Yesterday saw two important events: my cousin's wedding (congratulations, Annie Fannie!) and the Tate's Comics 20th anniversary tent sale. Decorum demands that I claim that it was the former event that most delighted me. But we know the truth, don't we?
I don't get to Tate's, (and the far more important to me Tate's Gaming Satellite,) very often, since it is quite a ways south (it's located in Ft. Lauderdale, and I am in Palm Beach County, so it's a bit of a drive.) But it is one of the best comic shops around (maybe they'll give me some store credit in return for this glowing endorsement.)
Every year they have a blowout tent sale, where they have huge deals on graphic novels, trade paperbacks, back issues and all sorts of other merchandise. My wife and I have benefitted greatly by these sales in the past, picking up tons of great stories that we otherwise never would have been able to afford, and thus never been exposed to (including a nice stack of old Judge Dredd collections.)
So when we heard that Tate's would be having a big sale on the same day that we had to drive south for my cousin's wedding, it was clearly an act of God/Fate/The Invisible Hand of the Market/Random Happenstance of Unusual Convenience.
It would not be the first such beneficial alignment of factors that day, as you will see.
My daughter is turning five next week, and although I may not have mentioned it, she is a genius. She reads very well, and loves chapter books. I've been introducing her to comics, starting with a Tiny Titans collection I had received as a gift, which she loves and rereads frequently.
Now, I have a slight addiction problem, which is a discussion for another post. But that addiction involves me going on Ebay and purchasing piles of used (cheap) Heroclix minis, and then ripping them off their clix bases and modifying them to suit my gaming purposes like a miniature modeling Mengele.
Well sometimes in my bargain hunting, I end up with some interesting minis that I do not particularly need. In my last load (which was several months ago, since money is tight, and I have to save up my paper route money,) included all four members of Marvel's Power Pack.
Power Pack was a comic from the 1980's that featured four children, siblings who gain superpowers after encountering a friendly alien child. They fight evil aliens, rescue their parents and have all kinds of adventures while hiding their (science lesson based) powers from their parents.
I never read the book myself (it was specifically pitched for young readers, and I was older when it came out,) but it was apparently a huge hit with comic creators. Lots of writers wanted to crossover with the team, and there was a large fanbase, many of whom were not kids.
The book tackled 'issues,' but was not cheap and exploitative, and didn't try to be grim and gritty. When a new writing team came on board to try just that, the fans revolted and the book was soon cancelled.
I gave the Power Pack minis to Grace, and I thought this would be a good comic to try to find to get her started. Flash forward to us hearing about the sale, and I thought that maybe I could find a Power Pack collection, hopefully the origin.
It was one of several things I was looking for there, I had made a list to remember what to look for. So when we got to the store (we were all dressed for the wedding, remember,) we dumped my two year old off on my sister, who was also at the sale with her teenaged son, and we hit the long boxes.
If you've never done any comic hunting, the general set up is that they lay out a bunch of folding tables, and upon them rests long boxes; the cardboard boxes they use to store comic books. The books stand upright, so one flips through them, looking for issues you might need or want to pick up and try for the first time. My fingertips are worn and dried out, a common ailment of the comic hunter.
Tate's sticks to the formula, and puts their larger books (graphic novels, and collections of comic issues that have been bound together) in the boxes as well, and that is where I headed. I had my list, but not a lot of hope on finding everything. But Power Pack was at the top of my list, and I was ready to go through dozens of boxes to find it for my little girl.
It was in the first box I saw.
I mean, I didn't even have to flip through. As I was walking around to decide where to start, I saw the Power Pack logo sticking out of the top of a box. I went over to it, and it was the Origin Album, the exact book I wanted to get.
Again, the forces of the cosmos were working for me. My Mother-In-Law is prone to using the term 'Godcidental,' whereas I am prone to vomit when I hear the term. Suffice it to say, I was pleased, and immediately handed the book to Grace to read it. She opened it up and did not put it down for the duration of our search. She just stood there reading it.
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| In her party dress and pearls |
These events draw out cosplayers and outlandish folk, and Tate's always take pictures of these dynamic people for their website. This time, they took a picture of the little girl with polka dots and pigtails, who spent the entire time reading a comic. People would walk by and smile, or tell her how pretty she was, and my little girl just kept on reading her book.
And if that isn't the best ad for a comic book store (and comics as a whole,) I don't know what is.
(So now can I have some store credit?)
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