Taking Stock

Morning, all, and good gravy, it's the weekend.

I've been up since about 5:30 AM taking stock -- literally -- and moving portions of it from the garage storage areas into the new studio/office/library space. While constructing the heavy-duty shelving units for the new work area, Olivier designed them with an uppermost shelf flat intended for the rarest backstock in the SpiderBaby archives, including the remaining backstock of Taboo. I won't have a final tally until next week sometime, but I'm far enough along to see 2006 will at last drain much of my backstock to nothing.

For instance, my stash of the 1963 comicbook series is down to almost zip, save for those issues (1963 #2 featuring The Fury, for instance) I stocked heavily on twelve years ago. After the next couple of orders, I will no longer be offering full sets of 1963 for sale -- it will be completely out-of-stock.

About two years ago, Rick Veitch and I got together and shrink-wrapped the final stock we collectively had on hand into the Shameless 1963 Six-Pack, and via King Hell Press we sold those out through Diamond. That process cleaned Rick out of his entire stock and left me with what little there was, beyond the overstock on #2 I'd socked away. The shrink-wrapped sets are long gone, though I've still been able to fill individual orders until today.

So, Alan Moore and retro-superhero fans take note: I'll no longer be able to fill complete set orders on that historic series. With no reprint edition planned (despite our best efforts in 2002-2003), this will be it on 1963 unless fortunes change.

Heads up to Taboo fans or potential buyers: Taboo backstock is low, and as of the next two orders for full sets, I won't be able to fill orders for full sets of Taboo any longer. Looks like Taboo 6 is the first to go, with Taboo 7 not far behind.

There's still plenty of backstock on select individual issues of Taboo, and I have abundant backstock on Tyrant and SpiderBaby Comix for the time being.

As work continues on the new website, a current catalogue of SpiderBaby Grafix material will be posted with PayPal payment option in place -- but just seemed fair to give any last-minute shoppers this info now.

For years now, I've been the only one-stop reliable source for Taboo, and have had to turn away many disappointed buyers seeking copies of items once available online from yours truly (primary among those the From Hell: The Compleat Scripts Vol. 1 signed & limited hardcover and paperback editions -- long gone, sold out in 1999). I've always given fair warning online prior to sellouts; here's the latest.

For easy peeks or info for the curious, the current links (and, for this week only, the still-valid prices) for Taboo and the 1963 series are still posted on the otherwise now-defunct

comicon.com SpiderBaby Comix site

-- just scroll down and click on the vertical menu bar on the left, under The Goods, for Taboo and/or N-Man, The Fury, and The Hypernaut.

I'll post a final end-of-2005 inventory warning by next weekend, once it's all tallied up and in place.

For those of you who could care less about all this, ah, well, sorry to bore you today. I'll have something of greater general interest here in the coming days, promise.

See ya on Sunday (probably posting late in the day), and until then have a great Saturday and fantastic weekend...