The 2014 Christmas Aftermath

Christmas 2014 was great, I really enjoyed watching Ava open her presents and I also came away with a few geeky sundries. Here are the highlights; enjoy and Happy New Year!

After almost nothing but rain we finally received a huge dumping of snow on Christmas Day!

Ava really got into Christmas this year. Her presents had an overall kitchen theme.

Santa told me he found this vintage 90's Disney's Snow White lunchbox with thermos at the DI for $1.50. The Jolly Guy can find some deals!

Santa find this little gem, Clue Little Detective, at the DI for just $2. Complete and in like new shape.

My wife got me a book that I've had my eye on for several years now, The Cult of LEGO! Maybe now I will finally join ULUG (The Utah LEGO User Group). Thank you Laura!

My siblings and I drew names for presents this year and Annie, the baby of the family, drew my name. She did not disappoint with her awesome gifts!

Annie gave me this awesome Hot Wheels logo T-shirt, along with a great Mario T-shirt!

Of course she also gave me some great little toys, these two Dino youngster you see above, as well as a beaver and a big old lizard. 

Lastly, my little sis gifted me a $10 iTunes gift card, which I used to purchase the animated mini-series Over The Garden Wall. It's AMAZING! I have watched 3 times already and I can't get enough of it!

Weeks before Christmas we went to the Festival of Trees and spotted an awesome Napoleon Dynamite Christmas tree. 

After Christmas steals:

This magnificent "white pine" cost me FIVE BUCKS!!! This tree may be my greatest bargain hunt EVER! A couple years ago I marveled at the beauty of Laura Hughes tree of Boo Bobby. Ever since then I have wanted a white pine of my own and now I finally have one! There will be a Valentine's Day tree this year for sure!

31 cents ain't bad for these fun vintage style Santa ornaments, found on eBay.

Next month is January, time to make resolutions! I will be going bat poop crazy with organizational and financial goals, culling down the old toy collection and making it look like a crazy awesome toy museum or something. Hopefully I will be able to find some new homes for my access goodies and make some sweet moolah in the process. Stay tuned!

Castle Playskull

One of my best DI finds to date, Fisher Price presents the Family Play Castle, set #993 from 1974. This thing was and is, in my opinion, the greatest toy ever created by FP. It's the Castle Greyskull of the Fisher Price universe.

I remember playing with this every year at my Auntie's house before our annual Easter egg hunt. It had everything, as my cute little assistant demonstrates:

Here's a nice little video by Lucky Penny that highlights the set nicely.

What's your favorite Fisher Price toy and/or memory?

DI Treasures 2014 Ugly Sweater Contest

I competed in the Ugly Sweater Contest at work. Check out the invite:

The holidays are upon us and that means it is time for our second annual Ugly Sweater Contest! Join us in the lobby at 2 p.m. tomorrow (December 17) in your ugliest holiday sweater for a chance to win a $25.00 gift card.

Categories include:

• Epic Fail
• Overall Fashion Mishap
• Just Plain Ugliest
• Most Likely to go Viral.

The competition was fierce and I didn't even place. I wish I had a camera on me, because there were some great sweaters! The best ones are always home made. Besides, I'm not spending $20 on a new ugly piece of crap I will wear once a year! Here's an artists rendition of the coolest sweater in the contest (below). The contestant informed me the sweater was hand crafted by his wife:

Horrible, dark photos captured by HR.

I dressed like a winner, so I'm a winner in my book

So what about you folks? Do you have any hideous Christmas sweaters? I wanna see links in the comments people! (Keep it clean please)

Christmas Bonus: Seasons Greetings from The Aquabats!

Creepmas Day 13: The Dance Of The 13 Skeletons

The Dance of the Thirteen Skeletons

In a snow enshrouded graveyard
Gripped by winter’s bitter chill,
Not a single soul is stirring,
All is silent, all is still.
Till a distant bell tolls midnight,
And the spirits work their will.

For emerging from their coffins
Buried deep beneath the snow,
13 boney apparitions
Now commence their spectral show.
And they gather in the moonlight,
Undulating as they go.

And they’ll dance in their bones,
In their bare, bare bones,
With the click, and the clack,
And the chitter and the chat,
And the clatter and the chatter of
Their bare, bare bones.

They shake their flimsy shoulders
And they flex their fleshless knees
And they nod their skulls in greeting
In the penetrating breeze,
As they form an eerie circle
Near the gnarled and twisted trees.

They link their spindly fingers,
As they promenade around,
Casting otherworldly shadows
In the silver mantled ground,
And their footfalls in the snowdrifts
Make a soft, sulfurous, sound.

And they dance in their bones,
In their bare, bare bones,
With the click, and the clack,
And the chitter and the chat,
And the clatter and the chatter
Of their bare, bare bones.

The thirteen grinning skeletons
Continue on their way,
As too strains of soundless music
They begin to swing and sway,
And they circle ever faster
In their ghastly roundelay.

Faster, faster, ever faster,
And yet faster now they race,
Winding, whirling, ever swirling
In the frenzy of their pace.
And they shimmer in the moonlight
As they spin themselves through space.

And they dance in their bones,
In their bare, bare bones,
With the click, and the clack,
And the chitter and the chat,
And the clatter and the chatter
Of their bare, bare bones.

Then, as quickly as it started,
Their nocturnal dance is done,
For the bell that is their signal
Loudly tolls the hour of one.
And they bow to one another
In their boney unison.

Then they vanish to their coffins
By there ghostly thoroughfare,
And the emptiness of silence once more
Fills the frosted air.
And the snow that masked their footprints,
Show no sign that they were there.

But they danced in their bones,
In their bare, bare bones,
With the click, and the clack,
And the chitter and the chat,
And the clatter and the chatter
Of their bare, bare bones.

—Nightmares: Poems to Trouble Your Sleep by Jack Prelutsky, illustrated by Arnold Lobel 



I can't believe it's the 13th day of Creepmas already! Scary Creepmas everyone, stay safe out there!





Creepmas Day 12: LEGO Minifigures Series 12

I wanted to share my Series 12 picks as part of the Countdown to Halloween, but I ran out of time! Better Creepmas than never, that's what I always say.

If I was a rich man I would buy every single LEGO minifigure, but I have to live on a budget, or at leat kind of pretend to, especially since the price went up to $3.99 per minifigure, so I limited myself to 3 from this series.

Katnis Everdean, Dino Crisis Girl, Jurasic Park Lass, or just an extra LEGO Dino minifigure known simply as "Dino Tracker".

The Space Miner! This guy was a must for my LEGO Space City project. With that orange color scheme he looks like he might belong to the LEGO Mars Mission team, mining for precious energy crystals.

Wednesday Adams, Goth Girl, LEGO Monster High, "Spooky Girl"

Did anyone else grab a few minifigures from series 12? Which one is your favorite?

Creepmas Day 11: Creepy Cruisers- Chillin' With Mac Tonight!

I found this little gem for 50 cents at none other than Capital City Antique Mall. It's Bill Elliot's Ford Taurus Mac Tonight stock car. I realize it's a bit of a stretch considering the Mac Tonight stock car a member of the Creepy Cruiser family, but hey Mac's head is a cresent moon and Strongbad was Mac Tonight for Halloween, so there! Also, I once owned a Ford Taurus. I never thought it would make a good racing car, but what do I know?

Anyways, Mac Tonight was one of the 4 boys Happy Meal toys, circa 1998, back when fast food toys were still pretty neat. There are stickers or "decals", it has a cheaper plastic body, and the windows are tinted to the extreme, but it still makes for a very nice cheap toy (oxymoron?). We are bombarded by some lovely ads including McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Super Motel 8, 76 Gasoline, NASCAR, Plasti-Kote spray paint, Ford, and 2 more logos I will need a magnifying glass to read.

That's all for tonight, this daddy's beat! Dang cold bug.

Creepmas Day 10: Goosebumps

Mass produced horror novels for kids! R. L. Stine was a machine, it seemed like he cranked out a new book every week!

If you keep an eye out at the DIs, Goodwills, and Savers you can often spot Goosebumps for about 50 cents a pop. 

If you follow the blog you may recall that I found the Goosebumps Shrieks and Spiders Game last Halloween, and I was missing just one "pog"! Well, I found another copy of the game and I was able to complete my original copy! Now I have some perfect Creepmas cards to mail out! Give me a shout out if you want a set of Goosebumps cards. The pogs are more limited, but what can ya do?

Merry Creepmas!

Creepmas Day 9: Gary Larson's Tales From The Far Side TV Special

Do you find The Far Side to be a little too dark and disturbing? Do you think Gary Larson goes a little too far sometimes? Then you'll hate this great TV special! Hilariously dark and frightfully funny, enjoy everything about The Far Side in amazing colored animation!

I couldn't find part II anywhere on Youtube. It's a shame too, because there is a great Creepmas scene where a deer battles it out with a group of hunters. It's a total blood bath. 

Creepmas Day 8: Mother 4

This is the perfect Creepmas present for that "gamer" on your list. Mother 4 is the fan made sequel to Nintendo's cult classic Mother series, known as Earthbound in the US. Earthbound (Mother 2) for the SNES is known for Giygas, one of the most disturbing bosses in video game history. I still haven't played Earthbound all the way through, but I remember watching my friend Karl play. The music is amazing, the story is engaging, funny, and creepy at times.

(Source)

Mother 4 looks to be everything that made Mother 1-3 so great and more. The game is 100% free and will be free to download from the website this winter! If you haven't played any of the Earthbound games then you are really missing out! When Mother 4 comes out download it and try it! You have nothing to lose, it's FREE!



Are there any other Mother fans out there in the blogosphere? What do you think of the new game?

Creepmas Day 7: My New Trashy Collection

I have been playing at the idea of collecting Trash Pack Trashies and I finally gave into temptation a purchased a few Moose Toy products.

The colorful magnets fit right in with My GPK magnet collection on the fridge.

Gross Ghosts, one of the latest series. I have flip-flopped in the past on my position on leaving toys carded versus opening them and playing with them as God intended. I've been having cold feet about opening toys lately. The Trash Pack toys may been one that should be opened because of the Mystery Pack nature of the toys. What do you think?

My small Trashie collection is not allowed to leave the stinky corner of the Christmas Village.

These Eraseez are great! You can really see all the gross little details.

http://collect.trashpack.com/

One thing that can make Trashie collecting so addictive, and one feature that I really like, is the official collectors site where you can make a list of all the Trashie you now own! You can also search the data base and create a Wish List , making it easier to trade with your friends.

Does anyone else out there collect Trashies? What do you think of them?

UPDATE:

Be sure to check out Bogleech's Trash Pack review: http://bogleech.com/scrapbook/scraptrashpack.html