Today is My Birthday.

Birthdays can be heavy or light. I have a few good friends who spend most of their “big day” contemplating their lives.

I think I own too many guns to follow their lead.

I keep things light. I’m hard on myself when I make mistakes but I try my best to move on and not make the same mistake twice.

For this year I’m going to focus on some elements that I have the power to change;

1- Work on my Japanese. I’ve done well in the past but I’ve let that fall to the wayside while I focus on work, I need to get back to it.

2- Work on Stoicism. It’s a lifestyle belief I am strongly behind and want to learn more. It’s basically the principle of removing emotion and focusing on Logic as you encounter difficulties.

That’s it, today I’ll eat some Chinese food, spend time with family and friends and I’ll still get some work done.

Working From Home - People Don't Want to Go Back!!

I read an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal— people who are being forced away from work at home are opting to get fired, and more and more of them are in a panic realizing they may never find another work from home gig.

Crazy.

So when the Scamdemic first hit back in, what 2019/2020- normal people reached out to me asking me for tips. How did I successfully work from home? How did I get dressed everyday? How did I not eat all day long? What was my secret!!???

I’m not kidding either, it was easily fifteen different friends and relations who reached out. The panic in their voices struck me. I told them my rules;

• I shower and get dressed the second I wake up. I’m not one to wander down to the breakfast table in a robe and slippers. I like to get dressed right away— not only does the shower wake me up, but I’ve often had someone ring the bell at the ungodly hour of 930am and I don’t want to look like I just rolled out of bed.

• I only work in my home office. I don’t do anything in there except work. Okay, I sometimes read a book or sit in a comfy chair looking at reference, and yeah, I’ve even taken a nap with the dog up there, but it is a place of work. I don’t eat up there, I do often take a coffee and I keep a steady stream of drinking water right next to me.

• I work eight to ten hours a day, and I take breaks every 90 minutes where I get up and use some exercise equipment— those rubber band things, a medicine ball, weights— I give it about 5-10 mins every 90 minutes. I also go down three flights of stairs (and three back up) to get water, a coffee refill, etc.

• I eat lunch regularly between 1:30-2:30 - if the weather is nice I’ll eat out on my deck. If it’s one of the 600 days of winter we have in New England I at least try and get some sun — my kitchen has big windows and gets a lot of sun.

• I usually take a coffee break at 4:30— that’s much quicker than lunch.

• Dinner is usually 7-7:30— and if I haven’t gotten an honest days work in then I have to go back after dinner. If not I shut everything down and I usually prep work for the next day. I try and take a walk after dinner and I eat small portions and I don’t snack. That’s how I keep my weight at 160lbs.

• If the mood strikes me I’ll work pretty late, which is why I often sleep until 9am— but I tend to plan on getting up at 8:30— but I don’t set an alarm because I don’t like them. I hate being jarred awake.

Many of those who reached out put on a lot of weight and couldn’t wait to get back to work. A few managed to make it work, and a couple still do a majority of work from home. But it seems like there is a large group of people who don’t want to go back— and I’ll be honest with you after 35 years I don’t think I could work in an office again.

Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas! I hope its a good one for you!

Twas the Night Before Christmas...

Christmas is such a great holiday— in normal weeks I usually take Dec 23- Jan 1st off— I won’t be able to do that fully for the second year in a row— but I’m planning on it in 2025.

I’m glad the DOGE Program is looking at eliminating Daylight Savings Time as one of its first priorities, I think that archaic bit of nonsense needs to go away. There is no argument to keeping it so please don’t try. There are 24 hours in a day no matter how many ways you cut it. Don’t like waking up in the dark, sleep later— don’t like going home in the dark— go home earlier— I can’t make all your life decisions for you.

Reeently I talked about BATMAN #14 when I reviewed the covers for the first 20 issues of BATMAN comics— these from the 1940s are considered “golden age”— #14 holds a special place for me for a number of reasons;

1- It was the first Golden Age Comic Book I ever saw and the first one I ever bought. I remember Paul Howley showing it to me at his great THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT on Chandler Street (that store is gone, now replaced by a much bigger but I’m sorry to say less fun giant store on Park Avenue— if you want to get a feel for Paul’s old store head out to THE OUTER LIMITS in Waltham— you might just run into me on a Sunday Afternoon). Coincidently it was in the Fall that he showed me, because I remember riding my bike back the 6 or so miles to my house in the dark.

The book was much larger than a regular comic book— and it was the incredible price of $50— I thought about it for about a day and then had to have it— I ended up with it and I still own it. I also own four other copies including the one in the photo above which I just picked up. I may clear the herd a bid and sell a few of my extras but I don’t like selling Golden Age Comics.

But that was a happy memory— hanging out with Paul, having him show me so many great things in the comics collectible world I’d never seen before— it was more than a store— it was a clubhouse.

You Can Handle More than You Can Handle

From the Daily Stoic;

It’s too much. Not another thing. Not another problem. Not another person. Not another piece of bad news.

You. Just. Can’t. Handle. It.

We all feel that way.

But that doesn’t mean it’s true.

Athletes learn that your body is a liar. That when you feel like you’re at capacity you’re actually not even close to your physical limitations This is partly why Seneca talked about treating the body rigorously—so we can learn to triumph over those limitations, that we get good at asserting who is in charge.

“I can handle/Way more than I can handle,” Bon Iver sings. And it’s true. We all can. You have so much more in you than it feels like you do. And how do you know this? Because the load you’re handling today dwarfs the load you could have carried at other times in your life, the things you are handling calmly today would have freaked you out just a few years ago.

You have so much more capacity. Your inner citadel is strong.

You got this.

The Classic Battle of Mac vs PC

Is there a difference? You betcha.

Superman vs Underdog, Batman Vs The Hulk, King Kong Vs Godzilla— in the age old and endless battles of battles I’m often asked, as an elder statesman of digital art— if there is a difference between MIcrosoft Windows and a Mac. In the olden days I used to say easily that Mac had the advantage, but then as the years went on and Microsoft upped its game (Windows 10 is a lot like Snow Leopard for Mac) I assumed the difference was minor.

Then Veronica bought a PC.

She bought a PC simply to play a series of puzzle video games she’s had for years and because PCs are SO cheap just use it as an external hard drive to hold all of her music and photos and free up space on both her Mac tower and her Mac laptop.

Well, my opinion is back to its original— if you’re planning on working digitally get a Mac. After an entire day of trying to get the new PC out of Windows 10 S which is a secure mode to prevent it from accepting any programs from outside the Windows Store it is abundantly clear here that you get what you pay for. And you pay a lot for a Mac don’t get me wrong, but in the long run it’ll run better, faster and you’ll get better results.
Mac’s are more expensive because they don’t clog the operating systems with tons of third party software, but in the end they are worth the extra 5-6x expense. Buy a PC now if you have to but save for a Mac and you’ll be shocked at how much more productive you’re going to be.

My Obsession with the Original Batman

My first exposure to BATMAN was the Adam West TV series reruns after school each day.  I loved the shows and the colors.  At a friends house one day he showed me an old Batman comic book that had belonged to his older brother and I was struck by the fact that Batman was a comic book character. In those pre-VCR days you didn’t have the luxury of watching anything on demand, and learning that he was appearing in a magazine that I could read over and over again was eye opening. I was also struck by the fact that this particular issue of Batman featured a very spooky art style to it— with Batman and Robin racing in the Batmobile with a giant moon with a Joker face on it staring them down.

The discover lead to an obsession with reading comic books and back in those days there was no rhyme or reason to release schedules, you just walked in and saw what was on the racks and made your choices.

One lazy summer afternoon I happened upon West Side Pharmacy which was the place I went to buy my comic books and discovered a Treasury Sized Batman comic book that caught my eye (these are about 11x17), it’s bright red cover jumping off the racks.

It was all reprints but they were great stories from the golden age all the way up to the 1970s and to a kid reading this, it was HUGE.   I think I spent the whole summer reading it over and over again.

On the front cover was the blurb BATMAN OF THE MOVIES— I wasn't aware Batman had been in any movies and was only vaguely familiar with the Adam West version, flipping to the back inside cover there was the article... (from Al Bigley’s great blog) which now featured the slightly altered title BATMAN ON THE SCREEN—

Well, there you go-- Batman the TV Show with Adam West-- no surprise there.  Kind of a gyp I must have thought-- but there in the upper right corner was an image that caught my eye-- ANOTHER Batman and Robin.  Eh???? “From Columbia Pictures”— I was savvy enough to know that was the outfit that put out The Three Stooges Short films.

I remember being struck by the costumes-- they looked homemade but in a good way.  I wanted to find out more about it.

For years I would try to find whatever information I could-- learning eventually that this movie was actually a movie serial meaning it ran several episodes over the course of many weeks. In actuality running from mid July to mid October of 1943.

Ad for the 1948 Superman Serial- I soon learned there were other superhero serials, but BATMAN was what I wanted to find.

In those pre-internet days finding such information was difficult, and libraries offered very little in the way of information. I know all there is to know about the 1943 movie BAATAN since that came up over and over again.

Amazingly enough one Summer afternoon my best friend and I were sitting at the new Burger King that had opened in the Downtown area enjoying a couple of burgers— the manager there liked old movies and he’d set up a projector and was running a black and white film that we barely paid attention to.

One of my friends pointed to the screen and said “Boy those guys could pass for Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson, couldn’t they?”

I looked over and sure enough there was a 40ish man and a 20ish boy talking in what looked like 1950s clothes. I laughed that he was right. Then they ran into a cave and changed into Batman and Robin and sped off.

I don’t remember if there was sound— I do remember that I played it cool like I didn’t care- I don’t know why that was a trapping of mine— but regardless they were only in costume for a few minutes and then the movie ended. I knew right away that this was a serial chapter.

The glimpse I got of the Batman suit made it clear that this was another serial and not the 1943— it was black not gray and the ears were different.

Lewis on the left, and Robert Lowery on the right

The chest emblem was also huge and sat closer to his stomach than his chest. My friends laughed at how dumb Batman and Robin looked, and I laughed with them, but the reality was I would have loved to have seen the whole serial. I played it cool and tossed my trash and left with them.

The early days of VCR’s came about around 1980— and for the first time they were affordable for normal folks— I laugh when I say affordable because the first one I ever bought was $1500— a lot of dough for a fifteen year old kid— believe it or not the small mom and pop video store that had them gave me a credit card and I bought my first one on time. As a huge film buff looking for the rarer works of Hitchcock and Kurosawa it was often the only way to see these movies.

Walking into FABULOUS FICTION BOOK STORE on Park Avenue, which was my backup comic book shop where I would go if my main store was out of something— FFBS also had an enormous inventory of books and related items so it was always a fun trip, I was thrilled to see they were opening a Video Rental Store in their basement— I signed up right away as I knew the owner, Bob Jennings, was himself a rare film buff and would carry things the bigger stores would never even think about.

One day there was a huge handmade poster on the wall showing the serial version of Captain America pointing his pistol at you with the words “Your Favorite Serials Now Available - $98”. I stopped in my tracks and asked Bob if 1943’s BATMAN was available.

“It sure is, but it’s a lousy serial. You’d be better off going with the 1949 serial or something like Spy Smasher or Captain America.”

I didn’t care what he thought of it- the 1943 BATMAN serial was the only thing I was interested in at the time. I told him to put a copy aside for me and I’d be right back. Hoping on my trusty moped I grabbed one of the pro-quality 35mm Cameras I owned and hawked it at my local camera shop— I told him I needed $98 for it and he obliged. I raced back to Bob’s with my $98 and plunked it down on the counter. “I’ll take BATMAN, please.”

Bob picked up the money, counted it, and said “Sure thing. It’ll be ready in about six weeks.”

Six Weeks?

They were what today we’d call Print on Demand— but the reality was these were bootleg tapes that would be run off by film-chaining the original 35 or 16mm film to video. I said okay and left. I’d waited eight years for this— I could easily wait six more weeks.

Only it wasn’t six weeks, it was more like eight— and Bob suffered as I’d ask him every third day if it was in yet. Finally one July afternoon I stopped in expecting more delays and he said it was in— he reached under the counter and produced THREE VHS tapes that were bound together with a heavy duty elastic band and slid them over to me.

“Wow— three tapes?” I might also add they were 3 regular TDK tapes with the name BATMAN written in fat marker along the spine— that was it for art— this was a no frills $98 package. In the span of the eight weeks I had saved up for the next one— and promptly ordered the sequel, 1949’s BATMAN AND ROBIN.

“Sure thing.” He said. “You’d be better off with Captain America— that’s a great serial. Batman and Robin is a lot better than the first Batman serial anyway”— and that’s how it would go everytime I ordered something.

I raced home and my then girlfriend was just arriving. I told her I hoped she was up for a marathon because this is how we were spending the afternoon. I pulled the blinds, dimmed the lights and popped the serial in. I loved it. It was like watching a newsreel of the “real” Batman and Robin.

I think I watched the entire five hour serial— I’m not sure, but I know I was very excited to see the 1949 serial since Bob had said it was so much better— better than this? it must be AMAZING.

Yeah, it wasn’t. The 1949 serial is pretty bad— like if Ed Wood made a Batman film bad. But that’s another story.

I posted previously that I’m such a fan of the serial that I went to a pair of expert craftspeople in the form of Williams Studio 2 and commissioned a full sized reproduction of Wilson's original cowl.

Photo taken in my old studio, displayed in front of a Batman Comic Book that would have been on sale at the time the serial ran.

The Williams did a spectacular job on it and it’s now a focal point of my collection, along with a near authentic belt and emblem.

The obsession started with an old comic book— and I’ll get to that another day.