1976: The First Day of Christmas V, Bionic Men!

This will be the final run of this series I started four years ago because in 2012, I would be repeating myself which I hate doing. I began reading a bunch on Christmas Day to see how they’ve held up beyond all the grammatical errors I’ve found; so far, I think they have. How I wish they received some comments or feedback, negative ones would be appreciated too, trying to get some direction.

Enough boo hoos, I’m behind by a day thanks to my trip to Chicago which is going pretty decently, that will be coming up next!

There isn’t a whole lot to go on with this Christmas. I was eight, third grade was moving along, we were settled into our house in Champaign (311 Royal Court, the first address I memorized) and life seemed good. The festivities were held at Grandma’s house as per the current tradition. Brian and I were disciplined enough this year to sit tight until the adults were awake; us busting through things at 5 AM made Dad less festive.

Star Wars wouldn’t hit theaters for another five months, Mego stuff was declining (it wasn’t very durable) and GI Joe had hit saturation. So this Christmas, the kick-ass toys we got were based upon the hit TV show The Six Million Dollar Man. For Brian, the star, Col. Steve Austin plus a three-pack of special cybernetic arms: one fired a beam from the wrist, one stored a gas mask and one hid a pistol. I fared better (in my opinion), my key present was Austin’s nemesis Maskatron whose features were a thousand times better. Unlike the Fembots in The Bionic Woman, I have no recollection when Col. Austin ever faced Maskatron. It didn’t matter, the switchable faces, the storage compartment in his back and pop-out limbs rocked. Contrary to the show/toy’s canon, the evil robot was integrated into our numerous space operas as a helpful android companion, even when we were ripping off Battlestar Galactica.

The other cool score was a “slot-car” track. I put those words in quotations because mine was one of those new non-slot-car-based solutions called Power Passers. Definitely an idea/technology ahead of its time since slotless cars are the norm and TCR proved to be superior. Sadly, this gift never such any further action after we brought it home; Dad and I didn’t re-assemble the track and the other kids at school had the traditional slot cars. Nowadays kids have no interest thanks to video games displacing all car-related toys. My PS3 solves all the problems I remember slot-car and Hot Wheels tracks having.

The remaining days were spent hanging around Grandma’s. I’m confident we stayed up watching Duck Soup on WGN for New Year’s Eve and then returned to prison, aka school, by January 4. It was a pretty good time as a kid.

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