Curse the toy manufacturers

If you have been reading my blog you know that I give updates on my son’s behavior in daycare. Today I am happy to announce that Bacchus Jr. (BJ) received (green faces) all week. This is the first time in a long time that he has achieved this goal for 5 weekdays in a row. He has split this achievement over a two week time period, but this is the first time he has done it from Monday to Friday straight. Yeah BJ!!!!

 

Since I promised him a surprise if he ever did this, we went shopping for additional pieces to his (Geotrax) train set. Now let me say that the Geotrac train set has been a wonderful purchase for us and keeps BJ occupied for hours at a time. I highly recommend the beginner set and then building up from there. As a suggestion from a co-worker, I purchase the beginner set last year when BJ was three and he really didn’t get into it until this year. On special occasions we add pieces to it and it has grown substantially.

Although I was looking for additional track pieces, we could only find an additional engine piece and a mountain section. BJ was ecstatic and we proceeded to open the packages once home and this is where this post begins. Why do the toy manufacturers package their products as though they were pieces of rare artwork? I started to put the ties and belts from the train packages into a bowl because our dog, Coco, was buzzing around the area. Below is what we purchased.

After about 30 minutes, I noticed that I had collected a hefty pile of these ties and belts from the packages. I had to use (scissors), a (mini-screwdriver), and my teeth at times to get these packages open. Is this really necessary? It doesn’t make sense to have to set aside 30 minutes just to open toy packages. Am I alone in this???? This has been a nightmare for all parents during the holiday season.

What are the toy manufacturers afraid of?? That Santa’s elves will break into a delivery truck and steal all of their trade secrets. Not going to happen. Or maybe aliens from out of space will mistake all the toy guns as actual weapons and us them against mankind. Or maybe they are afraid that the products will become damaged in shipping from India, China, or Mexico. I got news for them. I once dropped a toy on the floorboard of my SUV and accidentally slammed my car door on it. Guess what, no damage at all.

I still don’t see a rational reason why the toy manufacturers need to make these packages like mini-vaults. And if you were wondering what the total damage was: 27 ties and 15 belts. Just imagine how many of these a person would collect in a child’s lifetime.