Daddy/Daughter Day 2018 #2

Last weekend I took my youngest child (by 1 minute) out for a Daddy/Daughter day. The first thing we did was head over to Toys R Us to grab her a "Star Wars: Forces of Destiny" Princess Leia doll. Then after that she wanted to head to the arcade. Her twin brother had talked about it so much that she really wanted to go. The game she wanted to play the most was "Crossy Road"! I can't stand this game! It is one dollar per play and you only get 1 life! It's a sort of a "Frogger" clone where the goal is to cross the obstacles without getting hit. The only problem is there is only one button! That button moves you forward. One bad move and there is no turning back. WHAM! Dollar gone! Before I could even load my 4 quarters into the machine to play co-op with my daughter her turn was already over! We agreed to never play this game again and enjoyed the other offerings at the arcade including Space Invaders, Pac-Man Junior and Mario Bros. I got to play the Robocop pinball game and a round of pool with my 6 year old. It was fun, but we were getting hungry and headed to...

McDonalds for a Snoopy Happy Meal. My daughter opted for the cheeseburger Happy Meal and got the Baseball Snoopy toy. I had my usual Double Quarter Pounder with cheese meal. This was the first time I have had McDonalds new "Fresh" beef patties, and I gotta say I prefer the old beef patties. Maybe it's just because I'm used to the flavor of the old recipe, but something tasted a little off. It wasn't terrible, just not what I'm used to from the Golden Arches. Anyway after lunch we were going to catch a flick at the local cinema, but we have to get some rations. So we made our way to...

CANDY TOWN USA! I love this place. It is so retro from the candies they have available to the old school soda shop inside the store.

You want gummies? They've got walls of them! How about licorice, jawbreakers or Runts? They've got you covered! There are literally hundreds of varieties to chose from! And you get to mix and match and make your own variety pack. So amazing!

Throughout the store they also have vintage coin op machines like a strength tester, guess your weight machine and...

FREAKIN' ZOLTAR! He is not as cool looking as his counterpart from the Tom Hanks movie "BIG", but he does tell fortunes, his mouth moves and crystal ball glows! FYI, I am still only 6 feet tall and did not grow to 7 feet to chase my dreams of NBA stardom! Still fun though! We spent a lot of time at Candy Town, but we had to leave so we could catch our movie. We grabbed some Haribo SMURFS Sour Gummies and were off to see...

Peter Rabbit! My Mom read me these books as a kid and I have read them to my kids, so I was more than happy with my daughter's pick of movies. It was a pretty good kids flick and when it eventually is released on Blu-Ray/DVD, I'm sure we'll get a copy to add to our Easter movie rotation. If you have kids, I say give it a shot. Well, that was the last kid/dad day for a while! I wonder what their mom has ready for them? 

Throwback Jam of the Week: 3/29/18

It's that time of the week again here at 20 Years Before 2000...It's time for the Throwback Jam of the Week! These are the jams currently on my trusty Creative ZEN MP3 player and they encompass everything from Motown R&B classics to hip-hop & rap from the 80s & 90s! I would like to share them with you in the hopes that they get you off your feet and bring back some sweet nostalgic memories! So throw on your Starter Cap, get your hair cut in the fresh Caesar style and slip on your Pumas kicks as we take you back! Without further ado, here is the 20 Years Before 2000 Throwback Jam of the week...

Artist: Fifth Platoon

Song: The Partyline

Album: The Partyline EP (Released 1991)

Peak Billboard Hot 100 Position: NA

Bonus Fun Fact: Fifth Platoon never released an album, but were featured on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze soundtrack!

Comic Book Pick: 3/28/18

This week the comic book I am most excited to read is...
DAMNATION: JOHNNY BLAZE GHOST RIDER #1

DAMNATION TIE-IN! Johnny Blaze takes the fight to a different devil than he usually faces - Mephisto! But Mephisto will show Johnny his own brand of suffering - and give Johnny PLENTY of reasons for vengeance.

(W) Christopher Sebela (A) Phil Noto (CA) Clayton Crain 

SRP: $3.99

Synopsis provided by PreviewsWorld.com

Daddy/Daughter Day 2018 #1

Last weekend I took my oldest child out for a Daddy/Daughter day. The first thing we did was head over to the Women's NAIA Basketball Championship Tournament. Since I have been working the Tournament as a member of the media, we were able to score some courtside seats and hospitality room privileges. The game we were watching went into overtime, but my daughter wanted us to leave so we would have time...

to play video games at Chuck E. Cheese! With all the tickets we earned she was able to grab a notepad, book mark and some candy. We went to lunch at a local Chinese restaurant and shared a huge plate of drunken noodles with beef. It was really good. While eating we discussed what she wanted to do next. Her choice was to hit up...

Toys R Us! I was happy to take her, because I didn't know how many more visits we would eventually be making to the Greatest Toy Store There Is! She ended up with a Rey "Forces of Destiny" doll. But while we were there it made me think of all the great times we had at the store as a family. So we went home and I grabbed a few of the items to highlight here.

Every few weeks Toys R Us would host a special giveaway day. My kids were treated to lots of cool, free stuff like exclusive Pokémon Cards, Lego/Mega Blox sets, Pokémon figures and Hatchimals Colleggtables. Of course while we were at the store we would grab our free stuff and eventually get suckered into buying something extra for the kids.

Another cool thing Toys R Us would do is host a monthly birthday party for the kids. Every kid who attended the birthday party would receive a free stuffed Geoffrey the giraffe, a book, balloons and coloring sheets. Geoffrey would also personally attend the event and stay to take pictures with the kids. I am so glad each of my kids got to take part in this event before they closed. I hope it's a memory they will have for life!

The last thing I will mention here were the great exclusives they would offer their customers. I am happy to have this Mega Blox TMNT comic and Topps Geoffrey card in my collection. I can always look back at these artifacts of good times gone by. I will miss Toys R Us greatly, but I will always have the memories and I will always be a Toys R Us kid!!!

Throwback Jam of the Week: 3/22/18

It's that time of the week again here at 20 Years Before 2000...It's time for the Throwback Jam of the Week! These are the jams currently on my trusty Creative ZEN MP3 player and they encompass everything from Motown R&B classics to hip-hop & rap from the 80s & 90s! I would like to share them with you in the hopes that they get you off your feet and bring back some sweet nostalgic memories! So throw on your Starter Cap, get your hair cut in the fresh Caesar style and slip on your Pumas kicks as we take you back! Without further ado, here is the 20 Years Before 2000 Throwback Jam of the week...

Artist: Johnny Gill

Song: Rub You The Right Way

Album: Johnny Gill (Released 1990)

Peak Billboard Hot 100 Position: 3

Bonus Fun Fact: A Remixed version of this song exists with a rap verse from CL Smooth!

Comic Book Pick: 3/21/18

This week the comic book I am most excited to read is...
USAGI YOJIMBO: THE HIDDEN #1

On his way to see Inspector Ishida, Usagi is confronted by Shogunate guards . . . a sign of the times. While unraveling a pair of murders in town later, Usagi and Ishida become wary as they find the corpses stripped of all identification-except for a talisman that leads to a startling discovery! Part one of seven-the perfect place to start!

(W) Stan Sakai (A/CA) Stan Sakai

SRP: $3.99

Synopsis provided by PreviewsWorld.com

A Trip To Bones Arcade

Every now and then I like to take my son out on what we call a "Dude's Day". This is a day for just me and my son to go out without the girls and do the things he wants to do. Last week he planned the day out for us and off we went! The first thing we did was stop at the Lego Store. While we were there my son picked out a few pieces to make a Lego volcano and a Lego Shark to put in the volcano!

The next stop was to a place we had been wanting to go to for a while! It was a new arcade that opened a few months back. They had so many games in that place from Mario Bros. to Raw Thrills' Walking Dead game!

There was also a place in the back called "Pinball Alley" were they had at least 20 different pinball games to play. My son played the Jurassic Park game and he picked the South Park game for me, but the one I wanted to play the most was...

the Back To The Future Part II table! Unfortunately this one was out of order, but that didn't stop me from drooling over the artwork on this thing. They got Doc pretty close, but Marty...not so much!

After playing around in Pinball Alley, my son and I had a few cheeseburgers with fries and Root Beer for lunch at the arcade. It was pretty good. Then it was back to the games! We hit up the "Classics" section and played some Dig-Dug, Donkey Kong and one of my fave old school cabinets...Centipede with the track ball controls! I remember playing this same cabinet every time we had to go to the dentist. Yes, our dentist had video games in his waiting room and it was AWESOME!!!

We played a few more games of Crossy Road, Pac-Man and Mario Kart we hit up our favorite games in the place. Mine was Turtles In Time! Yes, I have played this game many times over the years, but not on a stand-up arcade cabinet. There is just something about playing a game this way that makes it 100 times better. My son's favorite game was a huge version of Space Invaders. This game was incredibly fun. It was like original Space Invaders with a twist. Each level had it's own unique challenge and there were mega power ups to use against the never ending rows of alien intruders. We made it to level 6 together and had a blast doing it!

We finished up our defense of the Earth and then we hit up the candy store and grabbed a bag full of delicious Gummy Sharks. We needed the candy because next we were off to the movie theater to see...

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle! Myself and my son both enjoyed the movie and he hasn't stopped talking about it since. If you havn't seen it yet, I would recommend checking it out. There are nods to the original film in the movie, but if you haven't seen the Robin Williams flick, don't worry, the story holds up on it's own just fine! We left the theater happy with our movie choice and my son requested we make one more stop...

GameStop that is! I got a gift card from my parents for Christmas and my son has been on a huge Sonic The Hedgehog kick lately so he picked out the Sonic Lost World game and I grabbed a used copy of Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition for $9.99. It was a great day and we had tons of fun. This weekend I'm taking my oldest daughter out for a daddy/daughter day. We'll see where she leads us. I'm sure it will be fun!