So, I saw Fahrenheit 9/11, 50 First Dates, Possession, and About Schmidt this weekend, but I didn't see Spider-Man. Yet I had the day off Wednesday! What in hell is the matter with me?!

Well, for one thing, Misty asked me to wait and see it with her, and since I'm a big sissy who lets his wife call the shots, I obliged.

The real reason, though, is that I'm in Birmingham. Sure, it's playing on 39 screens here — including 12 screens at the brand new Giant Orgasm Rave theater — but it just doesn't feel right seeing it in this city. If I had gone Wednesday afternoon or Tuesday at midnight, who was going to be there? A bunch of people from Legion, Kingdom, Lion & Unicorn, and Capt. Comics. I don't want to share this experience with a bunch of comic fans I don't know. I want to share it with my friends.

Unfortunately, those friends live in Huntsville. The Haven crowd probably went en masse Wednesday night to see the movie, but I don't know. I'm 100 miles away and out of the loop. It's a little depressing.

Even after a year of living in Birmingham, I still haven't found a comic shop where I feel at home. The problem is that I want Haven, and I'm not going to find it here. It's not so much the comics that I miss (I've got plenty of other things to keep me busy) — it's the camaraderie. Outside of work, I haven't found a new group of friends here. Haven represented that base for me in Huntsville. Now that I'm gone, though, my connection with them seems to have evaporated.