Episode Transcript
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Speaker 02 (00:00):
Hello world, and
welcome to the In My Footsteps
podcast.
I am Christopher Setterlund,coming to you from the vacation
destination known as Cape Cod,Massachusetts, and this is
episode 189.
April has started.
(00:20):
Hopefully you have not been thevictim of any April Fool's
pranks.
Well, I'm going to bring aheaping pile of nostalgia, and
that is no prank.
We're going to kick the showoff with the return of Blink and
You'll Miss It Retro, Part 4.
This is some household itemsthat came and went fast.
(00:40):
We're going to go way, way backin the day and look at some
forgotten 1990s cereals.
Were these on your breakfasttable in the 90s?
There will be a brand new topfive that are some of the
weirdest Sega video games ever.
And there'll be a brand newThis Week in History and Time
(01:01):
Capsule centered around one ofthe most infamous April Fool's
pranks in New England history,the Great Blue Hill Eruption.
All of that is coming up rightnow on episode 189 of the In My
Footsteps podcast.
So a funny thing, I actuallythought about doing...
Some kind of an April Fool'sprank to start the show where I
(01:25):
would introduce it in anothervoice or with different music.
And I figured those of you thatlisten to the show weekly,
you'd understand my humor.
But I also was thinking ifthere's someone discovering the
show for the first time andthey're like, what in the world
is this foolishness?
They'd never come back becausemy April Fool's joke would have
(01:45):
fooled them too well.
So April Fool's, prank or not,welcome into the show.
What are we going to talk aboutthis week?
Well, I already shared much ofthe itinerary.
I can give you a little bit ofa wrap-up of my experience on a
movie set for the first time.
This was last weekend.
You've heard me talking a lotover the last few months about
(02:08):
my very first acting gig in thecampy, low-budget horror film
that my friend Frank Durantproduced.
I did my scenes, so this pastweekend was the final shooting
days.
It was definitely a fun andunique experience.
The day started off withgetting up before sunrise to
(02:29):
drive to Provincetown to hikeabout five miles round trip to
Race Point Lighthouse.
And then the day continuedbeing on the movie set, trying
to keep my mouth shut and notget in trouble.
I didn't want the director toyell at me.
I did several interviews.
I've got a lot of content fromthis past weekend, but some of
(02:50):
it I won't be able to shareuntil the movie's ready to come
out.
Because I don't want anyspoilers.
I want to be able to attachlinks to the movie where you can
stream it or buy copies of it.
All of that content will beavailable, likely late May,
June.
The best way that I can sum upmy experience on the movie set
(03:12):
from this past weekend is with alittle anecdote.
One of the members of the crew,her uncle is a performer in
Provincetown, and she said, oh,he can dress up as Frankenstein
if you want him to be in thefilm.
So I had to go to anotherfilming location and we were
getting driven there.
It was like a half mile, butit's quicker to be driven.
(03:33):
So I go to get into thisminivan and in the passenger
seat, there's Frankenstein allmade up and he is fully in
character.
The highlight of this wholeexperience was driving down
Commercial Street inProvincetown, which those of you
that are from Cape Cod or havebeen here, you know that street
is very, very narrow.
(03:53):
Everyone is looking atFrankenstein and he is just
yelling and growling ateverybody that he passes.
It's just insanity.
It was so much fun, and I'mreally looking forward to
hopefully having more in the wayof acting roles, whether
they're small, whether they'revoiceover work.
I really enjoyed it, and Ithink I want to add more of that
(04:17):
to my content plate, my tableof contents, I guess.
So I'm not really glossing overthat fun experience from this
past weekend.
What I did do was I recorded along form video.
It was about 20 minutes longwhere I really went into depth
as to what was going on thispast weekend, complete with
(04:39):
visuals.
And that's up on Patreon for mysubscribers.
So there's a good tease.
If you want to become asubscriber on Patreon for $5 a
month, you get access to bonuspodcast episodes.
access to the remasteredWithout a Map live streams that
go up once a month, and alsoaccess to the long-form video of
(05:01):
what my experience was like onthe movie set.
So shout out and thank you tomy Patreon subscribers, Laurie,
Mary Lou, Ashley, Kevin, Leo,Marguerite, Neglectoid, Crystal,
Matt.
If you haven't watched thatvideo yet, Go watch it, complete
(05:21):
with behind-the-scenes clipsfrom the movie.
Ooh, there you go.
That is no April Fool's joke.
That's for real.
We'll get into more of thathousekeeping-type stuff at the
end of the podcast, becauseright now it's time to get into
it.
It's time for the return ofBlinkin' You'll Miss It Retro,
and that's getting started rightnow.
(05:42):
It's time.
It's time for the return.
The return of Blink and You'llMiss It Retro.
The segment where we take alook at a six pack of items from
the past that came and wentpretty quickly.
It's the segment that I wasjust looking for a placeholder
(06:07):
on the page where I was listingall of these items.
And I came up with Blink andYou'll Miss It Retro and I just
kept it that way.
I didn't come up with any moreclever title for this segment.
For those new to the podcast,this segment is divided into
categories.
I have done segments on TVshows.
(06:28):
I've done segments on toys, onfoods that came and went fast
where it's like if you blinked,you missed it.
This is part four.
We're going to be looking athousehold items that came and
went fast.
Pulling back the curtain alittle bit, the way that I came
up with this segment was I enjoywatching compilations of old
(06:48):
commercials, especially whenenjoying an edible.
And what I would notice wasthere would be certain
commercials that I didn'tremember the product.
I've got a pretty good memory.
Obviously, I built a podcastaround nostalgia, so I do
remember it quite well.
I found that when I...
saw a commercial of somethingthat I didn't remember, I would
pause the compilation, go Googleit, and see if it was something
(07:11):
that was famous and I justforgot, or if it was something
that really was a product failthat came out and was gone
pretty quickly.
And they all made the list.
Let's get started then.
As I said, I've got a six-packof items to dive into.
Why did I choose six?
Because...
Because I have top fivecountdowns, I have top tens, I'm
(07:37):
just going to have so manycountdowns, it'll be different
amounts in each one.
The very first item we're goingto talk about here is something
called the Airwick Air Wand.
Very good to say quickly.
Speaker 00 (07:51):
This
Speaker 07 (07:54):
was
Speaker 02 (08:04):
in a line of
concentrated air fresheners,
sort of like those little smallspace ones that you would plug
in if you've got a smallapartment or a small room you
want to smell good.
The Airwick Air Wand was aroundin the early 1980s.
This thing, it was kind of likea stick.
You would open it and you wouldtwist it and it would open and
(08:28):
the fragrance would come outfrom the bottom and you could
regulate how much scent youneeded.
It's interesting because it'snot that much different from the
types of air fresheners thatare out today.
They've got the ones likeRenews It.
where it's got the littlepackaging on it, and you twist
it, and the top part kind ofopens, and in the middle there's
(08:49):
that gel that's got the scentin it.
The Airwick Air Wand wasn'tthat much different from it, so
I don't know if it was justahead of its time, or if the
small space fragrance marketwasn't something that was there
at the time.
The second one to talk abouthere is a product called
Metaprin.
Speaker 06 (09:10):
As Bob's gotten
older, he gets more aches and
pains.
That's why his next move is toMediprin.
Mediprin has the same medicineas Motrin, and nothing's proven
faster for relief of body painor any kind of pain.
Speaker 02 (09:25):
This is a version of
ibuprofen, kind of a generic
brand from the late 1980s.
What made these commercialsstick out to me and make me want
to put them on this list wasthe Heaven Got Time for the Pain
song that was part of it.
If you don't know, that's aCarly Simon song from 1974.
Metaprin came in a red box thathad various human silhouettes
(09:53):
holding areas that would be inpain.
My guess is that when you'reflooding the market with pain
relievers and you've already gotAdvil, Excedrin, Aleve, Anacin,
that there's really not roomfor a new brand like Mediprin.
Although I was researching andit seems like Mediprin is the
(10:13):
generic name for ibuprofen,which I don't know if that's
true or not or if my sources arebad.
Because I would have thoughtthe generic name for ibuprofen
was ibuprofen.
But what do I know?
I'm not in medicine.
As far as I could see, though,metaprin was in a lot of places
in the mid to late 80s.
(10:34):
But then in the 90s, it's justgone.
So I'm not sure exactly whathappened to it.
But if any of you out there aremetaprin experts, you can let
me know if you know the story ofit.
We've gone from air freshenersto pain relief products.
Now we go to cleaning yourkitchen floor.
So this one is called Clean andClear Floor Cleaner.
(10:58):
It's from the early 1980s.
I can only assume that themajor selling point of Clean and
Clear Floor Cleaner was that itwas a no-rinse cleaner.
I assume that because that'swhat it says on the bottle.
You could use it on the floor,appliances, cabinets, all that
stuff.
Clean and Clear was made by theC.
(11:20):
Johnson & Son Company.
It says it's specifically forno-wax floors, but yet you can
also use it on appliances andcabinets.
I have no idea what happened toClean and Clear.
I kind of think it's sort oflike the Metaprint where you've
got a lot of competition.
So if you're trying to comeinto a market that's already
flooded with floor cleaners,you're going to have a hard time
(11:43):
getting in there and gettingyour share unless it's something
really special.
But hey, if you don't believeme about Clean and Clear, you
can buy vintage bottles on eBay.
I don't know if they're filledwith the liquid.
I don't know if it evaporates.
I don't know if floor cleanergoes bad, like if you're going
to pour it on your floor andit'll make it more dirty or
(12:04):
it'll disintegrate the floor.
Sometimes when you're trying toget your new product out there,
it's best to just say what itis instead of having a fancy
name.
That's this next one.
It's called For Oily Hair OnlyShampoo.
So you know that this productis for oily hair only.
Speaker 08 (12:25):
If you have oily
hair, you have a different kind
of sebum.
Speaker 09 (12:29):
And all the
detergent in the world won't
change it.
Speaker 08 (12:31):
Now there's a new
kind of shampoo.
Speaker 09 (12:33):
For oily hair only.
Speaker 08 (12:34):
FOHO.
Speaker 09 (12:35):
Made with a blend of
natural ingredients.
To control and normalize oilyconditions.
Speaker 02 (12:40):
Don't you dare go
use it if your hair's not oily.
This was around in the early1980s.
It was made by the GilletteCompany.
Obviously, it's made for peoplewith oily hair.
And you would get shampoo andthen something else just called
rinse.
It doesn't say conditioner, butI think that's what it is.
The company tried to seem cooland hip in the early 80s by
(13:05):
calling it FOHO.
So for oily hair only FOHO.
And they had it.
It was called the FOHO systemwith the shampoo and rinse.
In the ads that I have seen, itasks the people if they're
afraid of conditioners.
I will say, even though thisproduct did not last long, at
(13:26):
least Gillette knew who theiraudience was.
They were like, let's make ashampoo for people with oily
hair.
Well, what do we call it?
How about for oily hair only?
It's like, okay, great.
It is a very right on the nosetitle.
I know that a few minutes ago Italked about the Airwick air
wand as far as freshening up thescent in your house apartment.
(13:50):
If you're not convinced to buyan air freshener from Airwick,
how about buying an airfreshener from Listerine?
This next one, it's Listeroldisinfectant spray, and it's
literally made by the Listerinecompany.
Speaker 00 (14:05):
Speaking for new
Listerol spray disinfectant from
the Listerine people.
Listerol sounded like somethingI'd like, and I do.
It has four germ killers towipe out odor-causing germs,
prevents mold and mildew, andhas proven more effective in
controlling their odors than theleading brand.
Speaker 02 (14:21):
This came out in the
mid-1970s, and it does all the
stuff that an air freshenerwould do, kill germs and such.
But its claim to fame is, itsays, from the makers of
Listerine.
So your favorite mouthwash hasnow made a disinfectant spray.
Much like with the otherproducts on this Blink and
(14:42):
You'll Miss It retro segment, Icouldn't really find the time
when they were canceled ordiscontinued.
I give a product a few years,three years.
If they're around that long butnot longer, that kind of
qualifies as the Blink andYou'll Miss It type.
Because you figure companiesthat release these products,
(15:02):
they're going to give it time,hoping, well, if it doesn't
catch on right away, maybe wordof mouth after six months or a
year.
I mean, even Crystal Pepsi gotat least two years to fail
spectacularly.
So we've had air fresheners,floor cleaners, ibuprofen.
We've had oily hair shampoo.
(15:24):
I couldn't wrap up this segmentwithout another staple of the
1980s, and that's diet andappetite suppressant pills.
This last one, it's called PVMappetite pills, and they're from
the early 1980s.
Speaker 05 (15:41):
This is
Speaker 07 (15:53):
just
Speaker 02 (15:58):
another line of diet
pills, like Dexatrim, things
like that from the 80s.
What I found interesting aboutthe PVM pills was the
advertising campaign.
They must not have been doingwell, so they came out with the
PVM Beautiful Refund.
You can find these ads onlinewhere it's a woman, she's nude,
(16:21):
laying down, and it says they'llpay you to take these PVM pills
and then kind of report back tothem with pictures of them
making you more beautiful.
On the box it says you willlose weight because you will
stick to a calorie-restricteddiet.
Which, basically, anyone that'slooking to lose weight, that's
(16:42):
how you do it.
So I don't know exactly whatPVM was doing that you couldn't
do on your own.
It was hard to find in myresearch exactly why PVM was
taken off the market.
I am only going to assume thatone of those letters, PVM, stood
for some kind of medicationthat the FDA later found was
(17:02):
dangerous.
They didn't last long.
None of these products lastedlong.
A couple of years at most.
Did any of you out there tryany of these?
Hopefully you didn't try PVM.
But did you try the Airwick AirWand?
Or did you use Metaprin for aheadache?
Or use Clean & Clear FloorCleaner?
(17:24):
4 Oily Hair Only Shampoo?
Or Listerol Disinfectant Spray?
Well, that wraps up the fourthBlink and You'll Miss It retro
segment.
I'll be back with a fifth oneat some point in the future.
Let me know if you want it tobe something like toys or food
again.
I've got a lot, and every timeI watch these old commercial
(17:47):
compilations, I find more ofthese interesting product fails.
This week in history, we aregoing back 45 years ago this
week to April 1st, 1980 and theGreat Blue Hill eruption, April
(18:10):
Fool's prank.
For those not from New England,not from the eastern part of
Massachusetts, Great Blue Hillis a 635 foot tall hill in the
towns of Milton, Canton, part ofthe Great Blue Hills
Reservation up near Boston.
I've hiked it a couple oftimes.
(18:31):
It's got beautiful views.
You can see the Boston skyline.
So that's a bit of the backdropof what Great Blue Hill is.
But let's focus on exactly whatwe're talking about here, an
April Fool's prank.
On April 1st, 1980, Boston TVstation WNAC Channel 7 aired an
(18:51):
April Fool's prank that quicklyspiraled out of control.
And it led to widespread panicand significant professional
repercussions.
This happened at the end of the6 o'clock newscast.
There was a fabricated specialbulletin announcing that Great
Blue Hill in Milton had in facterupted, spewing lava and ash
(19:17):
onto nearby homes.
Now, I guess there could be avery, very small shred of truth
to this, because Great Blue Hillhad volcanic activity in the
past.
Now, that past was 440 millionyears ago, but still, you could
say, yeah, it used to be avolcano.
WNAC...
(19:39):
continued to stoke the flamesof panic with footage featuring
lava flowing down a hillside,but that was from the recent
eruption of Mount St.
Helens in Washington State.
They continued the prank withedited remarks from President
Jimmy Carter, Governor Edward J.
(20:00):
King, where they expressedconcern and labeled the
situation as serious.
Reporter Jan Harrisonattributed the disaster to a
geological chain reaction thathad been triggered by Mount St.
Helens.
The segment concluded withHarrison holding up a sign that
read April Fools.
(20:20):
If you had watched the wholesegment that took all of three,
four minutes, you'd see it was aharmless prank.
You and I both know peoplenaturally overreact, so despite
the reveal, many viewers hadalready overreacted.
The Milton Police Department,receiving over 100 calls from
(20:41):
distressed citizens, there weresome that started evacuating
their homes without seeinganything.
You go outside, there's nosmoke, you don't see lava flows.
The Massachusetts Department ofCivil Defense was inundated
with inquiries about theevacuation procedures.
So you imagine that, saying tothe civil defense people, what
(21:04):
did we do because Great BlueHill erupted?
And they're like, what in theworld?
The TV station faced immediatebacklash.
Dozens of angry viewerscontacted WNAC to express their
outrage.
In response, the station issuedan apology during the 11 p.m.
newscast.
Sadly, the following day, a mannamed Homer Silly, who was the
(21:28):
executive producer of the 6 p.m.
news, was terminated for hisfailure to exercise good news
judgment and for violating FCCregulation regarding the use of
stock footage without properidentification.
It's an unbelievable story, yetnot that unbelievable when you
(21:49):
really step back to think aboutit.
How many times hoaxes havegotten people?
You would have thought afterthe War of the Worlds hoax in
the 1930s that people would bemore apt to check around to make
sure something was real and notfake.
But I guess I have too muchfaith in humanity for that.
And that Great Blue Hilleruption prank occurred 45 years
(22:15):
ago this week in history.
Oh, this is no April Fool'sprank.
It is time for another timecapsule.
We are going to stick to thesame day.
So Great Blue Hill is erupting,according to news reports.
What's going on in the world ofpop culture back then on the
(22:37):
same date?
Well, let's find out.
The number one song was AnotherBrick in the Wall, Part 2 by
Pink Floyd.
This is off of their iconicdouble album, The Wall.
This part two was a part of athree-part song.
And this is the one that'sshorter.
(22:58):
It's got actually kind of adisco beat.
This song was a rarity for PinkFloyd, not just because it had
a dance beat, but because theyreleased it as a single.
The single sold more than 4million copies, with the album
The Wall spending 15 weeks atnumber one in the U.S.
and selling more than 30million copies worldwide.
(23:19):
The number one movie was CoalMiner's Daughter, and you could
get into the theater with aticket costing $2.69.
This is the biographical filmabout country singer Loretta
Lynn, starring Sissy Spacek asLoretta Lynn, Beverly D'Angelo
(23:39):
as Patsy Cline, Tommy Lee Jonesas Doolittle Lynn.
It made about $68 million atthe box office on a budget of
about $15 million.
and won Sissy Spacek theAcademy Award for Best Actress.
The number one TV show wasMASH.
This was the sitcom basedduring the Korean War.
(24:02):
It was on for 11 seasons from1972 to 1983.
MASH stood for Mobile ArmySurgical Hospital.
The show itself was based on afilm called And as many of you
know who've listened to thepodcast, the final episode of
MASH is the highest rated TVshow ever.
(24:24):
That had 125 million viewers.
And if you were around backthen, April Fool's Day, 1980,
maybe you've just seen the GreatBlue Hill eruption prank on the
news.
You want to go outside and seeif everything's burning down.
Well, you're in luck,especially if you're a kid.
(24:45):
Because you can go to the Searscatalog and get yourself what
they called a steel gym set,also known as a swing set.
You get, and this is theirwords, two cool plastic swings,
a two-passenger lawn swing, whatthey call the glide ride, and a
(25:05):
six-foot slide.
And that rhymes.
It's basically a typical swingset that you would have in your
yard in the early 1980s.
You could get all of this for$97.99 or about $377 when
adjusted for inflation to 2025.
Just make sure that the legs ofthe swing set are fully
(25:28):
supported because if you getseveral kids doing all these
swings, the thing might flipover.
I know that's what us kidstried to do with ours way back
in the day.
It was never successful, whichwas probably a good thing for
us.
So that wraps up the timecapsule.
That wraps up this week inhistory.
We go from a terrible AprilFool's prank to some video games
(25:52):
that seem like they would havebeen April Fool's pranks, but
no, they're real.
So let's look at some weirdSega games right now.
In the early 1990s, I became aSega Genesis fan.
That was my preferred console.
(26:13):
In the years leading up tothat, I had played the Atari
2600 as a kid, little kid, andthen the Nintendo Entertainment
System.
I remember seeing thecommercials for the Genesis and
the graphics and the gameplay,and I was like, ooh, I want
that.
So it pains me a little bit todo this top five segment where
(26:34):
we look at the weirdest Segagames ever.
I never played these, so I hadto do my research to find ones
that people were talking aboutas being just weird games that
you couldn't understand why theygot made.
Ones with characters that wereweird or plots that were weird.
And I'm stressing the wordweird, because I'm not saying
(26:55):
these games were bad.
I'm just saying that some ofthese ideas likely came after
either a night of smoking, anight of drinking, or whatever
the hell else the creators weredoing.
This is a continuation of mytop five series for weirdest
games from different gamingconsoles.
Back in episode 156, I did thetop five weirdest Atari games
(27:20):
ever, if you want to go checkthat out.
But now let's get into theweird Sega games.
So with a lot of these topfives, not all, but most,
they're in no particular order.
There are some honorablementions.
I'll try to kind of steamrollthrough the honorable mentions
to give a little more time tothe actual top five.
(27:41):
Honorable mentions for weirdSega games include McDonald's
Treasure Land Adventure.
This is from 1993, and you playas Ronald McDonald going
through this treasure land,trying to find bits of a
treasure map.
It's weird, but it's got greatreviews.
Another honorable mention iskind of a mashup It's Mutant
(28:05):
League Hockey and Mutant LeagueFootball.
These are two different gameswith Mutant League Football
coming out in 1993, MutantLeague Hockey in 1994.
What makes them weird is thatthey're seen as a way to get
around licensing for officialfootball and hockey teams and
players.
(28:25):
You just have mutants instead.
Another honorable mention,continuing with the sports
theme, is Shaq Fu.
This is a fighting game from1994 based around NBA legend
Shaquille O'Neal.
Another honorable mention isThe Ooze.
This is from 1995 and you playas this green puddle of ooze
(28:52):
fighting villains.
You're the good guy.
And the last honorable mentionis Toe Jam and Earl.
This is from 1991, with ToeJamand Earl being alien rappers
that have to escape the Earth.
Those are the honorablementions.
Had you heard of most of those?
Had you played any?
(29:12):
I would think ToeJam and Earlis the one that most of you will
have heard of.
Sega really pushed that when itfirst came out.
They pushed that almost as muchas Sonic the Hedgehog, at least
as far as I remember.
So if those weren't weirdenough for you, let's get into
the actual top five.
And we're going to start it offwith number one, Balls 3D.
(29:35):
Now you know it's weird becauseBalls is spelled with a Z.
This game is from 1994.
Things that make it weird, soit says Balls 3D, it's actually
considered 2.5D, which I didn'tknow was even a thing.
The characters are madecompletely of spheres, so it
makes it look kind of pseudo-3D.
(29:57):
It's an action-fighting game.
You can be one of ninecharacters, and in single-player
mode there are five bosses youhave to defeat.
Reviews were mixed for thisgame, with a lot crediting the
spheres, giving a new spin onthe action-fighting genre.
with other reviews saying thesoundtrack was so irritating
(30:20):
you'd want to play it with thesound muted.
So that's kind of the shallowend of weird.
What about this one?
Number two is Wild Woody.
This game came out in 1995, andit was for the Sega CD
platform.
Back in episode 27, I did afull segment about the Sega CD,
(30:41):
including the fact that Iactually owned that console.
Wild Woody is a side-scrollingplatform game.
He is an anthropomorphic pencilwho's looking to gather parts
of a totem pole that brought himto life.
Reviews for this game were notkind.
It was seen as one of the worstgames for the Sega CD platform
(31:04):
with lots of terrible cutscenes,grainy animation.
It was also crushed in itsreviews for the sexually
suggestive nature of the game.
I mean, think about it.
Wild Woody.
It's not just the title.
There's more to it in the game.
But being a high school boy,I'm sure a lot wanted that game
(31:24):
to at least see.
It failed pretty quickly anddidn't make any sort of lasting
impact on the gaming industry.
Was that weird enough for you?
A talking pencil named Woody?
Well, how about this one?
Number three is Seaman.
It takes all of my effort tonot just say seaman.
This game came out in 1999 forthe Sega Dreamcast, and it's a
(31:50):
virtual pet game.
It's unique because you canalso use the Sega Dreamcast
microphone as part of this game,but what really makes it weird
is the Seaman is a mythical fishwith a human face.
It's weird just because ofthat.
The graphics of the fish with ahuman face, it's terrifying.
(32:12):
Like I said, though, it's avirtual pet game, so it's in
real time, meaning you've got toconstantly check in with this
half-human, half-fish, keep itcompany, feed it.
The reviews are okay, but I canonly imagine being a kid in
high school and having this gameand having to go to school and
then come home and you forget tocheck in on your seaman pet and
(32:36):
he's just dead.
It was seen as a success forthe interactive nature between
you and the creature.
It even spawned a sequel,Seaman 2.
Moving on, though.
Number four is Boogerman.
Just the title in itself shouldgive you an idea of what this
game's gonna be about.
(32:56):
This game was for the Genesisfrom 1994.
And I'm sorry, the full titlewas Boogerman, A Pick-and-Flick
Adventure.
This adventure game stars youas Boogerman, who flicks, snots,
and farts on people in thisquest to defeat the ultimate
(33:17):
boss, the Boogermeister.
That in and of itself is weird,but you've got to think about
it.
You get this idea that seemslike it's a one-hit wonder.
Oh man, a Boogerman hero.
But then you've got to actuallysit down and create the game.
I don't know how you could beserious knowing this is what
you're creating.
(33:38):
Your audience would have to beteenage boys, but how many of
them are going to buy the game?
I couldn't imagine my motherbuying me this game back when I
was in high school.
I want to get Boogerman.
She'd be like, get out of here.
In 2013, a Kickstarter campaignwas launched to try to create a
(33:58):
sequel to Boogerman.
It did not get anywhere nearthe money needed, so I think
that this game is a one anddone.
And finally, number five on thetop five weirdest Sega games
ever is Bubba and Stix.
This is a side-scroller from1994 for the Sega Genesis.
(34:19):
What makes it weird is thatit's a tie-in to the Bubblicious
Bubblegum brand.
It features Bubba, a redneckcharacter who gets kidnapped,
and he's got his anthropomorphicstick-of-gum friend called
Sticks.
The reviews of the game wereslightly above average, but it
(34:41):
being a game based around abrand of bubblegum, that's what
makes it weird.
It's like going to thesupermarket and looking at any
product on a shelf and imaginingthat being made into a video
game.
Rice-a-roni Adventures, WonderBread Football League, Stridex
Pads Dating Game, I don't know,all those ones.
(35:03):
So there you have it, some ofthe weirdest Sega games ever.
Did you own any of these?
Come on, fess up.
Did you buy Boogerman?
Did you check out Wild Woody?
In the future, I'll be doingtop fives for other gaming
platforms.
So let me know if there are anyweird games for Nintendo or
(35:25):
PlayStation or PC or any ofthose that you want me to talk
about.
Oh yes, the 1990s were myheyday when it came to cereal.
I can remember we had this bigorange Tupperware bowl that I
(35:47):
used for cereal.
I would fill that thing up andeat cereal like there was no
tomorrow.
Honeycomb, Corn Pops, LuckyCharms, those were my go-to's.
What we're going to do now,though, is go way back in the
day and look at some forgotten1990 cereals.
These were ones that came andwent pretty fast.
(36:10):
That doesn't mean immediate,but it means it's ones that are
definitely not still aroundtoday.
I also tried to make sure withthese forgotten cereals that
they weren't just tie-ins tomovies so that they were briefly
out.
Because when I did a segment ondiscontinued cereals back in
episode 150, I had some guymessage me saying,
Speaker 01 (36:33):
all the ones you put
were movie tie-ins, so of
course they're discontinued.
Speaker 02 (36:39):
That's my imitation
of that idiot.
So these I tried to do my bestto make sure they're not movie
tie-ins so I don't get any foolslike that in my DMs.
Are you ready for someforgotten 90s cereals?
Do you remember Pop-TartsCrunch?
Speaker 09 (36:55):
To make sure I
wasn't dreaming, I attempted to
fly and landed on the dog.
Great, it means there really isa Pop-Tart cereal.
Speaker 03 (37:01):
Kellogg's Pop-Tarts
Crunch Cereal, part of this
complete breakfast.
They're Pop-Tarts for yourspoon.
Speaker 09 (37:06):
P.S.
Elmo's okay.
Speaker 02 (37:09):
This is the original
mini Pop-Tart cereal.
It's made a little bit of acomeback as a different brand
Pop-Tart cereal.
You can get it at Walmart.
I'm talking about the OG.
The cereal from Kellogg'sdebuted in 1994.
There was frosted cinnamonbrown sugar and frosted
strawberry.
(37:29):
I loved Pop-Tarts, so it wouldhave been natural to try mini
Pop-Tarts covered in milk, but Idon't think I ever did.
By the way, before I get toodeep into this segment, if
you're into old cereals, whichis a random interest, but hey,
there's an awesome websitecalled mrbreakfast.com.
(37:50):
I'll link to it in thedescription of the podcast.
He was a huge resource for thissegment.
A cereal that was prettypopular when it was out in the
90s but faded away was SprinkleSpangles.
Speaker 09 (38:04):
This
Speaker 02 (38:16):
was made by General
Mills.
It came out in 1993.
Sweetened corn stars with holesin the middle covered with
sprinkles.
I distinctly remember thecommercials, but again, it
wasn't one that I tried.
This is one where if you lookat the commercials, you can
definitely tell it's mid-1990s.
(38:36):
Another forgotten 90s cerealwas Hot Wheels cereal based on
the toy cars.
This was made by the RalstonCompany.
It came out in 1990.
There were marshmallow cars andfrosted oat mag wheels.
The big selling point for HotWheels cereal, at least for the
(38:59):
kids that got it, was there wasa free Hot Wheels car inside the
cereal box.
So you'd get your free car,then look at your parents and
say, can you go get me 10 moreboxes of this so I can have a
whole fleet of Hot Wheels?
Hot Wheels is hardly the onlytoy line to have its own cereal.
I mean, God, even Cabbage PatchKids had its own cereal.
(39:21):
Another forgotten 90s cereal isUrkel-O's.
Yes, I can hear that idiot guy.
Speaker 01 (39:41):
Family Matters, of
course, it's discontinued.
Shut up.
Speaker 02 (39:46):
Yes, it's based
around Steve Urkel, the
character from Family Matters.
This serial was created byRalston.
It came out in 1991.
Family Matters was on from 1989to 97 with Jaleel White playing
Steve Urkel.
Steve Urkel, the character,became a phenomenon.
(40:06):
His catchphrase, did I do that?
There was a do the Urkel boardgame.
The cereal itself wasstrawberry and banana flavored
loops, kind of like Froot Loops.
The cereal boxes featured SteveUrkel in different costumes and
different poses.
Those of you that didn't growup in the early 1990s have no
(40:30):
idea of how big of a phenomenonthe Steve Urkel character was.
Sadly, I've read that JaleelWhite, he's distanced himself
from the Urkel character.
I mean, he could probably stillmake tons of money at signings
just being Urkel, even thoughnow he's in his late 40s.
Come on, Jaleel, it's fine.
(40:52):
You were a huge star as Urkel.
Embrace it.
Another forgotten serial fromthe 90s was Major League Grand
Slams, so based around baseball.
This was made by General Mills.
It came out in 1998, and all ofthe pieces in the cereal have
to do with baseball.
(41:13):
Marshmallow bats, gloves,plates, home plates, not kitchen
plates.
You could send away for abatting helmet cereal bowl,
which that would have been rightup my alley, but when this came
out, I was in college, so Iwasn't eating as much cereal.
I would think that havingpeople over and...
(41:34):
And having me eating cereal outof a big baseball helmet in my
early 20s, you'd be like, what'swrong with that guy?
Now in my late 40s, I'd love todo it, so everything is
cyclical, I guess.
This next one I distinctlyremember as well, and that's
Teddy Graham's Breakfast Bears.
Speaker 09 (41:53):
Teddy
Speaker 03 (42:02):
Grahams are
Speaker 02 (42:08):
those little
bear-shaped crackers, which I
remember even when this cerealcame out, I was like, why not
just get Teddy Grahams thecrackers and just pour them in a
bowl and put milk on them?
These were created by Nabisco,naturally, because they make
Teddy Grahams.
They came out in 1990.
The boxes would feature cartoonversions of the Teddy Grahams
(42:29):
that you'd see in thecommercials.
It was said that these TeddyGrahams were specially made so
that the milk would bring outthe Graham flavor.
Sure it was.
It's just a way to sucker uskids into being like, can we get
Teddy Graham cereal?
They were in cinnamon,chocolate, and honey flavor.
(42:49):
Teddy Grahams themselves, theyare still around.
So you could definitely go tothe store, buy some, and then
dump them in a bowl and put milkon them and let me know if it's
just like having the cereal.
That's an interesting conceptto grab something like Teddy
Grahams, but maybe another kindof cookie or candy and dump it
(43:11):
in a bowl and put milk on it.
See if you could create a newcereal.
That seems like it was kind ofthe idea behind this next one.
That was cinnamon mini buns.
Speaker 09 (43:23):
What do I do with
these buns?
Then I get this idea.
Speaker 08 (43:27):
Kellogg's cinnamon
mini buns.
The cinnamini part of thiscomplete breakfast.
Speaker 09 (43:31):
Mmm.
Mega taste and crunchy minibuns.
Speaker 02 (43:34):
Cinnamon mini buns.
Get it?
Because, man, cinnamon rolls,cinnamon buns, whatever you want
to call them, they'redelicious.
So mini ones...
with milk on them are probablyjust as good.
These were created byKellogg's.
They came out in 1991.
And it had the genius marketingcampaign of saying that eating
(43:56):
70 cinnamon buns can benutritious.
That's the same logic asgetting the 100 calorie packs of
different snacks, whether it'schips or nuts.
And then you see the servingsize is like one half chip.
It's like, well, yeah, it's 100calories, but you don't get
nothing.
These cinnamon buns had noadded fat, no artificial
(44:20):
flavors.
Oh, and one of their biggiveaways was you could get a
free cassette single.
This was from 1992.
So take a moment, think of1992, the musical acts that you
enjoyed back Now, would you liketo know the artists that you
could have gotten a freecassette single from in Cinnamon
(44:42):
Mini Bun cereal?
There was Bad Company, Soho,Information Society, Betty Boo,
and TKA.
So there you go.
You could get a free cassettesingle of one of those artists.
And if there weren't any hiddentreasures in those artists with
(45:04):
the cassette singles, then thenext cereal, Hidden Treasures,
you could just go to the storeand buy.
There's a pretty good segue.
Hidden Treasures were createdby General Mills.
(45:30):
They came out in 1993 andfeatured this robot on the cover
of the box.
The robot was named HT forHidden Treasures.
It was sweetened cereal thathad kind of a center in the
pieces.
The Hidden Treasures idea wasthat not all the pieces of
cereal had this fruit center toit.
(45:51):
You get some that were empty,some that had fruit.
And you could stare at thehidden treasure cereal box,
stare at the back and look at HTthe robot and his
stereotypically 90s kid friendsand yell at him when pieces
didn't have fruit in the center.
One cereal that I think a lotof you 90s kids will remember is
(46:14):
Dino Pebbles.
Speaker 09 (46:16):
This
Speaker 02 (46:29):
was an offshoot of
Fruity Pebbles, Cocoa Pebbles,
the cereals based on theFlintstones cartoon.
Dino Pebbles were created byPost.
They came out in 1990.
It was very much like theFruity and Cocoa Pebbles with
the sweetened rice, but this onehad marshmallow-shaped
dinosaurs.
(46:49):
The cereal itself wasvanilla-flavored.
It said that it had 10essential vitamins and minerals
in there.
I don't know if one of thoseminerals was loads of sugar, but
I'm sure that was there.
I was actually surprised tofind that Dino Pebbles wasn't
more successful.
With these cereals, it's notthat they were here and gone
(47:11):
within a few months.
Some of them lasted a fewyears.
But when you go to the cerealaisle and you see Frosted Flakes
and Cocoa Puffs and Apple Jacksand things that have been
around 50, 60 years, cerealsthat are here and gone in like
five years, they are seen asfailures.
But let's wrap up with anotherforgotten 90s cereal that is
(47:33):
sure to irritate that guy thatdidn't like my discontinued
cereals having movie tie-ins.
And that is Millennios.
No, this is not a movie tie-in.
It's a cereal tie-in from theCheerios makers based around the
new millennium.
When I first saw Millennios, Ithought it was a cereal for
(47:56):
millennials for the generation.
I was like, well, where's Gen XO's for me?
Grunge flavored cereal withflannel shirt marshmallows.
Come on, we could make it now.
Millennios was Cheerios.
So all the little O's, but thenthere would be twos in there as
well for the year 2000.
(48:16):
Obviously, it came out in 1999.
One of the unique things aboutMillennios was that it said you
could use that cereal box tocreate your own time capsule.
It suggests that you put toys,newspaper clippings, coins,
stamps inside this box.
I don't know what you'resupposed to do with it then.
(48:37):
Put it in your attic, bury itin the yard.
Does cardboard, how quick doesit degenerate if it's buried?
I would recommend if you'regoing to make a time capsule,
you don't use a cardboard cerealbox.
It was definitely aninteresting concept, and I don't
blame Cheerios for trying.
Make more money off ofsomething that happens once
(48:57):
every thousand years.
I still like that idea of Gen Xcereal, though.
Anyone out there that's fromGen X, would you eat Gen X
cereal if it came out?
So those are some forgotten 90scereals.
How many of those did you haveon your breakfast table when you
were growing up in the 90s?
I'm thinking out of all ofthese that we went over, the
(49:19):
only one that I'm like, man, Iwish I had tried it, was the
Pop-Tarts Crunch.
And the irony is I could go toget the new brand of Pop-Tarts
cereal from Walmart if I wantedto.
But eating boxes of cereal at atime in your late 40s is not
good for your overall health, soI'll probably skip it.
But enough about cereal.
(49:40):
Until next time, that's goingto wrap up episode 189 of the In
My Footsteps podcast.
Thank you so much to all of youthat have listened, all of you
that made it to the end, all ofyou that make this part of your
week.
I do my best to help you escapefrom the world, look back at
the old days, even if it's foran hour a week.
(50:03):
I'm constantly on the lookoutfor nostalgia, pop culture,
Things from the 60s through theearly 2000s that I can share
because I know I'm not the onlyone that enjoys hearing about
these things.
I'll keep bringing thenostalgia week after week.
Next week is episode 190.
(50:23):
We're getting close to episode200.
Next week, I'm going to talkabout something that I can't
believe it took me this long toget onto the show.
And that is Garfield, theGarfield comics, the Garfield
books, the TV shows.
My childhood is empty withoutGarfield.
Well, not totally, but it's ahuge part of me growing up.
(50:46):
And I finally was like, wait, Ihaven't talked about Garfield.
Well, that's coming next week.
I still have all my vintageGarfield books, some of them 40
years old.
If you enjoy my podcast, therest of my content, and you want
to support me, like I said, $5a month on Patreon, you get
(51:09):
access to bonus podcastepisodes, remastered Without a
Map live streams.
Recently, the newest bonuspodcast episode went up.
In fact, it was yesterday onApril Fool's Day.
And I put up, as I mentioned atthe beginning of the show, the
long form video talking about mywhole experience with my first
(51:30):
movie role.
So go and check that out.
You can always buy me a coffeeas well.
That's cheaper.
You can go as low as a dollar,which I say won't buy me a
coffee, but that's fine.
It's the thought that counts.
The best way that you cansupport me and what I do is
sharing my content.
Liking a post on social mediadoes virtually nothing.
(51:55):
Sharing the post does so muchmore.
Because I can promote myselftill I'm blue in the face, and I
do.
But it means more when it'sothers besides me saying, hey,
go check out this guy's podcast,subscribe to his YouTube
channel, read his blogs, readhis books, and soon I'll be
(52:15):
saying watch his movies.
Yeah, so I've always gotsomething going on.
You've got forever to live aboring, mundane life with a
soul-crushing job that it's justpunch in, punch out.
Chasing your dreams, chasingyour passions, those things that
make you get out of bed andwant to do work like what I'm
(52:36):
doing right now.
That's the stuff you want tohold on to.
It's way more exciting andfulfilling for me creating
podcasts, YouTube videos.
from my own mind, my ownskills, I suppose, for lack of a
better term, and seeing thereaction of people.
I get lots of great interactionfrom people with the podcast
(52:59):
and on YouTube.
Every now and then you getidiots, but that's the thing is,
it's the risk when you createcontent for public consumption.
The more eyes that get on you,the more likely it is you're
going to get people that don'tlike what you do because they
obviously don't like themselves.
At least that's what I think.
If I see content online that Idon't like, rather than message
(53:22):
the person and give them crapabout trying to create
something, I'm just like, well,that's not my thing.
I'll move on.
Man, I just...
Paused this to take a drink ofmy seltzer water here.
It went down the wrong tube.
I've been gagging for severalminutes here.
I think that means it's a signthat it's time to wrap up
(53:44):
episode 189 before I choke anddrop dead and this never gets
finished.
So before I pass out on mykeyboard, I'll just wrap up by
saying, remember, in this life,don't walk in anyone else's
footsteps.
Create your own path and enjoyevery moment you can on this
journey we call life because younever know what tomorrow
(54:05):
brings.
Thank you all for tuning intothe show.
This has been the In MyFootsteps podcast.
I am Christopher Setterlund,but you already knew that.
And I'll talk to you all againsoon.