But when you read the books Dresden does announce to the world he's a wizard and there is such a thing as magic, he even in the yellow pages under wizard. The real world just refuses to believe in the weirdness.
In the TV series, he is found in the yellow pages by at least one "johnson" and he has 'wizard' in both the ad and on his storefront door.
However, it's one thing to say you're a wizard, and another to dress in robes with an ornate staff & wand. I thought it was really kitch to have the hockey stick & drumstick -- I was waiting for an explanation but then the series ended abruptly. My guess is that after the business with his uncle, he really wasn't looking for anything expensive & showy. When they flashbacked to his earlier days, I don't recall him using either the hockey stick or the drum stick -- They show him learning with Bob, and his final encounter with his uncle, but no wands or staves.
In the TV show he fled after killing his uncle, so he may literally have been a refugee when he picked those up. He had come back from a hiatus around the world, so he hadn't been in the mansion for a while, found the voodoo doll that was used to kill his father, confronted his uncle, his uncle died, and he fled. He wasn't exactly packing a bag... Then later he says he hadn't been to that mansion in 5 years when confronted with the fact that he could be living there. If his more fancy/ornate stuff was there, he wasn't fetching it...
Maybe the vampire babe who harbored him pulled them out of her bag of tricks and he ended up liking them? She owned a club -- so that might explain him lifting a drumstick out of some musician's bag or something....
I am not saying the TV show is better than the books, and for all intents and purposes they could be two nearly-completely-different things that share a title. I haven't read the books. I figure I'll see if the library has them. However in the TV-universe, the hockey stick & drumstick make sense given the character's impoverishment and such. But I wonder where he got the lab and stuff. He must have gone back to the mansion and took things -- oh yeah, he had at least burned one of his uncle's books at some point (mentioned by Bob). So he went back -- he got Bob, too! Hrm. Must have a thing for hokey props. Sure makes it much less expensive on the show set...shows nowadays don't have much budget for special effects, and this one chewed up a good bit of cash on that...it's no wonder they didn't renew it.
