Worcester Movies on the Common 2012: Raiders of the Lost Ark

The evening of June 21st marked the start of the 2012 season of Movies on the Common in Worcester, MA.  This series is put on by the group Worcester Film Works.  The movie featured that night was "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981) and was preceded by two musical acts, James Keyes and The Luxury.  As I wrote in 2012 Worcester Movies on the Common, I was planning on going to the show, but wasn't sure when I'd get there or whether either of my Little Monsters would be joining me.  It turned out that I wasn't able to arrive at the Worcester common until around 7:30, but The Little Monster did indeed accompany me for a little quality father-daughter time.  Here's what night one was like...

The show started ("doors opened") at 5:00.  Because we didn't arrive until 7:30 we completely missed the set by James Keyes, so I can't say anything about that one.  By the time we settled in we only got to see the last half-hour or so of The Luxury's set.  They are a rockin' band though and I would have liked to have heard more.  It's tough to perform at a show like this and play original tunes.  Cover tunes of stuff that people are familiar with tends to go over better (even if it's of less artistic integrity) with a random audience that's mainly there to watch a movie.  The Luxury played bits of some covers (and sounded good in doing so), but mainly played their own material--and that sounded very good as well.  I'm not familiar with the band and have never heard anything by them previously, so I went into it with fresh ears and liked what I heard.

The Luxury performs on the Worcester Common before the movie

I have to point out that the musical part of these shows is a major plus.  The whole point of the show is to see a movie on the big screen outside during the summer for free (it is called Movies on the Common after all).  You certainly get that, but there's so much more too.  Last year the first musical act didn't appear until the second show and by the third show there were two acts.  This year the schedule included two acts before each of the three shows.  It really is tough to beat this program for free summer entertainment!

Back to the show.  After The Luxury finished up the stage was transformed into a movie screen while the band packed up.  A member of Worcester Film Works let the growing crowd know that the movie would start up once it got dark enough.

From stage...

...To screen

With a break in the action it was time to check out what else there was to see around the Common.  The Little Monster was ready for some ice cream so our first stop was the Sweet Sister truck for a Pink Panther ice cream bar.

Vendors lining one of the Common's walkways

The Sweet Sister Ice Cream truck

Decisions, decisions...

A happy Little Monster!

Next we stopped at The Theatre Cafe's table and I got one of their tasty pulled pork sandwiches for myself.  Both of these vendors were present at last year's shows, but because of ongoing construction were set up on the opposite side of the Common this time.

Tables for The Theatre Cafe and That's Entertainment

Worcester Film Works had their own table set up as usual of course.  And probably the most exciting news of the night was that WFW's popcorn machine was actually working!  Last year they had a popcorn machine at each of the three shows, but it became a bit of an unintentional running joke because it failed to work at all of them!  It was a pretty big deal to see them selling popcorn that was actually popped in the machine on this night.  They had small bags available for a dollar and big buckets for three dollars.  Of course I HAD to get one of the buckets to celebrate the fact that the machine actually worked.

Worcester Film Works' table

Admiring the poster for the Movies on the Common series

Freshly popped popcorn! (at last!)

There was one new vendor set up at this show too--Worcester comic book store That's Entertainment (aka That's E!).  Actually, calling That's Entertainment a comic book store is selling them short.  A better description would be the one that they use--it's a "Pop Culture Emporium".  They had a selection of Worcester T-shirts for sale and also had a box of free comic books!  I got a copy of The Walking Dead and The Little Monster got an issue of Archie Comics.  We returned to our seats to eat ice cream and pulled pork and browse through our comics while waiting for "Raiders of the Last Ark" to start.

Ice Cream!

Pulled pork and free comic books, a great combo!

The Little Monster reads Archie while waiting for the film to start

Because this show was put on during some of the longest days of the year it wasn't until about 9:00 that it got dark enough to start the movie.  Film buffs might be a bit disappointed to learn that these movies are projected off of DVDs rather than being true film presentations.  It's hard to complain though when you remember that you're getting this wonderful outdoor entertainment for free!

Darkness (gradually) falls on Worcester Common

Firing up the DVD projector

And it's Showtime at last!

There's actually not too much to say about "Raiders of the Lost Ark".  It's obviously a great, classic film that speaks for itself.  The Little Monster hadn't seen it before, so it was new to her.  There are obviously a few questionable parts for a six-year-old, but she took most of it in stride.  I was a bit impressed that she (mostly) stayed awake right through the movie, which didn't end until about 11:00.  Interestingly enough, she tried to tell me that she fell asleep and missed the climatic Ark-opening-nazi-melting scene, but the fact that she knew what it was that she "missed" made it obvious that she had indeed seen it.  Nearly a month later I feel confident that she wasn't emotionally scarred by the experience.  She hasn't reported any nightmares or sleepless nights inspired by the movie.  I do think she was a tad young to really get everything in "Raiders", but am glad that she was able to accompany me on what turned out to be another wonderful night on the Worcester common.  The crowd was estimated at 375.  That's not bad at all--especially considering that Worcester was in the midst of a heat wave at the time, and sitting outside to watch a movie wasn't as enticing an idea as it normally would be without the oppressive heat.

The second show in the Movies on the Common series is rapidly approaching.  On Thursday July 19th the film shown on the Common will be "Jaws" (1975), another Steven Spielberg classic and one of the very first true "Summer Blockbusters".  Starting at 5:00 the bands IzaJane and Heavy Horses will open the show.  As usual, in the case of inclement weather the show will be postponed until the following Thursday, the 26th.  I personally didn't see "Jaws" for the first time until it appeared on TV in the early 1980s, and even though I was almost a teenager by then I remember being terrified by the film.  Because of this I'm going to go to this one alone.  I'm pretty sure that The Little Monster isn't quite ready for "Jaws".  We're going camping at the beach in Connecticut this weekend and I can just imagine her being petrified by the thought of going into the ocean and encountering a great white shark.  It doesn't help that over the past couple of weeks there have actually been numerous shark sightings off of New England beaches--including great whites.  Hopefully I'll be able to get up the nerve to step into the ocean myself after watching "Jaws" on the common.  We shall see...

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to The Common!

My Humble "Contributions" to IMDb

I'm of an age that I grew up before the online revolution of the past couple of decades.  Kids growing up now have no idea that there was a time when they couldn't go online and find the answers to their questions (and homework problems) with a few mouse clicks.  I suppose this might give me a greater appreciation for this incredible convenience that I couldn't have imagined when I was growing up in the 1970s and 80s.  It really is a different world and I don't want to get too deep into whether it's a good or bad thing.

But I will say that I don't know what I'd do without a handful of websites that I have come to really depend on for information that I need for my blog writing or to simply answer a nagging question that's running around in my head.  I don't really do a lot of true "surfing", but do end up at relevant websites outside of my little circle of preferred internet sites when they come up in search results.

The first and most important source of information for me on pretty much anything in the world from song lyrics to answers to those unanswerable children's questions from The Little Monster is definitely Google.  When I first heard of Google I didn't know what to think of it, but now I can't imagine living without it.  It's been absolutely invaluable for me.  I know that Google is now an online empire that includes e-mail (G-Mail), social networking and gobbling up smaller websites and companies, but it will always be a dependable search engine first and foremost to me.  I also know that there are other search engines out there that I could try out to see which one fits my needs best--but Google has always answered my questions reliably.  If it ain't broke, why fix it?

Wikipedia has also been an important source of information mining for me.  Unlike Google I never actually go to Wikipedia for information.  It just so happens that almost anytime I make an inquiry on Google a Wikipedia link is always at or near the top of the results.  I do realize that Wikipedia is made up of content from users so I always remember to take information I find there with a grain of salt and try to do further research to confirm what I find there (take note of that students of the 21st century who get their info from Wikipedia).  As a race we humans tend to believe what we hear or read.  It's very easy to read something in Wikipedia and automatically take it for fact.  Unlike back in the days when people actually had to open an encyclopedia (in paper format, not online) to look up reliable, well-researched information, people really need to stifle their instinct to believe it simply because we read it (and that includes myself as well).

I also find a lot of information in video form on YouTube.  YouTube is a great place to waste many hours of the day watching all kinds of meaningless "stuff" about various topics.  It seems like you can find almost anything on YouTube if you look hard enough and I've been amazed to find some very specialized and unexpected things there--like old clips from the Boston-area television stations I grew up watching in the days before cable and VCRs were ubiquitous.

I use a few other sites regularly (Yahoo! Mail, eBay, Facebook, Netflix...), but there's really only one more site that I regularly consult when trying to find information for blogs (or other things).  That site is the Internet Movie Database, or more simply and familiarly IMDb.  All these sites have provided me with valuable information that I wouldn't really have had any way to find twenty years ago or so.  While Wikipedia, "The free encyclopedia that anyone can edit", is of questionable reliability in many cases, IMDb tends to be a bit more authoritative when it comes to information about movies, television and the people who are behind both.  But it is possible to submit new or revised information to the site when you think something is missing or incorrect.  I can only imagine the constant flood of information they receive from people who "just know" that something found on IMDb is wrong because they remember it differently.  IMDb will accept edits and then research them themselves before adding the new or revised information to the site.  I don't know how their fact-checking process works, but feel pretty confident that it's reliable.

I had a friend who swore that something on IMDb was incorrect.  He remembered seeing a TV movie in the early 1980s that IMDb said was aired in 1978.  This was someone who was very knowledgeable about pop culture.  He was determined to contact IMDb to correct the information, but died before he was able to do so.  I looked up TV listings on microfilm for the date IMDb said the movie aired and it did indeed appear where it should have been.  Probably about a year later or so I was looking for something else in the listings and stumbled upon an early 1980s repeat of the movie.  It turned out that my friend was correct about when he saw the movie--he simply didn't realize that it was a repeat and not the premiere of the film.

I can't say that I've found many instances of misleading or incorrect information at IMDb (or at least not that I was aware of anyway).  Still, it would be nice to be able to submit some information to them---to sort of try to repay them just a bit for all the help they've given to me over the past few years.  I did submit two very small and rather inconsequential bits of information for two IMDb entries, and they were both adopted into their respective pages.  Despite how small these changes are I'm just a little proud to say that I made a contribution to the site (however small and unimportant they may be in the grand scheme of things).  All in the name of accuracy I suppose.

The first one concerned the movie "Oliver's Story" (1978), which was the much less famous follow-up to the classic "Love Story" (1970) that starred Ryan O'neal.  It seems like an odd film for me to have some connection to or reference to, but it just so happens that part of the movie was filmed in my teeny, tiny little hometown of Uxbridge, Massachusetts!  As a matter of fact, one of my sisters was even an extra in it.  I saw the movie quite a few years back on a VHS tape borrowed from the library I worked at.  That ancient and not-so-in-demand tape went out of circulation a while back and now the movie is somewhat hard to find.  Well, I decided one day to read about my hometown's little contribution to celluloid history at IMDb and was disappointed to not see it listed among the filming locations (which included Cambridge, MA and Hong Kong, China).  I decided to submit the fact that Uxbridge was also a filming location, but didn't really have any corroborating evidence to offer.  I never heard back from IMDb, but when you check out the page for "Oliver's Story" now you will see that Uxbridge, MA is included as a filming location!

My second, and to date only, other contribution to IMDb is in relation to the Vincent Price movie "The Last Man on Earth" (1964).  This one's a bit more up my alley, so to speak.  I've liked this movie for some time and was happy to see that it was going to be part of the 2011 edition of the Drive-In Super Monster-Rama show in Pennsylvania.  I was lucky enough to be able to attend both the 2010 and 2011 Drive-In Super Monster-Rama shows.

The pristine print of "The Last Man on Earth" screened at the show was a great thing to see, but also a bit of a mystery.  When the movie started it appeared to be pretty normal, but then the title came up and instead of reading THE LAST MAN ON EARTH it said THE DAMNED WALK AT MIDNIGHT.  This came as a surprise to most of the people I talked to at the show, including the man behind it all, who had rented the film.

I have no idea exactly where or when the movie was given the title "The Damned Walk at Midnight", but it was right up there on the screen so I knew it HAD happened at some point in time.  The IMDb page for "The Last Man on Earth" had a number of alternate (AKA) titles listed, but no mention of "The Damned Walk at Midnight".  I'm sure this title is familiar with some film fans and scholars somewhere, but it seemed to be a bit of a mystery.  I submitted the alternate title to IMDB with my photograph of the movie screen as evidence.

Once again I never actually heard back from IMDb, but I just checked the page for the film again and "The Damned Walk at Midnight" is now listed as an alternate title!  Check toward the bottom of the list.

This is a lot of writing about two admittedly very minor bits of information that most people will never even see, but it's all I've got on the subject.  It's one small step for mankind, but one giant leap for Monster Dad!

Amelia Earhart -- 75 Years Later

April 2012 marked the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.  July 2nd 2012 marks the 75th anniversary of another of the Twentieth Century's great mysteries, the disappearance of Amelia Earhart (and her navigator Fred Noonan) on her attempt to circumnavigate the world in 1937.  The Titanic claimed over 1,500 lives while Earhart's plane only carried two people.  Nonetheless these two events ranked right up there with the world's greatest mysteries until the Titanic was finally discovered by Robert Ballard in 1985.  It took nearly seventy-five years to find the Titanic and now it has been seventy-five years that people have wondered exactly what happened to Amelia Earhart and what her final fate was.

When I was a kid growing up in the 1970s and 80s I was very much interested in all kinds of unsolved mysteries, supernatural phenomena and other strange subjects (Bigfoot, The Loch Ness Monster, UFOs, Ghosts, ancient astronauts, Easter Island, spontaneous human combustion...).  Most of these subjects remain mysteries or myths, some taken more seriously in the scientific community and the world at large than others.  It was very exciting when the Titanic was finally discovered and the first photographs of the ship made it to TV and the newspapers.  Now it just seems like another underwater site of a sunken ship, and many young people growing up today have no idea just how much of a mystery it's final resting spot was for so many decades.  Amelia Earhart is another ocean-based mystery that continues to persist after all these years.

Paul Mantz, Amelia Earhart, Harry Manning and Fred Noonan in 1937

In a way I'm kind of surprised that no conclusive evidence has ever been produced.  Of course looking for a small airplane in the ocean is like looking for the proverbial needle in the haystack.  But still, it just seems like something would have happened by now.  I guess that's mostly because, like the Titanic, Amelia Earhart's disappearance was a "man-made" mystery.  It's not something supernatural or otherworldly in nature.  At its core it's simply a missing plane that no one has been able to find.

Since Amelia Earhart's ultimate fate is still a mystery it has been subject to many theories and much speculation--both logical and outlandish--over the years.  The two most likely scenarios have Earhart's plane crashing in the middle of the ocean or crash landing on or near a small uninhabited island somewhere in the Pacific along or close to her flight path.  The first possibility would mean that her Lockheed Electra is on the floor of the ocean thousands of feet below the surface, where it would most likely be out of reach of today's technology.  It took seventy-five years for nautical technology to develop to the point where it was possible to pinpoint the location of the Titanic.  Who knows how much longer it will take to find Amelia Earhart's plane if it's as deep underwater as it might very well be.  The idea that Amelia and Fred Noonan might have survived the crash and lived for some amount of time on an island is not only possible, it's also a much more interesting and intriguing idea than the thought of them being killed on impact and sinking to the bottom of the ocean along with their plane.  That's a major reason for the persistence of the theory despite lack of hard evidence.

But there have been many other theories over the years, many of which seem pretty far-fetched.  Some of these theories have included Earhart being captured by the Japanese and being executed or living out the rest of her life in captivity, assuming another identity and living out the rest of her life in secrecy and even being a spy for the U.S. government.  While many of these ideas may seem outlandish, the simple fact that nothing conclusive has ever been proven means that there will probably always be some support for them.  Back when I was a kid it even seemed remotely possible (however unlikely it might be) that Amelia Earhart might still have been alive somewhere in the world.  The simple possibility of it was probably more fuel for the various theories.  You don't really seem to hear so much about such fantastical ideas today.

But since it is still a mystery it seems like every couple of years the search for Amelia Earhart and her plane re-enters the news and the public eye.  Just like when I hear of UFO reports and Bigfoot sightings these days, I always sit up and take note when some new story comes out about someone claiming to have found evidence about Earhart or putting forth a new theory about the mystery.  Which brings us to today...

I didn't even realize that today (July 2nd) was the anniversary of the disappearance until a few days ago when I was at a Barnes and Noble bookstore reading the current issue of The Fortean Times.  The Fortean Times is a great magazine for people interested in the kinds of unexplained mysteries I have always been fascinated by.  This particular issue (June 2012) had a story in it about Amelia Earhart and a new expedition that hopes to solve the mystery once and for all.  Of course that's something people have been trying to do for seventy-five years, but I always hold out hope that this will be "the one".

On July 3rd (the seventy-fifth anniversary of the first search and rescue missions to look for the Earhart's plane after its disappearance) The International Group for Historical Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) will launch its ninth (I believe) expedition to try to find the plane and evidence of Earhart's and Noonan's ultimate fate.

TIGHAR believes the wreckage of the plane is located somewhere near the island of Nikumaroro, which was known as Gardner Island in 1937.  Along with various items and clues found by others over the years TIGHAR has collected a number of pieces of possible evidence on previous expeditions over the years.  They believe that this evidence shows that Amelia Earhart survived the crash and lived on th e island for a time after her disappearance.  For full details about the current expedition and background on TIGHAR and its efforts to date please check out their website.  They will also post daily updates once the expedition begins.  Read those updates here.

Makeup jar (left) found on Nikumaroro Island

Coincidently, just about a month ago an old friend of mine and I got together and watched a few episodes of the old TV show "In Search of...", which we both watched as kids.  The show was a big influence on me and I'm sure it had a lot to do with my interest in all kinds of strange phenomena.  There is talk that "In Search of..." might finally get a legitimate DVD release soon, but in the meantime it's possible to pick up the series on DVDs put together from recordings of a re-tooled version of the show that aired on a couple different cable stations back in the 1990s or so.  It's the same show I watched as a kid, but with new opening titles and other changes that try to mask the fact that the show was produced way back in the 1970s.

"In Search of..." title screen, with Amelia Earhart at upper right

Anyway, I bought one of these sets a couple years ago.  My friend and I watched a few random episodes, and we just happened to see the one about Amelia Earhart (not realizing how close we were to the anniversary of the disappearance).  It was interesting to see what kinds of theories were still popular (or at least still in play) forty or so years ago.  There was still a belief at the time by some that Amelia Earhart might still be alive somewhere in the world.

While it's a foregone conclusion that Earhart and Noonan probably died a long time ago (regardless of what may or may not have happened after the disappearance), it's still a thrilling idea to think that it's possible that the mystery might finally be solved after all these years.  I'll follow the expedition and hope for something new to be discovered.  It seems far more likely that it won't be solved and Amelia Earhart will continue to be a mystery for the foreseeable future, but you never know...

2012 State of the Blog Address

Almost a month ago marked two years since I started blogging.  I tried to begin this post a couple weeks ago, but just couldn't seem to get started.  This will more or less be a look at what the blog has been up to in the past year (since Happy Anniversary Monster Dad re-capped the first year of the blog's existence), as well as an explanation for why I haven't been writing much lately.  I realize this isn't a very interesting topic, but it's something I feel I should do, so here goes...

In March of 2011 I wrote what I consider to be my first "commercial" blog post, Godzilla Attacks Worcester.  It was at a time when I wasn't writing much in general.  In fact, that post was written on March 31st and was the ONLY post for that month.  Including that one I had only posted a total of four blogs over the first three months of 2011.  Godzilla Attacks Worcester generated a small spurt of interest in the blog in the Worcester (MA) area, and the fact that it was about Godzilla seemed to help it out a bit too.

Not long after this I submitted Monster Dad's url to Google and a few other search engines in an attempt to generate more traffic for the blog.  I also discovered the fact that you can look at and keep track of your statistics on Blogger.  Making this discovery was a good and bad thing at the same time.  It was cool to be able to see the numbers (however humble they might have been) generated by my "writing".  Unfortunately, I also became a bit obsessed with these stats and would check them every day--sometimes multiple times a day.  I was still going to the blog regularly, but was checking numbers instead of writing.  Even so, I was still able to post more blogs than I had in the past and enjoyed it when some of these pieces became modest "hits".

All-Time Post Views from March 2012

All-Time Post Views from two months later in May 2012

The latest look at the All-Time Stats for top ten posts
(Note the unreliability of these statistics in that
Anorexic Toy Soldiers actually now has FEWER page views!)

I realize that my little collection of writings generates only a small fraction of the hits and page views that popular blogs would, but I was happy to see my numbers gradually increase and watch as the all-time views for my top ten posts reached triple digits in number (Oooh, a hundred views for Anorexic Toy Soldiers?  I'm hittin' the BIG TIME baby!).  I was also happy with the fact that I was averaging around six or seven posts a month for the rest of the year (2011).  Of course I realize that six or seven posts a month is also a pittance compared to more prolific bloggers, some of whom write (at least) one blog every single day.  But for someone who's not a "writer" by any stretch of the imagination it was a pretty good output.  My posts tended to become longer and longer too, especially with the addition of more and more photos (which I assigned names to that I hoped would increase my search engine hits and overall page views by the way).  I've never been able to simply put up a quick photo with a witty caption or simply write a short paragraph and call it a post.  There's certainly nothing wrong with doing that (there are no hard and fast "rules" for blogging that I'm aware of), it's just not my style.  Speaking of which, I've also done my best to continue writing in my own "style" despite the increased interest I've developed in actually having my stuff seen by a wider audience.  I didn't mind "selling out" as far as writing more blogs that were about specific events I had attended or was planning on attending (like the numerous and lengthy posts I wrote about the 2010 and 2011 Drive-in Super Monster-Rama shows), as long as I was still writing about things I was interested in and felt like writing about.

A couple months back I posted my 100th blog entry on Monster Dad (The Titanic--100 Years Later).  That's not even including the modest ten or eleven posts I've added to sister blog TV Guide Time Machine over the past year.  Once again, I realize that one hundred posts would seem like a drop in the bucket to those more prolific bloggers mentioned above, but to me it was a bit of a surprising and satisfying milestone.

Starting the TV Guide Time Machine in July of 2011 was one of the biggest events for Monster Dad over the past year.  I have a rather large collection of Boston-area TV Guides from the 1970s and 80s that I thought I could mine for tons of writing inspiration.  I still think I can do that, but unfortunately have discovered that by writing two separate blogs at the same time I am spreading  my humble writing talents rather thin.  There's still reason to believe the TVGTM will become more fruitful in the future, but for now it is just crawling along at its own pace.  Don't give up on it just yet...

My biggest "sell out" moment with Monster Dad came around the same time as the stats and search engine stuff a little over a year ago.  I applied to and was approved for Adsense, and ads that (sometimes) were related to my posts began to appear on my blog.  I didn't see anything wrong with this since it was a very common thing to see on many blogs and on YouTube (where my uploaded videos also began sporting Adsense ads).  The fact that these ads were possibly going to generate some cold hard cash for myself certainly seemed like a good thing.  Even though the money wouldn't be much, I could actually say (with some level of truthfulness) that I was "getting paid for my writing".  That's a pretty cool thought!  Once again, I know that my Adsense revenue was nothing compared to the kind of money that big-time blogs generate through Adsense and other means, but it was still something...

Unfortunately Google doesn't cut you a check until you hit one hundred dollars of revenue.  Last summer I was about to hit that magic number and get my first check when I got the news that so many bloggers and YouTubers have received.  Due to "suspicious activity" my Adsense account was being disabled.  Subsequently, my "hard-earned" almost-one-hundred-bucks went back to the advertisers (or where ever it originally came from) and I didn't see one red cent (and what is a "red cent" anyway?).  You're able to dispute the cancellation of your Adsens account once, but I heard that they almost never reverse their decision so I didn't bother.  A couple months ago I finally submitted a request for reinstatement (or whatever it would be called).  I thought my increased traffic might be tempting to the folks at Google.  Naturally it was turned down.  It's easy to say that your blog is proudly "Ad Free" once this happens, but to be perfectly honest I kinda liked having the ads on my page--as long as it meant money for me!  Either way, Monster Dad is once again "Ad Free" for your reading pleasure.  Enjoy the short respite from internet ads that you can experience by reading Monster Dad!

Ad-Free!  (though not necessarily by choice)

My one success as far as getting money or free stuff for my writing came last spring when I wrote a blog about a movie series for children that a large theater chain runs.  I had taken The Little Monster to a few of these shows and thought it would be a good topic to write about (and promote).  Word got to the people who put the series on and they sent me a box by FedEx that was filled with DVDs, books and toys that were mostly related to the movie series program.  While there really wasn't anything it it for me specifically the Little Monsters got quite a few gifts (for birthdays and Christmas) from the loot.  Oh, and they also included a little note thanking me for writing the blog too--which I thought was nice.  I know that review sites and blogs receive tons of free DVDs and merchandise to be reviewed, but that's not really what Monster Dad is (at least not at this point), so I was pretty psyched to get that surprise box of goodies.

As far as my recent lack of writing activity goes, there are a few reasons behind it.  For the past few months I have been suffering from a bit of writer's block--or should I say "blogger's block"?  While I'm still writing at least something every month, my output has definitely decreased.  Part of this I blame on the whole stats thing.  For whatever reason some of my recent blogs (namely ones about the Titanic, The Incredible Hulk and Men in Black 3) have managed to generate a LOT of page views in a short period of time (a lot of page views as far as Monster Dad is concerned anyway).  It's been a fun ride watching the numbers pile up over the past two or three months.  Things have cooled down though and are getting back to normal (which means that seeing "normal" numbers of hits and page views now feels very disappointing).  It seems that Monster Dad has finally been around long enough and provides good enough content to have risen closer to the top of Google and other search engine inquiries.  In fact, last week I wrote my only post (until now) for the entire month of June 2012.  It was about last week's Worcester Movies on the Common show.  Obviously this is a pretty localized event, but I was still pretty stoked to hear that my nephew saw it on the first page of results in a Google search for the show. And this was on the SAME DAY that I posted the blog!  I don't really know how all this stuff works, but it's apparent that Monster Dad is moving up somewhat in the world of internet search engines.  and that seems to be a good thing.  The one area where I really feel I'm lagging in is subscribers.  A while back I was pleased to hit twenty subscribers.  But now I've been stuck on twenty-two subs for a couple months.  Those numbers don't seem to increase.  I'm hoping that there are people following the blog, but they are simply using some of the other methods--like e-mail subscriptions and following Monster Dad's Facebook page.  Yes, Monster Dad has his own page on Facebook now.

Two other factors probably have more to do with my "blogger's block" than my stat obsession though.  First off, The Little Monster just recently finished up her first year of school (Kindergarten).  Between all the end-of-year stuff and the fact that she's now around every day (taking up valuable blog-writing time--just kidding) has eaten into my output.  Even more importantly, The Wife started a new job in Boston a few months back.  We currently live in Central Massachusetts, close to Worcester.  This new job was a great opportunity for The Wife, but it also necessitates a move closer to Boston.  We've been spending a lot of time looking for a new place and trying to figure out exactly what we'll do with our soon-to-be-former house.  We've been in that house for nine years.  The Little Monsters were both born and raised in that house (well, they were actually born in the hospital, but you know what I mean).  I kind of thought that it was going to be our home for a long time.  Adjusting to the idea of leasing an apartment close to Boston and either renting or selling our house has been pretty stressful.  I don't know how this will all affect the blog over time, but it's obviously been getting in the way of writing much lately.

The good news (for me at least) is that the reason I haven't been writing isn't due to a lack of ideas and material.  There are a number of blogs floating around in my mind that I simply haven't been able to sit down and write out.  In fact, there are still quite a few ideas that I have had waiting to be written since before I even started this blog a little over two years ago.  One of them was something that I felt was very interesting (possibly even to the general public in addition to myself).  Unfortunately I waited too long to write this piece and it has now been covered by someone else.  A couple weeks ago I saw a similar story posted in Yahoo! News when I signed out of my e-mail account.  I'll probably still write that post at some point (it already has a name and has been in draft form for the last year-and-a-half or so).  Hopefully I'll start writing again soon.  We are moving in September and The Little Monster will be starting first grade in a new school then too.  With any luck I'll settle into a new routine and get back to the business of being Monster Dad.  Stay tuned...

One final update...  Last year I laboriously went through a process that required using a program in a PC at the Worcester Library to create a new title banner for Monster Dad that I then uploaded to the site on my Mac.  It was a very complicated method to create something that someone who knows better could have easily whipped up in a few moments.  I was pretty happy with the results though and decided to re-design the look of Monster Dad for the first and only time (to date).  Around a month ago I received a comment on a post.  The comment contained a link to a new and improved version of the header that the commenter made up for me (obviously someone who is more well-versed in technology than I am).  After ensuring that I wasn't clicking on Spam or a virus launcher I saw that the header looked great and replaced my cobbled together one with it.  That's really the only tweak to Monster Dad over the past year--other than the addition of a new widget (called Feedjit) that shows the past ten visitors to the site, where they are from and what they looked at.  It's been pretty cool to see that people all over the world are finding (or stumbling upon) my little part of the blogosphere!

Original Monster Dad header photo, circa 2010
(found in a Google Images search for "Oscilloscope")

Old Monster Dad header logo

New and improved Monster Dad header logo

Feedjit widget
(see right side of blog)

Worcester Movies on the Common 2012!

Last year I wrote about a series of movie screenings on the Worcester (MA) Common put on by the group Worcester Film Works.  Over the course of the summer of 2011 they showed one movie each month: "Grease" (1978), "Back to the Future" (1985) and "Spaceballs" (1987).  Starting with the second show they began to add live music before the movies.  There were also some vendors set up selling food, drinks and ice cream.  It was a great series and I was happy to be able to attend each show.  At the conclusion of the third show in August 2011 it wasn't clear if Worcester Film Works would be bringing the series back for 2012.  I talked to some of the group's members and it was obvious that they were very happy with how the series performed and were hoping to be able to do it again.

Well it's now Summer 2012 and I'm pleased to say that Worcester Movies on the Common is Back!  In fact, I've been a little slow in reporting this great news.  The first show is scheduled for tonight!  For this show there will be TWO musical acts playing before the movie.  At 5:00 James Keyes will be the first act, followed by the band The Luxury.  Unfortunately I won't be able to get to the show in time for the opening, but should be there sometime before the movie starts (which is as soon as it becomes dark enough).  Tonight's movie is going to be "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1985)!  We're in the middle of a bit of a heat wave in New England at the moment.  I was originally planning on taking my two Little Monsters with me, but because of the heat it seemed like a better idea to let them sit this one out.  I will try to report back in soon to comment on the show.

And now for some general information about the series.  The shows take place on the third Thursday night of each summer month (June, July, August).  The festivities begin at 5:00 with the bands.  After the music the stage is transformed into a movie screen and the evening's film begins when it becomes dark enough to see it on the screen (which will become earlier throughout the series as the sun begins so set earlier).  Last year Sweet Sister Ice Cream brought their ice cream truck and The Theatre Cafe sold sandwiches, hot dogs and other goodies at each of the shows.  The plan is to have vendors at this year's series as well.  It appears from the latest post by Worcester Film Works that The Theatre Cafe is confirmed for tonight's first show.

Sweet Sister's ice cream truck set up at the show

The Theatre Cafe's table

And I should also mention that Worcester Film Works had a popcorn machine set up at their table at each of the shows last year.  To what must have been incredible frustration for them the machine failed to perform at EVERY show!  I read in their latest post that the popcorn machine will be set up once again (resurrected?) for tonight's show, and they were planning on testing it out this afternoon.  We'll have to see what happens tonight.  Either way I'll be happy.  I'd certainly enjoy being able to buy  bag of popcorn to munch while watching "Raiders of the Lost Ark" on the big screen under the stars of a hot New England summer night.  But if it DOESN'T work it will actually feel a little like a sort of new tradition is continuing!  Time will tell...

WFW's table and the "infamous" popcorn machine!

Worcester Movies on the Common is a great program that has been put together by a small group of enthusiastic people trying to do something good for Worcester.  I'm very happy to see that it's back for a second year.  Hopefully the crowds will be even bigger this year than they were last year.  And I haven't even mentioned what is possibly the best thing about this whole thing...  These shows are absolutely FREE!  Just come out with your blankets and lawn chairs, relax and watch a great movie under the open sky.  It's not exactly the same as a drive-in, but it's still pretty awesome!  And the price can't be beat!

Here's the schedule for this year's Worcester Movies on the Common series.  All shows start (with musical acts) at 5:00, and each show falls on the third Thursday of the month.  In case of rain or other inclement weather shows will be postponed until the following Thursday (the fourth Thursday of the month).  This year's show will feature:

• Thursday June 21 - "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1985)
• Thursday July 19th - "Jaws" (1975)
• Thursday August 16th - "The Princess Bride" (1987)

See you at the movies!