In this installment of welcome to the Insta-hood I interviewed :@video_macabro

1. Tell me a little about yourself:

“My name is Eduardo Garza (but everyone calls me Eddie) and I was born in Monterrey, Mexico in 1989. I’m the oldest of three with two younger sisters—no brothers. At the age of four my family immigrated to the United States. I became a naturalized citizen and have been living in Texas ever since. I cherish my citizenship and the choices my parents made to give their children a better life. I don’t think that they would ever have guessed their baby boy would grow up to be a seeker of trash films and an obsessive collector of fake food (yeah… that’s a thing I do). I grew up in the 90s. I loved my childhood, but I was always wanted to be an adult. I loved the idea of being able to stay up late watching horror movies and driving to wherever I wanted whenever I wanted. Now that’s a reality and you know what, it’s pretty cool. I’m currently a single dog father (any singles out there, hit me up) and I have a house full of weird stuff.

I’m a collector of a lot of different things… Universal Monsters, old Halloween toys, true-crime books, alien stuff, movies, fake food, fake poop, et cetera… I don’t remember the year or how old I was, but I remember a couple of movies that got me interested in the genre.

First, The Neverending Story (1984). I remember this movie being really weird and those moments where the child empress seems to break the fourth wall to talk to Bastian always creeped me out. Now obviously, it doesn’t have the same effect, but I am fond of those memories. I collect anything I can that’s NES related. The second film, I’m thinking of is a roughly cut version of The McPherson Tape (1989) I saw when I was really young. It’s a found-footage movie that came out years before The Blair Witch Project and centers around a family’s tragic night fighting off a bunch of grey aliens. I legitimately believed it was real. Growing up in a Hispanic home, we would watch a lot of Spanish TV and there was a TV personality named Jaime Maussan who was a ufoligist and hosted a UFO/Alien footage show where he would show clips of different supposed video evidence of extraterrestrial beings and their round disc-shaped ships. He would analyze the hazy images and pause and rewind and talk about magnetohydrodynamics or echelon formations or alien flares and, to me, it wasn’t only otherworldy, it was absolutely terrifying. How could beings like this exist?

Many nights I would stay up praying nothing remotely like what I was seeing on this guy’s show would ever manifest itself to me. And then, The McPherson Tape… this movie was presented to me as seriously as evidence is presented in a court room. It was the closest I’ve ever felt to watching a snuff film. It is the one movie that truly terrified me, but it had everything to do with my age, my limited understanding of the world, and my, apparently, innermost fear of aliens. Now when people ask me (and the often do) what the scariest movie I’ve ever seen is, I’m not sure how to answer. I’m obviously thinking “The Mcpherson Tape!!”, but I never say that. I simply tell people that no movie has ever scared me and that’s a lie. ”

2. Why compeled you to start a cult?

“I grew up in the Mormon church. It’s the only way of life I knew until 2008 when I left the church and even moved out of Texas. I started to really investigate religion and fell in love with finding out as much as I possibly could about other people’s faith. I became obsessed with scripture and spirituality and spiritism. Believe it or not I decided to return to the Mormon church. It, for me, had the most interesting history. It’s a history and a foundation full of magick, seer stones, revelation, extra-terrestrial visitors, polygamous scandals, new scripture, spirits, rituals, et cetera. Of course, for me, there was also a familiarity with the religion that existed, but now it was totally different, because I truly felt converted. I had researched enough and was compelled to share the message. That’s right- I became a Mormon missionary. Yes, the kind that knocks on your door and asks if you have to time to hear about the church. I did that for two awesome years. The difference between me and other regular missionaries is I started to go really deep into the scripture. I went deep into really old conferences of the church. Old meetings. As soon as I returned home in 2013, I started collecting everything I could get my hands on that had to do with doctrine and modern revelation. I learned absolutely everything about the church. I became so well-grounded in the doctrine of the restoration of the church of God that I started to see how the modern Mormon faith had changed from when it was founded in 1830. It has changed so much! It is virtually nothing like the church that it’s founder Joseph Smith had helped form. So I felt I had to do something about it. I started to truly believe that I had been placed on Earth to fix the church… the church I loved so very much. I felt impressed to start a record of personal revelation. Here is where things get crazy. I started to feel the presence of something in my life, a real presence. This presence communed with me through thoughts and feelings and called himself Abrac. I only physically saw Abrac once. He instructed me to write. I wrote everything he dictated to me until I finished the book. This is a book that no one has read, except for me. It tells of a land called Gok that exists within the same dimension of space as Earth, but is a lot farther away, in a “government” or realm called Goriax. It contains bible-like stories from that planet and expands on Mormon doctrine of deification and blood-relations of the Gods. I was really close to printing the book and starting to spread the message about another testament of Jesus Christ (the book also contains conversations that Jesus Christ had in the Garden of Gethsemane with Satan in a period that is much longer than the Bible says). But for one reason or another, I started to question everything. Had I gone to deep? Had I simply imagined these feelings? Seven years later, here I am and I’m glad I didn’t publish. A lot of good has happened and I’m very happy with where I am in life. I feel like a positive influence for the most part and I hope to keep it that way.”

3. How did you come up with your Instagram name?

“My Instagram name used to be video_trash. Some of my oldest followers might remember that. I decided that I wanted to create something that is more inviting to other sub-genres so I decided to switch to the Spanish word for “Macabre” which is “Macabro” and is pronounced muh-caw-bro. In Spanish it doesn’t necessarily only have to deal with death or injury, but can be translated to “ghoulish” or “weird.”

4. What are the top 3 weirdest movies you have ever watched and why?

“That’s a good question, but one that may not have the desired response for your readers. I’ve seen plenty of classically labeled “weird” movies… things like Funky Forest (2005), Cat Soup (2001), Eraserhead (1977), Naked Lunch (1991), et cetera… and obviously a lot of “weird” art films like what The Holy Mountain (1973) was trying to do. But a lot of those movies were trying to be weird for shock value or provocative artistic expression. Sure, they may relate to the times and may even contain deep philosophical drama within the subtext, but are they really weird? Since they are deliberately trying to be weird, it’s almost as if they aren’t weird at all. They are just art to me in the same way as when you walk into an art gallery. The weirdness about a movie doesn’t come so much from aesthetic for me as it does from the plot. I’m reminded about The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975). Richard O’Brien’s musical is absolutely wonderful, but I only ever saw the movie version. I was barely in High School when I saw it for the first time and thought it was hilarious, and as the years went by the plot seemed to sound weirder. Fluid-sexual transvestite aliens come to Earth to impart their sexual wisdom upon us lowly humans. Now you can probably take any mainstream movie, dumb down the plot, and then it sounds really weird, which is probably what I’m doing. Some strange movies I recommend that I think are more than just weird, but actually really good are:

Panna a Netvor (1979) – A beautiful gothic retelling of the Beauty and the Beast where the Beast looks like a giant bird.

The Cat (1992) – a Hong Kong sci-fi movie about a cat from space teaming up with an alien girl to battle another alien… all here on Earth!

Hiruko the Goblin (1991) – a movie about a space goblin that is sent here for the sole purpose of beheading people and turning them into spider demons.

Devi aka Goddess (1999) – basically this movie is ET The Extra-Terrestrial, but instead of ET you have an Indian Snake Goddess and instead of Elliott you have an Indian woman who is tormented by a Snake Demon. Also, there’s lots of musical numbers and psychotronic special effects.

5.  What is one thing that people don’t know about you that you would like to share?

“People don’t know that about a month ago I started a YouTube channel where I share some of my toys and things. It’s nothing like what I do on Instagram where I edit videos with music. This is a pretty boring thing where I just talk about things that I have. It’s called “Cryptic Cauldron”… I currently have zero subscribers. ”

If you like to know more information or have questions for Eduardo. His social media outlets are below:

Instagram: @video_macabro

Youtube channel:

Cryptic Cauldron

Thank you so much for the interview!!

Until Next time!

Food is always a universal key item in any occasion and especially at funerals. Every culture has there own particular kind of comfort food that is made during the grieving process. Here are five recipes from five different cultures and feel free to try to make them and see what you think!:

Funeral Potatoes (Idaho and Utah):

This recipe is well known in Idaho and Utah among the Mormon community. This super decadent food is filled with butter, cheese, hash browns and corn flakes in a pan and cooked in the oven.  This is usually served as a side dish for not just funerals but for other holidays. I will most likely try to make this side dish in the near future.

Irish Wake Cake (Ireland):

This is serve usually during the wake in Irish cultures. It is like a mixture of a pound cake and a fruit cake because sometimes fruit is added depending on your preference. Link to recipe is below:

Irish Wake Cake

Pan de Muertos (Mexico):

This sweet bread is usually made in Mexico for the Day of the Dead (November 1-2nd). The shape of the bread various because it really depends on who makes it. Sometimes it comes in the shape of regular buns with a criss cross bone shaped pattern on top of the bun and sometimes in comes in shapes of people and animals:

This food is typically eaten  at the gravestone of the departed with that particular love ones favorite food.

Funeral Pie (Pennsylvania):

This recipe is well known in the Amish Community and is also known as Rosina Pie in German. The ingredients are usually items that are usually found in a typical household and are not that expensive. The pie was usually made a day or two before the actual meal for the funeral that day due to the ingredients shelf life. This desert was a good desert to bring to someone who family member who passed away.

Link for the recipe is below:

Funeral Pie

Kyuri uma and nasu ushi (Japan):

During the Obon (Buddist memorial service)- it is believe that the love ones who pasted away return to the Obon as spirits. Families of the deceased place offerings at their Buddhist alters in their homes. One kind of offering is made out of a carved cucumber that is in the shape of a horse and then it is left at the recently deceased’s gravestone so they are able to return to the afterlife.

Until Next time!

Source:

https://www.funeralguide.co.uk/blog/traditional-funeral-food

Grease like many other movies has always had a special place in my heart. The first time I watched it I was four years old and at my babysitter house. It caught my eye while I was flipping the channels because of the intro segment.

I thought that I was about to watch a cartoon but after a couple of minutes the cartoon disappeared and the movie begins at a beach. Although the singing of the catchy songs and fun plot line kept me watching until the end!

However there was a hot minute decision that the whole entire movie was going to be a cartoon instead. When the adaptation from the hit broadway show was available as film rights. The first person that was interested in turning it into a movie was Ralph Bakshi. He made some of my favorite movies such as Fritz the Cat, Wizards and Cool World!

His version was a little different than the live version. Bakshi wanted do something like “Fritz the Cat.” And the ending would be Danny Zuko kills myself at the end of the movie. However Bakshi could not obtain the rights of the film but he did ended up making a movie in 1982 called “Hey Good Lookin’. With the same 1950’s vibe with a similar Danny Zuko character background.

However after watching Grease many many……many times. I always wondered who made the cartoon opening segment to the movie?

It was done by a man named John D. Wilson and his studio Fine Arts Film. He also worked on some Disney movies such as Peter Pan and Lady and the Tramp. He also did the cartoon version of Cher’s Dark Lady music video:

I always felt like the first three minutes of Grease can be a music video because it really stands out and alone:

And it doesn’t hurt the imagery at all with the song that is playing with it. “Grease” was composed by Barry Gibb (Of Bee Gees Fame) and sung by Frankie Valli. 

This song along with four other songs was not part of the original Broadway soundtrack. However “Grease’s” film director Randal Klesier did not like the added songs to the score because he felt like it did not fit the 1950’s music to the film however it did fit the music scene of the year the movie was released. Although John D. Wilson and his studio has tons of references of the 1950’s within the tiny three minute cartoon segment: 

Here is a youtube of one of my favorite openings in a movie ever. Play and see how many 1950’s references you can catch while watching it!

Until next time!

Hello everyone! This week I had the pleasure of interviewing fellow Instagram account:

@poppopandily

1. Tell me a little about yourself:

“If 50 is the “new 30”, Then I am pushing the “new 40 “.A sin that dare not speak its number .I have been self -isolated by choice since January of  2016 in a haunted house that was left to me by my Maternal Grandmother.”

2. Can you talk a little your experience being a teenage Drag Queen?

“I was a Teen-Age Drag Queen from 1977-1980.This fact was necessitated by the extreme bullying I received for the unforgivable act of being “Too Pretty”.

My response was to be even prettier at the Drag Bar on the Weekends which awarded me with minor Celebrity status as Miss Ashley or “Angel” as I was dubbed by the Gay community of Atlanta Ga.Fun facts about Miss Ashley -Ate Monday and Tuesday only ,Had one Bi-Sexual Construction Worker Boyfriend the whole 3 years.”

3. If you were to make a top 5 movie list to watch while staying indoors. What would you pick and why?

“Top 5 Movies to suggest -5) “A Stolen Life “ with Miss Bette Davis -Master Acting Class.

4)”Logan’s Run” -Sci-Fi about eliminating the Old -Could it be more pertinent ?

3)”Female on the Beach “ Joan Crawford at her post apocalyptic best.

2) “Glass Menagerie “ -Shirley Booth 1966 version .I have been every one of these Characters in my life .Had to include Tennessee Williams.

1)”About Mrs .Leslie “ -Shirley Booth again .Plot involves My ideal relationship -6weeks of undivided perfect attention per year -the remaining Year spent alone with my Dog!”

4. Who are your top 3 current inspirational people and why?

“Top 3 Inspiring People -1)Meryl Streep -who I aspired to be like as a Woman

2)Justin Vivian Bond -mxviv on Insta ,Who is living our best life.

3)Mr.Brad Pitt – Who I would want to be like as a Man .So admire his body of work. Especially “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood “sobbed for hours at relief for the ending!”

5. What was your craziest experience you had this year and why?

“Craziest experience this Year :Double Hernia operation -First Surgery of my life -2 Foot scar from “there “ to my Rib cage .Still recovering .”

If you like to know more information about Morgan this is his Instagram account:

@poppopandlily

Thank you so much for the interview!!!

During the summer of 3rd grade I had an Gothic soap opera romance with the TV series “Dark Shadows.” They would show reruns of the show on the sci-fi channel. I would be glued to my TV every morning at 11 and watched it so intensely that nothing could tear me from it.

I was so devoted to my vampire obsession I wrote in my journal a fantasy story about a vampire, a set of woods and a mystical creature who was a close talker.  I talked nonstop to my parents and my siblings about Dark Shadows  that one day my brother brought home a shopping bag from Suncoast Motion Picture Company and had this VHS inside:

I got so excited that I immediately dropped whatever I was doing and started watching one of my favorite vampire movies ever.

House of Dark Shadows came out in 1970 and directed by Dan Curtis. It starred Jonathan Frid, Kathryn Leigh Scott, and Grayson Hall.

Barnabas Collins (who is played by Jonathan Frid) who was entombed in this coffin was awaken by groundskeeper Willie Loomis (who is played by John Karlen) in the “1970’s future.” He comes in contact with the modern day version of his long lost love who he was suppose to marry before he became a vampire.

Determined to become a regular person he is convinced by Dr. Julia Hoffman (who is played by Grayson Hall) that she is able to turn him back into the person he was before he turned into a vampire. However everything does not go to plan!!!

I won’t lie and say I only watched this movie once over that summer. I want to guess I watched it at least twenty times instead.

Here are some facts about the movie:

The filming location took place in Lyndhurst Estate located in Terrytown, New York and the cemetery scenes were shot at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery :

Dick Smith worked on the makeup special effects on the film. In order to cut some cuts on the movie he actually reused some appliances he used for another movie he worked on: Little Big Man.

Quentin Collins theme songs is played during the costume party.

This was the first movie that was based off a soap opera.

Until Next time!

Source: Wikipedia, Imdb,

In Fall River, Massachusetts there is a very famous house where a very unfortunate scene happen in the late 1800s.

Lizzie Borden was the central figure surrounding  this house. If you ever heard of the nursery rhyme of her it goes like this:

She was accused of murdering her stepmother Abby and her father Andrew Borden in the house with an ax. She was later acquitted by a jury although the killer was never caught. It still remains a mystery of who killed them although there are many theories. (Perhaps I’ll do a separate blog post on those at another time!)

Which  made the house that the sad incident happen at  grew mystery lore and creepy vibes. Many ghost hunters have past through this to record haunting incidents and also weird things have happen to people that have stay here the night.

The current owner named Martha McGinn actually inherited the house because her parents brought it in 1948 and kept it in the family every since. In 1996 Martha decided instead of using the house as a private residence she instead turned the abode into a cozy bed and breakfast. She kept the inside of the house with the same kind of furniture during that time frame.

Naturally she named the house Lizzie Borden Bed and Breakfast and it has a good rating in terms of service and stay on many travel sites such as trip advisor. The house also doubles as a museum and has it’s own gift shop:

Even the Fall River Historical Society promotes this bed and breakfast as a great tourist attraction in the city.

On certain nights the Bed and Breakfast even hosts a “Paranormal Night” that are usually held during the evening hours and the link is below if you like to know more information about it:

https://lizzie-borden.com/

According to Wikipedia Martha McGinn said that the most booked room in the residence is the room where Abby Borden was found murdered:

The price to stay in the rooms ranges per night but I believe that the starting rate is $250 dollars and it is an additional cost for extra people as well. You also have the option of renting out the whole floor and also picking out the room (if available during the time you book) by the name of the family member that actually resided in it. Although they do book quickly. However for the time being they the Bed and Breakfast is currently closed.

If you like to learn more information about this quaint Bed & Breakfast they do have their own website:

https://lizzie-borden.com/

Would you like to spend a night here? Comment below!

Until next time!

Source: Wikipedia,

https://lizzie-borden.com/

Growing up I immensely enjoyed the bright colors and action pack cartoon that is  known as the  Powerpuff Girls.

What was more interesting then the heroes on the show were the villains! So here our some of my favorite Powerpuff Villians.

HIM:

Him was always the most fashionable villain on the cartoon series and a close talker. With his thigh high black heels boot and fantastic red trim jacket he was my prefer villain fashionista.  He is the kind of villain that played with the Powerpuff girl’s mind and usually it was effective enough because they would quickly turned against each other. With his unique high pitch but echo sounding voice and claw hands. He truly carried the villain persona a 100% throughout the series.

The Amoeba Boys:

They are the kind of villains that fall into the category dumb but endearing villains. The head of the gang is Bossman who is the most talkative of the three and he wears the gray hat. Then there is Junior who is the smallest of the three and wears the black hat. He doesn’t really talk as much as the other two and when he does he usually just repeats what Bossman is saying. Finally their is Silm he wears the tan hat and is little slower than the other two.

The Gangreen Gang:

This is one my favorite gang of villains on the show. They reminded of a group of high seniors who skip class to go to parking lot and smoke and talk about how much life sucks!

Ace is the guy with the orange blue vest and always wears sunglasses even at night! He is a big of a charmer and uses it to his advantage. He is the front man for the group.

Lil Arturo ( Real name is Arturo de la Guerra). He is the smallest one of the group which the gang uses his tiny size to their advantage when needing someone to get through small spaces. He seems to be the one who enjoy creating the most trouble as well.

Snake. His name came from his tongue having a split in the front and physical cartoon appearance.  He is the second person in charge of the group and always wears a brown cap.

Big Billy is the big guy with a child like imagination. Always wearing smaller clothing and is very dedicated to the gang and their evil ways. A fact about Big Billy is the he only have one eye!

Grubber’s full name is Grubber J. Gribberish and has eyes that always stay in that shooting eye like appearance.  He doesn’t talk just shoots out the random raspberry to communicate. His hidden talent is playing the violin.

Fuzzy Lumpkins is my favorite name for a villain EVER!!! He is often compared to a pink version of Bigfoot. He usual attire include overalls with only one side buttoned up and no shirt. He often carries around a banjo that he named Jo which he plays most of the time during the series. He also carries the honor of being the first villain that was on the series.

Sedusa-  she is half lady half gorgon. She often uses her latter half to make men do her bidding and uses her hair as a weapon when she is fighting. Her mood are often known by her eye color. When her eyes are green she is a nice normal self but when they turn red that is when she is mad and turns into a villain.

Which villain is your favorite in the series? Comment below!

Until next time!

Source: Wikipedia

I always admired clowns ever since I was little. I used to watch a lot of Bozo the clown growing up:

So it was no surprised that when I heard that this clown Motel in Tonopah, Nevada  I added it to one of my wish list destinations. The location of this motel  is a town that is in the middle of the desert and the closest town is about 200 miles away.

Some interesting facts about this unique destination:

This motel has been deemed as “American’s Scariest Motel:”

The motel is right next door to Old Tonopah Cemetery. It was an active cemetery from  1901 until 1911. Many of the “residents” of the cemetery were from a unknown illness that was termed as “Tonopah Plague” that hit that town during that time frame.  This cemetery had a short shelf life because of the tiny space of land it kept and the number of people who was passing during that time outgrew it. A lot of towns people believe that this cemetery along with some other key places in town are actively haunted.

Back in the summer of 2017 former owner Bob Perchetti wanted to retire after running the hotel for over 22 years. So he put the hotel up for sale for a staggering 900,000 dollars.

However there were some stipulations in the sale: Any and all of the clown motifs would stay and any kind of future renovations would need his approval. Also random visits for him to see how the motel was progressing after his retirement was a must. And yes it was sold under those stipulations sometime later in the following year.

Everywhere in the motel has a clown in it. From the main lobby which has over 500 clowns alone:

Even the doors to the rooms had pictures of clowns with the door number appearing above it:

Yes even the rooms has a little bit of the clown motif:

Every room has a unique and special clown touch to it:

In 2019 there was a horror movie shot at the motel about well the clown motel:

The title of the movie was called…..CLOWN MOTEL:

Atlas Obscura made this motel part of the 100 wonders list:

So what are your thoughts about this motel?

Would you stay here? Is the theme of the motel scary or cute? Comment below!:

Until Next time!

Source: Atlas Obscura, and Trip Advisor.

Hamburglar was first on the McDonald’s scene in March of 1971. He was cast as the villain of the group even though he was friends with Ronald McDonald, Grimace and Birdie he lost all control when it came to them eating hamburgers and sometimes cheeseburgers. He was often try to steal those delicious burgers away from them and often in quantities then he would run as fast as he can.   That is how he developed his beloved name of Hamburglar.

He first appeared as an shaggy grey hair older man with a sharp nose.

In some of the ads for McDonald’s he wore a shirt that said “Lone Jogger and spoke in a language that only Captain Crook (an often lost and not very well known Mcdonald’s character) understood and was able to translate it to the rest of the McDonald’s gang. When Captain Crook appeared he often had Hamburglar with him as part of a team.

Hamburglar got a makeover in 1985 due to the creepiness factor of the original version. There was complaints that he was consider to scary for children and his new appearance became more of a young, scary cute version. He still kept the staples from his original outfit like the cap and hamburger tie.

However they made some adjustments such as the direction of the stripes in his jumpsuit, add red gloves and shoes and made the hat wider.

He also started to appear more regularly in the commercials after the make over:

This is the version of Hamburglar I remember more when I was growing up. I really enjoyed watching a lot of the commercials that had the Hamburglar in it. Such as the one where the Hamburglar turned himself into a cheeseburger:

There was even a commercial explaining how the Hamburglar got his famous stripes:

You will also notice in the commerical he has a catch phase “robble, robble” and he is a little more coherent  in his speech although he only says things in short phrases.

The Hamburglar became a standard character until 2002 and then he retired. He did come out of retirement in 2015 as this new version:

Which is probably my least favorite version of this character to be honest. The character was brought out of retirement to promote a sandwich but I felt like they should of gone back to the 1985 version of him instead:

Who is your favorite McDonald’s character? Comment below!

Source: McDonald’s Wiki