Mel here, at Nefarious Fiddlesticks, getting ready for the big event!
This is the first year we're bringing 24-Hour Comics Day to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee campus, and I'm really excited to be a part of bringing 24HCD to Milwaukee.
The week before last, I was in week two of the Fall 2011 semester, teaching the usual First-Year Comp class and a brand-spanking new class I'm super stoked about: Introduction to the Graphic Novel. Oh, what? Spend an entire semester reading and talking about comics? Oh NO! DON'T make me do THAT!! Hang out with comics enthusiasts and aspiring writers and artists?! That sounds just horrible!! Folks, we're only four weeks in and already this is the best class I've ever taught. I really dig my students, and I love this opportunity to share my stoke for comics and graphic novels with students.
So, the week before last, one of my Graphic Novel students asked me if I'd ever heard of 24-Hour Comics Day. I said no. Here we are using Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics and Making Comics as our course textbooks, and I'd never heard of 24-Hour Comics Day! My student had signed up as a online participant, but I wanted more people involved. So I proposed setting up the event on campus.
Here we are, almost two weeks later and the night before the first 24-Hour Comics Day kicks off on the UWM campus!
I'm excited, and anxious. I didn't have the time to pull together the kind of event I want to set up next year, with local sponsors, prizes, rare comics in the library display cases, and plenty of free food and supplies. But we're doing this thing!!
Kinda like the night before Christmas, I'm having a hard time getting to sleep. The PB&Js are made, got some tea and my favorite commuter ready to go for tomorrow, and I've got my 24-hour outfit laid out. Got my overnight stuff, art supplies, and 24-Hour Comics Day Survival kit packed! Next step is to have wonderful dreams of endless comic possibilities.
See y'all at 5PM in the UWM Library!
Although I'm bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, I imagine, at some point between Thursday and Friday, I'll look a bit like this:
