13: A teen who shoots webs and walks on walls, an intellectual gorilla who speaks English, and a little boy with antlers. It's been about a week and a half since my last post, and I have plenty to
	catch you up on. I went through a real rough patch with my lungs in
	the middle of this month, but over this past week things have started
	to improve somewhat; some days I've felt strong enough to get out of
	the house and get down to some comic shops. I had to use a walker or
	a wheelchair, but I did get out of the house and it was great to be
	back in the shops again scouring through the boxes to piece together
	my Ultimate Spider-Man collection. This is a diagram of my activity
	for this month recorded by my Nike+ Fuelband (a product everyone
	recovering from serious illness should have): As you can tell I have good and bad days.  I'll post another one of these next time so you can see if things have gotten better.
	Before I tell you about my latest adventures let me share something about
	overcoming an illness. Your family and friends become more important
	than you ever knew. I rely on them for essentially every aspect of
	my life, and one of the many things I rely on them for happens to be
	my comic books. This being my blog about a comic book hunt, I feel
	like I should give credit to everyone who has made comic book hunting
	a possibility for a guy who can barely walk, and can't drive. I
	haven't forgotten the many things that have been done for me. My
	brothers have both taken me on multiple trips to comic book stores in
	all different places, and living in different cities, they've both
	made trips to stores to pick up issues I needed. Any time I've been
	sick, my mom has picked up my pull list on her way home from work.
	My dad's done the same, and he's also taken me to a few stores. My
	Dad is incredibly patient when it comes to waiting for me while I
	browse through bins. My friend Kenny has done the same. Yeah, he
	picks up comics too, but that doesn't diminish the value of his deed.
	He also introduced me to New England Comics, the store where I found
	my Ultimate Spider-Man #1, Peter Panzerfaust #1, and Daredevil #7.
	My friend Mike was the guy who drove me to the store when he was
	tired so I could grab the Peter Panzerfaust I needed. Meg picked up
	a few Skottie Young covers that I was missing, and offered to pick
	others up on other occasions if I hadn't been able to get them.
	Kyle, Mike, and Kenny brought my Daredevil #10 to Boston Super Mega
	Fest to get it signed by Paolo Rivera, one of my favorite artists.
	You get the idea. Since my last post, I've taken three comic
	hunting trips, one with my older brother, one with my dad, and one
	with my little brother. I was successful in finding plenty of comics
	needed for my collection on each of these three trips, but I'm not
	going to bother posting them all. I'll adjust the checklist on the
	right accordingly though.  What I really want to post is the
	hilarious classic issue my brother Tom found. While I was busy
	digging for Ultimate Spider-Mans at the Cranston location of Time
	Capsule, Tom was browsing through whatever oddball bin he could find.
	Through some kind of beginner's luck (in the sport of bin diving) he
	came up with a 1958 issue of Strange Adventures. We bought the issue, but in any photo I take, the text doesn't show well because of my shaky hands..  I still want to show it to you, so here's a stock photo I found online.
	Make sure you take it all in! I know seeing this image will undoubtedly leave you wanting to read the issue,  if only to find out what led these men to subject the gorilla to a lie detector test, but don't worry.  The issue is safely in my hands and visitors to my house can read it any time they want.
	I have one more thing to talk about. It's a 40 issue epic called "Sweet
	Tooth" and it's written and pencilled by Jeff Lemire.
	I don't know why it took me so long to discover this series, but it's
	quickly become one of my favorites. I got the first trade from Amazon and
	finished it the next day. I had to go out and buy the next volume
	because Amazon wouldn't be quick enough. While I was reading that, I
	realized that the entire series isn't out in trade form yet, so I did
	what any over zealous comic book junky would do, I searched online
	until I found every single remaining issue.  Now I read at my own rate.
	Should I have done that? Probably not, but when it comes to comics, nothing
	beats reading them in their original single issue form.  The
	story is about a nine year old kid named Gus who has been raised by
	his father in a forest, in complete isolation, for his entire life.
	His father has told him never to leave the woods. The reasons for
	this are mysterious at first, but you can assume that it has
	something to do with the fact that he has a set of deer antlers on
	his head. Soon, his father passes away, and Gus is forced to choose
	between staying in the woods alone and fending for himself, or
	disobeying his dead father, and leaving with a man named Mr. Jepperd,
	who has offered to take him to a place called "the preserve."
	This is expert storytelling that carries the reader through a wide
	range of emotions. In addition to that, Lemire's art has an eerie
	power to it that leaves thoughts and images from this story lingering
	in your head. I highly recommend this book.(or comic, or graphic
	novel, or series of books, whatever) Edited: I just realized the checklist on the right malfunctioned, possibly a PEBKAC scenario.  I'm gonna do my best to make a new one that works properly soon.

12.1

12.1     

Brief visit to Midtown Grand Central

glad I got this one out of the way

I've been to midtown in Times Square, and now i've been to midtown grand central. The idea i left with is that most of the great Reputation this store has comes from Times Square. Don't get me wrong. This is still an above average comic shop.. But it doesn't come close to it's Times Square big brother, and so I can't see a reason to go back. Even though the store wasn't quite what I was hoping, I only had about 20 minutes to shop, so it felt just about right. I quickly checked through the trades to see if they had a few trades I've been hunting for, the most elusive of which is The Goon Vol. 2. I was unsuccessful with trades so I checked the boxes for a few series that I'd be able to sort through quickly. Ianaged to get 6 issues of "Wolverine and the X-Men" that I didn't have(Kenny put me onto this title and it's weird, but pretty good, especially considering it's an x-men book. Not normally my cup-o-soup). Then I went over to my friendly neighborhood Ultimate Spider-Man bin where I can usually find enough well cared for issues to drop about $40.00 on. The selection here was a little lacking, and I found one issue that met my standards, and I paid the inflated NYC price of $3.50 for Ultimate Spider-Man # 112.

UPDATE 3/10: Went to quite a few NYC comic shops, but was largely unsuccessful because of the chair.  Lots of stairs, very little space, not easy to breathe, and really crowded.  I hope to try NYC again when I'm walking, but I feel pretty bad for anyone who's stuck in a wheelchair for life.  If I ever open my own shop, the aisles are gonna be big enough for anyone.. even if the shop is tiny.  I'd rather have just one aisle than have to give the handicapped another raw deal.

12     

GOING ON A TRIP

(train, plane, or taxi cab... all the choices hip)

I'll be heading up(down) to NYC with my parents to visit my little brother.  We'll e spending a couple days checking out the city.  Lucky for me, my little brother likes comics a little bit, so I'll have an ally when I attempt to devise the entire itinerary.

Unfortunately, the trip contains two challenges that I must meet and they are:
a) The open road.  I have to be alone with my parents for at least 3 hours each way.
b) My lungs.  They're still ineffective at best.  I'll be getting around in a wheelchair, wearing a mask and gloves and an oxygen supply, but if anything goes wrong or my body just decides to have a crappy day, I'll be stuck in the hotel.

Fortunately, I have a plan.  I'm bringing a good selection of mostly unread comics(see the distorted panorama below) and a few trades, and hopefully buying some in the city.  Buying them in the city will be extremely important if I finish my other ones on the way there.  I'll have trade paperbacks for backup, but we all know man cannot survive on TPB alone!

The comic books in the photo, from left to right, are:
Invincible presents Atom Eve & Rex Splode #1 & 2, Brit(2nd series) #1, Science Dog #1 & 2, Five Weapons #1, Guarding the Globe(1st series) #1 & 2, Superman: Secret Identity #1, Ultimate Six #1, Amazing Spider-Man #400(worst idea for a cover in spider-man history), and Batman and Robin (2nd series) #1.