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This past week, I got to talk to one of my childhood heroes: Berkeley Breathed, the man who created Opus, Bill the Cat, Milo, Oliver Wendell Jones, and the rest of the cast of Bloom County(which debuts on the New York Times graphic novel bestseller list at number one). Each morning in the 1980s entailed my reading this strip, along with Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side was my favorite, though; it had a skewed vision of the world that I related to and felt drawn into. Its sense of mischief and fun was exactly what I wanted and needed to carve out my own worldview.

Last Monday brought a huge downpour here in the city, and I managed to get caught up in it. Normally I wouldn't mind, but I happened to be wearing a sport coat (which is incredibly rare for me; I'm not dressed up often), and I also happened to be running (even rarer) to an event at Powerhouse Books in Brooklyn. The event was a special presentation featuring two of the biggest graphic works out right now and their respective authors: David Small (Stitches) and Josh Neufeld (A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge). I'm a big fan of both, and I had already had the pleasure of interviewing them both for GNR, so I was very familiar with both books. Which is a good thing, because I was the moderator for the night's event.