One of my favorite magicians — Pop Haydn — favors us with a bit of amazement…

As much fun as I have at Comic-Con, there's something refreshing about being home — unpacked, sitting in my usual computer chair and typing on a real keyboard instead of my laptop.

Apart from a couple of unpleasant encounters with "security personnel," I had a wonderful 4.5 days down there. I could never live full-time at that pace, rushing from meeting to event to panel to meeting, but it's fun now and then. I saw so many people for five minutes and wished I could have spent an hour or two with them.

There's much more to write about the con but I'm playing Catch-Up right now and will try and write some of it later. In the meantime, I recommend to you this article in the L.A. Times about the Eisner Awards and this article in Rolling Stone about the early days of what we now call Comic-Con International.

Regarding the latter piece: I believe it is accurate except that I should not be described as "another person involved in the founding of Comic-Con." I was a reasonably-close observer of what went on but I did not do any of it. I want to make that point loud and clear because folks like Ken Krueger and Mike Towry and Richard Alf and Scott Shaw! and Barry Alfonso and others did the heavy lifting and too much credit for their efforts has gone to Shel Dorf. I sure as heck don't want any of it going to me.

Shel was a controversial figure and I knew the sweet side of him…the side that did a lot of nice things for a lot of people. I also knew the side that was furious that he could not be the unquestioned monarch of the institution that the Comic-Con became. I don't think he ever grasped that once the convention became a non-profit organization, he could not do any damned thing he wanted with the money it made. I was one of many folks who tried to bridge the chasm and negotiate some sort of arrangement whereby he could be involved and compensated but with Shel, it was kind of like, "Give me everything or go f*ck youself!" The end result was one of the sadder stories I've witnessed in my life and there didn't seem to be any way to rewrite the ending. I do not think he was ever wronged except somewhat by fate and an awful lot by himself.

Off-topic: I think all dictionary makers should include "f*ck" — spelled with the asterisk — as a legitimate word in their editions. It's certainly used often enough.

I'll try to get back here later today with more con tales.

A lot of things made me happy yesterday but none more than running into the two gentlemen in the above photo. The one on the left is Marty Krofft and the one on the right is Sid Krofft. In other words: Sid and Marty Krofft, producers of some of the most memorable, inventive TV shows of all time. I had the good fortune to be part of their little "family" — and at times, it really felt like one — for many years. I wrote and occasionally produced (under their supervision) a number of Krofft Productions, some even starring people who were (a) not puppets and (b) spoke English. It was occasionally maddening, usually wonderful and always interesting. I'll write more about these two great gents soon.

Other things which made me happy were how well Quick Draw! and my first Cartoon Voices panel of the con went. The latter went so well, I barely had to do anything as host; just introduce Jeff Bergman, Grey Griffin, Josh Robert Thompson, Mick Wingert, Kaitlyn Robrock and Richard Horvitz, then stay (mostly) out of their way. Every moment of it was fun and for the rest of the day, people were stopping me to tell me how much the loved it when Jeff and Josh engaged in Dueling Morgan Freeman Impressions.

I was glad I didn't have to work hard on that panel because I sure did on the one before it. I'd tell you about it and other things that happened on Day Three except that right now, I have to run out and have Day Four. I'll catch you up when I can…and I'll fix any typos in the above.

In less than a week, our friend Misty Lee will be debuting her new magic show with a too-short run at the El Portal Theater in North Hollywood. We told you about it here and we highly suggest that if you can make it, you order tickets here.

We've also been featuring installments of a video diary of how the show is taking shape. Here's the latest installment which includes a cameo appearance by me. Stan Lee will be so jealous…

The above photo is from one of the best panels I've done out of umpteen zillion at Comic-Con. It was called "Jack Kirby: Friends and Family." The "friends" were artist Mike Thibodeaux and, I guess, me. The "family" consisted of Jack's daughter Lisa and grandkids Jillian, Tracy and Jeremy. In the above photo, the back row is (L to R) me, Jeremy and Mike. The front row is Jillian, Lisa and Tracy. Despite the indifferent look on my face in the pic, I thought it went great with each person talking about what being related to or associated with Jack has meant to them. Lisa and Mike especially shared personal stories about Jack and his beloved wife Roz.

At the end of the panel, there was a special treat. I introduced David Glanzer, who is Director of Marketing and Public Relations of Comic-Con and he presented the convention's highest honor, the Icon Award, to Jack Kirby. This has never before been awarded posthumously but Jack was a guy who rewrote almost every rule he ever encountered so it seemed appropriate for the convention organizers to rewrite this one. His family was thrilled to accept it on his behalf.

Earlier in the day, I presided over another important panel. Eric Reynolds, Maggie Thompson, Scott Shaw! and my friend John Plunkett joined me to speak of Pogo, Walt Kelly and especially my dear Carolyn Kelly. I'll write a little more about this one after I return home. I was very pleased with how this one went, too. We not only announced that the much-delayed Volume 4 of The Complete Pogo is off to press, we even showed pages of it on the big screen.

I'm running out of time to write this post so I'll cut to the awards ceremony…a great time. The lovely Athena Finger (granddaughter of the man it was named after) joined me in presenting the Bill Finger Award for Excellence in Comic Book Writing. We gave one to Bill Messner-Loebs, who was present to accept it and who showed with his witty acceptance speech what a fine writer he was. The other went to Jack Kirby and to the delight of the audience was accepted by the above-named Kirbys. I believe Jack has now received every award he could possibly receive for his work so we'll have to invent some new ones.

I missed some of the show because I was backstage in the "green room," which of course was not green, talking with my fellow presenters. At some future convention, I would like to interview Jonathan Ross for an hour or so because he's one of the sharpest, funniest people I've ever known. Come to think of it, so is Wayne Brady, who was a surprise presenter there and so are Tom Lennon and Phil LaMarr and others who were back there at various times…Sergio Aragonés, Dave Gibbons, Paul Dini and Misty Lee, Phil LaMarr, Art Adams and I forget who-all-else. Jackie Estrada, who presides over the awards and the award show, did her usual fine job and I need to get in the shower if I'm going to make my first appointment this morning. More to come and I don't have time to proofread so if there are any tyops in here (like that one) I'll fix them later.

• ‪Sean Spicer says he's "looking forward to lying in the private sector."‬

Howdy. Yesterday — the first day of Comic-Con International 2017 — somehow felt like the nineteenth to me. This is not to say I didn't enjoy it. I've enjoyed to some extent every day of every one of these I've attended — and I've been present for at least one day of every one of these things. I'm just not used to feeling Fourth Day Fatigue on the first day. I'm hoping the process has just reversed itself; that today will feel like Day Three, tomorrow will feel like Day Two and by Sunday, it'll be like I just arrived.

Breakfast was with my friend and editor — two descriptors that cannot always be hung on the same person — Charlie Kochman. Charlie is responsible for the new, revised edition of my 2008 book, Kirby: King of Comics, which debuts today and which I'll be signing later this afternoon at the booth for Abrams Books. If I were a better promoter of my own work, I'd have the booth number handy to give you.

Got to wander the hall a bit and then it was time for my first panel of the con: Spotlight on Mike Royer. I've known Mike since a day when neither of us could have imagined he'd become the main inker of Jack Kirby's work…and in the opinion of many, the best. I hope my interview of him made folks appreciate the exemplary professionalism that Mike brought to that job. Jack's work had been previously lettered and inked in New York by people selected by the office there…and the office there liked it that way.

Jack was living in Southern California so though officially the editor of his comics, he couldn't see or impact much about them between the time he finished the writing and penciling, and when the books went off irrevocably to the printer. For that reason alone, he wanted to have his work finished by someone closer to him — someone who would deliver the pages to him, not the New York office. (There were other reasons, as well. He felt the folks in the office were trying too hard to make his work look like everything else they were publishing, plus there were security breaches. The fellow then inking his work was also inking for Marvel and showing Jack's work around that office.)

In his spotlight, Mike said, "They gave in to Jack's demands because they were sure I would fail." That's true but it was more important to them that Jack fail. They did not want to believe that someone could deliver a finished, ready-to-color-and-print work without their input. But Mike did not fail, which meant that Jack did not fail. Mike never missed a deadline and everything he did was solid and professional.

It was also very, very good but that was almost a bonus.

We discussed that and his work with Russ Manning and what he did for Warren (Creepy, Eerie and Vampirella) and for Gold Key and on the Marvel Super-Heroes cartoon show, and later for Disney for a couple of decades. He really has had an amazing career.

Later in the day, I was on "The Mark, Sergio, Stan and Tom Show," or as most folks call it: The Groo Panel. This year, it was without Tom Luth and as usual, we talked about upcoming projects. I'll do a separate post about those in a few days as we are still using our convention time to firm up some plans.

Saw a lot of old friends and made some new ones. Were I not due for a breakfast meeting, I would tell you more about it. Later.

A little magic trick for you…

The drive here to San Diego was fine until the last twelve miles felt like twelve hours. I had the same experience back in February when we came down here for the San Diego Comic Fest. Note to Self: Time these things so you don't do the last dozen miles during Rush Hour. Further Note to Self: Rush Hour is anything between about 3 PM and Midnight.

Doing 2 on the 5 (two miles per hour on the 5 Freeway), I reminded myself of how good it always feels to pull into the valet area at the hotel and experience the dual rush of "It's over!" and "Home again!" They're always faintly tempered by the nagging suspicion that I still have to drive home someday but that can wait. The rest of the evening was decompressing, unpacking and going on a grand hunt for where guests pick up their badges and swag bag this year. We finally located ours at 8:55, five minutes before the Convention Hall — into which they'd admit us — closed. Then we went to dinner.

Hey, if you're not attending the con this year, try to get hold of a copy of the souvenir book. It's wonderful. Gary Sassaman assembled and designed a fine, fine book full of tributes and articles about Jack Kirby, Will Eisner, Reed Crandall, Carl Barks, John Stanley and others. (Full Disclosure: I wrote several pieces for the book.) I don't know how non-attendees get a copy of this thing but I'll find out and report back.

Okay, so this is a boring first report. It'll get better today if only because we have our badges and I don't have to drive anywhere today. One thing I do have to remember is to keep moving. Down here, if you stand in one spot for more than about three minutes, someone will plaster an ad for Conan O'Brien on you.

I've written in the past here about my friend Jim Brochu. He's an actor, writer, director, producer…there's not a whole lot that Jim doesn't do. I don't think he's much of a podiatrist but he could probably learn it. Anyway, he sometimes does this marvelous one-man play called Zero Hour, in which he magically becomes Zero Mostel for an hour or two. He knew Zero and the play does great service to the man and his memory.

During a recent revival of the play, Jim had a superstar guest there one night. It was Harold Prince, who as a director and producer worked with Zero on A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum and Fiddler on the Roof. Those are only two of the dozens and dozens of impressive credits Mr. Prince has on his résumé. At that performance of Zero Hour, the play was followed by an on-stage discussion with this man. Here's a video of that important conversation…

Fred Kaplan notes that Trump is stuck with Obama's Iran deal because it's working fine. But it is Obama's deal so that means Trump has to sabotage it even though he has nothing to put in its place. This is the same strategy that's being applied to this nation's Health Care.

One of the few issues on which most Liberals and Conservatives agree is that Civil Assets Forfeiture is a ghastly abuse of governmental power. Basically, it's the power wielded by some agencies to seize and sell your belongings if they accuse you of a crime, regardless of whether they later drop the charges or you're proven innocent. No one approves of this except the Trump Administration, which is promising to undo all restrictions on this insidious practice. Conor Friedersdorf will tell you all about it. He says Jeff Sessions' plan to increase Civil Assets Forfeiture may succeed because "…in the era of Donald Trump, a faction on the right seems to hate whatever liberals favor more than they like liberty, and another faction seems willing to defend whatever the Trump Administration does so long as the press is criticizing it."

Steve Benen notes that Trump keeps changing his position on how he feels about the Health Care bill that informally bears his name. Only Donald Trump can manage to be on both sides of an issue and be wrong both times.

And Ezra Klein says this is because Trump doesn't understand what's in the bill or how anything in there might affect American lives. I think that's right. All he knows (or even tries to know) is what he can try and sell to his base.

One nice thing about Comic-Con: It'll keep me too busy to follow a lot of this kind of thing.

A mother panda puts her baby back to bed. Thanks to Zane Magnuson…

Trump boasts that the vote on the G.O.P. Health Care Plan would have been 48-4. That's right. He's boasting about a loss and not even one to an opposition party. Is this the kind of "winning" we were all supposed to get sick of? How is it that I think most Trump voters are a lot smarter than he does? Jonathan Chait has more on this.

Jonathan Chait also explains why the G.O.P. Health Care Bill failed. It's because, he says, the party cannot govern. That's probably so but I thought of another reason. We're talking here about a bill that had 16% support out there. Even people who hate Obamacare thought this was worse.

And Ezra Klein notes that more people than ever think Obamacare is a pretty good system.

While campaigning, Trump said that NAFTA was the worst deal ever made. He also said that the Iran deal was the worst deal ever made. He vowed to kill or completely transform both…and what's he doing now? He's making minor tweaks to NAFTA and leaving the Iran deal as it is.

And finally for now: It's costing us a helluva lot of money to have Trump live the lifestyle he wants. How come all those Republicans who complained about imaginary Obama travel expenses aren't outraged about this? Oh, right. Outrage is only for the opposition.

This is from a French TV show but the act is in English. It's Tony Chapek, who has one of the most original magic acts I've ever seen. He was at the Magic Castle a year or two ago and when I walked in, a magician friend told me, "You've got to see this guy." This video is an abbreviated version of what I saw that night…