Cameras, Grave Stones, Comic Books and Cereal

As this weekend starts, I feel I am still recovering from the past weekend’s activities. Last Friday the illustrious illustrator, Pamela McCarville, and I went to a taping of Off The Page to talk about our children’s book, Willow May Goes to the Midnight Carnival. This will be our first big TV debut and even though I tried real hard not to be, yes, I was incredibly nervous. Luckily, Off The Page has the most gracious host, Stacy McKenzie, which help put us to ease. We were both quite impressed with her production and found the whole filming process fascinating.

I still feel I came across nervous, but I think maybe my hair will distract viewers from that fact. It had been warm and dry all week, but of course on the day of filming, it was cold and wet with 100% humidity, which natural curly hair just loves....NOT! I believe my hair took up another zip code that day and I am sure it not only frightened the camera crew and host, but also the illustrator sitting next to me who was probably afraid it was going to take over her seat at any moment.

The program will air on Broomfield Public Access TV, Channel 8, starting in October. We will be getting a DVD of the show and Stacy said we could put it up on our blog or website, so I will try to do that. I asked her if it would be okay if I had the illustrator Photoshop Jennifer Aniston in for me, but she seemed to frown upon that idea. I do want to thank her and the crew for putting together a great show that supports local Colorado authors and illustrators.

The next morning a project that my sister and I are working on took us to the Riverside Cemetery. Founded in 1876, this is the oldest operating cemetery in Denver. In its heyday the cemetery use to be quite lavish sitting next to the South Platte River with green lawns, trees, flowers and shrubs. Now it is in the middle of an industrial park right next to the railroad tracks where we had to wait for the longest and slowest coal train to pass by before we could drive through the gates. The cemetery is no longer being watered or regularly maintained and was vandalized a few years ago, which is sad considering the wealth of Colorado history that is beneath its grounds and the art above. The cemetery statuary is amazing. Since I feel this post is getting a bit long winded, I will post more in the coming days on our morning’s journey through stones of Riverside and the stories that reside with them.

From the cemetery we made our way to Mile High Comics to get our comic and graphic novel fix. I got an eclectic grouping consisting of Igor, Hell Boy, The Surreal Adventures of Edgar Allan Poo, The Umbrella Academy and a few others of varying genres. Should be some interesting reading (if I can just find the time). After that we stopped at our favorite eating place, The Shoppe, to fortify up with a big bowl of cereal and fruit. Next we stopped at the Tattered Cover to stock up on even more reading material. Finally after a few more stops and a harrowing near miss by a red car that did its darnedest to hit us, we arrived back home and collapsed on the couch for the rest of the evening. Who knew cemeteries and comic books would be so exhausting.

Here are a few of the photos from Riverside: