Can you believe it’s been nine years since I did this strip for Comic Shop News?
Sorry about running repeats this week. I was all set with what I hoped would be a great series of strips on 4th Edition. Unfortunately, a few things came up. Specifically, many, many massive thunderstorms that hit our little corner of Wisconsin in wave after freaking wave. As a result, the basement flooded.
The damage to the basement could have been worse – a lot worse. However, it hit the “annoying increase in work” level, and much time was spent and still needs to be spent rapidly moving books, pulling up the carpet to dry, replacing the carpet lining, etc., etc.
It was a close-run thing, though. All praise to the Lovely and Talented Judith for recognizing the problem far sooner than I did, otherwise, I would have lost many more treasured trade paperbacks. A lot of my favorite trades were in the affected area. Ultimate Sandman, for example, survived. As did “Lost Girls” and beautiful hardcover versions of “Box Office Poison” and “Tricked.” Unfortunately, my “Girl Genius” hardcover collection (the most beautiful hardcover comics ever produced, IMHO) is now down to volumes II, III and IV. Likewise, the hardcover “300” took the worst hit in that regard…
As Brent Frankenhoff, my Comics Buyers’ Guide editor, noted, at the very least the book should have driven back the floodwaters with a yell of “This … is … Sparta!” Or maybe “This … is … carpet!”
****
It got me thinking, though…in case a REAL emergency happened, and I could only grab a few books, which would I grab first?
What games or trade paperbacks would you grab first, if you only had a few minutes?
– John