The Greatest Stories are the Ones Left Untold

Or, at least, that's what I say to strangers at the bus stop when they try to engage me with their inconsequential small talk. Sorry, but I've heard your unique and interesting observations about recent meteorlogical conditions about a non-hyperbolic thousand times today already. I mean, come on. When I leave the house, it's with eyes down and mouth shut.

But what if there were a story so great that had to be both told and yet, not told? I think this is one of those stories, and that's why I'm telling it here, on this ancient blog that hasn't been updated in around three years. If a story is told, but there is nobody around to read it, was it ever really told at all? And if there is anybody still lurking around here on the off chance of seeing some new material, you should be ashamed of yourself. You could have gone and got yourself a job by now.

My tale begins at a website called cybertron.ca, which is a website for canadian "collectors" of Transformer "collectibles". It has a message board, broken down province by province, for people to report what they've seen as they make their rounds of their local toy sections. This allows the other members to stay home on their computers instead of spending their lives outdoors, rushing frantically from store to store, desperate to acquire the latest new toy before it falls into the hands of some undeserving child, who are probably too stupid to even know that this character's only comic book appearance was in the background of one panel of one issue where he wasn't even coloured correctly. (As a sidenote, it is totally nerdy to post on their message boards. However, if you just read them without posting, you are probably a smooth operator who's playing the system. You may even be the real firecracker that your grandma always told all her friends you'd grow up to be.)

So I was reading the boards without posting one day, when somebody reports a new and peculiar discovery. If you've ever heard of the San Diego Comic Con, you are probably be aware that it is the world's largest gathering of nerds for the purpose of furthering their nerdy obssessions. You can meet comic book creators there, and... other stuff, too. Of course, they have exclusive toys and merchandise that is available nowhere else so you can rub it in the faces of all the nerds that didn't go, which is roughly none of them.

This year's SDCC is happening even as I type this. There was one last year, too. One of the exclusives at last year's convention was Blaster, the Autobot communications officer who transforms into a ghetto blaster.

Blast-Off, a transformer with a name similar to "Blaster"

As fate would have it, these self same "Blaster"s were now apparently turning up in canadian retail outlets called "Winners" and "HomeSense". How and why was not important, but acquiring a Blaster was everything. Fortunately, there is a Winners store just a short jaunt from very own home. Unfortunately, they never get any of the good stuff, Blasters included. So that's pretty much where the story of how I didn't get Blaster comes to it's conclusion.

Because the rest of this is the story of how I got a Blaster! I was cruising around cybertron.ca again, when I come across a report by some some silly vancouverainian who'd just been to my very own town and listed all the neat things he saw while touring our toy stores. Most important among his discoveries was that he'd found a Blaster at HomeSense! Imagine my surprise to discover this city has a HomeSense! I was even more surprised to find out that it is right next to Wal-Mart, which I've been to many times. The have one of the most important toy sections in the area after all, and I can even remember going there and... Ah, perhaps some other time.

After reading this finding, I immediately lept from my bed and into my socks. After leaping into my socks, I immediately said "You'll never make it before closing time besides it's probably going to rain and it's so cozy in here". So I slipped back under the covers, vowing to head over to HomeSense first thing in the morning. For once, I was true to my word and HomeSense received an early caller that day. Actually, there were a bunch of even earlier callers, even though they'd been open for only ten minutes. I guess some people really like that place.

Finding the toy section, such as it was, and wandered around, and around, and around, the same twelve foot section over, and over, and over again, without finding my precious plastic friend. Concerned but undaunted, I circled ever wider, until I was wandering around the whole store, fruitlessly, before returning - okay fuck it. No point in trying to build suspense when I already full out admitted to getting one. So here's what I was so determined to keep from the children:

. It comes in this slipcase that is huge, orange, shiny, and has nothing on it but an autobot symbol with only the words "AUTOBOT BLASTER" written on it, and still I went past it ten times without seeing it. On the inside there's this:

Which is the sort of traditonal transformer packaging which I had trained my eyes to look for, and why the slipcase never registered.

Here's the desired fellow with his included compatriots, Steeljaw the lion scout, Ramhorn the surly Rhino, and Eject, the autobot sports enthusiast. They all turn into this:

I just noticed the watermark in those pictures and, after looking everywhere in the box, I didn't find one. I might have gotten ripped off. But now that I have Blaster and his friends, I can confidently say that Blaster is pretty lame. Keep in mind that this is the original version, from 1985 or so, so he's pretty limited in every conceivable way by today's standards. Also, even as a kid, I never really liked Blaster as a character or ever really wanted his toy. I was even fully aware that I didn't really want Blaster, even as I desperately searched for him, and it didn't disuade me in the slightest. It only cost twenty bucks so it's no big deal.

The little tape guys are pretty cool, however. I like Steeljaw the best. I even like Eject, but only because he is characterized as the autobot who likes sports, which means the other autobots don't like sports. That's why I want to be an autobot. So, when this guy turns up and starts going "How 'bout that game last night", instead of just me not knowing what he's talking about, nobody knows. That's the kind of environment I could be comfortable in.

That's basically all I've got for that. See you in another three years.