FAO downtown.

The office has been extremely quiet of late, and today
is no exception. So, after lunch, I decided to wander
over to the FAO Schwartz store in my building. It is
closing in three days, and everything in the store is
on sale. 70% off today, not that I saw much of
interest to me. The closest item that even tempted me
was a craft set that poured colored sand into various
interestingly shaped bottles. Still, not exactly
something I've got space in my apartment for.

Also, if you've never been to the downtown store,
there were several animatronic critters. A roaring
lion, a talking dinosaur, and the incessantly singing
clock tower. All of these were evidently being
auctioned on E-bay. The lion is already sold and gone.
The clock tower is there, but listed as sold. I guess
the auction for the dinosaur ends tomorrow. I can't
help wondering if the clock tower was bought by a
former employee of the downtown FAO. If so, I imagine
they are now dreamily preparing for the total
catastrophic destruction they'll inflict on it.

There is still one very large stuffed animal there. An
elephant, with one noticable tear on its truck,
forlornly sitting at the top of the stairs. And the
toy I noticed the largest remaining supply of, is a
rideable Whinney the Pooh construction, made out of
wood. The candy still in the greatest supply in their
candy section was jalapeno jellybeans. The Barbie
section is now stripped of all Barbie paraphenalia,
though they have lots of baby dolls, and some "happy
family" pregnant dolls that look like Barbie, with a
Ken-equivalent packaged along with them. *snort* Can't
sell a pregnant doll by herself, there has to be a
"daddy" with her.

i'm caught between sneering cynicism and a kind of
sadness when I looked around there. Yes, the place had
dreadfully overpriced toys, but the closing of any
toystore isn't a happy thing. And i'm *still*
wondering what they'll be doing with the big bronze
statue of a teddy bear out front.