National Cartoonist Society Canada Holiday Party

Partying with cartoonists is never dull. At least that's been my experience each time I attend the annual NCS Canada holiday party in Toronto, and each year is just more fun.



Above on left: Sandra Bell-Lundy, creator of Between Friends, a comic strip currently published in over 130 newspapers worldwide. Other fellow facing the camera is Paul Gilligan, whose Pooch Cafe appears in about 275 papers worldwide.

This year I went with our friend John Kalisz, who does work for Marvel and DC. I met John through Rand Bellavia; ironically, I see John much more often than Rand these days because of John's trips to Toronto. John's a wonderful houseguest and both Jeff and I enjoy his company and friendship. There's a non-zero possibility he may be moving to Toronto, yay!



Below: John Martz, also known as RobotJohnny. John is the President of the NCS Canadian chapter. He and Ryan North contributed a great story to the fifth volume of the Flight series called "Scenes in Which the Earth Stops Spinning."



It was great to see Patricia Storms again - she is SUCH a fun lady, bursting with energy, enthusiasm and wit. As you can tell from the photo at the top of this post, she also didn't need a microphone when she was calling out the winning raffle numbers.



Two of my three raffle tickets won prizes! I won a bag of literary goodies donated by Patricia, plus a three-DVD set of Tutenstein, an Emmy Award winning animated television series, produced by Porchlight Entertainment for Discovery Kids and based on an idea by Jay Stephens.

I didn't take that many photos at the party because I spent most of my time talking with people, but I've posted pics in my NCS Holiday Party 2008 Flickr set. Here are a few more:



Great to see Deborah and Derrick Peyton again (above). Deborah Peyton is a New Brunswick cartoonist who does custom cartoons and illustrations and is also the creator of “Day to Day“, a cartoon that appeared in newspapers throughout Eastern Canada and Florida. She has two ‘Day to Day’ collections distributed by Thomas Allen and Son Ltd. of Toronto, as well as a line of merchandise.



Really enjoyed meeting Tak Bui, a professional comic artist and editorial cartoonist. He created two popular strips, 'PC and Pixel' (daily) and 'Cheap Thrills Cuisine' (weekly), which are distributed worldwide in over 80 newspapers including The Washington Post.



Above, from L to R: Patricia Storms, Mark Askwith and John Martz. When I first saw Mark, I thought he looked very familiar and then realized where I had seen him before -- interviewing Neal Stephenson in Toronto last month! Fascinating guy; I enjoyed talking with him.

Thanks to John Martz for the invite, and thanks to Patricia Storms for getting me involved with these NCS gatherings in the first place!

If you're a cartoonist, especially one in Canada, do check out the National Cartoonist Society website if you haven't already. You can find out more about the regional chapters on this page.