SF: Comics, Booze and a bearded guy named Sparky

A friend and I drove up to San Francisco last weekend so we could attend the Alternative Press Expo. How was it? It was great.

We drove up from Los Angeles friday night only to arrive at Pachoob's house at the wee hours of the night. Upon our arrival, we started drinking and watching Delta Force II. While my friend Sparky started to mess around with a Wii so he could check his myspace, Pachoob and I discussed our mutual disdain towards Warren Ellis's more recent, non-Authority/Planetary/Transmetropolitan work. After some more Wii action, we all passed out, with Sparky having the last word in regards to Pachoob drunk, annoying female roommate. Sparky is only in SF for the girls and Angela didn't make the cut.

Saturday morning comes and Pachoob's friends started to make their way over. Sparky cracks open the first beer at 11:30 AM much to the surprise of everyone. "I'm on the Vay Kay, dudes!" After a little bit of lollygagging, we make our way to the convention. As we enter, we discover a bar to our right. Sparky and a few others quickly make their way over. A half-hour later, I myself am walking around the floor with some Whiskey & Coke, apologizing to all the booths for not having any cash on me to buy their stuff. After some effort, I manage to get directions to an ATM and make a withdrawal.

The Alternative Press Expo is my first comic convention. Thank God. If half the things they say about San Diego and the WizardWorld are true, I think I may stick with the indie crowd. No bad BO, no idiot fanboys, lots of cute girls, and a bar. Everyone I talked to was really friendly. I could have easily spent a whole paycheck on comics if I wanted to. Its hard to approach a booth and not find something you like. I got my hands on a number of mini-comics this way. I met Nate Powell, whose work I have read in the Meathaus 8: Headgames anthology. Anders Nilsen did a couple sketches for me(which I will post later.) I also got a really cool sketch from Jason Turner as well. I did miss Bryan Lee O'Malley and Kevin Huizenga unfortunately. I saw Art Spiegelman talk for a bit. Ran into a kid I know from LA. Sparky had a nice Stranger Than Fiction moment when some cute girl came up to him and told him that he looked just like a character from her comic brought to life. It was a great time. I wish I would have taken more pictures, but I simply forget in the face of so many great comic books. Everyone that came with us to the show walked away with something they liked. Even the non-comic book reading fans such as Sparky enjoyed it.

After the show, we ate and rested. Watching Charm School we found ourselves enamored with the ramblings of Buckwild, occasionally invoking her sage-like wisdom several times through out the day. Night time came and we headed to the bars. We did shots of fernet and danced to 80's music. Sparky, being the Dodger fan that he is, accosted the Giants fans in our group. At some point we made our way home and passed out. We had ourselves some brunch the next day, said our goodbyes to our gracious hosts, and headed back down to LA with a hang over.

I had an awesome time. Pachoob and all his friends were really cool and I look forward to hanging out with them again soon. Sparky himself was as entertaining as ever, whether it was on the dance floor trying to get with chicks or on the car ride home, divulging all sorts of stories about his idiot self. I ran into some old friends that I have not seen in a while. To top it all off, I have a crap load of new comics that I will be making my way through for the next couple of weeks. If you ever get the chance to go to APE, do so. Its a great show with lots of great comics and good people. You can even stay with Pachoob! That dude's got himself a Wii!