While it’s cute and all, I have to say I kinda like the other way :).

My wife won a contest last week through a local parenting magazine called Island Parent. As a prize my wife got to pick anything they had on their prize table. She and The Girl went down to the magazine office on Monday to claim their prize.

After scanning the assorted books, toys, tickets and related stuff on the prize table for a few minutes, The Girl’s eyes stopped and became fixed on something. My wife looked at the book The Girl was checking out. It was titled Got Tape?: Roll Out the Fun With Duct Tape!. How could she resist? Their first project? The pair of flip flops in the photo above. I sense a new suit is in the works for Father’s Day.

Take, for example, these reviews on Amazon.com for 2 Playmobil products; Playmobil Security Check and Playmobil Police Checkpoint.

Here is one of the more popular comments for the Playmobil Security Check.

I was a little disappointed when I first bought this item, because the functionality is limited. My 5 year old son pointed out that the passenger’s shoes cannot be removed. Then, we placed a deadly fingernail file underneath the passenger’s scarf, and neither the detector doorway nor the security wand picked it up. My son said “that’s the worst security ever!”

And then there are these reviews of the Playmobil Police Checkpoint:

This playset is one of the best purchases I have made for my three-year-old. In the past, when we have been stopped at roadblocks, or when during one of Daddy’s arrests, he would start crying uncontrollably. Now, after playing with this for the past several months, he is perfectly docile.

As an adjunct to this product, I would also recommend that you purchase the Playmobil Armed Standoff Playset, Fisher-Price Little People Battering Ram, and the Nerf Tear-Gas Canister Deployment Gun.

and

I was pretty pumped to get this model. After my Leviathan teddy-bear burst at the seams and my Guantanamo slip and slide tore into several pieces, I was looking for a petty distraction as durable as state tyranny itself.

Finally, I found the Playmobil Police Checkpoint. It’s everything a colorful plastic method of indoctrination should be: mobile, plastic, and filled with red warning signs. I love setting it up outside my house. That way I feel like I have to show papers to get in. I know I own it, but it’s cooler if the state lets me in. They know best.

Still, I have a complaint about this darling set. I mean, I’m no curmudgeon, and I hate to nit-pick, especially over such a usefully didactic toy. But I must-

No taser?

Oh, how I do love user generated comment. Read plenty more over at Amazon.

A little while ago, The Girl caught wind that I do not like clowns. I suspect traitor Mom. Anyway, one of her favorite games to play with me is to come barreling down the hallway screaming,” Dad, Dad! There is a clown in the backyard!” And then she falls down in hysterics, thinking this is the funniest thing she has ever heard.

A slight variation of this game involves her running up to me and saying, ” Dad, Dad! There is a clown in the backyard…and he is carrying a pickle!” Yes, you guessed it. I don’t like pickles, either.

Anyway, I don’t know where this clown phobia comes from, but methinks I might have run into this guy when I was a kid. That is some serious Jell-o that clown is packing in the backyard.

via Boing Boing