Toyphobia? I don't think so.

While browsing in a toy store at the Third Street Farmers Market in Los Angeles this weekend, a reporter from KNBC introduced herself and asked me a few questions about the Mattel toy recall. I'm pretty sure we weren't able to deliver the sound bytes she was hoping for.

In her best hyper-end-of-the-world voice the reporter asked, "How can you be shopping for toys at a time like this? Aren't you fearful for your children's safety with yet another toy recall announced this week???"

Channeling the blase attitude Santa Barbarans are known for, I responded, "In the last three-weeks, my daughter has chewed on an acrylic fingernail she found underneath a lounge chair at a hotel pool, eaten a marshmallow dug up at the beach from a leftover bonfire, and sucked the moisture out of a used Swifer floor wipe. Really, toys in the mouth aren't even on my parenting radar." As if on cue, Lucie grabbed the microphone away and started gnawing on the foam covering. Rob says I should have concluded the interview by insisting the microphone be swabbed for led-based paint.

Comments

Anonymous said…

Ha!

This picture is perfect for the text, too: it's as if you've peeked in on the little creature with other-worldly intestinal resistance as she chews on a kaleidoscope (?) in her holding cell.

September 6, 2007 at 10:35 PM

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My picture of hell: one soggy rainy day, two healthy energetic children, three solid days of DVDs, one dog that needs to pee but refuses to get wet, and me. Alone with the carnage and contracted to get 4 hours of work done. And just to frost the cake, Lucie can take off her pooy diaper now, which delights us all, but especially the dog, to no end. These days it is sort of a toss up for who has left the pile on the carpet. Lucie? Dog? The fact that it landed on top of a princess high heel is good indication the culprit was of the two-legged, shoe-loving, Oreo-eating variety, which makes it only slightly less disgusting to remove behind a 28-ply Kleenex. Pray for sunshine.

Montecito Mama

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