But I haven’t studied French since high school and we never got to the rude words so I’m trusting them on this one. But I digress.

• The FIBD in Angoulême apparently decided that all of the idiocy it went through in the runup to this year’s festival wasn’t enough, and decided that as long as there are pooches to screw then par Dieu, they were gonna screw ’em. It seems ridiculous to say, but the big awards ceremony at Angoulême kicked off by presenting fake awards to unsuspecting creators and then pulling the metaphorical rug out from under them because … comics?

  The invaluable Brigid Alverson¹ has the best summary of the events, including a reasonably heartfelt apology from the host who perpetrated the cruelty, and the quote from FIBD president Franck “there are no notable women in the history of comics” Bondoux declaring that the conteremps is all our fault because they got caught being enormous dicks instead of being able to pretend it didn’t happen². Oh, wait, I was paraphrasing … the actual wording was The problem is the dictatorship of the tweet.

  No kidding, I’m wondering who in the world of comics will be willing to show up next year. The only thing I can see that will prevent name creators from abandoning Angoulême in droves is for Bondoux and his entire staff to be replaced (bitterly complaining, of course, that nobody can take a goddamned joke). I’ve always wanted to see the FIBD in person, but now you couldn’t pay me to go.

• While we’re in Europe: Rene Engström has been largely absent from webcomics for a number of years; Sofa Rap Art got taken down a while back due to the intervention of evil scammers, and last we heard from her and partner Rasmus Gran, they were expecting a child. Engström’s telling us what having a toddler around is like in her Hourly Comics today (starting here), and we have news that her most famous comics work is on its way back:
  

  Starting on the 4th of February, 6 years to the day the series first ended, I will be republishing Anders Loves Maria with both old and new content.

  The schedule will be roughly 1-2 pages per week initially.

  New ALM, y’all. Read it again for the first time, hooray!

• Speaking of February anniversaries:
  

  .@dinosaurcomics is 13 years old today! I HAVE A TEEN.

  IF YOU HAD REPRODUCTIVE SEX WHEN I STARTED MY COMIC YOU COULD ALMOST HAVE A TEEN TOO

  Congratulations on your strip anniversary Ryan and also for not making the passage of time seem creepy at all!

• And to finish things up, the inimitable Dante Shepherd (so don’t even try imit him!) has taught me about a concept that kept me from ever taking a second class in thermodynamics back in my college days³, one that befuddles the bejabbers out of more than a few baby engineers: fugacity.

  His latest science comic is the one that gave him the idea for a series of scientific-concept comics in the first place, the reason that he went out and got a grant to produce ’em, so it’s kind of a big deal. Hey, Dante, let me know if you want to get around to talking about Nyquist’s ratio or Shannon’s Figure 1 for the next set of science comics. They can’t all be about smelly stuff in tanks and columns.

Spam of the day:

Our processing center is waiting for your response

A response on a VA loan that I don’t have because I wasn’t ever in the military? Yeah, you’re gonna be waiting a while longer.

_______________
¹ Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin has yet to check in, and we’ve been asking him to deal with a lot of complete and utter stupidity and I completely understand if he wants to give this one a miss in the interests of mental health.

² As I said, my high school French is rusty, but I can make out the meaning of Bondoux insisting on le droit à l’impertinence.

³ Aside from the fact that electrical engineers were only required to take one thermo class, and one fluid dynamics class, and there’s no rational reason to take any more of either. I bet he hasn’t taken even one class in communications systems, so he shouldn’t be getting too full of himself.

I would have been willing to spend two or even three of my Not My Circus, Not My Monkeys coins but it turns out blizzards (70.3 cm of snow!) don’t work that way. My spine and I are going back to bed as soon as we’re done here.

• Scott McCloud will be teaching a two day class on comics at the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art on 20 – 21 February (that’s a Saturday and Sunday) in Van Nuys, California. It’s US$495 for the course, but it’s probably equivalent to at least a semester’s worth of classes at Art School™ if you want to make comics, so jump on that.
• First noted during the blizzard thanks to the work of Fleen Senior French Correspodent Pierre Lebeaupin, cartoonist extraordinaire Boulet had released a do-it-yourself avatar-o-matic, the products of which I’m already starting to see pop up on Twitter. I’ma have to play around with this.

  FSFC Lebeaupin is also staying on top of the ongoing Angoulême story, and we’ll be looking to him for his reactions on the eventual winner of the Grad Prix, and whether or not the voters take the opportunity to leave off for a year.

• This makes so much sense I’m surprised it didn’t happen before today: Angela Melick, engineer and cartoonist, now has a Patreon. Jam’s one of the best — do support her.
• Of course Jim Zub is announcing another series that he’ll be writing for Marvel (Thunderbolts this time). It’s what he does.
• Diana Nock (of Intrepid Girlbot fame) is launching a new webcomic, Wonderlust, today-ish, with five pages, so be sure to scroll back to the beginning. It’s too soon to make a recommendation, but Nock’s past work makes this worth a look.

There’s a new Science Comic from Dante Shepherd, this one illustrated by Matt Lubchanksy on the topic of heat exchangers.

Spam of the day:
So, you guys know that I’ve been in an ongoing dispute with Verizon, which is why it’s especially amusing that they sent this:

Jonas is coming, are you ready?
The most common storm-related occurance is a power outage which can affect your Fios® by Verizon services.

Consider:

1. I don’t have FIOS. They know this, despite the fact that they’ve been trying to upsell me FIOS in lieu of fixing my DSL, and oh yeah — FIOS isn’t available in my area.
2. They sent this oh-so-helpful prep email approximately 03:11 on Sunday, after the snow had been stopped for some six hours.
3. They sent it again twelve hours later.

So in addition to an ongoing dispute, Verizon apparently believes I have the ability to go back in time by 36 – 48 hours.

But first, everybody knows that there’s a new Emily Carroll cartoon today, yes? I swear, each story that she puts out is somehow creepier than the one before, and Some Other Animal’s Meat is no exception. She gets more mileage out of one slightly wobbly line, one miniscule suggestion that Something Is Slightly Off (leading to the inevitable truth that Something Is Seriously Off And We’re All Screwed And/Or Doomed) than other horroristas get out of entire novels. 10/10 would be scared witless again.

• It has been about ten months since we pointed you to the fact that Boum was translating her La Petite Révolution into English and running it two pages per week as a webcomic. A Small Revolution had its big gut-punch climax a couple of days back, but today is the day that it wraps up. There’s been plenty of downs and precious few ups along the way, but there’s an odd potential for hope at the end of the tale.

  Revolutions lead to struggle and strife and sacrifice and disquiet¹, trees watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants; yet this particular watering might just lead to a society where just waterings are no longer necessary². Maybe all that happened was one sufferer exacted a price from those that made her suffer. Read the whole thing through.

• The Cartoon Art Musuem continues their cartoonist-in-residence program, as well as their new event-hosting partnership with the FLAX art & design retail concern at their location in the Fort Mason Center for Art & Culture. Specifically, they will be hosting Matt Harding on Saturday, 13 February, from 1:00pm to 3:00pm; the event is free and open to the public, and further details may be found here.
• It’s been a year since Exploding Kittens launched its Kickstarter campaign that became one of the biggest crowdfund deals ever. Not much you can do to surpass that, so why not try? Today marks the launch (iPhone only, booo) of the slightly modified³ Exploding Kittens play-against-your-friends app, with all in-game purchases discounted down to zero for the next four days or so.

  The only way I can think to damage your friendships more than playing Exploding Kittens would be to do so on an app, or to take up Scrabble. Those of you with iDevices, give ‘er a look while those of us with Androids look on sorrowfully from outside in the cold and snow where we’ll die of misery. Have fun without us!

Spam of the day:

Directory of engineering programs available here! Start your search to earn a degree!

I’ve had an engineering degree for more than 25 years, Bunky.

_______________
¹ And they aren’t revolutions until they do; cf: John Adams, on the Congress’s argument as to whether or not to be so rude as to refer to George III as a tyrant, This is a revolution, dammit! We’re going to have to offend somebody!

² I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Painting and Poetry Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine. John Adams, in a letter to Abigail Adams, 12 May 1780

³ It lacks NOPE! functionality, booo.

It’s a good day for those of you that travel to the northerly climes for comics conventions featuring indy-type creators, and are interested in discovering exactly who the guests of such cons would be. Let’s take ’em from North to South, earlier to later, and smaller to larger.

• We mentioned that there was going to be a small convention in Juneau, Alaska, under the aegis of Pat Race and Alaska Robotics about two weeks back. Race has now put up a dedicated site for what is now dubbed Alaska Robotics Mini-Con and the associated camping trip, to be held 22-26 April.

  Confirmed guests appear to have been heavily pulled from those that Race has brought to Juneau over the past couple of years for spotlight appearances; the fact that they’re willing to make the long trek to Juneau speaks well towards how AKR treats its guests. So if you’re in the land of whales ‘n’ bears in April you’ll be likely to meet Kate Beaton¹, Vera Brosgol, Tony Cliff, Amy Kibuishi, Kazu Kibuishi, Dylan Meconis, Ryan North, and Raina Telgemier.

  Joining them will be musicians Seth Boyer, Marian Call, and Molly Lewis, as well as Georgina Hayns and Jeremy Spake from Studio Laika (they’re responsible for the puppet and armature manufacture behind such films as Coraline, ParaNorman, and The Boxtrolls), and superlawyer to the artistic world Katie Lane. After the convention on Saturday, the artists head off camping for a creative retreat, with a limited number of spots for [aspiring and accomplished] artists who want to attend.

  Best of all, AKRMCon has the best first-year show harassment policy I’ve ever seen:

  Many conventions have harassment policies and we feel like it’s important to approach this event in the spirit of inclusion. We love the many varied groups and fandoms that congregate at comic conventions we’ve attended and we want everyone to feel safe and welcome at our convention. If anyone makes you feel unsafe or goes out of their way to make you feel uncomfortable, let us know. We’ll feed them to the bears. [emphasis mine]

  I call upon every convention in the world to adopt this sanction for jerk behavior; f you don’t bears, put the offenders in a box and ship ’em to Juneau with a note asking Pat Race to help and I’m sure he’ll do you a solid.

• Some three weeks later, many of those that were at AKRMCon will be making their way southeast about four time zones to Toronto for TCAF, who have just announced their first eight featured guests. Kate Beaton will be there, of course, along with Duncan Fegredo, Lisa Hanawalt, MariNaomi, Sean Phillips, Michel Rabagliati, Chip Zdarsky, Japanese vulva sculptor Rokudenashiko (really! look her up, she’s super cool!).

  The exhibitor list is too extensive to copy here, but it’ll include Lucy Bellwood, Tony Breed, the Boston Comics Roundtable, Anthony Clark, Eric Colossal, Tony Cliff, Rachel Dukes, Mike Dawson, Sophie Goldstein, John Green, KC Green, Megan Rose Gedris, Meredith Gran, Nick Gurewitch, Der-shing Helmer, Mike Holmes, Kori Michele Handwerker, Alex Heberling

  [inhale]

  Ananth Hirsh & Yuko Ota, Abby Howard, Dustin Harbin, Faith Erin Hicks, Kel McDonald, Erika Moen, Angela Melick, Sfé R Monster, Tom McHenry, Hope Nicholson, Ryan North, Em Partridge, Ryan Pequin, Carey Pietsch, MK Reed, Sarah Winifred Searle, Kean Soo, Tessa Stone, Ben Towle, and EK Weaver. Oh, and also publishers Drawn + Quarterly, Iron Circus Comics, Koyama Press, and Retrofit Comics.

  Also professional terrible person Karla Pacheco, who should not — repeat, NOT — be allowed in the same space as Tony Breed and/or Chip Zdarsky if we (as a people) wish to avoid unpleasantness. Like, international incident unpleasantness.

  As in past years, TCAF, will take place at the Toronto Reference Library, 789 Yonge Street, on 14 (9:00am – 5:00pm) and 15 (11:00am – 5:00pm) May, and it free and open to the public.

Spam of the day:

Your life is at stake: I’m Offering you My special ritual to remove the negative energetic vibration in your home — Adrian Medium – Mentalist – Master Hypnotist – Prophetic Expert

Can you tell what I’m thinking at you right now, Adrian? Here’s a hint: it starts g-o-a-t-s-e.

________________
¹ Beaton’s travel distance from Nova Scotia to Juneau will be approximately 5000 km, greater than the distance to London, Madrid, Havana, or Mexico City.

Sorry about that — the hosting facility that brings you Fleen was down from approximately 23:30 14 January (last Thursday) until 20:30 15 January (last Friday), and thus we weren’t able to update on Friday. It also appears that when the server came back, Thursday’s update was lost, meaning that news relating to my holy book, Abby Howard, the Cartoon Art Museum, and multiple creators whose comics are coming to film would be lost to the ages.

Except for VaultPress. Their service pings this page pretty much continuously, and when there are changes they are automatically recorded. It was the work of a moment to find the backup taken after Thursday’s update and to restore it to its proper place¹. Heck, as I am writing this the restored site and the draft that I am partway through writing are being backed up in case anything goes wrong again.

Honestly, if you run a WordPress install of any kind, you really should be using VaultPress (their simplest plans are five bucks a month; I pay ’em more for a greater degree of confidence and automation). They don’t pay me to say that, I just think that they’re a damn good service and worth every penny they charge.

• Professional terrible person Karla Pacheco (she’s a lot of fun to drink with!) has a lot of irons in various fires: the most inappropriate children’s book ever, naughty, naughty pirates, and a vagabond lifestyle of boats and comics. In keeping her fans (I know! crazy!) up with the latter, she posted her convention schedule for 2016 and inadvertently let us all in on a key piece of information: TopatoCon 2016 will take place 22-23 October. Seriously, she even scooped TopatoCon’s own site on that one. Start making your plans for *hampton, MA in late October — the cocktail competition we had was such a hit, we’re sure to do a repeat variation of some kind.
• We mentioned the Penny Arcade Kickstart to fund a live-action webseries of Automata, and in what’s nearly world lans speed record time for the entertainment industy², filming has gotten underway and they’ve shared with us costumed photos of their leads with bios.

  Given a series length of five episodes each at 10 – 12 minutes, principal filming may well be done in a week or so (it probably depends on complexity of locations and set dressing as much as anything). Then the long process of post-production and effects generation starts, but I’m guessing they may have rough footage to share at PAX South later this month and possibly a finished episode or two by PAX East in the spring.

• The National Cartoonists Society is soliciting nominations for its various division awards, including (for the fifth year) those in the webcomics sphere. Deadline for nomination is 7 February and in the interests of disclosure I’m part of the consulting committee again this year and will be doing my best to make sure that the best work of the past year makes it to the final ballot.

  Like any institutional awards structure, the NCS division awards are not always going to go to what I personally think is the best work, and no winner is going to satisfy everybody (unless we manage to find the webcomics equivalent of Mad Max: Fury Road), but the odds are better when you participate. So if you can think of longform or shortform webcomics that did stellar work in calendar year 2015 that you think I might not have otherwise noticed, make with the comments.

For reals though, back up your shit³. Like, today.

Spams of the day:
Three messages, all coming from the same source (or at least, all claiming the same, likely bogus, contact address to stop being emailed, ha ha ha):

Is alcohol affecting your life? Search for rehab centers here
Senior Independent-Living May Be The Right Choice-For You
Are you in need of – treatment for an addiction

So apparently I’m in the throes of alcohol use disorder and need treatment and/or a stint in a rehab center, preferably one catering to still-active senior citizens. I can’t wait to figure out what combination of click-tracking led them to that conclusion, but it’s probably somehow Facebook’s fault. Fucking Facebook.
_______________
¹ Okay, it took a moment to find the appropriate backup, about 15 minutes to completely restore the site to the appropriate point in time, and about 2 minutes more to fix the header image.

² Seriously, if this was done through the Hollywood studio system, midlevel executives would still be holding cocaine-and-hookers “meetings” to figure out exactly how much they could pad the production budget to cover cocaine and hookers.

³ To quote the oh-so-quotable R Stevens: I named my hard drive DAT ASS so I remember to always back it up.

What’s this package with no return address and a mess of British stamps on it?, I asked myself. One quick rip of the opening strip later, I had an answer: my personal philosophy encapsulating notebook, courtesy of Stefan Johnson’s Book Block Kickstarter campaign; a bit late, but absolutely exactly what I wanted in all of its Figure 1 glory. This is enough to make me carry a sketchbook to conventions again.

And, per the letter included with the delivery, the Book Block team are gearing up to launch a commercial upload/customization service in the coming months; keep your eyes on www.bookblock.com in the near future if you want to get in on it.

• I realize that January is not, traditionally speaking, an especially spooky time of year (Straubian efforts notwithstanding), but there’s a nice bit of info for those of you that are interested in good, hearty scares. Namely: Abby Howard (whose The Last Halloween just pulled an eleventh-hour reversal on us and now I have no idea where the story is going, in the best possible manner) has announced a new website for her short horror projects, which makes it easy to find some really great work. Bookmark Terror Town to get your short- to mid-length startles on, which so far has features Howard teaming up with writers.

  I love Howard’s take on what’s truly scary, but seeing her work in somebody else’s voice makes it somehow even more unsettling — I’ve perhaps gotten used to how Howard would develop a scene and to see her pictures following a different pace and progression makes everything more a surprise. And you can purchase these comics for your very own in both digital and physical forms, so you’re helping Abby make a living being Abby, which is the very best thing you can do. Check ‘er out.

• The Verge has a nice roundup of upcoming comics adaptations to film and/or TV, as compiled by one of my favorite former writers at The AV Club, Tasha Robinson. Of particular interest to those of us that dig the web-slash-indy comics scene: Kazu Kibuishi’s Amulet¹, Ursula Vernon’s Castle Hangnail², Scott McCloud’s The Sculptor³, Jeff Smith’s RASL⁴, and the omnipresent Noelle Stevenson’s Nimona⁵.
• Continuing their involvement with the community while awaiting a new home, San Francisco’s Cartoon Art Museum is about to have the first of a traveling series of events to be held on the third Thursday of the month, hosted each time at a different Bay Area museum. The inaugural Traveling Third Thursday will be next week, 21 January, at the Museum of the African Diaspora in Yerba Buena.

  The program runs from 5:00pm to 8:00pm, and is free and open to the public. This first event will feature Ajuan Mance, CM Campbell, and Myisha Haynes; those attending can pick up a wristband at MoAD good for all-night happy hours at area bars and restaurants. For info on events in the coming months, visit thirdthursdaysf.wordpress.com.

Spam of the day:

It will flop out of his pants and into you

Oooo, floppy. That’s not half-hearted and mediocre at all!

_______________
¹ With book 7 getting ready to release, this one’s got franchise written all over it.

² From her kids-lit career as opposed to her webcomics career, but man it would be great to get a Digger adaptation.

³ That’s gonna take an SFX budget and a half.

⁴ I love RASL but where the heck is our BONE movie Hollywood do you hate making money or something.

⁵ About which enough good can never be said.

Rassin-frassin Verizon throttling me down to 2585 kbps and now they’ve got me down to friggin’ dial-up speed¹. And on top of that I made a major mistake in logic in yesterday’s post so be sure to click back and read the correction. Is there any good news today?

• Actually, yes. Today is the day that we acknowledge the birth and continued existence of the very sexy R Stevens Three. Long may he continue to consume oxygen, coffee, and the envy of weak mortals that require sleep. Stevens, of course, is ever-changing, ever-adaptable, and ever-present wherever webcomics are known, and thus will be figuring out new guerrilla marketing strategies for viral merch after the rest of us are food for worms. Let us praise him with great praise, may his deeds never be forgotten while the thrones of the Valar endure!²
• Speaking of good news, I finally noticed the back cover of Invader Zim issue #6 — written and drawn by KC Green and available at fine comic shops near you since last Wednesday — wherein I learn that Green’s Graveyard Quest (the last long story arc from the now-finished Gunshow) is fixin’ to be published by Oni Press. I’d known that, I’d even written about it, but I’d completely forgotten it. Thank you, house ad on the back of Invader Zim #6, for letting me know we’re a mere eight weeks or so away from the Graveyard Quest print collection!
• And speaking of webcomickers and work that will appear in the spring, news came today that MoCCA Fest (the 14th iteration of same) will feature a show poster by none other than Noelle Stevenson, and boy is it purty to look at. As a reminder, MoCCA Fest will be in its second new home in two years (owing to last year’s space getting snagged for condos, screw you runaway NYC residential real estate market), the Metropolitan West event space, at about 12th Ave (way far west) and 46th. Panels will take place at the Ink48 hotel at 10th & 48th.

Spam of the day:

What would happen to your family if you died today gary.tyrrell?

I’m guessing a massive party with hookers and blackjack. Why? You got a good supply of either?

_______________
¹ Seriously, I’m metering out at 28 to 40 kbps right now.

² I seem to be channeling Aaron Diaz, the Latin Art-Throb.

There were a few other things (some of which got displaced by yesterday’s dumbassery) so let’s talk about them, yes?

• Jess Fink has finished — for the second time, no less — the ongoing story of Chester 5000 and the people who built him, love him, and love each other. It started off as straight Victorian robo-erotica (that old saw) way the heck back in 2008 but quickly became something more. It wasn’t just about heaving bosoms sprung free of corsets and a startling array of gadgets put to increasingly hot use; it was about neglect and jealousy and absorption and fury and reconciliation and forgiveness — it was about love.

  And then in 2011, Fink went back and told both what came before and what’s happened since the original run of Chester; subtitled Isabelle and George, it dealt with the characters in even greater depth, added a dash of adventure and vengeance, and gave us a better idea of who these people (Chester himself appears less and less as the story goes along) really are. It’s full of heart, completely lacking in dialogue, and immediately engrossing. Not to mention hotter than hell. Thanks for letting us ride along for the last 300 or so pages, Jess. Here’s hoping that we get a print collection of Isabelle and George to go alongside the first Chester collection.

• We mentioned not too long ago the Voltron-like collaboration of KC Green and Shmorky to make some animated bumpers for [adult swim]. Via Shmorky, we now have a collection of GIF clips from the other bumpers (ten in all), which are conveniently collected for your viewing pleasure at NerdSpan
• From the Big Damn Numbers department, today is as good as day as any to declare an end to Child’s Play 2015; per the CP site (which hasn’t changed for the past couple of days), the lifetime fundraising total for the campaign sits at a little north of forty million damn dollars. Taking into account data from previous years, the history of Child’s Play looks like:
  

  2003: $250,000
  2004: $310,000
  2005: $605,000
  2006: $1,024,000
  2007: $1,300,000
  2008: $1,434,377
  2009: $1,780,870
  2010: $2,294,317
  2011: $3,512,345
  2012: $5,085,761
  2013: $7,600,000
  2014: $8,430,000
  2015: $6,438,053
  Total as of 7 January 2016, the arbitrary end of CPXIII: $40,064,723

  So, in case you were wondering what it looks like when Child’s Play doesn’t raise more than the prior year, it looks like they still raised almost six and a half million. If that counts as failure, we could all use some more failure in our lives and endeavours.

• New show alert: Pat Race, the never-still creative force behind Alaska Robotics, has with some partners brought a bunch of indy/web comics types up to Juneau, Alaska for talks, cultural events, and meet & greets; word on the street is that the creators have had a fabulous time, and the denizens of America’s least-accessible capital city have enjoyed ’em even more. So how to top a record like that? With a mini-con, naturally:
  

  I’m very happy to announce Alaska Robotics Mini-Con, a festival and artist camp taking place right here in Juneau from April 22-26th.

  Aaron, Lou and I have been hosting guest artists for several years through our work at the Alaska Robotics Gallery and JUMP Society as well as through partnerships with other non-profit organizations like the Friends of the Juneau Public Libraries. We’ve also spent many years attending and exhibiting at comic conventions and arts festivals. Encouraged by those wonderful experiences, we decided it was time for us to host our own tiny comic convention and artist getaway.

  I hesitate to even use the phrase “comic convention” when describing the event but those who have attended such things know that the term has grown to include a much more broad collection of pop and contemporary arts, games, music and more. We’re planning to embrace the spirit of those outside conventions but provide a far more down-to-earth, Southeast Alaska experience.

  The draft schedule calls for a one-day public event on Saturday, 23 April, followed by a two day artists camping retreat with a limited number of attendee slots — applications will open on 18 January. Look for a roster of guests in the near term but for now, if this sounds like fun, I’d say start looking into transport to Juneau before knowing the lineup; the on-faith, camping-centric thing works for MaxFunCon, and it ought to work as well for ARMCon. Given the talent that Race has attracted to Juneau in the past — Kate Beaton, Vera Brosgol, Dylan Meconis & Katie Lane — I’d bet on there being some killer guests hanging ’round the campfire under the northern lights.

Spam of the day:

Reverse your Blood Pressure in only 7 Days

If I reverse my blood pressure, doesn’t that make my entire cardiovascular system collapse? That doesn’t sound good. Then again, this particular bit of sparkling medical science (featuring the obligatory one weird food) came from an actual email address that I swear I am not making up: Dr. Dave <cretin @[redacted].date>. That’s just beautiful.

Hey, Franck? Franck Bondeux? I know that you think that women just haven’t ever made comics, and that your complete dismissal of considering even one woman for inclusion on the list of nominees for the Grand Prix d’Angoulême is therefore just logical¹, but let me help you out a little.

On the very same day that you decide there’s simply no notable women making comics for a lifetime, the cover of Ghosts, Raina Telgemeier’s next book — not due for nine months! — was released along with a brief excerpt. It wasn’t released to the comics press, it was released to Entertainment friggin’ Weekly because she’s that ingrained in the popular culture. But, you know, women haven’t made careers of comics.

Or maybe we could look at today’s announcement of Hope Larson’s upcoming series, Goldie Vance, a collaboration with Brittney Williams. That one ran in the LA Times, the paper of record of the popular entertainment capital of the world … but you can’t think of any women that have made contributions to comics.

Franck? I hate to say this, but you are not very good at your job. I’ll leave it to others to provide the extensive lists of names that support this argument (and seriously, Rumiko Takahashi is gonna surpass Tezuka’s lifetime page count before long), as there are so damn many of them running around today.

Just — just stop doubling down on the stupid, okay? Withdraw the award for 2016, let some other person start transitioning into your position, and they can do better next year. Because honestly, if you give out the Grand Prix this year, you’re gonna have to mark it with an asterisk that notes the severe dumbassery that surrounded this entire process.

Spams of the day:

Find Divorce lawyers here

Is there something that you know that I don’t?

Your name nominated to list of distinguished women of achievement

Seriously, is there something that you know that I don’t?

_______________
¹ In the most fedora-topped sense of the word.

One of which is basically today, so be sure to read this one quickly.

• Apologies for the lateness of this announcement, but I think it snuck up on all of us. We’ve mentioned previously that Christopher Baldwin has a forthcoming original graphic novel of Little Dee (in color!), roundabouts April or so. I’ve actually got a review copy here and will be sharing my thoughts closer to the release date. Now for the time-critical part of this announcement:

  As part of the deal for this new Little Dee story, the old books must be withdrawn from sale and today is your last day to buy them.

  If ever you wanted to get in on the print adventures of an adorable little girl, her wise bear friend, her loyal dog friend, and her terrible, terrible vulture kinda-sorta friend, do it now. You’ll have to pry my copies from my cold, dead hands.

• Also as previously noted, the Cartoon Art Museum is doing a spiffy job of keeping up programming even without a place to hang its collective hat, much less its extensive collection of cartoon art. To that end, they will be holding their first cartoonist-in-residence event since leaving their former home on Mission Street this weekend:
  

  On January 9, 2016 from 1:00pm-3:00pm, enjoy a family-friendly event in beautiful Fort Mason exploring the creative process of cartooning with Rachel Dukes and creative possibilities with FLAX at their new location, 2 Marina Boulevard.

  Rachel Dukes will be the first Cartoon Art Museum Cartoonist-in-Residence since the museum vacated its gallery space at 655 Mission Street, and will be the first artist in a series of traveling Cartoonist-in-Residence events in 2016. These events will be held throughout San Francisco in 2016 at creative institutions like FLAX, Comix Experience, Mission: Comics & Art, and Two Cats Comic Book Store.

  You may recognize Ms Dukes from her work for BOOM! or her own webcomics. She does good stuff, so if you’re anywhere near the Fort Mason area in San Francisco,the FLAX art & design store is where you want to be.

• On the far side of the continent, Jeph Jacques will be doing his own public talk in his new hometown of Halifax, Nova Scotia, at the Halifax Central Library. Fun starts at 7:00pm on Wednesday, 27 January, on the first floor. Halifax is one of those towns that have attracted more than the demographically-proportional number of comicker types, so who knows who else you might see in the audience? Actually, I have no specific knowledge and don’t want to mention names, lest I create false expectations, but you know — comics types go to catch up with each other, so keep your eyes peeled.

Spam of the day:

Enter the Computer Training Field – Get Degree Info.

You know that I’ve been in that field for more than twenty years, right? In terms of picking your victim, this is worse that the physical junk mail I’ve gotten the last two days running offering me Medicare plans, which ignore the fact that I am nowhere near 65 years old.

The scammier of the two — the one filled with dire warnings about OFFICIAL COMMUNICATIONS and PENALTIES UNDER FEDERAL LAW FOR FAILING TO DELIVER — just got sent back (I love prepaid postage) with a cheery Fuck off! scribbled in Sharpie.