I get asked occasionally what kind of pencil the great comic book artists use. Answer: All different kinds. When I met Steve Ditko in his studio in 1970, I asked him what he was drawing with and he showed me. It was a pencil that only said on it "Chemical Bank."
A lot of artists though like Palomino Blackwings. This is not a breed of horse. As this article explains, it's a popular kind of pencil.
This is not only a newsfromme encore, it's actually a newsfromme encore encore because I've rerun this item once before. I am rerunning it again because I have an announcement to make and I'll make it after the following recycling…
Long before comic books discovered the mini-series, there was the mini-comic. In 1966, Marvel issued six "comic books" that, depending on the size of your monitor, may have been even smaller than they appear in the above photo. They actually varied a tiny bit in size but were generally under 7/8" in height and a bit less than 1/4" thick with black-and-white interiors. Each was bound along the left ledge with the kind of rubbery glue used to bind a pad of writing paper and featured jokes and an occasional smidgen of story. I dunno who wrote them but some of the art was stats from the comic books and some of the new art was by Marie Severin.
I first heard about them in the Marvel Bullpen Bulletins page when they said…well, here. I'll let you read it for yourself:
Upon reading that, I immediately began checking out every vending machine I passed. As a more-or-less Marvel completist, I had to have them. For weeks, the search was fruitless but then one day, my father took us to a White Front department store down in the Crenshaw district…down where white folks never went in '66 unless they wanted to save money buying a washing machine or something of that size. While my parents priced portable room fans, I scoped out the vending machines and sure enough, there was one with with Marvel mini-books therein. Alas, it also had other stuff. You put in a quarter, turned the handle and you got a little plastic egg with a cheapo toy in it — a ring, a balloon, a little top, something of the sort. From what I could estimate as I peered in the glass, the odds seemed like about one in five that you'd get a Marvel mini-book.
I ran off and found a nice snack bar lady who changed three dollar bills (all I had) into twelve quarters. Then I ran back to the machine and began feeding in those quarters. By the time I'd used them all up, I'd scored mini-books of Sgt. Fury, The Hulk and Millie the Model as well as a lot of plastic whistles and other things I didn't want.
In later years in Vegas, I would see grown men and women look almost hypnotized as they pumped quarters and silver dollars into slot machines. I experienced some of that at the White Front that day. By the time my parents had made their purchase, I had squandered every quarter but I had half a set of the Marvel mini-books. To make matters worse, I could see some of the missing ones in their little plastic modules inside the glass dome of the vending machine. They were distributed across the top of the pile and the machine picked from the bottom, so what I was seeking was perhaps unattainable without injecting a few hundred more quarters.
"Let's go," my father called and I headed for the car, defeated. I knew full well I'd never see another vending machine that sold Marvel mini-books; that there would always be that aching void in my life…sigh, weep, moan. Fortunately for me (unfortunately for my parents), the room fan didn't work right so we had to go back a week or so later. I was well-armed with quarters this time and while they exchanged, I gambled some more. My luck wasn't quite as good. I think I went through $5.00 of quarters and got lotsa dupes but came away one mini-book short. I still needed a Captain America.
But sometimes things work out. A week or three later, a new kid showed up at our Saturday afternoon comic book club and he brought along his almost-complete Marvel Mini-Book collection. He had an extra Captain America but no Hulk. I had an extra Hulk but no Captain America. You didn't have to be Monty Hall to close that deal.
At the time, it seemed like I'd spent an awful lot of money to amass that complete set, especially when you compared the cost-per-mini-book to what it then cost to buy a full-sized real Marvel Comic but it was worth it, just to not have to feel unfulfilled and to scratch that all-consuming itch. And if you look at what those mini-books sell for today on the collector market, it wasn't that bad an investment.
Okay. That piece first ran here on March 3, 2004. The update I am now appending takes the form of a press release from Harry N. Abrams books, one of the finest publishers of art books and comic-related material in the country…
Marvel Comics Mini-Books
By Marvel Entertainment
Text by Mark Evanier
Photographer Geoff SpearReprinted for the first time, the world's smallest comic books — originally printed in 1966 and now enlarged to a more readable size — in a seven-book collectable boxed set
In 1966, Marvel printed what the Guinness Book of World Records certified as the world's smallest comic books. Smaller than a postage stamp, and sold in gumball machines across the country, these six books told the quirky origin stories of Marvel's most beloved characters at that time: the Amazing Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk, the Mighty Thor, Captain America, Sergeant Nick Fury, and Millie the Model.
Marvel Comics Mini-Books reproduces facsimile editions of all six books in one affordable box set — along with a seventh book written by Mark Evanier that details the history and creation of these rare, vintage collectables.
Don't get too excited about this yet. It won't be out until May of next year but isn't it kinda wonderful that pumping all those quarters into a gumball-type machine in front of White Front in 1966 led to me getting a job more than a half-century later? When they asked me to do this, how could I say no?
I thought, "Wow, my life is going full-circle and I might actually make back the money I spent to acquire those silly things!" And I would have if they hadn't paid me with a mini-check.
One of the most famous dances ever done for the cinema is the "Moses Supposes" number from Singin' in the Rain — which, by the way, is frequently misspelled as Singing in the Rain. That bothers me way more than it should.
Originally, of course, it was danced by Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor. Here, a large chunk of it is re-created by dancer Derek Hough and an animated Donald O'Connor created by animator Norbert Torok. I don't know which of them had the tougher job, Hough or Torok…
Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney sat down with Fox Newsguy Chris Wallace this morning to deny he'd said what he said and didn't do so well. He looked like a gangland lieutenant trying to walk back yesterday's confession before his bosses have his legs broken.
Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
He still stubbornly insists on being president.
Two Interesting Articles That Say the Same Thing About Donald Trump
Recently, in a nutty attempt to make things better between Syria and Turkey, Trump penned a letter to the President of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, telling him, "Don't be a tough guy. Don't be a fool!" Over at the American Conservative website, two of its columnists — Rod Dreher and Daniel Larison both wrote about Trump's letter. These two men rarely agree but this time, they both think it showed zero grasp of international diplomacy and a worrisome indicator of mental instability.
Meet Baby Fiona. She, unlike you probably, is a hippopotamus…
I really don't care a whole lot what Martin Scorcese or Francis Ford Coppola think about Marvel Universe films. I've never met either gent but come on. You know that deep down inside, most people who create films (or TV shows or comic books or oil paintings or whatever) have a limited capacity to care about films (or TV shows or comic books or oil paintings or whatever) that they didn't create.
Reading those two esteemed filmmakers' views, I sense a lot of "these kids today with their so-called 'music'" in their complaints. They remind me of the adults who in 1964 confidently predicted that the kind of noise the Beatles made then would be gone and forgotten by 1965, '66 at the latest. A teacher I had back at Emerson Junior High School back then would have bet his house that we'd all come to our senses, dump those God-awful rock records and be listening to George Shearing.
And the folks issuing frantic rebuttals to Coppola, Scorcese, et al? They remind me of the folks who write me in anger when I post about not liking cole slaw. So what if I don't? The world would not be so much nicer if we all liked the same things. It would be so much more boring. I suspect that the people who make Marvel or Marvel-type movies can get along just fine without Martin or Francis buying tickets. (Come to think of it, I'll bet it's been a couple of decades since either of those men actually paid to see a movie.)
This is all I'm going to say about this issue. It's about three paragraphs more than anyone should say about this issue.
Lydia says she's not happy with the photos I've been posting of her lately. Here's one she had me take when she was momentarily out of the little house, waiting for me to put down the friggin' camera and put something delicious in her supper dish.
By the way: I just passed 27,000 posts on this blog. From here on, it's just photos of Lydia.
Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
So many people, including Republicans, have said it's wrong for Trump to host next year's G-7 meeting at a hotel he owns that he's been forced to reverse that decision. And it's always bad news for Trump when anybody tells him he can't do any damned thing he wants. It's almost like "What's the point of being president if I can't be an absolute despot and always get my way?"
Today's Bad News for Rudy Giuliani
Rudy seems to have taken a day off as he tries to decide (a) whether or not to go on one or more of the Sunday morning talk shows tomorrow, (b) if so, which one? and (c) what self-incriminating thing will he blurt out as part of his "defense?" I'm guessing (a) if it's at all possible, (b) all of them and (c) "Was I in on the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby? Of course I was!"
Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
And here we have another quid pro quo: Josh Marshall reports, "Notorious Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash would help Rudy and DiGenova and Toensing cook up dirt on Joe Biden. In return, they'd work with Trump to get U.S. corruption charges against Firtash tossed. Firtash has been fighting extradition to the US on federal corruption charges since 2014." Everything's a deal.
Every so often, I feature a music video here by this award-winning barbershop quartet, Main Street, just as every so often, I embed a video from the harmony group, Voctave. The more observant among you may have noticed that one guy's in both of those teams.
The fellow with the beard is Tony De Rosa, member of Main Street and Voctave and the Dapper Dans (sometimes) at Disneyworld and he's probably one of the Rolling Stones these days. If there's a singing group, he's in it. Here, Tony and three of his colleagues favor us with one of my favorite Gershwin ditties…
So it used to be that I could turn the ringer off on my iPhone and a little window would pop up telling me it was OFF and when I turned the audio on, the little window said it was ON. Now, I do the same thing to turn the ringer off and a little window tells me that Silent Mode is ON and when I turn the audio on, I'm told that Silent Mode is OFF. They did this just to confuse me.
Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
A former Republican governor is calling for impeachment…and sure, it's John Kasich, who's probably positioning himself to step in if Trump doesn't get the nomination. But that's certainly not good news for Trump.
Today's Bad News for Rudy Giuliani
Meanwhile, as predicted, Rudy is in more legal trouble than he was yesterday and less than he will be on Monday. The new revelation? He pressed the Trump administration to grant a visa to former Ukrainian official Viktor Shokin, who claimed he had dirt on certain Democrats. You know, I don't have a license to practice law and it's looking Rudy and I will soon have that in common.
Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Vice-President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo held meetings in Ankara to work out what Trump supporters touted as a "cease-fire" between Syria and Turkey and Trump himself called it an "amazing outcome." But firing has not ceased, the deal expires in a matter of days and Mevlut Cavusoglu, Turkey's foreign minister, issued a statement that said, "This is not a cease-fire."
Today's Runner-Up Outrage by Donald Trump
Trump is threatening to sue CNN because their coverage of him is not fair and balanced. So if you're following his interpretations of the Constitution, Congress has no legal right to investigate or impeach him and the press has no right to report what he thinks is unfair. I'm waiting for him to get rid of that "We the People" nonsense and demand that he gets top billing.
As you may recall, Lydia the Feral Feline finally took up residency last Monday in a little cat house that I bought to house the many feral cats that treat my home like a B-and-B, which in this case means Buffet and Backyard. The house has been out there since 2006 and she's been out there since 2007, steadfastly refusing to set paw in the place. Even which I picked her up and put her in there, she made a break for it and I gave up all hope of her ever dwelling in that dwelling…
…until last Monday. I dunno what caused her to suddenly love it but since then, she's only exited for food and, I would imagine, disposing of that food. She couldn't be happier if I installed wall-to-wall mice. I took the above photo about twenty minutes ago.
Mostly quiet on the Trump Front this morning…which is good. I'm thrilled at his slow, steady descent and at the increasing number of his supporters who have to be thinking, "Well, I love what he says he wants to do for this country but I'm increasingly uncomfy with the lawlessness and/or craziness." Still, I don't like how often I have to discuss this guy, even with myself. "Trump Fatigue" is a term we're hearing more and more, though so far not as often as any phrase about throwing someone under a bus. A full day off from any of that would be nice. I also think the Sunday News Programs should emulate Chick-Fil-A and close down on Sundays.
On Fridays, I always think Trump will do something especially outrageous if Bill Maher's show is off. I don't mean intentionally; just that Maher's luck runs bad that way. Big things happen when he isn't there to comment on them. Anyway, he's doing a show tonight so maybe not much will happen today except a lot of people on his team denying they said what they said yesterday and, of course, Rudy Giuliani saying something any competent lawyer would tell his client not to say.
Halloween — a holiday I will abolish just as soon as I'm powerful enough to do that, which I soon will be — is looming ahead. My new problem with Halloween is that as I get older, it seems to be followed by about three days of Thanksgiving prep and then everything's All-Christmas, All-the-Time until about January 15.
I used to have a friend who was born on December 25 — no, it was not Jesus Christ — and I felt sorry for him because his birthday kinda got lost under the Big Name Holiday. Also, of course, he had half as many opportunities for presents as someone like me who was smart enough to be born in March. Now, I feel sorry for anyone born in November or December.
And speaking of birthdays: Had he lived, tomorrow would have been my father's 109th…sort of. Like many Jewish kids of his era, my father had no birth certificate. Way back when, it was not uncommon for Jewish families to bribe someone to destroy those certificates, the better to keep the kid from getting drafted when he'd later be needed to help support the family. My father was reasonably sure he was born in October and only a tad less sure it was in 1910.
Because we needed a date on which to give him a tie and a cake with candles on it, he arbitrarily picked October 19 as his birthday. And I don't know how this worked but he got it onto his Drivers License, passport, government I.D. (for his job) and everywhere else even though it was a made-up, educated guess of a birth date.
When he died in 1991, I got access to many documents he had and had never studied all that closely. A few of them gave me enough info to do some research and I tracked down a government record that said he'd been born on October 25, 1910 — not that far off. I assume that's right but it doesn't really matter now, does it? The only reason it might is if I was the kind of person who only thought about his father on Dad's birthday and I think of him every day — with nothing but fond, positive memories…
Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
White House Chief O' Staff Mick Mulvaney admitted there was a quid pro quo involved in the release of military aid allocated for Ukraine. A few hours later, he was out insisting he hadn't said what he said…but he said it. Wouldn't you have liked to have heard the phone call or meeting where he was told to do that?
Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
In his never-ending quest to project his own misdeeds and failings on everyone else, Trump began slamming Nancy Pelosi. As Anna North observed…
The president's attempt to shame Pelosi likely worked among his base. But for most other Americans, it backfired. That should come as no surprise, given Trump's track record with powerful women.
As I've written before, Trump's strategy in confrontations with men is often to question their masculinity — he called Marco Rubio "Little Marco" and made fun of Jeb Bush's supposedly "low energy." It's a style he's likely developed in a long career in male-dominated spaces, from the military academy where he went to school to the heavily male real estate development business to the Hollywood sets where he bragged about being able to grab women "by the pussy."
But that strategy doesn't work on women, so Trump usually tries to invade their personal space, insult their appearance, or, as in the case of "Nervous Nancy," insinuate that they are mentally ill or unstable. Any woman who's gotten to where Pelosi is now, though, has had to put up with being called "crazy" a time or two. Except with people already primed to applaud Trump's misogyny, the strategy is doomed to fail.
I think when some non-partisan, observant author writes the history of American politics in this century, it's going to amaze many how much of it has to do with men who can't rationally deal with women in positions of power. And usually they don't call them "crazy" so much as they impugn their appearances and femininity.
It's Randy Rainbow Time! It's Randy Rainbow Time! Oh, yes! It's Randy Rainbow Time!