Warm and fuzzy

The Christmas season kicked off with our very own Annual Empoverished Cartoonists Xmas Party on Sunday. Dan and I duly set off on the Oxford tube and swelled the attendance numbers by 100%. A most pleasant day was spent in the excellent company of Paul Rainey and Pete Clack, while we hatched our plan to take the comic world by storm and consumed many pints of ale. And onion rings, made with real onion no less.
Fired up with enthusiasm for social contact, I dragged Dan over to Brick Lane last night, only to find I had misread the email and Ladeez Do Comics is scheduled for NEXT Monday... I made amends with a pint of stout.
The last month has flown by with a trip to Paris to pack up Ma's belongings, Thought Bubble, the move, organising the work on the flat, and even a fair few days of proper work.
Thought Bubble didn't disappoint, definitely the best con in England for small pressers, and the bestest party afterwards. The next day I mumbled pathetically through a short presentation to the Ladeez (some of them were men) – I hope to give a better performance some time in the future if they ever ask me again.

Punky reggae comic party

My first visit to Caption was a resounding success. After the usual shouting match, we headed off down the M40 on Saturday, Dan in the back and Richy K's stock in the boot. 45 minutes later, we rolled up outside the East Oxford Community Centre. The location was lovely and funky, run by a couple of sweet guys to the wonderful sound of classic roots reggae.
The communal table system worked very well: free to hang out with old mates, meet new ones, draw (a bit), and drink. And be really envious of Karen Rubins' position as Comic Artist in Residence at the V&A (couldn't have happened to a nicer person).
Garen Ewing's inspirational long journey to mainstream publication and Sarah Macintyre's look at children's picture books were the other two talks I made it to.
Nick got to chill out , drink beer, read the paper and get invited back to DJ there in October...

I got my hands on Paul Rainey's gem of a Book of Lists, laugh out loud funny and gleaming like a little jewell in glorious gorgeous glossy full colour. This is far more than some one-joke humour book, this is a portrait of a very engaging character, built up through an accumulation of little snippets of information, a judicious use of repetition, warm and wonderfully candid in its revelation. Above all it is human, I may not be a bald single middle-aged male, but I can identify with his anxiety, his anger, his embarrassment and his joy. Get youself a copy HERE.
And to cap it all, had we not stayed in such a ridiculously overpriced hotel, my sales would have covered our expenses...

Prolific or what?

I have just received Rob Jackson's marvellous Pasty Anthology through the post.
Jam packed full of mouth wateringly hilarious material from Rob, Jim Medway, Dave Hughes and more!
And did I mention that I contributed a few pages? get yourselves a copy here, you won't be disappointed!
At this moment I have newly published work in an astonishing number of comics, namely Richy K Chandler's excellent Bunch 2, Jim Medway's Garden Funnies 2, my own Sole Searching and now the Pasty Anthology bringing it to a total of four.
Ubiquitous, moi?
At 176 I picked up Part 9 of Paul Rainey's wonderful graphic novel There's no time like the Present, which keeps up the top quality of the series' storytelling and artwork. Get yourself a copy here.
And I finally got my hands on Undertow, Ellen Lindner's masterful, and beautifully drawn tale of delinquents, drugs and redemption set in sixties Brooklyn.

The Thing vs Schmurgencon

Saturday 28th March dawned and Richy K. and I set off for the wilds of Mile End, fortuitously hooking up with Sally Ann on the tube. We set up our wares on our very well-positioned table, next to Rob Jackson, and awaited the rush of punters. It was busier than last year, possibly due to it not being Easter weekend, with a fair amount of the traffic stopping at our table. At the end of the day, I sold all my copies of Striptacular and came away with a profit after table costs, which is a good result.
I picked up the latest Curtis and Terrorist from Oliver Lambden, Jake Harold's That Time I Went on a Trip to Berlin, Rob Jackson's Bog Wizards 2 (with board game!), Paul Rainey's No Time Like the Present part 8, Phil Spence's Reasons Why I'm Scared to Love You and Whores of Mensa 4.
All really good stuff – I will endeavour to review things more fully at some point.

We then moved on to Schmurgencon which was taking place in uncompromising fashion just down the road.
It was altogether a more intimate affair, involving a certain amount of liquid refreshment and experimental performance art. The mysterious Norwegian was nowhere to be seen, he was rumoured to have suffered some kind of accident...

Low Energy Day

Another brilliant day out with all the London Underground collective and all those other fab creators who made it to Camden on Saturday. A bit lighter on punters than the last one, no doubt due to the very warm weather (phew what a scorcher), so consequently not so lucrative. Not having any new product to push may have had some bearing on the matter too...
CLICK HERE to see more pics of the event.


Just finished part 7 of Paul Rainey's There's No Time Like the Present, a dystopian fantasy set in a Milton Keynes not a million miles from now, where time travel exists and the future is accessible online via the ultranet. Not normally a great fan of science fiction , I find this tale utterly gripping, as the story is just as much about two average blokes dealing with their frustration in an ordinary world and their inadequacy communicating with the opposite sex as it is about time travel. The characters and dialogue are written with a deadpan wit and Mr Rainey's beautifully clear drawings make it a pleasure to read.
Also got my hands on the new Bedsit Journal Issue 3 hot off the press, as well as the Dan Lester Mysteries.

Oli Rocks!

Did you have to eat that kebab, Oliver?
NO BARCODES was a resounding success. Between forty and fifty exhibitors showed up and mingled happily in an atmosphere of bonhommie and camaraderie, meeting old friends and new faces, checking out each others work, and even selling comics to passers by. I shared a table with the charming Marc Ellerby and sparkly Sally Anne Hickman who did very well with her very tactile productions - fur, flock and glitter certainly draw the punters in, there's a lesson for all of us here... Sean and Oli were on our table too but spent the day being mine hosts, introducing people, recording the event and running the regular stall round the corner.
Due to being stuck in the middle of a row, I had to squeeze past Jake H quite a few times as he beavered away inking his magnum opus. He never complained once and put us all to shame with his cheerful industriousness.
I met Paul Rainey whose excellent No Time Like The Present I had picked up in Bristol, I bought a copy of Tom Humberstone's My Fellow Americans, and sweet Mikey made me sing on camera (view the shame here) .

The very low table price meant there was minimal pressure and I imagine everyone will have recouped their costs,and made a profit, unless they travelled a very long way. The weather was clement and the rain held off and we all wandered round to the pub and downed pints by the canal feeling all warm and fuzzy from the good vibes.
And Ned finally got to meet Gary Northfield.