Roy Blount, Jr. will be at Chapters this Friday. He's promoting the new Mark Twain book that he did a big ol' introduction & afterward for. Of. Around. Whatever. I like Blount. So I'm planning to go. And that's really all I have to say about that.

Oh, and I bought some comic books over the weekend. I sorta forgot about that because, in a fit of tidying, I've already put them away on the shelves. It's a lot easier for me to remember what I read lately when the books are sitting in piles on every available surface. There was the latest Rising Stars, and the final Just a Pilgrim. Neither of which were terribly thrilling. Oh, and Transmet Which wasn't exactly thrilling either, but there were some recognizable emotions taking place, and I enjoyed it. I'm pretty sure that I got something else, but I can't remember what it was. I'm a little sleepy.

Right now Flix is showing Message From Space, one of my all-time favorite bad movies. It was an attempt to capitalize on Star Wars, and was a joint American-Japanese production. "Joint" being the operative word, I think. The Japanese cast speaks Japanese, and the American cast speaks English, even when they're talking to each other. It's got everything. Intergalactic warfare, soldiers on horseback, witches, "cute" robots, a spunky heroine, a Han Solo-esque cocky young rebel, dogfights, an exotic alien princess... It's twelve different movies in one! With Vic Morrow and Sonny Chiba!

And with glowing walnuts, which I still can't explain. Oh, and my favorite part is that most of the spaceships are, uh, normal. But there's one that looks like a big frigate. I don't mean it's modeled on a frigate in some subtle way. It's got masts, with sails. And oars. Makes no sense at all. I really should re-tape it while it's in heavy rotation on Flix, because my copy was taped off commercial tv very late one night and so it's chock full of ads and gosh, I'd hate to think they edited any of the thrilling details out. In college the local comic shop also had movie posters for sale, and once they had a poster for Message From Space. I was tempted, but it was kind of pricey for a crappy movie no one had heard of, so I didn't get it. Then I thought better of it, went back a few days later, and it was gone. A little part of my heart died that day.

In other news... today's Post had a look at the Fall movie releases, so naturally I can ramble about that for a while. Bear in mind that, as discussed, even when I say "I kind of want to see this" that probably means I'll see it on video a year from now. But there's always a chance I'll get off the couch at some point in the next four months.

• Happy Accidents (opening Sept. 14) interests me slightly, because recently the Post had a profile of the director, Brad Anderson, and he sounded neat. The premise of this sounds an awful lot like it's just the romantic part of 12 Monkeys, though. It stars Vincent D'Onofrio, too. On the other hand, it also has Marisa Tomei.

• Hardball (Sept. 14) -- I saw an ad for this last week and fell over laughing. As far as I can tell, it's Keanu Reaves in a remake of The Bad News Bears. Maybe he's finally found his level.

• Mulholland Drive (Oct. 12) is coming out as a movie. It's an expanded version of the TV pilot David Lynch made when he thought The Straight Story might have obliterated our bad memories of Twin Peaks. Bad call. This tied for best director at Cannes, but they tend to throw awards at Lynch over there.

• From Hell (Oct. 19). I'm keeping my expectations very low for this. But with Heather Graham starring, they're probably not low enough.

• Novocaine (Oct. 19). A black comedy starring Steve Martin as a dentist. I liked this better when it was called The Little Shop of Horrors.

• 13 Ghosts (Oct. 26) -- Speaking of remade B-movies... When will they get around to remaking The Tingler?

• The Count of Monte Cristo (sometime in October). With this and The Musketeer, it looks like it's Dumas' turn for the Shakespeare treatment. I wonder if in another year there'll be a bunch of "modernized" versions set in high schools. This looks like it'll have pretty boys (like Guy Pearce) in pretty clothes, which is fine with me. And it's a tale of calculated vicious revenge, which is always good.

• Tape (sometime in Nov.) Ethan Hawke and Robert Sean Leonard play former schoolmates at a class reunion. So it's like a sequel to Dead Poets Society. Except Leonard's charcter is alive. Or is he? Dun dun DUNNN!

• The Man Who Wasn't There (Nov. 2) -- The Coen brothers! Yeay! This is the co-winner of the best director award at Cannes. I've been hearing about it for months and months. Want it now!

• The Time Machine (Dec. 25). Guy Pearce again. Simon Wells, the director, is apparently H.G Wells' great-grandson, so one would expect he'll show some respect for the original story. And it's from Dreamworks, so you know it'll be shiny.

And before you ask, I'm not at all interested in Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Unless LotR has exploding livestock.

This is the pause that refreshes. Or something. As with my book-reading habits, my movie-watching habits might seem a little bit unusual, and so I thought I'd take a break to explain them here. Especially since I've decided to put this online as a new freaky log-ish thingamabob. I hope my technical lingo doesn't frighten you. Anyway.

I don't see many movies in theaters. Because I'm phenomenally lazy. And because at some point seeing movies with friends got to be a big chore (because I'm contrary and difficult and stuff), so I figured I'd just see them on my own, which is fine, but I have a hard time motivating myself to leave the house when I don't have someone else saying "you have to meet us at X time to see Y movie." Which has led to the ridiculous situation that the movies I've seen in a theater in the past 12 months are: Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Memento, Valentine, and Dracula 2000. I realize it was a bad summer for movies and all, but that's still a little bit embarrassing. Particularly the part where apparently I can make the effort to see really, really bad movies. (I saw Dracula 2000 on my birthday, if that gives you any idea.) And I tend not to see movies that everyone else does, for a variety of reasons.

Like, I haven't seen Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Sorry. I'm not likely to see it, either. I'm sure it's good. But I've seen kung-fu movies, I've seen wire-work, and you know what? I don't care. That stuff bores me. And the hype makes me want to see it even less, and I know that's unfair, but like I said, I'm contrary. It's even more unfair that I'm more and more interested in seeing The Musketeer, but, see, that looks like it'll be bad with silly stunts. I'm used to that. Being good with silly stunts might confuse me.

Anyway. I'm also unlikely to see anything that has Spielberg's name associated with it in any way. The last of his movies I saw was Jurassic Park. I'm done. No, I didn't see Schindler's List. No, I didn't see Saving Private Ryan. And I never will, because I'm incapable of watching five minutes of his movies without mocking them. The man may have permanently biased me against WW2, I hate him that much. I was about to say, "and that goes double for Lucas," but on second thought, I may actually hate Spielberg more. He's at least got some genuine talent, and he's decided to piss it away on manipulative melodrama. I'm sure I'll have reasons to rant about him again later, so I won't vent all at once.

Oh, and we won't even talk about Brian DePalma.

Hm. I was trying to sum up things neatly, and it occurs to me that I like directors who have a distinctive feel, no matter how odd. I like Tim Burton, I like the Coen brothers, I like Stanley Kubrick. I'll freely admit that some of their movies have major plot problems, but they do have a distinct perspective, so I enjoy watching their movies even as I notice the flaws. And then, as is already obvious, I love me some bad, bad movies. Woo. You'll hear more about that when I get around to watching Something Weird. But I think that's enough for now.

Tonight Johanna, Zachary, and Mike came over, and we watched Incubus. It was also exciting because I got to meet Mike, who's very funny and neat, but that's not really the topic of this page, so I'll just shut up.

Incubus is, of course, the world-famous horror movie starring William Shatner, filmed entirely in Esperanto. Which is an artificial language some idealists made up once upon a time. Zachary was quite into learning it for a while, and I started learning some basic vocabulary just to keep up with him, but at this point all I remember is how to count to ten. Anyway, the movie was subtitled, thank goodness. Quite apart from the Esperanto gimmick -- wow, that's one seriously bad movie. So very dull. So many scenes of a woman leading someone through the woods, along the river, by the shore, across the dunes -- okay, we never really saw the dunes, but she mentioned them a few times. And those scenes are. So. Very. Long. The climax of the movie comes when the demonic woman has to wrestle with a stuffed goat's head for a while. And then it just ends, and I'm not entirely sure whether it's a happy ending or not.

Basically, it's absolutely awful, and I encourage you to see it if you can. With witty friends. And, perhaps, a large amount of alcohol. And if you watch it, and think that it's dull and there's no point in mocking it -- just wait until the Incubus himself appears, and starts dancing around like a demented mime. Comedy gold.

Oh, and then we watched the last half of Godzilla vs. Mothra. I had no idea that Mothra had the power to defeat its enemies with glam-rock power. Godzilla was overwhelmed with glitter. Freaky. I was really into Japanese monster movies for a while in elementary school, but I guess I outgrew that before this one came out. Gosh.

I watched the last of my three weekend rentals, Shadow of the Vampire, last night. I wasn't giving it anything like the proper attention because I was doing laundry and puttering about the apartment for the first half or so. Which may be why, for quite a while, I was wondering why the movie had gotten so much acclaim. It was good, it just wasn't... good. Y'know? I didn't see anything that explained why it was getting all kinds of critical praise. Except that it was sort of self-referential and full of jokes for film students. However, the last third or so was very, very funny. Up to that point, there were parts that were funny, but only funny enough to make me smirk a little. The last section made me laugh out loud repeatedly. And maybe all of it would have if I'd been paying closer attention. On the other hand, maybe I paid more attention if it had been more interesting. It's so hard to tell. I just felt like it took until the final scenes for it to really assert itself as a black comedy. And I wonder if that's why the critics were so enthusiastic about it: they had that last bit fresh in their minds, and the rest of it was just set-up for an extended punchline. Which is fine; I enjoyed it. But you do have to be a little patient.

Oh, and poor Cary Elwes. I thnk it's funny that he's almost always in period/fantasy roles. And it's especially funny to watch his scenes in this movie and imagine him thinking, "Man, I thought I already did this for Coppola." He gets some of the funniest lines, though, so maybe that helped.

Finished False Allegations earlier; it's next in Vachss' series about Burke. As I said before, I like this one quite a lot. Partly because it's essentially about a very complicated grift, and I like those kinds of stories. I don't know if it's really good -- there's a sequence that consist of lectures about how abuse affects the brain & behavior patterns. But I find that stuff inherently interesting, so it doesn't bug me.

And now, a shallow complaint. Having no self-control, I usually get Vachss book as soon as it comes out. Which means hardbacks. Which would be fine, except the dustjacket art for the hardbacks is pretty lame. Whereas the older books have been reissued by Vintage Books, in really nice trade paperbacks with pretty covers. Luckily, the first few books I got were cruddy paperbacks that are falling apart, so I'm gradually replacing them with the Vintage versions. I was thinking that I could maybe sell the hardbacks I have at the local used bookstore, and replace them with the nicer trades, but two of them are signed. And when the third one comes out, I'll pick it up immediately and get it signed, too. Because I'm just that way.

It's not that big a deal, I realize. It's just when I'm reading the hardbacks and happen to glance at the cover, I say, "Ew." Anyway, next up: Safe House. After that there's two more and I'm all caught up. And the new one comes out Sept. 25, so yeay. Oo, and there's a new Hap & Leonard book from Joe Lansdale coming out soon, too. Mmmm, books.

Oh yeah. Last weekend I went to my mom's, and while my brother was searching desperately for The Shy Stegosaurus of Cricket Creek, I found a book I'd been thinking about. It's actually a reprinted collection of three books: The Bad Child's Book of Beasts, More Beasts for Worse Children, and A Moral Alphabet. All by Hilaire Belloc, with illustrations by Basil T. Blackwood.

They're essentially Victorian Dr. Seuss books, which were first published from 1897 to 1899. Little nonsense poems with funny pictures. And sometimes the poems aren't very funny, and frequently they don't scan very well, but hey, century-old children's books. Expectations were a little lower. And there are a couple of footnote gags, which is all it takes for me to enjoy a book. And most of the pictures are fun, too. Here's a sample from The Moral Alphabet, which, as you might expect, contains a series of poems for the letters of the alphabet, each with little morals. Although not of the standard kind:

"G"

stands for Gnu, whose weapons of Defense
Are long, sharp, curling Horns, and Common-sense.
To these he adds a Name so short and strong
That even Hardy Boers pronounce it wrong.
How often on a bright Autumnal day
The Pious people of Pretoria say,
"Come, let us hunt the --"
Then no more is heard
But Sounds of Strong Men struggling with a word.
Meanwhile, the distant Gnu with grateful eyes
Observes his opportunity, and flies.
Moral:
Child, if you have a rummy kind of name,
Remember to be thankful for the same.

I had a full weekend of cinematic delights. If you're easily delighted. After seeing Bruce Campbell last week, I had to see one of his movies again, so I watched Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn. There's not much point in my commenting on it, so I'll just say: tee hee.

Then I actually left the house and saw Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back. I caught the earliest showing on a day during Labor Day weekend, which means there were maybe twenty people in the theater. Which was completely fine with me. I could have done without the Catwoman-lite girl gang, though. I mean, it's a road trip movie, it's a collection of in-jokes and cameos, and the only real purpose is to set up a flimsy rationale for Smith to have a light-saber duel with Mark Hamill. That's fine. That's great. But the girl-gang thing seemed like he was actually trying to put some small semblance of a plot in there. No. No plot! Plot bad! You've got a totally stupid movie rolling along just fine; don't go screwing it up with character development, for goodness' sake. But I laughed a lot, and that's all that really matters.

And then I came home and watched Pitch Black which I've been vaguely intending to see for a while. It would've been better as a short story. Then you could have the ending that was required, which is that the blonde chick and the serial killer abandon the others and flee the planet to build a wonderful sociopathic life together. Having the killer inexplicably redeemed by his adventures was just stupid. Although points for having the blonde bite it.

Oh yeah, and I spent a good portion of the movie confused, because they find this stowaway (I think) and I immediately think that this kid is a girl. And I go on thinking that for a while, until the other characters begin referring to the kid as a boy. And then I get confused, and then I sort it out and start thinking about how much cooler it would be if it was a little girl that decided that a serial killer was an appropriate role model. So I'm distracted by that, and then eventually they reveal that the boy is actually... a girl! At which point I'm totally confused. Apparently the kid was a girl, but she was pretending to be a boy? But she wasn't pretending that well, or I wouldn't have thought she was a girl for half of the movie, right? So that was distracting.

I dunno. It's a good movie if you don't think too much about it. Some interesting ideas. But it's really not a good sign when you're watching a movie chock full of CGI effects and thinking, "This would be better as text," y'know?

Last week, I got to see Bruce Campbell. The end.

Oh, okay, a few details. And maybe a rant or two. Guess what about? Yeah, we'll get to that. But let's do this in order.

So as you might know, I read If Chins Could Kill, and I was talking to Katie about it and how funny it was, and she mentioned it to Aaron. Aaron used to work at Olsson's, and still chats with the folks there, which is how we all found out that Campbell would be doing a booksigning. Johanna decided to come along and get her super-special limited edition Army of Darkness DVD signed. This is significant, because she had bought it on the cheap to resell, the fool, but she figured she'd keep it if she could get it signed. I was strongly in favor of her keeping it, because I want to see (hear?) the commentary tracks. Oh, just for the hell of it, I'll also mention that last week Johanna had a dream in which I and Campbell turned up. We were dating. Or, perhaps, "dating." She didn't dream about the, uh, details, mind you; we just passed through, but she knew we were headed off for naughtiness. She has since said that she thinks maybe she meant (in the dream) for me to be with Joe Bob, but they look kind of similar. Either way, I'm totally fine with it. Mmm, cheekbones. Okay, let's move on.

I left work a little early and took the Metro down to Olsson's in Arlington. When I got to the store, I realized that when I put my sunglasses on, I left my normal glasses in my car. So I was going to be super-extra-cool at the store. And on the Metro home. And by super-extra-cool, I mean "stupid-looking." Oh well. I'd rather see the world in focus than correctly lit, so I stuck with the sunglasses. I got to the store around 5:45, and Campbell was supposed to be there at 7. The place was already comfortably full. All of the seats were taken, so I wandered around and picked up a remaindered copy of The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove and Magnetic Fields' Holiday album. I also got my number for the actual signing portion of the book signing. Number 84. So you can see that already there was a pretty big turnout.

Johanna turned up and then we were frightened by this guy, who showed up in his homemade Jack of All Trades outfit. Sigh. Fans. He was handing out nice bookmarks that had the address for Campbell's site and some fansites and that was very nice, but it didn't make him any less of a freak. Katie and Aaron turned up eventually. And then we waited and waited and more people came and none of this makes a good story. Except I'll mention that they sold out of books, and the "tickets" for getting your book signed went up to 250-something. And it's worth noting that you couldn't get memorabilia (or body parts -- yours or someone else's) signed, so that was just people with books. This also meant that Johanna couldn't get her DVD signed, so she began muttering about how she was going to sell it after all, while I pleaded with her to see reason.

The staff came up to make announcements periodically. One of them mentioned other upcoming events, like book-signings by P.J. O'Rourke and Susan Isaacs, and made some amusing comments about how he was sure that the crowd was chock-full of Susan Isaacs fans. Eventually they sold out of books, and said that they were trying to get some more in from local stores, but if they didn't have any they'd have bookplates that Campbell would sign. And if anyone still wanted a copy of the book, they could order a copy through the store, and Olsson's would send them to Campbell, who'd sign them and return them. This is just to say that both Olsson's and Campbell are nice. Oh, and they also repeated that no merchandise would be signed, but finally conceded that if people stayed until after all of the books were signed, Campbell would then sign merchandise for anyone who'd waited. Which is kinda what I'd expected, since I've heard many stories about how Campbell will go way beyond the call of duty to make fans happy. He's a sweetheart. With nice cheekbones. Er, anyway, after an hour or so of standing around, getting squished from all sides, Campbell turned up. I could occasionally catch a glimpse of him when the people in front of me turned their heads in just the right way, but mostly it was like listening to the radio. Still, it was fun. Here's what I recall:

He started by reading a bit from If Chins Could Kill. If you've got your copy handy, he read from the "Fanalysis" chapter, specifically pages 247-250. If you don't have a copy, it contains a few examples of fanmail, including a piece of snide (but you gotta admit, kinda funny) hate mail. You'd think that would have been a hint for the freaks in the crowd. I can't help thinking that he picked those pages for a reason. It's worth mentioning that, given that Campbell is an actor, he reads well. He also inserted a few extra editorial comments, particularly when he got to the hate mail. Presumably he was also acting out the conversations he mentions in the book, but again, I couldn't see that.

Then the Q&A session began. Oh man. There was "Wanna come out to a bar with us after this?" and "Are they gonna make Evil Dead 4?" People, get a grip. One guy asked if there was going to be a books-on-tape version for the "non-literate" crowd. Campbell said yes, and he'd read it, but pointed out that there were lots of pictures in the book that aliterates could enjoy. Heh. I think the winner was this girl who felt like telling the crowd that she didn't know who Campbell was; her friends had just shown her five minutes of Evil Dead 2, and well, that was all she knew about him. Now first, that's not technically a question. And second, what the hell kind of response are you expecting with that? "Oh, you don't who I am? I don't who you are either, so fuck off." Campbell didn't say that. I would have. Third, remember, there's a crowd of several hundred people smashed into this small bookstore to see this guy. You don't know who he is, you got dragged along by your nimrod friends, fine. That's no crime. But don't you think that maybe the people who do know who he is, and who maybe went through some effort to see him, might appreciate the chance to ask their own question? And that, even if you're so desperate for attention that you don't care what kind of attention you get, maybe that five minutes could have been spent letting some fanboy ask their own question, so they could have had the thrill of talking to someone they admired, even if their question probably would have been dumb, too? Maybe she was there to remind me that people who aren't fans can be just as moronic as the people who are. Okay, point taken.

The best anecdote was probably about the "Give me some sugar, baby," line from Army of Darkness. Apparently that wasn't in the original script, and Raimi added it just before they shot the scene. So Campbell and the others are all set to do the scene, and Raimi wanders out, giggling, and tells him that now he's got this new line. Campbell said it was a stupid, cheesy line, whereupon Raimi stopped giggling and told him to say his damn line. And thus was motion picture history made. In a small, unimportant way.

What else... Campbell said he would, of course, be in Spider-Man, since Sam Raimi's directing it. He plays the ring announcer who thinks that Peter Parker's suggestion of the name, "The Human Spider" is lame, and therefore introduces him to the crowd as "The Amazing Spider-Man!" So, as he put it, his role is small, but pivotal, since without his character the movie would have a really dumb name. He also mentioned that he had just finished shooting Bubba Ho-Tep, which is based on a Joe Lansdale novella. I was all excited about that, since I'd read the story. Campbell plays Elvis. He went into detail about the story, but I won't, because it's just too funny to summarize, although the fact that Campbell plays Elvis ought to give you some idea. Oh, and Ossie Davis plays John F. Kennedy. No, honest. If you want to read the novella, I believe it's in the Riders of the Purple Rage anthology. His other upcoming movie is Serving Sarah co-starring a fresh-out-of-rehab Matthew Perry. He said we should expect to see it as an in-flight movie sometime next year. Snerk.

Someone asked which movie he was most embarrassed about being in, which led to a funny bit: Campbell said he thought it would be better to do a little exercise. He'd turn his back, and the audience could shout out the names of movies he'd been in that made them want their money back. There were, of course, lots of titles shouted. When someone said, "Congo!" (which is a fun thing to shout all by itself), he took some time to answer. Basically, he picked someone out of the crowd and said, "Okay, you're a big-time film producer. I'm pitching a movie. I've got a Michael Crichton story. The director has done second-unit work on several Spielberg movies, and the guy who wrote Moonstruck did the script..." and so on, detailing the credits of everyone involved. Eventually the guy conceded that he'd green-light the movie as described, and Campbell said, "You just made Congo." The book goes into the reasons Campbell agreed to do it, which was basically that it was a paid vacation in Costa Rica.

Oh, someone was also very bitter that Robert Patrick had gotten the nod to replace David Duchovney on The X-Files instead of Campbell. I mean, she was really angry about it. If you care about The X-Files at this point, you already have a problem. Campbell said that Patrick was the most serious guy on the planet, which is as good a description of his acting style as any I've heard. When asked for Homicide gossip, he didn't have any, but he did mention how bizarre it was to be able to suggest what kind of story he'd like to be in. Oh yeah, he also thanked the crowd for helping his book get onto the best-seller list, and mentioned that originally his publisher hadn't known who the hell he was. (Hey, maybe that's who that girl was.) But now he had a deal for another book -- I got the impression that it would be an expansion of the "Fanalysis" chapter, especially since he's also done a half-hour documentary on the same topic. He'll probably be too nice, but I'm still interested in reading what he has to say about it. Heck, maybe I'll pay full price for that one. Heh.

And then it was over, and time for the big book-signing. Some of the crowd left, and we headed to the coffee shop for a soothing beverage until our numbers came up. When they finally called for numbers 80 to 90 to go up, I ended up in line next to an older bearded gent. He began muttering to me about how he was just there for his 18 year-old son, who loved Army of Darkness I told him that his son would love him forever for waiting all this time to get the autograph for him. The guy grumped that he hoped so, and we chatted a bit more. Then suddenly they were calling for numbers 90 to 100. Apparently the guy I'd been talking to wasn't actually in line. Whoops! So I hustled up and got in the real line (it was hard to distinguish it in the general crowd). While I was second or third in line I heard the staff-folk talking about how, yup, they were going to be there till midnight. Aaron later said that they had been very surprised by the big turn-out (as were we), and were frantically sending out for pizza and beer because they were going to be there all night. The Olsson's staff guy took my book to open it in readiness, and the noticed the letter from the press agent which I kept slipped in the front cover. "Hey, this is a promotional copy! You didn't pay for this!" Then he spotted the price written in pencil inside (since I'd gotten it at a used bookstore) and corrected himself: "Oh, I see, you didn't pay full price!" Meanwhile I was jokingly "shh"ing him. Ah, bookstore finance merriment. Maybe you had to be there, but it was funny. Staff-guy took the letter as the guy ahead of me finished his chat session, and set the book on the table. Before I walked over, I said, "Hey, I want that!" and took the promotional letter back. Staff-guy was surprised that I cared, and I tried to explain that the letter was funny.

Originally the only clever thing I could think of to say was to apologize for the insane fans, on behalf of the sane fans. My fall-back was to show Campbell the letter and demand to know what the other part of his double-life was. (See my original comments for details.) However, the mention of the Bubba Ho-Tep movie provided me with better material, so that's what we talked about. He seemed pleasantly surprised that I was aware of the story. I asked if Lansdale had written the script, and Campbell said no, but that Lansdale had come to the set for a day or two. And presumably, that meant he wasn't too upset with what they'd done to his story. I said that was good, since I don't think it would be good to have Lansdale mad at you. Campbell sort of made a face and said, "No, he's from East Texas." I was gonna add, "And he's invented his own school of karate," but I was trying to keep it brief because I kept thinking of the two hundred other people waiting for their 30-second brush with fame. So that was it. Campbell signed my book, and then offered me some candy from the big basket he had on the table in front of him. He had candy for his fans! That's really cool. I got a grape Jolly Rancher. Which I've put in my scrapbook. Well, no; I ate it. Oh, and I have no idea if he heard the little to-do about my resold copy of his book, but I'm thinking maybe he did, since he wrote "Shop S-Mart!" Heh.

Hey, I've got a whole page plugging his book now, so I think he's been repaid for whatever I (and some unknown reviewer) cheated him of.

Then I went back to wait with my friends until it was their turn. Johanna was going back and forth over whether to wait for hours so she could get the DVD signed, or to go home and sell the thing. I was torn, too, since I didn't think I could wait with her all night, but I really, really didn't want her to sell it. If it weren't for the fans who were offering her a $60 profit on the DVD, the whole dilemma could have been avoided. More reasons to hate fans.

Everyone got their books signed, and then we were trying to help Johanna what to do. One of the problems was that the Metro stops running around midnight, and while it looked as if the signing would be done by then, the timing might be tight. Eventually we hit on the bright idea of exploiting Aaron's connections: he'd give the DVD to a friend who worked at the store, and they'd get it signed and Aaron could give it to Johanna later that week. So that was all settled, and Johanna finally broke the seal on the packaging, to my joy.

While we were all chatting, some older gent came by our table and asked to see what Campbell had written in Katie's copy of the book. Freak. She showed it to him (I can't remember what it was right now) and he left, and I said I'd noticed him peering over shoulders earlier to see what messages other people had gotten. Then we speculated that Campbell had told him that there was a secret message just for this guy if he'd read all of the messages and take the third letter from each one, or something like that. I mean, honestly. You need to see everything the guy's ever written, down to each individual autograph?

And then we left. During the Metro ride home, Johanna suddenly pointed to the floor in front of us, and then immediately put a hand up to block my eyes. Which was enough to tell me that she'd spotten a bug, and gave me a fit of the giggles that lasted about five minutes. When I was able to speak and ask what she'd seen, she said it was a daddy long-legs. I assured her that I wouldn't have freaked out if I'd seen it (anything but a centipede is okay, really) but I appreciated her trying to protect me. And then we parted ways, and I went to bed. Which isn't a great ending, but so it goes.