For anyone visiting the site for the first time, I’ve completely overhauled the About Breaking the Ice link up at the top of the page.  Please check it out to get some background on all of the characters and the strip itself.

The second guest strip I did for the photo site INANIMATE was posted on November 3rd.  You can click here to check it out!

INANIMATE is a photo comic site run and created by Jon Horsley.  For each strip, he (or the guest “artist”) take inanimate objects and give voices to them.  The first one I did can be found here.

**Not at all, actually, but she IS in this picture with BTI T-shirt contest winner Erik Hoard. And really, I’m taking that as a win!  So while Ms. Day may never have seen BTI in her life, we are still big fans of hers!

Are you on Twitter?  OMGROFLMAO and sometimes Y, what a coincedence, so am I!

If you’d like to read about the minutiae of my day, you can find me at www.twitter.com/jkeats

jhorsley of y2clcomic fame also runs asite called Inanimate.  This site is a photo comic site where guest artists will give “voices” to inanimate objects and create a comic strip with him.  A while back he asked me to contribute and I submitted two different ones.  The first of them, based on an old street joke (and one that actually opens the Breaking the Ice screenply that the comic is based on), appears here.  He also has a really nice write up on BTI as well!

I invite you to check the strip out and the site as a whole…and while you’re at it check y2clcomic out as well!

Here’s the actual pic of Papa’s TwitSpace profile, for those interested.

Papa: A Self Portrait

Are you a Facebook user?  Well there is a Breaking the Ice fan page there where you’ll get all the latest updates and be able to interact with other BTI readers.  If you wanna join I would love to see you there!

Here are some podcasts that I’ve appeared on:

Popcorn Mafia – My favorite movie review show on the web.  The lovely and talented duo of Grae Drake and Gariana Abeyta host this weekly podcast and had me on to review the movies “Bangkok Dangerous” and “Man on Wire”.  It’s a fun listen (and definitely not suitable for worktime listening!)

League of Extremely Ordinary Gentlemen – I did this interview back at Staple this past March.

Clockwise: Amber Willey, Carlos Saumdio, Mark McCollum, Nicholas Lopez, Phillip Hughes, John Keating

Breaking the Ice was fortunate enough to be featured at this year’s Staple      Independent Media Expo in Austin, TX. I was invited to come out by the publishers of the BTI comic book Carlos Samudio and Mark McCollum of Hopper Comics. The one day event was held at the Monarch Event Center and it was a blast. A lot of times at conventions, web comics and small press can get overshadowed by the big boys of Marvel, DC and Hollywood. This event, though, was created solely to spotlight independent comics and that, they did.

Official Hopper Comics Booth Babe (and my fiance) Amber Willey accompanied me on the journey and we flew into Austin on Friday afternoon. We met up with Carlos and Mark and headed over to Texas Land and Cattle for some Texas beef! Then it was off to do a little impromptu tour of downtown Austin and the Capital building, which was gorgeous.

Then we head over to Austin Books & Comics, which is one of the coolest comic shops I’ve seen in awhile. They had EVERYTHING you could ever want in comics there. They even have Breaking the Ice, along with the entire Hopper Comics line, there as well! I was thrilled to find out that, of the 30 books they carried of BTI, only two were remaining! I don’t even have any family in Austin!

We had a couple of beers and then it was off to a late showing of WATCHMEN. The book is one of my favorite of all time, comic or otherwise, and I loved the movie. I’ll save that review for some other time, though.

Saturday was spent at the convention. Carlos really outdid himself with banners for Breaking the Ice as well as his newest superhero book, Tex-Shield. We had a constant stream of people coming over to talk with us, buy books, buy prints (I had a Popeye print that I drew up, along with some comic strips that I made as prints for people to buy) and even get some sketches done. We had plenty of freebies, too. One was a print of Mick and the BTI logo and the other was the same picture on a button. People love buttons and more importantly, love free stuff! We sold a bunch of books and prints and Carlos seemed thrilled with the results.

I even did an interview with Spill.com and their “League of Extremely Ordinary Gentleman” podcast. Phil’s Tex-Shield one seems to be up for the March 13th show but mine has yet to be uploaded. Keep checking out the site or I’ll let you know when it’s available right here on the site.

One of the nicest things to happen to me at the convention itself was a woman coming up to the table and exclaiming, quite enthusiastically, that she reads Breaking the Ice online and loves it! That totally made my day!

That night Carlos and Mark had the entire Hopper Comics team, along with various friends and relatives, over to the house for a party to celebrate the company and also…my birthday!! I was very surprised and thrilled when they unveiled a cake (this was the same image on the print and buttons, as well as the BTI t-shirt) with Mick on it!

The party was a blast as we gorged on AMAZING BBQ from a place called Rudy’s. Seriously, this stuff was so good I’m about ten minutes from ordering the sauce online. In fact, I’m doing it right now!

Amber had to catch a (very!) early flight out of Austin to North Carolina on Sunday so I hung out with Carlos until my 3:00 flight. We got some Huevos Rancheros and drove around Austin. I have to say, I really like that city. Has a great vibe and atmosphere to it.

All in all, we sold some books, got some people interested in the strip and Hopper Comics in general and Staple was a success. Amber and I really enjoy these conventions and as always, getting to hang
out with Carlos and the rest of the Hopper Comics team. It’s really a great company and I’m proud and honored to be a part of it.

Next stop, Wizard World Chicago in August!