In fact, sometimes when I look at something my memory does work. I remember the panel where Alex Toth told me, "Mike, if you really don't understand all that, you don't need to put it on there."

I like to think that I gave Jack Warner Brothers inking and Joe Sinnott gave him MGM inking. If you're not as in love with old movies as I am you might not make that connection, but I can see that connection.

I've been very lucky with the people I've met over the years. Way back in the early '70s I went to [Phil] Seuling's conventions for something like three years in a row from '70 to '72 and I remember at the '72 luncheon with the Academy of Comic Book Artists and talking with John Romita about the kind of brushes he used. Pros ask pros the same questions that fans do. "What kind of pens do you use? What kind of brushes do you use?" I was so amazed that the wonderful work John Romita was doing was accomplished with a Windsor-Newton series 7 Number 4. Not a 2 or a 3, but a 4.

I'm finding that everything sells. I've been toying with the fact that I have this big giant glass jar with the metal screw lid on it that's full of ribbons and memorabilia from conventions and stuff. I've got buttons and I have all of my Walt Disney Mickey Mouse credit cards. I'm wondering in my old age if anyone would pay for a credit card with Mickey Mouse on it issued to me. I wonder if anyone would pay anything for that?

I was with Roy Thomas on a panel and he turned to me and said, "You know, your name is on the cover a magazine every month." I said, "Really?" He pulled out a copy of "Destroyer," and said, "If you cover up the DEST you've got Royer on the cover every month."

I did get a nice compliment from Ramona Fradon a few years ago.She was talking about the one and only Plastic Man comic that I inked for her for DC and she said it was the only time that she'd ever had anyone ink her. Everyone else put in their own personality and changed it. In fact, bless her heart, she said if she were still doing Brenda Starr, she'd have me ink it.

I learned early Jack Kirby favorite movies were the Warner Brothers from the '30s. When you look at Jack Kirby's comic books, or at least when I do, I can make an instant connection. When he said he loved those movies it was like, "Of course."