Gottacon! It is starting tonight at 5pm, in my old hometown of Victoria, BC. Are you going to be there? If so, come by our booth and say hello to me, Shannon, and Weregeek's Alina Pete! We are bringing a ton of cool comics and shirts and other crap, and drawing lots of pictures. It will be the best!

Sam and Fuzzy Q & A: Fridge Edition
Got a question you want answered? Just drop me an email with "Q & A" in the subject line!

"What is your most favourite thing that you've had Conscience Cat say, in a comic or otherwise?" -Agni

"Murder is an inappropriate method of career advancement" is the classic, and the phrase that helped make him a success, so I should probably give it a nod. But personally, I lean towards Conscience Cat's more esoteric and unintelligible signs, like "A stitch in time saves the whales." I love the idea of words that sound like real advice but don't actually mean anything. You know, like everything Dr. Phil says.

"When Fuzzy mentions taking business advice from a shapeshifting slug in this comic, is he referring to Jess Starr, ambassador of underground hospitality, first class?" -Bernardo

Yes! Jess works at the Saucy Hippo, which, as we saw in this strip, is owned by Mr. Gillespie, the Sam and Fuzzy universe's seldom-seen habitually unsuccessful independent businessman extraordinaire. And from these two strips, we can insinuate it was Gillespie that Fuzzy was working for when he first met Sam. So it was probably Jess that introduced them!

Just a little easter egg for people paying waaaay too much attention.

"Almost every time I see Hazel, I can't help but think of Jhonen Vasquez's work. Devi from 'JtHM' and 'I Feel Sick' comes to mind. Homage, or one of those inadvertent co-inkydinks?" -Rip

Inadvertent, I think! But I do like Jhonen's stuff... I started getting into it a year or two into Sam and Fuzzy, when I first saw Zim online (it wasn't airing on Canadian TV). He's a great artist, and also a nice dude who humours my dumb jokes on twitter, so I don't have a problem with the idea of me accidentally channelling some of his mojo.

That said, I think Mr. Sin is probably my most Vasquez-y character, especially in his earliest appearances.

That's a wrap for this week! Come back on Monday for, you know, some comics or something.

-Sam Logan

Hang in there

Oh, Mario Kart 7! I want to like you. I really do! I am just not sure I can take your blue shells and nonsensical rubber band AI anymore. And hey, I know this is not an original complaint by any means. But I swear, it feels like these issues have become more and more pronounced with each iteration of the series. Either that, or it just took a few games to really wear away at me. But I mean, it's... it's just not very fun to suddenly be thrust from 1st to 5th place at the last second due to some uncontrollable, unavoidable random attack from a computer-controlled players. I mean, right? This is not a controversial opinion, is it? No one enjoys that. Do they?

I don't know. But for the good of my sanity, I think I am just going to abandon the single player campaign and stick to playing with other humans. At least when it's a friend dumping crazy overpowered items on you, it can be kind of funny! Or honestly, maybe I should just go back to Sonic and the Sega All Stars Racing. It may be one of the most shameless, shameless rip-offs of all time (green boxing gloves and red rockets?), and it may be responsible for unleashing the historically nonsensical concept that is Sonic driving a car... but it was a fun solid racer, and felt a lot more balanced than any of the past few Nintendo affairs. Ack!

Victorians! (By which I mean citizens of Victoria, BC, not time travellers from the 1800s.) Shannon and I will be in your general vicinity for Gottacon starting this Friday at 5pm! And so will Alina from Weregeek! If you're going to be at the show, come by our booth and say hello! We will be bringing a mighty assortment of comic books, art prints, t-shirts and other crazy crap. And we will also be drawing stuff because, you know... cartoonists.

-Sam Logan

Gottacon: Feb. 3-5

Big week! Gottacon, my first convention appearance of 2012, starts this Friday at the Pearkes arena in my old home town of Victoria, BC!

If you are going to be in the Victoria area and you have any interest in gaming (or Sam and Fuzzy!), please do come by and say hello. The show itself is open 24 hours a day, but if you're looking to see me specifically, I'll be at the booth (along with my pal Alina from Weregeek) from 5-9 PM on Friday, 9AM-9PM on Saturday and 9AM-6PM on Sunday.

In other news, don't forget to check out the new Skull Panda site! It's still going strong with... whatever it is.

-Sam Logan