As pretty incorrigible used bookstore addicts, we have the extreme good fortune (or bad fortune? monetarily speaking...) of living close to several wonderful independent bookstores. Our favorite for the past few years is definitely the aptly named BookBuyers, and I really believe that I can count the times we've made it out of there without buying anything on one hand (fyi, I almost went back and deleted the name selfishly, so that no one else will compete with us for the new treasures that appear. But I think my desire for their business success won out). I always giggle when the person at the counter asks if we've got store credit, since the couple of times we actually sold things to them, we used up the credit before leaving the store. Most of what we get is books, most recently favoring comics and graphic novels that we snatch up for our growing collection. However, they also sell things like games, music, movies and sheet music, among other delightful things - so you can see why we very rarely escape without carrying something out. Once in a while we really luck onto some crazy finds, like when I happened on the complete box sets of Gundam Wing and Neon Genesis Evangelion on two separate occasions. Lately we've had some good holiday vibes and gotten pretty awesome scores, including this haul the other day:
1) Volumes I and III of The Complete Little Nemo in Slumberland, a classic comic by Winsor McCay I got turned on to by a Stanford prof. of Film and Media Studies, Scott Bukatman, who just published a new book on it that I'm very excited about called The Poetics of Slumberland: Animated Spirits and The Animating Spirit, not yet released but available for pre-order.
2) The Castafiore Emerald, from The Adventures of Tintin, to add to the other four volumes from the same set that I found at BB on another visit. Incidentally, another Stanford prof., Jean-Marie Apostolides, from the French department, wrote a book about Tintin called The Metamorphoses of Tintin: Or Tintin for Adults. I recently heard some disparaging words about the upcoming Tintin movie release from Spielberg by a cartoonist who will here remain nameless, but whose opinion I value highly (and which confirms my skepticism based solely on the previews). Nevertheless, I will likely be seeing it in theaters, if only because we are doing a session on it in the Graphic Narrative Project workshops next quarter (an academic community for the study of graphic narratives, of which I am co-founder and graduate coordinator). Oh, and by the way, we were very excited to read this article about our group written for the Stanford Human Experience website, then picked up on the Stanford Report: http://humanexperience.stanford.edu/graphicnarrative. As per item #1, I should mention that Scott Bukatman has been instrumental in our development as a workshop and was one of our faculty coordinators last year. Huzzah!
3) Not pictured - UNO! One pack, to supplement another Target-bought pack, in case we need to play with a double. I can't wait to revive the old favorite card game. Woot Woot!
4) A vintagey puzzle of the city of San Francisco. Must still do some digging to find out more about it, but there's a medium-to-high likelihood that I'll give up that idea and just enjoy it sans historical details for its delightful aesthetic qualities and fun-having potential. Speaking of puzzles, stay tuned for some piece-gathering insanity on my next post. Tootles!
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