Cancel Christmas ?

Regular readers of this blog will know that I like to give myself presents... and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Especially at Xmas time I really like to indulge myself and buy something "really nice". Last year I bought my JIM 83 and my Batman 11. The year before that my ASM #1 and in 2005 my present of choice was Fantastic Four #1. So what's the big book I'm giving myself this year ?

Well to be honest there isn't going to be one... and no art page either. The main reason is that I haven't been able to find anything that :

A) fits in the budget.
B) Is a grail or close-to-a-grail.
C) Is of acceptable condition to me.


The budget-clause is a given, I'm looking for something around the $1250 range...which should get me a good selection. But it's clause B that's giving me the problem... there isn't really that much out there anymore. Top of the list is a nice Tales of Suspense #39 in 3.0/3.5 with at least Off-white pages, next up is a very nice looking X-men #1 in 4.0/4.5 again with the same pages...and then there's.. well to be honest that's it really.
Sure I could take the money and buy 4-5 books from my want list and complete a series...but that wouldn't be the same. My Xmas present should be one single knockout book which I normally only can afford around Xmas. So I guess it's not going to happen this year

But all is not lost, for once I did manage to get into the Xmas present thanks to a cool gift I got from my German friend and fellow collector Rudy. And here's me wearing it in all its monochrome beauty (and I'm not talking about the hat)
Just click the pic for a higher res version and Merry Xmas to all and thanks for reading my blog from time to time :)