It's Still Grifmas

Dear Woodsy,

Since it's still technically Christmas, I thought you'd like the attached - I got this old SF mag in a second-hand bookshop, and it's so evocative of the "reveries of reclusive boys and hopes of the handful of men" that the "Dreams of Space" guy spoke of!

Grif

Zorglumobile

In case anyone missed the comments to 
The Future Never Become, Paul has pointed out that one of the models pictured on the cover of the book is the Zorglumobile from the Spirou et Fantasio comic strips. (It's the red vehicle with the four rotors, to the right of the boy's head.)


He also found this movie on YouTube of a flying model! Thanks, Paul.

Now if only someone would make a radio-controlled flying model of the SpaceX Nuclear Pulse.

MAC PACK

Here's a few more goodies from my old Ebaying days. Like all my bits and bobs these were all purchased from Car Boot Sales and Charity Shops between 2000 and 2010. Sometimes friends just gave me bags of stuff as well, which were always great fun to root through! Long gone now, we have amongst the above a nice boxed Matchbox MAC Snow Rescue Unit and some unidentified GI Joe vehicles.

Oddly enough, MAC is the sign-off in the SWORD SOLO comic strip, like FAB in Thunderbirds. Matchbox's acronym meant Mobile Action Command. Like FAB, I don't know what MAC stood for at Century 21, although the superb GACCH comics history site postulates that it might mean Moving As Commanded and tongue in cheek, Mainly A Commercial! I personally like the other use of MAC on GACCH, namely a shortened version of machines or machinery, which reminds me of the Japanese Mecha. What do you think MAC meant?

Shinji Okada Husband Doo

Toad's look into the Space Game at the back of the page of the FUTURE NEVER BECOME book inspired me to look closer at the covers, where I found an ISBN number. The book is available from Amazon Japan.

The Author of the book is Shinji Okada Husband Doo, [aka Okada Toshio or Toshio Okada] who has also written another two interesting looking tomes called LOST FUTURE and LOST PLASTIC MODELS, also available on Amazon Japan. Anyone got these?

The Future Never Become

One book I would have liked from Santa SWORD is this THE FUTURE NEVER BECOME from Japan. There's some pics of SWORD ships in the top picture, which, along with the covers, are pages featured in an Ebay listing a couple of years ago. Maybe there's more? Has anyone got a copy?

No, It's Not Time ...

After Hector's House and Barnaby Bear, here's a more spacey puzzle. OK, it's not a jigsaw, but it is an interlocking puzzle. The fourth "D" is for "Details".

The pieces are made of a heavy rubbery material, and the ones in mine seem to have become distorted over time (that other 4th D). They don't fit together that well, as you can see from the third photo.

There was at least one other space-related "4D Puzzle", but I can't recall what it was. The LEM, maybe? Does anyone have it?

Just Brazils

Putting the Xmas decs away for another year this afternoon in our attic [is it too soon?] I remembered how I used to spend hours in there selling old toys on Ebay. My old desk and chair where I had my laptop look forlorn and unused under all the junk piled on them. I loved selling on Ebay and I once even had a shop and powerseller status back in 2006 for a couple of years. I suppose I finished in 2010, when Ebay just got too much of the profits. It wasn't worth it. Maybe I'll start up again some day. Who knows. Anyways, looking through my old Ebay photies here's a few jigsaws I once found already made and laid flat in layers in an old Just Brazils christmas cholocate box [yum!]. A couple are TV shows. Do you recognise them?

I've included the game The Sorcerer's Cave as well, as it sort of related to the Mystic Wood game we featured last year. I sold a couple of examples of both of these during my Ebaying years. Do any of you still sell on Ebay or do you just buy?

Andy B's So Bad it's Good Christmas Cracker

Dear Woodsy,

Re. your enquiry to the readership about Xmas presents, thought this might be suitable for the Blog.

This 1950s Adventure Annual was an unexpected and delightful present (under the category of "so bad it's good"). Its main interest is the cover and a space story illustrated by Denis McLaughlin. I knew he used toys as models, but didn't know how far this went. As I am sure others recognise, all the spaceships are Pyro toys -in some illustations even the wheels are included. The space suits are copied from spacemen marketed in the UK and US (Alphadrome website identifies these as Tudor Rose spacemen). Even more extraordinary, the robot is from a "Magic Robot" game!

If anyone wants to see the whole story (it's terrible!) I'll scan it for the blog.

 

 

Seasonal greetings,

Andy B.

Toad On The Team

Not wanting to the Postings hog,

We invited Toad to join the blog,

Warmed by her witty repartee,

Please welcome Toad most heartily!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Art by Pierre Mion