Being very tired and having just gotten off a plane, it took me a moment to comprehend that the thing shaking in my coat was my cell phone. You see, I had gotten my cell phone a couple of years ago when I was going through some life issues that made the idea of getting a cell phone make sense. But after that particular bump on the road of life, I really don’t use the damn thing. Except when traveling.

So, I always feel a bit inept at cell phone ownership, the care and feeding thereof, not to mention answering the damn thing. I’m always startled into answering it when it goes off, sometimes against my will. And I have to remember to turn off the vibration option when I leave it on a table.

Anyway, it was Patrick Farley, calling to see if Kip and I were safely on the ground in San Francisco. We were in fact, waiting at the baggage carrousel. Patrick, out of the kindness of his heart, was coming to pick us up. This was on top of letting us crash at his house in Berkley during the Alternative Press Expo, or, more commonly, APE.

The table Christopher and I shared, surrounded
by the usual suspects.

But APE was tomorrow and we had all of Friday afternoon and evening to ahead of us. The afternoon was spent pleasantly by Kip and I at a coffeeshop/lunch joint in Patrick’s neighborhood as our host finished up some work.

Then came dinner, made by Patrick for many people in three waves. He made two gumbos, one vegetarian and one not, wild rice and a strawberry and spinach salad. The first wave were friends of Patrick who were dashing in before an Ani Difranco concert. Next came those more focused on comics and animation, including the lovely Kristen
Brennan. The last in were Erika
Moen and Jen Wang and Erika’s friend Jeff. Kip and I then scurried off to the Kinko’s in downtown Berkley in order to get the banner for Chris’s and my table plotted out. And in the process I found the most frustrating Kinko’s I
had ever hoped to deal with.

We made it back from our first excursion on BART safely to find the party huddled around the TV watching Liquid Television. And wasn’t that a blast from the past! Much of it didn’t age well, though Aeon Flux is still a winner with me.

Soon after came the mass collapse. In the morning, Patrick made some of his amazing coffee and then he Kip and I hooked up with Lori. Too long since I last saw Lori, a curator for the Museum of Jurassic Technology and all around hipster.

Lori drove us all to the Con where I finally could tell my table-mate, Christopher Baldwin, of the delay in our banner. You see, Christopher doesn‘t have a cellphone and has had limited access to phones and internet. So, while not a big deal, I was anxious that he’d be apprised of the situation.

But, Christopher was cool with it and Bethanne leapt into action, cutting and forming a banner out of paperbags on which Chris then drew the Bruno logo and Kip recreated the Dicebox logo. It ended up being quite decent looking and actually more successful in some respects than the official banner we put up
the next day.

Christopher, Bethanne and Kip raise the banner high.

And never under-estimate the usefulness of a cellphone at a Con. Though APE
hardly approached the size of the Comic-con in San Diego, I still needed it to find Patrick across the crowded floor. And why I needed to locate him immediately was that Erika had just called to say she and Jen needed directions to APE from another part of San Francisco.

The lovely and talented duo of Erika Moen and Jen Wang.

We were finally joined by Erika and Jen, who put out a small trove of Mostly Acquisitions which then started to rapidly disappear into the hands of eager buyers.

It was a busy and tiring day that passed quickly—I didn’t have much of a chance to hunt down everyone I wanted to talk to or really take a good look around.

Scott counts the number of Jen(n)s that will be at dinner as Patrick looks on in his fabulous fur free fuzzy coat.

Right after the Con I was off with a large crowd to Buca de Beppos, including Scott McCloud, Derek Kirk Kim, Kristen Brennan, Justine Shaw as well as Christopher, Bethanne, Erika, Jen, Patrick and some local friends of Patrick’s. It was a good dinner and I got the chance to talk
extensively with Erika, which was nice. It’s near impossible in the bustle of a Con to focus on a conversation and I left many regretfully unfinished.

Next was the party at the Cartoon
Art Museum for a couple of hours before trundling back to Patrick’s again to sleep like rocks that night.

The swanky Madison Clell at the Cartoon Museum of Art.

On Sunday, getting to APE from Berkley took us two cars, a cab and an aborted attempt at taking BART. Sunday then passed more quickly than Saturday, but I was able to hook up with Howard Cruse as well find time to briefly peruse other tables. I picked up the
first issue of a promising comic series, The Malay Mysteries by Shoto Press. The story and series is set on the Malay archipelago around 1910 mixing Indonesian ghost stories and political upheaval. In the spirit of the
time and setting, the books are printed in black and metallic silver, to affect the look of daguerreotypes of the period. The effect is stunning and the first issue is promising enough for me to buy the next in the series.

And suddenly, APE was over. Sunday dinner was much smaller, just me, Kip, Patrick, Justine and more friend’s . Then back to Patrick’s to watch Logan’s Run, which helped Patrick reach an odd sort of closure.

I purposely booked Kip’s and mine flight back to Portland on Monday in the late afternoon so as to provide a chance to visit with the McClouds. And it turns out we could along with Patrick and Justine. We all had a very late breakfast at Max’s Diner, shouldn’t be allowed to call itself a diner as it doesn’t open until 11:00am and certainly not a New Jersey style Diner since it’s not open at least 20 hours and serves no fried bread (pancakes, french toast, waffles). Not to mention everything else they got wrong.

Patrick draws a map to the Pirate Store as Justine, Kip, Ivy and Scott look on.

Then we all trundled over to 826 Valencia, home to McSweeney’s pirate store—which is closed Mondays. Thanks to some effective pleading on Patrick’s part, a staff member allowed us two minutes inside, which only made me more determined to have a chance to poke around more extensively the next time I’m in the San Francisco.

Pirate dice.

We said goodbye to the McClouds and then to Justine and went back to Patrick’s to wait until Kip and I had to go to the airport. Which, after double checking our flight itinerary, turned out to be a few minutes after getting there. This was totally my bad as I had somehow fixated on 6:10 being the time we left San Francisco as opposed to what it really was—the time we arrived in Portland. Sweet, foolish Justine had said she would be our back up ride if the car that Patrick had reserved didn’t work out—which given our timeframe wouldn’t.
A woman of her word, she swung by and picked us up and graciously ferried us off to the airport. Wow, do I owe her and Patrick big time.

My last view of San Franciscan cartoonists Patrick Farley, posuer, and Justine Shaw, Woman-of-Action.

Using my cellphone for probably the last time until the San Diego Con in July, I phoned John and Becca pretty last minute to ask for a ride home from the airport. We have decent Airport shuttle karma with them, so I thought I could risk it. And as they willingly agreed, I guess I assumed correctly.

We ran into Christopher, who, it turned out, was on the same flight as us. I knew he was to leave around 4:00, which is part of the reason I thought our flight must be at 6:10, as you never end up on the same flight as a friend when reservations are made separately. The other part was clearly due to an inadvertent curse laid on me by Scott McCloud when he complimented my organizational skills and ability to get things done.

But true closure for this trip was only acheived when Kip and I flung our luggage about our previously tidy flat and were throughly bitched out by our cats.

Additional:
I neglected to mention that I had the pleasure of exchanging words and greetings with Lea Hernandez, Rachel Hartman, Shaenon Garrity, Roberta Gregory, Steve Lieber, Jeff Parker and others who names escape me at the moment but who I hope to see again at San Diego or maybe APE 2004.