Goodwill Geek Mailbag: I Won This Box of Trash... YOU GOTTA SEE.

Soooooo... yeah. There was this contest thing over at the second-best blog on the internet: Pop Pop! It's Trash Culture (It's only second best because the blog you are currently reading exists. But on the day I die The Trash Man becomes king of the internet. It's in the bi-laws. Read 'em). 

Anyway... this box showed up at my post-office. And it was HEAVY. And not in like the tense emotional sense. I mean physically heavy. I almost slipped a disc lifting that thing. We're talking turn-your-head-and-cough-please style hernia. 

Here's what it looked like when I opened that b**ch:

And I'll form the HEAD! Wearing this HAT!

It was at this point that I started hyperventilating a little bit. I had been chosen at random on the Trash Man's blog to receive what I had assumed would be a bunch of random junk. As I pulled more and more stuff out of this seemingly bottomless box that was decidedly NOT junk... I started to realize that I had become the victim of a bait-and-switch. I was not the recipient of junk at all. I was horrified to realize that I was the recipient of ALL THIS AWESOME STUFF:

Everything you see on this desk (not counting the laptop computer or the dough boy)... WAS INSIDE THAT BOX. Guys, it was like a clown car in there. Except instead of clowns trying to kill me with cotton candy ray-guns, it was AWESOME stuff trying to AWE me with... AWESOME. Let's whittle this MOB of amazing down to its components shall we? 

First up is a set of mini-figs that made me squeal out loud when I saw them. S.L.U.G. zombies!!! I only ever picked up the Christmas variants, the Series 3 Coffin pack, and I think one or two of the 2-packs from that same series. I'm hard up for series 1 and 2 zombies (and display space for them). What I was most excited by was the "Curly" zombie, which gives me two-thirds of the zombie Stooges! I just need the Larry zombie now! This also brings my "food-service" zombies up to something like... six  I think? Bizarre. And Cleopatra is just awesome. The guy on the far left is getting ready to serve up a brain like a tennis ball! Zombie love!

Next up we have a couple of the Family Dollar Joes. When I saw these popping up on fellow collectors' blogs I was sorely tempted to go track them down. Of course, when I finally got around to it, they had all disappeared. I love Snake-Eyes's color scheme here but didn't care for the bulky gray vest, so I took it off. Storm Shadow looks great too, in mostly black, but juuuuust enough white to make him... him. They're getting ready to fight here. (Spoiler Alert: Snake-Eyes is going to WIN.)

PEZ!!! I'm not even sure which of these I already have, and which ones I needed. Taz is new to me for sure. I LOVE PEZ. Some of these guys will be tossed into whatever give-away I may do in the future. I kind of feel like a putz, letting Trash Man beat me to a give-away when I've been blogging for a year. Sigh.

M.U.S.C.L.E. Guys!!! Well... at least the 5 on the left are. The 2 on the right? Those guys are from the original Kinkeshi line put out in Japan, that they later based MUSCLE on. They have slightly darker colors, and are made of the more plaint eraser-like material. I have never owned any of them before, and I was QUITE happy to receive these!!! The MUSCLE men brought me right back to my childhood. I now have around 25 of these guys total. I think I'm going to have to start actively tracking down more of them. I'm not kidding when I say these kind of hit me in the soft-spot nostalgia-wise. 

Trash-Packs!!! These are the modern-day equivalent of everything I loved as a kid back in the 80's. The gross factor, similar to GPK... the size factor similar to MUSCLE and other mini-figures... Just awesome. My oldest son is 4 and he collects these like a boss. Occasionally he gets duplicates and they disappear into my Geek cave forever. Now I have some legit Trash Packs of my very own! I think my absolute favorites are the two guys furthest to the left. The blue slug with the giant red mouth, and the gray grub with the dazed expression. Priceless. 

Here's a random assortment of other mini-figs that were included. Skip past the Smurf for a moment and look at that other little bue guy next to him. That's Jagged Tooth, an Army Ant from General McAnther's Blue Army. Army Ants are a FAVORITE line of mine, right up there with MUSCLE, Battle Beasts, and California Raisins. SO EXCITED to get my hands on this guy! Up and to the right of the ant is a figure from a line of discontinued mini-figs called Fistful of Power from the mid-aughts. His name is "Cursor". And he has a chainsaw hand. He's pretty bad-ass. The rock and roll guy on the missile skateboard is a Savage Mondo Blitzer from 1991. His name is Direct Hit. The gray monochrome guy is a Nazi officer from the BMC Toy D-Day Playset. He's pretty Nazi-ish. The last of these Unusual Suspects is a Devil finger-puppet guy. I think he's one of my favorite items to come out of this box, to be honest. Just look at him. He's amazing. Now back to that Smurf! I couldn't tell what accessory he was originally supposed to be holding, but a Google investigation turned up this: 

Image from eBay.

So now I know! 

But of course, that was not the end of the mini-figs, by any means. Top left here you have War Machine and Whiplash from the Iron Man 2 Mega Bloks sets. Next to them you have a Clone Trooper/Y-Wing Transformer (you'll see the other form below). Far right we have another favorite of mine! Storm! This is a Marvel Mini by ZAG.  Next a couple of AWESOME LEGO mini-figures! A MEXICAN WRESTLER and a GUY IN A GODZILLA SUIT!!! Two of the very best LEGO mini-figures EVER CREATED. MINE NOW. Next we have some Marvel's Avengers Chibi minis, which to be honest, I already have a complete set of. But that's okay! I now have an Agent Coulson, Iron Man, and Nick Fury Chibi miniature set to give away! Aaaand there, in the middle is a Yoshi K'Nex mini-fig!!! I am so effing impressed by the sheer volume of mini-figs in this package you guys!!!

Next up we have some packaged stuff, and some vehicles. First, a packaged Ren figure from the Nicktoons line. I've been eyeing these for some time now. I think now I am going to be forced to track down a Stimpy. ALSO!!! A Burton-era Hotwheels Batmobile for my collection!!! This one got me to shout out loud with excitement! That sucker went right up on my wall with my other pop-culture Hotwheels! In the front row, there's another shot of my Star Wars Transformer (in Y-Wing mode) a loose BttF Hotwheel, and a Johnny Lightning version of Dick Dastardly's Mean Machine. 

I don't know if readers of my blog also follow Trash Man's blog (if not, you totally should)... but one of the first posts he did over there was one featuring some weird old party favors he picked up from one of his favorite stores. I would have been CRUSHED if some of those hadn't found their way into this box... And I was NOT disappointed! The least exciting item for me was probably the pack of VR Troopers Napkins. But I'm just not a Saban live-action-stuff fan. The REST of these are AMAZING!!! Top left we have a set of TMNT party hats from 1989!!! Next to that we have Millennium Masters of the Universe Drinking cups! I loved the Millennium reboot of MotU especially the action figures. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with these cups... but it will be EPIC. Finally there's an incredible package of Voltron party hats!!! Look at that image! It's BEAUTIFUL!!!

But wait!!! There's STILL MORE!!! Here is the assortment of Wax-Packs and loose trading cards I received as well! The cards up top, above everything else are Power Ranger cards. The Wax packs in the middle include Dinosaurs Attack!, Harry and the Hendersons, Weird Ball, and a 6th Series Garbage Pail Kids pack! That one GPK pack is the only one I didn't crack open almost immediately after taking these photos. It's the one item I want to keep untouched. The Harry and the Hendersons pack had almost the EXACT same set of cards that I got in the pack I remember buying as a kid. It was really strange actually. The Weird Ball cards were interesting... but not really my thing... and Dinosaurs Attack! is probably my second favorite set of Topps trading cards from my childhood, directly following GPK. I'm going to make another embarrassing confession now... finding the MUSCLE figures and the unopened GPK wax-pack had me a little choked up. Not quite full on blubbering but there was just SO MUCH of my childhood right there in my hands. It was a full on rush of memories that I wasn't expecting.

All right, the last of the loose baubles includes a handful of Double Dragon Pogs and some metallic "slammer whammers". The items in this picture that make me go completely APES**T are the SDCC exclusive GL rings promoting Blackest night. I may have another new obsessive collection to track down now. Love these. AAAaaand... the "I Saw E.T." button, which I also FREAKING LOVE. I have no idea if it's from the original release of the film, or the big rerelease... but it doesn't matter to me. Finally, there's an awesome K-9 Dr. Who keychain! It's like this box knows the contents of my soul!  

Turns out part of the reason the package was so heavy was because it was loaded with books, movies, and comics too! First up is one of these mini-books featuring a random topic... but THIS ONE IS ALL ABOUT PEZ!!! Yet another amazing item in the GIANT BOX OF MIRACLES. I feel like you guys might think I'm trying to oversell this box... but I can't even tell you how much of this stuff is just perfectly "me". 

I had to smile when I pulled out this VHS copy of "Superman The Movie". Trash Man is a big VHS enthusiast, and this is just so HIM. Probably the item that elicited the goofiest chuckle when I saw it. I don't own a VCR so this is being displayed for box art alone. It is THE item that best represents my pleasure over having won this prize package. It is truly the Oscar statuette of the whole box.

Next up are these two excellent books of two great old childhood properties. First we have "Six Guns and Shurikens" starring the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. This is a young readers chapter book where the turtles FIND A F**KING GENIE and are transported to the F**KING OLD WEST!!! I haven't read it yet... but I certainly plan to. Then there's "Operation: Poison Dart" which is not only a G.I. Joe Book... But A F**KING CHOOSE OUR OWN ADVENTURE BOOK!!! This is amazing. I didn't know these even existed. I love that they do. I love that I now own one. I love life.

Next up, a couple of DVDs. First, another item which made me LOSE MY S**T. Neil Gaiman's Julius Schwartz Lecture at MIT? YES PLEASE. I am a complete Neil Gaiman fanatic. And I've never seen or heard this speech. I remember reading on his blog about it back when it happened... but never thought I'd get to check it out for myself. Next to that is a Troma Pictures double feature of "Psycho a GoGo" and "Rawhide Terror" which I cannot wait to watch. They look deliciously crazy. 

Next... animation!!! Batman: Mask of the Phantasm is a movie I have been meaning to watch for years because I've heard it's a classic Batman tale, and a classic in geek animation in general. Aaaand speaking of classics in geek animation... we have He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, Vol. 1. 20 episodes of MotU goodness. I have a "greatest hits" DVD somewhere, but that's it. LOVE this.

I'll confess this next one is a bit of a cheat. The novelization of the movie Alien was something I noticed Trash Man had an extra copy of and asked if I could have. So he tossed it in when he sent me the package. It's still effing cool. I've really started getting into collecting old novelizations of awesome films, and this makes a perfect addition to the pile.

Here are a couple of excellent kid's books based on a couple more AWESOME properties! Darkwing Duck "The Darkest Night" and Voltron "The Deadly Flowers". So completely blown away by these! Love Darkwing AND Voltron! And since I also collect vintage 80's (and early 90's) cartoon kids books these are PERFECT for me!

And FINALLY I got to the bottom of that box full of miracles only to find these: COMIC BOOKS! Among the titles included I found 5 Spider-Man books, 5 Avengers books (including 1 Transformers crossover issue!), 4 Captain America Books, 3 G.I Joe Books, 2 Hulk books, 1 X-Factor book, and a partridge in a pear tree! I was overwhelmed by the sheer awesomeness of these cool old issues! Some of my favorite covers (I haven't had a chance to read through them all yet) have to be The White Rabbit, Speedball, and Tower vs. X-Factor covers. These ones are just amazing to behold. These are all awesome looking comics though, and I can't wait to dig into them further!

So in summation... I was floored by the sheer amount of AWESOME packed into this one small-ish (yet back-breakingly heavy) box! I cannot thank the Trash Man enough for the free loot, and I can't wait to see what else he has in store over at his blog! Trash Man, from the bottom of my heart, please know how thankful I am that I received this prize pack it is amazing. I only hope I can come up with some sort of prize pack in the future that will make some lucky guy or gal as happy as this one made me. Thank you thank you, thank you. 

WELL. That's it for me tonight kids! I'll be back soon with some Geeky Goodwill Goodness! 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!

The League of Extraordinary Bloggers: What a Nightmare!

Well it's League of Extraordinary Bloggers time once again! Seems like I just did one of these... doesn't it? 

Last week the topic was "I Have a Dream..." so of course what are we following up with? 

"What a nightmare!" 

When I think of nightmares... I think of my childhood in the 80's. I remember vividly as a young scamp being allowed to be "around" when my mom and my aunt were watching horror movies. Weird thing is, the would choose all hours of the day to do this. They would watch movies like Nightmare on Elm Street at noon in the summer time. And unless I wanted to be locked outdoors I was usually either watching too, or off in another room still able to hear the horrific action. I was exposed to SO many inappropriately terrifying movies as a child. I think I'll run down the list of the most traumatizing moments I was exposed to and then at the very end of this post I will detail to you the most memorable, vivid, and terrifying nightmare I had as a ten year old child. I still remember almost every detail of it to THIS DAY. 

So here are just some of the images that fueled my nightmare factory as a child.

1-a. The Stretchy Arms Scene from Nightmare on Elm Street Pt. 1

There wasn't much that didn't upset me about Nightmare actually. But this scene and a couple of others really stood out. Looking at the effects they use in this scene nowadays just kind of makes me cringe in an embarrassed way... but back when I was a kid this was just mind-numbingly horrifying. The first movie had very little on-purpose camp to it. It was deathly serious and used dream-logic to scare the audience, not to make wry puns or slapstick kills. Watching this shadow man's arms reach out and out and OUT just made me feel like there was nowhere I could possibly safe. 

A spring! A spring! A marvelous thing! Everyone knows it's Slinky!

1b. ANY scene with Tina in a body bag in Nightmare on Elm Street.

This is the only time I will be dedicating a whole entry in this list to a different scene from the same movie. But dammit I NEED this one to be singled out on here! Any time Nancy would dream of Tina after she is brutally (and TERRIFYINGLY I might add...) murdered by Freddy, she's in her body bag... either soaked in blood... or pale and spitting up centipedes. A girl's gotta have options... I guess? Seeing Tina zipped up in a giant plastic bag in various states of death and distress was extremely mind-altering for me.

-Burp-

2. The Faceless Bounty Hunters from Critters

I personally think it's ironic that in this movie about carnivorous aliens the pseudo-heroes are the things that disturbed me the most as a kid. These guys are only faceless for a very short while... But It's that weird, pale, wet smoothness that just gets under my skin. There's this terrible sense of foreboding to them until they get their disguises on a short while later. It really climbed into my brain in a real way too, as I will explain later. 

Do NOT poke these dough boys in the belly.

3. The Chatterer from Hellraiser.

This guy is just a mess. Hellraiser was a sickeningly disturbing movie for me to glimpse as a child. I get that my mom was pretty progressive in letting me watch whatever I felt like I could handle... but I should never have glimpsed even an IMAGE from this film at that age. There are a good half-dozen moments, creatures, kills, visuals, etc. that I had stuck in my head for a long while after. Chubby cenobite Butterball is no child's fantasy of warmth and comfort and Skinless Uncle Frank running through the house, bleeding through all his outfits was distressing as well. But the Chatterer takes the cake. He's disturbing in the way the bounty hunters above are, in that weird, amorphous fleshy way... but turned up to 11. With the lips peeled back and the teeth clicking away... ugh. The Chatterer is the reason why characters like the fluke man from the X-Files and the Master from Buffy the Vampire Slayer have been some of my favorites. 

"You have Kool-Aid mouth."

4. "Fluffy" the Crate monster from Creepshow

Again, Creepshow is another movie that I clearly remember about a DOZEN disturbing moments from. The Caaaaake! Drowned, blue Ted Dansen coming back as a water-logged zombie... Steve King blowing off his head when he's covered in alien vegetation... All deeply traumatizing. But this terrifying ape-like creature from the crate under the stairs just absolutely wrecked me. I think the fact that he goes unseen for a good portion of the story is what really got me. He kind of embodies the nebulous threats that come from places like the closet or under the bed. And the fact that he was dragging full-grown adults kicking and screaming into his little hidey-hole just made it that much more horrifying. I was forced to go and play outside for large portions of this film (which was even more terrifying BY MYSELF in rural Maine...) because I kept jumping up off the couch and screaming my fool head off. 

"I am the one hiding under your stairs...
fingers like snakes and spiders in my hair!"

5. Whatever the F**K this guy is from From Beyond.

I have never gone back and watched From Beyond as an adult. I remember it being so deeply mind-altering to me as a child that I have never been able to bring myself to do it. And I LOVE HORROR MOVIES! (In fact most of the movies I take scenes from on this list are favorites of mine as an adult) I remember a LOT of body horror, a LOT-LOT of skull-tentacles... and a LOT-LOT-LOT of smeary-faced people eating parts of other people. This movie makes a barbecue rib eating contest look like tea with the Queen. I didn't know what it was (still don't!) that had gotten inside that guy's head to poke that weird feeler out... but I knew it made me desperately uncomfortable. (Another one that I always get confused with this is "Brain Damage" which has a lot of horrible imagery in line with this film as well...)

Nope.
Just no.

6. Almost EVERYTHING from Night of the Creeps... but if I had to pick one: This guy.

Yeah, Night of the Creeps was just wrong on so many levels. As a kid I knew that leeches infesting your brain until they made your head explode was a bad thing. The fact that as a side-effect they zombify whatever bodies they've infested, be they living or long, long dead... just made it all so much worse. This is the reanimated corpse of a serial ax-murderer who was himself murdered 20 years or so before the story takes place in the film. He spiced things up a bit, that's for sure. Zombies terrified me from a very young age anyway, and this guy did nothing to help that. 

A zombie with an ax and alien leeches in its brain.

Not overkill at all.

7. The face-peeling scene from Poltergeist.

Everyone always seems to remember the clown and killer tree scenes from poltergeist. Me? All I remember is the guy from the paranormal investigative crew who has the vision of himself tearing off his own face. Well... that and the slimy skeletons popping up in the muddy pool-hole. That was pretty messed up too. But watching this guy strip off his face like the skin off the back of a Thanksgiving Turkey will ALWAYS stay with me. 

Damn. Now I just want turkey.

8. Again... a LOT of stuff from the Prince of Darkness... but forced to choose: This chick.

Yeah... she nasty. There were so many new concepts to learn about from this movie! Possession by demonic forces for one. The scenes where this scabby-faced woman would reach into mirrors and enter a murky, dark-water-filled realm that imprisoned the Prince of Darkness also freaked me deeply. It's honestly one of the reasons why I have such a hard time going swimming in the local lakes and ponds around here. All I can picture is some eczema victim reaching her crusty hand in and pulling out a monster. The whole movie deals in disturbing concepts. People being devoured internally by bugs while they talk in creepy voices... The big black guy singing as he stumbles around... Even just watching people getting squirted with the evil fluid from the big green tube was scary. 

That stuff sure wasn't Oil of Olay.

9. The closet monster from HOUSE.

It was partly the same reason that "Fluffy" from Creepshow above freaked me out... same kind of "monster from the unknown" concept... but then look at this thing. Part of it was that you knew this creature brought madness with it when it came out that door. I understood that it was defying logic whenever it showed up. That closet was normal one moment... and then it contained this slimy green mess of sinew and bone and teeth and snot, all asymmetrical and insane the next. It represents the polar opposite of everything children take comfort in. I heard more of this movie from the upstairs of my house than I actually saw... but seeing this guy and the big fat-lady monster was enough to send me squealing from the room more than once. 

Not the be confused with Mike Wazowski.
Different department at Pixar.

10. Big-Mouth Amy the vampire from Fright Night.

I look at the effects from the end sequence of the 80's Fright Night film these days and I'm forced to chuckle. But back when I was a kid? Seeing Amy in this state sent me over the edge. I felt like I was going to fall completely into her bottomless, gaping maw if I just leaned too close to the TV. I remember my mother, frustrated, explaining to me that it was actually just a "dark comedy" over and over again and that I just needed to calm down. I didn't see the difference. I didn't see the "dark comedy" difference when we went to see "An American Werewolf in London" at the drive-in either. My reaction to Fright Night got me banned from watching almost all of "Vamp" when she rented that. 

"Black Hole Sun... won't you come..."

So there are my 10 most emotionally disturbing horror movie memories from childhood. Or whatever. Now what that was all leading up to was this: 

The Worst Nightmare I Have Ever Had

I was around 10 years old and I was spending the summer with my grandmother in North Carolina. I was playing with my action figures in her upstairs hallway. I can see myself sitting on the floor up there, just totally oblivious to anything else in the world. I am looking down at myself from the top corner of the room... like an out-of-body experience or whatever. What I can see from my vantage point up by the ceiling, and that the other me playing on the floor can't is that the door to my grandmother's bedroom is slowly sliding open behind me. The room is pitch black. And then a figure steps out of the doorway, very slowly and into the hall behind me. The figure is clothed in all black. A solid black body suit. It reminds me of the cenobite gear from Hellraiser. But the head and face are completely blank like the faces of the bounty hunters in Critters. I want to warn myself that someone is there, but I can't make myself talk to the me on the floor to tell him. I am trying desperately to move, to reach out... to do anything. I watch in mute, growing horror as the me on the floor slowly stands up. The faceless man hasn't moved from the spot just outside my grandmother's bedroom door. He doesn't move at all. The me that was playing on the floor is now standing, and turning around slowly. The faceless man moves now, but only to step to the side. He's letting the other me walk slowly past him into the dark bedroom. I disappear into the darkness. I'm still watching all this from the corner of the ceiling. Then the man seems to look up at me there by the ceiling, and then he follows the other me into the dark, and slowly shuts the door. As the door shuts, I am suddenly slammed into my body... the one that is now in the darkness with the faceless man. And I start to scream. 

That was when I woke up. 

Let's see what's disturbing the slumber of the other League Members shall we?

- Chrisloc over at Random Nerdness had a similar idea for his nightmare post, as he recounts some of the move moments he remembers as a kid that gave him nightmares! 

- Ashley at Life With Fandom recalls a vivid nightmare involving a Russian invasion!

- G.I. Jigsaw lived out a real-life nightmare!!!

That's it for me today kids! Come back soon because I'll be showing off some Geeky Goodwill Goodness! Until then, Happy Hunting!

League of Extraordinary Bloggers: I Have a Dream...

It's League of Extraordinary Bloggers Time once again kids! So what's the topic this week? 

"I have a dream… "

Oh Brian... this one is killing me. 

There's a reason I waited this long into the week to write this post (actually, there are several... but let me just focus on one). I've been having such a hard time determining just what my "dream" is... and it's really bumming me out. For those of you that don't want to read down through a bunch of existential bulls**t on the part of this blogger, scroll down now. I put a dream in almost as a white flag, signalling surrender. I came up with something. But boy did it take me a while to get there. 

I used to think my dream was to become a published author or poet. But I haven't sat down to write anything non-blog related (with a very few poetic exceptions) in years. I invest so much of my time these days into work, family, and collecting/blogging that it leaves with me with little time to sleep much less dream. 

Me... 'cept different.

Right now I sit here and stare at this computer screen and for the first time since I've started to write this blog... the thing I'm writing about (taking a good long look at myself) makes me feel genuinely scared of what to actually put into words and/or depressed by what it implies about me.

Me... 'cept different.

What do I want out of life? Do I want to see how many toys I can accumulate? Do I want to keep writing this blog forever? Well... yes. Sort of. I'd like to think that's not ALL I want. But what else? What else is there to me? 

Oh... nope. Just more toys apparently.

For reasons I won't go into great personal detail over, I feel like the father-and-husband parts of my life are pretty well covered for the most part. I am by no means a perfect at either... but I am trying. And that puts me pretty far ahead of the curve. So what do I want to achieve past maintaining the basic and emotional needs of my family? What do I want to achieve beyond my own ridiculous (and literally quite often childish) consumerist impulse gratifications?  

Me... 'cept- No actually this one's pretty accurate.

I. Don't. Know. And that is pants-s**ttingly terrifying. 

In his book Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs Chuck Klosterman writes: “In and of itself, nothing really matters. What matters is that nothing is ever in and of itself.” I don't know why I wrote that in here except that I love the quote and have been desperately been looking for ways to shoe-horn it into any and all conversations (My kids are getting tired of hearing it when they ask for Cheerios in the morning.) No, I guess it reverberates for me here because I want to be able to tie all the things I love about this blog into some sort of direction for my... life? I want to feel like all the weird little parts of my collecting and blogging could be rolled up into one idea and become something bigger than the sum of its parts. 

I guess in my wildest dreams I would be like that Toyhunter guy on the Travel channel:

Me... all up in your attics, b**ches.

I've mentioned to my wife more than once that I would love to open up some sort of old collectibles shop, with a focus on toys. Happy Meal toys, old action figures, anything I could hunt down and bring back I guess. I would want to instill that sense of wonder that I always had when I was a kid walking in through the door of a toy store... but these would all be secondhand. I'd have a few long-boxes for old comics I'd found, and have sections for old collectible board-games and LEGO sets, and whatever the hell else I could find to sell in there. I'd go hunting for stuff EVERYWHERE. 

I know it would probably be doomed to fail, because I'm not terribly savvy... and brick-and-mortar stores are swiftly being eaten by online shopping... ESPECIALLY the secondary market. And honestly, I'm not terribly good at like... letting go of toys once I've gotten ahold of them. 

THIS IS HOW I LIVE.

And to be honest, I worked as the toy department manager for a large retail store chain and it left me completely unsmiling in every aisle. Remember 1998? The year Furbies came out for the first time? I was working the Christmas season as the Manager of a toy department, fielding ridiculously threatening telephone calls, and getting literally spit at (not actually on) in my store. Because of those experiences, I know toys are serious business and I don't know if it would be something I could convert to a realistic business model without it eating a hole in the lining of my stomach. But a guy can dream right? 

If I can dream selfishly of a house big enough to store all the books, and toys, and comics, and DVDs, and collector's cards, and games and other childish crap that I want without having to cram it all into one little room... Then I can certainly dream of a job I go to whistling every day because half the people looking on will be asking themselves: "Where does he get those wonderful toys?? 

Whew. That's it for me THANK GOODNESS. I'm sorry if that got weird. Let's pretend I was sleep-blogging, and this whole post was just a bad dream. 

Let's see what the rest of the League is dreaming about: 

- NeedlESSentials waxes poetic about how the past just doesn't seem to be holding up to the reality of today... and how he dreams of a time when ALL the toys of the past get cool new updates to reflect how cool they felt way back when.

- Joe Burden of The Mos Espa Collection tells us the future he dreams of... which quite literally depends on the futures he can dream of. 

- Infinite Hollywood dreams of a simpler MotUC purchasing system. 

- Geekshow Ink features a dream that I think a lot of us bloggers share. 

- G.I. Jigsaw gives us the run-down for his dream monument to a particular kind of geekiness. 

- Random Nerdness throws a classic geek-dream into the ring. 

- Thirtyish Year-Old Boy has basically just outed himself as an enemy of the X-Men... and I guess that's okay. Just a bad dream? 

- Jathniel Vasquez dreams of trapping mostalgic lightning in a bottle. 

- Vikki Verka's dream is a little catty. 

- Our fearless leader Brian over at Cool and Collected has a pretty awesome, achievable, and accessible dream. Check this one out for sure!

- Yelinna over at Travling Pics dreams of keeping things simple. 

- Tintod over at Junk Fed dreams of a place where geeks can go and not be judged... to... well... to... I'll just let you read it yourself. 

- Miss M from Diary of a Dorkette is, if not on exactly the same page, at least writing in the same dream journal as Geekshow Ink above.

That's it for me tonight kids! I'm off to slumber and dream of Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until I'm back next time to write about them, Happy Hunting (and sweet dreams)!