Nicole & Brandon
Originally uploaded by Laughing Squid.

(This entry was re-posted on the SF Metblog save for a few details — see “Non-Metblog content” portion of this entry).

The Alternative Press Expo took place last weekend (April 9th and 10th). It was held at the Concourse Exhibition Center on 7th and Brannan. APE is known within the comic book industry as one of the biggest independent/small press conventions in the country. It is comprised of two days of zines, comics, and hand-made crafts galore. And like the past two years, the husband and I took our place behind the table to sell our wares. Or his wares rather. For the uninformed, Brandon happens to be a rather talented cartoonist, and has been churning out comics for the past three years now. He started exhibiting at APE in 2003 with a half-table, and has moved on up to a table all by himself in 2005. Well, we shared two tables with Entropy Comics, but you get what I’m saying (Gary from Entropy Comics also runs a comic book store out on Ocean Avenue called Comic Outpost). This year, we were debuting his new book The Stereos: In The Garage, as well as selling last year’s The Stereos: Battle of the Bands, past Little Things collections, and lots of Geek Pride shwag (the ones on our table were of the non-Cafepress variety).

We arrived pretty early to set up on Saturday, and were super-stoked to see what a good table we had. Our table was situated in the front center of the hall, and we were right across from the tail end of APE behemoth Slave Labor Graphics. In indie-comic speak, this means we had a Very Good Spot. We set up our materials, and waited around for the crowd to spill in. Meanwhile, I was stoked to spot so many people from such big name indie publishers like Fantagraphics, Top Shelf, Oni Press, AiT Planet Lar — all of whom were situated really near us.

Once the con started going, I became the defacto Booth Bunny. Dressed up in my Geek Pride shirt, mini-skirt, and Vans sneakers, I was pushing the cute-wifey shtick to the hilt. Not that it mattered — most people seemed more interested in the free brownie squares that I had baked up to give away. And no — they were not that kind of brownies. I had several people come up to me and asked if the brownies were made with pot. And at least two people WALKED AWAY when I told them it wasn’t. Like, what’s their problem? It’s FREE FOOD. Regular chocolate not good enough any more?

Anyway, while Brandon was doing the soft sell, I often got up and walked around the place to visit other tables. I was enamored with Giant Robot’s booth, and immediately purchased a small hoodie. I was similarly taken with the Super 7 booth, and bought a green t-shirt. Other than that, I visited our friends (mostly cartoonists) who also had tables there — Thien Pham from Global Hobo & Sparkplug, Lark Pien, Derek Kirk Kim, Jason Shiga, Shaenon K. Garrity of Narbonic (as well as her husband Andrew Farago who’s the manager of the Cartoon Art Museum), Keith Knight, Paige Braddock, Chris Kohler of Hidden Agenda Press, Tom Beland, Scott Beale (the only non-cartoonist on this list) of Laughing Squid, Jason Thompson of Mock Man Press (and new friend Dirk Tiede from Dynamanga.net), Bryan Kolm of Atomic Bear Press, and lots more that I can’t remember right now.

Walking around, I also turned rather fan-girly when I encountered such big indie names like Adrian Tomine, Dan Clowes, Seth, and Jhonen Vasquez (who was hands-down THE rock star at APE, with the longest line of fans throughout the whole con). I then bought the latest PunkPunk issue, which has this awesome packaging of hand-embroidered grocery bags as the covers (The latest one, issue 4, is an anthology of stories by couples/partners. The covers were designed by Derek Kirk Kim. Cool stuff). And seeing as the Cartoon Art Museum had a booth at APE, I took the opportunity to renew my membership right then and there. I then ran into Alex K. from Illegal Pussycat (who happens to be an ex-Metblogger), we talked for quite a bit, and she even gave me a free copy of her comic. Throughout the weekend, I wandered around the rest of the hall, trying to take in as much sights and sounds as I could. I saw so much wacky and wonderful stuff that it’s impossible for me to list them all — it was like a sea of comics, zines, shirts, buttons, bags, and more.

‘Course, this entry wouldn’t be complete without me mentioning my friends who came out in support of The Geekout — fellow Metbloggers Jason Schupp and Courtney Patubo (with her Kevin in tow). Thanks guys, you are the bestest. It was clear that they too were having a blast. I especially enjoyed Courtney and Jason’s bat hats.

[Non-Metblog content]
I also ran into — wait for it — a fellow Malaysian! His name is Azmeer, and it was quite the bizarre thing. He apparently came across my blog while looking for Malaysian restaurants in the Bay Area (long-time readers will remember my Banana Island entry) , clicked on Brandon’s link, and recognized him due to the many pictures I’ve posted on here. It was such a breath of fresh air to actually meet another Malaysian here in San Francisco, you have no idea. We talked and reminisced a good bit about Malaysia, exchanged immigration stories, tips and tricks of the process (he’s already got PR here), and overall I think I have a new friend. How awesome is that! Ah, the community-bonding powers of blogs. It’s not to be understated. Now back to the APE stuff.
[/Non-Metblog content]

All in all, we did good. Our sales were high, people seemed to like Brandon’s stuff (he even got approached by a few potential distributors), and the brownies were a huge hit (despite the lack of pot). Here’s looking forward to next year’s APE!