So last Sunday I was working late at the shop…we were still open, technically, but I was at the computer prepping some reorders and waiting for closing time to come around. And suddenly, a young woman, blondish, in her early 20s or maybe very late teens, black-framed glasses, hunched over like she’s trying to avoid my getting a good look at her, dashes in the front door, plants a plastic baby doll on the counter, and rushes out, to sound of giggles and such outside from her partners in…whatever it was she was doing.
Now, “why a doll” I have no idea. But there it was on the counter, and I figure it was just some prank by local kids, and no big whoop. I took the doll off the counter and continued working.
A few minutes later I hear the clatter of what sounds like a lot of pieces of plastic something-or-other being dropped outside the door. By the time I get out the front door, I find a whole bunch of plastic coins like this scattered around the sidewalk:
…and no sign of whoever put them there. Now this annoys me a little, because now I have to clean up after these people. But just a little…again, it’s just kids playing pranks, and it only takes me a minute with the broom ‘n’ scoop to sweep it up.
Finally, we’re closed, so I kick out the last couple of customers…er, I invite them to leave but please return tomorrow, I meant to say, I lock the front door, and then I go to the back room for a bit to grab some of the paperwork I need for the end-of-day procedure.
I reemerge to find one of the last customers of the day knocking at the locked front door, trying to get my attention. I go to open up and see what his deal is, when I notice this certificate has been shoved under the door:
And it had one of these attached to it as well:
I’ve no idea what the ATF4 stands for, by the way, unless this person/these people are really into
the gene.
Anyway, the customer says a young lady (the same from earlier in the evening, from how he described her) ran up and shoved these under the door.
Now, I don’t know who this girl is. I got a pretty good look at her, despite her attempts to hide herself during the first bit of business with the doll, and as far as I can remember, she’s not a customer. She was doing this with at least two other girls, whom I never saw, so I don’t know if they’re customers or not. But for whatever reason, these girls have decided to be “fans of the comic shop,” I guess, for better or worse. And this isn’t the first incident…we’ve had other notes and “surprises” left for us before over the last few months.
It’s not really anything worth calling the police over…yet. It’s mostly harmless, though I wish they’d stick to doing things that didn’t require much cleaning up.
So Employee Aaron brought his button maker to work, and since we had a bunch of junked comics that would have been tossed/recycled/whatevered, I let him cut pictures out of those for button face material.
One of the first he made was, of course, Swamp Thing, as a bribe for me to allow him his continued life:
The buttons measure about an inch across, by the way, and sorry about the glare in the scans.
Here are a few more buttons he made(which, by the way, aren’t for sale, since that, I imagine, would be a Bad Idea) and which amused me:
I asked Aaron to make this button mostly because I just wanted to see what it would look like:
And here’s another button I specially requested, because man, just
look at it!
BEHOLD YOUR JEALOUSY.
So remember that publicity stunt of Marvel’s, where they’re trying to make it look as if DC’s Blackest Night series is tanking in sales by letting retailers turn in their BN extras for one of their Siege variants? (I talked about this deal at length last week.)
Well, here’s what the variant looks like. Go ahead, if you haven’t seen it, check it out. I’ll wait.
hmmmm hmm hmmm hmmmm hmmm…oh, you’re back. So, what’d you think? …Yes, yes, you’re right, it is kind of dumb-looking. I realize nobody is getting these super-limited variant covers for their artistic value, but merely for their commodity as rarities, so it really doesn’t matter what’s on the cover, but good gravy that’s unappealing.
Well, here’s hoping folks who get this variant can realize a $100 sale with it, just to break even on the wholesale cost of the BN books that were traded in. Even better, if they can get the full $199.50 retail. I suspect that won’t be a problem, because I don’t imagine there are going to be too many copies of this variant out there, and there are plenty of people who’ll pay a lot of cash for something that’s collectible just because it’s hard to get.
And as pal Dorian said to me the other day, someone out there is probably going to list it for $75 or less, and thus effectively lose money in the deal. Well, unless they were just buried in BN overstock and losing a little money in turning that dead weight into cash is preferable to losing all that money. But I suspect if that were the case, “losing money” is a situation that would not be unfamiliar.
Johanna gets her mitts on the Howard the Duck DVD, and proceeds to give her positive review on the film’s surprisingly-deluxe presentation. (See, I’m not the only one who likes it!)
A couple of Swamp Thing links:
First, Twitter pal @misterjayem points me in the direction of Todd Klein’s lettering weblog, where Swamp Thing’s logos, among others, are discussed.
And there there’s pal Cully, who let me know that Covered featured one of their cover redos of a Swamp Thing comic.
REMINDER: You’ve read it online, now get it in that new “printed on paper” format that’s all the rage! El Gorgo #3, now available for order in physical stapled-and-folded form! Get all 3 issues for a special deal! Buy two sets, and give one to Grandma! I love this comic, and I think you will too. As always, you can read all the issues online, but throw the boys some cash for all their hard work and spectacular results!
