doctor doctor

hi there

well, a really, really busy day today - concerts, laundry, parcels off of Spiros, underwear arriving, greeting employees of the Mail of Royal whilst wearing a towel and a spot of food when time permitted. oh, and we had the small matter of a major birthday today.

this, as you can well imagine, meant a rather early start to the day to do some top level card and present opening. well, didn't or wouldn't you at that age?

oh yes, big brother was very much on hand to lend a hand if in need with opening up cool, shiny stuff!

was there a particular theme or specific wish expressed and realised in the gifts given and happily received for the birthday day today? why yes, there was. that funny fella off of Trek Wars or whatever it is, that sort of Doctor bloke that no one seems ever quite capable of remembering the name of, hence them always asking who? in the shows and movies and that.

this would be a selection of them Doctor Who (let's just call it that to keep it simple) toys that he was after and, indeed got. well, last year we were in the midst of packing up our entire estate and moving, so he didn't get much of a birthday. we are kind of making up for that this year.

as above, so below. this is the rather smart Angels Take Manhattan playset you can get. there are, i think, 3 or 4 different Doctor Who play sets like this you can get, but as he really loves these Angels things i thought this would be a safe one to get.

a review of this play set? to be honest, it's brilliant. a big size, the surface, as you can see above, is ace to stand characters up on (mostly, the Cyberman is sort of chilling and leaning) and it's got brilliant detail, in particular the hologram 'moving' Angel in the doorway.

is it easy to assemble it? yes - if you have a (considerably) better half to get to do it for you. so no, not really. quite fiddly and complicated to slot it all together, so you have been warned if you are reading this for some sort of review purpose.

was it all Doctor Who, then? no. no it was not. it was going to be a 100% Doctor Who birthday, but then a small film called Guardians Of The Galaxy walked into our lives. as William loves the film, it seemed to me rather mean not to have got him some toys off of that film.

here you go, then - the walking tree, the talking rat and a few of all of them others off of the film.

yeah, they are from two different ranges or sets of toys. some of them "big" action figures, some off of some "mini" range of action figures. they were all that i could find, which is strange - with the DVD out and it being Christmas soon, i would have thought that lots of kids, of all ages, would want these being brought to them off of Father Christmas.

not that he minds the different ranges. far from it, he thinks that all of these toys are smart. which, indeed, they are. even if my pictures do not do them justice.

now, as all fellow fans of Star Wars will know, one of the things most associated with the vulcan Doctor Who character is his ace spaceship, that Tardis thing.  by a peculiar and strange quirk of fate, William has ended up with no less than two of these Tardis thingies. what, the same ones? well, sort of yes, and sort of very much no. but also yes.

here, look you see, have a gander.

two, as you can see, distinctly different sets of packaging for what actually says is the same thing - the Doctor Who Spin & Fly Tardis.  a bit naughty, that is, of the BBC. an accusatory mind would suggest that they have done this just to get coins of money off of collectors who want every and any variation of product.

the really weird part is that they are different in a way that the box does not say. here, have a look at the proud owner - who i should stress and point out is delighted to have two - holding them up.

as you will no doubt have observed, one is a dark blue, the other a regular or if you like lighter blue. this is somewhat at odds with the description on the packaging, which hails one of them as having a "new interior".

but oh no it does not, look you see, the insides on both are the same thing.

a review of the  Doctor Who Spin & Fly Tardis, you say? interesting. it is a spin and fly toy that does not, as it happens, fly, and spins only if you push it. like, for instance, any toy would if you pushed it. if i got a Lobot out of Empire Strikes Back toy and marketed it as a Lobot Out Of Empire Strikes Back Spin & Fly toy, it would be the same sort of thing. a spinning Lobot would be quite class, actually.

anyway, some of you will want to see the back of the boxes to see how far the "same but different" thing goes, so here you go. the barcode numbers, for what that is worth, are identical too.

the important thing here is that William loves having two of them. this is in particular because he can recreate that Day Of The Doctor episode, or whatever it was, when two or three of the same characters turned up in their whatever the plural of Tardis is. 

another look at the arrangement i made on that Angels Take Manhattan playset? surely, why not.

dear me, excuse me, i am somewhat yawning as i write this. it has been a long day, but a very good one. i shall, however, to some extent enjoy being back at verk tomorrow, away from domestic types of jobs and stuffs to do.

i hope that for whatever reason you celebrated and had fun today, for you should every day, that it was a most smart and excellent day!



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!