Richloam General Store, PopStroke, Taffer’s Tavern, Nine Inch Nails, & Naples

My apologies for not posting this a few days ago like what was planned. Other things have happened that I’ve been preoccupied with… don’t worry, nothing bad.

One fun happening was returning to the Magic Kingdom a few weeks ago. The highlight was riding TRON Lightcycle/Run again; for the time, there were some minor changes meant to plug TRON: Ares. The ride now has a storyline where “code” from the enemy in Ares has infected that world, meaning there’s more red than blue during the ride… and instead of Daft Punk’s music from TRON: Legacy, the Nine Inch Nails soundtrack from Ares is heard. To state the obvious, back around this time in 2000, I never would have thought that NIN music would be heard during a Disney ride… I wouldn’t have believed there was a TRON ride, either.

One weekend afternoon, I went to a unique place in the middle of nowhere. It’s an old general store founded in 1922-the appearance hasn’t changed much since then-and is located by a former railway. Richloam General Store has very nice employees and various retro gifts for sale. Not that many pictures were taken while there-a rude family was milling about the entrance. I state that as they had a dog with them, despite obvious signs that dogs weren’t allowed in front of the store. I’ll be happy to return one day, hopefully not as busy. It was charming and quaint.

Another night, a trip was made to Pointe Orlando, a place rarely visited by me. Given the new expensive rates to park there, there isn’t great motivation to visit more often. That’s a shame, as that location has never drawn huge crowds and some interesting new places have opened. That includes Taffer’s Tavern-that’s Jon Tapper of Bar Rescue fame. That’s a show never seen by me although more than one person I know is a fan. My visit was due to general curiosity more than anything else. The building is best described as “cozy” but I can’t carp about the service nor the food. In addition, Pointe Orlando has a new hallway best described as “a liminal space.”

It certainly beats PopStroke, a.k.a. the "hip" miniature golf place that has the involvement of Tiger Woods. The bar area looks great and the food was alright... however, having to do EVERYTHING on your phone was enough to turn me off even before the lousy service and the excessively loud music/noise. I will never return. 

As done the past several years, some days last week (including Thanksgiving) were spent in the Fort Myers area. As always, the time spent down there was fun. This time I was able to spent some time in Naples for the first time. Some areas are ritzy, especially the HUGE mansions that can be found right by the beach. No new restaurants were visited, although that is OK as that’ll change this month and the day after Thanksgiving, the now-yearly tradition happened: a sub sandwich was picked up from Lennys Grill & Subs to eat a few hours later for dinner.

I’ll return sometime later in December.

Predator: Badlands, Mountain Dew Baja Blast Midnight, Coca-Cola Holiday Creamy Vanilla, & Shelby Oaks

As now customary, this will be one part of two; the second will be posted likely the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Hopefully everyone has a nice, long holiday weekend-I should. I did go to Epcot last week to once again experience their annual Food & Wine Festival before it concluded.

Another customary thing I did: revisit various places. This includes the Lotte Plaza Market Asian grocery store to purchase more food & drink. Most aren’t really worth mentioning, to be honest. Thus, what I will mention are two new beverages. The first was Taco Bell’s exclusive flavor, Mountain Dew Baja Blast Midnight. I like regular Baja Blast; not surprisingly, a grape version is one I was happy to have tried. Second: Coca-Cola Holiday Creamy Vanilla. It’s not too terribly different from regular Coca-Cola Vanilla. That said, I do enjoy both.

Since last time, I’ve seen a pair of movies theatrically. The first was a horror film called Shelby Oaks. It was the feature film of a famous YouTube movie reviewer, Chris Stuckmann. He’s not one I’ve ever watched regularly, whether it was during his previous era of “dude who yells and curses constantly” or his current era of “he doesn’t criticize any movie now that he’s in the industry.” The movie got a mixed reception; me, I actually did enjoy the tale of a woman attempting to look for her missing sister. Appealing to me was that it was NOT the usually insufferable “elevated horror” and instead felt like something from the past. The movie did have faults, for sure-however, the claims that the movie “didn’t have a third act” are completely erroneous and there were nice atmospheric moments not often seen in horror anymore.

The second film was Predator: Badlands. Of course, the original is an all-timer I’ll always love. Predator 2 is pretty sweet (don’t listen to the naysayers) and I guess Prey was fine. Otherwise, a great creature has been in some lousy movies. Yes, Badlands was “safe” for modern audiences by having an underdog “runt” Predator-a Yautja, to use the proper name of the alien species-attempt to kill an unstoppable monster & he has a wacky synthetic human sidekick. Even I can admit there was a bit too much humor and it’s quite different in every facet from the original Predator movie. Those points duly noted, I still enjoyed Predator: Badlands. I was fine w/ them attempting something new, people wanted to see a Predator movie that at least partially took place on their home planet, and creativity shone both in the score and the various creatures on what they called a Death Planet. I was happy it wasn’t a movie I was disappointed in.

To reiterate, I should return sometime the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

Test Track, Clermont Brewing Company, Webber International University Football, & Deathstalker

Finally, I am caught up on the activities I have done since the beginning of August. The main highlight to mention this time: one day I went to the Animal Kingdom, the other EPCOT. It’s always nice seeing the critters at the Animal Kingdom but the day at EPCOT was the more interesting of the two to discuss here. Besides it being nice to walk around during their annual Food & Wine Festival, the Test Track ride was refurbished. It looks different and there is an increased focus on electric vehicles; otherwise, it’s still a fun attraction once the ride vehicles go over 60 MPH outside.

I went to a pair of lower-level college football games. The first was last month; the Southeastern Fire football team in Lakeland defeated Reinhardt 41-20. Last year, I saw Southeastern play against… Reinhardt. That game last year was called in the third quarter due to lightning-the Fire won that one 28-10. I was glad to see them play a full game this time. That was a fun time.

The second game was just yesterday; it was Southeastern again, this time at Webber International University, in a town (Babson Park) that is sort of in the middle of nowhere. I shouldn’t carp-I saw a game at their campus a few years ago and not only are they situated right by a lake, they have an outdoor swimming pool for their students. Unlike last time, they actually had bleachers for the crowd-no lie. While I wish there wouldn’t have been so whiny sports fans around-an epidemic, I say-otherwise it was another fine game. Southeastern won 24-7; the result wasn’t too surprising although perhaps I expected something a little closer. They had two food trucks there for concessions so that was a nice change from the norm.

Still, I visited various restaurants for the first time in awhile. This includes a Potbelly Sandwich Works (although that was in Davenport and not Orlando) and my returning to downtown Clermont to eat at Clermont Brewing Company for the first time in awhile. The last thing I’ll mention is a wacky movie I just saw theatrically. In the 80’s were a cheesy set of sword-and-sandal movies called Deathstalker, one of many that were “inspired” by Conan the Barbarian. Only the first was seen by me-last year after hearing that it’d be remade and star Daniel Bernhardt, a martial artist who’s been in the likes of John Wick, Nobody (and its sequel, playing different characters in each) & Ballerina. Only afterwards did I hear this new movie was more in tone to Deathstalker 2, but alas…

This new Deathstalker was styled after 80’s movies in general; most importantly, most of the effects were practical. That includes graphic gory moments, numerous creative creatures, and general carnage. The tone is silly on purpose yet it’s also a lot of fun as they aren’t insufferable or winking at the camera. The only other name of note is Patton Oswalt; he voiced an elf-like wizard. The only thing in common w/ the first film is the hero’s name and how he meets various people he teams up with on his quest. I recommend it for those that have viewed those cheesy 80’s ripoffs of Conan the Barbarian. Note that Slash (yes, THAT Slash) is one of the many executive producers.

I’ll return sometime in November, promise.

TRON: Ares, Deer, Nine Inch Nails & Ace Frehley

It wasn’t the plan to do a FOURTH one of these (to be posted either Sunday or Monday) so I can finally be caught up. Truth be told, I’m exhausted right now, don’t feel 100% and as I promised to post something tonight… At least this afternoon I was able to visit the rural James A. Van Fleet State Trail for the first time in years. In the past such wild animals as gators, tortoises, turtles, and snakes were seen on the trail. Today, it was… a pair of deer. They were too far away to take photographic evidence of but they were pleasant surprises nonetheless.

I finally saw TRON: Ares. In what’s not a popular opinion, the original movie from 1982 was a weird, quirky thing I dig because it uses legit computer terms & the aesthetics are still awesome. TRON: Legacy looked & sounded great yet the story and characters were lame. Unfortunately, while Ares looked and sounded even better (especially at a Dolby Cinema in 3D like how I saw it), the story and characters were even worse!

The plot was nonsense-it’s a basic story not told that well and they only paid lip service to such topics as AI-the villain, pathetic, the other characters, forgettable… and oh boy is there an awful odious “comic” relief character that didn’t make me crack a smile even once. I’m glad the visuals at least looked nice and the Nine Inch Nails score was awesome. Jared Leto I don’t love as a human being—his presence isn’t why my opinion of Ares (character & film) isn’t high.

Just a little earlier I heard of Ace Frehley passing away. Now, I did once see KISS perform live in Orlando for the grand sum of… $4.80! Someone I knew mentioned on Twitter that August afternoon in 2013 that there were “free” tickets on Ticketmaster for a KISS concert—that was the night before the Arena Football League championship game in the same arena. The band would sponsor a team in the league the next season, as Gene Simmons will never turn down ANY opportunity to market his band’s likeness. While that version of the band did NOT have Ace nor Peter Criss in it, that was a lot of fun as someone who almost never attends any concerts.

For a long time now I’ve enjoyed the band and their music-Frehley played a key role in that as lead guitar. There have been other unfortunate deaths these past few months (such as Diane Keaton) but as Ace dying was just announced… hopefully when I return in a few days there won’t be any further deaths to mention.