KJToo

While looking through the third box of comic books last night, I hit a veritable treasure trove. I found about two or three dozen issues of The Mighty Avengers, a hefty pile of The New Mutants and probably a dozen and a half issues of What If…?1

I even found an issue of Crystar, The Crystal Warrior as well as an issue of the DC equivalent, Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld. Good grief.

But the real jackpot was a near-complete collection of Rom, Spaceknight. The series ran for seventy-five issues (plus four annuals) between 1979 and 1985. I’m guessing it’s 80-90% complete (including three of the four annuals. Some issues in the collection may have belonged to my brother, David, but the bulk of them were given (or perhaps sold, the details are somewhat fuzzy) to me by Mike Butcher.2 For the most part, they’re in decent shape, but ten-plus years of sitting in a box in the attic have taken their toll. Even sitting in a box specifically designed for them, comics degrade over time. If they’re not bagged and boarded (and these aren’t, though I’m thinking about correcting that), gravity works its evil magic and the bottom of the comics start to curl.

Condition aside, this is an amazing find. I knew the series was there, but I had no idea how close to complete it was. It might even be possible to fill in the gaps without putting too much hurt on my wallet. Maybe. I have no idea what the comic book market looks like these days. Apart from the occasional issue of Captain America or Ultimate Spider-Man, I’m pretty much out of that particular loop.

What’s the big deal about Rom? Well, he sacrificed his humanity to save the planet Galador from the Dire Wraiths. After defeating the Wraiths on Galador, Rom—who was the first Galadorian to volunteer to become a spaceknight—followed them through the galaxy for 200 years, eventually arriving on Earth. Using his Neutralizer, Rom banished Dire Wraiths (who had disguised themselves as humans) to Limbo. Unfortunately, whenever Rom banished a Wraith to Limbo, it appeared that he was killing a human being. This didn’t sit well with the populace of Earth, and Rom was treated as a murderer and pursued by the U.S. Army.

Marvel did something incredible with Rom. They took a Parker Brothers toy and created a fantastic, compelling story. Rom wants little more than to regain the humanity he sacrificed to save his people, but he cannot rest until the threat of the Dire Wraiths is eliminated. Deep within the awesome armor of the spaceknight is a man who longs to be a man once more. The Rom, Spaceknight comic book far surpassed the toy upon which it was based, becoming a story that explored the depths of what it truly means to be human.

Plus, that Neutralizer kicked ass.

1. I loved What If…? The series required that the reader have a pretty good knowledge of the history of the Marvel universe. Uatu, the all-seeing Watcher who made his home on Earth’s moon would focus on a key event (or, in some cases, a seemingly trivial event) in the Marvel universe and show us how different things would be if that event had played out differently. What if Spider-Man had never married Mary Jane? What if Susan and Reed Richards’ second child had lived? What if Rick Jones had become the Hulk? One of my favorite issues is “What if Spider-Man’s clone had lived?” Why? Because it turns out that Spider-Man’s clone never died. In fact, the Spider-Man that many of us followed for years and years is the clone! Not every spiderfan is happy about his development, by the way.

   At any rate, I remember explaining the concept of What If…? to my brother, Keven, many years ago. “Yeah,” he said, “and what if superheroes were real?” I guess he thought the idea of alternate histories for a fictional universe was kind of silly. And it is. It really is. But it’s entertaining, too. [back]

2. Mike Butcher was my aunt Susie’s boyfriend. When my younger siblings and I went with my mother to visit my dad (working in lower Michigan at the time) one summer, we also visited Susie and Mike. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Mike was an avid comic collector. I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but I (or maybe it was Adam and I) wound up with a hefty chunk of Mike’s collection, including not only Rom, Spaceknight, but the first twenty-five issues of The Savage She-Hulk. Mike, unfortunately, is no longer with us. He suffered a fatal heart attack several years ago, while attending church. I didn’t know him all that well, and only met him on a few occasions, but I always thought he was a cool guy. [back]

Posted July 11, 2005 Comments(4)

I’ve added a few vacation pictures to the photo gallery. I’ve also updated the “Fotografix” link on this page to go directly to my galleries, as opposed to the main gallery page. Hopefully, this should make it a little easier for some people (*cough*Dad*cough*) to navigate.

The thing about being the photographer is that you rarely appear in the pictures.

Posted July 9, 2005 Comments(0)

Birthday wishes to my brother, Keven (AKA KJwon), who is 39 years of old today.

Belated birthday wishes also to my brother, David (AKA Thagg), who achieved 42 years of even older on Thursday, the 23rd of June. I apologize for the belatedness. I have a laundry list of excuses for being so tardy, but they are all lame.

Posted July 8, 2005 Comments(2)

There are certain things in life that aren’t contagious. I can’t “catch” unibrow by sitting next to someone who’s got one, nor am I likely to contract dentures by sitting next to someone’s grandmother.

Air-conditioning malfunctivitus, however, seems to transmitted through the air (or perhaps concrete), because the MVoD caught it just by parking in the driveway of a house that had a non-working AC unit.

Before we left for vacation, I brought the MVoD to the dealer to have them look at a couple of things. First, water had gotten into the left taillight assembly and one of the bulbs was dead. Second, the AC had ceased conditioning air.

The taillight was no big deal. The bulb was replaced and the assembly sealed free of charge. My wallet says thank you. Ah, but the AC. Seems there’s a crack in the condenser and the coolant leaks out as fast as it can be pumped in. Estimated cost to replace the condenser: $950. My wallet says it’s time to roll down the windows.

The AC doesn’t work in Laura’s Sunbird, either. Further evidence that air-conditioning malfunctivitus is communicable. In the Sunbird’s case, I think a simple coolant recharge will remedy the problem, at least temporarily. If I’m proven wrong, it’ll be like attempting to treat tuberculosis with a Band-Aid.

Edit: After some consideration, I’ve come to the conclusion that the proper spelling is most likely malfunctivitis, with an -is as opposed to the originally presented -us.

Posted July 6, 2005 Comments(7)

Laura and I spent the last week in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula visiting my relatives. We left Sunday afternoon and returned last night.

Sunday: Drove to Lansing, MI1. Spent the evening with the Wiitala family. Ate ice cream, played UNO.
Monday: Got up early and drove the rest of the way to my parents’ place. We left Lansing at 7:30AM and arrived at Messy Manor Ranch at about 4:30PM. Managed to not get eaten by Onyx, my parents’ German Shepherd2. Mom baked two large pies3.
Tuesday: Lazy, lazy, lazy. Also, Dad made about eight dozen cookies (oatmeal raisin and chocolate chip) because Mom wasn’t around to tell him not to.
Wednesday: See Tuesday. Brenda showed up a day ahead of schedule.
Thursday: Ditto. We did run into town in the evening to get some frozen treats (Lemon Chill, Bomb Pops) to soothe Laura’s sore throat.
Friday: The big trip into town. Breakfast at the Suomi restaurant, then a visit to Dee Stadium (the birthplace of professional ice hockey) to view the exhibit chronicling the history of Houghton County. Afterward, we went to a junkyard in a failed attempt to find a head for a Dodge Caravan, then took Laura to the emergency room at Portage Hospital4. Then it was off to ShopKo to get Laura’s prescription filled. After that, we bought groceries, went to lunch, dropped by the Jeffers High School open house, stopped to see some relatives and went home.
Saturday: Karen arrived at 1:58AM. She drove in from Chicago after Brenda’s plans to visit her there fell through. Laura and I attended the all-school reunion dinner at Jeffers with my Mom, Dad, one uncle and two aunts. There were only three people in attendance who graduated between 1981 and the present. I didn’t know the other two.
Sunday: Croquet in the early afternoon followed by a cookout and birthday celebration at my aunt and uncle’s “camp” on Lake Superior. Dad was born on this day in 1939. The water was cold but certainly not too cold for swimming. Alas, my trunks were back at my parents’ place. To make matters worse, the flies were biting, which kept most everyone inside the whole while. Volleyball in the evening. The flies back at Messy Manor Ranch weren’t anywhere near as vicious as those at the lake. Adam and Brenda went back to the lake to watch the fireworks, but Laura and I skipped them due to exhaustion.
Monday: Drove, drove, drove. Thirteen hours and forty-one minutes from door to door. On the way back we saw one black bear (in the U.P., between L’Anse and Alberta) and fireworks from perhaps two dozen different communities (along the 80/90 turnpike and driving through Cleveland in Ohio). Average speed in the Upper Peninsula over a five hour period5: 56mph.

Mom is very eager to clean out the attic, so I took four large boxes of comics back to Ohio. I’d guess that’s 800 or more comics. They’re not worth any money, but they sure bring back a lot of memories. My brother, Adam, and I spent a couple of hours sorting through the boxes separating his comics (Silver Surfer, The Flash, The Punisher, Amazing Spider-Man) from mine (pretty much everything else).

At some point during the week, we were visited by the Toivola Volunteer Fire Department’s new pumper truck. Several members of the TVFD drove to East Jordan to pick up the truck earlier in the week. My father has been a member of the TVFD since its inception, and the entire family has been involved in various events sponsored by the fire department. The firemen were very excited about acquiring this new truck, and I suspect some of them slept in cots at the firestation that entire week.

1. Lansing allegedly won the capital of Michigan by a single vote over Calumet, which is in the northwestern Upper Peninsula. [back]
2. Once Onyx determined that it was not necessary to eat me, she wanted to play fetch at every possible opportunity. The dog is absolutely insane for her tennis ball, and will chase it all over creation for hours at a time, if given the opportunity. [back]
3. The pies were baked in half-sheet pans, and I’d estimate them to be about 16″ x 22″. Dad claims to have eaten eighteen pieces of the rhubarb in the course of the next four days. I’m not sure this is possible, as I ate nearly half that many myself. The apple pie was also quite good, but everyone was rabid for the rhubarb. [back]
4. Laura had a bit of a sore throat early in the week that developed into a very nasty, wet cough by Friday. At the ER, she was given some sort of inhaler, a prescription for Robitussin with codeine and a prescription for an antibiotic, the latter to be filled only if she got worse. She was feeling quite a bit better by Sunday, but still has coughing fits. [back]
5. It took us precisely this long to get from my parents’ house in Toivola to the center of the Mackinac Bridge, including a stop in Chassell (not South Range) for gas. [back]

Posted July 5, 2005 Comments(8)