Boxing Day part two – Headed out to Soundscapes first to grab more stuff that I didn’t get yesterday – got pretty much what I expected to. Some stuff that I wasn’t sure about, the 15% discount wasn’t enough to persuade me. I did come away with The Kinks’ Arthur Or The Decline And Fall Of The British Empire and Are The Village Green Preservation Society, as well as the Pavement reissue of Slanted & Enchanted. I’ve never ‘gotten’ Pavement, but I figure I should own some – and this extended deluxe repackage of their best album seemed as good a candidate as any. I’m actually enjoying it – not enough to run out and get their entire catalog, but I may add Crooked Rain Crooked Rain to the collection.

I’ve got the comic book itch back again, so it’s just as well that Hairy Tarantula’a Boxing Week sale is 35% off all Marvel and DC trade paperbacks. I grabbed The Ultimates paperback on recommendation from Kevin, and he’s right – it’s excellent stuff. I will probably go back for more books after I do some homework about what’s good and what’s not. I’ve been out of it for so long. I’m obliged to the store for the sale, but man – some of the conversation that goes in there… it’s just scary.

Andrea and Bryan are in town tonight, I don’t think I’ve seen them for months though it doesn’t really seem like that long. Time really does sneak away from you when you’re not looking.

np – Pavement / Slanted & Enchanted – Luxe & Reduxe

For the record, I generally think Robin Black is a dink, but in this article, he speaks truth.

np – Doug Martsch / Now You Know

I re-read Grant Morrison’s complete 26-issue run on Animal Man this afternoon. Hard to believe these were originally published almost 15 years ago. This was my first venture beyond the realm of conventional superhero comics – while the characters and many situations depicted in the book were decidedly of the spandex persuasion, the stories and themes were not. Initially, a lot of the main focus was on animal rights, but by the end, it was a full-blown existential experience, with a terrific Deus Ex Machina in the final issue where Animal Man comes face to face with Morrison and the circumstances of his existance as a comic book character are laid down bare in front of him. I will confess that I wasn’t old enough to fully appreciate the depth of this book when I first started reading it – hell, I was 14 at the time – but I would say that I ‘get it’ now. Which is ironic, because now that Morrison has taken the scripting reins of my first four-colour love, X-Men, I don’t think I understand what he’s writing about again. It is my fate to be constantly 12 years behind the man, I guess.

np – Sleater-Kinney / One Beat

So salvo one of the Boxing Week sales turned out to be pretty understated. As expected, came up empty through the Annex and did all my shopping at Rotate This, who kept in the festive spirit by offering a grand 25% off everything in the store. My acquisitions consisted of The Magnetic Fields’ Holiday, Sleater-Kinney’s One Beat and Doug Martsch’s Now You Know. Also grabbed some stuff for Kevin since he’s too lazy to come downtown and do his shopping himself. And I grabbed a used copy of Echo & The Bunnymen’s eponymous 1987 album at Penguin.

Tomorrow I’ll be getting more goodies as Soundscapes opens up with their Boxing Week sale, and I’ll also be hitting Silver Snail to load up on graphic novels. There will be more spending and bolstering of the local economy in the days to come, just not sure exactly what yet.

My typing is all dodgy as I adjust to this natural keyboard. I guess my typing habits were pretty poor before.

np – The Magnetic Fields / Holiday

Greetings and salutations from the currently whited-out burg of Oakville. Back with the parentals for Christmas, and I was not expecting to wake up to a goodly heaping of snow. The sentimentalist in me says, “yay, white Christmas!”, the pragmatist in me say, “shit, gotta shovel!”.

Christmas isn’t really a big deal around the household, there’s a cursory gift exchange (I got some cash, a Microsoft natural keyboard and a shirt and tie so I stop borrowing my brothers whenever I need to break out the suit) but mostly just hanging out and building up the goodwill bank so as to mitigate the grief I get the rest of the year for not calling or visiting as often as I should.

There’s not an awful lot to do here, though. I’ve already reset all the VCR clocks so they don’t blink “12:00” anymore. I should make some phone calls and if the roads clear up some this afternoon, drop off some gifts. But mostly I’ll probably just be sitting around reading.

Merry Christmas to everyone!