Like all creatures great and small I took a fall and found out I could bleed.

Charlotte was a blast this year.

I know Ed and Ron got a real kick out of me kneeing my cell phone into a sewer grate. I know I got a kick out of promising Kevin Mellon to never ask him to draw Indiana Jones again. I know Dawn got a kick out of watching Ron and I geek out in the back issue bins. So everyone got a kick out of Heroes Con this year. It was entirely to short a vacation.

I’m trying to get back into the swing of work again with little to no success.

Just finished the “Blade of the Immortal 10 : Secrets” by Hiroaki Samura. This is my favorite Manga out there right now. I love getting these in trade and I hope I can catch up on the story in the near future.

* Title from "Dream About Flying" by Alexi Murdoch

Saturday Comics Showdown

Another fine day at the comic con. I was able to succesfully deliver many of the comics I had planned to give away despite depositing m phone in the Charlotte City sewer system.

Today's haul was more modern but just as much fun.

Conan the Barbarian - 74, and 75
Batman - 399, 411-412, 414, 434
The Flash(59') - 264, 289, 292, 294-295, 297, 301, 304-305, 311, 314, 319-320, 331-333, 335, 337, 340, 344-48
The Flash(87') - 34, 40, 93
"Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards" by Jim Ottaviani and Big Time Attic
"Two-Fisted Science" by Jim Ottaviani and Various Artists
"Chickenhare: The house of Klaus" by Chris Grine
Chickenhare: Fire in the Hole" by Chris Grine
"The Death of Captain America" by Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting ,and Mike Perkins
"Iron Man: Demon in a Bottle" by Michelinie, Layton, and Romita Jr.
"The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier" by Alan Moore and Kevin O'neill

Ron and I will be heading out to the Fox and Hound this evening to watch the Ultimate Fighter Season Finale and then it is back to Raleigh then Silver Spring tomorrow.

Hi, this Rich's cell phone ...

Rich won't be answering his phone right now, because Rich is a dilweed.

He punted his phone down a storm drain in Charlotte.

Friday Comics Cavalcade.

Well we made it out to Heroes Con again this year.

Today was relatively uneventful. Ron got a mess of trades for half price. I found about forty issues of the flash to help fill holes in m attempt at a flash run. Just a couple hundred more issues to go ;)

Here is my Haul for today.

"Too Cool to be Forgotten" by Alex Robinson.
"Lower Regions" by Alex Robinson. - both of these are fantastic.
X-O Manowar: Retribution Trade
Judge Dredd: The Streets of Mega City
Savage Sword of Conan #1
Green Arrow - Long Bow Hunters 1 - 3
The Avengers: Kree/Skrull War Trade
The Flash(1959) #186, 199, 223, 224, 233, 244, 246, 248, 251, 252, 255, 256, 265, 266, 268, 269, 271, 272, 273, 274, 276, 278, 279, 280, 281, 283, 285, 286, 287, 288, 296, 309, 327, 334
The Flash(1987) #32

Officer Friendly's little boy's got a mohawk and he knows just where we're coming from

Round two on this post. Blogger saw fit to crap can my first effort.

Trina and I went to Wolftrap to catch a Ben Folds concert last night. Wolftrap is outdoors so my allergies are in overdrive today from my lengthy exposer to pollen yesterday. The show was great and Folds was very entertaining. The crowd was more docile than I'm used to.

Been catching up on the Hellboy Universe. I really do like that Mike Mignola fellows creations. Check it out if you are so inclined.

* Ben Folds Five - "Underground"

Silent punk rocker take a break and shut down that guitar.

So I've been trying to get rid of some books to make room for more and keep my collection to a manageable size of eight long drawer boxes. I started a thread over at the comics forums for the Comic Geek Speak podcast where I offered to give away a number of my books. Reception has been sporadic but it has lead me to find a couple of local folks who are comic fans.

I handed a 90+ issue run of SIP over to Just Bill from the Just Bill: Comic Drawer Box podcast and he thanked me on his show but mentioned that my idea and his idea of a manageable collection size are very different. He is running fifty two boxes and I'm working with eight drawer boxes, a magazine box
and one short box. That being said I thought it might be nice to present some of the space saving techniques I have and will be using to pull this off.

There are three Rules to follow.

1. Only keep the most valuable comics to you.

It is rare that more recent books increase in value any significant amount. If one of your recent buys increases in value at a rate that is disproportionate to the amount you really care about it, sell it. If it's not worth anything and you don't think you will read it again, get rid of it.

2. Never Use Backing boards unless absolutely necessary.

Most likely you don't need to board every comic you own. Boards take up a ton of space. See the rest of this post below.

Now I know what your thinking. "The boards can't take up that much space." Well let me show you just how much you can save.

Lets say you have a collection like the one below. True it is modest but in these days space is at a premium.



So now you have thirty three issues of backing boarded Detective Comics.



You take the boards out and you see a decent decrease in size of the stack.



As you can see below that stack of boards translates into about eight more comics per thirty three boards.



And you can use all the boards you take out to support your drawer box.



3. If you don't want to get rid of it and you can't find a trade, bind it.

Library Binding offers a chance to take those comics that you just can't part with and can't replace with a trade into a nice bookshelf worthy edition. I'll be using this service in the near future to bind some Dark Horse Grendel Tales Miniseries and some old Iron Empires material.

* Title from "Zero Friction" from The Presidents of the United States of America

The beer I had for breakfast wasn't bad, so I had one more for desert.

Saw this in my reader this morning. I could not help but laugh.

Mullet proof helmet. 'nuff said.