Daft Musings

On Sunday morning, as I was running over to our hotel to get something for the booth, I saw this truck driving around the area near the convention center, clearly meant to promote the movie Joyride to the Comic-Con audience:

This really gave me pause. It had a decapitated head and various disembodied body parts hanging off the front, to promote a film that is obviously meant to be more about gore than plot.

Now I don’t believe in censorship, especially in artistic endevours, but most of the art venues I go to have the taste to let me opt out of things not for the faint-hearted, like the Holocaust exhibit at the British War Museum, or the photos-of-suffering-European-children exhibit at the Legion of Honor a few years ago. I can’t even read Steven King books without being disturbed, so I am grateful for the warning, and those who can stomach grittier images can see it.

On the other hand, there is ugliness in the world, and whether I like it or not, I will see it sometimes. On the other hand, I’d rather my children didn’t have horrifying images pushed on them. And I’m glad my children didn’t see (or at least notice) this truck.

So did it belong at Comic-Con? The show does have a lot less children (or at least a smaller percentage of children) attending than it used to. A fair percentage, if not the majority, of the audience is young adults, and some of those enjoy gory movies. But wouldn’t it be nice to have known that if my children were out on the streets of downtown San Diego on Sunday morning that they’d probably see a truck with blood and body parts all over it driving past them? Or should I really start putting Comic-Con in the category of an adults-only show?

There is really only so much volume and stress any system, even one as well-managed as the San Diego Comic-Con can endure. After 4 days of activities staring at 7 am and running to 3 am; of crowds gathering as early as 4 am and filling every available space around the San Diego convention center; of a cell phone tower being so trafficked it crashed, I believe the convention had nowhere to go but to actually begin a meltdown on Sunday.

To my surprise, when Carl and I walked into the convention exhibit floor at 9:15 am on Sunday morning, it was already abuzz with attendees lining up, shopping, and taking pictures. The show schedule said the show didn’t open until 9:30 am, which was already an early opening concession to the crowds which had been arriving earlier and in larger quantities every year. The security guard I spoke to swore to me that he was only letting in exhibitors and Comic-Con staff (whose badges looked similar to regular attendees’.) I could obviously see that most of the people on the show floor were regular attendees. Now, I don’t mind early admission: honestly the show floor could be open from 6 am to midnight and it would still be busier than any other comic book convention anywhere, ever (though I think as exhibitors we’d be dead from exhaustion within a day.) But I would really like to know when the show is open, unofficially as well as officially, so I know to be there. If the friends, family, and assorted hanger-ons of selected V.I.P.s are going to be browsing past our booth at 8 a.m., especially en masse, I would like to have a heads up about it, and not just 15 minutes before it happens.

The convention finally just gave in and officially opened the show at 9:20 am. Mark got in line for a giveaway and found out all the tickets had already been given out to the people who’d gotten in before that. When Peter and I got to the 4000-person room for the Hamlet 2 panel at 10 am to sit through the 10:30 am It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia panel beforehand, it was already half full. Enough people had arrived at god-knows-how-early-an-hour to snag the free prizes It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia was giving out (DVDs of the first season to the first 45, and t-shirts for several thousand more.)

Neil had originally wanted to see the children’s independent film festival after the Hamlet 2 panel, but he opted out. I took Kelly there instead, though I have to say it was more G-rated film student films than films specifically meant for children. Kelly was a good student, however. She paid attention to each film and loved being able to ask the director a question about it. I was proud of her that she always asked a question that was relevant. She has a strong future as a panel attendee.

Since people were actually beginning to leave the show on Sunday afternoon, it reverted to barely manageable, and I enjoyed the last few hours. That doesn’t mean the meltdown wasn’t still in effect. Ever since we had Neil, we’ve been aware that the show generously offers child care for the exhibitors. For safety reasons, children aren’t allowed on the show floor during tear-down, and it’s nice to have someplace safe to put them instead of having one parent trying to entertain children for hours as the other struggles to pack up the booth in a timely manner. But now that the show attracts a higher-end industry show presence, the day care center is less used than it used to be: many mom-and-pop type operations simply can’t afford the cost of this bigger, splashier show. And 90% of the security guards as well as people with Comic-Con staff badges didn’t even know where the child care was, and in fact, were often surprised to hear such a thing existed. Finally, one security guard had heard of it and pointed me in the right direction.

The rest of the experience went smoothly, the con being over and all. But I have to say, one big speculation I’ve had with Peter is how the con will evolve from here to handle its popularity and success.

As you might surmise from my earlier postings, the San Diego Comic-Con is kind of like geek Mardi Gras or Karneval. And as wonderful and amazing as any of those events are, I don’t find it as much fun as some of my fellow human beings to be part of a massively crowded event. But even though I bailed on the show for most of that day, I got more than enough of it.

I took Neil over to the show just before it began, and as we disembarked from the bus, a security guard was already advising us to enter the convention center on the northern end. The southern end was impassable because the line for the Heroes panel (not due to start for another hour and half) had already snaked around as much as it could on the top floor, snaked down the stairs and wound around to take up 1/4 of the bottom floor. Luckily, our booth was in the northern end.

I figured with at least 7000 fans drawn away to stand in the line, Kelly and I might have a chance of walking around the show in the morning. It turns out if you weren’t standing in the line for Heroes, you were probably in line for something else. There was a long line for the Hasbro booth: not for freebies, but just to buy toys. There was another line just to have a moment to sit on the unicorn, like one of the characters in Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. It is evidence of Comic-Con insanity that I actually thought about getting in the line, even though Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay sounds like one of the worse movies ever made, and I thought exactly that when it came out in the theatres. Why would I want to sit on the unicorn from a movie I don’t want to see, which is out on DVD already?

I managed to convince Neil he’d have more fun coming out with me and Kelly than sitting around in the back of the booth or waiting in lines. As it was, the walk back to our hotel and towards the Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor promotional setup across from the convention center was as full of people handing out pop culture freebies as openly as on the floor. We all received History Channel bags and USB keys with the History Channel’s web page about dinosaurs. The Mummy exhibit was a reproduction of the terra-cotta soldiers, which is probably as close as I’ll ever get to the real thing.

Eventually, after a lunch in our hotel, I got my car and took the children to Coronado. Even though I lived in the area, I knew Mission Beach, but I’d never gone to Coronado Beach, so this was my chance to see it. As I expected, it was a long, beautiful stretch of sand and surf near the famous Hotel del Coronado. Ironically, it was an overcast day making the beach trip no different from a trip to one of our local beaches. In fact, I daresay the weather was a lot warmer at New Brighton Beach the last time Kelly and I went there, though the water was definitely much warmer and pleasant to be in at Coronado.

Just as we were leaving the beach, Peter called me and asked me to pick him up because he needed a ride to the local Fry’s Electronics. He said one of the antennas on our cellular modem (which was providing internet access to our computers) had broken and he needed a replacement ASAP. As it turned out, the Fry’s, Radio Shack and Verizon didn’t have any replacement antennas in stock, though Peter did buy himself a pair of sneakers because the shoes he had and all the walking and standing on the show floor had done in his feet.

As he found out the next day, he didn’t actually need a replacement antenna. He’d lost internet access (as well as the ability to be reach by phone) because the cellular network near the convention center had temporarily crashed from the volume of traffic going through it.

I returned and dropped Peter and Neil off near the convention center, where they hopped off in hopes of being able to get into the Mythbusters panel. They didn’t, but they had extra time to get in to the Masquerade later that night.

Our hotel had an open bar from 5 to 7:30 pm each night, but I’d usually been unable to make it there on time. This night, I managed to get back in at 7:15 and snag myself a much-needed beer plus some snacks for me and Kelly. But there was no seating to be had. I spotted an open table near the elevators, but since it only had a single seat, I asked for one from a guy who had pulled 8 chairs around a little table near him. He waved me off, saying that each of the chairs (which he’d taken from all the surrounding tables) were taken. Each chair had a little drink in front of it, but no person anywhere in sight. Oh, great, I thought: now I not only have to compete for space and resources with way too many freakin’ people than I’m comfortable with, now I also have to compete with people’s imaginary friends too. I took my drink and snack up to my hotel room and put a Do Not Disturb sign on the door.

Later Loretta called me and told me she and the rest of the staff had declared it “Crash and Burn Day.” Anyone willing was simply staying and eating leftover Indian food from the restaurant they’d managed to get in the night before, because they just didn’t have the energy to go out and try to fight for food with 100,000 other hungry people. I had my own stash from Ralph’s I’d set aside for this very occassion, and I invited the others to join me, but they worked it out.

San Diego’s children’s museum is only two blocks away from the convention center, and I took Kelly (and later Neil as well) there as an escape from the Comic-Con craziness. I’d been there many years before when Neil was a toddler, so it was a surprise to me that this incarnation of the museum was completely new: the museum had been closed for 5 years, and only reopened in May of this year.

This new children’s museum was like no other children’s museum I’ve ever seen before, but conceptually I loved it. Most children’s museum are focused on teaching some academic concept: they’re kind of like junior science museums. This museum was an art museum, in which you expected to interact with the art, in whichever way you wished. Adults were strongly encouraged to play with the art, too, and sometimes I wondered if maybe the museum wasn’t misclassified as a children’s museum when perhaps it should really be called a hands-on art museum. It requires imagination and creativity to make the most of the museum and many of the younger children seemed lost without an obvious activity at hand.

The museum’s still new, so I have to give it some slack, and assume the curators will learn what kind of exhibits work better than others. As it was some of the exhibits/installations were clearly more compelling than others. For instance, no matter how modest the attendance (and it seemed to be rather modest during the show, because downtown parking was completely taken up by Comic-Con attendees), there was almost always a line for the No Rules, Except exhibit, a room considing completely of mattresses and pillow-like tires (plus one or two punching bags).

I wasn’t alone among adults wishing there was there was a grown-ups only session. Adults were welcome to play with the children, but really, you’d have to be a real ‘tard to bop a 4-year-old with a foam tire.

Having to wait for the mattress room wasn’t really a bother, however, since right in front of it was an open room of climbing walls, with a sparkling birds art motif. One of my favorite art installations however, was the nearby Porta-Party, especially since I could share it with my children without being some weirdo adult in the children’s museum. It looked like a Porta-Potty from the outside, but if you went inside and locked the door, a mirrored ball spun lights through the dance floor and you could groove down to the music playing from the iPod. I need a Porta-Party in my house, because sometimes you just need to dance, but you don’t need to dance with everyone.

The least successful art installation was the Golden Rectangle art that took up half of the basement floor. It was certainly beautiful: a huge structure of delicate wood above a duct-taped labyrinth with a few capes and one of the museum’s curious double-wheeled scooters. But children spent at most a few minutes there. Even Neil, who loves everything having to do with the Golden Rectange, simply threaded the labyrinth and gave up on it.

For art museum aesthetics, I liked the other side of the basement level. It had a large room with a video installation: being in it (and running around, as many of the children did) give the impression of being inside a large aquarium–kind of like the Monterey Bay Aquarium but via video without the massive crowds. Right outside of it was the shadow puppet theatre with a mural (entitled something like “My Mother Told Me Not to Put That in My Mouth”.) Here’s a section of it:

It’s what the Camille Rose Garcia exhibit at the San Jose Museum of Art could have been if Camille Rose Garcia had a sense of humor and talent instead of attitude.

Within it, adults were happily doing something that was acceptable for them to do, namely creating shadow puppets out of cardboard. But I didn’t do that, because I’d discovered I could plop in and toss around the nearby bean bags. Again: this is a museum that requires you to bring your own imagination to make the most of it.

On the main floor, the most children’s-museum-like exhibit was the art section on (and close to) an outdoor patio. My nemesis was an old VW bug that had been placed there together with buckets of paint and paintbrushes. Kids (like Kelly) loved it, but I thought it might have been simpler to dunk the children in the paint and give them a wall they can hurl their paint-covered selves against. I put smocks on Kelly front and back but she still ended up with paint all over and I was immensely happy she was in short sleeves. Another girl showed Kelly that you didn’t need a paintbrush to paint: you could ditch the whole thing and paint with your palms. Better yet, you could dig your fingernails into the wet paint and create patterns in it! Meanwhile, a boy enthusiastically working his paint brush accidentally splattered me and everything else within 3 feet. Neil was perfectly happy to limit himself to working on other mediums with clay, ink paint and chalk.

The museum’s appeal certainly skewed older than any other children’s museum I’ve been in. Neil, who is usually indulgent for Kelly’s sake at children’s museums, got more out of this one than Kelly did. He led her through a tent maze. And he showed both of us how the video installation for a build-this-building section worked: it played back whatever was being done with the blocks backwards. So Neil experimented with walking backwards and deconstructing things and then watching how it looked like he was walking forward and creating. Unlike other children’s museums, this museum also had a teen room where teenagers could make their own costumes with crochet and paper-mache. And teens would certainly be capable of enjoying the museum’s other installations, maybe even more so than the preschoolers which seemed to be the predominant audience.

So I think San Diego’s New Children’s Museum still has to find its feet. But I love art, and I love making art interactive, and I certainly look forward to exploring the museum again if I get the chance.

It was a given that Kelly would bring her Superman costume (a hand-me-down from Neil) to the Comic-Con and wear it. In fact, this summer she’s wanted to put on the costume and be “Super Kelly” all the time. She wore the costume at the park; she wore it at the children’s museum; she wore it at our Fourth of July celebration; whenever I gave her the choice to pick her own outfit, she pulled out the costume, no matter how dirty it was. It didn’t matter that it was really a Superman costume, not a Supergirl costume: she’s Super Kelly!

But I’m not sure she was prepared for the duties and responsibilities of being a superhero at the San Diego Comic-Con. She was often asked to stop and pose for pictures, and (as our many photos of a turned blonde head prove) she’s not good at presenting herself to a camera. She was surrounded by hundreds of other superheros and pop culture icons, many of whom were eager to interact with her. And she had to acknowledge her many fans. It’s tough being a super-hero!

On the last day of the show, I took her into Ralph’s (the grocery store within walking distance of the convention center) and she was so glazed that my fellow conventioneer waved his hands in front of her face and she didn’t even blink. “That’s enough Comic-Con for you, young lady!” he exclaimed. I laughed. Kelly remained static, her brain still blown.

Since then, Kelly’s been perfectly happy to go incognito. I hope she’ll be up to resuming her Super Kelly duties by Halloween.

Peter miraculously had some time off from booth duty on Thursday afternoon, so we strolled off to explore the convention hall. Just steps from our booth, we discovered a freaking long line of people. I asked the person on the end what was the line for: people will stand in line for anyone, and I’m sure I would have no clue who it was.

“Jim Butcher is signing,” the woman in line told me. I quickly got right in line behind her. I love the Dresden Files novels, and I’d just finished reading the latest one, Small Favor, which was the best one yet. I was about to step out just to look at one of the people in line in front of me who was dressed as the hero of the novels, wizard Harry Dresden. Peter advised me to stay in line, and then smiled as I’d become a crazed fan like everyone else at the con.

The signing hadn’t actually begun yet, but I think I was the 95th person in line. I know because the bookstore that was hosting the signing handed me a card with that number on it. I was nervous because I hadn’t brought anything for Jim Butcher to sign, but the people in line around me let me step out to buy myself a copy of Small Favor. As it turns out, the card I’d been given entitled me to another free book of his at the signing, whereupon he’d sign it as well as any other book of his handed to him. That blew my mind: a book signing where you get the author’s book for free. I’m happy when I go to a book signing where the bookstore isn’t a complete fascist and insists on $25+ purchases for the honor of having an audience with an author. But here, the bookstore was going to give me one of his books?!

I found it hard to believe. I happily clutched my copy of Small Favor, and spoke to the woman in front of me who was holding three short-story compilations with Jim Butcher stories in them. As people passed me by, they asked me who the signing was for, and like the fan girl I was I held up Small Favor and happily burbled “Jim Butcher! The Dresden Files author!” They all politely nodded, and said “oh, yeah…him.” They had no idea who he was which put me in that delicious exclusive category of Jim Butcher fan, together with the other 150 or so people who were waiting in line 45 minutes before the author appeared. Shiaw-Ling came by to laugh at me.

As it turns out, I really did get a Jim Butcher book (The Furies of Calderon, from another series of his, which I will now discover), as well as Small Favors signed. To my surprise, this practice of giving books away with a signing seemed to be typical for the con, and once I discovered it, I became a book ho. Before the con ended, I also snagged Mirrored Heavens, a futuristic action thriller by David J. Williams; 30 Days of Night: Eternal Damnation, a novelization based on a comic book series Peter really loves, by Jeff Mariotte and Steve Niles; and Exit Strategy, a hunting-for-a-serial-killer mystery by Kelley Armstrong, each book personally signed to me and Peter in person by the author, who more often than not had his/her editor at their side. I’ll probably still be in happy shock about it when I get around to reading the books.

But I digress. The next day, I went to see the Jim Butcher panel. I wasn’t sure I’d get into it, because most of the people at our booth had already been skunked out of getting a seat at any of the panels they wanted to see. But I figured I’d try, so about 30 or 45 minutes before the panel began I went to get in line for the appearance. The line for the huge room (I think 3000 seats, if not more) ran around the halls and then twisted back in on itself, but there was still room for me to get in line. I’d discovered the day before Jim Butcher fans are fun, probably because I’m one of them and I know what they’re talking about when they discuss the short-lived Sci-Fi channel TV series or other fantasy authors, like Laurel K. Hamilton. So even if I didn’t get in, it’d be interesting.

As it so happened, I did make it in, where I encountered the Avatar: The Last Airbender fans who were already in from several panels before and keeping their seats until their panel 4 hours hence. I don’t think they kept any Jim Butcher fans from making it in, and I was happy that both guys wearing Harry Dresden costumes made it in and got to ask questions. Jim Butcher simply opened the panel up directly to answers, and I have to say my fellow Jim Butcher fans asked good questions, though it helped greatly to be familiar with the novels already: What inspired the Codex Alera world? (The interesting answer: Pokemon and The Lost Roman Legion.) What happened to the demon Lasciel, and what was going to happen to Dresden’s shot-up friend Michael? What did Butcher think of the Sci-Fi series, and is there going to be another series or Dresden Files movie? (Answer: possibly, in about 4 years when the Sci-Fi contract expires.) What’s with the funky wizard hat in the Dresden Files comic book? At one point, Jim Butcher mocked the Avatar fans, who woke up to cheer at the mention of their series. When you’re going to sit in a room all day for your favorite cartoon, you’re beyond mockery. As far as they were concerned, it was our non-Avatar-fan loss that we were not one of them.

And then one of us, one of the Jim Butcher fans, asked Jim Butcher why he had a Disney allusion in every book of the Dresden series. Disney allusion? Butcher was as surprised as me. When you’re picking out things in the books that even the author doesn’t know about, maybe you are being a little too obsessive. Anyway, the panel ended with all the Jim Butcher fans happy, and most of them (not including me) heading over the autography area to get more Jim Butcher books signed.

But I discovered I am a Jim Butcher fangirl, and in that, I am not alone.

I originally planned to leave the San Diego on Sunday morning and skip the last day of the show, but when I was looking over the program guide, I saw an ad for the Hamlet 2 panel on Sunday morning, which would include an appearance by Steve Coogan.

As I’ve blogged earlier, I seem to have Steve Coogan karma. In 2006, I saw all of 3 movies in the theatres, and they all happened to have Steve Coogan in them. Since then, I happen to catch every movie in American release that has Steve Coogan in it, even though I don’t know as I buy the ticket that he’s in it. Whatever casting agents want to put him in, it seems, is the kind of movie I want to see. And now, at the first Comic-Con I’d gone to in years, Steve Coogan was going to be making a public appearance. The movie he was in and promoting (Hamlet 2) didn’t even have any association with comic books whatsoever. It was simply a quirky indie film…exactly the kind of film I go to. Apparently because I came to the con, Steve Coogan suddenly found himself there, too. So, of course, I had to be sure to stay another day to see him.

In short, Hamlet 2 is about a washed up actor turned drama teacher (played by Steve Coogan) who tries to save the drama program at his school by writing a blockbuster play: a sequel to Hamlet. OK, so Hamlet died in the original play, but there’s a way around it: put in a time machine! And while you’re at it, bring in Jesus, too, because everyone loves Jesus! And make it a musical, with a song taking advantage of how everyone loves Jesus: “Rock Me Sexy Jesus!”

No doubt because of my Steve Coogan karma, I scored a free Rock Me Sexy Jesus t-shirt and a Sexy Jesus air freshener for my car (so now I can drive around with eau de Steve Coogan). But I think the best promotion for the movie had to be the rockin’ sexy Jesuses (Jesii?) greeting people who were going into the Hamlet 2 panel. Here’s my picture of them, though it’s not so good because I only had my cell phone camera:

Or perhaps it wasn’t that my camera was bad, but better explained by one of the Jesi who told me the picture would sparkle. I think they may have been professional actors, but come to think of it, given Comic-Con weirdness, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were simply enthusiastic Hamlet 2 fans.

Peter, Neil and I managed to find seats close enough to actually see Steve Coogan in person (no small feat in the 4500-seat room which had filled by the time the panel began). It was actually a fairly brief panel, about 15 or 20 minutes) in which we saw a few clips from the movie and the panelists took a few questions from the audience. Thanks to one of her fellow school-mates in attendance, we found out the movie’s writer had been a Catholic school girl, which may explain the sexy Jesus angle. I found out I have a Japanese counterpart with Steve Coogan karma, real Steve Coogan fans want to know when the Alan Partridge movie is coming out (Alan Partridge being a character he did in Britain), and that Steve Coogan seemed to be somewhat shocked to see 4500 fans in one place, all looking at him. Neil hasn’t seen as much of Steve Coogan as I have, but we did discover Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride this summer, and I told him we were going to see Mr. Mole. Neil commented that in person Steve Coogan sounded more like Ratty than Mr. Mole.

And yes, I’ll be seeing Hamlet 2 when it shows at our local art film theatre.

I skipped out on the last two years of the San Diego Comic-Con because it’s just to freakin’ huge for my comfort: in particular I loathe being caught in a huge crowd. But this year, Neil needed a ride to the show, and like his dad, he’d be heartbroken if he missed out on it. We could shuffle our crew around to make room for me and Kelly in the hotel room, and since I was driving (in a car that reminds everyone I RLYH8LA, no less), I could always bail out for a day at the beach or the zoo. I ended up hitting a happy balance: I nibbled at the show visiting it for just a few hours a day, and balancing it out with other things. It kept me mostly sane, so I was still capable of enjoying the little of who and what I did see, but it was still overwhelming at times.

Now, the 2005 San Diego Comic-Con was massive, crowded and chaotic. As Peter warned me, the 2008 con would be even more so,and he was right. Though it’s been trending in that direction, this year the con actually hit full capacity, which in real world terms meant everything overflowed capacity. Every hotel room in San Diego and beyond its borders was booked. Light rail trains were standing room only and busses had to turn away riders. The sidewalks and crosswalks around the convention center were packed and security had to constantly warn pedestrians not to stumble off them, lest they get hit by a bus. And as for the aisles inside the convention center: there was many a time they were nearly impassible because of the press of people. Theoretically, it can’t ever get more crowded than this (unless the convention organizers manage to bend space and time, which they may be looking into), because every ticket and exhibition space was sold out before the convention even began.

Like others who have been going to this convention for years, I could wax nostalgic for the old times, when I worked the booth and could kick back and hang out in between visits from potential customers. But honestly, the people who are coming now are overall a better crowd. Besides the genuine comic book geeks, the show used to have a fair share of snotty looky-loos and bratty kids. I particularly remember some stoners laughing at the very idea of comic book information on a computer; and a pair of 10-year-olds going from table to table with the mantra “what do you have that you’ll give me for free?” With few exceptions, the people who come now are serious attendees: they know what they want, they know what they’re looking for, and they watch for what they’re interested in. There’s no time, or room, or energy to be an ass. If you’re in for free goodies, there’s so much to be had it couldn’t be carried about by one person, so there’d be no point in hitting up random tables.

On the other side, there can be a frightening edge of obsession in some of the fans. Some people aren’t just serious about their pop culture interests: they’re really really obsessed. The person wearing the Luke Skywalker costume may simply be a Star Wars fan; or he could be someone who has embraced Star Wars as a lifestyle and religious philosophy, and to your horror, may openly describe himself as Wookie-sexual. Since the panels were, well, overflowing, some fans would find a seat for an earlier panel and sit through it in order to have a guaranteed seat for the panel they wanted. At the Jim Butcher panel I went to, I sat next to a man who’d been there for two panels before, and planned to keep his seat until the Nickelodeon Avatar panel 4 hours later. And that was nothing compared to the people who camped out in front of the convention center at 4:00 am (yes A.M.!) so they could see the Heroes panel which didn’t begin until 10:30 am. The organizers moved the opening time to 9:30 am from 10 am because the crush of the crowd had had them consistently opening the con earlier than planned: but that just meant that, instead of beginning to line up for the show at 7 am, now the fans were lining up to get in at 6:30 am. Such dedicated fans are not so unusual at Comic-Con, and it’s only until you return to the real world that you remember most of the people in this great grand world couldn’t tell you Ghost Rider’s secret identity, and they don’t really care, either. They may not even (OMG) know who Ghost Rider is.

It all reminds me that the positive word “fan” came out of the less complementary word “fanatic.” And given the effort and ongoing energy it takes to get into the San Diego Comic-Con, being a fanatic may be the personality you need for this kind of a show.

Presidential candidate Barack Obama recently said “Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English, you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish.” He’s been criticized for that comment, but I agree with him. As I’ve found, having to put up with gringo efforts at Spanish (like mine) encourages Latino immigrants to pull out and practice their English much better than speaking English does.

For several months now, the local day laborers, the night janitor in Peter’s office building, the strawberry man, and my neighbors and their friends have had their social skills tested by my Spanish, which came from an aborted series of lessons with Auralog, a library book called Spanish for Gringos (without the audio portion), and children’s television shows. Guess what?! Everyone realized their English, as limited as it may be, was worlds better than my Spanish, and they had nothing to be embarrassed about. Soon we were communicating just fine, and I learned some salsa dance steps to boot.

In fact, at times, their English may be even more understandable than mine. For instance, I can never get the pronounciation of nut names right. Is it k-SHOE, or CASH-oo; PEE-can, or P-kawn? No matter what I say, people don’t know what I’m talking about. A native Spanish speaker speaking English, however, will say “thees nut, it ees the nut from Brazeel,” or “thees nut, eet comes from Texas.” Charming and comprehensible, so why speak Spanish?

Most Americans (at least here in the West) have had some Spanish in high school, but won’t speak it, because they know it’s so awful. But honestly, fellow Americans, pull that near-forgotten knowledge out and spring it on some unsuspecting day laborer when he least expects it! Barack Obama is right: speak Spanish! That’ll teach the immigrants how important it is to speak English in America; it’s the only thing that will save their beautiful language from horrible abuse.

Last night, Peter and I went to San Francisco to see Stan Ridgway perform at the Great American Music Hall. It was one of the most enjoyable concerts I’ve seen in a long time, and the acoustics at the Great American Music Hall (which I’d never been in before) were great.

I haven’t really been in a going out to San Francisco mood ever since gas prices took a stratospheric jump, and I was even dragging my feet on this concert. I generally dislike having to see opening bands, and I remember many a show not even beginning until an hour after the scheduled show time. Peter reminded me I was still in a 90s frame of mind. I had to remind myself that this decade in music concerts in much better: the opening acts aren’t always an insult to the audience, and most shows start on time, instead of having the band you wanted to see finally appear 4 hours after the scheduled start.

The opening band (and there was only one) was Penelope Houston, whom I didn’t know, but whom Peter recognized vaguely as the lead singer from a seminal San Francisco punk band, The Avengers. By the time we arrived, she’d already gone on stage, and she surprised us both (pleasantly) with how amazingly good she was. She’s evolved into an alt-country singer with impressive musicianship both in herself and her band. And the lyrics were edgy, like these from one of my favorites among those I heard, Pale Green Girl. Penelope Houston’s playing a zither these days, and she kicks musical a**.

She was a good opener for Stan Ridgway, who opened with “Factory” and joked that he was going to bring us all those feel-good songs of the New Wave era. He followed that up with his film noir song “Peg and Pete and Me,” which is still going through my head. The show followed that vein throughout the night, with Stan Ridgway occasionally singing out “Walking on Sunshine” to remind us that there was never anything frothy about his songs. Unfortunately, though Peter’s been seeing Stan Ridgway since the late 80s, I’d only seen him once before when he played at Slim’s in 2006. I had to ask Peter if Ridgway had always been as quirky as he was on stage, and Peter said he’s pretty much been the same kind of guy, but his fans are getting a little more eccentric (us included, probably.) It seems to be a tradition for someone (or perhaps a tradition for a small group of fans) to send Stan vodka martinis. Does this only happen in San Francisco, or does he get vodka martinis all over the world? He received three drinks while he was performing, though he only had time to take a polite sip from each.

This show was set up with chairs and tables for the audience, which was a surprise, since I’m used to open venues in which I’m shoved about near the front of the stage. But the Great American Music Hall is a small venue, so even seated, the show had a pleasant, intimate feel, and the people who wanted to dance just gathered on either side of the stage. And as I said, the acoustics were great: I could hear both Stan Ridgway and Penelope Houston clearly, and I’m used to having to decipher lyrics through garbled sound.

So in all, the concert turned out to be even better than I expected: it was a nice crowd, an intimate feel, great acoustics, and even a worthy opening act.