Followers of this Blog Please Take Note! Change of Address!

I know I just got on here and posted that I wasn't dead just the other day... but that wasn't entirely true. I am fine of course, a living, breathing person... but every time I sat down to write a new post for the blog, I stopped myself because I knew that the persona of the Goodwill Geek is being laid to rest this weekend.

I've been tossing around some ideas for a new blog lately, and this would require me dropping the Goodwill-laden image I have here. So I'm discontinuing the Goodwill Hunting 4 Geeks blog. It will still be here to read, but I will pretty much be done creating new content for this blog after this final post.

R.I.P. Goodwill Geek.

So what's the new blog you may ask? Well let me tell you!

reallyratherrandomguy.blogspot.com is the name of the new joint, and it is going to end up being the sort of blog where I feel a little less restricted in what I talk about. I don't really restrict myself too much here, mind you... but when I don't keep the site focused on Goodwill purchases I sort of feel bad about it. Like I'm cheating on my blog. So the new site will still talk about junk I've picked up at Goodwill... it will just be so much more as well. 

And the Goodwill Geek persona? The mask and secret identity are being retired. I will NOT be taking up the moniker of Random Guy online... I'm just going to be blogging as myself from here on out. No reasons to hide anymore really. 

Just a small town boy and his big dreams...

So that's that. I'll be doing the rest of my blogging over at the Really Rather Random Guy blog, and I hope you'll all join me over there. I'm going to miss this old pastel green eyesore... but it'll still be around. I don't want to lose the last couple of years worth of blogging I've done by deleting it all so I'll leave it up and probably even post links to it from time to time when I'm feeling lazy. The RRRG will be participating in all of the League of Extraordinary Blogger posts when those start up again, and things will probably seem like business as usual with a slightly different color scheme, to be honest. 

So for the last time: I'll be back real soon with some Geeky Goodwill Goodies (albeit on a new blog) so until then... Happy Hunting!

Not Dead... Again...

So I've been sort of absent from the Blog for a while now... and I've had some good reasons, and a few that were just me being lazy. And I have SOOOO much to blog about. Like a whole SERIES of packages from blogging friends I need to get on here. I also have some pretty big blogging news (for me) that may come before or after I get back to actively blogging... and that may affect the delivery of everything that comes next for me on here.

So... there's that.

And here's a preview of what's to come:

What can it mean!!!

And with that I will simply disappear into the mist once more, dear readers. I shall return though. That is a promise. 

I'll be back soon with... hmmm. Let's drop the tagline for now, eh?

Halloween Countdown Day 12: Catching Up With the Goodwill Geek

I know it's kind of random to post one of these things in the middle of the month... but hey, random seems to be what I'm all about these days. For those not in the know, I wanted to start doing a monthly feature where I just get totally away from the "here's a bunch of stuff I've bought!" type of posts and really focus on some of the stuff I've been doing, or watching, or reading, or listening to. It's a way of putting a little more focus on the "Geek" part of the blog. 

Since it's October, and the Halloween Countdown is in full swing, I want to focus on stuff I've been doing to get into the spirit of the season. I'll start with what I've been reading:

Nothing gets me in the Autumn-y, October-y, Halloween-y mood more than Ray Bradbury's The Halloween Tree I didn't read it last year because I was in the process of reading The October Country (Follow that link for even more Bradbury goodness, including the book pictured above...) which I had recently found after searching for it for what felt like FOREVER. But this book above almost an other, feels like a wonderful trumpeting fanfare for the start of all things Halloween. The story is a great one, a timeless one, and that's why I included Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud (if this book were Disney's Aladdin, Moundshroud would be the genie) in my list of Halloween Icons for this week's League post. I talk about the Halloween Tree quite a bit in the two posts linked-to above, so I won't go on here. Just. Love. This. Book.

Right after I set The Halloween Tree aside, I had already decided to continue on with Joseph Payne Brennan's anthology The Shapes of Midnight, which is a collection of old-school horror stories written back in the 50's and 60's. Brennan's stories are similar in some ways to his contemporaries like Bradbury, and there is a definitive hints of similar elements such as those found in predecessor H.P. Lovecraft's stories... but Brennan's writing style is much simpler, and without the flourishes in language found in those other writer's works. He's pretty meat-and-potatoes in his descriptions, and most of his stories end pretty abruptly instead of having a lengthy denouement where implications and ramifications of events are explored. Brennan's stories are full of monsters: slime creatures and zombie hobos, and murderous madmen are in full bloom here. But there are plenty of creep-out tales involving murder and karmic retribution, or people whose obsessions bring them to their own doom, or to the brink of doom at the very least. There are houses dreamed into existence, haunted backyards that devour prey like pitcher plants, and indescribable creatures dredged up from the ocean depths or even up from the depths of time itself. If you're a fan of books like the House on the Borderland, or even the short works of Stephen King, then Brennan is a writer you will stake you right through the heart. 

I'm currently working on the simply titled Halloween which is an anthology edited by Paula Guran and contains stories by authors as varied as Peter Straub, ol' Mr. Bradbury once again, and Joe R. Lansdale. This was a late-arrived birthday gift from my wife, and she kindly decided not to save it for Christmas instead. I'm only about 4 or 5 stories in and so far I haven't really been wowed, but I'm in the process of reading Peter Straub's "Pork Pie Hat" which tells of a jazz musician recounting a childhood Halloween experience that haunts him well into his adulthood. It's been the best story in the book so far, which surprised me considering I did not think I would be a Peter Straub fan whatsoever. This short story has really changed my opinion and I may seek out more Straub later on. Don't know how the rest of the collection is going to be, but hopefully it won't disappoint. 

As for television... I've become a fan of FOX's "Sleepy Hollow" which takes great liberites with the source material and-yadda-yadda-yadda. It's not a great show, as it has plot-holes out the wazoo, and the characters just don't behave in a fashion befitting the events going down on the show. After the first episode time-displaced Ichabod Crane just sort of seems to join the police, and works with them in solving all the weird X-Fil-- I mean cases that crop up in Sunnyda-- I mean Sleep Hollow. No one bats an eye at the fact that Ichabod is wearing the same anachronistic Sturbrige Village gear that he showed up in for however long the plot has been going on for. Apparently he washes it in his hotel room every night. And apparently the police are paying for Ichabod to stay at a hotel? There is so much MORE that bugs me about this show too. But I'm done tearing it down for a bit because I am genuinely having fun watching it! I like Tom Mison, the actor that plays Ichabod, even though he tends to be a bit ridiculous in his one-note portrayal of too-accepting-revolutionary-war-guy-in-modern-day Ichabod, with his inspirational speeches and profound dun-Dun-DUN proclamations about demons and conspiracies and the like... because he's just so earnest and likeable, and I get the feeling he's really enjoying the hell out of himself. 

I also really enjoy Nicole Beharie's performance as Abbie Mills. With her no-nonsense attitude and troubled past she is the key to making this show feel more like Castle than Supernatural... with broad strokes of both shows influencing just about everything you see here. And the optimism displayed by the show when they reveal the characters will go through seven years of trials as witnesses to the coming of the Apocalypse? Priceless. This may all sound like I'm tearing this show down, but I really do enjoy it! It's familiar and comfortable, and influenced by everything that has come before it. It really just requires you to unplug your brain and check it at the door as they take a National Treasure approach to fighting off the End of Days. Equal parts Goonies and Monster Squad only with grown-ups playing deadly serious as they chew up the scenery. New interpretations of tired old baddies like resurrected witches, Dream-killers, and even the Riders of the Apocalypse are welcome as well. It all feels like retread, but retread you don't mind going over again because it's all so shiny and new. This show has guilty pleasure written all over it... but I feel no guilt whatsoever. 

Before I'm totally done with this post, I also want to mention a podcast I have been completely and totally obsessed with for a good long while now. 

"Welcome to Night Vale" is a hard podcast to describe. It probably rest easiest under the category of absurdist horror parody. Or just absurdist horror. Or just horror parody. Or just horror. Or just absurd. Or just. It is put out by Commonplace Books and is co-written by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor and it is amazing. It's available for free on iTunes.

"Welcome to Night Vale" is a radio news program in the small desert community of Night Vale. The voice behind the microphone is Cecil, who reports on all of the activities going on in the community. Said activities include: killer librarians, hypnotic glow-clouds joining the PTA, armies invading from below the bowling alley, hovering rest-room cats, a dog park being erected in which people... and dogs... are not allowed to walk, a five headed dragon announcing his candidacy for mayor (while in jail), STREET SWEEPING DAY (lock your doors!), angels living with Old Woman Josie, a waterfront boardwalk being built (in a town with no... water... it's a desert town), and hooded figures, menacing government agents, Sheriff's Secret Police, feral dogs, mute children, and a man in a tan jacket with a deer-skin suitcase whom no one seems to be able to describe after they see him, all lurking about, up to no good. 

"Welcome to Night Vale" is not for everyone. If you are expecting a serious, "Twin Peaks" sort of story, go elsewhere. This is more Eerie Indiana meets Gravity Falls meets Saturday the 14th meets Lemony Snicket meets Shadow Rock. I am addicted to it. Listening to the ridiculous and dark events of Night Vale through the soothing filter of Cecil's voice, you are struck by how commonplace it all (sort of) seems to the residents of Night Vale. And you begin to understand something is terribly, terribly wrong with the world they live in there... and you wonder what world it is supposed to be... and then there's a Taco Bell commercial or something. 

Cecil Baldwin, voice of Night Vale

Night Vale has sky-rocketed in popularity in a relatively short period of time, considering it's only been around a little over a year. There's a wiki based on the show already, and a thriving fan-art community. They've already celebrated with a one-year anniversary episode, and a companion book is forth-coming. But all the extra stuff aside, the episodes are just FUN. There's always a twist, always a moment of revelation, always a moment so absurd that I laugh out loud, and always a moment that gives me a reason to think. I urge you to give at the very least, the first few episodes a try. 

My favorite episodes so far?

Episode 1: Pilot 

Episode 3: Station Managment

Episode 13: A Story About You

Episodes 19A & 19B: The Sandstorm Parts 1 & 2

Episode 26: One Year Later

But I really urge you to listen to all of them, all the way through. They are only about 20-23 minutes long and, at the time of this writing, there are only 32 episodes to get caught up on. There's a "Weather" segment to each episode which is really a song played by a different independent artist each week, usually having absolutely nothing to do with any of the stories being told in the episode (as far as I can tell). I really can't make it clear to you how addicted to and obsessed with this podcast I've become. It's like they created it just for me. 

Well, that's it for this month's Catching Up With the Goodwill Geek (Halloween Edition). I'll be back soon with more Grave-digging Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Haunting!

Be sure to check out all of the great blogs participating in this year's Halloween Countdown! You can do so by clicking this link, or clicking on the Cryptkeeper 2013 banner on the sidebar to the right! Also, check out the "Blog-O-Ween" Halloween Blog collective, again by following this link, or through the badge on the sidebar! Thanks!

Halloween Countdown Day 1: The Geek gets Freaky!

I thought I would really kick off my Halloween Countdown with a bang!!! The first day of October deserves nothing less! As I mentioned a while back during one of my new "Catching Up With the Geek" posts which are totally going to become a regular thing... my daughter has a new love of special-effect make-up spawned from her watching the show Face-Off on SyFy with her grandmother. I've been watching a little bit of it with her lately as well, but mostly just the really interesting chunks of the show. 

ANYWAY... I volunteered back in mid-September to be a test subject for her, since she seems to think that she is terrible at doing make-up on other people, and can only really do a good job on herself. I waited and sat on these pics until now because I wanted to feature them during the Halloween countdown. This... is my story. I went into the make-up chair with more than a little trepidation:

Be gentle.

I regretted my decision to be her guinea pig almost as soon as she told me that I needed to wear a shirt "I didn't care about" and then put an old pink towel across my lap... "for all the blood." I kid you not, those were her EXACT WORDS. I had already liberally used a cheese-grater on my thumb-knuckle while shredding cheese for tacos earlier that evening... so I thought I had seen my share of blood for the day. Not so dear readers. Not so.

"Hmm. We should really paint the ceilings in here...
and I need to buy toilet paper. Is that a spider?"

She started off by gluing a wad of toilet paper to my face and then painting a bunch of stuff over it. It surprised me, the thoughts I had while staring at the ceiling... my daughter painting toilet paper onto me. We plugged my iPod into its charger/speaker and blasted some mood music. She initially asked if we could skip Tom Waits's "Murder in the Red Barn" but I told her no. She needs to learn some frigging culture.

The Noxema Girl I ain't.

The Cramps were uh-huh-huh-huh-ing their way through "Creature from the Black Leather Lagoon" when she finished the burn-wound on my cheek. Rob Zombie started screeching into "Werewolf Baby" as she began the process of gluing a piece of latex glove over my left eye. 

Nope. There's nothing in your eye. At all. 

We made it through Horrorpop's "Hitchcock Starlet", The Squirrel Nut Zipper's "The Ghost of Stephen Foster" and Captain Clegg and the Night Creatures' "Transylvania Terror Train" before the eye was finished. Man that sucker itched the WHOLE time. But I was a good little guinea pig. I only whined a little bit. I imagined I was experiencing something akin to phantom limb syndrome... except I still actually had my eye and I still actually could have scratched it if there wasn't all this STUFF on it. So it was totally different.

Southern Culture on the Skids howled through "Werewolf" while my daughter applied a scar to my other cheek. Then Voltaire started in about how much he loved eating "Brains!" which I thought was rather appropriate, considering my daughter was zombifying me. 

Not sure why I'm eating this brush.
Maybe because I'm a zombie.
OR maybe just because the artist isn't paying attention due to photo-op.

I think the longest part of the whole process when when my daughter decided I didn't look "dead enough" so she had to pale up my face, darken my lips and add shadows to other parts of my face. It felt like FOREVER, considering one of my eyes was sealed shut. Luckily I had the Creepshow singing "Grave Diggers" The Bubblegum Hearts singing "The Ghost of Vincent Price" and the Aquabats "Attacked by Snakes" to get me through the final stages. All in all the process took just under an hour, and we rocked almost all the way through. 

Like looking in a mirror actually.

Here she is showing off her preliminary "potato head" (her words not mine) sketch of her plan, and then her finished result. Personally I was very impressed with her work (I mean the make-up. The sketch we killed with fire afterwards... Kidding! I kept it in my cave as a souvenir.) 

Here's a bit of a closer shot of the finished product... again, I feel equal parts pride and revulsion when I look at this photograph... and I feel that is the correct set of emotions to have welling up inside me at this time. 

I had my wife take some action shots. As she snapped this one she accused me of being "such a kid" to which I replied "That's why you married me!" ... to which she had to simply shrug and acquiesce. 

More action shots here... and as all monster-makers in all stories everywhere eventually learn... my daughter also learned: your creation will ALWAYS turn on you!!! Her brains were... less than filling to my disappointment. I'm not saying she's an airhead... but she is a blonde. 

Mrs. The Goodwill Geek thought I was sexy as HELL. She's into big dead kids. She's freaky like that.

Can't even begin to tell you how nice it was to do this with my daughter. That's it for tonight boils and ghouls! I'll be back soon with some Ghastly Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Haunting!

Be sure to check out all of the great blogs participating in this year's Halloween Countdown! You can do so by clicking this link, or clicking on the Cryptkeeper 2013 banner on the sidebar to the right! Also, check out the "Blog-O-Ween" Halloween Blog collective, again by following this link, or through the badge on the sidebar! Thanks!

Pneumonia.

So I'm officially home for the next two days because I need to rest and recover from PNEUMONIA!!! I have pills and everything. Apparently my little cold has turned into a sinus infection and is dripping vile fluids into my lungs. Had to go get an x-ray and everything. Internet: PITY ME.

I'm looking at this as a positive as it will give me time to work on the blog... and maybe be healthy enough to take my lovely wife out for her birthday Sunday night. Either way I'll be catching up on my day-time television. 

I'll be back soon with some Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Hunting. 

Catching up with the Goodwill Geek

You know, I never take time to just get on here and just... like... talk about stuff. I have a lot of blogging friends who focus their blogs on all aspects of their lives, not just the junk they buy in the course of a month.

I know. It's shocking.
But stay with me.

I thought I'd give it a try. But... if I'm not going to be blogging about the crap I've bought and brought home from Goodwill... or Mardens... or Dream Catcher Antiques... or some other store... I thought I'd take a post to talk about some of the stuff I've been doing, some of the stuff I watched/read/listened to in August, etc. I think I might try to make it an-end-or-maybe-the-beginning-of-every-month kind of thing from now on.

So here goes. Don't expect content any deeper than "Guess what I bought!" by any means.

I've just finished reading Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs by Chuck Klosterman. It's a collection of essays on pop-culture, and some of them border on enlightening. It's been slow going for a number of reasons. I don't get as much time to sit down with a book as I used to for one. But for another, I have a hard time buying Klosterman's tone in many of his essays. In so many of his pieces he derides egotistical hipster high-brows for poo-pooing on certain subcultures... but it really just comes off as a hipster (who considers himself above the other hipsters) pointing at a bunch of hipsters and going: "Don't you just hate those guys?" BUT I did especially like the essays he wrote on The Sims, Pamela Anderson, Breakfast Cereal, Serial Killers, Saved By the Bell, and I especially love the parallels he draws between The Empire Strikes Back and Reality Bites (He postulates that they are essentially the same film).

I finally got around to watching Paolo Sorrentino's "This Must Be the Place". It stars Sean Penn as Cheyenne, an aging emo rocker who I imagine MUST be modeled after Robert Smith. I really, really like almost everything about this film. It has the road-trip element that so many of my favorite films do, and also the outsider/misfit as protagonist that covers the rest of my favorite films. I think my main complaint about the film has to be that Penn's portrayal of Cheyenne occasionally just seems impossibly unreal. He completely OWNS the character, but it's so hard to imagine this flesh-and-blood Muppet of a man existing and interacting with other human beings. It's obvious he's supposed to resemble the aforementioned Smith, but elements of another aging rocker: drug-addled, wife-dependent Ozzy Osborne bleeds in there as well. It's a coming of age journey story for men with Peter Pan syndrome, and it uses a Nazi war criminal angle to get there. So much emphasis is put on Cheyenne and his interacting with the world that the Nazi angle didn't feel especially important. It was more an ends to a means that could have been almost anything else as long as it got the ball rolling. Overall I really liked the film though. I liked the pacing and the character development, and the little vignettes that get us from point A to point B. I'll be watching it again sometime in the future for sure.

In other news, my daughter is obsessed with doing make-up FX work. She's been watching SyFy's Face-Off with her grandmother since last year sometime, and now she's been experimenting on herself. I've been doing all I can to encourage her. Above you can see a number of her experiments. I hope she sticks with it because she has a lot of natural talent and she's just starting out at 13. I could see her making a career of this. She'll randomly poke her head into my Geek Cave and look at me with one eye (because the other one is apparently torn from its socket) and ask me to take some pictures for her. She's having fun and she's being geeky and I couldn't be more proud. 

Finally, I've been listening to a handful of podcasts lately, and I wanted to highlight a handful that I've been enjoying. 

Nerd Lunch Podcast

The Nerd Lunch Podcast just recently hit its 100th episode. They're a trio of guys, CT, Pax, and Jeeg who discuss everything in the interest of "nerds" although in my opinion, I really think it's more of a "geek" show than a "nerd" one. They cover topics ranging from fast food, movies, comics, classic geek books, and "other" stuff. It's the "other" stuff where the magic happens... like deciding who the "Expendables" of other movie genres would be. Or what foods you'd choose if your replicators on the Enterprise were broken and you could only have 10 choices for the next several decades. The thing I love most about this podcast is the pseudo-professionalism balanced with fun... meaning, the guys have a great time but take their topics seriously. They don't meander off topic the way a lot of pod-casts do, and while the occasional swear can be heard, for the most part the guys treat their listeners with respect. While I have no problems with profanity when I'm disciplining my kids*, I hate foul-mouthed podcasts that just wander all over the map when what I really want to hear about is what horror movie icons are going to bite it first during a zombie apocalypse.

Stuck in the 80's Podcast

Stuck in the 80's is a podcast that I just recently discovered. Like as in I've only heard about 3 episodes. But I'm hooked already! they mainly talk about 80's music that I can see, with a healthy smattering of 80's films mixed in. These guys were a little bit older during the 80's than I was... but it's all still pretty relevant stuff to me. And like the Nerd Lunch podcast above, these guys stay on topic and have fun while taking their topics seriously.

Thrift Store Movie Score Podcast

The Thrift Store Movie Score is another podcast I discovered recently. It's... interesting. There's none of the polish you see in the above two podcasts. The hosts Justin and Christine tend to be a bit... distracted from time to time, but they have a certain kind of goofy charm. They mostly talk about goofy VHS films they've found in thrift stores. They go into great depths analyzing the plots of the films they've watched, and pull in pop-culture references from their own past experiences. Again, it's not super polished, so a lot of times it feels like the hosts have done zero or less preparations to discuss some of their films and they ramble on at times about details I can't even begin to fathom the reasoning behind... but honestly, it works. Justin and Christine are a bit younger than I am so again there's some gaps between what they're nostalgic for and what I would be. But the podcasts are fun and still manage to bring back some memories. I especially liked the podcast about the Elijah Wood film "North" and another film "Motorama" I'd never heard of.

The Cult Film Club Podcast

The Cult Film Club podcast is one I actually discovered through Shezcrafti. It is the podcast that inevitably led me to discovering the Nerd Lunch podcast. Jaime Hood teams up once a month with Shawn Robare and Paxton Holley (the same "Pax" from Nerd Lunch above) to discuss a cool cult movie. But they don't just "discuss" a movie. They discuss their favorite parts, they discuss the terrible acting. They discuss where they have seen the actors in the cast before and since. They also recast the movie with their own casting choices. In other words it's not just some dry analysis of old weird movies you've never heard of... it's FUN with weird old movies you've never heard of. It's like those bizarrely in-depth discussions you used to get into with your friends at like... 3 o'clock in the morning about the Mortal Kombat movie. 

It was nice catching up with you guys, but that's it for me tonight! I'll be back soon with more Geeky Goodwill Goodness! Until then, Happy Hunting!

*Maybe I'm kidding... maybe not.**

** I am. 

I've been blogging for a year... Yesterday?

So I saw that Dex over at AEIOU and Sometimes Why? was celebrating his second blog-i-versary (his term... not mine) back on July 13th.

THEN I saw that Erick over at the Wonderful Wonderblog was celebrating 7 YEARS!!!

THEN... I saw that Michael Lewindowski over at Memories of Toymorrow was celebrating his 1 year Anniversary, and mentioned it on July 22nd!

And that got me thinking... I couldn't remember exactly when I started blogging about all the second-hand crap that I buy at Goodwill (and other places) so I had to investigate.

But first, I want to congratulate ALL of those guys, as I have been following, reading, and enjoying their blogs for quite some time now.

Happy Blog-Birthday, you studs.

But then I want to point out that MY first blog post was back on July 24th of last year!

The picture above is the very first picture I posted to my blog. At the time I only knew they were from a baggy I'd bought at the Brewer, ME Goodwill. They were obviously E.T. I just wanted to give a hint of the sort of thing I would be posting about on my new blog. I put out a call to help identify them and I found out they were game pieces from an old E.T. board game. Ever since I found that out, the idea that the rest of the game might have been kicking around the very same Goodwill store that day has haunted my dreams... But on that fateful day the Goodwill Geek was born! 

Bitten by a radioactive Thrift Store, the Goodwill Geek stood for second-hand geekiness everywhere he went afterwards! With the powers of endless patience to dig through piles of old, broken remote control cars and Hotwheels car-tracks with missing pieces to retrieve the awesome vintage Happy Meal toys hiding beneath! With the eyes of a biblio-phile on the prowl, picking out secondhand graphic novels, Little Golden Books, and Choose Your Own Adventure books in a sea of Babysitters Club novels! This Geek was ready to tell his tale! 

Since I've been blogging for a year, a lot of stuff has happened to me!

- I joined the League of Extraordinary Bloggers! In fact, I created this blog just so I could join!!! My first post for the League was an imaginary road trip!

- There was the time I brought home the AWESOME Toxic Crusader's Poster book! That was during my very first month of blogging!

- I featured some excellent Comic book finds including Iron Man's Demon in a Bottle and a classic volume of TMNT comics!

- Then I joined Reis O'Brien's Dork Horde!!! It was a proud day when I took the hood!

- Still one of my favorite posts was the one detailing the weird collection of art-books I've acquired. 

- I professed my love for Fisher Price's Little People! Not just once but twice!!!

- I won a pack of goodies from none other than Michael Lewandowski from the aforementioned Memories of Toymorrow! The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles helped me open it when it arrived!

- I blogged about the purchase that really turned me into the most obsessive Goodwill Geek that ever roamed this Earth!

- I helped in my own small way to kick off the Great Candy Corn Wars of 2012. 

- I finally revealed the Goodwill Geek Cave for all the world to see!!! (I think I'm going to have to do some update pictures here sometime soon, as the Cave is looking very different in many ways these days...

- I also won an awesome Firefly tribute book from Brian over at Cool and Collected! 

- I showed off my Green Lantern Action League collection AND the awesome Dex-Starr custom that I traded Reis O'Brien a bunch of California Raisins for!!!

- Thanks to Eric from Toyriffic I started listening to Macklemore and Ryan Lewis's Thrift Shop before it was COOL to listen to it!

- I filled a second-hand jungle with tiny Indiana Jones figures!

- I tried to identify a handful of mystery toys! (You guys were NO help by the way... just sayin'...)

These are not all mystery toys... but some of them are...

- By far one of the most exciting things to happen to me as a blogger was getting to see the movie, Motivational Growth while it was still travelling the festival circuit. My interest in the trailer drew the attention of director, Don Thacker, who gave me a two-part interview (Here's pt. 1... and Here's pt. 2), and permission to see the film. It was pretty great. I loved the film and can't wait to see where it pops up next. 

- What turned out to be one of my absolute favorite posts of ALL TIME was one of the three I did for the League's Pirate's Week. I wrote about my favorite, cheap-ass set of pirate figurines, and gave them each a name, personality, and back-story. It was one of those posts where I just let loose and write cRaZy!!!

- I started a new feature when I got my new iPod with a built-in camera called Goodwill Gone Bad. I featured pictures of items I could not picture ANYONE buying from Goodwill (I then spent time standing in line behind a woman buying one of those VERY items... so that just showed me). I then plopped my iPod into a bucket full of bleach-water and let it soak over night. So... that ended that feature. But it was fun while it lasted! I got to do 2 of them. 

 

- I also told the convoluted tale of my childhood love for mini-figures for the League... and the handful of specific characters that I carried around obsessively. 

- One of my highest-hitting posts was one where I just took some random shots of stuff in the cave! I wasn't sure how to feel about that. I've put a LOT more effort into posts that haven't been nearly as popular... 

- Not really due totally to the fact that I have this blog... but still related to it... I did a Charnel Chat over at the Grim Reader. I think I had the confidence to contact him and do one because I'd been writing on here for a while. 

- Another couple of favorites I did for the League, I reminisced about my first impressions of the Thundercats, and talked about how much I wished the California Raisins would make a come-back!

   

I've even won a couple of contests recently! I just posted about my winnings from Hake's Americana and Collectibles... and I'll be posting soon about my winnings from the Pop Pop! It's Trash Culture "One Man's Trash..." giveaway! 

  

So as you can see, it's been a very busy year! And I am looking ahead to the future! I'm still participating in the League posts week after week, and I'm discovering new blogs and interesting bloggers every day, and I feel like these are my people. What I write... I write for them. I love the blogging community I've become a part of in the last year... and I am greedy for more!