Happy New Years!!

I have been off the grid for the last week. It's a long story, but needless to say, it has left me refreshed and renewed. It is nice to have a moderate disconnect with the world... no cable or internet.

In that time, a number of things have occurred, Gerald Ford passed on, Saddam was hanged, and many other things.

I got the chance to finish another book on blogs... I may be a poorly practicing blogger, but I have become fascinated with the culture behind it and its applications in so many sectors.

I hope you all have a Safe and Happy New Years and prepare to check back more often... I'll be ready for you.

The Spirit Returns...

Before I even began collecting comic books with interest, I was a fan of cartoons and great suer hero stories. I was given a book, by a friend of my grandfather, which on the outside looked like an old faded red cover tome. Probably on a dry and boring topic. Than I cracked open the spine and discovered Jules Feiffer's The Great Comic Book Heroes. Within it's pages was a gathering of the original stories of Batman, Superman, The Green Lantern (Alan Scott), and many more from the Golden Age of comics... including one such classic that wasn't readily known to Mainstream Media as many of the other, The Spirit.

The Spirit told the tale of a mysterious man in a blue suit with a fedora and a spirit gum mask hiding his identity. The story was unique and I read it many times. DC Comics as decided to resurrect The Spirit in a new monthly series.

This week I picked up Issue #1 because I wanted to see how the story would be rewritten and to think back to that time with my red book. This edition which stays true to Will Eisner's rendition, is written by Darwyn Cooke and illustrated by Cooke and J. Bone. Their style rings true to the classic and has touches of animation style seen in The Batman, Legion of Super Heroes, and the Dini's Batman and Superman series. It's really nice to see a simple clean style that still can tell a great story.

I look forward to seeing how the story progresses. Will they be able to maintain the style and still keep the story relevant to today's readers instead of the audience of the original.

I hope that it does well and look forward to hearing the retelling of The Spirit's background.

December and the cold is setting in...

Well I haven't written a post in a while. Who knows what thoughts I lost in the meantime. The one thing I discovered was that there was an organization for people who run every day. They have a really clever web site name... runeveryday.com. Okay, it's not that clever... but as someone who wouldn't even scratch the surface of those who are part of the organization... I know that you don't have to be clever to put one foot in front of the other and repeat every day. Rules for counting your streak as official are running one mile within every 24 hour period. Some documentation will also have to be provided for it to be official... although I have to imagine most streakers keep a running logs like myself.

I am happy to have run 251 days in a row... I have to say the 251st was one of the more difficult, today was the first time that the temperature dipped below 30 degrees F. But, I like the notion of being one of very few people out there. It's the attitude of knowing that you are working harder than the competition. Anyway...

I wish the Running Streak Association had a cool tee shirt or something... I'll wait until I rack up a year of non stop running until I think of joining... until then... Make Mine Marvel.