It's in the bag

There's been some talk of non-card collections on the blogs as of late, and even though I've already covered plenty of non-card stuff/collections here in the past, I figured that if everyone's jonesing for some non-card stuff, who am I to disappoint?

Today's collection isn't so much of collection as in I go out of my way to collect them, so much as it is that for whatever reason I've saved a bunch of them over the years, and now have a "collection".

Most of this "collection" is still in boxes from cross-country move five years ago, and I wasn't about dig into those just for a post, so you're gonna have settle for just a few examples, or in other words... what I could find in the five minutes or so that I spent searching for them!

I guess this would be a good time to mention that this "collection" that I'm speaking of is... plastic bags... yes, plastic bags! But not just any old grocery store bag mind you, no, I'm talking about the more heavy-duty bags that you would usually (or used to) get from businesses, which were more often than not, of the non-food selling variety.

I don't recall when, or why, I started saving bags, but I did, and have accumulated quite a few over the years, enough that if I ever get around to opening up some boxes, I might have think about doing a part 2, as those currently boxed examples are likely to be far more interesting than what I've got for you here today.

So, is anyone still reading this? I'm gonna go-ahead and assume that there isn't, so from here on out I'll just be talking to myself:

Me: Hey, Jon!
Also me: Yo!
Me: You feeling like checking out some bags?
Still me: Bags? What like... dirtbags... or fleabags... or...
Me: Ha! You're so funny! No smart-a**, like plastic bags.
Me to the second power: Plastic bags? Sounds kind of boring.
Me: Perhaps, but it's not like you have anything else to do right now, and don't try to say that you do, because I'll know that you're lying!
me: ...

Seeing someone Twitter about Amoeba shuttering it's original Hollywood location the other day, was sort of the impetus for this post. Though I've never been to one of their physical locations, it's still unfortunate to hear that such a well known place would have to close a store (which was their first) due to the corona lockdown, but I would imagine that the rent/taxes are pretty incredible there, and were just too much to eat with no customer base coming in. I bought a bunch of cheap CD's from them on multiple different occasions back in the mid-aught's, and got at least one bag with one of those purchases. I was losing my light when I took this photo, so it's hard to tell that bag is much more yellow than it looks, not quite Tower Records yellow, but yellower than this. Oh, and speaking of Tower Records...

Couldn't get the right shade of yellow in this pic either.

What would a pseudo bag collection be without at least one form Tower? I actually have a few Tower bags, all of which are of the older variety, pre-dot.com old. Although this one isn't too bad, if only because of it's heavy-duty snap together handle. Thanks to it's high prices, Tower was never one of my favorite places to purchase things, but it was very easy to spend a couple of hours just walking around and looking at things, especially in the days before the internet, because they used to have a lot of stuff that just couldn't find anywhere else.

Rogue Toys started out in Las Vegas, and then opened up a second store in Portland (OR) of all places, and of course they just had to do so a couple of months after I moved here -- although in retrospect, it was probably a good thing that I moved before it opened, as I know would've ended up going there way too often, and spending way too much money. I think it's been about two years now since I bought a NECA Robocop NES figure from them online, they had it cheaper than everyone else at the time, and although they packed it extremely well, there was no way that they could've packed it well enough to survive the ice pick that the box suffered sometime during it's time with the USPS. I don't that it was actually an ice pick that went through the box (could've been a screwdriver too), all I know is that when I got it there was a very noticeable hole going through the shipping box, through the padding in the box, and in to the figures sealed box. I had heard people say that they've had trouble with the USPS when it comes to paying out claims for damaged items, but I filed a claim, and had it accepted in less than a day, so I don't know if I was just lucky, or if those other people just weren't doing something right.

And here's my newest bag! I just recently bought a few more old issues of Scary Monsters Magazine from a person on the eBay, and to my great surprise they arrived in this circa-'92 SMM bag. The bag has definitely been around, but was still very nice to receive... now if I could just get one of those old catalogs :)

That's gonna do it for what isn't packed away, but I do have one more "sort of the same, but not really" thing that I can tack on to the end of the post...

It should come as no surprise to longtime readers of this blog to find out that I've got quite a few vinyl lunch/trick-or-treat bags from McDonald's as well. This particular McBoo bag was found by my mom at a sale sometime last year, is in minty fresh condition, and the glow-in-the-dark still glows too. I don't feel like looking up the exact year that these came out, but I want to say that it was in either 1990 or '91, because I do remember them fairly well, although I never did use one for procuring candy, because a) They were too nice to take out and get all soiled, and b) They weren't big enough to hold all of the candy that I knew was gonna be gotten... that's what pillow cases were for!

If there is actually anyone who made it through this one, thanks for reading a quick post about bags, and to all that took off early, or didn't even bother to click on, I completely understand!


Thanks for taking a moment to look at my page.