Howdy, anyone paying attention!

Well, it’s been busy. The Comic Con was a subtle smash hit, as DC and Marvel decided not to show and gave us little Davids a chance to shine with folks who normally wouldn’t take a stroll down Artist’s Alley. There were a few artists and writers “slumming” it in the Alley who would normally have been under the protective, sterile canopy of said super conglomerates had they been there, as well, so it was good for the fans as well.

I thank anyone who stopped by the WBD table and said hello, especially the kid from Logan Square who was nice enough to pretend he’d specifically searched us out. Hope you’re digging the books, buddy. Appreciate it. It was also a great weekend, as I was signing at The Comic Vault on Montrose and Ashland on Saturday and the turnout was better than I’d hoped (considering I just now advertised it on my own site, three days after its occurance). I am the worst salesman in the world, no wonder I got fired from the men’s Polo department at Marshall Fields ten years ago. That and I showed up drunk all the time. ANYhoo…

Believe it or not, I am still working on the film. Everyone is prepared to lynch me at this point, those who are still interested. Everyone else who worked so damned hard on it and haven’t heard anything from me, I don’t blame anyone for being irritated or just giving up on their favorite hard-luck hero. I am wrestling with a few factors, post-production issues I have no control over as well as things that are just my fault; like being caught between wanting Sam Fuller-style energy and Kubrickian methodology. You cannot have both, my man!

Don’t give up yet! I am hard at work! It will be done soon and it will knock the shit out of you! Thank you for working on it and I have not forgotten anyone!

On that note, I’d better get back to work. Anyone who’s picked up the books in the last month, especially the Lie Down Low series finale, I would love to hear what you thought.

Well, if those big bold letters above don’t explain the jist of this, I don’t know anymore! I’ll be there today (June28) and tomorrow, sitting at a table sent from above and sweating the greasy sweat of the undiscovered! Like a carnival barker with an inferiority complex, I will silently and soundlessly urge you closer, to look at this promising new talent and freak of nature who sits, like “The Fabled Geek”, in a cage-like room in semi-darkness for many hours doing doodles of Lord knows what - emerging only to ravish his food of choice: Spaghetti burritos. I made that last part up.
At any rate, I WILL be at the Chicago Comicon, held in the Donald A. Stevens Center in Rosemont, IL, today and tomorrow. I’m in Artist’s Alley, table #3311. I think. I’m in that neighborhood.
I will, I’m sure, write a depressing “blog” later as an account of this soul-crushing experience but for now let’s keep it light and skippy! Here’s to good times, artificial light and circulated air! Here’s to esoteric ringing and titillation everywhere! Candy for your eyes and ears, an overexposure of the senses! Help!
Love,
Jim

Hi, Jim Terry here.

Why do I forget that being an artist is hard? I’ll get into these incredibly self-defeating modes where I just don’t understand why nothing seems to work, a frustrated and dark mood that won’t dissipate and I’ll wonder “how the hell did it come to this?”. I’ve been in that cloud lately, stressing about bread and how will rent be made and will my new book ever get out of the printers, will I be able to afford the cost when the times comes and… so on. I work part time in a bookstore and today I about incinerated the stockroom with impotent rage. What am I doing working in a dive like this? I have important work to do; don’t they understand that???

I neglect the fact that it’s a part time gig, it’s not my destiny. And as far as gigs go it ain’t bad - I dig most of the people I work with and there’s nothing like being surrounded by books all day. Okay, I can live without seeing a new James Patterson novel every 72 hours, but you get the drift. Our store is home to Dostoyevsky and Hemingway as well, after all. The knowledge of the centuries, stacked against the wall waiting to be opened and experienced.

I had a great dinner tonight with my friend Chris Kildorf. I think that’s how you spell his name. Anyway, he’s a carpenter by trade and an artist at heart. I mean, this fella’s underestimated constantly by his burly physical demeanor and he rarely betrays his keen understanding of “the arts” but it’s there. I read his graphic novel, xeroxed and stapled and left in pencil stage, and it knocked me out. He set me straight tonight, reminded me that drawing on my days off is not a duty, it’s a luxury not everyone can afford. My wife is supportive, and though we live beyond our means she’s never doubted me despite all my underhanded, strange efforts to get her to do so. We get by and we go without and though it’s not always comfortable there’s comfort in it.

I truly think a decision needs to be made, a commitment. I’m lucky to have a good support team. Hope to see you this weekend at the Free Comic Book Day. I don’t think I’ll have Lie Down Low #4 by then, but I should be wearing my Tom Waits hat.

May 3, 2008 - “The Comic Vault”, Montrose & Ashland, 1-4pm.

See you there.