I dropped by in the afternoon to help Gene unload his car. We folded shirts and tweaked the set up on our front table. At library conferences we just need to say the three words "library comic strip" and we're halfway to a sale. Here we have to work much harder, and we decided to lead with an ace card - the Book Club shirt, which should really appeal to this pop-culture-savvy audience. It's everywhere at our booth. That pink on black really grabs the eye.

Next door, Eric Powell (The Goon) was a little flustered. His (otherwise great) corner booth only had a 5' wide backdrop. Normally this is a good thing - it gives better visibility from one of the four approaches - but he has a 8' banner and no place to hang it. He was going to see if the folks in charge could trade him for a regular backdrop. On the other side of us is the talented (and Eisner-award-nominated) Frank Cammuso and next to him Kyle Baker, who is one of my cartooning idols. Across from us is fellow Seattlite Phil Foglio and next to him our friend Terry Moore. Looking forward to spending some time with all of them over the next few days.

Wednesday Comic Con is open just a few hours for Preview Night, a nice chance to warm up against a much smaller crowd. Thursday the audience grows and by Friday evening it's in full swing as those with "jobs" are finally able to join in the fun. I talked to Gene last night after Preview Night was over. We did very well. His opinion is that our book+shirt bundle seems to be making sales happen where they might not have.