Go Nuts This Weekend

Mind Hacks has an interesting post about a marathon biker who hallucinates when he's out on the road for long stretches of time. I thought I'd quote it in honor of 24 Hour Comics Day this weekend.

". . . The last days are marked by hallucinations: bears, wolves and aliens prowl the roadside; asphalt cracks rearrange themselves into coded messages. Occasionally, Robic leaps from his bike to square off with shadowy figures that turn out to be mailboxes. In a 2004 race, he turned to see himself pursued by a howling band of black-bearded men on horseback . . ."

I normally hallucinate during 24HCD, although not as vividly as this guy. My episode usually starts around hour 20 and involves seeing little black bugs on the periphery of my vision. They don't actually look like insects, just blurry black moving things that my brain interprets as bugs. And of course, as soon as I try to focus on them they disappear.

If anyone else has a 24HCD hallucination story, please leave it in the comments!

Link to the Mind Hacks post
Link to the original NYT article

SURROGATES! TOMORROW!

Top Shelf's FIRST MOVIE is coming out tomorrow! Do yourself a favor and go see Bruce Willis do a bunch of cool stuff.

... or is it his SURROGATE doing a bunch of cool stuff?

You probably know that The Surrogates is based on a graphic novel penned by Top Shelf mail room guy Robert Venditti and illustrated by Brett Weldele. What you may not know is that I was roommates with these guys at this year's San Diego Comic-Con and Chicago Wizard World. They had a lot of cool things to say about the film, and about visiting the set in Boston. Little known fact: the film is co-produced by Elizabeth Banks, a WHAS alum. WHASome!

Anyway, let's give SURROGATES a successful box office run so that movie investors start knocking down Top Shelf's door looking for more graphic novels to produce.

"A Time to Thrill" on Top Shelf 2.0

Pink Hobo gallery is currently exhibiting a show of Pinewood Derby art cars. Unfortunately I missed the opening, but it looks like it was a ton of fun, as evidenced by this late night race and this eye-popping portrait. My contribution does not have moving wheels, unfortunately, so it had to sit on the shelf during the race. Or maybe Tim and Curtis threw it around like a football. I don't know. Anyway, playing off the ultra-cheesy theme that every car has a story inside of it, I decided to literally fill my derby car with a stream of consciousness mini comic, which you can read more about in the next paragraph.

"A Time to Thrill" is an automobile-themed comic strip I drew on eleven slabs of painted balsa wood. Unfortunately, when I joined all the slabs together to form a car-shaped sculpture, the world lost the ability to actually read the comic.

Until now.

Top Shelf 2.0 -- an online library of awesome mini-comics and serialized comics, updated daily -- has posted the complete comic! Go check it out! And then go check out the actual car at Pink Hobo in NE Minneapolis while the show is still running!

We R Super Heroes Video

Zander and I (plus a boatload of other folks) are in a music video! We contributed original superhero designs for a Robbert Bobbert video, which is the brainchild of Apples in Stereo frontman Robert Schneider.

Puny directed and animated, and throughout the video you can see the visual stamps of King Mini and the rest of the Puny gang.



Here's Zander's guy, "The Bunny":



... and my guy, "Prosthetic Paddy":



Click on the stills to see all the other great superheroes created by these fine cartoonists:

24 Hour Comic Day is Coming Up!

You've got a half a month to get caught up on your sleeping, because 24 Hour Comics Day hits October 3 & 4.

For full details, bookmark 24-hourcomic.blogspot.com, where you can read all about this year's event as well as scroll down and see how last year's victims (erm, participants) fared.

And finally, spread Dan Olson's poster around like it was peanut butter! Here are two delicious sizes to choose from:

download SMALL
download LARGE

We'll have more info on this blog over the coming weeks, but just think of this post as a "save the date" kinda thing.

Your One Stop Shop for Recent Far Arden Reviews

There has been a slew of very thoughtful reviews of Far Arden lately, and I would be remiss if I didn't mention them. The surreality of reading complete strangers' thoughts and criticisms of this bizarre little book has not worn off, and I hope it never does. Click on the logos to read the full review.



Review by Jillian Steinhauer


Review by Myosotis


Review by Greg Burgas


Review by Matthew Brady


Review by J. Caleb Mozzocco


Review by Nick Dutro


Review by Jared Gardner


Review by Chris Partin


Review by Kyle Lemmon


Review by John Jewitt

Zander Cannon Answers Questions about Star Trek: TNG: Ghosts!

It's true, I'm writing a Star Trek miniseries for IDW, and here's the proof! Comic Book Resources has an interview with me about my philosophy and background and how those will come together in a Star Trek book. My guess? Awesomely.

ZANDER CANNON ON “STAR TREK: TNG: GHOSTS”

Pinewood Derby at Pink Hobo -- THIS SATURDAY!

I was never in Boy Scouts as a kid, but I would have considered joining had I known that they get to sit around and race cars all day. The only thing I had was Odyssey of the Mind competitions, where we had to use teamwork and teacher supervision to build a car to solve some sort of science problem. The only problem I wanted to solve was how to kick the competition's ASS. And I wanted to do it ALONE.

That's why the new show at Pink Hobo Gallery is so rewarding. Twenty years out of elementary school and I finally have a legitimate excuse to build and race a car. Granted, I ended up going the artsy-fartsy route and built a car with non-functioning wheels. But the rest of the cars will be racing. And there will be cheering. And screaming. And blood. Well, maybe not blood, but there will definitely be wine.

OPENING RECEPTION
PLACE: Pink Hobo Gallery
ADDRESS: 507 East Hennepin Ave, Mpls, MN
DATE: Saturday, September 19, 2009
TIME: 7pm (Race starts at 10pm)
WEB: pinkhobo.com

Manly Tales of Cowardice: The Guest Strip

I'm very excited to be a guest artist in Danno Klonowski's epic 14-page "Guest Artist Spectacular" ... and as luck would have it, my page premieres today!

So head on over to staplegenius.com and see what ol' Fleming Hazmat is up to now.

As an added treat, see if you can figure out what kind of lunch box Mr. Hazmat has taken with him to the logging site.

Top Shelf Mega Sale!

Check out this über-sale from Top Shelf:
www.topshelfcomix.com/specialdeals

I highly recommend the $3 That Salty Air and the $14.95 Far Arden.

Pink Hobo Open Call

Have you started your derby car yet? Make 'em fast, make 'em artsy-fartsy... just make 'em by September 15th. Details below:

Shad Petosky of Minneapolis, MN writes:

Hey, we're looking for more customized Pine Wood Derby art cars for our Pine Wood Derby Art Car show on Sept 19th.

Here are the details:

Open call for artists.
Pine Wood Derby Art Car Show
Entries due SEPT. 15th

Get yourself a Pinewood Derby Kit at a hobby shop or cub scout store. Carve it or just paint the block or replace the the wood with whatever but give it wheels! (or don't)

What we need from you:

NAME OF ARTIST
TITLE OF PIECE
PRICE OR NFS (Gallery takes 25%)
CONTACT INFO
RETURN ADDRESS

Send your piece to:
PINK HOBO gallery
507 E. Hennepin Ave.
Minneapolis, MN 55414

or deliver it yourself. We'll pay shipping back if you piece doesn't sell.

Contact shad at pink hobo dot com for more info.

www.pinkhobo.com