Several of you have written to tell me that you keep checking in here every few hours to see if I've posted a big piece about Stan Lee. Save yourself the trip. If I do one, it won't be for at least a week or two…and I may not do it at all. I am happy to see so many folks celebrating the guy as I've always thought he deserved to be rich and famous and to be praised for so many things he did. I am dismayed to see that for some, that celebration involves minimizing and even denying the contributions of others, particularly the artists who are now officially (finally!) recognized as co-creators.
Stan was a very charming, friendly guy most of the time and he did lovely things like send little thank-you notes and if you showed him something you'd made — a drawing, a story, anything — he'd usually praise the heck out of it and make you feel like a star. Many, many people owed their careers to him and he was a great, witty interviewee — a skill most others around him lacked. You can apply any measure of weight to all that good will and gladhanding but it's certainly not nothing. He made a lot of people love him and I don't mean that in a bad way. Like all of us, he was a multi-faceted person even if he usually managed to show but one facet. The time will come when it's easier to talk about the others.
In other news, the fires in California rage on. At the moment, the one they're calling the Woolsey Fire is only at 40% containment. That probably sounds better than it is because — remember — a fire being "contained" is not the same thing as it being extinguished. "Contained" means the firefighters have established lines around, in this case, 40% of the fire perimeter. It will not spread past those lines but can still do damage within that containment and still spread in directions where it is not contained. Some of the reporters on TV need to explain this or, in some cases, have it explained to them.
People say of those who are out fighting those blazes, "Whatever we pay them, it's not enough." No, it isn't and I wish folks who could make it happen would make what always seems like an impossible leap to "Hey, let's actually pay them more." "Let's get more of them and more equipment" would also be nice and if the obstacle is "We can't afford it"…well, how many fires like these can we afford? I don't think letting whole city blocks and communities burn to the ground can possibly be cost-effective.