Yvette's Inner Geek Blog

I can now check these items off my Comic Con to-acquire list:

• 4-day Comic Con pass for me
• Thursday and Friday Comic Con pass for Ben
• Hotel reservation
• Airline tickets

The only thing left to acquire:

• More money (so that we can eat food, drink beer, and buy things while we’re there)

There’s still a lot of planning that needs to happen in the next couple weeks before our plane leaves at an ugly-ass early hour on Wednesday, July 23. If you’re lucky, you’ll get to read all about the glorious details. (Do I bring my favorite Teva sandals or sneakers? Or both? How can I maximize space for swag in my suitcase and still bring all the clothes that I need?)

I will definitely be bringing along my camera, cell phone, old laptop with wireless card, mini notebook, and pen. Which means that while I am splattering my geek saliva all over everything at the con like a Saint Bernard, I will also be taking copious notes, snapping photos like a madwoman, updating my Twitter feed via cell phone, and hopefully not being too exhausted to write a little about each day on this blog and maybe post some photos.

I did a little research and just discovered that the DC Comics talent search, which includes a free seminar and portfolio review, is just for aspiring artists. Writers are left with the old-fashioned way to break into comics: by hobnobbing with any editor they can corner at a booth and forcing sample writing and business cards down their throats.  Maybe I’ll be nice and round the corners of my business cards.

I won an eBay auction for a 4-day pass to the San Diego Comic Con!

It wasn’t a stellar deal compared to the face value, but reasonable compared to what some people are currently willing to pay the evil scalpers. Oh, I’m sorry, I meant to call them “people who are unfortunately unable to attend the event due to a wedding/flaky friend/business trip.”

Now I’ve paid my money and I am waiting quite anxiously to hear back from the seller, who has to contact Comic Con to transfer the registration. I don’t think that I can handle another post-elation-let-down, so I hope that all goes smoothly and I don’t have to track down a dishonest eBay seller and unleash the Brute Squad upon him/her.  Not that I’m preparing myself for the worst or anything.

It looks like Ben and I will be leaving on Wednesday, but the return date is still a tiny bit up in the air. Do we stay an extra day (with added hotel expense) to go to Sea World? If the Padres were in town over the weekend, we would definitely go to a baseball game… but they won’t play a home game until the Tuesday after the con.  And spending six nights in San Diego is not an option for us this time around.

Sigh. When you have the time to do the things you want to do, you rarely have the money. When you’re making  money, you rarely have time to do the things you want to do.

And sometimes, when you’re making money, you preorder books on Amazon that finally ship out (and are charged to your credit card) when you’re laid off. But what’s thirty bucks when it comes to graphic novel deliciousness?

These are my favorite comics that I have been reading as they come out in graphic novel form. I am a sucker for almost any re-imagining of fairy tales and folklore, even if the story ends up not being as well-written as I’d hoped it would be (not the case for “Fables”). And what’s not to love about the post-apocolyptic scenario of one man left in the world? Whose name is Yorick? I’m also a sucker for characters whose names start with the letter Y. (Except for the reference to prostitutes named Yvette and Yvonne in the musical “Miss Saigon.” My high school theater friends got a good snicker out of that back in the day.)

I LOVE that the titles of Fables and (spin-off series) Jack of Fables are yin-yang: “The Good Prince” and “The Bad Prince,” respectively. I can’t wait to find out if there’s a reason for that in the storyline.

Oh hey, comics talk got my mind off Comic Con for a minute! Oh. But now I’m totally geeking out about it again because I remembered that “Fables” writer Bill Willingham will be one of the Special Guests! Officially on my list of things to do in the remaining 17 days until Comic Con: create three great questions that I would ask Mr. Willingham if I have the opportunity to meet him there. Because the last thing I want to do is to ask for his autograph and just stand there drooling geek-froth on him while he politely avoids eye contact.

One more thing before I end this undeniably pathetic written record of how much I need to get a life. I just found Bill Willingham’s website where he lists pieces of original artwork from his comics collection. Nothing there that I need to have, but it just reminded me of how quickly the San Diego trip could become a spendy adventure in Original Art Acquisition with a spin-off jaunt into Watching Ben Blow a Fuse as I try to convince him not to pass up the opportunity to purchase <one-of-a-kind-thing>.  Also officially on my list of things to do in the remaining 17 days until Comic Con: create a map of all microbreweries in San Diego for husband-bribery purposes.