the fundraiser
October 19th, 2006 | Uncategorized
Man! Since “DTWOF Fan” made that post yesterday about raising $500 before the impending 500th episode, 90 bucks have come in from 5 different people. Okay, first of all, I am not “DTWOF Fan,” though that would have been brilliant. Secondly, I’m really, really touched that people are pitching in like this. Third, I feel kind of sheepish about it, though not so sheepish I won’t take the money. And fourth, $500 happens to be the exact amount of my outstanding debt to my web designer. Is that wild? I just promised him last week that I’d try to pay this off by the end of the month.
On another note, I’m happy to say that my camera, which I left behind on my travels last week, has returned home. After the jump, I’ll post a short photo essay about my brief sojourn in Toronto.Here’s a really amazing comic book store I visited in Toronto. The Beguiling.
They had this really cool Tintin figure bolted to the wall outside. Note the colors of his hair and sweater…
Look, they’re the same as the colors of my book. I can’t believe I didn’t realize that before.
The guys at the Beguiling had the first editions of my book separated from the later printings. Hey, my book also happens to have the same color scheme as the old Howard Johnson’s, now that I think of it.
While I was in town, I got a haircut at this great barbershop I’d been to before. Mr. Ho’s. I highly recommend it.
Now check out my Tintin ‘do:
One of these Halloween’s I’m gonna dye it orange and get me some plus-fours and a turquoise sweater. Lastly, here’s a shot of the hip and jaded audience at my reading with Ivan Coyote at the Gladstone Hotel.
37 Responses to “the fundraiser”
you look adorable!!
This doesn’t have much to do with the current topic, but
you raise an issue that I’ve wondered about before.
I’ve seen other references to “first editions” of “Fun
Home” (for example on book-store sites). Now, I got
my copy of “Fun Home” as soon as I could lay my hands
on one after it was originally published, so I’ve always
assumed it was a first edition.
However, most first editions state this fact explicitly
on the back of the title page (or whatever you call
that: at the bottom of the page with all the copyright
information, etc.) However, my copy does not
say “first edition” or anything else to indicate that
this is the case.
Anyway, I was just wondering: How is this indicated
in copies of “Fun Home”?
hi, alison.
agreed, you do look adorable in your tintin hairdo. i just thought you’d appreciate this remark, given your otherwise exhaustive and ever-vigilant attention to detail: coifure s/b spelled coiffure.
best wishes,
wendy
Thank you, Wendy. I thought I’d fixed that misspelling. It’s done now.
oh my god, you really have to go as tintin. will you do it this halloween?? it would be so perfect. amazing.
BiblioPhil,
Yeah, I thought first editions said so too. But my book doesn’t. Is there a difference between ‘first edition’ and ‘first printing?’ I don’t have time to research that right now. But here’s how you tell the difference between printings. See the row of numbers at the bottom? They scratch one off with each successive printing. Thus the top book is from the third printing. The bottom is from the first.
(Thanks for taking the time to reply.)
Yes, I see now. And I’m happy to report that my copy
is a first edition as well.
By the way, did you do the lettering on those pages
yourself? Or did the printer whip up some kind
of “Bechdel Gothic” font to mimic your handwriting?
Let’s make this fundraiser happen, people!
I just paypalled (now a verb, apparently) my ten bucks to AB. It’s the merest of down payments on a debt of gratitude I can never repay. I will send some more next month. I love you, Alison, and I love these boards.
Very few of us at the Toronto reading were hip and jaded — I think Elvira was mixing up our Canadian reticence with hipster coolth. There was a good mix of ages, genders, and such — I’m just a comic book geek and long-time fan myself.
It was a great show!
just because you believe you can never finish repaying a debt, doesn’t mean you can’t start 🙂
thanks to everyone else who starts (or continues!) – increases the likelihood that we’ll all get to keep on reading.
Sent my $10 for the net-fund from the other side of the pond. Small price to pay for the years of DTWOF joy. (see actually, I don’t even know how much $10 actually is these days – you could dupe thousands out of me and I’d never know).
I love that on the paypal receipt it says ‘Item/Product: Alison Bechdel…Buyer: me’.
I expect an Alison-shaped parcel within the week.
Third printing, congratulations! (My understanding is 90% of books published don’t get past the first printing, though that probably includes all manner of technical manuals, etc.)
Good question about the typeface on the copyright page (BiblioPhil). Within the text, when you see double letters (how embarrassing, I actually checked this), one letter is always raised, which seems impossible in a computer font, but that isn’t the case on that particular page. bOOks, the O’s are the same size and level, permiSSion, the S’s are the same, etc.
Uh, instead of “always raised,” it would be more accurate to say often raised but usually a little different in some way.
I’m very glad to hear the $ is coming in…….see, the universe provides! Hey, I love the Tintin do….very, very sexy! I didn’t know that about how to check for what edition you have. I have a first edition. I always wondered what those lines of numbers meant. Alison, I believe you now have a good solid base of supporters from the blog that would be willing to support the blog on a regular basis. You have given us so much for so long…..it feels good to give back!
I didn’t know about the fundraiser 🙁
Well I’m going to have to send something I’ve been reading DTWOF since I was in high school.
I love the strip and the oh so sexy Alison too.
What a cool name for a store;”The Beguiling”!(“Ho’s Place” ain’t too bad either).
Speaking of the color scheme of HoJo’s-my family would often get to tag along on my dad’s business trips in the summer. My sister and I used to call that color “motel green” because we seemed surrounded by that color on every vacation. The thing is,I used to despise the color, but now I really like it-whenever I see it, it takes me right back to my childhood. So when your book arrived in the mail,and saw those colors, I was right back in the 60’s…
About the haircut; the Tintin thing is cute, but didn’t you just get your hair cut? (saw something in a prev. post)If you keep up at this rate, your head’s going to be awfully cold this winter!
Well……….I just have to say this…..off the subject………with that haircut……..I bet she stays really warm this winter! *blushes*
Hurrah! Fundraiser ’06. Like a PBS pledge drive but not as crazy-making. Unless episode 498 has Ken Burns or Roy Orbison* in it, but please not.
___
* Seattleites know what I’m talking about.
Haha MC, those of us just across the border know exactly what your talking about too… I’d much rather give money after reading an episode of DTWOF than that black and white Roy Orbison concert that just wont go away…
If you, like me, were puzzled by the term “plus-fours,” here is the wikipedia link. And guess who is featured on the plus-four illustration?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plus-fours
*ahem*………speaking of manic~!!
Ellen!
That’s amazing, the wikipedia illustration! Thanks.
Thanks also for the elimination of the one post.
Yes, I guess you can sometimes ignore the elephant in the living room.
Now in the Oval Office…I’m not so sure.
Alison and BiblioPhil-
To answer your questions about identifying first editions and the difference between a first edition and a first printing, check out:
http://www.emptymirrorbooks.com/collecting/firstedition.html
P.S. Since it looks like the $500 dollar goal has probably been met by now, how about we all contribute another $500 to help produce the *next* 500 strips?
This is on another thread but I can’t remember which one so I’m putting it here because I just looked at the Wikipedia illustration link above with Tintin — the colors of Tintin’s apparel, the turquoise and orange that also echoes yr book, Alison, and HoJos, were originally most famously used by Van Gogh in his self-portraits. They are opposite each other on the color wheel (or so I’ve been told) and he deliberately those them to do whatever it is that does to the brain. Since he was a Leo, I think of it as a Leo effect.
I have many fond memories of those two color combinations.
I’d love to see you as Tintin, orange hair n’ all! That would be a great Halloween costume. Would you dress one of the cats as Snowy though? The only thing better, would be to ‘cross-dress’ as Bianca Castafiore (only joking!). If you’re coming to Europe why not pop over to Belgium – I’m convinced there’s a Tintin theme park. There’s lots of cheap flights and trains from London nowadays.
Deb,
I hope you think I wasn’t dissing the haircut (I think it’s really cute-I even tried to get my hair to do the Tintin thing, but despite the various hairgels, my hair has a mind of its own, just lays there). It’s just that, speaking as a person who once had no hair at all, you really miss it most in the wintertime!
I also have many fond memories of those colors (not all from trips to HoJo’s). When I was growing up in the 60’s,most of the children’s books didn’t have the technicolor illustrations that they do now. Often they were illustrated with pen and ink drawings with a delicate wash of one or two colors. When I saw the first few pages of “Fun Home”, the illustrations took me right back to that time and place.
Oh, and dontcha just love plus-fours? I have some in khaki, but would love to get some tweedish ones, maybe with a vest. Even though I’m not much of a golf fan, I did watch when he played, mostly to check out what he was wearing…
Damn! I was writing about Payne Stewart in my last post! I wish I could go back sometimes, just erase everything I write and start over! But once it’s out there, it’s out there.
oh man, the Tintin haircut is fantastic!!!!!
the sign at the barbershop reminds me of hair places in England. Most regular salon/barbershops (ie not the ritzy London ones) say “unisex.” I know what they mean by this, but I always had the mental image of every single person coming out of the place with an identical bowl haircut…..don’t know why.
Bonjour! What a super websight! Very refreshing to peruse from where we live in Paris (France). I eat frogs and drink wine. Woold like more informatons on this. Best regards! Mikael.
Superb! (I wrote something else and then I read below that I aint supposed ter. So I deleted it.)
Shrek3 Far Far Away needs a new king, and unless Shrek can find someone else, he’ll be stuck with the figazavar…
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