A Token Gift

Birthday Gift Coupon
Aladdin's Castle
Oli Oliver of the Aladdin's Castle Arcade group discovered this card while working on a Spy Hunter pinball machine.

I Come From A Planet A Long Way From Here

I found this little guy at the bottom of a tote when I was packing up Christmas decorations last year.  It's a keychain that my grandmother gave me when I was a teenager.  Grandma could be a handful, but she was a generous woman with a good heart.  She knew that I liked aliens, so when she found something with an alien head, she's get it and put it away for me to give to me for Christmas, or my birthday, or just because she thought that I'd like it.

This also reminded me of one of my favorite Christmas songs.  It's not one that I hear on the radio too often, but it's has an ethereal and soothing sound that stops me in my tracks every time I hear it.  It was released by Chris de Burgh in 1975.  The singer/songwriter is probably best known for The Lady In Red and Don't Pay The Ferryman, but I think this is the song of his that I like the best.

A Spaceman Came Traveling

Chris de Burgh (1975)

A spaceman came traveling on his ship from afar

Twas light years of time since his mission did start

And over a village he halted his craft

And it hung in the sky like a star, just like a star

He followed a light and came down to a shed

Where a mother and child were lying there on a bed

A bright light of silver shone round his head

And he had the face of an angel, and they were afraid

Then the stranger spoke, he said "Do not fear

I come from a planet a long way from here

And I bring a message for mankind to hear,"

And suddenly the sweetest music filled the air

And it went

La la la la la la la la la la la

Peace and goodwill to all men, and love for the child

This lovely music went trembling through the ground

And many were wakened on hearing that sound

And travelers on the road, the village they found

By the light of that ship in the sky, which shone all round

And just before dawn at the paling of the sky

The stranger returned and said "Now I must fly

When two thousand years of your time has gone by

This song will begin once again, to a baby's cry"

And it was

La la la la la la la la la la la

Peace and goodwill to all men, and love for the child

Oh, the whole world is waiting

Waiting to hear the song again

There are thousands standing on the edge of the world

And a star is moving somewhere

Yuletide In The Shire

Yuletide In The Shire
Everstar (2003)
This is my favorite Christmas album.  I picked it up during Musikfest 2008 at a Celtic shop called Donegal Square, along with a few other similar CDs, and my wife and I have listened to it every holiday season ever since.

There's not a lot of information online about the recording artists.  The only thing I can find for sure is that they released one other album called Enchanted Journey in the same year.  The website for the label, Sequoia Records, is still online, but it's just a placeholder page with a message that the site is closed for maintenance, along with a few links to listen to the music that they have produced on various streaming services.

Yuletide In The Shire is available to stream on YouTube, Spotify, Amazon, Pandora, and many other sources.  It's a very mellow and peaceful holiday listening experience that I hope you enjoy as much as I do.

Sun-Loving Snowman

Snowman Suncatcher
Zayre

God Bless Us, Every Kernel

Mickey's Christmas Carol Coloring Book
Orville Redenbacher (1983)
During the holiday season of 1983, shoppers could pick up a free Mickey's Christmas Carol coloring book with the purchase of two jars of Orville Redenbacher popcorn.

These days, you can usually find these coloring books on eBay for ten dollars or less, but you'll have to supply your own popcorn.

Cooking Missouri

The Times Leader Cookbook
Times Leader (1985)
This cookbook was two dollars at the Slatington Marketplace.  I did a little research and found that I got it for three dollars less than it cost back in 1985.

Most of the recipes that I saw in here look pretty good, but one of them caught my interest.  My grandmother used to make a hearty ground beef and potato stew that she called Missouri that I especially enjoyed on cold days.  She'd make it in a pot that was big enough to feed the army, so we usually had it for at least two or three days any time that she made it.

I had never heard of any soup or stew called Missouri other than from her, so I always assumed that it was a concoction that she came up with at some point, but there it was in this recipe book.

My grandmother's Missouri had large chunks of potatoes, and I'm pretty sure she either used tomatoes or tomato paste in it too, but I could be wrong about that.  I'm going to have to give this a shot over the winter.

A Wearable Menu

Big League Hat Menu
Howard Johnson's (1963)
I found this children's menu at the Slatington Marketplace over the weekend.  It has a series of cuts that fold the menu out into a hat that could be worn.  My dad still raves about their fried clams to this day.  Everything else on the menu looks pretty good too, but shouldn't the Miss Muffet lunch be curds and whey?

Click here to enlarge the front and back.

More From The Toy Store In The Mall

Black Friday Circular
KayBee Toys (1990)
This advertisement for a sale that began on the day after Thanksgiving 35 years ago was shared on Twitter by Dinosaur Dracula.  Check out the early draft of box art from Super Mario Bros 3.

Santa Shops At The Mall Toy Store

Kay-Bee Dear Santa Sale
KayBee Toys (1989)
This advertisement for a sale that ended on this day in 1989 was shared on Instagram by Dinosaur Dracula.  I was nine years old when this flier was publishes so I was into pretty much all of this stuff except Cabbage Patch Kids.

The Only Important Thing These Days Is Rhythm And Melody

Prisencolinensinainciusol
Adriano Celentano (1972)
On this day in 1972, a song that was written by composer Adriano Celentano and performed by he and his wife, Claudia Mori, was released in Italy.  It would go on to chart in their native country, as well as Belgium, West Germany, and The Netherlands.

If you're having a difficult time understanding the lyrics, there's a pretty good reason for that.  He's not singing in English or in Italian.  The entire song is gibberish sung with an American accent.

ps: if you caught the Big Audio Dynamite reference in the title, you're my kind of people.

Spooky Season At Zayre

October Sales Circular
Zayre (1987)
This page from a Zayre sales circular was shared by Dinosaur Dracula last month.

The highlight for me is the ad at the bottom left corner for Friday The 13th, Deadly Friend, Fright Night, The Believer, A Nightmare On Elm Street 3, and Halloween on VHS for $16.99.

This is the candy that we all wanted to find in our bag after we were finished trick or treating... except maybe for the Smarties, which had about the same flavor as the packets of sugar on the table at the Blue Comet.  Also, I still say that Reese's Peanut Butter Cups tasted better when they came in a paper wrapper.

The Count Dracula Chocolate Flavored Candy at the top left of this part of the ad is the kind of thing that savvy kids would trade to their friends for their old boring Hershey and Snickers bars.  The package may be awesome, but they didn't usually taste very good.

Once in a while, there would be a seasonal goodie that you didn't want to give up, like these Alma Skull Crushers which oozed strawberry blood when you bit into them.  I don't think these are still sold in stores in the United States, but I was able to find them for sale on UK eBay and other online retailers under the name Hannah's Skull Crushers.

I was more of a rubber mask kid when it came to Halloween, but makeup was always a solid option.

These cardboard wall hangings sold for a buck and a half back in the 80's,  My grandmother used to wait and buy things like this when they went on sale after the holiday to put away for next year.  These old decorations are considerably more expensive when you can find them on eBay, especially if they're in good condition.

The last thing that caught my eye were these Halloween pinatas.  I can't say I ever remember seeing pinatas out for a Halloween party when I was a kid.  The witch in the center is giving off Viola Swamp vibes.

When The World Is Running Down...

Zenyatta Mondatta
The Police (1980)
The third studio album from The Police is turning forty five years old today.  Practically every song on this record was a hit, including Don't Stand So Close To Me, Driven To Tears, Canary In A Coal Mine, and Man In A Suitcase.

My favorite one of all, and probably my favorite song that the band ever put out, is the third song on the album.  When I listened to this song in my 20's and 30's, it reminded me of Roland describing Mid-World in The Dark Tower by saying that "the world has moved on".  When the pandemic began, and the effects of global climate change became harder to ignore in the years after the pandemic, it started to remind me of our world because all we can really do is make the best of what's still around.

When The World Is Running Down, You Make The Best Of What's Still Around

The Police (1980)

Turn on my VCR

Same one I've had for years

James Brown on the Tami show

Same tape I've had for years

I sit in my old car

Same one I've had for years

Old battery's running down

It ran for years and years

Turn on the radio

The static hurts my ears

Tell me, where would I go?

I ain't been out in years

Turn on the stereo

It's played for years and years

An Otis Redding song

It's all I own

When the world is running down

You make the best of what's still around

When the world is running down

You make the best of what's still around

Plug in my MCI

To exercise my brain

Make records on my own

Can't go out in the rain

Pick up the telephone

I've listened here for years

No one to talk to me

I've listened here for years

When the world is running down

You make the best of what's still around

When the world is running down

You make the best of what's still around

When I feel lonely here

Don't waste my time with tears

I run Deep Throat again

It ran for years and years

Don't like the food I eat

The cans are running out

Same food for years and years

I hate the food I eat

When the world is running down

You make the best of what's still around

When the world is running down

You make the best of what's still around

Frightful Fun

Halloween Body Stickers
Mello Smello (90's)
These were scanned and shared by Dinosaur Dracula earlier this year.

Where The Sun Light Don't Shine

I'm not really sure where this Halloween witch came from.  It's possible that we picked it up form a flea market, but I don't remember buying it.  It's more likely that my grandmother made it when I was a kid, but I don't remember seeing it.  Maybe she manifested in our attic all by herself.  Who knows.

Wherever she came from, she's a pretty groovy decoration and we try to find a place to put her this time of the year.  It's made pretty well, with fabric for the hat and the dress and doll hair on her head.  She's also surprisingly heavy.

The witch's body is a bottle of Sun Light dish soap that's filled with sand.  The copywrite on the bottle is from 1992.  Whether this was made by my grandmother or by a flea market vendor, this little witch has been haunting people's homes at Halloween for 33 years.

My, What Funny Little Ducklings

Fantasy Friday: The Black Cauldron / The Last Unicorn
Mahoning Drive-In Theater - Lehighton, PA

Before I get into the movies, Donnie brought his dog Una tonight.  She's an absolute sweetheart.

Show banner designed by Andrew Kern

Out of all of the movies that have been scheduled at the Mahoning since we first started coming here five years ago, I think that I was looking forward to the first movie of Fantasy Friday the most.

 

I was never much of a Disney kid growing up.  It's not that I disliked their movies or cartoons.  In fact, some of their cartoons and movies are among my childhood favorites, like Flight Of The Navigator, The Three Caballeros, and Duck Tales, but I was was more into things like Loony Tunes, Rocky and Bullwinkle, Danger Mouse, Dungeons and Dragons, and Charlie Brown than anything that you'd find on The Disney Channel.  However, there was one production from The House of Mouse that holds a special place in my heart, and that is the 1985 full length animated feature, The Black Cauldron.

Standard Speaker - Hazleton, PA  (July 25, 1985)

The Black Cauldron was the first movie that I ever saw in theaters.  It came out just a few weeks after my fifth birthday and my grandfather brought me to the Hersker to see it.  That's the theater that I wrote about a few days ago that eventually became the Cinema & Drafthouse in West Hazleton which closed this month.  I thought that this was the coolest thing in the world when I saw it on the big screen.

I even had the Book and Record which I read and listened to countless times when I was a kid.  It's kind of amazing that these are now archived on YouTube.  Technology can be pretty cool sometimes.

The first feature of the night was The Black Cauldron, which marks the second time I've seen it on 35mm in forty years.  It was a beautiful print from 1990 when it was re-released in select test markets under the title Taran And The Magic Cauldron, but apart from the slight change in the title card, the movie is exactly the same as I remember seeing with my grandfather when I was five years old.

The second feature was a 35mm presentation of the 1982 animated classic The Last Unicorn.  I'm pretty sure that I've seen at least part of this movie at some point in my life, but I didn't remember very much of it.  For all intent and purposes, it's the first time that I paid attention to the entire movie and it's excellent.

I brought in the Bluray of my favorite animated feature ever made to play as the secret feature.  I'm not going to name it here, but you can probably guess.  It was an incredible experience seeing it on the big screen, but I'm hopeful for a 35mm screening next season.

You're Tearing Me Apart, Lisa!

The Room
Mahoning Drive-In Theater - Lehighton, PA

Show banner designed by Andrew Kern

Show poster designed by Tom Bifulco

I saw this movie for the first time two years ago when it was last screened at the Mahoning and I was an instant fan.  It's by far the worst movie I have ever seen, but it's the very definition of "so bad, it's good".  It's so terrible that it's difficult to believe that Tommy Wiseau was serious when he made it.

Once again, Greg Sestero (who played Mark in The Room) was on the lot to meet fans, sign autographs, and to host a Q&A after the film.

Mr. Sestero was very nice and he signed my VHS copy of The Room and the 1999 Charles Band horror film Retro Puppet Master which he starred in.

I wish I knew the right words to convince everyone who is reading this to drop what they're doing, seek out The Room, and watch it from start to finish right now.  It's so bizarre that it defies description.  How many movies have an entirely separate movie about the making of the first movie.  I'm not talking about a documentary or a "behind the scenes" special.  The 2017 film The Disaster Artist is a full length scripted film that, like Tim Burton's 1994 film Ed Wood, tells the story that led to the creation of its subject's work.  It's an excellent film in its own right and a great companion piece to the train wreck that is The Room.  Watch them back to back.  You won't regret it.

This Is The Noise That Keeps Me Awake

Garbage / Starcrawler

Happy Endings Tour
Franklin Music Hall - Philadelphia, PA
Garbage is one of my favorite bands of all time, and they're on a farewell tour with a stop at my favorite venue for live music.  There was no way in the world that I was going to miss this!

Things got a little interesting between the opening act and the headliner.  I got light headed all of a sudden and felt like I was going to pass out.  I'm not sure if I hadn't eaten enough, or drank enough water, or if my blood sugar crashed, or if it was something else altogether, but Angie got me a bag of Skittles and a bottle of water and I rested for a little while near the stairs and it passed after a little while.

The opening act was an awesome band from Los Angeles called Starcrawler.  The have kind of a psychedelic metal punk sound, but I'm really terrible at describing music to people, so have a listen for yourself.

This playlist is their three albums, Starcrawler, Devour You, and She Said, with their non-album singles added in chronological order, or at least what I think is chronological order to when they were released.

Garbage took the stage next.  They've been one of my favorite bands since I heard their debut album for the first time when I was fifteen years old.  I've seen them in concert on three other occasions: they were the opening act for Blondie in July 2017, for Tears For Fears in June 2022, and for Alanis Morissette in July 2022.  They were incredible each time, but I had never gotten to see them perform a full set until last night.  It was a phenomenal experience, and I'm so glad that I was able to be here for it.

I was very pleasantly surprised when they played one of my favorite songs in their catalog, Bleed Like Me.  The setlists for the shows on the Happy Endings tour prior to this show didn't include it, so I wasn't expecting them to play it.

I didn't take very many photos, and I didn't take video at all because I just wanted to live in the moment as much as possible.  A couple people recorded the full concert and uploaded it to YouTube though.  No video can ever do a concert justice, but I'm thankful that they shared it.

Here are the setlists for Starcrawler and Garbage.