A brief introduction:
My name is Paul Howley, owner
of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s
Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg,
Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book
business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s
been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought
these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about
my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my
wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember
it.
The Current Cast of
Characters:
Paul Howley: age 48
Mal Howley: age 49
Adam Howley: my son, age 21
Cassy Howley: my daughter,
age 18
MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE
HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP: Part #212: We
Meet Some Friends!
I had been buying and selling things on eBay
for a few years at this point. I really enjoyed the entire process of finding
an interesting item, listing it on eBay, and finding a buyer who was excited to
own the item. EBay is a lot of work and it’s sometimes difficult to end up with
successful transactions but I do it all anyway. I had listed a fairly rare set
of The Man From Uncle paperback books that came with the original cardboard
slipcase that had illustrations on the sides of the characters from the TV
show. When the auction was over, I noticed that it sold to a collector in
Wellington, Florida. Wellington was about 30 minutes away from our new home in
Jupiter, Florida. Before I could pack up the books, the buyer asked if he could
pick up the books in-person to save the shipping expense. We agreed to meet
halfway in the parking lot of City Furniture in West Palm Beach. Mal and I
figured we could look for the much-needed furniture while we were there.
When we got to the parking lot, we met Ric
and Liz. Ric was a serious collector of James Bond and The Man From Uncle
memorabilia. Liz was a talented seamstress. We chatted about our mutual
interests (I’m a big-time collector of The Man From Uncle stuff!) and enjoyed
meeting them both. We exchanged contact information with each other and
suggested that we plan to get together for dinner soon. Within a week or so, we
arranged to meet up at a restaurant to get to know each other a bit more. Over
the next several years, we usually got together with Rick and Liz at least once
a week. It was nice to have friends in the area.
I must admit, it’s not like we didn’t have
lots of things going on to keep us busy. We had set up our “guest house” to
include two queen-sized beds in the bedroom, a pull-out sofa bed in the living
room, a dining room, full kitchen, and a full laundry room. We moved into our
Florida home in early August and by September 19th we were already
welcoming our first houseguests. Friends from New Hampshire, (The Bassett
family), who’s daughter Jocelyn went to college here, came to south Florida for
Parent’s Weekend at Palm Beach Atlantic University. They stayed for four days.
Three weeks later, my parents drove across the state from Bradenton, Florida
and they stayed with us for a week. The day after they went home, Mal’s sister
Ginny and her husband Denis came for a visit for several days. Two weeks later,
we had a family we barely knew come to our home for a week-long vacation. We
had no more guests until after Christmas that year because we flew back to New
Hampshire to celebrate the holiday with family and friends. Shortly after we
returned home to Florida, Mal’s sister Carol and her husband Mike, and their
three children, came for a week-long visit. On February 13th, Barb
and Jim Foote, our friends from New Hampshire, came to spend a week with us.
The day after they left, my sister Sharon and her friend Ellen (and her son
Kory) came for a few days. When they left, our friends Paula and Phil came for
a weekend visit. One of our daughter’s college roommates (Jamie) called and
asked if her mother, Sue, could stay with us for a week while she visited her.
While Sue was here, Jamie and several of her friends stayed in the guest house
too. A week later, two good friends from our time in New Hampshire, Mike and
Liz Verhoeks, came for a week.
The guest house was convenient for our
guests and for us. It allowed our guests to enjoy their own space and we were
told that the time spent there was quite relaxing. We enjoyed showing many of
our guests around the area, especially West Palm Beach’s interesting
shopping/restaurant district called City Place, Jupiter Beach, and many of our
friends also wanted to visit Disney World. Mal and I bought annual passes for
Walt Disney World because, for Florida residents, it was only $235.00 per
person and that included the parking fees. We lived about two hours away from
Orlando and it was an easy trip. We went to Disney World fifteen or twenty
times the first year we lived in Florida!
In the middle of the month of April, Rick
and April Stephens, two more friends from New Hampshire came for a visit. We
picked them up at the airport in West Palm Beach and went directly to a local
restaurant called “Schooners” that specialized in local seafood and had a
definite south Florida feel to it. We enjoyed a nice week of relaxing times at
the beach, lounging around our pool, and playing boardgames. At the end of the
week, they borrowed one of our cars and explored the west coast of Florida.
They were considering buying a second home over near Naples, Florida because
they had heard so many nice things about the western side of Florida from
friends. After spending several days on the west coast they decided to look at
homes in the Jupiter, Florida area. Of course, we would have loved it if they
would end up living near us!
Two days after Rick and April went back home
to New Hampshire, my parents came for another visit. We took them out on a fun
casino boat out of West Palm Beach and we attended a play that Cassandra was in
at her college.
Cassandra was enjoying a busy first year of
college. She studied hard, enjoyed some club sports, was a competitive
cheerleader, participated in the theatre productions, and she still found the
time to date. In the middle of her freshman year of college, she began dating
Matt, also a freshman from western Florida. Our lives were about to change
again!
Pictures: Our little guest house!
