Town Sign Project: Wright County

I need to start the day by wising Anders a happy birthday. Happy birthday Anders!


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PHOTO JOURNAL - PAGE 121 ALTERNATE

LOSER - BLACK & WHITE


I hope your birthday is as amazing as you want it to be!

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A few weeks back I loaded up into the car with my Mom and Teresa as they joined me as I went around and harvested the town signs in Wright County.

Here are some facts about Wright County:

+ Wright County is a county in the U.S. state of Iowa. As of the 2010 census, the population was 13,229.
+ The county seat is Clarion.
+ The county organization became effective in January 1851, and is believed to be named either after Silas Wright, a governor of New York, or Joseph Albert Wright, a governor of Indiana.

Here is a look at the Wright County Photo Map:


Wright County Photo Map
Boundaries approximate at best.

And with Wright County completed, this is the updated Photography 139 Conquest Map:


Town Sign Project -11 Counties
PURPLE=COMPLETED

11 counties completed. 11.1% of the state conquered.

Here are the Wright County Signs:


Eagle Grove, Iowa
Eagle Grove, Iowa
Eagle Grove – Chamber of Commerce – Summerfest – June 18-20
Population: 3,583

Clarion, Iowa
Clarion, Iowa
Clarion Welcomes you
Population – 2,850

Belmond, Iowa
Belmond, Iowa
Belmond Welcomes You!
Population: 2,376

Goldfield, Iowa
Goldfield, Iowa
Welcome to Goldfield
Population: 635

Dows, Iowa
Dows, Iowa
Welcome to Dows – A Friendly Community
Population: 538

Woolstock, Iowa
Woolstock, Iowa
Woolstock – “The Friendly Town” – Birthplace of George Reeves – Humanitarian, Veteran, Actor
Population: 168

Rowan, Iowa
Rowan, Iowa
Rowan
Population: 158

Galt, Iowa
Galt, Iowa
Welcome to Galt – The Little Town That Won’t Give Up!

Holmes, Iowa
Holmes, Iowa
Holmes
Unincorporated Community

Wright County only has 8 communities, but it has a solid set of signs top to bottom. There isn’t any that I think are terrible, with maybe the exception of Eagle Grove. Their sign is more of an advertisement for the town festival. Which is fine, but the sign doesn’t even welcome you to town.

Dows and Woolstock must have a healthy rivalry. A friendly rivalry though. Cause one is a “Friendly Community” and the other is a “Friendly Town”. I also really like Galt’s sign. It is a little surprising that a town of 32 has such a nice sign. There must be some money in that town. There probably is, because they murderize a lot of chickens in that town. No joke, 15 million chickens in that town. Also lots of salmonella in that town. But you probably don’t want to talk about having to recall 380 million eggs due to salmonella on your town sign. However, their can only be one Best in Show and it goes to:


Woolstock, Iowa
Wright County Best in Show – Woolstock, Iowa

We will discuss George Reeves when I publish the auxiliary images from this road trip. I can say though, thanks to Jodie Cue for the tip on Woolstock.

There are also a couple towns with alternate town signs:


Belmond, Iowa
Belmond – Alternate

Belmond, Iowa
Belmond – Alternate

Dows, Iowa
Dows – Alternate

Dows, Iowa
Dows – Alternate

Galt, Iowa
Galt – Back of Sign

Also, on the way back home to Boone, I discovered that Roland had updated their Gary Thompson sign:


Roland, Iowa
The Roland Rocket

Here is the current list of Best in Shows:


Moingona, Iowa
Best in Show – Boone County

Coon Rapids, Iowa
Best in Show – Carroll County

Ricketts, Iowa
Best in Show – Crawford County

Dexter, Iowa
Best in Show – Dallas County

Scranton, Iowa
Best in Show – Greene County

Stanhope, Iowa
Best in Show – Hamilton County

Haverhill, Iowa
Best in Show – Marshall County

Bondurant, Iowa
Best in Show – Polk County

Collins, Iowa
Best in Show – Story County

Badger, Iowa
Best in Show – Webster County

Woolstock, Iowa
Best in Show – Wright County

No change to the BENNETT TOWN SIGN POWER RANKINGS:


Scranton, Iowa
#10. Scranton

Ricketts, Iowa
#9. Ricketts

Liscomb, Iowa
#8. Liscomb

Dexter, Iowa
#7. Dexter

Templeton, Iowa
#6. Templeton

Haverhill, Iowa
#5. Haverhill

Farnhamville, Iowa #3 - East Side
#4. Farnhamville

Pilot Mound, Iowa
#3. Pilot Mound

Moingona, Iowa
#2. Moingona

Coon Rapids, Iowa
#1. Coon Rapids

The next county we will visit is Jasper County.

20 thoughts on “Town Sign Project: Wright County”

  1. I hope it isn’t an Ayn Rand reference. One of the worst, biggest frauds on history. When I see an Ayn Rand quote by an adult, I know they aren’t to be taken serious as a human.

    Perhaps somebody told them they should give it up in 2010 when their big industrialist pled guilty to animal cruelty and in the same year they had to recall 380 million eggs.

    Give it up Galt, you made more than 2000 people sick with your salmonella eggs. But they didn’t.

    Although, in fairness the animal cruelty charges stemmed from a chicken farm in Maine and not the one in Galt.

  2. I read “Fountainhead” and “Atlas Shrugged” so that I could see what it was about – and what it is about is utterly selfish garbage. It’s so reductive to a huge portion of the population, and just such selfish crap. And boring. There’s literally nothing good in her works.

    I guess that the objectivism or mega-capitalist or whatever she wanted to call herself view of the town of Galt is that they probably should have died out with their poison eggs. But I’m sure there was some bailout of some sort. (I’m not even sure the best way to research that – it was just a flippant way to minimize Ayn Rand. Because she sucks.)

  3. My favorite fact about the fraud that is Ayn Rand is that she died taking Social Security and Medicare. And because she was hypocrite, she had someone else apply for the benefits for her.

    I’ll just add that even though her philosophy is trash, she was an even worse writer. Maybe some of the worst writing this side of… I’m struggling to come up with somebody as overrated as her. I’ll just say this side of a Mack Bolan book. Maybe that Nicholas Sparks guy.

    And everybody is a capitalist until a Reddit thread crashes their hedge fund. I’m sure they will get a bailout, when they should just get a carton of poison eggs from Galt, Iowa.

    I will say, we did drive by several of the HUGE chicken barns on the outskirts of Galt. There size was impressive, if you ignore the amount of animal cruelty going on in there.

    But then I probably ate fried chicken when I got home, cause I also have some of Ayn Rand’s hypocrisy in me.

  4. Yep, the writing wasn’t even good. It makes me sad/angry when truly crap authors become huge hits. An example is that 50 Shades crap. I don’t particularly care about the sex stuff – sex books aren’t my bag, but do whatever, man. What is insulting is how poor those are written. It’s similar to Ayn Rand – they’re just read by people with a low bar for literature and the desire to soak in whatever BS the author puts out because it gets their brains all excited. It’s like the literary version of a Trump rally – all vacuous excitement with zero redeeming value.

    Jon and I put a little bit of money into the stock market this past spring when things were so bad, because we figured we might as well try to stimulate the economy and hopefully make a profit. I traded some of our crap the past few days and purchased some of the stocks from the Reddit threads, and even though we’ve only made about $50 on it, I’m still happy to help screw over some short sale-ing dickheads in a tiny way. It’s nauseating to me that the retail sites like eTrade (which we use) and Robin Hood are somehow taking the side of the capitalists. They’re the Ayn Rands sucking up to Medicare in the end.

    Did the chicken barns just reek terribly? We had a few chickens when we lived on a farm for a brief time, and they were mean and stunk. But we let them just run around (we only had about 20 or so), and we fed them corn by hand and crap. I don’t want to even picture how chickens are treated in those large facilities. I don’t enjoy chickens as animals, but I don’t want them to suffer like that.

  5. I’ve read differing accounts on Ayn Rand. Some say that she wasn’t all that successful in life, but after she died Libertarians really glommed onto her and made her more successful. Other say that she was a big hit in life. I’m sure the truth is somewhere in between.

    My understanding about 50 SHADES OF GRAY is that they were originally written as TWILIGHT fan fiction. Somehow that makes them so much worse. I haven’t read them, but the lack of fiction reading I do these days is embarrassing. Not that they would be on the top of my list, but it is embarrassing. I did try to watch the first movie and didn’t get it. I mean I got it, the story isn’t complex. I just didn’t understand why women were so into cause the male romantic lead, was a tremendous a-hole. I know women like fixer-uppers or whatever, but I just didn’t get it.

    Wish I had gotten in on the Robin Hood-Reddit stock game the stock market action, but most of my investing goes into a coffee can I bury in the backyard. You know we are going to bail out those hedgefunds that went bankrupt. Cause we only believe in welfare for the rich in this country.

    The thing about the chicken barns is this… they didn’t smell that bad. I mean, yes there was a smell, but the difference between the smell of a chicken farm and a pig farm is almost night and day.

    Chickens are pretty awful animals. Some can be mean, but mostly they are just as dumb as a creature as God put on this green earth. They are the conspiracy theorists of farm animals.

    That being said, if I lived in the country, I would have some free range chickens. My nephew lives just barely outside the city limits (okay, he is probably breaking the law) and has 5 chickens. Every once in awhile he brings over fresh eggs. So delicious.

    I want to be a vegetarian intellectually, but animals are just so tasty. Kind of like I try really hard to be against capital punishment, but every once in a while, I hear a news story and I’m like, they need to light this bastard up.

    Anyways, chickens aren’t my favorite animals is what I’m getting at. But nothing deserves to be treated the way we treat most of the animals in our corporate farm system.

  6. I don’t want to be unkind and hope she was a big fat failure in life. But she did a lot of damage with her garbage ideas and writing. So I’m very torn on which I want to be true.

    It truly is horrifying to think that someone liked Twilight enough to do fan-fiction of it (I don’t really understand the point of fan-fiction, anyway), and then that they made that junk out of it. I cannot imagine which is the greater crime against literature. I usually still only read classic literature, but will occasionally change it up and read something more contemporary for a change – I made the mistake of reading that. It was just awful. I am the opposite – I don’t read as much non-fiction as I should or would like to read. I’m reading Tina Fey’s autobiography right now because I had an Amazon free download of it, so I guess that’s non-fiction.

    That’s shocking, honestly, that the chicken barns didn’t smell terrible. I always felt on our very, very small scale like the chicken smell was much more acrid than the pigs and cows – which, while awful and on a VERY small scale, were… earthier? I don’t know. But we did not have enough of either to really tell, and since the chickens were free-range, the smell was up closer to the house, so maybe that’s the basis of my memory. The conspiracy theory analogy is as accurate as any I’ve ever heard. They’re just sort of too dumb to function.

    I do also want to be a vegetarian. I almost entirely eat chicken, and there was a long time when I only ate it (most of my mid-20s). But I still don’t want them to suffer at all. And even eating eggs – I mean, don’t they do some terrible stuff to chickens to get them to overproduce? Or to cows for them to keep producing milk? I feel terrible about all of it – but could I handle being a vegan? But you’re right, I still occasionally want a big ol’ steak, served medium. And I am not great at eating non-meat protein always, so that’s also a problem. I agree – I’m ideally (and situationally) bothered by it. And I agree – you can’t hear certain stories and think, “Man, that person just deserves to stop breathing immediately.”

    That’s AWESOME that you get some of those delicious farm fresh eggs! We bought some from a former co-worker at the start of the pandemic when you couldn’t find eggs anywhere. Charlie LIVES on eggs, so it’s a huge deal to him to not have them.

  7. You know, I used to not get fan fiction. Maybe I still don’t get it, but I am starting to dig it. Maybe not in the writing realm. But I guess it has to start in the writing realm. I’ve killed many a slow afternoon at the mine buy watching fan films. There are actually some pretty impressive ones out there. There is a guy that has made a couple of fan FRIDAY THE 13TH films that are better than most of the stuido films. I know, low bar there. He has even got original cast members of studio FRIDAY THE 13TH films to appear in his movies. But even some of the terrible STAR TREK or HALLOWEEN fan films I have watched are still fun. There are some really impressive STAR TREK fan stuff out there. It is amazing what special effects you can do at home these days.

    While fan fiction still isn’t anything that I’d probably engage in, I have found some of the results to be fun. It seems like a harmless activity. Well, maybe not harmless because it spawned 50 SHADES OF GRAY, but mostly harmless.

    When I’ve been around chickens, I’ve never found them to be all that smelly. Maybe you guys got the extra smelly breed of chickens? But all the chicken farms I have been around have been more in the hobby chicken farm variety.

    You would never be able to tell that Logan has chickens, but then again, he only has 5 chickens.

    I never even knew that there was an egg shortage. However, eggs is one of the grocery items I gave up buying. They always went bad before I would use them. I only buy eggs if I have a specific recipe I’m going to make, like that day. So I don’t think I’ve bought eggs in years.

    They definitely do some terrible things to animals, so we can eat. I know that farm turkeys are so malformed that they couldn’t survive in the wild now. Something to do with the size of the breast.

    It shouldn’t sound like I’m tooting my own horn on reading nonfiction either. I do read plenty of it I guess, but it isn’t like I’m sitting down and reading tons of books to cover. More like sections of several books at the same time. If that makes sense.

    I shouldn’t toot my horn on reading non-fiction

  8. I didn’t know that there was a whole cottage industry of fan fiction films – that does sound entertaining. I guess, in a way, remakes of old books and movies are technically fan fiction. I’ve just never really sought it out at all or come across it, I guess? I will say – I find that I am apparently not overly adventurous in my internet holes or YouTube watching. I don’t use it a ton, in comparison to a lot of people I know. I don’t know if that’s bad or good, it just is.

    We very well may have had extra smelly chickens. They were also very tough when we ate them. We had about 30, 35 of them, and we had a miniature schnauzer who would chase them all over, so I’m assuming that they were constantly traumatized. Maybe I was smelling fear. Fear and chicken poop.

    The egg shortage was crazy around the same time as the first TP shortage. We were making backdoor, furtive hand-off deals for eggs back then. Someday the kids will be able to tell their children about riding in our car to a farm, honking outside the second entrance, and having a brown paper bag of farm-fresh eggs handed through our window, because that all actually happened. Before Charlie was born and became obsessed, I think we’d only get one of those little half-dozen cartons every few weeks if Jon was making something that required them. Otherwise we also didn’t get them as a staple.

    The only way we could make 30-lb turkey breasts is just by pumping those poor things full of hormones and trapping them in a cage so they can’t move. It’s so sad. I already feel bad for our dog that we can’t play with her 24 hours a day, even though she’s almost never more than a foot from us and is happy. It’s horrible to think.

    You didn’t imply horn-tooting! I think that makes sense – looking up certain parts that are interesting.

  9. Right now, they can’t make new FRIDAY THE 13TH films because there is a legal battle going on. I won’t get into it, because you truly don’t care. So that really opens the window of opportunity for people to fill the void by creating fan films for that particular franchise.

    The guy who made a couple of fan films I referenced hopes to parlay them into getting a show from a legit studio. It might be a long shot, but stranger things have happened. He certainly has the skills and those movies could use somebody that actually loves them. This is something that started be missed from the series early on. A podcast I listen to (yes, another podcast reference) did a lot of research on these movies and it is surprising how many of the directors were given the keys to a sequel that said, “I never watched the others.”

    I get it, it isn’t Hamlet. But you aren’t Shakespeare. About every famous director got there start in horror. And with that kind of laziness, you’ll be lucky to escape genre films.

    Any way, if you are ever hard up for entertainment, the first one he made can be watched here:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7K_wkQSM8xM

    He made a shorter prequel that can be found here:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbl0DmPR9fo

    As for smelly chickens. They do say that you can taste fear in meat. Possibly you can also smell it. But nothing smells as bad as a pig farm. You can smell those for at least a mile.

    The back alley egg story is awesome! I definitely don’t have one of those stories. In fact, most of my pandemic stories are pretty boring. I sat on my couch and didn’t go anywhere or talk to anybody. I never ran out of anything. I saved a ton of money by not commuting to work. The End.

    Dang it! You are pushing my urge to be a vegetarian again. But I’m eating a slab or ribs for lunch, so not too strong of an urge.

    Any ways, I was impressed with the production quality.

    Which means, one they knew what they were doing AND it is a testament to how much technology has come. It isn’t an exaggeration is those commercials to say that you could film a movie on an iPhone. Or if you aren’t a lemming, many an Android phone.

    Yes, I still hate all Apple products.

  10. I didn’t know there was a legal battle for the Friday the 13th films! Was that after the Freddy vs Jason thing? I sort of remember that taking way longer to produce than was originally supposed to happen – I don’t think I’ve seen any of the films since “Jason Goes to Hell.” I’ve found that I’m a big old wuss watching horror stuff after about 3 pm. I love Stranger Things, but haven’t seen the third season yet because I don’t have opportunity to watch them while the kids are awake, and I get really weird dreams if I watch them after. It’s ridiculous, and I’m fully aware of that. So I’ll likely try and watch these some day when I’m snowed in or something, or home sick without the kids! It’s always impressive when people actively try to make a thing they’ve loved better – including a movie franchise. I think passion is wonderful (so long as it isn’t about crackpot conspiracy theories or other damaging things).

    I didn’t tell the kids at the time that this was as close to a drug deal as they’d ever come, because that seemed weird – but accurate. I think the biggest thing I’ve done during the pandemic is make about two dozen different arts and crafts for the home. Photoshopped some various sea creatures into old photos I found on the internet from the 50s to look like alien attacks. Gardened for the first time in my life really (and only in a maintenance sort of way, but still). But all at home, mostly on the couch or in the yard. But hey – still REAL excited about that vaccine, especially since I should almost be at full efficacy now. (Not gloating – it’s probably the biggest thing I have accomplished.)

    I enjoy your consistency – even in hating Apple! I will admit that I now have an Apple Watch and Airpods (both presents from Jon). They just integrate really well – which is the exact intention. But I also still use my Beats, because I have not forgot about Dre.

  11. I don’t think you are missing anything. Well, I can’t really argue that you are missing anything if you had never seen any of them. I can’t really remember why FREDDY VS. JASON took so long to produce. I think their were some rights issues that crept up. But I think ultimately, they went through several scripts. Then they finally settled on something.

    But what is happening with rights now, fascinating. The guy who wrote the original screenplay is a guy named Victor Miller. There is a law that was designed to protect musicians. After 40 years, the rights to it go back to you. The law was originally designed to protect musicians that got swindled by music producers that gave them a few bucks for a song and then a different musician records it and it becomes a big hit. After 40 years, that original composer gets rights back. That way they can start getting paid for their hit. It also applies to screenwriters.

    So now the guy that wrote the original screenplay is claiming that he owns the rights to the character Jason. He wants paid now. The original producer doesn’t want to pay him for the rights, so they have been in court for years. I listened to a podcast where they interviewed a guy that was in FRIDAY THE 13: 3-D about it. After he gave up acting, his dad paid for him to go to law school and now he is a very successful entertainment lawyer.

    But legal rights are weird anyways. There are many stories of a studio just putting out a quick movie because if they didn’t, they would lose the rights to the characters. There is a rather notorious version of the Fantastic Four out there cause of this. Not the one with Jessica Alba.

    Cause, if I remember correctly, although the screenwriter owns the rights to the character Jason. However, the producer owns the right to the name FRIDAY THE 13TH. Because he came up with the title.

    If they wanted, the producer could make a FRIDAY THE 13H movie without Jason and the screenwriter could make a Jason movie and not call it FRIDAY THE 13TH. It is why JASON GOES TO HELL is called JASON GOES TO HELL and not FRIDAY THE 13TH: JASON GOES TO HELL because Paramount (when they owned the rights to everything) sold the rights to New Line (I think), but kept the rights to the name FRIDAY THE 13TH. Or something like that.

    All this is why it was such a headache to bring Spider-man to the Marvel Universe. Because Sony owned the movie rights to the character. There is something similar with somebody and the X-Men characters.

    Something weird is that I don’t even think about STRANGER THINGS as horror. Which I guess it is, but I just don’t think of it like that. I guess because I think of it more like a monster show and I don’t think of monster movies as horror. Even though they are.

    I don’t really watch horror movies much anymore either way. Or maybe I do and I just don’t realize other people consider them horror. One that is definitely horror that I did watch recently on Hulu and thought was really well done is ALONE. It is clearly done on a budget and there are probably only 3 actors in the entire movie with screen time. A few others that you hear on the phone, but get no screen time.

    It is about a widow that moves to the country, but on the way she is stalked by a serial killer. Anyways, if you are ever looking for a horror movie, it is really well done. You can tell it is done on the cheap, but you never feel it.

    “As close to a drug deal as they’d ever come”. Somebody is cocky about their parenting abilities.

    I remember at the beginning of the pandemic I got so much cleaning done! My house was spotless and well organized. Those were the days! With the weather the last few weekends, it feels like being trapped at home and that feels like the beginning of the pandemic.

    But today is Monday and Covid Kim says the pandemic is over! But the weather is too cold to go any where, so maybe I’ll do some cleaning. But probably not.

    Someday you’ll have to send me a couple of your alien attack images. I have a longstanding dream of making some 50’s sci-fi type images, but I never do anything about it.

    You can gloat about your vaccine. Enjoy your autism. While the rest of us made it through the pandemic, which is 100% over, without having to get autism, I mean the vaccine.

    My Mom got her second shot on Thursday. I’m sure I’ll get mine sometime in late July. If I’m lucky.

  12. I had literally no idea any of that was going on. It makes sense that it’s a whole intellectual property thing, especially since it’s changed hands and directors, etc. so many times. Jon sort of has explained to me the SpiderMan thing and why they keep doing endless reboots so many years to retain ownership (even though a lot of them are terrible). He also understands the situation why one studio owns X-Men when apparently they’re Marvel but not Disney Marvel, and has also explained that one to me, but I keep forgetting all of the nuances. It all definitely makes for a lack of continuity in series – but I guess it sees a lot of variety, which can be good and lead to innovation?

    Oh man, I forgot about that Fantastic Four w/Jessica Alba, let alone any others. I never saw any of them – but I remember how El Presidente at the Mine used to show her photo in every quarterly meeting for several years. That probably wouldn’t fly in 2021, I am guessing.

    I think monster movies are seen as horror because they usually eat people, so I guess that’s a display of gore? I mean, ALF wasn’t horror, nor was ET, just because they didn’t eat people. (I guess they’re more aliens than monsters, but so are some horror “monsters,” so nuance.) I just looked at Alone’s ad – nope, I won’t likely be watching that one. Wasn’t there a really big Netflix thing about eight months ago that was super-scary? I also didn’t watch that. I mostly don’t watch many movies that come out around the end of October, unless I can verify they are 100% not scary. Which, sometimes horror comes after the fact – apparently I should now be terrified of anything I watched with Armie Hammer in it.

    Touche. Maybe I should say “as close to a drug deal as I hope they ever come.” It does seem unlikely, doesn’t it? I assume there are drug deals going on in parking garages constantly, based off of the TV shows I have seen.

    The last two weeks have been brutal in terms of being stuck inside – and man, old Covid Kim is just flaunting it in our faces that apparently the world is fine forever now. I’ve cleaned a few times! We did a massive purge and closet gutting when we self-quarantined when Charlie had a potential exposure over Labor Day. It feels great to have things clean, but sucks so bad to clean them. So I get it.

    I just emailed you the alien attack images! They are purposely terrible, if that makes sense. It’s harder than you think to find images where the sea creature matches the 50s photo. I need to do more, but I think I started another project and abandoned it after the three.

    I am currently unable to look anyone in the eyes, but at least I shouldn’t get the ‘Rona. I think you should go sneeze on Kim and thank her so much for doing what nobody else in the US could do, ending COVID.

    I hope she felt well after that second shot! The second shot was sort of a doozy (I had Moderna). I hope that somehow they bump up our absolutely terrible response to this, and we get these rolled out faster. I’ve been calling 1b to try and help schedule, and it’s super upsetting that so many turn it down.

  13. I mean come on. Why would you know any of that stuff was going on with the FRIDAY THE 13TH franchise? I only learned about in the last few months because I started listening to a certain podcast. I assumed that nobody was interested in making a FRIDAY THE 13TH movie because they are for the most part, historically bad, and I assume stopped making money somewhere in the 80s.

    Plus, after you send Jason to space, where do you really go from there. I know there was a reboot about 10 years ago, but I’ve never seen it. Well, never seen all of it. From what I saw of it, I don’t even know what to call it. It isn’t quite reboot, but it isn’t really a sequel. It certainly isn’t a remake.

    They are horrible movies, but I have a fascination with the subculture.

    Here is the trailer for the 1994 FANTAST FOUR. Which was apparently only showed in a theater once:



    I’ve never actually seen all of the Jessica Alba movies either. But I know they are better than that. Jessica Alba has also been retired from Computer Mine meetings.

    As for monster movies. I think I don’t see them as horror movies, since I’m pretty much always rooting for the monsters. Cause human kind of suck.

    I don’t recall a big Netflix horror movie from 8 months ago. But it is certainly possible. Just lost my Netflix access, so I’m on the outs with Netflix. The last one I can remember that I would consider viral and horror on Netflix was BIRDBOX. But that feels like it was 2 years ago.

    Armie Hammer sure was the perfect choice to play the Winkelvoss twins. Maybe a good choice to play the Lone Ranger in a Lone Ranger movie that had a very white guy playing Tonto.

    Perhaps you should also define what you mean by being “close to a drug deal”. For example, I have watched a few drug deals go on across the street from my church. I’m close to them by proximity, but not close as in being involved.

    Plus, if they work literally anywhere that typical teenagers work, they are going to know some drug dealers. But maybe most drugs will be legal by then. Wouldn’t that be nice?

    I won’t even bring up that we all know that Ames High Gets High.

    I do love the 50s photos. I’ve been recently watching the entire collection of the original Godzilla movies to prepare for GODZILLA VS. KONG. So they are right in my current wheelhouse.

    My Mom also got Moderna. She had a sore arm for about a day, but that is the only side effect she experienced.

  14. I had thought maybe it was a well-known thing among people who watch movies that I had missed! I don’t read a lot of blogs, and listen to super-specific podcasts rather than ones about the industry overall. (I’m guessing you also don’t, but thought maybe you had heard something I hadn’t that just flew straight over my head!) Wasn’t it Jason’s heart that came out of his chest and wandered around NYC? It’s an interesting game to try and guess which is the actual worst of those movies. I mean, with Halloween, it’s clearly Season of the Witch, if you look at it from traditional standards. Although one might argue that it’s the best horror movie EVER for sheer camp.

    Wow, that’s an incredible movie in it’s absolutely terrible-ness. It’s almost impressive. Actually – I tried to rewatch the old “Emma” recently, the Gwenyth Paltrow one, as I love the new one from 2020. I didn’t get very far in because it was so dated and mediocre, so maybe I am also biased against certain 90s films. I am guessing that this is truly just a crap movie, however, not the result of bias.

    I do remember not watching Birdbox. Were there a couple of movies on Netflix about a House? I honestly don’t remember the name – googling, maybe “Haunting of Hill House?” I heard it was terrifying. Just zero desire.

    Sorry – yes, proximity. I assume that they will be near dozens of drug deals if marijuana is still somehow illegal by then. It’s going to keep happening at the high school – why would we not regulate, tax, and profit, then put that money back into the schools? It’s so wildly dumb.

    I’m glad you like the photos! They’re not great. But they made me laugh, and they killed an hour or two! They 100% were intended to be Godzilla-esque. Charlie asked to watch Godzilla movies this past spring, and so we watched a couple together. It was just right for him – not scary, but filled with action.

    That’s awesome that she didn’t have any side effects! It was amazing – all three of us on our team got Moderna. My boss (the eldest of us) had no effects other than a sore arm. I’m the middle age-wise – I got a low-grade fever, fatigue, body aches, but they were gone after about 30 hours (and never terrible). The youngest of the three of us had fatigue and aches, but no fever. It’s kind of a fascinating cross-section.

  15. I’m kinda all over the place on my podcast listening. But the majority is history/politics. With a few movie podcasts sprinkled in.

    Strictly speaking, if Jason’s heart came out of his chest, it walked around Vancouver.

    But no you have two movies confused. There is JASON TAKES MANHATTAN. Which less than 5 minutes of screen time was filmed in New York City. The grand majority of the movie takes place on a boat. The rest was filmed in Vancouver as a stand-in for New York City.

    The other is JASON GOES TO HELL. Where some kind of government S.W.A.T. unit blows him up. Then the coroner eats his heart and then the Jason demon moves from host to host until being reborn or something at the end.

    SEASON OF THE WITCH has a lot of people that have really resurrected its reputation. I haven’t seen it in about 20 years, so I still remember it as being a complete turd. But there is a big faction of people that think it is a legitimately great movie. I don’t know. I have my doubts. Some movies age better over time. Maybe this is one of them. Some movies look worse over time. EMMA is probably one of those.

    But with FRIDAY THE 13TH, I think it is clearly JASON GOES TO HELL, followed closely by the ambulance driver movie and JASON X.

    But with the HALLOWEEN, HALLOWEEN RESURRECTION is universally considered the worst of the franchise these days. But I ask you this, does SEASON OF THE WITCH have Busta Rhymes in it?

    (Although I shouldn’t pretend like I’m plugged into these communities, but this is what I have gathered from different podcasts I’ve listened to.)

    I think there was a “Haunting of Hill House” thing on Netflix. I think it might have even been a television show. Don’t know, cause I never watched it. Never been real big into haunted house type stuff.

    I’m seven movies into the original set of Godzilla movies. I’ve never watched them chronologically before. I was surprised that there is more of a thread that holds them together than I ever noticed. But, Godzilla very clearly dies at the end of the first movie. They don’t really address that in the second movie, he is just alive again. Watching the original Japanese GODZILLA with the American release of it, was a trip though. Basically they just filmed Raymond Burr standing around and try to splice it in like he is in the same location as the main Japanese characters. I never realized how bad that is until I watched them back to back.

    Then the story behind the release of the second Godzilla movie in the United States is also fascinating. For some reason they didn’t want it to be released as a Godzilla movie, so they re-edited it and changed his name to Gigantis, The Fire Monster. I don’t know if there is a way to way to watch that version. It isn’t in the Criterion Godzilla Boxed Set. It was probably lost to the sands of time.

    That is weird about the age breakdown of Moderna side effects. I’ve heard that how it effects you correlates with how the flu vaccine effects you. I never have any flu virus side effects, so I’m not too concerned. Which means I’m sure it will bite me big time.

    But our state is such a disorganized mess, I doubt I see a needle anytime soon.

  16. You’re right, I do have the two movies merged together in my mind. For some reason, I remembered the Manhattan one as involving a gritty coroner. Probably due to multiple decades of gritty Law & Order series being set in NYC. Man, that was so campy and terrible. And gross. But I guess that’s sort of the point of horror – to make you squirm for any reason available.

    I think the only time I saw Season of the Witch was with you, and it was definitely a long time ago. Since the Bollywood event has not happened – YET. It was completely awful then, but I can still sing the song. I certainly don’t have any illusions that it was a good movie, for sure – I think it was hilariously awful, which is how I see an ironically enjoyable horror movie. I could watch it at 8 at night and be able to sleep, but still was weirded out. It’s not a GOOD horror movie, however. That’s totally different – the first Halloween was a GOOD horror movie.

    I haven’t seen Resurrection! That’s the one where Jamie Lee Curtis came back, right? I remember it coming out, but I should go back – Busta is pretty awesome. I was just looking at his IMDB page, and he’s got a pretty diverse variety on there. Good for him.

    That’s really fun about the Godzilla movies – I’ve not seen the vast majority of them. I think Charlie and I watched “Godzilla 2000” (maybe?), which had some pretty terrible dubbing, but I don’t think it did terrible cut scenes to my memory. The others I’ve seen have been at least 20 years ago. Are you streaming them? I had a REALLY hard time even finding Godzilla 2000, and had to look at a questionable streaming source that a friend had on his server.

  17. I’m not sure you want to open this can of worms with Godzilla.

    There have been 4 eras of Japanese Godzilla movies:

    Showa era – 1954-1975
    Heisei Era – 1984-1995
    Millennium Era – 199-2004
    Reiwa Era – 2016 – Present

    I’m currently watching and really only care about the Showa Era of Godzilla movies. I have all of those on Blu-ray in the Criterion Boxed Sets, which is one of the coolest boxed sets ever. The Showa era starts with GODZILLA and endede with TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA. There are 15 movies in this era. Not counting the Americanized versions.

    The movie you guys watched is the Millennium Era. GODZILLA 2000 kicked off this era. There were 6 movies in this era. It ended with GODZILLA: FINAL WARS. Sony owns the American licensing rights to all these movies. I don’t know that they stream anywhere, but I think you can find them pretty cheap on Amazon.

    The current era of Godzilla movies are mostly animated. They are available to steam on Netflix.

    Including the American movies, there have been 36 official Godzilla movies.

    They hate the 1998 American GODZILLA movie so much in Japan, that they don’t even consider the monster to that movie to be Godzilla. They call it Zilla.

    Here is an example:

    Initially, during production of Godzilla: Final Wars, director Ryuhei Kitamura asked producer Shōgo Tomiyama whether or not they were allowed to include TriStar’s Godzilla in the film, whereupon Tomiyama checked Toho’s contract with Sony and saw they were allowed to use it, Tomiyama stated: “Kitamura asked me if it was possible for us to use the American Godzilla in Final Wars, so I checked our contract with Sony Pictures and found out we could use it. Since this was the 50th anniversary film, I thought ‘Why not include the American Godzilla?'” This incarnation of TriStar’s Godzilla was named “Zilla”.[4] This decision was made because they also felt that Emmerich’s film had taken the “God” out of “Godzilla” by portraying the character as a mere animal.[13] The name “Zilla” was chosen for the character by Tomiyama as a satirical take on counterfeit Godzilla products that use “Zilla” as a suffix.[14]

    “Toho had filed the “Zilla” name on July 21, 2006 and was registered on April 20, 2007.[15][16] This name change has been reflected in subsequent official products featuring the character since 2004, though “Godzilla” continues to be used on products that predate the name change, such as home media re-releases of the 1998 film and Godzilla: The Series. Matt Frank (co-writer and illustrator of Godzilla: Rulers of Earth) further clarified the name change, stating, “Toho makes zero distinction between “Zilla” and “Godzilla 1998” with the exception of title alone. Ever since 2004, Toho’s official stance has been that any future incarnations of the character be referred to hereafter as ‘Zilla’.”[4][17] Keith Aiken (co-editor of SciFi Japan) also clarified that “Zilla is a variation of the 1998 Godzilla” but stressed that only the incarnations from the 1998 film and the animated series retain the Godzilla copyright and trademark.[3][4] Toho had renewed the trademark on April 4, 2017 and is set to expire on April 20, 2027.”

    So in GODZILLA: FINAL WARS, there is a scene where the real Godzilla just completely destroys Zilla.

    They were 100% right to do that.

    I have looked into watching SEASON OF THE WITCH, but I think it is even hard to find a copy of it. I don’t think it was ever released on Blu-ray. I don’t like to buy DVDs. I recently watched every American Hitchcock movie and was sad that for two of them I had to buy DVDs. MR . AND MRS. SMITH and STAGE FRIGHT. Oh the humanity. Looks like you can rent it though. I guess I’m just not that interested in it.

    FRIDAY THE 13TH V: THE AMBULANCE DRIVER also had received an upgrade in fan estimation in the last several years. I can unequivocally say, it doesn’t deserve it.

    HALLOWEEN RESURRECTION is really, really bad. It was one of those movies that wanted to rip off BLAIR WITCH PROJECT, but didn’t know how to do it. It does not include the return of Jamie Lee Curtis. She returns in HALLOWEEN H20. Where she cuts off Michael Meyers head.

    She was contractually obligated to appear in another Halloween movie, so she is in the first few minutes of the movie in a mental hospital where she has been after it was revealed that she didn’t actually cut off Michael Meyers’ head, but the head of a paramedic. Michael Meyers tracks her down there and kills her.

    That paragraph right there should be enough to tell you how terrible it is.

    The rest of the story involves Busta and Tyra Banks starting an online company called Dangertainment. They basically take FEAR FACTOR (I think what that show was called) and instead of being a television show, they streamed everything live on a website. Anyways, Dangertainment’s first show is in Michael Meyers’ boyhood home. You can see where that goes from there.

    Movie is probably best know for a scene where Busta uses kung fu on Micheal Meyers and the line “Trick or Treat, motherfucker!”

    or

    “Hey Mikey! Happy Fuckin’ Halloween!”

    The movie ends with Busta moralizing to the media after they ask him like one question:

    Michael Myers
    is not a sound bite…

    a spin-off, a tie-in,
    some celebrity scandal.

    Michael Myers is a killer shark
    in baggy-ass overalls…

    that gets his kicks
    off of killing…

    everything and everyone
    that he comes across.

    That’s all.

    We’re done dancing
    for these cameras.

    Oh Busta…

  18. Did you have the Showa Blu-Ray series when we came over for Charlie’s baby photos? It seems like I’ve seen it before in person, and I believe you’re the only person I know who would own it! I had no idea there were 36 of them – doesn’t making it a cartoon take away some of the magic of the camp? It’s sort of like when they made Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles a non-ironic cartoon – the whole point of it was that it was ridiculous. That’s what made it fun! I may take a look into seeing if I can find some more of the Millenium Era – not because I think they’re better, but because Charlie seems like he may not engage (at least at 6 years old) with the Showa era.

    I feel useless that we still own a bunch of DVDs. I also much prefer Blu-Ray – it looks and sounds so very much better, and has much more room for content. Alice has been going through a Harry Potter phase for the past several years, and the DVDs are gold mines of extras.

    Is Friday the 13th Part V the one with bald Corey Feldman? That one was awwwwwful. Probably because it seemed to take itself a bit more seriously?

    Aw man, I am legitimately bummed that they did Jamie Lee (and her franchise) so dirty. Those first two were honestly good horror movies – shot well, suspenseful. Particularly the first one, which isn’t horribly gory. (Sort of my same complaint about all of the recent Tarantino movies – I wish they could just stop right before the asinine gore fetish display where they rewrite history.) That lets me know I absolutely don’t need to see them.

    Oh man – poor Busta. He had some legitimate talent as a rapper – it’s too bad they turn him into a trite laughingstock. Tyra Banks is an abomination. I have seen a few old seasons of that “America’s Next Top Model,” and she’s a legitimately terrible person. I hope that they made her look absolutely terrible.

  19. I did not. It hasn’t been out that long. It was released in late 2019.

    I haven’t watched any of the cartoons because it is anime style, I believe, and I really can’t stand anime style. I don’t know what it is, but it gives me a headache. No matter how good it is. I’m not a fan. I think they have tried to make the special effects better over the years. Probably haven’t been the best at it.

    If you want to watch something truly bizarre, checkout SHIN GODZILLA. I don’t even know how to describe it, other than to say it is the most non-Godzilla movie ever. It is like an arthouse Godzilla movie and Godzilla looks nothing like Godzilla. It is the last live action Godzilla movie made it Japan.

    I still own plenty of DVDs, but I don’t buy physical media that much. Well, until I went through all the American Hitchcock. Then I bought like 20 some movies that I didn’t have. Otherwise, it has to be something pretty special or I’m buying it for movie night. I did replace all my Harry Potter discs with Blu-rays. I have a good sized box of DVDs I’ve been meaning to get rid of, because I purchased the movie of Blu-ray or 4K. But some movies I keep all formats. I have like CLOCKWORK ORANGE on like 4 or 5 different discs. And will buy it again when it comes out on 4K.

    Bald Corey Feldman is in FRIDAY THE 13TH IV: BALD FELDMAN AKA THE FINAL CHAPTER. The one that was supposed to be the end of Jason. Part V involves a brief opening sequence with Corey Feldman that was shot in his parents backyard. Part V continues his Tommy Jarvis character, but Jason isn’t in the movie. It is actually called NEW BEGINNING. Then Part VI finishes off the Tommy Jarvis with a third actor portraying the character.

    Tarantino definitely likes his gore. Incidentally, FRIDAY THE 13TH PART V: THE AMBULANCE DRIVER is his favorite Friday the 13th movie. Alot of his later movies are a collection of great scenes that don’t turn out to be a good movie. Although of his most recent set of movies ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is my favorite. It suffers from the same rewrite history gory ending, but there is so much great old Hollywood stuff in there that is brilliant.

    HALLOWEEN is a funny franchise because of the major horror franchises, it it the only one that I can say has more than one movie that is a great movie. Yet at the aggregate level, the franchise is worse than FRIDAY THE 13TH and NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET… and so on and so forth…

    I was disappointed in HALLOWEEN H40. There are some great parts of it. They were trending in a good direction and then it has the stupidest plot and the movie goes careening off the rails. I’m hoping that HALLOWEEN KILLS has more of the good and less of the bad, but that isn’t usually how sequels work. Or sequels to sequels.

    I don’t know if they really make Tyra look like anything. She is in maybe 3 scenes before she is killed. I think it is an off-camera death as well. But I can’t remember. The movie is very unmemorable, unless Busta is in the scene chewing up the scenery. And understand, Busta isn’t the main character. I may have made it seem like he was, but he isn’t.

    The main character is some girl that gets talked into doing this by her best friend because she needs the money for tuition or something like that. It really isn’t memorable. One of the guys from AMERICAN PIE is in it, Which one? The most forgettable one.

    I’d say the other main character is the heroine’s online boyfriend who helps her by sending her instant messages telling her where Michael is in the house as he is watching the Dangertainment production at some house party he is at.

    I should call him a boyfriend. They have never met. His screen name is taken from Harrison Ford’s character in BLADE RUNNER.

    How bad is it, these are 3 of the first 4 trivia items on IMDB:

    Jamie Lee Curtis hated the idea of a sequel, as she felt that Laurie had a satisfying ending in the previous film. She initially refused to be in this film, until she ultimately agreed to do her part, only under the condition that she is killed off in the opening of the film so as to make sure her character, Laurie Strode (or herself) wouldn’t appear in another sequel. (At the time of the film’s initial release, executive producers Malek Akkad, and Moustapha Akkad tried to explain it by claiming Jamie Lee Curtis “was so impressed with the screenplay, that she wanted a large part in it”. She has publicly stated that was not the case, she was under contract to do it.)

    John Carpenter has stated that the movie made him cringe.

    Jamie Lee Curtis was quoted as saying she considered this film a joke.

    I hadn’t really

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