Very Merry Christmas Haul!

We all have great Christmas memories, some better than others,  Most of mine involve getting new awesome toys.  When i say new awesome toys I really mean new awesome G.I. Joes!  One such memory was opening a brand new Salvo, Bullhorn, and Metal Head when I was 5.  The memories don't stop there.  The most recent memory of Joes on Christmas was 2 days ago when I opened up a vintage Wolverine with Covergirl.  I was so excited.  I didn't own many vehicles when i was younger and the Wolverine came out before I was born, so this is my first one ever.  I was so excited, my inner child started taking over.  I stopped opening my gifts politely and started ripping them open instead.  Among the fury I opened even more Joes!  A straight arm Stalker and Scarlett, Doc the teams original medic, Psyche-out the teams psychologist and psionic weapons expert,  Backstop the teams sole Canadian, and Skidmark the man who has the worst code name in the history of code names, all complete with filecards.  I knew my girlfriend was very supportive of my collecting but I never guessed she would go out of her way to get me some of the hardest to find Joes around.  It was a very merry Christmas at the Jackson's this year.

                                                              YO JOE!

Left to Right: Covergirl,Doc,Scarlett,Stalker,Skidmark,Psyche-out, and Backstop

Hardhats & Robots

   These are the two newest additions to my Joeverse.  Everybody welcome Tollbooth.  Tollbooth is the Joe's no nonsense engineer.  He was originally released in 1985 with a pretty cool vehicle called the Bridge Layer.  He was the last Joe offered in the old style swivel heads.  He's a pretty damn good looking figure too.  Look at that hard hat leaning slightly to the side.  His sledge hammer is possibly one of the greatest Joe accessories ever!  Just imagine getting slugged in the gut with that thing.  Tollbooth must get a crazy workout swinging that thing around all the time.

Next we have one of the Joe's explosives experts Lightfoot.  Lightfoot was originally released in 1988 part of the 7th series.  He looks like he's wearing yellow coveralls with a  blue helmet with red eyes and crazy antennas for what, I'm not sure, but damn does it make him look cool.  He comes with a dark green backpack and a really awesome orange ROBOT!  Sure it's for bomb detecting and disposal, but it's still a ROBOT!  This accessory goes right up there with Tollbooths sledge hammer as one of the coolest accessories of all time.

So there you have it, the two newest additions to my Joeverse Tollbooth and Lightfoot.  I'm glad i picked these two guys up.  They are great additions and two of the coolest Joes around, not to mention the terrific accessories.

Santa Came Early

With the Holiday season approaching the guys over at www.hisstank.com decided to do a secret Santa.  The point of the event is to help out your fellow collectors by getting them anything Joe related.  Well i received my perfect gifts earlier this week and I couldn't be any more happy.  A 1987 Outback, 1988 Hit n Run, and a 1983 Duke.  Now the great thing about this gift is I asked for the Outback and Hit n Run on my wishlist but the Duke was a total bonus figure.  All 3 figures are complete and with C9 paint and super tight joints.  Hit n Run is now my all time favorite Joe, a title previously owned by the Joes resident ranger Beachhead.

Sorry for the shitty picture. 

Plans

That's right it's that time again, turkeys, trees, and tinsel.  Yea you know what i mean, it's CHRISTMAS TIME!  And when Christmas time comes around I get a month long winter break from school.  Skyrim here I come, I knew I bought you are the right time.  So yea that's it for me Skyriming the month away but what about my fellow students and colleagues in crime, what are they going to do?  Are they going to play Skyrim as well or do something more constructive.  I took the liberty of asking a few students around campus what their holiday plans were and got a plethora of answers.  As a smoker I frequent the campus smoke pit and get into a lot of a conversations among my fellow smokers.  One afternoon I saw a young lady sitting by herself.  I approached her and her a couple questions about what she was doing over winter break.  Her name was Savanah Jones and she had great plans for the holiday.  "My whole family and I are going on a trip to Phoenix AZ to see my grandparents." Said Savanah.  "My family is pretty big and it's going to be one long ride with all of us crammed into a mini van."  She has some great plans get out of rainy frosty Portland and go down to clear frosty Arizona.

The following day I took my Golden Retriever Bleu to the North Clackamas Dog Park for the day, and boy were the dogs in abundance there.  I let Bleu loose and went to the human area, the picnic tables.  The tables were filled and there was no place to sit, of course.  But luckily for me a nice guy waved me over and squeezed me in.  It turns out he was a Clackamas student and was about to head on winter break himself.  I asked him what his plans were and he didn't hesitate in telling me.  "I'm in a metal band and I'm going to play a few shows over the break." said Ryan Woodrow.  "I play the keyboards and sometimes the brass when the song calls for it."

It seems like everyone has a plan for the month of December.  Some involve traveling and some involved music while others are just sitting at home, but regardless of what your winter plans are I hope you have a great break.

Battle Wagon

Feast your eyes on this marvelous piece of plastic that is the 1991 G.I. Joe Battle Wagon.  It is a terrific vehicle one of my all time favorites.  There are two aspects to the Battle Wagon that make it stand out above other similar vehicles.  1. It's battery operated and will roll over just about anything you put in its path. 2. the missiles fire Gatling gun style via a small black button on the turret.  The turret is the best part of the vehicle it's so fun to shoot not only cobras but your cat!  It can hold up to a total of 10 figures when fully loaded and doesn't look goofy.

Another awesome perk that this beast has is the tow rope on the front bumper.  Hook to a Vamp stuck in the mud and pull it to safety, or just hook up your resident mountaineer and throw him off the edge of a cliff.

This vehicle is so high tech that there are two drivers seats!  One for the driver and one for the uhh navigator?  And a there's a sweet non-bulletproof canopy to guard the precious drivers.

Did I mention it's high tech?  Well it is and has an extensive computer system in the back!  That's right, now if the Battle Wagon is broke down in the middle of the desert just get on the super fast awesome computers and contact HQ to come get you, or get the layout of the area your in and ambush those nasty Cobra's. Oh yea the computers are so high tech and powerful they are located right under the turret.

This is the Battle Wagon one of the greatest vehicles in the entire Joeverse.  I love mine, and it will be the Joe's primary vehicle until it deteriorates and crumbles to dust.

Missiles and Machetes

Here are the two newest additions to my Joe verse.  Mr missile is Fast Draw a mobile missile specialist and wannabe gunslinger.  He is carrying the new FAFNIR missile system and wears a protective body suit.  He has to be one of my all time favorite characters/figures.  His accessories are some of the toy lines best.  Thankfully he has a visor on his helmet to cover his ugly mug.

The man in the green hat on the right is Muskrat.  He is the G.I. Joe's resident swamp fighter.  He comes with a light blue machete and an awesome shotgun to keep those alligators and snapping turtles at bay.  Muskrat has been a favorite of mine since i first owned his 1993 Battle Corps figure.  Little did I know that this figure is even better than the later version.  His dark swamp green army fatigues are terrific camoflague for his specialty.  No Cobra's will be able to sneak up on old Nutria er... I mean Muskrat.

Two great additions, more to come!

Joe Collection

I promised you pictures of my collection and here it is.  It is only a temporary display until i get my official Joe shelf up and in good shape.  It's not the biggest collection ever but it's growing and will be huge one day.  So feast on my collection that is G.I. Joe.

Cobra Civil War

Thursday January 11, Cobra entered a civil war.  The IDW comic book title G.I. Joe started a year long story arc entitled The Cobra Civil War spreading across three different titles. The titles are G.I. Joe, Cobra, and G.I. Joe: Snake eyes. Each title tells the story of the civil war through the different factions eyes and how they cope with it. It was kicked off by the murder of Cobra Commander by an unknown assassin causing the Cobra Army to break into chaos. With the death of CC the army has no leadership and are without a true leader. The Cobra hierarchy came up with a way to decide who will become the new commander by having a destruction contest. The person who does the most damage to the G.I. Joe team becomes the new leader.

The contestants are: The Baroness, Krake, Major Bludd, Khalikhan, Oda Satori, Tomax, and Dr. Vargas, each bringing their own style of destruction. Most just kill as many Joes as possible, while others try to do interior damage by hurting the good name of the team itself. Many Fans of the Original G.I. Joe comic series which ended in 1994 are thrilled to see the new publishers take on their old favorite. "I love that IDW is taking G.I. Joe in a new direction by actually killing off popular characters." said Shawn Aubrey. "I like my stories dark and brutal." IDW is changing the way fans enjoy their favorite anti terrorist organization by death, betrayal, and execution. The original series was intended mainly for a child audience and contained very little death of characters. Fans love that G.I. Joe is back in comic format after the hiatus it recently had. The original series ended in the mid nighties followed by a relaunch in the early 2000s and ran for a good seven years. The new series picked up in 2008 and was a complete reboot of the property. "I am very happy to see G.I. Joe as a comic book again, I've collected them since i was around 7 years old and i hope to keep collecting them until i am 70." said Jon Rocca about his heroes.

Here is a link to the scoreboard for the candidates for Cobra Commander .

YO JOE!

As many of you know I am a huge fan of the toy line G.I. Joe A Real American Hero, have been since I was a little collector. I recently began collecting again and my collection is ever growing. Recently I added 4 new Joes to my collection. Topside the naval assault seaman, Airborne the helicopter assault trooper, Dial Tone the communications specialist, and Gung Ho the tough as nails Cajun marine. My favorite character out of the four has to be Dial Tone. His character design is a step above the others and he is from OREGON, Hell yea!

More Pics of the collections and better reviews to come.

Space Slopera

Foundation by Isaac Asimov

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I tried i really did. I read the first 100 pages but just couldn't slog through this book. I love sci-fi but this is what you would call hard Sci-fi which i guess i'm really not that into. Give me spaceships with guns a blazing and hot alien chicks and I'll finish the book in one sitting. This book is about a bunch of old scientists and mathmaticians sitting around trying to solve problems BORING!



I love Asimov's robot series, and he is one of my favorite authors of all time but i am displeased with this series. Hard to believe it won the only Hugo Award for best series of all time. This series actually beat out LOTR for that award, yea right.



View all my reviews

Parranoyable

Parranoyable, I never heard of that!

Parranoyable is a term i coined which means a paranormal entity that annoys you. The concept came to be late one night at my good friends Shawn's townhouse. It was a mistake he accidentally merged the words annoying and paranormal. We had a good laugh, and immediatley turned it into a screenplay. Here is the end result a cheap 10 minute college movie about an annoying ghost.

The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book started out strong but fizzled out towards the end. It was supposed to be a book staring the boisterous Professor Challenger but instead became a book staring the boring reporter Malone. Most of the book I was waiting for Challenger or even Lord John to be the vocal point but got stuck reading about Malone. The main dissapointment for me was a book with a dinosaur on it's cover has very little dinosaurs in it!



View all my reviews

Rock Journalism

 I recently signed up to produce a piece of work for my portfolio project at CCC and i decided to document my good friend Justin Smith's smooth rock band Gobel Warming.  I attended two gigs of theirs and was blown away.  Their sweet sound causes your ear drums to melt and ooze down your body infecting every inch with smooth harmonies and melodic tonality.

If you ever see a flyer with the words Gobel Warming Playing tonight, do yourself a favor and see them live.  They will not disappoint.

Here it is

Here it is, my first blog.  I've had the idea of starting one for quite awhile now and it has finally come to fruition.  This blog is to express my opinions and beliefs on anything I feel like sperging about, may it be comics, action figures, movies, or simply my orange tabby Riptide.  So for all who read enjoy.