I've Got 99 Problems, But Not Really

I feel like writing, but I don’t feel like writing about toys. I am currently caught up through Monday – a rare occurrence for me – and need to do something else. This is unfortunate because I still have a ton of toys to review – Platinum, Lead, Rambo Gizmo, a RoboCop, two Four Horsemen originals, and a few others. That’s not including the new stack of stuff waiting to be opened – the Big Red Predator (from Batman: Dead End!), a new Doctor Who set, and some of the new Battle Beasts.

I’m thoroughly disgusted with MattyCollector.com right now, and not just a little bit disgusted with myself. I keep going back to them even though I find so much about what they do absolutely unacceptable. I know me and Beau were mostly positive on the podcast, but Matty has some big fucking problems that I simply should not be tolerating.

            Here’s my current issue: Days of the Dead: Atlanta is coming up (check back here for my preview on Thursday). If you don’t know, this is a fan-run horror con. We had a lot of fun last year and I think this year has the potential to be even better. Danny Trejo and Diamond Dallas Page – my favorite wrestler from back when WCW was still a thing – are guests, so I wanted to have figures for them to sign. On January 15^th I went on MattyCollector.com and ordered a Diamond Dallas Page figure. Ten minutes later I ordered a Machete figure from NECA.

Now, I knew I was taking a chance by ordering something from Matty a mere 17 days before I needed it. While that would be completely reasonable from any other online store anywhere on the fucking planet, Matty has the miserable wreck of a distribution service known as Digital River. So while I could order some black market, chopped-up viper penis from Zimbabwe and expect it to arrive within ten days; Digital River doesn’t seem to have access to the same modern resources as a tribal shaman who wears antelope shit as a hat and talks to rocks. But I had looked around and there were no cheaper alternatives or figures quite as nice.

Shipping on DDP was $9.90. Just plain USPS shipping. The same shipping I use on eBay sales that for a single action figure costs no more than six dollars and arrives in 2-3 business days. Shipping on Machete was five dollars.

Machete arrived on January 18^th. As of 12:32 PM on January 29th, DDP has not even fucking shipped yet. There’s no way it will arrive by the time I need it. The fastest I have ever received anything from Matty was ten business days. And guess what? Digital River does not allow you to cancel orders. You have to wait for the item to arrive and then ship it back. And then 5-7 days after they receive it you get a refund. DDP is going to be somebody’s birthday present. Maybe Monkey’s daughter would like a DDP figure.

I’m going to head up to Billy’sToys on an off day between now and the con. Maybe he’ll have a DDP.

So that’s going on.

I’ve also had a couple of semi-traumatic events occur recently. As if the DDP fiasco wasn’t bad enough, I hit a deer on the way into work the other day. I was doing about fifty on a four lane, divided highway and the damned thing hopped off the side of the road right in front of me. I hit it with the front passenger side of my car and knocked its dumb ass right back out of the road. I’m lucky it was small. If it had been a buck it could have totaled my car and possibly even killed me.

I thought I had escaped with little damage, but once I got into work I saw that my passenger side headlight was shattered. I still feel lucky, but that sucks ass because I fucking hate having to fix anything on the cars. I don’t like spending money on practical stuff. I still need to buy that damn Ninja Turtles sewer playset. I can’t be buying replacement headlights and shit. One of the guys at work that I can stand to talk to told me to check out Craig’s List for a new headlight. My only experience with Craig’s List is the Le Sexoflex song, so I wasn’t sure what to do. He told me to sign on, that it would probably be about fifty bucks, and that I should meet the seller in front of a Walmart. That seemed reasonable. Clark Howard says to do it in front of a police station, but you don’t want to be looking like I look exchanging packages and money with people in front of a bunch of cops. And besides, that seems excessive.

Sure enough, there was a seller in the vicinity of my normal travels and he had a headlight for fifty bucks. I called him up and arranged to meet him on my way into work. Everything went about as perfectly as it could and I was the proud owner of a pretty much brand-new driver’s side headlight.

Shit.

Yeah. I looked at the headlight in the box that he brought, but it didn’t register that it was the wrong side. So now I need to list this thing on eBay or Craig’s List or something and also still need a passenger light. Dumbass.

The other bit of trauma cam with my side job in MCW as ring announcer.

I have already accepted and resolved that the MCW work can never affect my real job. As much as I love MCW and working there, I have to make money, you know? Thirty-six is too old to be doing dumb shit that endangers your paychecks. I can’t go into details about the first thing; partially because I don’t entirely know what it is and partially because it’s SUPER SECRET, but something came up that I knew I wouldn’t be able to take part in. Definitely not fully and maybe not even partially. It was something that would have required too much of my time and would definitely have been a problem with my real job. But I tried to keep an open mind about it and had plenty of time to figure it out. But the point is that the seed had been planted for the possibility that I would be done with MCW sooner than later. It bummed me out, but I have to be realistic about this sort of thing. Ring announcing is never going to pay the bills. And at least I got to do a it a few times and have the experience, right? Not only that, I might have another opportunity along different but similar lines coming up. More on that in the future.

So I knew the end of the MCW gig was probably coming before the end of the year, but at least I had the Days of the Dead show and the big show in March to look forward to. If worst came to worst, at least I would get to work the big show before I dipped out.

Then we got notified that the Days of the Dead thing wasn’t happening. No details as to why, but I’m guessing insurance was the problem. I dunno. Not only that, but The Asylum – which I will write more about once I know we won’t be doing shows there anymore – gave our Friday nights to a fucking dubstep thing. So the MCW Chairman had no choice but to move our February and March shows to different weekends. Weekends that I was working.

It seemed to me that was sealing the deal. I work 5 AM to 5 PM Friday through Sunday when I do work weekends, so there’s no way I can emcee a three-hour event on Saturday night. Especially if it wasn’t going to be starting until 10 PM. So I left a message that I was working and wouldn’t be able to do it. Again, bummer, but that’s being a grown-up.

But wait! There might be light at the end of this tunnel!

We got an update that a February show was not practical and that the March show had been rescheduled to a Thursday night when I was off. I was supposed to work the next day, but I resolved that I would do everything within reason to keep working with MCW. I asked the real job if I could switch to nights for that weekend and told the MCW Chairman that I would be there. So at least I still get to do the big show in March. That’s pretty awesome and I’m going to treat it as though it were my last time out.

Update: Now the show is on March 1st, which still works for me, but now I'm stuck working the swapped schedule that I didn't really want on the 8th - 9th. I'll let you know if it changes again.

I feel like I kind of fucked up last time. Everybody tells me I was great, but I know I wasn’t. I have a lot better in me than what I put out there. And everybody is going to see it on March 1st. And any other dates after that that I can work. I will never again botch an opportunity to get on the mic and shine, even if I am the only one who notices it. I am going to have my shit together and I am going to entertain the fuck out of everyone there, from the wrestlers to the audience. No raffle problems, no dead air or spots of silence. My shit will be together and my mic hand will truly be strong. I will make it so they don’t want to run an MCW show without Phantom 

Troublemaker.

-Phantom