(That’s me on the far left!) I didn’t think to jot down notes for my lame-o con report until, oh, the last day or so. As such, this is going to be frightfully incomplete. If we had a meaningful encounter and I’ve forgotten to jot it down here, it’s because a) I’m an idiot and/or b) I’m greedy and I don’t want to share your love with the masses. I assure you, it’s not a lack of interest.Okay, in no particular order:

• It was so great to see Ed Brubaker and Mel Tomlin. I wish the money truck would come to our house so we could move in next door to them in Seattle. Alas, I’m not holding my breath. (Mel has a real gift for, well, gifts. She bought Henry the only sunglasses he’ll tolerate and a puppet book that he just loves.)
• Speaking of couples I wish we lived closer to: Eric Searleman and Beth Kawasaki. Love.
• Totally had dinner with Zoe Bell! She’s hilarious and awesome. (Thanks for including me, Ed and Mel!) There was another gentleman there, from Sony, I think, who was a delightful conversationalist. He went out of his way to make me feel welcome, which I appreciated. So much so that I forgot his name. Wah wah. Anyway, thank you kind stranger.
• We chatted with Tim Callahan and his brother a bit at the Marvel booth. Tim’s a really bright guy; if you haven’t checked out his blog, I recommend it.
• I am was waaaay too old for the IDW/Circle of Confusion party! It was, like, a gabillion people and loud music and I am a dinosaur who does not get the point of loud music when no one is dancing. However, in the four seconds that I actually stayed I got to chat with THEREMINA (At long last!!), Wil Wheaton, Warren Simons, Joanne Starer, CB Cebulski, Andy Schmidt, Dan Curtis Johnson, Ben Templesmith… and I don’t even remember who all else. The place was PACKED and there was a line down the block to get in, so I’d call the party a wild success even though it wasn’t my bag. (Imagine that!)
• All my colleagues on the Comic Book Tattoo were delightful company. Special thanks and shout outs to Rantz, Ted McKeever, Jeremy Haun, my most beloved Andy MacDonald, E. Bess (Oh, and hey! I met Leland Purvis at long last!) Dean Trippe, Lea Hernandez and Kako.
• At the Eisners, we checked in with some of our favorite people: Ivan Brandon (who looked totally great, modern and stylish… until he put on the JEANS JACKET. Dude. It was a nice jeans jacket, but COME ON), Kristyn Ferretti (Yowza), Jeff Parker, Joe Casey, the Twins, Ed and Mel. Mel and I both rocked the fake hair. Tom Spurgeon looked fantastic, like he’d walked right out of Gatsby, in a beautifully put-together linen ensemble. Heidi MacDonald sported the most impressive shoes of the evening. The awards were a bit long, but shoot — Fraction was nominated so I’d have happily sat through a reading of War & Peace. I’ll do it again, too. [Ivan wrote me to insist that he didn't put the jacket on until AFTER the ceremony, so that's entirely different.  Mm hm.  Ivan, you have no idea how satisfying it is to tug on your pigtails.]
• Had my yearly catch up with Joey Cavalieri at the Hyatt on Saturday night. He declared my blouse very 80s and meant it in a good way. We also discussed the merits of the various wedding dresses that wandered by and our crushes on the Immonens.
• SOY GELATO! at Mondo Gelato with Kit Fox! Awesome.
• If I try to talk about how great Terry and Susan were, I’ll cry. They took such great care of all of us. And Terry made me a HUNGRY FOR CHANGE button with a cupcake on it!
• I bought presents for me and Miss April from JustJenn, a fellow cupcake enthusiast.
• Saw colorist extraordinaire and my Twitter pal Trish Mulvihill at the Hyatt and it had been so long since I’d seen her that I didn’t recognize her. Dur. As we were walking away I asked Fraction who was the woman with the gorgeous mane. “That was Trish!” I was too embarrassed to go back and say hello again properly so I make my confession here.
• Han!  Oh, Han!  How I adore Han!  Han and Megan (who is similarly adored) came back to the condo to see Henry.  *Sweethearts*.  I ran into Jill briefly but somehow never saw Dan or Chu.  WTF?!
• Sam “Kubark” Humphries still has the best hair in comics, California and possibly the world.
• Sam, what was the name of your friend – the gentleman who gave me the polaroid?  He used to be a nanny…?  He was charming.  [Mystery solved: Lou O’Bedlam!)
• Met Kevin Church for about 2 seconds at long last.  Hi, Kevin! 
• Saw Aman and Scott too!  How is it I’ve never made it to Aman’s Big Gay Dinner?  Am I retarded? (Rhetorical question.)
• Saw Bryan O’Malley and Hope Larsen in passing.  I like them.  In addition to being crazy-talented, there’s something really… warm… about them.  Does that make sense?  Sincere, unadorned, no-bullshit.  Hope, in particular, exudes good taste, too.  I bet I’d be stupid jealous of their home.  
• Speaking of Canadians with good taste: Chris! Butcher!  
• Okay, that’s enough for now. I need to go get my car inspected. I’ll correct name spellings and add links later.
• EDITED TO ADD: Dinner at Morton’s with Rick Alexander!  And guests Gloria (Eep! Her last name escapes me.), Nick Barrucci, Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie (who, very mysteriously, stopped me later and told me my husband was a Very. Bad. Man. Something to do with some text messages…?) and Ivan Brandon.  Hello, yum?!
• EDITED TO ADD: Right next to JustJenn, we met a couple of guys from Kansas City! I promised to put them on the email list the next time the whole KC Comics crew gets together.  Well, I hope they read this because my stack of postcards and business cards doesn’t seem to have made it home with me.  (Fraction, did you pack them…?)  Guys, if you do see this, drop me a Twitter DM or leave a comment here. 
• EDITED TO ADD: Finally met Kevin McShane!  I met Kevin on Flickr, but as it turns out three of his friends also friends of mine — all from different circles.  He knows Dave Holmes, who I used to perform with in NY; Irene White, who I went to college with; and Opus Moreschi, who I met in Las Vegas and met through an old music posting board.  Weeeeird.  Opus was also at SDCC apparently, but our paths never crossed, alas. 

It’s very simple, I think: 

• Thursday, 12:00 – 1:00 pm Signing at Image Booth, #2729
• Thursday, 6:00 – 7:00 pm Signing at Image Booth, #2729
• Friday, 5:00 – 6:00 pm Signing at Image Booth, #2729
• Saturday, 11:30 – 12:30 pm COMIC BOOK TATOO PANEL, Room 6B
• Saturday, 6:00 – 7:00 pm Signing at Image Booth, #2729
• Sunday, 4:00 – 5:00 pm Signing at Image Booth, #2729

My husband has posted his appearance schedule, appropriately, at Matt Fraction dot com.   Eisner Info is here. General Con schedule info is here.   I forgot to pack a sweater and a belt, so at some point I have to hit the Gap.  Just in case you were wondering.  

Yeah, yeah, I’ll post my signing schedule for SDCC at some point soon, but first can I say how INCREDIBLY TICKLED I AM that my cupcakes made the Cupcakes Take the Cake blog??

Of course, now I’m all like, “Oh no! I should have take better pictures!” And written more about the cupcake I did manage to post.  Etc.  It’s like when someone comes over and you wish you’d known they were coming so you could’ve run the vacuum first.

The Comic Book Tattoo is out July 23rd! Woo hoo! I have two stories in this fine collection: SILENT ALL THESE YEARS with Laurenn McCubbin and SUEDE with Muscles MacGunshow Andy MacDonald.

Comic Book Resources has a blog up for the book here and a forum here.

(Also, my friend Kathryn’s HELLCAT book is out.  I have read it.  It’s funny and good and ohmygod BEAUTIFUL and you should totally buy it.  I wanted to link to the purchase page on Midtown Comics but apparently they don’t do permalinks (?), which is, in the parlance of our times, a bummer. )  

(The Immonens are revamping their site.  It’s gorgeous and I’m jealous.  Go see.) 

Got a sweet email from my step-mom this morning, wishing me a happy birthday (early) and sharing some fun birthday facts. Apparently my special day is also Ice Cream Day, Winnie the Pooh Day and COW APPRECIATION DAY.

That last is rather hilarious, I have to say.

Anyway. I also share a birthday with Iris Murdoch and Vladimir the Bold. I don’t know anything about ol’ Vlad, but I do like his name.

My plan for tomorrow (right now, and I reserve the right to change my mind) is to leave HL with Miss April and run away from home for a few hours. I think I’m going to go to a sale in the morning, come home and have lunch with Henry, Matt and Miss April, then go spend a couple of hours at the gym. I might swim or use the sauna or… I don’t even know just yet, but it’s very exciting anyway.

Then in the evening we’ll have some family time.

Doesn’t that sound lovely?

I toyed with the idea of inviting everyone out to a dinner or bowling or something, but there are so many birthdays in July around here, I suspect our friends might have a wee bit of celebration fatigue. And anyway a bit of time to myself just sounds like gold and honey perfume to me right now.

In the meantime, I need to get through today. Miss April is here (she’s mopping the kitchen right now. I love her so much I might ‘splode.) I just made a few phone calls and answered a few emails. I’m about to give up waiting for one return call and take the dogs for a walk. Then I need to start on volume 5 of the Japanese book I’m currently adapting (Is that announced yet? I’m not sure.), write up a piece for the Comic Book Tattoo Blog, do a little calendar tetris/deadline math and make a meal plan for the week. And a hundred other things. But those for sure. Oy.

It’s 11 o’clock already. I better get going.

(Happy Birthday, Ehren Christian!)

GTD People — and particularly OmniFocus people — what contexts do you use?  

It took me a few days to screw up the courage to watch this, but hey — it’s not that bad. In fact, I think everyone comes across as fairly charming. Whew. (Thank you, Tom.)  

Can I say how much I love that Kathryn and Stuart’s first date was Brazil…? 

I don’t know how to make an animated gif (which is probably a good thing) but Kathryn Immonen does.  I find this hilarious for some reason.  I’m not sure why.