A study of consumer satisfaction has shown that America agrees with me: The airlines in this country have never been worse. And United Airlines — which you may recall I vowed to never fly again — got one of the lowest scores. This article will tell you more but I love the line about...
United Airlines and US Airways Group Inc., which are in talks to potentially combine into a single carrier, finished next-to-last and last, respectively, in the university's American Customer Satisfaction Index.
Think how wonderful that would be...the two lousiest airlines joining forces to create one big, super colossal rotten airline! I can't wait to not fly on that one.
Southwest, where I've also had my problems, got the highest rating and I think I know why. It's not that Southwest is any better but the way they act and dress, you just don't expect much out of them. You're real impressed if the plane takes off at all.
Sorry to hear of the passing of Rory Root, an important voice in the world of comic book retailing and the owner of Comic Relief, a darn good shop in the Berkeley area. Cause of death is being given as complications from some surgery he underwent to repair a ruptured hernia. Rory was fifty years old and was one of those sellers who truly loved the product and the people to whom he sold.
Last February, my new book on Jack Kirby was coming out just barely in time for the Wondercon in San Francisco. For a moment there, it looked like none of the dealers would get it in time for it to be sold 'n' signed at the con...but Rory went to considerable trouble and expense to obtain a few crates of 'em, and I was only too glad to sit and inscribe them at his booth. This was not just a matter of potential profits. Rory was a big Kirby fan and he just wanted to have the book at his table. Whatever profit he made off them was probably nullified by the number of copies he gave away to friends. You have to like a guy like that. Actually, I liked Rory even before then. Everyone did.
July 1, a couple of new laws go into effect in California. It becomes illegal for the driver of a motor vehicle to be using a handheld cell phone while driving. It also becomes illegal for drivers under the age of 18 to use any kind of cell phone while driving, including hands-free phones. If you're over 18, you can use a hands-free connection. Here's a link to a PDF that explains all about the law but I've pretty much told you everything you need to know.
I don't know why this hasn't been publicized more. We'll probably hear a lot about it around the end of June, whereupon there'll be a stampede to purchase hands-free kits and get them installed. Wise California drivers won't wait.
I got mine installed more than a year ago. My BlackBerry fits into a little cradle and makes a Bluetooth connection with the system in my car. I push a little button and a lady's voice says "Say a command." I carefully and distinctly say "Call Sergio Aragonés" and the phone immediately dials my plumber. If I want to talk to my plumber, I have to tell it to phone Sergio. For a while, it refused to dial my pal Scott Shaw!, who spells his surname with an exclamation point and was in my phonebook the same way. I finally figured out that the hands-free software was getting thrown off by the exclamation point.
The outlawing of handheld cell phones while driving is way overdue. Every one of us has had a few near-collisions because some clown was driving one-handed while ordering a pizza or engaging in some intense conversation. (I know some stats say that hands-free phone connections are just as likely to result in accidents but I'm skeptical about those numbers.)
That's about all I have to say on the subject except that I wonder if we're now going to hear stories of people contesting their fines on the following basis. You're allowed to use handheld phones while driving in the case of an emergency...and to some people, making an appointment to have your hair cut or finding out what time a movie starts is an emergency.
I will be a guest on Wednesday on Fresh Air, the popular talk program on National Public Radio. The topic, of course, will be Jack Kirby and my new book on the guy...though the interviewer (we taped it this afternoon) spent more time than I would have liked asking me about me. Why you'd discuss me when you could be discussing Jack Kirby, I cannot begin to explain. We recorded much more interview than they're going to broadcast so perhaps most of that will get excised. Either way, there'll be a podcast link here whenever one is available...or you could do the unusual trick of actually listening to a radio show on the radio. This link will take you to the home page for the series and from there, you can find info on your local station.
George Packer authored a long essay on the current state of Conservatism in America and I found it most interesting, even if I didn't agree with every one of his leaps. If nothing else, read the last few paragraphs which essentially say that John McCain cannot win if he runs as a Republican or even a Conservative. He can only win if he can convince people that John McCain the human being would be a better leader.
J. Peter Scoblic has a good overview of this "appeasement" nonsense. There are times when I want my leaders to be tough but I'd also kinda like them to be smart.
Here we have two tributes to the late, looney Will Elder, who as everyone knows was one of the original artists (some would say the keystone artist) for Mad, and who later illustrated "Little Annie Fanny" for Playboy. On this page, you can read the eulogy which was delivered at the funeral yesterday by Elder's son-in-law, Gary VandenBergh.
Then we have our video link. This is a two-part video and both parts should play, one after the other, in the player below. It's a twenty minute documentary that VandenBergh produced about his father-in-law...a pretty good one, I might add. It says it was released in 2000 but some of the footage is obviously much earlier than that. (Bill Gaines died in 1992 and Harvey Kurtzman died the following year.) The trust that Kurtzman and Elder have in each other is quite evident.
May 20, 2008
