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Last night while looking for a reference book among the shelves I spotted my old Tintin books. I opened The Calculus Affair and completely forgot what I’d been looking for. Then I read Tintin in Tibet.

Today I had intended to watch a movie, but as I considered the choices—The Changeling (Not in the mood for lost child drama), Yes Man (Maybe this weekend, with company), Bride Wars (Only if there’s nothing else)—there was nothing I wanted to see more than I wanted to re-read Tintin. (Love Me Again (Land Down Under) was no longer showing, so I’d have to go to another mall if I wanted to figure out why it needed a parenthetical title. I know Star Cinema uses pop songs for its movie titles and I remember a Vernie Varga song called “Love Me Again”. Does Piolo Pascual sing it?)

So I went home early and read The Broken Ear, The Black Island, King Ottokar’ Sceptre, and The Red Sea Sharks. Billions of blue blistering barnacles, that was a blast.

Nicholas Lezard writes that “Tintin only really comes fully alive with the arrival of Captain Haddock. Broadly speaking, Tintin represents Hergé’s ideal self, the perfect boy scout, idealistic, brave, pure-hearted; but there is more to people than that, so enter Haddock, the alcoholic, irascible, foul-mouthed (in a cartoonish sense: his insults are interpreted as bad language because he uses words that others do not understand) ex-sea captain.” True, the books are more fun when Haddock is around to yell, Coelecanths! Filibusters! Bashi-bazouks! Lezard’s best three Tintins: The Crab with the Golden Claws, Tintin in Tibet, The Castafiore Emerald. (Incidentally Tintin and Snowy first appeared on January 10, 1929. Happy 80th Birthday!)

So far I have kept my new year’s resolution. I haven’t bought any books since December 30, but I may be tempted to get some Tintins. (My two-year-old niece could be my excuse. I could hang on to the books until she starts reading.)