"Farrago"--with apologies to Melrose

Also, apologies to everyone else, because my brain has been really out of whack lately, and the only way I can work through it is by being insufferably obnoxious.

• ITEM! Kevin Melrose, always on the ball, had the Marvel-digs-slurpees-at-a-flippin'-higher-pricepoint story first. Also, he links a Rolling Stone piece on Paul Hornschemeier, which has me even more anxious to check out The Three Paradoxes.

• ITEM! Crisis on Infinite (well, one... Two? One? Whatever) blogs. Like a hydra, Comics Should Be Good lost two heads (Joe and Alex), and gained a bunch more, which explains the We3--Sentimental Crap! post that still has me shaking my head... But new head Brad Curran seems to say the kind of things I'd say if I could get my head out of my own ass, so there's that.

Fear not, fans of orgastic-declarations-of-comics-love and excrement-tinged-keystrokes-of-anger, Alex and Joe can now be found at the sticking-their-cocks-out-in-the-title Listen To Us, We're Right, where Joe sums up reasons why everyone should love Kyle Baker. Juvenile sometimes? Sure. Scatalogically obsessed? Perhaps. But I love that fucker (see, it's infectious).

• ITEM! Graeme beat me to the linking punch, but I still want to point people towards Neil Kleid's latest Big Pond column, where he talks with Brian Wood and Alex de Campi about pitching comics. For some reason, I love anything that's about pitching--it's just a prime topic for fun anecdotes. Some de Campi bits I liked:

"Most importantly, your first pitch to an editor is nothing but an opening salvo in a long-term conversation. Often it will take you three or more rejected pitches before you understand what the editor is really looking for. Listen to what the editor says, and learn from it. You must not get all bent out of shape if your masterpiece dream story gets dinged first-off. Chances are, it will. You’re a writer. Go out to the pub, bitch to your friends about how nobody recognizes your genius, then go the fuck home and write something else. Good thing you’re only sending these pitches as 200 word springboards, isn’t it?"

And,

"My biggest criticism of pitches I read is that many are all plot, and no story. Plot is what happens. Story is why, and how, it happens. You have probably thought up some wonderful plot details in your pitch, of which you are immensely and justifiably proud. Here’s the stone cold truth: you shouldn’t put most of them in your pitch. Spend your time making us fall in love with your main character. Be clear about who the villain is, and what their motivation is. Everything else is just plot gubbins."

Although I don't know what "gubbins" are, I think that's solid advice.

• ITEM! A space knight like Rom, consume planets like Unicron/Blasting photon bombs from the arm like Galvatron. - Wu Tang Clan, "Impossible."

I just kind of wanted to say that again.

Part two: I think I need to change the sidebar, too, now that I've decided to keep the template. Comics and comics blogs are great and all, but I need to add other things that reflect my interests, if only so I have easy access to make with the clicky. Example? Lyman's blog, which he slugs with "A journal recording the days of a hipper-than-hip jazz bassist trying to make his way in a rap and rock n' roll world. Pity the tortured artist ..." Self-deprecating humor, jazz talk, and random comics-related posts? I'm in.

• ITEM! Since he's going away for wedded bliss and honeymooning in a place obscenely gorgeous, Shawn Hoke used the quieter-than-the-vacuum-of-space Comic World News forum to announce the winners of his The Comics Journal #266 contest. I should have entered--I misplaced my copy after going through the great "Best of" stuff, so I still haven't read that Bendis interview. Shit. I'm hoping it turns up at some point.

• ITEM! Just so I have to hold myself accountable to it, here are the books I'll definitely be reviewing within the next month, provided the wife doesn't make me do other things:

• Escalator - Brandon Graham.
• A Strange Day - Damon Hurd, Tatiana Gill.
• Lunch Hour Comics - Robert Ullman.
• IWGP - Ikebukuro West Gate Park Volume 1 -Ira Ishida, Sena Aritou.
• Worst Volume 1 - Hiroshi Takahashi.
• Stickleback - Graham Annable.