TMNT Books, Sesame Street, Applause toys,

Welcome back! I've been lazy, I'll admit. Completely slacking off. I don't usually let the blog rest this long, especially with Halloween less than 100 days away now, and so MANY posts still cluttering up my reservoirs. So without further ado, let's take a look at a load of stuff I brought back from a trip to Goodwill awhile back. 

Here's the obligatory group shot, but say it with me kids: Let's take a closer look, shall we? 

First up, here are a couple of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles books, both based on the 1990 movie. "The First Battle" is interesting because it tells the first third of the movie with the cartoon-versions of the turtles. This is an obvious move to bridge the gap for younger viewers/readers. And of course there's the young readers novelization of the film. Some year I'm going to go on a novelization-reading BINGE and just rot my brains out with books based on awesome old movies. My friend Biran over at Pop Pop! It's Trash Culture has been talking about starting some sort of book club... maybe it's time to roll that out. 

One Little Golden Book, and one of the Mickey Mouse Club books that desperately emulated them. "Ernie's Work of Art" is one I never had as a kid, but would have loved. "Bongo" looks like fun too, although I'm not familiar with the character, I know I've seen him before.  

I was pretty happy to add a couple of fun looking Halloween books to the shelf... "Ghost Train" and "Trick or Treat" will both probably get a second look as we get into the Halloween countdown this October. 

"Big Bird Joins the Carnival" is from 1985 and is based on the "Follow that Bird" film. This tells the story of how he meets the Sleaze Brothers and gets painted blue. It's... not as much fun as you'd think honestly. 

The E.T. the Extraterrestrial Storybook. I honestly don't have a ton to say about this. I have a love/hate relationship with E.T. It simultaneously scared the ever-loving s**t out of me as a kid, and I also LOVED it. So... now I own the storybook... 

I also found an issue of Marvel Comics Presents, featuring the Daughters of the Dragon, Wolverine, Union Jack, and best of all: Wonder Man! I can't remember if I've even mentioned this comic before, but I loved MCP as a kid. It was such a weird, disjointed introduction to several corners of the Marvel Universe all at once, especially considering that many of the stories were serialized, and so you might pick up an issue to see Wolverine, but then realize that you were actually in the middle of an 8-part story starring him, and then you'd move on to the 7th part of a 13 part Black Panther Story, the 6th part of a 7 part story starring the Master of Kung Fu, and then there would be some weird one-and-done story starring Spitfire or Longshot or some other random c-lister. It was kind of confusing but it really did make the Marvel Universe that much bigger and more magical for it. Plus for around a buck you 4-5 times the action and adventure, even if you didn't get the whole story. 

Now! Onto the grab-bag. All of the loose toys you see in the intro picture above were in one great big grab-bag for 2 dollars. There was a lot of detritus to be cast off, but there was so much great stuff included that it pretty much outweighs the junk. Here you can see a Smurf figurine, a Goomba toy from the 1990 Happy Meal toy line featuring Super Mario Brothers 3, and a Fisher Price Jumbo Little People Bear from the Poppity Pop Car set. But by far (to me) the greatest treasure here is the pink dragon in the front, marked "Applause 1987". Google has turned up only one other possible toy in this series, and I am tempted to say this was some sort of random junk-toy series they put together for bookstores, gift shops, etc. The detail they put into these guys were of the level usually reserved for licensed properties (which Applause was the KING of back in the 80's. They were the Funko of movie licensed products back then. PVC figurines out the rear...) this guy looks so familiar to me that I suspect I had one from the set, or spent a lot of time begging for one.

Here is a set of little vintage decorative figures for... whatever those were used for back then. Cake toppers maybe? Cupcake toppers? Either way, they are charming. And they've been saved to send off to a new home already, as I have a friend who eats this stuff UP.

This is the "Gotcha Gusher Squirter" from the 1992 Nickelodeon Happy Meal toy series from McDonald's. This is actually my second toy from this series. I lock only the blimp game and the loud mouth mic now. I love this thing for being exactly what it is: A piece of Nickelodeon history from the days when they were hitting it big and becoming a brand unto themselves. Yes I would have been 13 or 14 around that time, but Nickelodeon still monopolized a lot of my viewing time 

And finally, here are the vehicles from the bag. Bugs, Knuckles, Wakko (from Animaniacs), and Ratchett (from Tail Spin) are all fun, but it's the Batman Returns and Ernie (also produced by Applause!) toys that really made my day!

Well that's it for tonight kids! I still hope that you enjoy seeing and reading the junk I find at Goodwill nearly as much I do finding it! I'll be back soon with more Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Hunting!

Halloween Countdown Day 19: Ellsworth Goodwill Finds

We are creeping sooo close dear readers. The Day of Masks is less than two weeks away now. So much to do! I took a trip to the Ellsworth Goodwill very recently, and I brought home some new Halloween items. 

This little Halloween lantern cost me a dollar (all my local Goodwills are transitioning from .99 cent price-points to 1.00 price-points so you'll see a mix of them here) , and he looks magnificent hanging above my porch with the others!

I've been eyeballing this little plastic jack-o'-lantern for nearly a week and I finally brought him home. He was .99 cents and I'm pretty sure he's just the head to some of flashlight thing... but I love the green and white paint on the garish orange plastic, so he finally made it.

This Jack Skellington bowtie was 1.99. I'm  too portly to do a convincing Jack Skellington for Halloween but I'm thinking about trying to talk one of my sons into dressing up as Jack Skellingtion sometime, if not for Halloween then maybe for a Christmas card photo...) and this would be the hardest part of the costume to reproduce.

I've been tracking down spooky-themed anthologies for next Halloween (or for Halloween in general I guess) and this book of young readers nautical ghost stories looked fun. I picked it up for 2 dollars and this thing is kind of massive. 

I usually don't buy multiple copies of books for no good reason... but I bought two copies of Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth by E.L. Klonisburg because I couldn't decide if I wanted the older edition or the one with the cover art I like better. So... I picked them both up and at some point I will be giving one copy away.

I love a good John Bellairs story around Halloween. Last year I read about 4 of his books as a part of my Halloween reading pile. This year I've only found one new book I didn't already own (I don't count the ones finished by or written whole-cloth by Brad Strickland... they're just not the same) although I have been hunting NON-STOP for a nice copy of Eyes of the Killer Robot all I turned up was The Treasure of Alpheua Winterborn which is one I've never eve heard of before, and doesn't star Johnny Dixon or Lewis Barnavelt (and co.). Still ANY John Bellairs book is better than NO John Bellairs book. One can also never have enough of Roald Dahl's books, and I think this is one I don't own yet...? Either way, it;s perfect for a Halloween post, so I snapped up Revolting Rhymes for both potential reasons.

Drifting slowly out of the Halloween territory we are still kind of waving to it from a distance with these two books, The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet which is a trippy old sci-fi book, and a young-reader novelization of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: A Tale of High Adventure which has color photos included throughout the entire book, not just in a little parcel of pages stuck in the middle. This is how it should be done people. We get to see pictures of a few of the dishes served during dinner, for instance. Awesome.

This Double Dare Game Book is from the heyday of the Nickelodeon show. I can't think about Double Dare without thinking about the fact that the host of the show Marc Summers suffers from obsessive compulsive disorder. I try to imagine the absolute horror show that Double Dare would be with the slime and mess and human element... and shudder to think how hard that must've been for Summers. I still have super fond memories of the show from when I was a kid, even though it wasn't exactly the kind of show that kept me glued to the tube. 

I already own a copy of Circus of Fear which is one of TSR's Endless Quest books based on Dungeons and Dragons. But these things are just so cool I almost never don't pick them up when I see them. I'll give this one away too at some point. 

Since I recently became obsessed with finding out more about the illustrator of all the 80's-era editions of the Ramona-verse books, I've started exclusively picking up the editions with the artwork of Joanne Scribner. I love Love LOVE the whole scene depicted on the cover of this one. From the can-headed robot kid to the indian war-paint on Henry, to the werewolf mask on Ribsy... this one is just gorgeous. Tony DiTerlizzi did a post on his site a while back dedicated to the influence Scribner had on his work, and Joanne Scribner read the post and replied SEVERAL times in the comments. It is an amazing read. This is mostly what has prompted me to seek out all of these books with Scribner's art on them. 

As is becoming my new habit, I also picked up a couple of cassette tapes. The reasoning behind the TMNT cassette should be fairly obvious (because TMNT) but "The Last of the Mohicans" may be less so. Honestly, I don't think I ever watched the entire movie, but back in 1993 I was dating a girl in highschool and she bought me this tape for my birthday. Honestly "dating" is a hilarious term for it, because I didn't know how to act around other PEOPLE much less a girl who was interested in me. I was... awkward to say the least. The relationship didn't last long. But I honestly didn't mind that because it was pressure off. AND I ended up with this great soundtrack that was actually very moving and nice to listen to while I was writing or just laying around daydreaming as I often did as a teenager. This is a true blast from the past.

The final item of this post is as far from Halloween as it gets, but is still pretty great. "Pizza Party" is a sort-of-board-game-sort-of-memory-game-sort-of-card-game-you-get-the-point from Parker Brothers, put out in 1986. I dreamed of owning the game because they advertised the HECK out of it, and I got to play it a couple of times at a friend's house.

The copy I found is (of course) missing some tokens, rendering it unplayable. As you can see above, there is a green pepper, an onion, and two pepperonis missing in action, in addition to one of the green and one of the yellow "switch" tokens. Sigh. I am now making it my life's mission to track down another incomplete version of this game and get these six tokens BACK. I want to play this with my kids!!! Plus the theme song from the commercial is a brain-worm that I sing the chorus to EVERY time we order pizzas: 

So that's all I've got for tonight kids! I'll be back with more Ghoulish Goodwill Goodies soon enough. Until then, Happy Haunting!

Goodwill Grab-Bag: Monsters and Mayhem!

It has been a while since I have focused an entire post on just one grab-bag found at Goodwill. And I'm kind of excited. This one was a nice one. First off, for everything I'm about to show you, I paid a grand total of .99 cents! And it's a healthy little pile of toys! Take a look:

Eagle eyed observers will already recognize a few familiar forms in there, struggling to free themselves. So let's not make them wait. Let's dive right in and see what this grab-bag had in store for me shall we?

First up, we have this little set of Angry Birds Star Wars toys. I don't think this is a Happy Meal toy... but I'm not 100%, and I haven't Googled the sets to see where these came from. I will note that I had pretty much sworn not to get tangled up in the whole Star Wars Angry Birds fad, and now I'm finding that decision REALLY hard to stand by. I think I can make this statement and not be considered a liar: I will not buy any brand new Star Wars Angry Birds sets. I will ONLY buy them second hand. Obviously we have R2-D2, Leia, Luke, and Chewbacca all lined up there in the front. Also included was a light-saber-catapult and a couple of blocks to knock over. There were no signs of any other parts or pieces to this set. 

Next up are these two BEAUTIFUL freaks... who I think we can all agree are not just your average, typical members of a cheap, bagged assortment of dinosaurs. These are SPECIAL, in all the ways that may be interpreted. Look at the bulging eyes! Look at the interpretive-dance, jazz hands! Look at the slack-jawed Goober expressions on those faces! Look at the eye-blisteringly bright colors! These are amazing! 

No idea where these could have originated from, but I think we can all agree that it is/was a magical, wonderful place full of magical wonders and wonderful magics. And finally... 

A couple of toys from the Aaahh! Real Monsters line. I was never a fan... or really even a casual viewer of this show, but I supported it in spirit as a show about monsters. I saw that the complete series has just recently been released on DVD, and this, like the claymation series "Bump in the Night", is the kind of show I would like to discover that I would have loved all along if I had watched it way back when. So I may pick that DVD set up sometime soon. I do know enough about the show to tell you that Ickiss and Krumm, the two seemingly "main" characters of the series are not the two I found. These are The Gromble and Oblina. And that... as the say... is that. These toys were originally put out in 1995 by Mattel, and they each have an action feature. Oblina's head raises so her mouth opens and a purple tongue pops out. The Gromble has a "chewing feature" which you use on the student figures apparently. 

So that's my Goodwill Grab-Bag post! I'll be back with more Geeky Goodwill Goodies soon enough! Until then, Happy Hunting!

A Random Handful of Goodwill Goodies: The BIG Toy Post

Hey everybody! Welcome back! This time here on Goodwill Hunting 4 Geeks I'm going to show off a random handful of toys I've recently found at Goodwill. 

First up is this sandwich baggy full of little plastic Indians. I apologize if this use of the term Indians is considered offensive to any of you out there, but "little plastic Native Americans" just doesn't have the same ring... and is probably way more PC than these little figures probably warrant. Do they even make these any more? These figures don't look too old, but I have no real way of telling. I almost didn't buy these little guys, but I have a weakness for mini-figs of any kind, and the classic plastic-playset variety especially hold a warm and snuggly place in my heart. As you may be able to see in the picture, I paid .99 cents for these guys. They come in six different sculpts and 4 different colors. And I love them. 

These are the only toys in this post that I did not in fact buy at a Goodwill. I got them at a thrift store called Nice Twice in Ellsworth, ME that I have mentioned here on the blog before. Specifically, the post featuring the 80's/90's comic books and ads on here not long ago. Anyway, these are two Tiny Toons Adventures Happy Meal toys and one 101 Dalmation toy (that I am going to only look at pig-side up so I can pretend it is a Tiny Toon toy). The gimmick to these is that they flip over to reveal a second character in a different vehicle. I didn't match my pictures up well at all, so I'll just let you know, the first car from the first picture is the bottom of the second car in the second picture, and vice versa. The third car in both pictures is a match. Easy! I find it bizarre that the exact same gimmick was used for two different properties from two opposing animation houses. These three cars were .50 cents apiece. 

These three toys were in a grab-bag together for .99 cents at the Bangor, ME Goodwill. I have a pseudo-collection of those translucent Ben 10 Happy Meal toys packed away somewhere and I liked the look of this guy so I decided I'd keep it going. I do wish that you couldn't see Ben in the middle of the alien. I really just like pretending these big clear-plastic aliens are Ben-free.The snake from Kung Fu Panda I already own so I gave this one to my kids to play with. The long, brown, segmented dragon I just really liked the look of... until I got home and realized it was from the live-action Last Airbender movie. I still like the toy... but it feels tainted somehow. He was the real reason I picked up the grab-bag in the first place, honestly. The Ben 10 toy was just a butter on the bread. Ah, well. 

These next two items I paid .99 cents apiece for. The first is a little Tic-Tac-Toe game that reminded me of a doll's version of Toss-Across. It's Tic-Tac-Toe, so you can't really go wrong. I'm keeping it in the random-toys-and-boredom-busters drawer (which I've blogged about. Click on the picture below) of my desk:

 

Because it's the sort of thing I can grab and play with for 10 minutes when I need a distraction (because I am SO short on distractions in the Goodwill Geek Cave) and some time to kill. The other toy next to the Tic-Tac-Toe game is a Nickelodeon Applause-gun-toy-thing. Pull the trigger and the yellow plastic hands clap together, while an applause sign simultaneously pops up. This went in my distraction drawer as well.

I found this little green Cyclops guy for .99 cents. He looks like he's a collectible urban vinyl mini-figure... but is actually a toy from the "Children's Place". That pricey kid's clothing store at the mall. I haven't been able to find any other information other than the stamp on the back of his head. I don't know if they made others in a series or what. The little green plastic Indian was included for scale purposes only... no cyclopes (or Indians) were injured in the making of this blog entry. 

I found this set of magnets in a sandwich bag for .99 cents. No idea what they originally came with, but no searches have turned anything up yet. I thought maybe one of those Klutz sets... but no. The paper-clips and the little metal rod to the bottom left are definitely pieces of the set, because the paper-clips are way too heavy-gauge to be used as actual paper-clips. Their like little tiny paper-weight paper-clips.

Next are some Happy Meal toys that were all together in a Grab-Bag for 2.99. It was a weird but pretty awesome assortment of items. First up is this "magic box" Star Wars thing, which gives the illusion that if you look in the left side of the box, it is full of Darth Vader's floating, disembodied head, and if you look in the right side, it is Yoda's floating, disembodied head. The whole thing is done with mirrors and half-heads, but I'll never give away that secret. Shhh. It's magic. 

I found the effing thing incredibly hard to photograph as well. These were the best out of something like 20 shots I took of each side. After that, I just picked the best two from each lot and ran with them. You guys already know what Vader and Yoda look like. Just deal with this.

Here is a cute little Bernard toy from either the Rescuers or the Rescuers Down Under. Not sure which. Look at him! This might just get made into a Christmas ornament... I don't know if it was a Happy Meal toy or what. He's hollow plastic, and there's a great big hole in the bottom of that cheese... making me wonder if he was the cap to something... I just don't know. 

Here is a cute little Bartok toy! Remember him? He's the little albino bat who sidekicks for Rasputin the Mad Monk in the Don Bluth Anastasia film. I don't remember liking that movie all that much, but I can't remember why. Apparently it did very well. I do however, happen to be one of about 3 people in the world who enjoy the utterly weird direct-to-dvd spin-off/sequel: Bartok The Magnificent! At first I assumed this might be a toy from that sequel, but upon examining the packaging (This also turned out to be a Burger King Kid's club toy) I realized this must be Rasputin's eye that Bartok is hugging. Pull it out of his paws and a string causes Bartok to shake violently until the eye reels itself back in. Bizarre. I'm going to have to go back and re-watch both movies at some point soon I think. 

Next in the bag was this Peanuts toy from a Wendy's Kid's Meal! It's pretty basic... but pretty awesome in all the right ways. I'm a casual Peanuts fan in that I like the Holiday specials, and I like Snoopy. This dog-house toy has three little sliders on the back end that let you slide up three different, iconic images of Snoopy into view. The first is Snoopy asleep on top of the house. 

The second is Snoopy in his classic Flying Ace get-up and the third shows Snoopy and Woodstock sharing a care-free dance together. The real struggle here was deciding which picture to put on display. I went with the Fling Ace since I like him from the Great Pumpkin special... but then it hit me... I CAN CHANGE IT AT ANY TIME!!! I did a little Snoopy dance myself I was so excited. 

 

The last toy in the bag was another Burger King's Kid's club premium. And it may just be one of the weirdest toys I now own. It is a Nickelodeon 1999 Kid's Choice Awards toy featuring Rosie O'Donell under what is supposed to be a tank of Nick's trademark slime. I own a Rosie O'Donell toy you guys. And I kind of adore it. The slime in the tank above her has dried up in the 14 years since it was put in there... so that's a little disappointing. What I ended up with is a Rosie O'Donnell perpetually staring up at the sky, as if paranoid a low-flying sea-gull is going to "gel" her hair. 

Inside the Grab-Bag, the Snoopy, Rosie, and Bartok toys were all in their original Fast Food Packaging. I shucked and saved the baggies and inserts though. Take a look. 

Moving swiftly on, I paid .99 cents for this alien that I know for a fact originally came from a Dollar store. Why buy it then? Because I haven't seen them in the Dollar Store for a very long time now, and I always meant to pick one up. So instead I got it from goodwill. No prob, Bob. He's about as tall as a GI Joe figure. And he's sort of adorrifying. That's adorable and horrifying squished together. I thought I just made it up but a quick Google search proves me completely wrong.

Here's a Diego toy from one of the Ice Age sets. I haven't looked to see which one. But it's pretty faithful to his appearance in the first one, and that's all I really care about, as that first film is the only one I've ever really enjoyed. I got him for .99 cents. 

Here's a bobble-headed Chewie after he's just taken over a wind-up AT-ST in the battle of Toy Endor. I actually bought this one for my son, but thought I'd show it off on here before letting him have it. Got it for .99 cents. 

Why what's this thing all secretively sealed and ominous looking? Is it full of gold? Is it full of severed human ears? (I really suck at playing What's-The-MacGuffin?) Let's look shall we? 

Well let me show you! It's a 1985 Playskool Poppon' Pals Sesame Street toy! Sort of an activity toy with different latches, buttons, levers and dials used to make the characters pop out of hiding. 5 of my favorite Sesame Street Muppets are waiting to be discovered! 1.99 for this little piece of history!

So there. A TON of toys featured today, all bought at different Goodwills on different days, all gathered together for one big post! 

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