May the FORCE be with me...

I haven't always been the biggest fan of Star Wars. There, I said it.

When I was growing up in the 70's and 80's, a few of my friends were Star Wars freaks and had every piece of Star Wars memorablia, toys, and action figures that hit the streets. My parents took me to see Return of the Jedi at the Drive-In one time, and when the box set of the Trilogy was released on VHS my buddy Chris bought it and we had a Star Wars marathon.

Well, I'm back on the bandwagon thanks to Pepsi, Coca-Cola, and a guy by the name of Duncan Jenkins. (And truth be told, I had to go out last week and rent Episode I and II to catch up with the saga.)

Duncan is the subject of one of the stories in the upcoming Summer 2005 edition of Soda Pop Dreams. That particular story is dedicated to soda collectibles released to commemorate the Star Wars movies over the years. It's not just a Pepsi story either - Coca-Cola, Mountain Dew, 7UP, and Red Bull have also released their fair share of Star Wars promotional signage and collectibles as well.

So where does Duncan fit in? He's got a collection of more than 50,000 Star Wars items in his house - most of them food-related packaging. So when it came time to find a source for the story, Duncan was the natural choice and let me tell you, it's a great story with a number of excellent photos of rare and foreign soda Star Wars memorabilia that you probably won't find elsewhere.

Living in Rosseau, it's a bit more of a roadtrip to get to a decent movie theater. We have a theater about 30 minutes away, but it's one straight outta the 70's, retro seats and tiny screen to boot. So yesterday afternoon, I sucked it up and drove an hour to Orillia to the new Galaxy theater (with stadium seating, booming surround sound, and all the high tech stuff) to finally see Star Wars Episode III. It was all that it was hyped up to be, and then some... I loved every minute of it! Not that George Lucas needs any more money stuffed into his pocket, but I highly recommend seeing Episode III the way it was meant to be seen - on the big screen. If you're not a fan of this genre, after seeing this film, you will be.

See you next week, Happy Collecting, and may the force be with you.