PCB, Grown Ups, Zombies and We Have Trees Down

Excuse me while I wipe the blog cobwebs off here. Been a few weeks since I've stopped in to say hello and muse on thangs. Time to catch up and pass along the latest.

NO OIL! Had a ten day vacation with the family down in Panama City Beach and took a load off for a few days. Lots of seafood, especially raw oysters and beer! One thing we love to do is go down and have have a mess load of shrimp and crab legs steamed in Old Bay and/or lemon pepper seasonings. MMmm Mmm good people. No oil on the beach! They did have people checking in the mornings combing the beach up and down, but nada.. nothin' clean as a... well you get my meaning. Water was almost sauna warm at times. If you're ever down that way you should visit some local favorites like "Dusty's" on Front Beach road. This place is always busy, even in the off season, because it's a favorite with the locals. They shuck oysters right there in the bar and Scotty O' has been the world shucker champion 3 times! I believe he had to go to Ireland for that one. He's been there for at least 15 years or more. Another fave of ours is "Hunt's" in downtown Panama City. Their cajun baked oysters and fried seafood platter are the best (no honey, I SWEAR I didn't eat no fried food.. ;-).

We always save some of the summer movies to see while we're down there in PCB and TOY STORY 3 is just fantastic. Do yourself and your family a favor and make a night of it - fun dinner, see the movie, maybe a double scoop afterwards (we had Dippin' Dots - man they're making a fortune offa that). It's a wonderful film and yeah that had ten years to make this and tweak that, but the proof's in the pudding. And the writing in this film is just plain good. I've been catching every Pixar film when it's released (The Incredibles being a real fave of mine) and if you've been watching the Toy Story series, this is a nice coda to it all. I was surprised at the emotion that I, and my family, felt during this story. That's a big pat on the back to Pixar, Woody and Buzz.

A TREE DOWN: A couple of days back and recouping from vacation (funny how that happens) and had a wind storm that was almost a tornado. Might as well have been.. it took down our 80 yr-old Oak tree in the backyard, which took down another huge Maple tree. Thankfully it went backwards and not forwards - which would have been our house. These trees covered our wonderful courtyard and pavillion and we are truly in mourning here at the Hinchberger hacienda. We have to be thankful that we're all okay, and the house is in one piece. Everything has been cleared away now, and I haven't seen this much sun in our backyard - ever. I am making some good out of the bad though... the Oak tree, which was ten feet in radius!, was cut very high, and we're going to build a gazebo around it! No joke! It's going to make a great bar and a new addition to our back area. And we still get to enjoy the ol' red Oak we've loved for all these years. But this time we'll just be sharing a Tecate (with lime) on it. I'll work on putting some pics up for all to see.

My son and I went to see GROWN UPS the new Adam Sandler flick with Chris Rock, Kevin James, Rob Schneider, and David Spade. A lot of fun, and what my wife calls a "boys movie" and she's probably right in this case. However, as with a lot of recent Sandler films, he's been working on more family friendly films, this is one you can enjoy. Certainly there is suggestive material, but it's not flagrant. Being that I'm around the same age as Sandler, I always enjoy his music picks from the 70's and 80's - let's me go back... time to make another CD collection ;-).

Brian Keene's THE LAST ZOMBIE first issue arrived! The long-awaited original story (with more story arcs to come as I understand) has begun. The artwork, by Fred Perry, is good, effective. I do wish it was a little lighter in their faces, but it's a personal preference and doesn't change the fact that I am already intrigued and looking forward to issue no. 2.

You may have noticed the the front page to The Overlook Connection Bookstore website has been updated. We've worked on making it a little more uniform and easier to see what we have in stock, and what's coming up. Let me know what you think. In fact I'm open to any suggestions and ideas you might have to make it easier to visit our store.

Hey, that's it this time out, but I should be back soon with a lot more

RECENT NEWS & HAPPENINGS June 18th, 2010


Nick Mamatas at SyFy gives the LOWdown on the new JONAH HEX movie, the hoedown on the horror flick SPLICE, and some news on the new Speilberg TV projct TERRA NOVA.


THE LAST ZOMBIE - 2nd Story Arc In The Works!
Brian Keene's post on The Last Zombie original comic series and the announcement that he is indeed writing for a second story arc!

KING FOR A DAY

Author Stephen King was the VIP guest at a Maine Democratic Party event at the Boston Park Plaza on Tuesday night. After the event, Sox diehard King went to the Diamondbacks game at Fenway. He posed with Cynthia Wachs and Stuart Meyerson of the Park Plaza Hotel & Towers.
From Boston.com

THE WALKING DEAD
Frank Darabont's THE WALKING DEAD - Residents of Atlanta have posted photos from set! Sneak Peek HERE!

Review of Stephen King's Blockade Billy from Bookhound is now up.

Justin Cronin On Good Morning America on his vampire novel The Passage with a Surprise Visit from Stephen King!

THE TIES THAT BIND - DVD REVIEW

THE TIES THAT BIND - DVD REVIEW.

Story by Brian Keene.

Directed by Jeff Heimbuch.

I Finally had a chance to sit down last night and pop in Brian Keene's first cinematic production of THE TIES THAT BIND, and watch it on our big screen. Brian Keene has gained a lot of popularity in the last decade, much of that due to his diligence to keep writing and getting his work published. It's worked, because he's gained a faithful audience the world over., and his audience is ever-growing. This DVD will help bring a new audience to the mix.

As Keene's video introduction discusses, he's had Hollywood options before, but this is the first film to actually be produced. Based on Keene's short story of the same name, this was a good tale to film. This is obviously a low-budget production, but with high standards: Heimbuch took a lot of care in this production and his passion shows. From the actors to the details of editing and sound. If I can be so bold as to compare this short film to an episode of Tales from The Darkside, the television horror series, it's qualities are close to that production.

Mention actors, especially husband.

All the extras are fun and informative and Brian Keene shows up with a reading titled Have a drink ... definitely worth watching.

This is a straight-to-DVD production that is also limited to 300 signed and numbered copies by Keene and director Jeff Heimbuch.