Bob Kane signed Batman comic book

What a find! I visited one of my favorite out the way comic shops today and spent an hour digging though the back issue bins. I ended up coming home with some great old Batman, Detective, Daredevil and Amazing Spider-man issues, including one very special Batman issue. I picked up Batman issue #254 from February 1974 for just $8. Imagine my surprise when I opened it up to read it tonight and found that right there on the first page, it was signed "Bob Kane". And later on in the issue it was again signed with a note "to my friend." How lucky is that!? You don't think it could be a fake do you?

Little Golden Book Monday #122

Today's Little Golden Book is Casper and Friends, BOO-O-S On First from 1992. I have been wanting to pick up a copy of this book for a while, but never seem to find a decent copy. This one was in fair shape and at just 69 cents I could not pass it up. I happen to be a fan of Casper the Ghost, and I love the title of the book (gotta love Abbott & Costello). It also gives me an excuse to do a post about the Casper Ghosts minor league baseball team and their awesome logo... I do love logos you know!
I first heard of this team (and their logo on The Clink Room web site.
The Casper Ghosts are a Minor League Baseball team in the Pioneer League based in Casper, Wyoming, where they play at Mike Lansing Field. They are the Rookie-level affiliate of the Colorado Rockies, established in 1978.
Unveiled in 2007, the Casper Ghosts are the only team in Minor League Baseball to wear glow-in-the-dark caps. The Ghosts official colors are orange and black.
In addition, they use as an alternate logo the image of Casper the Friendly Ghost with permission from the Harvey Entertainment division of Classic Media.
And hey, notice this book, features Casper playing baseball!

Little Golden Book Monday #121

With the upcoming release of Toy Story 3 later this month, I went hunting for a new Little Golden Book based on the film. I managed to find it listed on Amazon, but when I visited my local book seller, they did not have any copies of this book. They did however have a large display of other Toy Story 3 story books, coloring books, sticker books etc. Looks like I will have to order this one via Amazon if I want a copy. Back in 2008, I had to order the Little Golden Book version of Presto which I never found at my local book sellers. Seems that many stores no longer carry the Little Golden Books and the ones that do, seem to carry a rather strange selection of Little Golden Book titles.

[UPDATE July 7, 2010 - I found a copy at a local Walmart today and on the front cover was a sticker that read "Only at Walmart", so it would seem to explain why I could not find this book at any of my usual book sellers.]

iCade - iPad Arcade Cabinet

Didn't think you needed an iPad? Think again! When the iPad was announced, we all crammed into a conference room to watch live and drool over every shiny corner and reflecty icon. After the glow of the initial announcement wore off, many of us came to the conclusion that the iPad was actually pretty useless. "It's a giant iPhone!" some said. Others exclaimed, "WTF, no Flash!?". Still, we knew that most Apple fanbots (us included) would have to have one anyway.
Knowing that many of our loyal geeky customers would eventually get their retractable claws on an iPad at some point, we knew we needed to take it to the next level. What cool things could we do with the iPad that you, our lovely geek customers, would squee over? A few brainstorming sessions later, the idea of a MAME cabinet came up and we knew we'd struck gold. How cool would it be to slide your iPad into a desktop-sized arcade cabinet and rock it old school with some Pac-Man or Space Invaders?
Enter the iCade iPad Arcade Cabinet! To use the iCade, gently slide the iPad into the docking cradle. The docking cradle uses a standard 30 pin connector to link the iPad to the professional-grade arcade controls. Once the iPad is in place, launch the iCade App (available free in the App Store April 3rd) and it's game on! We didn't want to take any chances you'd run out of juice during your favorite game, so we included a 10w USB power adapter so you can charge the iPad through any electrical outlet. Now you're all set to make an uninterrupted run on the Dig Dug World Record!
This article was on Think Geek back when the Apple iPad was released and I am sure many a video game geek ran to their local electronics store looking to pick one up. Problem is this item does not actually exist - it was just a tongue in cheek hoax, which is too bad because I really, really want one!

Little Golden Book Monday #120

Today's Little Golden Book is Walt Disney's Cinderella. This is a nice reprint, originally published in a slightly different form by Simon and Schuster in 1950. Once again, this is a LGB that doesn't seem to have an actual print date listed, but my best guess is that it is from the past 4 or 5 years.
From the the back cover: Dear Reader, Each of us remembers our own favorite Little Golden Book. I've searched our archives for the best Little Golden Books ever published to bring back as keepsake editions. You've just selected one! I'm sure this cherished classic will delight parents and grand parents as well as today's fun-loving kids. After all, lively, satisfying stories never go out of style. Look for your favorite Little Golden Book Classic! Sincerely, Diane Muldrow, Editor.
I have been meaning to pick this up for a while and finally found this copy at a local thrift shop in perfect condition, earlier today.

Little Golden Book Monday #119

Ok, so I have managed to escape from the zombies and am back for another Little Golden Book Monday. Today's book is We Help Mommy, originally from 1959, but I have no idea what year this edition is from. It has a UPC code on the front, so it is obviously not 1959, but as so many other Little Golden Books, this one doesn't seem to have a a date of printing. I have done a little Googeling to see if I could find a simple way to figure out what year a LGB was printed, but there doesn't seem to be a simple way to figure it out every time. If anyone knows of a simple way to date this and other Little Golden Books, let me know!
I particularly liked this illustration of Bobby and Martha at the grocery store. Apparently little Bobby is a fan of Little Golden Books... OR kittens... OR Little Golden Books about kittens.

Hey Look... I'm in a Groo Comic book!

I've been reading comics for over 30 years now and one of my all time favorites is Sergio Aragones GROO the Wanderer which had been going on and off all most as long. My mother is not a big comic reader, but over the years of my collecting there have been a few comics they she always looked forward to each month, two of those being Kevin Smith's Bone and Groo. For years when I would come home from the comic shop, she would ask, any comics for me??
Dark Horse just published a 4 issue mini series of Groo titled Groo the Hogs of Horder. I read issues #1 and 2 and passed both along to my mom, but I had not read issue 3 yet. When I came home with issue 4 I realized that I had never passed issue 3 along to my mom, so I gave her both 3 and 4 before I had a chance to read them. A day or two later when I picked them up, she said, "Wow, you have a letter in there!" which was news to me! I quickly snagged the comic from her and flipped to the back to have a look at the letters page, and right there on the first page was a letter from Ronn Roxburgh... wowee! There was even a response from Mark Evanier and a silly little drawing to go along with it! This is so cool as I am a big fan of both Sergio and Mark. Have been reading the Groo comics since the first appearance in Destroyer Duck and I visit Mark's blog every day!
I was thrilled to get my letter in a Groo comic book, and I didn't even have to mention the word 'mulch'.

Little Golden Book Monday #118

Today's Little Golden Book is NOT a Little Golden Book, but rather a LGB knock off called A Happy Day Book. Its the identical size of a LGB and has a shiny spine - silver instead of gold. These books were published by Standard Publishing of Cincinnati, Ohio and featured religious stories such as Jesus Makes Me Happy, Bible Stories Make My Happy, and Buzzy Bee Says "Be Happy".
This one is called Buzzy Bee Story Book and is from 1980.
When I first saw this book, it took a few seconds before I realized it was not a LGB, and I thought the bee on the cover was the Romper Room bee. Boy, did they fool me!

Little Golden Book Monday #117

Today's Little Golden Book is The Wait-for-Me Kitten by Patricia Scarry with pictures by Lillian Obligado. This is the Fourth printing from 1977, with the original being printed in 1962. Patricia happens to be the wife of one of my favorite children's story writers, second only to my all time favorite writer/artist Bill Peet.
This story follows three mischievous little kittens and their tag along pal Wait-For-Me as they go searching for some fun. Along the way they get into trouble with a big rooster, Ms. Fox, Farmer Pig and Mrs. Dog. When the other little kittens cause trouble and run away, Wait-For-Me sticks around to help Mrs. Dog re hand her laundry, which prompts Mrs. Dog to say "A good little kitten must have a reward," and she gives Wait-For-Me a big tuna fish pie to eat, yum, yum, all by himself!
But the three little kittens came tumbling over the hill. "Wait for me! Wait for me!" begged the three little kittens.
Did the littlest kitten wait for those three, hungry little kittens?
Oh yes he did! And ever since then, those three little kittens have always waited for him.

Plants Vs Zombies

Where have I been the past 2 weeks? Fighting off the frackin zombies that's where! I heard about this game called Plants Vs Zombies while listening to the podcast This Week In Tech (TWiT) and it sounded like fun. Little did I know that once I started defending my home from the zombies, I wouldn't have time for anything else! I managed to go through a full week of spring break without doing much of anything other than playing Plants Vs Zombies. Even my 4 year old is now addicted to shooting zombies with frozen pee shooters and blowing them up with potato bombs! So, if you have stuff to do, DO NOT check this out. If you, on the other hand have a few empty weeks to fill, then visit Pop Cap games. But don't say I didn't warn you!

Little Golden Book Monday #116

Today's Little Golden Book is Another Monster at the End of This Book from 1996. I didn't actually clue into this until I was writing this, but this is actually the sequel to the original Monster at the End of This Book from 1971 which I remember reading when I was younger. You can actually read the entire original book online here.
The really cool thing about my copy of Another Monster at the End of This Book is that is seems to have been owned by one of Grover and Elmo's Sesame Street pals Zoe.

Canadian Men's Hockey Wins Olympic Gold!

I was in front of my TV... where were you?

2010 Olympic Coke Bottles

I went to the Vancouver 2010 Olympics and all I got were these Coke bottles. That's OK though, as that was pretty much the reason we went in the first place.
The 2010 Winter Olympics are happening here in Vancouver, BC, CANADA and one of the big sponsors is Coke. LiveCity is an area they have set up with sponsor pavilions, live music etc. Coca Cola has a pavilion there titled "Open Happiness". My wife had seen that they were giving out free light up, color changing Coke bottles so we decided to make the trip downtown and battle the crowds to visit the Coke Pavilion and get our own light up, color changing Coke bottles. After about a 1 1/2 hour wait to get into LiveCity and another 45 minutes in line for the Coke Pavilion, we finally got inside and got to see the exhibit that they had put on - full of vintage Coke bottles and cans, lots of advertising, a short movie and some interactive games etc. After the short movie, they handed everyone an ice cold Coke, and then, if you did any of the interactive events, you got a sticker on the bottom of your Coke bottle which could then be traded in for one of the light up, color changing Coke bottles. You were supposed to trade in your empty bottle for the light up one, but we asked if we could keep the empties and they let us keep them.
We didn't get a chance to do any of the other stuff in LiveCity as we didn't get in until around 10 pm and things closed around 11 pm. We did get to watch the Sam Roberts concert while we waited in line - too bad it wasn't actually somebody I actually knew or liked.
Pictured here are 3 different Olympic Coke Bottles. The first one (far left) was purchased at my local SafeWay grocery store. The Second (middle) was given out in the Coke Pavilion, filled with ice cold Coke. The third bottle (right) is the light up, color changing bottle. It has a button the the bottom to turn it on and off. Pictured at the far right is the back of the light up bottle. It is a limited edition. This one is 28,714 of 50,000.

Kaden's Comic Book Spinner Rack

A few months ago I picked up a comic book spinner rack from our favorite toy & collectible shop called Toy Traders in Langley. They didn't need it any longer and so we arranged to purchase it. I already had one that I purchased years ago from an old drug store that was going out of business. That one is set up in my basement and is filled with some of my favorite comics. This new one has been sitting in our foyer in pieces ever since I purchased it this past summer. I finally decided to set it up, and my son asked if he could have it in his room to display his comic books. After I set it up, he spent the next hour or so arranging all of his comics just the way he liked. He was so proud of his collection he could not wait to ask mom and grandma into his room to see what he had done!
How many other four year olds have their own comic book spinner rack? For that matter, how many four year olds have enough comics to fill a comic book spinner rack?

Little Golden Book Monday #115

Today I have a couple of Little Golden Books that both feature someone sewing with a needle and thread on the cover.
First is The Brave Little Taylor from 1953. This copy is a third printing from 1975.
The second is The Elves and the Shoemaker from 1993, originally printed in 1983.

Little Golden Book Monday #114

Here is perhaps one of the most famous inside covers to a book ever. I have seen this so many times that I don't really even notice it anymore. It wasn't until I was scanning in some book covers and I was noticing all the various children's names written inside on the "This little Golden Book belongs to" spot that I decided to scan in the inside cover for today's Little Golden Book Monday.
Its kind of funny that although I had many Little Golden Books as a child, I don't recall ever writing my name in any of them. Even at a young age, I think it was the collector in me that wouldn't let me deface my books by writing in them - even it it was just my name, in a spot specially made for me to personalize my book.
Now Im really curious if I ever did write my name in one of my books. I am going now, to dig through my collection to see if I can find any of my original Little Golden Books with my young signature inside!

Little Golden Book Monday #113

Today's Little Golden Book is Disney's 101 Dalmatians, Rainbow Puppies from 1998, and based on the 101 Dalmatians animated series. As I was scanning the cover I started to recall the cartoon being on TV. I went looking but didn't find a ton of info on the cartoon. I did find out it came after the live action 101 Dalmatians movie and ran for two seasons from 1997 to 1998.

Little Golden Book Monday #112

Today's Little Golden Book is Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse, The Kitten-Sitters from 1976. This book features a few of my favorite Disney characters; Pluto and Figaro the kitten. It also features two of my least favorite Disney characters; Mickey's nephews, Morty and Ferdie. To be fair, I also dislike Donald Duck's nephews, Huey, Dewey, and Louie. There is just something unsettling about introducing 'cute' little characters alongside my favorite characters that has always urked me - need we go any farther than Scrappy-Doo!?
This book features typical '70's Disney illustrations, not really up to Disney's usual standards from previous decades. Here is one of the illustrations that happens to feature Pluto & Figaro.

Captain Canuck 1979 Reintroduction Letter

Back in 1980 when I was just learning of the enjoyment to be found in the pages of superhero comic books, I had a neighbour who showed me his modest comic book collection. In it he had 3 or 4 Superman comics and one Captain Canuck comic book. Something about that Captain Canuck comic seemed really cool and I asked him if I could have it, to which he asked, "Do you have anything to trade?" I don't remember what I ended up trading him for it, but the end result was I got to go home with my new copy of Captain Canuck, issue #6. I read it 3 or 4 times, and just couldn't get enough. On my next visit to the Bookaneer book store (which sold comic books), I asked is he had any Captain Canuck comic books and he pointed me to the rack on the wall behind the cash register. On it was all the newest comic books, and there in amongst all the other super hero comics was issue #7 of Captain Canuck!
I was so captivated by my first two Captain Canuck issues that I asked if I could subscribe to the comic. My mother who was always trying to find things I would read, was more than happy to pay the $3.90 for a years subscription.
Ever since I wrote my post about my first two comic books I have been wanting to find my copy of Captain Canuck #6 so that I can display it along with my Rom and Silver Surfer comics as my very first comic books. Today I decided to hunt though my comic boxes for the issue. After spending a while hunting though boxes, I was not able to find that particular issue - I did find a few copies of #6, all were in much to good condition to be that first issue I traded for. What I did find was a copy of issue #4 that I bought at a thrift shop years ago. What made this issue interesting was that inside it was a letter from CKR Productions, LTD that was addressed to "Original subscribers of Captain Canuck".
I think its pretty cool that a Captain Canuck fan (myself) just happened to purchase an old issue in a thrift shop that still had this letter inside. I would guess that there were not that many subscribers to the comic during the first 3 issues, so this letter would seem pretty scarce, and finding one still tucked inside the comic book years latter, priceless!
PS: I'll have to keep hunting for my first copy of Captain Canuck #6.

Little Golden Book Monday #111

Today's Little Golden Book is Walt Disney's Dumbo. This edition was originally published in 1941 in slightly different form by Simon and Schuster, Inc. This is the first Random House Edition from 2004 and features the original artwork from the 1941 edition and it is absolutly wonderful. Along with the cover I have scanned two images from the inside. One is a great full page illustration of Dumbo being pushed out a window of a burning house at the circus. The other is an illustration of the crows from the story. The crows have always been some of my favorite Disney characters and I love their song in the film "When I See an Elephant Fly".

Scratch N' Sniff Colgate Toothpase Packaging

I bought this a year or so ago and kept the box with plans to post it on my blog. Sometimes getting a good photo of something can be a real pain, and the results can be less than desired - just check out the Delgo poster in my last post.
I found this box under a pile of stuff in my office while I was rearranging stuff and thought it was time to take a crack at photographing this toothpaste box. Of the 10 photos I took this is the one that turned out the best. Kinda artsy actually!
Anyway, the reason I bought this toothpaste in the first place was the box. On the front of the box, as you can see from the photo, it has a Scratch N' Sniff spot for you to check out the vanilla mint smell. Like most scratch n' sniff, I didn't really smell much more than cardboard, but then I guess it really didn't matter, as they sold me the tooth paste anyway... cha-ching!

One of Worst Openings in the History of Cinema

Recently while at our local cheap theatre my son asked for the poster from Aliens Vs Monsters. Since we go to the theater so much the owner is more than happy to help us out with our poster requests. On this particular day he brought out two posters, the one my son had asked for, and another animated film poster that he thought my son may like. When I opened it to have a look I found it was for the film Delgo. I remembered reading about the film on Cartoon Brew. Check out what they had to say about the film:

The CG animated feature Delgo opened last weekend and nobody went to see it. According to Box Office Mojo, Delgo had the worst opening ever for a film that opened in more than 2,000 theaters earning just $511,290 or $237 per theater. Moments like this really make one pause and reflect. What is the world coming to when an animated film with the voices of Freddie Prinze Jr., Jennifer Love Hewitt, Chris Kattan, Anne Bancroft, Eric Idle, Val Kilmer, Lou Gossett Jr, Malcolm McDowell, Michael Clarke Duncan, Burt Reynolds and Kelly Ripa isn’t a box office blockbuster? A story that makes sense and visuals that don’t make you want to heave are quaint touches, but the filmmakers behind Delgo understood where it really counted: celebrity voice actors. They hired every B- and C-list actor this side of Dancing With the Stars and somehow still failed. You know the recession is affecting Americans deeply when they no longer want to see Chris Kattan and Kelly Ripa voicing their CG characters.

The theater owner who game us the poster said that it was the ONLY kids movie that he had ever played for just ONE week before removing it for another film. So not only did it do poorly on opening weekend, but it did just as poorly when it moved over to the cheap theaters.

I was going to toss out this poster as neither my son or myself really want to put it up on our walls, but I thought, with the film being so poorly received, that someone might actually want it. If anyone reading this wants it, just email me and if you are willing to pay for postage, its yours!

Reason for the Season

Here is the cover of Stryper's "Reason for the Season" EP from Enigma Records, 1984. On it you will find the long and short version of the title track along with what is perhaps my favorite Christmas song ever, Stryper's rockin' version of "Winter Wonderland"!

You can check it out with the youtube video below.

Enjoy and Merry Christmas!

Peter Pan Records - Frosty the Snowman

Here is a 45 RPM Extended Play record I found last month. Today I was going to listen to it and I found that the record inside the sleeve was not the correct one. It was instead, a Disneyland Record of Frosty the Snowman, so although it is not the actual correct record, it is at least the correct song. Too bad though, as I was really looking forward to listening to Morris, the Moose.

Coca Cola 2009 Christmas Bottles

I found these cool Coca Cola Christmas bottles at my local Walmart recently. There are two different (plastic) bottles which both look like round Christmas tree ornaments. One has Santa drinking a Coke and the other has a mother and baby polar bear also drinking a Coke. They look pretty small, but are actually 400 ml, making them slightly bigger than a traditional Coca Cola can. People were snapping these up like crazy, and I heard a few of them talking about giving them to family members etc as stocking stuffers. They have certainly made a great addition to my Coke collection.

Little Golden Book Monday #110

I forgot to post last Monday, so I missed the perfect chance to do the 12 Little Golden Books of Christmas on Monday when there was exactly 12 days till Christmas. So instead, since there are 5 days till Christmas, I present to you, The 5 Golden Books of Christmas!

On the Eighth day of Christmas my true love read to me... Santa's Surprise Book from 1966
On the Ninth day of Christmas my true love read to me... Frosty the Snowman from 1950
On the Tenth day of Christmas my true love read to me... Big Bird's Ticklish Christmas from 1997
On the Eleventh day of Christmas my true love read to me... Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: Oh, Nose! from 2001
On the Twelfth day of Christmas my true love read to me... The Night Before Christmas from 1949

Roy E. Disney Passes Away

Here is a letter written by Bob Iger, Ceo of Disney today (December 16, 2009):

It is with great sadness that I inform you of the passing of our friend and colleague Roy E. Disney. After a courageous year-long fight with stomach cancer, he passed away peacefully this morning at Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach, surrounded by his loving family.... See More

Roy played an important role in our lives here at Disney, and in the success of our Company over many years. Along the way, he touched many of us in a personal way. During his 56-year association with the Company, his true passion and focus was preserving and building upon the amazing legacy of Disney animation that was started by his father and uncle. His commitment to the art of animation was unparalleled and will always remain his personal legacy and one of the greatest contributions to Disney's past, present and future.

Roy not only helped to keep the legacy alive, but he also embraced new technologies, and gave the filmmakers the tools they needed to tell their stories in new and exciting ways. He encouraged talent, and loved working with the creative community. And they loved working with him.

Roy was a Disney Legend in every sense of the word, and his contributions to this great company have been profound and will always be remembered. For the next week we will be flying the Disney flag at half mast here at the Studio and at our parks, and I know you join me in sending thoughts and prayers to Roy's wife, Leslie, his four children, and his 16 grandchildren. For those who wish to pay their respects, the family has requested that donations be made in Roy's name to the California International Sailing Association (CISA) to benefit youth sailing.

Shown here is a bumper sticker I received from Roy Disney back in 2005 promoting his Save Disney campaign. The slogan refers to Michael Eisner who at the time was the head of the Disney Company, and Roy E. Disney who had been removed from the Disney company by Eisner's regime (he was asked to come back to Disney after Eisner was removed as head of the company). This sticker has been stuck just above my iMac screen where I can see it every day every since I received it back in 2005. Now it will be just a little more special.

Little Golden Book Monday #109

Today's Little Golden Book is The Velveteen Rabbit, adapted from the story by Margery Williams and illustrated by Judith Sutton and published in 1992.
I have never read the story of the Velveteen Rabbit, but could not resist picking it up when I found it at a local thrift shop for just 25 cents. When I flipped though it, this one page stuck out to me. Is it just me or does this scene look like something out of a horror flick?! A couple of clowns, an evil looking flying lion, and one of those mechanical drummer monkeys. The rabbit looks absolutely frozen in fear... or is it just me?