I Feel Better

WELP. You may be wondering what the hell happened with us at MoCCA. That makes all of us. For the second year in a row, the fucking ‘rona stopped us dead, or sick. Our man with a party plan, the one and only Eric Kostiuk Williams, failed his COVID test, leaving him stuck at home in bed and us without anything to do on Saturday night. 2AM Eternal made its way to the big apple, at least. We admit to being a little bit star struck meeting OK Fox IRL. The original Sonic 2006 Clubkid drops one of the best (OK, maybe the best of all the) essays in Eric’s 2AM Eternal. OK, the person, compared 2AM Eternal to the Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions, the highest of compliments ever, so say us. Eventually, for the love of God, we swear to party with OK and Eric in NYC. When is Flame Con, anyway? Meanwhile, TCAF is coming right up, so you better get better, Eric Kostiuk Williams.

 

 

2AM Eternal sat pretty on the table, but we never found Satan’s Kingdom. Robert Sergel‘s immaculate collection kept to itself after a last minute paper stock issue prevented a timely MoCCA delivery. Unlike Eric, Rob spent the weekend with us, and with at least a quartet of his comics occupying a corner of our spread and making a real dent in our sales. We are grateful to all the MoCCA peoples picking up Rob’s comics, and for never complaining even once. You guys and Rob may be troopers, but this one hurt. We owe it to Rob, and you all, to get him and his book at the same show at the same time, some time this year. When is MICE, anyway? Now that we think of it, maybe MICE would be a good homecoming for Rob since he can pretty much walk on over.

 

 

Then came strike three: Sean Ford and L. Nichols added insult to injury, being no-shows both, for reasons. L. takes the cake for excuses, though, claiming to need the time to work on the last details of their forthcoming I Am Only Foreign Because You Do Not Understand. You know who came through? Gabriel Howell. Again. Forget Me Not wins our Biggest Seller Award for the second time, following its TCAF debut. We bet he does it again at CAKE. Speaking of homecomings, by the time CAKE happens, Gabe’s going to be a Chicagoan, so he oughta know where the party’s at. Gabe made the point that MoCCA needs a Saturday night Thing. God bless Austin English for making it happen on Sunday, but some of us had to hit the road. Le sigh.

 

 

MoCCA lacks a party but packs ’em in, to the tune of record crowds for NYC’s finest comics show. Day one saw something like five thousand people, who trapped us way in back, where we boiled. The heat, or lack of AC, really fogs our memory of Saturday, but we did play catch-up with J.T. Yost, before he escapes from his own Birdcage Bottom and hands the reins over to some young whippersnapper. We feel you, man. Our stablemate, Uncivilized, won this year’s Best of Show for Pete Rostovsky’s Damnation Diaries, and gave us an essay to read so we can feel even dumberer. Congrats, y’all! There’s no show without Mr. Phil and the Beat‘s Heidi Mac, which is about as New York as it gets. Heidi, if you’re reading, you have to come to TCAF. Don’t be silly now. We even managed a real conversation with Nicholas Offerman, who is pretty much a Nick Offerman character. We think that’s a good thing, as we are big stans of Offerman. We swapped baby pics at the Fanta table, and boy, oh, boy does the little Hanselmann look the part. Speaking of Fanta, Grayson Bear‘s upcoming book for the Fanta flagship caught the buzz Heidi was looking for – or maybe the buzz book belongs to Nate Garcia, slinging comics on the street since the poor fucker didn’t even have a table and is apparently twenty and has no phone (or so we were told by our table neighbor, taxidermist Kate Lacour, who had a book of her originals, all out of our price range, but inspiring grand theft charges).

So there. Keep on truckin’, as they say, and we will see you at TCAF, this time with L. Nichols, Zak Sally (!) and yes, finally, Eric Kostiuk Williams. You, too, Heidi. Till then…

Your Pal,

Leon

---