I can plainly see that.

And why might some of my choices in life seem foolish in hindsight. Let's look at the time period of the late 1980's to about 2003 when I was a regular on the comic book convention scene in the New York area.

Here is a list of some of the shows that I set up at:

East Meadow -- At the time, this was the longest running monthly show in the New York area, run by Perry. I used to have two tables and would lug about 20 long boxes down a steep flight of stairs every month. Oh, my aching back. Thank you to Peter, the son of another vendor, who helped me in exchange for credit at my table. One day a collector brought in 3 copies of Iron Man 55 in what I remember as 9.0+ shape. He wanted $50 each and I passed on them because that was high at the time and I did not think that Thanos would be a major character after the Infinity Gauntlet storyline in 1991. D'oh!

Rockville Center -- I remember a new "kid" setting up a table at the show who showed a lot of promise in the way he interacted with customers and even other dealers. He went on to be a major part of Metropolis Comics and have a job that I envy. Cheers, Vinny! I also remember a few guys at the show bringing stacks of original art and selling them from $10 a page and up. I never bought one

Great Eastern Conventions -- I used to drive from Long Island, NY to New Jersey at least twice a month to set up at Fred Greenberg's shows. Once I did his big show in Boston and had a choice of an non-prime location or a table very close to where an up and coming artist was going to be signing books. I chose the one with more foot traffic. The line in front of my table was crazy all day but no one even looked at my stuff or the other dealers in the area, not even when the line wasn't moving. Everyone just stood there waiting for Todd McFarlane to sign their books. Luckily someone fought his way through the crowd a bought Iron Man #2-8 from me that day at my full asking price.

Same Boston show - I did have someone who responded to my employee classified ad in my regular job's newsletter regarding "Comics Wanted" show up. He brought a dresser drawer, literally, to my table. Other dealers were trying to entice him to see what he had but fortunately he came straight to me. He had Amazing Spider-man #1-170 plus Amazing Fantasy 15. I took them back to New York (along with the drawer), evaluated them and asked him what he wanted for them to open the negotiations. I gave him a few hundred dollars more than his asking price and still got a sweet deal. I have yet to truly refine my negotiating skills. So far, I've only had CGC grade the AF 15 (2.0 SS Stan Lee) and the AS 1 (4.5 SS Stan Lee) from that collection (see photo). All the other issues were removed from that drawer and now reside in Mylars. People can argue all day about having key silver age books signed but IT'S STAN LEE. If they were higher grade I probably would have passed on the signatures.

Selfless plug -- I remember JP also doing the Great Eastern shows and now he runs some very successful shows in New Jersey. We reminisced about the "olden days" and I hope to start setting up in the future at his shows.

I also did the monthly Farmingdale, Bayshore, and Floral Park, NY shows if anyone is still reading or thinks they might recognize me if they attended these shows. I stopped doing shows in the early 2000's when I got married and my regular job required more travelling. I couldn't also be selling at a con on weekends when I wasn't home all week.

So, was I a fool for some of the choices I made? I don't think so. Everyone lets a purchase opportunity pass and regrets it once in a while. Could I have become a successful Comic Dealer... probably, but right out of college I got a job in the tax department of one of Wall Street's leading Investment Banking firms. How could I could pass up that opportunity with regular paycheck with health benefits? Should I have continued doing shows, even if I cut down to one or so a month? Looking back, I might have sold many of the books from this wonderful collection that I own now. Or I might have spent a lot more buying collections that came past my table and be in some crazy debt right now.

I'm happy with the way things turned out. Fortunately I got back into the hobby early last year and have been rejuvenated. I don't buy much now but I enjoy attending shows and getting some of my books autographed and CGC SS graded. I have met some of the boardies at the CGC table and have started friendships from the "pod" as we called it that would stick together with a CGC witness to each get all our books autographed by the same artists. Name dropping: Bagofleas and Tnerb.

One last thing: I forgot to give credit to Mick Jagger for the Subject line of my last journal. This one is from Mark Evanier and Sergio Aragones (Groo). I am prone to quoting movies, songs and comics, sometime obscure ones.

James

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