Well, I'm 26 as of today. Yay me!

Last night I got part of one birthday present: I went to see Art Spiegelman talk at a local bookstore and get my copy of "In the Shadow of No Towers" (the other half of the present) signed. I actually got there late, but it was okay because he'd delayed the start of the talk so everyone could watch the VP debate. The bookstore even set up TVs so everyone there could watch. I only caught the closing remarks. When entering, the staff warned everyone that "Mr. Spiegelman will smoke during tonight's talk." And at the beginning of the talk, the MC reiterated, "Mr. Spiegelman will smoke during his talk...but you don't get to." Art's talk was very interesting: he read bits of the book (which I recommend, BTW), talked about his approach to comics structure and how it's changed over the years, talked about the early history of the comic strip, and was generally witty and entertaining.