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Post by The Captain on May 29, 2021 8:05:06 GMT -5
Memorial Day looks to be a wash out in NY , as it is forecasted for rain all weekend. The bright spot is my son is bringing my grandson over here for the weekend. Does anyone on this forum have anything exciting planned ? I don't, which is just how I want it. Watching my Swans play in the Championship League playoff final this morning, running a couple of errands later that may or may not lead to a comic book shop or two. Sunday morning is church, then might watch Endgame (again!) in the afternoon before my sister and my mom come over for dinner. Monday is going to be spent doing some re-org on the comic collection as I am looking to start purging the stuff I know I will never read again.
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Post by The Captain on May 28, 2021 17:28:23 GMT -5
Saturday morning, the "richest match in the world" is being played, that being the English Championship League's playoff final. The winner gets promotion to the Premier League and an estimated 185MM Pounds ($225MM USD) windfall, while the loser licks its wounds and spends another campaign in the second tier while trying to earn a spot with the big boys.
Brentford, a club in west London, hasn't played in the top-flight in 74 years and has failed in its last nine playoff appearances for promotion. They will be facing Swansea City, from Wales, who is eyeing a return to the Premier League after being relegated after the 2017-2018 season. The two squads played to a pair of 1-1 draws in the regular season just completed, so it should be a very even match.
My butt will be on the couch and my eyes glued to the 55" TV while rooting on my Swans to take the victory and move back up to the top once again. GO SWANS!
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Post by The Captain on May 28, 2021 9:14:19 GMT -5
Watched the first two episodes last night and it was OK, but nothing special. The second was definitely the better of the two, although that may just have been a function of them needing to set things in motion in the first. Things I don't like about it: 1. The violence toward small animals, which is cruel and gratuitous, not amusing as they probably think it is. Unlike Sparky dying horribly in WandaVision, this serves zero purpose other than shock value from being "edgy". 2. The "adult" language, which really serves no purpose other than allowing them to call it Mature to pull in adults who wouldn't normally watch a cartoon. 3. The Super-Adaptoid. I'm not sure what vibe they're trying to develop with him (I have a guess), but it's off-putting and not funny. Wasn't planning on continuing with it, but I may tune into the third based on shaxper saying it was an improvement over the first couple.
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Post by The Captain on May 27, 2021 13:31:34 GMT -5
Never bought anything from Mile High, but it sounds like it wouldn't be my kind of scene, as I hate overpaying for anything.
Almost visited them the one time I was in the Denver area, but I got stuck in traffic on my way there and had to bail on the trip in order to get to the airport on time for my flight back to Pittsburgh.
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Post by The Captain on May 26, 2021 20:15:09 GMT -5
ps Another beloved childrens author has died: Eric Carle, creator of The Very Hungry Caterpillar Carle was 91. he didn't start illustrating childrens books until he was 40, after working for the New York Times. He was born in Syracuse, NY, but his immigrant mother grew homesick for Germany and his parents returned, just in time for WW2 to kick off. His father was drafted into the Wehrmacht and was a prisoner-of-war in a Russian camp for many years. Carle's books were an easy and regular sell, at Barnes & Noble and we had a local hospital who had been given an endowment, by the grandfather of a child born there, to provide books the newborn children,, to help set them on the path for life. For several years, we regularly filled large orders of several books, including Dr Seuss (The cat in the Hat), Eric Carle (The Very Hungry Caterpillar), Sam McBratney (Guess How Much I Love You) and Maurice Sendak (Where the Wild Things Are). My girls loved his books, particularly Brown Bear, Brown Bear... and its related titles. I read each of those 100s of times for naptime, bedtime, or just because. At 91, he obviously didn't get cheated on time, but it's still sad that he is gone.
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Post by The Captain on May 25, 2021 12:17:19 GMT -5
I have been watching/reading a lot of reactions to this trailer over the past day (had nothing better to do yesterday while trying to choke down the prep for my procedure this morning). It seems the only people I have seen reacting to this negatively are hardcore comics fans. Most casual fans or non-fans seemed excited or at least intrigued by the teaser and are looking forward to finding out more. And since hardcore comic fans are such an insignificant fraction of the total potential audience, their negative reaction is meaningless in terms of the potential success of the movie. -M Nothing but the utmost respect for you, my friend, but there is a huge difference between being "negative" and being "unimpressed". As you responded to me above, yes, I know it's the teaser trailer, but it didn't tease me in a big way as others have, such as the one for Shang-Chi. Let's not act as though people, including me, are saying we ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY 100% WILL NOT SEE THIS, but that we're not seeing much Kirby influence in the images we've seen THUS FAR and that the trailer, while pretty, was fairly pedestrian. I love you like a brother, but sometimes you exhibit a lot of disdain for the hardcore fans and Wednesday Warriors when we have an opinion based on what WE would like to see. Folks losing their mind over Heimdall being Black or The Ancient One being an androgynous White person, tear them apart all you want, but people not enthused because the trailer is kind of bland and doesn't evoke any sense of that Kirby magic or wonder aren't necessarily against it, just not thrilled by what they've been shown to date.
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Post by The Captain on May 25, 2021 7:45:02 GMT -5
Thanks! I buy them when I find them for less than $3 apiece, but there's no real concerted effort to put together the run. I've always liked the Rogues, so any issues with them get grabbed on sight. I buy them when I can too, but won’t pay more than a buck. My cap used to be $1 and then $2, but as I move further back in the series, it's harder to find them that inexpensively. I figure since I'm only buying four new books a month and my Want List is almost non-existent (and devoid of high-end books entirely), I can up it to $3, especially if any of the classic Rogues are featured.
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Post by The Captain on May 24, 2021 21:43:13 GMT -5
Cool books The Captain. Looks like you're filling in the Flash V.1 series. Thanks! I buy them when I find them for less than $3 apiece, but there's no real concerted effort to put together the run. I've always liked the Rogues, so any issues with them get grabbed on sight.
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Post by The Captain on May 24, 2021 20:24:25 GMT -5
THREE RIVERS COMICON REPORT:
As mentioned a few pages ago before things got somewhat political, yet everyone managed to keep things civil, I took my two daughters to the stripped-down, outdoors Three Rivers Comicon on Saturday. This show is usually a much bigger affair, but with the pandemic not quite over yet, the host store, New Dimension Comics, elected to hold the show outside in the parking lot of the large open-air mall where one of their stores is located.
We headed out right around 11:30 on Saturday morning to get there when the "doors" opened at noon, and we couldn't have had a better day for it. Yeah, it was a little on the warm side, with some humidity, but there was some breeze throughout the afternoon and it didn't rain, so that's a win for Pittsburgh in May.
We elected to walk the entire length of the show first to get a lay of the land and see what we might be interested in checking out further (and spending money on), which took about 30 minutes or so while sort of poking our heads into all of the various tents and booths that were set up. From the outset, it was apparent that this show was light on comics and heavier on toys and pop culture stuff, as well as a good number of crafts dealers and local artists, but no real industry names like previous shows (one guy, whose name escapes me, had done some work for Marvel in the late 80s/early 90s on books like Nick Fury and MCP, but he was about it).
I posted my comics purchases over in the usual place, and I will say that my prediction that my daughters would spend more money that I did was completely wrong. They each got a Perler-bead magnet from one of the craft booths (my younger one got one that looked like Snow White, because of her obsession with the TV show Once Upon A Time, while my older one got the Water Tribe symbol from Avatar: The Last Airbender). From one of the local artists, my older daughter got a Kylo Ren print, and they both picked up some Lego Mini-Figures from a dealer that had THOUSANDS of them in all different styles.
Highlights: 1. There was a guy cosplaying as Winter Soldier (it was pretty good), and my older daughter kept trying to get the younger one to go up to him and ask him "how much for the arm" (ala Rocket in Infinity War). She wouldn't, so my older daughter texted the younger one's best friend (who lives in the Bahamas now) about it, and all she sent to my younger one was a text that said "Man up and do it!" She didn't. 2. My younger one saw her first Furry in person, to which she stated rather matter of factly: "I'm scarred". 3. The both of them were also a little traumatized by a...Rubenesque...woman in some kind of bumblebee costume that had approximately 75% of her rear end hanging out, as well as a Black Widow in movie costume who was roughly three Scarlet Johanssons, and a pirate girl in leather pants with quite ample booty. While they appreciated that these women were comfortable enough to go out in public like that, they were also a little bit "yeah, but should they" about it. 4. They learned that if both of them go to a show with me, they can hang out together and check out other booths while I scour my way through the comic boxes. I think I may have my new partners in crime for these kinds of things.
It was a great time and we are looking forward to our next opportunity to do one of these, hopefully later this year and indoors at a larger event.
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Post by The Captain on May 24, 2021 19:53:52 GMT -5
As mentioned in the "Meanwhile" thread on Saturday, I attended the stripped-down, outdoors Three Rivers Comicon that afternoon with my daughters. I'll be posting more about the day as a whole in that thread, but I wanted to share my purchases from the day here. Everything will be grouped by booth where I bought it. First buy of the day, each of these for $1. The guy who was selling these had sort of a hodge-podge of items, not really focused on comics specifically (he had about six short boxes, one of "as marked" and the other five of $1 books), but also some toys, Pop Figures, etc. Just across the way from that first purchase was a guy with a much more robust comic selection. About 20 long boxes of "as marked" books, good wall stock (early X-Men, a Star Wars #1, nice collection of Silver Age DC), and some discount books, which is where I got these at 3 for $5: Next guy I bought from was someone that I used to play Magic: The Gathering against about 20 years ago at a store long-since-closed. He makes custom coasters from old MTG cards and comic book pictures (he buys collections and cuts out large panels from junk books), but at this show, he only had comics with him, about 20 short boxes. Picked up these also at 3 for $5: Next guy I came across had about as nice a selection as the second guy I mentioned above, but what really caught my eye was a sign on one of the long boxes that read "New Western Collection", from which I got these books. All were "as marked", but combined they were only $18 (average of $3 each): Lastly, came across one last guy as we were making our way out, and he had probably the most books out of any dealer there (including the host store, which was located right across the parking lot, but who seemed to only bring old toys, Pop Figures, and about three boxes of Vargas prints that were conspicuously angled so that the naked women could be seen by all walking by). Probably 40 long boxes, big display of really good wall stock, and varying deals (a number of $2 boxes, $3 boxes, and "as marked" as well). From him, I made my biggest purchase of the day in terms of books (10 in total) and money (all of them were from the $3 boxes, so $30):
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Post by The Captain on May 24, 2021 19:14:40 GMT -5
Hamburgers, without question. There are so many things you can do with them, from seasonings to toppings to buns, that you could have hamburgers for days on end and never eat the "same one" twice. Just starting with lettuce, tomato, pickles (dill or bread-and-butter), onions (raw or sauteed), sauteed mushrooms, BACON, and any kind of cheese imaginable, and this is just a starting point. The combinations are virtually limitless.
Hot dogs are pretty much "Bun, Dog, standard condiments". Sure, there are some standard toppings or styles (Chicago-style, chili dog, sauerkraut), but anything beyond that and it's just adding something to say you did it (I saw a place at our usual beach spot serving a hot dog with crab meat on it and I'm like "why"?).
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Post by The Captain on May 24, 2021 15:29:18 GMT -5
Just voted as well.
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Post by The Captain on May 24, 2021 10:53:39 GMT -5
This is the first MCU trailer that didn't leave me screaming "TAKE MY MONEY" at the end.
It does look "different" from previous MCU offerings, but I'm not sure that translates into "interesting".
Unfortunately, because of how well Marvel has done at interconnecting everything, this will be "important" amd thus will need to be seen.
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Post by The Captain on May 22, 2021 9:05:50 GMT -5
Super excited about today!
This afternoon, both of my daughters and I will be going to an outdoor comic book convention. This is the first time my younger daughter is going to one of these shows with me, as she has started to discover her "likes" and wants to see if she can indulge any of them. My older daughter has gone to three shows with me previously and was really bummed when COVID canceled the entire slate of them last year, as she was hoping to attend more with me.
Funny thing is, there isn't really anything I'm actually actively searching for today, so more just hoping I run into things by chance. It's more about just going, being with them, and doing something the three of us can enjoy together, as I'm anticipating they will each spend more money than I do (or more accurately, I will spend more money on them combined with the money they spend on themselves, than I will spend on myself).
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Post by The Captain on May 22, 2021 8:57:41 GMT -5
Welp, my auctions ended, and they went so high that I'm honestly feeling anxious, like that's too much money for these books. What if they think they bid on something nicer than what I was selling? Of course, I can logically tell myself I provided very detailed pictures and was very clear about what I was selling, but this is just...a lot more than I expected. Here are how the auctions ended. Two didn't sell. I was honestly surprised the second appearance of Moon Knight has been selling for so much, so I can't say I'm surprised that trend hasn't continued here. The other, the first appearance of Shang-Chi, is the only one I was really on the fence about selling, so I'm actually relieved. Of course, if the price shoots up after the film's release, I'll list it again. That is awesome! Really happy you made as much as you did, as well as being happy knowing that the books in my collection are as valuable as they are. $455 for the first Killmonger, and $180 for the first War Machine? I paid $6 combined for those two books. The price on that WBN #32 is nuts. I was hoping to buy one at some point, but it looks like the facsimile edition coming out in July is the closest I'll ever get to it. That's fantastic for you however! Thanks, folks, but it has genuinely gotten to the point where I feel a bit guilty. I paid $60 for that first appearance of Moon Knight! DON'T FEEL GUILTY ABOUT THIS! This is part of the risk/reward of a hobby. Would you feel guilty if you bought a stock in a small company that made widgets for $5/share, only to have them shift business models and start making large-scale batteries that would revolutionize the solar energy industry by allowing for the storage of electricity, which bumped their stock price to $2,00/share? My dad bought a stamp (US #2) in the early 1960s for $25 (he took over a friend's paper route for the summer and spent part of his earnings on this). Today, that stamp is worth, unused, around $18K, and used, depending on condition is a minimum of $1K up to potentially $10K. Should he feel guilty for that, when it just as easily could be worth the same $25 today as it was the day he bought it. Same as MTG cards. I bought a collection from a woman three years ago, one box of rares and "premium" uncommons and another bigger box of black commons and uncommons. In the past month, the uncommon Chain of Smog from the Onslaught set was found to have a insta-win combo with a recently-printed planeswalker, and it went from a $.05 card to a $20 card. There were three in the second box, all minty and unplayed, and I sold them for $40 to my usual buyer. I don't feel guilty in the least, because they could have never increased in value and the money I paid for each of them, however minimal, in 2018 would have been wasted.
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