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.

Tuesday, October 7, 2025

H is for Hell, it's Halloween!

Or it will be soon, and while I haven't found much, I thought I'd post before the 31st this year, instead of saving it all 'till the 'The Day', it's not the same as ITLAPD, and if you do happen to like the look of anything, you need the time to go and find it! These were all sent to the Blog by its roving reporter in New York, Brian Berke, and then there’s a big, fat apology at the end!
 

Brian reported he didn't find much to interest figure collectors, and neither have I this year, but there are a few bits for another post, and I may raid the internet images for something, but one thing I had seen, but not shelfied, was some of these, and very Warhol'ian 'pop eating itself' are Christmas nutcrackers, transmogrified for Halloween! Shot in a store called Ollie's?
 


Bats! Safe now, Ozzy will be flying with them, this year! Note the gold ones have lost a lot of glitter in transit, from rubbing, I guess? I found the same thing with that 'sugared' Gummi Bear, Christmas-tree bauble, last year (or the year before?), in several baskets of them, spread around the sales area, it was hard to find one without bald-patches, a little more glue, or a shorter time between glue and dipping in the glitter/beads would solve the problem! Dollar Tree, now!
 
While I owe Brian a big, fat apology for this one! He sent it in 2018, and somehow it got lost in Picasa? Scully and Scully who don't always do Halloween like they do Easter (or Christmas, but Easter seems to be their biggie?), and, in my defence, I think that was the year they did all the blown-glass stuff, some of which was published at the time, some went in a sea-life round-up, and one or two (frog?) may still be waiting to be added, to something more thematic?
 
But Scully and Scully are a favourite, and I think the autumnal tree is particularly stunning! Cheers Brian!

D is for Discounted Dino's!

A quickie now, a bag of dinosaurs I got from a charity shop a few months ago - the trouble with having had two months away from the blog this year, is that everything is 'a few months ago'! But it was a better than usual bag, with three Schliech and several other nice examples.
 

The three Schleich's first; a stunning Brachiosaurus, a Triceratops and a kerthunkersaur called Salchania, all dated 2002 or '02, and among Schliech's earlier models, certainly a cut-above your average Hong Kong models of the time, but they have helped raise the bar, with some modern dinosaurs from China, just as good as the Schleich/Papo world!
 

A chunky-monkey from China, Dimetrodon, usually my favourite, but I'm not keen on the frayed, goldfish fin edges to his, or her sail! Most modellers, over many years, have given them stretched skin, like bats wings or the web between a human thumb-forefinger?
 
The Jaru and others (?) reissue of an old Holly sculpt on the left, and an actual Holly Pterosaur on the right.
 
"Slava Ukraine!", says . . . err . . . Bi-ceretops! A better quality, modern Chinese dinosaur from Happy Kin Toys, depicting a Nedoceratops, which had been called Diceratops until someone realised there were also wasps with the same name!
 
Based on a single skull found in Wyoming . . . it may not exist!
 
 
Compared to the Schleich.
 "Why habben'd you god a lumb on your dose?"
 
More traditional fayre, from China, and above average, but more in tune with older Hong Kong stuff, there has been an attempt at overwashing/overspraying a bit of realism! Fiver the bag, gives the ten a 50p retail cost, per animal, which is how I like to get these larger models!

M is for May's Visit - Civilian and Sports Etc . . .

You know the score by now, so no pack drill, just running through vaguely thematic group shots of known or unknown figures, with a bit of my blurb to try and explain some of the many, many figures out there, with the civilian and/or sports, being often among the more interesting of the posts.
 
 
Seated; I think I've decided (or found?) that the Napoleonic hat figures (two sizes, right) are actually firemen from smaller garden/beach toy fire engines, while the huge blue one is from a very larger racing motorcycle and sidecar, the smaller blue is the Budgie motorcyclist, and the painted-blue, from a 1:24th'ish racing car.
 
The little red one on the left is from the might be Kamley / might be Marty artillery/speedboat crew, as seen on the But Is It Giant blog, the grey naval-looking chap in the middle is still unknown, but keeps turning-up so his toy must be common, a jeep or taxi, plant, maybe? While the other is also one who turns up from time to time, an arabesque/LRDG type, possibly from a 'dessert' vehicle toy, but just as likely to be a helicopter/fighter-pilot, or B/Op' Tank crew, and one of two poses, if I recall correctly.
 
Various farm/civilian types; I think one or two might have been marked I can't rememeber1 Best pleased with the orange one which is another of those 'animated' novelty figures, we saw a pink tennis player from the set of a while back.
 
I think we've seen the synthetic rubber guys at the back, in ones or twos, before, but this looks like it may be a complete pose line-up, or set's figure contents? The rest are larger carpet-toy figures, four Casdon and a damaged Poplar I think, with a simplified copy of the Corgi cherry-picker cage chap.
 
There are tubs of these waiting to be sorted in the main stash and bags of them in the TBS (to be sorted) zone, and one day I'll have a session uniting all the flippers, masks, tanks and accessories, with the correct figures, and we'll have a better look at them all and ID a few!
 
Board game figures from the Charity shop, no idea, yet, but obviously aimed at younger players, and having some kind of nature-walk or safari/hunter theme, not 100% sure the bush goes with the four figures (slightly different base design), but they came together and look to have similar sculpting?
 
Mechanics and construction workers, there are so many of these, but I have, over the years downloaded or shelfied many sets, with figures, so again, a big ID session and better look will happen at some point!
  
A cake-decoration baseball player, small novelty Olympian, from Hong Kong, and taken from larger-scale sets, and two figures who are more interesting; they seem to be more HK rack-toys, but I have a couple with silver belts, a bit like the MPC ring-hand chaps, but these are much smaller and more sportsmanlike with bare-heads - but helmets could be missing? I suspect Christmas cracker novelties, as they have come in, in ones and twos.
 
Another couple of firefighters, and two policemen, the fully painted is the Hong Kong copy of Cavendish's policeman, which Cavendish also carried/wholesaled to the tourist trade at one point, and two Matchbox figures, I think those with a touch of paint were earlier than those without.
 
Two Bell Games (foreground) footballers, from the magnetic sets, three Gem, and damaged, larger 'kicker' figure from Subbuteo, along with a small-scale copy of Airfix's goal-keeper, or, at least, he looks similar to the Airfix guy!
 
A chalkware figure, probably a cake-decoration, possibly of a good-fairy, or fairy tale character, sleeping beauty? Dated 1964, with what could be a logograph, or cypher mark, but the crudeness of the writing suggests they may be more of an ownership thing, by the kid, or a parent, it's quite fine, but not formal, if you know what I mean . . . a real mystery figure?! 'Betty's Birthday 1964' . . . that kind of thing?
 
Farmers and a cuckoo-clock/barometer figure (left), we saw a similar one the other day, and I've recently discovered you can still buy them, as craft items for home hobbyists, although they look to be poured-resin copies!
 
I used to confidently say 'Thomas' for all these rubber seated figures, but having found similar figures with Tudor Rose stuff, I'm not so sure these days, and some poring over old files is needed! Probably Thomas, or similar!
 
These are nice, soft plastic versions of the frangible, hard-plastic copies of Gem and Britains ski-wearers, Arctic/Antarctic explorer on the left (ex-Britains sculpt), more Gem-like sports skier on the right. The righthand figure has ring-hands, with the broken remains of sticks, so will need a pair of them and they both need skis, but there are bags of this stuff around, so hopefully the best of everything will make-up good samples one day!
 
Two Airfix German Infantry, who were left over (we're working 'up' the folders, so, last shots first), and the larger-scale 'Lawn Jockey' (for trying-up horses) statue from a Marx playset. I have a whole bag of these somewhere, in various colours and conditions, vintage and reissue, as I was literally one of the few small-scale guys in the room for years, and people didn't know what they were (including me), so I would buy them as 'unknown, odd-scale', from 10, 20 or 50p rummage trays!

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!

M is for May's Visit - Purchases

So, back to May, and a visit to London, to pick up some stuff Peter had found, saved or got at a car-boot for me, but while I was there we dived into a couple of shops on the journey to/from the Toy Project charity shop, and I managed to find a couple of things of interest.
 







The pictures say it better than I can, on this one! A couple of daft animals on motorcycles (not 'cars'?), which are neither terribly cartoony nor caricatures, or any kind of licensed character, more like realistic big-heads, so heading straight to charity, where they will find similar trike-mounted dinosaurs, currently in Poundland!
 
But a nice bag of model animals with four of the 'big 5' (tiger instead of leopard) and other iconic ones including North American (Grizzly) and Asian (Panda) animals, along with some useful scenic items, and a strange modular base, which looks like it might interlock with some of those white-button vehicle track-ways?!
 
Probably a generic with a phantom-branding to Toey Play®, who have a presence on platforms like Amazon, but aren't on the Animal wiki's so are probably other recognised Chinese manufacturer/s products? But, for such a big box, it was cheap as chips in an anonymous general store.
 
These, seem to be very good for what they are, which is dirt-cheap rack-toys ffromKandy Toys, certainly both compatible with and of equal quality to the current Tomy-Britains or New Ray stuff (where I think they may from, or be copies of), so, if you're into farm animals, look them out?
 
I also bought a few bits at the Toy Project, but I broke them down and photographed them with all the figures in Peter's box of bits, for me, so they will be sprinkled through the next series of posts, but you can spot paratroops, Phidal's and board game pieces!

L is for Look What I Saw!

Driving out to Alresford for a drop this evening, I saw signs for 'Ride with Thomas' and 'Steam Spectacular' on the road between Farnham and Alresford, and assumed it was something to do with the Watercress Line.
 
Then, while at the customer's house, a gurt' weezin' and a'puffin' was occurring behind their house, and I said "That Thomas is a noisy chap isn't he?", and she said it's not Thomas, it's Nigel Gresley, you should to talk to my husband about it!
 
Anyway, I got on with my route, only to find the road over the line was closed, so taking it as a sign, I parked up at the barrier, ran up to the bridge and managed to get these . . .  
 

 . . . somewhere in all that, which is mostly coal-smoke, not steam, is Sir Nigel Gresley, one of the few remaining streamlined biggies from the height of the steam era! And it was a still evening, after the storm of the last 48-hours, so it (the smoke) wasn't clearing, and while I had to get on, I knew I was 20-minutes ahead on my route (it's all computer and satellite driven these days), so I formed a quick plan, and shot-off to one of my favourite tea-break spots, more in hope than anticipation, and started to clean my windows, which I'd already told the internal camera needed doing - you need an excuse to stop, off schedule! When I heard them . . .
 


 . . . and managed to get these three off! Halfway between Ropley and Bishop's Sutton, on the embankment which runs from Arlesford to the Four Marks hill, I was about a quarter of a mile away, so they're not the best, but they are still awesome beasts!
 
Full steam from both of them, I think the leader might be 506 (30506) LSWR Urie S15 Class, with the 'Gresley behind, and the setting sun (6pm'ish) shining right at them! Apparently, they'll be performing again, this coming weekend;
 
 
Now, I'm no 'spotting' train-buff, but there are certain things, old tanks, tall ships, steam long-boats, Massey Furguson 135/165's, which are literally living history, and you only fail to be moved if there's something wrong with your soul, so if you're not doing anything next weekend, get your arse to Arlesford!
 
That's it - happenstance! Made a reasonable shift, memorable!