Chapter 3 - Page 47
In which Jennifer may be acting paranoid and spots someone she’d rather have nothing to do with at all, ever.
Things Are Finally Settled.
Hi there, folks! It’s been a busy few weeks at SC Central, starting with Wizard World Chicago, four glorious days of sketching Transformers and superheroes (got a dollar for doodling a Green Arrow, which more than made up for not selling any books at all on Saturday — Ollie’s one of my fave DC Comics heroes), selling copies of issues #1 & 2 of Scwonkey Dog (a big thank you to Ryan Kelly for being the first person to part with actual cash money for a Scwonkey Dog comic — oh, and the rest of you, go read Local, not just because he drew it, but because it’s excellent), and passing out postcards featuring the cover art from not only #1 & #2, but the story you’re looking at right now, #3. (Yes, I did the cover art early just for the postcard. No, you can’t see it yet. Not unless you hit the next stop on the Ally Comix Convention Tour, FallCon, where you can probably snag one o’them postcards.)
Where was I? Oh right, Chicago.
It was kind of weird wandering around the area surrounding the convention center in Rosemont (where the convention is actually held, not in Chicago proper), since I’d actually been there at least twice before for Anime Central, the anime convention that’s held there in mid-May every year. Back then, though, I was working for Asylum Anime down in Pittsburg, KS, and was at Central as a member of that store’s staff. Consequently, I was there selling anime gewgaws and knick-knacks, hopping about like a madman to grab this thing, that thing, the other thing — and let’s not forget the pain of setting up and tearing down all those shelves!
Also a pain, dealing with anime fans … ah, but I kid the anime fans! Most of them are okay folks. It’s just some of them are a bit … err, too enthusiastic? Hyper? And some of them are very, very creepy. Even the guy at Wizard World Chicago who was a little too in-character as Edward Scissorhands and was beating my comics with his scissory hands wasn’t as creepy as some of the guys I’ve seen at anime conventions.
After the joy of Chicago and its good food, good drink, good friends (hey there, Michael!) and assorted Rob Liefeld and Lou Ferrigno sightings, pal and co-conspirator Evan and I hopped a train down to Kansas and I got to spend the 4th with my folks before packing the vast majority of my worldly possessions into a Uhaul trailer (a quite exhausting experience, not helped at all by my parents and their displeasure with the state I was leaving the house in) and heading up to Evan’s stomping grounds here in North Central Wisconsin.
Evan drove the whole way, and only slept about half an hour in the middle, when we stopped at a rest area for a few hours between three and six a.m. Then we unpacked. And to be quite honest, I’m still unpacking, every day. “Oh look, here’s another thing! Oh, crap, I broke it. Maybe I can sell it on eBay …”
And today … I have to find a new job. Ugh. That’s the part of moving that I wasn’t looking forward to. I hate applying for jobs. Hate it, hate it, hate it.
“What are you good at?”
“Um, I dunno. Stuff?”
Wish me luck.
–Jonathan
