Happy Birthday, Chris Sparks

This is a desk at Andrews & McMeel in Kansas City MO,  and mostly obscured behind that pile of packages is Caty Neis, who works at that desk. Caty's editing the Team Cul de Sac book, a project launched by my friend Chris Sparks, whose birthday is today.

I met Chris mostly by accident at the Charlotte Heroescon in 2008, when he kinda blundered into a room where Tom Spurgeon and I were giving a talk. For scheduling reasons, the rooms had been switched around among the various panels and discussions on the top floor of the Charlotte Convention Center, and our talk was moved into a larger room so all 7 of the attendees could have their own section of 40 chairs or so to sprawl out in. Chris came in a few minutes into the talk, looked around and asked me What do you do? I must have given the right answer because we became good friends, practically family, and when he heard about my Parkinson's deal he decided to take on a project with a goal that'd make a difference.

I've met some interesting and excellent people in the last four or five years and that's the part of this side of the comics business I've enjoyed the most. Few have blundered into my life so gracefully as Chris, and I'm glad he did.

At the Reubens from left to right, me, Caty Neis, John McMeel, Chris Sparks.