Why can't everyday be like Columbus Day?

It's not very often that I have what I'd call a 'perfect' day out, and by 'out' I mean, out amongst the masses. I can head out into the woods all by myself for a couple of hours and have a great time, but when other people are involved it doesn't take much to ruin, or at least lessen the fun of, an excursion.

Crying babies, whiny children, whiny adults (is it just me, or does this particular group seem to be on the rise?), not too mention traffic issues, namely all of the people who've gotten their license from a box of Cracker Jacks; any and all can make me wish that I had just stayed home. This being said, I just so happened to have had one of those rare 'perfect' days out a couple of weeks ago - Columbus Day to be more specific- when I went to Knoxville to go to McKay's (heaven for lovers of all things physical media), and then hit the "local" bookstore, and a thrift store on the way home.

Traffic was a little dense in a few places, being a holiday, this was expected, but other than that I had absolutely no issues with anyone, or anything, during the rest of the day trip. I took some stuff in to McKay's for trade, and ended up getting $44 in credit, which was more than I was expecting, so that certainly was a good thing. I then spent $28 of said credit on some really neat things (including two Christmas presents!), which would've been good enough for the day, but I also ended up grabbing a couple of things at the bookstore, and the thrift store, so all in all, it was a pretty good day for this lover of STUFF.

Seeing as how this post is loaded with STUFF, I'm going to cut the intro short, and just jump right in...

Doing some time traveling with these. I realize that very few people will care about these books, hence the group photo, instead of picturing them (and their synopsis') individually. I'm not sure why exactly, but ever since this year got started I've been feeling awfully nostalgic for all things Christopher Pike, Bob Stine, and Nicholas Pine; all of who's books I read as a kid/young teen. I've been trying to pick up anything that I didn't already have, as long as it's cheap, everywhere I go, pretty much all year, and did really well this time.

I've mentioned more than a few times on here that Kolchak is my all-time favorite television show, but what I haven't mentioned is that book adaptations for the two original television films, The Night Stalker, and The Night Strangler, have been eluding me for years. Sure, I could've long ago paid the stupid-high online prices to get them, but that's not my way, so I've waited, and waited, waited some more; and have now been partially rewarded for my wait by this finding of the first adaptation, and for a very reasonable price I might add. 

This book has definitely seen better days, but was still a find. Now if I can just 'find' a better copy at some point :)

I remember checking out this series (as they came out) from the library way back when, but never owned any of them. I own some of the newer Predator books (the good ones), and am now endeavoring to go back and get all of this run.

That concludes the book portion of my purchases, so let's head to the bargain DVD/Blu-Ray section, shall we?

Seems kind of funny that I'm just now upgrading my VHS copy of Predator 2 to DVD, I guess that means that on my current trajectory, 2045 should see me upgrading this DVD copy to Blu-Ray.

Just another upgrade here, albeit this time on a film that I haven't watched in far too long.

Here's one that was new to me. I'm not sure how it could've flown under my radar for so long, but it did. Still haven't watched though, so I don't have much else to say about it at this time.

Nothing says early 2000's like DVD's of old, and somewhat obscure, low-budget horror films from Alpha Video. I had read about this film a few times over the years, but had never seen it. Now that I have, I can say that it's not quite what I expected, and definitely isn't for everyone, but I could see myself watching it again, so that alone makes it worth the $0.95 that I paid for it. As an aside, I feel like there might've been a few things that didn't make it past the censors in this one. I don't have it on any sort of authority mind you, it just seems like some of the sexual content was pushing the limits of what you could get away with at the time. It'd be interesting to know if there was anything that had to be cut, and if so, has the footage survived?

I don't normally spend a lot of time looking through their bargain CD's, mostly because they're all mixed up, and I just don't like having to sift through all of the crap. However, I did have some extra time before leaving, and decided to look through at least one multi-tiered shelves worth.

In case you ever wondered what my reflected fingers looked like...

I'm not a huge Tori Amos fan, a little of her goes a long way with me, but my favorite song of hers is on this album(Caught a Lite Sneeze), and even though I've never heard anything else off of it, I figured it was worth a go for 25¢. After listening to it, I'm glad I didn't pay any more for it than I did, it's terrible! Other than Lite Sneeze, I think I liked half of one other song and that was it. They can't all be winners.

I think it was either late last year, or earlier this year, that they added a big bin for small toys, mostly of the fast food premium variety. It's one of those deals where they have pre-priced bags that you can fill up, or if you only want one, or in my case two, you can also buy them separately (95¢ each).

Fast food premiums look like sh*t when left in their bags, and should always be opened, so...

I don't recall Burger King having the Gargoyles license back in 1995, but we rarely ever ate at BK, plus I would've been 12 or 13 at that time, and wouldn't have still been ordering kids meals anyway. I was still buying the toys however, especially when at the collectibles show that used to be held at the Expo Center in Portland. Looking at toy line now, I think that this figure of Broadway is the best of the bunch, not sure if his color changing feature still works though, I'd rather not muck him up trying to test it.

I never saw Disney's Hunchback, nor do I ever plan to see it, but I have a thing for gargoyles (and Gargoyles), so when I sees a cheap gargoyle, of any kind, I usually buys it. 

I struck out in the action figure department this time, so these were my consolation prize if you will

Broadway came with this cool foldout (which is currently being flattened out underneath a stack of heavy books).

In case you're wondering, Gargoyles shoes are really hard to find in 2020, I already looked :)

Not counting the presents I got, that's the end of my purchased haul from McKay's, but not my entire haul, as I grabbed a few things from the free box out front as I left.

This book is about as chunky as a paperbound book gets. I didn't notice anything wrong with it either, so I'm not sure it was free. It might be awhile before I give it a go, but it's always nice to have options around.

I'm fully expecting to dislike this one, but again... options!

Free cassette? Sure, why not. Too bad it f*cked up like three tracks in though, which of course the person who tried to trade in probably knew about, I really dislike those kind of people. They're the same ones who donate wonked videos to thrift stores, wonked videos that are then purchased by obsolete weirdo's like me.

Aside from the crappy free cassette, it was an awesome day spent at McKay's. But as mentioned, it wasn't my only stop that day, the closest bookstore was hit on the way home as well...

Every time I think that I've found all of the Alfred Hitchcock short story collections, I find another one! These are always good, and this one has by far the best cover of any of the ones I own. Hopefully I can find a nicer copy at some point.

Looks like I'm doing shadow puppets.

Here was a nice surprise, and another item that's been on my to get list for quite some time. Of the two Sherlock Holmes v. Jack the Ripper films, I prefer A Study in Terror, but I do like this one too. After re-watching it this past weekend, I realized that the last time I had seen it was on AMC, when the channel was still commercial-free. Any cable historians out there will know how long ago that was, for everyone else, that's over twenty years ago.

Here's another one that I haven't seen in ages, and have never seen for sale anywhere. I remember reading once that this film was only so-so as far as spaghetti westerns go, but I always thought it was a fun one, certainly not the best, but also nowhere near the worst.

And ending my bookstore goodies is yet another upgrade.

Even though it's not my favorite thrift store, more often than not when I go to the bookstore, I end up going to Threads of Hope, which is just across the parking lot. I didn't find anything of interest this time, but on the way out I noticed a table on the other side of their lobby(?) that I came in from, piled up with with wrecked books, and slipcase-less videos; color me intrigued!

Nothing was priced, and given everything's condition, I suspected that they were free, but still went back in to confirm. I was right, free videos!

I grabbed all five of the recorded videos, three of which didn't say what was on them, and Touring New Zealand.

All the videos were dirty, like they had been stored in a garage, which is never a good sign, but hey, they were free! This was one that I was most excited for, being an old tape, maybe whoever had recorded this episode during it's original run -- but I'll never know for sure, because it was just static. Either they didn't record it properly, or the tape came in contact with a magnet at some point.

This 'Home Video' was intriguing too. And praise be, it works! I haven't watched much of it yet, but it's from someone's Christmas party back on 12/24/92, about 2 ½ hours worth. I'm not one to upload things to YouTube, but I wonder if there's any sort of moral, or legal, dilemma about uploading something like this?

One of the other unmarked videos seems to be a couple of hours worth of SoapNet programming, and from what I can deduce it was recorded somewhere between 2003 and 2005. It starts with new episodes of One Life to Live and General Hospital (both of which are god awful btw), which are followed by Soap Talk, one of who's guests was Darva Conger (remember her?). I stopped it when an old episode of Dallas came on, because I actually want to watch that, but didn't want to do it when I was previewing the tape. Who knows if there's anything after that. I still have two unmarked tapes to go, and won't lie when I say that my hopes are high.

So, like I said earlier, it was a good day, one that I'm hoping to duplicate on the very day that this post is being published, as I'll be in Knoxville again, and of course will be stopping in at McKay's again. I've got more stuff to take in, and am hoping that an item which I naively passed on last time (I didn't know what it was, now I do), will still be there. I also found out about another bookstore that's about 25 minutes north of McKay's, that I really want to go to as well. 

Thanks for taking a moment to look at my page.

DC comics buyout at Ollie's part 2

In part one of this series, I mentioned that if all went as planned, I would be going to the Nashville Ollie's (as well as back to the Cookeville location) to see what might still be available from this sale that has been going on for six weeks and counting, and even though mother nature seemingly tried to dissuade me from doing so, I did end up going last Saturday... and thankfully there was still plenty to be had.

The forecast was calling for 2-4" of rain to fall throughout the day (and it did), being from the Pacific Northwest I am quite comfortable driving in any adverse weather conditions, but the people here are a different story, so I do have some mild concerns about sharing the roadways with them during inclement weather.

About 30 minutes into the drive there, it started dumping, so the next hour or so was spent traveling through a whiteout. Thankfully though, the traffic kept moving at a decent pace (75-85 mph), so my time table was effected in any way. I actually ended up getting there early, and was the first person through the doors that morning.

Once again I'm starting off with a couple of Showcase "phone books". I wasn't familiar with Strange Adventures in the least, but with a cover and synopsis like that, how could I not give it a try?

This series sounds like it was pretty hokey, but for $3.99 it's worth the risk.

This was by far the biggest, both in price and in sheer size, purchase of the day. I had seen this book being shown in some of the YouTube videos that were made right after the sale started, but I figured that after almost a month and a half later that there was going to be no chance of my still being able to find one. The comic book gods must have been with me that day, as it was the last copy that they had. Also, within just couple of minutes after I put it in my basket... another fellow showed up, and by the way he was checking the prices of everything on his phone I could tell that he was buying for resale purposes, and had I not gotten there before him, this book would have been listed on eBay by day's end.

See how big this honker is, I would be very surprised if it weighed in at less than five pounds.

The retail price of this book was $60, and it's currently $40 on Amazon, so even though the $12.99 price tag seems like a lot, it really isn't. Considering that this was the book that I was most hoping to acquire, I would have been happy even if that was all that I ended up getting, but it wasn't... so let's get back to it.

I believe that there are three different Tales of the Batman books out there, all three of which were done by a different artist, on this particular day I able to pick up two of the three (the other one is a couple of books down).

More Batman of course. This is the third book of a three-part series, so I'm going to have to try and find the first two at some point.

For such a relatively thin book, this one has got a lot going on!

This is the one book that I have a little bit of buyer's remorse on, as I didn't read the back as carefully as I should have, but maybe The Outsiders teaming up with John Walsh won't be as bas as it sounds.

This Shazam hardback didn't have a synopsis, and with it still being sealed and all, I just have to hope that it will be good. Me thinks that Billy might have some choice words in regards to this particular title.

I suspect that this will be the better of the two Tales of the Batman books that I ended up getting. I was surprised to find that the Nashville location still had so many different hardbacks available, not that I'm complaining mind you, I'm just sayin'.

No one should be too surprised to hear that I had to make a quick perusal of the toy aisle before leaving, or that I ended up finding something of interest either. They also had the Arnim Zola figure from this series, but it is a very unattractive figure, so he had stay behind.

The Nashville Ollie's also has a fairly decent DVD section as well, and not surprisingly, I found a couple more things of interest, including this boxed series of BBC's Life. This was another great production from the BBC, my only complaint was them having Oprah narrate it for the American audience, while the great David Attenborough narrated the version meant for European audiences. David always narrates the BBC nature programs, so I still don't know why they changed it up for this particular series. I mean if you were going to change it up for the American crowd, you could have at least gotten someone with a more distinguished voice to the job... and someone who wouldn't mispronounce as many words as Oprah did throughout the series!

No, this isn't Manbo, it's the surprisingly enjoyable Manborg.

I hadn't seen this before, and had no idea what to expect, but I ended up really liking it. It's cheesy as all get out, and the budget for this picture had to be like $5, but they made it work. I really can't put into words why I liked it, but I would recommend giving it a chance, especially if you come across it for $1.99.

So as I mentioned at the beginning, I took an oh so slight detour before heading home in order to hit up the Cookeville store again. I was most curious to see if anything new had been put out in the week since my previous visit. It's about 75 miles between stores and it was of course, still raining... now I was driving right into the storm, so for the next hour and change it was like driving straight into a monsoon. The highways here were not designed to accommodate a lot of rain, so they tend to acquire standing water pretty quickly, which made the drive a little more interesting as well. I saw one car that, judging by the angle of it's resting place, had hydroplaned off the road on the opposite side of the highway. And a car in front me hit a pool of water and almost lost it, as the driver obviously panicked when he/she started to slide and almost over corrected right into a concrete divider, which obviously would have been bad for them... and for me, as I probably wouldn't have been able to avoid hitting them, especially since there was a semi on my right, so was no where else for me to go.

Anyway, I made it to Cookeville in one piece (not that I thought I wouldn't), and ended up finding a few more things:

Without even trying I seem to have acquired a mini-collection of these Showcase books. This was yet another title that I wasn't familiar with, but since sounds sort of Thundarrish, I am looking forward to reading it.

I'm expecting this to be really good too, and how great is that cover?

There was quite a few different titles that hadn't been out the week before, but the above three were the only one's that jumped out at me. I thought it was kind of interesting too, that all three of the copies that I got, appeared to be the only copy of each title available.

All in all, I would say that it was another successful outing, and certainly worth all the driving. After making the trek to the Knoxville location a couple of days ago, I now have at least one more entry for this series, but I'll probably get a few card posts in before I get around to the haul that was brought home from that trip.


Thanks for taking a moment to look at my page.