Happy Halloween!

Tonight is Halloween night. What am I doing to celebrate Halloween this year? I am doing to Seattle to see one of my favorite bands, Nightwish, live. If you have not heard of Nightwish, they are an amazing metal band from Finland that combines melodic metal with operatic vocals. I saw them in 2004 when they did a handfull of shows in the US, and it was one of the best shows I have ever seen. They have a new singer now, so I am looking forward to seeing how she handles the vocals on all the old songs, as well as hearing the new songs. Should be an amazing show!
Seen here is the cover to a Casper the Friendly Ghost and Wendy the Good Little Witch book from Wonder Books, 1974 (originally printed in 1963).

PS: ABC aired It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown last night, so I recorded it while I was at work and then came home and watched it with my son. He doesn't usually sit though TV shows, but he got on the couch and sat quietly and intently watched the show with me. When it got to the part where the Peanuts kids go Trick or Treating the kids all announce what they received, Charlie Brown says "All I got was a rock", Kaden began to giggle, which I thought was funny since that has always been a favorite line of mine, and I was surprised that a 2 year old would get the humor. I guess he really is my son!

Little Golden Book Monday #29

Today's Little Golden book is The Pink Panther in the Haunted House. I have always been a big Pink Panther fan and I also love anything to do with haunted houses, so this book was a great find. This copy is a third printing from 1980.
The story has the Pink Panther buying a new home, which happens to be haunted by a ghost I especially like the real estate salesman in the story who is the character from the Pink panther cartoons. I'm not sure of him name, but he's the guy that always ends up being tormented by the Panther in each cartoon.
The story is a fun read, and I found myself being reminded of the Cat in the Hat book I enjoyed so much as a child. A great addition to my collection, and a fun read to boot!

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

Linus Believes! He keeps the faith every October 31st. And Sally's right there with him in the pumpkin patch. They don't care who laughs - Charlie Brown, Lucy, Snoopy - what do those skeptics know about the transcendental mysteries of the Great Pumpkin?
Perhaps the greatest Halloween tradition of them all, It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. It's not Halloween if you don't watch this classic cartoon on TV before Halloween night. And last year I even found a down loadable copy of the Great Pumpkin record which is now in my iTunes library ready for listening again this year. I also picked up this neat paperback edition of the story which I will share with my son this year.

Some Great Halloween Comic Reading

Being that Halloween is less than a week away, I thought I would post some recent comics that would make for some great Halloween reading.
First off we have Slave Labor Graphics Haunted Mansion comic which is based on the famous Disneyland attraction of the same name. Shown here is the most recent issue, #6. SLG obtained the rights to some great Disney properties including Tron, Gargoyles, Alice in Wonderland and the Haunted Mansion. Being a big Haunted Mansion fan and collector, this series was a no brainer. I was a little disappointed that SLG went with an anthology series instead of a continuing story, but each issue still manages to provide some fun reading.
Second we have another of SLG's Disney comics, Gargoyles. Again, I was a big fan of the show when it was on TV back in 1994, so when I saw this title I was also very interested. This series is very cool, as it is written by Gargoyles creator Greg Weisman and is written as a continution of the TV series as the creator envisioned. They have done a great job of creating stories that really feel like they have come right out of the cartoon series. The illustrations are done by David Hedgecock, Karine Charlesbois and Gordon Purcell and and looks great!
And finally we have the most recent comic version of Jason Voorhees and the Friday the 13th series. After comic runs in Topps, Avatar, Chaos Comics, the series now finds a home at Wildstorm, where already more than a handful of series titles have been released. This most recent one is titled Friday the 13th: How I Spent My Summer Vacation, a two issue limited series. This one is suggested for mature readers, and for good reason, as it is filled with lots of what you would expect from a Friday the 13th film - suspense, nudity and gore!
Check them out at your local comic shop this Halloween!

Little Golden Book Monday #28

It's Higitus-Figitus magical mirth!
Ok, I'm back... did you miss me? For today's Little Golden Book, I decided to go with something to go along with the Halloween theme since Halloween is just nine days away. What I came up with was the 1974 "Walt Disney's Donald Duck and the Witch Next Door".
The story here dose not have anything to do with Halloween directly, but it does feature a witch, who's house is made of candy, and Huey, Dewey and Louie do find some spiders and cobwebs in the attic.
While flipping though this book, I knew I recognized the witch character, but could not figure out why? A quick trip to the imdb.com web site, and a quick flip though my copy of "Disney A to Z" by Dave Smith, and I figured out that she was the witch from the 1963 Disney animated film "The Sword in the Stone" and her name was Madam Mim.
I realized that although I am a big Disney fan and own most of the Disney animated films in one form or antoher (including this one), I have never actually sat down and watched this one all the way though. I guess I will have to dust off my VHS copy of "The Sword in the Stone" and watch it with my son Kaden some time in the next 9 days.

Little Golden Book Monday will Return...

My computer is at the shop being upgraded, and my digital camera just died, so putting together something for today isn't working out. Everything should be back to normal next week. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!

Little Golden Book Monday #27

Today's Little Golden book is "The Three Bears" (1981 printing). The reason I am posting this one, is that I thought it was kind of a unique find.
So, today I present for you the 3 "The Three Bears" books!
First off, back on Monday, September 10th, I posted the Little Golden Book "The Three Bears" for the Little Golden Book Monday #24. But this new copy was totally different. I had never seen this Little Golden book before, and I was amazed to find two copies. I thought it was pretty odd that after never seeing this version of the "Three Bears" before, I would find two copies at my local thrift shop, both on the same day. But then I was even more puzzled to see that both these new copies had belonged to the same person!
If you check out the picture (to the left), of the inside front cover, you will see I have placed the second books signature along with the first signature, and they are obviously the same signature. Both copies belonged to Kimberly.
So this then is the puzzle... Why would a child (I assume it was a child) have two copies of the same book?