Life's better with more friends

I spend a lot of my internet time on the blogging site, Livejournal. (If you ever want to catch me over there, my screen name is the same as here, Jordi124) So I decided I would do an interest search for 'imaginary friends' and see what kinds of communities came up.

First off I noticed a TON of Foster's interest communities were listed. That was cool, but I was looking more for groups that wanted to share stories or thoughts about their personal friends.

Though the ones I did find haven't been posted in very recently, there were a few that dealt with that topic. Here are the links if you are curious to see what other people might be publicly posting about their experiences with imaginary friends:

imagine_nation - People with Imaginary Friends

imagin_friends - Imaginary Friends Annonymous

imaginedfancies - Castles in the Air

It tells you when you do a search on Livejournal, how many days or weeks ago a journal was updated and most of these ones say a pretty long time ago. I wish they were more active communities, because then I would join one of them. But even so, just the fact that they exist means that I'm not the only one around my age who still has an imaginary friend, or who likes to remember the one they had. And even if you don't have your friend anymore it's good to be able to say that you did have one and joke around about and laugh.

-Lauren & Jake

Video!!

Oh my gosh! I found this wonderful independent film on youtube about imaginary friends. It's so sad and adorable at the same time.

It's 8 or so minutes long but I promise it's really well filmed and really cute.



I just kept hugging my Jake pillow through the whole film and saying to him, "aww I never denied my love for you!" But I think the film did do a great job of showing how some children do do things like blame their actions on their imaginary friends, or eventually cast them aside because of age or criticism from peers. I also liked how the film showed the friends devotion towards his creator although she treated him poorly, as if she still wanted him to love her when she had pushed him away.

I hope you liked that.

-Lauren & Jake

Foster's

If you've never watched Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, well then I suggest you start. Whether you had an imaginary friend growing up or not it's an amazingly entertaining show, and luckily....it's about imaginary friends! So that means I get to talk about it!

Foster's (as it's more commonly called) is shown on the Cartoon Network rather often, so it's pretty easy to catch. The show is mainly about this giant house run by a little old lady named Madame Foster and her grand daughter, Frankie, where old, unwanted imaginary friends go to stay. Other families come to the house to adopt friends for their children...who apparently aren't imaginative enough to come up with their own imaginary friends.

The main characters of the show are Mac and his friend Bloo. Bloo's full name is Blooregard Q Kazoo. Bloo lives at Foster's because Mac's parents wouldn't allow him to stay at their house anymore. But Madame Foster told Mac that if he came to visit Bloo everyday, he could stay in the mansion and no one would be allowed to adopt him.

In the picture to the left we have Coco, who can only say her name, yet everyone seems to know what she's saying. She can also lay plastic easter eggs that contain random items. Frankie, who helps take care of the house. Mr. Hariman, Madame Foster's imaginary friend from when she was little who also helps keep the house inhabitants in line. Wilt, who always apologizes for everything. Eduardo, who looks big and tough but is scared of most anything...and speaks Spanish. Then on the couch is Bloo, Madame Foster and Mac.

The show deals mostly with Bloo causing trouble and Mac chasing after him trying to fix it. Most of their hour long specials are centered more on the actual theme of creating imaginary friends or adopting friends or where the friends came from. Either way, it's a very entertaining show.

-Lauren & Jake

Imaginary Friends in the Media

I went and did a Google search for imaginary friends, and as always, one of the first items to pop up on the list was Wikipedia. Scrolling down to the bottom of the entry, I noticed a rather large list of movies and television shows where imaginary friends had either established roles or made one shot appearances.

I decided to pick and choose from the list, those that I thought would be most recognizable. Most have a standing role on the show/movie they appear in, and not so oddly enough, most tend to be cartoon characters.



Young boy, Calvin, with his imaginary friend Hobbes from the Sunday Funny, Calvin and Hobbes.


Mac (left) with his imaginary friend Blooregard Q Kazoo, more commonly known as Bloo. Both from the Cartoon Network animated series, Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends.


Jonny 2x4 with Plank, and imaginary friend who actually seems to be quite real at times. From the animated series Ed, Edd and Eddy.

The former Mr. Garrison with his imaginary puppet friend, Mr. Hat.

Tom Hanks in the movie Cast Away created an imaginary friend out of his blood smear Wilson vollyball, and aptly named it Wilson.

Snuffleupagus is the imaginary friend of Big Bird on Sesame Street. When he was first introduced, only Big Bird could see him, but later the show changed to allow all characters to be able to see Snuffy.