Sunday, June 07, 2026
New NYC civics comic
Thursday, November 06, 2025
Jon's Joint, a restaurant in Arlington, has comics history
On furlough, I've got to get out of the house at times. Today I went to Jon's Joint https://www.jonsjoint.us/ on North Glebe Road in Arlington. The decor reflects the childhood of the owners, Safa Farighi and his partner Jan Amaan. There's a decent amount of comics content which immediately caught my eye. I chatted with Safa to get the story about the restaurant's look,
| Also the comics I grew up on including Keith Pollard's Thor |
Oh yes, since it's a restaurant, I'll say the burgers are good, and the ice cream is great (and to be transparent, he comped my friends and me ice cream when I said I wanted to write this blog post.). And the owners are super friendly. I'm embarrassed to say that they've been open for a year as of yesterday. Sometimes you miss what's right in front of you.
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| Original painting of gangsters by Safa's brother Wali Farighi |
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| Original painting of the Capitol by Safa's brother Wali Farighi |
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| the ice cream is really good. I recommend the chocolate shake |
Saturday, October 11, 2025
Introducing the Bottorff Comic Backs Price Guide & Checklist 2025 Edition
The Bottorff Comic Backs Price Guide & Checklist 2025 Edition
Ray Bottorff, Jr.
Greenbelt, MD: Ray Bottorff, Jr.
https://archive.org/details/the-bottorff-comic-backs-price-guide-checklist-2025-edition
What Exactly Is a ComicBack?
Basically, it is a neologism meaning a cartoon or comic related mass-market-sized paperback. In 2001, I was going through my two boxes of comic paperbacks and discovered that no one had done anything cataloging them. A little bit of brainstorming later, I came up with the term for them, ComicBacks.
Sunday, July 06, 2025
Flea Market Finds, with some modern bootlegs
As regular readers of the blog know, I look for comics and cartoon oddities, especially at antique shops and flea markets. Here's this weekend's haul, with hi-res scans of some to come on Flickr later, and donation of the postcards to the Library of Congress later this summer.
A flyer from the Dunes casino is Las Vegas - is this by Frank Frazetta?
A 1938 tearsheet by Jimmy Swinnerton of Canyon Kiddies. I don't usually buy tearsheets, but it was a dollar. I'm no purist though; I tearsheet the newspaper and New Yorker regularly.
but this one is interesting...
Another dumb scatological cartoon, only of interest for the the reverse noting "Not for mailing. Suitable for framing." By who? I guess you could put this under doctor cartoons (aka graphic medicine) though.

Something not bought (it happens) - 2 posters signed by Joe Quesada. I really enjoyed The Ray, but who has the room.
And finally the modern bootlegs. Green Kush marijuana is probably not a licensed Green Lantern product, and I'm also thinking that Kevin, while an excellent firework, isn't really part of the official Minion merchandise. I love a good counterfeit though.





























