Made Real: Onion Bubs from H*R!

In the Homestar Runner cartoons there is a character named Bubs.

(Pic from hrwiki)

In the sbemail "original" Strong Bad talked about all the different Bubses they've had over the years. These included Onion Bubs.

(Pic from hrwiki)

I made one!

He was also in "Kick-a-Ball" and "Doomy Tales of the Macabre"!

I hope you love Onion Bubs as much as I do! My only wish is that he was made of more permanent stuff so he could stay with me for always!

Slush Puppie Pouch Slush Drink! - a review from the Ponder Couch

When I was working on my review of the Slush Puppie Freeze and Eat Slush Bars I found out that Slush Puppie also has slush drinks in pouches!

I got the cherry flavored pouch (I didn't find any others) and tried it.

The directions say to freeze, squeeze, and drink.

It froze solid and took a lot of squeezing.

It didn't come out of the spout very well. It was more ice chunks and melted juice than slush. The texture was surprisingly more like the common freezer pop than the Slush Puppie Freeze and Eat Slush Bars.

The other option, besides the spout, is to tear the pouch open and dump it out, pour it into a glass, or use a spoon.  I suppose that's several other options.

This was pretty good. It's no substitute for a real Slush Puppie slush drink from a Tastee Freeze or other small town eatery, but it's still pretty tasty.

I suppose my only complaint with it is that it didn't have any Paw Points on it! So I guess I won't be buying any more of these in my efforts to earn enough Paw Points to get a medium t-shirt.

Slush Puppie, if you're reading this. Please... send me a Slush Puppie machine.

Ponder and Enlightening for 6/28/14!

                                                             Click on it to make it bigger!

This is the newest Ponder and Enlightening comic! Click here to start with the first comic!

Made Real: H*R- Marshie and Cold Ones!

I've been making things from the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip real for almost 1/2 a year now for Project CALVIN and HOBBES! I plan to keep making something for Project C and H for as long as I can, but I've decided to expand it into"Made Real"!

For the "Made Real" series I will be making fictional things real from other sources that also make me happy! It could be other comics, cartoons, shows, movies, etc. Whatever I wanna make real, I'll make real!

I was thinking about calling the series something like "Joy Made Real" or "Awesome Made Real", but any and all of those just didn't seem enough. So I am going the Jack White III route and stripping it down to the essence: Made Real. It means all of those wonderful adjectives are becoming incarnate entities. I am taking stuff I love that doesn't really exist and turning them into little works of... real.

To start off the non-Calvin and Hobbes Made Real stuff I'm focusing on Homestar Runner! Homestar Runner and Strong Bad have been important to my ever since my friend Justin Whitcomb introduced me to them back in 2000-mumbles. I love them almost as much as C and H, but I do not have any H*R characters tattooed on me.

The first thing I've Made Real from Homestar Runner is Marshie! I took a real marshmallow, took a bite out of it, and drew on it.

That's... not as good as I remembered it being....

Here's the other!

Mmmmmm.... Cold Ones!

I didn't actually make any beer. These were empty bottles that I took the label off... of... and added my own sticker Cold Ones label! I took the Cold One image from the Homestar Wiki and printed it on sticker label paper! Then stuck them to the bottles.

They might've been root beer bottles. I don't remember.

Cheats like 'em.

A little too much. Cheat, don't spill any Cold One on the Ponder Couch! Princess Melawesome says "The Cheat needs to calm it down"!

That's it for the makin' stuff portion of this article post. Here's my Homestar Runner collection!

I've seen all of the cartoons and played the games and stuff on the interwebs.

Here's all of the DVDs!

The two shirts I have

Both are Cheat-related. I used to have the Homestar star, but I... don't... anymore...


The CD!

The Limozeen sticker that came with the CD!

... covered by a Ravenclaw sticker...

2 key chains!

And I had the Strong Bad messenger bag, but it got all ripped up. So I cut out the SB image and sewed it onto another messenger bag. Which also got worn out. Then I cut it out and sewed it onto my current messenger bag!

Lookin' good, Strongabea!

And the action figures!

on my embarrassingly-dusty shelf! I don't have series 2. I thought I did. I was wrong.

I also have Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People! digitally. I bought it for the computer and then for the Wii. I also have the Aquabats album with Strong Bad singing about Pink Pants! Also digital. Here's a video of him singing it with the Bat Commander!

And I think that's it! I would love to have more shirts and the 2nd series of figures from the Homestar Runner Store!

You know... if you wanna buy me something...

"A one that is not cold, is scarcely a one at all." - Strong Bad

Krispy Kreme Glazed Pies! - a review from the Ponder Couch

I tweeted this after trying a Krispy Kreme Glazed Banana Kreme Pie and a Krispy Kreme Glazed Lemon Pie. They were both amazing. There are actually five different kinds of Krispy Kreme Glazed Pies available at the new Marsh grocery store which is up the street from my house (the Ponder Haus).

I loved all two of the glazed pies I tried and was sad that they were only for a limited time.

So I decided to review them all while they are still around. Then I found out that only the Banana Cream Glazed Pie (my favorite) is the only one that is for a limited time. Only.

So here goes the reviews!

Glazed Chocolate Pie! It was my least favorite. It kinda tastes like chocolate library paste. Library paste?  I looked it up and Library Paste is indeed what I meant.

Next Glazed Pie!

Glazed Apple Pie! I don't usually like apple pie, but this was pretty good!

The pieces of apple in it don't have the usual apple pie mouth feel that I like not so much.

...

I don't like apple pies.

Glazed Pie the 3rd!

Glazed Banana Kreme Pie! My favorite of all 5! I recommend that you try to find this and buy as many as you can while they are still available (Limited Time Only!)!

It's the best Banana Kreme Pie (or banana cream pie, for that matter) I've ever had. It so creamy and banana.... and the glazed doughnut pie crust... !

Glazed Pie 4!

Glazed Cherry Pie!

Cherry is the favorite fruit flavor for everything. It's fine. I like cherry flavor. It's pretty much always good in whatever product it resides.

Glazed pie is no different.


Glazed Pie the Last (5)!

Glazed Lemon Pie!

When the Limited Time (only) runs out, and the Banana Kreme Glazed Pies have left us forever, my only comfort will be that the Glazed Lemon Pies will still be around. They are my second favorite. So creamy lemon that you'll wish you wish you had a time machine to stretch out the taste for infinity and you could just taste it forever. Always just as delicious, always lemon cream.

That is all of them! Go out and try them if you want something new in your life that you'll want to keep eating even though they are not at all good for you.

Ponder and Enlightening for 06/21/14

Click on it to make it bigger!

This is the newest Ponder and Enlightening comic! Click here to start with the first comic!

Suncoast Motion Picture Company - a Memorandum

Back in September of 2011 I wrote a review of defictionalized Cheesy Poofs. In the article I mentioned my love for the Suncoast Motion Picture Company and said I would write more about it later.

(picture from a google search)

NOW IS THAT LATER!

I love the Suncoast Motion Picture Company today just as much as I did when it was still only 15 miles or so away from me in Sioux Falls when I lived in Hartford. I would frequent the store, browsing and downright loitering every time I visited the mall (frequently).

The thing about the Suncoast Motion Picture Company was... sure, they had VHS tapes. That is where I bought my video copies of "Mystery Science Theater 3000: the Movie", "Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail", and saw a physical copy of "The Garbage Pail Kids Movie" (dear lord, do not watch it)... And it was the first place I bought a DVD when those started showing up in stores. I think they used to sell laser discs as well.

The thing about the Suncoast Motion Picture Company was... yes, they had CDs and comic books. Suncoast was the first time I realized that "Tank Girl" was a comic book before it was a movie. They had a copy of one of the trades. I thumbed through it and swore one day to own it. (I have read it more than once, but do not own a copy as of yet).

The thing about the Suncoast Motion Picture Company was that they were the first place I found defictionalized products! Suncoast had the first box of real life Cheesy Poofs I ever tried.

(picture from www.sideshowcollectors.com)

Suncoast had the only for-human-consumption Scooby Snacks I've ever seen (and purchased, I'd love to find them again so I could do a review).

(picture from wikipedia.com)

When the movie version of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" came out, Suncoast had the knitted version of the characters. They were amazing.

(picture from starstore.com)

Suncoast had lots of toys, including the scary Todd McFarlane fairy tale toys, Space Ghost: Coast to Coast toys, and decks of cards in over-sized fictional beer and soda cans.

(Me and Slurm and Fry!)

There were so many reasons to love the Suncoast Motion Picture Company... is what I'm trying to say.

Suncoast was around before I knew that I could get almost anything in the store off of the internet. Given the choice I would still go to Suncoast instead of using giant online stores (amazon.ca, what's the website for that?).

I even applied to work at Suncoast one summer. They took my application and told me that they thought there might be a position opening up soon. They never called me back.

*****

When I was researching Cheesy Poofs for the 2011 post I found out that there was still a Suncoast Motion Picture Company store open at the Fort Wayne mall in Indiana! I got unreasonably exited about it and decided to visit right away so I could write an article about it for the pondercouch.

So I finally got around to it a few weeks ago.

Sir Mike, Geoff, and I drove the 2 hours and change to see this Suncoast store in person. I'd called the store a few months before to make sure it was still a Suncoast and hadn't been turned into an FYE. I like FYE stores okay, but they just aren't as nostalgic as Suncoast...

We walked all over the mall, hoping to happen upon it.

I'd even looked online and saw that there were pictures of it on yelp from 2012. So it had to still be there, right?

We never found it.

After we walked around the mall we broke down and looked at the directory. The directory still listed it. We checked the place the directory said it should be and it was a Forever 21 or some other such nonsense.

I fought back man-tears as we got some food court pizza (me) and cheese steaks (them). I got some Funyuns, too. As we ate I looked up and called the Suncoast store number. It was out of service.

We had been defeated by the higher powers. And my poor planning/research skills.

At least there was a wicked-awesome 2 story carousel next to the food court that we could watch as we ate and I sulked.

(wicked-awesome. Taken with my iphone.)

On our way into town we noticed a store near the mall named "Ollie's Bargain Outlet"!

(This is a photo I took of the Ollie's in Carmel IN, just north of Indianapolis)

We had to check it out! It turns out Ollie's is full-to-the-roof with marked down merch. From the website: "Ollie’s Bargain Outlet is one of America’s largest retailers of closeouts, excess inventory, and salvage merchandise."

Every section has a sign with a great drawing of Ollie with some kind of pun or play on words relating the merchandise in that section.

You have everything for Christian YA novels to Cheese Doodles to jumpsuits that would be perfect for a Ghostbusters cosplay!

We loved it! Geoff bought some off-season Capri Sun Jingle Berry Juice.

(picture from www.dinosaurdracula.com)

It was amazing.

All-in-all, it was a great trip.