Scenes from the Life of an Amateur Comic Book Collector (9)--Back to Philly

I feel like a little kid on the day after Halloween. I've had too much fun and eaten too much candy. Over the New Year's weekend I visited my parents in Philadelphia and spent part of the time shopping for comics on South Street and going to a comic book con at a Ramada Inn near the airport (the same location as a previous con which I've blogged about). It turns out this Philly con is held every other month. I also watched the last episode of Doctor Who with David Tenant on BBC-America with my parents (they enjoyed it) and in addition to all the comics, I bought a DVD of Birdman and the Galaxy Trio for $6 from a used-book store (I stopped short of spending $8 on a DVD of Wacky Races, another favorite cartoon of the 1960s). It was a total mind-junk binge.

I also went on another mini-binge at Time Machine here in New York. I had previously bought a Lois Lane with an entire story missing so I returned it and got the full catalogue value and bought some Atoms and another Lois Lane. In Philadelphia, I went to Showcase Comics on South Street and they had some really good deals. Their back issues were 40 percent off. I didn't buy too many because I was going to the Philly con the next day, but it turned out I didn't find any of the titles at the con that they had at Showcase, so I should have spent the money. Another thing that stopped me from spending more moolah at Showcase was the fact that I got a parking ticket while browsing through old Silver Age comics in the store. I put money in a parking meter and got one of those little slips through you're supposed to display on your dashboard, but I lost track of time and they issued a violation exactly seven minutes after the time expired. Bastards! The fine was $36. I felt so guilty, I didn't buy an old Superboy for $6.

The next day I stopped feeling guilty and bought a whole new haul at the comic show at the Ramada Inn. Here's a list of the loot from both Showcase Comics and the Philly Con:
2001: A Space Odyssey #8 (origin of Machine Man, a 1970s Jack Kirby creation after he went back to Marvel from DC)
Action Comics #316, 359
Archie as Captain Pureheart #4
Batman #214 (See cover above, a fairly sexist depiction of the women of Gotham City when you think about it)
Blackhawk #215, 230 (which I already had, damnit. I need to start taking lists to these things)
The Flash #181 (featuring an incredibly racist depiction of Japanese people)
Green Lantern #11
Jimmy Olsen #64, 83, 84, 88
Jonny Quest #1
Lois Lane #82
Marvel Tales #17, 23
Marvel Team-Up #74 (featuring Spider Man and the Not Ready for Prime Time Players from the late 1970s)
Metal Men #31, 34, 38
Modeling with Millie #47 (I couldn't resist, no superheroes, but plenty of fashion)
Our Fighting Forces featuring The Losers #154 (Kirby again, I wouldn't have bought a war comic otherwise)
The Owl #2 (obscure Dell title)
The Silver Surer #18 (only Kirby artwork in this title)
Strange Adventures #204
Superboy #107, 109, 201
Superman #220
Thor #130, 151, 159, 174
World's Finest #191

On Monday I had a discussion with a co-worker also into comics. We were trying to identify the artist of a comic cover on a calendar I had bought. "That's a Kirby mouth," I said. "Yeah, but those are Ditko hands," he replied. Now that I think about it, that's the nerdiest conversation I've probably ever had.