Halloween is Just Around the Corner!

    Our local Spirit store opened its doors last Saturday.

    Our local hardware store rolled out their Halloween decorations.

    And our local grocery store is stocked the shelves with Halloween candy. 

    I even bought a couple of Halloween candy tins that I emptied and am now using as refrigerator magnets.

    Yay! x 3!

    

    I really enjoy this time slot on the calendar. Fall, my favorite season, is almost here, and the stores aren't focused on Christmas, yet. I have a brief time to walk around and enjoy a preview of October and not just December. 

    So, let's see what's on the Holiday Horror Shelf!

    Okay, let me explain. DVDs were pretty expensive in the late 90s and early 2000s. The average price of a new release was around $24.90. That's $53.85 in today's money. Going to Best Buy to look at DVDs back then was luxury shopping for a teacher on one income... I couldn't afford anything there.

But, BUT!, but, I could afford to shop at Kmart or Walmart. AND! They sold cult and horror movies on DVD from a company called GoodTimes Entertainment. 

    I found both Halloween II, and Halloween III: Season of the Witch at the Urbandale Kmart (that has now been demolished). I was so excited. They only cost 6 bucks each... SOLD!

     I grew up seeing this message on VHS rental tapes and movies airing on cable. So, watching a movie I loved in "WIDESCREEN" was incredible.

    None of this information meant anything to me decades ago. I didn't know "non-anamorphic" was a thing. These DVDs looked great on my 27 inch tube TV, and I couldn't have been happier. (BTW, no one called them CRTs, and no one could have predicted they would become collectible.)

    I was disappointed when I played my old GoodTimes DVDs on my new HD TV years later. I was used to the black stripes above and below the film, but the smaller image, imprisoned by black bars, threw me off. I could "zoom" in the image, but that made the film look even more pixelated. 

    I donated my GoodTimes DVDs when I upgraded to DVDs that were "Enhanced for Widescreen TVs" or in "16:9 Widescreen." I was totally pumped. The new movies looked so good!

    But then something weird happened. I  began to miss my old Halloween GoodTimes (don't we all?) when I started the Holiday Horror Shelf displays. That prompted a thrift store search that has proven to be more difficult than I thought. These budget DVDs are now 25 years old, and I guess most have probably been tossed away. 

    

    So, I was surprised to find H-III at a local Goodwill last week. The H-III DVD is in perfect shape, and I upgraded the case with a nicer one from a DVD that I bought from our local library for a buck. 

    Rather than hoping lightning would strike twice, I went ahead and bought H-II from a seller on eBay. That DVD arrived today. Its case didn't need a library upgrade.

    The total price of both DVDs is less than the original $12, I'm totally pumped. They look so good! It was also satisfying to slide them next to their anamorphic Halloween brethren on the media shelf.

    

    I don't care if people think nostalgia for inferior DVDs is strange. I have always told my students, and my daughter, to not be embarrassed by what they like, "What you collect is a reflection of who you are and how you represent yourself. It doesn't matter how many people don't agree with your style. Those people aren't coming over to your place to hang out. But your friends are coming over, and they like you no matter what is on in your room."

    I like how the VHS logo is dunked into healing waters and emerges with a DVD logo... so modern.

    PS. I also enjoy that a '66 Dodge Sportsman Van was used for a crash scene in Halloween II. 

    I drove one of those to college in 1987. I had a lot of fun in that van.

    Didn't crash it, though.

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #7

 We've made it to the end of Shark Week! Let's see what's on the Holiday Horror Shelf.

    2003's Open Water is an indie film based on true events that happened in 1998. Roger Ebert (a hero) wrote that he wanted to walk around in the sunshine to cheer himself up after seeing this in the theater.

   2004's 12 Days of Terror is a made-for-TV movie about true events that happened on the nothern New Jersey shore in 1916. The DVD's tagline said these events inspired the movie Jaws, but I don't know if that really true. I suppose it could be.

    Search for the Great Sharks is short documentary from 1995. The most exciting thing about this release is the DVD's cover photo of a great white shark apparently swallowing another shark whole.

    2004's Frakenfish was inspired by the actual discovery of northern snakehead fish in a pond in Maryland in 2002. These fish breathe air, can survive on land,  can "walk" to other bodies of water, and they can spawn several times a year. Oh yeah, they're also aggressive and have long rows of sharp teeth in their snakehead mouths. Their discovery also inspired the films Snakehead (2004), and Swarm of the Snakehead (2006).

    If you haven't noticed, today's theme is "based on true events." But I bet you did.

    Parting shots and thoughts:

    Gotta go back to the original Jaws for today's tee shirt. 

    

    A few years ago Daphne surprised me with tickets for a special screening of Jaws at Flix Brewhouse. Here are the souvenir  glasses we brought home.

    Okay, Monstro is a whale, not a shark, but here's a pic of his jaws that we sailed into when we visited Disneyland on our first trip to Oceanside in 2015.

    

Me, in Oceanside 2026, wearing my "Snorkel Bob Cares shirt" (Man, I love that shirt). I'm yelling, "Hope everyone had a great Shark Week!"

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #6

    MEG: a Novel of Deep Terror by Steve Altin came out in 1997. I had a first edition hard cover, but I kept it in my classroom when I exclusively taught language arts, and it got really beat up by the guys who would fight over it during my required reading time. 

    The MEG movie came out in 2018, and I was disappointed the filmmakers didn't use the same opening as the book. In the book's prologue, a herd of Shantungosauruses are on a beach feeding on a smaller group of dinosaurs when a T-Rex breaks up the party and flips the script by making the herd his prey. But when he stumbles into the nearby ocean, a Megalodon emerges from the depths and kills the T-Rex with it's superior size and jaws. Or something like that... I think The MEG 2: The Trench used this idea for its prologue. Both films used Jason Statham, and that's always a good thing.

    Great White's LP Once Bitten came out in the summer of '87. I was working 60 to 80 hours weeks on a road crew so I could pay for my freshman year of college. I had my tuition covered by the end of June. I had enough cash for my dorm room, books, and food by late July. In August I bought a few records to bring with me, and Once Bitten was in that lot. I'm not gonna lie. Working the road crew was zero fun. It's probably also the reason why my dermatologist keeps coming at me with a scalpel. 

    The Black Demon movie came out in 2023, and the novel Extinct by Charles Wilson was published in 1997. Both also have a Megalodon as the antagonist. I like how the covers echo each other. Extinct's cover says a it was coming to NBC-TV presumably as a made-for-TV movie, but that - spoiler alert!- didn't happen.

    When I bought Shark Night from Goodwill, I didn't know the original title for the film was Shark Night 3D. Of the four Jaws movies, Jaws III, or Jaws 3D, is my least favorite. I also didn't know that during the credits the cast was going to be in a music video performing the song, "Shark Night Cast: Shark Bite."     

Here's Char hamming it up at Flix when she was about to turn eight

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #5

    The plot to 1981's The Last Shark is so similar to Jaws that Universal sued, and the film was removed from theaters after two weeks. I like how the AI generated summary on IMDB states that the "shark" in this film resembles a pool float. 

    At least the filmmakers of The Last Shark tried to use their own special effects. In 1976's made for-TV movie Shark Kill, they used previously shot stock footage and wrote their boring screenplay around that.

    I'm using the soundtrack to West Side Story because the rival gangs in the film were The Jets and The Sharks. Even I'll admit that's a bit of a reach.

    What can I say about 2003's Shark Zone? It's the third sequel to 1999's Shark Attack, and a bunch of scenes were taken directly from Shark Attack: Megalodon and the unrelated Dog Watch. At least the cover looks good. This DVD is going back to Goodwill because...

     I now I own the four film collection the Shark Attack movies. I haven't even torn the plastic off of this set yet, but Casper Van Dien stars in the first Shark Attack film, and any movie with Johnny Rico can't be all bad.

    Today's vintage t-shirt is in honor of The Last Shark's inordinate amount of windsurfing.

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #4

 

    Like the movie Jaws, The Deep also stars Robert Shaw. 

    Like the novel Jaws, the novel The Deep was also written by Peter Benchley.

    Like the novels Jaws and The Deep, the novel the The Beast two-part TV series is based on was also written by Peter Benchley.    

    Today's LP is Deceptive Bends by 10cc. I chose the album based on the cover art work by Hipgnosis. The LP's title was inspired by a warning road sign in Surrey, England. I assume the art work was inspired by the word "bends" being associated with the decompression sickness some sea divers can experience.

    I999's Deep Blue Sea is the only proper shark movie on the shelf today. I saw this film in the theater, and at the time I thought it was the greatest shark film ever after Jaws. I probably still think that.

    Here's the back of today's shirt. Charlotte found it for me when we were thrifting in Oceanside, CA. Good eye, kid!

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #3

    For today's post I'm picking the soundtrack to 2021's The Suicide Squad due to the King Shark character voiced by Sylvester Stallone. You can see him there on the left.

    I think buying Blu-ray movies just because they have a slipcover is dumb. I thrifted 47 Meters Down because it came with a slip cover...

    One of my biggest thrift store pet peeves is getting stuck in the checkout lane behind someone who is is buying glassware. I found 47 Meters Down: Uncaged today at Goodwill, but the woman ahead of me ended up buying $93 in stemware. I was standing there for over 15 minutes while the clerk wrapped the glasses in brown paper. I hope the movie moves faster than that.

    1979's Up from the Depths was supposed to be a horror comedy, but Roger Corman had all the comedic elements removed in the editing room to make the film an outright horror piece. That didn't work. The VHS cover looks cool, though.

    I almost forgot to add this Flix Brewhouse picture from 2017 ----> link

    Today's outfit is courtesy of Snorkel Bob.

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #2

    The Sharknado soundtrack is by a band named Quint. They are named after Robert Shaw's character in Jaws. The band is fronted by Robbie Rist who is an actor who played Oliver, a new and young character added to The Brady Bunch TV show's sixth season. It was an attempt to revive their dwindling viewership. That didn't work. The show really jumped the shark when Oliver showed up, but that's not his fault.

    The Holiday Horror Shelf is also displaying Sharknado, Sharknado 2, Sharknado 3, and a souvenir magnet from our vacation at Oceanside.

  Anymore, the only souvenirs I want to bring home when I travel are pictures, magnets, and thrifted t-shirts.

Shark Week 2026: Group Photo #1

     Sunday night markes the beginning of the Discovery Channel's 38th "Shark Week." I haven't paid to stream the Discovery App, but I don't need it to watch shark movies. Physical media rules! 

    Let's see what's on the Holiday Horror Shelf!

        Ah, Jaws, the OG. I was six when this movie opened, and I didn't see it until it finally aired on ABC when I was ten. I wasn't allowed to stay up to watch the whole film (I had school the next day), and that was okay. In the opening scene when Chrissie is attacked by the shark, she screams, "It hurts!" That was enough to scare the crap out of me.

    Now I count this as one of my favorite movies. Jaws has everything. It's a horror film, a monster movie, a sea adventure, a thriller, a drama, and I'd argue it's a buddy film, too. 

    Let's see, we've got the 1995 letterboxed VHS, 2005' 30th anniversary edition DVD with the Commemorative Photo Journal, the 2012 Blu-ray, and the NES game from 1987. The game's storyline, if you can call it that, has more in common with Jaws the Revenge, the 4th Jaws film, and that's not a compliment.

    Peter Benchley's novel, Jaws, came out about a year and a half before the movie. Director Steven Spielberg was rooting for the shark when he first read the novel because the characters were so unlikable (according to IMDB). I have read this book, and I agree with him. 

    As for the other three Jaws books... I haven't quite absorbed them, yet.    

    This one of my favorite skateboard deck designs. Jaws, Robert Shaw, Narragensett beer, and skateboarding? Yes, please!

    Yes, I even dressed up for the beginning of Shark Week. 

    I'm such a nerd...

    

    Stay safe in the water!

Going Back to Oceanside

"We've been living in the city such a long time
You and I should live by the water
I'll shape up and you'll fill out
And we could buy a house
Maybe even have us a daughter..."

"Live by the Water" by Papas Fritas

    Neither Daphne nor I can remember exactly why we chose Oceanside in 2015 to be Charlotte's first out-of-state vacation spot. We think it had something to do with the price of the apartment we rented. Anyway, we have nothing but good memories about that trip, and we decided to go back this summer.

    It didn't hurt that both Daphne and Charlotte have discovered that they really enjoy vacationing by the water.

    On our first flight to Oceanside, all the screens in the back of the airplane's seats were showing scenes from the Discovery Channel's "Shark Week" programing (more on that later). That imagery scared Char quite a bit.

    This time the screens were much more welcoming.

    I was pumped that they still sell novelty license plates at the souvenir shops. I had one of these when I was a kid. Char used it as a book mark for her beach book. 

    I didn't spot Daphne's name anywhere, but we stayed in condo "D", and I figured that was close.

    

    The view of the ocean from the patio was great, and we spent every morning getting caffeinated to the sounds of the waves. Our walk to the beach was only three minutes.

    Oceanside still offers their Farmers' Market from 9 pm-1pm on Thursday mornings. Here's Char about to enjoy the cookie she picked out. She was almost five years old.

    

    This year Char graciously agreed to recreate the photo for me. Now she's almost 16.

    

    The same goes for these sunset pictures.

    Hopefully we can go back to Oceanside in ten years or so, and I can retake these pictures again.

Cool Shades