Dinosaur Dracula!

Tabasco Bloody Mary Gift Set!

Cheap perfumes, beef logs and s’mores kits. Every December, the cavalcade of crappy gift sets comes back out of hiding, charming the great many of us who refuse to put real work into locating decent Christmas presents.

They’re considered “bad” presents almost by default, no matter what’s in them, or to some degree, what they cost. I’m here to tell you that this is COMPLETELY UNFAIR. Even the worst of the prepackaged gift sets are never boring, and I’d rather get a wicker basket full of cheese or Old Spice than yet another book about something I’ve made a lifelong career of taking no interest in. Bring it on, baby.

In a department store that had a type of gift set for virtually every salable item you could think of, I found this. The official Tabasco Bloody Mary Gift Set, consisting of two tall glasses and a bottle of “mildly seasoned” Tabasco Bloody Mary mix. I draw a blank at explaining how a Tabasco-branded mix could ever be “mild,” but then, I can’t say that I’m really trying.

I loooove Bloody Marys, and if drinking them didn’t instantly turn me into a balloon, I’d down three of them every day. At $14, this was an easy sell. Read More…

Dino Drac’s Advent Calendar: 12/5/12.

Dino Drac knew that Playmobil wouldn’t top yesterday’s motorcycle so soon, but a pair of ceratopsian lunchboxes is pretty damn cool.

They’re made from a resilient tin – the kind that keeps hot stuff hot and cold stuff cold. “That’s probably why they gave me two of them,” Dino Drac figures. He’s a bit miffed about being a walking advertisement for a lesser suborder, but since those red heads are merely stickers, they should be easy enough to scratch off.

From this angle, we can clearly see that Dino Drac’s upper thighs are his problem areas. He would *kill* me for pointing that out, so if this paragraph isn’t here tomorrow, I came to my senses.

But then, what would I replace it with? Without the thigh gag, this will be way too short of an entry. Maybe I could explore the idea that if you removed Dino Drac’s arms, legs and head, you’d be left with something eerily reminiscent of a southbound alien shuttle.

Christmas Creature.

I made this. I made this using nothing but glue, a hunk of Styrofoam and a $5 “craft value pack” from Michaels.

What should I name him?

Dino Drac’s Advent Calendar: 12/4/12.

Well, this is more like it! The roar of the engine meets the roar of the vampiric Tyrannosaur!

Dino Drac is thrilled with his new motorcycle, but I can’t help raining on his parade. “It’s actually more of a dirt bike,” I shout. “Dirt bikes are motorcycles too,” he shouts back. We are at an impasse.

Racing around the Advent Calendar in what he believes are concentric circles but actually aren’t, the constant skidding of rubber tires puts the cardboard ground to the test.

I pleaded with Dino Drac to slow things down. He argued that only top speeds could make his cape flap in the wind, all picturesquely. Apparently, flapping capes are very important to Dinosaur Dracula. The truth is, he never listens to me, and I’d do well to employ reverse psychology.

Best of all, the motorcycle (dirt bike) is red and orange…as are mixtures of blood and cheese…which just happens to be Dino Drac’s 2nd favorite dish. His 1st favorite dish is too disgusting to describe on a site that is otherwise pretty okay for tween readers.