Tag: horror

Dark Shadows: The Revival (1991)

On By Michel McDonaldIn TVLeave a comment

I have had this on my Hulu Queue since I saw Dark Shadows with Johnny Depp and I don’t know why it took me so long to watch it, but I finally finished it today.  There are only 12 episodes and it is totally worth watching.

According to IMDB, the original Dark Shadows had 1225 episodes, but Netflix is only showing 162 episodes.  I saw the first season which is 40 episodes, but haven’t seen the 2nd season yet because I kinda got bored with it.  I don’t know what made me decide to watch The Revival on Hulu, but I am glad I did because it was an awesome version of the story.

I don’t know if Dark Shadows The Revival is a condensed version of the original, but I really liked it.  I wouldn’t have minded if they had more than 12 episodes, but I think I was satisfied with what I got to see.  If it is just a condensed version, I can only imagine how much I missed from the original series that I will never get to see.

The best part of this series is we get to see Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a child who plays David Collins.  Also Pretender Jarod Michael T. Weiss plays Joe Haskell… without a shirt… yum yum gimme some!

I could go on about how I liked one more than the other, but who really cares what I think?  Just go watch it on Hulu before it expires on 1/2/2013.

Cirque du Freak

On By Michel McDonaldIn Books, Movies, NookLeave a comment

(This is not a book review)

I have wanted to see this movie since it was first released in theaters but since one us in the house doesn’t like horror, the other (me) never gets to see it until it’s either on DVD, HBO or Showtime. Although, I still have yet to rent it from the Red Box at the grocery store. I seriously don’t know why I haven’t seen it yet. But right now at this very moment as I sit here typing this out, I’m glad I haven’t seen it yet.

This morning I wanted to start reading a book and I had chosen to start reading the 2nd book of the Belgariad but then I decided it wasn’t going to fit with the theme of this very day, Halloween. I mean sure it has witches and lots of magic but is it Halloween worthy? I think not. I have a queue of books that I want to buy and read and so I searched through the queue and remembered Cirque du Freak.

I got on the Nook store and found the first book for $1.99 for the e-book version. Perfect! I don’t have that much money in the bank for another few days but I have just enough that if I could buy a few of these volumes at $2 each. But I only bought the first one which is called Living Nightmare.

I started reading it after breakfast. It has fewer pages than the paperback version does as mostly all ebooks do but it also had way less than my regular books do. I can usually read 50 pages of a book which probably equals out to 75-100 regular paper back book pages and since this one was 149 pages, I thought, this is going to take 3 days, no problem. If I read half of it then I can shorten it to 2 days no biggy. But, after the live Ghost Hunters investigation was over I figured I’d at least give it a shot and see if I couldn’t just finish this book. And you know what? I did.

The story reeled me in, hook line and sinker. Whatever that means, some fishing term I don’t know. Anyway I was immediately hooked.

Here I am typing this out so late at night after spending so many hours reading, my eyes are tired and blurry and I’m having to squint to read, closing one eye making it easier lol. But I want to make my point before I go to bed and forget about it in the morning.

It was the most awesome $2 book I have ever taken a full day to read. Actually, it’s the first book that has taken me a full day to read. I love it and I can’t wait for the next one.

I wonder though, should I just go ahead and rent the movie or read the next book tomorrow and can I read the whole thing tomorrow like I read today? And is this a new trend for me? Reading these books one a day? How many are there? Do I need to read the entire series before seeing the movie?

Ok I’m too tired for all these questions since it’s 1:30am. I need to rest my eyes. I just wanted to let it be known that my dyslexia, ADD and learning disability didn’t prevent me from getting through this book, well, it was touch and go but other than that it was pretty easy to read and that is the kind of book I like.

I will start with part 2 tomorrow and hopefully the DVD will either be at the red box tomorrow or I can go into the HBO or Showtime on Demand and find it. I like to watch the movie first, it makes voices in my head for each characters easier so I cam impersonate their accents easier.

To be continued…

Deadly Pet Toys

On By Michel McDonaldIn PetsLeave a comment

We got our Toy Chihuahua last year so we’ve had her for maybe a year and 2 months.  When we first got her we went to PetSmart and bought her this little toy that is a green frog with a squeaker inside of it.  She loves that frog.  She’s always playing with it and her favorite thing is to bite down on the squeaker to make it squeak.

She’s chewed the hell out of that frog and she’s even torn the fabric so that she was able to access the squeaker and she chewed the tip of it off.  This was like 6 months or so ago.  I took the squeaker out and threw it away when I realized what she had one.

About a month ago I found the spare squeaker that came with the frog and there is an access in the back of the frog with Velcro so you can remove the one inside and replace it.  Well, even though she chewed the hell out of the stomach it didn’t occur to me that she might try to chew the spare squeaker the same way.  I don’t know why.  I forgot that she did it to the first one so it didn’t really occur to me to not put the second one in there.

Today Darrin was laying on the couch talking to his brother on the phone and our dog Flower was laying next to his feet just going to town on this frog.  I saw how passionate she was chewing on this thing and it didn’t occur to me that she might have been chewing the tip of the squeaker.

Darrin got off the phone and I noticed that she was clawing at her face.  I went over to her and picked up the frog and she didn’t try to get it back, she was still clawing at her face.  She had this look of horror in her eyes.  I could tell she was in trouble but I didn’t know what to do.  I looked at the squeaker and the tip was gone.  The part that makes the squeaking sound was laying on the couch where she was laying all by itself next to the frog and I realized she was choking on something.

I put my finger in her mouth and I could feel it in her throat but I couldn’t get at it.  I accidentally pushed it in her throat and she was struggling still.  I knew she couldn’t breathe at all.  I told Darrin to blow inside her mouth to help her out but he didn’t know what I meant.  He put his lips up to her mouth and blew on them, I grabbed her and put her entire snout into my mouth and just blew and then chip squeezed her chest and you could hear a popping sound, the plastic piece shot out of her mouth and fell onto the floor.

OMFG!!!  I was in total panic mode, I didn’t know what to do.  I didn’t know what I was doing when I blew in her mouth, I thought I was helping her but at the same time I would’ve been hurting her.  If it weren’t for Darrin squeezing her chest she would’ve been dead.

I immediately threw the frog away and took a picture of the squeaker.  You can see in the picture the piece that she had stuck in her throat, it’s the thing that the arrow is pointing to.

squeeker

I can only imagine what might have happened if we weren’t home to see this happening, what we might have walked in on one day.  I might have been on my bike ride and come home to find a dead toy chihuahua laying on the living room floor or on the couch.  Or we might come home from the movies or from going out to dinner.  I will never ever buy another toy with one of these things in it ever again.  And if I find a toy that has one, I’m going to take it out first.

My aunt Louise takes them out.  When I went to visit her for Christmas in Texas someone bought her dogs some toys and she took the squeakers out but I didn’t know why, now I know.  They are killers.  But her dogs are a lot bigger than mine, like Golden Retriever sized dogs.  Our dog is smaller than a cat.  Like half the size of a cat.  I never even imagined this would happen but now I do and I’ve learned from it.

When Playing Becomes Scaring

On By Michel McDonaldIn PetsLeave a comment

I have a 3lb Chihuahua.  She likes to play.  She LOVES to play.  I was holding her and blew on her neck, you know like when you blow on a baby’s stomach and it makes a farting sound and it makes them giggle.  Well, I can tell when she’s laughing because she starts sneezing and, well, I can tell.  And so I kept doing it and she thought it was funny, she was having fun.  Then I did it on her side and all of a sudden she got real serious and PEED on me.

I don’t know what’s wrong with her.  Whenever I’m playing with her I kiss her and stuff but whenever my face goes anywhere near her side all of a sudden she gives me this look of horror and starts peeing on me.  It’s like she’s scared all of a sudden that she thinks I’m gonna just start chowing down on her.  As if, she only weighs 3lbs, she barely has any meat on her at all.

We’ve had her for a year, don’t you think that by now if we were going to eat her we would’ve eaten her already?  What’s up with that?  I mean it’s not like we’re fattening her up to prepare her for Thanksgiving dinner, I mean, Thanksgiving has already passed.  LOL.  Poor thing.  I really love her, she’s so cute and so funny but… I don’t want to eat her.