Gearing Up For San Diego<\/p>\n
DECIDING TO BRING IN A THIRD PARTY<\/p>\n
Last year, Elizabeth and I bought a 10\u2019x10\u2019 booth for this year\u2019s San Diego Con. <\/span>If you buy it a year in advance, you get a hundreds-of-dollar savings. <\/span>We knew we didn\u2019t want to share again, because it just wasn\u2019t enough space. <\/span>However, when we found out Elizabeth would be eight months pregnant for the convention, we knew she wouldn\u2019t be as mobile, and that she wouldn\u2019t be able to help her usual enormous amount. <\/span>She wouldn\u2019t be able to run from one end of the hall to the other if I needed an errand done. <\/span>She wouldn\u2019t be able run into town and grab us some food. <\/span>She\u2019d have a hard enough time, I suspect, just getting from the hotel to the con and back. <\/span>She\u2019d probably want to spend some time just getting some rest back at the hotel, which means she couldn\u2019t just sit around and watch the booth while I goof off and make connections, go hunt down artists for pin-ups, get things signed by my idols, try to speak to editors, or whatever other \u201cgoofing off\u201d I feel like doing. <\/span>It became pretty quickly apparent that it would do us well if we could find someone to give us help, keep an eye on the booth, make food runs; give me freedom to goof off (= do business); whatever we might need. <\/span><\/p>\n I thought over the people I knew, who knew comics and who didn\u2019t. <\/span>I thought about pretty female friends of mine or of my wife. <\/span>I thought about comics nerds I know, either who publish their own stuff, have strips in local papers, or aspire to one day be published. <\/span>I thought about cool friends who don\u2019t read comics at all. <\/span> Our friend Matt Silady seemed like a good first choice. <\/span>First of all, he reads A LOT of comics, and really knows the industry. <\/span>He really knows all the people in the industry, including all the creators, editors, companies, reviewers\u2026He REALLY KNOWS the industry. <\/span>Second, he self-publishes his own book, \u201cThe Homeless Channel,\u201d but has only done two issues so far, so if we offered to let him share the table with us, he wouldn\u2019t take up a lot of space. <\/span>(You\u2019ve got to think about this selfish stuff\u2026) <\/span>Third, he\u2019s one of the artists I see at conventions who I\u2019m intensely jealous of, because he\u2019s just such a good salesman, he sells five times the number of books I\u2019m ever able to sell, and I don\u2019t know how he does it. <\/span>But however he does it, it sounds like it would be worth having at my table, if nothing else to try and pick up some hot tips.<\/p>\n We offered, if he was willing to come help us out, not to charge him table space, and he was excited to accept. <\/span>And it took a lot of stress off us, knowing we\u2019d have someone informed, capable, and talented \u2013 who we get along with \u2013 sharing our space. MOVING BEFORE THE CON<\/p>\n The weekend of the 8th<\/sup>, my wife and I moved from a two-bedroom into a three-bedroom apartment. <\/span>As moves go, it was as easy as a move can be, because 1. We stayed in the same apartment complex, and literally just went down one door (about twenty feet.) <\/span>We didn\u2019t bother to pack at all. <\/span>We just filled a box, carried it over, dumped it in a drawer, and went back to fill the next box, etc. <\/span>2. <\/span>We had been there four years, and the landlord informed us she would be replacing the carpets and painting the walls in our old place, so we didn\u2019t need to worry about cleaning the carpets or puttying all the nail holes, etc. <\/span>3. <\/span>The people moving into our old place wouldn\u2019t be coming in until August, so we had weeks to get moved and settled. Just the same, moving always sucks, and what horrible timing, it being a week and a half away from San Diego (when there\u2019s so much preparation to do), and with a pregnant wife who can\u2019t do the usual strenuous lifting and slavish house-fixing I would normally demand of my wife.<\/p>\n By the weekend before San Diego, Elizabeth finally let go of the fact that our house wouldn\u2019t be completely ready before we left, and even seemed okay with that. <\/span>We still have some closets to rearrange, a few boxes to unpack, lots of pictures to put on the walls, and a few baby furnishings or elaborate toys to put together, but we\u2019re not doing too badly. I spent a week moving, unpacking, building shelves, organizing stuff. <\/span>Then I saved the weekend to try and get all the last-minute things finished for the con. <\/span>I printed, cut, and stapled Dr. DeBunko mini-comics. <\/span>I designed three different flyers and printed hundreds of them. <\/span>I designed a new, larger, catchier price list, making it clear what bargains I\u2019m offering. <\/span>I packed comics into bubble envelopes and boxes for the trip. <\/span>I sent out a mailer, so people would know where to find us in San Diego. <\/span>Between the move and getting ready for the con, we only managed to get one decent night\u2019s sleep in the last week. <\/span>We won\u2019t get any sleep this week either.<\/p>\n But we\u2019re ready as we can hope. <\/span>Wish us luck.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Gearing Up For San Diego DECIDING TO BRING IN A THIRD PARTY Last year, Elizabeth and I bought a 10\u2019x10\u2019 booth for this year\u2019s San Diego Con. If you buy it a year in advance, you get a hundreds-of-dollar savings. We knew we didn\u2019t want to share again, because it just wasn\u2019t enough space. However, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-diary-of-a-struggling-comics-artist"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"woocommerce_thumbnail":false,"woocommerce_single":false,"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"cwisnia","author_link":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/archives\/author\/cwisnia"},"uagb_comment_info":156,"uagb_excerpt":"Gearing Up For San Diego DECIDING TO BRING IN A THIRD PARTY Last year, Elizabeth and I bought a 10\u2019x10\u2019 booth for this year\u2019s San Diego Con. If you buy it a year in advance, you get a hundreds-of-dollar savings. We knew we didn\u2019t want to share again, because it just wasn\u2019t enough space. However,…","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}