Wednesday, July 20, 2005

I finally found a comic book shop yesterday, and a really nice one, too.

On our way to the Comic-Con on Friday morning, Tim, looking out the window, had spotted a Comics N Stuff. I couldn't see where he was pointing, but I knew the general area, so decided yesterday to explore it.

I scoured the shoddy clumps of storefronts in El Cajon as carefully as I could while driving, but I was ready to give up after about ten minutes or so. Then I saw it, wedged against a skinny, busy street by the freeway onramp; a small, white brick building with an impressive mural painted on featuring an enormous Batman, Hellboy, Jack Skellington, Roman Durge Lenore, and Yoda. Inside was like the intestines of a giant coated with comics and action figures. Labyrinthine, and the biggest comic book shop I'd seen in San Diego County.

I looked up and down the walls, though, without seeing the Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder comic I was looking for. I didn't want to leave empty handed, so I looked closely at everything, to see if there was something else that was cheap and interesting. I saw Mike Mignola's and Troy Nixey's Jenny Finn, the first two issues in a single trade paperback, for seven dollars. Caitlin had mentioned it on her forum yesterday, so I grabbed it. It turned out to be a really good exploration of British sailors in the late nineteenth century being corrupted by a strange fish disease.

As I was paying for this, I noticed, lying on the counter, without a plastic sheath, the very Frank Miller/Jim lee Batman I'd come in for. So I bought it too. Miller's writing was decent, and Jim Lee's art reminded me of how much I suck.

I was strangely restless for a few hours after that, wanting something, but not sure what. Finally, I pulled into a grocery store parking lot, bought a couple apples, and sat in my car eating. It ended up being precisely what I wanted.

I used to really hate apples--they'd always give me a stomach ache. But lately I've been struck by random, odd cravings for them.

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