one I'm pleased with, one I'm not

It's been a long time since my last journal, several weeks in fact. I've just been too busy to write much, but things have still been going on.

This week I gained two Signature Series books. The first, Atomeka's A1 #1, signed by Glenn Fabry and Brian Bolland. I was initially drawn to this comic for the cool Warpsmith cover. I recognized the characters from Miracleman, and the table of contents on the back cover read like a who's-who of influential creators: Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Simon Bisley, Brian Bolland, a dozen more. I was surprised to find that I enjoyed several of the stories by unknowns more than some of the headliners. One in particular, "Bad Bread," really stood out to me. It is a short story that may have a "grain" of truth to it (pun to be revealed). It is the story of a Medieval peasant who has consumed his usual meal of hard, dark rye bread, but this time the rye is infested with the fungus Ergot. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergot) One of the natural chemicals produced by the Ergot life cycle is lysergic acid, a precursor element to LSD. As such, ingesting Ergot typically results in dramatic hallucinations which were generally ascribed to spiritual hysteria in Ye Olden Days, considered visions or demonic torments. Some years later, I cited this story as a reference in a paper I wrote on Dante's Inferno, postulating that some of his descriptions of the underworld were influenced by hallucinations he had heard about or perhaps even experienced himself. I still have this copy, but it is in "reader" condition by now. My new SS copy, however, came via eBay. The list price was a bit more than I was willing to go for, so I made an offer expecting a counter-offer, but my initial offer was immediately accepted. Hooray!

The other Sig Series I got this week is one that I had been expecting for a while. I've seen several people make some good-natured (and some not-so-good-natured) comments on how many Stan Lee signatures there are out there, but I didn't have any. TIme to remedy that. I checked the Desert Wind Comics website to see what was coming up, and decided on trying for Wizard World Chicago. Chris Claremont and Alan Davis would also be there, and I saw a chance to get a great X-Book triple signed. I considered an Excalibur 1, but I thought the dark cover would be tough to get good results. I settled for an Uncanny X-Men 213, with an iconic Wolverine-Sabretooth battle cover. This is an issue that I'd never owned, so it would be extra special. I bought a Blue Label 9.6, thinking that would be sufficient with triple sigs to be a real highlight of my collection. I sent it to DWC in July for the August show. I was immediately struck by the lack of communication from DWC, who never acknowledged receipt of the comic as they said they would on their website. After two weeks and confirming delivery through USPS, I emailed and they replied that they had received it. Earlier this week I decided that it had been gone for a long time, so I emailed to check on it. They replied that it was on Delivery Exception from Fed Ex. I found the FedEx second notice in the bushes of the townhouse next door, but no first notice or final notice. The Door Tag number was also not to be found in the Fed Ex tracking system. After an hour on the phone with Fed Ex, and an hour drive to the Fed Ex ground HQ, I had my box direct from CGC. I know CGC sends me an email when they ship to my account, but I guess DWC was too busy to relay that to me so I could look out for it. If I hadn't emailed DWC myself I would still not have it. Less than stellar customer service. Even worse, I open it to find that the book has dropped a grade to 9.4 (unfortunate but understandable). The corners are pretty serevely dinged; in fact I'd say 9.4 was generous. Still, acceptable so far. Hey, wait a minute... signed by Stan Lee and Chris Claremont. Not signed by Alan Davis. What? Why not? I paid for multiple sigs, and can understand that time constraints with Stan Lee may have prevented all three, but at least give me the courtesy of letting me know that at some point in the two months between the show and getting the book back. Not a satisfied customer.

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