Merry...uhhh...day AFTER Christmas!

Didn't get a chance to post yesterday.  I hope everyone had a good day doing whatever they do on Xmas.  Mine was pretty great.  Had a good time with the family and scored some pretty excellent loot. ;)

Next up...

Xmas draws near!

It's about 2:30pm Christmas Eve and I'm in the midst of final preparations for tomorrow. Got the Christmas tunes going. Thinking a lot. This is the time of year I miss people who aren't around the most.

Some are no longer with us...but others are alive and well (as far as I know) and probably just a phone call away. For various reasons, the calls are just never made or emails sent. Once in a while I see someone has found their way to this blog by searching Google or Yahoo for my name and i wonder if any of them are these people I've lost touch with. I wish they'd drop me a line if it's them....I don't think my number or email address has changed in 7 or 8 years. Yeah, I could probably pick up the phone too (assuming I have any clue as to how to find your number) but I didn't lose contact with these people because everything was peachy between us at the time. So, I don't know of they even want to hear from me.

In case any of you are reading this...I WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU.

Now for some fun stuff...

Just a little more Christmas silliness. More movie and tv images of things I enjoy during the season.
(And a few more babes...which, actually, I guess I enoy all year long.)

For my money, one of the best Santa's ever.

Gotta love Frosty...as long as it's not the sequel they made in the early 90's (I think). I'll stick with the original, thanks.

Just more classic Rankin-Bass claymation holiday good ness.

More Rankin-Bass!




And a few more babes for

Christmas Eve!

Happy Christmas Eve!!

Another xmas card came in the email today.  This one if from Mahmud Asrar, artist on Dynamo 5!

I certainly hope all of you did better than me at getting things prepared early.  I'll be struggling against an aching back to be wrapping and baking and cooking all day.

They're starting to make me resent the entire country!

India.  Home of lots of cool and interesting stuff, I'm sure.  Unfortunately, also the home of hundreds...perhaps thousands...of men and women who think I'm STUPID enough to believe them when they tell me their name is David or Bob, Susan or Mary in barely recognizable English with accents so thick Wolverine's adamantium claws couldn't cut through when I call a customer service number or (shame shame) I get a call about an overdue bill or something. You struggle to understand what they're saying and then they don't understand you half the time....

Kel -  Okay, "Bob," let's go ahead and make that blue.

"Bob" - (Barely decipherable) Okay, we're making that red then. Yes?

Kel - No...blue...we're making that blue.  Like the sky.

"Bob" - (Barely decipherable)  Okay, yes, I have it. Now, let me confirm...you want "red." Is this correct?

Kel - No!  "Bob"....BLUE....BLUE....B...L...U...E!!!  Do you understand?

"Bob" - (Barely decipherable) Oh, I am terribly sorry...blue?

Kel - Yes, blue.  Thank you!

"Bob" - (Barely decipherable) Alright we will get one of those out to you in red right away.

...this is not some racism rant...this is a crappy state of customer SERVICE rant.  I don't care where someone is from or located...I just care that when I'm trying to address a problem or take care of some business that the person there to HELP me can actually do so without me emailing them a frikkin diagram of what I'm saying and without me having to play fill-in-the-blank guessing games to figure out the words between the words I actually understand.

And then when you get ahold of a number where you can call someone in-country and you explain to them your difficulties all they can do is sigh in a way that tells you they spend a good portion of their day dealing with people who are sick of outsourced customer DISservice.

Card from Cinar and Babes (Christmas variety)

Noble Causes artist (he was the Nothingface artist first!) Yildiray Cinar has sent out a holiday card and I thought I'd share. :D
(As usual, click to enlarge)






















And just for good measure...a couple Christmas babes. ;)
(you can click them too....ya pre-vert)

So we all know those guys over on the right, don't we? Of course we do! It's the cast of the classic Rankin-Bass claymation special of the Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer!

Below is another pic of Rudolf...but this time he's a light up Christmas decoration. Yay for electricity.


One week from to day is the big day. Christmas! I'm glad it's so close, we could use some holiday cheer around here. We had to put down one of the dogs yesterday. She was old and having some serious medical issues and it was clearly her time to go, but it's still sad...she was around here for 13 or 14 years.

Christmas Babe (installment one)

A couple years ago I did a 12 Babes of Christmas thing...I was going to do it again this year but time got away from me.  Christmas is less than 12 days away!  (It's only like a week from now!)  So... random Christmas babes will be popping up in here between now and Xmas.

Merry Christmas to our armed forces

This poem was making the rounds on the internet some years back, I just laid it out.

(Please, no politics if you leave a reply)

Click to enlarge

Miranda Mercury...and some Christmas

Many Adventures of Miranda Mercury #295 (of 300)

In less than one year, a lifetime of heroism will come to a premature end---Miranda Mercury, the greatest adventurer in this or any other galaxy, is dying. With her partner, Jack Warning, she has done the impossible over and again. But Miranda's greatest adversary Cyrus Vega will ultimately succeed in causing her death where so many others have failed.

So why have Miranda and Jack gone through so much trouble to secure the legendary Riddle of Rebel Ronin? It might have something to do with extra-dimensional terrorists and the secret auction of the Eighth Day. Or it just might be that Jack knows something he isn't supposed to. Something that will change their relationship forever and endanger the legacy Miranda hopes to leave behind.

Everything changes from this point forward...and in the next issue, it all changes again.

From creators Brandon Thomas (ROBIN) and Lee Ferguson (BLACK CANARY/GREEN ARROW WEDDING PLANNER).

THE MANY ADVENTURES OF MIRANDA MERCURY #295 (of 300)
Writer: Brandon Thomas
Artist: Lee Ferguson
Inker: Marc Deering
Colorist: Felix Serrano
$3.95
Diamond Code: DEC07 3385
32 full-color pages, Ages 10+ for Mild Violence.

PREVIEW PAGES AT NEWSARAMA
Lee Ferguson is a pal of mine so go preorder this book. It's in Previews right now. Ask the guy who runs your comic shop to make sure he orders it for you.

And a couple more Xmas images. These are just things I look forward to at Christmas, I still love all the classic TV specials and movies....

Rogue Angel

Some time back I read the first novel in a series called Rogue Angel (and have since started the second book and added the whole series to my Amazon wishlist) and from about half way through that first installment I found myself wishing I could get my hands on the license to do comics based on the series.

It's such an obvious property to try in comics. Beautiful, daring Indiana Jones type traveling the world using her job as a correspondent for a supernatural investigations show (looking for folklore monsters and such) to facilitate her more serious pursuits. And did I mention she's apparently the reincarnation of Joan of Arc or some such and can magically draw Joan's sword out of thin air?

Anyway, someone at IDW thought it was a good idea too! I was excited to see they're trying a comic (even if I don't get to write it) and was even more excited when I noticed the name of the up-n-coming young artist attached to it.

The solicit from IDW....
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Rogue Angel: Teller of Tales #1
Barbara Kesel (w); Renae De Liz (a); Rebecca A. Wagner (c)

Gold Eagles novel heroine comes to comics for the first time! Annja Creed is a world-traveling archeologist who also happens to be the heir to Joan of Arcs mystic sword. In this debut miniseries, Anna's drive to explore unrecorded, shadowy history leads her to Virginia City in search of a rumored manuscript that could change the public perception of Mark Twain forever. But a very powerful mystery man doesn't want anyone to find the truth, and will stop at nothing not even murder to keep Annja away from the answers she seeks. Written by Harvey Award-nominated writer Barbara Kesel and featuring art by Renae De Liz.

*******************************************************************

Renae is familiar to many online comics folk, a much liked regular on the Digital Webbing forums. Over the past couple years I've really enjoyed watching her art grow and I'm so blasted excited for her to get this gig.

SO GO PREORDER IT, YA LOUSY PUNK!!

Christmas 1

I'm posting something because someone asked me too, they were going nuts without fresh comments from me...I think he has a little man crush on me.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!  Take THAT, JD!!!

Okay, something to talk about....

I have a lot of work the next few weeks.  Yay!

I'm a Christmas kinda guy and I watch a lot of Christmas movies, the one to the left here I just watched on Sunday. It is NOT your typical feel-good holiday flick but it was very good...thought provoking.  A good one to watch later in the evening after little ones have gone to bed or whatever.

It's set in WWI and based on various reports of fraternization between enemy forces on Christmas. This movie concentrates on German, French and Scottish soldiers who find themselves brought together by music wafting out of the trenches on Christmas Eve. They eventually come out in the open and start to see the men they are fighting against for who they really are, knowing full well they will be looking at each other once again over rifle sites when Christmas is over.

Good movie, really enjoyed it. The different nationalities speak in their respective languages so there is a bit of caption reading but it's worth it.  The DVD edition I had had an interview with the French director in French....had to pause a couple spots were he got extra chatty but it was worth it because it's in the interview we learn how much is true and hear about some of the real events and people who inspired the story.