that one random adventure (+3 for hump day) episode 5

So August 28, 2011 marks the return of "International Read Comics in Public Day", a day for us geeks to hit public transportation, coffee shops, parks and anywhere one can sit and proudly pull out our old trade paperbacks or new weeklies and spread awareness and appreciation for comics. I'm a big fan of a good "(insert cause) day". I cannot even begin to express how geeked out I am by September's Social Media Week, where your's truly will be moderating an event at my awesome day job Catalyst Ranch. The trouble with this particular day I find is...well...I already read comic books in public. Every day. On both ends of my commute.

But the notion reminds me of this one time this past spring. Free comic book day to be exact, reading the awesome  FCMBD edition of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN. Spidey sacrificed his iconic spider sense saving the city (again) in ASM#654 and was training with Shang-Chi (fresh off the pages of SECRET AVENGERS) to better tune his awareness through martial arts.

Lost in my book, I get a tap on my knee. A mini-me (7 if a day) looked up at me with gleaming almond shaped eyes and asked "awr you weading Spidew-Man?" (Swear to God he said his R's like that). His mother was napping next to him.

"Sure am pal" I replied.

"He's my favowite!" His torn up, third hand velcro Spidey sneaks proved as much.

"Mine too!" I replied.

"He's really funny."

"That he is." And so I nudged my book over so he can read with me, letting him turn pages when he'd caught up.

Spidey was off on Avengers mission. No spider sense, P.Parker is off his game.The turn of the page revealed a training scene between Spidey and Shang-Chi. Mini-Me's eyes lit up.

"Who's that?!" He demanded, setting his little finger on Shang-Chi. He could've cared less as I went over Chinese born Shang-Chi's master of kung fu street cred. His eyes remained fixated and he said in the most awestruck voice "He looks like me."

My stop came shortly after, the book remained unfinished between us. "Keep it" I said. "And make sure you ask your mom if you can read more. There's more Shang-Chi coming up in Spider Island." Standing on the platform, looking through the window, I saw Mini-Me flipping to the front of the book and reading it over again.

So yeah, when I read about NRACIPD, I thought "I don't need a day to celebrate this any more than I need the gay pride parade or Asian American Heritage Month. I celebrate these aspects of myself prudly every day." But like meeting an old drag queen who was there at the Stonewall riots, a closeted kid who suffers bullying in silence or meeting Mini-Me seeing himself represented in his favorite comic, its nice to get a reminder sometimes.

Celebrate yourself every day.

Three things I'm looking forward to for the rest of the week

Theatre (& Social Media)

Filament Theatre Ensemble presents a brand new theatrical experiment in partnership with Zaarly, the marketplace that helps you buy and sell with people nearby, Filament will attempt to create a brand new, locally-sourced, world premiere theatrical production in 36 hours. Community members can then share their stuff or their time in exchange for a ticket to the SUSTAIN36 Theatre Project performance which will be performed Thursday, August 25 at 8:00pm, a mere 36 hours after the playwriting process began.

This such an innovative and collaborative event. Following Filament's Twitter feed in every part of the process is pretty fuckin' rad. In the true spirit of Social Media, I read a retweet of the event on the SM side and was pleased as punch that it was a theatre event. A few tweets back and forth between Filament and lo and behold, I'm involved! Your's truly will be there video taping the process and the event as well as live tweeting tomorrow from 5PM on. For other convos happening about the event, search Twitter for #sustain36 and check for my blog/vlog footage on Friday!

For more info click here. If we had you at hello, get your tickets here. Will I see you there?

New Book Wednesday

X-Men Legacy #254
Written by MIKE CAREY
Penciled by STEVE KURTH
Cover by MICO SUAYAN

FINALLY! Someone's going into deep space to save Marvel Girl, Havok and Polaris. About goddamn time!

Family

I've been an uncle since I was one and a half. All of my nephews and nieces have been more like little brothers and sisters. None more so than DJ. In a blog where I open with a story of a mini-me, I am happy beyond belief to close out this entry to say the ultimate mini-me, not only blood family but best friend family, the fourth bertucelli, my little brother Mikey DJ is now in town and here for at least a month. Let the adventures commence!

Til next time!

that one time diversity took a HUGE step forward in comic books

ULTIMATE SPIDEY SPOILER ALERT

(that is, if you don’t  read things on the interwebs)

There’s a lot of noise about the reveal of the new Spider-Man in the Ultimate universe. My initial shock was “Ok, seriously, who the fuck is this kid?” because I was sure it was going to be someone already established in the universe that takes on the mantle. I was hoping (like my good buddy Archie) that it’d be Flash Thompson. But then it was…some kid. Could’ve been anybody. And I was like, whatever. I’m not gonna read it anyway. But then all the ignorance started. People were just not having this new Spider-Man. It’s not that they were mourning their beloved Peter Parker (as I would if it were the regular universe) Oh no, they had another reason to hate  on Miles Morales…

He’s half-black and half-Latino. See, to me his race was a non-issue: it was just some kid who wasn’t Peter Parker. But judging from the comments from USA Today’s August 1 reveal (as reported by bleedingcool.com) others in the fanboy community weren’t as blasé. Some of my “favorite” comments were…

Minorities are typically less than 18% of the population, but they seem to get nearly 100% of the history. Why should white children not have a comic book hero that they can identify with?

Since when did minorities get 100% of the (comic book) history when the vast majority of history goes to such iconic (white) super heroes as Captain America, Superman, Batman, Wolverine and countless others? We minorities have hardly had any one to identify with (racially) when reading comic books. I apologize that (in the commenter’s opinion) the 25 to 1 white to ethnic super hero ratio is making it difficult for white children to identify with someone. I completely sympathize.

                               

What’s next,a muslim spiderman who enforces sharia law or perhaps a jewish one with webs that look like the star of david or the ultimate PC spiderman there could be.A homosexual spiderman that shoots rainbow webs and is basically an easy going spider unless you ruffle his feathers and then oh no girl,you didn’t go there.

Well, since German born Nightcrawler teleports in a cloud of beer foam and anti-Semitism, Captain America throws a shield made of apple pie while standing for the ideals of capitalism, and Thor throws a hammer made of ludefisk while raping and pillaging, all of those proposed super powers for minority heroes makes sense. But otherwise, I say bring them on!

Peter Parker could not be whiter. A black boy under the mask just don`t look right. This opens up a whole new story line with a whole new set of problems. Who is going to believe a black man in a mask is out for the good of man kind?

Sigh. The sheer ignorance in these (and many more) comments are maddening. People have blown this whole thing out of proportion:

What?! They never mentioned that he’d be gay! And so what if he is? Awesome! Thank god for Stephen Colbert

The Colbert Report
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Why is it so hard to accept an ethnic minority as the lead of his own book? I applaud Marvel comics in their efforts to diversify. The fact that they do so with one of their (albeit alternative universe version) flagship character makes much more of an impact.  A positive one in my opinion. Because the world isn’t just black and white. There are many shades in between. There will be a bi-racial kid who reads this book and finally be able to identify with a hero that’s just trying to make the right choices with his power and he himself will make the right choices. The same will probably be true for a white kid reading this book. Or an Asian American kid. I wasn’t particularly interested in reading a non-Peter Parker Spider-Man myself. But now, I am compelled to support this book. As long as it’s written and drawn well, I will read it. There is good to come from this, as evidenced in one of the positive comments to the USA Today post hidden amongst the ignorance:

Gotta admit, I love this. I’m not one of those race baiting liberals, but as a kid growing up with 0 major super heroes who looked anything like me, I’m glad that my kids will get to see this.

Also glad that there’s finally a black Disney princess…this is one of those things a non-minority just couldn’t understand. It doesn’t take kids long to realize that all the main characters look like someone else and all the sidekicks and extras look like you.

This is a good thing…not saying it’s going to change the world, but it will change some kid’s outlook on the world.

Til next time, true believers…

that one random adventure (+3 for hump day) episode 2

Random Adventure of the Week
(cuz anything can be an adventure)

Like most city living folk, I've got a great set of blockers that keep me separated from the rest of the world when walking around. With my ear-buds in while I wear a pair of wayfarers, I'm unstoppable. I'm impervious to the noise and disruptions of this bustling metropolis. And in it's way it's dehumanizing. You cut off any real connection.

The people I try to avoid are the people on the street asking for stuff. Whether they're begging for cash or street canvassing. Street canvassers I feel bad for because they know no one wants to talk to them. Beggars...well I feel bad for the ones who are really in need. But it's so hard to tell nowadays. Ever since I've moved to Chicago, I've had to learn the hard way not to engage them, thus blinders on the moment I step off of CTA. But I've honestly felt bad about just ignoring a human being who is trying to connect with me, whatever their motives. At the same time, I don't have any money to give them.

A month ago, some street kid tried to slip me a piece of paper on the train that I'm sure was asking for money. It's not the first time I'd seen this bit and it won't be the last. But it served as inspiration for a solution to my problem. I tore out a couple of pages from my comp book and scribbled the following:

I kept them folded up in my bag and just waited for the opportunity to give one out. And, as it is with the Bernardo luck, one never really presented itself. Until a couple of days ago. It was a pretty standard day. After my afternoon work out, I thought I'd take a walk through Lakeview because it was a very pretty evening and I hate getting on the train at rush hour. A group of street kids came up to me and muttered something about their basketball team. AH HAH! Opportunity, she's a-knockin'! I quickly held one finger up, interrupting the delegated speaker mid-sentence, dug through my murse and pulled out one of the slips of paper and handed it to him. Judging from how loud they got and how far I had to run, I don't think they liked the message very much.

Maybe it wasn't interactive enough? It was a statement that didn't engage conversation. Maybe it would've gone over gangbusters if it was QR code? In any case, I've restrategized my interaction slips and made them more customizable and interactive for this modern day and age. I feel rather than checking the boxes myself, I'll let them decide for themselves my intent based on my body language and demeanor when giving it over. See, fun, interactive and customizable human interaction. Feel free to use them if you want:

Three things I'm looking forward to for the rest of the week


Event

The lovely and talented Shannon Strodel will be hosting live band karaoke at Mary's Attic! Not only do we get to hear Shannon belt a few songs out of the park, not only does live band karaoke always rock, but there will be some show tunes in the rotation. How rockin is that?

official info:
Mary's Attic (Andersonville)
Sunday August 7th
 LIVE BAND KARAOKE with Shannon and THE JAM starts at 10pm!(after regular MaryOke 9pm)

From hard rock, to 80's to current and even some musical theater- this band's list is ecclectic and just waiting for you to come Jam with them!! Come early and sign up to rock out!!!


Class

I haven't taken dance class in a hot minute. Gonna don the tights and head into ballet tomorrow night. Cravin' some petite allegro.


New Book Wednesday

X-FACTOR #223
Writer: Peter David
Artist: Emanuela Lupacchino

Rahne's baby mama drama is finally coming to close today folks. And thank god for it. Look, I think she's a neat character. She's been through a lot since NEW X-MEN volume 2. When she left X-Factor to join X-Force, it left Rictor all emo and ready to explore um...new possibilities with his long-lost bromance Shatterstar.

Not that their relationship has been a walk in the park...

But they're working things out. Mostly. Then Rahne comes waltzing back in after leaving X-Force..

Things have gotten hella complicated...

And I am just ready for Rahne's baby mama drama to be over. With her baby being birthed in today's issue (and its mystical significance explained) maybe Rictor and Shatterstar can get on with their relationship. Hopefully?

UPDATE/SPOILER ALERT

She didn't have the baby. Goddammit. Hurry up already Rahne!

Til next time...