THanks to Jamie, Laura, Jason, Juan and numerous others who have all sent me this link.

Super strong baby.

Jim has, as promised, submitted his entries to the 2004 Mellies. Good for Jim. He's not the rat that the rest of you are who have not yet submiited a nomination of any kind. Some of you are rattier than others, especially people whose names rhyme with "dandy."

Thanks to Jim. I was wondering how long it would take before Fillmore showed up on the list of Presidents we just don't know enough about. I was disappointed to see Jim doesn't see the crystalline beauty in a democratic process where Al Sharpton can even manage to get his name on a ballot. I weep for Jim sometimes.

If Maxwell really loves me (and I know she does), she will rush down to Midtown Comics at Grand Central and get Geoff Johns, Greg Rucka and Judd Winick to sign me some comics. If you can only get one, get Geoff to sign an issue of "The Flash" for me. If two, then get Rucka to sign the newer issues of Adventures of Superman. I am aware that seems to run counterintuitive, but I really like Johns' work on Flash and JSA.

GEOFF JOHNS, GREG RUCKA & JUDD WINICK
Signing at Midtown Comics Grand Central
(very first signing at the new store!)
Thursday, June 24th from 5pm-7pm

Judd Winick, by the way, is the dorky cartoonist from the LA Season of The Real World (just before the show turned into 21 Year Old Hanky Panky Fest). It was the one with Pablo and Puck, I think. Judd now works for Marvel and DC. He's currently working on some Batman comics.

I forgot to mention my 1.2 seconds of fame.

Last Halloween, a household down the street from us participated in TLC's daily show about straightening up your junk entitled: Clean Sweep.

Clean Sweep basically has a host who is this blonde with a pretty bad eye-job (seriously, if she didn't have eye-work done, I'm Winston Churchill), a carpenter and a "professional organizer."

Embodying why the rest of the world hates the US, the people living in these houses have just accumulated too much stuff and delight in THAT being their biggest problem. Golf balls. Cabbage Patch kids. There's actually a common theme of too many toys for kids ages 1-4.

And, basically, these people dwell in heaps of items bought and never used. But they don't have the heart to toss away the stuff, nor the sense of mind to drive it to Salvation Army.

So they bring a lady in who basically throws away their stuff and gives them shelves. That's it. It's totally dumb.

Anyway, part of the show entails people having a garage sale in which they sell their used junk, and so Jamie and I wandered down the street to see the garage sale. I was pretty sure if I involved Mel we'd get some screen time, but even as I was signing the release papers so I could be on TV scrounging through these people's leftover plastic and moldy books, I got a sort of sinking feeling. I knew I was never going to buy enough of this useless crap to make it on TV for any length of time, and Mel was pretty much unwelcome.

At any rate, I bought what I think is a rare novelization fo the first Star Wars movie, and Jamie bought some lamp we threw away about a week after we brought it home. But we never did see the show. Until Tuesday night. I watched for forty minutes, and then, all too briefly, you can hear someone yell "Wanna buy a lamp?" And I turn and look at the lamp, as if to say "Are you serious?" Jamie is in the background of the shot looking on, and Mel is sort of waddling through the bottom of the shot. The total shot lasts about 1.5 seconds. If that.

So that's it. My brush with fame. C'est la vie.

It'll be interesting in a few years when they finally take me down, how Access Hollywood or somebody is going to locate that one second of footage and keep replaying it in slow motion to demonstrate my evil.

Who should be Superman in the next movie?

It's a question which plagues Super-nerds like myself. I, of course, open the floor and the comments section to any and all opinions. I liked Reeve and Reeves. Very different, but both great.

MSNBC asks the same question.

Tom Welling is probably my pick, if we can't get the greatest American alive, Dennis Haysbert.

So I ask Loyal Leaguers... who would look good in a blue unitard to you?

Apparently Lollapalooza 2004 has been cancelled.

I can't say I'm suprised.

I did have a very cool mother who let her two sons hop in their one son's barely functioning car and make an odd journey from Houston to Austin to Dallas, all in one day, so we could go to the first Lollapalooza. The line-up was pretty good, and a nice yardmarker for what was the music of the day.

Butthole Surfers
Rollins Band
Fishbone
Ice-T
Siouxsie and the Banshees
Jane's Addiction

And I'm sure I'm forgetting somebody. But this was before the festival had all the different stages and took up a land mass the size of Rhode Island. I went for the next few years, but became progressively less interested in the bands. I was never an Alice in Chains kind of guy, and by the time Metallica was headlining... I mean, please... Of course, I think that meant I missed Devo.

But I did get to see acts I would have otherwise missed. Front 242. Jesus and Mary Chain. Nick Cave. Other fun stuff.

And I most certainly would have gone to this year's show but for a few items.

1) It's insanely hot here in the summer, and I do not want to stand outside all day.
2) Jamie doesn't care about most of the acts, and wouldn't be that interested.
3) I couldn't figure out who from Phoenix would go with me, if not Jamie
4) I'm old

I am. I'm old. I have shit to do. I mean, I want to make time to go goof off for a day and see some great acts from my angry youth, but a whole day?

Anyway, I'm sorry to hear this got cancelled, but I do find it funny they basically said "yeah, once they're older than 23, they kind of don't like standing out in the heat all day."

If you're not watching Joe Schmo on Spike! TV, you're probably missing the most fun reality show on TV right now. They're only on episode 2 as of last night, so you have plenty of time to catch up. And believe me, it's not so complicated that you're not going to be able to follow.

Turns out my student worker, Scott "Scoot"/"Scotty", was once in a student improv group with "Eleanor" from the show. He didn't say much about her, except "it's weird, because she's not like that." Lord, I hope not.

Next week, The League is taking a much deserved rest and heading for Minnesota, land of 10 bajillion lakes. If you want to find us, we'll be here.

I don't really fish. I've only fished four or five times in my life. And I don't eat meat if I can help it, so I don't know that I'll be doing much fishing. But I do plan to bob around in a boat for a week watching the loons float over the lake.

Anyway, The League will be on hiatus, so I will redirect you all to my blogroll during that time.

Clinton's memoirs came out yesterday, but until it's in paperback and until I hear a decent review of the book, I'm not very inclined to pick it up. I voted for the man the one election in which I could, and I followed the misadventures of the Clintons with the rest of the country for the term of Bill's presidency. It's probably a worthwhile memoir to have. Just not yet, for me.

If anything, the interviews Clinton is giving on his book tour seem as interesting as any book is going to be. The left-leaning media is constantly fishing for him to bash the current administration, and the right-leaning folks are keeping quiet thus far, I guess. At least I haven't heard anything. But the whole thing is dredging up a lot of bad memories.

But it is nice to remember we had a President in the recent past who can form a complete sentence. And that's about as political as I feel like getting right now.

You know those commericals where somebody joins Bally's gym and in 30 days, they're suddenly sexy? I am getting none of that effect. But I also am overweight for real, not TV overweight. I'm the dude who would have been called "Tubs" or "Chubby" in an old 1940's western. People like me do not become sexy after joining a gym for a month.

And this should tell Randy why I would not dress as Superman for the annual Superman celebration, should I ever attend.

whoa. A real supervillain.