Live From The West Coast.

Just flew back from California, and boy are my arms tired. Ba-dump-bump-pssh. The trip was a mixed bag.

First of all, American Airlines sucks, let's get that out of the way right now. I had a connecting flight, which I hate. In the interest of saving money I let them put me on such a flight, but I won't again. Every flight coming and going was delayed. Every one. The connections were horrible, especially the flight back. Everybody was in the waiting areas looking like refugees, trying to make it home.

Speaking of the flight home, they (American) wouldn't let me extend my stay on the West Coast (they said that if I missed my flight, they'd cancel the ticket and I'd have to buy a one-way ticket home all over again for $600) so I missed the Basquiat retrospective in Los Angeles completely, which devastated me.

(The ticket was purchased before I found out about the Basquiat exhibit; if I'd known, we would have scheduled it accordingly.)

On the up side, went to Comic-Con for the first time. My God, what a huge show! I've been to cons before, but this was mammoth. Yes, I met my favorite comic artist of the moment, ASHLEY WOOD (top). Pretty cool guy I suppose. I was such a fanboy. Not too many people impress me like that anymore. People come up to me as a DJ and act that way, now I know what it's like.

The rest of the show was great too. Took a few pics (including one with Ron Glass from "Barney Miller" and "Serenity" pic three), talked to some of my favorite childhood comic artists and writers, even saw some old friends, like Dave from the former Dave's Comics in Royal Oak. He had a table there. It was so great to see him, I almost shed a tear. Turns out he opened a new store way out in outlying Michigan somewhere, far from Detroit.

I'm really inspired to draw some more. I went to the Con and got my eyes blown out. These new kids out here are out of control, art-wise. Real rock stars. Lots of graf and manga influences even in mainstream DC and Marvel comics. And they dress like fucking rock stars, too. Super-cool brothas with dreads flying all over the place.

I guess I should talk about the gig itself, the reason I was there in the first place. =)

First of all, after the hell flight getting out there (I'd been up since 5 am), nobody picked me up from the airport. I ended up having to call my friend Gina from a payphone to come get me (she's the one that bought me that book for my b-day). That wasn't cool. Turns out the the promoter, rather than parking his car and actually coming in the airport like one does when they're PICKING SOMEONE UP FROM THE AIRPORT, stayed in his car--and out of sight-- the whole time (????). He kept calling my cell, which was dead due to the long flight out there. He finally appeared, but then Gina got there. And she's prettier ;-)

He later made it up to me by taking me to sushi dinner which was the best sushi I've ever had, and remember I've eaten sushi all over the world, including Tokyo. The place was called Sushi Ito. It was right on the main drag. The streets were crowded, everybody out having fun, San Diego was jumping.

The hotel was weird, though, it was a refurbished YMCA with shared bathrooms. They didn't have a pool, either, grrr. The only reason I didn't throw a diva fit was because I knew that all the hotels were booked due to Comic-Con, so I made do. It wasn't so bad once you got used to it. I kept meeting all these interesting comic-book people in the elevator and I heard somebody next door, fucking. =)

The party was pretty cool. The people there were so nice, coming up to you, saying hello. You don't get that anywhere else in the USA anymore, really. I guess my return was long-anticipated. Make a long story short, I lost power to the DJ set-up, twice. The club's circuit breakers kept shutting everything down. After the second time, people had started leaving and the vibe was gone, so I just played records 'till the end. Kinda disappointing, especially since we were recording the set. But the people who stayed were very enthusiastic! I appreciated that a lot.

Despite the glitches, though, it was a cool time, just because of the people. So happy and un-jaded. Lotta love out there on the West Coast.

On the plane back, I ended up meeting Margot Kidder's manager. She was Lois Lane in the "Superman" movies. He does all her convention appearances. In fact, he represents most of the casts of "Superman" 1 & 2. Interesting guy. He'll be here for Wizard World Con next month with Margot, we may hook up. It would be great to meet Lois Lane!