EDITED! MONDAY NIGHT is the big night!

So, I’m in Savannah to lecture on comics at SCAD and drop in on a few sequential art classes.

But! While I’m there, I’m giving a bigger talk on comics and webcomics…and hot buttered ham you should come!

The talk is at 6PM at The Pirate’s Head, and it’s open to the public, but there’s a max capacity of 150 people. After the talk, I’ll be signing and sketching free for everyone (I don’t have books with me, so it’s more of a “bring the Sheldon books you have” kinda thing), followed by a possible stroll down to Leopold’s ice cream for amazing ice cream.

So! To review:
– Monday night, 6PM
– The Pirate’s Head, maximum 150 people
– Free sketches, etc, to follow
– Possible group stroll for ice cream at Leopold’s
– Hugs

I arrived home from a (very, very busy) Festival weekend in Ohio, only to realize that Friday’s strip never made it to the server, and so never made it to the website.

Rather than go back and post it for “Friday” in the archives, though, I’m going to just accept that accidents like that happen, and use it for this week. Huzzah: Lemonade outta lemons!

This past weekend was the triennial “Festival of Cartoon Art” at Ohio State University, and the weekend was an absolute joy.

I told the Festival organizer, Jenny Robb, that it was the single greatest cartooning event I’ve ever attended — and I meant it.

The weekend is designed for pro-cartoonists, historians, academics, and passionate comics fans. It’s the perfect mix of academic talks, professional talks, beautiful museum exhibits, cartoon library tours, and big headliners like Matt Groening and Art Speigelman.

I was honored to be one of the guest speakers this year, especially among such an amazing list of folks.

If the video of the speech came out all right, I’ll share it with you guys… or, I’ll pass along the transcript to Fleen.com as I promised.

Since giving the talk, though, I’ve had two other cartooning organizations ask me to give the talk again, though — so it may be coming to a town near you. 🙂

Wednesday’s strip about getting astronauts to Mars without boring the spit out of them generated a great e-mail from NASA engineer Lee S.:

I am an engineer at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, and I work on the telemetry processing systems that handle the current internet connectivity for the astronauts aboard the International Space Station. I have forwarded this particular strip to a number of engineers and controllers here for their amusement, and promptly received a hardy LOL from one controller. Good stuff! Keep it up!

No word yet on whether they forwarded the strip up to anyone on the space station: Most of the station’s internet time is dedicated to LOLcats and Facebook, purely for scientific reasons.

Sheldon reader Ben M. has been fighting the good fight against cancer for a while, now. And he just let me know he’s moving to Houston for further, specialized cancer treatments. As part of that move, he asked if I’d be comfortable mentioning the eBay sale of his prized original art from this Sheldon strip.

This is a strip that a *lot* of you have asked about over the years, so I know one of you will be overjoyed to snap it up. More importantly, I’m happy to help Ben out in this moment — as he’s been one of the kindest, nicest people a cartoonist could ever hope to meet. I first met Ben at Emerald City Comic-Con, what, three years ago? Four? And he’s always, always, always been quick with a kind word or a helping hand. So this is the least I can do for a genuinely good guy.

Ben’s framed up the strip in a really cool way, as well: Go have a look!

Just a heads up for those following our Saturday-only scifi feature: There won’t be an installment of Drive this weekend, with apologies.

But it’ll be back, rarin’ to go, next weekend! All tanned and rested and in fightin’ shape.

If you are on the internet, and have a working mouse and keyboard, then THIS MESSAGE IS FOR YOU:

You have until Friday to save $15 on the Sheldon 3-pack of books!

The 3-pack combines books 1, 2, and 3 — three books that would otherwise cost you $45 –but until Friday it’s just $30 for all of ’em! Plus there’s a cheap, bundled shippin’ fee for gettin’ them all at once, so you’re saving there, too. Wa-BAM! Savings!

Sheldonista Kathy M. just e-mailed me with a reminder: Since it’s Fall, that means it’s the Sheldon anniversary: 12 years of the strip online!

Neat!

Attention, Pasadena! This Friday night I’m a guest at the big ol’ Pasadena Art Night, which takes place in all the big cultural building around the city.

The young David Malki and I will both be signin’, sketchin’, sellin’, and sayin’ “hi” to readers…from 6-10PM in the cool 1920’s room in the Central Library. Come on out! Bring the kids! Bring the cat!*

*Provided the cat likes cultural events, and gettin’ cool, free sketches from cartoonists.

Hot buttered ham! All this week, save $15 on the Sheldon 3-pack of books!

The 3-pack combines books 1, 2, and 3 — three books that would otherwise cost you $45 –and this week it’s just $30 for all of ’em. Plus there’s even a cheap, bundled shippin’ fee for gettin’ them all at once, so you’re saving there, too.

Another way of looking at it: That’s 408 pages of Sheldony goodness for just 30 smackers!