Previous Post Work has been especially busy as of late, since they've stepped up demands on our daily productivity (news stories must be written and submitted throughout the week now, rather than simply on deadline day) and saddled us with an extra section (our annual community guide, listing activities throughout the year). Money has not been much better, since I've been saddled with a series of one-time expenses (everyone in my office, including me, has now been pulled over by the police twice for speeding, since the start of the year), I'm still paying off my last remaining student loan (which I should be done with by this summer), and getting an extremely slight raise in pay resulted in a significantly larger jump in my taxes this year. Once my student loans are paid off, and once I get my tax rebate along with everyone else, I'll be able to get back in the black, but as it stands, I'm currently living exclusively off Ramen and Chef Boyardee, and in spite of making regular payments on my credit card, I'm still carrying over a bit more of an unpaid balance on a monthly basis than I would like. The positives are these; both work and money will improve soon (work after this week, when I turn in my community section, and money in a few months), and things will get better. And in the meantime, I've got one less thing to worry about than I did last year around this time, since I've got a new car, that's under warranty for the next 10 years. Oh, and I've been selling some of my books to Half-Price Books lately. I enjoyed those Ultimate Spider-Man hardcovers, and the single issues of various other titles over the course of the past few years, but it's time for someone else to enjoy them now, I think. Don't worry; I'm still keeping all my hardcover collaborations between Busiek, Ross and Waid (and their work on both the JLA and the Avengers), and once my wallet gets healthier, I'll be looking to buy the hardcover(s) of Morrison's JLA work, as well, but for now, it feels good to shed some of this stuff. I already sold my Volume 3.5 D&D manuals, in anticipation of the next revision, and I'm considering doing the same with my no-frills DVDs of "The Key to Time" and "The Five Doctors," to give myself an excuse to buy the newer versions later on. And that's my real life, at the moment.

I also use Half Price Books. I've recently sold off the last chunk of the comics I didn't want to them. Got a nice chunk of change for them, too.

I also find that while I'm waiting around to found what I'll get for them I've already spent some of it by searching their comic book bins for stuff to add to my collection. I've found some good stuff in there. I found almost all of the first set of DC's Tangent Comics in there. Those were some books I had been looking for a while.