Great Green Globs of Teachable Moments

The other day my son wandered into the kitchen singing an old classic for the elementary school set, Great Green Gobs of Greasy Grimy Gopher Guts (or GGGoGGGG as it's known online by the kids these days). My mom taught it to me when I was around 5 and I guess I taught it to my son a couple years ago. I don't remember teaching it to him, I assumed he'd learned it at school, but he swears it was me. For whatever reason it's become quite popular at our house the last week.

If you're not familiar with the song, it is sung to the tune of The Old Grey Mare*, and goes like this.

Great green globs of greasy grimy gopher guts,
mutilated monkey meat,
little dirty birdie feet!

All mixed up in all-purpose porpoise pus.
Gee I forgot my spoon!

(After a few rounds it ends with "But I've got my straw!" followed by gross slurping noises.)

*If you're not familiar with The Old Grey Mare you really need to brush up on your 1850s civic political operatives.

Beyond the nostalgia factor I ended up being really happy the song came up at this point in the kids' lives. Right now they're really into asking questions about things they don't know. They're not embarrassed by not knowing something, which I'm trying to encourage. It turns out they didn't know what most of the things in the song were.


"Dad, what's a gopher?"
"Dad, what are guts?"
"Dad, what's mutilated?"
"Dad, what's a porpoise?"
"Dad, what's pus?"

I love when my kids ask these questions because it shows me the gaps in their knowledge and the things I have not yet found time to teach them. I also love living in an age where I can go online and show them exactly what we're talking about. It's become such a staple of our time together that in a stunning reversal of the common trope my kids are often telling "just look it up" if I don't know the answer to something.


By the end of breakfast the kids knew four things they hadn't known when they woke up. Not bad for the 90 minutes before the school bus. The best part though wasn't the incidental educational opportunity, it was watching them squirm and giggle as they sang the song while brushing teeth and hair and on the way to the bus stop. Knowing what all those things are made the song all the more disgusting and fun to belt out.

And isn't that really the point of learning?

We Still Have Work to Do

My in-laws are visiting, which is great for the kids. They are good people and adoring grandparents. They bring out the best in the kids. Like many grandparents they come bearing gifts. Usually things from the posh Goodwills of the Phoenix suburbs. Both kids, but especially The Boy, have been into little green army men and toys like that. They have sets from the Civil War, both World Wars, and even the Star Wars. This time grandma brought what she described to me as "cowboys and Indians." I'll be honest, I had mixed feelings about that, which were rapidly leaning towards uneasiness. We've been talking to the kids about the problems with the Washington football team's name and I wasn't sure how that message would jibe with plastic cowboys fighting plastic Indians.

Maybe he's an Arsenio Hall fan

Lucky for me, as often happens, the kid bailed me out. He looked at the plastic tube of figures and said, "Oh, it looks like Native Americans." I understand there's still some discussion among native people about what they want to be called but for now "Native Americans" seems like the safest way to go so I was relieved. Looking at them, and the sleeve of "cowboys" it struck me that it was really a set of "Pioneers and Native Americans" and not the traditional cowboys and Indians I had grown up with. I'm sure some of my native friends might tell me that's not really any different, and I understand that perspective. As a toy though the primary difference is that they were all in nonviolent poses. Some of the figures had bows or rifles, but they weren't pointing them at anything, so it was easy to label them as hunters. The one that looked the most war-like was easily dismissed by another observation from The Boy, "Hey, he looks like he's celebrating something." Indeed, maybe a touchdown? (No? Not funny? Sorry.)

I've written before about social consciousness being a moving target with kids. It seems like for every victory they soon show you where the gaps in their knowledge remain. Sure enough, The Boy's next comment caught me a bit off guard. He turned to his sister and said, "This is how we imagine them looking from a long time ago." Um...hmmm. Now of course these particular figures are to some extent the product of someone's imagination. They are labeled as "Powhatan Indians" but I have no idea how accurate the representation is, but I hope they're somewhat accurate. At least it's a real tribe. But that's not what The Boy was saying. He was repeating a line he'd heard from me when we saw depictions of cave men at the natural history museum. We'd identified a gap in his understanding of America's complicated and horrifying history with native people. "Well no bud, we actually know what they look like because they are still around. Also, there were photographs back then. Native Americans aren't gone buddy, they're still here today." He replied without looking up from his play, "Oh, OK dad. Cool."

Cool indeed. We didn't get into the plight or politics surrounding modern native people. We'll get into it another time I'm sure. For now it was enough to have him understand that Native Americans are not relegated to history. It's enough for him to realize that there is more to know and more to explore. For now I'm happy to see him playing with the pioneers and Native Americans as peaceful contemporaries in his make believe world. Even if he's playing out a peace that never really happened, at least he's able to imagine it thanks to a re-imaging of a toy that, when I was a kid, was one-hundred percent based on conflict. It's a step in the right direction in terms of seeing people as people and not as adversaries or worse, as fictional or extinct. It's enough that once again the kids were able to show me where I had yet to teach them about our world. We still have work to do.

Peaceful pioneers and Native Americans. And a Samurai for some reason.

What's the Harm in Those Facebook Privacy Disclaimers?

I admit it, I do it every couple years.

I scold people for posting those stupid Facebook privacy disclaimers. I post replies with links to Snopes. I mock their lame "Better safe than sorry" prefaces. Nope. No. Not better safe than sorry, you're just posting that because you're too wishy-washy to admit that you're falling for it. I HATE when people post this dumb crap. I hate that it keeps resurfacing long after I'm sure that not only should everyone I know already understand that it's total BS, but so should everyone who has even heard of Facebook. I hate it.

But why? Why does it bother us so much. I'm certainly not alone in this. Just look at the hundreds of articles that are written and shared about it. Look at all the mocking posts that are written in response. People love to HAAAAAAAATE these stupid notices.

But WHY? Why do the articles have headlines like, "Watch out for these Facebook privacy hoaxes," and "Don't fall for the Facebook privacy notice hoax?" Why not fall for it? These headlines make it seem way more ominous than it is. It's even listed on a site called Scam Detector. It's not a malicious thing this hoax. It's certainly not a "scam." A scam implies that falling for it will do you some sort of harm, typically financial harm. But this bout of silliness doesn't actually harm anyone. So why do we care?

I couldn't really figure out the answer. I thought about it, even as I typed up witty yet gentle put downs on my friend's posts. Why did I care? Then I saw this and it explained everything:

I would totally credit this, but I can't find the source. If you know please tell me.

Bingo. I'm a smart guy. (Really.) I pretty much believe that I associate with smart savvy people. How could I not? I'm writing a dissertation on cognition and I may not even be the smartest person in my house. I am friends with a ton of really really smart people. And yet.

And yet I still get this crap popping up in my feed, and it kills me. It kills me, and I think the reason it inspires such ire in many of us is because it shows that all these people we respect can be kinda dumb. Not just, "I turned on the wrong burner and super heated a non-stick pan" dumb, but really really dumb. Like, "I just sent my personal info, and yours, to a Nigerian Prince" dumb. It's even worse when it's our parents or mentors, people we look to for guidance and wisdom. Like, am I really supposed to take your advice on parenting or investing, or whatever when you're re-posting this nonsense? And your stupid "Better safe than sorry" only makes it worse because you're just screaming that even though you know you should know you're doing it anyway. How can I ever look at you and trust your judgement or your instincts ever again? HOW???

OK, yes I'm being hyperbolic. But I do think that the reason this otherwise harmless hoax vexes us so deeply is because it causes us to see the clay feet of people we respect. It's akin to that moment when you realize your parents don't actually know everything. There's a feeling of loss, of finding out about something we'd just rather not know. In short (too late), it's a bummer.

I won't go into how Facebook is really just a big thing that uses your profile to make money, but not from using your photos, or how it's actually this great tool that you get use for free. There's plenty of that out there. I will close with two statuses mocking this whole phenomenon that rang true to me today. First, there's this one from a friend of mine. It sums up nicely why these disclaimers are completely unnecessary:

"As of September 29, 2015, I hereby ban you all from posting stupid bullshit on your Facebook pages. This notice of prohibition of stupid bullshit is legally binding due to Q.E.D 123-456-789, and extends not only to stupid bullshit claims that Facebook is going to begin charging you money for a service that already generates a $5 billion annual operating profit through converting the stupid bullshit you post everyday into demographic information for marketers to further refine their stupid bullshit, but also the stupid bullshit claim that you can create a legal contract between yourself and a company with a valuation of $230 billion by posting some stupid bullshit words on a web site."

 The second comes from the Facebook page for the blog Modern Father Online. It's a rallying cry for us bloggers big and small.

THIS IS NOT A HOAX...As of September 30th, 2015 at AEST 8:00am UTC/GMT +10 hours, I DO give Facebook or any entities associated with Facebook permission to increase my organic reach of my public posts, both past and future. By this statement, I give notice to Facebook that it is strictly encouraged to let all my followers see everything I share, when I share it.

The content of this page is NOT private and confidential information. I WANT people to see what I'm sharing and they want to see it. Now there's no violation that can be punished by law (UCC 1-308- 1 1 308-103 and the Rome Statute), I'm not about to claim that... I just don't want to have to pay heaps of my hard earned in order to share my posts with people who want to see it.

NOTE: Facebook is now a public entity. They need to make money. I get that. But punishing the small time bloggers like me and asking for lots of money otherwise my posts won't reach any more that 2% of my followers is ridiculous. Of course, you as my followers can like, comment and share and help me out now and then so my posts stay in your news feed. That would be sweet.
Posted by Modern Father Online on Tuesday, September 29, 2015

So remember folks, sharing is caring. Facebook is a great tool for all of us to stay in touch and see pics of each other's kids. For us aspiring bloggers it's a good medium to find readers. So if you've enjoyed reading IDL please give our articles a share, or like our Facebook page.

Thanks, and remember, research before you re-post. The respect you save could be your own.

Economic Theory and Bad Parenting

The buckets are not actual buckets.

My kids are a little bit obsessed with money. Not in a terrible way, but it does make me a little bit uncomfortable. (This past month they have been talking about wanting to live "in a big fancy house." It's been kind of a bummer.) Ever since they were little we have tried to introduce the concepts of budgeting and smart shopping with them. This usually related to how they would spend Christmas money that came in from various family members.

We've been doing allowance with Buddy since he turned six a few months back. It's been going pretty well. We've done the three bucket approach where we expect him to put some amount of his money into buckets for spending, saving, and donating. It's been great actually. The spending money has allowed him to buy things that we wouldn't normally buy for him. His first big buy came when we were at Target and he realized he had enough money to buy a LEGO set he'd been pining over in his catalog.  A few weeks later he treated himself and his sister to treats at a baseball game.

The other buckets have come to have their own purposes as well. The saving bucket has mostly been used to replace things he loses or breaks carelessly. For example he was at a friend's house and broke the kid's piggy bank. So he used his savings to help replace it. Kind of like what his parents (us) did with their roof. It's been a good lesson on why saving is important. He has decided to use the donation bucket to give money to our church, and also to donate to causes we read about or discuss.

Buddy always knows how much money he has, and how much he needs for whatever thing it is he's got his eye on. He's also started to identify the types of things he thinks we won't shell out for and often says, "It's OK, I can get that if I save my money." We've even had a discussion of how credit works when he doesn't have his wallet and wants to pay me back for something.

Lou is also becoming more interested in money and often wishes she had as much as her brother does. She sometimes laments that she does not also have three buckets, but just a piggy bank, which is low on clank after she decided that her coins were pretty and repeatedly took them out to play with them, resulting in her losing most of them.

The kids are also aware that we have reached the maximum "stuff" limit in our little home. Since we moved we have one fewer room than we had at the previous house. The result has been a purging of toys and clothes that really should have happened previously. The kids have heard several times over the last year that if we want any new things we have to figure out what old things we can donate or let go of. This has come into sharper focus recently as the kids have gotten deep into LEGOs and want to expand their collection.

All of these ideas coalesced into one case of bad parenting last weekend. On Saturday our neighbors held a yard sale. They were doing all at once what we had been doing piece by piece, paring down and getting rid of things. The kids loved it. They hadn't known that you could get rid of old items by selling them in front of the house. We had always just donated things or given them away on Freecycle. They bought a few things from the neighbors. I had no idea what was coming.

Sunday was a lazy day for us. We came home after church and fell into our various activities. The kids played, T tended to the baby and likely did something productive, I sat down to enjoy the first week of the NFL. At some point I pulled the classic dad move and fell asleep in front of the TV. As I drifted through a semi-conscious state I remember hearing Buddy declare, "Hey Lou, let's have a yard sale." I thought, "That's cute, they're going to play a game."

I woke up some time later to the sound of a barking dog and Buddy saying, "OK, well we'll be here all day if you want to buy some toys." I wandered out to the living room and peered out the door. Sure enough, there were the kids with toys strewn about the lawn, Buddy doing a half carnival barker, half Fox-from-Pinocchio act gently tossing coins in his hand and enjoying the weight of them.

"Scarcho Man" was once Buddy's very favorite toy. 

It wasn't a game. "Good job dad," I thought, "sleeping on the job. Today it was a yard sale, next time it'll be cooking meth or playing with firearms." I felt a bit conflicted. On the one hand I admired their drive. I was also happy that they had chosen things that they felt they didn't need and could do with out. On the other hand I was sad to see that some old favorites had been out for sale. It seemed to mark a transition from a sentimental age where everything you own is precious, to one where things are just things and are not imbued with any intrinsic value. It was a loss of a certain kind of innocence, the kind that makes us love the story of The Velveteen Rabbit. I also had a nagging feeling that I should have been part of the process. Not to reject any of their decisions, just to be there and be involved. But I wasn't. I was asleep.

"Hey guys," I said as I sauntered out of the house in bare feet, "this is cool, but you can't sell the baby's toys." I scooped up a few things that Yo wasn't finished chewing on yet. I marveled a bit at my little capitalists. I'm still not sure what they sold, or how they determined their pricing. Based on what was left my guess is that their love of Hot Wheels is on the wane. I haven't seen an Lightning McQueens around lately.

As surprising as their little endeavor was I was more surprised by the plan they had for their profits. A short time later they declared the yard sale over and came inside. "Here dad." Buddy said holding out his hand. He plunked 85 cents in assorted coins into my hand. "What's this? I asked. "Well," he replied, "I wanted everyone in the family have some money. We made some good sales, but if you have money you should share it with people around you." So my little salesmen were actually socialists. I don't think I'm a socialist, I don't know what I am, but I was happy to see the kids being generous.

I feel like there's supposed to be some kind of lesson here, I just can't think of what it is. I definitely think I need to be able to shake myself a little better when I overhear the kids planning something. Waking up to the aftermath wasn't a great feeling. Or maybe it's that I got an early glimpse into the fact that even though it sometimes feels like we're just telling kids things, they actually are listening and will eventually find a way to put our words into action.

Yeah. I like that second one.

What We Mean when We Say "Sorry."

This was not actually an attempt to get them to get along, it was just a chilly morning.

It seems there have been a lot of articles floating around the last year or so about whether and how much we should apologize or use the word "sorry." Some say we shouldn't force kids to apologize. Others claim to be able to teach us how to apologize correctly. There has also been renewed focus on how women sometimes use apologetic language in a way that is disempowering.

This got me to thinking about what an apology actually is. Sure, it's an expression of regret. It can be a way to show someone that you acknowledge that you've hurt them in some way. It can be an attempt at an easy out when you're trying to avoid the consequences of your actions. An apology can take many forms and have many shades of meaning to the speaker and the recipient.

But what is an apology really? What is the expectation that comes from an apology? Is there an implied promise inherent in the act of apologizing? I think that there is, and this is what I've been teaching my kids.

An apology is an illocutionary act, an utterance that has some force to it and is usually expected to lead to some sort of physical action. For example, the phrase "It's chilly in here" is often in fact a request or command that carries the expectation that someone will act to change the temperature of the room. Specifically, an apology is a commissive illocutionary act in that it binds the speaker to a course of action. In less flowery terms, it's a promise to change. It's a promise to take steps to avoid repeating whatever action led to the apology.

I wish I had come up with this all my own (and I'm sure there's another article out there somewhere that says proposes the same idea), but it came to me through a conversation with my son. I was frustrated with him, and with my kids as a whole, over what seemed to be increasingly empty apologies. During our discussion I asked him what he thinks he means by an apology. I asked him, if he finds himself apologizing for the same things again and again what is the apology for? Why should I care? He told me, "Dad, when I say sorry, what I mean is that I am going to try to change my behavior." Boom. He nailed it. It was the point I had been dancing around and trying to impart, but I hadn't been able to put it in those words.

Ever since then we've had a framework for what an apology is. We've had a touchstone to go back to when we need to decide whether an apology is warranted. As a result there aren't always apologies when I think there should be, and the ones that come may come slower than before, but I can live with that. The great thing is when I see the kids apologize to each other I know what they're doing. They are strengthening their relationship in small but meaningful ways. And it's working.

It also makes it easier for me to apologize to them, something that was hard for me to do for a long time. Now they know that when I tell them I'm sorry for losing my temper, or sorry for not hearing a request, that I am promising to do better for them in the future. It's helped them to feel better faster when I misstep. It's helped me to feel better about showing my kids that I can be vulnerable or wrong, which in turn has helped them do the same.

Understanding that words are actions opens up a greater understanding of how what we say affects the people around us. Framing an apology as a promise to change can help all of us, parents and kids, better understand what we're really saying when we say "I'm sorry."

Like Everyone

Buddy playing catch with a member of the opposing team after a match. Sometimes you feel like you're doing it right.

Sometimes I have those moments when I feel like a "good parent;" those moments when I feel like a modern day Ward Cleaver. Before my kids were born I had no idea what I would teach them in terms of being people in the world. I didn't have a "parenting philosophy." Sometimes people would actually ask me what my parenting approach was going to be. I think it's because of the popularity of self help books and parenting guides. I had no idea, and really I had no interest. My mom didn't have a parenting philosophy, she did fine. Now that I'm six years and three kids into this adventure I am finding that I do have certain points I try to emphasize with them.

As I've aged I have found that my disposition towards people has changed. I used to hate everyone unless they gave me a reason not to. Through my 20s and 30s I've done almost a complete 180. Now I generally like everyone unless they give me a reason not to. This became important as I navigated corporate and academic politics. It's been a key to whatever success I've had, but until yesterday I had never made it an explicit part of my parenting philosophy. Sure, I had told the kids to "be nice." Last week, when Lou started pre-k there was a girl who was having a very hard time separating from her parents.  I encouraged Lou to sit with this girl and to be extra friendly towards her for the day. My worry was that Lou and other kids would shun this girl because she was melting down in a way that was kind of off putting, especially for a room of four-year-old strangers who were already nervous and in a new place. I was hoping this girl would see that there's at least one friendly face, and that Lou would learn about "loving everyone."

I grew up in Berkeley, California. I am also a member of a church. In both places I have often heard that you should love everyone. I have always felt that this is a tall order. How can I love everyone? Some people are terrible. As I've gotten older I've come to understand this idea more for what it's supposed to mean in terms of finding a way to reserve judgment of people until you know more about them. It's supposed to get you to empathize with strangers as you would with the people you really do love based on knowing them. But it's a hard concept to impart to a child. Especially when my daughter is so friendly she'll happily wander off the porch and down the block with anyone who stops to say hi. It's hard to say "Love everyone, but don't trust people you don't know." Learning to love new people is often bound up in trusting them. Love feels like too tall an order.

This weekend we took a family trip to the beach. We parked at a park and ride where you could get a shuttle to the shore. There was a typically diverse crowd waiting for the shuttle, people of all races, ages, and sizes. While we were waiting Buddy asked each of us about one thing we needed, and one thing we wanted but didn't need. I assume they're teaching this in school, and I'm very happy about that. Then somehow it got changed to naming one thing we loved, and one thing we liked but didn't love. Buddy said he loved everyone in his family, and liked his friends but didn't love all of them. I said I loved my family and that I liked everyone at the shuttle stop.

Buddy was shocked. "Wait, dad, you like everyone at this shuttle stop? How can you do that?" And that's where I felt like I was having one of those important parenting moments, the ones where you hope you're saying something that's going to stick with them and help shape the core of their being. I explained that I like everyone until they give me a specific reason not to. I told him that unless someone does something that hurts me or others I just assume that I like that person. I imparted that if you go into every new interaction assuming that you like the person in front of you and they like you the world opens up to you. As I said it I prayed that the kids were really listening, the way they do when you slip up and yell at a bone headed customer service rep on the phone. They always remember that.

It works (liking people, not yelling a customer service reps). I'd seen it long before I experienced it. I never realized it until recently, but my dad was really good at treating everyone as if he already liked them. I remember being out with him as a kid and he would talk to people many parents would tell their kids to avoid. He never had any problems with it. If he needed a light, or directions, he'd just ask whoever was at hand, and we used to inhabit some pretty rough areas of SF and the Bronx.

I've also seen it in a friend who did more to meet my neighbors in one walk to the store than I had in two years. I had assumed that my neighbors wouldn't like me. I was the male figure in what looks like a white family in a gentrifying area. I worried that my neighbors saw us as the tip of a young hipster professional spear that was going to take over their town and push them out. So I kept to myself, and so did they. Then my friend came to visit. We went for a walk and he said hello to every person who was sitting out on their porch, and they said hello back in a way that was warm and welcoming. I realized that I'd been missing out. I saw that he assumed that he liked them, and that they liked him, and it was true. After that I followed his example and I got to know my neighbors better and it was great.

I don't know what happened with that little girl in Lou's classroom. I know that as of Thursday she was still melting down at drop off. I hope Lou has continued to be kind and welcoming towards this girl. I don't love everyone, and I don't expect my kids to either. (In fact, I sometimes wish they'd love people a little less. They are very quick to show physical affection towards new people.) I do try to go through my days liking everyone though. It's been a positive force in my life and it's one of the few things I'd put into the box labeled "parenting philosophy." I hope my kids can learn to approach everyone with the assumption that they already like each other, then I'll feel like a "good parent."

Never Junk an Expensive Toy Again

OK, maybe the title is an overstatement, but that's how I felt when I saw a Facebook page for a service I always thought I needed, but didn't know existed. I'd say something like, "Toys these days are complex," but the fact is that toys have been complex since I was a kid. This is especially true of things like Transformers, which have inscrutable and, in my mind, unrepairable tiny parts. For the entirety of my life a broken Transformer stayed broken. Still, I usually found it hard to part with these broken treasures. I thought I was just a hopeless pack rat until I read this post by Tenor Dad who put to words what had been a vague feeling for me:

"...because we moved so much when I was kid (pretty much every year), stuff became my home and my comfort. My room wasn’t a structure or a place, my room was my posters and my toys. If a room had my bed, and my desk, and my Thundercats, then it was my room. And so I began a lifetime of packrat living, unable to get rid of anything, because everything I owned was a living piece of me."

Yup. That was me too, and true to form I've been carting around a broken VF-1 Varitech toy for almost 15 years because even though it had a busted arm I couldn't bear to part with it.

Then today I was invited to like a Facebook page called Jamiko's Action Figure and Collectable Repair. The service is run by Jamiko Hercules, a dad and a jack of all trades who recently went into business repairing Transformers, Robotech/Japanese Robot toys, and basically any complex, non-electronic toy or collectable . I got in touch with Jamiko to ask him about his business and the mission of saving broken toys.


Name: Jamiko Hercules
Business: Jamiko's Action Figure and Collectable Repair
Location: Online
Service Area: National, by Mail
Quote: "If it can be fixed, I can fix it"

An Interdisciplinary Life: This looks like a cool service. How did you get started, and why are you the person filling this need. Basically who the hell are you and why should we entrust our toys to you?

Jamiko Hercules: I’ve been doing this for a little while now, over 6 months, and I just figured out how to invite people to like my Facebook page. When I first made it I was like, “Now I just need to invite people...I don’t know how to do that." So, I'm learning how to program the VCR

IL: Yeah, my friend just posted a story about her 5 year old daughter secretly creating a new Netflix profile so she could get around the parental controls. I'm like, "My kid just learned how to use the space bar to pause and un-pause." It's been a struggle for me to figure out how much technology and at what ages.

JH: That's the game you play as a parent in the 21st century. You want your kids to go out and ruckus, and skin their knees, and at the same time you also don’t want them to be behind the curve. The thing about computers is that the thing that stops people from doing anything with them is fear. They don’t want it to break, but unless you throw them against a wall, you kind of can’t really break them. Just messing around in a program you can’t break it. You can get somewhere and you don’t know how to get back, and then you need to ask for help, but you can’t really break it.

     Someone told me, years ago, "If you don't learn computers now, you'll never learn." But because things change so rapidly you can really jump in at any point. Learning computers is like the universe. There’s no beginning and no end. No matter when you start you're at the center. Anyway, my son can do all this. I’m figuring it out.

IL: That's deep man, but we're way off topic. Who the hell are you? Why should I send my broken Transformers to you?

JH: I started off building model cars and I quickly found that the pieces I wanted, because I didn’t want to build out of the box, I wanted to build what was in my head, weren't available from manufacturers or from third parties. I had to start scratch building them myself. So I started getting parts  and doing that. After about 20 years of that I got good at it.  I also worked in a robotics lab for 2 or 3 years. I worked in a machine shop and that’s one of the places where I built my skills.
 
     Then about seven years ago I got back into collecting Transformers and Japanese robots. I quickly found that I’m poor, and buying Transformers, especially Gen 1, can get expensive. If they’re pristine they can be $300, but broken ones can be $25 or $1. So I started buying broken ones on eBay. For me having the figure is enough. The figure is attached to a character and having the character is what was important to me. I don’t need some pristine in the box collector’s edition. So I started repairing these broken toys. Then I realized I was good at that and I started coming up with some innovative ways to make repairs at home. But I started doing it because I was broke.

     I realized I was getting good at it and I wondered if there were other people out there who had the same problem but didn’t have the same tools, or space, or know how to fix them. I joined some Facebook groups for toy collectors and got my name out there. Half the people were like “Cool!” and the other half  were like, “It’s scam, you’ll never get that toy back again." But people started contacting me.

     Also, I have an eight-year-old and toys break. If they break I can’t afford to buy new ones, and many were gifts. So when something broke, instead of junking them I could repair them and he could get more years of enjoyment out of them. Bottom line, I’m a parent, I want to help my kid.

IL: What kind of toys do you work on?

JH: Transformers, Robotech, Japanese robots, or any action figure that exists. I also do custom work, so if you want a different head to make it a different character, or a gun built, I can do that.

IL: So what's a typical repair like?

 JH: One of the first repairs I did was on a third party Transformer. Third party toys are expensive, they're made by companies that are not Hasbro or Takara (the primary makers of Transformers). They’re not knock offs because they’re not copies of Transformers. But say a particular figure hasn’t been made, because there’s a lot of figures that they don’t make because it wouldn’t be cost effective because it would only appeal to hard core collectors, not droves of kids. But say you want a highly articulated and detailed Overlord, no kid wants that, most people don’t know who that is. So these third party companies step in and they operate in a grey area because they're stealing intellectual property from the companies. They’ll make a cool new updated version of something and then call it something else. So they pretend they’re not stealing intellectual property, but they are. Some third party companies will do add on kits for Transformers. They add something cool to an existing toy, adding height, or guns or a cool new head, or a movie style head.

     For this repair the toy was shipped to a guy and the shoulder ball joint was broken off at the stock. So I had him send me just the figure, not the accessories, just the parts that are broken. It took a couple days and I rebuilt the shoulder ball joint from scratch.

IL: What was involved in that?

JH: I took the ball joint, I cut off the part where it snapped and flattened out the surfaces. This joint is attached to a stock. I rebuilt the stock using concentric pieces of aluminum tubing. Then I drilled a hole the body of the figure and added a new piece of aluminum that went through the stock and all the way through the figure. Then I drilled more holes in the stock and the figure so there were 3 tubes that attached the joint the figure. That protected the rotational force on the stock. Then I glued the stock in place and covered the entire length of the stock with super glue. A 1/37 of an inch cocoon around the whole stock. I sanded it and color matched the paint, reattached the arm and it’s as good as new.

IL: So you do this by mail? What's the turn around time?

JH: Time depends on complexity of the fix, how much I have to build. I just did two for a guy in SF. For one, all I had to do was build a spring, and one was just a shim. If it’s complicated then it can take a couple weeks. But usually it’s within a week.

IL: This seems like a unique service. Are there a lot of people doing this kind of thing?

JH: I’m one of  a few. There are others out there, but most people don’t have the skills to fix transformers or complex toys. The people who do have the skills usually apply them to other things. They become jewelry makers, or watch makers, or work in robotics labs. They don’t think to apply the skills to toys because most adults don’t like toys. I’m not the only one out there, but I’m not one of the many, I’m one of the few.

IL: So the big question is, what does something like this cost?

JH: That’s a good question. All I’ve been doing is saying, the customer pays shipping each way and then I’ve been working on a sliding scale. I try to keep prices fair. I got into this because I was broke so I don’t want to break anyone else’s bank. Most of the reason I do this is that I love toys and I hate to see them broken. I’m not trying to get rich off of this, it’s nice to make some extra money. Obviously I'm providing a service and I need to get paid for it. But when I take a commission I always talk to the person to work out what we both think is a fair price for the work involved.

IL: So how can people find you?

JH: Get in touch using the Facebook page. You can like the page, you can friend me. That’s a great way to get in touch because I’m part of the 21st century now and it all comes to my phone. I just got an iPhone so I can use Facebook on my phone. I used to have to wait until I was at a computer. Now I am constantly available for toy repair.

IL: There you go, it's just like the universe right? It doesn't matter when you jump in. Any last words?

JH: You don’t have to junk your old Transformers or other figures and collectables. If it can be fixed I can fix it. Some things will be beyond the realm of fixability. (Is that a word?) Some things will be deteriorated beyond where they can be fixed. But an arm, a leg, point of articulation, or almost anything else, I can repair . One of the first things I repaired was a Masterpiece Robotech Alpha Fighter. They’re about $300 on eBay. I got it for $25 because they have fully articulated fingers that are infamous for breaking. This one, all the fingers were broken off, the feet were broken, the arms were off, I rebuilt the head. I color matched the paint and now it looks great.

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So there you have it.  My old Varitech can live again. There's a very Toy Story 4 vibe to this whole thing that gives me the warm fuzzies. Like maybe this is what Spike really grew up to do. Our old broken toys can live again.