A hobby of sorts...

A Hobby of Sorts…

I had a ton of hobby’s growing up. Mostly involved collecting. As a child, I can recall having a cigar box filled with used stamps. They had all sorts of pictures and were very interesting to me. I also had a large baseball card collection, which I continue to drag around with me throughout all my moves. I also recently gave up collecting comic books. I had a ton of them and majority of them, I’ve only read once.

My newfound hobby was autograph collecting. I always browsed helpful forums containing information about upcoming celebrity signings. I love collecting from the people who inspired me to be the guy I am today. They either taught me something I will never forget or did something I had admire. I begin getting certain comics or books signed my favorite authors or CDs signed by my favorite artists. I have admittedly confronted several of these guys in public, but having the respect and even sometimes star stuck would strongly prevent me from approaching them. I often run into these celebrities at my place of work. Brandy rapped at me once. Yes, she did. I got to talk to Nascar driving Danica Patrick about online radio. I masked my excitement well.

I haven’t chased after any autographs in a while. I did start collecting the entire 2010 Chicago Blackhawks for my daughter due to her birthday falling on the same day as the victory of the Stanley Cup. I waited many hours in all sorts of lines waiting for their signatures and even tried catching some at public events. I even donated blood a few times in hopes to catch a couple. I begin to build my daughter a scrapbook that has a bunch of cut outs and pictures. I think the most memorable thing in that collection was her picture with the Stanley Cup. We went to the Gay Pride Parade, hearing about its appearance at on a float. We ended up taking a quick pic with it, as it was being place in a limo. My daughter was just a couple of months old so she was petite compared to that cup. Several Hawk players were really generous on responding to my request for autographs for her collection as well. That was an idea given to me by a friend when I realize some players were traded to far off teams. 

I am not currently working on this hobby. Lately, it has been this blog and watching random movies.

At The Movies!

AT the Movies!

I have spent a great portion of my life watching flicks. I can recall times where my father took us to the cheap shows. It was at the crappy theatre of the town. I like to think that’s where all the movie reels from the expensive theatre would end up. It would have the new movies weeks after they have already been viewed at the newer theaters for dirt-cheap. One of the earliest movies, I can remember is Jurassic Park. It had to be around 1993, the year Jurassic Park came out, and I wasn’t even 10 years of age then. We really wanted to see it and our father took us. The filmstrip ended up burning in the reel and we had a pass to see another showing of JP at a later time. I do remember seeing Fantasia and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as well. With a Father, who worked over nights, would fall asleep during these showings and we would have to constantly keep waking him up so we would not get into too much trouble for the loud snoring.

When I got a bit older, I started to build my own collection. Someone gave me a gift of a DVD player. I bought Gone In 60 seconds with Nicholas Cage, Broken Arrow with John Travolta and the cartoon movie, Shrek. I have seen all those movies a hundred plus times since I couldn’t afford new movies. I would only buy movies that I really wanted to see again. I hardly bought stuff that I haven’t seen unless I was familiar with the director or actors involved. I eventually ended up with a wall of movies that would surprise anybody who came over. Around that time, I would also make it a weekend ritual to go the movies and catch cheap matinees. For a movie that came out on Friday for ten plus bucks a ticket, I would catch it the very next morning for four bucks or less. Even if I have seen everything I wanted to see at the show, I would watch something I haven’t seen, even if I didn’t know what to expect.

I eventually got to a point where I had given up, and sold majority of my collection. The people I sold my collection to, ran a movie resale shop. They constantly repeated the joke, “With this much, we can open a new shop”. I guess it was an addiction. In a world where movie streaming is king, I try not to spend so much on movies. I do hope to get my daughter into the entertainment of motion pictures. I even started off her collection by collecting every cartoon Disney movie made. I even had this movie podcast as well with my brother, called MuvCast where we would talk about flicks we have seen or information about flicks.

Creepy Church Carnival

Creepy Church Carnival

I used to live by this church that looks like an architect’s masterpiece with the exception of the weird abortion poster on the side of the building. It displayed a naked infant, lying on his/her stomach with an extended arm, with the line “Take my hand, not my life”. That conjured up several thoughts including “Is that baby real?” or “I wonder if that was a safe haven child.” I always imagine the crazy characters that protest those antiabortion clinics begin there. Ironically years later, I came across this place again for a carnival. There was a large box van parked on the street with the back cab open. It had the words Merry Go Round Spray painted on the back wall of the cab.

 I didn’t think much of it, except a Sunday night filled with entertainment for my family. I decided to check this place out, forgetting about the past thoughts. As my wife, kid, and I entered the church’s parking lot that contained an outside market place, we decided to cruise the tents filled with cheap merchandise and ended up buying a toy to please the pursuing child. We finally get out to the playing field where the carnie games are with some of the rides. I have several experiences in arguing with carnie game attendants, so I tried to avoid them at all cost, so I dragged my child on some rides. The first ride we hit up is a Ferris wheel. Old and wobbly but we survive. The toddler enjoyed herself if you can look passed her look of fear every time she saw skyline oppose to ground.  When we finally got out of the Ferris wheel cab, I quickly dragged her to the next toddler friendly ride, which was a circling coaster. She was open to the thought of jumping into a cart with daddy, but in a matter of moments of the ride beginning, I found her face shoved in my kidney. That sort of set the tone for the rest of her trip. She refused to go onto any rides. We tried to get her on a kiddy cars ride, but she objected and we had to find a ride quick to use up the shredded tickets of the ride operator. We saw a mirror maze across the way. The Mirror Maze operator was this scary guy name Bob. Bob had sleeves of tattoos of curved words. Something you wouldn’t expect at a church carnival. He was friendly and sent us on our way. We quickly got through the mirror corners and found a set of rusted stairs. At the top of the stairs was a short walk of fun mirrors that lead to a slide. The slide was awesome. So much so, the toddler raced back into the mirror maze to try this again. I followed her. Unfortunately, even after already conquering this maze, she still managed to run into a mirror and occasionally get stuck and cried for help. When getting off of the slide for the third time, we had to pull her away.

Upon exiting, we found the ultimate slide! About two million feet in the air, the child found her sanctuary. She didn’t mind the 2 billion steps up to the slide and was overjoyed and ready to climb again after every time. We convince her to leave by saying we needed to feed the dog at home. As we were rounding the corner to the front of the church, we came across the creepy, weird, abortion sign. I guess antiabortion campaigns aren’t so bad.