Conspicuous consumption, point one:
If you’re having trouble getting your internet connection to work this weekend, then I think we can all safely assume it’s because several million comic readers have all finished reading their hauls of this week, and have logged on simultaneously to post comments about them.
No, seriously – this week sees the release of Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill’s much-anticipated ‘Black Dossier’ (see Alan explain how it was delayed by the publishers here and here ), the latest issue of Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s startlingly fun ‘All-Star Superman’, and the latest in Bryan Lee O’Malley’s very fun series of ‘Scott Pilgrim’ volumes (as well as a whole load of other stuff which I’m not so interested in).
In comic terms, this is pretty much the equivalent of new films being released by Orson Welles, David Lynch and Stephen Spielberg ON THE SAME DAY.
And that’s why the internet has been broken in two.

Conspicuous consumption, point two:
Today, shopping for weddings rings with my fiancee, I learned the following –
a) I take a ring size W. That’s quite large, isn’t it?
b) All jewellers are conspiring with my betrothed to ensure she has as much spangly jewellery as possible, and so they look at me with a mixture of mockery and pity. Has she, I wonder, been in advance contact with all the shops that sell spangly things to ensure she gets the shiny and they get the money? It certainly feels that way…