This weekend was another one that was fun and fundamental, meaning that it was again full of all kinds of good natured fun and lots of reading. Of course, I really had to stay with my standard persona of all or nothing, and this weekend, from a partying and bizarre times standpoint at least, was definitely on the nothing side. But man, it was freaking awesome. What went down?
- GCI vs. the Biz Bee
- Being asked to be interviewed in a piece about cougars (not even joking)
- Catching City of Ember (not bad overall, but definitely didn't follow the book and had some ridiculously hokey CGI and an incessant need to speed through details, or ignore them entirely)
- Organizing my comic collection with my sister and mom
- Dinner with parents, sister, and two nieces
- Getting wiped out at scrabble
- Coffee discussions with dad and sister
- Finishing Warren Ellis' Crooked Little Vein
- Seeing the Rays make the World Series
It was definitely heavy on getting things done, but doing those things were a lot of fun. The highlight for the weekend?
"What in gods name did we get ourselves in to?"Somehow I coerced my sister and mom into helping me organize my comic collection. Note to all: I'm a comic freak. There are probably comic stores out there that have less than me. Negotiating all of these comics to fit into the boxes I had, splitting up the series and then organizing them numerically, and managing to do that in one day was a Herculean effort (Greek god or comic character, you decide) by all of us, and it was strangely therapeutic and incredibly fun in the midst of the torturous aspect.
Nearly done, about to die
By torturous, I of course am referring to the fact that I woke up this morning actually feeling sore from the experience. Sore. From moving comic book from box to box. Good lord. I am the world's biggest pansy.
Of course, most of the heavy lifting was done by my mom and sister, as I spent most of the time clarifying and finding old gems in my collection for me to read later (Examples of statements from me: "No, that is not a comic version of a soap opera." "The Initiative is not a comic. Avengers: The Initiative is, the other is just a branding Marvel used because of the after effects of Civil War. Why are you looking at me like that?" "It's okay that I read Spider Man Loves Mary Jane, I swear."). Thanks so much for the help, and I'm sure the both of you can hardly wait for next year when we do it again. Hopefully that won't have to happen, as theoretically I should be able to just organize as I go and not have to worry about any more all day affairs.
Oh who am I kidding. Of course I won't do that and we'll just have to do it again. But man, they sure look nice now! One unnecessary side effect is I believe my family thinks I'm either crazy or horribly addicted (little of both more than likely) but that's okay. They seem understanding of it at least. Everyone has their little thing. Mine just happens to be a 15 book a week comic diet.
6 comments:
Enjoyed having the weekend with you even though it was WORK!!
I had fun! It's amazing how many comic book titles I have bouncing around in my brain now. I thought it was a great bonding experience. Looks like you may have hooked Emily. :o)
All those boxes remind me of why I switched to trades only...although there is something exciting about flipping through a long box and looking at each individual issue.
Long boxes are such a pain to deal with, and so are individual issues once you are done with them. Trade waiting really is the ideal way to go, but sadly I don't have the patience to do it.
Also, the pure blast of nostalgia I feel every time I go through an individual comic, no matter how many I read, is worth it by itself.
It was definitely a blast going through all of my old comics. Nothing like seeing all of the old "What If's" and "Transformers" comics. Plus, I was reminded of the horrible time in comics (the 90's) when nearly every comic had some gimmick (3D! Foil! Holograms!). It was entertaining...and a little sad.
Yeah, the nostalgia of reading those old singles was a truly awesome experience. I can remember specific moments in my life that coincided with certain issues of G.I. Joe and West Coast Avengers. Even being able to look through at the comic book store ads and see what the "hot" comics were at the time is a great reminder of my youth.
And I remember being so sure that issues 6 and 7 of Punisher War Journal were going to make me rich someday.
Also -- Ugh, 90's comics. The last I truly collected singles was near the end of the 90's "boom". I had 5 copies of X-Men #1, too many polybagged X-cutioner Song crossover issues, all sorts of holographic, die-cut, and gatefold crap. And Deathmate. And Spawn. And Turok. I wasn't even reading any of the good comics that were coming out at the time. It's amazing I ever got back into comics again after that crap.
I think reading the crap made you stronger as a comic fan :)
It's weird how a combination of Image and Valiant nearly ruined the industry, with their ridiculous amounts of foil covers and variants up the ying yang. Looking back at my favorite comics from when I was younger (mostly Gen13) I think to myself "wow, what was wrong with me?!"
One of the comics I pulled out to read was this one I read all the time when I was younger - West Coast Avengers Annual #2. It has the West Coast vs. the East Coast in a Baseball game, and then a showdown in the realm of death between the two teams after the Collector kills all of the East coast team. That issue pretty much blows my mind. So awesome.
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