It's frustrating that so much fundraising is necessary -- unfortunately, it is. A retailer in Texas, convicted of selling an adult manga comic to an adult cop, was refused leave to appeal to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals last week. We're going to try to take it to the Supreme Court, although there's no guarantee they'll take the case. (The Supreme Court didn't take the Mike Diana case, although it was the first time in history that an American artist had been found guilty of obscenity for his or her own work.) You can read more about it at the cbldf site, here.
(On Monday night I was presented with an amazing early birthday present -- a huge, gorgeous, almost abstract until-you-see-it-from-far-enough-away Sandman quilt, the kind you could spread on a huge bed or hang on a wall, with the suggestion that I might want to donate it to the CBLDF from me and from the artist, Michelle Hyman. Which I shall. Although if the bids aren't high enough, I'll happily bid for it myself. It's lovely.)
The best birthday present of all though was the one I was given at the weekend. And I'll try to remember to tell you all what that was on Sunday, which is my birthday. (I'll be 42, an age which, even without the Douglas Adams connections, sounds astonishingly adult.)