Post-Thanksgiving

Thankgiving Weekend
That’s kinda how I feel about this past weekend. Those four days sure did rocket by quickly. I didn’t even have time to nap. More on all this later.

As a Side Note: The sheer amount of e-mails coming in advertising Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales has been stupidly insane. It’s time to start hitting that “Unsubscribe” link.

Post-Thanksgiving

Moving and Shaking

Every once in while I will check what domains are available. For years I have been wanting to secure some form of “Boy Wonder” type web address. Well … it happened yesterday. I managed to snag theboywonder.net. I swear I have never seen it available before. It would have been awesome to get the .com companion, but that thing is listed for purchase at nearly $3,000.

Introducing TheBoyWonder.net
Now I have two domain names. So fancy! For the time being (and maybe forever), theboywonder.net will forward to the cgm13.net address. I am going to look into moving my WordPress installation over to the new site and have cgm13.net forward on to there. Reading up on the documentation made it sound like it could be a dodgy thing to do (broken links, etc.). If it doesn’t work, I’ll keep things as they are.

So, the short of it is that you can get here from theboywonder.net or the existing cgm13.net addresses.

Meanwhile … IT’S A FOUR DAY WEEKEND!!!

What might be happening, you ask?
– Made the yearly batch of egg nog last night. It has to cure for at least a week and then it will be ready to drink. Yes!
– David and I are making some food stuffs (Cranberry Sauce and Parmesan Smashed Potatoes) and then we are off to share those goodies at a big Thanksgiving dinner that A&A are hosting.
– I have to finish up the leaf removal from the front yard. After that, yard work is done for the year. Yay!
– I will be hiking on Saturday with Kat (and maybe her special friend). Triple Yay!!!
– Then, the rest of the time is up for grabs with plenty of books and movies (and the possible web address change) to keep me busy.

Have a great “Eat Until You Burst Day” (aka Thanksgiving) everyone!

Moving and Shaking

Fifteen Years Ago Today …

15th Birthday!
15 years ago, on a similarly deary November day, this blog was born.

If failing memory serves correct, the bosses had given me a free domain name when we first signed up for web hosting. I registered cgm13.com, installed Blogger and was off and running. Blogger was in it’s infancy back in 2002 and didn’t have all cool features we now take for granted. You couldn’t give a title to any posts and you had to have a third party add-on for comments. The blog rocked along for a little while and was actually gaining some readership when our hosting company (and holder of the domain registration) shut down with no warning. I was left scrambling to register a new name and get the site up and running again. Hence the .net address and not .com. I also signed up for my own hosting with Dreamhost at the suggestion of The Man. Blogger eventually became popular and pesky to deal with in regards to slow service and outages. So, I switched over to WordPress which offered more features and seemed more stable as it was a self-hosted platform. Supposedly, I was going to able to import the comments from that Blogger third-party add-on. That failed and I lost a couple of years worth of comments, but the site soldiered on. I changed the “theme” of the blog every few months because I could never settle of something I liked. Eventually, readership was up and people were linking to me. That was about the time I did a Robin/Burt Ward theme. The title kinda stuck (because people were actually linking to this site) … and, thus, The Boy Wonder was cemented as this blog’s name.

Over the years, I have met some really cool people because of this site. I have even pissed a few of them off. Such is life, I guess. This blog, and those friendships, helped this small town boy gain a better perspective on the world and feel a little more comfortable in his own skin.

It seemed like almost everyone had a blog at some point. It was “social media” before social media (i.e. Facebook, etc.) actually became a thing. Eventually these new online social spaces overtook weblogs as the place for personal expression. One by one a lot of the people on my blogroll just disappeared. Bloggers that were very active just suddenly stopped updating. It was like those houses where dinner was still on the table but everyone had disappeared mid-meal. It’s kinda sad but change is a part of this crazy thing called life.

There are a few of us old timers still around (including two of my three Blog Daddies). That makes me happy. I took a break for a few years, but I am back at it and hope to continue documenting the events, places, people, eye candy, toys, and movies that make life bearable.

Happy Birthday, Boy Wonder.

Fifteen Years Ago Today …

Back At It

The weekend went by waaaaaaaaaaaay too fast.

Here are some things that happened.

– Kiki came over to hang out Friday night. I drank too many Dark ‘N Stormy‘s BUT I did discover that Fever Tree’s Ginger Beer is way better than Gosling’s Ginger Beer. We also stayed up way to late dishing about the state of things.

– Beth and I went to Biltmore to check out this year’s Christmas display. I actually enjoyed it. The decorations seemed more tastefully done and less like a Christmas shop had exploded.
Christmas at Biltmore

– Saturday night, I ordered cheap and sleazy Pizza Hut for dinner and felt guilty about it afterwards. I feel fat and gross all the time. I know this is because I eat badly and don’t exercise enough.

– Mom and I went over to WCU to see the School of Stage and Screen‘s production of Company. It was pretty good for the most part but there were some strange directorial decisions made (birthday party in bed?).

– The rest of the time, Bowser and I lazed around watching Marvel’s The Punisher on Netflix. Four more episodes and the binge is complete.

Bowser!
Bowser is thrilled to be watching The Punisher.

This week promises to be busy as well with the following planned: Lunch with Retired Pilot, Tripping to Asheville for the B&N Criterion Sale, Making Egg Nog, Thanksgiving Festivities with A&A, (maybe) Black Friday Madness, and (hopefully) a Hike with Kat.

Back At It

The Lowdown

This past weekend was a bit crazy. Lots going on. So, let’s get to it.

Saturday, I went to the River Arts District Artists Studio Stroll. I hadn’t been in a couple of years as this was something that Franke and I did every Fall until we had our falling out. I ended up going by myself and it was kind of depressing. I didn’t have anyone to talk about the art with, so I don’t think I will do it again (at least not by myself).

The Stroll also depresses me because all the cool art just reminds me how long it has been since I have done any real art because I am terrified of failure. Recently, two paintings of mine that I have hanging in the house were met with some skepticism (i.e. “Oh, YOU painted those?”). That didn’t help my fear of failure issues where making art is concerned.

Anyhoo … I did see this cool painting that I wanted to buy. It was only $700 which seemed pretty reasonable as this was a large piece.
River District Studio Stroll

Saturday evening, I put in an appearance at my nieces birthday party and then we attended a wedding. I didn’t know anyone there and it freaked me out quite a bit. The wedding got started 45 minutes late (annoying) but the service was really sweet (I almost cried) and the reception was “breakfast for dinner” foodables. Yummy! I think I ate my weight in bacon.

Sunday, we went to the dedication for the new public art piece here in town. Afterward it was off to John’s 60th Birthday Party wherein the free wine flowed a little TOO freely. The “photo booth” thing seems to be all the rage at parties now. David, Judy, Jeff, and Lloyd joined in on the fun.
Highsmith 60th Photo Booth

Somehow we made it home … after a Walmart detour (why the fuck did we go there?) and a stop at Taco Bell for cheap and sleazy eats to soak up the wine.

And then … MONDAY. It was a suck-ass day (and not in the good homo way). I was tired (and, thankfully, not too hung over) from all the wine consumed the day before. I hadn’t slept well and got out of bed with a feeling that something bad was going to happen. This feeling lasted most of the day. Work was annoying as I couldn’t seem to do anything right. After work, we met Wanda for dinner which was a nice distraction from the general awfulness of the day.

And now, the boyfriend is off to a conference in San Diego … so I am footloose and fancy free for the rest of the week. I am going to listen to my records too loud and watch movies that I know he would hate.

The Lowdown

Eye Candy [Ragnarok Edition]

Thor/Hemsworth
We saw Thor: Ragnarok this past weekend. On the whole it was pretty good with a fun story and some cool visuals. Some of the forced humor was pretty lame … I mean REALLY lame. I am not sure why some screen writers think that forced jokes are going to be funny. Oh well. Cate Blanchette made a really sweet villain. It was especially refreshing since her villain in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was so lame (I blame the writing on that one). Throw in a great supporting cast (Hiddleston, Elba, Urban, Ruffalo, Goldbum, Thompson) and you have probably the best Thor stand alone outing.

Plus … I really approve of Thor’s new (and fresh) hairdo. It’s so much better than those tired, long, golden locks.

And … the completely gratuitous “Thor looks for his shirt” scene was quite nice. I feel a little sad that Franke wasn’t around to see it. She was always partial to seeing some Shirtless Chris Hemsworth on the big screen.
Thor/Hemsworth

Eye Candy [Ragnarok Edition]

MonsterFest is a Wrap

Four days and 16 movies later, MonsterFest 2017 is now in the history books.

Dr. Phibes and Co. traveled up here this year to a swank rental cabin. They checked in on Friday and we were off to the races with too much beer and junk food. And that was pretty much the weekend.

Beer. Junk Food. Movies. Hot Tub (thank you, rental cabin).

As always, it’s great to see Dr. Phibes and Co. It happens way too rarely. One day (hopefully) they will get the hell out of Florida and get back to the mountains.

MonsterFest 2017 Movies:
The Finals Girls
Night of the Creeps
Bubba Ho-Tep
Ouija: Origin of Evil (Don’t laugh. It’s Great!)
The Wicker Man (2016)
Rawhead Rex
Dreamscape
Blacula
Baby Driver (The Obligatory Non-Horror Offering)
Miracle Mile
Sugar Hill
Poltergeist (1982)
Hell Night
Dog Soldiers
Slither
Dead of Winter

MonsterFest is a Wrap