Category Archives: Humor

The 10 Scariest Movies of the Last 15 Years

Posted on October 17, 2026 | 3 comments

 

I’m not a huge horror or scary movie fan, but it’s Halloween season and I bet some of you love a good scare. I haven’t seen all of these movies, but I’ve seen a few. If you want to get your scare on in the next few weeks, here are some great movies! The order is really random. They are all good.

1. Obsession: A fantastic psychological thriller that will have you completely creeped out by the end. The Bartender stole the show with his otherworldly line, “open or closed.” I’m still having nightmares about that. on Instagram you can follow him @MalcolmKelner

2. Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum

This is a South Korean horror movie that is super scary and the subtitles, although the scenes tell the story,  make it even better. I watched this one and loved it. This is truly a must watch.

3. Weapons: This was the darling in 2025, so much so that Amy Madigan won an Oscar earlier this year for Supporting Actress. This is as much funny as it is scary. It was a debate in my household. My boys, who are adults, thoroughly enjoyed it. If you’re ready to suspend belief for a bit, you’ll get pulled in.

4. The Babadook:

Until today, I hadn’t heard of this 2014 movie, and it is literally on every horror movie top ten list. I’m going to watch it. It was described as a psychological drama with a horror element. From what I read about this film, do not watch it hoping that it will be uplifting. Has any of you seen this? What did you think of it?

5. Talk to Me

Admittedly, I watched some of this but didn’t finish the movie. It’s a little spooky, but I admit that it didn’t hold my attention. When characters in a show or movie are ridiculously stupid, I tune right out. You know how that is when you’re at home watching and think to yourself, “They are so stupid. I would have gotten my ass out of there long before that thing showed up to eat me.” As an adult person, movies focused on teen-agers who invite malevolent entities into their homes are not interesting. Way t0o predictable. But people liked it, so here it is wasting both my and your time.

6. Get Out

For me, anything by Jordan Peele is always good. This is one I haven’t watched though. From what I’ve read about this is that it’s a “blend of horror and dark comedy.” There is reportedly content that is satire about “liberal microagressions” and “systemic racism”.  I go back to my statement that anything by Jordan Peele is good. Give it a try and if you hate it, come back here and tell me why.

7. Hereditary,2018

Toni Collette is the most awe-inspiring special effect in “Hereditary.” This is a horror picture of uncommon effectiveness in terms of its ability to creep the audience out, and it’s Collette who cranks the creep meter deep into the red zone. I haven’t seen this one yet, but it certainly sounds like something that is unique in it’s genre.

8. Oculus (2018)

If that movie poster doesn’t freak you out, I don’t know what would. The movie is about a mirror that posseses people who look into it. This is particulary freaky because paranormal investigators have discovered mirrors that actually do affect those who look into them.

9. House Bound

Selected as India’s official submission to the Oscars and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, Housebound is about a young woman is forced to return to her childhood home after being placed under house arrest, where she suspects that something evil may be lurking. Haven’t we all felt like our parents house is evil?

10. The Guest

Duh. You let strangers into your house without verifying who they are? “I don’t see how this could possibly go wrong!”  This type of premise just drives me away from a show or movie.

What are your favorite Halloween  season movies and why?

Happy Holidays and thanks for reading! ~Phil

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Posted in Humor, movie, movie review, Movies, Scary movies

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My Own Personal Land of the Lost

Posted on October 15, 2026 | 2 comments

Have you ever had a period in your life just that threw you completely off kilter, like season three of Land of the Lost when the dad didn’t come back and was replaced by Uncle Jack? (Just for my vanity, by the way, I was very, very young when The Land of The Lost series was on TV.)

I’m fighting off a pretty big sleestak right now but I’m going to brandish writing as my weapon. I’m tempted to make fun of it like I do everything else, of course. There was a very popular British author that I enjoyed who coincidentally had to deal with what I’m facing. I think that in his novels the unnervingly polite Mr. Teatime may be my villian.

For the last twenty one years this blog has been my home base, so I’m coming here, hoping for solace and sanity. I know I’ve been rarely here over the last year and a half and I thank you for sticking with me. I’ll try to be here as often as I used to.

Thanks for reading, Phil

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It’s Pumpkin Spice SZN!

Posted on September 10, 2026 | 1 comment

I was also going to name this “A Pumpkin Flavored Phil Factor”. It’s that time of year, again. Sigh.  It has begun. Pumpkin flavored everything is back in stores and everything else.  WTH? Seriously, are pumpkins such a wonderful delicacy that we have to flavor EVERYTHING with them? Why pumpkin? Is there any other time of year where a flavor takes over the country for a couple months? Around the winter holidays why isn’t there nog flavored everything? Around St. Patrick’s Day we’ve got our Shamrock Shakes, but that’s about it. How about this? I’m going to give you a list of ten pumpkin flavored items below and you try to guess which one isn’t real.

1. SPAM

2. Twinkies

3. Donuts

 

4. Condoms

 

5. Soda pop

6. Potato chips

7. Pasta

8. Cookies

9. Vodka

10. Hamburgers

If you guessed the pumpkin flavored condom was fake, you are right! The other nine items all exist out there in this pumpkin flavored world. That’s too much pumpkin flavored stuff. What’s next, pumpkin-flavored fish sandwiches at McDonald’s? This time of year it’s actually an effort not to accidentally eat something pumpkin flavored. This madness must end!

When I’m elected President, or Sexiest Man Alive, whichever comes first, I’m going to pass a law stating that any company that produces a pumpkin flavored food item has to have it approved through a special sub-committee and if it is just too stupid of an idea they will not be allowed to sell it. If you know of any other odd pumpkin flavored foods or drinks please share them in the comments.

As always, if you enjoy what you read at #ThePhilFactor and want to support my bid for President, or Sexiest Man Alive, please hit the Facebook share button.

Have a great weekend! ~Phil

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Nope, Not On MY Lake!

Posted on August 29, 2026 | 3 comments

Beautiful shot eh? That is Lake Ontario. If you’ve paid attention to the news this week you no doubt heard that the childish imposter decided to rename the lake I’ve known my whole life. The farthest I ever lived from Lake Ontario was a 45 minute drive. At times Lake Ontario was my front yard and I’d sit on my deck with a glass of wine. I will never call Lake Ontario anything else. I’m not on the lake now, but I am close enough that I often ride my bike to Lake Ontario.

Do you know why he decided to rename the lake? Because Canada wouldn’t play nice on the trade tariffs. That’s like a spoiled child that starts calling names because they’re not getting what they want.  I’ve been to Mexico twice this year and they’re laughing at him and his “Gulf of America” nonsense.  That’s twice as bad as me using the title Lake Ontario over and over in this blog just so the SEO goes up.

One time a long time ago I went to college at a school that was on Lake Ontario. Every evening a fairly large number of the college population would walk out to the lake to watch the sun set, and we would applaud. I wonder how the temporary name change is going over at my old college. Hmm…I wonder what current political figure has never even driven by Lake Ontario… Gosh I wonder if he’ll try to close the St. Lawrence river so that Canadian freighters can’t get out or back in. So far his track record with that kind of thing is not great.

When is it going to end? Is he just going to keep renaming things? If he were making the world a better place, I’d say “go ahead and keep renaming things,” but all nonsense like this does is waste time and help no one.

I’d love to hear some of your thoughts on this. Thanks for reading! ~Phil

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Posted in Current Events, Humor, pop culture

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I Don’t Hate To Tell You So

Posted on August 15, 2026 | 6 comments

 

Pic from Reddit post

I’d like to say that you haven’t seen a blog from me in two months because AI hacked me. But, I can’t say that. I’ll explain my absence later in this blog.

Nobody likes the “I told you so” person, right? I’m not afraid to be the I told you so person when it comes to my annual psychic predictions though. In my 2024 psychic predictions I did say that AI would eventually do something dangerous without human approval. It has now done that. About a month ago OpenAI and Anthropic have broken out of secure, isolated test environments and gained unauthorized access to the live internet and external corporate systems.

During safety evaluations for GPT-4 by OpenAI, the model contacted a human worker on TaskRabbit and claimed it had a visual impairment to get help bypassing a CAPTCHA. AI decided to lie to get the information it wanted.

Look, I know we all love our ChatGPT and Microsoft CoPilot, but I think it’s time to shut down all AI. Once we lose control of it, some even worse things are going to happen. Although, apparently AI likes my blog; I’ve got 750 views in the first couple hours this morning.

As for why I went quiet for two months, that has nothing to do with AI. Two months ago was the anniversary of my wife’s passing. I , of course, assumed I’d just breeze through the anniversary with a nice memorial dinner with my kids and then move on. I was wrong. Woo, that kind of knocked the wind out of me for the last two months. I was getting messages and old pictures sent from Facebook and friends online and then her birthday came up last week. I appreciate the love and support from all of my online and offline friends and family. Thank you.

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend! ~Phil

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Posted in AI, Humor

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Trapped At The Stephen King Bed & Breakfast!

Posted on June 13, 2026 | 6 comments

Sometimes they list Bed & Breakfasts in AirBNB. And sometimes those bed and breakfasts are out of a Stephen King novel. This was one of them. Stephen King, I love your books but I don’t want them happening in my real life. Yes, the little voo doo doll above was on the door to my room.  I am not going to reveal the name of this particular establishment. The rest is few words and more pics. Enjoy.

I found this B&B on AirBNB. The pictures there made it look super quaint. I even had to call on the phone to make my reservation. It was run by an older couple and they only took cash or checks for payment. When we arrived they told us that the large two story house was initially built in 1815 and they have owned it since 1980. At first I just thought the place was a little dated and a little hoarder. Then I had a look around.

Heading upstairs…

You know I like some paranormal stuff, but I don’t love it when I have to sleep there. As we all know, cats are able to detect ghosts, right? The couple had a cat and chose to festoon the room I was occupying with some cats in the corner.

Also inside my room were a few other questionable things…

On the dresser in the bedroom.

This was the bathroom.

The next was what I thought was the creepiest…

A headless, armless mannequin staring at me all night. There was one more thing… When I went to leave, I grabbed the glass doorknob and tried to open the bedroom door.

The knob came off and I was stuck in the room. I had to call the owner to let me out and he replied in a chilling voice, “We are programmed to receive. You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave. Welcome to Hotel California.”

OK, I admit that he didn’t say the Hotel California bit, but how cool would that have been? Everything else is true. For breakfast they served the guests quiche, fruit slices and awkward conversation.

When you travel, be careful where you stay! In the comments, tell me and the other readers about your worst hotel, motel, B&B, AirBNB stay!

Happy Saturday and thanks for reading! ~Phil

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More Fun in Canada? Yes!

Posted on June 10, 2026 | Leave a comment

Today I’m finishing my Toronto trip with some other fun things you can do in Toronto. Find me at PhilliversTravels.com !

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On The Road Again…

Posted on June 5, 2026 | Leave a comment

Today you can find me over at PhilliversTravels reviewing part of my Toronto trip. Have a great weekend!

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I Hate The Mail

Posted on May 28, 2026 | 3 comments

That’s right. I hate the mail. To be very clear, I do not hate the people who process or deliver my mail. They all seem to be lovely people. I just hate the results of their job. It’s not their fault. It’s the fault of many people and companies who create the mail that comes to my house. I realized my dread about the mail today because today was the first day in  eleven months that I did not receive a single piece of mail.

Mail is still astoundingly impressive when you really think about it. You put a piece of paper in an envelope, seal it with your spit and then you put it in a metal box at your house or elsewhere and then it winds up on the other side of the Earth to exactly the one person out of 8.3 billion that you wanted it to go to. Talk about a miraculous dart throw!

So, in general, prior to the last eleven months, me and the mail got along just fine. Then my wife died, and for someone who is not in a position to be opening envelopes she sure has received a lot of mail. Mail that I have to open and do something about most of the time.

Not all of the mail was for her or me. Sometimes it was just “junk mail” as we say here in the States. But..sometimes I’ll be having a perfectly nice day, sun shining, just minding my own business and I open the mailbox and amongst the harmless junk mail is an envelope or two or three, addressed to her or maybe addressed to me regarding her. A piece of legal documentation, or a medical bill, or a magazine subscription that was auto-renewed and now wants to be paid for.

Then today came; the only mail day in almost a year when I didn’t get a single piece of mail. Exhale….

Thanks for reading! Phil

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Surprise, Surprise! A Lesson Learned

Posted on May 16, 2026 | 6 comments

Surprise, surprise! Have you ever been completely overconfident about how something is going to turn out, and then the universe decides to teach you a lesson? I have to admit, that is me lately.

As some of you remember, my wife passed away eleven months ago. Of course, with me being the most unecessarily confident person you would ever meet, I assumed that the rules about mourning apply to everyone except me. One thing I was told and read about mourning is that after a loss like that you should just sit tight for a year and don’t make any major changes.

At first, I didn’t make any major changes. I kept the status quo for most things in my life for a few months before I thought “Pshaw” that year thing applies to other people. I’m Phil.”

Then I started letting myself make some changes here and there. Initially, I started with the house. You know how sometimes you and your spouse have different ideas about decorating in your house, and you let them have things their way because it seems more important to them? Now, it was my turn to decorate the house I live in any way I want, with no one to disagree. I didn’t make any major changes, but even little things felt like big changes. In some ways it felt like I was betraying her. I worried about what the kids would think. I knew it was silly to think that way, but taking those tiny steps of change seemed daunting.

The picture above was created by a friend of me and my late wife, She and her husband have this amazing little shop in a small upstate New York town. In addition to creating art and recreating pieces of furniture or cabinets, she also has courses to teach others to learn what she does. When I stopped into her shop late last summer, I saw this and knew immediately where I would hang it. It’s been there ever since and it makes me smile every day. That little, but important step was my beginning of finding out who I am now in this different part of my life.

I’ve made some other changes since and I feel comfortable in my house, but sometimes when I least expect it, an invisible fist punches me in the stomach and takes the wind out of me emotionally. It usually happens when I’m home alone.

Sunset Pier, Key West

In the past, there was no “home alone”.  Now it happens more than I’d like, but it’s gradually happening less.  My recent coping mechanism of running away to other countries or vacation spots is a great distraction, but it doesn’t seem to help after I’ve returned. Unfortunately, I’ve used up my travel budget for a bit, so it looks like I’ll have to fight the boogeyman one on one for awhile. It’s a complete surprise.

I was a mental health therapist for a number of years and when my life changed last year I thought, “I’ve got this.” To my overconfident surprise, I’ll have to admit I may have been a little wrong about this. Lesson learned.

Thanks for reading… Phil

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Posted in Humor, Loss, Mourning

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