Monster Commute – a Traffic Novel

Dawna and I are in Seattle, Washington today for the Emerald City Comicon.

Seattle is actually Dawna’s hometown (Redmond, technically), so it’s always really nice to be there. I lived here in the late 80’s early 90’s, and attended Shoreline Community College for a year. (I lived in Edmonds.)

Going further back, my grandma Marty lived in Seattle prior and during World War II; she was young, single, and worked as a telephone operator.

Seattle feels like an old city to me, probably because I’ve never been to Europe or many older places back East. There’s something about the rain and the trees, the mountains and the ocean that make it feel like folks have lived her for thousands of years.

And really, I guess they have when you remember the Pacific Coastal Indian tribes that lived here for a long while. I read somewhere that they only had to spend 2 hours per day to maintain their high standard of life. The rest of the time was spent in pursuit of the arts.

This could explain why they have the most refined looking artwork of any ancient people, which is really fantastic. (Well, my opinion at least.)

The “Space Cage” is evidently the original name for the Space Needle. I’m not making this up. The restaurant was called the “Eye of the Needle” which apparently is where “Space Needle” came from. I think that “Space Cage” is more odd.

And also, this artwork is a snippet of my exclusive Emerald City Comicon print, the first one that I’ve ever been invited to do. Thanks to Brian Meridith for inviting me to do it.

- Daniel