Updated: Comic Fans In Need: Donate to Help Carla and Lance Hoffman

Update: There's an update over at the http://blog.newsarama.com/2008/11/29/info-on-carla-and-lance-and-some-auctions-to-help-them-out/ and more information here.

A few weeks ago, the fires in Montecito, California took the home, possessions and nearly the lives of Carla and Lance Hoffman. The couple is currently in critical condition and news reports indicated that theirs were the most serve injuries as result of this particular fire. This story is well known and documented well here and here. On the off chance that you didn't hear about it, please consider donating to the Lance and Carla Fund at this address:

The Lance and Carla Burn Fund

Santa Barbara Bank and Trust

1483 East Valley Road

Montecito, CA 93108-1248

We were able to make our donation last week and even persuaded a coworker at the place that pays the bills and our mother to pony up as well. Every little bit helps.

We had hoped to blog about it a while back, but we have a personal connection here and sometimes it's hard to verbalize when the personal is involved. We know Carla and wish her and her husband Lance speedy recoveries. Although we do not know Lance, we are sure that if Carla chose to spend her life with him that he's a stand-up guy.

Carla is a manager at Metro Entertainment in Santa Barbara, CA, which just happened to be our local comic book shop for 2 years before we headed out to the desert. Metro is the friendliest and most helpful local comic book shop that we've ever encountered. In fact, nearly 2 years later we are still receiving most of our books via mail order from Metro. One of the reasons we like Metro so much was that Carla was ever-helpful, constantly offering suggestions on great books to read. Sometimes we agreed on this storyline or that, and other times we disagreed. But it was always entertaining chatting with Carla. If I recall correctly, we agreed that Cable and Deadpool was best on the pages without Cable. Little things like that add flavor to memories. The last time we saw Carla was about 6 months ago.

We wish a speedy recovery for Carla and Lance and the return of some semblance of normal as soon as possible. We hope you will consider helping them get on their feet. Metro is also accepting donations for the couple if you happen to be in town.