About Me

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No Fixed Abode, Home Counties, United Kingdom
I’m a 60-year-old Aspergic gardening CAD-Monkey. Sardonic, cynical and with the political leanings of a social reformer, I’m also a toy and model figure collector, particularly interested in the history of plastics and plastic toys. Other interests are history, current affairs, modern art, and architecture, gardening and natural history. I love plain chocolate, fireworks and trees, but I don’t hug them, I do hug kittens. I hate ignorance, when it can be avoided, so I hate the 'educational' establishment and pity the millions they’ve failed with teaching-to-test and rote 'learning' and I hate the short-sighted stupidity of the entire ruling/industrial elite, with their planet destroying fascism and added “buy-one-get-one-free”. Likewise, I also have no time for fools and little time for the false crap we're all supposed to pretend we haven't noticed, or the games we're supposed to play. I will 'bite the hand that feeds', to remind it why it feeds.
Showing posts with label TJ - TK Maxx. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TJ - TK Maxx. Show all posts

Saturday, November 29, 2025

R is for Retro Kitsch

The theme we've been revisiting all year, in fact the initial post was last autumn, so it's been over a year! NASA-type astronauts of a cartoony design with rockets of a retro, playroom wallpaper style! TKmaxx seasonal shelfies, I took these weeks ago, and I think they're all sold out now, not something I'd give house-room to, but a fun addition to the trend.
 

Delivering gifts!
 
Scraping the inside of the glass dome!
 

Regolithball fight!
 
I hope they haven't sold-out of these, as I would hope my fellow Brit's have more class, sense, taste and decency, than to spend a tenner on this shite, but I know I'm deluding myself, and Tanyachelle from Essex has already put them on the fridge! Nasty.

Tuesday, November 25, 2025

A is for Are You Kidding Me!

Well, sometimes it doesn't rain, but it pours, however, if it pours sunshine, who are we to complain! I managed back in the summer to drop the box with the new addition baubles, when I opened the storage unit's 'blast doors' one day, only one bauble broke, but it was the astronaut from TKMaxx, and given the lengths I'd gone to, last year, to find a second one for a friend, a bit galling!
 
So, I've been going into the store every few days, hoping another will turn-up, as one eventually did last year, and they tend to run decorations for several seasons, or until they've all sold, and while that was one reason I caught the second robot the other day, damn me, if they didn't have a set of three this afternoon, which definitely weren't there on Sunday, when I popped-in before closing.
 
 They also had a new set of mini ones, which we'll look at later, but - three more robots!
 
 
Slightly demented, if not, full-on sinister grins, created by the hint of teeth picked-out in flat white paint, but that may just be cynical me, are they grinning happily, in your more-balanced universe? I have a feeling these are old stock (which holds out hope for a replacement astronaut before the big day), as I think I may have rejected them at a higher price a few years ago?
 
But these work-out at less than two-quid each, with one in traditional shiny gloss, a matted, muted one and a kind of stained-glass window one, covered in colour-matched glitter! It's the same moulding for all three, mirroring the second trio, from Homebase we looked at here . . . 
 
 
. . . but in glass, not plastic, like those Homebase ones. Homebase are now owned by The Range, who have had nothing like these this year. Together with the original resin (too heavy for the tree) trio . . . 
 
 
. . . and the other three found this year . . .
 
 
. . . means there are twelve now, too many for the tree, which already has bears, birds, hedgehogs, musical instruments, and soldiers, among a plethora of other things and themes! With another shelfied in Maxx a year or two ago, and a trio from Habitat in the press, years ago, it's a theme which could run, and run! I have to admit it, I'm now, also, a bauble collector! Is there a BCA - Bauble Collectors Anonymous?

Saturday, November 8, 2025

W is for ♪♪♫ We . . . Are . . . The Robots! ♪♫♪

Last year it was spacemen, the year before hedgehogs, other years have had a soldier theme, and bears are perennial, this year I've had some more success with hedgehogs, but also these fellahs all came in over the last ten days or so!
 
I found this chap in Home Sense (the TKMaxx furnishings offshoot) the other day, and thought "Well, if they haven't got any spacemen, you're coming home with me, mate", not intending for it to start anything in particular, but maybe feature in a post on mixed Crimbo Dec's.
 
But then the actual TKMaxx on the other side of the car-park had a few of these yesterday, so I thought "I'm sure I got one in TK the other day, but I'm also sure it wasn't pink?" and took a punt on it, pretty sure it was different, and it was! Well, the game was afoot, Watson! . . . 
 
. . . And I got this one, this afternoon in the big M&S down at the Meadows in Camberley, it seemed to be the only one left, but there were still two, in their pink display tree! He's got a helmet on, so clearly needs some special atmosphere! And with five or six shopping weeks to go, before the big day, I'll have my eyes peeled for additional bauble-bots!

Saturday, October 25, 2025

F is for Follow-ups - Recent Posts

A few 'matters arising', as it were; things to add to recent posts, which have come-in or been found since I posted the original stuff!
 
Power Rangers
 
 

I had the commercial art/shot in Picasa all along! And this white chap, who would seem to be a knock-off, came in some mixed lot and was shot separately by me, back in 2010, and I'm not sure where he is now, as he wasn't in the over-view post a few years ago?
 
True Legends - Mythical Warriors
 
 
Brian Berke sent this shot of his 'Goodly Hero' as they tend to be called on the gaming table, all painted-up, and fighting a mini-Godzilla from the Wicked Duels / SCS Direct sets, also painted.
 
White Ghosts
 
 

Confirmation of this year's trend for short, fat, funny-faced ghosts, with an odd plate and bottle-stoppers shelfied in TKMaxx, and some 'Illooms' or illuminated-balloons from B&M, and it's not ghosts per se, they've been a feature of Halloween stuff since before I was aware the event, it's this half-opened shroom-head design, which is so strong at the moment!
 
Rado Industries / Ri-Toys Centurion 
 
Purely a confirmation shot, tying the tank into Ri-Toys sets, where it did stirling service as a British, American and German WWII AFV!
 
Noddy
 
Mentioned in passing a couple of times recently, figures in one's or two's, this is a partial set of what I suspect is over 18, maybe 20-plus figures, and which I think are Marx? But were they a Swansea 'Kins' thing, or contract manufactured for someone else? I have a PC Plod somewhere, and the damaged Skittle, plus a couple of others I think?
 
Marx . . . check, Noddy . . . check!
 
https://projectswordtoys.blogspot.com/2025/10/weve-found-noddy.html 
 
How desperate is he? And he didn't "pick it up", it was relisted on eBay the other day! 
 
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/277455102102
 
So he's lying, to copy me, and scrape doll shite, off of evilBay without any apparent context, why? How threatened is he feeling? It's almost more fun than annoyance now! What an idiot! he also managed to check-off the unknown Power Ranger knock-off above, with some Mexican Luchador he knew nothing about, so when it's not faux ignorance (what do you think readers?), it's actual ignorance! And he did skulls the day after me, it's faintly tragic!

Friday, October 24, 2025

J is for Jurassic Busy Book

A return to Phidal, there's been a big restocking in TKMaxx for Christmas, and while most of them are sets we've seen already, or sets I'm not interested in, this seems to be new, except it's dated 2022, but isn't the one we looked at here, which was dated 2021 anyway! Although with the same 'Phidal' bases, they will go together well.
 
 Cover.
 
Contents.
 
Tyrannosaurus Rex - Giganotosaurus 

Velociraptor - Atrociraptor (best dinosaur name ever!)
 
Allosaurus - Dilophosaurus

Dimetrodon - Parasaurolophus

Therizinosaurus - Pyroraptor 

All from the other side.

Two of these play-mat scenes (top right and bottom left) might make useful background sheets for future photography, but due to the polymer lamination of these sheets, it'll require careful ironing at low temperatures to get all the folds out, but I have hung on to them for now.

H is for Hoarded Hord of Halloween Horrors

Except none of them are remotely horrible, nor in any way horror inducing, which makes them all the more acceptable as fun figures/items you might use in gaming, or just chuck in the collection as box-ticking completers!
 
Indeed, if you want to hear something horribly frightening, or frighteningly horrible - I saw my first Christmas-lit house on Wednesday night, it's still October! And that's not including those few in our region, who have given-up taking their shite down every year, and just display a mawkish, illuminated-idea of a fantasy fairy-dell, 24-7-365!
 
I think we saw these a year or two ago, but I'm not sure if they went to eight colours last time? In The Works, and the only Halloween-related thing, of a figural nature I found there, worth a penny!
 

I shot these in Sainsbury's, but didn't buy them, as we did a whole bunch of these sets a few years ago, with various posts and comparisons between the contents, the differences between similar items, like the millipedes and such like, and I suspect these are re-issues of some of those, and I don't need them in the collection, nor the vast numbers in the bag, but I guess, for party 'scatter', they are good value. Credited here to a Rayland International.

But I did purchase this chap, about 6", so the top-end of the collection's range, and not very animated, he's a box ticker! The amount of safety information on the little card, for a single-piece moulding the length of a pencil-case ruler is daft, but that’s the times we live in!
 
TKMaxx gave-up this little gem of an eraser set, the ghost doesn't stand up, and could use a cotton-thread to hang him off something! In the Japanese, Iwako style, with multi-parts and ethylene inserts for eyes etc.
 
These are new, seen in The Range and too big a hole, for pencils, I wondered at the point of them, until I saw the boxes of glass straws! A sensible attempt to end the plastic straw problem, and invent a whole new genre of 'topper' at the same time.
 
The straws had year-round packaging, so I didn't shoot it - bad-enough I talked myself into buying straws I'd never use! - I thought, although I've since used one to get the juice out of the bottom of one of those prepared fruit-salads with separate compartments, so useful after-all, and luckily they also come with a useful straw-washing brush!
 
Also in The Range; figural 'pop-a-point' stacking coloured pencils, we saw a similar set earlier in the year, and there were others which were too big and or cartoony for the collection (similar in TKMaxx too), but these were figural fun in the smaller scale, or at least the ghosts are - box ticked!
 

Brian Berke sent these from New York, and they are definitely fun items from Forum Novelties, being those semi-sticky wall or window walkers, that jerkily shudder down flat surfaces!
 
I'd normally crop these sorts of images closer, but you can see pumpkin shaped treat-collection jars to their left, which are also quite fun, I've seen similar (in B&M I think?) but didn't shoot them.
 
I thought these were the same as the first item in the post, but bought them for the packaging variation, and the possibility there were colour variances too, only to find they were larger, but slightly less well-sculpted skeletons, in the style of, but all new mouldings. I guess the brand is Tell-a-Tale, but it's not clear, and I think I found them in a garden centre?

Sunday, October 12, 2025

M is for More Stationary

Picked these up the other day, planets in The Range, and the cacti in TKMaxx, actually looking for Halloween or Christmas stuff, drew a bit of a blank on those, but these were worth a punt, given previous things seen here!
 

Tinc again, on the small ones, the larger are an unbranded generic, and I'm beginning to think the originals of these must have been Iwako, just because of the number of other items pirated from them, and the number of these cacti I've seen, we saw two lots a few years ago, one lot I cut-up and 'painted' with marker pens, to make Wild West scenery, the other set I may have only shelfied, but these two sets, in different sizes, were in TKMaxx on red-tickets the other day, so it was a no-brainer, as the expression is, these days!
 
While The Range was carrying these (CDS Group), and they were nearly out, in two stores, so I must have just missed them on previous visits, they are in remarkably subdued or nondescript packaging, so that's plausible, and because the carrying cartons were nearly empty, I don't know if there were more than the two designs seen here, an Earth-like planet and a Saturn like ringed-world.
 
But it's what's at the core of these planets that got me purchasing them, not giant diamonds, boring! But, a shuttle-craft and an astronaut! Which, judging by the wooden-pick in the shots (which looks slightly longer than the one supplied on the packs?) are about 25/35mm, and eminently suitable for joining the stash!

Wednesday, October 8, 2025

W is for Wax Wildlife!

Wax novelty-shaped crayons, a staple of Kinder for many years, but other people do do them, from time to time, and these were picked-up in The Range and TKMaxx, months apart, but they were figural, so . . . Small Scale World's latest wax wildlife!
 

Not very gummi-bear'ish, their arms and legs are too 'formed', and they have proper faces! Pretty sure these NPW were in The Range, back in April, but I'm not as sure now, as I was a few minutes ago, and they may have been TKMaxx clearance?
 
These (Rex London) were definitely in TKMaxx, last weekend!
Gotta' get your ducks in a row!

Monday, October 6, 2025

S is for Season's Shelfie Summery

Recently shot shelfies, nothing exceptional, just a few things shot over the spring/summer, which either missed other shelfie posts, or have only been taken recently, and typically after a couple of weeks of behaving itself, Blogger just unloaded them in reverse-order, so the less interesting ones are at the end now!
 
Shot in Poundland about a week ago, as with all similar shots, it's against future ID's, although they look familiar, and are probably under several brands already going back a decade or so, here 'Gear Box' with a Maisto/Jada style 'die-cast' cartouche!
 
I don't think I've had the Peppa Pig 'Busy Book' from Phidal here yet, but knowing these Tattle Tales are only half a set or less, I wasn't about to start now. Interestingly, I think this was in Morrisons, up at Elvetham Heath, near the DVD's!
 
The Works, thematic Lucky Bags, I did get a test purchase, which will get a post, but it was disappointing, as these things always are these days, human progress disappeared in a miasma of disinterest and rip-offery, years ago!
 

Currently, or still (I shot this in April) in B&M, and again, it's to ID insects in mixed lots years form now, and not something which came home with me, although, it's nice to see old favourites like fake poo, whoopee-cushions and snapping-gum are still of interest to modern kids!
 
Also April, TKMaxx, and it's a bunch of hares and rabbits (arbitrary ear-length!) in ceramic, got shot in passing, and should have been in one of the Easter posts, really!
 




The rest, all figurals, were shot with the cats we saw the other day, all in TKMaxx, all in the catering section, with bag-clips, bag-ties, tea-diffusers, a banana-tree and a fun potato-peeler!