Playing the guitar is one of the most popular hobbies in America. Millions of Americans play the guitar as a leisure activity; and why not? It is one of the easiest musical instruments to learn and the most popular music of the day is played on the guitar. Many people do not realize how easy it is to really learn to play the guitar. Some people, who first begin learning to play the guitar, try to learn a very hard song from the start. Then they start thinking they will never be able to learn to play, that they just do not have that “natural” musical talent that some people have, when really they just picked a hard song. Some people try to play the guitar for only about a week and expect to pick it up that quickly. If they cannot do it in a week, then again they think they just do not have that musical talent. All of that is nonsense Not even an experienced musician would be able to pick up the guitar and learn it in a week. He or she would know how the music works and understand how the guitar is supposed to played, but it still takes a little time to develop the correct motor skills with your hands and fingers. Anybody can pick up the guitar and learn to play some of their favorite songs if they just stick with it for a little while and practice for only a short period of time each day. To begin playing the guitar, all you have to do is learn a few chords. Most rock, country, or other popular genres or songs can be played with only a few easy chords on the guitar. They say with only three or four chords you can play most rock songs ever written. Most people I have taught to play the www.VarietyAccess.com>acoustic guitar or electric guitar, if they would just listen to me and try it for one week, they could get down three chords in that week or two weeks and then be able to play a song with those chords. I also teach them a strumming pattern to play the chords with. That is all you need and you are set with your new hobby of playing guitars. I myself studied music for seven years or more before I tried to learn the guitar, so I did have a good grasp of music theory, but it still took me several months to learn to play well, because I had to develop the motor skills of moving my fingers on the strings and coordinating my fingering and strumming patterns. It also takes a little while to learn to sing on top of keeping the beat and playing the guitar. But it can be learned quickly as well, if you just stick with and give it a real try. I did not have anyone to teach me when I first began playing the guitar. I just bought an acoustic guitar and taught myself to play. Every now and then people would give me pointers or teach me how to play something. I have taught other people to play also, and noticed that with a teacher it is surprising how fast people can pick things up. I wish I would have had a teacher when I was learning. There are little tricks and licks on the guitar that only an experienced guitar player would know. So if you are looking for a new www.VarietyAccess.com>hobby, one that you can do whenever you want, with friends or by yourself, then learn to play the guitar. It is like riding a bike. Once you learn it, you never forget. It will be something you can take with you for the rest of your life, entertaining crowds and parties and serenading that special someone. And, if you do not have a special someone, it will definitely help your chances of finding them. That is what we do at the www.VarietyAccess.com>online hobby store and more

According to Dictionary.com, a hobby is “an activity or interest pursued outside one’s regular occupation and engaged in primarily for pleasure” (Dictionary.com). Merriam-Webster defines a hobby as “a pursuit outside one’s regular occupation engaged in especially for relaxation” (Merriam Webster Dictionary). A hobby is relaxation and pleasure, OUTSIDE of one’s occupation. Many people today, go to work, come home, do not do anything, and then go back to work the next day, like mindless drones slaving away at their job, making money for bosses and owners who are pursuing their own interests and hobbies. That is why they started the business in the first place; it was something interesting to THEM that THEY could pursue. Well, it is time to work to live, not live to work; that is my motto. Find something to do outside of the workplace, something that YOU enjoy, something that relaxes you and brings you pleasure. Find something you can do with your family or with other people, to have good experiences, rather than that job you are always doing. It is time for such working people to find a new hobby. Find something they like to do. There are a million www.VarietyAccess.com>hobbies or interests one can pursue. Just think of all the things you like, or all of the things you ever wanted to do. Think of what you need to do to achieve those things, and start doing it. Do it in your spare time. You will be surprised what a difference just half an hour a day focused on one particular interest will do. Many of my own hobbies I learned by studying them on my own in my spare time. If you can learn anything, you can learn anything, it just takes time, and if you prioritize right, time is something you do have. Learn another language, a new game, a new sport, a new musical instrument, or a hobby craft you would enjoy.

Maybe you have many interests or hobbies you would like to pursue. That is great, the more the better. Variety is the spice of life. Find a variety of hobbies you would like to pursue and spice up your life a bit. Some of the hobbies I enjoy or camping and hiking. I bought myself an acoustic guitar and taught myself to play. I taught myself to play the piano a little, and I also play the trumpet. One www.VarietyAccess.com>hobby is designing websites. I speak English and Russian, but I want to learn some other languages as well.

Geocaching is a fun new hobby; use Global Positioning Systems to find hidden treasures. I also like to play yard games like croquet, kubb, bocce ball, and others. Sports have always been a way for me to find pleasure and relaxation. I play tennis, basketball, golf, football, and others. Some people find pleasure in scrapbooking or other hobby crafts.

The origins of the comic book are somewhat controversial and perhaps the jury is still out on comic book history. So lets go back to the cartoonish broadsheets of the Middle Ages, which were parchment products, created by anonymous woodcutters. These could have been the very beginnings of the comic book. As mass circulation of these broadsheets became possible, they soon developed a market, particularly at public executions, popular events for centuries (ugh), which drew thousands of happy spectators. Many of these spectators would invest in an artist’s rendering of a hanging or burning, and thus making a very lucky day for the broadsheet seller.

The broadsheet evolved into higher-level content as humor was introduced. Eventually, all types of broadsheets emerged, which were eventually bound in collections, the prototype of the modern magazine and thus the comic book. Magazines formatted like the popular Punch, an elegant British creation, became the primary focus of documentary accounts of news and events, fiction and humor.

One can see in Punch, the sophisticated evolution of a comic book style, particularly in respect of the evolution of comics in Great Britain. Still and all, from an historical standpoint, the comic strip, and later the comic book, stood in the alley, waiting to be born. And then some say Great Britain’s Ally Sloper’s “Half Alley” was the first comic book. This was a black and white tabloid that had panels of cartoons mixed with a sliver of news; circa 1884.

Now while all this was going on in Great Britain, this inching towards the comic book, the United States had its own brand of evolution. Instead of magazines, US newspapers took the lead in creating the comic book industry.

Newspapers, with their first steps, took their single image gags and evolved them into multi-paneled comic strips. It was during this period that William Randolph Hearst scored a knockout with the Yellow Kid, which was actually printed in yellow ink.

So where did the actual comic book begin? Some say it was with reprints of Carl Schultz’ Foxy Grandpa, from 1901 to 1905. Although others say it was Great Britain’s Ally Sloper’s Half Alley. In 1902, Hearst published the Katzenjammer Kids and Happy Hooligan in books with cardboard covers.

For a time, the Yellow Kid himself was a top contender. But it depends how rigid you are in your description of a comic book. These examples, for sure, were predecessors to the modern comic book, which exploded in the 1930’s.

The Whitman Publishing Company, in 1934, became one of the pre-launchers for the modern comic book. They published forty issues of Famous Comics, which was a black and white hardcover reprint. The first regularly published comic book in the more recognizable modern format though, was Famous Funnies. It featured such memorable characters as Joe Palooka, Buck Rogers and Mutt and Jeff.

Superheroes as we know them today took a strong foothold in the 1930’s. In 1938, Max C. Gaines, who was one of the comic industry giants, brought “Superman” to Dell Comics publisher, Harry Donenfield.

Donenfield scored the comic coup of the century when he published a story written by two teenagers, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster- and so “Superman of Metropolis” (the title of their short story they wrote in their own fanzine) was born. Superman was to set a standard for comic book heroes that persist to this day.

What has gone wrong within the industry and can it be fixed? The rape and pillage, in the eyes of some, may have left the comic book industry gasping for life support. It seems that for an industry that has seen so much success, the history of comic books, has apparently been confounded by seemingly dumb mistakes. The first could have very well been the coining of the name “comic books”. The earliest versions of the so-called half-tab (for half tabloid) reprints of the Sunday funnies (the comics) became known as “comic books”. This led to the thinking in general, that comic books contained comic or funny material, which we all know, is a far stretch from reality. Comic books can be very somber, dark or adventurous magazines. It has often been suggested that there should be another term coined to better describe this literary package we all know as comic books. To date, no other user-friend term has been suggested for use in the comic book industry.

A second misdirection came when magazine prices started to rise. Instead of increasing comic book prices, like other successful magazines did, the comic book industry decided to cut pages to keep the then current price tag of 10 cents. This brought on the impression that comic books were “cheap” by definition, and neglected the fact that a dime was a lot of money at one time (steak & eggs cost 35 cents). This presented the image that comic books were just for kids. It also made the product increasingly less viable for retail merchants to stock. Why take up the same shelf space, when a higher priced magazine would do more nicely. Again the perceived value of the comic book was loosing credibility.

Then as the 1950s rolled around, an individual by the name of Dr. Frederick Wertham, published a book entitled “Seduction of the Innocents”. Through the use of unscientific research and assumptions, he stated that all the nation’s ills were directly related to kids reading comic books (ah hmm, what?). Central to his thesis, was the misassumption that comic books were strictly for kids. The more adult material, it was irrationally assumed, was aimed at our sweet, naïve innocent children. Yes, we do have to protect our children, but it still bothers me to no end, that certain self-righteous individuals believe their lot in life is to make the rest of the planet adhere to their own personal beliefs. If this were the case, then our great country would have never been founded.

With this wildly irrational attack on the comic book industry and many congressional leaders jumping on the bandwagon, comic books were gaining a bad reputation. The comic book industry publishers at this point, could have banded together and declared that comic books, like movies, were not “just for kids”. It should have been stated that the wide range of comic book genres represented was target to as wide a range of readers. All but one of the publishers (William Gaines, publisher of EC Comics) buckled under to this Congressional Investigation and the Comic Code Authority was created. This governed the content of comic books and ensured that for the next 15 years or so, the literary content would not rise much above that of pablum for the mind. Therefore another slide into incredibility for the comic book industry took place. Can the comic book industry be saved? Very possibly, but when the individuals in charge of the saving are as eager as ever to make the same mistakes all over again, what will the outcome be? They don’t even appear to be cleaver enough to make new mistakes.

When one says, yeah, I collect comic books, what is the general public response? Oh no, a slightly off the wall geek. Here is someone who has lost touch with reality. Or someone that is in his or her own little world. I think not. Yes, comic book collectors may sometimes march to the beat of a different drummer, but who says we all have to be cut from the same mold. Comic books are big business. Back in the days of my youth (what, several millennia ago?), I loved reading comic books. And so did a lot of my friends. Whenever we had an extra dime or sometimes a quarter, we could run up to the local small town grocery and spend some very happy times at the comic book rack.

We would even go out and find small odds jobs for pocket change, which was enough then to purchase 2 or 3 good flights of adventure and fantasy. I can even remember crawling under our house to retrieve a cat that had the misfortune of dying there. My Dad couldn’t stomach the smell and enticed my friend and I to accomplish the chore for ample pocket change. We braved the spiders and other crawly creatures to retrieve and bury the unfortunate cat. Not long after that, we were the proud owners of yet, several more intriguing comic books. Even the local bully (who was really a pretty good guy) would purchase our worn out or unwanted magazines for far more than they were worth, so we could purchase new ones.

I didn’t know much about collecting then. I just liked saving what I enjoyed. I had a large cardboard box that I kept under my bed, filled with all my little treasures. I didn’t realize that I had the beginnings of what could have been something very lucrative. In later years when I headed off to college, I dragged my large cardboard box with me. At one point in time, I left most of my belongings in the charge of what I thought were trusted friends. When I returned from my forest firefighting adventures, my box full of magazines were no where to be found. And needless to say, were my trusted friends either. Others had seen the value in what I had and wanted it for themselves. Oh well, live and learn. That limited collection of comic books and other magazines would have been worth a small fortune today.

Are there big bucks in the comic book genre? Just look at what Hollywood has been up to for the last few decades. As far as I can tell, the really big blockbusters started back in 1978 with the release of Superman, The Movie. And since then there has been comic book hero after comic book hero to hit the silver screen. And they all make tons of money. The Hollywood moguls may or may not be “into” the genre, but the can smell large profits. And these kinds of profits aren’t harvested from a small out of touch with reality niche. It take large numbers of individuals forking out 5 to 10 dollars a pop, to accumulate the astronomical profits that Hollywood is seeing these days. Individuals who may or may not want to admit their avid interest in comic book characters. I will stand up and say, I enjoy watching these movies and have even started my own collection of comic book character DVDs. Who knows, maybe some day my DVDs will become as valuable as comic books. Probably not.

Although, not every individual’s collection has magazines worth thousands of dollars, there are a sizable amount of collections that can be worth hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars. These are not people that have lost touch with reality. A while back, the actor, Nicholas Cage, put his comic book collection of about 400 magazines up for auction. Word was that he might have realized a value into seven figures. That ain’t chicken feed.

It is not uncommon for single additions to be worth several hundred to several thousand dollars. Some comic books can enter the realm of several hundred thousand dollars for one magazine. Now the owners have to be some pretty rich economically savvy geeks. Are these the types of small niche individuals who have lost touch with reality or don’t want to confess they like comic books? So the next time you hear someone profess, yeah I collect comic books, you may want to look inside yourself and say, how do I release my hidden passion and start collecting myself?

Dave Gieber, a former rocket engineer, has decided to take up residency on the Internet. He is the owner and editor of several websites, one of which was built around one of his childhood passions; www.comic-book-collection-made-easy.com . You can visit here to keep up to date on the world of comic books and comic book collecting. Feel free to sign up for my comic book ezine.

Hobbies - everyone has them. Some are very common and others .. well some hobbies are pretty unique to say the least. Over the next few days we will be taking a look at some of the most interesting and unique hobbies.