be good and i will see you in a few weeks!
i will be away from thursday the 24th of january and wont be able to reply to emails until the 8th or 9th of february. hoping to buy heaps of thomas and tomica over in australia.
be good and i will see you in a few weeks! had decided this morning i wouldnt go around the op shops and would stay home and tidy instead. 9.05am... and my gut was calling loudly. i dont ignore gut instincts anymore, so got the helmet on and went to savemart.
lots and lots of toys there today... everyone cleaning out after christmas. i found, for a whole $7NZD, an almost complete original release tidmouth sheds! its missing the rc face changing thomas and a couple of other less important bits, but for that price im not complaining!! from there, i decided to visit the salvation army family store. not a lot there, but i did get a vintage style mickey mouse, a minion from despicable me and a boogie board for the nephews. had to leave the board for mum to pick up... there is a limit to what i can carry on the motorbike. lol. after that, went to the gonville hospice shop. dont usually buy anything there, but my instincts had kicked in again. good thing too, as i got a pull back tomy set for $1. for some reason the pull back engine doesnt work, but will pull it to bits and figure it out. worth the price for the tracks... love the multi colored stuff. so all in all, a good day to op shop. well worth it. :) the big lot of plarail from trademe arrived yesterday. around half of it is genuine and the other half is a brand called "@rail". as such i have created a new page for these, even though i will not be collecting them, i felt they needed to be showcased. lol. the new page is here. i think they are quite fascinating. they are the same gauge as tomy, but work by pull back as opposed to batteries.
the new pla rail trains are here. there was a bonus of a plakid inside one of the coaches, which was great. in the box was also a decent amount of track including some new/special bits. mainly being slightly opaque blue and green curves. these are slightly more see through than normal. i also got 4 pieces of double length straight, which i hadnt had before. they are shown here. when i got home from the club last night, i had a look on trademe at the latest tomy listings. almost cried when a i saw a takara boxed pyramid set for a mere $40! havent hit a buy now button that quick for many years. cant wait to get it paid for and have it arrive. had two canadian hopper cars arrive today. one is an environmental route, the same as one i already have, and the other is a black CP "pacman" design. its photo is here
i have an HO scale canadian gondola still to arrive, hopefully tomorrow. mum and i are going to australia later this month, which means i will miss the club running night. i have arranged to leave the new arrivals with rob for him to run. i had an awesome buy on monday... a huge lot of plarail trains. they are coming from dunedin. cant wait for this lot to arrive... so many trains! i paid $18.50, which is beyond cheap. sorry for such a long absense everyone. hope everyone had a good christmas and a fun new years. things are still bonkers busy here, but i have been adding to the collection slowly but surely. additions include the 4 takara wagons and 2 takara sets including one with talking thomas. freight wagons japanese talking thomas water and coal set shinkansen kodama set the thomas set was a bit of a shock. one of my favourite second hand shops posts photos on facebook of their shop. in one photo, i saw a japanese thomas box. given i had to squint to see it, i took it to be a thomas and terence set.
the shop was shut over the holidays and reopened on the third of january. the shop is located in tauranga, some 5 hours away. luck has it my brother lives there and my folks were heading that way to see him and his kids. i sent mum with the mission of buying the set and also checking out a tunnel that was on another shelf. she phoned the day the shop opened and said she had the set and the tunnel, but giving no more information. the two sets plus tunnel cost $54NZD. an absolute steal. needless to say, i was surprised when they arrived home tonight with not only thomas, but in the same bag a shinkansen kodama set. both must have come from the same home, along with the curved tunnel. when i was unpacking the boxes, i found a fair amount of big loader track, plus a chassis and terence cover. the track will be donated as i have no need for it, but the other two bits will be kept. the kodama set is really nice. the engine needs a replacement coupler, but on the whole its in great condition. it came with two pla-kids, and a nicely detailed station. the thomas set was better than i expected. it wasnt the terence logging set, but instead a coal hopper and water tower. thats not the best part though... thomas is actually a japanese talking thomas! he contains a voice box, while annie is the drive unit. she needs a new axle and a bit of a clean. clarabel needs a coupler on the back. unfortunately, i cant understand what thomas says, but he has a number of phrases and plays the theme song [much less irritating than the english talker version]. as he is going along the track, he says "wheee". the coal station and water tower trigger reactions as well. for example, when he stops at the water tower, you can hear water running, he goes "glug glug glug" and then "ahhh". also in the boxes were a few extra bits, including three different radius curves, two hill tracks, yellow girders and best of all, a bell station. you can see in the photo the 3 different curves. these are parts that didnt appear to fit in either of the two sets. |
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