// thoughts

Arvin and I were just talking and remembering the past when we were kids and all the toys and thing we'd do back then!

How we miss all those toys and those times where sky's the limit on what we could do. Just get together and play and do whatever you wanted to do in our own little worlds.

Matchbox Cars
Remember matchbox cars and how we'd crash them into each other! Or how we would make them DRIFT because it looked so cool. Then they came out with those matchbox cars that had the caps in it so when you crash them into each other smoke and that small "bang" goes off, how awesome is that. Every weekend I would get one new car - go to the mall with my parents and were in KayB toys. Would ask my mom if she could buy me a toy and she'd tell me only $1.00 and I'd go run to the matchbox rack and pick out a new car for me to drive...if only they had an audi a4 back in the day!

GI Joes
No I'm not talking about the crappy life size, 30 foot dolls they have now! I'm talking about the plastic, movable, 3 inch toys! Straight from the show with all the accessories and the vehicles. Oh man, the wars between Cobra and GI Joe were on a daily basis! GI Joe had their base made out of a red/white/blue shoe box that I had - all that was needed was to cut out holes for a door, a few windows and stick a couple of guns on it, draw on it if you want and GI Joe had a home to defend! My favorite of GI Joes were Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow - only had Snake Eyes but never got Storm Shadow. I loved the ones that had accessories! One of them had a rope where it had a grappling hook at the end and I would make him slide from the TV to my bed. O o O o ! The vehicles! The best one I had was the F-16 jet that Ace had. Santa gave that to me for Christmas once and it was the most awesomeness gift ever! That thing was huge and whenever I just wanted to end the fight with Cobra, I'd call in Ace and make him land his jet right on top of the enemies! There was even this one time where I skinned the head of the Baranes (spelling?) and left her bald! YOoooo JoE!!!!

Parachute Men
These where cheap little toys of plastic men with plastic parachutes, but there were off the hook! You just throw them up in the air and then watch them come down slowly as a real parachuter would. For some strange reason I happened to always, always lose them! Sometimes Mr. Parachute Man would make his way to GI Joe headquarters to try and save the day.

Motorcycles with the stick
Have no clue what they were called but it was a plastic motor cycle and when you pulled this stick that was lodged in the back tire, it would just speed off! Those were just amazing, simple toys but awesome toys. These I would always lose as well!

Marbles
My sister from Philippines had sent me a whole buncha marbles and I played with them a few times. After watching Duck Tales with the episode that had the "Great Masher" in it, I had to go find one! So during a field trip in school, in the gift shop of where ever it was we went, I found one! I got it and it was over. Played marbles with my friends and I kicked their butt! They couldn't hang with the Great Masher! But then they didn't want to play anymore because they would never win.

Ahhh so many toys but these were just a few off the top of my head, how fun it was to play with the simple toys of yesterday. We didn't need a computer, we didn't even need electricity! We used our imaginations, we used our hands, we would make these plastic toys come to life. I wish I would kept all these toys...

+ mon

Man once you say that you know you're old! I was just on the subway and thinking about how Christmas used to be when I was a kid - it was freakin' awesome!

We'd be in our apartment, sometimes relatives, friends and neighbors come over and I'd hang out with my friends and play with them. Remember that word - play.

"Hey watcha doing today?" "I'm playing..."
"Come over to my house and we'll play..."

Ahhhh sooooo innocent and not a care in the world back then. We'd sit there for hours eating and playing Sega, Nintendo, with our GI Joes, Transformers, Lego, Lincoln Logs, draw something, or just play some made up game that came off the top of our heads.

Then we'd count the minutes until midnight to open our gifts! Usually I'd ask for a video game or a video came console every year. It started out with Atari 7800, then Sega Master System, then Sega Genesis. I would get games for Christmas and play them until there was no tomorrow. I even remember a few times where I would open my gift, since I already knew what it was and asked permission to open it, and play it a few times then put it back in it's wrapper so I have something to "open" on Christmas. After I would open it, I'd just sit there for hours and hours just playing!

It was the best when I was younger, no school for a week or two and I'd just be playing that whole time, either with my new video game or with my friends. Then I'd go to sleep and when I wake up Santa left me a gift that I've been asking for or a totally other gift which made Christmas morning even better.

Ahhhh how great it was to be a kid! Now it's about the shopping, eating, drinking and worrying about last minute gifts that I haven't bought yet. Fun times but I so wish I were a kid again, no worries, no cares, just playing.

+ mon