ComicCon International: July is Banish the Crazies Month!

Obligatory Snark: Did anyone else here think that CCI's "There's Only ONE!" slogan for this year sounded like Highlander? (Forgetting it was a shot over upstart NYCC's bow.)
CCI and New York Publisher's Weekly/Elsevier Comic Con facing off like MacCloud and the Kurgan? (Which one you think is which is a fun game!)
Imagine, say, Jackie Estrada and Calvin Reid facing off with swords! Who would look better with their head held on with safety pins?
Funny, huh?

Anyway, it's time for those interested in maintaining their sanity to join me in CCI: Banish the Crazies month. It's simple: just ignore CCI news.  
The sole exceptions will be: any coverage of Herb Trimpe, who got pink-slipped by NuMarvel, and went on to become a high school teacher, and Ground Zero chaplain. HE THE MAN! The other would be if Josh Nuefeld gets the Bob Clampett Award he should've gotten last year for his work in Biloxi, Mississippi after Hurricaine Katrina. 

You can ignore that at least two of the eight female guests at CCI aren't, um, comics professionals. 
You can avoid that "Maybe I should've gone this year..." feeling. It looks fun in coverage because it's doesn't capture the experience of lines, crowds and young teenage firls being pimped out by overindulgent parents. 
You can forget that feeling of being a mote awash in a sea of Pokemon, Sideshow, movies, tits & ass booths, and booth bunnies wholly inappropriate for a "family" show. 

It's easy to ignore every single bit of that if you don't go and don't read about it. It'll feel good. I immediately binned, without reading, this year's updates. Reading them makes me feel like unaccomplished shit, and that's stupid because this is five days out of 365. (Or it's a month out of twelve, which is a batshit crazy amount of time for a single person to spend on five days. No sane person spends that much time on Christmas, even.)
It's no fun to read about other people's movie contracts, options, panels, dinners*, and awards, if it's not fun. So don't!

You don't have to get outraged at whatever stupid thing Reginald Hudlin with mouth this year. (Last year, it was hitting on a woman who asked where the jobs in comics were for black women who wanted to write. The answer isn't Hudlin telling you you look good for your age, it's making the fucking comics, like Cheryl Lynn tells you.)  

This is all for the benefit of those not going for various reasons. It's not a value judgement on those who are. CCI can be hella fun in small doses, like 48 hours without a table. (Jackie need not take that as an endorsement, it certainly is not. I say this because my acknowledgement that eight female guests was a good thing was seen as my having no problems with the proportion of this or previous years. Hiss.)

Take a mental health break. The world will still spin. It'll be as dead as vaudeville in comics while Nerd Prom Nerdi Gras (tm & c Harris O'Malley) is in full swing. Meanwhile, we'll all be back here, drawing and chillin', not missing three ass-testing hours of Awards Someone Else who wrote Batman This Year is Getting. (Although I am always happy for my deserving friends.)

CCI is only nominally about selling books. It's hard to in most spots on the floor with T&A clogging many aisles and repelling readers that want kid's comics, non-supers, or women's and girl's books.  
I have a fantasy of a CCI women's block that'd do a land office business as it would become an oasis for drag-alongs and women who came to the show and found the "you aren't interesting unless you're a model or comic character with big tits" vibe off-putting and wanted a place to go.  We'd give tokens for the coffee shop with cumulative purchases, have a couple of those hideously exepnsive Teamster couches for women and kids to sit on and read their books. We'd sneak them string cheese and tea. We'd get a masseuse to buy a table with us.
If CCI won't make itself women and kids friendly, then vendors can answer the call.

The idea that it's about getting face time was true about ten years or so ago. (It's nearly impossible to get face time now, even with good long-time friends.) Everything that you could do, even only do at CCI, can be done mainly via the Internet now. 
You want to see fans and have fun at a venue about books, go to CAPE! or APE or MoCCA.

REMEMBER: Ignoring CCI coverage is fun, delicious and GOOD FOR YOU!

KITTIES: Prepare the Way for Zinnia the Gozerian!

kitties zinnia eating, originally uploaded by DivaLea.

Click on the Kitty of Destruction for kitties with dogs, kitties with litter, kitties with kitties.

Zephyr, Zeek and Zinnia have been with us one week now. They're gulping down three times as much kitten milk. They're walking great, mostly walking instead of staggering then falling.

Summer and I got them litter trained, which is such a non-event: put down a box of sand they can get into, you're good and they're good.

The personalities are also evident. Zephyr is definitely the mix of personable and aggressive I enjoy. She's going to be best for a family who wants an adventurous and energetic companion.
Zeek is playful and likes the others and dgos.
Zinnia is the shy sweetie who'll be perfect for the person who wants an adoring lap cat. She purrs like crazy, and was the first one who did.

We're enjoying them, and are finding them rewarding. I'm looking forward to them at about five and six weeks, because that's when kittens go from cute to cute and hilarious.