TCAF Report:
Last week, we went up to the sunny beaches of Canada for the Toronto Comics Festival. We bunked with the ever-hospitable Victoria and Chris, along with Miriam and Mike. We left at the crack of dawn on Wednesday and arrived on the East coast around dinner time. We had a few hours to wait for the bus, so we took refuge across the street from the airport at the only restaurant within walking distance: McDonalds. We did learn, however, it was “buy one get one free” day for McFlurrys at that location:
At 7:30pm, we walked back to the bus station at the airport to wait for our 7:45pm bus. Almost immediately after we got there, it started raining:
Then it started pouring, with lightening and thunder. Then we waited for the bus for an hour and a half. (By the time it arrived, we were soaked up to our knees!) We arrived in the city late Wednesday night, spent a few hours eating pizza and sharing YouTube videos. We spent half of Thursday sleeping before Miriam and Mike arrived. That night, we went to watch Miriam open for James Sturm at the Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre where they both talked about Judaism’s influence on modern comics.
Again, much of Friday was spent sleeping off travel fatigue (but I got most of the way through my book, John Dies at The End, which was awesome)… we went and set up for the show, we went to the official TCAF welcoming party (where we ran into Box Brown and Sarah, Ed Brisson, Robin McConnell, and others), and Leslie arrived.
Saturday was relatively uneventful except for the long list of internet friends that stopped by and kept my spirits up – many of whom I was meeting for the first time! Some of the friends/artist included (in no particular order): Jay Marcy, Dino Caruso, Robin LeBlanc, Madéleine Flores, Katie Shanahan, Jeff Ellis, Adam Cadwell, Marc Ellerby, and Michael Lalond. (I know there were several more of you – so apologies to everyone I’ve forgotten to list!)
Saturday night was the Queer Comics Mixer and the TCAF Official Saturday Night Party. Mike and I inevitably bailed early to go back to the house and check in with our partner in crime, Megan Rose Gedris, who was supposed to join us at some point that evening.
Sunday we met up with Megan, sold a ton of merchandise, caught up with Lucy, Dave, Raina, Becky and Frank, and a few others, completely forgot the meaning of “inside voices”, packed up for the trip home, got lost, found our way back to Victoria’s, and all went out for poutine! We said goodbye to everyone – with some particularly uplifting hugs! – then we caught the late bus back to the Buffalo airport.
A huge thanks to Christopher Butcher and all the volunteers/staff that made the show so wonderful! All the great things we heard about TCAF are true, and we hope to see you guys next year!
