Linky New England

Stayed here.

Also stayed here. And here.

Good meatloaf here.

This place had good eats too.

Scared me, no joke.

Bowed down to this.

Cool show.

Bought some great zines here.

More later!

Give me a shout at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.

The Witches' Hammer

History weighs heavily on Salem, Massachusetts. It is a genuinely creepy place, even outside of the touristy witch trial stuff; it's a town where the police tell somebody to board up the windows of their haunted house because there are too many wrecks outside on the street, where the wall of a restaraunt caves in and coffins come through from an old graveyard, where they dig the foundation for a new apartment building and unearth a bunch of unmarked graves and the mayor tells them to put them all back, thank you, we're haunted enough. It's a place where our Inn showcases a letter from a paranormal TV show discussing their findings, where the door to our room creaks open on its own and our 18-year-old daughter has to sleep at the foot of the bed. It's a place that, when I describe it to the Polonia Brothers later--two b-movie horror-meisters whose movies feature guys pooping out knives and whipping Jon McBride with hooked chains--they both decide they don't need to visit there in case something follows them back. A shame, as these guys could make two or three movies out of just driving up and down the narrow cobbled streets and shooting out the car window.

My wife was only scared after eating some dicey potato salad at a local deli. But my imagination was fueled like no other.

More later; until then, give me a shout at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.

Witch Finder General

I have returned from my New England vacation. One of the influential writers of my teen years, Mickey Spillane, died while I was gone. I, THE JURY; VENGEANCE IS MINE; KISS ME DEADLY; THE BIG KILL all great books that I found and devoured once upon a time. Google him if you don't know about him.

I have had adventures great and small; I brushed against my heroic twin, saw orbs in Salem, ate liver and onions with the Polonia Brothers in Wellsboro, ate mussels with my pal Jason Santo in Ipswich, went whale watching, visited graveyards.

Obviously, I'm tired. More later.

The Captain of Her Heart

My pal Amit Tripuraneni is working like a fiend on his movies and when he has down time climbs rocks and cooks gourmet food. Me, I've been catching up on watching Entourage from Netflix and drinking Encore Cola from Meijer. But since I really liked his movie Memories of Tomorrow I thought I would take a page from his lesson book and try some clean living. So Saturday I ran-ish, and by that I mean walked, in a charity 5K at Indiana University East. I finished 159th out of 165 people, right behind an obese, elderly man who seemed on the verge of death. I actually felt rather chipper after, and ate a portabello mushroom sandwich at a cool little restaraunt I like.

So where is Adrian Greiner's hip screenwriter friend on Entourage? In fact, where are any screenwriters on Entourage? And there you go.

Saw this, wish I'd written it myself.

I'd like to go see this.

What the---

Heroic Poses

Me and the Muse, Cranbrook, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. http://www.cranbrook.edu/.

Zeus Has The Blues

A cryin' Zeus statue, that starts bawling when you step on a stone at its base. Huh, rich people. Cranbrook, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.

Skulls

Two big heads, one thicker, at Cranbrook, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. http://www.cranbrook.edu/.

ROOWF!

Captain Incredible, a passive/aggressive vigilante who relies rather heavily on his robot dog to do the ass-whipping, takes on a green-clad speedster in this one-page adventure from the late 70s.

Math-Challenged

Calculus Man? Even I don't know what I was thinking. From 1977-78.

Giraffe Man versus the Monster from Below

As a tribute to my pal Tom, here is an early adventure of Giraffe Man from around 1977-78.

Save Jimmy Carter!

Not only was I producing a line of superhero comics, but I also dabbled in James Bondian adventure with "Agent 3." In this pulse-punding adventure from 1978, Agent 3 tries to rescue my hero, President Jimmy Carter, from an assortment of bad guys.

Luna-Raker

In this subtle homage to "Moonraker," Agent 3 battles a terrorist organization hiding out on a nicely-appointed moonbase.

Dim Star

Perhaps more an homage to "Dark Star."

Kuwait, 1980

In 1980, I foreshadowed coming problems in the Middle East, with Agent 3 taking on some oil-hungry madmen in fetching red berets.

The Return of Plastic Sam

My wife dug out a box of my old comics from the 70s, highlights of which are now presented for your viewing pleasure. From 1978: In my team book "Dial 289-HERO" we find the first mission of the team, assembled by cleverly-titled hero "Plastic Sam," fighting both the villain Bolt and his monster as well as the sinister Garbage Man.

Seven Soldiers

Here we see the debut line-up: Plastic Sam, Carrot Man, Beartrap, Sunman, Melvin the Magnificent, and Hawk. It does add up to the team-desirable seven team members if you count Beartrap's coonskin cap, which had a life of its own.

New Threads

A somewhat melancholy Plastic Sam keeps quitting the team, leaving first Beartrap and later Hawk in charge. Melvin also discards his star-spangled costume for a more reserved lime-green-and-white ensemble, and we see the Heroes' ship.

The End of the Cooties Era

In 1979, the gender barrier was broken in "Dial 289-HERO" at about the same time, ironically, that the book's creator began to notice girls in earnest as well. Eyebeam's introduction to the team comes through a misunderstanding, naturally.

From the Leaves

Longtime reader DG writes:

John, God bless your blog. It is some really funny shit. I have it as an RSS feed (brilliant invention for blogs) so I always see your new posts. Without the RSS I don't think I'd catch it anywhere near as often.-DG.

The bad thing is, usually I'm trying to be serious!

The people at Scar Magazine scare the living shit out of me, but they liked SEX MACHINE. Check out their site here. NSFW, natch.

Give me a shout at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.