Long, strange day.

It began with a five-hour bus ride into New York City, which took seven hours. Then I had, for lack of a better term, afternoon tea with Craig Wedren and David Wain. David looks much as I remembered him from summer camp, except with a higher hairline. Craig, who has moved in with his girlfriend since I saw him last, is disturbingly thin (as I am disturbingly fat?) but seems very happy. Craig is playing with two bands and discussed his most recent movie soundtrack, which sounds interesting and cool. David is filming a pilot for Comedy Central next month, which I’m sure I’ll love, since I thought David’s last show (an MTV show called “The State”) was way excellent. I showed them both some Hereville art, which they oohed and aahed over satisfactorily.

It’s so odd - these two people were once so important to me, but over the years we’ve barely seen each other. When we were kids we used to wonder if someday we’d sit around a table at a cool NYC cafe talking about Craig’s music and David’s films and my comics. Did it occur to me that we might do it, but that I’d no longer really know them?

Then it was on to Air America, where I met Janeane and Sam, and debated Megan M. of Asymmetrical Information. We spent our entire half-hour discussing the wage gap, which was fine with me - we could have spent two more hours discussing it and still not run out of material. I think I did okay - I messed up a few times, but got in a few decent points, and on the whole probably didn’t sound like an idiot. However, I won’t know for sure until I can find an archived link to the show.

I told Janeane that David said “hi” (she acted in a movie he directed). Sam seems a bit put off (in a funny, self-mocking way) that David hadn’t asked me to say hi to him, too. Janeane seemed surprisingly interested in the topic of comics about hasidic girls; we end up spending most of the break time discussing books and films about hasidim. After the show, I get Janeane to sign a DVD of “Mystery Men” for my friend Aaron.

Then, dinner with Elayne Riggs and her husband Robin. I’ve met Elayne a few times before, but never Robin; he is laid back and has a british accent, which contrasts wonderfully with Elayne’s in-your-face energy and New York intonations. We eat Chinese, Robin discusses a cutting-edge inking technique he’s working on and gives me a couple of issues of his current inking assignment, Bloodhound (which certainly has nice inking, although otherwise it’s not my sort of comic). Elayne tells me about all the bookcases in their home, which makes me almost wish I had gone to Yonkers to see the comic book collection for myself. Elayne and Robin make the proper oohing and ahhing noises over the Hereville art I show them. Like everyone, the first thing they compliment is the color, which is especially nice to hear from Robin since he’s a kick-ass colorist.

Then it’s off to Brooklyn to visit my old pals (and former housemates) Paul Winkler and Scott DiBerardino. Scott and Paul are being nice enough to put me up for the night. Paul, who listened to me on Air America, assures me I didn’t sound like an idiot. I keep them up past their bedtimes talking. They ooh and ahh over Hereville art; Paul shows me a 24-hour comic he had done that I have never seen. It turns out that both of them are planning to visit me (and others) in Oregon this October, but neither of them knew that the other was making such plans.

They go to bed. I jump on Scott’s computer to answer some emails and write this post. Tomorrow it’s back to Ithaca and next-to-no internet access; regular posting from me will resume on Friday, or maybe on Monday. Meanwhile, it’s late and I must go sleep.

Page 12 of Hereville is up. It’s in black-and-white for now, because my access to computers is limited.

As several of you have noticed, this page is more than a little late. I was blocked. Being blocked is a strange and disquieting thing. At first you think you’re just being lazy. But, eventually, I noticed that what I do when I’m blocked is a heck of a lot less fun than just drawing a new Hereville page would be. It’s just - whatever it is that lets me know how to lay out that next panel, or how to draw a figure so it has some life in it - it just isn’t there.

It’s not fun, and it’s not just being lazy. And it’s something I hope to avoid in the future - but that’s what’s frightening, that being blocked or not feels so beyond my control.

In any case, I’m over it now. The timing isn’t great - at first I was over it in a period when I was working non-stop at my day job, now I’m over it and thousands of miles away from my drawing board - but I’ll take what I can get. Look for a new Hereville page next Thursday, and (I hope) every Thursday after that.

UPDATE: Color art is now online.

Damn, now I have that song in my head.

Oh, well — this is just too funny!!!

The End of the World

Hey, folks. I’ll be visiting New York state for the next week or so - I’m going to be hanging out with my family in Ithaca. I’ve never even met my neice before, so I’m looking forward to the trip.

So if you’re an “Alas” reader in the Ithaca area between August 11 and August 18 and would like to have lunch with Ampersand, leave a comment in this thread and maybe we can work it out.

Also, I’ll be in New York City on Monday the 16th, returning to Ithaca sometime on Tuesday the 17th. Again, any “Alas” readers who’d like to get together while I’m in NYC, leave a comment and maybe we’ll work something out. It looks to me like I’m available for an early dinner on Monday, or for breakfast/early lunch on Tuesday. (Warning to everyone: My dining preferences are for inexpensive diners serving bland American food, rather than interesting ethnic restaurants or expensive coffee shops.)

While I’m in NYC, I’m going to be a guest on Janeane Garofalo’s radio show, The Majority Report. I’ll be debating Megan McArdle, aka Jane Galt, who I hope will not entirely humiliate me. If you’d like to hear me on the air, tune in via radio or webcast at 7:15 pm (eastern) on Monday, August 16.

From The One True b!X:

Willamette Week is reporting on this poll, too.

Speaking of polls, the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy (an anti-gay group) has a summary of polls on same-sex marraige from the last 16 years (pdf file).

From the current Willamette Week:

Freespace has an excellent post dismantling the concept of “anti-democratic judges.” Here’s a sample:

Read the whole thing. (Via Positive Liberty).

In one of my favorite bits of a well-regarded speech, Barack Obama said:

Since my own political philosophy falls somewhere between Swedish Socialism and John Rawls, this pleased me; like most folks, I enjoy hearing my own views fed back to me, but eloquently.

But Jason at Positive Liberty, who is (as best as I can make out) a small-l libertarian, wasn’t so pleased. And he makes a good point about the story of Cain and Abel: it’s a lousy story for illustrating a moral principle, because it papers over the rather large gray area that lies between “taking responsibility for my sibling’s well-being” and “beating my sibling to death and hiding the body.”

The problem with Cain isn’t that he lacks charity; it’s that he murders people whom God seemingly likes better. So, in context, “I am not my brother’s keeper” doesn’t seem to illustrate the moral problem with indifference so much as it illustrates the moral problem with beating people to death and hiding the bodies.

* * *

By the way, since I’m plugging Jason’s site, make sure to read his sensational series on attending GALA (the Gay and Lesbian Association of Choruses annual event). Jason thoughtfully discusses questions of religion, family, and “why do we need a gay chorus?,” among many other issues.

Jason’s site isn’t set up to let you read a series of individual posts. So the best way to read the GALA post seriess is to go to the July archive, and then scroll down to July 26 or search for “???” to find the first GALA post. Then just scroll upwards to read the more recent posts, as well. (Jason: maybe it’s time to add “next post - previous post” links to the individual post template?)

• I really enjoyed this post, which - being on the right-wing Koch Fellows blog - might have escaped some “Alas” readers’ notice. The author is arguing that even if same-sex marriage somehow weakens straight marriage (something SSM opponents have failed to prove, to put it mildly), it by no means follows logically that same-sex marriage ought be outlawed.
  If we’re judging the “strength” of straight marriage by indicators like the number of divorces and births out of wedlock, allow me to offer some social variables that strengthen straight marriage. Where there is ess financial independence for women, divorces will be less common. Where women have fewer choices and opportunities for education or work, more will seek security through marriage. Excision certainly cuts down on infidelity. And hey, for a sure-fire way to ensure the “strength” of marriage, as evaluated by births out of wedlock, try honor killings and radically enforced sharia (see also: northern Nigeria). If we assigned an infinite value to stable straight marriage, we wouldn’t think twice about the necessity and value of the above.
• Gabriel Rosenberg has a must-read trilogy of posts (1 2 3) regarding sex discrimination and SSM. In particular, the last two posts - one responding to those who say hets-only marriage isn’t sex discrimination, one responding to tose who say hets-only marriage is justified sex discrimination - are terrific.
• Stephen Miller (conservative but pro-gay) reviews the Democratic Convention and finds it wanting. Still, he expects the Republican convention to be even worse.
• Along similar lines, Matt Foreman is disappointed in the lackluster Democratic support for gays.
• I’m a bit late in linking to this, but still: Dale Carpenter argues - I think persuasively - that there is no excuse for Kerry and Edwards to have skipped out on the Federal Marriage Amendment vote.
• Nearly all the Senate Democrats took Kerry’s “I’m against gay marriage but also against amending the (federal) constitution” line, but one honorable exception is Ted Kennedy, who calls a vote for the FMA “a vote for imposing discrimination, plain and simple, on all 50 states.” (Teddy does make one lousy argument, however: the FMA would not have told “churches they cannot consecrate a same-sex marriage.”)
• The Common Man, bouncing off a post of mine, discusses his own history to make the point that having opposite-sex parents isn’t a guarantee of anything.
• I would have guessed that same-sex parenting was most common in places like Vermont and Northhampton, Massachusetts. I would have been wrong. According to the author of the Gay and Lesbian Atlas:
  The states where same-sex couples are most likely raising children are in order the top 10—I won’t name all 50—Mississippi, South Dakota, Alaska, South Carolina, Louisiana, Alabama, Texas, Kansas, and Utah—oh, and one more. And Arizona is number 10. [...]

  So while the atlas is, I think, good at demonstrating differences in the geographic and demographic characteristics between same-sex and different-sex couples, perhaps its most compelling contribution to the marriage debate is the extent to which these couples are similar and share many of the characteristics of their married counterparts.

  The quote comes from an Urban Institute discussion: Marriages Made in Political Heaven: Families, Values, and the Election. Thanks to Chairm for pointing this link out to me.

• The debate over same-sex parenting at Sed Contra continues. (Again, if anyone participates because of my link, please be very polite.)
• New to the blogroll: FreedomToMarry.org.
• Susan Frelich Appleton argues for SSM from the anti-sex-discrimination angle.