In late 1979, the TV cartoon show Thundarr the Barbarian was developed at the Ruby-Spears cartoon studio in the hope of selling it to ABC for its Saturday morning cartoon show lineup. A bunch of us pitched in on its concept and I think the name "Thundarr" came from me…but my pal Steve Gerber and the studio-head Joe Ruby had way more to do with the series than I did. Alex Toth did the initial designs of the three main characters.

ABC waffled, trying to decide between it and a few other submissions from other studios. An agent for Hanna-Barbera was trying to get me to commit to story-edit one of the shows his studio was pushing for that time slot. I told him I thought Thundarr would be selected and I'd kinda/sorta agreed that if it was, I'd write a third or so of the scripts for it. He told me I was making a big mistake.

Ruby-Spears would later be acquired by the corporation that owned H-B but at the time, they were competitors…and H-B could be pretty ruthless in squeezing competitors off the networks' schedules. He told me there was no f'in' way Thundarr would get on the ABC schedule. Hanna-Barbera had the clout to keep it off and to place the show he was offering me. I decided not to believe him. In hindsight, I'm not sure anything this guy ever told me was accurate.

Joe Ruby decided that maybe more artwork would close the sale but Alex Toth refused to draw another line for it or the studio. Alex was one of the most brilliant artists who ever worked in animation or comic books but he did not play well with others. Some of his many employers over the years treated him poorly and when they did, he would tell them to drop dead and leave him the hell alone. Some of his many employers over the years would treat him like a god and when they did, he would still find some reason to tell them to drop dead and leave him the hell alone.

Another brilliant artist was needed to quickly draw some large, awesome sales presentations that would enchant the network folks. I solved two problems at the same time by suggesting Jack Kirby. The other problem was that Jack was real, real unhappy — legitimately so, not like some of Toth's raging — with how he was being treated in comic books. Trouble was, he couldn't just then find any other way to make a living. He was hired to do the necessary drawings, ABC bought Thundarr…and Ruby-Spears put Kirby under contract for the rest of his career. He was much happier working for them than he would have been in any of the then-feasible alternatives.

I only wrote one episode of Thundarr the Barbarian, plus I wrote the opening titles and helped on a few rewrites. That's because I was suddenly engaged to be the head writer on a prime-time variety show starring two young ladies from Japan who did not speak English. And who could turn that down? Gerber and other folks turned Thundarr into a respectable — that is to say, renewable-for-a-second-season — success. There would have been a third if Garry Marshall, who in 1982 was the most powerful man around ABC, hadn't demanded that the network clear a half-hour in their Saturday AM schedule for a Mork & Mindy cartoon show.

A year later, NBC picked up Thundarr but only for reruns. No new episodes were ever produced. There was talk of an animated feature for which one of the show's best writers, Buzz Dixon, wrote a wonderful screenplay that was never produced. There were samples drawn up for a potential newspaper comic strip that never happened. And there was a comic book that was readied for publication but never published. The other day on Facebook, Jason Moore asked about it after posting this item that ran in Amazing Heroes magazine in its February 1981 issue…

Whitman Comics will be adding a substantial number of titles to its lineup in 1982; most of these will be revivals of old titles, although there will also be one new adventure title (Thundarr, based on the popular Saturday morning cartoon show), and three mystery/fantasy titles, Shroud of Fear, Astral Frontier and Shadow Play.

"Whitman Comics" was the new name for Gold Key Comics, the line produced by Western Publishing, AKA Western Printing and Lithography. During the late sixties and especially throughout the seventies, Western had increasing problems getting their comics distributed. At one point, they were literally not available in the state of New York and also in many other areas.

"Why" is a long story but basically, the system by which magazines had long been distributed was crumbling, at least for publications that didn't have photos of nude women and/or very expensive advertising. Other comic book companies managed to cope in different ways…and had stronger distributors who were elbowing the smaller publishers off the steadily-decreasing number of newsstands across the country. Other comic book companies also had incoming revenue — often, way more than they made publishing — from the licensing of their characters. But Western didn't share in the licensing of the main characters they published — Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, etc.

Western was still making money with its lines of coloring books, kids' books, activity books, jigsaw puzzles and other items they produced under the Whitman brand. They tried distributing their comic books along the same lines…which is why the switch from "Gold Key Comics" to "Whitman Comics" but that wasn't working too well. Many of their comics simply and quietly stopped coming out. They did publish one issue of Shadow Play and I think one or two others but never published most of them and never published a traditional sized issue of Thundarr.

Asking about the Thundarr comic, Jason wrote on Facebook, "So does anyone else have any details on this? Mark Evanier, Buzz Dixon, Wiliam Wray…do you guys know any details on the plans for the comic?" I came along and posted the following…

Okay, here's Mark with the answer. During its last few years of operation, the comic book divisions of Western Publishing Company produced dozens and dozens of never-published issues of whatever they were then publishing and also some new comics. Some of that material (mostly the Disney stuff, I suspect) may have been published by overseas publishers. Most of it, I'm sure, was never printed anywhere..

The finished artwork for all or most of that material went into a big pile at the offices of the New York division where it sat for many months while the company, which had stopped sending comics to press, decided if and when to resume and explored different ideas about distribution. They finally decided not to resume.

I saw that pile on a trip to those offices. DC Comics flew Dan Spiegle — then the artist of the Blackhawk comic I worked on for them — and myself and others back to New York for a big conference. Dan and I snuck away for a few hours to visit the Western offices. I, who had written for Western for several years, had been there before. Dan had worked for the company for something like thirty years — mostly for the Los Angeles office but occasionally for New York — and had never been there. It was a sad visit as the once-huge offices had been reduced to two small rooms.

I got to flip through the pile, which was about two feet high. There were several issues of a completed, ready-to-print Thundarr comic book in there. All the ones I saw were drawn by Winslow Mortimer and one had a script credit for John David Warner. He may have written all of them. I was a big fan of Mr. Mortimer's art but I thought he was miscast on this particular book and that he made it look too cartoony.

The pile also had completed issues of Daffy Duck and Pink Panther and whatever else was in the Gold Key/Whitman line when publishing was suspended forever. I have no idea what became of the art in that pile.

So there's all that history. Oh — and you see those covers above of the Whitman Thundarr comic book? They're fake. I made them up in Photoshop a few hours ago. Forgive me if you were fooled.

I've heard rumors that Western did publish one mini-comic of the property that had very limited circulation but I've never seen one. There have been toys of the characters and I believe Thundarr also did a cameo in one of DC Comics' Hanna-Barbera titles. An editor there once asked me if I'd be interested in writing a new comic book of it that was under discussion. I said yes, he said he'd be "in touch" and he's never gotten in touch with me. That just might be because he's no longer in touch with the company.

That's kind of the way most Thundarr plans seem to go but I still think it was a good show and I'll bet it'll be back someday. I'll also bet it won't look much like the show I worked on and that many people seem to remember fondly.

Baby sea turtles heading for the sea…

It's been two weeks since Donald Trump said that "within two weeks," there would be "a full and complete healthcare plan." Have you seen it? I haven't seen it. And I would think that if you did have one, you'd have to give Congress more than two weeks to analyze it, discuss it, propose changes to it, etc.

Clearly, when he said that, he knew there would be no healthcare plan in two weeks. There won't be one in two months, either. The guy just says whatever he has to say to get himself off the spot at that particular moment and then doesn't give another thought to delivering on his promises…

I just found this in my e-mailbox…

Mark,

I've been involved in many races over the years and never before have I witnessed a President who is as dedicated to serving this Nation and its people as President Trump.

I took some time to review our vital End-of-Month results, and while we hit our $25,000,000 goal, I noticed that your name was MISSING from the list of donors.

JULY END-OF-MONTH DONOR FILE
SUPPORTER: Mark Evanier
END-OF-MONTH DONATION: $0

President Trump told me you've been a HUGE supporter since DAY ONE, so I was surprised to see you missed this opportunity to help us WIN BIG. Your support is vital to our movement, which is why I've been authorized to EXTEND your 600%-MATCH.

For 1 HOUR ONLY your gift will be 600%-MATCHED!

Please contribute $42 in the NEXT HOUR and your gift will automatically be 600%-MATCHED.

Bill Stepien
Campaign Manager
Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.

I don't understand. Donald Trump has been so truthful about the economy and his taxes and the screw-ups managing The Pandemic and his relationships with folks like Stormy Daniels and Jeffrey Epstein and how much of The Wall has been built and his relationship with Putin and his conversations with the Ukraine and what Article II of The Constitution means and who really pays for his increased tariffs and what the Mueller Report said and where Hurricane Dorian was expected to hit and how windmills cause cancer and all those other things…

But why would he tell his campaign manager that Mark Evanier has been a huge (excuse me — a HUGE) supporter since Day One?

About sixty minutes ago online, I noticed that John Byner has written an autobiography and it's out. It was Kindled within one minute and I really enjoyed as much of it as I've read in the last hour. My rapid response was because Mr. Byner has long been one of my favorite comedians. I'm sure I've said that on this blog and I would have said it more often if we saw more of him.

I've seen him perform live several times, met him a few times and worked with him once on a Garfield & Friends. Very nice man. Great teller of stories. When I booked him, I asked his agent, "How come we don't see this man more often on TV?" The agent sighed and said, "He turns down a lot of stuff. He's not one of those comics who gets panicked if he doesn't get applauded once a week. He's real happy with his life and with his wife and taking it easy." (I've met his wife, Annie Gaybis, and she's quite wonderful.)

In this business, that's all very refreshing to hear. What I've read of the book so far confirms my sense of him as a sane, happy man who simply has the ability to be hilarious when he chooses to be. If you want to enjoy his book along with me, here's a link. I'm thinking that after I finish reading it, I might just spring for the Audiobook. Maybe he reads a chapter or two in Georgie Jessel's voice.

Shelly Goldstein tipped me off about this wonderful video. It's 24 minutes of clips from The Ed Sullivan Show featuring Julie Andrews doing numbers from My Fair Lady and Camelot.

The Camelot scenes are especially interesting. These may be the only filmed records of those performances since neither Richard Burton nor Ms. Andrews were in the movie. More important is what The Ed Sullivan Show meant to Camelot. I explained it at some length in this post but if you don't feel like clicking and reading, at least skim this excerpt from that post…

Camelot, sets and all, opened on Broadway on December 3, 1960. If unknowns had been behind it, it might not have lasted a week. But the reps of Lerner, Loewe and Hart had sold enough advance tickets that it was destined to run at least six months, during which two "miracles" (as Lerner called them) occurred. One was that [Director Moss] Hart, released from that Toronto hospital, came to see it and helped Lerner to do a significant rewrite. Shows rarely change much after they open but in this case, Camelot was said to be substantially improved. This is the version performed ever since.

Then came the second miracle: Ed Sullivan, who then had the most popular show on TV, devoted an entire program to the works of Lerner and Loewe. (This miracle may have been aided by the fact that the show was on CBS, and CBS had financed Camelot.) At the time, current Broadway shows rarely "gave away" their best moments on television, on the theory that audiences wouldn't pay after experiencing them for free. Camelot had nothing to lose so they did all the best songs on the Sullivan show and the next morning, the box office finally had a line of ticket buyers befitting a smash hit.

I don't think this video has all the songs from the show that were performed on that telecast; just the ones with Julie Andrews. But everything in this video is, as they say, loverly…

• I wish every time Donald Trump tweets or says something like how he wants to move Election Day, the press would cover it AND also cover the bad news — like the latest economic news he got just before that tweet — from which he wants to divert our attention.

In the last few weeks, I've made Jeff Bezos a little richer — hey, the guy needs the money — by buying a few pretty useful (to me) things. The first two relate to my welfare during my COVID-19 banishment from the world and the third has to do with the feral cats I feed in my backyard.

First up is the Innosipo Touchless Automatic Soap Dispenser. Like you if you have a brain in that head of yours, I wash my hands a lot these days. I like liquid soap for this activity but I keep having trouble with those "pump" bottle of the stuff. The pump part always breaks or jams or just plain doesn't work.

Solution: I bought one of these and poured the soap from a jammed bottle into it…and now it dispenses perfectly. I then bought two more for other bathrooms in my home. Each one takes four AAA batteries which are not included. The instructions say not to put alcohol in it so it's not designed for hand sanitizer.

Then there's the AXHKIO Infrared Non-Contact Forehead Thermometer. There are dozens of these on Amazon and this is one of the cheaper ones. I bought one and it works fine.

I wasn't sure it did at first because every single time I used it on myself, it told me my temperature was 97.7. But I've had my temp taken by other such handheld devices in doctors' offices and it turns out my temperature is always 97.7. And I used it on a friend who was visiting and her temperature was 98.1 so it doesn't always say 97.7.

I assume all the others they sell on Amazon work well but this was cheaper than most of 'em and it works. It's kind of comforting to find out my temperature is normal, which for me is 97.7 — same as my I.Q., the age I feel I am first thing in the morning and, the way things are going, Donald Trump's Disapproval Ratings by the end of October.

Lastly: As you know, I feed Lydia, Murphy and the occasional Special Guest Varmint in my backyard. I have big bags of dry cat food and a cupboard full of the canned stuff and I alternate — wet in the morning, dry in the evening. Both are Friskies brand…and to the folks who've written me that other brands are better for the felines: I've been feeding Friskies to Lydia now since 1991, which is like thrice the usual lifespan of a feral cat in an urban area. She's so healthy, I'm thinking of eating the stuff myself.

Usually, I buy the cases of Friskies canned cat food that they sell at Costco. The box they have of 60 cans contains ten each of Mariner's Catch, Mixed Grill, Turkey & Giblets Dinner, Ocean Whitefish & Tuna Dinner, Chicken & Tuna Dinner and Chicken & Liver Dinner. It sells for $36.59, which works out to 61 cents per can.

I have never had any reason to believe that the cats care which flavor they get. They're feral cats so they eat anything edible and they attack each bowl with the same gusto. Nevertheless, I felt a tad guilty giving them the same six things over and over. So just to make me feel better, I bought one of these from Amazon…

It's the Friskies YUMbelievaBOX YUM-credible Surprises adult wet cat food variety pack. That seems to be its official name even though the box abbreviates it. It's 40 cans for $21.63, which is 54 cents a can but that's not the reason I like it. I like it because it's a much wider variety of flavors.

What flavors? Well, I'm speculating here but I think it's whatever the Friskies people have too much of in the warehouse. It's like a Pussycat Food Mystery Box with all sorts of varieties, some of which I don't think I ever saw on the shelves of a Los Angeles market. They might be flavors that were test-marketed and didn't sell or discontinued ones or they just plain had too many of them in stock.

They all seem to be well ahead of their expiration dates but maybe these could have stayed in inventory too long if they weren't clearing them out in these boxes. And I say "boxes" (plural) because I bought two more of these and they all seem to have slightly different contents, not itemized on the website or on the outside of the box. Someone just grabs whatever cans are within reach, fills a carton, seals it and ships it off to Amazon.

The cats are exactly as satisfied — no more, no less — with the chow they're getting from these crates. I feel better because I'm not giving them the same six flavors over and over…and I am saving seven whole cents per can — which, the way Murphy eats, feels like a couple of bucks a day.

A quick flashback to when I was 20 years old. I was still living with my parents, still attending U.C.L.A., still ignoring my studies there in order to write scripts for Gold Key Comics and I think still working on the weekends with Jack Kirby. My folks were away in Las Vegas for a few days…a trek they made often and one which I encouraged because it meant I had to the house to myself. When I did, I had a place to take some young lady I was dating. You may be able to guess why.

At the time, I was seeing a young lady named Leslie. I suggested to her that Friday night, we could go to dinner and a movie then go to my house for a bit. She suggested — she suggested, I didn't — that we skip the movie; just grab a pizza and go to my house for more than a bit. I was all for that. She asked though, did I have a copy of "Brandy" to which we could listen?

The number one record in the country that week was "Brandy" (subtitled "You're a Fine Girl") by a group called Looking Glass. I didn't have a copy of it but I said that by Friday night, I would. The first record store I went to was out of it but I bought the last 45 RPM copy of it at the second.

The evening went well up to a point. That point was when we started playing "Brandy."

I picked her up, we negotiated pizza toppings and then picked up such a pie and drove to where I lived. Much of the pizza was consumed, then we adjourned to my parents' bedroom, which is where the phonograph was located. "Brandy" went on the turntable. This story is not heading where you think it's heading and certainly not exactly where I was hoping it was heading.

Leslie and I began "making out" on my parents' bed. No apparel except for shoes came off. There were two obstacles to further disrobing, the first being that "Brandy" was three minutes and eight seconds long. That meant that every three minutes and eight seconds, one of us — usually me, sometimes her — had to interrupt the making-out, get up off the bed and move the tone arm on the phonograph from the end of the song back to the beginning so it could play again.

And again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again. We were there for about ninety minutes so "Brandy" was played…let me do the math here…something like twenty-nine times. The obstacle to romance was not her desires. She wanted to do what I wanted to do but we had to kind of sneak up on it and she insisted on "Brandy" playing constantly.

Today, I could easily have my iPhone play it in an endless loop. Back in the stone age, one of us had to get up off the bed and walk over to the phonograph every three minutes. It's hard to get any momentum going for affection when you have to keep starting over every 183 seconds.

But that was only the problem for the first half-hour or so. Around the thirty-minute mark, we got to talking about the song and about the lyrics. They aren't the cheeriest or most romantic words. It's about loss and being alone and never seeing the person you love again…and Brandy is not the happiest person in it. Neither was Leslie as we discussed how, though she had never lost a love to the sea, she identified somehow with the fine girl.

She got more and more depressed so I got more and more depressed. Finally, we both realized nothing was going to happen so we stopped playing the record over and over and, as Leslie suggested, we put on our shoes and I took her home. Then I went back to my home and ate the rest of the pizza. Leslie and I somehow never went out again.

The lead singer on "Brandy" was a gent named Elliot Lurie. Recently, backed up by some new friends, he performed an a cappella rendition of it. It's a nice arrangement but it reminds me of what it reminds me of…

I've decided to end my imaginary stay at an extended Comic-Con International. It was a nice Alternative Reality while it lasted but if I want to live in an Alternate Reality, I can just become a Trump supporter. In case you're interested, I hosted a record 121 panels including the Super Golden Age Panel with Jerry Siegel, Joe Shuster, Bob Kane, Will Eisner, Joe Simon, Jack Kirby and C.C. Beck. I'll admit it was a little disappointing when Bob Kane turned out to be Sheldon Moldoff in a clever plastic disguise. Also, it was nice to actually give the Bill Finger Award to Bill Finger.

I came home to find me exactly where I'd left me: Sitting in front of this computer, writing something for this blog. In the next few days, I will post the 28,000th message on this page and in December, we will celebrate this blog's twentieth anniversary. That will occur on December 18th and maybe — just maybe — that will coincide with finalizing the outcome of the November 3rd Presidential Election.

I would guess the next big political news will be Joe Biden's announcement of his running mate…though "big political news" seems to come out of almost anywhere these days. It's hard to remember that after all this campaigning, neither Biden nor Trump officially have their party's nomination and Trump could still dump Pence and replace him with a labrador retriever…probably a neutered, well-trained white one.

Pretty quiet here. The other day, I tried a new fish & chips place that opened not far from me. I had Grubhub deliver an order and the chips were partly-frozen while the fish was battered beyond recognition. The only part of it I could eat was the ampersand.

Some of my friends seemed giddy with excitement to hear that Congressguy Louie Gohmert tested positive for the virus. I wouldn't wish that on anyone but if somebody has to get it, it makes good, karmic sense for it to be a guy who, even as thousands died of it, was declaring the whole thing a hoax and scolding anyone on his staff who dared to wear facial coverings. One fellow I know who saw this on the news was beside himself with glee…but even he had the good sense, while beside himself, to wear two masks.

This year was, in reduced form, the 51st Comic-Con in San Diego…and to the extent I "attended" by being on four panels, I "attended" my fifty-first.

One of the things I've learned about Comic-Con is that it's a real smorgasboard of expectations and thrills. If 130,000 people are there, there might just be 130,000 different answers to the question, "What do/did you want to see happen?" As I've said so many times I'm sick of hearing me say it, you have to pretty much make your own convention because there are dozens of different ones going on there at the same time. Find the one you want in that building and you can have a wonderful time.

Of course, it may be a little difficult to do that when you can't get into that building. Like this year.

I may have heard 130,000 different complaints about the con. That's not counting the biggie, which is "I tried and tried and couldn't get a badge to attend." This year's con succeeded wildly in not having that complaint. But other years, I've heard a lot of folks complain that they went to make some connection that would result in some form of employment and that didn't happen. I've heard "I have this list of comics I need and I couldn't find half of them and the half I could find were way overpriced." And that didn't happen.

A woman complained to me once that all she wanted was to meet and get a selfie with Leonard Nimoy and he was there but the lines to meet him were too long and he left before she got to him. Another woman another year complained that she wanted to meet William Shatner but he wasn't there that year.

The topper may have been the guy who complained to me not that long ago that there was no Golden Age Panel featuring people who wrote and drew comics in the 1940s. I asked him who we should have gotten to attend the con and appear on such a panel and a conversation ensued that went kind of like this: He named a Golden Age Artist or Writer. I said, "He's dead."

He named a Golden Age Artist or Writer. I said, "He's dead."

He named a Golden Age Artist or Writer. I said, "He's dead."

We went around like that about nine times and finally, he named someone who's still alive and said, "He isn't dead, right?" I said, "Right but he's 97 and he can't walk and he's in a nursing home in Florida." I think the guy felt that Comic-Con should have sent a limo for him.

What am I getting at here is that everyone has different things that they want to see or experience at Comic-Con and too many of then act like the whole convention should only be about that. Which brings us to a very silly, narrow-visioned article in Variety called 'Why Comic-Con 'At Home' Was a Bust." Here's why, according to this piece: Its online videos that were promotional vehicles for TV shows and movies didn't attract enough viewers in the estimation of Adam B. Vary.

And I'm not even faulting Mr. Vary, who is "a senior entertainment writer covering the business of genre storytelling and fandom across movies, television and streaming platforms." Variety has never cared much about anything at Comic-Con but movies, television and streaming platforms. Neither have his two previous places of employment, Buzzfeed and Entertainment Weekly. If that Oprah Winfrey magazine had assigned a reporter to cover Comic-Con, he or she would probably be disappointed that the con didn't do a great job promoting Oprah.

In the days leading up to Comic-Con's online version, Mr. Vary wrote a series of articles about what he considered the major events. They were all about the Star Trek panel, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Charlize Theron, Joss Whedon, this new series on HBO Max, that new series on Amazon Prime, Stumptown, The Simpsons, Nathan Fillion, etc. The closest he got to mentioning comic books or anything printed on paper (you know, like Variety used to be) was telling when the Eisner Awards ceremony was and promoting a panel on the challenges of adapting comic books to the screen.

It really isn't isn't that much different from the lady who thought Comic-Con was a failure because she didn't get her selfie with Leonard Nimoy.

I probably don't have to point out that nothing in Comic-Con's mission statement was ever about disseminating promotional videos by which HBO and Netflix can promote their products. If there was a failure to attract enough attention to them, how do you think all the dealers who count on Comic-Con as a place to sell books and artwork and crafts and COMIC BOOKS feel about the impact on their businesses? Keanu Reeves has other places he can promote his new movies. He'll do just fine. So will Netflix and Amazon and Fox and all the others.

Nor do I have to point this out but I will: The kind of panels Mr. Vary cares about would have happened, had they happened this year, in either Hall H or Ballroom 20 at Comic-Con. Hall H seats 6,000. Ballroom 20 seats 4,900. Most of the panels that he says underperformed online had a lot more viewers than that.

And while no one can say how many people would cram into Hall H for any given event if the room had infinite seating…well, Comic-Con welcomes about 130,000 people each year. Clearly, one of the most popular, hard-to-get-into events in the world attracts a lot of people — I'd guess an overwhelming majority — who never go near the kinds of superstar promotional panels that are all Comic-Con represents to reporters who cover movies, television and streaming platforms. And who measure success by how many people tweeted about something…because, you know, Comic-Con fails if it doesn't create buzz for Disney-Plus.

In fairness, as they say, Variety's reporter acknowledges "if Comic-Con [at] Home achieved anything, it was revealing the abiding truth that there is no substitute for the live experience." What I don't get is why he thinks that anyone thought it would be. Did any sentient human being on this planet think that? I don't know. Are there people who think that watching PornHub is a substitute for the live experience?

Well, maybe if that's all that's available at the moment…

Laura Benanti and Christopher Fitzgerald (and a couple of stand-in dancers) perform a song from The Sound of Music. I can't get enough of Laura Benanti…

In the Comic-Con of my mind, I only hosted five panels today but I had a great lunch with one group of friends and a greater dinner with others. I feel like the Alternate Reality con is winding down in my mind and I may be about ready to head home to where I really am.

Folks keep asking me if I think "this virus thing" will abate soon and we'll see a return to normal events. I think "no one knows" is still the only safe answer but I can hope it'll be safe to attend WonderCon next March 26-28 in Anaheim. I can also hope that if they can throw it, it won't be a difficult decision to decide whether or not to attend. But there are still people in this country who'd rather catch a painful, life-threatening disease than admit they were wrong about COVID-19 being no worse than the common cold or some kind of Liberal Hoax.

Question: Will cities or states mandate that you'll have to have a proper face covering to go into a polling place on November 3 and cast your ballot? I can almost hear the arguments: "I have a Constitutional right to vote and there's nothing in the Constitution that says you can deny me that right if I refuse to wear a mask." November third is going to be a long day.

In other news: My next live Cartoon Voices Panel will be at 4 PM Pacific Time on Saturday, August 8. I know that's a ways off so I'll remind you before then but here's a preview of who I've wrangled into participating…

If you're a follower of Cartoon Voice Actors, there must be a couple of folks on there who you'll be delighted to see in the lineup. And I will be resuming my one-on-one webcast Conversations week after next. Some of the ones in the near future won't be live because I'll need to record them at times that are not conducive to gathering a crowd…but some of them will be.

By the way: Folks who've seen my podcasts keep writing to ask what the deal is with the books they see in the background — What are they? And which books do you keep that close to your workspace and why? The answer is that just before the pandemic hit and my assistant stopped working here most of the time, we were rearranging all my bookshelves. So what's on the shelves closest to me is just whatever we stuck there at that moment and not necessarily the final location of those particular volumes. Move along. Nothing to see there.

• Okay, how many people had Louie Gohmert in today's "Person Who Mocked Wearing Masks Tests Positive for COVID-19" lottery?