A Special Toy - Blog Competition.

I've been over to @tattooedmummy's place again, mucking about and singing songs, and there, low and behold; a competition! Well, I knew I had to enter, and to enter you simply have to blog about a favourite toy you owned as a child or a toy perhaps your child owns.

The rules at the lovely @tattooedmummy's blog, found here - http://tattooedmummy.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/a-special-toy-blog-competition.html , the prize is provided by the awesome people at 'The One Stop Bug Shop.' They have a website and the link for it is right here - http://www.onestopbugshop.co.uk/ , and that's really all the links you need... Right?

This is easy, see I still have one of my most prized childhood treasures, something I thought long and hard over and had to make many deep and painful sacrifices for... Yes, I owned a Giraffe hand-puppet.

I'll take you back to the nineteen eighties. I was short, small and kind of odd... So not much has changed really. No, seriously...

Okay let's start again.

It's my birthday and as we live in London and I have some money to spend I'm in the greatest toy shop in the world, long before Toys'R'Us crammed more things under one roof than a big thing crammer with loads of space, this was the place to go; Hamleys.

Yes, I'm in Hamleys with my folks and family and I'm torn. See there are three things I want more than I need oxygen and yet I only have enough money for one of them. Action Man with Eagle eyes, beard, small pink scar on cheek and I think he came with either a parachute or a full amount of kit that include such classics as plastic knife, big gun that fires lots of bullets and  back pack, boots and cool helmet.

Going up against the man who knows how to do all the action is a similar sized plastic doll type thing of Han 'the fucking man' Solo. He comes with plastic hair that looks nothing really like him, pistol and belt to carry pistol in.

Yeah, fucking cool right?

Finally we have the outside choice; a hand-puppet, either of a dog that I feel would swear a great deal when no-one was listening or a giraffe with cold, dead eyes. He had the look of a savannah stalking Dexter Morgan and I knew he'd get me in trouble. Lots of trouble.

I to and fro and it's no good, I can't make up my mind, so my dad sits me down in a quiet area and says we have to go soon and so... I have to chose.

The agony.

After a while I know I have to go with my heart and so I pick the monster that would happily stamp on a thousand Lion cubs heads, and we leave. Me and my giraffe; Ken. Ken and I form a bond on the way home. He doesn't have arms or legs, nope, he's just a neck and head, two ears, two silly horn things, a felt tongue sewn into his mouth, two hard button type dark eyes and a pattern that would bring all the she giraffe's to the yard.

Over the coming years the boy and his giraffe had many adventures, many of them would end in the giraffe placing bricks in peoples shoes, the giraffe savaging someone else's toy, the giraffe sneaking through darkened corridors (the boy following closely) waiting for someone to walk out of their room so that the giraffe could pounce and strike fear into the hearts.

The boy and the giraffe did fit into the sometimes rowdy house well, with three older brothers all stalking around there was always some fun to be had and an older child to pounce and with a younger brother and sister there was always someone to tickle and perhaps sometimes chew.

They didn't go too far, they were robust and perhaps naughty, but never evil or nasty, and this giraffe later came to stay with the boy, moving from house to house, flat to flat as the child grew and became slightly taller than a child... but only slightly.

It's a testament to the lasting friendship of the the pair and their effectiveness in combat that now the giraffe is with the boys children, and yes, when one of my older brothers came round and was greeted with the sight of Ken wandering the halls of the flat on the hand of another small child the response was, 'Oh fuck, that giraffe was evil!'

So yes, I had a buddy and he came with me, and now he's a bit worn and threadbare and his eyes are scratched and yet, when I see my mate, I can still pull him on and feel like stalking the halls once more, or perhaps waiting behind the sofa for ages till someone walks in and sits down, only to get scared shitless as the giraffe makes a well executed attack.

The bond is still strong, so strong in fact that he's in one of the books I've written and am currently editing. You won't be able to miss him.

He's the killer giraffe with the scratched, dead eyes.

Just another victim.

So thanks for reading, do you have a toy that really played a strong presence in your childhood? Join the comp thing and relive some of those good times.