Looking through Comic Retailer (the trade mag) and I am struck again by the fact that we run about 25% less than your average comic store in singles sales; after 27 years in business, in a population area that is supposedly above average. Never have figured that out.

On the other hand, our graphic novel sales are 5 times higher than average.

Go figure.


Rock chuck are running wild. Driving home, saw one scurrying his fat little butt across the street. Another one was sunbathing on the rocks on the front berm; grabbed my cat and tried to get her interested, but she looked up and down and sideways and didn't see the critter (or pretended not to see it.) Was on the back porch, heard a dog barking, and looked up to see another rock chuck running down the sidewalk.

I'm a little leery of trapping, because I know there is a neighborhood skunk around, and what if I get it, instead?


Today's business headline: Wal-Mart Sees Billions Slip Away; Shoplifting, employee theft are major contributors.

Karma's a bitch. Problem is, their negligence is like a virus that spreads to other retail.


Read World War Hulk #1 last night. Really liked it. Straightforward, Hulk has come to smash earth and take no prisoners. The way a crossover should be done.
Also read Submariner, and it was pretty good too. Love the way Marvel has incorporated the real world terrorist problem into their universe.
Local, by Brian Wood, about a young girl who moves from city to city, reinventing herself, always flakily self-destructing. Very real and affecting.
Finally, tried to read The Amory Wars, by one of the creators of Coheed and Cambria (rock group.) Amateurish. Lost interest real quick.


I don't know. It's probably me. But it seems like the people walking around downtown are getting more snobby. I've got a big bushy beard right now, when I'm usually pretty trimmed down. People treat me differently, it feels like, and I just get my rebellious nature up and think -- you don't like bushy beards? I'll show you bushy beards.

I've gone from an opossum to a grizzly.


Card Trade is my other trade mag. Find it fascinating the way they ignore what I consider to be the biggest problem in the card industry. Not just that the mass market has cards, but they have advantageous packaging.

I spent alot of time recently demonstrating to a woman how a box of cards at Target only had 8 packs, and mine had 36 packs, and the Target packs had 10 cards, and mine had 12, and if you took your calculator out my 79.99 box cost .21 cents a card, and Target's 20.00 box cost .25 a card.

She said, "I've only got 20.00." And walked out. Hard to argue with that.