USPS Damaged Mail Claim:(

I spent a good portion of the weekend negotiating a miniatures trade involving my new on sprue Tyranid army, new on sprue Tau Riptide, new Iron Kingdoms Unleashed Game for a used/built/primed Hordes/Warmachine lot that includes the Gatorman Sacral Vault, Croak Raiders, Retribution figures, Khador figures and Trollblood figures.  I was pretty excited about the trade because I'm really getting into Warmachine/Hordes, and with the job situation, can't afford to buy the miniatures.  We both shipped U.S. Priority Mail on Monday.

My trading partner got his package in good shape yesterday, and I excitedly went to the mail room of my complex to get my box after work.  I picked up the box and could hear lots of parts shifting around.  Not a good sign.

I opened the box and to my dismay, many of the miniatures were broken.  Some were broken beyond repair...

Not only that, the key pieces to the deal that I received, the Gatormen miniatures were completely destroyed.  Felt like a good kick to the gut.  Luckily my trading partner insured the box of miniatures.

 

We went back and forth with e-mails, and he feels really bad about the situation and is willing to help me in any way possible.  I spent well into the wee hours this morning completing a damaged mail claim on the USPS website.  I'm absolutely exhausted this morning.

Filing a claim was a pretty straight-forward process.  I entered the insurance number/tracking number, my trading partner's contact information, the date of the shipment, evidence showing the value of the damaged goods and evidence of my damaged goods. 

Determining the value of my damaged miniatures was particularly tricky and time consuming because it was a trade and not a purchase.  As a result, I couldn't produce a receipt or eBay auction price details.  In the end, I had to go to two major war game web store sites, Miniatures Market and the War Store, to take screenshots of the miniatures I received and then come up with a lower value since I traded for used miniatures.  I then submitted the screenshots in my claim.

We'll see how the process goes... I need some sleep.   

Update: It continues Here.

Lego Aquazone Aquanauts Store Display

I remember when Lego came out with the Aquazone line, it was the winter of 1994, my senior year of high school.  That winter I had my first job, seasonal cashier at the Toys R Us on Gold Road in Schaumburg.  My cousin Brandon convinced me to join him at the store.  It really wasn't convincing because Toys R Us was already my favorite store and my cousin was my best bud.  The above display was prominently featured in the Lego aisles at Toys R Us, K-Mart, Venture and other stores that have folded since the mid-1990's.

Upon starting the job, I realized what a tough job standing eight-hour shifts tending to grumpy parents was.  Brandon on the other hand had the plum job of looking for toys for callers on the phone.  He donned a headset and took his sweet, sweet time looking for Tickle Me Elmo, Power Rangers and Holiday Barbie.  I remember seeing him once sitting on boxes resting when he knew that they didn't have an item, pretending to look for it.  He gave me a smirk as I frantically was trying to take cash from and give correct change to the never-ending line of shopping parents.  How unfair.

For some reason we didn't have many shifts together, maybe Toys R Us had some type of Saving Private Ryan policy that prevented relatives from working together.  Or maybe they just knew we'd mess around on our joint shifts, which actually did occur the next two summers while Brandon and I worked together in the shipping department at Motorola.

Back to the Legos, the Aquazone line somewhat paid homage to Disney's Horizon's attraction whereby humanity had a colony of undersea explorers.  The undersea explorers called Aquanauts mined for little silver Lego crystals.  Unlike the Disney attraction, however, there were these bad guys called the Seasharks trying to steal the little silver pieces from the Aquanauts.  More about the line can be found here. 

I think I bought an Aquazone set after my shift every week I worked at Toys R Us, which was only a little over a month and which only paid $4.75 an hour.  Silly me.  For some reason, a few years later I ended up acquiring an Aquazone display, as shown in the pictures above and below, at a toy show.  Looking back, I'm not sure why I bought the display.  I think it was one of those things my Dad thought was cool and I was somewhat pressured into buying once I showed a little interest into it.  He loved bargaining with those dealers at the toy shows and I can imagine that once the game started, we couldn't back out until we had the entire glory of the 20-pound wooden Lego store display.

The display lights up when you press one of the buttons and you can see two Lego sets within the bubble.

Here's a better look of the goodies inside of the bubble.

And if you press the top button, it plays a recorded Aquazone message.  Like this:

If you are wondering why the display is in the box, it's because I just sold it earlier this week.  If we backtrack, I had forgotten about the Lego display for some 20 years or more until we moved back to the U.S. from Japan.  When we moved back, Mom gave us over 30 boxes of my stuff, mostly action figures and other toys.  This bad boy was in one of the boxes.

Of course the batteries were dead when I first unearthed it, but a little dusting off and eight shiny new D batteries got it running again like we were back in 1994.

Selling it was somewhat of a fiasco.  I didn't want to ship the display across the country due to the set possibly being damaged in transit and the incredible pain of packing a tube-T.V. sized 20-pound wooden box of Legos.  As a result, I listed it on eBay and marked "Local Pick-Up Only"  for the shipping.

Sure enough, within 10 hours of listing it, some dude from Los Angeles selects "Buy-It Now" and becomes the new owner of my Lego store display.

Oh well.  We worked out the shipping details and it ended up taking me over an hour to pack the display.  Mind you even though I unearthed it only a few months ago, Mom had packed it to be stored in the attic, which is completely different than being packed to be sent on truck/plane across the country.  Luckily wifey helped me by driving me to the Post Office and we jointly carried the giant box into the lobby and onto the counter.  The clerk couldn't find a ruler to measure the box, and we ended up paying 20 bucks less than he told us the shipping amount would be.  I bought insurance just to be sure it didn't get too damaged.  We'll see how and if it gets to Los Angeles in about a week.  I'll update this once it arrives there.  Thanks for the read and have a good one today.

Super Mario Happy Meals!!!

As I reach closer and closer to 40, it's extremely rare that a Happy Meal will get me excited.  I mean, there's about zero chance that Deadpool will get a toy assortment that includes a hooker/stripper girlfriend figure, chest-exposed Angel Dust, puking Colossus and a Wade Wilson with a baby arm.

Well, here's one that might have me at McDonald's once, maybe twice a week.  To promote the impossible-to-find-Switch, McDonald's has eight different Super Mario Brothers premiums that may be picked up until May 22nd.  Part of the reason I'm nuts about the figures is my seven-year old is the world's biggest Mario Kart fan.  She can turn any conversion into one about Peach, Luigi and Yoshi.  In fact, she once told me that she never gets sad at school because she can always just think about Mario.  The other part of the reason is the figures are just cool.  There's a Luigi that shoots out of a pipe, a Mario that lights up like he's in invincible mode and a red Koopa shell that zig-zags around once pulled back, amongst other cool figures.  Check out the picture below for the different prizes available.

The little one's favorite character in the Mario world is Baby Peach, a baby version of Princess Peach.  That said, she loves the Princess in all shapes and forms.  Looking at the above assortment, there was a one-in-eight chance of my little princess getting the princess.  Already preparing for the almost inevitable of not getting her first choice, while in line, my daughter told me that she would be happy even if she got the evil Bowser.  Her reasoning was that she needed a villain for the rest of her Mario figures to square off against.  While waiting, the cashier gave my daughter her drink for the meal, chocolate milk.  Even the milk containers are Mario themed.  Nintendo and McDonald's went all out for this promotion.

The food took longer than expected and my family retreated to the table.  When I finally got our food, I walked back with the treasure.  We went without soft drinks and the whole meal was only $13.79.  Not bad at all for a family of four.  I nervously looked at the Happy Meal box and prayed to the Mario gods for a Princess Peach.

I sat down and distributed the meal items.  My youngest one was handed her Happy Meal box last.  We all stopped what we were doing and watched the little one open the box.  Time seemed to stop as she reached her hand into the McDonald's treasure chest.  In slow motion she pulled out...

Princess Peach!!!  We all shouted in joy.  It seriously was my happiest moment in two months with the job situation and the Blackhawks being eliminated in the first round.  We hugged each other and enjoyed the precious moment.  The relief of getting Peach on the first try is enormous.  This bit of luck definitely saved us multiple trips back to McDonald's.  However, even though we got Peach, we plan on returning as the toys are pretty darn cool. 

Thanks for the read and go get yourself some Mario Happy Meals.

 

Cinco de Mayo! Burrito Parrilla Mexicana; Carol Stream, Illinois

Two days, two holidays.  May the Fourth Be With You was immediately followed by Cinco de Mayo.  To celebrate the fifth of May we enjoyed burritos at Burrito Parrilla Mexicana in Carol Stream, right on Schmale Rd., in front of the Home Depot.

Upon entering the restaurant, diners are greeted by a wall of large flat screen T.V.s on the right and a view of the entire kitchen through windows on the left.  The interior is very modern and had it not been for television programming in Spanish, one might not be able to tell Burrito Parrilla is a Mexican restaurant.

The menu choices at Burrito Parrilla are fairly standard, which as expected are burritos and tacos with choices of various meats.  I choose the wet (red chili sauce and melted cheese on top) chorizo burrito and wife choose the three-taco combo with cilantro/onion toppings and beef tongue, chicken and shredded pork as the meats.  The kiddies got the one-taco kiddie meal and cheese enchilada kid meal, respectively.  The kids are allowed to choose fries instead of refried beans as the side, which is a big plus for my guys.  The kid meals came with drinks too.  Wifey and I chose to just drink water, so it was a dinner under 30 bucks, which is pretty nice considering the size of the portions and quality, as explained below.

After sitting down, we were brought two bowls of warm nacho chips and three different salsas, two spicier ones in condiment containers and a very mild one suitable for everyone in a smaller bowl.  This was a pleasant surprise as there is another Mexican place further down the road  toward Wheaton that doesn't offer free ships.  The chips were good, not too oily and too salty.

Within ten minutes later, our order was brought to our table.  My wet burrito was huge!  The ingredients tasted really fresh, especially the greens inside.  The chorizo wasn't too salty and meshed well with the veggies.  Being a wet burrito, it was that, definitely not dry but not soggy at all.  I ate the entire thing and it was very satisfying.  It didn't give me the sick-full feeling you get from consuming too much greasy food.

Wife liked her taco plate a lot.  The corn tortillas were not too dry and like the burrito, they were made from fresh ingredients.  Three tacos were too many for her and I "helped" her by eating the beef tongue taco.  It was my first time trying beef tongue.  I think the tongue is a softer piece of meat that has a more neutral taste than other beef cuts.

All in all, due to the portion sizes, fresh ingredients and value, we would definitely return to Burrito Parrilla.  I give it four tacos out of five tacos for the foregoing reasons.  Thanks for the read!

May the Fourth Be With You! Kenner's Star Wars Micro Collection

In honor of this special May the Fourth Be With You, I'd like to talk about my favorite Star Wars collectibles, Kenner's Star Wars Micro Collection.  In 1982, Kenner released Star Wars playsets that came with pre-painted little metal figures.  Some of the figures are shown above.

Unfortunately, the figures chipped rather easily when dropped as you can see above.  This was not the best for toys to be played with by little hands.  Perhaps that was what led to the demise of the line in only about a year.  Some of the playsets, which are plastic, from the line are shown below.

 

Kenner made a Death Star series, a Hoth series (complete with the Ion Cannon) and a Bespin series as well as vehicle main stays, the X-Wing Fighter, Tie Fighter, Snowspeeder and Millennium Falcon.  The Millennium Falcon is particularly rare because I understand it was a Sears exclusive that was produced near the end of the line in 1983. 

Being a toy soldier nut, I had various Micro Collection playsets from my childhood but also started collecting them again during my high school days in the early 1990's.  My buddy Scott and I would patrol garage and rummage sales looking for Star Wars stuff during that time.  I was really focused on finding more Micro Collection items during our searches.  For some reason, Micro Collection stuff didn't have that old moldy plastic smell quality that the other Star Wars stuff we would find at the garage sales had.  Maybe it was because kids didn't play with the Micro Collection items very much.

In one of my pre-Internet acquisitions, I proudly got the Micro Collection Millennium Falcon, which is boxed away somewhere in my apartment.  In those days, other than garage sales, the only places you could find Star Wars toys were toy shows and a monthly toy classified publication called Toy Shop.  If I can locate the Falcon, I'll add a picture... And here it is in all of its glory.

That's all for now about Micro Collection.

What are you wearing today?  I'm wearing the below shirt thanks to Mom's lucky find during her days working at Macy's.

Have a good one today, and May the Fourth Be With You!

My Latest Project: Hordes Minions Blindwater Congregation Gatormen Blackhide Wrastler

When I'm not job searching or working remotely, what am I doing?  Building and painting miniatures of course!  My latest project is the Blackhide Wrastler/Blindwalker from Privateer Press' Hordes game.  Who doesn't think giant muscled gatormen wearing gimp masks are cool?

I've been assembling and painting for over 30 years.  I remember how it all started.  Dad got me one of those cheap party-favor WWII soldier sets from Toys R Us.   I was instantly hooked on the mini olive green Japanese soldiers, dark grey Germans, burnt red Russians, forest green Americans and beige British dudes contained therein.  Plastic crack...  Visiting that Gamer's Paradise during junior high at the now-gone Town & Country Mall on Rand and Palatine Roads in Palatine sent the addiction through the roof.  It was there where I was introduced to multi-part Games Workshop Warhammer Space Marines.  These guys were larger than the WWII soldiers, customizable and much more expensive.  Thank you Mom and Dad for all the Warhammer stuff over all these years.

That said, let's get down to business.  The process starts with assembling the Gatormen Wrastler. He came like this:

 After a quick wash in warm water to remove the chemicals that allowed him to easily pop out of his mold (and adversely affect paint adhering to the model) and subsequent drying, I glued him together using super glue.  Unfortunately, I had to use some gap filler (the green stuff) where the model's parts didn't fit snuggly together.  The green stuff is really called Green Stuff and solidifies in a few hours. I also removed the flash (excess plastic on mold lines, etc.) using an Exacto knife.

Let's wrastle!!!

After drying, I sprayed him with Tamiya grey primer and once dry, Tamiya flat desert yellow.

Next, I added a wash of Army Painter Green Ink on all of his gator flesh.  There are two types of paint I used, regular paint and something called ink.  Inks are heavily diluted paints that nicely flow into cracks and crevices. 

And then two washes of Army Painter Dark Ink (black) on his back scales, followed by another wash of green ink on his gator flesh.

I did about four layers of Games Workshop Agrax Brown Ink on his ropes and two layers of the brown ink on the gimp mask.  I let each layer dry and then applied the next layer of ink.  I then painted his mouth using a mix of Games Workshop White Scars White and a few drops of Games Workshop Crimson Ink followed by a wash of the crimson ink and a dry brush of the white paint/crimson ink mix.

Dry brushing is a process where one dips a little bit of paint on a brush, removes most of the paint with a paper towel/tissue/napkin and then rubs the very light layer of paint on the surface of a model.

I next applied a 4 parts water to 1 part brown ink mix on his belly and underside.

 

Finally, I painted his eyes Games Workshop Sunburst Yellow, his nails and teeth Games Workshop Bleached Bone (followed by a brown ink wash and then bleached bone dry brush) and his shoulder pad Games Workshop Sigmarite Gold (followed by a brown ink and gold paint dry brush). 

Voila! Gatorman Wrastler in about five hours!!!  That was my quota of geekiness for the day. Thank you for reading. Now go out there and paint some minis! Waaaarrrgghhhhh!!!

E Komo Mai, Welcome

So much has happened since my last post at the Tokyo Tiki Room...

Most importantly, the Tokyo Tiki Room has moved because I have moved to... Chicago.  That said, we'll pick up with the pop culture reports, restaurant reviews and general geekiness, but instead of being in Tokyo, they'll be coming from Chicago. 

Not only that, I have unexpectedly become jobless (at least full-time) so there's a good chance that I'll be posting more, at least until I obtain a full time job.  You can hear more about my job search here.  I'm going on month two of the search, so hopefully it won't last much longer.

During our New Year's party, I remember telling my wife, Mom and cousin Ryan that 2017 would be a great year.   So far it's been a pretty difficult 2017- my employer lets me go only six months after hiring me away from my company in Japan, there are still no main male East Asian heroes in the Marvel Universe and the heavily-favored Blackhawks get bounced out of the playoffs in the first round.  Not sure which is the worst.  I guess it can only get better... The picture above demonstrates that it is really possible to hit the jackpot; I got this at Enchanted Castle and won 1,000 tickets.  Hopefully that'll occur with my next permanent role.  That'll balance the poor luck of the past few months.