Sun, 30 July 2006 So now we move on to the second possible mascot idea, Jr. Salty2 (the 2 is susposed to be squared, as in 2 squared = 4.) He's basically a three chambered peanut where the third chamber on his head is his Siamese twin brother who is half formed and shriveled (thus the squared bit to his name.) Oh and his Siamese twin has Turret's syndrome. I wanted to get away from the Mr. Peanut look, but it's freaking hard to do that with a peanut character. This is the first doodle I did to try and get the concept down. At first I wasn't sure if I wanted his third nut to be a tumor on his head or a bun in his oven.  Well, I decided that he could be drawn from many angles and was kind of fun to draw, so I fleshed him out a bit like Clumpy below. I threw some quick photoshop colors on him to get the more finished concept look down.  I was pretty happy yet again, like with Clumpy so I decided to try and go to the next step which is a more finished looking drawing, a comic strip this time with him from at least two angles and with different expressions. Here is a bigger version.  I'm not sure which of these two comes across better. I'm thinking of just using both. Also, I wanted to mention that though I am aware of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, I've yet to see more than one episode, and I really wasn't thinking of that kind of thing while coming up with there. While I was doodling Clumpy I had a hard time not thinking of Meat Wad, what with the one tooth and his unshapely-ness. Category: Branded in the 80's Webcomics -- posted at: 12:31 PM Comments[0] |
Sat, 29 July 2006 So this is the first of two possible mascot ideas that I'm fleshing out. He doesn't have a name yet, though for sake of ease I'll refer to him as clumpy. Like I said, I wanted the mascot to involve a weird food nostalgia memory and though I could think of a few (for a later podcast probably) only about eight were easily doodle-able. Of the eight, only four stood out as fun and of those only two that seemed relatively easy to draw dynamically. I really liked the idea of a burnt Cheez-It, but you can pretty much only draw them from one angle. So I now present to you Clumpy, the wad of cheesy snack finger dust (think Cheetos.) This is the first doodle I did to try and get the concept down.  Well, I decided that he could be drawn from many angles and was kind of fun to draw, so I fleshed him out a bit, going with a more Jabba the Hut/Fraggle Rock Garbage Heap/Snuffleupagus kind of look. I threw some quick photoshop colors on him to get the concept down.  I was sort of happy with that and I kind of have a back story figured out, so I went ahead and tried to get some of his personality out in the following drawing. Here is a bigger version.  I'm pretty happy with his design though I think it can use some more work. I'll update tomorrow with the second mascot possibility! Category: Branded in the 80's Webcomics -- posted at: 1:32 AM Comments[0] |
Fri, 28 July 2006 As I mentioned before I'm working on a mascot for this blog & podcast that will introduce and possibly star in my reviews and stuff. I wanted something along the lines of Timer from the 80's Saturday morning PSA's (he's a hunk of cheese that educates kids on nutrition and crap you can do at home for free.) Well, I did a bunch of brainstorming and doodling and I'm proud to announce that I've come up with two ideas that I'm happy with. I've got the character concepts done and I've started to draw the characters in more finished situations (like a mini comic strip and a weird piece of Pop art.) Anyway, I'm not sure which way I'm leaning, but I thought I'd share the process in the next few blog entries. Category: Branded in the 80's Webcomics -- posted at: 3:33 PM Comments[0] |
Thu, 27 July 2006 Part the last, my round up of 80's nostalgia candy, or at least what I have nostalgia for. 13). Runts. I admit it; I am one of those people. You know, one of those people who buy Runts specifically for one flavor of Runt. I am a banana man, not THE Bananaman that used to bookend episodes of Danger Mouse and Count Duckula, but the dude that would buy a box of Runts, eat only the banana, flirt with eating the strawberry and Cherry and then would toss the orange and lime away. I even remember back in the day, when this was uncommon, my Dad took me to a flea market and there was this awesome booth set up with Mexican sodas on tap and a bunch of candy by the pound. Well one of the bags was pure banana Runts. I didn't get it because I wasn't supposed to have that much candy at once, but it was like the grail that I kept looking for since. Nowadays you can find just banana pretty regularly in vending machines and stuff. Unfortunately for my friend Kevin who will be sharing these with me and who loves citrus flavored candy, Wonka changed the Lime Runts to Watermelon, so it won't quite be a perfect trip down Runts lane.  14). Sugar mf-ing Daddies! Yeah, so I only had one Sugar Daddy as a kid and it was the hardest thing to eat ever. It was just so big and immune to the saliva in my mouth. I want to remember it taking like three weeks to eat it, but I'm sure it only took an hour. My mom was a lot fonder of Sugar Babies so we had those around a lot more. I found these mini Sugar Daddies and figured they'd be perfect for movie night. Turns out that the formula has changed because these went super quick.  15). Orange Tic Tacs! Are they a candy or are they a mint? I'll lean towards candy as a pack of Orange Tic Tacs lasted about 55 seconds in my hands. These things were addictive too. I remember in high school, my friend Jeremy had found this mega box of individually wrapped Tic Tacs and I was so jealous. I'm glad they still make these. They even have Lemon, Lime and a Citrus combo now.  16). Warheads! I don't think I was introduced to these until high school, but I think I was only in the 9th grade, so that's close enough for nostalgia's sake. For some strange reason Sour became the flavor du jour in the early 90's and it's had the staying power only rivaled by Cherry flavored products. In fact now it's sometimes hard to find non-sour versions of candy products I know and love like the squeeze lollipops and most gums. Warheads were the penultimate sour candy. You can scream about Crybaby's all you want, they weren't nearly as volatile as Warheads were and they had the art down to a science. On the back of the candy wrapper it gave the timeline of just how long the candy would be mega-sour, it was like 20 seconds, and then you'd get to the plain candy center. Like habanero peppers, these are a good way to test someone's limit to extreme culinary delights.  17). Freaking huge Unicorn Pops! First off, I don't have a neat posed picture for this because no Legos outside of the life size Darth Vader at the Lego store can heft one of these pops. I first saw these at Disney World as a kid, along with the gargantuan regular circle lollipops and craved them throughout my childhood to no avail. I never got to eat a lollipop that was longer than my head. But I'm an adult now and damn it, I'll eat one if I want to. I bought two, one for me and one for Kevin (I don't think I'm the kind of comfortable that I can suck a lollipop with a friend...) and we chowed down on them while we watched The Last Unicorn and Water Ship Down. I must say that I was very disappointed. If I could pick one hard candy flavor to never ever have again in my entire life it would be tutti frutti, which is Satan's gift to fruit flavors. It's sort of cherry sort of any-fruit and it's just plain nasty to me, and I'll tell you, makes eating a foot-long lollipop mighty difficult. At least I finally got one and now if I ever go back to Disney I will only feel pity for the kid stuck eating one instead of green eyed jealousy.   18). My last candy entry isn't technically a candy, but I was deprived of it as a kid because my parents saw it as one, Kool-Aid! The only powdered drink I was allowed to have was Tang, because you know, the astronauts drank it and we did live near Cape Canaveral. I so wanted Kool-Aid and would covet it at friend's houses every time it was served. There just seemed to be so many flavor combinations and possibilities, not to mention the violent wall crushing commercials that would air ten millions times as I sat to watch cartoons every Saturday and weekday afternoon. I sort of OD'ed on the stuff when I first moved out from home, but have picked up a taste for it again recently. I'll tell you what, my friend Kevin makes a mean pitcher of Kool-Aid too.  The one candy that I wasn't able to track down because it's no longer being made is Bonkers. I used to love Bonkers because it was like gum that you were allowed to swallow and I just remember it having the perfect commercial taffy consistency. It was also the first candy to do the flavor within a flavor, where there would be like strawberry wrapped in a banana covering. It was also the only fruity candy that also came in a chocolate variety (outside of fruity Tootsie Roll varieties that you used to only be able to find around Halloween.) The other small thing I've done with this candy-consuming feast is to bring in another candy nostalgia memory, selling candy at school. One of my last great childhood candy memories was selling Atomic Fireballs in middle school. I was pretty industrious and got together with two other kids to form a candy selling alliance. We only sold Atomic Fireballs because they had the best markup since you could by them by the pound and they were individually wrapped. We'd sell 'em for a quarter a piece and then at the end of the week the three of us would pool the money and split it evenly. The one thing I always wanted to do was to branch out and sell all kinds of stuff. I saw this one high school kid do it once and he used a tackle box to show his wares. I was smitten with that idea. Well because I'm frickin' 29 and I'm not in college and it would just be creepy to show up at a local middle school, I can't very well sell candy. But I can go out and buy a tackle box to store all this candy until it's time to eat it, and that's exactly what I did (well sort of, I bought a toolbox since the tackle boxes at the local target were all shaped like fish and I though that was kind of lame.) I keep all of the gums on the top removable shelf...  ...and all of the other stuff piled underneath.  So thus ends my big 'ol list of nostalgia candy. I hope I don't get cavities 'casue of this. Category: Food -- posted at: 11:28 AM Comments[1] |
Wed, 26 July 2006 So lets get right the hell into Part 2 of my reliving Nostalgia Candy list. 7). Gobstoppers! Like I said before, I am very much into “hard� candy, be it the Brach’s Butterscotch candies, or the more tart chalky candies like Gobstoppers and candy necklaces. I think I really dug on these as a kid because a box would last me two weeks as I didn’t try and eat them as much as let them dissolve in my mouth. Later in middle school I made the switch to Atomic Fireballs, which are basically the same thing just larger and hotter.  8). Heads candy! I didn’t really get into these as a kid as the 7-11 by me didn’t have them, but sometime in middle school I went though a heads eating phase. I’m sort of bummed that the entire line of candies is now all Head related in name. I miss the weird racial names like Cherry Clan and Injun Grape, not because I’m racist or anything, but it’s just another connection to the past that’s gone. Not pictured, but I also have some orange and grape heads as well.  9). Nerds! I definitely ate my share of Nerds as a kid. I think this was one of the first gimmicky candies I got into heavily. Not only did you get two flavors per box, but they were also separated with neat little pull-tabs for easy consumption. This was also the closest thing to rock candy I was allowed to have. I clearly remember sucking on a mouthful one day until the colored candy coating came off and I was left with a mouthful of sugar, pure sugar. I actually find these kind of sickening now, though I adore the little lumpy Nerd character branding. Unfortunately, in order to get a better flavor variety I had to dispense with the classic two sided box and get the mini boxes.  10). Much like their cousin candy Nerds, I present Pixie Sticks. These are basically pure sugar in a paper tube with a little bit of tart flavoring. The only time I ever had these was on Halloween because they were in virtually every giant mega candy assortment bag along with Smarties, Tootsie Rolls, and Dum Dum lollipops. These are probably the only candy on my list that my parents might also have nostalgia for.  11). And now Pop Rocks! I don’t remember when I first had Pop Rocks, but I do remember that I never ate them originally. I think the first three or four packets when straight into the toilet just so I could hear them crackle and pop and jump out of the water. Though as candy goes, these are probably more entertaining them good, I will say that the company that developed them came through with flying colors on the whole fizzy thing, as anyone who has even been let down by the pathetic fizzy-ness of Bottle Caps can attest. Not that Bottle Caps are bad, just that their gimmick is pretty lame.  12). If I had to pick one candy only to eat for the rest of my life it would probably be Reese’s Pieces. They probably have the best balance of sweet and salty, with just enough crunch and creaminess. Of course, my memories of the candy are completely entwined with a little kids movie known as E.-freaking-T. Man, Reese’s sure as hell won the magical product placement lottery that year. Not since the Baby Ruth shined in the pool scene in Caddyshack has a candy so entered the public consciousness like that. In fact I’d be willing to bet that half of every kids Halloween haul that year was Reese’s Pieces.  Stay tuned for the final segment in the Nostalgia Candy list, where I show you how I can waste $12 bucks on a fun way to lug all this candy around. Category: Food -- posted at: 8:47 AM Comments[1] |
Tue, 25 July 2006 So I’ve mentioned the ongoing Movie Night I hold with my friend on this blog a few times, and hopefully by now you know that I’m pretty obsessed with nostalgia. Well recently we’ve put together a list of flicks to see that are nostalgia related so that we can get our fill while we’re in the mood. Besides it’s going on 20 years since we’ve seen a lot of the flicks on our list and that’s sort of a good anniversary number. Well along with watching the flicks, we also go out to eat. Well once again, in honor of nostalgia we’ve been trying to hit a bunch of places we ate at a lot when we were kids, Like Red Lobster, Long John Silvers and Pizza Hut. Part of this is also munching on candy that we were hugely (or only semi-huge in Kevin’s case) into as kids. I was super bored at work and wanted to chronicle the vast amount of candy we’d soon be consuming so I did a mini photo shoot over the course of a few days, starring the candy and my Lego Mecha collection. So without further ado, I present 80’s Nostalgia Candy: 1). First up we have Big League Chew. Now I didn’t subsist on this or anything, but I remember it being pretty darn cool back in the day. Shredded bubble gum that was supposed to be like chewing tobacco, but without all the nasty brown dip juice and spitting. Hell, actually now that I think about it, any candy product that was modeled after tobacco products was pretty freaking cool in the 80’s including candy and bubble gum cigarettes. At the time of the photo I could only find the original bubble gum flavor and cotton candy, both of which I can’t stand. When we finally had it (in conjunction with watching Bad News Bears and Animalympics), I had managed to find Sour Apple which was a little better.  2). Next up we have Blow Pops. I had my fare share of these in high school when they started making them in more crazy flavors like Blue Raspberry. I never really liked the gum inside, it’s way too sugary for my taste, but I’m a sucker (har har) for hard candy. We haven’t gotten to these yet, mostly because I’m not sure what to pair them up with.  3). This is a sampling of the rest of the Bubble Gum on we’re going to get to. Included are Bubble Tape, Hubba Bubba, Bubble Yum, Bubblicious, and Bazooka. I didn’t think they even made Hubba Bubba anymore. I wasn’t huge into gum as a kid, mostly because my Mom & Dad had this antique looking bubble gum machine that we kept full most of the time and I sort of overdosed on gum. I do prefer chunks of gum, if only because it seems easier to blow bubbles than with sticks. Unfortunately, flavor-wise, this was the best assortment we could get. We both really wanted Orange and Cherry Cola flavored, but we couldn’t find any companies that made them anymore. We settled for Grape, Watermelon, Blueberry and Strawberry in most of the brands, and well Original for Bazooka, because I think that’s the only flavor they make (though I want to say they have a strawberry or grape too, I’m not sure.) Not pictured is Fruitstripe Gum, in both Chewing Gum and Bubble Gum flavor varieties.  4). Pictured below is a buttload of chewy taffy-like candy including Now and Laters, Airheads, and Starburst. Now I’m not sure when Airheads came about, I don’t remember seeing them until I was about high school age, though I think they were big in middle school, but I decided to throw them in for fun’s sake. Now, Now and Laters, those were one of my favorite candies growing up. They sort of start out like hard candy and then soften as you eat them into a more taffy-like consistency and they came in a bunch of flavors not to mention Banana which was my favorite candy flavor as a kid. Banana sort of gets the shit end of the stick when it comes to candy flavors, mostly because it’s almost impossible to replicate in the lab. Not that many candy flavors actually taste like the fruit they’re masquerading as, but they all sort of have their own unique flavor that’s roughly fruit like. Banana on the other hand is very chemical and is an acquired taste. Then we have Starburst, which was always good, but a little too mainstream for me. I was more into the candy that you could only get in gas stations, and Starburst was pretty damn common.  5). Now we move on to Chunky Bars. Though I’m not a big fan of chocolate, I adore Chunky bars because they have raisins. I love raisins in candy bars, and it’s pretty rare. I was convinced that Nestle had quit making them, as all the websites and actual stores I went into didn’t have them. Then one fateful day last spring I walked into this no-name Food Mart (it was literally called Food Mart) and there they were. I checked the expiration date to make sure and yup they were fresh. I was freaking ecstatic.  6). Last we have Fun Dip. I love me some Fun Dip, but not because of the dip. I can’t describe it but the flavor of Lik-Em-Aid sticks is beyond heavenly to me. It’s a little tart, and a little vanilla and it’s all-good. I never dip, I just eat the sticks.  Category: Food -- posted at: 3:35 PM Comments[0] |
Tue, 25 July 2006 So as promised, here is the next thrilling chapter in the textbook that should be a part of the curriculum of Frozen Drinks 101 (to be offered at any self respecting community college near you.) Category: Soda Pop Culture -- posted at: 9:06 AM Comments[1] |
Mon, 24 July 2006 So here's another exciting chapter in the book of Frozen Drinks 101. Today I'm going to review the second leap in frozen drink technology I encountered when I moved to Georgia, the Burger King Frozen Coke and Frozen Fanta Cherry (formerly Frozen Minute Maid Cherry.) If you'll remember last time I reviewed the less than stellar Slush Puppie. Category: Soda Pop Culture -- posted at: 12:42 PM Comments[5] |
Fri, 21 July 2006 So a couple weeks ago, my friend Kevin, my fiancee Carrie and I went out on the town to eat, but since we had nostalgia in mind, we far from did it up right and opted for a trip to Pizza Hut. We decided to "dine in" as that's what we did most as kids before the hellstorm that is Pizza Delivery really gathered much steam. I brought along my trusty digital camera to document the trip back into memory (man that's hokey.) I took a bunch of pictures of us stuffing our faces in a less than fine dining establishment and here is my review.  First off, part of what prompted the decision to eat at Pizza Hut was that we still have a dine-in version right down the street from us. From what I gather most large chain pizza places are pretty much carryout and delivery only now and the mom and pop joints are few and far between where I live. I was hoping that the inside of this Pizza Hut looked like it did when we were kids, and I think it pretty much does.   We knew we wanted Personal Pan Pizzas, because that's again, what we had as kids, but we weren't sure how big those were and if it was going to be enough to fill out hearty appetites, so we opted for some appetizers. We ended up over compensating and ordered way too much, two orders of fried cheese sticks and two orders of cheesy breadsticks ontop of each of us getting our own Personal Pan Pizza. A crazy amount of food by anyone's standards.   The first thing I'd like to say about dining in at Pizza Hut was that we won the lottery in terms of fast food waitresses. Ours was awesome, nice and didn't bat an eye while I took pictures and acted all the fool. She was also super attentive, though we were like one of two parties there, so there probably wasn't much else to do. The second thing I'd like to state for the record is that going into this meal I was going to be a hard sell. See I hate Pizza Hut. I just don't think they make good pizza and I had my fare share of it growing up. I'm just not a fan of thick bread-y pizza and I hate the way the bottom of the crust is like this grease sponge that's all orange and disgusting. Well the appetizers were awesome, and freaking filling I might add, which went a long way to putting me in a better "accepting the pizza" mood for the rest of the meal.  It also didn't hurt that they had Wild Cherry Pepsi on tap, which is the first time I've ever seen this. I typically can only find it in the 20oz variety in gas stations here, so that was cool.  Our pizzas arrived sans pans, which bummed me out a little, but I was honestly just glad they still had that variety of pizza at all. I decided on a basic Pepperoni Lovers, while Carrie opted for a Veggie sampler, and Kevin decided to go for the Supreme.    I must say that I was really impressed with the quality of the food. I didn't go gaga over the pizza as the thick crust is still not my personal favorite, but it was piping hot and pretty darn good for what I remember it being like. It probably helps a lot that we ate in, because I suspect that if it were allowed to cool down, like say in a trip from the pizza joint to your house or apartment, it wouldn't be nearly as good. The Personal Pizzas turned out to be smaller than we remembered, but just the right size for what we wanted. I was surprised that we had so much food leftover, but my gut was about to burst and I think everyone else was the same.  The topper of the evening? This particular Pizza Hut had an original (I'm assuming, it looked about 20 years old) Galaga arcade machine. So I popped a couple quarters in and actually ended up playing far longer than I expected, making our little party wait for me to be killed. The only thing that would have made this evening perfect would have been if they had one of the sit down table Pac-Man arcade games that I remember them having as a kid.  All in all I'd have to say this was one fine dining experience, and if you haven't eaten at a Pizza Hut in ages, I suggest dining in, it makes a world of difference. Category: Food -- posted at: 3:46 PM Comments[6] |
Fri, 21 July 2006 It's movie night again here at the house of Branded. This week brings screenings of E.T. and Starman, and it will conclude three weeks of space themed flicks my friend Kevin and I have been watching for our nostalgia movie list. It started with Flight of the Navigator and continued on last week with Space Camp and the Explorers. Flight of the Navigator was pretty fun to watch, as I haven't seen it since I was a kid. It's a really weird film really, being more about time travel than Pee Wee Herman voiced spaceships, which I always forget until I'm in the middle of watching it. The film plays out like an episode Twilight Zone mixed with a space themed Disney movie. In fact it's closer in kin to Starman than E.T. Space Camp had little in the way of surprises as I've seen it a million times and even recently to boot. We did it up right though and mixed up a big pitcher of Tang that we horked off of throughout the flick. I still get goose bumps when Jinx causes the Thermal Curtain Failure to happen. It also brings back memories of the Challenger disaster as I was living in Florida at the time of the explosion. You could see the smoke in the sky from where we lived. We had contemplated a drinking game where each person has to take a swig when Jinx says something about Max, but after the eighth annoying drawn out spiel we were glad we didn't. "Frrrriieeeeeeennndsssss Forrrrrrrreeeevvvveeeerrrr." The Explorers unfortunately is still not one of my favorite movies. It was, like Return to Oz, one of the few kid movies I missed when I was young, though I managed to catch it on TV when I was in high school. The thing that I have a hard time getting past in the flick is the last third of the film where the kids board the alien spacecraft. The film goes from being moderately serious in tone and execution to a live action combination of a video game and a Looney Tunes cartoon. Considering that Joe Dante directed it (he of Gremlins, Twilight Zone: the Movie, and the Howling fame), I shouldn't be surprised. I'm sure he had to grit his teeth through directing the first hour without any rubber suits or zany sound effects (don't get me wrong, this is actually something that I love about his style of directing, but only when it's a little more homogenous.) Ah well, each part of the flick separately makes for a fun time, but put them together and it always sort of gets me down. Also, before we caught those two flicks, we decided to eat at Pizza Hut and as a nostalgia enhancement we dined in. I took some pictures and will be putting up a review soon. Tonight, like I said above, it's E.T. and Starman, so there will be a ton of wholesome alien interaction with just a tinge of sadness throughout. We're also going to be dining on Oscar Meyer Cheese-Dogs (I'm sure augmented with Easy Cheese) and Bugles corn snacks. So Nostalgia ho! Category: Movie Nights -- posted at: 2:26 PM Comments[2] |
Thu, 20 July 2006 Just a quickie. I'm trying to come up with a character to introduce all my food related posts. Nothing to complicated, maybe in the vain of Timer from those 80's Saturday morning PSA's Time for Timer (you know that big blob of cheese with a hat and cane that "Hankered for a hunka, a slab, a slice, a chuncka, hankered for a hunka cheese".) He also showed kids across America how to make a wagon wheel out of cheese and crackers ('cause our brains were obviously too cartoon addled to know how to put a piece of cheese on a cracker) and how to freeze juice in an ice-cube tray with plastic wrap and tooth picks to make Popsicles. Well anyway, I want to have something in that vain for my food reviews and stuff. Well I was trying to think of odd foodstuffs that I was enamored with as a child that might make good mascots and I thought I'd mention a few since I was thinking about 'em. First, the preferred cracker in my household growing up were (and still are) Cheez-Its. My mom and I would snack on 'em while watching movies in the wee hours of the morning and both of us coveted the much more tasty burnt Cheez-Its. You were usually guaranteed to get a few per box back in the days when anomalies still happened on the production floor. Nowadays every single Cheez-It is identical and perfectly cooked which sort of takes some of the fun out of 'em. Next, and about the same rarity, were the fabled double pretzel sticks. You know those two pretzel sticks that were fused together and usually a lot crunchier, sometimes rocklike in density. Finding a double stick always sent me into happy convulsions and I'd be reluctant to eat it for fear of never finding another. Last we have the rarest of the bunch, the solid clump of Cool Ranch Dorittos flavoring. Every once in a blue moon there would be this ginormous clump of Cool Ranch flavoring at the bottom of the bag that was about an inch in diameter. It was slightly moist and packed a flavor that was so intense that it had the possibility of sending one into a sodium-induced coma. I've only seen one of these buggers twice in my lifetime, one was of the fabled Cool Ranch variety and the other was a concentrated ball of Hot flavoring from the Golden Flakes Hot Chips variety. Though I'm leaning toward the clump of flavoring as the mascot since it resembles Timer (as he is a weirdly shaped clump of cheese I assume) I'm thinking that it might be hard to convey that idea in simple cartoon animated style. I might just go with the double pretzel because of it being a lot more common and easy to draw. I'm also toying around with using a frozen burrito or that foil flavoring packet found in ramen noodles, though both of those were staples in my teen years and not so much nostalgia for the 80's. Category: General Nostalgia -- posted at: 10:15 AM Comments[1] |
Mon, 17 July 2006 So today is my 29th Birthday and the fiancee and I decided to celebrate it up right by taking the celebration to Chuckie Cheese. With out trusty camera in tow and being in a particular wacky mood we hit that place like a thunderstorm. Or at least an ill tempered wind... 
Though we don't drink much, it's nice to know that the fine folks at CC recognize the importance of liquor in taking the edge off of sixty thousand screaming shoeless kids running around asking strangers for quarters. I still can't believe that you can get a beer at Chuckie Cheese and not Disney World proper. When is frozen Walt going to learn... 
The inside looks pretty much as I remember it as a kid as far as the game floor and the seating is concerned. The only thing different (outside of the lack of a stage full of animatronic animals rocking out to Beach Boys melodies) is the decor which is a lot more, well, colorful and Andy Warhol-esque... 
The one thing that I was disappointed in (once again outside of a non-existent Rock-Afire Explosion band) was the food. Pizza is a pretty basic food stuff and pretty hard to get wrong. Well, actually, let me say that another way. Even bad pizza is usually alright pizza, I mean how hard is it to slap tomato sauce on some dough and then sprinkle some toppings on? This pizza was bad pizza, and I know from bad pizza. I spent years after I moved out from home, subsisting on the bottom of the barrel in bad frozen (usually store brand) pizza, and even that sometimes had its merits. What exactly was wrong with it? Well the dough was gritty, the tomato sauce was barely there, and the toppings were still cold. We opted for the veggie pizza since the fiancee is a vegetarian, and well, this was just bad pizza. The topper? This was a $20 pizza (not including drinks or tokens.) For $20, I expect just a little bit of quality, even if all it amounts to is cooking it thoroughly. 
Carrie was a trooper and forced four very expensive slices down... 
...while I did my best to make a dent in the rest, going so far as scraping off cheese and the edible raw veggie toppings. I spent $20 on that pizza and I would be damned if it didn't at least look like I tried to eat it. 
Well at least there were the games right? I mean who goes to Chuckie Cheese for quality food? So we loaded up our pockets with $20 worth of tokens and went to town on the arcade floor. 
Now typically I make a beeline for the Skee Ball machines and just plant myself there. Earlier, while we were eating though I noticed that they were getting a lot of attention and in particular, attention from parents that had no problem with their kids getting up on top of the machines and depositing the balls into the 100,000 holes. Well that sort of soured me on Skee Ball for the evening, though I did have to laugh as apparently Chuckie Cheese has tried to solve this problem by adding a tilt function to the machines so no tickets will be awarded. 
I ended up throwing all my tokens at machines I typically never play which are the "skill" (I write that with the utmost sarcasm) machines that are only good for tickets. This on in particular was a pretty freaky customer. Though I've seen machines like this before (it's basically Operation in Carny form) I've never seen one that looked so sinister and just plain evil (not since that weirdly bearded wish machine in Big.) 
It might just be me, but this Fantasia knock off Chuckie looked downright creepy to me. 
The big surprise of the night though came from the sweet animatronic Chuckie Cheese on the stage in front of the main dining hall. Though he was no Rock-Afire Explosion, he was a pretty sweet customer that perpetually waved and scanned the room. I don't think he said anything or took part in the stage show (which was just a bunch of really bad cartoon on a jumbo-tron tv.) 
I knew the evening was a success when Carrie opted to crawl up into the kiddie-tunnel-play-thing attached to the ceiling. I did make sure it could support her before I practically begged her to go up. 
It was a pretty fun birthday and it did bring back a lot of memories... 
So what did $20 worth of tokens nab up ticket-wise? About 450 tickets, which was just enough to "buy" the junk that you see above. One plastic spider (staple of all ticket buying venues), two pages of crappy sports themed Chuckie stickers, and a Superman bookmark and super-mini hardback journal. Sigh... 
We did buy a whole heck of a lot of "Sketch" portraits from a booth that only cost one token, and honestly they are some of the best pictures of us as a couple we own, so I guess there's that... Category: Food -- posted at: 10:34 PM Comments[2] |
Sun, 16 July 2006 So I’ve been thinking a lot about Slurpees lately, or more accurately the lack of Slurpees in Georgia. I figured it’d be fun to cruise around to the various gas stations and fast food places to do small articles on the state of the frozen drink availability in rednecksville GA, so today the fiancée and I tooled around the city looking for Slush Puppies. Category: Soda Pop Culture -- posted at: 9:21 PM Comments[7] |
Sun, 16 July 2006  In this podcast I round out my recent Long John Silvers review with some childhood memories of that fine eating establishment. Comments[3] |
Fri, 14 July 2006 Holy crap. If you get a second (or actually just over 20 minutes) mosey on over to scifi channel.com and watch The Amazing Screw-On Head. This is the best translation of Mike Mignola's work to the screen ever, and it's really funny to boot. The show was created by Patton Oswald and the dude who created Wonderfalls. It's got voice work by David Hyde Pierce (as the best zombie ever) and Paul Giamotti (or that American Splendor/Lady in the Water guy). The plot is like a mish mash of the Tick cartoon mixed with a healthy dose of the Adventures of Briscoe County Jr. Right now scifi channel is taking a survey to see if fans want this on the air and even though I don't have cable, I want it on TV so that I can buy the DVD later. So go watch and vote. Category: Cartoons -- posted at: 8:03 AM Comments[0] |
Mon, 10 July 2006 So it's been a freaking full week in the house of Branded. Between the water problems, buying a car spur of the moment, and our dog being sick it's been one stress after another. Hopefully I'll be able to catch my breath this week. Anyway, I plan on hitting another podcast this weekend (most likely the afore mentioned LJS review, plus some sweet news on the 80's cartoon DVD front.) I think I might just throw order to the wind and do two, because on the one hand I have more to talk about than LJS, and on the other I just don't want these to be longer than a sitcom. I surely don't have half the talent of the likes of Bronson Pinchot (Balki from Perfect Strangers for you non-TGIF newbs), so why should I ask more than 22 minutes of your time when Balki can piss of Cousin Larry by getting them involved in a sticky plot, help to come up with a zany soultion, say at least ten weird things about life on Mepos, and then top it all off with the dance of joy in under that amount of time. If I'm not a sitcom in terms of time per interesting segments, I'm surely no 44 minute crime drama either, so I'm gonna try and keep 'em under 20 if possible, and hopefully just more often than once a month. Category: general -- posted at: 12:08 PM Comments[0] |
Fri, 7 July 2006 So I got a new car. It’s a long story that I’ve told too many times in the last day, but it was the most fun I’ve ever had at a car dealership. I not only got top dollar for my trade in, but I got the new car for practically half the MSRP in the end.  This is Sebastian my old car of 5 years. It’s my second VW Golf, this first was totaled and even though the car was in horrible shape I walked away without a scratch, so when it came to get a new car, I chose another Golf. This is the last I’ll ever see of him.  Here’s our new car, as yet un-named. It’s a 2006 VW Rabbit, which is just a Golf in Rabbit’s clothing (which is weird, because the Golf was just a Rabbit in Golf’s clothing considering it was a Rabbit first, whatever…) It’s everything that I wanted out of the Golf with all the stuff I’ve never had like Cruise Control and a CD player.  It’s a Rabbit alright.  And here it is safe at home. I need an Autobot sticker for the back window, but that’s about it. Category: general -- posted at: 9:20 AM Comments[0] |
Tue, 4 July 2006 Here is the finished alternative foil pouch drink opening instructions diagram.
Click Here to Enlarge! Maybe I should put this on a T-Shirt... Category: General Nostalgia -- posted at: 12:57 AM Comments[0] |
Mon, 3 July 2006 So today sucks. Actually last night and today suck evenly. Last week we called maintenance when there was a wet spot on the floor where it appeared our water heater might be leaking. The guy came out and said that it was just some melted ice from the air conditioner and that it wouldn’t be a problem. So yesterday afternoon it started getting worse, so we called again. We had been hearing water in the wall between that hall and the bathroom so we mentioned that it’s probably not from our unit but maybe upstairs instead. The dude went up and checked it out and said that it was an overflowing drainage pan from the air conditioner upstairs, so he had a couple pf carpet guys come out to vac up all the water and take out the sopping pad underneath. Well they said to let them know if it’s alright. Well later that evening the water was back, and back a lot more. So we called, and they said that it was probably just residual water and not to worry about it but to call if it got worse. Well I wasn’t about to just let it pool, so I broke out some old towels to try and soak some of it up. Carrie and I broke our backs sopping it up and wringing it out for a hour or so before we quit and went to bed. Well Carrie woke up at 3:00am and there was now even more water. This time when we called they curtly said they’d be there first thing in the morning. Well we didn’t want to wait so we traded our towels for sponges and sopped again for another hour or so. Woke up this morning and it was back and yet again, even farther spread. So after three hours of calling they finally came and realized that a pipe was burst upstairs and now they are finally fixing the problem. Well sort of, we’re still waiting on the plumber. Also, on the way to work this morning my check engine light came on. Oh freaking happy day. Here are some pics of the great water escapade 2006! 
So this is what our hall looked like this morning. It might not be obvious, but there is standing water, enough so that every step is like stepping in a puddle after it rains, with back splash and everything. Hike your jeans up boys, we’re going in… 
If you look behind the water heater you can see the hole the maintenance man punched in the wall to find the drip. 
Our super fun cramped living quarters! 
The Super not fun noisy as all hell blower that really isn’t doing anything right now because the plumber hasn’t stopped the leak but maintenance insists we keep on. Category: general -- posted at: 1:42 PM Comments[0] |
Sat, 1 July 2006 Here is my review of Long John Silvers, an eating establishment that my family frequented in the 80's.  So here we are at the wonderfully bright and clean...okay the downtrodden, depressing and dingy downtown Lawrenceville Long John Silvers, the only one within comfortable driving distance.  Upon entering this fine establishment you are immediately herded toward the counter of ultimate batter-dipped decision delight. Choose your heart attack from either 5 combo meals, 4 dinners, 6 baskets, or for the truly brave, 2 different sizes of family meals.  After placing your order and receiving your drinks, you must now sit yourself in one of two areas of fine dining and comfort. Unfortunately there was only one area open and it was squalid, containing the same furniture that the place was most likely opened with in the 70's.    As you wait for the server to bring your meal of fat and fish you can cast a gaze around the establishment at their many pieces of fine ambience and art, including two paintings so sun faded that they are just light blue now.  Just as you are about to burst with anticipation a 16 year-old counter jockey with a stare that can only mean he's contemplating suicide will bring out your meal. I opted for the #10, the Seafood Feast with fish, chicken, shrimp, and sides of slaw, French fries, and hush puppies.  My beautiful fiancee (seriously no sarcasm in that statement) opted for a two piece fish basket and a side of the New Veggie Bites (which are actually just jalapeño poppers.)  I tackled the single chicken plank first. Now I don't know how they do it, but the fried batter covering was piping hot while the chicken inside was merely lukewarm. It was a little dry too, so I ended up drowning it in tartar sauce just to take the edge off. Plus I love freaking LJS tartar sauce.  Next came the shrimp, not bad but how do you screw up batter fried shrimp, and the fish. Now I grew up on this fish and once upon a time in Florida is was the best fish ever. Now it's revealed its true self to me. It's just unidentified flakey triangular white fish and it's just not that good. Without the golden, salty, batter exterior I simply wouldn't take the time to eat it. No sauce needed though, as it's moist as all get out.  Next I started tackling the sides, or as the above picture will show me lying, I was mixing it up as I went, but for the sake of this review I waited for the sides. The slaw was first and it was pretty damn good slaw-wise. I'll be honest, I'm not a big slaw fan, it's milky and cabbage-y and I just don't bend that way mostly, but I did grow up on LJS and I developed a taste for theirs and it's just the exact same as I remembered it. The fries sucked monkey balls though. They are the worst fries ever, all plain and not salty and sort of stale. The hush puppies though were fan-freaking-tastic as LJS hush puppies tend to always be. Just enough batter goodness without too much onion.  By this time Carrie was getting a tummy ache, but like the trooper she is she powered through her meal to the almost bitter end. Her assessment of the Veggie Bites was that they were good, but not as good as store bought jalapeño bites simply because instead of one solid piece of pepper LJS decided to dice theirs which sort of made it, well, not as good. What made me laugh was the sign for the Bites promotion that proclaimed "Eat Your Veggies!" when in fact they are mostly batter and cheese, and let's be honest, jalapeños aren't really veggies in the healthy sense of the word.  Having each made our way through most of the meal (Carrie stopped per her tummy ache and I stopped shoveling in slaw when I got a mouthful of hidden slaw-soggy French fry) we made out way to the best part of any LJS meal and something I was totally obsessed with as a kid, the crumbs. I apologize for the picture quality, apparently it's impossible to get a clear light reading or distance reading off of LJS crumbs, and they will always turn out blurry as all four pictures that I took did. When I was a kid I would always order a free basket of "extra crumbs" which the server never batted an eye at, so apparently I wasn't the only one begging for what amounts to LJS scrapings.  with our meal finished and our tummy's either full or sick we sat and contemplated life...  ...and then we contemplated the freaking bill. $15.76 for that! Man, this should be like McDonalds prices. We should be able to walk out of a LJS only $8 lighter than when we walked in, but $16!?! There was a family of 6 eating a table away from us that must have spent upwards of $50 at LJS, and that is crazy. Also, not to pick on that family, but the grandmother was hooked up to an oxygen tank, with full on wires tubes and everything, and she was chowing down on batter-fried greasy fish and that's just wrong.  Though the family of 6 before us gave this a healthy tug, needless to say we did not ring the bell of ultimate happiness.  It's sad to say, but I believe between the price, the attack of the ninja-like soggy French fry, and tummy aches abounding, this is probably my last visit to Long John Silvers for the foreseeable future. I didn't eat there all the time as a kid, but we did eat it often enough that when I moved to Georgia and I couldn't find one I was sad and craved it for years to come. But maybe some things need to be relegated to that black hole of memory that is nostalgia.  That isn't to say you can't leave with one of these though... Category: Food -- posted at: 10:54 AM Comments[3] |
Fri, 30 June 2006 Oh my hell. How did I miss out on watching Return to Oz when I was a kid?!? Oh my freaking poop nuggets! I am so speechless, well sort of. When we started watching this flick last night I was instantly in love. This is the best Oz movie, if not one of the most interesting kids movies of the 80's, and it was freaking made by Disney. How the hell did that happen? First off Return to Oz was one of the darkest children's movies I've ever seen. Between the opening of the film where Dorthy is set to have electroshock therapy to cure her of her Oz fantasies, to the amazingly dark and well done practical effects of the post Emerald City Oz, this movie never fails to disturb or be interesting. The puppetry for a lot of the main characters was done by the Henson Company, or at least Brian Henson and friends, so the Tick Tok Man, Jack the Pumpkin Man, and the chicken (no Toto on this adventure folks) are astounding. This movie feels like the secret love baby of Time Bandits and Edward Scissorhands with a dash of Hellraiser to boot. This is the kind of kid's movie Neil Gaiman would write, and honestly I just can't believe it exists. If nothing else, it goes a long way to showing how the main actress Fairuza Balk turned out to be the gothed out crazy person she appears to be. There are so many cool things in the film, from a headless witch who has an entire room of spare heads to choose from, to a reanimated moose head that just want to be dead, to underground rock Gnome kingdoms full of amazing claymation. Do youself a favor, if you have never seen this film and are a fan of either Tim Burton, Terry Gilliam, or Neil Gaiman, rent this movie. You will not be disapointed. "She has....A CHICKEN!!!" Category: Movie Nights -- posted at: 7:55 AM Comments[0] |
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