Pop Culture League Challenge: Red State/Blue State

     Red State, Blue State; One State, Two State... A Thought provoking prompt from

     Election day draws nigh, and the conflicting sides spew hate at each other, and slander the two candidates. We have two sides, divided by hot-button issues, such as guns and right to choose. And each candidate hits those issues over and over, while the real problems, like health care for all Americans, are ignored


    The story we are told is that the reds are rash, ignorant, "deplorable" and love guns and red meat. They think people should be able to take care of themselves and if they can't... the hell with 'em.

     The story we are told is that the blues are effete, interfering intellectuals, and they will tax you to death, take your guns and kill babies. They want to be in your business 24/7 and tell you how you are living your life wrong.

     Don't believe it. Both of these stories are true, and both are false. People are always too complex to put into little caricature boxes like that.

     People need to stop letting demagogues push their hot buttons and acting as a herd. We need to choose based on who will be the best for all Americans, the ones who have been here forever, the ones here now, the ones who come to our shores tomorrow with the promise of freedom in their hearts.

After all...Freedom is the right of all sentient beings!

When all is said and all is done... our Red Vs, Blue is as silly as this one.

If you cut the strings, step outside of the play, you will see that red and blue are the same. We are all just people- afraid, courageous, overwhelmed, coping... our differences are tiny, and emphasizing those differences makes us tiny.

Be great.

And from my fellow leaguers

• Another F Blog gives a different perspective
• Green Plastic Squirt Gun gave us an array in shades of red and blue
• The Toy Box brought us Smurfs, and Franken-Boo cereal of his own devising
• Alexis' Universe brought more Smurfs and a whole lotta blue besides
• Toy Break also went blue on us. Sensing a preference here among the leaguers.
• Cassie's Library did a rare photo-post for us, also Blue
• 20 Years Before 2000 gave us the Brawl for it All
• D.I. Treasures brought up some timely Garbage Pail Kids, who seem strangely familiar

For any other league posts...click the league logo above

A Chance Encounter in a Random Walmart

     I was at my local Wal-Mart on the evening of Oct 31st and happened to get started talking to a guy at the Hot Wheels bin. We talked over tastes, what draws us to a car, and eventually he directed me to his channel on YouTube.

     I also picked up this Warthog from HALO, which I love the design of.

Well, they call it a Warthog, but I think it looks more like a Puma...

Anyway, a shout out to my new acquaintance Matt!

Sifting Through a Few Bugs

     Way back in January of 2015 I posted this

     At the time, I kind of despaired of ever getting a matching set of Insecticons from Hasbro. Because we had Shrapnel, Legends sized, and FOC Kickback, Deluxe sized

     Shrapnel(or Skrapnel) came out in May 2014, and that looked like it was going to be it

     And then Bombshell came out, in Dec 2014( I didn't find him in store for a month or so after that) and made me cautiously hopeful. He upped the muted colors of Shrapnel to a much more dynamic tone and was a really fun, but simple transform. his engineering was solid in both modes.

     And together on my shelf, these two legends class figures cried out for justice, and they cried out for their third partner.

     The insecticons called out for aid.

     And Hasbro answered

     Now the Insecticons are united in my collection, here to gobble up all the energon!

Thanks to our good friends at The Chosen Prime for getting this wave in- Wavemates Bumblebee and Gnaw will show up here at the appropriate time

Pop Culture League Challenge: Cast your Ballot!

     A timely topic from

     In a year when...lets face it, the presidential race became election 2016: the reality TV show, an election for pop culture president seems a little on the nose. Some want to just vote them all off the island and start over fresh. Flip the board over and switch to checkers, or possibly backgammon.

     Robert Anson Heinlein considered the vote to be a sacred responsibility. In his novel Starship Troopers(the novel, not the schlock Sci-Fi splashfest movie) He envisioned the vote as a responsibility given only to those who had served in the country's military. Heinlein was one on my early literary influences, and continues to be a valid read to this day for me.

     Ordinarily I don't touch politics with an eleven foot pole. I keep it away from my blog, and try to keep my blog light and fun. I would be keeping the policy if so much of our culture weren't being twisted by the process this year. There are very few topics so divisive that they can tear a family in half, but Politics is in the top three, along with religion and dancing with the stars. And that's just an ordinary year. This year, people are desperate, and desperate decisions are dangerous ones. Those decisions can lead scared citizens to trust people who they ordinarily would never trust. Our main choices are a lady decried as corrupt or an orange-tinted malignant narcissist.

     That country would be served best by a strong veteran, who fought for peace. A man of vision, of intelligence, of great strategy, and incredible moral fiber. Someone Strong and Brave and Here to save the American Way

He is the Star Spangled Man with the Plan

And his nomination for VP

     We know his cabinet would be Mighty. We already know who is up for secretary of defense...

     To Homage Yakov Smirnoff, "In Steve Rogers administration, Cabinet protect secret service!"


     You are probably surprised I didn't default to Optimus Prime, but while his Alt-mode may be all-american, his birth is Cybertronian. And I think Clark Kent would make the birther movement go crazy.

     In these troubled times, we don't need media personalities manipulating the fears and doubts of good people and true. We need people who stand for all Americans. People we can trust all the way. We need real American heroes, people who got where they are without being dirty, who pulled themselves up and pulled up others along with them. People as enduring as Old Glory

     I wish we had them outside of our favorite fiction.

UPDATE: I may vote for the cat. 

Here are the thoughts of some of my fellows in the league

• Green plastic Squirt Gun is voting the Addams/Venture ticket. 
• The Toy Box is voting in a local cereal election
• Alexis' Universe went with a superhero ticket too- Advantage? neither her chosen VP or mine would need to use an aircraft on state visits
• Cassies Library is voting a Berry delicious and colorful ticket
• 20 Years Before 2000 takes us back to the famous Spider-man Obama team-up
• D.I. Treasures gives us the choice of Kang or Kodos