ShortRun Hooked

Me and Mark.

I am so going back to ShortRun, the Seattle Indie comics, zines, blah blah festival. It was a chance to see old friends again, like Mark Campos, here. 

Roberta Gregory shared the table with me, and wished she'd brought more of her Cat Toons books. She had to leave for work after a couple hours, but I could have sold a lot more of those books. Unlike my books, which take a lot of marketing - and cough drops - Roberta's books sell themselves.

Got to see Gary Groth, the surviving owner of The Comics Journal. He'd just written a long article talking about webcomics, so I clued him in that webcomics are like the old periodicals - but free or for low cost - that build a market for hard-copy collections. He'd never heard of ProjectWonderful, and after hearing my description of the micro-payment ad-bidding format, said he wanted to look it up, so there's more grist for the TCG mill. Maybe a more up-to-date article in the future. Always love seeing Gary, old buds from way back.

The show was held in Washington Hall, a handsome building from what looks like the turn of the last century, or the 1920's - someplace in there, when women wore a lot more beads.

Speaking of "wearing," everybody stepped it up for the show. They were dressed in their best. And unlike so many fan groups, it's a place where the question of the safety of women and children never even came up. When I mentioned it, people were, "Oh - yeah. You're right." Everybody's treated as an equal. 

Of course the show is run by three women, which makes it like my Clallam Bay Comicon. Us girls aren't in love with the process. We just want to put on a good show and enjoy ourselves. Like my show, ShortRun has no admission fees.

Wonderful books and art and people. And the bake sale - which includes gluten-free goodies. And that hot coffee you need to keep going for a Seattle show.

Ka-Blam!

This is me in my Ka-Blam Tshirt. Earning more printing money. The Indyplanet reprints were a great hit, and I walked out of there with a much skinnier bundle of $1 bills - they'd been exchanged for a great run of sales. 

ShortRun, as I understand, was originally for zines and hand-bound books and pamphlets. But as the show has expanded, so has the definition. Since print-on-demand can turn out any number of books - even though there is no end to the number itself - it's technically a short run of books. Again, girls aren't in love with any process, but the show itself.

After the show and a supper break, everybody was back to watch The Shivas perform their infective version of punk surf-rock. I know I kept warm, bouncing up and down. Couldn't stay for the whole show, but it was sold out, so I could give my place to a young woman who was next in line.

For those of you who need a near-by place to eat supper, Seattle's R&L Home of Good Bar-B-Que is just up the Yesler Hill, on the north side of the street. But when they ask which sauce you want, say "Mild." No, really. There's no reason the place shouldn't be packed for ShortRun.