Like many of you, I've been spending the morning unwrapping and then playing with all the new toys I got as presents.
Santa was very generous to the Monkeyball household this year, bringing almost everything I asked for. I got:
- The Allan H. "Vlad" Selig poseable action figure! With lifelike shrugging action, removable comb-over, and optional blinders. Maybe next year I'll get the accessories: Vlad's Army of Sycophants, the Ballpark Village playset (which also transforms into a spaceship with death ray!), and the SeligMobile, with lifelike reverse-odometer action. This is one gift that I know will only appreciate in value over time.
- The LEGO Officially Licensed Billy Beane Rebuilding Set. Unfortunately, half of the bricks in the set snapped in half when I tried to fit them together, the foundation set-pieces needed to construct the models in the photographs on the front of the box are really expensive, and none of it really fits together unless and until you also buy the Bud Selig Ballpark Village playset.
- Urban Myth -- the new vicious-rumor boardgame from Milton Bradley. Defamatory fun for the whole family. Backstab sis and get her kicked out of the house -- before she does the same to you!
- One-Card Monte -- the card game where every suit is black.
- A DVD of It's a Wonderful Lie, where guardian angel Clarence Wolff averts franchise disaster by discovering where Uncle Bill Beane mislaid the extra payroll checks. I always cry at the end when Jimmy Stewart says "Zaidi's petals!"
Also, thanks to an innovative joint program between AN and certain unnamed private and governmental entities, I've been able to monitor communications between certain AN'ers and the North Pole. Here's what Santa delivered to a few other AN'ers this year:
- Nico: Some more RAM for his "hard drive" (I keep telling him that's not how computers work, but he sheepishly insists that's what he wants)
- cindi: A pony!
- Poppy: A solution to the A's dilemma of how to afford extending Mark Ellis and cheaply address the injury situation
- Sal: A professional elective development kit
- Sal, Jr.: A learning kit that will help him explain to his old man how the world really works
What did everyone else get?
