The Bastards are Back
It doesn’t hit me till the drinks arrive that this is the first time the boys have all gotten together again in, what, three, four years? The old days with the band never did seem very simple seen through the juvenile goggles we had then. God were we stupid. But this is now. We have better goggles now. We’re less stupid now. Primer’s back from North Carolina, which makes SuperPinch (and that’s pronounced Japanese style, SUPAH PINCHU!) and FlimFlam civil enough with each other to want to come chill with me and Fizzy. We drink. We laugh. We make fun of each other and piss each other off, but then we remember that Primer’s only here for the month, so we laugh and let everything slide. It’s a good night.
SuperPinch is an expectant baby daddy. Fizzy’s started up this fencing school, and judging by his students’ gear I had to sit beside in the back of his car, I’d say he’s pretty serious about it. Fucking swords poking my ribs. FlimFlam’s the only one left still pursuing a band career, but it’s a showband. Fuck that. I tell him he rocks. He laughs. Primer’s finishing a degree in ‘puters. If he stays smart, in a few years, he will help fit the world in people’s pockets.
I draw comics.
Beer brings giants together.
I’m reminded of the time co-genius Matt and myself drank ourselves silly at three in the afternoon in a little store down the street from my house. We had just come home from night shifts, were overpaid, and hated our jobs. So yeah. We drank. So much so that we made the clerks nervous till we hit our ceilings and started talking seriously. This is when INSTRUMENTS started forming. This is when we decided what we wanted to do.
Beer makes things happen.
More on that later.
I’m in a weird place with my Nextwave pages. I already know how it’s all going to look, so I’m not too excited by it. That’s not a good sign. No, it isn’t. Which begs to ask whether I should receive scripts a page at a time to keep myself interested. But then that blows pacing sensibilities. Fuck fuck FUCK! But I don’t know. My heart’s a bit out of it, so I’d rather not even try and end up with something I know I’ll hate. I know something resoundingly Romita will boom outta the clouds one of these days and tell me, in an echoey Brooklyn accent, to just fucking do the pages. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Until then, I fail.
