Collecting Toy Biz toys isn't that hard, so I've tried making it more difficult for myself.  One way is by trying to find MOC figures and ensuring that the cards are in mint condition.  The other way of making it more difficult is by finding purchasing errors.  This is where Cool and Collected came into play. 

"Why did I buy that?" isn't a phrase that normally comes out of my mouth.  I don't usually regret any purchases that I've made.  But I do have one glaring regret that's embedded into my mind.  Its taught me a valuable lesson - always know the value of items that you are searching for.

It was just last year, my brother and I were heading to a comic con and I had my normal list of comics that I was in search of.  I'd done my research on majority of the comics on my check list but not all of them.

I was in the search of a Batman 357.  A decently common comic.  Its the first appearance of Jason Todd and Killer Croc.  To me, its a key issue in the bronze age of Batman that I wanted (needed!) in my collection.

I wanted a very clean copy of the comic.  I knew that it wasn't hard to find, so a clean copy shouldn't be to expensive.  I was wrong!  I only found two vendors that had copies.  One vendor had a copy that was extremely rough, and the other vendor had a copy that was excellent (at least to my amateur eyes). 

The nice copy was 5 times the price of the rough copy.  But in my mind, I had already committed to a nice copy and I wanted to bring it home that day.  I thought for sure that the vendor wasn't asking much over the overstreet value.

I forked over the cash.  Got the vendor to negotiate a little but not much.  When we got into the car, my brother looked the values of our comics up in the overstreet.  I had drastically overpaid for the comic.  My only hope was that someday I could have it graded and receive a 9.8 or pray for a miraculous 9.9 grade.

I finally got around to sending it off for grading (this was my first time ever having my comics graded).  I was worried that I'd get a 9.2, or God forbid a 9.0.  But no, I opened the box and felt like a gut-punched boxer.  The comic came back at 8.0, - It hurt.

This regretful purchase taught me two things: 1) Always know the value of the comics on my wishlist, and 2) I'll probably never send off a comic to have graded again unless its a valuable comic that I want preserved. 

Make sure to check out everyone's regrets at Cool & Collected!

Crooked Ninja
Monster Cafe
Lando
The Nerd Nook
That Figures

I'm excited because this is the first time that I'm able to participate in the League of Extraordinary's Bloggers' topics.  I've read countless topics and posts from multiple bloggers and kept telling myself that I would also someday have a blog that I could share my thoughts.  Today is a great day.... I'm finally able to share!

It took some thinking to come up with my latest obsession.  I'm a fan of so many things that my obsessions don't normally change, I just change my focus on the same items time and time again.  I felt like I'd be lying to myself if I picked Toy Biz's Uncanny X-Men line or TMNT figures, because those are latest obsessions that are just revisiting a time of previously obsessing over those same items.   I wanted to pick an item that's a new obsession that I hadn't collected or shown significant interest to in the past.  And then it hit me...... the Fantastic Four

I go to multiple comic and toy shows a year.  Every year I search through hundreds of long-boxes looking for my normal items; Daredevil, X-Men, The Flash, etc.  In every long-box I breezed over several collections of Fantastic Four.  Never once giving it much thought to purchase one but always taking notice to the famous font on the cover page.  I can't help but love the font.  Several comics have their specific font but Fantastic Four speaks to a period in which it was created.  

The font screams 1960's.  You can't help but love it.

My wife always buys me a comic for our anniversary.  This past Jan.16 she bought me my first Fantastic Four comic.... #48.  Yes, my wife is real, awesome, and you all should be jealous.  (It didn't dawn on me until I typed it in here, but it was our 4 year anniversary, pretty ideal time to receive my first Fantastic Four comic.)

If you do not know of the significance of Fantastic Four #48, it is the first appearance of The Silver Surfer and Galactus.  Two of the longest running supporting characters of The Fantastic Four.  A great comic!

Receiving #48 was the beginning of my fascination.  Now I've got multiple Fantastic Four comics on my "want" list for my upcoming comic shows.

I've also decided to complete The Fantastic Four in Mego form.  So far I've acquired The Human Torch and The Thing.  I love the patterned fabric on the figures.   

I've got two comic cons coming up and one large toy show.  Hopefully I'm given the chance to find the other two figures and allow me to complete the set.

That in a nutshell is my latest "new" obsession.  I hope you enjoy.  Make sure to jump over to Cool and Collected and read everyone's LoEB obsessions.