Disney Die-Cast Attractions Collection

Several years ago (around 2005), Disney made a series of toys called the Die-Cast Attractions Collection, only available at Disneyland and Walt Disney World. They were really cool die-cast metal versions of the various attraction vehicles, usually with some fun characters siting inside and enjoying the ride! Since I absolutely love the classic DIsney attractions, I started buying these as a way to commemorate my many visits to the Disney parks, but soon I become obsessed with finding the complete set, so I started hunting on eBay and other places online. Besides attraction vehicles, I soon discovered they also made parade floats (mostly cars from the old Stars and Motor Cars Parade at Disney's Hollywood Studios), and they even made a few deluxe vehicles with more detail (such as the Main Street Fire Engine and the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad engine) with nice plastic display cases included. Back when I was buying these, I reached a point where I thought I had them all, and after doing a little research I think that's true (minus a few specialty items), thanks to a website I found with an overview of the whole collection (scroll about halfway down). Lately I have been taking snapshots of these with Instagram (also available in a Flickr set), and it's been so much fun to think about riding the Matterhorn Bobsleds, the Jungle Cruise, Pirates of Caribbean, the Haunted Mansion, and of course all of the Fantasyland dark rides! These toys seem to be fairly rare now, and I've seen some being sold for ten times what I originally paid. I'm proud to have this series in my Toy Museum!

Sideshow Planet of the Apes figures

After collecting all of the Medicom Planet of the Apes Ultra Detail Figures, I didn't think there were any Apes toys left for me to pursue, but recently I stumbled upon some great prices for the Sideshow 12-inch Planet of the Apes figures! I kind of have a knack for discovering toys soon after they are out of production, so I can find decent prices before the collector's market has really heated up, and this definitely seems to be the case with these figures. First I ordered a Zira figure at a price I couldn't pass up, and I was amazed at the detail of the sculpt, which not only captures the spirit of the character, but even looks like Kim Hunter in makeup! Next I found a good price for Dr. Zaius and Taylor in his ANSA astronaut uniform, and eventually found a Cornelius (which seems to be in demand) at a price I was willing to pay. All of these figures have incredible articulation, beautiful cloth costumes, tons of cool accessories (Cornelius even comes with the doll that says "Mama" from his archeological dig in the Forbidden Zone), and even wonderful stands with the movie logo! I recently snagged the Mutant Leader from Beneath the Planet of the Apes (complete with removable face so you can see his deformity), and I'm thinking about getting Brent soon. I would love to add General Ursus to my collection, but since not as many of this figure (along with a few other characters) were produced, he's pretty expensive. I'm keeping my eyes open, though! All of these tall figures look spectacular in my Toy Museum, and as always it's fun to express my fandom by collecting cool toys from one of my favorite movie series!

All aboard the LEGO train

My LEGO addiction is still going strong, and lately I've been obsessed with LEGO trains! I had been thinking about getting a set for quite some time, but when I saw them in action at Brick Fiesta (a local LEGO convention that was fantastic) I was hooked. By some great timing, my parents hit a slot machine jackpot and decided to share the wealth with lucky me, so it was easy to buy the semi-expensive Passenger Train set (7938). This is a wonderful starter set, since it comes with all the electronics you need to get a train moving: a motor, a battery box to power it, an IR receiver, and a remote control, which wirelessly controls the train. I really enjoyed building the engine and other cars, hooking up the track (plus the small passenger platform), and watching my new train in action! I was so excited that I made a short video of it. A few days later I was at the LEGO Store and spotted the Train Station set (7937), so I added that to my track and enjoyed watching the train go under the pedestrian walkway. Now I wanted to get more track, but I soon realized that LEGO has replaced their old curved track with "flexible track", which most enthusiasts agree is inferior to the original. So, I started hunting around on eBay for standard track and eventually ordered some (the market for LEGO train track seems huge), plus some Switching Tracks (7895) and a Level Crossing (7936)! I even bought some nice thick foam mats so I wouldn't have to build my layout directly on the carpet in my Toy Museum, and I studied a bunch of track layout designs until I found one I really liked, which happened to be the Double Loop! I can't really explain it, but it's so much fun to run my train with the remote control, making it go around the outer loop, switch into the inner loop, then reverse it back onto the outer loop again. Now I want to add a few small buildings around my track, and I really want to get a second engine so I can watch two trains running at once and try to make them exchange loops!

Oha Suta

Although I've watched it off and on for quite a while, recently I've been totally addicted to Oha Suta, a Japanese kids show that airs live everyday in Tokyo (the name is kind of an abbreviation of "Good Morning Studio"). The show is hosted by Koichi Yamadera (Yama-chan), who is a famous voice actor in anime and American movies dubbed into Japanese, and he rides around on a Segway in the most colorful, crazy set you've ever seen, containing everything from moving toy trains and Pokemon to candy walls right out of Hansel and Gretel. Each day he is joined by a different cute girl or two who announce different segments with even more silly characters. Sometimes it's a guy showing off new yo-yo tricks, or a sketch artist who draws funny scenes, or the Nazo Nazo guy (my favorite), who presents Japanese word puzzles and sings a funny victory song when they are solved. Sometimes there are video segments of different grade schools and their activities (like sports groups or choirs), and of course everyday they give the Ogenki Tenki weather report (with moving anime characters all over the map!). Some of the regular girls have Jpop connections (which is how I discovered the show), such as Koharu Kusumi (former Morning Musume, and much more suited to Oha Suta in my opinion) and Saki Ogawa (current member of S/mileage), who does baton twirling tricks and an insect segment where she has to touch a big beetle or something (and usually ends up crying!). Almost every episode is filled with promotions for new toys and manga, and I really enjoy seeing demonstrations of the new popular things that Japanese kiddies are into now. Each Oha Suta episode is only 15-20 minutes (with commercials removed), and it's always hilarious and often teaches me some Japanese, so I love watching it before I go to work!

Magic happens

I just got back from five incredible days at Walt Disney World with my Disney pal Melinda, and once again, we had an absolutely wonderful time! As usual, we were amazingly lucky with our timing, and so many things just "worked out" better than expected. My mom says I have a "Disney star" watching over me to reward my sincere fandom, and even though I do a lot of planning before I go, I'm beginning to think it's true! We literally experienced every attraction we planned to see, plus a few more as a bonus! There were far too many amazing things to mention here all at once, but here's a few of the highlights.

Magic Kingdom: The new themed area on Main Street to meet Mickey is great, and when I saw Mickey and Minnie were there together, I was totally holding back the tears! The new graveyard themed queue of the Haunted Mansion is frightfully fun (not to mention the new interactive hitchhiking ghosts), and even though we had a bit of rain in the middle of the day, it cleared up before the Main Street Electrical Parade (with revamped and new floats) at night. The most magical event of all was lunch at Cinderella's Royal Table (inside the castle), which is one of the most difficult restaurants to book. I lucked into a reservation since the windows were supposed to be covered for refurbishing, but when we walked in, they were totally open to bright sunlit views of Fantasyland. Not only that, but we even got a window table!

Epcot: The Flower and Garden Festival really added a whole new dimension to the park with so many beautiful topiaries and displays to discover! We also got to experience the Sum of all Thrills, a new "industrial arm" attraction that lets you design your own thrill ride and experience it - difficult to describe, but awesome!

Animal Kingdom: Besides riding everything and seeing the big shows, we got to encounter DeVine (an exotic plant performer who blends into the jungle) up close, and follow the parade through most of the park!

Hollywood Studios: This is the big one! Thanks to constant updates from StarToursLive, we were able to ride the brand new re-imagined Star Tours attraction during a special preview, before the official opening on May 20th! It was just too good to be true, since we got to ride it three times and experience several of the random planets and events (there are 54 combinations you can experience). Plus, we somehow hit the Fantasmic jackpot again and got to view the show from the third row! It was so cool seeing the character floats go by on the water directly in front of us!

View photos: Walt Disney World 2011
Watch video: Walt Disney World Highlights

Pizza Planet Truck

Since I'm getting excited about going to Walt Disney World next week, I've been gravitating towards Disney choices in music, DVDs, and even LEGO sets! I only recently discovered they make a set of the famous Pizza Planet truck, which was part of the original Toy Story and has since made a cameo appearance in every other Pixar movie except for The Incredibles. Being a huge Pixar fan, I had to get this set, which I needed to order online since for some reason it's not even available at my local LEGO Store. Even though it's only 224 pieces, the Pizza Planet truck is a beauty! There are quite a few unique custom pieces (like windows and curved body parts) that made this a really fun build, and I love the custom printed graphics (no decals) for the Pizza Planet logo on the working doors. There's even a "YO" brick (the middle of the Toyota logo) for the back of the truck! Of course this set includes great rubber tires, and they even added a "pizza launcher" feature that shoots little round pizzas from the front of the truck! The minifigs are really custom as well (I'm sure Disney required LEGO to create accurate representations of their characters), including Buzz Lightyear (who even has little wings), Hamm (with removable cork), one of the Claw aliens, and even Rex the dinosaur! You can actually get all four figures into the truck, although the process is so crazy (mainly because of Rex's tail) that they actually had to explain how to do it in the instruction book. I had a lot of fun celebrating my Disney happiness by building this cool set. I only have a few automobiles in my LEGO collection, so it's nice to see this Pixar classic on my toy shelf!

Technic Rescue Helicopter

Last weekend I was checking out Toys R Us (as I often do) and decided to take advantage of a LEGO sale, so I got a couple new sets. One of them was the fairly new Technic Rescue Helicopter, which was a really fun and interesting build. Technic parts are very different from traditional LEGO bricks (although they work together nicely), since they are mainly girders and tubes with small connector pieces to lock them together. Several of my other sets have contained a few Technic parts, but the Rescue Helicopter is my first complete set of the Technic line. Technic sets are also considered a little advanced, since they usually have working gears and other moving parts, so even though this set was only 408 pieces, it took me much longer than expected to finish, which is great! The helicopter has working landing gear (with real rubber tires of course), and a really cool gear system that spins the main and tail rotors just by turning a knob on the side. The color scheme is really cool, and the decals look fantastic (although I prefer it when LEGO actually prints on the parts so you don't have to apply stickers). The instructions include complete steps to build two quite different styles of helicopters, so maybe someday I'll take it apart and try the other one!