M is for May's Visit - Historical Bits

We reach the penultimate post in this series, but there's still July and September's lots to go through, so there will be plenty more of these mixed posts, which do seem to get the traffic, even if it fell off a cliff on the 1st October, and probably ain't coming back, something called the 'The &num=100 Parameter Change', which, as I've never chased traffic, doesn't concern me, I post stuff even AI isn't interested in!

 

Two 70mm's from Papo, both women who lived and died [young] in a man's world run by men who didn't like 'uppity' (that's 'successful') women! Joan of Arc (Jeanne d'Arc), and Cleopatra, and I can imagine her, wandering about her palaces, with a cat in her arms, a mini-God for a God-Queen!

 

Nice pose sample of Spencer Smith Miniatures 30mm Wellingtonians, with a colour/mould-purge gun-carriage. It's funny, but when you encounter a sample like this, you know he saved-up his pocket-money, and bought a few of each, just to see what they were like! We all did it!

 

Lido on the left, Hong Kong on the right. The Hong Kong goes with those copies of European wagons and coaches, while the Lido are usually found bi-coloured, but with a clean and dirty yellow, I suspect these halves were unioned years after they left the factory!

 

At last! Loyal Readers who've been with the Blog for a while may remember several posts on these a few years ago, as both Chris Smith and me, kept finding another, then another, then another pose, and it ended-up with Chris having one more pose, the tied explorer above!

 

Which raises the question of the nature of the - as yet - unfound set, one of the Great White Hunter's is free to wander about with a gun, the other is tied up? Shades of H. Rider Haggard or Burroughs about the whole thing! And he looks like a 'Bad Guy'!

 

Papo 40mm pirate and the painted version of the lady we saw, bagged, as a generic, in Rack Toy Month, and whom we had seen before, unpainted in the Webbs' sets, it took me a while to work out she hadn't got her hands tied behind her back too, but is hiding a pistol, to either defend her honour from a pirate, or slot a Revenue Man, if she is a pirate!

 

Three 15mm war games figures, may be one for Gisby? They look to be a command group, with officer, standard barer and bugler, all mounted, for the English Civil War? Thanks again to Peter Evans for all these.

T is for Two - Green Machines

Dropped into Blue Cross, the animal charity the other day, to drop-off some stuff for them, and managed to walk away with some stuff for me! Neither is that exciting, but we'll have a look at them anyway!

 

Timpo Bren-gun Carrier, nice and clean, with two, apparently unbrittle, crew, but needing a Bren and a set of wheels, I'm pretty sure the former is in a bag of spares somewhere, the latter may be found under a tatty one, at some later date!

 

Not so clean, but otherwise complete, a generic (for now?) Hong Kong tank, in the style of those which are usually die-cast (Zee), with the black-plastic plug-ins, for aerial and MG, but is, in fact, actually all-plastic, and recognisably a Panzer IV, albeit, 'only just! The barrel looks damaged, but in the flesh, seems fine, just a little loose. And it's not far of HO-OO 'readymade' carpet-toy scale!

P is for Papo's Pot of 40mm Plastics

Picked this up, reduced, at a garden centre a while back, I visited a couple this afternoon and picked-up some useful tree decorations, but nothing Halloween, nor any new toys, or novelties, but I like to keep an eye on them!

 

I think we saw these when they were first released at the London Toy Fair at Kensington Olympia, but that particular lot of shots may still be in the long queue . . . Doh! Anyway, we've seen the 40mm Pirates, probably not all of them yet, but most now? These are the farm!

 

Horse rider and horse, I think we've had her come-in with a mixed lot at some point, so she can go in the swaps pile, once I've everything together and sorted, the poultry, however are a tad big in my opinion, they could chase that calf 'till its heart gives out!

 

Heavy horses.

 

Everybody else! That's it box, or Toob, ticked!

M is for May's Visit - Animals

Moving on to the animals, and I could have reduced the shot-count with these I think, but nevertheless, we'll whizz through them, and highlight the interesting bits, while enjoying the rest!

 

Oh, they've loaded in reverse again! Not that it matters with these, there's no particular narrative to the images, or the order I took them! Hilco here I think, or Cherilea? I always get confused by these two, and one inherited the tools of the other!.

 

Almost certainly off the covers of contemporary kids magazines, I see this stuff all the time on the racks, but don't follow it, or even sample-purchase it, as one hopes somebody else, somewhere else is recording/collecting it, some titles are issuing half a dozen puppies, kittens, or cutesified pets, bare, painted or flocked, every month, or bi-monthly, there are thousands of them out there, often slight 'deforms', sometimes 2nd generation copies, and I have large bags of them, already, without ever trying!

 

I think Asterix has to be in here somewhere (or Obelix!), but which might be a licence for the comic-strip, and which might be a cartoony toy figure, if either or neither, I don't know! Is the one on the right destined for the village feast, and the one on the left from another toy, or are they both from the forests of Northern France, circa 200AD?

 

Britains bull, sans ring!

 

Vitacup pheasant, and a nice old composition hen, a bit tatty, but a 1st sample!

 

Mixed eepy-deeps!

 

He escaped from the civilian post! Looks like he should have had wheels, but possibly a bit too small for a stand-alone novelty toy, I thought, so maybe a race-game, one of those vibrating-mat games maybe?

 

Horses!

 

These keep turning up, and the total sample is probably quite big now, but rather spread to the four winds. I noticed the other day the guys at Cerealoffers, had them as question-mark cereal premiums, but I suspect they are Lucky Bag gifts, contemporary with the disc-foot Wild West figures Brian B remembered as Lucky Bag figures, and there are two versions of these, I think (slight moulding or base differences), which would tie in with the Cowboys and Indians, where there were also other types/generations.

 

Two Holly Plastics (outer pair), a novelty blow-moulded fish and a very small butterfly!

 

Four random dinosaurs, the one on the far left is from the carded set we looked at the other day! While the little, vinyl Triceratops is a cut above, but again, we were looking at that 'trickle down' improvement in a recent post.

 

Another horse-racer! Clearly, they rode straight into another folder! He's obviously from a board game, and comes with a Lego shrub, gum-ball premium donkey charm and a flat cow/calf, who keeps appearing, and may be an early (1950/60's) vehicle load, if so, maybe a pair?

 

A couple of modern vinyl animals and a Kellogg's rhino, based on the old Lido set.

 

Thanks as always to Peter Evans for finding/saving this stuff for the Blog, they may be single oddities here, but when it's all sorted out, it will make more sense! 

A is for A'maze'ing!

I ventured up to my Alma Mater in Saffron Walden at the beginning of September, a dispiriting move, as it's all being developed into posh flats for London commuters (which only means the M11 will get worse!), but I had some time, well, I was literally, in my own time, so I took a trip down to the town, and checked out the old Maze in the corner of the park!

 

Seems to say as much as I could, after a Google, especially if AI started making it up! We used to walk it occasionally as kids, first as younger kids, in daylight, later as 'seniors', with perhaps a little embrocation of the not so medicinal kind, helping us . . . or hindering us, in the task! 1.5km is a few hundred feet shy of a mile, so it takes a good 15-20 minutes to complete.

 

Start

 

Finnish, about 5 yards from the start!

 

The fair was in town, the same fair which was in Aldershot a few weeks earlier!

 

A drone's eye-view from the council's website!

 

I spotted this on a service cabinet/enclosed pilaster, at Highbury & Islington tube/overground station, when I visited a mate later in the month, it is a simplified version of the same consentric pattern, with the start/finish in line.

 

I don't know if it has any significance beyond helping people pass the time while they wait for friends, colleagues or a taxi pick-up? Nor if there are others, elsewhere on the networks, can any Londoners help us out with that one?

 

Mazes have always been a side interest of mine, along with labyrinths, which is what we're actually looking at above - you can't 'go wrong' so long as you stay on the path. And I'm minded to try and find/visit one every year, and chuck the shots up here, for a change of pace, or 'bucket-list' quest!

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!

M is for May's Visit - Combat Troops

Sand, green and field-grey, the proper 'toy' soldiers, and there were a fair few in the bag, along with several paratroopers, who are always welcome here!

 

The blow-mould has suffered from a bit of a facial collision, but might be a new colour, the other three have probably all been seen before, but it's all grist to the mill, and there's always new colours, or new-sized copies-of-copies to be found.

 

China copies of Tim Mee's Cold War warriors, possibly a new colour in the washed-out sand, but they'll need to be compared with the existing samples before I know for certain.

 

Modern mix of Matchbox and newer sculpts.

 

Modern, and dodgy hollow-backed rack-toy rascals, but with several sizes, a few poses and severl colour-ways, it will be a while before I've got all of them, or even most!

 

Japanese infantry from Rado or Hing Fat, covered before.

 

Odds and sods, the interesting one here is the chap in the middle who would appear to be one of the Pioneer die-cast accessory figures in soft rubber, and a new pose, to his left, our right, a less common Manurba-Tallon in grey.

 

Seen on the respective Airfix Blog pages, the yellow figures are new to the collection, and that's the beauty of these lots, there's always something new! Many thanks to Peter for most of these, one of the paratroopers was a purchase, I think.

L is for Lazy Lizard Lounges in Lucky Bag!

So, I said in the shelfie-post the other day, that I'd bought a test one, and I dare say those of you who know me well enough, might guess which one it would be, farm? Unicorn? Noooooowh! Dinosaurs, of course! But it turned out to be doubly disappointing!

 

The first disappointment, it was mostly flat, paper product, and yes, I know kids love colouring, kids love stickers, kids love puzzles, but in my day it would have been a plastic or rubber dinosaur, some sweets, and something which made a noise! We buy this shit so you don't have to!

 

One small surprise was that the stated eight items, were in fact nine; they clearly think coloured-pencils and a colouring sheet count as one item? And it was also interesting to see some of the contents branded to both Playwrite (WH Cornelius, ex-WHC / Success) and Henbrandt, who are rivals in the same pocket-money, novelty field.

 

The second disappointment though, was that the otherwise, kitsch, but cool-looking inflatable dinosaur, was so cheaply made, it leaked air from a half-welded seam, and I had to try and carefully close the cap (no valve) without pushing so much air out, it wouldn't stand up! You win some, you lose some, and now we have half-an-idea what all the bags contain . . . no figures, no sweets, no whistles, rattles or blowers, except a blown blow-up!