WonderCon in Anaheim starts two weeks from today and they've just posted the entire programming schedule. I'm hosting six panels and I'll be posting the list here in a day or three. I need to make a few adjustments in who's on a couple of my panels because of certain folks suddenly not being able to be there.

If you're thinking of attending, get your badges now. Saturday is sold out…can Friday and Sunday be far behind? Whatever admissions are left can be purchased here.

And if you're going, spend some time on the WonderCon website. A lot of people who have complaints about this convention and Comic-Con International come to me with them, in a few cases wrongly thinking that I'm part of the staff or that I have the power to make more parking spaces magically appear. I would say that a good 70% of the complaints sent in my direction fall into two categories, the first being Unrealistic Expectations.

Unrealistic Expectations can range from the big to the small. The small can be to expect that dealers will have all the merchandise you seek at prices you'll be happy to pay…and it's somehow the fault of the convention if they don't. Or to think that you can go to an event that will attract a dozen thousand attendees and you'll never have to wait in a line or not be able to get down an aisle without someone bumping into you.

Yes, it's crowded. That's because you're not the only one who wanted to be there. They could reduce the crowding by not letting as many people obtain badges but then you'd be joining the group complaining you couldn't get a badge.

The Really Unrealistic Expectations? Well, I can recall a guy a few years ago who went to several San Diego conventions and was steamed that Spider-Man co-creator Steve Ditko was not present and signing autographs at any of them. The following conversation ensued…

ME: Steve Ditko doesn't go to conventions, sign autographs, grant interviews or even allow his photo to be taken.

HIM: Well, the convention should do something about that.

More recently, I got a long, rambling e-mail from a gent who was parboiled that he went to Comic-Con International with the intent of hooking up with someone at Marvel who would hire him to write the X-Men comic book. He admitted that there just might be others in the hall who had the same wish-dream but he was upset that he never found a way to even apply for the job. I'm guessing that was because the convention was too busy sending a squadron to New York to capture Steve Ditko and drag him to San Diego against his will. The Unreasonable Expectations people need to appreciate what's there — and believe me, there's plenty — rather than to bitch 'n' moan over what's not.

The other category is the Criminally Unprepared…and if you're going, you can do an awful lot to avoid joining this throng. Do a little research, starting with the convention's most-informative website. Take the time to look over that Programming Schedule I just mentioned and make a list of events you must see, events you might see and events you might go see if your first choice is full.

Look over the list of exhibitors, note where they're located and spend enough time on the map of the hall to get a little sense of where things are.

Plan when you're going to get there, where you're going to park, where you're going to eat, etc. If you want to meet up with others, see if you can make appointments in advance instead of hoping to run into them or finding them at their table or panel. Just put a little time into it and you'll maximize the joys of your visit.

Comic conventions have gotten incredibly diverse. This is good because there are lots of different things happening there, some of which will enrapture you and some of which could cause drowsiness faster than a fistful of Ambien. It's bad because you have to do a little more work to locate the stuff that's of interest to you and to avoid that which is not. The videogame aisles can be a very good place to visit if you're sick of being able to hear.

But do the work. You'll be glad if you do…and so will I.

In or around 1931, the Chicago Tribune produced a promotional film called From Trees to Tribunes about how their newspaper was produced each day. We have here an excerpt from said promotional film. It's the segment about various comic strip artists who were then producing strips that ran in the Tribune and were syndicated by the company. Some of them — like Harold Gray of Little Orphan Annie and Gus Edson of The Gumps — you may have heard of. Many of them are so obscure, even I never knew of them.

Thanks to Anthony Tollin for telling me about this. I wonder how many of these guys actually drew their strips each day wearing a suit and tie. If they worked in an office at the Tribune offices, they probably did…

Last night, five late night hosts told essentially the same joke. It probably would have been six if it had been Friday and Bill Maher was on.

Lately, I find myself not driving as much as I used to. Since I do most of my work at home, I've never put a lot of miles on my car but in recent years, even that total has diminished. One reason is how bad traffic has gotten in some areas around me. Another is the rise of services like Lyft and Uber. It's simply easier to use them for some appointments, like when I go to my ophthalmologist, as I did last week for my annual check-up.

Driving there costs me some unknown amount of cash for the gas but it also costs me $12 to park in his building. Round trip by Lyft came to about $15 so it's less than three dollars to save myself the aggravation of driving myself. I've also had some great conversations with Lyft and Uber drivers.

Other reasons for driving less: I now have a real good assistant to run errands and then there's my still-relatively-new knee which works well but occasionally is not in the mood to work the pedals, especially when it's likely to be a lot of stop-and-go and stop-and-go and stop-and go. I didn't drive at all in the months after I got it and I got used to alternate modes of transportation. Plus, it was good for the knee to walk some short distances I might otherwise have driven.

And then there's the bus. Yes, the bus. There are some destinations in L.A. that are hell to get to by bus but many which are a breeze if you have two things. One is a Tap card, which you can buy and reload on the net. The other is the Google Maps app I have on my phone. At least in my experience, it's great at telling you which bus to take, where to wait for it, when it'll be along and when it'll get you where you're going. You also can read your iPad as you travel on the bus and you sometimes get good anecdotes.

Yesterday, I journeyed into Beverly Hills to meet with my Business Manager Person. I do this every so often so I can make sure he's still in the country and hasn't absconded to Peru with all my money. I probably shouldn't worry since all my money would actually get him about as far as Hermosa Beach and only if he took the bus and used the senior discount.

On the way there, I was running late so I took a Lyft. The driver overheard my end of a phone conversation with Paul Dini and figured out I was involved in comic books. We then had such a nice chat about conventions that I was almost disappointed when we arrived at my destination and it had to end. On the way home, I took a bus. Sitting next to me was a person who looked like Steve Bannon would look if Steve Bannon had a gender-reassignment.

She was telling everyone — not just me — how screwed-up the world was and especially "those idiots in Washington." She was harsher on Republicans than Democrats because Republicans are in power, but not fond of either. At one point she said, "Trump oughta bring me to Washington and let me tell him what to do" and I told her, "The way things are going, you may get a call any day now."

Not that any of us passengers were that interested but she told us all what she would do. "Locked rooms," she said. "You want to solve health insurance? You take all the people who have to agree on health insurance and you lock them in a room. Nobody gets out to eat or pee until they solve it.

"Taxes?" she said. "Put 'em all in a room, lock the door and nobody gets out until they get a deal!" For about eleven blocks, she ticked off the issues of the day — guns, gay rights, defense, election fraud…all of them are instantly solvable if we just start locking people in rooms without snacks or toilets.

As she was saying all this, I was exchanging looks with other passengers. There was much eye-rolling on that bus and quiet tolerance of the crazy lady in our midst. But as I got off, another passenger was getting off at the same stop and I said to him, "Gee, I'm almost sorry the ride's over. I wanted to hear about locking the leaders of Israel and Egypt in a room until they agree on what to do about Gaza."

The man chuckled and said, "You know, what scares me is that I don't see anyone around these days who makes a whole lotta sense more than she does!"

Baby Goats and a Big Pig…

Sean Howe has a nice article in the New York Times about Billy Graham…and no, not the evangelist who just left us. This Billy Graham was a comic book artist who worked for Warren and Marvel and a few other places…and as Howe reveals, also did a lot of other things besides drawing for comics. He worked at a time when there weren't a lot of other black artists in the field and so was assigned to a lot of strips starring black characters, including Luke Cage, Hero for Hire and Black Panther.

I never met the man so I have little to add to what Sean writes other than that his teaming with writer Don McGregor was fortuitous for both of them. And I'm sure Don agrees.

This reminds me of something I've been meaning to write about here for some time. There is much wonderful scholarship going on about old comic books. I can't believe some of the data and info that some have dug up about the history of the form and the people who wrote and drew the comics. But there is a tendency to ignore the unknown.

There are men and women who worked in comics who never or only rarely signed their work or got their names in any credits. I've written here about a man named Owen Fitzgerald — a great talent who drew hundreds of comic books. I think he got credit on about six of them. Pete Alvarado, who may have been one of the ten most prolific comic book artists who ever lived, probably got his name on even fewer. This was true of folks who worked mainly for Dell, Gold Key, Harvey, Archie or other companies that rarely or belatedly gave credit. There are even writers and artists who worked for DC and Marvel who are still unidentified.

Those who write about comics sometimes forget that we don't know who did some comics. When Billy Graham was active in the field, I occasionally saw him called "The only black artist currently working in comics." I don't think he ever was. Some people knew about Wayne Howard (who worked mostly for Charlton) and a few others but hardly anyone knew about Joe Prince, who was inking several comics for Western Publishing's Gold Key line including Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig and Donald Duck.

I employed Joe occasionally when I edited comics for Hanna-Barbera and I suspect the credits we gave him on those books were the only ones he ever received during a long, usually-employed career. They seem to be the only credits listed for him in the Grand Comics Database and I'll bet he worked on hundreds of other issues of mainstream comic books. (I lost touch with Joe in the seventies. If anyone knows his whereabouts, there are those who'd love to do interviews and research.)

In the same way, when articles are written about the insufficient number of women who've worked in comics, I almost never see any awareness of Eula Mae Hardesty Liggera, who surely inked well over a thousand issues of Disney, Warner Brothers, Walter Lantz and Hanna-Barbera comics during her lifetime. Here is everything I know about her…

She was born May 15, 1925, possibly in Indianapolis. She attended various art schools and worked in commercial art. In either the late forties or early fifties, she married John Liggera, who had worked in animation for Disney, M.G.M., Walter Lantz and the Ub Iwerks studio. Mr. Liggera began moonlighting from those studios drawing comics for Western Publishing around 1940, probably commencing with stories of Barney Bear, whose cartoons he was concurrently animating.

John segued from animation into full-time work for Western on their Dell Comics, eventually doing a lot of inking of other artists' pencil work. He never stopped drawing but after he married Eula Mae, the two of them team-inked several comics per month for Western throughout the fifties and sixties. One editor at Western told me that between the two of them, they sometimes inked the equivalent of 4-5 comics a month.  After John died in 1972, Eula Mae continued inking on her own until the early eighties when Western shut down.

My entire contact with her was that around 1977, I got her phone number and called to offer her work on the Hanna-Barbera comics I was editing. She very graciously thanked me but said that she had all the work she could handle from Western…and that, as we say, was that. She died October 12, 2016.

I can't fault historians for not knowing more about her.  I just wanted to point out that when someone writes "Marie Severin and Ramona Fradon were the only two women doing art for comic books in the sixties," that's not quite accurate.  Same situation with those who wrote about black artists and hadn't heard of Joe Prince.  Just because you don't know about someone doesn't mean they never existed.

We haven't had four guys singing barbershop style here lately.  Here's the Frontier Quartet performing the theme from arguably the greatest western movie of them all…

If while watching the Oscars, you missed seeing some recently-deceased favorite in the "In Memoriam" segment, you may have a small comfort in this. It's the link to an online photo gallery from the Academy that cover a lot more names than they had time to include Sunday night. Happy clicking.

Lydia has spent the last few days just sitting or lying around the yard, often hiding in some bushes.  It's quite unlike her old, energetic self.  As recently as two weeks ago, she was scampering about and when she wasn't scampering, she was tongue-washing every part of her she could reach.  Now, she's just kind of sulking and sad.  I got her to eat a few bites of food but only a few. She's not a well cat but as many of you have written to remind me, she's had a much, much longer life than the norm for any feral feline.  She doesn't seem to be suffering so I've decided that I won't either.

I haven't done as many of these lately because, frankly, even I'm getting tired of stories about how incompetent and dishonest the guy and his administration are. And here's one opinion I've come to which I'll pass along for what little it may be worth: Those who are predicting what Robert Mueller will do and when he will do it are speculating blindly. It sure looks to me like all the leaks are coming from the Trump side, none from Mueller's office. He'll tell us what he's doing when he's good and ready. Now, this…

• Kellyanne Conway, Jared Kushner and other members of Trump's mob seem to have been violating the Hatch Act.  I'm sure Trump will take immediate action to discipline them.
• As the New York Times editorial writers point out, Trump sure loves them dictatorial leaders who rule for life and can silence their critics.
• Daniel Larson thinks Trump's decision about tariffs was (a) a bad one and (b) arrived at almost on a whim.  This is not a good way of running the country.
• And William Saletan tells us how much other Republicans don't like them.  For once, they're not following Donald like sheep.
• How come Paul Ryan so fiercely backs Trump on just about everything?  Jonathan Chait has a good explanation: "[Ryan] was inculcated at a young age with the works of theorists like Ayn Rand, George Gilder, and Jude Wanniski, all of whom share a belief that the core mission of political life is to protect the earned wealth of the rich from political redistribution by the masses."

And I see that Trump's top economic advisor, Gary Cohn, is jumping ship. He got his big corporate tax cut and now he doesn't want to take the blame for what happens next. Can't wait to hear Trump's next speech about loyalty.

Our pal Steve Stoliar caught this. On this week's new episode of Pawn Stars, a gent brings in a book from the mid-seventies to sell — a bound book in which 41 cartoonists signed autographs and most also did a sketch for someone named Katherine. I used to like this show when I first discovered it but it got so repetitive and formulaic and obviously rehearsed that I gave up on it. (I also didn't like how in some episodes, the Pawn Stars family treated each other badly. I'm told there's less of that on the program now.)

As is usual for this show, a member of the Pawn Stars team (in this case, Chumlee) says something like, "Hey, this is neat. Would you mind if I got a buddy of mine who's an expert in these things to come down and take a look at it?"

The would-be seller says sure. The Expert Buddy comes in…and about 90% of the time, the E.B. authenticates the item and says it's worth X, then says "Thanks for letting me take a look at it" and leaves. Expert Buddies in Las Vegas seem to have nothing better to do than drop everything they're doing and rush over to the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop to help out, even if it means helping a competitor. The seller almost always accepts what the Pawn Stars guy's friend says. Then, once the E.B. is gone, the haggling starts with the seller starting by asking X and going down from there.

In this case, the seller came in wanting $2000 for the book and though the expert said it was worth $2000, the seller settled for [SPOILER ALERT!] $800. I don't know how fair that would be since we don't see all 41 autographs. We get quick peeks and see Milton Caniff, Don Rico, Steve Leialoha, Trina Robbins, Frank Ridgeway, Brad Anderson, Russell Myers, George Clayton Johnson, Walter Gibson, Jim McQuade and one or two others.

The two biggies the show focuses on are Joe Shuster and Jack Kirby. What would make this book truly rare is if someone somehow managed to circulate a sketch book at a San Diego Con and somehow didn't get Sergio Aragonés.

My keen deductive abilities suggest the book was circulated at one or more San Diego Cons and I have a hunch some of the circulating was done by the con's figurehead founder, Shel Dorf, on behalf of Katherine, whoever she is. The Caniff drawing is dated 1976 and I don't think Caniff was at the con that year. Shel was then lettering the Steve Canyon newspaper strip for Caniff and visiting him often. Maybe Shel took it along on one of those visits.

Two other things I should mention. One is that if you catch the episode, ignore what Chumlee says about Jack Kirby and Joe Shuster. His command of comic book history is not great. In fact, most of the expertise we hear on that show from the principles sounds like it comes from a researcher on the staff who cribs stuff from Wikipedia.

Secondly and oddly: The drawing they show most during this segment is this one…

I assume that's because it's Bugs Bunny. It certainly isn't because the "cartoonist" is very good or notable. I used to do such sketches for those who asked but I was never too comfy doing it. Even if I'd had real art supplies and a lot of time available to me, I didn't feel I should despoil a book containing drawings by folks like Kirby and Caniff. When I did, I always heard the Sesame Street song, "One of These Things is Not Like the Others" playing in my brain.

I drew a lot when I was a lad but while I enjoyed it, I never enjoyed it the way most great artists I know enjoyed it. I liked writing about a hundred times as much and felt I was way better at it. I'm not sure whether I enjoyed drawing less because I wasn't as good at it or if I wasn't as good at it because I enjoyed it less but either option gets you to pretty much the same place.

Have I ever told you the moment when I decided to give it up? I'll tell you if you promise to not think I'm suggesting I am in any way comparable to James Thurber. I was reading a book about him and they were discussing the period when he was going blind. About that, he wrote…

If I couldn't write, I couldn't breathe but giving up drawing is only a little worse than giving up tossing cards in a hat. I once flipped in forty-one out of the whole deck, at twelve feet.

That's about how I felt and upon reading that quote, I instantly felt that I had permission to not draw in any venue where a real cartoonist was expected. It's one of those life decisions that I've made and never regretted for a second. Since then, what I do are not drawings but doodles…and on that basis, where absolutely no standards apply, they ain't bad. I'm also, by the way, not very good at tossing cards in a hat. Maybe I should try that again, only having it not be on somebody's head when I attempt it.

Last night's Oscars were the lowest-rated ever. I didn't think they were any worse than any recent telecast and I can give you a couple of reasons why the numbers were so bad. In fact, here's three…

1. Few moviegoers had any emotions attached to any of the nominees. The field this year was full of good movies with good performances but they commanded respect more than love. The question generating the most suspense was "Will they open the right envelope this time?"
2. The ratings of most things on broadcast television are going down. Why should the Academy Awards be any different?
3. Here's a point I rarely see anyone mention. Audiences these days are becoming more and more accustomed to watching TV shows with no commercial interruptions. The commercials on the Super Bowl seem less frequent and they're a point of interest by themselves. More and more though, I think all those cutaways to ads throughout the Oscars are seeming more and more intrusive.

Jimmy Kimmel did as good a job as host as anyone has for years. I like him more than I used to but I still see him as a competent guy who does a decent job reading — and perhaps selecting and editing — what is usually pretty good material. What he lacks as an Oscar host is importance. It's nothing special to see Jimmy Kimmel host a TV program that starts with a monologue. He does that (literally) across the street five times a week.  I understand why ABC wants to promote their late-night host but maybe, some year, they might try having this show about movie stars hosted by a movie star?

That said, I don't think Kimmel is the reason the ratings were so low.  I think America just didn't care that much who won.

The one thing that bothered me during the proceedings was the little field trip…when Kimmel took a bunch of A-list stars next door to interrupt a regular movie screening.  There was a certain air of condescension to it…as there is in most of Kimmel's outside-the-studio stunts.  In this case, the premise felt like "Let's take royalty over and watch the peons go out of their minds with worship and hysteria."

When the stars started tossing Raisinets to them and firing hot dogs at them from a hot dog cannon, it reminded me of Donald Trump cluelessly lobbing rolls of paper towels to desperate, homeless Puerto Ricans.  And yeah, I guess I'm exaggerating a bit but maybe a fourth reason fewer people were watching is that the public is getting tired of watching the rich and famous celebrate how rich and famous they are.  An awful lot of folks in this country think Big Stars look down on them…and certainly some do.

But I still don't think it was a bad show.

As usual, folks are grousing over who might have been in the "In Memoriam" reel and wasn't.  Among those who could have been there were Dorothy Malone, Glen Campbell, John Hillerman, Rose Marie, Stephen Furst, Powers Boothe, Miguel Ferrer, Robert Guillaume and Frank Vincent…and that's just among the actors.  Nice though to see June Foray and stuntman Loren Janes.  And to hear Len Wein mentioned when they read the screenwriting nomination for Logan.

I'm not suggesting there's a way to have an "In Memoriam" segment without a few somebodies being omitted.  But given how much time-wasting goes on at these things, I don't think it would be wrong to extend the montage another minute or so and get thirty more names in.

Lastly: Let's not forget the main reason for this show each year.  It's to give Ken Levine something to write snarky insults about.  Listen to his podcast and you'll be glad they have this ceremony.

Here's a link to learn darn near everything you need to know about cooking rice.

Hey, if you have a moment, read this article by Ezra Klein. It's about an intriguing definition of Conservatism and how Donald Trump tapped into it.

It comes from political theorist Corey Robin who says it's "the felt experience of having power, seeing it threatened, and trying to win it back." Yeah. Every self-described Conservative I know is always talking about how things were better "back then."

But I also note that most self-described Liberals I know are always talking about how television was better "back then" or movies were better "back then" or comic books or plays. All of this, of course, only applies to people who are old enough to have a real sense of "back then," whenever "then" is for them.