Hot Wheels IZOD IndyCar Series

  Today I thought I would write about Hot Wheels cars. I haven't written a post about them in a long while. So around Christmas time last year, I was shopping in Ollie's Bargain Outlet, when I happened to come across some Hot Wheels IZOD IndyCar Series 1:64 scale cars. It bought 1 of each of the 4 different cars I could find since they were $1.99 each. Anyway it struck me that why on Earth would Mattel pick up the IndyCar license. Mattel already discontinued the Hot Wheels NASCAR diecast line in 2006. That begs the question, so why bother picking up a license that isn't nearly as popular as NASCAR?
  For instance every major big box store I have been in has never stocked the Hot Wheels IZOD IndyCar Series cars. These stores include Walmart, Target, Kmart, Toys "R" Us, pretty much any of them. However I have seen them in one major closeout store, Big Lots. Ollie's is a regional chain so I wouldn't count them as a major player, but they are expanding to new areas constantly.
  Did I mention that IndyCar isn't doing as well as NASCAR? That's pretty much a fact. I read in AutoWeek that IndyCar has a hard time maintaining a good fanbase. People just aren't attracted to it, whereas the NASCAR Fans are very loyal. Mattel picking up the IndyCar license was a huge mistake. Not only do these cases of cars end up in closeout stores, major retailers would rather carry the Spin Master NASCAR diecast instead. Well one thing is for sure I have more Hot Wheels IndyCar cars than Spin Master NASCAR cars. The ratio is 4:1. 
  So Mattel needs to dump the IndyCar license to get back the NASCAR license. At least the NASCAR diecast never ended up in closeout stores.

Bill McLain

Bill McLain

  Years ago a webmaster for Xerox wrote a bestselling book called Do Fish Drink Water? The book was a question and answer book that dealt with puzzling and improbable questions. This book was written and published in 1999. BilMcLain later wrote a second book called What Makes Flamingo's Pink? Unfortunately Bill McLain passed away in 2001 just before his second book went into print.
  These books were written back in a time when people really did not know how to find information on the internet through a search engine. So people would email their questions to Bill McLain through the Xerox website since he was their webmaster at the time and Bill would make it his mission to respond back to you within 24 Hours. Not much is known about the author's biography other than a brief interview found here. It's a shame that he never got to write a third book, because I have been dying for a new one and there hasn't been an Imponderables book in several years.

Gobs and Gobs of Free Stuff

This Book is a scam

  Yesterday I went to my church to drop off a huge donation of books and housewares items that my brother and sister and law had stored in our attic. While I dropped off the items I happened to stumble across a book by Matthew Lesko. The book was titled Gobs and Gobs of Free Stuff!. So I bought it for a $0.25 along with Sweatin' To The Oldies 1 & 2 on VHS for a total of $1. Anyway Gobs and Gobs of Free Stuff! is a very misleading book. For instance the book has free toys on the cover. When you look up toys in the index, toy safety comes up, not toys that are free.
  Basically this book is about free government information such as pamphlets and brochures and resources found on government websites. So if you bought this book at retail you got ripped off big time. Every Matthew Lesko book is a scam of some sort. Free Money books are so stupid because the free government grants are basically for certain regions of the USA such as certain cities in certain states. So if you bought any book by Matthew Lesko, you should feel ashamed of yourself.

Cleaning Out the Attic

  So my brother came in from Arizona with his wife and three sons to visit us and do a bit of cleaning. Around 11 years ago he moved to Hawaii and couldn't take all of his stuff with him due to the exuberant shipping costs and simply not having enough room to put all of that stuff in his house in Hawaii. Since land is so scarce and expensive in Hawaii, the houses are very small than houses on the mainland.
  Now onto the cleaning. This has got to be a very fun experience for all of us especially me because I get some things that they have no use for such as a mirror and a vintage Paymaster Check Writer which my brother denies he owns. Anyway. One of the boxes he uncovered was a file box with all of his wives bank statements and former employer benefits and credit card bills and store receipts. My brother even found their chapel rent bill from their wedding day. That was the only thing he kept out of that file box. Everything in that file box went into the shredder.
  Shredding everything was a real fun experience. Because there was so much paperwork, we had to toggle it between our shredder and the one my other brother has for his business because after too much use shredders tend to overheat and that can be a problem. So we ended up shredding everything by 11:30 PM last night and ended up with a huge black garbage bag full of shredded paper.
  In addition to the shredding of documents my brother also has a lot of stuff he doesn't have any use for back home in Arizona, so we are going to give that stuff to our church for their flea market for the church picnic in August.

Uses for old Hearses

  I always wanted a hearse since I was a little kid. For some reason I am fascinated with these custom cars used for your last ride. So about 10 years ago, a used car lot had an old 1980s Buick hearse for sale on. My dad swore he saw an elderly couple looking at the hearse when he drove by the car lot one day. Years later I came up with a joke about that. Here is that joke. One day there was this elderly couple who was looking at a used hearse. The salesman came over to the couple and asked them are you going to use that for your funeral?
   Anyway I thought of some really cool uses for old hearses. Since there is no backseat in a hearse, there is plenty of space for putting things when you are moving or helping a friend move out. The rollers for the casket would come in handy for sliding boxes or furniture down so you can have more room to put more junk in the back.

Hearses are great for moving

  Also a hearse is also ideal for junk pickers. When I was a little boy, the city of Hazleton, PA would have a junk drive every spring. The junk drive was the only time of year you could literally throw away anything away in the garbage with no restrictions whatsoever. In fact I remember people who would drive
their crappy hatchbacks and station wagons packed full of junk and drive up and down the streets looking through all of the various junk that people tossed away. It was literally The Most Wonderful Time of the Year.  Sadly the city of Hazleton allows you to toss anything away at any given week now so the Junk Drive is sadly no more. However a hearse would be great for picking up junk that people throw out.
  Did I mention that hearses are great for yard sales as well? Nothing will be able to turn heads at a yard sale by no other than a hearse. You can go to yard sale to yard sale with your hearse and not run out of room thanks to the large amount of space. Yes you might get stared at and talked about but don't let that bother you too much.
   You can even enter it in car shows and car cruises. Hearses always attract crowds and get a good reaction with the spectators. Bringing an old hearse to a car show or car cruise guarantees a lot of questions from people. People will ask you is it haunted or are you a little bit creeped out by the hearse? Just say no.
   A great use for an old hearse is using it for a haunted trail, or haunted hayride. Have it parked outside your event and you will attract visitors to your Halloween Attraction. Be sure you have a casket with it.
  Finally you can Kustomize it. Custom hearses are always cool. Especially lowrider hearses with black satin paint, ghost flames and hydraulics and spinners.

For Dummies Books Are A Waste Of Money

  Every time I go to Ollie's Bargain Outlet, I tend to look at the shelf full of those For Dummies series books. I notice every time that they never move, People just don't buy these For Dummies books like they used to anymore. It's not 1998 anymore so the tech For Dummies Books has already met it's obsolescence.

Worst For Dummies book ever

   For example, Facebook For Dummies, that book is obsolete the day it gets published due to all of the constant changes that Facebook makes to their site. Why bother to write a For Dummies book if it is going to be obsolete the moment it is published? Plus once they are obsolete nobody even wants them anymore.
   Now here is a solution to printing these books. Instead of making a printed version, they should just release an iPad or Kindle version of the books. That way, they save trees and paper and ink. This will also save retailers money and shelf space for something that will at least sell.  Now I am not for the For Dummies books at all. They are a huge waste of money that eventually will go down the drain when the newest edition of the topic the books are for such as eBay or Facebook or LinkedIn for that matter.
  Nothing will ever top the stupidity of The Royal Wedding For Dummies.  Trust me this ain't no Photoshop, it's an actual book. I've actually seen it at Ollie's Bargain Outlet with all of the other For Dummies Books.

Nipper and Chipper

  Today I thought I would write a brief post about RCA's mascots, Nipper and Chipper. For those of you who don't know, Nipper is the older dog and Chipper is the puppy. A lot of people don't know the names of the RCA dogs. In fact Nipper used to be the only dog until they added a puppy named Chipper, to represent the youthfulness of the RCA brand, while Nipper represents the elder aspect. The then current Nipper from 1995 was rescued from an animal research facility. Chipper is a Jack Russell Terrier.

The Best of Bad Luck Brian

  Today I thought I would write about one of my favorite internet memes, Bad Luck Brian. Poor Bad Luck Brian he never gets a lucky break. Here we go..

Oh The Irony

The Front of the belt buckle

See where it says Taiwan on the bottom where Texas is?

  A year or so ago, my dad gave me a belt buckle that is shaped like the United States. On the front of the belt buckle it says Made In The USA. Ironically it is really made in Taiwan. Oh the irony. This has got to be one of the most funniest examples of fails that I have ever seen. This is not only a lie but false advertising.

Enjoy this ironic fail.

Man Of Steel Movie Masters Jor-El

  On Saturday my Walmart finally restocked the Man of Steel Movie Masters figures. I was hoping it would be wave 2 with Faora but it was wave 1 instead. I needed to pick up Jor-El for my collection. Jor-El's headscan is a perfect likeness of Russell Crowe. Mattel Really hit a home run out of the ballpark with this one. 
   What irks me is that Mattel could throw in something else with the figure instead of a display stand which I will never even use. Release the command key with Jor-El instead of releasing it with the second wave Superman. Man of Steel Movie Masters figures.
   Now it's not too often that a figure of Jor-El gets made. I believe a Toys R Us exclusive Jor-El from Superman Returns. Also Hot Toys made one as well.

2 Tuff Series 1 Goldust and Marlena

  On Monday I ordered a Jakks-Pacific BCA 2 Tuff Series 1 Goldust and Marlena 2pack for $6.48. Not too shabby. I primarily bought it for the Marlena figure and to see if Goldust's blonde wig would fit on a Mattel basic Goldust. Oddly enough it fit the Mattel figure's head. Also it's odd that Marlena is in scale with a Mattel Goldust. Marlena is 5`1" in real life and Goldust is 6'6"  so the scale is dead on.

Marlena's champagne gown is stunning

  Now this 2pack is very obscure due to the Marlena figure.
   Marlena is one of Jakks finest work it is practically the perfect Jakks figure. Her headscan is dead on accurate. The hair sculpt is amazing.  Also her gown and is absolutely stunning. The way Jakks molded it is perfect. I like how they sculpted her big bosom. They also molded on earrings and bracelets and a necklace to her. Jakks really knocked this one out of the ballpark.  
  One of the unique things about Marlena is that she has no legs whatsoever. This is because Marlena's body and gown are all one piece of plastic. I guess Marlena was designed that way so she wouldn't topple over like most BCA's do. This is also Marlena's only figure ever. She never had a Mattel Figure, and I doubt she will ever have a Mattel made.

A scale comparison between a Mattel Goldust with BCA wig and Marlena.

The backside of Marlena

  Also Marlena has a cigar molded into her left hand. This is something that Mattel will never include with a figure. Cigars in kids toys? Give me a break. Not too PG is it? Anyway, The Goldust figure is unique in a way since it shows half of Dustin Runnels face and half of Goldust's face. I gave the Goldust to my nephews since I gave them the Triple H from the Chyna 2pack last year.

Celebrities and Stupid Baby Names

  One of the things that really grinds my gears is when celebrities give their baby a stupid name. Is it just me or does every celebrity do this? Kim Kardashian just named her baby girl North. I mean how retarded is that? Naming your child after a direction is pretty darn stupid and makes the Whole world shake their heads in dismay at the naming decision.

Listen to Bill Lumbergh Dammit

  Seriously why do celebrities give their kids such ridiculous names? It's very mind boggling and pops up in the back of your head from time to time. I have a theory of why celebrities give their kids stupid names. I believe they do it for shock value and controversy. They probably think that by giving their baby a stupid name will make another expecting celebrity jealous and want to top that baby name with something even stupider. 
  In other news Jessica Simpson named her newest child Ace. You ought to be kidding me. Who in their right mind would name their kid Ace? Ace would be a biker nickname or a poker player's nickname for crying out loud. Where are their brains when they name their baby's? Don't get me started on the name Apple. That name is really stupid. It's like naming your kid Banana for that matter.
  I strongly believe that celebrities be drug tested when they name their babies so when they give their baby a stupid name, the nurse can go ahead and ignore that.
  Here is a list of Stupid Celebrity Baby Names.

1. Seven
2. Moxie Crimefighter
3. Pilot Inspektor
4. Audio Science
5. Denim
6. Banjo
7. Pirate
8. Camera
9. Free
10. Buddy Bear
11. Brooklyn
12. Zuma

Hess Voyager

  If you ever do an image search of the Hess Voyager tanker ship, you either get 2 things. Thing 1 is are pictures of the 1966 Hess Voyager toy. Thing 2 is pictures of the 2002 Hess Mini Voyager. You never ever find pictures of the actual Hess Voyager tanker ship.
  Now why is this? Well for starters Hess Corporation probably never took pictures of their ship fleet for archival reference or anything. I mean why would you take pictures of a tanker ship? From a corporate reference you probably think nobody gives a hoot about a tanker ship. Well they are wrong. There are plenty of nautical enthusiasts out there who care about the history of certain vessels and whatever happened to them.  Now on to the photo of the Hess Voyager which is above.
  Apparently there has been many tanker ships named Hess Voyager in the Hess fleet.  As this picture is of the Hess Voyager it is a bit different than the 1966 Toy with some obvious details missing such as a second bridge or house.