Where did all those darts go?

The holiday season is upon us and we have an economy tumbling downward like Robert Downey Jr. in the movie “Less than Zero.” But instead of asking for some money to pay back his dealer, they’re asking for 700 billions dollars (don’t worry man, they’re good for it). Retailers are now trying to bury us under thousand of newspaper inserts desperately praying for a return our impulse buy mentality. In yesterday’s paper I found and looked through the latest Toys "R" Us insert and found that at least one of my childhood toys has managed to survive and actually become “awesomer.” What toy am I talking about?

Nerf.

In a time when The Ninja Turtles are no longer just sewer dwelling bad-asses, but (I kid you not) futuristic warriors in space, I find solace in knowing that Nerf has avoided this bullet. Too often I awake early on a Saturday morning and put on cartoons only to find myself confused and upset by what I see. How many idiotic anime monsters/card/robot battling shows do we need? I’m pretty sure most of us remember the tremendously retarded re-imagining of the Looney Tunes as “Loonatics.” Only some one on a bad acid trip could possible think of re-imagining Bugs Bunny as “Ace Bunny,” and giving him (I swear to God) “Laser vision” and a “Guardian Strike Sword.” Who let this get past development? Did they give the keys to CEO office to a bunch of fat, anime obsessed, 12-year-olds who think shirts with dragons on them is “phat?” Jesus Christ!

But I digress. Nerf is still bad ass. The Nerf bow and arrow was my first Nerf weapon. I remember spending hours in my backyard shooting the arrows at absolutely nothing. My arsenal quickly grew and became increasingly more vicious as I grew older. Nerf wars became a common event in my house and neighborhood. The only thing that stopped us was when we lost all our darts. The zenith of my Nerf gun tooting years came when I was given “The Ulimator.” This gun was all business. If this gun were a man, he would beat the crap out of vegans while he wore a fur coat. And to top it off, he’d knock up your girlfriend. I remember reading the warning on the side of the gun, “Do not shoot at people or animals,” and instantly wanting to see if I could hit my cat from across the yard. My cats soon recognized the sound of any Nerf gun being pumped and would scatter at the sound only to reluctantly crawl out from under the couch hours later. The recoil on this bad boy was enough to leave a bruise on your face if you held it wrong and when fired sounded like you snapped a leaf spring in half.

The new Nerf guns seem to becoming better with age. Who would have ever though that an automatic Nerf gun was possible. These people did. I want this gun like a middle-aged single woman wants a baby. Seeing this in the insert blew my mind, and made me proud to still have my Nerf guns safely tucked away in my basement.