who Paul Smith is, but I certainly seem to enjoy his gear...

For the third time in the last four days I had to wake up at the crack of dawn and take the train out to South Orange, NJ. This time it was to apply for the marriage license. I have to admit, it was actually kind of exciting, it made this whole marriage thing seem even more official.

Apparently you used to have to take a blood test when you applied to be married, but not anymore. Now you just have to check a box that says "Do you have a sexually transmitted disease? Yes or No?". I am quite happy about this, because I don't like giving my blood up, and I'm sure it's just as reliable to check a box as it is to go through all the rigamarole of having blood taken and tested and all that. Also, if we still had to give blood we'd be in trouble now, because we are so close to our date, and we'd totally slept on the whole license thing.

Took my third yoga lesson. I am getting better at keeping my legs straight when I try to bend down and touch my toes. I also almost chanted "om" when everyone else did. Maybe I'll do it for real next time. However, I didn't participate in the bit at the end when we close our eyes and say a little "dedication", because to me it feels too much like a prayer, and I just can't get into it.

In other news - not related to my new yuppie exercise routine - comicreaders.com did an interview with me and Radtke.

Today I discovered Friendster. It's kind of fun, but I am a little self-conscious about how few friends I have. It makes me feel a little losery, but just as I kept reminding myself in Junior High, quality is more important than quantity.

The only problem will be if they start having Friendster Gym, because if it's anything like Junior High then it means that absolutely nobody I'm friends with will ever be in a gym class with me and I'll have to either be mocked by the jocks or befriend the losery girls who take pity on me and let me be the only boy on their volleyball team.

My bath-tub is clogged again. Two bottles of liquid Drano hardly made a difference. The plumber is coming tomorrow to "snake the drain", which hopefully will fix everything. I am going to feel stupid if the problem is just that the plug is closed or something. We have this really weird plug in our tub, it's this weird plunger thing off to the side. I think you're supposed to keep it in the "up" position, but it really doesn't make much sense.

The area that this plunger sits in is a small 2 inch gap in between the sink and the bath. There's not much room for anything to get down in there except lots of water and various caps to shampoo bottles and stuff. Consequently, we kind of have this nasty little swamp area in there that you can't get to. I can see all the blackness and gunge down in it, but I'm not going to put my hand down there to try and clean it, and neither is Aliza. I know there's probably all sorts of spiders and water-bugs and shit down in it.

I had an idea to do a little comic about that this morning, about the nasty things that live in-between my sink and bath-tub. It'll be like Fraggle Rock. Something the children will enjoy.

My body hurts a little today, I am having some kind of delayed reaction to the minor amount of yoga I did on saturday. I am all stiff in between my shoulders.

Aliza and I took a private introductory class together. She doesn't need introductory classes, it was all for my benefit, since I have been dragging my feet on ever actually going to yoga with her on the feeble basis that I'm not comfortable doing something like that in a room full of people who know what they're doing. I guess I have no excuses anymore, so it looks like I'll be doing yoga from now on.

I told my parents about the lesson yesterday when I went to see them. In response to the story my Dad showed me how he can balance himself on his head and elbows. It was pretty impressive.

The American Splendor movie website is running a little contest where people can submit their own strips to a script written by Harvey Pekar. Here's my entry

Got home last night around 9:45, in time to catch the very end of Paradise Hotel, which I have to admit was a big disappointment. I do not think I will be tuning in next season to see the sequel. No thankyou.

On sunday I am going down to see my folks for my birthday. We are going to go to the annual Scottish fair at the PNC Bank Arts Center in New Jersey. Aliza can't make it, which is a big shame, 'cos I think it'd be fun to expose her a bit more to that kind of stuff. I plan on buying lots of t-shirts that say "Scotland the Brave" and stuff like that. I haven't had any t-shirts like that since I was in high-school, so I think it's high time I replenished my collection.

Still struggling with the cartooning, I have to force myself to sit down and do some work rather than go watch TV or just go to sleep. I have it figured out though, I have no show or con coming up, so I've got nothing to get ready for. It totally helps me motivate when I've got a clear deadline. I don't know how my friend Alex -who's writing a full length graphic novel- does it. I wouldn't be able to work at all if I had to wait so long for feedback.

Anyway, I've managed to get going on the wedding comic. We finished writing it, and I drew the first page in one of those Japanese brushy pens because I had it in my head that it'd make my drawings more "expressive". Turns out it made my drawings more "sloppy", so I had to re-draw the first page. It came out good though, I am going to work on it more later tonight.

When we were writing our story I told Aliza that we were going for a "naturalistic" style of storytelling. Last night she asked me what I meant by that, and I said "it means we're writing in all the boring shit that actually happened in our lives and making it all realistic and shit." When she seemed non-plussed by my answer, I admitted I didn't really know what it means. I'm dumb.

Aliza and I have almost finished writing the script for our little wedding comic that we plan on giving away on The Big Day. I am very happy with it, it has an actual story and everything. It's about how we went shopping for our rings and the discussion we had about what to engrave inside of them.

We would have finished it up last night, but the seven-hour premiere of The Bachelor was on, so Aliza's attention was elsewhere. I'm not criticizing too much, because I enjoy a lot of these "reality TV" shows, but I hate The Bachelor. It's just a bunch of messed up women who're willing to degrade themselves just to be on TV and hopefully be the next "Trista and Ryan". This show is more disturbing than entertaining. At least though, in the preview showing all the highlights of the upcoming season, it looks like at least one of these mentally ill women tries to kill herself because The Bachelor isn't going to pick her to be the one to have a much hyped but ultimately failed engagement with him.

"But Mike", you might say if you knew me really well (and I don't think many people outside of Aliza knows this next fact about me), "you love to watch Paradise Hotel, which is the sleaziest of all the sleazy reality TV shows." And to that I would reply, "yes, I do love to watch Paradise Hotel, even though I am mad at the producers for the awful cliff-hanger they gave us on the penultimate episode."

I can't justify it all that well, but I can at least say this: At least on Paradise Hotel they make no pretense that this is anything but some nasty awful people behaving atrociously for our viewing entertainment. And it has been an extremely enjoyable show to watch. There's no discernable rules or rewards in the show, the whole premise is that for some reason all these attractive, yet despicable, people want to stay on this hotel to fight with each other and deal with lots and lots of drama. The best was when they brought back a bunch of the booted cast-members who proceeded to "get up in everyone else's grill" and fight and squabble and generally give me something worth watching on the TV.

But, The Bachelor isn't as good as that. First of all it's bogged down with all sorts of boring rules and rituals that get in the way of everything. Second, it does have a prize, but the prize makes even less sense to anyone than the one on Paradise Hotel, because the prize is to be lucky enough to "get married to this guy who you met as one of 25 desperate and pushy women on a television show". Wheee!

Well, whatever, I know that if I'm watching some junk on TV, I can't act like my junk is better than some other junk. It's all junk. At least I am getting bored of Fear Factor and Making the Band II is over. Maybe I can come up with more productive things to do with my time...

Currently listening to Tie Your Mother Down by Queen. It's nice having a door at work so's I can play my music without having to wear headphones.

Poor Aliza hurt her neck last night when we were hanging about in bed. She didn't even do anything too extreme, just turned her head quickly and pulled something. It was my fault, I was trying to drool on her. That may sound gross, but if you were there you'd understand that I was only trying to drool on her because she was acting up and biting me for no reason. Of course, if you were there I would have gotten upset and probably smacked you with our iron. We keep it conveniently next to the bed, so's I can step on the plug in my bare feet in the morning and yell.

I ran into an old college friend the other day when I was in Brooklyn for Aliza's shower. It was cool, he looks good and seemed happy to see me. I gave him copies of Gabagool! 4 and 5. I find the comics are a good thing to hand to people when you run into them like that. It's a good shorthand for the whole "what have you been up to?" thing. I don't have to explain, I can easily just show them that I've been up to spending too much money on vanity projects...

Radtke, often reads my blog and seems to get disheartened when I say things like the above. So, for Radtke, I must make it clear that I am only being funny. I know Gabagool! is very worthwhile. I am very proud of it.

Speaking of which, I had a good night last night drawing. I am almost finished with this page that has been dogging me since SPX. I think once it's done with I can get back on track with my usual one page every two nights or so, which I think is a better rate than one page every month. Incidentally, the current page has boobies on it.

Tomorrow I have three parties to go to. I am going to be pretty tired when it's all done because they are all over the place. On sunday we have a wedding. I am psyched for that, I'll get to wear my new suit again. My brown one, not my wedding one. I am not allowed to wear the wedding suit until after Our Big Day. That is when it will be making it's debut. I think the shirt will recieve rave reviews. My Dad told me the other day that fucia was his favorite color, so he should be pretty psyched when he sees me in all my Hot Pink Glory.

Soembody To Love is playing now, so that means it took me about half of Queen's A Day At The Races to write this shit. I better finish up in that case, I have some work to do...

Speaking of which, the office baby just came by for a visit. It was very cute, like an adorable, wrinkled up little old woman.

Things have been moving slowly since the big SPX. Usually after a show I am recharged, but after this particular show it has been different for some reason. It's taking me a bit to get back into the swing of things. I drew four pages in the week or so before SPX, and I've barely finished one since I came back. But last night I had a bit of a breakthrough, things started to come out right again, so I feel good once more.

My pal James is due to have a baby at the end of this week. It is exciting, he is the first high school buddy of mine to have a kid (well, first one that I keep in touch with). A lady at my work just had a baby, and Aliza's cousins both had some too. Seems like a lot of babies around.

So, a few new things. One: I updated the Gabagool Page on my web-site so there's actual content there now. Click here if you haven't yet read Gabagool #3: Rock Soldiers, because this is your chance.

SPX came and went. I couldn't help but notice an air of Carter's Malaise hanging over the convention, but overall it was a good show and I got to meet and talk to some good people. We made some bucks, and sold some comics, and that's the whole point of these trade shows. But still it was fun. And Aliza came which was great. It was her first multi-day show, and she was wonderful.

There was a guy who we'd sold a comic to at MoCCA who makes documentaries who wanted to film us down at SPX. He showed up on saturday and filmed us for a few hours. It went reasonably smoothly, and he got some good footage of Radtke selling the books and a few other things. He came over to my apartment last night to actually do some interviewing.

Originally we were going to conduct the interview at the bar where Radtke and I usually go to write our scripts, but we forgot that they blast music from their jukebox in there. Aside from being loud, it presents a problem of clearances and rights for this guy.

So we left and went to try and find somewhere we could sit outside. We tried a few restuarants, but eventually decided to climb up on my roof and do it. Because yesterday was September 11th, we had an amazing view of the towers of light from my roof-top, but we wisely decided to shoot in the other direction, facing the Empire State Building, so's as to not appear exploitive. I was worried that it would seem weird that we were talking on my roof in the dark, because that really isn't where I usually go to write or even hang out at all, but the guy seemed happy enough with it. So Radtke and I talked until his battery powered spotlight died, at which point I suggested we go film in my actual apartment.

Why didn't we film in there to begin with? you ask. Well, the main reason is that Aliza was down there trying to finish up our invites, and I felt guilty not helping, and assumed that bringing some stranger into our apartment to film me talking about myself might have annoyed my darling bride to be. I was wrong though, she was fine, and we finished our interview in the bedroom next to my drawing table.

There is going to be a good scene in the movie, if it ever gets made, of Radtke seeing the new pages from Gabagool! 6 for the first time. There is a full-frontal nudie picture on the fourth page of the protagonist, Christopher Vigliotti, and I think Radtke was suprised at how graphic, and un-flattering, I'd been with the first ever Gabagool! penis shot. It'll make for good laffs, in the movie and in the comic.

The guy left soon after that and I helped finish the invites. They went out today, all 160 or so of them. And they look awesome, if I do say so myself.

Some good news: I got an office at work. My very own one, with a door and a massive window that has a view of some of the trees in Central Park and also a bit of Carnegie Hall. This is nice. After all these years of sitting in a cube in one of those employee corrals, it's pretty sweet to have some space to myself. I know that complaining about stuff like having to sit in a cube-space is the stuff of Dilbert cartoons, but seriously, that's why that cartoon is so popular, because working in a cube does suck, and people enjoy laughing about how much life sucks.

Other good news: SPX weekend is almost upon us. Aliza and I will be driving down to Bethesda tomorrow with Radtke, our pals Alex and Kristen, and Tony "The Mad Shitter" Consiglio. I've got plenty of Gabagool! #4's and #5's to sell, and I'm pretty psyched about it.

Not feeling great today. The weekend started off well, although I don't really remember what we did friday night. Saturday was spent getting ready for and going to a friend's wedding, and sunday was a barbeque with all the folks (mine and Aliza's). We got back to the city early sunday evening, and sometime between then and last night I slid into a mopey depression which I'm still feeling now. It's mainly because things aren't going great at work, but the cold, rainy, inactive Labor Day holiday probably didn't help.

Reading a fun little book about our nation's Vice-Presidents called "Bland Ambition". It gives a little bio about each one in a very humorous but still informative way. I wouldn't mind being Vice-President. Apparently you don't have to do anything at all, unless of course the president is killed or something. But aside from that, you can just coast for four years and live in the Vice-President's mansion in Washington D.C. I don't think that's what you're supposed to take from reading the book (I think we're supposed to think these were all men of low ambition - thus the clever title of the book) but I'm sorry, the way I feel right now, I don't think it would be such a bad deal.

I need to think of a Queen song that I can dance with my mother to at the wedding. It has to be Queen, I have no choice, but there are no Queen songs that are appropriate.

Maybe "Bicycle Race"...

We're going to start looking for a new apartment in December or January, doing it before the wedding would just be too much to think about. We are going to go uptown, where people act like grownups, and there aren't bags of smelly garbage in the streets, and the guy downstairs doesn't blast "Ziggy Stardust" on repeat in the small hours of the night.

Of course, I don't know what I'm talking about. I am sure that an apartment uptown will have just as many odd "extras" as any apartment in this city. I have never had an apartment yet where there wasn't some odd thing about it that I had to deal with, such as the "second room" we have now where the ceiling is too low to stand up in, or the fact that I had no doors or kitchen in my last place, or the fact that my place in Brooklyn was in what's called a "rough neighborhood". It could be worse though. A friend of mine was telling me last night about a friend he had who was shown an apartment that had no bathroom. Apparently the realtor suggested "joining the gym up the street if you want to take a shower".

The actual responsible thing to do would be to move out of Manhattan, but Aliza and I aren't quite that grown up yet. I guess one day we might move out to the Jersey suburbs like proper people and pay a reasonable rent/mortgage, but neither one of us is looking forward to that eventuality.

The new comic should be showing up any day now. If it shows up early I will have to keep that a secret, because I don't want to make myself ineligible for the "Outstanding Debut" comic at SPX.

Turns out that we are going to be staying to see the Ignatz awards afterall. This makes me happy, because I enjoy awards ceremonies, but Aliza is more wary of it because it's going to make things difficult for us the next day going to work. Oh well, so we have one sleepy day at work, that's no big deal. How often do you get to see a bunch of cartoonists sitting around a hotel convention room eating pigs in blankets and drinking. Not often enough I say!

Today at lunch I thought I would doodle in my sketchbook, which I never do. There's nowhere around that I feel comfortable doing it though. I can't go to Central Park, people will think I am just drawing to get noticed in the hopes that a girl or someone will come over and think I'm fascinating. Obviously I can't draw at my desk. They can't tell when I'm goofing off when I'm on the computer (like right now for instance) but they'd notice if I was sitting and drawing. And even if nobody gave me guff, I'd still feel like they were all thinking that I was thinking that they'd think I was fascinating or something. Makes me too self-conscious.

In the end I snuck out to the balcony on our floor and sat there for a bit. I went back in after a minute though because I was spilling my food all over the book, and besides the people in the offices across the street could all see me drawing and they probably all thought I was an asshole.

Yesterday on the subway a girl got on at 23rd street and sat next to me. She pulled a book out of her bag which has come out recently collecting all the issues of a 'zine called "Cometbus" into one tome. It struck me as such an odd thing to see somebody out in public reading some obscure 'zine. I wanted to mention to her that I had read Cometbus too (though truthfully I've only read one issue where there was a guest writer) because I thought she would also be interested to know that there were other people out there who're familiar with this stuff. I didn't of course because a) nobody wants to be talked to on a subway, b) I got off at 14th street, the next stop, and c) I'm engaged anyway so what is the point of meeting new girls? (Of course there is "d) I was scared and afraid of rejection", but "c" cancels that problem out these days. I now have a more than legitimate excuse for not talking to pretty girls that I lacked in my single days)

Anyway, the one thing that has stuck with me is that it's pretty sad that I think it's such a remarkable thing to see somebody reading a small press comic when they're not actually at a small press comics show.

I can name all of the presidents from McKinley on up and tell you how many terms they served. I know this isn't such an amazing feat, but my friend Rob didn't know things as simple as "who became president after Nixon?" or "How many terms did LBJ serve", which leads me to believe that the average citizen doesn't know that much of their own history. I'm not really any better, like I said, I can only do from Mckinley on up. I can't do any of them before that. It goes Washington - a bunch of people - Jackson - some more people - Lincoln, Johnson (I remember that because of the eerie coincidence of a Johnson following a President who gets shot in the head), -some more people - Hayes, - some people, Cleveland (I think), and then McKinley, etc...

So if you ever see me in person you can quiz me on Presidents of the 20th century and I will amaze you.

There was a blackout. Did you hear? It sucked my balls. The only thing that made me feel better about being one of the last people to get his power back was that my friend's Alex and Kristen also didn't have power the whole time either. That may sound mean, but I can guarantee they'd say the same thing about me.

If friday was the Blackout of 2003, saturday was the Big Wedding Suit Odyssey of 2003. It was a long day, but happily it ended with me getting an awesome suit and a cool shirt and tie to go along with it. It is very slim fitting though, so there isn't much room in it for me to gain weight, so I had to start running again. I don't want it to look like my pants are too tight on the day of my wedding, because then people will think I bought the suit a few years ago or something rather than specially for the big occasion.

Yesterday, amongst other things I watched a little bit of some wedding show on Lifetime, the Network for Women. It was all about three brides of different ages and their weddings. One of the brides was 30-something year old Kathy Griffith from "Suddenly Susan" and "Celebrity Mole". Being that she is a comedienne, she was being all funny the whole time. Like, when the priest asked if anyone knew any reason these two shouldn't be wed she made a big hammy angry face at the crowd and everyone laughed. Then when she said her vows she was being all funny too, like "I'm so glad I found you... 'cos God knows I looked..." and she made another face, and everyone laughed again.

I hope I am not as annoying as that on my wedding day.

I left work a little early last night because there was an Epic Heroclix Battle planned. I was very excited about it, I wrapped all my Gabagool! 5 stuff on saturday and was looking forward to some serious gaming action. And I was not disappointed. I fell asleep last night thinking of Energy Explosion combinations and adding Perplex to Long Range Combat Expert... If you don't know what I'm talking about, then there's no use explaining it, 'Clix is a world unto itself...

It was pretty intense last night though, I am okay waiting a week or so before the next round of the ongoing war we are all engaged in...

Speaking of ongoing things, I was defeated the other day in my never ending Quest to Eat the Weirdest Things I can Find On the Menu. I went to a very tasty brunch place on sunday and everyone ordered Bloody Mary's. They had all kinds of different mixes you could get, so I opted for one that came with all kinds of pickled vegetables in it. It was very strange, it had pickled brussel sprouts, turnips, green beans, everything. The people at the table next to me even leant over to peer wondrously at it and ask it's origin. Anyway, I couldn't drink it, but it was more about having vodka in the morning than all the pickled things. Not a huge deal, I know, but I felt defeated...

New interview with me and Radtke posted at this site called comicsreaders.com

I am the guy at the top of the photo in case you weren't sure. Radtke is the one at the bottom with the red shirt and red face.

Whitey at Optical Sloth reviewed the SPX anthology. He seemed to dig it. Plus he mentioned my name.

Have decided to only print 1000 copies of Gabagool! 5, even though the cost of doing 2000 is a difference of 150 dollars. I think it's unlikely that I'd sell over 1000 copies of the comic before it's time to collect it all up and make an awesome Hedo Dogs graphic novel, so why pay more and have more copies of the comic going unsold?

Did our engagement shoot last night. I tried my hardest to look casual and relaxed, but it's hard to pose in the middle of the street and not feel a little self conscious. Also: my hair is too long, and didn't look good.

Psyched to get the latest comic off to the printer tomorrow. Frees me up to relax for five minutes before coming under fire to get the invites GOCCO-ed up and sent out.

Been working on the cover for Gabagool! #5 (2).

A near complete image of it is viewable here

Productive meeting with the wedding DJ last night (www.djshakey.com). She is a nice person. We were concerned about when we should play the traditional Jewish music and when we should play the traditional Scottish music. Talking it over with the DJ cleared it all up.

We will do the Jewish stuff first. This is good because more people are going to expect it, and also it requires more physical effort on our guests behalf. I need them earlier in the night when they are still capable of hoisting me and Aliza on chairs and running us around, and then possibly doing the same to the folks. At some point there will also be the circle dance (The Hora).

I wonder how my family will do with all this? Hopefully there will be enough Jewish people there to tell them what's going on and which direction to dance around in a circle and so forth.

Then later in the night when my family has had enough to drink there will hopefully be some Scottish dancing too. I have been to weddings with my family where this has been pulled off, so I am hoping to see it at my own wedding too.

In an effort to be better prepared for this whole thing (spiritually I mean) I have finally started reading my book on The New Jewish Wedding. So far I have discovered two things:

1) There's one tradition called yichud where the bride and groom go and spend ten minutes by themselves after the ceremony. I like the sound of this a lot. I understand that we're supposed to be worrying about getting our photos done at that point, but I think that can wait a few minutes.

2) There's actually not that much that's required to be done for a wedding to actually be a legitimate Jewish wedding. I think all you really need is some witnesses and I have to give my bride a gift worth more than a dime. She has to give me something too, but I can't remember what. It might be something like she has to promise to tend my sheep or my goats or something. Or maybe that's the ketubah...

Obviously I have only started reading the book, so things are still a little sketchy...

I was a fool to not start re-numbering Gabagool! once it went legit!

Diamond has just agreed to take me on and distribute the book, but the fact that the first issue is a #4 is hurting me. Stores aren't going to want to start buying a new series on the fourth issue, and there are no issues 1 through 3 that I can sell (unless Diamind is itching to get into the mini-comics biz). There are a few options, but the whole thing has given me a massive headache.

But still, it's great news that Diamond has picked up Gabagool! If all goes smoothly there'll be a listing in the October issue of Previews, and soon after that I will be able to quit my job and make a living off of the funny-books...

If I want to get Gabagool! #5 printed up in time to take it SPX I have to have it finished by the end of next week. This is probably possible, but I am a little nervous about it. However, worrying over something like that isn't going to stop me from playing HeroClix tonight with my buddies (Chris "Gabagool!" Radtke, Alex "Box Office Poison" Robinson, and Dave "Eep" Mazure - check out all their fine comics, I endorse them all). I can't not play, I still haven't used the promotional Superman that Aliza picked up for me at the Wizard offices.

I spent this past weekend in a remote cabin at a bachelor party of a friend of mine. The best thing we did: Paintball. It was so awesome. But hard work too. I am in reasonably good shape, but I was sweating and out of breath the whole time. Also, the paintball pellets hurt, and I have two large yellow bruises on my leg now from the game.

I told my pal Gary "Gazbot" Gretsky about the game. He is a player, and has been trying to get me to play in the past. I could see wheels turning in his head as he asked me whether or not I would like my own paintball gun. I'm taking this to mean he's thinking it might make a good wedding gift. I think it would be a swell gift. Aliza on the other hand... didn't really seem to appreciate the concept in the same way that I do... I think the bruises on my body look sexy, like I am some kind of warrior. She doesn't get it though, she just makes dissaproving sounds and forces me to rub cream on them before I go to bed at night.

I ate a real jellyfish last night. The whole thing. It was kind of gross, but I wanted to prove that I could do it.

Aliza had a jumbo shrimp that not only wasn't cooked, but had it's still alive severed head sitting next to it's body on her plate. She had to make the waitress take the twitching head away. Ugh, that was stomach turning.

For dessert we went to a place up the street and I had a cream puff and felt better.

The SPX anthology came out yesterday. I was so excited about it two weeks ago, but when I got to the store my enthusiasm faded. I think it was because they only had one copy available. I preferred the idea of someone else buying it than me taking it home just to look at my story again, so I left the store without it.

I'll get it another week, I am sure that they'll order more.

Instead I got Blankets and am working my way through it. I think it is very well crafted. I'll have to finish it up and digest it a bit though before I can determine my final thoughts on it.

Aliza had a meeting with Wizard magazine yesterday for non-comics related purposes. She just talked me up the whole time and gave them copies of my comics. She's so great. In return they gave her a promotional Superman heroclix toy.

Aliza recently discovered a site called "Fresh Direct", where you can order your groceries online and have them delivered to your apartment. It's really great and convenient because they come whenever's best for you, so we've been having them come late at night, so we can be home with no hassles. Our last order got screwed up though (our fault) and we ended up with 12 giant bottles of water, 3 six packs of soda, and 3 cartons of milk. The milk is the worrisome one, 'cos how am I supposed to drink all that milk before it goes bad? I don't wake up in time to have any coffee or cereal in the morning, and I can't run home at lunchtime to drink some milk. My only option is to eat a lot of cereal for dinner, which is okay with me, because that's what I used to do in my olden single days when I wasn't eating out every night and getting soft.

This weekend I am going to a bachelor party, so I will be able to practice being vulgar and enjoying strippers and stuff like that.

The coolest thing about this upcoming weekend will be the paintball. I am looking forward to that, though I anticipate not doing very well. I know from my spotty forays into the sporting world that I'm not all that agile or quick on my feet. I imagine I will just get hit a lot out of nowhere and have to lie down and act dead until my team finishes up. I imagine that's how things would be if I was in an actual war too, so I am glad I never joined the army like I briefly thought about doing after I graduated high school.

Oh, Print Gocco, how I love thee. You are so easy to use, and you will save me so much money on my wedding invitations... Yes, for a mere 118 dollars, I bought my own little silk-screening machine, and now I don't have to stress about paying for any fancy printer to do the work for me. Nay, all I have to do now is buy the paper, and Print Gocco will take care of the rest...

I have got 3 and half more pages to go and then the next chapter of the Hedonism epic is finished. Once I realized I was almost done with it, I got depressed. I think because I know I am going to have to start doing all the tiresome back-end book prouction stuff again, and Gabagool! #4 is still sitting around in boxes waiting to be sold. I feel like the books will do well at SPX, but without real distribution this whole project is going to quickly become stupid. Luckily for me, my depression made it hard for me to do all that much drawing yesterday, thus delaying the inevitable, expensive, and perhaps ill-advised production part of the process.

Sometimes when I get the urge to promote Gabagool!, I'll post stuff on message boards and hope that I'll get a little feedback. Yesterday I discovered a site called nerdnyc.com, which caters to Nerds in the New York area. This is basically my target audience. I posted a thread here and they all seemed to love it. This is much better feedback than I ever get on the stuffy comics forums. NERDNYC RULEZ!!

When I was out at dinner last night, a mutual friend told me that the cartoonist that's lined up to draw a story for Gabagool! #5 has changed some of Chris's and my dialogue to "make it funnier". While I bristled at the idea that someone could make the script "funnier", I really didn't care that the dialogue had been tweaked. In fact, I didn't realize that it had, even though I'd seen the offending page at MoCCA. I was just happy to see the comic coming out and looking good. I don't usually ever get to see someone else drawing from my script, and it was a lot of fun to do so, even if they do think they can make it better, which they can't, it's already perfect.

There is a thread on the comics journal message board about the death of the pamphlet comic book. This is relevant to me, because I have been wrestling with what seems to be the best way to release this Hedo story. I like coming out with the issues, because it makes it easier for me to have new things at each convention, but I feel like perhaps it's not so good for me in the long run since it costs so much money to print up the comics. Maybe I should save it all and come out with a collection, releasing it as an "Original Graphic Novel", or OGN. But that would mean no new material for a while, which is lame. Also, I enjoy the comic book format because it's a lot of fun to do the short back-ups. I dunno, I'm not sure which is the right way to move forward.

Went to the beach again this weekend. I got no color at all, because I wisely used some sunscreen for babies which is super-powerful. I like to maintain my crisp paper whiteness. I may look like something that's been living on the bottom of the ocean all it's life, but at least I'm not going to get prematurely wrinkly. At this rate, by the time I'm in my forties I'll still have the soft smooth skin of an acne-free fifteen year old, and I'll still get carded at bars and stuff, and then make jokes to the bouncers about how flattered I am.

It is fucking freezing in this office! It's terrible. It is cranked up so's I've been on the edge of getting sick from the cold for over a week now. I had to go into the bathroom and put on an undershirt which I'd packed up for my Jersey weekend. That means I'm going to be short an item of clothing on sunday and have to come back to the city topless, because I can't be wearing soiled apparel.

In other news: I drew a bit last night, so I feel ok.

Went to dinner way up on 111th street last night. Interesting to go that far up town. I rarely venture above 59th street too much, and even then I don't get up much past the 80's.

Did not do any drawing last night. I feel terrible about it, especially since I won't be able to draw again until maybe sunday. It sucks too, because the pages I'm working on at the moment are coming out extra-good. Not just my normal level of competent drawing - but above and beyond! I am at the point when the main characters are just chekcing into their room at the Hedonism resort and having a look round. This is when the story gets interesting because now I get to draw all kinds of cool background characters and nudity and debauchery. The sequence before this was a scene in a van, which is harder to draw and harder to get excited about. Soon I'll get to draw drugs, and then I'll know I'm having a good time.

I had heard rumors that the SPX anthology was going to be shipping this week, so I actually left the Carnegie Hall area during work hours and went down to Jim Hanley's on 33rd. I looked around and discovered that the anthology was nowhere to be found. Sadly, I learned it ships next week instead. I was duped...

Obviously the reason I was so excited to get the book was because I am in it. Technically it is my first published work, so for that reason it is exciting to me. Normally I don't buy anthologies though, because usually there are too many "eh" comics in them. I don't even know if I've read all of the previous SPX anthologies that come out. One thing I did pick up and look at in the store was a book called "Kramer's Ergot #4". It looks pretty impressive, and I've heard good things, so I just might have to break my rule this one time.

Tomorrow we are going to see the New York Philharmonic in Central Park, and we have seats since a friend of ours works for the parks department. Apparently this is a sweet deal, 'cos supposedly it is hard to get a seat at this thing. I've never heard of this Philharmonic in the park thing, but I am willing to give it a try.

I came up with a joke recently about how people in England are all living in newly re-modeled homes with fancy modernist designs because all that seems to be on BBC America are shows about people in England re-doing their houses for cheap, but I don't think it plays out that well. You kind of have to had been watching as much BBC America as me, and specifically watching the BBC America shows that I've been watching. I think I will have to keep the joke to myself for the time being.

Went to the beach on saturday. It was actually very nice, although the beach is not my natural habitat. I burn way too easily, so I have to get totally slathered up with sunblock, which just makes me feel greasy. I did a good job of covering up this time though, I have two small patches of sunburn, one on my ankle and one on my hip.

Upon returning from the beach and reflecting a bit, I have decided it's finally time to go to a dermatologist and find out the official State of My Skin Union.

Things of note about the beach:

1) Long Beach actually wasn't that far away, and it wasn't completely packed like I assumed it would be.

2) There were naked people there.

3) I need to start working out again. Not only am I pasty, but I am getting doughy. This is not a good look. I know that I am allowed to let myself go now that I am getting hitched, but I think I'd like to try and hold on as long as possible.

In case I slack off again, here are my upcoming plans: Friday: Meet the wedding cantor. Saturday: Go to the scottish florist and sit quietly and politely as Aliza talks to her about flowers. Saturday afternoon: drive down to Jersey and hopefully go to the beach again.

New review of Gabagool! #4 at comicreaders.com

Kick-ass review of Gabagool! # 1-3 at icomics.

Some late spring cleaning yesterday. Was very much needed. Now the whole house smells like floor polish and your feet stay clean when walking around barefoot on the hardwood. Maybe we should make cleaning the house a regular thing. Aside from it making the house nicer, it would also take less time to do it.

My favorite part of the cleaning project - when we took a break and got some lunch. I liked sitting out on the street eating a gyro and getting some sun finally. The only part that ruined it was two guys who were carrying toilets in and out of a doorway right next to us. I assume that the toilets were clean and probably even unused, but they were getting awful close to my back with those things at some points. And the toilets looked unweildy, I would not have been suprised if one was dropped.

My second favorite part of cleaning: it's a tie between taking a shower in a shiny bathtub with nothing growing in it, or getting into bed with sheets that have just been washed. One or the other, they're both nice.

Watched the third episode of the new Project Greenlight on HBO. The set up of this show seems to be the same as the last one: Get an amateur, give him some money to make a studio picture, then get mad at him for being an amateur. It's gripping!

I have had to take a few days off to recover from the madness that was MoCCA weekend. It's sad that it flew by so quickly. know, I know, everyone and their mother is saying, it really would be better if it was two days. From what I gather from talking to the people who put it together though, getting the Puck building for two days does much more than just double the costs, because it actually costs a lot more to get a saturday than it does a sunday.

Anyway, who cares? Here is my run-down of the weekend:

Friday night: Non MoCCA related - we went out to get some fancy pizza with my Best Man and a bunch of other people, including a couple who have also gotten engaged who I haven't seen in a while. That it always fun because then you can start comparing notes. Aliza and the girl got to talk about invitations and guest lists and stuff, while me and the other guy got to sit and chuckle at our wives to be and complain about money and adult things like that. I am glad to see that I have turned into my parents in a matter of only months. My new main routine is to act like a cranky husband who's wife is a spendthrift, who likes to blow all my hard earned money on shopping sprees and weddings. Just like on the Flintstones. Of course, in real life, Aliza earns as much as I do, and isn't actually so bad when it comes to money. Her only thing is that she is a little too free and easy with cab rides, but we all have our things.

Slightly comics related note to the evening: One of the other people who came to dinner is Bob Kane's second cousin. I guess this is neat. It's not like I am a huge Bob Kane fan, but this was a nice little fun-fact all the same.

Saturday: I don't really remember what we did all day, but I know we did something, because we were out of the house most of the day, and therefore pretty tired by the time we went out to start our night of pre-MoCCA parties in Brooklyn. The first party started at 6 (boo) and was in Brooklyn (booooo) out in Bushwick (double booo). Actually, I didn't know where we were, but a few people were mentioning the shabby neighborhood we were in. It didn't actually register to me that it was a shabby neighborhood, because most of my Brooklyn experience comes from the year I lived in Crown Heights, which is pretty rough. Maybe I just think all of Brooklyn is run-down, with collapsed buildings littered about, but this probably isn't so. All's I know is I spent a year living across from a tumbled down heap that I think was attached to a children's day school, so I didn't really think it was odd that there was a similar looking structure across the street from the party.

A cartoonist who calls himself James Kochalka Superstar played an acoustic set. Everybody stuck around and watched him do his thing. Then Collider went on, and everyone left. It was too bad, because Collider rocks, and I think everyone missed out.

On the way to the second party Chris told Aliza about the strip club we went to when we went to SPACE. This was remarkable, because we had made a blood oath to keep this a secret. I was aghast at his betrayal. She didn't seem to care.

Sunday: MoCCA day!

Well, MoCCA weekend is here. I am excited. I really didn't have to scramble at the end to get ready for it this time, I guess since I had to be so on the ball about getting the comic to the printers and all, I was very responsible. Last night I stapled and folded a couple things and watched the Pianist with Aliza.

The main thing I gotta do on sunday is sell. I need to make some money. The bill for the printing is going to come soon, and I want to do my best to get it taken care of a fast as possible. So if anybody who reads this is coming to the show, don't be annoyed at me if I'm in my "salesman" mode when you see me. I am just trying to earn some of my money back, don't hold it against me. I am normally not so annoying.

Tomorrow will be busy. We have to go to the paper store and try and get somewhere on these invitations. We also apparently have to make "Save the Date" cards and send them out too. Another thing is the cake. We have been discussing it, and we are definitely leaning towards taking the economical route with it. Cakes can cost up to a thousand bucks or so for weddings, but i think we'd like to keep it more around 3-4 hundred bucks. I know I am barely going to get any of it anyway, because once again I imagine I will be in my "salesman" glad handing mode at the reception, meeting and greeting and annoying everyone I come into contact with. I won't have time to sit dowjn and enjoy my cake, so I figure we ought not to spend much money on it.

Got a mention on comicon.com as one of the books debuting this weekend. Pretty sweet.

First review of Gabagool! 4 is here at Optical Sloth, and it's positive. Got a review of Gabagool! # 1 and 3 here, which is also pretty positive, despite the reviewers aversion to mini-comics. Interestingly, the book is compared to Doublecross and Box Office Poison once more, which are books done by some good friends of mine. I wonder if I started to make comics like Alex Robinson and Tony Consiglio because I'm friends with them, or if I became friends with them because I make comics like them?

Things I need to do, Comics related: Mail out orders that I've recieved. Update my website. My weblog is getting much more action these days than www.mikedawsoncomics.com, but I love them both equally.

Things I need to do, otherwise related: A lot. Wedding, wedding, wedding! Come on Mike, kick it into high gear here, those invites aren't going to silk-screen themselves!

Aliza and I managed to run three miles last night. From 9th street to 39th and back. I complained a lot, and Aliza told me that I need to not hate running, because that's why I never do it. It's true, I hate working out, but I always feel so good afterwards.

When we got back we ordered some awesome italian food and watched the last couple episodes of Project Greenlight. I really feel bad for that Pete Jones guy. Sure, he's makes a couple schlubby calls throughout the making of his film, but he really seems like a good guy. But I looked him up on imdb and I see he's not got any sort of followup project, which makes me sad. A person I know who made a short film that did well looks like he's got some followup projects already lined up, and he's newer on the scene than Pete Jones. Why nothing for Pete? He's got two kids to support! Give him a job, he did fine. The project greenlight show was kind of annoying because all these people are looking at this guy directing and shaking their heads the whole time like he's some asshole. It's his first time, what do you expect?! Poor guy...

After the show ended I got some awful abdominal pains and had to spend the rest of the night on the toilet/curled up on the bed whining, and so I got no drawing done, which made me very pissy this morning.

The comics came this weekend. I am now the proud owner of three boxes full of books in my little upstairs attic. Chris has the other four boxes in his place out in Brooklyn. Sales so far: 15! Five went to Forbidden Planet, and ten to Jim Hanley's. I went in to talk to the people at St. Mark's comics, and naturally they were kind of pricky to me, so I don't intend to take my comics back to them. That store has a bit of a rep for being run by assholes, but luckily I don't buy anything there, so I don't have to worry about supporting an establishment that I have a problem with. I take all my business to FB and Jim Hanley's, those stores are run by some nice people.

I have to say though, I find the whole process of going out and trying to get people to buy my books to be a disheartening and slightly humiliating one. I really hate it. I think the next order of business is for us to find some distribution of some kind.

Weekend was cool, did a ton of stuff on saturday, including buying a too-expensive shirt at the Beastie Boys store. I boughta couple cheap things too at H&M, but those were not recieved so well by Aliza as the Beastie Boys shirt was. In fact, one of the items received an actual thumbs down, but I'll show her. I'll wear it all the time until she gets used to it and admits it was a good clothing choice.

Gave my family copies of G4. I think they liked it okay, but I know that the constant outpouring of comics littered with foul language and gratuitous nudity is not impressing them that much.

I got sent some samples of Gabagool! #4 today. This is even more exciting than getting the blue line proof. It all looks perfect, except I think the writing on the cover is slightly too close to the bottom of the paper, but overall I feel great about it. It was my first time sending stuff off to press anyway, so I deserve a break. At least all the images came out beautifully and not pixellated. Now I will know for Gabagool! #5 to make sure and leave more room around the edges.

Speaking of Gabagool! stuff, I forgot to post these nice reviews of issue 1 and 3 that we got over the weekend. They didn't review issue #2, because I didn't send it to them. I am out of them at the moment. I don't care though. If truth be told #2 is my least favorite of the Gabagool!'s. The drawings are the worst, and we come dangerously close to making fun of homosexuals and retarded people, which I am sometimes not proud of. But whatever, it still has it's moments, the meat story I think is really funny, and it showed a growth in the storytelling and the characters.

I went to see Collider record a live album on saturday night. On the way home Aliza and I played a new game where we pretend to be a drunken fighting couple. I would keep grabbing her arm and saying "come on!" and she would shake me off and yell and say she wanted another drink. This is funny to us, because we see these drunken fighting couples all the time and they make us uncomfortable. I think it would be really funny though if it turned out that all the other couples were faking it too, and in reality everyone is just having a good laugh.

Engagement Barbecue was yesterday. It was a delightful affair, the sun almost came out for about five minutes, and I was mildly drunk by 1:30 in the afternoon. It was totally sweet of my parents and Aliza's parents to put it together for us, and I think we were very gracious guests of honor.

After we wheedled our friend Rob into driving us back into the city (hey, we had a lot of gifts, we couldn't lug them all onto NJ TRansit...) we were wiped out. Aliza and I just lay in front of the TV for the rest of the night and watched the Tony's. Strangely we find them to be entertaining, despite the fact that we never go see any of the shows. Last year the only thing we'd seen was "Top Dog/Underdog", but we still watched the whole awards show.

Brian Denehy got up and totally dissed Eddie Izzard, who he had just beaten out for Best Actor in a Play. First thing he said was "Eddie Izzard would've been funnier". Har har, big joke, Eddie Izzard is a funny dancing monkey here to make you all laugh. Nevermind that he was up for his role in a drama - he's really just a funny clown who dresses like a woman. Speaking of Eddie Izzard's cross-dressing Brian Denehy next launched in to how Eddie should have his own category - since he's such a weirdo! I think he realized the gaffe this time, 'cos he quickly mumbled something about Eddie Izzard deserving an award and then looked nervous for the rest of his speech. Of course I have no idea what I'm talking about, but it's fun to play armchair critic when I'm sprawled out on the couch, my stomach full of hot dogs and potato salad. For all I know Eddie Izzard was laughing too. I don't even know if Eddie Izzard's play was a drama, I just assumed so since everyone looks so serious in the promo pictures I saw.

Talked about "Smells Like Teen Spirit" today. Mentioned how it is the official anthem of our generation ("our" meaning me and people who're around my age). This seems to be something that people agree with. Funny though, I didn't really like the song when it was big. I wasn't even trying to be anti-mainstream in those days either, I just only really liked bands like Queen and Billy Joel and the Who. It wasn't until later that I decided I liked the Nirvana song.

It makes me sad that I missed out on the whole grunge scene. I would have liked to have been a part of the whole grunge "happening" when it was happening. Then I could have stories about going to see cool bands when they were in their prime instead of the actual concerts I went to when I was in high school, which was basically two Rush concerts and one The Who concert where they'd played with the philharmonic.

If it counts for any kind of grunge cred, Eddie Vedder showed up at that Who concert. Also: Linda Perry from 4 Non Blondes, and also The Spin Doctors who sang "My Generation". So even though it wasn't a cool concert to go to it was still clearly a part of the sign of the times. Incidentally, I always really loved Linda Perry's cover of "Captain Jack". Embarassingly it got me to become the one and only fan of the 4 Non Blondes album "bigger, faster, better, more..." (or something). This lead me to become a fan of today's hot act "Pink", when I saw on the MTV show "Driven" that she too was a Linda Perry fan. Now I think "Mizzundastood" is a great listen. Thus: My out of touchness back in my own youth has somehow brought me into being in touch with the kids of today.

I don't know what I'm on about today. It's six o' clock friday, and I wanna go home.

The radio was telling me the news this morning as I was getting ready for work. As usual, the news was depressing. Today they were talking about how the unemployment rate went from such and such percentage last year up to such and such a higher percentage this year. I liked it better during the web boom, when everyone was getting paid big money for work they weren't necessarily qualified to do. Then I thought about how the bottom fell out, and all the investors took all their money away. Then I got pissed, and socialistic, because really all that was happening with the boom was that some of the money that the rich people have anyway was getting spread around a bit. Why shouldn't we internet workers get paid inflated wages for little work? What's wrong with that? It's not like these wealthy people don't get money for nothing.

Anyway, I am finally feeling less sick, which is good because I have a busy weekend coming up. Aliza and I are going to go see the rabbi for a second time, and I am going to be scolded for not doing my readings on Jewish weddings (I already know what happens, we smash a glass, and then I ride around on a chair), and then we are going to go help Aliza's mom get ready for our Engagement Party on sunday. The Engagement Party will be interesting, it will be the first time I've been in a setting with my whole family, someone else's whole family, and then a bunch of my friends from different walks of life. I'm one of those people who likes to compartmentalize the people I know, and not mix them up that often. It helps me, because it's easier for me to keep track of how I behave around which people. Am I condescending to this person?, am I a suck-up to this person, do talk about comics with this person or not? etc... I don't know how I'll behave with everyone there at once. I guess I'll know next week.

Got my Gabagool! shirts in the mail yesterday, and they look nice. Apparently the cafepress site will start charging money if I don't sell a certina amount of product in six months, so if anyone is thinking of getting a snappy looking Gabagool! 4 t-shirt, waste no time! (Wife-beater shirts recently added)

Lousy weekend. I have had a cold I can't quite shake, so I pretty much stayed in and moped.

Started watching the Toy Story DVD disc with all the extras. Some of it was pretty interesting, but it is mostly a series of slideshows that you have to scroll through. Like, they have a segment called "character design ", which I figured would be a neat little mini-documentary showing the various designs of the characters and a little bit of commentary. Sadly, like I said, it was just a slideshow of about a billion little drawings of each character that you had to hit your arrow buttons to look through. I don't know about anyone else's DVD players, but mine takes a good 2 or 3 seconds to load everytime you hit one of those buttons, so I quit watching almost immediately.

There were also "Deleted Animations", which mainly showed little segments that were made, but then later edited out, or changed. This was pretty interesting, but on the Toy Story I features under this heading was a segment called "Render Bigs". I checked that out, and it turns out to be about 8 or 9 little snippets of animations where things got fucked up in the rendering. So in some cases the wrong symbol was being used in the animation (in one case Rex's head is replaced by a human hand), or the pieces are out of synch, or placed wrong in the frame. I don't know why they thought this was something that people wanted to see. I have animated stuff for work from time to time, and it's not that unusual to fuck something up as you're building it. You make the animation, you look at it, you see the bug, and then you fix it. You don't make a DVD reel out of it. That's just self-indulgence.

On the upside, when Aliza comes back from her trip we will watch Toy Story 2, which I think it the best Pixar movie, and I daresay may be one of my favorite animated movies of all time. She has not seen it yet, so that'll be fun.

Haven't said much this week. I'm not sure if it's 'cos I'm busy, or because I'm concerned my life has been getting boring.

THE MAIN EVENTS OF THE WEEK:

1) Got the proof back from the printers of Gabagool! #4. It looks awesome. I feel so legitimate. On June 11th all the finished comics will be shipped from Canada to Chris Radtke's house, where he will store them in his basement - but not on the floor! I think it's risky keeping things in basements, because basements tend to leak, but he claims he has thought of this and devised a place to keep them where they would be safe from natural disaster.

2) Finished coloring Gabagool! #3 for moderntales, and I was told the stuff looked great. The story will go up in June sometime, not exactly sure when yet. Will be followed up by another Gabagool! story in August, which I will start coloring soon.

3) Played Hero Clix on wednesday, and kicked everybody's asses. Once more, I had dreams of being a Hero Clix. That's what you get from 6 hours of intense concentration. Concentration ON DESTRUCTION!

WHAT I HAVE PLANNED FOR THIS WEEKEND:

Nothing. Aliza is out of town. I am going to draw, perhaps play a little Clix, and get my hair cut. I need to get it cut now because it takes a week or two to look any good, which will coincide perfectly with the big MOCCA show on June 22nd.

Aliza and I cannot decide on dishes. It can't be done. Who knew it would be such a task? We almost agreed on a set of dishes that had little cartoons of French waiters on it, but luckily we changed our minds. The problem is that you have to think of these dishes in the long term. Sure, I think it'd be cute to eat my cereal out of a cartoon French waiter dish for a week or so, but 40 years from now I am going to be sick of them...

From what I heard on the radio last night we are going to start getting pushy with Iran. Also, the government is continuing it's process of quietly admitting that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

I made a little "store" at this place called cafepress.com, where you can go if you want a T-Shirt with the cover of Gabagool #4 on it. I may be overestimating the demand for such a thing, but hey, it's possible that someone might want one, and they're not that pricey. If anybody wants the design on something other than a T-Shirt (mouse pad anyone?) send me an e-mail and I'll hook it up.

The forecast for my three day weekend: Rain. This depresses me before I even get out of the gate. Nothing I hate worse than a crap weekend, especially one where I've got little-to-no solid plans as such. We have a couple things going on, but when you can't really go out much I find that axes my weekend activity fun by about 2/3rd's. I like being able to walk around and go places, not having to sit inside and watch TV. (well, I don't mind watching TV, but when I do it for twelve hours straight 'cos it's shitty out, then I get a headache...)

Gabagool#4 gets here in a little over 2 weeks. I am so excited. The people who've read it so far seem to approve, and I feel very confident in it. I can't wait for MOCCA. It's going to ROCK-A! (I know, that's a dumb thing to say, but I actually think those words every time I say "Mocca", so I thought I might as well get the phrase copywrited to me by posting it up here, even if it is dumb...)

There is a pregnant woman in my office. I thought she looked pregnant a few days ago, but I knew you can't really ask someone if they're pregnant or if they've just been gaining weight. Conveniently I overheard her talking to a co-worker about pregnancy, so I am going to use my detective skills and deduce that she is, in fact, knocked up. I told Aliza I couldn't wait until she was pregnant, I think she'll be so cute all waddly and bloated and cranky. Aliza disagrees.

The kick ass cover of Gabagool! #4 can be found here, and the laff riot backup story starring the "lil' Gabagool! Kids" can be found here. Warning: This could be a heavy page, you might have to wait a moment for it to load.

Swell weekend of Birthday Celebrations and Socializing Fun Times. Culminated in me cooking Aliza dinner for her birthday. I know, it might not sound like much, but considering that the only other thing I ever cooked was Pea Soup "from scratch", it was a major step for me. My soon-to-be-brother-in-law was responsible for giving me all the tips I needed, and it went over very well.

I was totally stressed in the "Garden of Eden" market though, where I was trying to buy Flank Steak. I didn't know where anythign was, and there were tons of people in there who seemed to have more of a clue than me, so I felt very lost. I forget that to some people cooking dinner is a fairly normal thing to do.

I also never knew that the actual cooking time of some dishes is under 45 minutes to an hour. In fact, steak took 10 minutes to sear on both sides in the broiler, and the aspargus only took 5. I always assumed that anything, except the kind of food that you just heat up, like soup or beans, took almost an hour to cook.

This is a new and exciting world to me. Maybe I can learn to cook well. Aliza said my steak came out perfectly, so perhaps I have a gift for it...

Okay, I have decided what songs I would want covered should we still have Collider play for us at the wedding. Earlier I had thought of having them cover "Funny How Love Is" from the Queen II album, a delicious deep cut indeed. It occurs to me that probably one of my favorite Queen songs is on the same album, actually right before FHLI. It's called "The March of the Black Queen" and it's a kick ass eight minute or so mini-rock opera. It has all these different parts that I could totally see this band playing (they are good musicians) and all those patented Queen "aaaahhhs" that I love so much. The best part is that it goes directly into Funny How Love Is on the album, so it will make an awesome Queen rock block. And like I said, it's about a deep a cut as you can get, and I know the Collider guys like that.

I'm psyched.

Decided on a whim last night to try and go see the Matrix Reloaded. So walked over to the theater near the house thinking I could pick up tickets. No such luck. There was a big crowd outside, and even though they had movies starting every half hour, the first non sold-out show was midnight. So Aliza and I just went and got some dinner with her brother and his friend from out of town.

I should have known better though. I gathered through the nerd-grapevine that people bought their tickets to see this movie over two weeks ago. You can't go see anything on opening night in this city without buying the ticket six months ahead of time it seems. Oh well, I don't care that much, The Matrix has never been a movie I was particularly fond of. Interestingly, I was reading John Byrne's forum a few days ago, and I saw that he has the same exact problem with the first movie as I do: which is that the "heroes" of the movie kill a lot of innocent people in their quest for freedom. At some point Morpheus says something about how Neo has to regard the humans that are still a part of the Matrix as enemies, and then when Neo and co. go to bust Morpheus out of the building they shoot the shit out of a bunch of security guards and stuff. What was their crime? That they were not "enlightened" as to the true nature of reality, the way that Neo and his cool leather buddies were. Whatever, I'm sure tons of people have beef with this movie for the exact same reason, but it was a pleasant suprise to see John Byrne felt the same way I did. He was a favorite creator of mine as a kid, and I was a little saddened to see that his online persona had become this shrill and angry man. But, maybe I mis-judged, who knows?

Today begins Aliza's Birthday Festival which will carry us through monday with it's various celebrations and get togethers. Tonight's activity is Dinner with My Folks, and they've even come into the city for it. Tomorrow is the Meal with all the Friends, and sunday is the Meal with Aliza's Folks. Then monday is the Meal for Just Me and Her, and after that life returns to normal and Aliza loses her VIP birthday-girl status.

New review of Gabagool! #1 Special Edition here. This guy seemed to like it, but doesn't seem to think the ugly nature of the book is for everyone. He will probably not like the newer Gabagool! stories much at all...

Trounced Alex in Heroclix last night. 2 games to 0. Next week we'll play again, with Radtke as a third, and we will truly have ourselves a war. Alex is hard at work on a custom battlefield. My suggestion is to re-create a scale grid of New York and stage the Battle for Manahattan. The next step is to take it beyond the grid paper and into 3-D cardboard buildings...

This week has been rough in terms of drawing comics. I think it might be because I just wrapped on G4, so I don't have anything else to do but do all the pre-press work so's I can send the book out sometime next week. And now I am supposed to work on things like invitations and stuff for the wedding. I should also start working on any little comics that I wanna make as a favor for the guests.

Also, the past two nights have turned up the most wondrous distractions. Monday's was pathetic: I got sucked into this stupid Three's Company movie that came on after Fear Factor (which always sucks me in). I don't wanna harp on about the Three's Company movie too much (it's embarrassing enough that I watched it), but I couldn't help but notice that Janet was the only cast memeber who had anything to do with it, and in the movie Janet was the only character who didn't screw anybody over, but was instead screwed in one way or another by Chrissy or Jack. Oh Janet, why are you blaming the others for your lack of post-Three's company success? They're talented people. Maybe if you'd showed some solidarity with Chrissy you all woulda' got raises, she wouldn't have been kicked off the show, and it wouldn't have sunk in the ratings. Look at the cast of Friends now, see how they do it. If you're the number one show in the country, there's nothing wrong with asking that you get paid something that reflects that. (Although, I will admit, according to the Three's Company movie I saw, Chrissy got a little out of hand with her demands). Anyway, I guess my main point is: Isn't there something wrong with a movie that asks us to treat the Network executives as the heroes and think of the evil greedy actors as the villains. Those poor execs, they were only trying to make an honest buck, why'd that money-grubbing cast member have to destroy such a good thing? Oh Chrissy, didn't you realize that the producers were only making the show out of the goodness of their hearts, and you had to ruin it by bringing money into the equation?

Ok, I have to stop. I've already harped on more than I wanted. Like I said, it's embarrassing that I got so caught up in this movie. I am going to be sure to not watch the Martha Stewart movie they have coming out in a few weeks, as I think my thoughts on whatever that is will not make exciting journal reading...

Instead, lemme tell you about last night's distraction: Heroclix! Yes, some friends came over and introduced me to this new nerdy pastime, where you get to be the heroes and villains of the Marvel Universe, and the objective of the game is to simply "get the other player". It was good fun. I dreamt about battle strategies all night (except for the part of the dream where I was being attacked by Freddy Kreuger and Jason Vorhees) and I think I may have come up with an idea of how I can combine Heroclix and Lord of the Rings RISK, and make the Ultimate Dork Game of All Time!

Anyway, these are all bad things, because I should be drawing, not acting like a man-child with my little superhero figurines or watching garbage on TV and yelling about it afterwards...

Also: The lineup of the 2003 SPX anthology was announced, and Dirty Banana made the cut. Pretty sweet news. There is a link to the story somewhere in one of these posts, so if you want to go to the trouble of searching for it amongst my babble, then you can save yourself the eight bucks it'd cost you to buy the book.

SPX books are notoriously hit and miss. I do feel though that mine and Chris's story kicks ass, and this year we will be the toast of Bethesda...

Friday night: Went to see "Spellbound", the documentary about 8 or 9 kids competing in the 1999 National Spelling Bee. It was like the definition of "bittersweet". I found it to be very touching, funny, and melancholy all at the same time. I got weepy when the brother of one of the contestants talked about how proud her family was of her, and how they'd come to this country so their children could succeed, and now they had and they were very proud. I'm not embarrassed, I think it's okay to let the emotions out once in a while.

I participated in a message board thread about the importance of spelling over here, which I thought was pretty funny, but also relevant. I like especially how a couple of the people who are notoriously bad spellers get all bent out of shape and indignant, arguing not that they are bad spellers, but that the people who point it out are judgmental and anal retentive.

Maybe I only see it from my point of view, because I am a reasonably good speller, and I try and correct my typos when I can. I'm not perfect though, just reasonable.

Yesterday Aliza and I plunged back into bridal registration hell. This time: Bloomingdales. We are having real issues with our plates. Can't agree on a pattern to suit both our fancy. This is because Aliza's tastes run more "modern", and mine more "country homes and gardens". So I'd like the plates with the flower patterns, and she'd like the ones with the facist-like-suprematist-art-for-art's-sake-minimalist-speckle pattern on it. We have yet to find our middle ground.

Watched a film clip of Picasso in his studio fiddling with his sculptures. A co-worker of mine mused "I'd like to live like that, in some sweet spot in France, just dinking around in my studio all day". I couldn't agree more. Who are these people who get to live lives like this? He's just tinkering around, all fat and hairy, with his paper mache donkey. That's all Picasso has to do with his day. One day I hope to be just like Picasso, except not hairy and bald.

Aliza keeps mentioning some desire to move to England. I don't know where this is coming from. Why would she want to live in England? Who wants to live somewhere were it rains all the time. It brings you down. That's why Brits always look so miserable. You'd be miserable too if you had to go to the beach in a sweatshirt and bring along a "windbreaker" to sit behind so you don't freeze to death. Then you have to pay 6 dollars a gallon for gas for your dinky little car that will get you back to your dinky little house along some tiny narrow roads. Who needs that?

Nothing exciting to report. Couldn't work last night, everything was coming up crap. So I watched a bunch of HBO On Demand "Sex and the City", which is a funny show and hung with Aliza.

Tried to convince Aliza that we should just go to Las Vegas for a long weekend and get married. We could blow a ton of money doing it, and still come out ahead from where we're gonna be. But, I realize it's too late for that now anyway. Some people are already booked, and I only just sent out my little cards to my groomsmen and best man asking them to do the honors. If we backed out now they'd all be so let down.

Aliza is not sure what songs to ask Collider to cover for us. I am pretty sure I'm going with "Funny How Love Is" by Queen. She is not so certain. I like "Crazy on You" by Heart, but I think she was just kidding when she suggested it. I also enjoy the song "All I Wanna Do Is Make Love to You" also by Heart, but that's my own issue and has nothing to do with the wedding...

If fact, I am going to go listen to my MP3 of that right now, and then after that "Freebird".

First off: My archives now work. This makes me feel good, and less hopeless.

The insides of Gabagool #4 are now done. I worked like a fiend all weekend to get it finished. I am determined that we'll get this thing printed up properly. Now all that is left to do is the cover. Radtke and I are both undecided on whether or not we want to go with our first idea for a cover, which was to make it like an homage to an issue of the Fantastic Four with the Watcher's first appearance. We think it's a funny cover, but are unsure if we want our first properly printed comic to have a swiped image on the front. I dunno, we will discuss this more later.

My plan is to wrap this issue and get it sent out to the printers by the end of the week, or early next week.

Printing it makes so much sense on many levels, I am annoyed that we never did it before. If my quotes are right, we can print 2000 copies for under 1000 bucks. It is totally reasonable to sell them for 3 bucks. The math there works out to be that we'd make about 5000 bucks profit. However, we all know that they won't all get sold, or at least won't be sold for full price, but even then we can recoup all our money and earn a little more. I am very excited.

Today is awful. I have nothing to do at work, and the time is dragging by. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't X-Men tonight. Agh, I wish it was 9:30 already... I wanna watch X-Men!

I know, I know, I'm behaving insufferably, but it can't be helped. I was just very much into the X-Men comics as a kid, and I hear that this movie is supposed to be great, and the anticipation is killing me.

Ok, I gotta focus on something else. What else is going on? Well, it is going to cost a lot of money to print up Gabagool! #4 the way I want it. So much that I am re-thinking my original concept of what I wanted and downgrading the product a bit. At the moment, instead of having it printed on nice paper with a un-glossy card stock cover, I think I am goign to end up with a comic printed entirely on glossy paper, including the cover, which will be the same stock as the interior. Hopefully this will make it affordable. Chris is concerned, I don't blame him, because not only do we have to pay for this, but we have to pay for issue 5 too in a few months. And then #6 and then so on, unless of course things go according to plan and some publisher realizes that Gabagool! is a cash-cow just waiting to be discovered and the series is picked up.

My major dilemma now is that I have gotten so excited about printing the comic, I don't see any way I can be talked into going back to the crummy ass Kinkos way of doing it.

Anyway, if I don't finish the comic soon this won't be an issue, because I won't be able to get it printed in time for MOCCA anyway...

So, this weekend I am going to work my ass off and get a lot of this stuff done. Aliza is going to Jersey tomorrow to see her parents and look at florists, and then on Sunday she is looking at bridemaids dresses, so that means more time for me to work. I have to do 2 and a half pages, the cover and the inside front cover. I hope to have almost all of it done by monday morning, but that won't happen.

I'll update on monday and we'll see how I did. I will have seen X-Men by then, so at the very least I will be a bit more coherent and focused...

Bought a couple comics last night at the comic store, including Robert Ullman's "Grand Gestures", a new issue of "The Nimrod", and Robert Crumb's "Art and Beauty magazine" #2. The R. Crumb was my favorite by far, just 'cos the drawings are so amazing. That goes to show you what a lifetime of honing your craft can get you, some seriously nice looking drawings. I eagerly await the time when I'm an old man and can draw so good.Sadly, none of the comics lasted me until this morning, so I had nothing to read on my subway ride to work.

Still have a ways to go on the Gabagool! #3 coloring for moderntales, but I am confident it'll get done. They need it by early June, so that gives me all of May, and I only have to do 12 more pages. For a sneak peak at what this stuff is coming out like, click here.

Tomorrow is the X2 premeire. Ridiculously, we had to buy our tickets on monday to go see this movie tomorrow. It is going to be a mad-house at the movie theater, I am not looking forward to it. There are a bunch of people going who I know, but I am planning on meeting up with them after the film. I can't be bothered with trying to wrangle a row of seats for twenty people so we can all sit together. Who gives a shit? I'm not planning on talking to any of them in the movie. All's I'm concerned about is getting a reasonable seat for myself, the rest can fend for themselves. Sadly, my eagerness to see this movie has caused me to read a considerable number of reviews, and now I think there is probably very little left in the movie that I don't already know about...

Good gabagool! review today here. Gabagool! is a joy to read, a JOY.

Chris wasn't too happy about not being mentioned in the review. I don't blame him. I would flip a lid if my name got left out. In fact, when someone wrote to me to tell me they enjoyed Chris's artwork, that's exactly what I did. Well, "flip out" is too strong a word, I just made a point of correcting them when I replied to thank them for their kind words.

Couple of links:

Got a good review yesterday from Rich Watson of A View From the Cheap Seats for my mini comic Cabaret Comix #2. You can find it on this page. (It's the only one that scored an "A". I rule)

Aliza started a blog too. It can be read here. I think her's and mine will just go swimmingly together since we will probably both be talking a lot about our upcoming nuptials.

For instance, tonight we will be continuing our quest to be registered. I think we will be hitting flatwares and dinnerwares and stuff like that. Sure to be thrilling!

On thursday we meet up with the guys who're going to play at the reception. we need to figure out which songs we want them to learn. One that occured to me yesterday was "Funny How Love Is" by Queen. It's a nice little jam, and it's by Queen who rule. It's a win-win.

We had friends over on friday night to play games (a game called "Apples to Apples" and then a round of Trivial Pursuit in which Aliza and I were creamed...), and then on saturday out to Chris's house in brooklyn for another little soire. I ate tostitos for dinner both nights. All the chips have mashed up in my colon and become this immovable mass. I can eat nothing but Broccoli for the rest of the week if I ever wanna get regular again...

But seriously, Chris's girlfriend Vania makes the best dip for chips ever. Seriously, no joke. The best. That is probably why I ate seventeen economy sized bags of Tostitos...

Yesterday was nice. Once we got out of bed we began the joyous task of registering. We walked over to this gigantic Crate and Barrel over on broadway and Houston. On the way we found ourselves walking behind an "ex" of Aliza's, who was also going into Crate and Barrel. So we had to duck out of sight and go to H&M to look at T-shirts for a bit until we thought it safe to go back to Crate and Barrel. Childish, I know, but really I got no need to be making awkward chit-chat with some doof that Aliza used to date. Plus, he was like 8 feet taller than me, so that makes it even worse. But he had dumb hair and wore a motorcycle jacket, which makes him uncool, so that part was okay.

After we registered (we did well with baking stuff, but lousy with everything else) we went and bought something to grow in the flowerpot that used to house the plant that Aliza recently killed (Some friends of hers refer to her as "scorched earth" after a plant sitting mishap from a few years back). Then we went and had a late lunch at some Italian place near our apartment with all these wide open breezy windows. It was so beautiful and sunny out, and the food was good, and we'd accomplished one of the ka-jillion tasks we still have to do for this wedding, so I felt really really good. If I didn't have a concrete ball of corn chips sitting in my gut it would have been perfect.

Went home, hung out, wrote some cards to my groomspeople, and drew Gabagool pages while listening to Joe Frank on NPR. I don't know why I like listening to his show. Usually it is nothing but whiny self-centered people telling whiny self-centered stories about themselves, but for some reason I find it to be fascinating. Aliza hates it. It is like her sunday night torture, as I listen to it in the bedroom late at night while she tries to sleep.

These frickin' archives aren't working yet. I dunno how to fix this shit...

Don't worry though, I didn't say anything interesting in any of the posts that aren't shown on this page. This page is the A-list stuff...

Okay, so I've got a little under three weeks to draw roughly seven pages, and do the cover for Gabagool! 4. I think I can do it, I average about a page every two days or so, but I wish I didn't feel rushed. I want it to be pretty flawless, since I'm gonna go to the bother of printing it for real. Ah, what can you do though? The deadline is a good thing. I told Aliza that she needs to let me work hard of the comic for the next couple of weeks, and then after that I'll be all hers for getting the wedding in order.

So far: We have decided on a DJ, and said we want to use her. No contract done yet.

We booked the photgrapher. She seems pretty cool, and she's tall, so that will hopefully mean we'll get some nice shots where you can see a lot of people. There are a few shorties on my side of the family, and Aliza's side doesn't run too tall either, so it should work out.

We have a caterer. We like their stuff. They do a lot of cool hors d'ourves, which is all we're having. My favorite is this little proscuitto wrap with arugula, some kind of cheese, and raspberry jam. I know, I know, sounds a little odd, but the combination is delish.

Aside from that we are scrambling. We still got some time, but it just sounds like there's so much left that needs doing. I swear, all's I wanna do is say "I do" (actually, it's "I will" apparently) and dance my first dance song, and get me to Mexico.

Some talk last night with some friends about bachelor parties. I have mixed feelings. I think a night or a weekend with my boys will be a blast, as long as I can get good and fucked up. Not sure about strippers though. I dunno about being the center of attention at any kind of place of ill repute. I tried to explain last night that the part about strip clubs that I don't like is when they come over and solicit you. I don't mind when they're up on stage being all nudie, but I've never been able to get over the part where I know that the only reason they talk to me is 'cos they want my money. They are like hot sexy bums, asking me for a dollar, and letting me slip it in their crack as a treat to me. I have to get over this, I know, and be a real man. 'Cos in all honesty, most strips clubs that I've been to, well I've probably been one of the most attractive guys in there. The Strippers Bums are probably happy to come sit on me for a change, rather than the Herbs who normally hang out at those places hollerin' and yellin' and being way less cool and "with it" than I am...