Happy Late Patrick's Day

I know I'm three days late and promised that there would be more than one Holidaze post dedicated to St. Patrick's Day but, once again, work got in my way and cut into the fun.  It happens, I accept it, but that doesn't mean we can't be a little bit tardy on the site, right?  I mean, it's always better late than never, especially when it comes to St. Patty's Day!  I don't know about you, but St. Patrick's Day has become one of my favorite days of the year.  Despite what my last name may incline, I'm actually about 95% Irish and come from a very traditional Irish family.  As a kid, I couldn't stand it.  I hated the Irish music, I hated the fact that everybody was drinking, and I would have much rathered spend my Sunday morning watching cartoons than up the block watching the Jersey City St. Patrick's Day parade.  I just wasn't feeling the culture or fun that came with it.  But once I turned 21??  Oh boy, everything changed.  St. Patrick's Day became St. Patrick's Month and I began to embrace and enjoy my time with family and friends.  I guess I can thank beer for the happy transition, but it went beyond that.  For whatever reason, I flipped the switch and welcomed it all and made it my own.  I started listening to The Dropkick Murphy's and Flogging Molly instead of the classics my Mom always played.  I went out to Hoboken for Leprecon and dressed like an idiot.  I dyed beer green and wore the same from head to toe.  It's an absolute blast, but it needs to be embraced.  It doesn't matter what nationality you are, we can all celebrate March 17th in a variety of ways.

Because of work, I didn't celebrate this year nearly as much or as hard as I have in the past.  I missed out on the Jersey City parade, Leprecon, and the weekends building up to the big day.  But, in an attempt to salvage something from it all, Eileen and I kept true to certain traditions throughout last week.  To kick things off, you have to bring home a few green bagels.  It's the perfect way to start the festivities and change your morning's theme.  It's amazing how a simple change in color can also change one's mindset, but I don't ask questions, I just butter it up and consider myself lucky.  This particular bagel was purchased at Wonder Bagels in NJ.  If you're ever in my area, make sure you find one and stop by.  They're delicious.

For me, Dunkin Donuts are synonymous with the holidays and I always appreciate when they release limited-edition flavors or change their icing to match the season.  I wasn't expecting much for St. Patrick's Day, but I stop in every morning for Iced Coffee and was happy to find this green beauty staring back at me.  As soon as I saw the icing, I had to have it.  I didn't care what flavor it was, it just needed to be eaten.  It turned out it's "Green Oreo Mint" and I was actually the first one to buy one at that specific store.  That didn't surprise me, but it's cool enough to brag about on a blog!  The taste?  Nothing amazing, but the look makes up for it's lackluster flavor.  It's certainly Oreo-y, and a bit mint, but overall it's pretty bland and boring.  I only tried it once, but once is all I need.  I just gotta say I tried it!

There's also a "Green Mint Oreo Creme" donut available (at least I think it still is), but I was never a fan of the Boston Creme variety so I stuck with the Strawberry Frosted.  That will always be my favorite Dunkin Donut and the inclusion of Shamrock shaped sprinkles was a nice addition.  If not for those green bits of sugar, there would have been nothing new with the Strawberry Frosted.  Although the flavor and icing color didn't change, a simple sprinkle is all it takes for me to drop a few bucks.  Big spender, right?

This year, for the first time ever, I tried a Shamrock Shake from McDonald's!  I know, I know, it's kinda hard to believe, right?  A guy who devotes his free time to a site that focuses on holidays and nostalgia has never tried a Shamrock Shake?  I'm with you.. I hear you.  This was long overdue!  I grew up looking at these, I vaguely remember Uncle O'Grimacey or at least Internet remnants of his appearance, and should have picked one of these up a long time ago.  It's basically Mint ice cream melted down into a refreshingly cool shake, whipped with a cherry on top.  It's delicious and the only thing I'm mad at is the fact that it took my this long to try one.  Again, the theme of today's post is better late than never and it once again applies to this shake.  One thing I can tell you for sure?  This will now be an annual tradition that I add to the March collection.

I had a box of St. Patrick's Day Lucky Charms last year and knew I'd talk about them if they were released again in 2014.  I didn't branch out as much in 2013, but The Holidaze is attempting to take on all holidays in one way or another.  So, I looked everywhere for the "50 Magical Years" edition.  Shop Rite, Pathmark, Stop & Shop, Wal-Mart, Target - I looked everywhere - but came up short each and every time.  I knew it was available thanks to social media, but I couldn't locate a box, so I gave up.  Then, as I stopped for gas and went into the Exxon for a drink, I looked behind me and saw Lucky jumping out at me as if HE found ME!  It was one of those awesome moments that you never expect, but are more than happy to accept.  Who woulda thought I'd find a box of overpriced cereal at a sketchy Exxon in Jersey City and not at the major retailers?

In terms of flavor, there's nothing new in this box of Lucky Charms.  They taste just as great as they always have.  But the biggest and most important difference?  Those four-leaf clover marshmallows!!  They're perfect for St. Patrick's Day and make for a great limited-edition.  I always feel like Lucky Charms and cereals as a whole can do more to celebrate St. Patty's Day, but the ball is never even picked up let alone dropped.  For the last two years, Lucky Charms has hit a home run and I'm happy they brought these back for another run.  They're hard to find, but the search is complete and the hunt is over.

TruMoo has become one of my favorite brands because they go all out for the holidays.  Remember when they released orange milk for Halloween?  Well, now they're back with GREEN milk for St. Patrick's Day!!  Of course, it doesn't taste like real milk and that's the worst part.  I'd love to pour this into a bowl of cereal or cup of coffee to enhance yet another experience, but this "Lucky Green" milk is Vanilla flavored and is better off on its own.  But besides the colored milk, take a look at the sticker label!  The leprechaun hat, the rainbow, and pot of gold scream St. Patty's Day and stand out just as much as anything else I've seen on store shelves.  It's attractive and lures you in.  Once that happens, I'm pulling out my own green and dropping dollaz!

What's the best way to drink green milk?  Well, out of an oversized Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles beer mug, of course.  Yeah, you'd think I'd reserve that for green beer, but I've done that in the past and this was a welcomed change.  The milk is good, it's very tasty, but it's not something I'd drink on regular basis.  It's a shake in itself and heavy going down.  But when we're talking about appearance, I love the way the green pops off of the different shades of green against other shades of green.  It's a good thing that's my favorite color, otherwise I might have already had enough of this post. 

My girlfriend is one hell of a baker and I wanted to put her culinary skills to good use.  Much like what we did with the General Mills' Monster Cereals, I had the idea of doing the same with our limited-edition Lucky Charms.  I thought long and hard, about 15 seconds, and came up with rainbow cupcakes, topped with green icing and Lucky Charms.  I'm no genius, but I'm even less of a baker, so I went to Eileen with the idea and asked her to make the magic happen.  Before I knew it, she was in the kitchen baking.

Before decorating them, she showed me the rainbow cake and it blew me away.  If I was a kid and had rainbow cake like this, I might have passed out due to brightness.  I honestly never expected these to look so good on the inside.  I figured it would be a mix of rainbow that made some type of dirty brown.  Instead, we have a beautiful butterfly that was ready to be topped with green icing and shamrocks!

I couldn't be happier with how they and the photos came out!!  My girlfriend did one hell of a job and they came out amazing!  We topped a few with the limited Lucky Charms, but others with traditional Lucky Charms because, hey, they're Irish, too!  Especially those rainbows - they were a must!  So overall, I'm thrilled with these cupcakes and think they make for great images and even better snacks to satisfy our tastebuds!

Traditionally, I like to rock green from head to toe when I go out for St. Patrick's Day and I was excited to whip out my new sneakers and take my girl out to Hoboken.  Unfortunately, going out on Monday night is just as boring on St. Patrick's Day as it is on every other week of the year.  We were expecting a lot of people roaming the streets and bar crawling without any Tuesday care.  Work?  Screw that, It's St. Patrick's Day!  But nope.. like that #Selfie song says, "Who goes out on Mondays?"  Apparently we're the uncool ones!  But, still, we made the most of it and had a great time in each others' company.  That's all that matters!

It's a shame that I didn't take each of these topics and spread them out across March.  It would have made my post-count look like I actually have more than enough time to dedicate to The Holidaze, but work sucks, man.  I'd love to sit back and do nothing but talk about food, junk, candy, and toys all day, but the real world always has something to say about that!  Luckily, I found time today to share my St. Patty's week experience with all of you and, again, I hope it's better late than never.  As for those two pics above, they're from our personal Instagram and Twitter accounts that you're more than welcome to follow.  I'm @CKCash30 and Eileen is @Leeni219.  If you're already following @HolidazeBlog, you might like the differences on the others :)

Even though we're 3 days out, I'd like to wish each and every one of you a very Happy St. Patrick's Day and I hope you all enjoyed it as much as - or even more than - I did!  It's always a great time of year and if you haven't embraced March 17th yet, make sure you do in 2015!  You'll thank me later :)

McDonalds Happy Meal Classics

When I was growing up, McDonald's was always a hot spot.  I know it catches flack for not being healthy, and I understand that, but can we all agree that it tastes pretty damn good?  When I was a kid, I couldn't get enough of McDonald's and it's probably due to their advertising.  Activists who fight against child obesity today have made the classic fast food characters of my day an endangered species.  Now, only Ronald McDonald exists.  The rest of McDonaldland has gone into hiding.  But I remember when McDonald's and Burger King characters were just as prevalent on TV as Spongebob is today.  I even had a McDonaldland video game!  They were such a crucial part of McDonald's business strategy and, really, can ya blame them?  Ronald McDonald lured kids in, he showed them what type of cookies and toys he had, then he ran off with their Parents' money with a big smile on his face.  Talk about a Hamburglar!

That's an old commercial that I don't own.  I found it on YouTube and, apparently, it's from 1995.  I would have been about 7 and I greatly remember those Happy Meal toys!  The toys didn't move, they didn't have any fancy lights or sounds, but they had removable  costumes and that was better than anything I could have imagined.  There was something about putting those characters in costume that made the season seem so much better.  In my mind, I completely changed them from Grimace to a Ghost.  It was all in my mind, but the nostalgia stays with me to this day.

Because I miss those times and the days when Fast Food Cartoon Characters ruled over all Saturday morning commercials, I had to turn to Ebay and see what I could find.  Once I get my mind set on a certain time, I have to do whatever I can to relive those memories.  Luckily, I found a few!

 

Here's Birdie the early Bird!  She was known for representing the breakfast line at McDonald's, but became more of a fixture as the years went on.  Because I'm a boy, she was never my favorite.  "Pink is for girls!"  I never wanted to find a Birdie toy in my Happy Meal, but when you went as much as I did, it was bound to happen.  But, around Halloween, it didn't matter because it meant a new costume!  I always liked seeing what the characters would come dressed as so, even in this case, I would have been happy to find something new.  Now, at 25, I still would have rathered Grimace or The Hamburglar, but I'll take what I can get when it comes to 18 year old Happy Meal toys!

Here she is!  All decked out in her pumpkin suit!  I like this costume a lot because you can still see her face.  Plus, it's a pretty girly costume.  The last time I saw a boy dress up as a pumpkin, he was either 3 years old or dressed in one of those Creature Reachers.  That's totally different.  So I like how much McDonald's focused on who would wear what costume.  This is the perfect fit for Birdie.  The only thing that would have been better is a cat.  Ya know, since cats eat birds? How ironic would that have been? Hmm.. Stay tuned.

Here we have the Hamburglar.  It's not the one depicted in the video (that one was my favorite back in the day,) but he's still pretty cool.  I think this was released at a later time and his sole purpose was to work as a candy dispenser for kids.  I'm not sure how that would work exactly, but I believe the kids would store their candy (probably came with the Happy Meal) by lowering the Hamburglar's mask.  I guess the point was that his mask would scare any thief's away from stealing the one or two sweetarts you could fit in there.  I like the concept, but the removable costumes were so much better!  Either way, I can't hate on my man The Hamburglar.  He's always been my favorite McDonaldland character.

When you lower the mask, it fits perfectly around his head leaving just enough room for his eyes to peek through.  Let me point out how interesting of a mask this actually is.  The first thing that comes to mind is Freddy Krueger.  The rounded nose, the heavy wrinkles and, of course, The Hamburglar's hat only enhances the illusion.  Something tells me that's what McDonald's was going for in a time where slasher films were still relevant.  But I also see a green goblin.  Not THE Green Goblin from Spideman, but a generic form.  He's hideous, that's for sure.  And the kicker is the fact that his tongue is sticking out with a giant spider crawling up and into his mouth.  If this didn't scare kids from opening the candy dispenser, what would have?  This is a very cool McDonald's toy.  Not one of the best, but definitely a classic.

In the lot I purchased on Ebay, I received four legendary Happy Meal toys and Birdie was included twice.  That's probably why I snagged these for less than $3 shipped.  But in this case, I don't mind it because Birdie is bringing me back to the topic she originally started up above.  Wouldn't it be cool if the crazy minds at McDonald's decided to dress her up like a cat for Halloween?  Well..

 I may be the only one who thinks so, but this is extremely clever!  Obviously, Birdie was intended for young girls.  So there weren't many options to choose from in terms of making Birdie scary AND approachable.  We all know how much little boys love gross things.  That spider on Hamburglar's tongue would have made a little boy's day.  But a little girl?  She would have been disgusted.  I guess some things never change.  But for an adult with too much time on their hands, they can look at the Happy Meal toy and snicker.  Cats eat birds so, in Birdie's mind, this would be extremely scary!  I don't think it was going to keep kids from stealing your candy, but if your friend happens to be a bird, then you're in luck!  The only think that would have been funnier, is if she dressed up as a chicken nugget.  Oh, the irony in McDonaldland.

Last but not least, we have the head honcho himself -- Ronald McDonald.  Let's face it, this guy isn't clowning around.  He is, without a doubt, a world-wide icon!  He's a legendary figure and I don't think there's a kid on Earth who hasn't seen his seducing smile.  Even the hungry kids in Ethiopia have seen him.  They may not have seen any burgers, but they've definitely seen him.  He's everywhere, including my deck for the photo above.

This was one of my favorite McDonald's toys of all time.  When I think back to everything, I remember The Hamburglar, Grimace, and Ronald.  Halloween was such a big deal for me as a kid that this figure would have certainly enhanced my Holidaze tenfold.  The fact that I remember it so well is telling, but the fact that my heart skipped a beat when I saw his picture on Ebay is even more telling.  I'm a giant nerd, but I love Halloween.

 How amazing is his costume?  When Halloween rolls around, Ronald pulls out all the stops and dresses up as.. Frankenstein!!  And not just any old Frankie, but a traditionally green Frankie with BLUE hair!  What maniac at the McDonald's factory decided to paint his hair blue?  A genius, that's who!  It's crazy how much a stationary figure that doesn't make any sounds could do so much for me.  When I was a kid, I would act things out with the McDonaldland figures.  One second Ronald would be a clown, the next he'd be Frankenstein.  He'd scare the rest of the crew until they wound up having a Monster Mash costume party in the end.  I let my imagination do the work and, to this day, I try to uphold that tradition.  There's a time and place to be serious, but Halloween?  Nahh, that's not one of 'em!

Now that I've found a few of the classic Happy Meal figures, I'm interested in finding more.  Hamburglar dressed as Dracula is definitely one that I'd like to find, along with Grimace the Ghost.  I don't seem to remember much more than that, but the memories are vague so they could come back to me as I see them.  We'll see.  But if I do find anymore for a reasonable price, I'll place the order and review them on The Holidaze!  For now, just be Happy....Meal.  So corny.

McDonalds Halloween Happy Meals

When I was a kid, the country wasn't so obsessed with child obesity.  I don't know if it was a big problem in the 90s, but I know McDonalds and Burger King didn't care enough to correct their ads to be more health conscious.  Ya know what?  I liked it better that way!  Remember the Burger King Kids Club?

This gang was everywhere!  They were in commercials, graced the Kids Meal bags and boxes, and specialized in luring children to the play area.  They were awesome.  Personally, my favorite was Kid Vid and, yeah, I'll admit, he and his followers probably did encourage me to eat more fast food.  But, now those days are over.  Fast food chains advertising toward children is no longer accepted in our society, so characters like The Hamburglar are as good as gone.  What a shame.

I mean, just take a few seconds and remember how colorful things used to be.  From the commercials and toys, to the videos and holidays, everything was so much more fun.  After watching this video, I started to realize how much more I was "lovin' it" in the 90s!

Ronald McDonald and his buddies always made me happy, but what's even better about this commercial is the end.  Do you guys remember the Halloween Happy Meal Pails?  I can remember the first time my Dad brought one home to me and I just couldn't believe it.  I was in a complete state of shock and, really, moments like that are reasons why I'm so obsessed with Halloween today.  Seeing that little orange pail filled me with just as much happiness as the food inside it.  And now...

They're Back!

The McDonalds' Halloween Happy Meal Trick-or-Treat Pails are variations of what I remember and what's depicted in my video, but they're obviously related to the originals.  They come in both green and orange and you're asked to make monsters with the use of stickers.  We have eyes, noses, eyebrows, and scary teeth.  We're in control now!

I wasn't going to post pictures of the McDonalds food, because I think we all know what that looks like, but just look at those apples.  Really?  Apples?  What happened to the little plastic chicken nuggets that I can dress up like Dracula?  Now I'm stuck with a bag of stupid apples.  Oh well..

Let's get to the faces my girlfriend and I created!

From what I've noticed, there are different sets of stickers and, in the one we received with our green pail, there really wasn't much of a selection.  We did our best with what we were given, but I'm really not all the hyped up on greeny.  In this case, we have what looks to be the face of Mickey Mouse.. if he was a zombie..or going as Frankenstein this Halloween.

He's more fun.  We pretty much used the better stickers on him.  He has cross-eyes, a pig nose, one protruding tooth, freckles and band-aids.  He's obviously dumb, but he's happy with who he is.  You know you love him.

You know we had to pick up the orange pail too.  You can't have one without the other and I was not letting this Halloween come and go without decorating each color.  Thankfully, we got a different set of stickers with the orange pail.  This enabled us to create three faces on one pail and call this trip to McDonalds a complete success.  Our first, pictured above, is some type of half-dog, half-clown face.  He's smiling, but I wouldn't get too close.

The One-Eyed Beast reminds me of Mike from Monsters Inc., but I don't mind that it makes me look less creative.  I knew, once I saw that big eye on the sheet, that this monster would be created with the stickers I associated it with.  I like to think that he just ate a big meal, probably a living creature, when nobody was looking and is now just laying back with a full belly.  I like this face, but it's not my favorite.

This...is my favorite!!  Why?  I don't know why.  I just love him.  He reminds me of a cartoon character.  I can't figure out whom, but I think it might be Powdered Toast Man from Ren & Stimpy.  Something about this face makes me smile just as much as his railroad grill.  Speaking of his smile, I've decided to name him "Stitch" for obvious reasons.  Although, that is yet another Disney reference in one post and I'm probably pushing it.  I'm really much more creative than stealing from Disney, I swear..

We only have a few more days left, but I can almost guarantee you live near a McDonalds.  It doesn't matter what country your from, I know you're close enough to a McDonalds that you can go out and pick up a few Halloween pails.  Don't get me wrong, I don't expect anybody to actually use them when Trick-or-Treating, because you'll only fit about 15 pieces of candy in them, but they're still a must have.  For the price of a Happy Meal, you get a bucket of Halloween glory and an instant blast from the past.  It's completely worth it and, like carving pumpkins, provides a great face-making experience.

And hey, if I didn't sell it to you well enough already, check out this 2011 McDonalds commercial which, shockingly, reminds me a bit of the old days!