The Painting

Here's some random pictures, including a short tale about a piece of haunting artwork.

Okay my friend has to share this bizarre story. While watching an anime, Fate: Apocrypha, this painting is seen in the background. He's seen that painting before, and back then, there was a odd discussion about how that painting wound up in the apartment. At the time, nobody knew, and it was dismissed as just a strange thing to have on the wall.

Much like my friend's reaction to seeing it, the anime also seemed intensely focused on the painting in the background. It was like seeing a ghost. Like some kind of time travel paradox. How?... How is that the same painting?! Why is the anime so focused on sharing this with my friend? He was freaking out a bit, and had to stop watching because he was really not paying attention to the show anymore, all he could think about was this painting.

The anime at one point showed only the painting, full screen! He shared this story with his brother, who recognized the painting! It was also in the game Animal Crossing, which had a collection of famous paintings. In Animal Crossing it was called, literally, "common painting." Google quickly discovered it's a famous French piece "The Gleaners" depicting common workers during a time when only aristocrats were painted. The anime was using it to foreshadow the rising power of the characters. So we sort of discovered how it could have appeared in the apartment so many years ago, as well, if it was truly a common famous painting. And even though it turned out to be just an odd rare coincidence, it still was a shocking event for my poor friend caught unaware.

Stew in New Jersey

On the way to the Westfield Garden State Plaza Mall, we got a little lost. Thanks to the Tom Tom GPS directing us to "exit left" which was actually on the right. Blowing past the exit and finding the nearby Paramus Park Mall instead. Since we were there, lets take a look around for a minute. There's also some extra non-mall pictures.

Stew Leonard's! I remembered hearing somewhere they were opening one of these further south, and here it is! On the end of the mall here. Oh yeah are we going to run around that place and get some pictures!

Toys R Us is BAAAAACK!

ITS BACK! Calm down. Toys R Us came back last fall, and opened two stores in America. One was in Texas somewhere, and the other one... in New Jersey! It's in the Garden State Plaza Mall in Paramus. Which is a little over an hour drive for us. Finally got a good weekend to go check it out and got some pictures to share!

You may still see these logos on abandoned buildings around America, but this one is all lit up! It might be a little awkward to see this in a mall, and not on a giant building outside, but I'm going to take what I can get!

Trump's Hot WHeels

Well now that all those vacation photos are posted, what else have we been up to? Here's a bunch of random pictures of stuff to share.

We'll start off with something we saw in a grocery store. Here's a Golden Toilet Hot Wheels car. I'm trying to figure out a way to say this is like something Trump would have, a golden toilet. That's what we were thinking about when we saw it, and got a laugh out of it.

Park Munches

I saved the best for last! This is the final group of pictures from the Disney World vacation. This is all the yummy stuff we ate! I already posted pictures of the Star Wars foods and the best place ever: The Trail's End, this is the rest of the meals. I knew it would be nice to reminisce about the food, everything we ate there was super scrumptious without exception. Forget about prices or calories for a week. Totally worth it.

Ah the simple Mickey Ice Cream Bar. You know you can buy these at regular grocery stores now? I'm pretty sure these are magically better while in the parks. Also, make sure to keep hydrated all day.

Disney Vacation Stuff

Only a few more groups of pictures left to post from our um... recent... Disney World vacation. Can you believe we took that vacation about two months ago and I'm still posting pictures from it? This bunch is from all the crazy merchandise we saw. Rather than spend a bunch of money, just grab some fun pictures to share.

There's an overwhelming amount of them, but we like to get a pin or two to help us remember our trip. Even though we did not go see the Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue, it's right next to the Trail's End restaurant, and serves the same food for the show. It's the food we want to remember. And this also has Chip and Dale on it, so that's close enough. I bet they do have a Trail's End pin,... somewhere.

Disney Springs 2019

Still posting pictures from our Disney World vacation! Leaving Epcot "early" we headed right over to Disney Springs. Well, we did hop back to the Hotel to get the "real" credit card, assuming the stores might not accept the Magic Band, but then back out to shop! Who wants s'more souvenirs?

Remember where the bus dropped you off! I wonder if these stores pay extra for the near-bus locations. I'm trying to figure out a clever way to point out the "Coach" store which has an old coach-and-buggy logo, and that's basically an old-time bus. So that's easy to remember where the buses are. Sort of.

Epcot part 2

Happy New Year! One more bunch of pictures from our short day in Epcot. So I guess New Year and Future are kind of thematically related?

Future of the um... future? Epcot almost seems like it could be two different theme parks because they have the World Showcase with the lake and all of the "countries" around it, but also they have a lot of future-inspired attractions, too. And it looks like they are planning more.