My brother is set to return from art school in Arizona in the coming month. He'll be here for only a week, but we've got all manner of mad plans to carry out. He's supposed to be bringing the pencilled pages of our first comic book for editorial approval (I guess I'm co-editor as well as writer).
In an event that occurred last month, yet my buzz over it is just now fading, my best buddy and I went up to a hole-in-the-wall comics convention in Toms River, NJ. It was just a half-dozen dealers set up in a VFW hall, but we made out like frickin' bandits. I ended up with Star Trek #1 (DC second series from 1989) for only $5: I was willing to pay the $8 on the sticker, but the dealer actually bargained me down to $5! I also snagged Star Trek: The Next Generation #1 for another $5, and the biggest prize of all, a stack of old back-issues bigger than my head, including Marvel's The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones #1 & #2, for only 50 cents each! I'm now 50-75% of the way towards having a complete run of the Star Trek, Star Trek: TNG, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, and Spelljammer comics from DC; and I found a handful of near-impossible-to-find Alien Legion issues from Epic. After this mighty looting-and-pillaging session, we sought cold drinks, and I found a place called the Java Joint that makes the most astonishing frozen Chai. Not just Chai with ice cubes in it, but more like a Chai-flavored smoothie. Tea, spice, milk, and ice in perfect four-part harmony. To top it off, as a mightily satisfying lunch is settling and we sit wondering what other treasure troves we might hit on the way home, two absolutely gorgeous young women sit at the table opposite us, repeatedly slipping their flip-flop sandals on and off.
More 50-cent comics than I can carry in both hands, the best frozen Chai in New Jersey, and the first painted toes of Spring on display. Aahh, yes, a most excellent day.
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