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I try to walk too. When I'm in SF I'm always walking, and with the hills it's a work out. At work I try to use the stairs instead of the elevator as much as possible. So I agree with you, the little things matter to try to keep your weight down. I always promise myself to order fish at restaurants, but usually I get steak. Although this past weekend, I got soft shell crabs. It was fried, but at least fish over steak.

Rats, too slow

One of the best classic covers Rick. Great win, congrats!

House of Prime Rib I haven't had a food post in a while so here we go. Last week I was in SF on business. Whenever I'm in SF I try to go to House of Prime Rib. It's touristy but incredibly good. But they only have steak. Okay, they do have 1 fish dish. But House of Prime Rib is all about (duh!) Prime Rib. They have an undocumented feature -- they will sear your prime rib if you ask. If you go this direction, order it rare if you want medium rare. Another tip -- for a drink, order a martini or Manhattan. They will give you the tumbler so it's like getting 2 drinks. Another (well known) secret -- after your meal, you can ask for another piece of prime rib to top you off. It's free, and you can take it to go if you want. It's perfect for breakfast the next day, with runny or scrambled eggs. One more tip -- they have a list of 100 point wines. Some are deals! During my visit last week, we scored a 100 point Kathryn Hall cab for way below market. It was amazing! Here are pictures of my dinner last week. The Grey Goose martini you see was after a Basil Hayden Manhattan (both before our food), and then we had the 100 point Hall (with our food), so yeah I was feeling no pain. To finish our meal, my work colleague ordered Irish whiskey; fortunately, all I had to do the next day was ride a plane home. Thanks for reading.

I haven't heard anything lately on converting our journals. Maybe (hopefully) the THE PEOPLE IN POWER will just leave things as they are. Like, don't fix it if it ain't broke!

No, this is not the attic. Our beach house only has 1 floor, and my comic room is in the back of the house, in space we added a couple years ago (we also added another bathroom, to essentially make the house big enough to retire in; I hope to retire in 6-10 years). The ceiling of the room, though, is high as it goes right up to the roof of the house. I did that on purpose as I knew I would need the vertical space to fit all my stuff. Fortunately, the house has central air and decent insulation, so even with the high ceiling, heat is not a problem. My bigger concern is flooding from the ocean. Not so much an issue now, but with global warming .... Well, hope that never happens (knock on wood). If it does, we'll see if the insurance policy I have with Collectibles Insurance is actually worth anything. I've been paying them close to a grand for over a decade, so if they stiff me when I need them I'll be very pissed.

Let me know if you ever think about selling it.

I'd love to see your collection. Have you posted it somewhere? I think I'll probably not include the Venus comics in mine for the reason you mention, they don't have the gothic feel. Also, the lady has to be in distress -- that's the case with 6 but not 1. Trying to find gothic in the golden age may be the hardest thing. Off the top of my head I can't think of any.

Thanks, your original collection was definitely my inspiration. I seem to remember you going back and forth about whether to include certain books in the set, and the same is happening to me. For example, I love that Night Nurse but at this point I'm not sure about putting it into the set. Also, I'm not sure how strict to be about "white" or if other colors are okay, like that House of Secrets from your old set. Oh well, these decisions are part of the fun of doing something like this.

No Soup (Jon Berk) For Me I had about a dozen bids on the CC Jon Berk auction. Even though it's only the 2nd day, I'm pretty sure I won't win any of them. Oh well, I didn't really expect to. But, to help with the pain, I won this grail this weekend ... for almost half my max bid. Perhaps people were keeping their powder dry for the Berk auction? Anyway, I'm glad to finally cross this one off my list.

Lady In White A few years ago @miraclemet put together a collection he called Lady In White. Then after putting it together, he decided to sell it. I remember reading with great interest his posts about putting the collection together, and then how sad I was when he decided to sell it (but of course I think we all understand wanting to change collecting direction from time to time). Anyway, fast forward to a couple weeks ago. I was looking at some of my comics and I realized my herd included "Lady In White" books. So I decided to put together a Lady In White collection. But what to call it? Damsel In White? Gothic Chicks? Really, "Lady In White" was the best name. So today I PM'd miraclemet, and he gave me permission to use Lady In White. To be in the set, the cover has to have a gothic feel to it, with a damsel in distress wearing a flowing white dress or gown. The books have to be silver or gold, perhaps bronze, but definitely not modern. For bronze and silver my threshold is at least 9.0. I haven't decided yet for gold. I think I'm going to be strict with myself on these guidelines or else the set will lose direction and won't be as much fun. Here's what I have so far (and I made a major pick up today; I'll post it when I get it).

Yes, all 3 of those are on my list. The challenge is finding them in 9.0+

Ugh! Now you're tempting me to branch off into paperbacks. I think I'll leave it up to CGC. If CGC won't grade it, then I can't add it to the collection.

Thanks, both are now on my list

Lady In White So I thought I'd post something for us to read as we wait for the Jon Berk auctions to close. A few years ago @miraclemet put together a collection he called Lady In White. Then after putting it together, he decided to sell it. I remember reading with great interest his posts about putting the collection together, and then how sad I was when he decided to sell it (but of course I think we all understand wanting to change collecting direction from time to time). Anyway, fast forward to a couple weeks ago. I was looking at some of my comics and I realized my herd included "Lady In White" books. So I decided to put together a Lady In White collection. But what to call it? Damsel In White? Gothic Chicks? Really, "Lady In White" was the best name. So today I PM'd miraclemet, and he gave me permission to use Lady In White. To be in the set, the cover has to have a gothic feel to it, with a damsel in distress wearing a flowing white dress or gown. The books have to be silver or gold, perhaps bronze, but definitely not modern. For bronze and silver my threshold is at least 9.0. I haven't decided yet for gold. If you know of comics that qualify, please let me know. Here's what I have so far (and I made a major pick up today; I'll post it when I get it).

A couple from my collection

They had a copy on sale at WW Philly last week. Dealer's price was $3000 firm (although I didn't make an offer so I don't know how serious he was).

Reggie has a number of very nice Bettys and Veronicas

New Additions - Sirens of Cinema and Pin-Up Pete I got this back from CGC recently, the Dave Stevens issue of Sirens of Cinema. Mine is the only 9.8. There are two 9.6s (one of those is mine too, as I sent in both hoping to get a 9.8 for my registry set). I'm thinking about selling some of my duplicates sometime this summer. Also, I finally got a copy of Pin-Up Pete for my collection. Not a major want or grail for me, but it seems you can't be a serious GA GGA collector without having one. As others have said, this book is a treasure trove of GGA.

I really enjoy your journal. I saw tons of fidget spinners last week at WW Philly. The first time I saw one, I was interested enough to stop and look, but not buy. I agree, anyone buying in volume will have alot of left over stock (IMHO). Also in Philly tons of people were selling Pop figures. The same ones, about the same price. Can't see how those people are making money either.

Tales From the Comic Book Room - GOT Lamp and the Corner By the Window I haven't posted pictures of my comic room lately so here are a few. Here's my desk where I have a new Game of Thrones lamp that I picked up at one of those Annandale firehouse cons a couple months ago. These 2 pictures show the lamp with a better view of the background: There's a window behind the desk. I've built shelves around the window to maximize storage space. Here's how it looks. I store long boxes to the right of the window. Above the comic boxes I've built a table with shelves on top. I have a flat screen TV (connected to Apple TV and Roku) and some statues on the table, and I store comics and books on the shelves. Here's a picture. I've also rigged a shelf to store CGC books in front of the long boxes. Cindy and Junie are displayed there. Thanks for reading.

Major Grail Alert -- TTA 13 -- First Groot Last month my wife and I took our 2 oldest daughters on a swing through California. SF then LA with a side trip to Napa. We went to give our kids a taste of CA, as they are thinking about moving there when they graduate from college (my oldest is a rising college senior). In Napa we did a barrel tasting at our favorite winery, Del Dotto. It included lunch with matching wines, including a waygu slider. Let me tell you, it was REALLY GOOD! Right before going to Del Dotto, I was checking the CGC market (of course) and I saw @Ricksneatstuff was having a sale of his Tales To Astonish 13. Of course, this is the first appearance of Groot. A couple of days before I saw Guardians of the Galaxy 2 and was charmed by baby Groot. I knew this was a terrible time to buy TTA 13 as Groot was hot, but Rick's sale price helped to ease the pain somewhat. My plan was to go to the Del Dotto tasting and think about it, but I was concerned someone might buy it. So just before heading off to the tasting, I dropped a flag on Rick's sale. Whenever I make a big purchase, I have some buyer's remorse. After Napa, we spent a couple days in LA. We went on a bike tour that included the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The main thing I made a point to see was the autographs of the original Star Trek cast in cement. After taking the pictures of Star Trek, I looked up. And guess what I saw? This poster of baby Groot. So then I knew I made the right decision buying Rick's TTA 13.

Dave Stevens Registry Set A goal this year for me was getting to the top of the Dave Stevens Covers registry set. For a few months I've been going back and forth between #1 and #2, and then suddenly the person I was competing with deleted his set. That was kind of a "fall of the chair" moment for me. Anyway, recently I've been able to add these books to my set. Hard to believe these books are over 30 years old. Seems just yesterday I was reading Dave's original Rocketeer comics.

Wizard World Philadelphia Con Report - Part 3 I'll close out this con report with some pictures of dealers walls. Here's a grail I didn't buy. It was offered at $3000 and out of my price range. Here's another thing I wanted but again the asking price was too high for me. Here's one of the many Pop booths. I bought one of these very cool Night Watch banners. The last thing I did before leaving was to get John Cusack's autograph. Pricey at $80, but Say Anything was one of my favorite movies growing up. This was the best picture I could get of John. Wizard World charges for pictures (same price as autographs) so I had to sneak a picture. Thanks for reading.

As I was chatting with Harley at the Philly con, he said something interesting. Offerings in upcoming auctions may be particularly good as people pay for what they got in the Berk auction.