today i got a big envelope of zines from pander zine distro and realized that it's been about two years since i read a zine that wasn't sent to me in the mail. i've been making and reading zines for ten years (!), but have been seriously out of it since i left boston in 2002. basically the only zines i've read are by friends or people who traded with me for my zines.

since the beginning of the year, i've been helping ericka out at pander sending emails about ordering and reordering zines for the distro and slowly realizing at the same time that i don't know half of the people and zines she deals with now.

the zine world has certainly changed in more than just what's out there. when i was a youngster (the old lady starts…), it was all dollar bills sent in the mail, usually in response to the ever-present zine reviews in the back of pretty much every zine that was made back then (not always true now). distros were all paper catalogs with out-of-stock items crossed out by hand. these days you can visit a site like pander and order online and receive an envelope in a matter of days. ah, technology!

a couple of the zines i got this time were by old school zinesters, returning to self-publishing after years of distance from it. maybe it will inspire me to return to the world of the per(sonal)(fan)zine with a cute title and numbered issues. the decoding treat of the shortest distance between two points isn't quite the same thing.