Building WALL·E

Last week I took Ada to the mall to get out of the house on a wet March day in Vancouver. We went tot Oakridge, as it's easiest to reach on transit. While there, I stopped into the LEGO Store and discovered to my amazement that they had the LEGO Ideas WALL·E in stock! In fact, they only had one left!

I grabbed it right away.

On Saturday, I took Ada to Family Place as usual in the morning, and when I got home, Claire and I cleaned off the table, set up my Canon G12, and built WALL·E together over about two hours, photographing the entire process in time lapse. Ada joined us after her nap and played with her own LEGO, Duplo, of course, beside us in her chair.

It was a great experience, and one I hope we do again. Sometimes it's easy to get distracted by everything in life, and forget that Claire and I need to stop and enjoy each other's company together, working on a shared project. This is definitely something I'd like to make into a regular occasion, and would recommend to others as well. There really is something deeply satisfying about building LEGO together.

Here's the finished time lapse. I don't like the framing. The camera is pointed too far down, and it's hard to see our hands working on the parts, while also keeping all those bright, distracting bowls in view. Still, it works.

A quick trip to IKEA and I have the perfect display case.

 

True Tales From Childhood: The Price Of Air

When we were much younger than we are now, my brother Philip and I went to a childminder after school every weekend until mum and dad got out of work. She had two older boys, Adrian and Noel, and together the four of us would play Action Man (they had an Eagle Eyes figure and a pull string talking one!), dinky cars (which, for us, referred to all small metal cars), and, of course, LEGO.

We could spend hours on the floor building incredible constructions before playing out some adventure with our creations. Adrian and Noel had a big pile of LEGO that would get dumped in the middle of the living room floor and then it would be race to grab the choice bricks and figure out something wonderful to fabricate. We made a good team, and there was never any fighting over parts. As I recall, it was pretty collaborative, with everyone looking for their own pieces, while simultaneously keeping an eye out for a "red 3 by 2 flat bit" for Noel, the elusive "grey thick corner piece" for Adrian, a "long white one" for Philip and a "flat blue light" for me.

One afternoon Adrian had spent all his time building a garage and petrol station (gas station, for all you US readers). I had done my usual bang-up job of spreading the remaining pieces from the pile into a circle with a few free standing windows and calling it a "house", while focusing my attention on more important things, like a space ship or a rocket car.

Some time into our game Adrian exclaimed "Why isn't anyone using my garage? I spent ages building this. Come to my garage." As the youngest one in the group, Philip drove his car over to the front of the garage, parked by the pumps and requested, in a most matter-of-fact voice "£10* of air, please."

Noel, Adrian and myself exploded with laughter. Wiping tears from our cheeks, we informed Philip that you didn't pay for air for your car. People can pump their tires for free. It's air. It's everywhere. You can't charge for it.

I was reminded of this wonderfully happy moment from my childhood by a tweet posted recently from someone I follow. It read:

The compressed air at the local gas station just went up to $1.00 for 3 minutes. I should really get these tire rims fixed.

I was stunned. Garages are now charging for air for your tires! And at a dollar for three minutes! After the best part of almost 25 years, Adrian's garage can now charge for air!

What a strange and funny world we live in.

*- This was long before Europe thought the Euro was a clever idea, so Ireland was still using the Irish pound, or punt.

Post Script: This story remains very clear in my memory to this day, but just writing it now, I've begun to realise just how long ago it took place. I have no recollection of my other brother Stephen being around, so it probably took place before he was born, putting it at around 1987! I would have been 7, Philip 4, and Adrian and Noel 10 and 13 respectively! I wonder if any of them remember this story?

My Morning Circuit

Last night Claire and myself joined seven other friends to watch Marvel's The Avengers. More on that in a later post. After the movie, we all went for food in one of my favorite restaurants, Café Gloucester, right near the theater we attended. We got home shortly after midnight and played a few rounds of Mass Effect multiplayer, bringing me up to an astonishing N7 rating of 1,001, before tumbling into bed, exhausted, at 3am.

Then waking again at 5am.

And again at 8am.

And just getting up at 9:15am.

At this point I was a little grumpy and grouchy from lack of sleep, but several factors quickly conspired to cheer me up. Firstly, it was beautiful outside, sunny, bright blue skies, with a gentle breeze. Secondly, it was Free Comic Book Day, and my local friendly comic and gaming store opens at 11am on a Saturday. And thirdly, Vancouver's first LEGO Store had opened yesterday in the Oakridge Mall on Cambie and 49th, about 20 blocks north of the comic store.

I decided that today would be a great day for an early morning walk. So I had some oatmeal and a cup of tea, kissed my wife, rousing her from her slumber just long enough to let her know of my plans for the morning, and struck out on my adventure.

I left our place and headed along 70th to the comic store, arriving just after they opened. They were virtually empty, so I grabbed a few of the comics on offer that interested me, namely Mouse Guard and Atomic Robo, stuffed them into my bag and walked north along Cambie.

I don't know what I was expecting given that it was the opening weekend of a LEGO Store, but it wasn't what I found. There was a three hour queue to get into the store! It's heartwarming to see that LEGO is still so popular, but not so much that I wanted to join the queue. Instead, I resolved to return on Monday when all the children will be in school.

I did find the event area where Eric, a master LEGO builder was building an eight foot tall LEGO R2-D2 with the help of the public. It's coming along nicely. The public follow plans on various tables to build, basically, giant LEGO blocks, which then get left in some containers until Eric uses them to continue building the toughest li'l droid in the galaxy! I stopped by and made a block or two to add to the cause.

After resting up a little in one of the seating areas and flicking through the comics from my bag, I headed back out of the mall, taking 49th avenue as far as Granville Street, and then following that back to 71st and home.

One thing's for sure: I'll sleep well tonight.