"Post No. 724"

Been helping my wife get some crafts together for her next show. Today I cut out seven yard ornaments, painted same and nailed stakes to them. Punpkins and black cats mostly; Halloween stuff. We only have two holidays that yard stake ornaments do well, Halloween and Christmas, so if we don't have any for those our opportunity is missed until the next year.


Also got up on the roof and calked every place I could possibly see that I thought rain might be able to blow in as I still haven't been able to completely stop a leak in our entranceway. It's still coming in between the glass in a side window and until I can get that fixed, repairing the ceiling would be redundant.

And too, early this morning I took my mom to get her flu shot and around to a couple other places for items she needed, so I've had a full day.

Still need to mow the yard and that's slated for tomorrow. Always "something" to keep me busy.

I got in a couple of lots of misc. comics that I'd won on different auctions; mostly 2000-2010 stuff, most of which were Marvel, and most of those various titles of The Avengers. Several of these Marvel comics were the "Secret Invasion" x-overs, some of which were interesting and others sorta "blah". The issues I got of the Mighty Avengers" were nice as each had a homage cover of some vintage Marvel comic, like the cover of Tales to Astonish 27, Strange Tales 135, etc.

There was an issue of The Astonishing X-men #28, which I figured I'd really like as it was written by Warren Ellis, but I found it nearly uncomprehendable. I'd read his hero-type books before and I thought them okay, but really I think Mr. Ellis does much, much better with non-mainstream subjects. (The artwork in that issue was pretty ... well, I just didn't care for it.)

I discovered two didferent Beatles app.'s or mentions in this lot (already have them listed in my "Beatles & Bizarros" blog listings).

The Ultimate Avengers 1-3 were interesting with some pretty decent artwork, but I really can't say I care much for the ultimate version of "The Red Skull". A couple of the better more modern Marvels in this lot were Spider-woman (2009) #1, and Web of Spider-man (2010) #2. The latter featured a new version of the origin of the villian, "Electro", with a few original Steve Ditko panels reprinted from Amazing Spider-man #9 (1964), and a pretty funny "J.Jonah Jameson" backup story.

The funniest was the M.O.D.O.K. Reign-Delay One-Shot #1 from 2009, by Ryan Dunlavey. It just shows me that at least someone at Marvel still has the intelligence to publish an oddball humor book from time-to-time.

The DC's in these lots included copies of the current Jonah Hex series (#'s 35 & 36). 35 I liked, 36 I can't say I did. The issues of the current titles of Secret Six (15-17) and Suicide Squad (67) were all excellant. The issues of Justice Society (31 & 32) were only "so-so".

Thus far of the approx. 80 comics I got in I've read something like 60 of them. I still have 15 or so various Image titles and a small handful from companies such as Archaia and DDP to digest in these lots.

"Post No. 723"

Took my mother over to the foot doctor today and stopped by Wallyworld for her to buy a new battery pack for her telephone and myself a new pair of shoes. Unfortunately, they didn't have the battery pack she needed, and I couldn't find a pair of shoes in my size (10-1/2 "Wide") to suit me, so that was pretty much a wasted stop. I did notice that in the kids department they had a pretty neat t-shirt that reproduced the cover to Justice League (silver-age series) #52. I "think" the largest size of that might have fit me, so maybe next time I'm there and feel like spending 7 bucks on it.


We did stop of McDonald's on the way home as it was well past lunch time and we both were feeling some hunger pains. I bought the only two remaining "Batman The Brave & The Bold" Happy Meal toys they still had in stock, which was a version of the current DC "Blue Beetle" (with flapping-wing action, and a retro-looking "Green Arrow" (that's supposed to shoot either a "boxing-glove" arrow or a reg. one, but I never could get those toys to work right). Others in that set include an Aquaman that throws a "ball of water", a "Black Manta" submarine that shoots a missile, "Plastic man" whose enlarged hand and hammer-like other one swings back-and-forth, a "Batman" that throws baterangs, a "Batmobile" with pull-back action and splits in half to reveal another vehicle inside, and "The Joker" that squirts water from his laple. The last three I'd probably like to have of that set just to add them to my "Bat-Stuff" collection.

Won a couple comic book lots that have yet to arrive. One has 26 misc. issues of The Avengers (post 2000 issues), and the other's a hodgepodge of 50+ Marvel & DC's mostly from 2002-2006 which included The Avengers, New Avengers, Mighty Avengers, Fantastic Four, Jonah Hex and The Invincible. So, a lotta reading ahead for me.

Finished mowing my front yard yesterday which included raking up leaves as well and mulching them. Autumn is only a week away, then it'll be Halloween, then Thanksgiving, then Christmas and finally 2011. As usual, the year's flown right on by.

"Post No. 722"

Always Something Dept: My wife and I started over to Glasgow, KY. today to Wal-Mart to pick me up a much needed new pair of shoes and stopped at Minit Mart along the way (about 5 miles from here), got some breakfast and ate that in the car before going on, and when we started back on our way, the brake light came on. I had just checked over the car before we started and even added a little brake fluid to it as it looked somewhat low, but upon rechecking the master cylinder, it was dry! I added some more and got under the car to look and told her to press on the brakes and it was squiring out underneath the back of the car. So, we cancelled that trip and drove it back home very slowly. Upon getting it back to our drive I got underneath it again and looked with a bright flashlight and saw that the rear right line had rusted almost in two. If we'd not stopped at MMt and went on to Glasgow, we'd never made it to Wallyworld (or had to maybe pay for a tow back home). Now I'll have to get it to a mechanic to have that fixed (another not needed expense for us these days), plus my wife will have to give me a ride to work tomorrow as I'm not off again until Tuesday and it'll be at least then when I can get it to the mechanic. On top of this, my mom has a doctor's appointment in Glasgow come this Wednesday. Always something.


Actually it "could" have gone out even earlier on me today as I took my mother to church then went by the flea markets about an hour before. So I suppose either something looks after fools like me, or ...

Anyway, I found a DVD copy of "Superman IV: The Quest for Peace" today at the flea market, so now all I need having a set of the Christopher Reeve flicks is Superman 3. There were a few scenes in this flick that has always bothered be. For one thing, Superman rebuilds The Great Wall of China" w/a power he's not supposed to have, i.e., some sort of super-mental-vision ability, and another scene where he mentally levites some people back safely to the ground, and yet, another thing, was when the solar-powered villian "clawed" Supes, it harmed him. Now...isn't Supes' powers supposed to be derived from solar power? Looks like that would have strengthened him instead? (Oh well...maybe the villian was actually "draining" Suspes' energy instead.) Then there's the scenes of "dust" falling on the moon, when it'd probably have floated upward into the atmosphere and "noise" during the lunar battle, and finally the scene where the super-villian takes Mariel Hemingway into outer space and she "okay"! Oh well, even with the flaws it's a pretty decent flick. Ironically, there's a scene where the solar-powered super villian tosses the State of Liberty towards a city street right past a shot of "the twin towers".

Then one dealer had these unopened full boxes of "Desert Storm" cards from the 1990's. The boxes had gotten damp from getting caught in a down pour yesterday, but I knew all of the cards were alright as they were wax packs all sealed. He told me he'd take $1.00 a box on them, so I snatched one up, and then he told me to take two for a buck as he was trying to get rid of them, so I got an unopened full box of the "pro" DS cards as well. "2 for a Buck"! Luv dem deals!

Otherwise I got in a lot of a couple dozen comics from an auction win. Nothing "special" in the lot, but some good reading material.

There was a DC Blackhawk #219 from 1966 with "Go-Go Checks" cover. Silly ass story though about Andre's South American cousin wanting to be a BH. 'Bout half way racist, actually, or either a good case for closing the Arizona border.

Then there was a Dell issue of T.H.E. Cat #2 (1967) w/a Frank Loggia photo cover. Stiny artwork, but neat cover. A Gold Key Space Family Robinson #17 (1966) with a "painted-type" cover and Dan Spiegle art. I always enjoyed that title and bought it from issue #1 right off the racks before the "Lost In Space" t.v. show ever debuted. They had some great covers, especially.

There was a Gold Key Doctor Solar #25 (1968), which reminded me of something I'd forgotten; Ernie Colan had drawn some issues (yep! Same guy that did "Richie Rich", "Arak" and "Amethyst"). And a King Comics' Mandrake the Magician #7 (1967), with only so-so artwork and a "Brick Bradford"secondary feature, but this issue had the origin of Mandrake's side-kick, "Lothar".

My favorites from the lot were copies of Megaton Comics' Wildman #'s 1 & 2 with Richard "Grass" Green artwork, and were the only two issues Magaton published (altho' it was continued by another company up to #5). Grass Green was one of my favorite of what I considered semi-professional fan artists of the 1960's, first seeing his artwork in a fanzine called Star-Studded Comics published by a fan group called The Texas Trio. Other well-known fans from that time appearing in these issues are Ronn Foss and Howard Keltner, so this was pretty much an old school first-fan project. The back-up feature in issue #2 of WM was "Xal-Kor, The Human Cat", which is probably more remembered than Wildman ("aaannnnnddd Rubberboy!")

The rest of this lot consisted of Shi: Through the Ashes (a 9/11 Tribute comic published by Crusade Comics and with Billy Tucci artwork, shown on this blog just yesterday), a Marvel-UK issue of Warheads #3 w/a "Iron Man" app., a Marvel Doctror Strange #16 with Guise artwork and an app. of our fave odd-guy, "Brother Voodoo",a Marvel Defenders #54 w/ Giffen - Mike Golden artwork, a DC Who's Who: Impact Comics (magazine-size), and some lesser stuff I wanted to read and a few dup's or just junk to me books that ended up in my yard sale quarter boxes.

"Post No. 721"

The years do not dim the memory.