Rory Root, proprietor of the best comic store ever, has died. The Bay Area may be a little less cool already; it’s sadder for sure.

Rory always seemed like an eternal Berkeley deity to me, because Comic Relief was the first thing I ever saw in Berkeley... and also because he just was kind of the way you’d expect an eternal Berkeley deity would be, just a big sloppy jolly presence. He did a lot to create a small-press comics scene around here that shares in the same spirit. I never really got to know him, although I found out recently that he was a friend of some non-comics friends of mine—small world this is. Bye.

(more about Rory here and here)