Mr. Peabody and the Way Back Machine

There used to be a little cartoon on the Rocky and Bullwinkle show called Mr. Peabody and the Way Back machine. Mr. Peabody and his little friend Sherman would step into the Way Back Machine and travel back in time. I doubt it was all that educational and I would hate to count on it for accuracy, but I do remember it being cute.

So, with that said, I'm going to post a Way Back Machine every Friday and talk about something I remember from the past. There is the chance that it might not be interesting to anybody else but me. That's the chance you take in blogging. Live with it!

Today I want to remember two little girls and the year was somewhere around 1988 I think. Whenever we went to McDonalds or Hardees, we would get the kids meal of course and at that time, usually the prize was a small character made of hard plastic. The girls began to collect them. They stored them in a little tan plastic container with a hinged lid on it. This collection soon became known as "hard animals". Each girl had their own collection, though there were many duplicates. Hard animals were collected in various places, not just fast food chains. That bread-box sized case was soon full to the brim.

In trying to remember what some of them were, I could only think of Strawberry Shortcake and Carebears.

If they wanted to occupy themselves on a Sunday afternoon, they would get out their hard animals and go to the kitchen floor. One girl would sit on one end and the other girl would sit on the other. They would then proceed to meticulously line up each and every figure. I'm sure there was a specific place for everybody - each "person" had a place to be. I'm not sure if they actually ever played with them - though I'm sure they did. The bulk of the time was taken in setting everything up.

I rarely heard a peep out of them during this time. They really concentrated on what they were doing - it was important business.

So whenever I see little hard plastic figures, my first instinct is to take one to add to the girls' collection. But then I return from the Way Back Machine and remember that they don't collect them any more.