JoshB's blog

Whenever I find myself in a new or far-away city I always take the time to do some toy hunting. San Francisco has some great toy spots that make it a fantastic destination for shopping.

My first stop was the Japantown Mall over near Geary & Laguna. I was staying near Union Square so I decided to take the #38 bus over, but in my rush to catch the bus I tripped off the curb, twisted my ankle, and landed flat on my face in the street. What a great way to start my adventure. I limped onto the bus and once on actually got there quickly. Despite the injury it was a short ride and much cheaper than taking a cab.

The guys over at Swass Cast (http://heroenvy.com/ visit CDX's own Nekrodave and took a tour of his collection. Check it out!

Watch as two $400 lego sets ($400? Really?) get smashed into one $800 pile of Legos. Anyone who has experienced frustration trying to build something with lego will find this cathartic.

Trains really are the way to travel. I'm writing this from the Amtrak Acela express somewhere in Connecticut. After years of driving to Toy Fair we've decided to switch to train and couldn't be happier. I wish I lived in an area with more train service as I would take it everywhere. It's one of the many reasons why I love Japan - the trains run everywhere.

Getting to the station was an adventure. I thought I left myself time by getting up at 4:30 in the morning, but after all was said and done I didn't get on the highway until six. The train station is about an hour from my house and my train was due to leave in 55 minutes.

Just when I thought I was going to scream if I saw another one of those "hunter" or "wars" shows, along comes one what I might actually be interested in. It's called "Toy Hunters" and it chronicles toy dealer Jordan Hembrough as he tries to acquire items to sell at the New York Comic-Con.

Found in our collection gallery in the collection of dukefleed, this assortment of scans from French and Italian Grendizer magazines!

This is insanely great. I love that it's based off of the Shogun Warriors toy!

Some of you may have been wondering where my reviews have been. Well, a lot has been going on here at CollectionDX and I have been super busy, but at last I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

First off we were hard at work on our CollectionDX YouTube show, which is now out of beta and running well.

Then we had the Summit, which was a lot of fun (more on that later).

But all the while I have been hard at work developing a new site to replace Anime.CollectionDX. It's almost done, and I hope you like it. We're aiming at a September 1 launch date.

Once that site is up and running, I get to take a breather and do some reviews, and then it's off to the next redesign, the long-departed chogokin.net.

So stay tuned, and thanks for your patience!

Josh

CDX Alumni Mason Fitch talks about our beloved childhood obsession...

My buddy Todd from Toddatron came across this Second hand toy shop in Japan. What makes this interesting is that it is not so much a collector shop, but an actual toy shop, just used.

Pay attention to the used sentai stuff - they have rows of used DX sentai bots shrink-wrapped...

Check out the youtube page video description for the location of the store, and check out Todd's other videos for more cool stuff from Japan through the eyes of a New Englander!

"The Show Must Go On"

Although it's an old theater saying, I think it applies here. I fought with myself back and forth about how long to keep their memorial on the front page. Each time I would hear Dan in my ear, telling me "What the hell was I doing?", and that he would want nothing more than to see this site continue and succeed.

So that's what we are going to do.

I've placed an image on the right of the page that links to their memorial page here. We will see them each time we come here, we will think of them when we think of CDX. They will always be part of our family.

The funeral is in a few days. I think this is something I needed to do before then. Maybe it will help brace myself for the event.

Thanks again for all your support.

Josh

Happy Fathers Day to all you geek dads out there...

If you go see Toy Story 3, there's one Japanese toy that gets a bit of screen time - it's a plush of Miyazaki's Totoro. But did you know that another prominent toy in the movie has ties to Japan?

Here's the US commercial from 1983: