More phone calls tonight. Hundreds of phone calls. Repetitive phone calls. Lots of lovely voice mails, and plenty of messages to people I called last week and three weeks ago. I am a phone calling machine. I can say a lot of things in 45 seconds, and I thank my years in broadcasting for that. But, otherwise, this is my role in things at the moment. It is a terribly exciting moment, let me just say.

You know who else has it this good? The boys and girls who get to product test all of these toys. People that have it not-so-good are the staffers who have to create these boxes after a weekend course in Photoshop. Which brings us to the final two box covers I wanted to show you this week. Six, I thought, were worth sharing. But I shot others earlier this week at Walmart, as well. I noticed a common theme. All of the models are white.

Anachronism! These two types of blades never met in battle.

Well … before Highlander, that is. Look, this is a great toy for active young children, but buy them face guards. And remove your lamps. And if you read the fine print you find that the foam sharpening stone is sold separately.

Listen for key phrases when the kids are playing. “There can be only one,” is OK. Seppuku or harakiri, if uttered, would probably signal a great opportunity to swoop in for a teaching moment.

And, while they are distracted, remove the swords.

I bet you had one of these. Or you had access to it. I had one. Held onto it for years.

Plastic. Two actual seats. Cup holders. Seatbelts. Radio Flyer has made some upgrades. Well, except for the plastic.

There may be others, I don’t know. I can’t, however, think of any other group that would still be working on their extracurricular projects until 2:30 in the morning. That’s motivation and passion — and clattering keys and tired eyes.

Student media is cool.

And since they were there until 2:30 a.m. I was with them until 2:30 a.m., too. Someone should recognize them. Unfortunately, I am not as cool as they are.

So my cousin and his friend went home on Sunday, and later that night we noticed that he left his work boots at our place. I’ll see him again at Christmas, but I figured I would send him pictures of all of the places his shoes have been since he lost them. Last night they went shopping.

If I’d thought to stop by a shoe store I could have said they were looking for a sole mate. But there was the newsroom to get back to …

Anyway, I thought it would be something I could torture him about. I think I’m mostly amusing myself, however.