It’s been a solid year since Howard Days 2023 came and went. However, Howard Days 2024 is still over a month in the future. I promised Ken Lizzi and Brian Murphy a year ago that I would do a blog entry on my share of the trip, so I’ve still got a little bit of leeway. Speaking of those two worthies, they both typed up posts regarding their 2023 Cross Plains sojourn in a timely fashion. You can find those here and here. Most of the photos in this post were ‘borrowed’ from their blog entries, by the way. Mucho gratitude for that.

In the service of full disclosure, I'll state right now that I always intended Howard Days 2022 to be my last for the foreseeable future. I attended my first Howard Days in 2006--the REH centennial. After that, 2007, 2010 and 2013. I went to Howard Days 2022 in memory of my friend, Chris Hale, who never made it to Howard Days 2021. I told Brian Murphy at the time--2022--that he should make the trip since he was up for an award--which he won--and because it might be the only time we might ever get to hang out beyond the Matrix. Brian couldn't make it and that was that.

Enter Ken Lizzi.

Ken knew me from social media. He contacted me last September asking about Howard Days since he had just moved to Texas. I told him to make the pilgrimage sooner than later--the same thing I'd told Murphy the year before. By the end of the month, Ken had rented a hunting lodge/bungalow between Cisco and Cross Plains. He quoted an absurdly low price if I wanted to share the rent.

Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in, as Michael Corleone would say.

I asked if there was room for Brian Murphy. Ken said, "Sure."

Iacta alea.

So, Brian was in--he has said more than once that Ken's offer sealed the deal. I then called my old buddy from high school, Jimmy Jarman. Since he'd moved to Nashville five-plus years ago, I hadn't seen him. In 1990, Jimbo recruited me as his first employee for his comics/gaming store in Muskogee, Asylum Comics. As he'll freely admit, I did a lot to get the store off the ground, but after a year, I had enough money for college and headed back to Kansas. Meanwhile, Jimmy moved his operation to Tulsa, eventually running five stores--renamed "Wizard's Asylum Comics" for obscure legal reasons--in the early '90s until the comics implosion hit. He rode that out mostly due to the Magic: The Gathering card game explosion. He ended up becoming a world-class MTG player, winning several US tournaments and playing in Europe twice.

Also, it should be noted, Jimmy graciously agreed to road-trip to the 2006 World Fantasy Convention in Austin--which was devoted to Robert E. Howard--for his birthday weekend as a special favor to me. That, right there, is more REH cred than most people will ever have.

I got hold of Jimmy. As fate would have it, he and his beautiful and gracious wife were embarking from Houston the Sunday of the HD weekend on a Caribbean cruise. It was decided that they would stay in Abilene. The missus would shop and Jimmy would spend most of that Friday and Saturday at Howard Days, returning to Abilene both nights.

So, three Howard Days newbies, all lined up to enrich the economy of Cross Plains.

Meanwhile, Brian and I were talking on the phone just about every weekend. As I recall, Brian asked me about the possibility of a panel at Howard Days where we could discuss the rebirth of S&S in the 21st century. I told him that if we were to do so, that we would have to have Jason Waltz on the panel as well. I knew for sure Jason would be there, since Hither Came Conan was debuting. Jason, as much as anyone, spanned the early days of the sword-and-sorcery resurgence in the 2000s right up until now.

I also knew that Jason was shifting from working mainly as a publisher at Rogue Blades Entertainment to focusing on writing his own S&S tales. As a member of the impromptu panel, he could tell the story of it all in a fitting and much-deserved swan song. It just seemed natural to include Ken, since he was actually part of the current S&S revival, publishing his own S&S novels, as well as being published by major venues like Tales from the Magician's Skull. He could report from the trenches, so to speak. Thus, the stage was set for Howard Days 2023.

Brian Murphy picked me up at my sister's house north of Fort Worth about 10 a.m. on the 27th of April, Thursday morning. We headed south-west on the main highway, which is the quickest route from the Metroplex to Cross Plains. I requested a stop at the Dairy Queen in Ranger.

This was for several reasons. Dairy Queen has been huge in Texas for almost a century. REH worked in a drug store/malt shop and served plenty of ice cream and loved ice cream himself. There is a Dairy Queen in Cross Plains; the only major fast food franchise in the town. One of my favorite uncles secured the Texan Dairy Queen advertising account--a very big deal--back in the early '80s and held onto it for over a decade. Finally--and most personal to me--that particular Dairy Queen was the meet-up spot where I caught a ride to Howard Days 2013 from my bud Al Harron and his wonderful family. A truly fun Howard Days.

I told Brian that since he was in Texas, he had to stop at a Dairy Queen--and that I was buying. He ordered an ice cream cone. I indulged in a decadent Peanut Buster Parfait, which delicacy I hadn't savored in about a decade. I told 'im: "Now you're in Texas."

We rocked on down the highway--talking REH, sword-and-sorcery and heavy metal--eventually reaching the outskirts of Cisco. There we met Ken Lizzi. I seem to recall some complications due to poor cell coverage. We followed Ken southwards toward Cross Plains, but then he turned off into the post oaks, red dirt and sand roughs of darkest Central Texas.

Down a lonely, serpent-haunted, cactus-fringed backwoods lane, we finally reached "The Hideaway". That's what it was called. A low-slung bungalow amid the post oaks with a pasture full of Texan beef on one side. It was supplied with sufficient amenities to be comfortable without any hint of luxury or decadence. A perfectly good hunting lodge.

We contacted the estimable John Bullard, Esq. Mr. Bullard is one of the foremost of those selfless madmen who keep the Robert E. Howard Foundation train on the tracks, year in, year out. He suggested we all meet at Red Gap Brewery in Cisco--a brew pub of note where our mutual friend, Keith West, would rendezvous with the rest of us.

Upon reaching Red Gap, I was astounded to see Chris Gruber and Tim Arney. Both are Howard fans/scholars of note, both are former members of REHupa and I had no idea either of them were within five hundred miles of Cross Plains. Apparently, it was a spur of the moment thing. We chatted--mostly about the Thurian Age, as I recall--and agreed to meet up later that night or the next morning.

Parting ways, I headed upstairs to where my crew were sampling the Red Gap's wares. There was Keith West. I first met Keith at Howard Days 2013--just as I had met John Bullard--and it was great to see him again. The conversation ranged--as I recall--from REH to Edgar Rice Burroughs and Edmond Hamilton. The kind of conversation one so rarely has in real life. Me, anyway. Something to treasure.

Eventually, we decided to head down to Muddy Mike's Bar & Grill for supper. Great place. Cool atmosphere and good staff. Our waitress was a sassy young blonde who was getting ready to attend diesel mechanic school. More power to her. I got the smoked brisket pizza. That is something that could go totally wrong, but it was great. Of course, pizza is possibly the greatest flavor-platform in all of world cuisine.

Cisco impressed me. Before 2023, it had always been the place where I turned left to head toward Cross Plains. Having spent a little bit of time there, I would recommend it as the place to use as home base when attending Howard Days. A nice little town that punches above its weight, quality-wise. I'd always done Brownwood before, but I'm now Team Cisco.

Being a year or more ago, it's hard to always nail down what happened when. That said, I think we watched Master and Commander at the Hideaway that Thursday night. We had a good selection of movies to stream and that won out. Ken--being the one who rented the place--held the moral high ground on movie selection, but neither Brian nor myself had any problem with that choice. Ken is a big Patrick O'Brian fan and I'm a fan as well. Brian is a fan of the movie, so there wasn't much argument.

In my opinion, M&C is one of the most manly/masculine movies of the last two decades. While there are a few women incidentally in the film, the vast majority of the movie is concerned with men whose ultimate job in life is to kill other men under the most hellish circumstances. Technologically and culturally, Captain Jack and his crew are far closer to Conan at the helm of a caravel with Barachans and their signal-rockets than they are to Post-Modern proto-cyborgs like ourselves.

Ken, Brian and myself had a great time watching Aubrey and his crew beat the odds for king, country and plunder. All of us then lamented that there was never a sequel and that such a sequel is absolutely impossible in the present Hollywood climate.

Everyone then went to their respective rooms and collapsed into exhausted slumber. The preliminaries were over. The official forty-eight hours of Howard Days 2023 lay ahead.

Part Two can be found here.