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Tour de Pain Aftermath: Laying low

Posted in exercise, life, movies, running, TV shows with tags , , , , , on August 14, 2009 by Paxton

I’ve been somewhat wrecked this week. This past weekend I ran the Jacksonville Tour de Pain.

Tour de Pain logo

Like the image says, the race is a grueling 3 races in 24 hours. The first race was on Friday evening at 7:30pm. It was out at Jacksonville Beach. The distance was 4 miles and you ran it on the actual beach. I don’t know if any of you guys have ever run on sand before, but it’s hard. REALLY hard. 4 miles on the beach is probably like 6 miles on asphalt. At least, that’s how it felt. Actually, I felt worse after running the beach 4 miles than I did after running the Gate River Run’s 9 miles. But part of the reason is the humidity and heat. It was overcast when I ran the Gate River Run. Anyway, I was looking to beat 40 minutes which would be 10 minute miles, but I seriously died the last mile and wound up crossing the finish line at 40:26. Just over 10 min miles. I was really not happy with that performance, but I had to live with it. I mainly was pissed about how I fell apart during the last mile. It was terrible. The time looks better than it felt, I’ll tell you that. Here’s a pic of me crossing the finish line for the 4 mile race. I felt like I was actually going to drop dead at that point.

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The Grocery Aisle of long forgotten breakfast cereals Pt I

Posted in breakfast cereal, Cap'n Crunch, cartoons, food, nostalgia, Pac-Man, pop culture, TV shows with tags , , , , , , , , on March 31, 2009 by Paxton

Cereal Boxes potpourriMy good friend Steve emailed me a few weeks ago and asked me to write an article on a subject he and his wife had recently been discussing.  He wanted me to talk about breakfast cereal.  More specifically, he wanted me to talk about some of his favorite breakfast cereals he remembers when he was a kid.  Now, Steve and I have known each other since first grade, but I won’t know all of his favorite breakfast cereals.  So, I thought I’d take the general topic of cereal, and look at it from the nostalgia perspective.

There is a surprising amount of cereal box enthusiasts out there.  If you go to Flickr, there are two main groups dedicated to cereal from the ’50s up through the ’90s.  There are more groups than these two, but the two I’m talking about contain the majority of the images.  So, scanning these groups, I thought I’d discuss some forgotten and long discontinued cereals that we may all remember.  So, let’s head on over to your local Western Supermarket or Safeway, and walk down the Nostalgia aisle (Aisle 7c) and see what we all used to eat when we were kids.  FYI…There were so many awesome, awesome cereals that I found that I decided to split this article into two parts.  Come back later this week to see Part II. For any of the pictures below, click them to go to a bigger version (most likely on Flickr).

All set, then let’s begin with the first batch…

No talk about breakfast cereals is complete without talking about Capt. Horatio Magellan Crunch (aka Cap’n Crunch for the noobs).   And if we are talking about the Cap’n, I’m going to have to talk about the elephant in the room.  It is a harsh truth that all cereal enthusiasts are aware of.  Cap’n Crunch is an incurable media whore.  Currently, there’s like five versions of Cap’n Crunch on the shelves.  That alone is enough, but if you look into the past, and include special editions, we are looking at a number north of 17 versions of Cap’n Crunch.  Seriously.  He will pimp his image/cereal out to any idea that comes across the table.  Here are 9 versions of Cap”n Crunch you may have never seen.

Choco CrunchVanilly CrunchCinnamon CrunchPunch CrunchDeep Sea CrunchHalloween CrunchXmas CrunchHome Run CrunchPolar Crunch
Deep Sea Crunch? Vanilly Crunch?  Seriously? And that’s not all of the images. How about Treasure Hunt Crunch? Or maybe you would prefer Choco-Donuts Crunch? This never ending parade of Crunch madness has got to end. The Cap’n is sick, he needs help.

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Rockin’ Around the Clock with Happy Days trivia

Posted in Americana, cartoons, Happy Days, pop culture, TV shows with tags , , on March 3, 2009 by Paxton

Happy Days logoSunday, Monday, Happy Days!  Tuesday, Wednesday, Happy Days!  Man, I used to love watching the show Happy Days when I was growing up.  I loved Fonzi and his catchphrase, “Heeeeeeeeeeeeey!”  I loved the show’s catchphrase, “Sit on it!”  I loved the theme song, I loved the setting and the sets, I loved the other characters.  It was just a lot of fun to watch.   I still enjoy it.  I DVR it every once in a while to see some of my favorite episodes.

Just a few weeks ago I got an email from Ticketmaster letting me know that tickets for Happy Days the Musical, showing in Jacksonville, were only 20 bucks during the week.  I didn’t realize there was a musical based on the TV show, but it’s not surprising considering the Broadway shows based on Saturday Night Fever, Xanadu, Road House and other movies from the ’70s and ’80s.  I thought it would be fun to see how they managed to translate the show to the stage so I bought Steph and I tickets and we went this past Saturday.Happy Days The Musical

The show was very good. The guy who played Fonzie was spot on. He had the mannerisms and voice inflection down cold. The guy who played Ritchie was familiar to me because he was in the cast of Avenue Q which I happened to see on Broadway in 2004 right before it won the Tony for Best Musical. Overall, the musical was like watching an episode of the TV show, cheesy and cute. The songs were fun, too. Steph and I really enjoyed watching it. If it comes to your town, and you loved the TV show, then give the musical a chance. I think you’ll like it.

Anywho, after watching the musical, I started Googling Happy Days. I was surprised how much info and trivia was out there. I was reading for like 3 hours about behind the scenes information and background info on the show and characters. I enjoyed it so much that I thought I would pass along some of my favorite tidbits.

So, without further adieu, here’s everything cool about the show Happy Days that you never knew.

* Originally there were three Cunningham children. Ritchie, Joanie and the eldest, Chuck.  Chuck Cunningham was phased out of the show  in Season 2 (off to college for basketball).

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Weekly Geeks 2009-07 – Interview with Barney Stinson

Posted in books, How I Met Your Mother, TV shows, Weekly Geeks with tags , , on February 27, 2009 by Paxton

Weekly Geeks

Weekly Geeks, time, people. You, in the back, take that iPod off or I’ll strangle you to death with the headphone cord. Pay attention.

Okay, this week’s theme is “A Character Conversation”. They want you to pick your favorite character from a book and invite them to your blog for an interview. Not a bad idea. I remember doing this exercise in one of my Honors English classes. Yes, I realize I could just say “english class” and not include the Honors, but a) I want you to know I took Honors English because I’m needy and shallow like that and b)…well, there is no b), I pretty much covered my reasons in a).

Barney

Anywho, I had several characters I could choose from but I’ve decided to invite one of my heroes, Barney Stinson, to The Cavalcade for an interview. Barney can be seen on the CBS TV show, How I Met Your Mother. However, Barney also penned the bestseller The Bro Code along with Matt Kuhn.  I read The Bro Code last month and was thoroughly entertained. I thought this could be a dynamite interview.

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Rankin-Bass: Kings of the Christmas Special

Posted in 80s, advertising, Apple, Christmas, holiday, pop culture, Rankin/Bass, TV shows with tags , , , , on December 11, 2008 by Paxton

Xmas Classics DVDIt’s Christmas time! I love Christmas time. The decorations, the holiday-only items in the stores and toys. Can’t have Christmas without kick-ass toys. However, I especially love flipping through the TV channels during the holiday season. All of the TV logos are juiced up for the holidays and our old Christmas Special favorites are dusted off and traipsed out in front of us like a former beauty queen, well past her prime. There are plenty to catch. Endless remakes of A Christmas Carol, TV shows centering their activities around Christmas parties, beloved cartoon characters meeting Santa Claus and learning that “to give is better than to receive”. You’ve seen them, you know them. But the undisputed king of television holiday specials has got to be the studios of Rankin-Bass. Rankin-Bass consistently made the most treasured and beloved holiday specials of all time. Their track record is undeniable. Their influence on the holiday is unmistakable. Let’s take a look back at the animation studios of Rankin-Bass and some of their most famous specials; most you’ve no doubt seen dozens of times, but many you probably didn’t realize they created.

Rankin-Bass logo

Rankin-Bass was established in the early ’60s by Arthur Rankin Jr and Jules Bass. Originally named Videocraft International, they independently produced several animation series including Pinocchio in 1960 and Tales of the Wizard of Oz in 1961.  Pinocchio was animated in the “ani-magic” style of animation using puppets and stop motion photography (which would later become a Rankin-Bass trademark), while Tales of the Wizard of Oz was animated in traditional 2-D animation.  The Oz series would be popular enough to adapt into a TV movie in 1964.  This TV movie would air on the popular GE Fantasy Hour. Then, in December of 1964, the GE Fantasy Hour would air the first Rankin-Bass Christmas special, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, which would go on to become one of the most popular and longest running specials in TV history.

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