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2011-04-19

Offbeat electronic toys for picky kids

Stuck for ideas about what to buy the kids in your life for the holidays? Here are some quirky, offbeat pieces of technology that could generate the excitement you’re hoping for.
At some point in their lives — right up until their 80s, in some cases — every kid wants to be a rock star. Now you can satisfy that desire and clothe them too with a Kids Electronic Guitar Shirt from camera battery. This is not just a T-shirt with a guitar printed on it: It is a musical instrument that is capable of playing all major chords. You just select the chords you want by pressing on the appropriate section of the guitar’s neck (instructions included). The audio has been sampled from an actual electric guitar, so the sound is authentic and you can use the included pick to strum!
The Kids Electronic Guitar Shirt comes with a wearable waist amplifier with working tone and volume controls — and yes, a la Spinal Tap, the volume control does go up to 11. Thinkgeek.com also sells an Electronic Drum Kit shirt.
If your child loves dolls and wants to be a TV producer, then you might want to buy her a doll with a video camera/recorder built into its chest! As quirky as this may sound, Mattel has created such a device. Video Girl Barbie has a TV lens built into her necklace, an digital recorder inside, and an LCD screen on her back with buttons to record the world as seen from Barbie’s perspective. The video can then be downloaded to a computer, edited and then emailed, shared or even posted on YouTube. Details, plus free Windows-compatible video editing software, can be found online at http://www.buy-laptop-battery.org/ .
Kids enjoying pretending to be spies, so why not equip them with the right gear for fun today and a possible career option when they grow up? Wild Planet makes all kinds of functioning spy gear. For instance, you can purchase a working Lie Detector Kit at http://www.canada-battery.org/ . You just put your suspect’s fingers on the sensors, ask them questions and watch the indicators light up when they lie. (This could be a useful gift for parents and spouses too.) The Ultimate Mission Spycase comes with a Spy Night Scope (red-tinted binoculars with a pop-up spotlight for night viewing up to eight metres away); a CSI-style Evidence Kit with 30X microscope, UV light, fingerprint kit and glow-in-the-dark powder; and an eight-in-one Spy Watch with stopwatch, flashlight, world time clock, wake-up alarm, locking armour, motion alarm with timer, two safe-drop message capsules and special spy paper.
Speaking of espionage, one of the great unanswered questions is, “What is my cat or dog doing when I’m at school?” To answer this, http://www.camera-battery.co.uk/ offers the Pet’s Eye View Digital Camera. This is a small digital camera that hangs down from your pet’s collar like a tag. You can set it to shoot up to 40 VGA resolution images (640 x 480 pixels) at time intervals of one, five or 15 minutes. When you get home, just plug the camera into your PC/Mac with the included USB cable. Voila! You will see what Fluffy and Fido have been up to — and which neighbours might be coming after your parents with lawsuits.
Kids love to scare adults, although this is not a skill they fully master until they become teenagers. Until that time arrives, kids need ’scaring aids’ such as remote-control tarantulas to bolster their terror tactics. You can now equip your children with realistic looking, radio-controlled tarantulas guaranteed to raise the blood pressure of anyone they encounter. Since these toys are sold by none other than the National Geographic Society at shop.nationalgeographic.com, you can defend your gift choices as ’educational’.
In keeping with our theme of quirky and offbeat presents, we have one last item to suggest: A USB-powered desktop refrigerator. Available from http://www.cheap-digital-camera-batteries.co.uk/, this retro-styled red and white fridge has just enough space for a single can of pop, ice tea or juice, and enough oomph from its USB-powered cooling fan to keep the drink slightly chilled. Dad might want this one for himself.
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