EP 34 - PLAY TIME OR SLAY TIME DEADLY GENX TOYS

The Girls explore the dangerous toys of GenX childhood. Robbie-Ann starts with Super Elastic Bubble Plastic, made of strange chemicals that you blew threw a straw to make noxious plastic bubbles. Amy recalls searing her skin on the hot metal slide on the playground. Blunt force trauma toys: getting hit in the head with your twirling baton. The notorious spinning merry-go-round, and flying off of it. Robbie-Ann and Amy both talk about getting knocked out falling off the monkey bars. Robbie-Ann's penchant for hanging upside down, which lead to a concussion when her head hit the asphalt. Robbie-Ann's father's infamous "Walk it off!" Amy's illegally modifying toys into unintentional dangerous objects. What's more painful to a bare foot: stepping on a jack, or stepping on a Lego? The horrible, painful "Dodge Ball Sting," and the unique sound that the hard red ball makes when it smacked you in the face. Robbie-Ann's dread of gym class on Dodge Ball Day. How building blocks became lethal weapons. The Big Wheel "spinout" that always led to a rollover and road rash. Sidebar: TV Toy Commercials -  Accessories Not Included. Batteries Not Included. Matchbox cars: the terrain was not included. Star Wars Ewok TV ads, featuring twigs and bushes that were not included. "Serving Suggestion" on the cereal box: Strawberries Not Included. The most infamous Deadly GenX Toy: Lawn Jarts, now banned in the United States. The white-hot bulb in the Easy Bake Oven. The Sit N Spin brush burns. Robbie-Ann's fat lip from the bouncy ball. Amy's head-slam from the Slip N Slide. Robbie-Ann reports what happens when you put Slip N Slide on a hill. The heart-tugging real history of Lawn Jarts, which are still legal in Europe. Candy cigarettes. Amy's grandmother's cigarette-accessory pouch. Clackers, knuckle-bruising balls on a string. Paddle Ball. Rubber Superballs: ricochet rubber bullets to the face. Gum Ball Machine toys. Sidebar: trading toys. Robbie-Ann trades her mother's wooden Christmas angel ornaments for a full set of Freakies plastic toys from her friend Connie in grade school. Recreational accidents: baseballs to the face, swingsets attack. Amy's tree-climbing-fall-rope disaster and other "Hey, let's make a..." accidents. Robbie-Ann on getting the wind knocked out of her by falling off of tree branches and horses. Collapsing blanket forts and the falling weighted debris. Unsafe playing locations: old barns, contaminated-water aqueducts, the woods. Robbie-Ann recalls upsetting an entire hornets nest and getting stung by dozens of them. Dirt: its many faces. Surviving riding in the open back of station wagons and pick-up trucks. Sidebar: the water in the aqueduct where "Grease" was filmed. Robbie-Ann's immunity to mosquitoes. Sidebar: TV Dinners.  What is Salisbury steak? Sledding: a deadly winter sport that is great in theory. Pool party injuries.