The New Floodgates of the Mind

Okay, I’ve been kicking this around in my head for a few days now, and realized that one of the biggest problems I’ve had with this top 10 list is that many of the things I’ve done which fall under the category of “I’ve done but you haven’t” are just way too incriminating. Thus, I had to delete those entries and replace them with others. (Any folks who’ll be lucky enough to read “Wasted Youth” will eventually get to read those tidbits :)) But, there were more incriminating ones than not. Thus, the exercise hurt my brain. 🙂

1- Was run down by a motorcycle in my own back yard when I was 5 and spent months in a cast with a broken arm.

2- Watched my best friend get struck and killed (by a taxi cab) when I was 7

3- Had a car drive over my foot without any ill effects when I was 8

(holy shit. do we see a pattern here? time to change gears)

4- Talked cops into exchanging our empty beer bottles with full ones they had confiscated from other rebels during a weekend binge at Angrignon park celebrating the end of College.

5- Got plastered in a cemetary and slammed with my buddies after a night of live punk bands (League of Dead Politicians, Asexuals, No Policy, at The Station)

6- Lost 3 band members over the course of a month (drummer dislocated shoulders – doc’s orders no drums for a year, bass player decided to quit (and got beat up for it), replacement bass player got chased out of town by New York Skinheads) just prior to going into studio to record a track for Primitive Air Waves volume 2

7- Had Richard Biggs chuckle and turn his back on me when I asked him “If a White Star captured a Shadow vessel, would they rename it to The White Shadow?” at a convention

8- Had my then-girlfriend-now-wife take me to 3 different oceans in 3 different years

9- Spent a Valentine’s day in the Dominican Republic watching my wife pray to the porcelain god (and took a picture of her brushing her teeth over said porcelain!)

10- Completed two over 50,000 word novels in the space of around 26 days… in the same month!

What if the News would suddenly just STOP showing us: scenes of destruction, scenes of death, scenes of hatred, scenes of disease/ corruption/ agression, etc etc.

In THIS sense of the word, wouldn’t Ignorance BE bliss? Would we not all live happier lives without having to constantly be force-fed so much negativity and having our lives controlled by that crap?

I’ve written it a long time ago, and I stick to it still. I’m a much happier person when I turn off the news channel in every shape (radio, tv, internet). Perhaps if more folks concentrated on the good in the world instead of all the death/destruction/disease/crap, then maybe more folks would be more inclined to do good for the sake of good as opposed to bad/evil for the sake of negative bombardment.

My beautiful wife felt our baby’s first kick yesterday. THAT is news. THAT is worth sharing. THAT is worth shedding a tear of joy for. And so I did, and do.

Ti amo, amore… 🙂

I didn’t get better yesterday morning, so I took the 12:30pm train home. I suffered through the entire ride, expecting to explode at any moment – guts and internal organs just splattered across the windows and strewn the length of the train… But I managed to get home intact and lucid. I basically hit the bed at 2pm and didn’t get up until 6pm when I had to go pickup Chantale at the train station. Even so, I was sleeping by 9:30pm…

So, after some pretty bizarre dreams involving a number of food/ beverage/ dancing/ music/ sleep/ and eventually theatre orgies, I managed to get out of bed at 6:30am. Yes, very bizarre dreams. I don’t remember when I didn’t have a dream involving hundreds of people that I didn’t wake up with a splitting headache. But this was definitely one of them.

I do have a headache now, though. Isn’t it bizarre to wake up feeling good, leave the house feeling good, commute to work feeling good and then get hit by a massive headache the minute you walk into work? And that’s before finding out I have 4 meetings today, 3 of which will be intense! Thus, time to inhale some caffeine and down some migraine advil and shovel my way through it all…

still fighting cold. today, chest hurts a little (beating in time with the drums in my head).

if i’m feeling better by the time noon comes around, i’m going home.

and that’s all i have to say about that.

I already thought it was Wednesday. Woah. Yup, I’m anxious for the week to be over so I can enjoy being off for March break with the kids. Among other things happening that week 🙂 2 of the 3 special ladies in my life are celebrating a birthday that week. My darling wife Chantale on Monday (Feb 28 although in truth Feb 29), and my little JitterBug Melyssa on Thursday March 3rd. 🙂

By the way, I’m taking Melyssa (and James) to the EchoMuseum on Thursday as that’s what she wants for her birthday. Anyone want to join us? 🙂

The past weekend was spent putting Comicopia together and mailing it off, driving the kids around, and everyone fighting off various cold symptoms. Bleah. The kids were dropped off early Sunday morning and then Chantale and I vegged and slept in the afternoon (after she made me some delicious pancakes! mmm! 🙂 ) Yes, we’re drinking plenty of liquids. Plenty. By the by, I’ve been enjoying laying on Chantale’s tummy. I press my ear against her belly, close my eyes, and listen to the sounds of our baby “swimming” around 🙂 I think it’s time to start reading and singing to it… 🙂

Speaking of Comicopia, can you believe I only have the non-bound copy left? All other copies of the latest issue have left the building or are already promised. I’ve been spending a lot of money shipping copies off to folks, but if any of those decide to join us, it will be worth it. At the same time, I’m sending copies off to other folks whom I’m hoping will help spread the word and thus also perhaps bring in some requests. Heck, we’re celebrating 15 Years this year. It’s definitely worth celebrating!

I just made reservations at Hotel des Seigneurs in Saint-Hyacinthe for May 21st. My buddy’s getting married that day and the reception will be held there! No way are Chantale and I driving to St. Hyacinthe and NOT spending the night! Come on! 🙂 … Hey, Marc! Do we need cigars? 🙂

In other Comic-related news, The Shuster Awards Nominations have been finalized. Stuff is at the Printers and should appear in comic shops either March 2nd or March 9th. On-line voting will be available (still only for Canadian residents) as of March 2nd as well. This whole process was a lot more interesting than I thought it would be! And the end result of who ended up staying on the ballot was also quite intriguing. I can’t wait to experience the cumulation of it all on Saturday April 30th at the Paradise Comics Toronto Comicon when the winners are announced. Yes, I’ll be going as will Francisco and his cousin (The SnatchMaster Trio!). Toronto beware! Expect pictures. Plenty of pictures. 🙂 And on that note, I wanted to add these two items of note from various on-line resources:

From CBR: “Astro City” will return with a 16 part maxi-series, “The Dark Age,” which goes back to the 70s to tell the story of the Astro City Silver Age in four issue arcs by the usual team of Busiek, Anderson, and Ross.

From Scoop: Brian Michael Bendis (Ultimate Spider-Man, New Avengers, Powers, the Pulse, Secret War, and the upcoming House of M) will be a guest of the Paradise Comics Toronto Comicon. Brian joins Warren Ellis, the writer of Planetary, Iron Man, Ultimate Nightmare, Ultimate Secret, and the upcoming Desolation Jones and Bill Willingham, writer of Fables, Robin and the upcoming Day of Vengeance.

Among the other guests already confirmed (in no particular order) are Dave Sim (Cerebus), Jerry Robinson (classic Batman artist and co-creator of many Batman related characters like the Joker and Robin), Alvin Schwartz (writer of gold and silver age DC Comics and strips, creator of Bizarro) Jim Cheung (Young Avengers), Adi Granov (Iron Man), Ty Templeton (Simpsons, Spider-Man/Human Torch), Dave Ross (Breakout), B. Clay Moore (Hawaiian Dick, the Expatriate, Battle Hymn), J. Torres (Love As A Foreign Language, Teen Titans Go, Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight), Tom Fowler (Green Arrow), Jim Craig (classic Marvel artist, What IF?, Spider-Man: The Trial of Venom), Tom Grummett (New Thunderbolts, Teen Titans), Kaare Andrews (Spider-Man/Doctor Octopus: Year One), Phil Jimenez (DC Countdown, Otherworld), Francis Manapul (Magdalena/Vampirella, Witchblade, Tomb Raider), Stuart Sayger (Shiver in the Dark).

Time moves too quickly.

Comicopia 87 – our completely Sideways issue – is in the mail, folks!

Covers will be available online when I decide what I want to spend my money on (I’ve used up my alloted 10 Megs). Good chances I’ll move everything off to a larger server (50 gig space). Stay tooned. 🙂

Message received?

I’ve had the following words as my tag line at work for quite a while now. I recently re-read it again and realized how much a part of my life it is. It’s the truth. Life is not just about living, it’s about continuing to live. Forming dreams, Realizing goals, striving for the future. Essentially? Moving forward.

“Greatness is not in where we stand, but in what direction we are moving. We must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it – but sail we must, and not drift, nor lie at anchor.”
-Oliver Wendell Holmes

Don’t let life pass you by. Or in the words of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Don’t Just Dream it – Live it.

With Comicopia electronic deadline tomorrow, I’m happy to have finally made the time to type up my comments tonight. I’ve had them written long-hand for a while now, but just never got around to transcribing them. Oh well, at least the rest of the zine was prepared ahead of time 🙂

I must say I’m greatly enjoying my new system. I replaced my P2 500 (4Gig HD, 128Meg Ram) for a P3 600 (9Gig HD, 192Meg Ram) on Friday. It was the best $50 I ever spent. It took me over 5 hours on Saturday to transfer all my files over (just doing a copy via a direct linkup) but afterwards, it was a short matter to re-install what I needed to work with. And now, I finally have a system with enough disk space to handle my playing around with digital images and Chantale has inherited my old system which is plenty strong enough for her to finally get some games she couldn’t play on her P1. Happiness all around 🙂

In Shuster Awards news, we’re finalizing the nominees this week. I think this means that by next week or so, preparations will be getting underway to get the ball rolling on the web. And I’ve finally decided that yes, I will be going to the Paradise Comics Toronto Comicon and be present at the inaugural Shusters event. I just realized that besides being what it is, the convention will also be my first one in years. I guess I’ll have to do a full job of detailing it for the following Comicopia 🙂

Okay, enough rambling. Time for some sleep. Tomorrow morning we go for Chantale’s monthly visit and see how things are propressing with the baby 🙂

weird thoughts… weird feelings… emotional thrashing…

– whenever i hear about bad managers who treat their employees like dirt – especially those not deserving of it – it makes me want to go over there and put a fork in their eye.

– a lady at work who’s pregnant with her second child (also due in july) brought her little daughter in to work today (she’s a little over a year old I would say). when i saw the tyke, i had to fight back tears. oh boy…

– i can always feel my touch back to my early punker days. every time i think i’ve forever distanced myself from the rage and anger and hatred of authority i had back in the days, something comes up which brings it boiling back to the surface. no wonder slam dancing was so therapeutic… and still is…

– i had a sad/warm conversation with james last weekend. he was telling me how he wished he was with us all the time during festivities because we celebrate them. he will always remember how we celebrate xmas with family gatherings (supper, worship, reveillon, etc) and new year’s (supper family gatherings, celebrations) and thanksgiving (family gatherings, supper, turkey, actually BEING thankful) etc. etc. i know it’s not the eating that he misses or wants, it’s the family companionship. i constantly state just how happy i am that when chantale and i got together it wasn’t just a ‘her and i’ thing, but rather it was a ‘her and i and her family and my family’ which always meant exactly what we wanted it to mean: holidays are to be celebrated with family. not because it must be done, but because we WANT to do it. we gave the kids their first xmas suppers/ midnight mass/ reveillon. we gave them their first big family thanksgiving. we gave them their first new year’s eve family celebration champagne at midnight. and you know what? it’s also to date been their only ones.

– i told chantale recently how i know that when the kids are older and capable of making their own decisions and actually following them up, that it will be moments such as we all share together that will determine their desire to stay with us when it counts. have i mentioned how much i love my kids? if i really had to, then you don’t know jack shit about me.

– when i see my wife in pain either physical or mental, it hurts me so much i would do anything to put it right. sad tears in her eyes or pain on her face breaks my heart beyond belief. and if you didn’t know that about me, then you’re really out of touch.

Woah! Monday 2pm already! Where did the time go?! It zooms by faster than ever lately! Oh, but there ain’t no complainin’ when it’s rainin’ (or something to that effect) 🙂 Weekend update? Why not!

Friday night was fucken awesome. Forgive your sensitive ears but that’s the truth. I lugged my new P3/600 from downtown to my car parked at Dorval – what a workout! – and then took care of a few errands (along with picking up a new fax modem and data traveller) before picking up my beloved. We headed over to Picasso’s to await the arrival of joy and merriment 🙂 And Lo and Behold, it was so! Folks, we had a fucken blast that night and it was extremely wonderful to see you all again. I’m thinking perhaps bi-monthly on this. What say you? t!, my blood still has not calmed down from the boiling it went through upon the many recitals of such wonderful music. I still think it’s pretty cool that I can teach you what came before your time and you can teach me what came after my time. Punk never dies, dude.

Saturday was a rather cool day but a wonderful evening experience. My incredibly beautiful wife took me to a classic Italian restaurant for an early Valentine’s day supper. Can I say fucken awesome again? The food was incredible – right from the bruschetta appetizer (made JUST right – a feat NO other restaurant or hall has done to date!) through the rest of the meal. Hey, even the vino di tavola was good (which doesn’t always happen). The only downfall was being sat in a smoking room. That was unfortunate, but didn’t ruin the evening. Just made it a little… stinky. 🙂 (Francisco! The four of us should go next time we want to celebrate something big!) My wife, dressed in black, shimmered as much as the bling blings on her ears and neck. Stunning, I say. Really took my breath away…

Sunday…. ah, but Sunday was also fucken awesome, but in a more relaxed way. After waking up feeling refreshed (even though I fell asleep at 2am trying to watch On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (CTV seems to be on a Bond kick and has been playing a Bond movie a week – seemingly in order)), Chantale and I headed out to The Ovarium. Anyone who knows me/us knows how much I love this place and especially how much I enjoy their half-day spa treatments. Mmmm. And it’s one of those things that folks don’t normally do but really wish they did regularly after the fact. This time around, it was something that was sorely needed. Emphasis on the “sore” as I’ve been having trouble sleeping for the last 3 weeks now. The floating bath proved how sore/stiff I was and then the massage… wow, did she ever get to work me over! In fact, my masseuese got so into working the kinks out of my muscles (heh. that sounds naughtier than the reality) she ended up almost getting right down to it. I half expected her to just get right on top of my back at some points! The funniest moment had to be as her hands strayed closer and closer to my bum. I’m lying on my stomach thinking “hmm. she’s moving beyond what my previous massages have been”. Then, as she goes ahead and gropes my right buttcheek, I flinch and she asks, “does it bother you that I’m massaging your buttocks?” “No,” I answer thankful she can’t see me blushing with my head in the support. “Good then – unclench! There’s a lot of stress in these cheeks!”

Priceless, that was 🙂 So, I paid some strange woman to grope me, and it’s covered by my Health Insurance. Now that’s a benefit! 🙂

Sunday night was supper at the in-laws after sweating for an hour bringing in 10 strips of gibrock through the window in the guest room. Another big workout. But the meal was really good and made for a fine reward for the sweat 🙂 (of course, considering I was covered in massage oil, the sweat just really made me feel “slick” all over… 🙂 )