Sent:  Tue 8/24/99 11:33 PM

Hello Again,

Or just plain "hello" for those of you just signing up after the San Diego Comic International.  If you couldn’t make it this year, I highly recommend it for next year.

We get a late start and head out to Denver International Airport (DIA) via the E-470 route. It’s a toll road, but well worth the $4.00 if you’re running late. It’s really worth it if you have to skirt around traffic on the ride home. We stop at Arbys for a quick meal to go, and then cruise on over to DIA. I’m travelling pretty light with a drag-bag, backpack, and an art tube. We say our good-byes quickly so Beth can go meet our nephew for an eye doctor appointment.

I couldn’t check in at the gate, because I had an E-Ticket that requires you to check in with everybody else who has bags. Maybe that’s just standard procedure now. I’m not sure. Why is it that when you’re waiting in line everybody else takes at least 10 minutes and I only require 3. Well I’m sure everybody else in line is thanking me for being organized enough to blaze on through. I suppose Disney set the precedent for long lines at the E ticket rides, eh?

This guy named Brad sat next to me on the plane. I thought I’d be able to get away with getting some work done, but we chatted a little about the comic and the upcoming convention. I don’t know if he’ll check out the web-site or not, but he seemed pretty interested in the project. He was heading out to San Diego to set up medical facilities that specialize in some sort of dialysis.

We touched down around 4:15 and I headed to the baggage claim and transportation area. I must have zipped by the courtesy phones that you’re supposed to use in order to sequester a ride to the hotel. Luckily somebody else did, and I didn’t have to wait long at the bus stop. I asked somebody that looked official if the Wyndham shuttle stopped at this stop, and he said yes; although he had no idea what its schedule was and when the next one would show up. I called Monte to let them know I was on my way and he said that they would wait for a while before going to the convention center. Some Italian guy was driving the shuttle and I could barely understand him, but what I did make out was that I needed to arrange for the shuttle back to the airport when I got there because they tend to fill up quickly.

Robert Rhett, from Boulder, CO (Big Bad Bob) showed up around 6:00 p.m. We were on the same flight, but he had to check his portfolio through as baggage. He does 1950’s pin-up type artwork. It’s very good stuff. Bob was able to drop his stuff off in 710 too, and then we headed down to Monte’s Durango and went to go set-up at the con.

It looks like there is about 6 lanes in front of the convention center, but 4 of them were being dug up. From the looks of things it will still be under construction next year too. Of course the convention center had to complicate things by having the unload procedure have about 1001 steps to it. We all nodded our heads, then drove on through as if we were going to park. We stopped, got out, and unloaded the truck in about a minute and then Monte went to find parking. So much for the "procedure".

I was still a little worried that the con was going to screw this part up too, but I was pleasantly surprised that I was pre-registered and my badge was "spelt" correctly. Although when I told them I was an exhibitor they proceeded to tell me that I had to go someplace else to register and pick up a different badge. Since Monte and crew have been coming here for a while, the lady who runs Artist Alley, Clydene, set everybody up with exhibitor sleeves. They’re just like the regular badge sleeves, but they’ve got "Exhibitor" in white on a neon green background. These get you where you want to go. As part of the deal, we had to give back our other sleeves, but we didn’t mind because they were pretty much worthless to us anyway.

I was pleasantly surprised again, because there was my Spilled Milk booth right across from Monte and crew. I also had a spot with them in Artists Alley, which Monte was able to finagle from Clydene. I thought being across from Monte would be the best bet. I think it was the better choice of the two. It didn’t take me long to set-up, because I only had three posters, the banner, and the 5’ x 5’ poster of CiCi deflecting bullets (Issue #2 pg 6). I was able to borrow a large flat box from Monte and mount it on top of one of their trunks. This raised the 5’ x 5’ poster about 4 feet from the ground, making it stand out very nicely. Monte gave me the original cover painting to display in my booth and he grabbed a stack of the promo cards for his booth.

We wrapped things up around 7:30 and were going to head to the Spaghetti Factory. We called the hotel (we, meaning I) and check to see if John Watkins-Chow (he writes and illustrates the comic Talismen) had made it in from Maryland yet. He answered the phone. He had no idea who I was, but I said we’d be picking him up out front in minutes. I had my token beer just to be sociable, and then stuck to Coke because I knew we’d head out to a movie afterwards. Since this was our first night, nobody had to do any sketches for people. The Factory was pretty loud so I missed the call from Beth, but I called when we got back to the hotel anyway just to let her know we’d be heading out to see The Sixth Sense. We walked about 4 or 5 blocks to the theater so we wouldn’t have to find a place to park.

The movie was pretty good. It kind of dragged on in some places, but it’s the end that gets you. Does that ruin it for you? Hope not. Go see it. It’s not that scary and there are only two gory scenes -- maybe three.

Alarm goes off at 8:00 a.m. sharp and we all drag out of bed. I didn’t get much sleep due to the fact that both John and Bob snore pretty heavily. John is much worse than Bob though.

I get the #2 at the café outside the Wyndham and we wolf breakfast down before the shuttle arrives. We get there a little after 9:00 a.m. and we walk right in. It’s all about the neon green badges. I had brought some more stuff with me, that I didn’t want walking away during the night. I brought the 11" x 17" booklets and the color proof copies. I forgot the frames for Monte’s pin-up and for the "FREE" sign. I also forgot gold pens and sharpies, but Bob hooked me up with those. I actually needed the gold pens, because I think two people asked me for my signature on the promo cards. Wow.

The foot traffic was kind of light so I resorted to standing in front of my booth handing out promo cards. That worked really well, because I gave one to whoever passed by. How could they pass up a FREE card? Well some did just because it was beneath them to carry anything and some just said, "Thanks, I already got one." I thought the large alleyway would attract more people but it was actually harder to hand stuff out, because people could sneak by occasionally or were distracted by Monte’s towering booth.

I was stunned that somebody wanted me to look at his portfolio. Who am I to judge what’s good and what’s bad; although I know what I don’t like. And his stuff didn’t suck. He did a series with the Flash in it, which was actually really good. The only things that I didn’t like were his conflicting motion lines on his arms. Some suggested that The Flash’s arm was moving up and down, and others suggested a circular motion. You get rid of either set of lines and things would look good.

I thought that these artists probably don’t have a web-site or even a single page for that matter. I told them if they drew my character, then I’d post it on my web-site for as long as I was in business. Along with their image I’d put all sorts of contact information so people could get a hold of them. Unfortunately I didn’t think of this until Friday, so I lost out on this guy. Hopefully if he’s reading this now, then he’ll draw my character and I’ll be able to put in on this site.

3:00 rolls around and I’m starving. I go across the alley and find out that the guys are just finishing up McDonalds. They had a cheeseburger left over so I ate that and liked it. Eventually I left my booth and grabbed a soft pretzel and a Coke from one of the vendors inside the convention center. Bob felt bad that he didn’t take my order, so I made him feel worse for the rest of the con. It was the least I could do.

This Todd guy dropped by my booth and his badge had Image Comics on it. I flipped through the colors and the inks and he asked me if I had submitted to Image or Dark Horse. I told him I submitted to Image in March, but I didn’t remember to whom I submitted the project. He said that they really dropped the ball on this one and that he would have somebody else come by and take a look. Don’t get your hopes up yet, because as it turns out nobody else stopped by. When Todd showed back up on Sunday, I asked him how he was affiliated with Image. It sounded like he didn’t have much pull with them, so I pretty much wrote him off.

The day flew by and my knees were killing me by the end. I must have talked all day. I was saying "Did’ja get one of these?… Check out the web-site." If you stood by me for any length of time then I sounded like a broken record. Once in a while somebody would stop and want to know more about the project so I reluctantly told them. At first I told them it had a lot of Nano-Tech in it and that I would actually try to explain the technology in the comic. Many people were content with that. Some people wanted to know the plot so I eventually told them. Yes that’s right, sooner or later (most likely sooner), I’ll post the plot and character profiles to the web-site or at least make it available through these exclusive updates.

One person commented that it was kind of like Transmetropolitan, but distinctly different. I was definitely relieved. I guess I’ll have to read that. My biggest worry is that somebody will say that the story is exactly like something that they’ve read. I guess I’ll just have to throw it out there and let it get picked apart. Most likely in the next update #7.

I think my biggest mistake I made on Thursday was that I didn’t utilize the empty booth next to me on the corner. I think if I had put a swarm of promo cards on that table, then people would have seen them and picked them up. Actually I think that was my second biggest mistake. My BIGGEST mistake, using my 20/20 hindsight was not asking Roxana to hand out my promo cards. She stopped by my booth dressed like Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. She said she’d check out the web-site and said the stuff looked cool. By the end of Friday she had a huge following. And by Saturday it was more like a mob. I mean she literally had a ton of people following her around asking to get pictures of her or with her. And all that time she could have been handing out my promo cards or at least her boy friend could have been. That would have been a good idea.

I met Sue, Otto, Claire, and Brian for dinner at a place just a block from the hotel. It was getting close to Otto’s birthday and that meant he had to get a kiss from a strange girl. I guess it’s sort of tradition. Bob and I were trying to convince Brian to ask this one girl to come over and kiss Otto. There was no convincing him until I asked him "what’s it gonna take?" as I reached for my wallet. After about a half an hour of trying to convince Brian; all it took was $5.00 and he was over there like a jack rabbit talking with the girls. I guess she was too shy to come over to our table. I don’t know why. So Otto had to go over to their table to get his kiss. Brian told me that next time it was going to cost me more. I told Brian that there might not be a next time.

Monte blew us all off at dinner, because he was having his with the Wizards of the Coast big wigs.

I don’t know how Bob did it, but he found an awesome greasy spoon called the Sun Café. An excellent breakfast for around $3.00.

It wasn’t about a half-hour into the con and security comes by and tells me that I have to be behind my booth. I can’t be handing stuff out in the aisles, because other people could be doing it and they might not have purchased booth space. Well unfortunately I was not quick with any comeback because I was totally shocked. After doing it all day yesterday, I was completely blown away that they were putting a halt to that. What a bunch of jerks. I thought that maybe I was being a fire hazard or something. But I had on an exhibitor badge. Apparently that neon green doesn’t mean squat to security. What a bunch of jerks. Oh yeah, I said that already.

I had to move some of my stuff from the vacant table, because a guy from Artists’ Alley was able to switch booths. That really sucked, because he had comics to sell and I didn’t. But then again nobody could compete with the free stuff. Especially when you tell them it’s free. They just can’t pass that up. I noticed a few of the other booths around me following my lead and saying things to the people walking by. Although this guy who just moved was "setting up" his web-site so he didn’t have one up and ready.

On one of my "breaks" I headed over to the DC booth and checked it out. I saw Travis Charest just sitting there. I talked with him a bit and told him that I really like his work. I said that I was back in one of the small press booths and told him that he should check out the web-site. He liked the card and said he would. I told him that I really liked his realistic style, but that I felt that J. G. Jones was on his heals or quite possibly ahead of him by a nose. He kind of laughed about that asked if there were any others that were about to "de-throne" him. I couldn’t think of any off the top of my head.

While I was milling around the Wildstorm area somebody asked me if I was with Wildstorm and if I could review a portfolio. This is when I thought up the good idea about displaying their artwork on my web-site. I said I was not affiliated with Wildstorm, but would like to look at the portfolio anyway. Why not, right? It was pretty damn good. I told him about the web-site deal and to get a hold of me after the con. (no word yet.)

A guy from Wizard came by my booth… Of course I had one of those instant daydreams about being interviewed by him and that my character would be the next Witchblade. As it turns out, he is an advertising rep. I had already talked to Allison James last year so I believe she handles the Denver area. Bummer, my dream was shot down.

Things were winding down a bit around 6:30 so I ventured out to the retailers to try and hand out more promo cards. I tried to make the conversations short, but they seemed to want to know more. I asked them if they could come by the booth tomorrow and check things out. Well none of them did. Hopefully they’re checking out the web-site. I wasn’t able to get to all the retailers so I would have to get back to them in the morning. At least everybody I talked with liked what they saw from the card and said they would check out the site when they had more time. I’m sure they’re all just swamped.

I sat across from Mike of Digital Broome and we talked the entire time. It was a great conversation. Meanwhile… Steve and Bob were trying to get the waitress to go to the comic convention on Saturday. Bob thought she had the 1950’s look (note the Y2K compliance) about her and she would be great for pin-ups. After a few napkin sketches she agreed to go around 5:00. (She didn’t show… imagine that) The bottom line was that Digital Broome does way better color than Digital Chameleon for half the price. It doesn’t take a Mathematician to figure that one out. Hey wait! I have a B.S. degree in Math!

We went across the street to see Bowfinger. I thought Eddie Murphy’s performance was better than Steve Martin’s.

"You mean you didn’t put your stuff on the free table!" – Steve Oatney.

Well I didn’t know about the free table until Friday night when Steve told me. There’s a free table on the upper mezzanine where you can hand a bunch of stuff to some guy and he’ll distribute it on the free table. I ended up handing the guy about 300 and he said that it would be plenty.

Otto came by early and said he’d hand out the promo cards. That was HUGE! He hit all the retailers. He even gave the golden and sliver age retailers a bunch. He said that everybody had a positive response to the card and that they would definitely check out the web-site. Yep, even the golden and silver age people. After he unloaded those, he went around handing them out to people. That was great too. He was also leaving piles of two or three near vacant computers. People would either see the web address or at least take a card and save it for later. The small pile ploy really worked at many of the tables. It was like somebody had a few and "accidentally" left them behind.

I took a break around 4:30 so I could look for Larry Marder. I heard he was at the Bean World booth and I wanted him to see the project. That was the plan. Otto came with me for moral support and we headed out on a mission. While looking for Bean World we came across the Digital Chameleon booth. I finally met Rick Nielson and Dan Brown who I talk with regularly, but have never met in person. They are actively working on the color revisions and have even started the lettering (this will be important for the next paragraph). So that means Issue #1 is almost in the can, and ready to go to printers. I didn’t stay long, because I was on a mission.

We found Bean World, but there was no Larry. Jim Valentino was in the booth so I asked his opinion of what I had so far. He liked what he saw, but he didn’t like the format of the packet I had sent Brent. He also proceeded to tell me that Image is very busy and doesn’t call people back. I pretty much understood that in my dealings with Brent. All I could say was that Brent told me to send him what I had, and that’s exactly what I did. Finally Larry showed up after I took a beating from Jim. My meeting with Larry was brief. All but five minutes. He said he liked it. "Get it lettered and I need to see it." Now I’m not sure exactly what that means in "Image" speak, but I’m going to give it a shot (again). I do remember that I need to put my contact information on every page. It’s almost like Image is admitting that they are the most unorganized people on the planet and will loose all but one page of your submission. Although "Overkill is better than no kill at all." (Alan B.)

That went as well as could be expected…

We wandered over to Wildstorm and saw Jim Lee. We waited for about three people to clear out and then he signed our free posters. He saw that I was carrying a stack of my promo cards and asked me what those were. I told him that I was back in small press and handed him a card with the back facing him. He liked what he saw and I told him to check out the web-site when he got a chance. He stared at the card for quite a while and then he said, "You must have gotten a lot of grief for your last name growing up". "Yeah, but I lived up to it," I replied. He laughed and said he’d check out the site. Then he packed up and bailed. That was waaay huge. I couldn’t believe the timing on that one. No line, and I was one of the last people to talk to him, so hopefully that made a lasting impression.

Brian was unimpressed that we met with Jim Lee. He had been at the booth for an hour and was not pleased. Although he did finish off my Reeses Pieces.

I forget what I had, but Chachi had the lasagna and a cheeseburger. He ate ‘em both. All the fries and even mopped up the sauce with a breadstick. Wow. Impressive.

I tried to be sneaky and pick up the check so Sue didn’t have to pay for us again. Although it was almost a done deal, but Otto squealed and Sue tried to stop me. It was too late. All the guys paid me back so their dinner was on us.

We tried to make it early to the con every morning, but it just didn’t happen. It would have been nice to wander around before everybody got there, but I had too much to do before the doors opened.

I went back to the free area to drop off more stuff. I looked around and didn’t see any of my promo cards. That means they must have run out on Saturday and that left me wondering when they actually ran out. I was under the impression that the amount I gave yesterday was more than enough by the look on the guy’s face who grabbed the stack. It wasn’t enough. I figured I’d go back to my booth and grab another couple of stacks just to make sure they didn’t run out. I saw piles of the same pamphlet spread out on many different tables so I felt that I could distribute my cards as I saw fit. I carefully put my stacks down on the different tables as to not alert the people behind the table. I was able to lie out a bunch of different stacks and then stand back and watch people grab them up. The free area was a success, at least on Sunday.

Only one person who I knew from the mailing list stopped by. Don’t worry, the costume will undergo a few modifications with the help of John Watkins-Chow and crew. The costume was a major topic on one of those nights and I explained exactly how I came up with it. I remember years ago Chris Claremont telling me that you need a cool logo and then everything else falls into place. I think I accomplished that, but the costume may undergo some revisions. I just don’t want to lose the female audience. I’m not exactly sure how big that is, but every little bit helps.

I was away from my booth for about an hour so I could win Chachi’s Wayne painting. In my opinion it was the best painting on the auction block (sorry Monte). You just can’t compete with Batman. I grabbed a Joker painting and a Darth Pikachu print signed by the artists. I got the non Batman pieces only because I got such a deal on the Wayne painting. Plus it all goes to charity J .

Otto runs by and says Jim Lee is back at the Wildstorm booth. I couldn’t really make it, but he was heading out anyway. He wasn’t even supposed to be today. Otto reports back after the signing and says that Jim Lee remembered my name and was going to check out the web-site.

The flight attendant asked if I had read The Dark Knight Returns. Well duh? Hasn’t everybody? I didn’t say that. I had a more polite response. I loved Frank Miller’s story, because I’m a huge Batman fan. If Superman ever gets out of line then you just have to bring Batman in and he’ll set him straight. It turns out that she used to work at a comic shop and read a bunch of Miller’s stuff too. Although she never read Batman: Year One, for shame. That’s what started this whole project. I wouldn’t be doing CiCi if it wasn’t for Year One.

The plane touched down. I was glad to be home. I was unable to catch up with Chuck and was so worried about getting my bag that I lost my tube of posters. I was bummed because this guy Art drew a pin-up of CiCi and now that’s gone! Hey Arturo, if you’re out there can you do another one? I hopeful that it will turn up at the DIA lost and found. Which reminds me, I need to call them again.

Well you made it! That wasn’t so bad; was it? For the people who wanted the promo post cards, that’s next on the agenda. I think I’ve got about 5,000 left over so there are plenty to go around.

Stay tuned and I’ll be updating the site with Character profiles and more artwork from issue #4. Jason was sorry he couldn’t make it to the con. I think it hurt his career more than it hurt this project.

Please feel free to comment on anything. If you thought something was funny please say so. It will help me as a writer. Even in the places where I’m trying to be funny. If something makes you LOL, or even chuckle, please say so.

Thanks for all your support,
Parker.