Life seen through a View-Master

So I'm back in the freelance-writing game after being laid off from NBC earlier in the year. My first story is. of course, something related to retro toys. I review the biography of William Gruber, who invented the View-Master, as written by his daughter, Gretchen. It's in the Seattle Review of Books.

 As I note numerous times in the review, don't expect a lot about the toy--it's a book about the inventor, not the invention. Still, he led an interesting life--and once belonged to the Nazi party, and was later investigated by the FBI for that and other pro-German leanings.

The book is "View Master: The Biography of William B. Gruber," and you can get the Kindle version for less than $5.

Yes & No Books, for ages 7-77

Oh man, did I spend a lot of boring car trips engrossed in these invisble-ink yes and no books

They're no Minecraft, kids, but we old folks had simpler tastes. Get off mah lawn.

78-year-olds, sorry, you're too old for these. YOU KNOW THE RULES. THEY'RE RIGHT THERE ON THE COVER!

Best action figure playsets

Love this so much. Did you or your friends have an action figure playset, like Castle Greyskull? Or did you just envy your cousins who did? That Muppets set is amazing!

What we wanted for Christmas in 1975

What we wanted for Christmas in 1975.

Although I don't think anyone really wanted Toughskins, that trio of plaids is hilarious.

The craze for ventriloquist dolls seemed to have died out completely. BUT LOOK! Hugo, Man of a Thousand Faces, perhaps the most popular toy in our entire book.

And really, the rest is pure awesome. CB radios! Creepy headphones that look like giant ears! Evel Knievel Stunt Kit! An Easy Bake Oven that is a Pizza Hut Pizza Oven! Guns! Corduroy!

Did you have any of these treasures?

And remember, if you're on Facebook, like us there for even more retro fun.

Real dolls

I am no doll snob -- I had Cher, the Bionic Woman, and Charlie's Angels dolls when I was a kid.

But I agree with Us Weekly -- there's something a bit off about these Kate and Pippa Middleton dolls.

Lotso

Have you seen "Toy Story 3"? The main toy villain is a pink Care Bear type bear, Lotso Huggin Bear.

Apparently Pixar went as far as to release a super realistic 1980s style commercial for Lotso. There's also a Japanese version.

Cold as ice

So I found this on the clearance rack at Marshall's and bought it for Kelly, because I loved my Easy-Bake Oven, and the little cakes were not actually half bad.

But this one cooks with ICE, not a light bulb. The mix has gelatin in it, I guess, and just like you have to put Jello in the fridge to let it set, you ice up this oven and then put the cakes in there to chill up.

And they're awful. Like melted plastic meets...I dunno, more melted plastic?

I'm gonna have to splurge for the real thing, with the light bulb, aren't I?

Doll ward

This bit from Deadspin cracked me up. You don't even wanna know how long we spent untwisting wires from Christmas toys.

Excerpt: "Speaking of Barbie dolls, every Barbie doll you buy is fastened to its box with about seven hundred very small gray wires. You'd think the doll was a fucking psych ward patient, they're so determined to hold it down. These gray wires exist in virtually all toy packaging now, and they have begun to ruin my Christmas every year. NO MORE GRAY WIRES!"

Snoopy pencil sharpener

I always wanted, but never got, the Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine.

But I did have this, the Snoopy Pencil Sharpener. Seeing it, with the doghouse with the three green areas to set pencils, takes me back!

Via Flashbacks, which has some amazing photo links!

More Twilight Barbies

More "Twilight" Barbies.

Man, eventually they're going to make dolls of even random students at Forks High School...

Although that's a pretty good rendition of Alice, I must say.

Pick Barbie's next new job!

Pick Barbie's next new job! Environmentalist! Surgeon! Architect! News anchor! Computer engineer!

I actually did not know "environmentalist" was a job.

Barbie Gaga

Barbie dolls dressed up in Lady Gaga outfits. Heh.

Dancing Dawn and her dancing friends!

Remember Dawn dolls? Here's a five-minute film, apparently prepared for sales people, showing what was new in Dawn's world for 1971.

Fancy Feet! Dancing Dawn and her dancing friends! And to absolutely no one's shock, Dawn wins the beauty pageant!

The toy we all wanted, but never got

Perpetual Kid is selling the original Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine!

Who didn't want this as a kid, at least until you found out how hard it was to actually shave down regular ice cubes?

This movie plot may be a streeeeeeeetch

You heard it here first: "Stretch Armstrong" is going to be a big-screen movie in 2011.

Yes, those dolls that trained you to be either a masseuse or a medieval torturer, that no one could resist pricking with a pen to see just what kind of sticky, cornstarchy gloop was actually inside. I always wanted to give it a real test, like tie it between two cars or something, but was never quite that bold.

I kinda think this character already hit both the small and big screen with Plastic-Man and the mom from "The Incredibles," but what do I know? I love seeing bits of my childhood resurrected and Hollywood knows it.

Meta Barbie

They're now selling a collector's Barbie with vintage images of Barbie on her dress.

That's a little too meta for me, I must say.

X-E goes to the Dollar Tree

Over at X-Entertainment, Matt's readers voted for him to spend $25 at the Dollar Tree, not agreeing with me that the weird Kool-Aid flavor would be the best readers' choice.

The results are as hilarious as always, featuring Noah's Ark figures, something called a slime egg, a weird Spider-Man eraser, and much more.

Best line: "Perhaps the shitty company that made this was trying to present the kind of food-for-thought “What If?” scenario that makes philosophers and Uatu run in circles. What if Noah was completely retarded and embarked on his God-given journey with only these tools? What type of new society could be forged from the fruits of Noah, his wife, one sheep and a four-day supply of carrots?"

Runner-up best line: "I’m confident that I could recreate Trader Vic’s on the strength of Dollar Tree’s luau aisle alone, and being confident makes me feel taller."

Funniest Barbie Doll ever

Based on Starlet O'Hara, from "Went With the Wind," the Carol Burnett show parody.

"Ah just saw it in the window, and couldn't resist."

(Link via Brad.)

Over hill and highway the Banana Buggies go

"The Banana Splits," a goofy animal rock band-cartoon showing program from my childhood (Hanna-Barbera + Sid and Marty Kroftt = COMEDY GOLD!), is being rerun on Boomerang.

We tape them for Miss Kelly, since we trust it not to be violent or scary, and she loves the theme song. ("Tra la la ... la la la la...") No one should be surprised that Rob's and my daughter is already a fan of a retro show.

As anyone who's seen it knows, the Banana Splits drive around in Banana Buggies ("Mystery Science" had a great line about this when one of the vehicles showed up in an episode), and here's an old Banana Buggies model kit. AWESOME.

View-Master rules

Matt at Scrubbles shared this old View-Master ad, which features the most all-star cast of its day: Henry Fonda! Jodie Foster! Christopher "Peter Brady" Knight!