This was supposed to be
posted almost two weeks ago, but other things kept coming up. Among
them are the fact that my external hard drive crashed and I do not
have access to my recorded podcasts. Or my music or pictures or
videos or anything else.
What the fuck is up with
technology? I have tried two different backup programs and I can’t
ever get them to work. I keep my stuff on an external hard drive
because I thought that would be better, but apparently there is no
“better”. Is the only solution to pay some exorbitant fee to one
of those cloud backup services?
Anyway, I’m writing
this on Saturday and there’s a possibility my data can be
recovered. We’ll see.
On a brighter note, as of
last Saturday I have raised enough money to upgrade my plan with Podbean. I want to
offer my sincerest thanks to John, Chris, R.T. Ewell,
Beth V, Sharron, John & Ashley, Heather, Gregg, and the Coopers.
You guys are outstanding.
I want to give
extra-special thanks to Lori of Third Half Studios
for not only helping out with a donation, but for providing the even
more valuable support of advice and encouragement. I don’t know
what I did to earn such a good friend, but I’m glad I did it.
As for the rest of the
Phantomaniacs, I want to thanks you guys for checking in every day.
Not everybody has the ability or desire to throw money at some
stranger’s website and podcast, but your continued interest means a
lot to me.
Having said all of that, I still have stuff for sale on Storenvy. There are L and XL t-shirts left, along with plenty of prints and stickers. And, of course, Mystery Boxes, of which I have a nigh-infinite supply.
You can also donate any
amount of money through the PayPal button:
All proceeds will
continue to go toward supporting the podcast and various site-related
things. I’m not buying toys or anything with this money. The most
frivolous thing any future funds go towards will be more merchandise
and maybe a banner for appearances. I kind of need a banner.
Along with the success of
this year’s fundraising came a couple of realizations:
- I do not want to do this again next year. It was unpleasant and nerve-wracking.
- I am probably not utilizing the most efficient combination of web, picture, and podcast hosting. There has to be a “one stop shop” where I can pay one fee to do everything. Unfortunately I am extremely internet-challenged and am not looking forward to figuring all of that out. My experience with paying Google for web hosting has been horrible and I do not recommend them to anybody under any circumstances.
Stay tuned – I am
putting together the schedule for future Needless Things Podcast
right now. The next episode – one long delayed due to its length –
will be up very soon. After that I am lining up what will hopefully
be the beginning of a string of very exciting episodes and
interviews. We’ll see.
Toy reviews make up the
bulk of Needless Things’ content, but I never planned on the site
being just
a toy review site. I wanted it to be a journal of dorkery where I
could share all of the various experiences of my life as an active
nerd, to have something new every day and to provide an environment
where my readers (who have only in the past couple of years been
dubbed “Phantomaniacs”, mostly because it seems to annoy Director
Faber) would never know quite what to expect; only that it would be
entertaining.
Today I’m going to
point out my favorite posts that would go in the “Other”
category. These are various types of ramblings, musings, and
recollections that aren’t reviews of any kind.
I was extremely
disappointed when Grant Morrison killed Damien Wayne. So much so that
I had to write a thing about the character and my feelings about
Morrison and whatever else came to mind about the current state of
the Bat-verse.
Speaking of the current
state of the Bat-verse, here’s a thing I wrote in anticipation of
the third Nolan film. If you only read one of the posts I link to
this week, read this one. Not only is it a lot of fun, I’m amazed
at how perceptive I was of Nolan’s butchering of the Bat-verse at
the time.
I love Sharktopus and I
loved The
Cape.
That’s really all you need to know.
I almost posted this with
my movie reviews on Monday, but this post is so much more than that.
This is my favorite movie ever, of all time. I speak of it with
passion. It was made by a couple of insane Canadians and you can
order it here.
And you MUST.
This is the story of how
I was an extra in Rob
Zombie’s Halloween 2.
It got me my first fans, who I hope are still following now. It
originally posted on MySpace, then MC4TR,
then here. I’m not gonna lie to you – it’s pretty great. I
don’t do a lot of long form stuff anymore and this thing was a
labor of love. And of labor. Being an extra sucked fucking ass. I
don’t know how Bobby Nash
does it all the time.
Also, I didn’t even end
up in the fucking movie despite being a three-hundred-plus pound
luchador.
The story of the first
time I watched The Original Trilogy with my son. It’s from June of
2009, which means it predates this site. As I was putting this
together I realized that I never actually reposted this one on
Needless Things. So here it is now:
I
had one of the most satisfying experiences of my life over the
weekend. It’s pretty dorky, so if you can’t handle that you may
want to go somewhere else.
My
son, Riley, is 19 months old and has over a hundred of the Star Wars
Galactic Heroes figures – the ones for toddlers that are barely
articulated and cartoony. He absolutely loves to play with them. We
keep them in this big bucket, and when it is Star Wars time he will
dump them out and point at the floor for me to come and play with
him. He knows most of the characters’ names now. I’ll ask him,
“Where’s Ponda Baba?” and he’ll search around and pull out
ol’ walrus-face. He knows who Klaatu, Barada and Nikto are and know
that they are friends. He knows Jango is Boba’s daddy and he knows
Wuher is Mommy’s favorite (That’s our inside joke. I have
in-jokes with my nineteen month old son and I think that is
AWESOME!). Pretty much the only ones he isn’t sure about are the
different kinds of clones. He knows who goes in what vehicle, except
he remains positive that Darth Vader should be flying the Millennium
Falcon. He might be right.
My
wife has been suggesting for a while that we watch the Original
Trilogy with Riley so he can see who all these characters are. We
finally had the time to this past weekend. I wasn’t sure he would
recognize anybody since his little figures are fairly caricaturized,
but I was wrong.
We
put in A New Hope and after I read him the opening line – you all
know it, but here it is: “A long time ago in a place far, far
away…” – his little head shot up as soon as that music started.
He kind of ignored the intro, but as soon as C-3P0 showed up on
screen, he looked at me and said, “OOOOHH!” and dove into his
figures. Seconds later he proudly held up the golden droid (who has a
movie accurate silver right leg!). I’m not sure too many moments in
my life have been better than that. It was awesome.
As
the movie progressed, he kept spotting familiar faces and pulling out
their plastic likenesses. His favorite was Darth Vader. Every time
Vader came onscreen, my son would point at him excitedly and grab one
of his two Vader figures. You couldn’t have gotten the smile off my
face with a blowtorch.
The
most amazing thing is that he sat there and actually watched the
whole movie. That is amazing. His favorite show is Yo Gabba Gabba and
he usually won’t sit and watch an entire thirty minutes of that.
This was a two hour movie and he was rapt!
Saturday
afternoon we were sitting in the living room and Riley brought me his
Vader figure and pointed at the TV. I asked if he wanted to watch
Star Wars and he nodded vigorously. I couldn’t believe it. I never
thought we’d make it through Episode IV, let alone the whole
Trilogy.
I
got up and put in The Empire Strikes Back and, sure enough, he was
riveted again. He loved the tauntauns. He is also a HUGE Yoda fan, as
that was one of his first words. He jumped up and grabbed his Yoda
bobblehead – his first Star Wars toy – and stuck it up in the
air. The best part was when Luke went into the cave on Dagobah. After
Luke cut the spirit-Vader’s head off, Riley looked at me all
wide-eyed and, in the most earnest voice I have ever heard, said
“Uh-oh.”
I
couldn’t have asked for a better Father’s Day.
We
haven’t made it to Jedi yet, but we will. I’m sure he’s going
to love seeing those adorable Ewoks. I’ll have to be sure and point
out that their plan is to eat everybody. Despite what everybody says,
Ewoks are badass.
I met my metal heroes, Anthrax. It was fucking phenomenal.
The story of one
of the worst things that has ever happened to me. It involves massive
amounts of poo.
(12-2011) You probably
shouldn’t even read this one. I used to be a lot more outspoken
than I am now, but it was because I only had three readers. Now I
have more and I know that at least a few of you are overly sensitive
pantywaists. The reaction to my “Top Ten Hot Dudes” post proves
that. So I try to be sensitive to you people’s pussy little
feelings. This is, after all, a public forum and not a private
conversation. Not anymore, anyway. That’s why I can’t fucking
afford to post podcasts.
Give me money.
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