What an incredible summer day in the country yesterday was, my brothers and sisters of the ether! It started with jumping off tall rocks in into these really deep pools along a really small river in the woods. Invigorating! That was followed up by a rousing game of ultra high-humidity soccer which led right into a brotherly dip in the big river.

And then! I came home, and there was an order for some comics from stores in the United Freaking Kingdom!! It’s my first order over seas and I’m pumped! (And don’t forget the shop.)

The night ended with drawing and drinking with friends, and martinis in honor of Alec’s Pop. It was a bittersweet note to go out on, but how better to end a glorious day than by toasting the life of a guy who sounded like both a lot of fun and a profound influence on a great cartoonist. And I’ve got things to share, like a new song. I did the Big-Bopper-on-the-phone segments of Chantilly Lace for my pal Dan “Friend Savage” McCool.

And speaking of projects with Dan, here’s a glimpse of what I’m working on. This will either hit the internets in August or never at all.

She’s a groundhog, and she’s Catholic. That’s all I’m saying. (So click it; yuh’ll big it!)

I’ve got some doodles from the last semester up at the CCS Visiting Faculty blog! Also representing are my buddies Melissa Mendes and David Yoder. What a semester jam-packed with Livin Legendz!! Here’s a lidl preview–some drawings of Kim Deitch that I didn’t submit to the blog. Instead I horded them to share with you, my Dear Sweet Pals.

And his hands. He has the longest, cartooniest, expressive-est figners I’ve ever seen. Special bonus: they’re actually square at the end! Like a Kirby hand!!

To see my crowning Deitchievement, check out that Visiting Faculty, aight? And by the way, I keep forgetting to mention that Oak & Linden issue # 2 is now available at the shoppe. Keep your inner consciousness alert for #3, dropping in the fall.

Hi friends. This past weekend I flew down to Charlotte with my buddy Joe to attend the Heroes Con (he beat me to the blog punch). My lovey dovey Caitlin’s parents live in Charlotte, and this was a great excuse for us to visit them. They were welcoming and giving as always, and I feel ridiculously lucky to have them as “in-laws.” They gave me a bed and rides to and fro (including today at four in the morning) and a bag lunch for every day of the convention.

I was representing CCS along with my classmates and pals Ben, Paul, Lena, Monty and Jesse. Although there were a few kerfluffles with the existence of our name badges or our table on day one of the three-day comicsplosion, the event was still fun and productive. Heroes is a big convention, and tilts toward mainstream superhero fare. It’s really refreshing for one of those events in that it’s not at all about pushing whatever new commodity the big conglomerates are hoping nerds will get feverish over, or that the entertainment news will scoop. It’s about comic books and the people who make comic books, and it’s for the people who read comic books. There are no Star Trek actors signing autographs and no big promotional launches of video games (with one exception).

And, thanks to the force of will that is Dustin Harbin, it also includes an Indie Island overflowing with the type of literary/comedic comics that I read and make. It was great to see graphic novelly indie snobs and rippling pectoral devotee fanboys join in the middle of this convention hall-sized venn diagram. Plus I got to meet some great artists, talk to some enthusiastic comics readers, scour through longboxes for forgotten, musty comics nobody cares about, and goof around with not only my tablemates, but also Joe, Gabby and Alec, all of whom I love very dearly. No homo.

This being a mainstream convention, there was a lot of drawing famous characters going around. I couldn’t resist. It’s Goofy acting like the Tex Avery Wolf.