The Joshua Yoder Blog

 Being a gamer myself, it does feel a bit weird to me that I am older than a video game console. Because since it is now 2025, the PS1 is now 30 years old. Now I say this because the PS1 came out here in America in September of 1995. Meanwhile it came out in Japan late 1994. At the time this system was released, the PS1 was competing against the Sega Saturn from Sega and the Nintendo 64 which came out a year later. Man did this system coming out the gates swinging, it came out with so many amazing titles it isn't funny. From 95 to 2006 when it was discontinued, the original Playstation had a a wide variety of different games from multiple genres which was one of the main reasons why I loved playing the system. The top selling game for the Playstation was the racing game Gran Turismo which came out in 1997 making 10.85 million. 😮 But there were plenty other great games that came out during the PS1's run. Games like Final Fantasy 7, Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, Tomb Raider, Metal Gea...

 With today being New Year's Eve, it marks as the final day of 2024 and it has gotten me thinking about a lot of different stuff. Like I recently wrote about how I felt about the year that was 2024 for me and needless to say it was pretty much an up and down year, but I also believe that it has opened my eyes to plenty of different views and I have noticed changes in my life and how I feel about those changes. And honestly, it was the first time in my life I really enjoyed doing a lot of self-reflecting. But also, it was a little weird though, I say this because I am 34 years old. I never in my wildest dreams, ever thought someone like me could ever feel like I could change. But not only that, I have accepted those changes and I can even feel the changes happening within me as well as around me, which is also something I never thought was possible.  To be fair though, I also feel like there are things about me that are still me and often I wonder if I am still the same person ...

 Well, my twin and I just gotten back from another fun little trip, this time we decided to go to Huntingdon to check out this little shop called Flashbacks. And I got to tell you, it certainly lived up to its name because Chad and I were having plenty of flashbacks as we searched through the whole shop. The first thing we noticed as we walked in was the comic books 😁 and they had a pretty good collection of theme ranging from low prices to comic books that have high value. Also there were plenty of old school toys from back in the day, even before Chad and I were even born. Heck! There were even VHS tapes showcasing some classic cartoons or movies that we both enjoyed some much. We ended up getting ourselves a few comic books and hopefully again we will make another trip down there and more importantly, continue to keep ourselves busy and try be more open and adventurous and also to be inspired and use it to keep me writing as I hope and pray that someday I will find one of my bo...

 Crazy to think that this show is now 20 years old, boy time really does fly by when you are having fun. In 2004, Nickelodeon came out with an animated paranormal show called Danny Phantom. This show was amazing and while I was doing research for this particular blog post, I realized that this show only lasted three seasons for a grand total of 53 episodes. Which to this very day I still honestly feel like this show lasted a lot longer than it did. Danny Phantom follows a young kid and Danny Fenton who is a child of paranormal hunters Jack and Madeline Fenton. Danny also had an overly protective big sister named Jasmine aka Jazz.  One day Danny sees his parents try to create a portal that can bridge the gap between the human world and the Ghost Zone only for their experiment to fail. Disappointed, his parents leave which allowed Danny to check it out himself. While inside he discovered an on switch which his parents missed, so Danny decides to push the button only to get zappe...

 Well everyone! It is getting to be that time of the year where we all turn a new page into our lives as we say goodbye to the year 2024 and prepare ourselves for the upcoming 2025. But before I do, I wanted to write this blog and discuss what the year 2024 meant to me. 2024 was shall we say a up and down year for me to say the least. A lot of unexpected highs and lows, ton of changes happening in my life. Some good, some bad, some I not even sure what it could all mean to me. Things about myself, that I have been dealing with for so long and I am slowly starting to accept some things about me and to be perfectly honest, I would love to explore these more. But like I mentioned earlier, there have been some positives and there have been some tough negatives for me during this past year.  On the negative side of things, I finally managed to open up and tried dating again which would be the first time in a little over 12 years after being completely ruined by ex-girlfriend who ch...

 Being a huge fan of Scooby Doo, I can honestly say that I have seen a ton of different series that featured the lovable dog and the rest of the Mystery Inc. One such series I really loved watching the 13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo which aired all the back in 1985 on ABC and lasted for a season. The story begins with the gang Daphne, Shaggy, Scooby and Scrappy are on a trip to Hawaii but are thrown off course and ended up landing in the Himalayas. Once there, the group meets a pair of ghosts named Weerd and Bogel who trick Shaggy and Scooby into opening the Chest of Demons which contain 13 of the scariest monsters that have ever walked on Earth. The only way that these demons can return to the chest is if the people who let them out have to be the ones who put them back. So the gang begins their search all around the world to stop the monsters from destroying the planet. Joining Scooby and Shaggy are Daphne, Scrappy and a young boy name Flim Flam. Also assisting the gang is Flim Flam's f...

 It is crazy to think that this show has now been done for 10 years now. And still holds up as one of the best shows ever. To this very day, you can still feel the impact that it had from back in the day and that show is Sons Of Anarchy. Sons Of Anarchy was created by Kurt Sutter back in 2008, which made me a junior in high school. The show aired on the channel FX and it follows an outlaw motorcycle club in the fictional town of Charming, California. Common themes that the show had throughout its run was love, brotherhood, loyalty, betrayal and redemption.  The show follows Jax Teller played by Charles Hunham who discovered his father's manifesto and learned about his concerns with the direction of the club. I remember first seeing the show and honestly, right from the opening song that was played before every episode, it just grabs at me and I was hooked. The song was called This Life by Curtis Stigers and the Forest Rangers. It was just pure poetry.  Plus, I always had ...

 This past weekend was quite interesting to say the least, as me and my family got to go to our annual Yoder family Christmas reunion. We also got a visit from my older brother Cody along with his wife Christine, my nephew Lukey and their always fun dog Macy. Thankfully they managed to get here safely on Friday. I always get nervous because it usually takes them or us about five and a half hours to get to each others' houses. Of course, with it being a lot colder out and there was some snow falling down, it just makes me more anxious and I am again thankful for them getting here safely. Of course it was going to be a crazy enough weekend as it is with a hyper four year old as well as the fact my family was going to be watching the Penn State game before heading off to the reunion. In fact, football was already going crazy in the house as I was watching Notre Dame defeat Indiana which I was thankful to see but now it is onto Georgia. Then on Saturday my father was glued to the TV as...

 To no ones surprise, I am a major dork! 😁 and I do enjoy a good anime. For me personally one of the things I enjoyed the most watching growing up as a kid was anime even though I wasn't able to watch a lot of them due to not having Cartoon Network. Most of the stuff I was able to see like Pokemon and Digimon because those were on stuff like Fox Kids. However, I did manage to see some of anime on Cartoon Network especially when I went to see my Nan and Pap. I got to see some of my favorite anime of all time like Dragon Ball Z and mainly Mobile Suit Gundam. But today I am going to write about one of the most underrated anime Blue Gender. Blue Gender is a mecha, science fiction, horror anime and was created by Ryosuke Takahashi who has been involved with manga and anime since the early 60s.  Blue Gender is set in the year 2030 and the planet Earth has been overrun by an alien monsters called the Blue who hunt and harvest humans for food. The survivors retreat to place in outer ...

 In previous blogs, I have mentioned a few of my influences as a writer and today I thought about writing one about a legendary comic book writer. His name is Frank Miller. Miller has been in the comic book business since before I was even born. In fact, my parents weren't even married yet when he first started writing comics. The first time that I had ever gotten to see anything of Frank Miller was back in 2005 when a movie based on one of his amazing comics (Sin City) and I become a fan instantly. Since then I have been researching him more and being a fan of comic books myself, I must say Frank has created some of greatest stories in comic book history in my humble opinion. Miller is one of the reasons why I enjoy the character Daredevil. As I went back and learned about his time there with the character, he created Elektra and wrote the Daredevil: Born Again story arc which many claim is one of the best stories in the history of the character. Frank also created the Dark Knight...

 With Christmas getting so much closer, there have been plenty of me watching some holiday classics. Usually when somebody says the word classic, it means of the shows that have been around for decades. But in today's blog, I am writing about a Christmas special that will soon turn 10 years old. And that is the Ho Ho Holiday special that aired on Nickelodeon back in 2015. I am writing about this because my twin and I were on Youtube and had found the full episode and started watching it. And let me tell you, it was still just as good as when I first watched it. What makes show so special to me was when it first came out, I hadn't really watched many new Christmas special up to that point. Mainly because, I hadn't liked some of the newer stuff. But nonetheless, when this special was announced, I figured why not give it a shot. And I am really glad that we did because man was it so much fun to watch. Basically it stars the actors and actresses of the time there at Nick and th...

 In my humble opinion, one of my personal favorite animes ever. Digimon, Digital Monsters. Digimon is an anime created by Akiyoshi Hongo back in 1997.  Digimon was created as a series of digital pets that were designed as a masculine counterpart to the female oriented Tomagotchi and since then created numerous anime series, video and card games. And I love it! The first time I saw Digimon was the original anime series that aired on Fox Kids back in March of 1999. And dare I say, I loved it so much more than Pokemon. There, I said it. lol I love the whole concept of Digimon. I mean the idea of traveling to another world where you can find and connect with a Digimon and basically have a friend for life and go and explore such a beautiful yet, dangerous world is quite exciting for me. Especially since I didn't really get to out much as a kid and I always dreamed of being in a world where I can feel free and Digimon certainly did that for me growing up. Even when I did get to hang...

 WOW! That was such a fun night! My twin brother Chad and I made our return to a local VFW in Mount Union to see our friend Eric Scott and his band Mindspell. This was the second time that we got to go to this VFW and watch our friends perform and these guys absolutely killed it out there tonight.  You know, being in a small town there isn't much going on, which doesn't help someone like myself trying to explore things and step out on his comfort zone, but nonetheless when the time comes, I try my best to go out and enjoy myself and meet new people and try and do things. Plus, I really love rock and metal music so we decided to go and see the band. And much like the first time, we had a total blast. What was even more fun about tonight's adventure was I got to meet a few new people, but also got to meet up with some old friends who I haven't seen in a long time and they just happened to be there that night. First, I got to hangout with Eric and the band before the show ...

 Holy crap! Talk about bringing back some Christmas memories, I recently found an old movie I loved watching as a kid and that was Babes in Toyland which was a 1986 Christmas musical film based off the 1903 operetta of the same name created by Victor Herbert and Glen MacDonough. This movie stars Drew Barrymore, Keanu Reeves, Richard Mulligan (RIP), Eileen Brennan (RIP), Jill Schoelen, Googy Gress and Pat Morita (RIP). The movie starts as Lisa Piper (Barrymore) a young girl from Cincinnati, Ohio no longer believes in being a kid anymore due to the fact that her father had passed away. But a snow storm is slowly working its way in so she meets with her older sister Mary (Schoelen) along with her sister's boyfriend Jack (Reeves) and his friend George (Gress) and group leaves to get home before the storm only to get caught up in it and accidentally sent Lisa flying out of Jack's jeep before hitting a tree and knocking her out. Only to be sent to the magic world of Toyland where she...

 I can't believe that this amazing game is nearly 25 years old. And just thinking about it brings a huge smile on my face and in today's blog, I thought about looking back on a video game called Nicktoons Unite. This was pretty much a peak part of my childhood watching Nicktoons like Spongebob Squarepants, Danny Phantom, Fairy Odd Parents, Jimmy Neutron, etc. So the fact that they decided to create a game where are all of these amazing characters come together was really exciting for me. This game came out for the Gamecube, Xbox, PS2 and a few other systems in 2005, I quickly got myself a copy for my gamecube and honestly, I was not disappointed. Nicktoons Unite begins with Spongebob discovering that Plankton has taken over Bikini Bottom with an army of giant vacuum machines and apparently works with a group called the Syndicate along with Professor Calamitous, Vlad Plasmius and Denzel Crocker who are looking to rule all of their respective worlds. Spongebob later joins up with...

 Keeping the Christmas theme going here on my blog this month, I thought I write about another fun Christmas special, and that is Frosty the Snowman. Believe it or not, Frosty was actually first created via song which was written by Walter E. Rollins and Steve Nelson and it was written back in 1950 and was first sung by Gene Autry who sang a lot of Christmas songs back in the day. The duo of Rankin and Bass were at it again creating this masterpiece. And were giving some help from long time writer Romeo Muller. The special featured the voice talents of Jimmy Durante as the narrator, this would be his final performance, and I must say, did a fantastic job. Also starring were Billy De Wolfe as Professor Hinkle and Jackie Vernon as the main man himself, or should I say main snowman lol Frosty. The story follows a group of kids playing outside and build a snowman which they named Frosty. Suddenly, a top hat flies over from the wind and lands on Frosty's head and the next thing you know...

   One of my favorite albums to come out of 2020 comes in the form of Even the Devil Believes from the Christian hard rock band Stryper. Now, Stryper has been around since long before my time in the 80s. But I must say, I totally can see why they have been so popular. One of the first things that stood out to me was the album cover. The photo of the Devil falling before God showcasing how having faith in God can help you against anything that the Devil may throw at you is truly inspirational and positive. Speaking of a positive message, one of my favorite songs on the album is Make Love Great Again. This song was amazing, from the music, Michael Sweet’s vocals and of course the message. To me it is a message that society needs right now. With so much hate in the world especially from our mainstream media. It amazes me that so many people in this world rather spread hate over love. In my humble opinion God wants us to love and understand one another with the key word in that se...

 There is something that I have been meaning to get off my chest. I just want every single one of you to know that I just want what is best. I am so sick and tired of all of this fighting, this terrible war has got to come to a stop. Because the violence is out of control and people are more worried about being on top. For it doesn't matter if your on the left or on the right. We shouldn't worry about being in a fight, but should all be working to get ever so much closer to God's Light. All this pain and suffering has led us to nowhere. At this point I wonder to myself. Do people even care? This Christmas, I pray that people could just lay down their arms and find their peace on this Earth. I mean isn't that what God has wanted us to do since the time of our birth? I do not want no fancy cars, no life of luxury, just for all of us to have a peace of mind. Because life is to be one with God, but we humans for whatever reason make it so difficult to find. So this year, le...

 You know, many of us during the Christmas season often ask and wish for that special present or that special moment to get what we always wanted. Sadly in this world we do not always get what we want. But there is one thing that I really hope to get, and it ain't for me, it is for someone else. Someone who I consider a great Mentor and more importantly, a true friend. And is his name is Brian Carson. You see, Carson has been dealing with a lot of health issues these recent years and has been struggling. And to say that I am worried about him is an incredible understatement. I first met Carson a little over 10 years ago when I first started covering sports. My first impression of him was a nice guy and crazy sense of humor and that he loves the Rams.  But say what you will about him, he was always there to help. And more I got to see him, the more I realized that. He and his humor were never a bore, honestly it helped brighten some of the most darkest days in my life. I honest...

 One of my personal favorite Christmas specials I ever watched, was the Year Without A Santa Claus which first made its appearance all the back in 1974, 50 years ago. This special was based off of a book of the same name which was written by Miss Phyllis McGinley and the book was created back in 1956. The team that put all of this together for this animated classic, were the Rankin/Bass Productions who were known for a lot of other amazing animations as well. The special stars Shirley Booth who plays Mrs. Claus/Narrator, Mickey Rooney plays Santa Claus and Dick Shawn as Snow Miser and George S. Irving as Heat Miser. The story begins with Santa Claus falling ill to a cold and is bed ridden. But begins to question if people really cared about Christmas anymore after his doctor sarcastically said so. With that in mind, Mrs. Claus with the help of a couple of elves, Jingle and Jangle as well as a little reindeer Vixon head of to prove to Santa that there is still plenty of Christmas le...

 Hard to believe that this was 30 years ago. Now it is no secret that I am a huge fan of football, but we all have our moments that introduced us to the game of football. And for me, that was the 1994 Penn State Nittany Lions. Growing up in the state of Pennsylvania, football was one of the main sports any kid was brought up on and I was no different. I was only four years old at the time and I remember seeing how my dad and especially my big brother Cody were while watching Penn State throughout that season. And man did this team leave an impression on me! The Nittany Lions went undefeated for the year which included winning the Rose Bowl against the Oregon Ducks which is ironic because 30 years Penn State will be facing Oregon for the Big Ten Championship this coming weekend. But again, this team was incredible to watch because they just had some great players on the roster. Penn State was so explosive throughout the year as they were blowing out a lot of good teams that season. ...

 Well today officially starts one of my favorite times of the year and that is getting to see some great Christmas specials and shows during the 25 days of Christmas which will be featuring on the TV channel Freeform. Despite my annoyance with cold weather, getting to watch some great holiday classics has always been a great way to stay warm and be with loved ones.  This annual event first started back in 1996 for the Family Channel before moving on to several other channels ever since. I always enjoy getting me some Christmas cookies, some warm hot chocolate and sitting down and watching such amazing classics like Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, A Year Without A Santa Claus, Garfield Christmas special, Little Drummer Boy, and so much more. Also can't go wrong with such great movies like the Home Alone movies, Three Days, The Santa Claus movies, The Christmas Carol and The Christmas Story. My personal favorites are How the Grin...