I Sent Him Into The Future!

Too pooped from a whirlwind drive to and from Kitakami to go into details, so I'll just briefly mention what I got up to last night. Before I met up with Alex, I had dinner at McDonald's. Why? Because I was hungry and they had a Street Fighter meal. I had the chicken. That orange concoction is some sort of Energy drink, obviously to help you pummel your opponent.

 

We went to BBs, but it was closed. ON A FRIDAY NIGHT! This does not bode well, that place is one of the few that are open until 6am. So searching for another venue, we discovered this very cool, mellow place that stunk of cigars (though no one was smoking) and had several huge lounge chairs that would be tough to get out of after a few of the potent cocktails they serve. We only had ONE drink. I promised myself I wouldn't drink at all, but that is always an easily broken vow.

 

Can't remember the name of the place though!

Unable to find a larger venue for our Halloween gig, we went back to Suu at Dragon's Diner and finalized plans for next week. It holds 10 comfortably, 15 with some squeezing and 20 if you suck in your stomachs. Hopefully, all the attendees will pop in for a drink or two and then scurry along to another party. There has been a lot of positive buzz about this soiree. I hope it doesn't bomb like last time we held a party there. (Alex, myself, and one or two regulars.)

 

I called it an early night and hopped on a subway around 11. En route home, I popped in the local conbini, MiniStop, and noticed that there's a new Ichiban-Kuji prize lottery for the 40th anniversary of BttF!

 

 

The A prize and the Last Prize seem to be different versions of the DeLorean. The B prize is a stuffed Einstein! I scored a C prize, a tote bag.

 

 

And the ubiquitous prize is the G prize, a poster. 

 

 

 

At least I got the second best one! (The best one is the 3D Jaws).

 

A quick Oni before bed (recommended by many of your top sleep therapists), is 鬼の妹 (oni no imouto) the Younger Sister of the Oni, a cannibalistic little scamp who dines on parents.

 

 

She looks a tad cuter in the following picture.

 

Before it gets so cold you need to put away your BBQ, check out Action Figure Barbecue, there're some cool figures hanging around. 

I have two LONG entries to get to tomorrow. And then I need to mentally prepare for a costume party for my students on Monday.

g'nite 

I'm Ticked Off!!

The last time I intended on writing in my blog was January 9th, almost 9 months ago! I started, then faltered, then tried again, got writer's block, made another attempt, aborted my mission, then realized I'd let it go too long! What I planned to write was about these Godzilla Burgers at McDonalds. They have disappeared since then.

 

A. Spicy Thick Beef & Potato. B. Smoky Pepper Chicken. C. Cheese Double Teriyaki.

 

 

 

To my recollection, they weren't very edible. The best was probably the Chicken.

More important than the food was this Godzilla/Be@rBrick/McDonalds collaboration they had going on.

 

Although I was broke back then, I did manage to scrape together enough to order one.

I am pleased with this. I was less pleased when they took it from an exclusive set, only ordered online with a deadline, to selling them over the counter in stores. Ah well. They have doubled in price if you try to find one in the used market these days.

These were all to promote Godzilla Minus One way back when. Since then Gojira has won an Oscar!

   

Okay. That's what I would have written 9 months ago. I need to get back into the swing of things considering the Countdown to Halloween 2024 is starting next month!

I just returned from a whirlwind tour of Toronto and spent three weeks cataloguing a ton of comics, and readying them for sale. I did come across a box of Tick Toys! What ticks me off is that I can't keep them in my friend's basement much longer and need to sell them.

The only place that showed any interest was The Silver Snail. They don't buy toys per se yet were willing to consider taking them off my hands. If I had access to eBay, that would be the way to go. Or could I get them shipped here? Hmmm.

Rain Delay.

As you may know, Japan is hosting the World Cup of Rugby right now. We also were in the thick of a mega-typhoon, known as Haggis Hagibis. As a result a few of the Rugby matches were cancelled or delayed. Canadian Rugbiers (is that a term?) couldn't participate in their game so instead they engaged in a typically Canadian enterprise, helping out.



In other Rugby news, Japan is doing quite well and have become quarter finalists for the first time after a win over Scotland.



Enough sporting news. The typhoon also took the lives of at least 33, 19 are still missing, and caused extensive flooding and mudslide damage wherever it struck. If you have the means to do so, please donate to the Red Cross to help the victims here.

Here are some photos taken by a friend showing the aftermath today.

On a more personal note, I had to drive two hours north to preside over a wedding in Morioka because all the Shinkansen Bullet Trains were cancelled. Fortunately, the rain didn't start until after the wedding but just in time for my drive home. All reports from friends in Sendai were warnings of  evacuations and I was not looking forward to the drive back. Surprisingly after an hour on the road, my wedding booker called me and asked me if I could do two more weddings on Sunday because the previously scheduled preacher couldn't make it. Since I was already in the neighbourhood, it wasn't a problem for me. So I stayed in a Hotel in Kitakami and spent a sleepless night from 12:00 - 3:00 listening to rain pelt down and then from 3:00 - 6:00 listening to the incredibly strong winds rattling the rafters. By the time I left the hotel, it was sunny and it was a beautiful day all day! My final wedding had this as part of its display.

I did manage to get some Otaku-shopping done but alas, didn't buy much at all. I'm still on the lookout for volumes of the Eko Eko Azarak Manga, anime or movies to no avail. Here is the latest postcard instead.

I've also run out of colour pictures and have to resort to creepy Black and White ones instead.

The Mandai-clone in Morioka had a pretty good Halloween display in its lobby.

And on the staircase leading to the goods is a Human-sized Godzilla plush.

Apart from a couple of toys for a friend, I didn't buy much there. I did score a book of postcards for Howl's Moving Castle and the first volume of the Princess Mononoke Film Comic.

 

At the Kitakami Mandai-clone, was a less impressive Halloween display.

I like the above. Creepy and eerie.

I've never been able to figure out why Pumpkins should have a biblical quote on them!

I asked some young gal to snap a pic of me in the big bad wolf mask. I didn't want to spend the bucks to buy it.

I won a poop pumpkin at UFO Catcher.

And a Marvel t-shirt in only two tries!

These A-3 sized posters are actually booklets that hold a Blu-Ray of the movie for only 10 bucks each.

 

The following three movies were 200 yen each or three for 500.

 

There wasn't much else so I got this as my third video. From what I recall, I think I overspent.

A display at McDonalds. I'm disappointed that they don't have a specialty burger or fries this year. I guess nobody ate the Squid-ink burgers from a few years back.

This is all they had left at Costco. I didn't get it.

Check out a fellow Cryptkeeper at Cult of the Great Pumpkin.
See ya tomorrow, since there was a rain delay on this weekend's blogging.