Been a busy two weeks since I last checked in.

During my last weekend living in downtown Toronto I attended the annual FanExpo.

The Expo has expanded in the scope of what is covered over the four or five years I've been attending. When I first went it had a tripartite structure of Science Fiction and Fantasy, comics and Anime. Now it has expanded to include Horror and gaming. The big celebrity this year was Buzz Aldrin (the second man on the moon), which in itself suggests the convention has surpassed being about any niche pop culture genre, this was reinforced by the appearance of Henry Winkler (famous for his portrayal of the Fonz on Happy Days). I spent my time watching the occasional anime (although it seems like there are fewer showings every year), talking to independent comics people hawking their wares (like skwerly and buying lots of stuff.

My purchases included, some back issues of the Hulk and ROM in my attempt to get all the appearances of Rick Jones. I actually now should have all the issues of ROM I need. In collecting these I ran across an old Marvel I just had to buy for the bizarre cover Rocket Racoon (the first of the 1985 mini-series). I also got Peter David to sign a copy of an issue of the Hulk he had written (the Rick Jones bachelor party volume). In terms of other mainstream publishers, I bought collection 5 of Teen Titans Go and got it signed by creator J. Torres. I also got the Day of Vengeance trade paper back, intrigued by one of its odd ball heroes Detective Chimp, who I learned of when I became intrigued by Rex the Wonder Dog, not the an amazing comic but kind of fun.

On the anime side, I bought the first third of Gurren Lagan, a fun giant robot show that has gotten so much buzz and sounds right up my alley.

I bought AWOL'd Jason Loo and also wore a promotional press on tattoo for him (I also have his comic Popper Cosmic). I got previews of Evan Munday's Quarter-Life Crisis and a preview of the novel Stripmalling, Evan is illustrating. I also got Action Satisfaction Supreme #2 by Zen Rankin and Medicine: book one, by Brian Hoang. All these guys are members of Sketchkrieg.


Intrigued by something about the art style I bought 4 issues of Empty Words, plus Snow 1 by Benjamin Rivers

The guys from Shock Effect were there. I bought Fragment by Shock Effect artist John Lang. Meanwhile the writer Ian Daffern was promoting Freelance Blues.

Other indpendent comics I bought were: No Girls Allowed by Susan Hughes and Willow Dawson. The Blitz - Dark Dagger Comics, Dufham comics collective. Rex Libris by James Turner. The Night Sky by Ryan Deane. A Monk's Tale 6 and 7 (I got the other 5 years ago) Laurie Breit Kreuz and Kandrix Foong. Mechalibre vol. 1 by Montrealer Marc B. An oldie The Silent Invasion by Michael Cherkas and Larry Hancock. Noreason comics "Teh Intranetz iz Brokun !!1!?" (maybe a bit crude for my taste, will see). The Annotated Northwest Passage by Scott Chantler (so far way better than his Tek Jansen stuff).

I also got a free issue of the RPG parody comic Looking for Group.

Finally my most expensive single purchase was: Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko by Blake Bell. An amazing tour of Steve Ditko and a chronicle of his work and impact on comics. An interesting portrait of a man and a good reminder of the credit Ditko is owed for his work.

The following week was taken up reading a large chunk of what I bought at FanExpo and packing for Friday when I moved out. My father borrowed a van from a friend and arrived Friday morning. I had been up late packing, but lack of sleep is not conducive to efficient work and much of my kitchen supplies were still to be packed. Still we managed the whole thing in about 2 hours and then had lunch at Joons. A Korean restaurant up on Bloor street just a short distance from the apartment. It is a favourite of my dad's because of the low price and such things as egg drop soup, but my mom has never really taken to Korean food. I can't say I've ever developed a taste for some Korean staples like Kimchi or the cold appetizers (despite living in the vicinity of Toronto's Korea town for 6 years), but I do like the curries at Joons. I also like those metal chopsticks.

I then spent the rest of the day in Toronto tiding up a few things and spent the evening at the Victory Cafe directly North of the apartment street on Markham Street. I had invited all the friends I could think of to come see me off, but in the end only two people came. Still I had a pretty good dinner and then biked down to Union station to take the GO train to Oakville. Meanwhile my dad had moved all the stuff into the garage.

I started moving stuff and unpacking it on Saturday and at the moment still have lots of books to unpack and organize although all my clothes and more utilitarian stuff is now pretty much dealt with.

On Sunday having spent the day unpacking, doing laundry, my parents got a laundry line recently and I'm learning the art of hanging clothes out to dry. That evening I went into Toronto and met up with my theatre reviewer friend who had obtained tickets to the final performance of Avenue Q, which is a neat adult musical and puppet extravaganza (with some pretty direct references to Sesame St.). The plot and the like are pretty old standby of young man fresh out of college making his way in the world ending up in urban New York, but the puppets and music give it a unique kind of social commentary. We learn valuable life lessons like that "Everyone's a Little Bit Racist" and "The Internet is For Porn."

Been taking it a bit to easy since then, but the end of the week promises to be busy, with orientation for a new year at UofT and me helping out at the Hart House Singers.