It's been a while.

But not as long as it's been since Spencer posted.

I finished Bizarro World last night, and even though Kevin just described it as such, I can't think of a better word than delightful. It improves greatly on Bizarro Comics, due in large part to the removal of the overlong framing story. With one notable exception (the Batman musical, but let's face it—even Alan Moore can't manage a 'musical' comic), I was grinning throughout the entire book. It was wonderfully arranged, too. I often found myself thinking, "Wow! Best one yet!" only to think the exact same thing for the next story. Let's go ahead and call that the Anthology of the Year.

And let's call that my yearly awards thing. Moving on...

After not going to the nearby Borders for a couple months, I went there a couple weeks ago to find that their manga section had doubled in size (still no Cromartie High School*, though they did have one copy of the first Antique Bakery), as had their single-issue last-month's-comics section. I went there again today and found a lot more, let's call them, real comics too. (Hmm. Wonder who that'll annoy.) They had Epileptic, Carnet De Voyage, a The Incal GN, many copies of the Runaways digests, the Showcase Presents collections of Superman and Green Lantern, and several other things I'd never seen there.

(I could never find those Showcase Presents books on Amazon—turns out including 'DC' in the search causes it to utterly fail. Also, the subsequent volumes are only $11.55 there. Not bad at all.)

I was so overwhelmed by those (and a $19 CD, which is ridiculous) that I had to retreat back to my home and request a bunch of (which is to say, three) interlibrary loans.

* Of which chapter 58 is the best so far. I ♥ that book. Manga of the Year!