Himself in an interview with comedian Lenny Henry, an event which I booked tickets for sometime, oh, TWO DAYS after my birthday.

I went. I had made my friend Stephanie read and watch Neverwhere, which she loved (the book I mean; am not sure what she thinks of the TV series), just so I could invite her, because she's one of my closest friends here. And of course

bex_x3d had to come, for myriad reasons, not the least of which is that she's a fan of Himself as well. A much more dignified fan than I am (read: fan, not fangirl).

So, it was five pounds a ticket. £5 for one of the best nights of my life.

Pics here: unfortunately not many, as we weren't actually allowed to take pics before the signing. Please note

bex_x3d and her smexy hat. Also grinning girl with plastic bag = me.

I've tried to transcribe as much of it as I can remember. Yes, I took notes while they were talking. It gave me something to do besides stare openmouthed at Himself, and calmed me down when I would have otherwise embarrassed myself with my overexcited hyena laughter. Because Himself can be very funny when he wants to, and Lenny Henry is a comedian after all (as well as a comic book geek, bless him), and together they were so funny it's a wonder none of us burst anything.

Neil was introduced first, and our applause was loud and long. Then because Lenny Henry was about to come on he made a little shushing motion with his hands, and we all shut up as if a switch had been thrown. Truly, Himself's power over his fanbase! Then when we had applauded Lenny, Neil asked who had read Anansi Boys, and explained to the ones who hadn't about the bit Lenny was about to read, which was the hangover scene with the vodka and orange.

Lenny gets to the bit where Spider says "Brother of mine, you are harshing a potential mellow here," and he does it in that lovely rich islandey accent he has on the audio book. We laugh. Then he stops, and stares at the book, and gives Himself the most incredulous, horrified stare, like "What IS this drivel you are making me read?!" or maybe "HARSHING a potential MELLOW, Mr British Writer McWriterlyPants?!" and over our howls of laughter Neil demands "What?!" as if he writes things like stoner slang ALL THE TIME.

I'm not going to post the interview until I find out whether it's been recorded. Hopefully there will be a fresh new link on Himself's blog some time tomorrow or the next week with streaming audio or something. If not, I'll put up my patchwork transcript, because he says some things there that are definitely worth saying.

Same for the Q&A; am only going to post one part of it...mine. YES, I GOT TO ASK THE LAST QUESTION ON A NEIL GAIMAN Q&A. It looked very chancy; I was waving and stretching like Hermione, and going "ohpleaseohpleaseohplease", and it looked like Lenny Henry was already moving on, but Himself's eyes lit on me for an instant and that's when

bex_x3d grabbed my hand and waved it FOR me and cried "Here! Here!" *glomps

bex_x3d* Thankyou thankyou thankyou, dear.

So I got the mike. Passing over the squeaky fluttering and going for the question. Insert laughter wherever you imagine it; I really don't remember when we stopped laughing during most of the event, to tell you the truth. ^_^
Me: I read that awesome comic you did in 24 Hour Comics about the Emperor Heliogabolous and really liked it. Would you consider doing another comic in the future which you both wrote and drew yourself?

And he looked REALLY PLEASED. *transports of ecstasy*

Himself: I'm glad you asked that, because I really liked doing it. The thing is, I don't draw comics because I usually have a Dave McKean or a [don't remember--Bryan Talbot?] or a P Craig Russell to draw them for me. I really like drawing [Me: (squeaky) Me too!], and I'd do lots of little sketches, but I wasn't exactly...I mean...(meaningful waving)...hard choice, isn't it? Do I draw this myself, or get P Craig Russell to do it? The thing with the 24 hour thing is that here were all my friends who were amazing artists, and suddenly people like Scott McCloud were doing these 24 hour comics, 24 pages in 24 hours, and they were just as bad as my drawings. I didn't really finish mine though, because I started doing one, and did it with nine of these little sort of Watchmen panels on every page, and then I noticed other people were on page 23 while I was only on page 14. So I stopped before I did all the 24 pages. But yes, I'd really like to do another one, and I think I will.

He stopped at that bit and then said: "Speaking of P Craig Russell though, I will tell you this, and you're all the first to hear this: we're working on a new project. He's going to draw Coraline."

And then I went "OMG EEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" practically into the microphone. Not loud, just...public. I SQUEAKED into a MICROPHONE in front of NEIL GAIMAN AND THE BRITISH PUBLIC. *crawls into hole and hides* They laughed their asses off. Oh God. I am all of six years old. They should have taken that mike off me as soon as Himself started to speak. I should have gotten rid of it. AGH.

Of course we queued for the signing. Steph bought Anansi Boys and wanted him to sign it, and

bex_x3d wanted a picture. They were so sweet and let me go first. As I handed Himself my journal he said "Oh, hello again. Where are you from?" I said "The Philippines," and he said, "I thought so," and smiled at me.

Of course I brought him a card and a present. You can see a pic of the present here. It's one of my favorite artworks, one of the few I'm REALLY proud of. It was in a plastic bag (seen in photos) and I thought he wouldn't open it, but he took it out right there.

AND HE LOVED IT. He said "Wow! This is so cool! Did you do this yourself?" and when I admitted that I did, he said, "Filipinos are just so cool." He wondered if he could get it home without damaging it, and I pointed out that the Sculpey I'd used was hard to chip, and I'd used an industrial wood box and strong PVA plus Superglue.

AND THEN! AND THEN! AND THEN he said, "I think this merits a hug and a kiss," and stood and leaned over the table and hugged me into his leather jacket and kissed me on the cheek.

NEIL GAIMAN KISSED ME!!!