I want to LIIIIIIIIIIVE!!!

Forgive the lack of activity here this week; I'm looking for work.

What's that, you say? I thought you already had four jobs? What the hell is the matter with you?

Couldn't say, exactly.

*****

That said, Terry Wallis is my hero. You've heard about this, right? This guy got in a car accident in 1984 and went nearly braindead - into a "minimally concious state," lying there in a hospital bed making the odd grunt now and then.

News just hit that in 2003, homeboy woke the fuck up.

This guy's brain fucking fixed itself. It took almost twenty years to do it, and he's still nowhere near 100% - he thinks Reagan is president, he can't walk - but we're talking about someone who was this close to being a vegetable and dug himself out of it.

My dad took a serious moment with me last year. I guess he felt it falls to me as the eldest son to pull the plug in the event he falls into a coma or becomes a vegetable, and he asked me not to hesitate.

It's funny - people seem really sure of what they want in this regard. Most of the folks in my life are firmly in the Pull The Plug camp.

Me? I'm convinced miracles happen. Nobody ever knew Terry Wallis had a chance. Now he's having conversations and hanging out with his loved ones again.

I'm not without qualms - I certainly don't like the idea of being retarded, or sending my family into the poorhouse so my corpse can keep its heart beating - but when it comes right down to it, being alive right now in this world is all I'm sure I'm gonna get, and I have a really hard time turning my back on that.

Especially when there's a chance. And while it's a minimal one - doctors are comparing his experience to winning the lottery, and as far as I can tell from the reporting this hasn't happened before in recorded medical science - I'll take it.

*****

Lots of fun comics coming out this week, and I'm looking forward to the Isotope's Continuity Retrogressive Art Closing tomorrow night. Of particular interest may be the live art event Josh hints at in yesterday's AiT blog post, but I'll say no more.

Battler Briton #1comes out tomorrow, a new Garth Ennis war book, and those are almost always worth checking out (somehow I passed on the recent Nick Fury mini).

Good to see more of War of the Worlds: Second Wave coming, too. I still think this is Boom! Studios' best book, and I'm looking forward to the odd addition to the cast promised by the cover.



Umbra #2 continues the intriguing murder mystery and, according to artist Mike Hawthorne, ramps up the violence element, so that should be fun.

Dark Horse has a big week. Conan & The Songs Of The Dead #1 kickstarts a miniseries by Joe R. Lansdale and Tim Truman, which editor Scott Allie calls "the most savage version of Conan you're ever bound to see." I've been enjoying most of the Dark Horse Conan stuff and will likely check this out. Then they've got the 25-cent Dark Horse Twenty Years book, which is gonna have art from Eric Powell and Mike Mignola and, I think, Joss Whedon, everyone bouncing around the licensed Dark Horse properties and doing characters they've never done before. Should be fun. And of course, a new issue of The Goon is always worth celebrating.

Almost all of my regular Marvel books come out tomorrow, too. Punisher MAX, The Thing, The Incredible Hulk, all in the same week. I'm also excited to see the final issue of Last Planet Standing, as I've been having fun with that book, and I'll probably pick up Franklin Richards, Son Of A Genius: Super Summer Spectacular because I've been enjoying the idea that Calvin and Hobbes could have taken place in the world of the Fantastic Four. This one-shots once or twice a year are also pretty much exactly right in guessing how much demand there'd be for a book like this.