"Spring Has FINALLY Sprung"

With Spring here (at last) I've finally got some people coming by to do some work on this house; things that had I the knowledge to repair, would have already been done.

For one thing, this back roof over my kitchen and pantry area. A location over the sink in two places has been dripping this past Winter: One over the mat in front of the sink, and the other above where the cabinets are attached. With the fear that it might destroy this plaster and cause not only parts of the ceiling to come down but perhaps an entire cabinet area as well, I knew that this was the main concern, i.e., keeping a roof over my head.

I've had two different repair people look at it and give estimates. I believe we're going with the one man who did the shingling and gutter/flashing repair of a couple of years ago when we had a terrible hail storm and wrecked much havok to this old place. He's reliable and does good, quick repair work. We contacted our insurance people and lo' an' behold, they may even pay for said repair which would leave us more money available to pursue having the interior paneling in the ceiling replaced in our entranceway, dining room and bathroom.

Yet another person is coming by early tomorrow to finish putting an extension up from our sewer cleanout valve outside, plus to fix our washing machine so we don't have to tote several heavy loads elsewhere just to wash and then bring back here for the drying.

Things are...finally...coming along.


Looks like I've completed another DC set from the 1980's. 1986-87, to be exact, as I've won a full run of 'Mazing Man 1-12 & Specials 1-3, and from another seller, won the "'Mazing Man Poster" complete with the letter of apology from DC Comics due to its delay in shipping. Other sets from the 1980's DC lineup I'll continue to work on will be Captain Atom, The Question, Suicide Squad, Secret Origins, Jonah Hex, HEX, All-Star Squadron, and then perhaps Young All-Stars.

The local flea market is now in full swing and tomorrow (as well as Easter Sunday) I'm off work. With a fair-weather day in the forecast I plan to go to the flea market as early as I can, then stop by a place that I know has many modern comics for sale. I've checked my "lists" and know that this place has at least one comic I need in a set, and probably more, but last time I was there I just guessed at what I actually had,so this time I'll take my inventory list just to make sure I don't end up buying several needless "dups".

Although I was just off work last Tuesday, the rest of this week has been very hard and hectic at work. Yesterday I was called "next door" to the wholesale department to help check out a customer and it took literally 2 full hours. This buyer had probably 20 grocery baskets full of merchandise, plus 5 flatbeds crammed full of tools and the like. I personally checked out ALL of the flatbeds as well as well as 6 or so full baskets. This is not to mention a good 5 pages of tools I had to order and put out/price over in the retail section.

Then today I had yet another good three pages, mostly of new merchandise to order, plus restock, plus getting odds and ends such as cash register paper, charge machine paper, invoices, going to the bank for our change fund,answering a telephone so many times I was ready to take a sledge hammer to it, etc., etc., and loads of customers out due to the pretty weather, Easter and Spring breaks from schools. Par usual, we only had two people working (including myself), and the other person was ordering merchandise all day for the other part of retail. It was a fight between waiting on customers, ringing them up, pricing and stocking all day long.

If all goes well I plan on taking my vacation this year during the week of May 3rd. so I can be sure to be off when the "Free Comic Book Day" happens at my regular comic book shop. Guess I need to start saving up now since they usually have some percentage off their back issues as well.