Back in my day (yeah, I said it; come at me, bro) fourth grade to be precise, my at-the-time best friend was obsessed with rubber bands. I mean just actual rubber bands in plain beige-brown. I don't know why he liked them so much, but he found some kind of use for them. Other kids did, too, mostly in the form of making rubber band balls.
Toys were a lot more simple back in those days- basically it was "here's a chunk of plastic, go to town". And we did. Polly Pocket bent at the waist and that was about it. The Littlest Pet Shop was nothing more than plastic shaped and colored like a tiny animal and some more plastic accessories. We supplied the goddamned imagination.
Toys have literally gone too far these days. They've taken all of the imagination and actual brain work out of them. These things practically play with themselves. Did we really need Polly Pocket to have a million pain-in-the-ass accessories? Whatever happened to giving her an outfit and a house and letting her and her friend go on adventures in it?
Seems like toys had achieved the perfect balance between the 50's and 2007- enough color and shape and mobility to stimulate the mind, but simple enough that it encouraged us to come up with a storyline on our own. Naaah, that's way too complex now. Kids don't wanna think while they play! Here- this thing thinks for you! It plays with itself!
I know I was kinda born sort of old, but as the weeks go by, I find myself identifying more and more with my RP Partner's character, the centuries-old vampire.
Notable Link: How to Make Rosepetal Jelly
