...or does the entire blogosphere seem to be in a gigantic rut these days?

Seems like ages since I've seen anything that's really made me go, "Holy crap, that's the coolest thing ever."

Maybe I just need a nap.

Posted by MrBaliHai at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

On the other hand, I posted a number of things in 2007 that I thought were the bees knees, only to have them completely ignored, so here's my top-ten list of EotG posts that should've caught the attention of every right-thinking denizen of the Æthernet, but for whatever reason, didn't:

1. Meryl, Moonlight, and a Dummy: Meryl Streep does a creepy duet with a ventriloquist's dummy in an aloha shirt. I guess I should just be thankful she didn't pull a Wynona and boink it
2. Bad Cocktails and the Bartenders Who Mix Them: over at DrinksTV, the world's shittiest bartenders show you how to make...um...really shitty cocktails
3. Shiftin' With Woo Woo: a gallery of ultra-bitchin' hotrod gearshift knobs by movie legend, Woo Woo Grabowski
4. Who Is Hoverboy?: it's Hoverboy, scourge of Godless Canadians!
5. Cartwright Rips CBGBs: my old high-school advisor reviews the classic punk LP Live At CBGBs
6. Forgotten Electronics of the 70s and 80s: remember 8-bit pr0n and the Bone Fone?
7. Beehives in Paradise: the retro-Exotic gals of the 1966 Mai Kai Restaurant calendar
8. Streams of Monkeys: my PCL pal splogman mashes up the Pogues and dancing chimps
9. Bally Hula!: politically-incorrect page scans from the 1935 issue of Ballyhoo Magazine
10. Think Small: a 1961 promotional brochure of VW Beetle cartoons

Posted by MrBaliHai at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I'm nowhere near as obsessive about checking my weblog stats as I used to be, but I thought it'd be fun to compile a list of the posts that garnered the most visitors in 2007. I received almost 4.5 million page hits last year, which was definitely a huge increase over 2006. I'm not bigger than bOINGbOING yet, but I'm doing okay. Speaking of bb, I owe Mark F. a huge debt of thanks for linking here as often as he did last year. It definitely put me over the top. Thanks also to other big referrers: Coudal, The Cartoonist, Table of Malcontents (defunct)/Ectoplasmosis, and PCL.

So, without further ado, here's my list of the 10 most-viewed Eye of the Goof posts of 2007:

1. Tony's Hot Nuts Redux: proof positive that sleazy cheese rules teh Intarwebs
2. The 5,000 Contract Hotties of Dr. T: who doesn't love this movie?
3. The Psychotronic Guide to Archive.org: my list of free, incredibly strange film downloads
4. Gordon's Jet Flight: a nostalgic look at a time when air travel didn't suck
5. In Soviet Russia, Tiki Mugs You!: Stalin and Lenin go Polynesian Pop
6. Quick, the Mental Bleach!: a jaw-dropping collection of highly disturbing album covers
7. Hobo Soup for the Junkyard Soul: the attention of the blogosphere is riveted by a can of 45-year old soup
8. X-8's 30 Years of Flipside Tribute: the best punk fanzine of all time
9. Shriner Mini Cars: in which I reveal just who's pimping the Shriners' tiny parade rides (post is actually from 2006, but it's still getting tons of hits)
10. Plop!: a collection of 24 Basil Wolverton covers from Plop! Magazine

Here's hoping I can come up with 10 equally great posts in 2008!

Posted by MrBaliHai at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Due to excessive amounts of work and a general sense of ennui, I've decided to suspend operations here indefinitely. As with my previous hiatuses, this will last as long as it lasts. If I'm still feeling uninspired by the time my ISP bill comes due next February, I'll be seriously thinking about reinvesting that money into something that brings me actual pleasure...like a bottle of top-shelf rum.

Adieu,

Mr. BH

Posted by MrBaliHai at 6:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (12)

Greetings from Blighty! It's a miserable, grey, and rainy Monday...quite a contrast to yesterday, when I met up with The Cartoonist, Konstantin, and several thousand commie bicyclists at the Sherlock Holmes pub in sunny Westminster for a Sunday Roast podcast where we talked a load of rubbish about Russian billionaires, bad '70s science-fiction films, bluetongue disease, and British football.

Afterwards, Konstantin left for the Scottish Highlands, where he intends to stay in a small cottage for several weeks and eat fried sheep.

[Link: Sunday Roast Podcast MP3 (19:19 minutes, 4.5MB)]

Posted by MrBaliHai at 2:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)

I'll be upgrading my blogging software and site templates this weekend. If past experience is any guide, you shouldn't be be surprised if things go kerblooey for a while...or longer.

See you on the other side.

Posted by MrBaliHai at 9:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I'm off to the Washington D.C. area for a week. While there, I plan to get together with some of my Tiki Central drinkin' buddies at Piratz Tavern (warning: painfully slow Flash site), a theme restaurant in Silver Spring, Maryland. No, I won't be wearing an eyepatch and saying "Yarrr!" while I'm there, but apparently the waitstaff will. I tend to view theme restaurants the same way I view Ren Faires...with a mixture of bemusement and annoyance...but I'll try to keep an open mind.

In other news, since I started posting at PCL, I've noticed a rather precipitous drop-off in site traffic at the Goof, a trend I find a bit worrisome considering how much time and effort it's taken me to build up my readership, and since I haven't stopped posting here, I find it kind of puzzling as well. Hopefully, it's a temporary phenomenon.

Avast, ye landlubber scum, I'm weighin' anchor!

Posted by MrBaliHai at 7:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)

I've accepted an invitation from Mr. Dante Fontana to be a guest-blogger over at PCL, so I'll probably be spending a bit more time over there than I will here, at least until I settle into a routine. In the meantime, I'll continue to post here when the fancy takes me, so don't go away!

Posted by MrBaliHai at 9:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)

Check out my interview over on Blog Interviewer and fall in love with the Goof all over again. The Cartoonist is there too, and at the risk of tooting our own horns, I think we're the best of a bad lot. Who knew there were so many blogs about sex and housewives? Not that there's anything wrong with that.

[Link]

Posted by MrBaliHai at 5:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Thanks again to Will Kane for taking the time and trouble to scan the Blogroll Vintage column from last weekend's entertainment listing section in the Guardian Unlimited, that mentions not only the Goof, but Dusty Sevens, Junkyard Clubhouse, Swapatorium, Booberry Alarm Clock, Branded in the Eighties, and Will's own website, World of Kane. A full scan of the page is linked below.

Yow, are we famous yet?

[Link: Blogroll Vintage]

Posted by MrBaliHai at 7:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)