Sunday, May 10, 2026

unknown scam phone calls...(plus extras)

I thought those of the online Instagram scams that I was being a victim in 2020 was bad enough, how about this one which is currently occurring on me through MANY of those unknown phone numbers? Believe or not, they call me specifically using regular phone numbers instead of WhatsApp like several of those advanced scammers with their respective methods out there, though this particular type of classic scam is already existed since more than decades ago, way before those of the advanced ones with combination between WhatsApp and those online social medias are now exist. Since I also installed GetContact on my 📱, I somehow leaked the slight secret about who are the culprits behind all of those unknown phone numbers, which I have no clue about how come if they also leaked my phone number there too.

After I briefly checked it through several of the identified ones (specifically for those ones which GetContact flags them as a spam, because there are many of them that are remains unidentified, oh boy), it turns out if those culprits are indeed either fake online loan promoters and fake (supposedly) technicians from one of the popular ISPs in our entire country, for this case (if I'm not mistaken, unless if I already read those popular articles related about them from various online news portals). There's not much else that I could say to them apart from the fact I still able to simply ignore them at all costs, unlike those online Instagram scams that I mentioned just earlier. So that's basically just it, I obviously DON'T accept any of those suspicious regular phone calls like so for highly obvious reasons. Which means, the only action that I'm gonna do against them is obviously blocking their phone numbers specifically using my 📱's built in contacts app (and possibly using Getcontact app too), though I'm not sure if they somehow able to call me back with a vengeance.

As for the bonus related to this short article, specifically in one of the popular online marketplaces. In the exact time where those of the aforementioned unknown scam phone calls that are now a thing in mass numbers instead of few, I received a single direct message thread from a fake (some sort of) customer service account on the direct message section where "they" claimed if my account would eventually suspended if I didn't do certain tasks which "they" specifically give to me, and "they" also sent me a random Google Drive link of an unknown file which I didn't even check it due to the fact I immediately deleted the entire direct message chat itself anyway, particularly in order to save my account from getting banned or hacked... This also reminded me to those times when I used to receive those of the SMS inbox message threads, which particularly claimed if I won IDR 500.000 (❔) from (supposedly) those of the popular marketplaces including that one where that particular unknown fake customer service itself used to exist there. They also even provided me those links that redirected to their fake Blogspot "winner" websites instead of redirected directly into their official sites from those online marketplaces, though they clearly stated if they don't do certain stuffs like so outside their official events from themselves. Those fake Blogspot websites also provided those WhatsApp numbers led to those of their following scammer syndicates, which roughly using the same scamming method like those online Instagram scams that I also mentioned earlier.

Well then, there's not much that I particularly say about this apart from the fact you MUST avoid them at all costs. If you suddenly caught those of the unknown phone call numbers especially outside WhatsApp, DO NOT call them unless if they're from the trusted source, or specifically from people that you know through your own phone app or contacts app. As always, pay FULL attention when it comes to dealing with one of these even if I already being a victim for few of those, because like majority of those scammers out there, you definitely don't want to lose your bucks over those simply for nothing.



Sunday, May 3, 2026

maintaining the legacy with my old Plants vs. Zombies toys and mini figures...

It's been a long time since I featured all of those old Plants vs. Zombies toys and mini figures that I own for years, so it's time to explain about how I maintain the legacy specifically with themselves. Since I do live in the country where it has really high humidity yet I constantly "play" with them instead of keeping them in their storage or display, resulting by how come if most of them suddenly had some wear and tear on them. Without further ado, let me explain about those figures that already suffered from the way how they withstand against it.

Before I begin, I exclude most of those Chinese mini figure sets that I also own, since they seem to survive just okay overall since I purchased them. As for the ones that they suffer from those issues apart from the fact they already accumulated quite amount of dusts on majority of them, here are my examples about them:

A. 2013 KFC Plants vs. Zombies toys (ID)

All 3 plants (such as Peashooter on Pumpkin, Cabbage-pult, and 🌻) do share their own issue where their own black eyes are easy to be erased by simply touching them any objects in the slightest touch. Because of this, I had to DIY fix one of them with the combination of the black marker and correction pen, though it obviously make the appearance of it looks slightly uglier than how it should. This also applied to the green eyebrows on the Cabbage-pult, but since I already learned the lesson with the exact same toy that I borrowed from one of my old friend's house in 2014, I have to be very careful when it comes to "playing" with it in general.

As for the 🌻, the bottom part of her stem already has some light stressing marks on it due to the way how I tried to connect her stem to the original base, since it's so loose every single time.

B. 2014 KFC Plants vs. Zombies 2 toys (ID)

All of them do seem to survive just reasonably okay, except for both of these moments that I mentioned here:

  • I lost the "🔥" disc projectile that originally came with the Snapdragon, and
  • I broke the inner workings of that iconic walkable Zombie toy since roughly a decade ago

Even with both of those aforementioned moments, but all of them still survive just like so, except with slight wear on each of them.

C. K'NEX Plants vs. Zombies

This one is possibly the weirdest one when it specifically comes to react against our country's high humidity. The fact I also "play" with most of those plant characters that I always wanted back then, they led to their weird issues which most of them couldn't able to fix them by myself. Apart from their original pieces that were loose overtime, here are more examples about the issues themselves:

  • Weird darkening issues on their own original paints, specifically occurred on certain plant characters with solid plastics like Peashooter, Snow Pea, Cabbage-pult, and Garden Warfare/Garden Warfare 2 version of Peashooter. Unfortunately, those aren't fixable unless if I have to bring each of them to the paint workshop in order to make them "bright" again.
  • Just like those of my old 2013 KFC Plants vs. Zombies toys, most of them do have their own similar issues where their own original prints are easy to be erased with the slightest touch from any objects (for example, 🌻's face, Peashooter or Snow Pea's black eyes, Bloomerang's face and his own boomerang's petal accents, 🌹's mouth [and possibly her eyes], and so on).
  • Some light stressing marks that already occurred on most of them, such as 🌻's stem, 🌹's feet, and so on.
  • Cracks on the bottom "leafy" part of my Fire Peashooter, since it clearly made using a translucent plastic, therefore it's partially hard to mount it on any of those Lego or any of those popular Chinese building block plates with ease anymore.
  • Even if I saved my Kernel 🌽 on the storage (for this case, a small jar), it strangely has some tiny bit of black spots on it's own yellow 🌽 parts (possibly some sort of mold spots, especially for his head).

Because of all of those issues, I had to DIY fix it to most of them depending on how difficult I could able to restore each of their appearance, otherwise I just simply accepted their fate (since all of them are obviously nowhere to be possible to search each of their identical replacements in case if I accidently break or lose each of them, even if they're already flawed to begin with since they produced them from an unknown factory in China).

D. Other figures...

That one cheap static Plants vs. Zombies 2 Grave Buster mini figure that I got since 2014, it has it's own issue where it suddenly separated both the top part and bottom part of it due to the fact I accidently dropped it to the floor multiple times, though it's still easy to be fixable by simply gluing both of those pieces together.


Well then, there you have it for the way how I maintain the legacy with those of my following old Plants vs. Zombies toys and mini figures that I particularly have for years. If you have your own story related to this, be sure to write your own short story in the comments section if you're able to. Anyway, that's basically it from what I could particularly say over this, and as always, thanks for reading this exact article.