Home again from APE. As far as shows go, this one is sure hard to beat. Financially speaking,
it wasn’t very lucrative — I didn’t break even — though I just about paid for my plane fare. I’m not
choosing to look at this year’s APE as a financial show, but rather as a PR move, and that by giving out a
couple hundred free stickers and comics that I can raise some West Coast awareness for my little faerie book.
It also seems like I was able to reach a lot of up-and-coming small pressers through the Self-Publishing 101 workshop, which is
an excellent thing, and I count being able to help out the next batch of self-publishers as a home run,
regardless of how the rest of the show went.

Now, on a social scale, this show was absolutely through the roof. I got enough partying and
running ’round wedged into three days to last me a couple months, at least. This counted as a most
excellent vacation, and I had a wonderful, exciting time. Here’s the rundown:

Friday, February 20th

Friday was comprised primarily of travel, and involved Planes, Trains and Automobiles.
I took a flight out of Detroit which landed me in Oakland around 10pm. I quickly learned that the San Francisco
Bay Area Rapid Transit system is one of the least-intuitive public transports I’ve ever used. No direct service
to the Oakland airport means you first have to catch a shuttle bus, which uses a different tickets/cash system than the regular
BART, necessitating two separate fare purchases while juggling tons of baggage. I was a little surprised — the T system in
Boston is interchangeable — passes work on both busses and trains — and that’s what I was expecting to find. Additionally, the
AirBART drivers seemed determined to see if they could get the bus up on two wheels when they rounded corners. The BART itself, however,
was clean, fast and on time, three things I am especially fond of in public transport. Intuitive it is not. They only had one map
on each station or car, (usually wedged way to one side and mostly out of sight. I mean, the eL in Chicago is
noisy and stinky, but at least they label everything within an inch of its life…) and the “lines” were not color coordinated, nor
did all of them run through the city. (?!) So, yeah, Dick, I’d give the BART a fifty-nine. It sounded good, but I couldn’t dance to it.

Upon finally arriving at Civic Center, I was met by the incomparable Dan and Katie Merritt of
Green Brain Comics in Dearborn, Michigan, who were kind enough to come
and meet me at the station. We hoofed it back to the hotel, where we met up with roommates
Lea Hernandez and Carla Speed McNeil,
and next-door neighbors Trisha Lynn Sebastian and
Harris O’Malley. We hung out for a bit, but Dan and Katie and I
begged off pretty early, it being three am our time.

Saturday, February 21st

Up early in the morning, we performed a Viking Raid on the continental breakfast, pillaging muffins and coffee back to our room
so that we could eat in peace whilst we got all primped and ready for our first big day. Joined again by Trisha and Harris, we
started telling funny stories. And more funny stories, and more and more, until we were snorting orange juice and toast crumbs all over the
place, laughing like a pack of hyenas. Poor Harris and Dan stood up well to the task of being the only two men in the ‘henhouse’, and
had to withstand TMI Girly stories for most of the weekend. We loves you guys, and we loves you even more for sticking with us in
our worst girly moments.

We finally got our act together, loaded all the stuff in a taxi van, and headed out to the show. Setup went quickly, and good thing, too,
because all sorts of awesome people were there to greet and catch up with: Donna Barr and
Roberta Gregory,
Tom Beland and Lily Garcia, John “Bean” Hastings and Lovely Wife Terry,
Larry Young, Batton Lash and Jackie Estrada (thanks for the shoutout, btw!!)
— the list just goes on and on. The show was a full third bigger than the previous year I attended, and it was a really high-quality bunch of exhibitors,
with tons of new faces, especially from the LGBT community. There was
a large new influx of queer and transgender artists and writers this year — I’m guessing thanks in large part to guest of honor
Alison Bechdel — and it was a great thing to see, especially with
all the hubbub in SF right now over the Gay Marriage issue.

The show took off and was great all day long — I was flanked on all sides by great, enthusiastic small pressers and mInicomics creators,
including fellow WEFugee benjones and the creators of a cool vampire comic called
Blood Roses. Lisa Jonte and
Madison Clell were out walking around, and stopped by to say hi — neither of them had
a table, and were just enjoying the freedoms of just being able to run around the show and actually — gasp — look at comics.

It was also a wonderful thing to give James Sime beer. I lugged two mixed sixpacks of Bell’s Beer
in my checked luggage for him, by way of saying thanks for all the great free PR he’s done for me over the years. It’s ever so nice
when you know someone appreciates a gift you’ve given — and there was no mistaking James’ glee as he unwrapped each bottle. Slainte!

About halfway through the day, I left the table in the capable hands of Trisha Lynn, and headed out to the Self-Publishing 101 panel, where
Harris, Rick, Justin and I spoke to a packed room. I was a little trepadatious about doing this panel, as the last time I had
a panel at ConFusion several years ago, only one person showed up, leaving me and estimable interviewer Mark Bernstein feeling a little
foolish. Not to fear– it was standing room only, literally. We had a very responsive, very attentive crowd, and modrerator Mark Thompson did a fantastic job
of asking very pertenent questions. I had intended to record the entire session, but thanks to the wonders of batteries, I only have the first fifteen
minutes or so — still, I cleaned up the file and took out a lot of the ums and mike noise, so it’s a lot tighter than the actual first
quarter of the panel… you can listen to the fragment in the new Audio Library section of the Self Publisher’s Resource page.
I got the chance to meet Justin Hall for the first time, and he was a really great guy — we swapped comics and
I can’t wait to get reading his books — they’re travel journals from all the great adventures he’s taken through places like the Amazon. No, not
Amazon dot com, the actual Amazon. How cool is that?

So after the panel was over, we finished up the show and went to join the Big Gay Dinner, which met at the
Metreon. Madison and I decided to be bad and defect from the main party because
we wanted sushi really, really badly. So we went and got eggplant rolls (yum!) and then rejoined the rest of the gang for dessert. Then,
forgoing the equally excellent CBLDF/Cartoon Art Museum fundraiser,
Rich Watson, Madison and I decided to head out to see
Keith Knight’s hiphop band, Marginal Prophets
perform at a tiny little nightclub on Folsom street. Holy crap, do those guys rock. Hard. We hung out for a set, danced a lot, got the blood moving, jumped
up and down to killer hiphop, and admired the other lead rapper’s Utilikilt. (woot!)

As though this weren’t enough partying, we then piled back into Madison’s civic (remember the pictures of all of us wedged in there last year?)
and headed over to James Sime’s Isotope Comics Lounge (thanks again, Madison!) where the
party was still in full swing. I listened to Trisha’s recommendation, and tried one of their specials — a “Dark and Stormy”, made from
Ginger Beer and dark rum. mmmMMMmmm. As I suspected, James quickly materialized with a toilet seat, and asked me to
vandalize my very own addition to the the world-famous Comic Rockstars Toiletseat Museum.
Now, I know some of you are thinking… er, toilet seat? Yes, my friends, this is a great and wonderful honor — my scribbles now
hang alongside those of Warren Ellis, Darick Robertson, Judd Winick, Donna Barr, and Tom Beland. Word to the toilet seats.

ed
So after defacing my bathroom fixture, Dan and Katie and Trisha and Harris and Rich and I all loaded ourselves into cabs and poured ourselves into bed once
we reached the hotel, in preparation for another day. And the con was only half-over at this point!

Sunday, February 22nd

Another great day of sales and camaraderie on the sales floor. Thanks to Trisha, I got a chance to cruise the show for a bit at the very end, and
go pick up some purchases of my own. I also probably frightened Lark Pien and her boyfriend again with my enthusiasm for
Long Tail Kitty,
but heck, that seems to be becoming a biannual occurrance as well. The show closed an hour earlier than Saturday, and after stowing our gear,
we possed up a huge crew and
headed out to The Stinking Rose for dinner. We ate garlic until it nearly killed us. We probably
killed some others with our breath, that’s for sure. The restaurant was on the edge of Chinatown, so we walked home, admiring all the cool
streetlamps and buildings. I stared with longing at the Sushi Boat Restaurant — someday I will eat sushi out of wee boats! —
but considering how full of garlic I was, I had to pass. After resisting two or three stores, we were finally drawn into a Chinese import shop,
where I picked up all sortsa cool brickabrack that I didn’t need but was pretty, as all proper brickabrack should be. On the way out through the gates,
Denise put her beret and scarf around the guardian lion, who didn’t seem to mind.

We then repaired back to the hotel room for another round of “Telling stories that nearly break Harris O’Malley”, which seems to be becoming
a habit as well, and finally to bed far later than we should have, especially since we had to be up at 3:30 am to catch the plane out at 6:30. Another
suicidal AirBART run, another navigational crisis averted thanks to Lea’s ten years of a priori BART knowledge (would somebody post friggin SCHEDULES for the
dang thing?) and another plane ride later, and I’m home. Whew!

Thanks to all the friends who stopped by — Van, whom I haven’t seen in ages, and hope to see again soon — and Benster from Colleen Doran’s board, both of which were very
bright spots of the convention. Also all the new small pressers who stopped by — especially the Gear Bot boys
and the wonderfully skully Order of the Fly gang — it was great to meet you all. Sorry if I have missed anyone
or failed to mention anything I should’ve (well, anything fit for publication on the blog, anyway *evil grin*) but it’s late, and I’m whipped after
jetlag, partying, and three hours’ sleep. An APE to remember, surely!