Not a huge haul from Comiket. I would be linking to more things I at least liked the look of, even if I didn't buy them, except that nobody had any business cards for me to remember who they all were. So you only get recommendations of things I actually paid for.

• this year's issue of Whores of Mensa, hot off the press and full of Parisian goodness. I think Ellen's piece on Lee Miller was my favourite from this issue, but I loved Jeremy's Les Chthulettes as well. Anything which combines girl groups, musical theatre and the screaming howling void between worlds is OK by me! It's not for sale online yet, but watch the Whores of Mensa blog for news.
   
• A bumper collection of Morgenmuffel, as well as the newest issue. I discovered this comic at the London Zine Symposium a few months ago, and I like it a lot. It's autobiographical but not boring because the stories are all about volunteering in an anarchist kitchen, fighting in riots, and culture clashes of visiting other countries. It's nicely drawn, as well.
   
• a new issue of the Sally-Anne Hickman diaries. Yes, more autobiographical comics, this time in the vein of James Kochalka's daily strips; they're brutally frank and not remotely self-aggrandising, but without being self-indulgent either (unlike many autobiographical comics) which makes me warm to them all the more. At the moment you can buy them from the LUC stall at Camden Lock, at least for a couple more weeks.
   
• a brand-new issue of There's No Time Like The Presentby Paul Rainey. It's a comic set in a mundane time where the Ultranet gets invented and people get nostalgic for a less-confusing time when every outcome wasn't already known. I can't easily explain it, so I suggest you just go and buy some copies here.

I went to Comiket on Saturday, part of this year's Comica festival, which was pretty cool. It was nice to catch up with some of the usual faces, but there were also loads of people whose work I'd never seen before, and seeing new stuff at events like these is always good.

Less good was the complete lack of any signs telling anyone where in the building it was actually taking place, which was poor show on the part of the ICA. Also, once again, hardly anyone had any business cards so I could make note of who they were to seek them out later, when I have some spare cash to throw down on such fripperies. People, people! If you want punters to buy your stuff, you have to make it easy for them to find you when they have money! It's not rocket science! I picked up a few good things to read, but I'll write about them in another post.

Most of the afternoon was spent having increasingly surreal conversations in the bar with Mr Jones, Mr Webb and Doctoe. Subjects included but were not limited to: FLCL, innovative restaurant ideas, honey badgers, fake band names, the mechanics of horoscope creation, cows, and Gay Bingo.

Our favourite restaurant idea was Cut Pig, where diners can carve their own cuts of meat, though Matt1′s Play With Your Food idea is a pretty good one, as well. I don't think I'll ever see truffles in quite the same light again, however, after hearing that there is a French term for women who put truffles into their private parts to get pigs to pleasure them¹. Finding out that there's a place in the Middle East where they bury dead people with honey and dig it up months later so the honey tastes better² was also a bizarre moment, but prompted a great conversation about honey badgers. I can't believe there are still people out there who haven't heard of honey badgers! Honey badgers are great! They're pound for pound the most dangerous land mammal! They're a secret weapon! And they're a Bond-girl name waiting to happen…

One of the less ridiculous tangents of the conversation, prompted by three of us having a fan-group moment over Madame Zee, was about whether there are any specific mechanics or distinct formulas to create horoscopes, and how these would be affected with different input. Maybe one could create useful horoscopes based on things that actually do affect a person's morning, like traffic and pollen count and Evening Standard headlines. Those things are more likely to affect whether you feel like you're having a good day or a bad day than whether Venus is in the house of Jupiter or something.

The Gay Bingo was the subject of much speculation. I had read about it on the ICA site and forgotten all about it, but there was a delicious moment when I realised that it was starting around the same time that the Comiket folk would have finished packing up, prompting fantastic images of the clash of cultures scrapping over who got served first and where everyone would sit. This latter was actually enough of a concern for one rather aggressive butch dyke to come over to warn us that we might not want to stick around if we weren't actually playing, because it would get so rammed it would be difficult to leave. "I'm saying this for the benefit of you two gentlemen, actually. The girls won't have a problem." She did have a point — for anyone who's been there during a very busy Tuttle, it was actually even more crowded than that. Srsly.

By that point, the comics people were starting to arrive in the bar, looking for places to sit, so we left anyway, so somewhat to my disappointment we didn't find out the difference between Gay Bingo and regular bingo. If anyone knows, please enlighten us poor ignorant souls.

¹"I read it on the internet, so it must be true!"^3
2This may only be the product of Matt Webb's fevered brain.
³Actual veracity of this statement may be in doubt, also.

Matt posted some photos of Comiket over here.