Yes, Everything is Catching on Fire

“Hey now everybody now”

And I’m back.

I ended up taking most of October off from the newsletter to prepare for a big speaking engagement in Warsaw. It’s true. I even have pictures to prove it!

It’s been a minute since I’ve been onstage and I had honestly forgotten how much I love it. And even though this talk was centered on marketing and language, I managed to get a couple of funny stories in.

Now that it’s over, it’s been great to get back into more creative projects.

But first, I want to talk about pancakes…

“The day that love came to play!”

I don’t have a lot of life advice to offer, but here’s something I want you to really think about - even if you’re not a great cook, you should learn how to make great pancakes. 

Any recipe will do. I prefer buttermilk pancakes or the like – something light and fluffy. Whatever recipe you choose, learn it by heart, and always have the ingredients on hand.

There’s going to come a day when it’s rainy and cold outside, and the whole world is closing in. There’s going to be a night when someone you love is sitting across from you in pain. There’s going to be a time when a child is going to look up at you with tears in their eyes. There’s going to be a moment when you want to win someone’s heart. And you’re going to say, “Want some pancakes?”

It’s like a magic trick - one that’s guaranteed to change the trajectory of the day for the better.

“Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?”

I love a good Harlan Ellison story. I’m not talking about his fiction (also good), but an Ellison story where someone wrongs him and he gets his revenge.

Comic book writer Kurt Busiek recently told a story on BlueSky about the time back in 1983 when writer Bill Mantlo plagiarized one of Ellison’s short stories in an issue of Marvel’s Hulk. Ellison found out about it and threatened to sue Marvel. When the editors approached Mantlo, he confessed to doing it. So Marvel approached Ellison to ask what it would take to settle this out of court. His response was simple: he wanted one of everything that Marvel produced for the rest of his life. 

As Busiek writes, “And that didn’t just mean one of every comic or GN, no. One of every poster, catalogue, sell sheet, everything. If Marvel made travel alarm clocks as a giveaway for freelancers, Harlan got one of those, too.”

The best part: Ellison paid attention. If he felt like he was being cheated, he’d call Marvel and have whatever he was missing shipped to him.

And he did this for 35 years - for the rest of his life.

“I walk along darkened corridors…”

It’s November already. That’s just insane to me.

I’m already figuring out what I’m going to be able to finish before the year is over. And that means powering down on some areas while ramping up other things. There is this feeling that I’ve been carrying with me, that I’m running out of time - not in a Good-god-I’m-old kind of way, but rather a the-other-show-is-about-to-drop sort of way.

I don’t know. Maybe it’s autumn talking.

Maybe I just need some pancakes.

Take care of yourself out there.