DIY CANDY

I haven't made a post in a while cos I was away for a couple of weeks in JAPAN and I bought back loads of things for the shop including some DIY candies, arggg they're so cute they're hard to acully eat, you just want to keep them!!!!! 

I will be making more posts on the other goodies I got in the next few weeks.

So we had a Takoyaki (a popular japanese snack made out of dough and octopus shaped like a ball) event at the shop so we decided to try out the takoyaki set! 

It wasn't complicated to follow the instructions although they're in japanese and it's overall fairly simple to make the takoyaki once we stopped stressing about getting it right!!!

the result????

well they didn't look as good as on the packaging but it was really fun to do, kind of cute science!!! and the taste you ask? well it tasted super artificial, just like candy!!! the 2 different textures between the ball and the octopus was interesting but not to everyone's taste!

mystery figure #2

Here is today's mystery figure, a 3" action figure articulated at the shoulders, neck and waist, quite detailed I found in a cool toy bundle.

I showed it to alex who knew straight away it was from C.O.W.BOYS of MOO MESA,  from 1991. this cartoon ticked all the boxes of kids entertainment of the time: mutants,  radiation back story, and the wild west! Made by TMNT's Ryan Brown. It looks like it got a big push at the time with loads of merch, funny that I don't remember it at all! 
There's even halloween costumes!
It's characters are bipedal anthropomorphic cows (they only have cow's head really) but the horses have stayed normal as well bad puns names like Mayor Oscar Bulloney!
This particular figure is Cowlamity Kate Cudster (get it?), not one of the main characters, and was released in 1999 as a kids meal promotion, so it's not from the original 1991 run of figures by Hasbro which if I'm not mistaken had no girl characters!
if you want to know more there a dedicated blog here: http://wildwestcow-boysofmoomesa.blogspot.fr/

DOS games

Do you ever get the urge to play a particular game from your childhood? well the other day I realy wanted to play DOS games, namely Caesar 2 and warcraft 2. I wasn't that good at it but I would spend days daydreaming during school, planning my city on corner of notebooks. This lead me to a long hunt on the internet to be able to play my old games, as I didn't keep the computer that it worked on! If only I had Mary Poppins' bag or a tardis to store all my stuff. If you don't have the games you can download abandonwares, it's basically a game which you can't play anymore and hasn't been re-released, it's an amazing archive of retro games with games I would never have dreamed of playing at the time or never even head of; not strictly legal as the copyright hasn't run out but I think that some of those games would have disappeared if it wasn't for the fans uploading them and making them available to all. if you don't want to download the games you can find them on ebay quite regularly but can be pricey. To play a DOS game you need the emulator DOSBOX It works really well, it's an amazing software, if you got a PC and you're old enough to remember MS DOS, I have a mac and I found a fantastic software called Boxer it makes DOSBOX super simple!

Started by playing Caesar II again, and it's so hypnotizing and addictive to watch your city grow and evolve, i still love this game!
 

McDonalds toys

Well I guess this outs me as a no longer secret McDonald's fan, what can I do? I am obsessed with the McDonald's of my childhood, the design, the place, the colours, the burger stools in the kids area, I just thought it was fantastic!!!! So here are some toys McDonald's released with other toy companies such as Mattel. It's basically advertising you have to pay for, which turn your kids into little consumers with low job expectations; if Barbie works at McDonald's? notice how it's named Fun Times? Needless to say I did not have those toys as a kid but as an adult nobody can stop me collecting them!!!!!


This is a video by BluCollection ToyCollector
Want this so bad!!!!! It even has the wrappers and the happy meal box!!!!







And here is another by DC Toys Collectors

Pound shop food test

This is where I test food so you don't have to!

I really can't resist buying the worst food stuff when it's endorsed by a character, what can I say? I haven't grown yet! So my cupboard is full of cool looking junk food that I can't eat cos they're out of date, but I'm gonna take this opportunity to eat the ones that are comestible and tell you how they taste and more importantly if they live up to their packaging!!!

Today's test is for people who want to transform a simple meal into a magical event… kind of…

So Tinker Bell got her spinoff movie and now, lucky her, she has become a pasta shape with her fairy friends! As with all pasta shapes you have to use a LOT of your imagination to recognize Tinker Bell but after a few minutes comparing the packaging photo and the pasta I spot her!!! Fairies are small and cute and now you can… eat them… not sure I would have liked that as a kid… I mean the pastas are actually fairy sized!
The taste: well this doesn't rock the boat, it's just really overcooked pasta with tinned tomato sauce, could do with cheese and seasoning, it tastes a bit of the tin but it's eatable if you're super hungry!

random figure bundle #1

Here is a set of totally random action figures found together ranging from 1979 to 2004 how did they meet?

The beauty of those is that they may be in "played in condition" with a bit of paint peeling and missing accessories but i love it cos can't help imagining a story; what adventures are they having? I think they've been on a quest with the reluctant good guy, the character who provides comic relief, the intense hero, the traitor, and the random one that gets killed off. Who do you think plays who?

As a huge fan of Harry Potter I was really chuffed to find a figure in this lot, it's a rarer one as well, from 2007, the more collectable ones are the magical creatures rather than the more common characters, you can find plenty of harry's on ebay, still they're not as common as one would think as they're not that old.

This harry is from Harry Potter and the order of phoenix from POPCO in his school uniform. The quality is very good I have to say (i'm one of those people that always say that toys used to be better in the 80s), it's really detailed and actually looks like the character in the movie, the jacket is made of softer plastic so you can lift it up which is a really nice touch! For some reason harry potter's leg articulation make him look very awkward, i guess it captures an adolescent super well!

Batman DC comics, 1995

Loved the batman movies especially the Tim Burton ones, I remember going to see Batman returns at the cinema and it blowing my mind away! the fact that it wasn't for kids felt amazing, a super hero taken seriously!!! being a kid  myself I also loved the animated series, I think it was one of the best cartoon of the time, it was really stylized and kept the dark elements!!! I mostly watched Japanese anime at the time but I still made time for batman.

the figurine is in good condition and it brings me back to playing at one of my best friend's who had loads of batman toys, he only  had one girl, Cat Woman from the 1993 Mcdonalds happy meal so I always played with her, I would love to have her!!!!!! arggg mcdonalds toys used to be so good!!!!!

Adventure people, fisher price 1979

This guy looks so 70s, he's got the hair cut and even platform shoes!!! He looks really funny with his chunky feet!! I guess he's an alien since his head is blue and apparently he's also a pilot. the figurine is pretty detailed and you can move his head up and down and side to side which is neat. He's got a bit of wear but looks so cool with his helmet and blue head!

Top 3 VHS of my childhood

In 1995 I got a VHS player, which to me was amazing as the rest of my household didn't really watch tv, it was really special cos they were still quite expansive at the time, and I basically spent the next 2 years meticulously reading the tv guide and setting up the vhs to auto record, I remember it being super complicated ( I was only 11 years old). In tv magazines they gave the sleeve jackets which i loved so that it looked "real".
So here is my top go-to videos, when I was ill and had to stay home or after school, I literally watched those 100s of times!!! I didn't matter that the TV was tiny and the image full of noise, it was the source of wonder and escapism.

 1. Beverly Hills Cop 1, 2, and 3
To me it didn't matter that the film was 10 years old, I found it hilarious (did I even get the jokes?)!! I don't really know why now and I haven't watched any of them in years, I'm not sure it aged well… when I met new kids and they asked who my favorite actor; as you do? I alway answered Eddie Murphy long into my teenage life!?

2. Star Wars trilogy episode IV,V,VI 
This one needs no introduction and is still a favorite of mine, what could match the sense of wonder and pure amazement of watching this as a kid! I especially loved all the different aliens and of course Han Solo, total dream boat!!!

3.Indiana Jones and the temple of doom 
I remember the day I realized it was the same actor playing Han Solo and Indiana Jones (my cousin told me) my brain nearly exploded!!! 2 of my favorite characters the same????? How amazing! In my defense I was really small when I first saw those films and I didn't really get the concept of actors, I actually thought that Indiana jones was a really old movie not a period piece! The temple of doom is my definite favorite, probably cos it got a kid in it, i loved Short Round!!! and gruesome food which to this day I still references as a bench mark.

So that was my top 3 (i know I cheated a bit with trilogies but i always watched them in a row), what about you what was your favorite VHS?