{"id":138,"date":"2008-01-28T10:34:42","date_gmt":"2008-01-28T16:34:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/?p=138"},"modified":"2010-04-26T11:25:30","modified_gmt":"2010-04-26T17:25:30","slug":"126-more-good-san-diego-fall-out-81706","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/archives\/138","title":{"rendered":"126. More Good San Diego Fall-Out 8\/17\/06"},"content":{"rendered":"

First of all, Shag \u2013 the artist whose work I adore \u2013 wrote me that he\u2019d like to contribute to my giant monster book.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>At the convention, we had talked about commissions, which he doesn\u2019t do, but he had said he had a piece he could give me permission to publish.\u00a0 <\/span>I had told him my books were black and white, but now, in his email, he said he wasn\u2019t sure that he had time to revamp his art in a way it would republish in black-and-white.\u00a0 <\/span>He said, if I wouldn\u2019t mind using an image for a cover, that would be fine, because that way he could just send me the color image as is.\u00a0 <\/span>So I\u2019m going to have a SHAG COVER for my next monster book!\u00a0 <\/span>I was thrilled.\u00a0 <\/span>I couldn\u2019t believe my luck.\u00a0 <\/span>Unbelievable!\u00a0 <\/span>I absolutely never imagined such luck.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

He emailed me FOUR options (!!!).\u00a0 <\/span>Did I mention I couldn\u2019t believe it?\u00a0 <\/span>Here I assumed we would maybe take one of his old tiki paintings, maybe crop it down so that it was just the tiki, or something like that.\u00a0 <\/span>But he sent me FOUR paintings, full on compositions.\u00a0 <\/span>Giant monster compositions!\u00a0 <\/span>Attacking towns, dragging screaming women into the jungle, stomping through a villa.\u00a0 <\/span>This guy has DRAWN GIANT MONSTERS!\u00a0 <\/span>I had no idea he\u2019d already contributed so thoroughly to my h\u2019ouvre.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Or is it ouvre?<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

THE SKEPTICS SOCIETY<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

My contact at the Skeptics Society emailed me out the blue, after my baby came, that they have an official podcast, that was the number one independent podcast online for a while, before they had to take an unforeseen break.\u00a0 <\/span>But they\u2019re just about ready to fire it up again, and want me to be a guest, hyping Dr. Debunko and talking about being a younger-than-fifty-year-old Skeptic trying to spread the word of Skepticism.\u00a0 <\/span>On top of that, he said he got word from the man in charge and my idol, Michael Shermer, that they want to be sure and talk me up in one of their e-mailers.\u00a0 <\/span>What great support!\u00a0 <\/span>What great news!\u00a0 <\/span>When my first comic was going to come out, they mentioned me on their e-mailer, and my website got over a thousand additional hits.\u00a0 <\/span>This time I have to be sure and be ready, and have plenty of info up, and my books and t-shirts available to buy.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

STAN \u201cTHE MAN\u201d LEE<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Next on the list of unbelievable excitement: I called Stan Lee\u2019s representative (whose contact info I got at the con) and told him who I was, and he assured me that he had gotten my book into Stan\u2019s hands.\u00a0 <\/span>I asked if there might be any chance to get a blurb from Stan, and at first he said he didn\u2019t think so, but then he rethought it, and by the end of the conversation he was asking me, So if Stan called me and just said something about my book, could I use that?\u00a0 <\/span>I was dumbfounded.\u00a0 <\/span>I told him, Well, you could just email me a sentence or two, if that would be easier.\u00a0 <\/span>He said he\u2019d check with Stan and get back to me.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

I assumed I would need to call back in a couple weeks, but before I had a chance to even think about it, I got a call saying Stan would do a blurb for me, and could I please send an email with an idea of what I might like Stan to say, and then Stan would rewrite it in \u201chis own inimitable style.\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>Uh\u2026okay\u2026\u00a0 <\/span>He wanted me to just send a couple sentences.\u00a0 <\/span>Man, what a lot of pressure.\u00a0 <\/span>So let me get this straight, I\u2019m just going to write whatever I\u2019d like Stan to say about my book, and then he\u2019ll change it so that it sounds like something Stan said.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

At first I thought maybe they had actually just lost the book or thrown it out without looking at it, and that\u2019s why they wanted me to give them a sample of what to say.\u00a0 <\/span>Upon looking at what Stan wrote, though, I see he must have seen the book.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

So I thought over my dilemma for a while, then I finally sat in front of my computer and basically just brainstormed a bunch of outrageous, self-congratulatory, pretentious, pompous compliments about myself.\u00a0 <\/span>I ended up sending a full paragraph of what I thought Stan \u201cThe Man\u201d Lee should say about my work, and here\u2019s what I wrote:<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cQuirky, kitschy, hilarious, odd, full of Lee-Kirby energy\u2026and I know!\u00a0 <\/span>A loving homage full of bizarre and random characters, plot twists that don\u2019t make much sense, kooky giant monsters, and a whole lot of exclamation points and fun!\u00a0 <\/span>Takes me back.\u00a0 <\/span>Kirby and I did giant monsters better, but Chris\u2019s \u201cDoris Danger Giant Monster Adventures\u201d are next up on the list.\u00a0 <\/span>A great package, full of pin-ups by all my favorite artists, in a gorgeous over-sized format that makes me feel like a kid.\u00a0 <\/span>The truest, most heartfelt homage I\u2019ve seen to my work.\u201d<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Oh, man, it makes me gag to think Stan \u201cThe Man\u201d Lee, my idol, saw me write this stuff about myself and knew I wanted him to say these things about me.\u00a0 <\/span>But the following week, I had a blurb from my idol, and the man who wrote the stories I grew up with and loved so much that I dedicated a book to ripping off his style\u2026Stan \u201cThe Man\u201d Lee wrote me a blurb about my monster books!<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Sometimes, I feel like I\u2019m on the cusp of really big, really great things that are just about ready to tip in my favor.\u00a0 <\/span>But then other days\u2026 (See next exciting entr\u00e9e, fans)!<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

First of all, Shag \u2013 the artist whose work I adore \u2013 wrote me that he\u2019d like to contribute to my giant monster book.\u00a0\u00a0 At the convention, we had talked about commissions, which he doesn\u2019t do, but he had said he had a piece he could give me permission to publish.\u00a0 I had told him […]<\/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-138","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":36,"uagb_excerpt":"First of all, Shag \u2013 the artist whose work I adore \u2013 wrote me that he\u2019d like to contribute to my giant monster book.\u00a0\u00a0 At the convention, we had talked about commissions, which he doesn\u2019t do, but he had said he had a piece he could give me permission to publish.\u00a0 I had told him…","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138","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=138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}