Toy Fair

When I was a kid way back when (when we didn’t wear crash helmets on our BMXs, we slept untethered, in a full body sprawl, on the tiny space between the back windshield and the backseat as our parents rocketed down the freeway late at night and our playgrounds were made up of rusted, jagged metal torture devices that cooked and absorbed heat in the blazing-​hot supernova of the summer sun and in turn cut, sliced, diced and scorched our innocent, young and perfect skin! Yee-​ouch!) but to see at your roller skating rink birthday party of whatever year it was, a gift wrapped in in the unmistakable red and white, candy-​cane-​like wrapping paper of Toy Fair, one knew in one’s young mind then that they were definitely getting something good! And I am happy to say that Toy Fair still stands, inside the same location, inside Pierremont Mall and they still gift wrap in the same iconic gift wrap for free!!! I just bought birthday gifts for my best friend’s son (he’s going to be 2!) and my daughter (She’s going to be 1!) here and it brought great warmth to my heart to see them wrapping those gifts in that paper! Heck! I remember getting my first pair of Zips tennis shoes inside this store!!! ZIPS!!! Toy Fair rules!!! And has ruled for decades!!!