If you're heading for Comic-Con and panicked about getting everything done that needs to be done before you go, don't worry. I just asked if the convention can be delayed a few weeks…maybe to late August. I'm sure they'll do that for me.
Just in case they won't postpone it — and I can't imagine why they wouldn't — posting here will be more intermittent than usual 'til it's over. I have a hectic schedule the whole time. My Saturday goes like this:
9 AM: Business-type breakfast meeting. 10 AM: Video interview. 11 AM: Business-type meeting. 11:45: Quick Draw! 1 PM: Cartoon Voices Panel. 2:30 PM: Signing. 3 PM: Business-type meeting. 3:30: Brief guest appearance on someone else's panel. 4 PM: Brief appearance on Abrams Books panel. 4:30 PM: That 70's Panel. 6 PM: Recess, change clothes. 7 PM: Party. 8:30 PM: Dinner with friends. 10 PM: Party if we feel like going.
And it's kinda like that for the whole convention. I couldn't live at that pace year-round but it's fun to do it for 4.5 days now and then, especially if I can sleep the entire following week. If you see me and want to say hello, don't let the schedule stop you. Except for obligations to publishers, I will not be sitting anywhere signing things because I don't like doing that. My main demand now when I'm asked to appear at a con is that they not give me a table. I'll be glad to sign a few things for anyone but I just feel stupid sitting there like I expect people to line up for it.
So…what's in the news? "Trumpcare" (which was really "No Care") seems to be gone. A lot of folks seem upset that Senate Republicans, who might conceivably have to run for re-election some day, were reluctant to pass a bill that was polling at 16% approval. To put that in perspective, hitting yourself over the head with a ball peen hammer is polling at 17% and is not all that different.
This means that now we have to watch Trump and the G.O.P. sabotage Obamacare every possible way so they can say, "See? We told you it would never work!" Oh, that's going to be so good for everyone.
They say Trump is seething because all his advisors insisted he had to keep Obama's negotiated deal with Iran. He was dying to get rid of it because, you know, it was Obama's. Despite campaigning on the premise that it was the worst deal in the history of mankind, Trump's keeping it…for now. Okay, but how long before he finds some pretext for voiding the treaty, blaming Iran and his predecessor and as with health care, trying to get rid of something without having any idea what to put in its place? This guy never seems to have a Plan B and sometimes, as with the border wall, he doesn't seem to have a workable Plan A.
I have to go pack. Back later.