Superheroes Wearing Jackets.

Wings (traditional/boneless): cake or pie?

Wed, 22 May 2013 10:58:41 -0500

My gut tells me that wing sauce is about the closest thing the world will ever have to meat frosting, so I gotta go cake.

Regular fried chicken is pie, though, because of crust.

natecosboom: SEPTEMBER 2013

Wed, 22 May 2013 10:46:08 -0500

natecosboom:

SEPTEMBER 2013

bettyfelon: happy daft punk day

Tue, 21 May 2013 22:00:48 -0500

bettyfelon:

happy daft punk day

Oh also! Can you talk a little more on the "all food can be called either a cake or a pie" theory a little more?

Tue, 21 May 2013 20:38:00 -0500

The basic idea is that every food item is, at its core, either pie or cake. Some are simple. Pizza is pie. Chicken pot pie is pie. Meatloaf and pancakes are cake.

But what about, say, a sandwich? Is it a layered cake, or is it pie, because it has crust with filling in it? ARGUMENTS COULD BE MADE! Baked potato? Could be cake because of toppings. Could be pie, because skin is like crust. DEBATE IS WARRANTED.

And so on with every food until you are dead.

I can't get into Michael Kupperman. I've read a couple issues of Tales... and I hear all the people I know and respect really dig his stuff. But I just find it to be empty Dadaism. What am I missing?

Tue, 21 May 2013 15:39:34 -0500

I don’t really know what to tell you. I guess either you’re into or you aren’t. What you see as “empty Dadaism” I see as brilliant absurdity. Different strokes and all.

In you opinion: Who is the best robot in fiction, and who is the worst?

Tue, 21 May 2013 15:31:33 -0500

Man, there are so many great robots. Marvin the Paranoid Android, all the replicants from Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep/Blade Runner, Robo from Chrono Trigger, Data.

But I gotta go with my heart, and my heart is with Tom Servo.

Worst robot?

Any thoughts on Great Gatsby (book and/or new film)?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:49:07 -0500

The book is probably the closest we’ll ever get to the Great American Novel. There are passages in it that are just breathtakingly well-written.

I haven’t seen the movie and probably won’t. I’ve seen two Baz Luhrmann movies (Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge) and that’s plenty.

Barbecue. What is best? What is acceptable? What is a crime against meat?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:47:37 -0500

What is best is classic, North Carolina style barbecue, which is sliced or chopped pork (I prefer sliced) with vinegar-based sauce. Hushpuppies are also something of a requirement. A pitcher of sweet tea on the table is good, too.

Acceptable? I mean, lots of things are acceptable. Pork with tomato-based sauce is fine. I’m not into mustard-based sauce because I don’t really like mustard, but I understand it. Ribs aren’t my idea of the Platonic ideal of barbecue, but I do love them. Brisket is OK.

Crimes against meat? Calling your cookouts “barbecues.” Famous Dave’s. That pulled pork sandwich I ate in Tennessee that tasted like an ashtray. People really do go nuts with the smoke.

so what happened to the euge opening to WRA i loved it so much

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:44:11 -0500

It’s not much of a story. The theme song we had got outdated. It had stuff about Fear Itself in it, among other things. We used it well after that event was over, even.

I actually asked Euge for another theme, and it just kind of ended up not happening. Dude’s too busy, man! And I don’t want to take time away from him doing his thing, you know?

favorite alchoolic and non alchoolic beverage? Also is bacon the ultimate food?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:41:52 -0500

Alcoholic: I’m a Scotch guy, but I don’t drink it all that often. Rum and Coke is what I fall back on a lot.

Non-alcoholic: Sweet tea!

Bacon is great, but I gotta go with pizza as the be-all and end-all of foods.

Do you ever make a joke and worry that it's the best joke you've ever made and that you've reached your peak so you might as well throw in the towel now?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:22:52 -0500

Sure, but then I forget that I even made that joke like an hour later.

This is completely true: I have had people tell me jokes, then I would laugh at them, and I’d ask where they heard that. Then they’d say it was something I said a week ago or something.

I know that is the humblebraggiest thing in the world to say, but it has happened. It makes it especially hard to write a follow-up book on a topic you’ve already written about. I probably spent half the time I took writing the Field Manual checking the Handbook to make sure I wasn’t repeating myself.

What the what?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:16:00 -0500

I know. I’ve been dodging this question for years, and it’s high time I answered it.

But first, allow me to make an admission. I often sidestepped this question because I generally found it far too personal, too hurtful, to respond to with the care, candor, attention and wit it deserved. It’s not that I thought the question wasn’t worth answering, it’s that I didn’t feel up to it.

But I have grown quite a bit since then, and I feel like it may finally be time to address this pressing, pertinent issue. Perhaps I should begin with this quote, from T.S. Eliot’s classic poem “The Waste Land”:

The river’s tent is broken: the last fingers of leaf Clutch and sink into the wet bank. The wind Crosses the brown land, unheard. The nymphs are departed.

Sweet Thames, run softly, till I end my song.

Perhaps I can’t say it any better than that. But allow me to attempt to put it in my own words, if possible.

“What the what?” you ask. To that, I can only respond, “I think you heard me.”

Love/Hate... Eugene Ahn

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:10:12 -0500

I got nothin’ but love for that man.

Of all of Spider-Man's powers, which do you think is the coolest?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:07:47 -0500

Spider sense. It’s the handiest, and the visual of it is always really neat. I particularly like the classic half-spidey/half-Peter face they used to indicated it in the original run of Amazing.

Which of your friends make up the Scooby Gang for you (not the Buffy one, but the real one) amd who fills which role?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:06:32 -0500

I’m the old man who dresses up like a ghost to take over the old amusement park. Everyone else can screw.

So ComicsAlliance has come back from the dead. Can you comment on it all?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:05:41 -0500

Can I? Sure!

But you probably don’t want me to, because I know literally nothing. That’s not me dodging the question. I really have no information for you.

Any thoughts on the new Xbox?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:03:59 -0500

The name is dumb, and confusing. It’s better than “720,” but “One” is patently wrong. It’s the third Xbox. Come up with a real name for it.

Otherwise, it looks like a slightly fancier 360 with some cool TV stuff built in.

I always really enjoyed the character Tabitha Smith / Boom Boom, but feel she has been largely discarded as relevant by comics fans and writers since Jubilee was introduced and gained instant popularity (having close ties to Wolverine probably helps). Is there character you really enjoyed or that you feel has a lot of potential which has never been realized?

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:00:47 -0500

There are a ton of X-Men characters that fall into that category. Beak was a really fascinating character with tons of potential, and they yanked that away right quick.

There was a lot DC could have done with the Renee Montoya version of The Question that they didn’t. Sasha Bordeaux kind of just got tossed aside. It’s like they’ve got something against Greg Rucka creations.

Say, if I wanted to ask War Rocket Ajax a question, how would I go about doing so? Please be as specific as possible.

Tue, 21 May 2013 13:54:29 -0500

Man, how would you even do that? Put it in a bottle and drop it in the ocean? Try to make passenger pigeons un-extinct? Build a giant series of pneumatic tubes?

This is a stumper.

Who is Amanda Palmer and why do you hate her?

Tue, 21 May 2013 13:53:06 -0500

She’s a singer. She’s married to Neil Gaiman (not why I’m not too fond of her). She has done some things that seem to be taking advantage of her fans or the good will of her supporters, like asking musicians to play at her concerts for free. She writes attention-grabby stuff like this that also is just in really bad taste. Stuff like that.