[Groop]Overly Long SD Con Report

[Gary Grossmann]

?Hi Folks!

As I said before, San Diego was great as always. This is my fourth year and
I plan on going back each year as long as Sergio & Mark keep coming. It was
really great meeting Kevin in person for the first time as well as Steve
Kuhn, Richard Gutierrez, Kaytee, and it was great to see Larry, and Eric,
and Scott, and Rick again. Rick really must have been hiding from me (who
could blame him?) because I went to the CBLDF booth several times and tried
to figure out where else he might be and I was unsuccessful! Anywho, we all
come from diverse backgrounds and have diverse lives, but we all like Groo
and everyone I met is a fun, interesting, nice person and I am glad to know
all of you. Anytime you are near milepost 99 on I-5 in Washington, you are
welcome to stop by!!

Perhaps the coolest surprise was meeting Sergio's daughter, Christen. She is
a very sweet, very pretty young woman. She was in the unfortunate position
of having me talk to her a lot while Sergio was talking to and drawing for
his legions of fans. (She was behind the table helping him with sales and
the like.) My usual shtick when hanging out at Sergio's table is to talk to
him with other Groopies in between other folks coming around, getting out of
the way when they do, and occasionally making sales pitches for the various
books Sergio has laid out. I also renewed my acquaintance with Mark’s very
good friend, Carolyn Kelly, another very sweet person.

Although Kevin might find this hard to believe, I was not as hyper as usual.
Perhaps that was because this year I didn't have T-shirts to distribute
(except 1) nor did I brings stuff to sign. But for whatever reason, my
energy level was a little down. However, this could not be said for Kevin,
who was definitely on Cloud 9 for all the reasons he described in his post.
Hey, Kevin, I hope you can swing coming again next year.

There were all sorts of fun little episodes. I brought some Groo Head Bread
for Sergio. It was my first attempt at Dough Art and by the time the thing
was baked it didn’t look much like Groo.  But my wife is a fabulous baker,
so regardless of the appearance, I knew it would taste great, which Sergio &
Christen later confirmed. I also brought a Sergio mask I had made by
blowing- up one of Sergio’s self-caricatures. He got a big kick out of that.
I also got to see Sergio tell his Gorilla Suit story in Spanish to some
folks from Mexico. They laughed hysterically as he pointed to the drawings
and translated. (Btw, in case anyone was wondering Sergio did the dialogue
for the Gorilla Suit story himself.)

(Speaking of speaking Spanish, the Spanish soap opera thing is rather
embarrassing. They are dumb enough in English, but the Spanish ones actually
have endings and my wife and I started watching this one and there were only
3 episodes left and everyone that the evil Federico hadn’t killed or tried
to kill he had either raped or fathered or combinations thereof, and....oh
never mind!!! Btw, Sergio knows the actor who played the evil Federico, who
is known for his dark sexuality and fabulous deep voice and Sergio’s comment
was “He’s going bald, you know.”)

But I digress.

The Groo Panel was great too. Sergio & Mark told some stories I hadn’t heard
before. And there was a special guest and Mark made us guess who he was. It
was Gordon Kent!!! Original colorist for Groo, creator of the Groo color
scheme!!! I was bummed that I didn’t have my Pacific #1 for him to sign. He’
s a very cool guy and he wanted a “Did I Err” shirt, whose color he is
indirectly responsible for. After the panel was when I got to talk to Mark a
little, which was great. He actually had a few minutes in between panels.
Must have been a mistake in his scheduling.

One of the things Sergio brought was the new French Groo. It is a very nice
publication, done  with a big glossy hardback cover, like a Dr. Suess book.
Sergio was good naturedly taunting me with it because I didn't have one yet.
Well, Jacques Colin, the translator for the French publisher was there (all
the way from France!) And he had brought a copy for me to buy! (We met last
year.) So then I held it up to Sergio and he said. “Hey, that is mine!” And
I said “No, it’s mine!” and he turned to see his still in his case and with
a bewildered look said “Where did you get it?” And I said “From Jacques” and
pointed to Msr. Colin. Without missing a beat, Sergio yelled at him in mock
anger. “Why did you do that? I was going to sell mine to him for twice the
cost!”

Larry, Scott, Richard, Eric, and I went to Dick’s again and then onto the
Eisner Awards. Mark received the Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award and gave a
very funny made-up-on-the-spot speech. Sergio was up for best short story
for The Gorilla Suit Story and was sure he would not win because after all,
“Pulitzer Prize winning Art Spiegelman was nominated” Well, Sergio won and
his speech was very short going something like this: “I think I will stop
making comics and just tell stories about my life because it is much
 easier.” I think he got the loudest applause, except for Eisner himself,
who actually won one of the awards too.

The guy who owns Atlantis Fantasy Land, Joe Ferrara is a great guy and he
had this promotion where if you get 10 signatures from artists who
contributed to his 25th anniversary Comic “The Song of Mykal,” you would get
a print of the art Sergio contributed, which is Groo walking away from the
sinking of Atlantis. Well, heck I had to do that!!! As a print, it’s an
Official Groo Item! The funny thing is, when Eric told about the
publication, I assumed it was just a small local thing, so I arranged to buy
one via the Internet. Then I go to my comic shop and find they had one for
me. But I had to buy another one at the Con to get the signatures for the
print. So I have 3! Oh well,....

This is getting long. Let’s see, Larry & I had Grooism walk to my motel, I
reminded all the people at Dark Horse that I have first dibs on their Groo
display boards when they get tired of them, told the CBLDF they needed to
put there 8' x 9' version of Groo & the Thought Patrol on ebay and if I didn
’t buy it, I’d sure jack up the price, spent a little time talking to Stan,
his wonderful family, and Tom Luth, and overall had another great, great
time.  Hope this didn't bore you all to tears.  take care -Gary G.

PS  Dark Horse was giving away lots of different large book marks, including
one that has part of the art from the cover of Groo & Rufferto #4.  I
grabbed a bunch and will be glad to send one to anyone who wants one.  Just
send me your address.