Stumptown! …and new Squid Row Flickr-ness!
I went away for the weekend!
Yes I did! I went to Portland to do a little Stumptowning… that is, to the Stumptown Comics Fest.
It was a super-quick trip… Me and my squid gang left San Jose Airport and flew into Portland, Oregon friday night. We checked into our hotel (the same one the Stumptown Comics Fest was at) just after 11pm. We spent 6 hours going from car to bus to plane to train to hotel. Whew… tiredness.
Saturday we did the fest which was at the Exhibit Hall there at the Doubletree Hotel near Lloyd Center. I attended a few workshops… one on coloring (offered by Aaron Diaz of Dresden Codak) which, remarkably had no coloring in it… it was more or less a “painting in photoshop” workshop… which was still cool. Coulda been another hour though. I sat in on some of a “Teaching Comics” workshop, but it was more about teaching graphic novels in a college situation… and the most helpful workshop was given by an all girl powerhouse toonist foursome on Self-Publishing. The panel included Meredith Gran (Octopus Pie), Lucy Knisley (French Milk), Shaenon Garrity (Skin Horses and Narbonic), and Erika Moen (Dar!)… I took 2 pages of notes from this one!
The actual room of comic-ers was packed and it was loud! I wound up with 5 or 6 books… and lots of pins… I found some great bargains… I wished I had more time to sit and MEET my fellow toonsters… I did get a chat in with Raina Telgemeier… (Smile) and spoke with some fellas from Victoria, Canada… I mentioned “Perogi Cat’ to Dan (the auto-biographical tooner) and he lit up! “We’re from Victoria! We know “Perogi Cat!” I was flabbergasted! It really is a small world! Sadly, Craig Thompson was a Sunday guest, and I only had Saturday to play at the Fest… so I missed seeing him… but I saved myself from embarrassment… I would have slobbered all over him.
The weekend didn’t end there! NO! We met up with the family… and went off on cool bicycling and donut-eating adventures… which leads me to the next thing….
Squid Row has a place on Flickr! I will deposit fun pics and Squiddy things there now and in the future … So wanna go over and check out pics from the Fest and my NW Trip? This is where you need to go…
