Countdown to Halloween day 30: The Very Last of the Halloween Goodwill Finds Posts for 2015

Well... this is it folks! The last Goodwill Finds post of the 2015 Countdown to Halloween! I'm not too sad though, because there's always next year to look forward to, and with the end of the Halloween season I get to go back to looking for items in general that tickle my fancy. Halloween, like all good things, must come to a close. 

I have to say too, that I think for a post I wasn't sure I'd even be writing, since I just found all this stuff last weekend... I kind of saved the best for last. Here's a shot of the whole pile, (anything that was actually in with the Halloween merchandise was 50% off) so let's dig in!

First up this little folding screen-thing made up of three black cats. I kind of wish they hadn't done two pumpkins and a skull. Wouldn't a skull, a pumpkin, and a witch have been cool and colorful, and reminiscent of Halloween III? Either way, I think these cats are cool. Serene, majestic... almost stoic.

When I picked this up I thought it was a night-light, but then I realized it was actually an air freshener. I love that he's got an eye patch! He's practically a pirate jack o' lantern!

I think they sell the filling for these at Bath and Body works. I'll have to see if they have some pumpkin spice ones.

This was a surprise! I was really hoping to find the entire set of KISS band members in vinyl toy form... but all they had was The Demon, Gene Simmons! He's pretty much the one you want to find if you're going to find one though, so no complaints. Ever since seeing KISS on the Paul Lynde Halloween special this season, I can't NOT think of KISS as a Halloween band!

This is Ghost Rider's red-headed step-child, Vengeance! He's on one of those bikes that is supposed to have a ripcord to rev up the bike before you set it off on the floor. As an unabashed lover of s**tty 90's comics, there is a soft spot in my heart for ol' vengie here. He's one of the Midnight Sons characters, and he's basically Ghost Rider on bath salts. Plus the colors here are just perfect for the season!

I was pretty excited to find a McDonald's Halloween pail that features the McDonaldLand gang circa 1999. I was pretty chuffed to see that the lid is intact, the handle was on there... and this thing is in great shape!

While I'm not a huge fan of the pails as they creep closer and closer to modern day, THIS bucket features both Birdie and Grimace in that animated style they were doing for the "Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald" at the time.

I know next to nothing about vintage Halloween masks. Like how to even tell if they are, in fact, vintage. But these two masks just look way too old, and way too oddly familiar for me to leave them behind. I'm using the McDonald's trick or treat pail here as a model, which I think lends an appropriate level of eeriness to the eyes that I really like. This green guy is just absolutely gorgeous.

I should mention that both masks do actually have markings near the bottoms that should be telling me what the companies are that made these. This might make it easier for me to trace them to a specific time period... but unfortunately they are impossible to read. So... no dice. This devil guy's mouth opens up sideways I guess? Not sure. I love the use of blues and yellows here to make the red look crazy bright. Both of these masks stink like old Halloween masks should. Just smelling their weird cheesy gasoline odor takes me back to the Halloween section of Ames as a kid.

This is another interesting looking book about monsters that I may save for next year's Halloween Read Pile... or I may just read it now. Not sure. But "Scare Scape" by Sam Fisher looks like fun.

I was pretty excited to find this comic book, which is a cheap, indy comic done by creator "Madman" and is touted as:

"Eternity's Halloween Special" which I realize now is the name of the publishing company. "Lunatic Binge" is kind of fun, but kid of rough around the edges. We're talking super cheap end of the old indy comics pool here. It's mostly fun to own for the novelty's sake.

This was another fun find! "World's Worst Monsters & Villains" is another of those weird compendiums that collects monsters from movies, cartoons, myths, fairy tales, video games... whatever, and includes them all with equal fervor... and a equal lack of correct information.

But it's fun to flip through and look at! Here are some particularly monstrous entries in Cthulhu himself and something vampire-y called a Camazotz. If you're an RPG enthusiast like I am, these kinds of books are our bread and butter.

Well that's it kids! I'll be back one more time for this countdown with a final wrap-up post to see us out of the countdown! I won't be hibernating this year during November before my Creepmas and Christmas countdowns in December... so I'm not really going anywhere! Ummm... anyway...

I'll be back soon with more Goonie Goodwill Goodies! So until then, Happy Haunting!

Goodwill Finds: She-Ra, More KISS, More Strangers in Paradise, and Donald Duck

Welcome back to Goodwill Hunting 4 Geeks! This time around there are some weird call backs to my last post that I'll point out when we get to them. In the meantime, let's take a look at the group shot:

Intriguing no? Let's dig in shall we?

First up, here are a couple of nice Donald Duck finds. I'm not exactly a huge Donald Duck fan myself, but this 50 year anniversary book and the figure to accompany it were definitely coming home with me.

This picture is from before I cleaned up the figure, so imagine this guy with a bit less grime packed into his sculpted detail lines. For now they kind of help to make him a little easier to photograph. This guy was produced by Marx toys back in 1971. He's not worth a ton of money or anything, but I absolutely adore this guy. He has this awesome classic toy vibe. It's hard to tell scale from the picture, but he's about 6 inches tall.

I passed this She-Ra book on to a friend after finding it, but not before getting an awesome photo of some of the Horde:

I don't know how much I've talked about my adoration of both Hordak and Leech here on the blog, but I had those two action figures long after all of my other Masters of the Universe action figures were long gone. The picture of Leech here is sort of awkwardly terrifying, like his mouth was sawed out of his head by a cartoon coyote.

Here in the cassettes, we have the KISS tape "Asylum" which, just like my LAST visit to Goodwill, I found and purchased this for the cover art. Then we have the soundtrack to "The Princess Bride" and the Bangles tape "Different Light" both of which are perennial favorites.

I know a lot of the internet focuses on "Creepmas" and the creepy Christmas stuff that helps fight back against the invasion of Halloween by Christmas earlier and earlier every year... but this year I thought I'd make it my mission to try and find some creepy Thanksgiving books too. I'll probably do a post on whatever I find sometime in November before Turkey Day.

This detective story spoke to me. I have no idea if I'll like it considering it stars a cat... but I can hope.

Apparently this book was a part of the Age of Conan video game marketing campaign. It has some gorgeous interior art and information about different phases of the character's life. I haven't explored it completely, but it looks fun.

And finally I brought home some more of Terry Moore's Strangers in Paradise! This one isn't a collected pocket book edition, and honestly, I'm not sure if I'll be ready to read it after the other one I got last time around or not. But I've got it. It's mine.

Well that's it kids! I'll be back soon with more Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Hunting.

Goodwill Finds: Strangers in Paradise and Well Zombie

UPDATED TO ADD: I just noticed that this post is officially my 400th! I noticed this very shortly after posting my 403rd post which I put on the site 2 days after my 3 year blogoversary! Lots of milestones I've completely missed! 

-Now back to the blog!- 

So... I think I'm actually starting to get caught up with the stuff I purchased in the year 2015! Finally! The year is half over and I think I'm finally here! Yay! Here's a little pile of junk I brought home. Nothing RIDICULOUSLY exciting, but a couple nice grabs. Let's check it out, shall we?

So here's a pic of the whole pile. Time to dig in.

I tore open the grab-bag first. Disappointingly, this was one of those rare occasions where I really should have looked closer, because once I got it home, I found there wasn't really a ton of stuff in this one to interest me.

A handful of interesting items, my favorite probably being the Imaginext crab in the bottom right corner here. We also have what looks to be some sort of Iron Man themed motorcycle, a Sportsmaster Happy Meal toy from the Batman: The Brave and the Bold line, and another Imaginext figure, this one some sort of medieval or caveman shaman or something.

There's this Robin from the Batman LEGO Happy Meal line, and a Toy Story alien (honestly Robin, this alien and that purple crab are probably the only real 'keeps' for me out of this bag... not really a win).

Some fun cassette finds... U2's "Rattle and Hum"is full of some great live performances, and KISS's "Creatures of the Night" I picked up for the cover art alone. I'm always on the lookout for Christmas cassettes with some personal meaning to them, and Chris Van Allsburg's "The Polar Express" read by William Hurt fits the bill NICELY.

A couple of nice Graphic Novel scores in a Marvel Adventures: Spider-Man digest "Spider-Man vs. Sandman and Venom" (maybe released around the time the 3rd Raimi film was out?) AAAND the first collected 'pocket book' of "Strangers in Paradise" by Terry Moore. I've never read SiP before, but I've heard people RAVE about how great it is, so I'm excited to give it a try.

You're going to start seeing a few more young-readers chapter books cropping up on the blog. I won't subject you to absolutely every purchase, but my reasons are twofold: I'm buying chapter books to read to my 6 and 4 year old sons. They REALLY like the Magic Treehouse books, and since I now know they'll sit and listen to a couple of chapters at a time (as long as there are a few illustrations peppered in from time to time) I've gone whole hog. The other reason is I like to track down books I loved as a kid myself. I was an avid reader and as soon as I learned I could read to myself for pleasure I never wanted to stop. Encyclopedia Brown books were a popular series with the kids I went to school with and I want to share these stories with my kids.

There was one final item this time around that I was pretty excited to bring home... and it's this guy right here. This is a Funko POP plush "Well Zombie" from The Walking Dead. Before their "Fabrikations" line Funko was putting out stuffed characters based on their POP designs. This fat fella is cleverly velcroed in the middle so he can be puled apart the same way he was on the TV show (probably one of 3 memorable moments for me from the "Herschel's farm period"). This guy was in a grab-bag with I-don't-even-know-what-else because this is from a while back and he was the only thing I was after.

That's it for tonight kids! I'll be back with more Geeky Goodwill Goodies soon enough! Until then, Happy Hunting!