Dave’s Cool Toys Blog

Archive for the ‘Fun Stuff’ Category

This exellent Lego dragon not only looks cool, he breathes fire!

I’m not sure what sets the Lego came from to create this. Maybe this one?

Via Gizmodo

“Escaped” tiger lounging in a field

Police in Hampshire, England were mobilized when a member of the public spotted a tiger in a field through a his camera’s telephoto lens. The tiger didn’t seem too upset. He was just lying in a field.

Police investigated and contacted a local zoo for advice on how to handle the situation. After advising the officers, the zoo prepared a team of staff members trained for just such a situation, armed them with tranquilizer darts, and got ready to travel to the scene.

The nearby Country Golf Club was cleared of golfers and a local cricket game was suspended while police boarded a helicopter and flew to the scene to assess the situation.

But when they flew over the area, the tiger was blown over by the helicopter downdraft.

	Hanging with police after the incident

It turns out it was just a plush toy. Police are now treating the incident as missing property and are investigating whether it was a hoax or just a lost toy.

The tiger looks to me to be the Melissa & Doug White Tiger Plush, which lists for $79.99. In fact, it’s almost a perfect match, down to the stripes on his tail. Not the kind of thing most people would accidentally leave lying around, which would lead me to believe it was probably a hoax.

I suppose it’s a testament to the realism of the plush tiger. It fooled police for about 1/2 hour.

Via BBC

This video is too funny. The kids in it are great too.

Via Gizmodo

Radio Flyer Grow "N" Go Bike

Right now Amazon has savings of up to 45% on select Radio Flyer ride-on vehicles.

While the sale says "up to 45%", savings I saw ranged between 20% to 51%. The bike shown here is 42% off.

It’s not a huge selection, and the classic red wagon
is not included in this sale, but it’s the perfect time of year for this type of item and there are some great savings.

In addition, the items ship with FREE Super Saver Shipping and Prime Shipping (check the Details at Amazon).

Google is celebrating Roger Hargreaves and Mr Men and Little Misses books
with an assortment of Google logos today to celebrate his birthday.

I’m sorry to say I’m not familiar with Roger Hargreaves, so I’ll have to check out his books the next time I’m at the Library. They seem to have been very popular in Britain, so I’m not certain how widespread they are in the U.S. There have been four animated TV series of his stories in Britain in 2008 and 2009.

He first drew the characters when his Son, Adam asked him what a tickle looked like. After Mr. Hargreaves death in 1988, his son continued writing and drawing the books until his wife sold the rights to Chorion entertainment group.

An animated move is in the works for release in 2014.

To see all the versions of the logo, go to Google and hit refresh to get a new version.

It’s Easter! And that leads us to wonder what happens when you place a Cadbury Creme Egg
in a vacuum? Check out this video for the answer to that burning question and more.

Via Gizmodo

Check out this amazing video of a xylophone constructed in the woods to promote the Touch Wood cell phone.

It’s supposedly entirely real with no tricks. I would think the timing would be better if it was done with any kind of CGI. But there may be a few camera cuts.

Anyway, it’s amazing to watch. Enjoy!

The only known suviving original Monopoly board

Earlier this year (or possibly late December, 2010, I’m not really sure) the oldest known Monopoly board sold at a Sotheby’s auction for £90,000, which converts to about $146,000. The Strong National Museum of Play was the high bidder for the board and it will go on display at the museum in Rochester, New York.

This board is the only known surviving example of around 5,000 that were hand-crafted by the games "inventor", Charles Darrow. It is circular rather than the familiar square board and it’s hand-drawn on oilcloth. Darrow drew the properties and his wife and son colored in the spaces.

There is some controversy over the origins of the game. It is certainly known that the game is based on a game created by Elizabeth Magie in 1903 called The Landlord’s Game which was more of a political statement rather than a game. She wanted to draw attention to the way in which rents enriched property owners and impoverished tenants. At least one version of The Landlord’s game is known to exist, which would pre-date the Monopoly board that just sold.

After Lizzie Magie invented the game it was used by various professors for instructional purposes and became popular with Quakers (who eliminated the auction rule because they didn’t believe in it). The streets were mostly around the city of Chicago at that time.

	A closeup view of the original board

In the 1920’s the game was apparently popular in Reading Pennsylvania, mostly through fraternities at Williams College.

Ruth Hoskins became aware of the game in Indianapolis and took it back to Atlantic city, where it took on the Atlantic City street names. This version was taught to Charles Todd, who taught Esther Darrow, the wife of Charles Darrow who then began to distribute the game as "Monopoly" with the hand-drawn boards which were reportedly the exact size of his dining room table. (Whew!)

Sign at the real Marven Gardens

You may know that the streets on the Monopoly Board are all in Atlantic City, but did you know that one of them, Marvin Gardens, is both not actually in Atlantic City and is misspelled? The actual location, Marven Gardens, is a housing area in Margate City New Jersey and is said to be a combination of Margate City and Ventnor City due to it’s location between them. Charles Darrow made the original mistake of misspelling it on his circular boards and it has never been corrected.

The history of Monopoly is as complicated as the game itself. The issues surrounding the origination of the game led to various law suits which were not finally settled until 1985 a change in the trademark laws, lobbied by Parker Brothers, allowed them to again claim ownership of the trademark name "Monopoly".

Like Futurama? Here’s the “Fabled” lost invention of Leonardo Da Vinci. In actuality, the outer shell is the design for Da Vinci’s armored car.

Alex is making his own shaped rubber band bracelet (ala Silly Bandz) with Shapelets. Just put the pegs onto the board around the blank rubber band, bake for five minutes, and the band holds the shape!

(Watch for these at Dave’s Cool Toys in the near future!)

Alex tries out lassoing at Toy Fair

I just shook Thing’s hand from the Adams Family movies. It was attached to Christopher Hart, the actor who played him!

Im not sure what this robot does that we saw at toy fair. I think he plays ping pong. He sure was cool.

Found out that he does indeed play ping-pong, but they were having trouble with the video that apparently controls him, so he wasn’t working today. Bummer.

Thomas Casey, an inventor has created an interesting amusement park ride which he calls the Rings of Saturn. It’s something of a mashup of a merry-go-round and Ferris wheel. He claims to have patented the ride, but I was unable to locate a patent in his name or one for anything similar and the document he displays in his video does not show any specifics.

His ride is insane. The mechanism would be huge and massive. It would have to be suspended very high in the air to clear the ground. I’m not sure how you would load the inner circle of riders. And the ride doesn’t seem all that much more exciting than simpler, current rides that are in actual operation. In addition, when you watch the ride run, some seats don’t really move much at all, while other are whipping around at ridiculous speeds. The folks at the axis of the outer ring barely move at all, just flipping over every half-turn. Hopefully the full-size version will run more smoothly than the model, which seems to get a little crazy every half-turn.

But, it certainly seems like he spent quite a bit of time and money on his model and idea. I think he has more of a future as a model builder than a ride inventor.

I’m a little surprised that he doesn’t seem to have a website and his listed email is fairly generic (I sent him an email, but received no reply).

It would certainly be fun to watch it run. I’m just not sure I’d ride it.

Would you ride this thing? Do you think we’ll see it an amusement park anytime soon?

	Snowman’s journey

Some guys at Panasonic who call themselves SPARKS got a message on their facebook page from a girl in Bahrain named Amna who’s brother, Saleh had never seen snow. They happened to have new super-insulating panels at their disposal called U-VACUA. So what did they do?

They started in Japan, made a snowman cast out of Styrofoam, filled the Styrofoam mold with snow, covered all 6 sides with U-VACUA, placed the box in a wooden crate and sent it from Japan to Bahrain.

But before the actual trip, they did a test of their idea in the closest thing they could find to the desert… A sauna. They used shaved ice, made a little snowman, packed it in the U-VACUA, and left him in the sauna for 24 hours. When they took him out, he was still frozen. Success! Now they’re ready for the real trip.

So they went out to the real snow, loaded up their form with about 67 L of snow, sealed up the snowman in the U-VACUA and sent him on his 40 hour journey to Bahrain.

What is U-VACUA?

U-VACUA is a glass fibrous core sealed inside a plastic-Metal foil which has then had all the air sucked out of it. This creates insulation that is 20 times more than polyurethane foam. They use it for refrigerators, thermal pots, cooler boxes and attic insulation.

Did the snowman survive his 5,314 mile journey? Did Saleh get to experience snow?

Yes, of course he survived. If not, I probably wouldn’t be writing this post about the adventure.

Check out the video below of the adventure and the excited Bahrainian kids when they arrived with their snowman.

Via Gizmodo