My Table

14 months ago I started in a woodworking class on Saturdays. All I wanted was to build a table for my art studio. It seemed easy enough. I wanted something tall enough so that I didn't get a sore back when I worked on cutting a mat or framing a piece of art. I also wanted some sort of flatfile system to hold my papers ...and finished drawing, plus something to hold my mat boards and mat cutter and other things as well.

I showed a drawing to the instructor and she never said anything like, "Isn't that a little ambitious for a first project?" though she should have. Well it is now 14 months later and though I still have to make the actual table top starting next week, the rest, as of today is done. Well, it does need six or so coats of wax to make it shine on like a crazy diamond, but other than that, it's almost there!

Morning Light

I take early morning walks with my dog and sometimes the light just astounds me. I'm not sure this one is finished, but it is moving in that direction.

To Retirement!

Today my brother Jack retired. Here's to taking it easy and doing nothing!

Dick Giordano, R.I.P.

Dick Giordano died this morning. I was re-reading Hot Wheels #2 (March 17, 1970) for my DC Comics blog last night, late as usual, and thinking what a stupid and utterly lame idea for a comic book this was. And what a magnificent series this turned out to be and the reason it was not the disaster it should have been was Dick Giordano. As editor he pulled together an amazing team, from the actually exciting scripts of Joe Gill and Alex Toth and Len Wein to the wonderful covers of Neal Adams and Alex to the even better pencils of Alex and Ric Estrada and later Neal and the glue that held the interior artwork together, some amazing, just dazzling, inks by Dick himself.

Dick Giordano had his hands on more of the comic books that I loved in those important early teen years than any other person in comics. The Marvel people had Stan Lee, but I never felt welcomed in by Stan. Dick Giordano on the other hand welcomed me into his books and seemed genuinely interested in what I and other fans had to say and he was nice enough to actually thank us at the end of each letter column for buying the book and joining in on the fun he had a hand in creating. I felt at home at DC because Dick Giordano made me feel that way.

I feel a hole in my heart the size of a child's wide-eyed enthusiasm. Thank you Dick, but this one is not going to be a very good afternoon.... See More

And I sincerely mean that thank you. Thank you Dick, for the best series I ever read, the Skeates/Aparo/Giordano run on Aquaman, a series that was likely to go anywhere at any time and always do it with style and the greatest of artistry, Thank you for the Secret Six, the Mission:Impossible of comics that made me appreciate the non-super-hero books for the first time. Thank you for The Hawk and the Dove and the Creeper and the excitement that Ditko brought to DC if only for a little while. Thank you for the Teen Titans issues with the Wein/Wolfman controversy, Wonder Girl's uniform, the sexiness of uniformless heroes, and the great artistry of Neal and Gil and George and of course and always Nick Cardy. Thank you for Hot Wheels, the greatest TV show/Toy/Comic book cross-over ever. Thank you for mixing a little more humor into the horror with The House of Secrets and even more humor in The Witching Hour, those early issues being more fun than chilling.

Thank you for knowing when to stay out of the way and let your writers write and your pencilers pencil and your inkers ink and for letting Nick Cardy create one amazing masterpiece after another. Thank you from bringing us Steve and Jim and Denny. Thank you for proving over and over again the pencils do not have to be weak to be improved by the inker. Thank you for some of the better parts of my childhood.

What's Behind it All?

We got back from San Francisco on Sunday. We stayed at a wonderful Worldmark Hotel there, in a colorful neighborhood full of cinematic history. Here is the view across the street from the hotel. I recognized it immediately