I'd make a terrible rich person

Well, terrible at being rich is what i think i meant.  When i woke up this morning i did my usual routine, shit, shower and shave.  When i dress it's usually, pants, white under shirt, socks, boots and button shirt.  But, between the socks and boots, sitting on the bed, there is always a pause i take to contemplate the day that has passed and the day ahead of me.  It lasts anywhere from 5 seconds to a minute.  

This morning i chose that moment to think about what would be different if i was a rich man.  You know what the best i could come up with was?  Never setting an alarm again.  Its weird too cause, i don't have a loud alarm and most of the time i'm awake a minute before it rings.  It's what the alarm means, i think, is what weighs heaviest upon me.  So many things are summed up on that alarm.  From the clothes i'm picking out to the lunch i'll eat later.  Not to mention the roof over my head, the bed i slept on and the TV i'll be watching later.  The alarm represents the need a rich man doesn't have.

I don't have a problem with working, far from it, i enjoy having something to do.  But, it's the having to do it part that bothers me i think.  There's times when i wake up 2 hours earlier than my alarm and my only thought is "i have 2 hours to try and get more rest".  I wonder what it would be like to just get up, do something, get sleepy and go back to sleep.  Wake up later and do what i want.  That's something a rich person can do.  An unemployed person can do the same, i suppose, if you want to be a dick about  it. 

But, that was the first thing i thought about.  Nothing extravagant, nothing surreal, not even something unique.  Yes i thought about traveling, paying off things and buying things.  But, sensible things.  A house, one for my mother, a few cars and just taking care of my family.  No tigers, blimps or a person to hunt for sport.  Not a even a harem of women to wake me up every morning.  I've been a poor bastard for so long that the only thing i need is to be left alone and wake up on my own time.

Sounds off

I went with my gut when i posted this conversation, when you hear it you'll know why.  But, in case you don't listen to it, here's why.  My mic went out and i didn't know, so the entire conversation is heard through Juan's mic, except i'm on the wrong end of it.  But, it was a good conversation and i hated losing it into oblivion.  So, yeah, let's give it a try.

Go here for it.

The San Diego Comic Con episode, finally

Show's how little we know, we thought we were gonna do one a day, Juan checking in every night to give us a rundown of the day's events, who would have known the SDCC was such a big deal.  Yeah, well, we meant well?  But, we're not letting Juan off the hook, i had him call in so that we could get a full 4 day break down of what went down.  Hope you enjoy, and if that's not enough to get you to listen, at least listen to Juan doing his Christopher Walken impression.  Fucking, gold.

Enjoy

Oh the humanity

So the new Batman movie came out, yay, right?  Wrong, so wrong.  The sad thing is, we're almost so used to it, that we'll say, awful, or sad, but we'll move on, like it didn't happen because it didn't happen to us directly.  Of course i'm talking about the Aurora, Colorado shooting at the Dark Knight Rises showing. 
I went to a High School that a few years before and a few after i was there had shootings, not to the include a stabbing and numerous fights while i was there.  I have a friend who lost a best friend to a school shooting, but that was something directed specifically for her.  We've all heard about Columbine, but we all know the wasn't the first one and not the last one, but it was the one that called a lot of attention to the problem.  So, they added metal detectors at schools.  My friend has been a school cop for over a decade, the schools he's worked at had metal detectors since they were established yet nothing more than a fight here and there ever happened.  These things are pretty random, a fucking movie theater of all places, damn.  I remember a few years back about a Jewish Community Center, i thought that took the cake.  But, they are random, some fuck loses it, or convinces himself that it's the only way, for what, who knows, the cowards usually kill themselves before they are caught. We talk about it for a while, we feel bad, we move on.  Like i said, unless we're directly affected by it.  Which isn't to say we're insensitive, it's just the way it is.  I know the thought of being unlucky enough to be there or to have someone i care about hurt in some way scares me more than when i was in the war.  At least there i had a fighting chance.  As much as i love living in this country, i know that things like this aren't common in others.  But, the randomness is the key, was it Norway that had the shooter dressed as police officer at a summer camp last year?  60 something fatalities, not including the bombing that was used to distract, horrifically well planned.  The theater guy too, he won't have a name here, not while i'm writing this, he did it in a such a way that people never saw it coming, by distracting them.  This is where someone would say what they would have done differently, me with my military training etc., no, i would have sat there, seen a guy come in, seen him throw out two gas canisters and maybe had enough time to react.  But most likely be one of the unlucky people who got hit first and never heard the rampage unfold.  If only running was an option, taking off to a place where this wont happen to me, but the randomness says i have the same chance of it not happening to me here or where ever i go.  So what to do?  Feel sad, think it's awful, be glad it didn't happen to us and move on until the next time.  It sounds insensitive, but it's really just disconnect, and only for a minute before realizing it's just life, it happens.

Florida Supercon after thoughts

Well, i spent two days in a comic convention and all i got was sore feet.  No, i got some pictures too.  Seriously though, i was invited to sit in with Creature Entertainment, by my podcasting buddy Juan, at their booth so that i could record some interviews with collaborators as well as people at the con.  It was a lot of fun and here are some of the highlights of the weekend. 

I won't lie, i was surprised saturday had this line waiting to get it in the entire day.  Yet for the most part, traffic inside moved quite fluidly.  

Because it was convention there was plenty of cosplay, it's honestly the first thing you notice there, this might not have been the best costume, apparently there was a full on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle with working mouth that i missed, but this one did it for me.  Clever and simple but very strong i thought.

The second thing you notice at a con is the shirts, store bought or home made, that show your support for whatever comic or character you follow.  Among all the shirts i saw this one was my favorite, again, it maybe wasn't the best one, but guess what, this is my blog, damn it.

I forgot to take a pic of Juan's awesome shirt, but i found it online.

and i was showing my support for the underdog.

A lot of con attendees also like tattoos, of all that i saw i geeked out the most on this one, eventhough it's not a geek tattoo at all.  I'm a huge fan of Mr Hitchcock, for my money there is no better suspense movie than Rear Window and no better dark comedy than The Trouble With Harry, if you haven't seen either, you need to do yourself a favor and do so right away.

Over all it was a great experience and i'd love to do it again.  The best part of the whole weekend was talking with the visitors to the booth, a lot of returning customer for Creature, a lot of new ones and plenty of interesting characters.  While there we did record two podcast, one for every day we were there, interviewing visitors plus a lot of the Creature crew that was working the booth.

G4 also came by the booth and spoke with Juan.

and he was also part of a very interesting panel for independent comics.  I'll be talking about that on a later entry, it was a good conversation about the current state of comics and the future of comics thanks to small companies publishing their own things.

You can listen to day 1,  here

Day 2, here

Also, a very nice visitor to the booth made me make sure that you see this picture so that her story of the con made sense.  Thanks for listening.