Showdown at Club Rolex

You might not be able to tell from the madman's scribblings I leave on the ISB, but in person, I'm fairy charismatic, outgoing, and a good liar, three qualities that make me a pretty decent salesman. This has never been more evident than at the last Dollar Book Sale we had at the shop. I worked the room like a Vegas hustler, convincing about five people to walk out with entire long boxes stuffed with comics they neither wanted nor needed. Just ask Phil!

But my crowning achievement as a four-color pusherman was ridding the store of a few sets of Eurohit with a sales pitch consisting mostly of: "Come on, man, it's EuroHit! The Punisher goes to EUROPE and HITS a guy! How can you NOT buy it?"

Man, am I paying for it now.

Eurohit, for those of you not "in the know" (read: non-masochists), is the last of three biweekly multi-part Punisher stories I've read in the past few days as I slog through the Box o' Punishment. The other two were "Jigsaw Puzzle" (featuring Jigsaw and Satan) and "Final Days" (featuring Jigsaw, the Kingpin, and a plastic surgeon turned smack-addict hooker), but changes it up by taking the Punisher on a whirlwind murder-tour of England, France, Germany, and Spain in an effort to stop the Kingpin from uniting the European underworld.

Written by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, it pretty much just shows why those cats should stick to stories about teenagers... FROM THE FUTURE!

Anyway, once I'd recovered from the Punisher turning black for five issues, I was able to give Tug a ride back to the SMT. His folks live on the opposite side of town from me, so I went a different way than I normally go, along a strip that features nothing but car dealerships, moble home dealerships, trailer parks, gun stores, and shitty nightclubs, one of which will always have a special place in my heart.

When I first moved here, it was called Roxy's, but due to a series of police busts and illegal liquor sales to minors, the deed to the place has been passed around a lot, leading to no less than five name changes that I can remember in about ten years.

The first name change was the best: Tricky Woo. Clearly, that name is awesome. I mean, it's so evocative. Think about it: Who... or what... is Tricky Woo? It means something different to everyone. It is everything, and nothing. The only limit is yourself. The impossible is attainable... with Tricky Woo.

Then, taking advantage of its prime location across from the Air Force Base, it became Afterburners for a while to cater to the crew-cut crowd. That didn't last too long though, and the place was reinvented as a hip-hop spot under the name "Club Rolex."

Now I'm not sure whether someone realized Rolex was a brand name owned by a rich corporation or if there was another police raid, but when it changed again, they didn't even have the money to pull down the entire sign, Which left us with: "Club o x."

Tonight, though, it had changed to "Club Mi-Ami," with the inexplicable hyphen added for x-tra street cred.

And the fact that I just typed all that should should give you an idea of how badly Black Punisher has fried my brain.