Category Archives: Toys

Ducktanic

When I was in Singapore this past weekend, I thought about flying on to Australia.  It’s only a seven-hour flight.

This guy made that voyage by water…in the opposite direction.

world's largest rubber duck

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rubber Duck, a ginormous piece of conceptual art by Florentijin Hofman, was last spied bobbing about in Sydney’s Darling Harbor. Today the inflatable duck, which measures 46 feet tall and 55 feet long, arrived in Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong for a month’s stay with a little help from a much smaller tug boat.

Let’s call it a Duck Boat — it’s earned it!

Checking it twice

sock monkey calendarExhibit A: 2013 Sock Monkey Calendar

Purchased December 30, 2012.  Brand new.  Twelve month-themed sock monkey images contained within imaginative and in excellent condition.

Fun year ahead — check.

 

Rory Sock MonkeyExhibit B:  Rory with Sock Monkey

Given to Rory on Christmas Eve 2012.  Brand new.  Ball on Santa hat chewed off within moments of gifting.

Hat destroyed — check.

Relationship with sock monkey secured — double check.

Face facts

I saw Snuffles twin at Rockefeller Center today.

Well, perhaps ancestor is the better word.

 

 

 

 

 

That’s Snuffles on the left — on the right, the brand spanking new version from Gund. I saw a little girl carrying him in a shopping bag near the ice rink. She had ‘adopted’ him from the Central Park Zoo.

What a difference two decades can make.

The newer version is obviously fluffier and puffier and whiter, his ears a bit perkier, his eyes shiny and direct.  But his mouth is stitched down flat, whereas my Snuffles smile is a moveable thread…so he can smile, frown, smirk, pout — whatever he’s feeling that day.

I mean, look at that face — so expressive.

But I’m sure after ten years or so, that new Gund bear will start showing some personality, too.

Paper cut

Is this a simple cardboard box….

…or a Hall of Famer?

It’s both.

The cardboard box earned a spot in the Toy Hall of Fame in 2005 — a recognition of the ‘gateway to the imagination’ it provides to children everywhere.

Who can argue with that?

But I have to feel sorry for the toys — real toys, that is — that didn’t made the cut, and have to face the fact that a paper box beat them out.  And if that isn’t enough salt in the wound…

Cardboard was invented in China.

Eightfold

So I’ve been thinking a lot about the number 8.

It’s taken on a near mystical quality this week — for an obvious reason — for Kentucky Wildcat fans.

But as digits go, it was already pretty cool.

Turn it on its side, and you’ve got an infinity symbol.  It’s the figure in figure skating.  And a few figure eight turns of a rope and you’ll got yourself a decent cinch.

But this week, it’s a magic number for me.  And I want to share that feeling with the world.

So, here you go.

The Magic Eight Ball

Go ahead — ask it anything.

You can thank me later.

 

 

 

Royal flush

There’s Team Edward and Team Jacob. But in the doll making game…

It’s Team William all the way.

Mattel has released a Barbie and Ken version of William and Kate to commemorate their upcoming one-year wedding anniversary.

As you can see, they have given William a full head of hair — something he doesn’t possess in real life — and strengthened his jawline. And although Kate looks a bit like every Barbie I’ve seen, she’s pretty and her gown is spot-on.

No doll marker would risk offending the royal family.

That clearly wasn’t a concern for the Mattel designer selected to create the dolls that recreate the wedding of Bella and Edward in Twilight Breaking Dawn.

I’m guessing he isn’t a fan of the saga.  And Edward in particular.

His doll’s face is flat and fat, and his hair looks like an old lady’s wig.  I know the white makeup isn’t flatteringly on anyone in the movies, but it eliminates all detail here.

In the words of my friend Tina…

Barf.

A doll’s life

Barbie…a hoarder???


That’s no dream kitchen, sister…

It’s a nightmare.

It kept Carrie M. Becker up at night.  So the St. Louis native, photographer and sculptor created “Barbie Trashes Her Dreamhouse,” a photographic exhibition at the Riney Museum of Fine Art at Friends University in Wichita, Kansas.

I love the idea of Barbie as a hoarder.

The girl is so perfect in every other way; you just know she has to act out somehow.  What better way than trashing that powder puff pink nightmare of a townhouse?

Which begs the question…

What is Ken’s secret?

Toys gone wild

I’ve heard of baby dolls that go potty…

…but dolls with potty mouths?

Some customers are demanding Toys R Us pull the “You & Me Interactive Play & Giggle Triplet Dolls” from their shelves because one of the dolls says “you crazy bitch.”

Triplet’s got ‘tude.

The dolls are sold exclusively at Toys R Us and are intended for children 2 years and up.  The store says the complaints have been scattered and they will stand behind the product.

Listen for yourself.

Personally?  I think the doll did it.  And I think parents are crazy not to want to keep it around.

Your kids start cursing?  You would never talk that way in front of them.  Must be that darn baby doll the children wanted so badly.

Not your fault.  Nope, you’re good parents.

Sticky treat


This is the third one we’ve celebrated together since I launched The Sticky Egg, so I think we know each other well enough to go trick-or-treatin.’

Here’s the trick:

The Egg has its own Facebook page now. Perhaps you’ve noticed the over-sized “Like” button at the upper right corner of the page.

Subtle, I know.

But The Egg needs your “Like’s” to make the page legit.  And I appreciate your support, if the feeling moves you.

In fact, in the true spirit of Halloween, I’m giving treats — actual sticky eggs, the toy everyone’s talking about — to 100 lucky “Likers” chosen at random.

(Hope I get that many.)

So speed right over to my Facebook page and do your thing.  I’ll message the winners for mailing details.

They are sticky, icky fun — just like Halloween!

Goo goo

What the flarp?

No, seriously — do you know what ‘flarp’ is?

I encountered this word yesterday for the very first time in an article online.  Thanks to the all-knowing, all-seeing Google, I soon learned that flarp is a liquid-like goo that makes a fart noise when you stick your hand in it.

Brilliant.

Flarp no doubt has a lot of admirers amongst the pre-teen set.  But what makes flarp rise above the farts it attempts to mimic is it smells good.  In fact, it comes in no less than six fruity aromas — orange, lemon, banana, strawberry, pineapple and grape.

You can see how that would beat the real thing every time.

Obviously, flarp entered the scene long after my childhood had passed.  When I was a kid, we were all about Silly Putty.  Silly Putty didn’t make any noise to speak of, and it came in only one color/smell combo — putty grey.

You could copy newspaper print and comics with Silly Putty.  Remember newspapers?  That stuff we used to read before the Internet?

You’re using your flarp right now to make fun of me…aren’t you?

Pfffttt!