Robot Claw

Happy Birthday To Me

March 3rd, 2021

It’s my birthday today! I was brought into this world at least 21 years ago to bring joy to my friends and despair to my enemies!

And as befits one of my stature, I received wonderful gifts. A lot of gifts. Too many in fact. Here’s some of them, so I can look back in future years and marvel at the bounty I received.

Let’s get some tedious stuff out of the way first. I got a bunch of games, mostly for the Switch. Many of these I bought myself and KLS squirreled away until today, and I’ll probably be playing them over the next year.

If you think this is a lot… well here are the DVDs!

There’s a story behind this haul: we’ve been doing ‘movie nights’ on Fridays and Saturdays for a while, and despite having a wealth of options available via streaming are stubbornly watching DVDs, mostly purchased for a song ($3.74 usually) from Walmart. Eventually we thought to check Amazon for cheap DVDs (yes, we actually searched for ‘cheap DVDs’) and found a goldmine! Some of those in the photo were under $3!! Yes we’ve seen almost all of them already, and yes many are ‘bad’ films, but neither means they won’t be fun to watch again 🙂

I got loads of books as well – 15 in total including a few hardcover art books – but that’s boring to most of you so I’ll skip it and move on to the more unusual stuff, like this:

A Pac-Man watch! It’s a Timex digital watch made to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Pac-Man! It’s all metal and has a snappy design and even plays the iconic theme when you hold a button down. I like this a lot 🙂

I got three boxes of trading cards! The Hook ones are from the movie (that I’ve never seen) that came out in 1991 and include stickers that you may see on a future postcard. The other box are Japanese ‘card + wafer’s for a game series I’ve never played. The cards are plastic with fantastic art though and I like them. I got a second box in a different series as well. (Alas Bandai stopped making wafer cards last year…)

This titanic LEGO kit came from J&J and was a massive surprise since I didn’t even know it existed. A 4000+ piece working roller coaster?!? You can expect a detailed blog post when I get around to building this one!

Bernard sent me these nifty photo coasters, and he was nice enough to include some stylish photos since he knew we didn’t have a printer. They’re extremely well engineered coasters and have already found their way onto our tables and desks!

A surprise gift from KLS was this amazing tiny synthesizer that makes all sorts of groovy electronic sounds and tunes. I’ve only played with it briefly but it seems to have a lot of depth! I’m very impressed so far and looking forward to composing a killer tune on it.

As I said I was spoiled mightily and this post doesn’t even show the model kits (yes plural), the candy (including sent from Australia – thanks SMC!), the shirts (including the one in the first pic – thanks SFL!) and various other items. Special shout out for my birthday cards: I got many this year and they were all extremely high quality 🙂

With birthday cupcake in belly it’s soon time to prepare dinner – Chicken a la Zoffë, Tuscan style is what I’ll cook myself – then an evening of dueling in my new Yu-Gi-Oh game. A great end in other words to a great day!

Posted in Miscellaneous | 1 Comment »

Japanese Stamps

March 2nd, 2021

It’s time to open another topical stamp pack, and this time it’s this one:

This envelope contains 100 Japanese stamps and – as with most of the packets I’m going through here on the blog – was purchased inexpensively from a Canadian seller. I was looking forward to opening this one since I knew it would contain mostly postal-used and canceled stamps, and not just the ones printed for collectors like we saw in mushrooms or trains.

The pack contained 102 stamps in total, including one repeat (can you find it above) and one unusual stamp that I didn’t include with the others in the pic. I’ll get to that one in a bit.

As you can see it’s a very colorful selection, and there’s a good variation in size as well. A few seem to be matched pairs from series, but the vast majority of these seem unique.

The above shows the largest and smallest stamps in the pack, both of which show traditional art which seems to be a popular topic of Japanese stamps. There’s quite a few stamps in this selection showing painting or pottery or more unique Japanese forms of artwork like flower arranging or origami.

There’s also a very large amount of commemorative stamps, often released for specific events. Many of these are scientific topics – such as the one on the right celebrating electron microscopy – but there’s also a lot of stamps commemorating organizations like Rotary or the Olympics.

As with most countries the most common type of stamp seems to be based around nature or animals. Despite growing up in Australia I somewhat associate cicadas with Japan now, so this is a fitting example.

Very few of the stamps are dated, but those that are seem to be from the 1960s through 1990s. This beautiful goldfish stamp is from 1966, and shows the high level of detail common to the older Japanese stamps that were in this packet.

Quite a few stamps feature metallic inks, including this origami stamp from 1996. Fancy inks on stamps are always nice, and I know from recent visits (and Postcrossing) that Japan still uses metallic inks quite commonly today.

This was the unusual stamp that I first thought was mistakenly included, but this is actually a Malaya stamp issued during the Japanese occupation of 1943. It’s not canceled: the black inked marking is an overprint applied by the Japanese forces on the native stamps. For all it’s historical interest these are apparently quite common; I suppose there wasn’t much postage being used in Malaya during those few years?

This last pic is of stamps on cards I’ve sent myself from Japan these past few years, and you can see the colorful designs have continued. Japan seems to issue an astonishing amount of stamps, but as a tourist that can’t speak the language its difficult for me to buy them when I visit! That said I’ve tried hard to use a variety of stamps on the cards I send from there, so take a second look at the ones I sent you to see what you got!

This was a good topical pack, and I enjoyed seeing the variety of included stamps. If I could get one, I’d like a second pack of stamps from 2000 onwards (although self-adhesive stamps don’t seem to be collected or sold this way).

In another month I’ll open another themed pack. What will it be? Come back next month to find out 🙂

Posted in Collecting, Stamps | Comments Closed

Magazines

March 1st, 2021

I’ve been buying magazines since I was a little squirt. Indeed, when I think back to the first things I bought with ‘my own money’, magazines are on that list. In those days it was mostly the British 8-bit gaming magazines that would find their way – months late – to the Australia newsstands, and I eagerly purchased and devoured the contents of Computer & Video Games, Commodore User and the mighty Zzap!64.

While ostensibly aimed at younger readers, these magazines didn’t simplify their editorial and even when I was 12 I knew the content wasn’t just trash for kids (as compared to another mag I bought, Smash Hits). The UK computer magazines were loaded with content and not easily read in a single sitting, I would invariably read every word including detailed hints or walkthroughs for games I would never own. I wrote to them as well, and sometimes even entered their contests. I suppose I optimistically thought that being on the other side of the world wouldn’t invalidate my entry!

All good things end though, but when I grew older and walked away from the 8-bit computer mags I simply replaced them with another essential purchase: the UK music rags NME and Melody Maker. These were pretentious magazines/newspapers covering all the bands ‘the kids’ (ie. late teenage me) were into. While I rarely read everything I lapped up the frequent content on the goth bands of the era, and even still have cuttings from some of the issues I bought back then! Of course with the rise of grunge in the early 90’s these rags changed their focus and I dropped them like an old shoe.

In these days I was also buying a few others: titles like Goldmine (for record collecting news), other music mags if they had an interview with a band I listened to, the occasional PC gaming mag and every now and then an RPG mag like Dragon, Dungeon or White Dwarf (before it went to a GW-only mag in 1987). These latter ones frustrated me since they weren’t on newsstands and only rarely available in (the very few) games shops I visited. I certainly would have bought them more often had they been more available.

Then came America. I gave away the few mags I still had before leaving Oz and within days of landing in the US I got into console gaming in a big way and very quickly started buying all the local mags like EGM, CGW PSM, Gamefan and (eventually) Next Generation. These were almost all trash: utterly beholden to the industry they covered and walking a very thin line between advertising and editorializing. Of course I knew this, but these were pre-internet days and if you wanted info on upcoming games this was all we had. I bought and read them all for many years.

For many years we also had a subscription to Entertainment Weekly, and even though I’ve never ever watched an episode I feel I have a deep understanding of Friends as a result of the countless articles on the show from that magazine! The RPG magazines were much easier to find here as well and I regularly purchased Dragon and Dungeon until they both folded. I also bought the occasional comic and toy magazines (absolute, utter trash like Wizard and Toyfare) and also some Japanese magazines on otaku topics just to look at pretty pictures 🙂

During these years though, and as a result of the internet, magazines started to die. I recently watched a stream in which a once-editor of classic 8-bit UK computer magazines lamented that it was trivial to make money in the 1980s since no matter what they printed the mags flew off the shelf, but that now it’s almost impossible to make money running a game magazine since the customers are all online and most newsstands won’t devote space to stocking them. In short: the younger generations find magazines quaint and unnecessary in an era of free information online, and the industry hasn’t find a way to counter this yet.

But I still love my magazines, and still eagerly purchase ones I like! Even during covid I’ve managed one or two trips to our local Barnes and Noble bookstore – which contains our only local newsstand of note – and the above photo shows the haul from my last trip. A stamp magazine, a retro-game specific magazine, a comic mag, a trading card magazine and two genre magazines (sci-fi and horror). With the exception of the card and comic ones these are all imported from the UK, and as a result of both covid and Brexit are hellishly expensive now! But I still read them avidly, and I’ll continue to buy them until the day they eventually go under.

I fear that day is sooner than later though, and I imagine magazines will eventually go the way of the DVD or physical game release. But I’ll hope for a renaissance – if vinyl returns surely magazine can as well? – and spend my time happily reading the latest and greatest issue of a magazine entirely devoted to games or movies released decades ago 🙂

Posted in Blog, Books, Books & Comics, History, Miscellaneous, Otaku | 2 Comments »

Two Card Packs

February 27th, 2021

Amongst many other wonderful things, SMC sent me two old packs of trading cards for Christmas. I opened them today!

These Jaws cards have been on the blog before, but they’re great so let’s feature them again. Released in 1983 these were 3D cards where every pack came with a tiny pair of red/blue 3D ‘glasses’!

Interestingly the gum stick was packaged between cards, but amazingly it didn’t adhere to any of them and slid right out without causing any damage. It was of course inedible and had the consistency of hard plastic.

The cards themselves have a remarkable good level of 3D when viewed through the glasses, and I imagine were a genuine treat for kids when they bought them back then. We all know the film is trash, but since Topps chose to use illustrations rather than movie stills they could have applied this 3D method to any other card set. 3D Star Wars cards in 1983 would have blown my mind!

The second pack she sent was quite special since I’d been looking for a pack of these for years. It’s another video game themed set from 1982, and as you can see is based on everyone’s favorite Puck Man!

The gum looked like this, and was absolutely caked in fine flour! This made the interior dusty, but at least meant it hadn’t stuck to a card. Obviously I didn’t eat it!

Each pack contains 3 sticker cards and three game cards. The above shows the front and back of a sticker card, and the art here is typical of the others: dreadful. But do they still stick? No they don’t, which is a shame since they would have been great on postcards 🙂

The scratch off cards are impressively designed, but no longer work. The scratchable material has concretized over the years and is irremovable without also removing the underlying card. No high score for me!

Back in 1982 I would have loved these. Scratch-offs were almost unknown in Australia in those days, and stickers are always fun. Did I ever see or buy a pack back then? I can’t recall.

Thanks Sue; these were great 🙂

Posted in Blog, Collecting, Games, History, Otaku, Trading Cards | 1 Comment »

Farewell, Sweet Little Emi

February 19th, 2021

It was almost 12 years ago when we adopted Emi. We’d seen her in a cage in a pet store and our hearts were immediately stolen. It didn’t matter she was disabled: she was just too cute to not welcome into our home. So we did.

As with all kittens she was a bundle of energy as a babe, endlessly amusing to us and perplexing to her sisters Daisy and Yossie. Her hopping quickly got her a nickname – Hopping Toad – which led to her lifelong nickname of just Toad.

In time her leg stump became a problem, and this led to a stressful period during which she had two operations and eventually lost the remainder of the missing leg, which I wrote about in some detail. While it kept us awake at night with worry as it was occurring, this change to her life would ultimately be liberating. After that point, she was never again disabled in our eyes.

Emi loved playing on paper. She loved getting under things like boxes or bags we left on the floor. She loved snacks like potato chips and popcorn and string cheese. She loved laser pointers and chasing the feather toy. She loved looking out windows so much we installed a shelf just for her.

She loved milk so much I called her ‘milk monster’. Very often – almost every day – I’d see her patiently waiting next to my desk as I ate my breakfast, since she knew I’d put the bowl down for her to lick clean. The sight of Emi looking up at us from the floor was a common one especially if we were in the kitchen. She was a bit clumsy and often underfoot, but always cute as she intently watched.

More than anything though, Emi loved a snuggle. She was the lappest lap cat we’ve ever had, and whenever either of us was sitting she was usually in our lap. Almost always this was Kristin’s lap, and in time Emi became ‘Kristin’s cat’. Not only would she sit in her lap every evening, she also slept close to her – very often under the covers – at night. Kristin and Emi formed a very strong bond, and if you wanted to find Emi you just had to look for Kristin.

Emi matured into a wonderful old girl. She was always gentle and forgiving, and demanded little. She was tolerant with the other cats – including when a lively new kitten moved in a couple of years ago – and rarely fazed by anything. She never got very big, and even in her older years never demonstrated less agility than a four-legged cat. She had a great and unique personality, and we knew our family would never again have a girl like her.

Last weekend Emi fell ill. She was hiding and not eating, which are always bad signs for a cat. We took her to the vet and learned that she was very ill. Four days of tests and treatment followed, during which our hopes were first dashed then rose on apparent good news. But when Emi came home after the second full day at the vet it was obvious she was declining, and our hearts were heavy.

And yet she still spent that evening sleeping in Kristin’s lap, and that night snuggled next to Kristin in bed. It was what Emi loved most, and what gave her peace. Yesterday we dropped her off again for another day of vet care, and not long after received the terrible call: Emi was dying. We rushed to her to say goodbye, and with her in Kristin’s arms it was time to let Emi go.

Emi had a wonderful life, she loved us as much as we loved her, and will always be our sweet little toad. Farewell, beloved Emi: now you can watch the birds forever from an always-sunny window, and spend every afternoon and night sleeping with the mother you love.

We’ll never forget you, and our memories will always be with love.

Posted in Miscellaneous | 5 Comments »