XL-Viper

Way back in March, I found one of the ships from the Lightyear movie intended for the 5-inch scale figures they produced on sale at Walmart and bought it. It was the XL-01 ship, which is a pretty cool ship, but I'd mostly seen everybody talking about the other ship they made for the toy line, the XL-15. 

People were mostly excited because the ship was big enough that if it were modded in the proper way, you could fit one of the new GI Joe Classified figures inside the cockpit. There have been precious few vehicles in that GI Joe Classified line, because the figures are large enough it tends to make vehicles unfeasible...or at least prohibitively expensive. But here was a ship that didn't cost an arm and a leg, and you could repaint it to look like it belonged in the ranks of GI Joe:

Or Cobra:

These looked pretty amazing, but I wasn't really looking for a ship that could go with 6-inchers. I wanted ships for my 4-inch scale (1/18) space station.

Besides, I never found an XL-15 for a cheap enough price. I'd pay $10 for that XL-01, but not $40 for an XL-01. So I wrote it off...until yesterday.

I went to Ross, and when I walked in, I was greeted by the sight of an XL-15 on the shelf. I assumed it would be $20, because even Ross has hiked their prices recently, but I was surprised when it was, in fact, $10. So I bought that thing without delay.

I was pretty stoked to get my hands on one of these. And it came with a figure too. All of that for $10. That's a pretty good deal if you ask me.

I have an idea about converting the Buzz Lightyear figure into an astromech droid. I've seen this guy repaint the Buzz figures to look like robots instead of guys in spacesuits.

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But what if you removed the arms, and swapped them out for R2-D2-like legs? Then cut the body off at the waist? Add a few things onto the dome, like an eye-like camera thing, and maybe some simple panels, and voilà, cool new astromech, right?

Here's a really crappy Photoshop visualization I whipped up for it...sorry it's so crappy, but can you get the idea?

Take what's on the right, and turn it into something like this:

But that's not all. This morning I decided to search the internet for ideas on what others had done to customize their XL-15s, and I found this picture.

I immediately started drooling. Oh my gosh is this perfect. This is exactly what I want to do. It's not exactly what a Battlestar Galactica Colonial Viper looks like, but it's close enough that it will make me perfectly happy. Besides, I'll never find a Viper in this scale (1/18) without it costing hundreds of dollars, so if I can take a $10 ship and make me what will pass for a Viper. I can't wait to do it. This is going to be amazing!

Anklecast 57 - Do Over (Part Two) on Patreon

Hey folks, the next episode is up on Patreon. You ought to join the cool kids club over on Patreon so that you can hear it earlier than the rest. It really makes you feel superior to those lowly non-Patreon supporters. Try it. It's nice. It makes you feel like this:

Definitely give it a shot. Anyway, you can find the show by following THIS LINK...or just wait a while, and it will be eventually released to all the hoi polloi.

Hey, Taxi!

Ever since I first compared Hot Wheels cars to the figure that came with my Star Wars Micro Galaxy Squadron X-Wing toy, I've been watching for any car that looks like it belongs on the roads in a space station. Something futuristic looking. 

The car I compared the figure to wasn't bad, but it looked like a racecar. 

Can't have too many of those on the roads, but a few aren't bad.

Today, I was at the dollar store, and I found exactly what I was looking for:

It's a Matchbox car of the Citroën Ami. It's one of those tiny little Smart car like rides.

Barely fits a person in it, it appears, but it has a weird futuristic look, and could make the perfect droid-driven taxi for the space station. Best yet, they had several of them. I bought three.

But I could have bought many more...and I still possibly might go back and do just that. These things look good alongside those same figures that I compared the Hot Wheels with. Here's Boba Fett about to jump inside the Droid Taxi for a lift to the landing pad where he parked the Slave I.

Oh, sorry, I mean his spit-fire-spray-whatever-the-hell-they-want-us-to-call-it-now. He hired a robo-taxi for his whole crew, and here's a shot of them arriving at the ship.

Looks legit, right? I like it. I need to get going on this space station. It should be pretty easy, really, since it's so small. There's no excuse not to start on it, and I think I'll be doing that soon. Not this month, though. It's about to get out of hand soon...family coming, helping my daughter move, visiting Rish Outfield. But I'll get around to it after all that slows up.

OMAD & BBBE Carnivore | Outlasting Illness On Carnivore | Journey to One-derland | Week 12 Roundup

That cold that was coming on at the end of last week hit me hard this week. I was down and out for several days. Did I give up and go back to my old ways of eating candy bars and chugging Mountain Dew to soothe my woes? Well, I did cheat a little...Watch and see just what awful things I did.

The Mouse That Would Be King

It's super hot outside right now, so maybe this isn't the time for this post, but I was at Target today, and I saw this Splinter figure for sale. 

It's the first time I've seen it among all the Ninja Turtle crap that's for sale because of the new movie right now. They've got all the other figures...every turtle, Shredder, Bebop, Rocksteady, Leatherhead, and so on, but I never saw Splinter anywhere.

Then, all of a sudden, here he is.

I don't like the Ninja Turtles at all, though. So why would I care? Good question. You are absolutely right. Turtles are not my thing. But...

A while ago, I got a few of these Fortnite figures to put up on my shelf at Christmastime.

So, who do these Nutcrackers need to complete the picture? The Mouse King, of course. Splinter is a mouse...or a rat? A rodent, anyway. What if I took the head off of that thing and maybe put it on another body? Or maybe I dressed up this one in something else so that he looks more like a king?

Gotta get rid of those glasses, for one. Will they come off cleanly? I don't know. Probably, but these are pretty mass-market level toys. They have to make those very strong and hard to break so that kids don't choke on them or something.

Oh, wait, I just saw this picture on a website selling the figure.

Apparently, the glasses are 100% removable. I kind of wish I'd known that, because I didn't buy the figure, even though I'd never seen it in all this time. I just took that picture, and left it there. Now I feel like I should run back there and buy it up. I wonder how hard it would be to get the head off.

Maybe I can find another one so that both of the nutcrackers have someone to fight...maybe I can add the head to a good six inch figure that...

Evil Emperor Zurg

I've heard of a bunch of people taking the Zurg figure from the Lightyear movie, swapping the head out, and creating an X-Men Sentinel.

I've seen some people who made it into a different giant robot, using different heads from 12-inch Halo figures too. Some of them are pretty cool...so when I found one on sale for cheap at Ross this week, I figured I'd grab it, and possibly make something fun like that of my own. After all, I've got a few 12-inch Halo heads sitting around in my toy boxes...somewhere.

I've been thinking that there might be some kind of robot sentinels standing around in Anketown keeping the peace...or more like the obedience. This Zurg could be the leader of those robot sentinels. Pair him with the other Zyclops robots that I got earlier, and we've got some fearsome robots to quell rebellion.

I gotta change that Zurg head, though. It's lame. We'll see what I can come up with for that.

Men In Black

A while ago, I mentioned that I found a Fortnite figure on sale at Walmart for $7. Well, this week, I found that same figure at Ross for $3. I didn't need the figure anymore, since I already had one, but it was so cheap! So, I bought it anyway.

They're pretty cool figures. I could probably customize this one, maybe putting the head and hands onto a different body or something like that...or these two could just be partners in the Men In Black organization or something. 

I wonder if I could pull the sunglasses off. Would it leave a bad mark or would it be fine? I don't know. Could make it cool for the customization.

They both came with those goofy miniature spaceships...Lil' Saucer they call it.

Those are surely going to get cannibalized into pieces to decorate the walls and stuff. I don't really have much need of mini-flying saucers.

I suppose if I find another one of these for $3, I'll buy it too. They'll make great residents of Ankletown.

Halo Pod

I've been finding a lot of things on clearance these days, and here's another example. This is the Halo drop pod.

They've been asking more than $20 for this thing, and so I haven't been interested much, but I just found it this week marked at $7. A figure and a ship...even if it's tiny and worthless, is a pretty good deal for $7.

So, the ship is just a pod. I guess it's like an escape pod, but they call it a drop pod. I suppose that's because it is a pod that a soldier drops to the battlefield on. A sci-fi version of a parachute I guess.

That might be upside down. In fact, I think it is.

The canopy doesn't flip open on a hinge. It just pops all the way off. I think it's supposed to be like a door that blasts open so the soldier inside can jump out.

The figure rides inside in the seat, although it was fairly difficult to put him in there without his legs popping off their joints. I did eventually manage to get him in there though.

I don't know what I'll do with this. It's not particularly cool, but it could sit on a launch pad somewhere on the space station and look cool...or it could hang on the side of a building as the escape pod for it or something. I don't know. Kind of cool. Maybe it could work.

Frankenstein

I know a lot of people think that their computers and phones and Alexas are spying on them. Not to mention Chief Quimby hiding there in the garbage can.

I don't personally think that's the case. I think we provide all the free info anyone needs to be able to read our minds and hack our wants. Case in point, I've been watching certain things on YouTube recently, then I was scrolling Facebook today, when I saw an ad for this shirt.

Just a glance at it was all I needed to be filled with want. What do you think? Are you like me? Does the sight of this shirt fill you with the desire to start wearing button up shirts? If you know, you know.

Arm-y Figure

I've seen this figure a few times at the store, but I've never once considered buying it. It's from the Fortnite Master Grade series, where they make 4-inch figures that are supposedly as good as a 6-inch figure, with lots of articulation and accessories. That's cool and all, but they're still 4-inch, so they shouldn't be trying to charge $25 for them like they do with the 6-inch ones.

However, somebody busted open the package on this one and stole the code thing that it comes with for use in the game. This thing here:

Well, I don't play Fortnite, so I don't mind having the code missing. But since the code was missing, Target marked the figure down to $2.99. Well, I couldn't turn that down. That's cheaper than most anything that I find these days, so I grabbed it and took it to the register.

It rang up as full price, and I had to grab the attendant to make sure that it got changed to what it should be, and I walked out with this figure for $2.99. I couldn't complain.

She's a very strange character. She looks like an anime character to me. Maybe somebody from My Hero Academia or something. You can see that her real arms are confined in some sort of handcuffs at her chest, but she has two much larger and stronger looking robot arms above her shoulders. 

She's definitely some kind of futuristic looking character, and that's what matters if she wants to inhabit Ankletown Station. So, she should fit right in.

A Fox And Chris Pratt

I've been getting a lot of clearance stuff lately. I guess we must be heading into the Christmas season or something...or at least making space for the shelf stocking to come. That Holiday Barbie I saw the other day is proof of that, I suppose.

I mentioned how I found the Claire figure from Jurassic World on sale, and this week, I found the other figure available from the same series, the Owen...I think his name is Owen. Whatever Chris Pratt's character was in Jurassic World. Okay, I looked it up and his name was Owen. I never saw those movies, because I swore to never be burned again after wasting my money on Lost World tickets back in 1997.

Anyhow, I found Owen on for the same price as Claire, $6. And he came with the velociraptor called Blue and...a fox?

It's a good figure for an everyday citizen. Just a dude in jeans and a...I was going to say a T-shirt, but that's not a T-shirt. What do they call those? A henley? I think that's it. Anyway, a dude in regular street clothes.

And it's the second figure of Chris Pratt that I have for Ankletown after getting the Guardians of the Galaxy version of him a few months ago.

Although, I have to say that I think they got a better likeness on the GotG figure than the Jurassic World one. Look at this guy's head.

I think mine may not have been painted quite right. Looks like some spots that should be brown hair are still flesh color instead. I suppose I could just swap heads on them when I need it to look more correct, but I have no idea when that might be.

So, I have a good regular citizen of town, and a dinosaur that I could possibly find a use for and a...fox? Why the hell is there a fox? I wonder if I could find a use for the fox. Maybe Rocket Raccoon needs a fox friend or something?

This Time It Is For Me

Two weeks ago, I talked about how Rish Outfield had found Boba Fett's Starship...also known as Slave I...on sale at his local Walmart. It had gone from $32.97 to $10. 

He bought one that he says I could have...but it's kind of big, and I'll be flying out to visit him with nothing more than a backpack that I have to stuff under the seat, so anything I bring back will have to fit in that small of a carrying case. So, last week, when I saw it on sale at my Walmart for $15, Rish said I was probably wrong to have left it behind. Maybe I'd be paying more for it, but it wasn't much, and at least I'd be able to get it home.

They had a lot of the ships, though, so I was hoping that some would remain until the next week, when they should drop to the next level of clearance. Well, my ploy played out just as I'd hoped. I went this week, and although all of the ships on the shelves that were marked down with stickers were gone, I found some up above the shelves, and they rang up for $7.

So now, right here in my hot little hands is the Slave I.

In fact, because it was so very cheap, I bought a second one. Maybe I'll repaint it to some other colors and use it like that on my space station, or maybe I'll just sell it on eBay to somebody who wanted one but never got the chance to pick one up. I've been in that situation many a time, so I kind of like being able to help somebody out of that situation. Who knows.

One more ship for my 1/72 Ankletown Station, and I'm pretty stoked to get it. Now I have to keep a look out for when they put the Razorcrest on sale so I can pick that one up too. For some reason, they didn't mark that one down here like they did where Rish lives, so I'll see when and if that finally happens.

Alternate Day Fasting & BBBE Carnivore | Raising Ketones | Journey to One-derland | Week 11 Roundup

Last week, my ketones dropped to a low level, so this week, I set about alternate day fasting to see if I could raise them back up and get that sweet, sweet autophagy.

Come On Guys!

Okay, this is excessive! I know I complain about this kind of stuff every time I see it, but this is way too early.

My guess is that they must design each year's doll during the previous Christmas season, so they can get in the spirit. Then they can put it into production right away, and it hits stores as soon as it's ready...which is way too early. 

Come on, guys. Can't we wait until it's time to put it on the shelves? Do you really sell so much more if you release your Christmas doll in August?

72hr Fast & BBBE Carnivore | Good Ketones and Bad Ketones | Journey to One-derland | Week 10 Roundup

 I did a 72 hour fast this week, and knowing what I learned two weeks ago, I wasn't afraid to keep going to the end. My numbers were great, but they didn't stay that way for the whole week. See how low they could go. Watch and enjoy.

Crimson Surprise

I was pretty excited yesterday when I was out looking for toys, and I came across this:

The Crimson Guard is one of my favorite GI Joe figures from the eighties, so when they made the new version of it, I made sure to pre-order one. However, they are army guys, and would be much cooler if there were more of them. They'd be a great figure to army build with, as is many of the Cobra figures from GI Joe. They had a few main character-type guys in Cobra, but a lot more army-type guys.

Funny thing is that I was at this Walmart last week, and they didn't have any Crimson Guards available at all, but now they have one, and they've even marked it down to $12. Did it fall down behind the shelf or something, and someone just found it? Where did it come from? It makes no sense...but it doesn't matter, I'll take it. Half-price is so much better than full-price.

I'd really like to have three Crimson Guards to have a mini-army of them like I got with the B.A.T.S. that one time when I went out on a toy hunt last year. The cool part is that this guy makes that possible. I already had one Crimson Guard that I paid full-price for, because I wanted to make sure that I got at least one. Add this $12 one, and that's two.

And now these two are waiting on the shelf for a third one that Rish Outfield picked up for me the other day. There's a store where he lives called Treasure Trove that gets damaged boxes that were shipped to other stores, but now are not fit for sale at full-price. So, they mark them down, and sell them at Treasure Trove. Somehow, Rish knows the owner...through Facebook or something like that...and the guy messaged him saying that he had some of the new Vintage Wave Crimson Guards at his store.

Rish, knowing how much I love Crimson Guards and want an army of them, rushed over and bought one of them for me. They weren't quite half price, but they were discounted to something like $17. The vintage ones are a little bit different.

I think the only real difference is that the face mask is silver instead of black, and the backpack is red instead of black. The cool part is that with that slight variation, I'll be able to put the silver mask one front and center, and his different coloring will make him appear as the leader of the squad. So, it will be a little cooler than my three B.A.T.S.

They're all the same, but they're also androids, so they probably should be identical. Also, they have different things that they can plug into their arms, like robot claws or flamethrowers.

Anyway, I had to share my big success from my toy hunt with you, even though nobody who reads this blog cares other than Rish, who I already told over the phone. Maybe I need to get my Big Anklevich on Toys videos going again so that people who might enjoy this kind of stuff will actually see it. Hmmm...

Anklecast 56 - Do Over (Part One)

Okay, the new episode is available for all to partake, not just the special patrons who found what I do to be worth a little tip. Check it out, and maybe if you agree with the rest of the folks who have already heard it, you can pitch in a little tip over on Patreon as well. It starts as low as $1 a month.

This is the first part of my novella called "Do Over," in which a man who has reached the end of his rope gets the chance to go back and try again, and possibly avoid the mistakes that he's made in the past...or does he?

Afterward, Rish and I talk about some of the things we would like to go back and change if we had the chance to do so, and we open it up to the audience. Please comment and tell us about what you'd like to change in your past if only a strange ball of swirling light opened up for you and spat you out fifteen years in the past.

You can find it now on your Anklecast podcast feed or just right click HERE to download the episode, or you can even simply push the play button below if that's easier. It's up to you. I try to give you all the options possible.

 

More Clearance...But Not For Me

I've been collecting ships for my 1/72 scale version of Ankletown Station for a while, gathering a bunch of Buzz Lightyear ships, ships from the new Avatar movie, and Star Wars Micro Galaxy Squadron ships. 

Those last ones in particular, I've been anxiously awaiting their arrival on the clearance aisles. So far, the Millennium Falcon is the only thing I've caught on sale. I did get a couple X-Wings on a slight discount from Walgreens, and stupidly bought a Tie Fighter and the Tie Advanced at full price.

The time may be arriving for the clearance sales, though. I was at Walmart the other day, and I saw both this Imperial Shuttle...

And this AT-AT as well.

Of course, I want both of those ships, but that's not why I'm talking about them. What matters is that they are from the new wave of ships. The wave is arriving on the shelves, which means they need to make room on the shelves for them. So, they'll have to clear out the old ones.

In fact, Rish sent me this picture of what he found the other day.

$10! That's a great price. Amazing! Here at my Walmart, they're still asking this:

So, they're already at something like 70% off at his stores. I often wish I still lived there, and for many reasons, this one isn't necessarily number one, but it is up there a little.

I've been going to the Walmarts continuously for the last while, watching for these ships to go on sale, but as of yet, none have. Rish says I can have one of the Slave I ships that he got, because there were so many that he can certainly spare one, but I'm not sure how I can get it home. I'm actually going out to visit him soon, but I'll be flying home with little to no room in my luggage for the toys that he'll have for me. So, we'll have to see.

I am excited about it, though. I really need to start building something on the space station so that I have a place for these ships to be displayed. It's gonna be pretty cool.

Some Clearance Finds (Part 3)

Okay, folks, it's the big finale of the saga that you've been glued to your screens for. Today we find out what the last thing was that I found on clearance. It was this Batman set:

I found it on clearance for only $8. That seemed like a great deal since it came with a Batman figure...who I will probably customize to make him look like he belongs on a space station...a Mr. Freeze figure...who already looks like a guy in a space suit, so I'll probably leave him as is...and the Bat-Tech Flyer...which could make a great little speeder bike/swoop bike/solo spacecraft as is as well, although I'll probably do a little repaint to make it look less Batman and more random spaceship-like.

Here's a better shot of Batman.

It's not a bad figure. It's got cool armor and stuff, but the paint job is crap. Also, I don't need a Batman. I may try to modify the head somehow, or I may just swap it out for another, but it needs work.

Here's a better shot of Mr. Freeze.

He looks very alien. I barely need to do anything for this guy. There's a few spots, particularly on the arms that need some paint, but otherwise, he's good as is.

The ship is pretty cool too. Here it is with a figure riding on it...not the Batman, but the Claire figure that I talked about yesterday.

I'm mostly happy with how it looks, but I wouldn't mind getting rid of the blue paint on it, particularly those eyes on the front of it. They make it into an obvious Batman vehicle. Without them, you probably wouldn't notice.

So, there you go. This time it was two figures and a ship for $8. Which makes them about $2 per figure and only $4 for the ship...at least, that's how I'd break it up. Again, a pretty great deal, so I'm happy to have gotten it along with the other two things I talked about.