Can't Knock The Hustle

Drove out to Benders Books & Cards yesterday afternoon. Ostensibly to show the place to Joe because he had never been, but deep down inside my body and soul secretly craved "Micronauts.... Miiiii-cro-naaaaautssssss....", or at least the few that I had as a child. A sudden wave of nostalgia forced me out of my already overpacked fortress of nostalgia to do a little digging at one of the few places locally that specializes in retro toys -- but then became overwhelmed as always and left with a back issue of The Comics Journal (#237, the women in comics issue), the new book by Dan Clowes, and an old issue of Mineshaft. But with every nook of the dusty old shop cram-packed with vintage this and thats, I gave up the Micronaut search for now. But here are the ones that I'm looking for specifically, if one should run across them, at I suppose a somewhat reasonable price:

The Alien Warrior set (Force Commander in white, Baron Karza in black) with their borg-like steeds (Oberon the white horse, Andromeda the black horse), all four released in the U.S. about 1978 to vaguely capitalize on the Star Wars market the year before. All four comes with a variety of rocket launchers, and the torsos of the Force and Baron could replace the heads and necks of their mounts to make centaurs. Both about 6 1/2 inches tall, and about 7 inches as centaurs. These toys were quite the all-consuming passion of mine that year, playing with them out in the woods back behind Sign Pine Road in Chesapeake with my best friend, and I think I wore the rocket launchers out firing them at squirrels so often.

Some time later, though probably not long after the inevitable destruction of my Alien Warrior set, my father and I stopped by a Toys R Us on the way to my grandmother's house and I picked up this Repto thing that I only grabbed because it looked cool, not making any kind of mental connection with the Micronaut line (and as a kid, why would I?). I'm guessing it was only about 3 1/2 inches long, maybe -- with a blaster for one hand and some kind of circular saw for another, bright bat-like wings that initially drew me to it (loved

anything with bat wings), and a brilliant green exoskeleton that I discovered glowed in the dark when I later took it into my grandmother's bathroom and turn out the lights. It was there that I also discovered that a portion of its brain is exposed at the crown of its angular noggin, which I wouldn't stop caressing morbidly. Somehow I think I held onto this one slightly longer than the Alien Warrior dudes, being easier to carry in my pocket, though he may have gotten himself stolen when I took him to school. Show 'n Tell was such an easy grade back then. And at least the teacher was relieved that I didn't bring another reeking, pungent deer skull that I found in the woods that one time.