Here's a new article that expands on something touched on in a previous one — the full tribute to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Cereal! I love the fact that it existed, and bought it several times, but I don't care what anyone says — this stuff just wasn't tasty. Especially when you open up a box that's been sitting around for fourteen years, which I do in this article. Commercial download is included, along with a short story about Michaelangelo's trip to the grocery store. New design is alllmost finished, so I'll link this one off the main page once it's done.
Still working on the new design; a couple of past attempts failed, so we're trying out some other stuff. I probably won't add a new article till it's done, but I think I'll have time to write one tonight. If so, I'll link it here and all of you can giggle because the rest of the site's visitors will just have absolutely no idea that it exists. And then we will set fire to Grandma's hair while she sleeps uh huh.
Anyway, here's some quick reader mail, kicking off with something pretty cool. Very rarely, someone who worked on a film I've reviewed will touch base. Since most of the flicks I tackle are fairly obscure, the letters are just general thank-you notes for even mentioning 'em. This one's sort of in the same category, but not really. Remember that Kingdom of the Spiders review? It's from a while back. Long while, actually. The producer, Jeffrey Sneller, sent in this note… [more]
We're working around the clock (ha yeah right) to put together X-E's post-Christmas design. Completely overlooked it last month. Longtime readers might remember that the site's past holiday designs usually remained active till around February, if not later. This new one's kinda funky. The basic goal was to super-simplify everything. I think the site's templates (mostly with the articles) had just way too many bells and whistles — since my plan is to write somewhat shorter articles much more frequently, I didn't want ten pounds of extra crap on each page. Anyway, the other coup of a more basic design is that there isn't a week's worth of gruntwork to tack on…it should be active by tomorrow.
Anyway, I've got some treeemendous news for Ecto Cooler fans. Ironically enough, once we figured out that Hi-C's "Shoutin' Orange Tangergreen" perfectly mimicked Slimer's ghastly color and fruit juice flavor, it seemed to vanish from the shelves. Seriously, I've gotten well over a hundred e-mails from disgruntled, thirsty readers wanting to know if the flavor had been discontinued. I have no idea, but they certainly stopped stocking them around these parts. Even if you're lucky enough to find it, chances are good that it'll be the "no stain" version, which tastes like Ecto Cooler but lacks the requisite green sheen. Worry no more — here's your solution, and no matter where you live, it'll work for ya.
A reader named Lars tipped me off to this one. You know Net Grocer? One of the last vestiges of that short movement to make people buy groceries from home, the site is a bonanza of…well, food. More importantly, they've got a lot of Hi-C juice. Most importantly, check this out:
Yup — the listing for "Shoutin' Orange Tangergreen" features a photo of — you guessed it — Ecto Cooler! This only further proves our findings: Tangergreen is Ecto Cooler, albeit with a less cool name and a box that doesn't feature Slimer. I didn't want to disappoint anyone with false news, so I went the extra mile and ordered some of the stuff. By "some," I of course mean "a giant box full." Take a gander:
It's the real deal. The radioactive green version of Tangergreen. Lord knows how much of the slop Net Grocer's got left, so if you're at all interested, check out their site and order a batch. This may be the last call for Ecto Cooler fans. If you'd like to learn more about the most fascinating fruit juice of all time, check out my article from a few months back.
Ahhh, the good ol' Christmas fallout. Everything always seems a little off for a few days after Christmas; it's some kind of immobilizing lull that we all fall into before prying ourselves out to get drunk on New Year's Eve. It didn't really hit me too hard this year — I became way too busy in December to even realize how close Christmas was, so it just kinda came and went. Yes, I caught the Christmas Story marathon. I didn't beat my personal record, but I think we scored 4-5 full viewings.
On top of finishing the Advent Calendar, I had to get my three print articles done on Christmas Eve — this kept me swamped till around 4 PM, at which point I had to jet into the shower and outta the house. We got to my sister's around six, drank lots of wine, made sure to steal enough rumaki to last us till 2007, and by 2 AM, we were home. Christmas Day was spent at my girlfriend's brother's house, with a side trip to my parents' to see everyone who couldn't make the Eve party. Sound like a mess? Oh yeah, it was. Christmas night was spent with our friends at a bar in a Chinese restaurant — one of our newer traditions from recent years. We were the only people in the place, downing Zombies and thanking the hosts repeatedly for letting us smoke despite NY's stupid bar laws.
Anyways, it was fun. Hope yours was the same. More importantly, here's some of the stuff I got. Keep in mind, I come from a huge family. This might seem like an impressive haul to the untrained, but I had to give out just as many gifts. Actually, since my siblings have spawned 14,000 children, I had to give out eighty times as many gifts. That said, this was an excellent year for free stuff. I nailed practically an entire new wardrobe, which is doubly nice as I've been wearing the same pair of jeans for the past, oh, year. I don't think anyone needs to see pictures of my clothes, so here's most of everything else. A couple of choice items are stuffed too far under the tree for me to dig out at the moment without topping it over, but here's the rest…
UPDATE: I'm going to keep this blog entry up top and active, since there's so many great Christmas stories in the comments section. Feel free to read 'em and add your own. I particularly liked the one about using a car remote to fuck with the neighborhood's Christmas lights…hopefully will have time to read the rest before tonight. I'll make a new entry tomorrow so everyone can compare their holiday loot haul.
Meantime, the Calendar's just about up to date. I've gotta do today's entry before I get going, and we'll wrap it up on Christmas morning. December 22nd's entry includes "Holiday Rice Krispies," an old Christmastime Saturday morning commercial, and a magic wand for two very special animals. For December 23rd, we've got an assortment of holiday sweets from Hostess, "A Charlie Brown Christmas" promo spot, and the beginning of the end for Mare Winningham. I'll make another update when the 24th's entry is up, but if any of you are on your way to wherever you spend the holidays, have a good one!
We're alllmost there! I kept these last two entries pretty short, as the last few and especially the last two are going to be fairly long. December 20th's entry features more Christmas candy, plus that classic CBS "special presentation" bumper that I'm sure some of you will remember. For December 21st, we've got "Winter Lucky Charms" and an old Kodak holiday ad. Of course, both entries include the continuing adventures of our friends from Playmobil. Four more entries to go! I'm doing two more today so we'll be all caught up. Fortunately, I don't have to be at my sister's house for the Christmas Eve Celebrate Good Times Come On till 6 PM tomorrow, and that should give me enough time to complete the saga.
I also wanted to take this time to thank you guys for your continued support of the site — especially those of you who continually participate in the comments section here on the blog. I don't think it's any secret to longtime readers that I've changed quite a bit in regard to the Internet — I do what I do, and that's pretty much it. The combination of having done this for so many years mixed with a marked distaste a lot of the time towards "web culture" has made me kinda like a virtual hermit, so this little corner of the site means more to me than it would seem. Frankly, it's been a breath of fresh air to see people willing to participate without a zillion ulterior motives, just for the sake of or enjoyment of it. With the holidays out of the way, it's back to the usual crunch of writing articles again. You know, lots of 'em. That means less playtime, but I'd like to think this part of the site will only grow in the next year. I'm toying with the idea of making comments limited to registered users (or making it an option), if only because it'd let those with an account quickly access their past comments and whatnot. Anyway, that wasn't the point of this paragraph — I just wanted to wish all you guys a MARY CARSTMARSH, or whatever it is y'all celebrate.
Speaking of articles, I'm very excited about January. Not because of any major projects planned, but because there aren't any projects planned. October was spent on the Halloween Countdown, November was mainly taken up with those massive parade reviews, and you know what I've been doing for December. I'm looking forward to getting back to what the site was built on — a hodge podge of kiddie culture crap that I and many others share love for. I've got around five or six articles in my head waiting to be written with all the materials right here in front of me, so next month should be fun.
Hey, let's do something interesting with the comments section for this entry. If you've got a Christmas memory, share it with the masses! Whether it's a story about your past celebrations, best or worst presents, or whatever else, feel free to drop a comment. Gimme something to read in-between finishing the calendar, wrapping gifts, and doing the ten trillion other things I gotta do before the 45,000 members of my family congregate to eat calamari and drink themselves stupid tomorrow night.
Two more updates on the Advent Calendar — December 18th features another Santa hotline commercial (this time for Mrs. Claus!), Kid Cuisine's Christmas-themed microwave dinners, and the ongoing struggles of Mista Snowman. On Decemeber 19th, Mare hits new lows while we sidebar with K-Mart and a ton of Christmas candy.
I got some e-mails over the weekend from readers wondering if the Calendar's actually going to get done on time. Well, YES — because if it doesn't get done on time, I know I'll never do it at all. (see: last year) I do it at my own pace because I'll hate the results if I don't, but I think we're on target. Just a few more days to go…and good lord, I still have a shitload of Christmas crap I haven't even touched upon yet. To tell you the truth, the Playmobil side didn't seem that attractive to me when I started this year's calendar, but it's really grown on me. I hope Playmobil shits out a new one next year, because I'd hate for our story to end this Christmas.
Oh, here's our Christmas Tree. We picked out a much smaller one than last year's, but I think I like it even better. It's just so trashy and messy. We inherited like forty-thousand boxes of ornaments last winter, and while it's hard to really tell from the pics, the tree is literally saturated in ornaments. You can barely see the green. Kinda sucks that we bought it so late in the month, but whatever…it's not like I'll be taking it down before February, anyway.
Wednesday, December 31st, 2003
Here's a new article that expands on something touched on in a previous one — the full tribute to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Cereal! I love the fact that it existed, and bought it several times, but I don't care what anyone says — this stuff just wasn't tasty. Especially when you open up a box that's been sitting around for fourteen years, which I do in this article. Commercial download is included, along with a short story about Michaelangelo's trip to the grocery store. New design is alllmost finished, so I'll link this one off the main page once it's done.
Posted by Matt @ 4:51 pm [Link] [73 Comments]
Still working on the new design; a couple of past attempts failed, so we're trying out some other stuff. I probably won't add a new article till it's done, but I think I'll have time to write one tonight. If so, I'll link it here and all of you can giggle because the rest of the site's visitors will just have absolutely no idea that it exists. And then we will set fire to Grandma's hair while she sleeps uh huh.
UPDATE: I'm going to keep this blog entry up top and active, since there's so many great Christmas stories in the comments section. Feel free to read 'em and add your own. I particularly liked the one about using a car remote to fuck with the neighborhood's Christmas lights…hopefully will have time to read the rest before tonight. I'll make a new entry tomorrow so everyone can compare their holiday loot haul.
We're alllmost there! I kept these last two entries pretty short, as the last few and especially the last two are going to be fairly long. 
Two more updates on the Advent Calendar — 
