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Pat Henry and the crew from Dragon*Con provided the David family with their standard excellent treatment and support, and it was much appreciated.

We had a great time, meeting and greeting the fans, plus seeing old friends (the crew from “Babylon 5”) and encountering some new faces (Barry Bostwick, for instance, whom I’ve always wanted to meet. Dig up on Youtube his 1985 re-creation of Danny Zuko from “Grease” singing “Summer Nights.” He’s at least 20 years too old for the role at that point and he STILL buries Travolta.) High points included Kath and I meeting Terry Gilliam and Kath, Caroline and I meeting Patrick Stewart (who was charmed when Caroline was excited to meet the voice of Mr. Woolsworth from “Chicken Little.”)

Also gave the Julie Award to Leonard Nimoy, which was a personal thrill for me, and reformed MC-Squared with George Perez to host the Masquerade. So that was cool. To me, best costume was Samurai Jack and Aku, with the former played by a seven year old girl squaring off against her dad who was hidden inside an Aku puppet essentially that stretched fifteen feet high, making it the first properly proportioned SJ/Aku confrontation I’ve ever seen.

Plus of course I was on a variety of panels with such folks as Bob Greenberger, Keith DeCandido, Tim Zahn, and Peter S. Beagle. Always an interesting exchange of ideas.

Overall a great time.

PAD

As if I have some sort of special insight into the Disney/Marvel purchase. So I’ll say here what I’ve been saying elsewhere and let it be my “official” statement:

I honestly haven’t formed an opinion yet. I’ve seen guesses ranging from “Nothing’s going to change” to “Everything’s going to change.” I think, as with most things, the truth is going to fall somewhere in the middle, and I’m perfectly content to take a wait-and-see attitude.

PAD

“Beauty and the Beast” from two years ago

Marvel Comics has been acquired by the Disney Corporation.

Seriously.  I’m not kidding.   This is the AP article:

Under the deal, Disney will acquire ownership of 5,000 Marvel characters.

Disney said Monday that Marvel shareholders will receive $30 per share in cash plus 0.745 Disney shares for every Marvel share they own.

It said the boards of Disney and Marvel have both approved the transaction, but it requires an antitrust review and the approval of Marvel shareholders.

PAD

X-Factor is not canceled. The following month will see the numbering switch to issue #200, and the story is double sized so we need to give the artist extra time to get a jump on it.

PAD

A whole bunch of years ago, when I was sitting in a court room during divorce proceedings, I noticed the words, “IN GOD WE TRUST” emblazoned on the wall above the judge’s bench. And I leaned over to my attorney and, indicating the wording, said, “So…the whole separation of church and state thing…?”

“Not so much,” said my attorney.

Well, a blow for remembering that shoving God in your face isn’t exactly always appreciated was struck in Kentucky when a judge ruled that a state law regarding homeland security had crossed the ever-flexible line in that regard. The law apparently treated survival in a manner similar to the way AA treats alcoholism: You have to acknowledge your dependence on a higher power for survival. And the judge rightly said, “Uh uh. Unconstitutional.”

The state representative–who is, not coincidentally, a pastor–declared that it wasn’t a matter of religion. “God isn’t a religion. God is God!” he declared. He also pointed out that the words “In God We Trust” appears on all the money. Which is true. But the mandate to put the newly declared national motto on all the money (not just the few coins on which it previously appeared) didn’t occur until the 1950s, at the same time that the words “under God” were inserted into the pledge of allegiance. You know, back when Congress was desperate to prove that we were different from the Godless commies, not to mention falling over each other to weed out Reds in our society and consequently ruining the careers and lives of a lot of good people.

Not that we’ve moved beyond the need to persecute people, harass them, and boycott them simply because of opinions they might or might not possess; the spirit of Tailgunner Joe is alive and well to this day, I can assure you. So the insertion of God into various aspects of life by government fiat has a not-so-proud legacy. I’ll be interested to see if the good pastor’s observation about the money triggers the next law suit.

More details can be found here: