Wednesday, April 20, 2005

girl in comic book store

As a first-timer in a honest-to-goodness comic book store, I was surprised to find that I was the only woman in the store. It was deathly quiet in there as about six totally random middle-aged men shuffled through the selection.

I had hoped that some music would be blasting or something so I could quickly and discreetly ask my question, and not give away my virgin-to-comic-book-world status. Without the cover of noise, I bravely asked the kindly gentleman behind the counter for the comic book I had come searching for. As an introduction to comic books, I had been told this was a good starting point.

He thought for a moment and then pointed out a large bible-esque book on the bottom shelf. "Hey," I thought to myself, "I though I was looking for a comic book?" I played it cool. I played it like I knew it was going to look nothing like what an actual comic book looks like. Under my breath, I rued the day that I didn't look this god damn thing up on the internet before I came galavanting in here like a know-it-all.

"Oh. It's a real book?" I didn't of course say this aloud, fearing that the random men in the store might stone me for implying that comic books aren't real books.

I bought the book anyway. Apparently, it's an illustrated novel and it's called Blankets and I've read a few pages and I'm like totally into it.

aside: although this story is true, I left out some key facts:
  • j-po was with me.
  • j-po was gently scolded by the so-called kindly gentleman for almost ripping some posters that hung loosly at toddler-level.
  • Despite the gentle scolding j-po was given a free comic book for being a first-time customer. He almost had the free comic book taken away because he wanted to switch it for a scarier one, but the not-so-kindly gentleman was standing his ground and had final say about giveaways.
  • For a brief moment, I thought I was going to have to buy a bunch a comic books that j-po was about the scrunch up. He didn't scrunch them, so I didn't buy them. Nonetheless, the quiet we found upon entering the store was broken often and with much enthusiasm on j-po's part during our visit.
  • The mean guy behind the counter was either ridiculing me for being a newbie or praising my taste when he said as I left: "It's an interesting choice -- all the rage right now."

4 comments:

Mandy said...

He gave him a Spiderman one that fits his age, but unfortunately I can't tell you any more about it because we can't find it.

Mandy said...

Or rather, we lost it somewhere along our travels today. Who knows. But we were in the car searching for it and I found a neato little toy in the depths of my car and I said, "Jerry, Look!" And he told me: "Don't say 'look' until you find the comic book." It was cute, but I feel bad because he's pretty upset that we can't find it.

Anonymous said...

manda-

the comic book is obviously under all of the crap in your backseat. just look a little harder. j-po is a very smart little boy. he has you all figured out. he he. ha.

Mandy said...

You butthead, my car has recently been cleaned out. As hard as that is to believe. And we found the book. It was in the bag from the store lying near the other messy part of my life...my desk. At least some parts of my house are clean.