Ep. 149 – Nostalgia Unleashed: Hobbies That Stand the Test of Time

Don (00:00) the launch of the movie did make me think like, ⁓ man, I miss Toys R Us. have from our childhood that we still kind of still do to this day? It's so funny that the Zen is driving little RC cars and sitting around sculpting plastic into fun little Japanese robots, super fun, you know? Alright, we're back Rob episode 149. Rob (00:42) Prelude to 150. Don (00:44) I feel like we should just name the podcast. We're back. Yeah. It's a little catchphrase. So I mean, we've all got our weird little particulars that we say all the time, you know, so ⁓ yeah, we're back. All right. Episode 149. All right. ⁓ So what here's what I thought we would talk about. I watched the hot ones. You don't watch hot ones. You're not a you're not a Sean Evans hot ones. You're familiar with the show, though, obviously. Rob (00:48) We're back. Yeah, I'm good with that. We're back, we're back. Yeah, every now and again, I'll watch a little snippet or an episode here and there. It pops up all the time. It's very popular. Don (01:15) Yeah, so Sean Evans had ⁓ Channing Tatum on recently to promo the new movie Roof Man, right? And I have not seen the movie. I do not know a lot about the movie. All I know is that ⁓ it's basically the story of the guy that lived in a Toys R Us, right? And nobody knew that he was in a Toys R Us or what, you know, how long did he stay in there? I have no idea. Everybody else can. Now, it's inspired by a true story. I don't even know if this is Rob (01:32) Yeah, right. I don't know anything about the real story. You're just inspired by a true story, right? I don't know anything. Don (01:45) like factually accurate in terms of, mean, none of that matters for the point of this conversation. The internet can fact check me as they fact check me on everything else. ⁓ But Toys R Us, Toys R Us. Mana from heaven, the greatest store ever when we were kids, right? Yeah, I mean, just the best, the best. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rob (01:49) Doesn't matter. Amazing. Incredible. You want a bicycle? They have it. You want a GI Joe? They got that too. Yeah, I mean... Don (02:12) I mean, they had everything. I mean, they had all the Barbies, all the toys. They had all the things, right? ⁓ So I think, ⁓ you know, I think I thought it might be fun to talk about like hobbies or things that we had as a kid, things that we loved as a kid that maybe we still sort of deal with today, you know what I mean? Or not deal with, but still sort of carry the torch, you know? ⁓ I think, you know, we both have kids. Our kids were still around when Toys R was closing down. So I used to take my oldest to Toys R Us. But my youngest, right? So eight years, eight something years, really only has like one memory of Toys R Us, two with the most, you know what mean? Before, poof, Toys R Us was gone. You know what I mean? Rob (02:48) Right? thought a few years back it came back. Am I crazy? Don (02:57) Well, I don't think you're crazy. I don't think it ever went under in Canada. I could be wrong, but I feel like it still is a retail store up north of the border. I'm probably totally wrong on this. And then there was an investment group that was like, we're bringing it back. But it didn't it didn't materialize, didn't materialize. Rob (03:11) Yeah. So here's what here's I'm going to give you the quick the quick check. They filed for bankruptcy in 2017 and they were closing all U.S. stores by 2018. The brand has returned through new strategies including flagship stores smaller shops inside Macy's department stores which I guess you're still around and they're trying to expand their the U.S. footprint again with new and permanent seasonal stores. Don (03:18) Yeah, check me. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Rob (03:41) which makes sense, planned for late 2025. So there's your quick update. Don (03:42) Okay. Like a pop-up, pop-up Toys R Us? Rob (03:47) Well, hey, Christmas, here's your Christmas pop up store. It's like the Halloween pop up store. You know what mean? Don (03:51) Yeah, yeah, spirit. mean, Jeffrey, the giraffe. mean, everything about Toys R was just magical, you know? I mean, we used to go to Toys R Us and just wander around and just look at stuff. You know, I mean, it was like, just, that's where you learned about things too. Like there was no like magical internet or Instagram ads or stuff like that. You would get like, you just go there and you're like, my God, look at all this stuff everywhere. It's amazing. So. Rob (03:56) Yeah. Yeah. Well, there's no ordering things. We're not ordering stuff. Like, we're going and getting it, saving up our money and buying it and coming home with it and freaking out. Don (04:17) No, no, you're going to Toys R Us and you're, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you're buying things is what's happening. So ⁓ things that, hobbies, things that we know and love and things that we do. You got anything right off the top of the head? You know what I mean? When you think about Toys R Us, when you think about things that you used to love as a kid that you still love now. Rob (04:39) I will tell you, this was not, it wasn't, they did not sell this at Toys R Us. They sold a version of this and I'll get to that in a minute, at Toys R Us. But ⁓ when I was in middle school, ⁓ back in the 50s, they, ⁓ we got, me and my buddies, ⁓ one friend, well, I was three or fours in particular, got really, really into, remote control cars, RC cars. ⁓ Don (04:45) OK. Come on, you're not that old. RC cards. Badass. Rob (05:08) So bad ass and it was, but back then you bought them. were all manufactured overseas shocker and they were all like brands like, like, like Kiyo show. I mean, it sounded very Japanese. Like it was all, and I mean, the box was, you were lucky if you got English instructions in there, but you would go to the, to the hobby shop, right. And you would pick out your, your Kiyo show. Kiyo show Ultimo was my, that was my car. It was a buggy. Don (05:17) Yeah, yeah, yeah, Keo Show. That was that was your jam. Was that was that a road? Was that a road or was that off road? It was a buggy. Okay, off road, off road. Okay. Okay. Rob (05:37) It was a buggy, it was like an off-road buggy. ⁓ But then you would buy separate, I remember the controller was a stick controller, it wasn't the drive controller, and that was made by Futaba. So again, we're following the theme. ⁓ But the difference then was back then you bought it, and I'm not even joking you, it'd be interesting to go back and look, but you had to build the thing from the ground up. And I mean, this was a, I don't know. Don (05:47) Okay. Futaba. Yeah, I had some futabas. yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Rob (06:04) three week process, two week process to build every single, oh my God, every single nut and bolt. And we would stay, me and my buddy, Jason, shout out to Jason, we'd stay up and we were also into metal. So we would stay up and listen to Ozzy Osbourne was our thing. All night long, just making, putting this car together. And oh my God, we're soldering things. We're soldering motor connections and like, you know, all the things. Don (06:07) Yeah, yeah, it took forever. was like plastic sprues and little clippings. Yeah, I mean, it was the whole thing. Dude, dude, you're scratching a niche, man. Yeah. Yeah, dude. It was the best. It was the best. definitely had the me and my buddies, we had the RC bug as well. We had my neighbor across the street AJ had a huge backyard. And I remember his parents let us like, break out shovels and like dig like a little course like a little circuit or whatever like that. You know, I was not a Kyosho go that guy though. I was to Mia. I was all about the to me. yeah, to me. I had a hot shot and a big wig. Rob (06:47) Yeah. Totally. No, it's Mia. Sure, sure, sure. Don (06:58) And then eventually we had the monster trucks. You had the Claude Buster and all those types of things, right? ⁓ Two-wheel drive, four-wheel drive, things like that. What I loved about Tamiya, it's interesting to think about from an advertising perspective, is here's these badass remote control cars you have to put together, but everything was illustrated. If you think about like 80s RC cars, it wasn't a photo of the car on the outside of the box. It was this big four-color glossy, beautiful airbrush rendering. Rob (07:15) Yeah. Don (07:24) of like what your car will never look like because you will never build it to that level. You know what I mean? But man, yeah, the Tamiya I had the Futaba as well. I was a stick guy. I did not like the gun and the wheel. It freaked me out. All of them now. Yeah, all of them. Yeah, yeah. All of them now are like that. Yeah. So my youngest Rob (07:29) Right. ⁓ I didn't like this thing. I didn't like it. I didn't like it. I hated it. I hated it. Yeah. Well, it was Tamiya. Was Tamiya, were they, were they the grasshopper and some of their brother? There was, they made the grasshopper. Yeah. Don (07:48) Yes. Yes, the grasshopper, the hornet, the monster beetle, Claude Buster, all those classic midnight pumpkin. I will also accept lunchbox. Do remember the lunchbox? Okay. Rob (07:59) No, don't, I just knew Grasshopper and Hornet and like I didn't, Lunchbox. Don (08:03) Okay, I don't want to ruin this for you. But again, it's been 40 years people. It's basically all the same inner chassis. Okay, the inner frame that you build is it's not the same as aggressive but like there was like one chassis and then that would be like four different vehicles and it was just the difference of drivetrain. Rob (08:18) Yeah. Yeah. Don (08:21) size of tires, you know, the the industrial design of the actual vehicle itself, right? You know, I mean, so is it a van? Is it a pickup truck? Is it a but you know, that type of thing, right? So a lot of similarities under the hood, which is kind of funny, because it's kind of like real auto manufacturing, to be honest, you know. ⁓ And then it was all about the aftermarket, the electronic speed control and getting a faster motor and all that kind of stuff. You know, ⁓ I love that stuff as a kid. there you go, dude. Yeah. yeah. What? Are you swapping out motors now? What's happening? Rob (08:34) Right, right. Replacement motor. Yeah. I'm going to swap out motors. I just soldered everything and I got it ready. Now I got to swap out a new one. I've gone. Wait, I've gone. But they used to. ⁓ So they so they used to make it. But now what's happened as society has evolved. ⁓ Now you buy them and they're they're called R2R ready to run. Right. They come out of the box and you don't you don't have to do anything. ⁓ Don (08:52) Dude, that's bad ass. I'm super into that. gone down a rabbit hole. Okay. They're all made, right? Rob (09:13) It's not as exciting. It's certainly not as gratifying. I mean, Don (09:15) I can't take the fun out. Yeah. Rob (09:16) it's definitely not, but we are a society of immediacy. So for that, it's good. But then you can Don (09:21) Yeah. Well, I want I got the box, I want to open it and I want to start driving something immediately. Yeah. Oh my god, Do you remember charging the batteries back? I mean, I had like a trickle charger that I had to hook up to like my dad's like VW and then it would take like 45 minutes to charge the battery for like 10 minutes of racing. Yeah. Rob (09:26) I want the battery to be charged. want everything. But what you can do, this was the... ⁓ yeah. Yeah. Well, I don't if you I mean, you remember how I got this car. This is the ⁓ this is the team associated RC 10. ⁓ You actually a few years back ordered one a ready to run RC 10 and they mistakenly sent you to RC 10s. And these things look it up, folks, but these things are not inexpensive. So that is not in consequence. So that's how I ended up with this. And that actually sparked me then going back down the rabbit hole that I'm in now. Don (09:57) I remember this. Yeah. I know, I know. No, no. Yeah, yeah. love it. love it. Hey man, a kid again is being a kid again is awesome. ⁓ My RC 10 smashed right into a curb. Never. And I never thought I haven't fixed it yet. So I mean that was years ago. Rob (10:14) which is motors on my desk and solder. Oh dude, there's, I'm soldering. There's all kinds of. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, but for those who are are unaware, it's pretty basic chassis motor back here and then your battery compartment. This is what's called your servo control. We're not going to go too down in the weeds, but yeah, now I've gone full bore into I'm I'm down into blogs. I'm reading about replacement motors. So even though it comes ready to run, you can still nerd out and go down the rabbit hole of of after marketing your Don (10:32) Yeah. Yeah. to the south. Yeah. Yeah, it's super fun, man. Dude, the hobby shops are awesome, man. It's a good Zen sort of deal, right? ⁓ So my weird little pastime, ⁓ since you're down the rabbit hole of ⁓ RC cars, has spawned from my son, right? We went to a hobby shop up in Kennesaw. Shout out to Hobby Town USA years ago, right? ⁓ Love that place. That place is awesome. Rob (11:11) I'll down in USA. They've been there forever. Don (11:17) Forever. Yeah. I mean, that place is fantastic. So hashtag those guys, right? ⁓ So we ended up wandering around and ⁓ he was like, Hey, I want to buy a model. We were down. We're in these Japanese ⁓ robot, you know, fighting robot model aisle, Gundams, right? Then I'm wandering around like, man, this stuff is awesome. This is like way better than it was in the eighties. You know what mean? So he rocks out a model and I'm like, that's super cool. And then he wants another model. And so he went and got another model. And next thing you know, you know, what's happening is like, dude, I'm gonna buy one of these models too, right? And you know how like adults do Lego as like a Zen chilled out kind of thing, right? So like, next thing you know, we're at the kitchen table, you know, he's, he's, we're modeling. I mean, we got little like, we got little nippers, you know, we're nipping models out of the sprues, we're doing all sorts of stuff, And I'm like, just totally zenned out. Like this is this amazing little world where we're building these Japanese models, right? Rob (11:53) Yeah, yeah. Are we painting with like Tops Paint? Don (12:14) And as you can probably tell from a little bit of the models behind me, I've totally I've gone I've gone crazy now, right? But for me, it's all about all of the old nostalgic, like dudes Megatron Megatron. Yeah. So it's all the old most out, know, but it's basically like making your own action figure from the sprue. Like everything's totally articulated, can totally move around. I mean, half the models can totally transform. It's such a weird, funny little Zen. You know, you got all these little Rob (12:20) That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don (12:43) You know, Star Wars model. mean, just like fun little interesting models or whatever that it's just such a fun sort of vibe. So I mean, it's it's ⁓ it's my little Zen moments or whatever that and yeah, we've got a fun little modeling station where my son and I will go and buy all these Gundam models and then they start as here. I mean, basically all the pieces come on sprues, right? You cut them all out and then put together a model. It's completely insane. And then you end up painting them and doing all this crazy diorama stuff. It's like Rob (12:53) Yeah. Yeah Don (13:11) It's like old men with like train sets, you know what mean? And like building the mountain. That's basically what's happening, you know, is my version of reading old World War II stories and ⁓ getting into model trains is building Japanese Gundam robots, which is completely insane. Yeah. And the freakier and weirder the better. Like the strange little like monster guy. Rob (13:15) yeah! yeah. Look at the snout on that guy. Don (13:35) yeah, dude, he's got a full blown like, like, ⁓ know, elephant elephants now he's got missile fingers, you know, got to get in there, paint every single missile, you know, it's just completely insane. Like, you know, but it's what a wonderful, fun, quirky little hobby, little chill sort of thing to do. It's super, super nerdy. So super fun though. I love it. Rob (13:51) We did, we did a lot. did models too. We, we, only did generally speaking, ⁓ aircraft models like, like F 14, a Tomcats. was all about the fighter planes. Yeah. Don (13:58) Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's what we all did in the 80s. I did that too. And then you'd then you'd like burn the wing and like hanging in your hanging in your room or whatever. Yeah. yeah, totally. yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, those were super badass man back in the day. Like the hobby shop was always the cool thing for for young dudes, you know, like there's so many awesome things happening there. Rob (14:07) Yeah, you hang it from fishing line in your room is what you do so that you've got like fucking fight. Pardon my French fighters everywhere. Don (14:25) Totally different vibe in Toys R Us, but the launch of the movie did make me think like, ⁓ man, I miss Toys R Us. And then what do we have from our childhood that we still kind of still do to this day? It's so funny that if the Zen is driving little RC cars and sitting around sculpting plastic into fun little Japanese robots, super fun, you know? Rob (14:47) Well, I'm gonna tell you, I'm gonna show you this. I'm gonna pull up a visual aid for our fans out Don (14:51) Yeah, do it. I mean, I'm skipping over the obvious, which everyone knows, of course, I'm a big comic book guy and I still love comics. We've done. Yeah, we've done podcasts about that in the past. So. Rob (14:57) Yeah, that goes without saying. But back on the model thing before we leave that, Don (15:06) Yeah, I got it. Yeah. Rob (15:05) Can you see that? Can people see that? So we worked on a project for Fox Factory, which is great. They make all aftermarket parts for real size cars, Jeeps and things. And we actually took inspiration from, from the things that we used to do, little shock absorbers and all this kind of off-road stuff. And then, you know, we did hobby kits with little showed them as little pieces and parts, which I think is a direct lineage to what we used to do. Don (15:14) Yeah. I see what you're doing here, Rob. Mm-hmm. Truth in advertising, right? Rob (15:34) and have, and then furthermore, yeah, think there, where's the, these are all Jeep ones, but then there's, yeah, well, zone off road is all the pieces and parts, again, focusing on assembling and pieces and parts and things, and then even, where's RideTech? Yeah, there you go. RideTech, the whole idea was it was a throwback to the 80s, where your old model kits. So we literally packaged it up as a kit. Don (15:49) Yeah. There we go. Yeah. had all the old models peruse. Yeah. Rob (16:02) Here's all the pieces you get inside and even did this fun little retro video for it. And then yeah, here you go. There's the model, there's the sprues. ⁓ all of the things that we used to love, we're keeping the dream alive is what we're doing. Don (16:08) Yeah, there's all the sprues. God, that's so funny. I didn't even think about that in relation to this podcast, but that's fantastic. Rob (16:21) My other thing too was I was really big into, this was in the mid 80s, early to mid 80s, was BMX freestyling. So it was when freestyling first became a thing. And we used to go up a shout out to a bike shop called Free Flight in Marietta. And it was when Haro and GT and those, they first started doing demos in the parking lots of guys spinning around and on the handlebars. And they hadn't figured out that you could do a half pipe yet. Don (16:30) yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay. my God. Rob (16:50) They would just do a quarter pipe. So these guys would ride, you know, 50 yards, 100 yards as fast as they can pedal and zip into the air. And then one guy went, Hey, let's just put another one and then we can use the energy. But I say all that to say there's been somewhat of a, somewhat of a resurgence and there's a whole rabbit hole of collectors who collect the original horror freestylers and BMX. I mean, you can get up into the pretty expensive stuff, but I've got my eye on a couple of Don (16:56) Get the speed, yeah. That's funny. Yeah, yeah, use momentum. There you go. Yeah. wow. Wow. That's crazy. Now, come on. That's fantastic. Rob (17:20) a couple of those. Just to have in a collection somewhere, the only problem with that is at my age, I know what'll happen. I'll get one of those and I'll go try something. And based on my trampoline experience, I think we all know how that might end. Don (17:24) Okay, yeah. my god. Yeah, I mean, they had at that point at the beginning, though, they had the pegs on the front. I mean, it was it Yeah, OK, OK. Rob (17:44) That's when they first evolved. Yeah, they started and it was, let's do pegs on the front. Let's do pegs on the back. And then they went pegs on the front. And then they, and so it was all land work. It was all just land and spins and bunny hops and all that kind of stuff. And then they, then somebody took flight and then that changed the game. ⁓ Game over. But I think the power of nostalgia, man, it's, ⁓ yeah, it's a wonderful thing. Don (17:52) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ Then the game over at that point so. ⁓ Dude, it's a wonderful thing. It's a wonderful thing. Yeah, for everybody. Whatever everybody loves love what you love. I think it's cool. So I mean, if you love sitting around building models with your son or if you like remote driving remote control cars with your son, you know, like, or whatever, it's the best. So ⁓ Rob (18:20) And keep it alive, keep it as a hobby, bring it into your work, do whatever, you know. Don (18:23) Yeah, I got into like painting miniatures for a hot minute to I was into like building little minis and things like that because I love the weird lore of Warhammer and things like that. But it's almost it's almost overly complicated. You know what mean? It's like there's too much going on. But there was we had Did you ever get into that like D &D and like little lead figures and stuff like that in the 80s and whatnot or Rob (18:35) Yeah. I didn't, I didn't, I wasn't really a D &D guy. Don (18:46) I mean, still got my, cause now I use them all, I use them all for, I use them all for my robots, my Gundams and everything. But it's all about the Citadel paints and all that weird, all that crazy stuff, whatever that stuff. Go. Rob (18:55) yeah. I thought you were going to say something different. Because one thing I'm experiencing with my with my car and some of the stuff that I'm doing like like even when it comes to soldering right little connections, I can't see anymore. So I thought you were going to say because the miniatures were so small you can't you couldn't see the paint. I mean I have a whole magnification system because I have to put them under the magnification system so I can even with my glasses on so I could see. Don (19:10) dude. Well, I got the. Well, there's definitely something to be said for like the jewelers light, you know what mean? That's got the little LED light with the matter. Yeah. Rob (19:26) Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's a loop we're getting in there and looking at things. Don (19:31) my god, I'm not at the loop point yet. You know, like, but it's definitely happening. It's definitely happening. So yeah, it's like, why did we decide to make a whole army of people 20 millimeters tall that we have to paint with like one little bruh, you know, so. ⁓ But that said, they're badass. They're super awesome. You know, like when those things are painted extraordinarily well, it's really remarkable. So yeah, that's its own weird little set of art form. So yeah, I mean, hey, let the nerd that's a nerd flag out super fun. So ⁓ Rob (19:34) I'm a little older than you are. Yeah, yeah. It's impressive. It's a talent. It's a talent. Don (20:01) Yeah, good times, man. Good times. don't know how I don't know where we go from here on this one. I mean, maybe maybe visit your toys or else pop up show. Yeah, there we go. Yeah. Yeah, there you go. Let's shut it down for the day and make models and drive RC cars. Rob (20:03) All right, I'm gonna go work on my car. I'm gonna go work on my car for a little bit. I don't know what you're gonna do. I'm gonna go run the car out in the parking lot. Sounds good to me. All right. Hey, Don, where can the people find us? Don (20:20) People can find us at the Toys R pop-up shop when that opens up. And everybody can find us at mocktheagency.com and on our YouTube channel at Mock the Agency. until next, until 1.50. Rob (20:25) Bingo. Sounds good, we'll talk to you for 150. Don (20:37) confetti confetti all right see everybody Rob (20:39) boom. Thanks everybody.