Life In The FORTHELOVEOFGODSLOWDOWN Lane

Do you recall how I said 2012 was my best year ever? Well, 2013 already looks to be giving that a run for its money.

Last week, I accepted an offer for my house. You know, the one I put up for sale back in September? For the next month or so, I'm going to be really busy getting that finalized and moving 300-ish miles away to the Chicago area. That is, I'll be moving up there after I find and buy a house up there. One of the nice things about getting my house ready for sale, though, is that I've already packed and moved a lot of the little stuff already. All my comics and action figures and all that are already in a storage unit up in Chicago, so most of what I have to contend with are clothes and furniture. (And probably a zillion other things I've forgotten about. But at least it's not a zillion and one things!)

As you may know, this is part of my grand plan.

• I get to live with the S.O.
• I get a more flexible work arrangement with my FT employer, so I don't have to go into an office every day.
• I'll be in an area that's less restrictive and less restricting in its acceptance of others.
• I'll be in an area with a more active comic book community.
• I'll be able to put together my actual comics library to better facilitate my research and writing.

Speaking of which, I've already got some new writing projects lined up for 2013. I've been doing a tad more writing for MTV Geek beyond my current Kleefeld on Webcomics column. Mostly just some one-off articles so far, but those will be increasing in number as the year goes on. (Well, once I get this house thing settled.) And I might be doing some convention coverage, too -- we'll see on that. What's more, I'm going to have a brand new column starting up in a few weeks! Totally different from my webcomics one, but it should still be fun and interesting. More on that as we get closer to launch.

I'm also going to be providing one of the essays in an upcoming book entitled The Ages of the Avengers: Essays on Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in Changing Times edited by Joseph J. Darowski. He did a similar book on Superman early last year, but this one obviously will be focused on Marvel's big team. My essay in particular will be an examination of Avengers Forever. I don't have a complete timeline yet, but I wouldn't expect to see this before mid-2014 at the earliest, but I need to start writing my portion soon.

Plus, I'm aiming to run the Chicago Marathon in October. Registration opens next week; while it's not as nuts as trying to get Comic-Con passes, it fills up pretty quickly, so we'll see if I can get signed up for that.

So that's what's going on in Casa de Kleefeld right now. I mention this partly to start drumming up interest in the comics projects I've got lined up, but also to apologize in advance if I miss a day or two of blogging over the next month or so. I'll be busy, of course, but I think the greater issue will be in trying to avoid my brain going in 12 different directions at once. I don't doubt the house thing will eat up a lot of my brain capacity (it already has!) but I'll try to make sure I have some time set aside for at least some comics commentary.

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