The author of this book on toys I found outside yesterday sounds like a fun dad. Some snippy-dippies (snippets):
Toys are often, or even most of the time, a mixed blessing.
Most of us also carry some long-forgotten scars, physical or psychological, caused by toys that gave us insult or injury in return for our affection.
We all know that children shoot water into their mouths from squat guns and this raises – especially with the added factor of lubricating jelly – obvious sanitary problems.
In conclusion,
Once my wife Linda and I began habitually to take a hard, long look at the toys available for our children, the toy buing in our own family was measurably curtailed. Relatives and friends nonetheless continue to ply our children with tokens of affection: Wind-up trains, go-go cars, “Hot Wheels” — hall have found their way through our front door – and then out again, and into the trash bin.
Although I do feel sympathetic to his cause when he mentions that the Wham-o Boomerang only omes with these instructions: “Returns to you! Hold with flat side down and experiment!” We need to hold the toymakers accountable for how how impossible it was to throw boomerangs right. Toymakers and everyone else – parents, society. Everyone must be punished for our interactions with boomerangs when we were little.