What Was That One?

Can't remember the name of that book, game, movie, tv show, elder god, actor, etc? Ask away here to pick the brains of the tumblr community! Inspired by the age-old livejournal of the same name.

[whatwasthatone]

Welcome all!

This blog was inspired by a long, long defunct series of blogs on Livejournal, in which people could describe bits of nostalgia that they couldn't quite remember the name of. Readers can comment if they remember the thing and reunite bits of lost media with those longing for them. Books, games, tv shows, songs, etc. all are fair game!

A few notes:

The more people follow this blog, the wider net we cast for our questions! The blog is still very new, so not too many people will see questions at first. If you like this idea, please reblog questions or just tell a friend about this project! Those asking questions, I will try to keep tabs on those that are not answered and reblog them on occasion to bump them to the top as we gain more followers.

If you think you have an answer to a question, please don't forget to @ the asker so they know right away!

The best way to submit a query is actually through the submit button. This is pure laziness on my part because I don't have to add unnecessary text each time I post one.

All other thoughts please put in the ask box!

I'll be starting a queue for new asks. Right now it's set at 1 and 6 pm est and we'll see how it goes from there.

This is a side blog so if I like your blog and follow you that notification will be coming from @beggars-opera

If for some reason the good nerds of tumblr can't help you with your search, r/tipofmytongue is the reddit version of this.

[whatwasthatone]

There was a Canadian children’s show from maybe the mid 90s, or possibly just the bumper segments between shows on a certain channel, I’m not sure I only ever had a recorded vhs tape from my great aunt. It was a stop motion world of toys who lived in a fort made of cardboard and wooden blocks? And that’s all I remember. I know it’s really not much to go on, but maybe somebody else remembers too

[whatwasthatone]

There was the book or maybe a series of books, about a kid that got shrunk down and his toy castle was real (maybe?) and he was in his house but was walking on an adventure in the woods. I remember there a medal with the two faces of Janus on it, and it did something magical. That’s all I can remember though :(

More fantasy, huzzah!

[whatwasthatone]

I haven't read this book or even hardly *thought* about it since 2012 so bear with me on the disjointed description lol

Early 2010s YA series, I don't think it was that well-known (I got my copy in paperback at walmart and I barely heard any buzz about it if any). It was about the fae folk (in their most ACOTAR-flavored sexy bad boy incarnation, but before ACOTAR came out)

The main character was maybe a changeling? (Unless I'm confusing it with another series, main character had a scar from her mother trying to kill her as a kid because she was convinced she was a changeling. Which she was. Maybe? I think her not being one after all might have been a second plot twist but I can *not* remember)

I remember the fae queen(?) had some kind of future sight via paintings, and there was a scene of Main Character lying on a balcony surrounded by broken glass.

Title possibly had something to do with trolls?

The cover illustration was a photoshopped stock image of a woman in a dress facing away from the camera (very original I know....) and the cover for the first book was predominantly green.

Go forth, fantasy enthusiasts, and find the magical orb book!

[whatwasthatone]

Ok, I actually Do have a book to search for. There was a middle-grade novel, maybe series of novels, or maybe it was chapter books for an even younger audience, I don’t remember. There was a mother cat, and she had kittens, and named them after what they smelled like. For example one was Tail and one was Milk. There were some dogs who I think were the main characters and were helping her with the kittens. One of the dogs renamed a kitten something like “Hamburger.” Despite all this the vibes I remember were serious. Any ideas? Thanks!

[whatwasthatone]

Anybody heard of a science fiction novel I read years ago? It followed a ragtag group of (traders? mercenaries?) on a junky kind of ship. The captain was a badass, the (possibly) pilot was a dinosaur guy, and one character was an android actor (named...Zeno? Xeno?) who was trying to get his sentience downgraded so he could be with his gf. There were Casablanca and Star Wars jokes. Similar to The Long Way To A Small Angry Planet; think the title might have had something to do with turtles but don't quote me on that.

Readers, any clues?

[whatwasthatone]

2004 I believe. I spent time on an isolated island off the coast of British Columbia over the summer (because Dads™️). The tv only got a few channels and it showed kids shows only in the evening. I think it was always dragonball z, then yvon of the Yukon maybe? THEN it showed this live action kids show where these kids like explored different things… I think they delved into real things but stuff like aliens may have been involved. But it definitely had educational info dumps with these kids leading the charge (maybe with the help of a quirky professor adult type?). They may have done like re-enactments of stuff. I remember vibes more than actual things they talked about but I loved it. Any ideas????

I'm also intrigued by this show called Yvon of the Yukon tbh

[whatwasthatone]

Please help me find my white whale! It's a book I read in elementary school about a boy who was on a car trip with his parents when they were caught in a flood. It seemed like they died, but instead they woke up in a seemingly perfect suburban neighborhood with robot assistants. Obviously the robots are actually evil/avatars of some greater evil which the main character and a new friend (a girl) defeat. Read it in my classroom library in the early 2000s, but it could have been older. Thanks!

Clearly I was reading the wrong books in school, this one sounds fun!

[whatwasthatone]

Okay, this one is a little bit in reverse.  In the late 90s, I used to play on a site called Wrath of God.  It was a single page that was a hand-drawn-style green grass and blue sky background, and little stick figure humans and cows would walk across the page and you controlled a lightning bolt that you could use to explode them.  There were no points or anything - it wasn’t a game, but it never stopped and you could explode as many cows as you wanted until you got bored. 

I can’t find any proof that this site ever existed.

It was pretty popular with my group, so I feel like it must have been fairly well known on that much-smaller internet, but I can’t find any articles, message boards, posts, ANYTHING that references it.

Does anyone else remember this site?  Have I been imagining things for 25 years?  Can anyone find any proof that this site ever existed?

[whatwasthatone]

This is probably easy. There was a heartfelt family movie (that I never actually watched, just saw previews) where a man could somehow talk on a radio to his dead father back in time. I feel like the radio was at his old family lake house or some place like that where his father used to visit a lot. I thought it had Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock, but I think I'm confusing it with previews for "The Lake House." Maybe it's 2 different movies. One is a RADIO tho.

I want to see it!

[whatwasthatone]

A long time ago, about 25 years ago maybe? I remember reading this book about a kid who would visit their grandparents fairly often. Or lived with them. One of the grandparents has a greenhouse where they grow mushrooms and their grandmother brews this disgusting tasting green tea that they're forced to drink because it's good for them. Anyway the mushrooms are evil or something and start turning the grandparents into spore zombies? MC is immune because of the tea. Can't for the life of me remember what it was called.

[whatwasthatone]

So I got a book I've been trying to remember the name of! It's an anthology revolving around cats, and one is a story of how cats were made at the start of the world by a woman(Girl?) serving a god - I distinctly remember it was vaguely Norse-ish in basis, and she'd made them using scraps, but didn't know what to call them until one of them knocked something over and she called them ket(t)lingrs. There have been another story in it involving a WWII ship cat with markings like a bomber jacket.

I'm learning about so much cat-centered media that I didn't know existed

[whatwasthatone]

For years, I've had very clear in my head a single line of dialogue from what has to be a show from the 90s. Probably an episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark, or something similar. It's a man's voice, kind of being like a creepy halloween chainsaw guy, and he's yelling, "Before the night is through, I will make stew out of you!" but like, exaggerated so it's more "Befooooorrrrre the night is thrrrrrouuuugh, I will make STEWWWW out of youuuuuuuuuuu!" I swear it's that exact phrase, but I've never been able to find any reference to it on the internet! Ring any bells for anyone?

Could it be this episode of Scooby Doo?

[whatwasthatone]

This is a tough one, I've asked elsewhere with no hits. It's a children's picture book from the 1960s-70s (NOT LATER) that is a mystery, illustrated with dense, busy, intricate pictures of anthropomorphic animals. I don't remember the plot except that one of the animals was a detective and trying to solve the mystery. Think Richard Scarry, but more realistic. It is NOT GRAEME BASE. Or Anatole - the illustrations were crisper.

Older readers, got any clues?

[whatwasthatone]

When I was a gradeschool kid - so, 70s probably, maybe 60s - I read a short story about a man who fell asleep and dreamed he was a goose or a duck in I think Rome who caused a ruckus in the street, and when he woke up he read an account of a historical event (a genuine one, I think, but I don't remember what) where a goose distracted a military leader who went on to lose an important battle. Anyone know this story?

It's a lovely day in the city of Rome 390 BCE and you are a horrible goose

[whatwasthatone]

When I was a kid and video rental places were still a thing, I once picked up this spooky children’s animated movie/series (not sure which). It was a VHS and this would have happened early to mid-90s, so the cartoon would have to be from then or even earlier. I remember the box art being pretty simple, very gray with a sketchy style. Just a few characters standing under a lamp, or maybe holding a lantern on a hook, something like that. The plot involved a character finding an odd chest, which he put in a little shed behind his house. That night, he heard some strange noises coming from the shed, but didn’t think much of it. But after hearing the noises again for a few more nights, he went to check on the chest … and then I turned off the video because I got scared lol. I’ve always wondered how the story ended, but no matter how I search on Google I never find anything that looks like this.

[whatwasthatone]

I want to find the songs from a cd/album I had about 7 years ago. The problem is not finding the name but getting any results for the name, so I don't know if you can help. The cd was called Cat Power, with about 12 songs about cats with the first song having the same name. I remember that there was one about a cat who wanted to go out but regretted it when it started raining, one about a cat who liked butterflies too much to want to eat them, and one short one called Fat Cat. I remember the lyrics to Fat Cat being "did someone say I'm overweight/I carry quite a pouch/I lumber 'cross the kitchen floor then pad back to the couch/ten times a day I make this trip I don't know what's the matter/despite my constant exercise I just keep getting fatter." I've tried looking up the lyrics with ro results, and when I looked up Cat Power, I could only find music by an artist of that name, not what I was looking for. Good luck - If I find it myself I'll post about it and tag this blog.

Cat people of tumblr, do your best! Does anyone recognize this cd?