Christmas 2022 - Part II

 

With people gone home, my girl and I were finally able to get a little down time, and focus on having Christmas together.

The tree was reloaded with our gifts to each other...and the dog, but we didn't dive right in. Rather, we enjoyed the peace and quiet for a while. The dog was having no part of that plan, and promptly took his reindeer chew toy off the pile.

When we finally set out to open our gifts, we let the dog go first with his traditional package. He's become an expert at opening it.

Content with his new toys, we opened our gifts.

My girl got me a whole lot of CD sleeves, both in single and "fat box" sizes. She bought more than enough for me to not only protect my entire collection, but to have many more for future purchases.

You probably wouldn't think that receiving plastic "envelopes" would be all that exciting to someone, and to that, I can say, you would be wrong.

For me, it's elevated my CD's from collection, to collectible. Plus, they make them look so shiny and nice in the sleeves. I've been enjoying bagging them all up, and taking the time while doing so to really enjoy the CD artwork all over again.

That seriously could have been enough for me for the holidays, and it will certainly take me a lot of time to complete this process. But, that was far from it.

I also received some Fallout stuff, which included, bottle caps, an Nuka-World Collector's Tin, and blanket. My girl also got me a red napkin holder for my Coca-Cola table, and a glass that holds a cigar on it. Mind you, I don't drink or smoke. The glass is intended for my Fallout caps. I went online and bought a resin fake cigar to put in the holder on the glass. I'll make sure to snap a photo of the "set" when it arrives.

My Fallout shelf is relatively small, and I like it that way. I need to also add the coin I got in my stocking.

To round everything out, if the above noted wasn't enough, I also got the second, third and fourth seasons of Snorks on DVD, and the last NES game missing in recreating my childhood collection, Wrecking Crew.

Between family visiting, the time spent together with my girl, and the gifts, Christmas was fantastic! Of course, the day will always first and foremost be about Jesus in our house. The true reason for the season, and every day of our lives.

I hope all of you had an enjoyable holiday, and started off on a happy new year!

Click "HERE" to go back to the home page. For more posts related to this one, please click the labels below.

Christmas 2022 - Part I

 

Christmas 2022 has come and gone, and was quite enjoyable. Sticking Christmas traditions, savoring every minute of it was key.

Most of the day was dedicated to my girl's son. He's visited us every year for the past...gosh, I don't even remember (years). However, this year was a tough one for him. He was celebrating by himself, having gone his separate ways from his girlfriend / wife of six years. We did our best to keep him in good spirits, and his mom went all out getting him all the gift in the below photo.

We started the morning with a homemade puff pastry square stuffed with sausage, bacon and cheese, and some scrambled eggs. Somehow, I managed to take zero pictures of this. Oops.

From there, we opened our stockings, which started with give the two dogs the stuff that was for them.

Most of my stocking was candy related goodness.
However, I also got the new Danny Elfman CD, Big Mess,
as ell as some auxiliary cords to keep my IPOD going in my car.
I also got a couple Fallout items, which included a limited edition coin,
and a Nuka-Cola stocking for next year. Yup, there was a stocking in my  
stocking...                                                                                                             

Her son said he wanted to try my tradition of spacing his gifts out throughout the day, but he just couldn't do it in the long run. He lasted about fifteen minutes. Fortunately for him, and what he didn't know, was that nothing under the tree from me was there. I had all of that put aside until after dinner.

He decided to take a nap, and my girl and I used the quite time to open our gifts from family and friends, and make our respective phone calls.

My mom gave me this super sweet CD / Cassette and vinyl
John Hughes Mixtapes Box Set, and my co-worker gave me a fun
coffee mug, which is hysterical to read. However, one of the coolest
things I got was this awesome casino chip set from George of G.I. Jigsaw.
For those of you who follow his site, you probably recognize his artwork which
he used to design them...                                                                                             

Additionally, I got a whole lot of ebay gift cards which will come immensely in handy to swoop up more of those CD's on my want list. I'm going to wait until after the holiday season, but then it's game on for shopping.

Everyone spent the majority of the day just doing their own thing with their new gifts. For me, that meant a whole bunch of CD ripping from not only the above box set, but the albums I got myself for Christmas / Christmas Eve.

Apparently I wasn't going to take any photos of food today, but for lunch we had some homemade baked lasagna spring rolls, and jalapeno poppers. For dinner I made chicken cordon bleu croquettes and potatoes. After that, we let her son open his gifts from me.

We finished the evening off watching Sonic The Hedgehog 2 on Amazon Prime. All and all, it was a nice day, but the holidays aren't over. Her son left the day after, and we then focused on celebrating our own Christmas together. Part II coming next week!

Click "HERE" to go back to the home page. For more posts related to this one, please click the labels below.

Christmas For Me!

 

I've checked off the more common staples of the era, and because of this, I'm at the point where things aren't as easy to find nor cheap to get anymore. Whereas before I could get twenty plus albums for a hundred bucks, now I'm lucky if that price will get me two to five.

 It's because of this, my CD collecting has slowed considerably. I can't rationalize buying forty dollar albums on a regular basis. As such, Birthdays and Christmas have become my relegated time of year for this, when it's easier to justify such a purchase. Waiting until the tail end of the year also allows me the time to set aside the funds to do so. Which leads me to my Christmas gift(s) to me in 2022!

I'm a firm believer that one should get oneself gifts for their birthday or Christmas. Why not? You work hard for your money. Treat yourself right! Besides. Who knows better what you want than you?

The name of the game this year was to focus on those rare and obscure soundtracks from the 80's. The one's to movies that most people remember, but don't necessarily have any recollection of a corresponding soundtrack.

Some of them are scores. Other's obscure various artists. All of them awesome in their own right.

Back to the Beach - A star studded cast, and an awesome soundtrack that features Pee-Wee Herman singing Surfin' Bird. Mind you, that's just the crest of the wave.

Big Trouble In Little China - You can keep the 2016 La-La Land release. I'm all about the original pressing. While it was released in the USA, this version I ended up getting is from France.

Breakin' - The movie may be a disaster, but the soundtrack brings some of the best and obscure electronic / hip-hop tracks from the early 80's. Ollie and Jerry's Breakin'... There's No Stoppin' Us, and the Bar-Kay's Freakshow On The Dance Floor, are must haves!

Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo - Neither the film nor soundtrack were as good as the first, and truthfully, the soundtrack wasn't even on my want list. I picked this up because it had the radio edit of George Kranz's Din Da Da, and to fill the completist void in me.

Halloween II - I got on a kick of "needing" 80's horror flick soundtracks, and quickly found out that some are far more scarce and expensive than others. It appears many, if not all of the Halloween soundtracks will set you back a pretty penny...IF you can find them.

Krush Groove - My intrigue for the soundtrack to Krush Groove was led by Sheila E. I've not see the movie, and frankly didn't hear about it until I found the album during one of my many random Google searches and added it to my want list. For the longest time there was only one copy available on Discogs, brand new sealed, and it was not cheap. I finally broke down and bought this copy after haggling with the seller for a price reduction. He'd had the thing listed for a long time - At least a year before it caught my attention.

Perfect - This soundtrack hit my radar for the Jermaine Jackson single, (Closest Thing to) Perfect, and only piqued my interest more upon reading the other contributors, Whitney Houston, Jermaine Stewart, Wham, Pointer Sisters, and the list goes on. I'm surprised this soundtrack isn't among the more frequently listed, "must have" ones from the 80's.

Planes, Trains and Automobiles - This soundtrack was on my list more so because I knew the movie, and it intrigued me with its layout. The first half of this all various artists contributed album is labeled as the "town side", while the back half is denoted as the "country side". Definitely interested in checking this one out.

Rhinestone - I saw tracks listed on here as being sung by Sylvester Stallone. That was enough for this to become a "must have" for me. I hope it's not as terrible as Michael J. Fox from the Light of Day soundtrack. Can't wait to find out.

Star Wars Ewoks - Technically, this is a well made Singapore bootleg that is highly sought after by Star Wars fans. It's a high quality pressing of the original vinyl version with additional tracks thrown in. While I have not confirmed this yet, rumor has it the tracks are all mislabeled as to what they actually are.

Supergirl - I wanted this one strictly because it existed. The movie was terrible, and I couldn't tell you with any level of honesty that I remember any of the music from it. It may not be John William's iconic score, but Jerry Goldsmith is no slouch either.

With eleven albums crossed off my list, Christmas was a massive success, and even though this post is going live in January, there's more to come! I'm just now getting started on my Christmas holiday posts, which will be featured throughout the month!

Click "HERE" to go back to the home page. For more posts related to this one, please click the labels below.

The Traditional G.I. Jigsaw Holiday Outing

 

George, of G.I. Jigsaw, and I, seem to have created a holiday tradition these past couple years. Wherein around the holiday season we'll make a run to a (not so) local toy shop, and do a little self shopping. Last year I nabbed up some good NES games, cups, and a G.I. Joe "figure". 2020 I got a mint in the box GameBoy, and an additional NES game.

This year, we took a trip to two places, Eternia Dreams, and Toy Exchange.

As always, the shop was filled to the brim with 80's and beyond toy goodness. From the common to the rare, there's definitely something here for everyone.

Truthfully, I didn't come on the trip with the intentions of finding anything I would want to buy. My toy buying days are pretty much behind me in favor of collecting 80's albums. However, when I when down the DC isle, I about fell over when I saw right up front on the peg a figure I had been looking for in the wild since 2018.

My initial plan was to see if they had a Tiger Force Flint to replace the poor purchase of the one I made at the Hershey Action Figure and Toy Show, also an outing with G.I. Jigsaw. At a glance, I didn't see it on the pegs, and didn't have much desire to go digging. Then out of the corner of my eye I saw a couple Tiger Force figures on a single peg, and dove in. While the figure wasn't on that peg, it was indeed on the one next to it. SCORE!

Located just a couple doors down,the owners of Eternia Dreams also opened Starship Lex, a store which houses even more Star Wars and Star Trek related stuff, as well as a secondary Eternia Dreams which is dedicated to all things toy cars. It seemed a bit odd to me that they would lease the additional spaces, but hey, whatever makes you happy.

After a bite to eat at the Crazy Plum, the diner we also went to last time, we were on our way home. This put us on a trajectory for Toy Exchange, which is a store we pass both ways going to and from, and a location I've been to many times before.

I didn't snap too many photos inside because there's never much room to move around, let alone get back far enough to take a decent shot. These photos do little to no justice to the shear volume of stuff crammed inside this little shop.

The owner had three 1982 carry cases from G.I. Joe, and I contemplated buying all three, but at minimum, one. Ultimately, I ended up walking away. The bottom line was that I had not need for them, and couldn't justify the purchase.

As typical with my prior year purchases, the items picked up today were put aside, with a few others, to be forgotten about until Christmas Eve, when I finally allowed myself to have them. And, here's what I got!

Batman Returns Quick Change Bruce Wayne! I've been looking for this figure for a long time! So glad to have this in my collection of 1989 / 1990 Batman movie related toys. The cardback is in terrible shape, but it will soon be in the trash anyway.

Tiger Force Flint (re)wraps up my complete collection of 1988 Tiger Force Joes.

I stopped at Big Planet Comics with the intentions of finding an Amazing Spider-Man issue 82. Instead, I found six copies of McFarlane's Spider-Man number 1. Well...I'm not going to leave those out in the wild if spotted.

This year I also crossed off a few rare, and only available abroad, 80's CD's. Captain Sensible's Women and Captains First (1982), Laban's Caught By Surprise (1985), Raff's self titled 1984 album, and Regina's Curiosity (1986). I'm looking forward to firing all four of these up for a future Retro Spins.

Click "HERE" to go back to the home page. For more posts related to this one, please click the labels below.