Click here to see the full line of Kaskey Kids sports figures, such as Hockey Guys

Imaginative play is important for your kids’ mental and emotional development.  It helps improve their intelligence, fosters psychological resilience, and teaches them to handle diverse circumstances.

There aren’t too many high-quality, inexpensive toys that can help expand your kids’ ability to play imaginatively, while at the same time being fun over the long-term.  But that’s exactly what the sports figures from Kaskey Kids are able to do. 

Not only can these creative playthings encourage your children to put their imagination into play, they also teach kids the fundamentals of team sports and how to think strategically.  As a result, the Kaskey Kids Football Guys, Soccer Guys, Baseball Guys, and more have won awards and become a notable success story in the toy marketplace. 

=> Click here to check out the award-winning Kaskey Kids Football Guys, Hockey Guys, and other team sports action figures, along with their “Bop Bags” and Go!  Go! Sports Dolls.   And, since you’re going through my site, enter code “CJ10″ during checkout to get 10% off your order!

You remember the toy soldiers you played with as a kid?  That was a perfect example of the imagination at play as you made up elaborate scenarios and stories for your army of action figures. 

Well, Kaskey Kids is just like that, except instead of soldiers the figures are athletes — baseball players, hockey players, football players, and soccer players.   See the video below for an in-depth look at the fun kids can have with Kaskey Kids sports action figures available at Kaskeykids.com:

For kids in the age-range of 3 – 10 years old, the Kaskey Kids sports action figures can provide hours of fun, unstructured play — as well as giving you the opportunity to teach your son or daughter about a particular sport, the rules of the game, how a team works together on the field, and so on.  They make excellent instructional play sets for your budding soccer player, hockey player, football player, or baseball player.

In addition to free-form play, there are also several different structured games that the Kaskey Kids company has created that enable you (or their siblings or friends) to play with their football guys, soccer guys, and other action figures along with them in ways that encourage strategic thinking and planning (see the Kaskey Kids site for more details).  For parents and for kids, Kaskey Kids sports guys are a win-win toy!

Click to see all the styles of Kaskey Kids Football Guys

Kaskey Kids are the brainchild of Christy Kaskey, a mother of three who in 2002 was trying to find action figures that her sports-loving kids could play with. 

She couldn’t find anything on the market that fit the bill — action figures other than soldiers or superheroes that her kids could play with while also focusing on the sports they enjoyed — so she created sports figures herself.  The Kaskey Kids company was born; the first production run of the Football Guys sold out in a matter of weeks, and the rest, as they say, is history. 

Kaskey Kids Sports Figures are Award Winners

Since they became available, Kaskey Kids’ sports-figure toys have received many accolades from the toy industry, including the Gold Seal “Best Toy Award” from Oppenheim Toy Portfolio, the 2011 Brilliance Award from Brilliant Sky Toys & Books (in the imaginative play category), the 2007 Best Toy Award from Learning Express (for the Kaskey Kids Football Guys), a “Four Star Certified” rating from WTS Toy Review, a National Parenting Center “Seal of Approval” in 2011 for the Hockey Guys… and the list goes on.  

Enthusiastic press reviews and articles have also appeared in national media — including, most recently, the Sports Illustrated for Kids 2011 “Gotta Get It Guide,” which is featured on the Kaskey Kids homepage.  In the “Gotta Get It Guide,” the Kaskey Kids NHL Hockey Guys, Rangers Vs. Bruins, are recommended.

The Kaskey Kids Football Guys come in both “pro” football and college football versions (with teams such as Auburn, Michigan, Ohio State, and Texas).  The Hockey Guys come in both generic (blue versus yellow) and NHL figures.  The Baseball Guys are classic red vs. blue action figures.  Each team of sports figures comes with a field (for the football guys and soccer guys — and there are also soccer girls), a rink (for the hockey guys), and a diamond (for the baseball guys), along with referee figures and other equipment that enable your kid(s) to play with their action figures on a surface that matches the sport.  The “outdoor” fields are made of sturdy felt — much more durable and satisfying to play with than a plastic sheet.

The Kaskey Kids sports figures are made of sturdy molded plastic and are in compliance with the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act.  They will stand up to years of play and are large enough for toddlers’ hands to easily grasp.

Customer (Parents’) reviews of Kaskey Kids Sports Guys

But what’s the bottom line?  What do parents have to say about how well their kids like the Kaskey Kids Football Guys, Baseball Guys, Hockey Guys, Soccer Guys and other toys?  Well, “5-star” reviews significantly outnumber any other rating for Kaskey Kids sports figures.  Here are excerpts from online customer reviews of Kaskey Kids creative playthings:

Kids of all ages can play with Kaskey Kids action figures in whatever ways they like (photo of an actual Kaskey Kids fan)

“So many toys advertise ‘hours of fun.’  This one should, because it is probably the most played-with toy my boys, ages 5 and 7, have.  We have the soccer guys, football guys, and baseball guys.  My boys play with them alone or together and have done so for several years.  This is one of our staple toys…”

“My nephew loves this [toy].  However, that being said, even without the [hockey rink] boards, he loved playing with the ice surface and players.  He would re-enact Bruins games and do the play by play.  As he grew, he wanted to have the side boards again and would often build them with blocks.  He plays with this toy so often that I wanted to give him a chance to have a new one now that he is older.  I love the fact that it is not an electronic [toy] but rather one that encourages his imagination…  He is now 7 and had the first one since he was 3 or 4 years old.”

“My boys use the field and baseball figures to track the the plays their ‘teams’ make on a baseball pinball game.  When used this way it brings the pinball game to life and adds the excitement of wondering what will happen next.”

“We’ve got three little boys, ages 8, 5, & 3, who love the hockey, soccer, football, and baseball guys.  For little ones who like ‘guys,’ these toys really encourage imaginative play.  For us, preferred over video games and movies.  Very fun to watch.”

“My 8-yr-old son has had the Baseball Guys for a couple of years, along with the Football Guys.  Great toys!  Very well designed and durable.  We love that one of the baseball teams is red (like our beloved Red Sox) and one blue (we pretend they are the Yankees).  The scoreboard that is included is so cute, you can adjust the score and it stands up.  Lots of imaginative fun with this toy!  Perfect for our little baseball fan.”

“My 5-year-old son absolutely loved [the Baseball Guys].  Although he received many other gifts for his birthday, many of which had pretty high ‘wow’ factor, this was far and away his favorite.  It won over Transformers, Star Wars figures, and Legos.  I’m still somewhat incredulous, but clearly he loves it.  One week later and he’s still happily playing and making up games.  In addition, it’s helped him understand some of the elements of the game that were beyond him.  He can position players and is starting to mimic the announcers he sees playing.  He’s even put #11 at short, since Jimmy Rollins is his favorite player.”

About the only critical comments reviewers made about the Kaskey Kids toys was that the carrying cases used to store the sets could be a little bigger — the size made it a bit hard for small kids (say, 3 years old) to put away.  Also, the play surface “fields” would sometimes tend to wrinkle, making it harder to stand the action figures up.  (However, those reviewers might not have followed the instructions from Kaskey Kids, which is to store the playing surfaces rolled up, and, when the new games are first opened and taken out of the box, let them sit flat for awhile to let the creases flatten out.  You can even iron the felt fields.)

Of course, Kaskey Kids sports figures not only encourage pretend play on the part of your kids, they’re also great for kids who have already developed a love of sports or an interest in a particular sport, such as football, hockey, or baseball.  Some kids — even 3-year-olds — take to such things early.  Just ask Christy Kaskey.  (Yes, 3-year-olds can understand the concept of a “body check.”) 

Click to see the Kaskey Kids Baseball Guys and accessories -- including field and scoreboard

And throughout the cold, short days and long nights of the winter months, letting your kids put their imagination to work with Football Guys or Soccer Guys will go a long way toward occupying their time when it’s hard for them to get outdoors and be active.

Further information on the benefits of imaginative or “pretend” play

Many studies have been performed on how kids develop both physically and mentally through play, as well as analyses of the types of play that foster healthy development.  With regard to pretend play specifically, much scholarly research is available and you can find this research summarized online, such as this article on pretend play entitled The Role of Pretend Play in Children’s Cognitive Development.

The bottom line, as summarized in the relatively brief article linked to above, is that high-quality pretend play fosters “cognitive competence” in kids.  A growing body of research suggests that pretend play, or imaginative play, plays an important role in cognitive, social, and academic development, that it may facilitate higher-level thinking and creativity, and that there is a clear link between pretend play and social and linguistic competence. 

Studies also suggest that children who lack opportunities to play imaginatively experience a diminished capacity for problem solving and social interaction, as well as a decline in the ability to handle academic subjects such as math, literacy, and science.  Complex skills and multidimensional abilities are most likely to be fully developed and thrive in an environment where high-quality pretend play is encouraged.

Kaskey Kids has also posted an article on their site written by Kara Bowman, an educator associated with the Museum Tour Catalog, entitled The Joys of Open-Ended Play.

You know, there’s a reason kids like to actively imagine things as they play:  it’s turning them into better all-around human beings.

Sports action figures are just a part of the creative, sports-oriented toys Kaskey Kids offers

As mentioned above, Kaskey Kids also has “Bop Bags,” which are 40-inch tall Tackle Buddies and Checking Buddies that your little guys can knock around and have bounce back for more.  Kaskey also has Mini Packs of action sports figures in different colors, so you can add new players and teams to your collection of Baseball Guys, Hockey Guys, or whatever teams you have.  And they also have the Sports Girls dolls, which are 14-inch plush, soft cotton dolls — girls doing various sports and other activities, such as Basketball Doll Taye, Dancer Doll M. C., and Tennis Doll Gracie — a collection of 9 Sport Girls dolls in all.

As with all the Kaskey Kids creative playthings, the Bop Bags and Sports Girls dolls are well-made and very reasonably priced.

There’s a big difference in how a kid is thinking, imagining, and interacting when he’s playing with something such as a Nintendo 3DS or with a truly 3-dimensional toy like the Kaskey Kids sports action guys.  

Not that there’s anything wrong with a Nintendo 3DS…  But your kid is not developing or expanding his imaginative powers in the same way when he’s pushing the controller of a video game as he is when he’s playing with a tactile, colorful, reality-based toy like the Kaskey Kids action figures — when he’s setting them up, imagining the plays the teams are running, doing the play-by-play like an announcer, and learning actual sports strategies.  Plus he can play along with his siblings and/or friends and expand the scenarios and action even more.

Give Kaskey Kids Football Guys, Soccer Guys, Hockey Guys, and other creative toys strong consideration for your young athletes-to-be (or whatever they want to imagine themselves being).  It’s hard to find a toy these days that offers so many positive benefits at such a reasonable price.  Plus offers your kids fun and satisfaction over the long term.

Related posts:

1. Paper Jamz Has Fun Musical Toys for Not Much Money
2. An Easy Place to Find Gifts for Guys Is at “Presents For Men”

Are you trying to find a gift for a man who’s hard to shop for?  When it comes to shopping for gifts for guys, you will certainly be able to find something suitable at Presents For Men — the UK men’s store online that features 2,000 gifts, tech gadgets, and manly accessories for men, travelers — even women.  But mostly for men.  Presents For Men has gathered some of the most interesting, unusual, useful, and fun gifts in one convenient place.

If you can’t find a present for a man at PresentsForMen.co.uk, then you are not online.  That is a prerequisite — you must be able to get on the Internet.  Presents for Men will take it from there.  (Even better, see below for a special, secret deal.)

Fun Gifts for Men

Click to get a Camera Lens Cup from Presents For Men

For example, at Presents For Men, you can find a Camera Lens Cup — a mug that looks just like a camera lens, and includes a removable lens cap that doubles as a coaster.  How many male photographers do you know who would enjoy a cup that looks like a lens?  All of them!  (If they don’t, they have no sense of humor or whimsy, so why are you hanging out with them?)

This lens looks and feels like a real lens and is insulated to keep hot drinks hot and cold drinks cold.

Hey, photographers get thirsty, too.

Puzzles and Games

Do you know a guy who likes to solve puzzles?  Does he enjoy the challenges of things like Rubik’s Cube and Sudoku?  Then what better gift to get him than a Sudokube — a 3-dimensional Sudoku game where the object is to get the numbers 1 to 9 on each face of the cube by rotating the different rows.

Click to get the Sudokube for a puzzle-solving guy

Get him a Sudokube and he will probably miss his next flight because he will be too absorbed in enjoying his new puzzle and won’t hear the boarding announcement in the terminal.  He will blame you.  But it will not be your fault.

Anyway, he will forget all about it after he boards the next flight out and continues to play on the plane.  And the Sudokube is just £3.99! (Multiply that by 1.6 to get approximate US dollars.)

Travel Gifts

You don’t want your traveler guy getting lost, so a handy tech-related gift you can get him at Presents For Men is a Universal GPS Nav-Pack.  This ingenious travel case will hold and protect his portable GPS device — and, when he wants to use it, he can set it up on the dashboard of his car so he can easily read the screen.

Get a Universal GPS Nav-Pack for your techy traveler

No more fumbling with or holding the GPS device when driving.  Instead, the Universal GPS Nav-Pack will position the screen of the GPS at 3 different angles, depending on preference.  And the case will not slide off the dashboard because it has a weighted base.  It will hold most standard portable GPS devices 3½” and 5″ in size.  The case is padded to protect his unit.

See the video below that explains the uses of the Universal GPS Nav-Pack.

You can also explore their travel-related gift store at Travel Paraphernalia for even more gift ideas related to travel.

Brilliant!  Click here to get the Universal GPS Nav-Pack from Presents For Men.

I could go on listing dozens of cool, unusual gift ideas for men that are available at Presents For Men, but where would be the fun in that for you?  I think you get the idea.

It will be much more fun for you to explore the site yourself and find just the right present for that man who’s hard to buy for.  (You know the one I mean.)  Plus, see the text link below for a special Christmas deal!

Just for your holiday-shopping ease…  Click here to go to a “Secret Christmas Gift Ideas” page at Presents For Men and get 50% off everything you see there by using code SECRET50 at checkout. This is a special code that is not generally available!

The Presents For Men website has guides to Best-Selling Christmas Gifts, the latest fun products (see “New Products”), and Stocking Fillers.

Presents For Men even has an interactive “Gift Finder” that helps you find just the right present for your guy (or gal).  You input the recipient (man, teen, grandparent, etc.), the price range, and an area of interest — Presents For Men then suggests many different gift ideas suitable for that person.  What could be easier?  You can do all this while wearing your pajamas.

They have gifts in the categories of Home, Garden, Travel, Gadgets, Fun & Games, Health & Beauty, Books, and more.  They even have Clearance items on sale for ridiculously small amounts of money, so you can shop economically there, too.  (If you’re shopping from the US, shipping to American addresses is not terribly expensive — starts around $18).

The Presents for Men site is laid out intelligently and is easy to navigate.  It has a search function and will let you know whether items are in stock or not.

The Presents For Men company has been in business for 22 years.  They have built their success on word-of-mouth recommendations and repeat orders, so you can shop there with confidence.  Presents For Men pride themselves on their customer service and providing quality, practicality, and value when it comes to shopping for a gift.

Try ‘em!  Solve all your challenging gift-shopping problems now!

Related posts:

1. A More Inspiring Gift — a Charitable Gift from Gifts In Action
2. Kaskey Kids Football Guys and Other Sports Action Figures are Fun Toys That Encourage Your Kids to Play Imaginatively

Most Christmas decorations are intended for children.  Candy canes, nutcracker Christmas tree ornaments, inflatable snowmen…  These spark the imagination of kids, but what about more manly decorations?  Can you express your masculine side with some DIY Christmas decorations that celebrate the holiday spirit in ways that reflect your grown-up self?

Yes — and here you can find out how to decorate for Christmas in a more duded-up way.  Kids getting excited about jingle bells and elves is fine, but you’re a man now.  Maybe you’re living on your own for the first time in a house or apartment.  Or maybe you have a wife and kids but would like to decorate your man cave in a way that evokes some caveman Yuletide spirit.

Most men seem to think they’re somewhat apart from the holiday atmosphere; most men don’t think about decorating for Christmas, how to decorate a Christmas tree, etc.  But where’s the fun in that?  Why leave it to the kids?

Click for a Scotch Pine Christmas Tree from Cabela's

Express your masculine side with a Christmas tree and other holiday decorations that celebrate the season your way.  It’s a time to enjoy, after all.  Just because guys light their farts on fire and snort beer out their noses when they laugh doesn’t automatically mean they don’t want to decorate for Christmas.  When you do your own Christmas thing, at the very least you’ll impress your friends. You might even help free their inner bad elf.

As far as how to decorate a Christmas tree, one way to start is with a Christmas Tree from Cabela’s.  They have several different kinds (bet you didn’t know you could buy Christmas trees on the Internet).  And a tree skirt from Bass Pro Shops that features wild game.  (And you can personalize it with up to 10 letters — choose your holiday message carefully.)

Guys are just as susceptible to the Christmas spirit as anyone (see Darren McGavin in A Christmas Story).  But they don’t necessarily want to hang plush heart ornaments on the fir tree they chopped down in the woods with their Fiskars axe, or place votive candles on the mantelpiece surrounded by porcelain angels holding a banner.

But hey, you got the spirit:  you like the idea of Kris Kringle traversing the world with his bag of Krispy Kremes for all the good boys and girls (including you — because aren’t you good, mostly?).  You enjoy the taste of spiked eggnog and the idea of a Christmas Star that was probably a supernova that occurred around 4 BC.   You think snow is sorta cool.  And you like those oil-drum-sized cans of flavored popcorn.

So, how do you decorate for the holidays, guy?  Without going all Marth-Stew?  Yet still managing to express your DIY Christmas decorating creativity?  Below are festive suggestions for decking your halls with a tree, ornaments, lights, mood-enhancers, food, and more…

Christmas Tree Decorating Solutions

Click to get the C-3PO Holiday Ornament from Entertainment Earth

Nothing wrong with having a conifer in your living room that you killed yourself or bought at a tree lot from a grizzled guy wearing a stained beanie (or got from Cabela’s above).  But with regard to decorating a Christmas tree, what kind of ornaments should you hang on it?

Star Wars ornaments.  At right, you can see a C-3PO holiday ornament that’s also a snowglobe.  Shake it and it’ll remind you of school closure days on Hoth.  You can get the Star Wars C-3PO Ornament from Entertainment Earth.  And click here to get a Chewbacca Snowglobe Christmas Ornament to match.

And that’s not all Entertainment Earth offers for decorating a Christmas Tree with masculine style.  You can’t get any more manly than John Wayne, so check out a pair of John Wayne Western Christmas Tree Ornaments — two 4.5-inch tall, beautifully-detailed resin ornaments of John Wayne in all his gun-totin’ glory.  Try those on for size.

Betty Boop Biker Ornament

Or how about Betty Boop on a motorcycle?  In her regular guise, Betty Boop is known for her saucy sexiness.  But a biker Boop in an abbreviated elf outfit is definitely a girl you would not take home to your mom.  Celebrate that cheeky spirit and deck your halls at the same time.  (Any ornament that depicts a scantily-clad female who is not an angel is in your Christmas-decorating ballpark.)

But Christmas tree decorating ideas don’t have to be limited to science fiction, gun-slingin’, and sex.  There’s also guy-centric tech, hardware, and food — subjects that bold, smart, hungry men have pursued for centuries.

Recycled Motherboard Ornaments from ThinkGeek

In that vein, check out what ThinkGeek, that bastion of products celebrating intellectual prowess, has for Christmas:  Recycled Motherboard Christmas Tree Ornaments.  These are cleverly-carved ornaments made out of printed circuit boards.  Who says electronics can’t be green?  Evergreen, that is, so hang this set of 3 electrical-engineer-approved ornaments on your pine.  They come in a handsome gift box, just in case you want to get several sets to enlighten your more traditional-decoration type buddies.

Another Appropriate Guy Technology: Airplanes

Tin Airplane Ornament

Besides computers, motorcycles, and women, guys also like airplanes.  And so to continue your virile Christmas decorating theme, you’ll want flying machines represented on your holiday tree.  Here’s the perfect aviation element:  a tin airplane ornament from Alexander Taron, maker of traditional tin toys.  You can find this airplane ornament at Wayfair, and Wayfair also offers an Alexander Taron tin car ornament — also appropriate to hang from your branches.  They’re both retro and hip.

Nothing Says “Holiday Spirit” Like Bacon

Sparkling Bacon Christmas Ornament from ThinkGeek

Even more than high-tech gadgets, food is an appropriate idea for decorating a Christmas tree.  But what kind of food?  There’s one clear choice:  bacon.  Of course you’ve got to include bacon on your list of Christmas tree decorating ideas.  Nothing says “Have a manly Christmas” more than hanging a rasher of cured pork slices from the branches of your holiday conifer.

But actual bacon is messy to string and will spoil in a few days (trust me).  Not to worry, ThinkGeek has you covered there, too, with their Sparkling Bacon Ornament.  Get several.  Don’t eat them, though, they’re made of space-age plastic.  Who needs candy canes?  You’ve got bacon!

There’s more to this idea of DIY Christmas decorations, though, than just buying pre-made ornaments that are already purposed for the Yuletide season.  No, you also want to venture outside the box a bit when it comes to exploring holiday decor ideas in an XY-chromosome sorta way.

DIY Ornaments

For example, Christmas ornaments imitate icicles hanging from evergreen trees in the wild (or growing in rows on Christmas tree farms in northern Vermont), and they also copy the brightness of candles that used to be placed on trees in the days of yore before OSHA and Underwriters Laboratories took all the uncertainty out of life.  In other words, ornaments need to be bright and shiny.  So, what else besides glass ornaments is bright and shiny but also masculine enough to adorn your tree?  Hex nuts.

But not just any hex nuts.  Marine-grade hex nuts.  The kind you use on sailboats.  Why?  Because it’s cool.  And, after Christmas, you can use them on your boat, or wherever.  West Marine is a good place to get bulk hex nuts.  Half-inch diameter nuts would be a good size.  Click here to go to West Marine and order a bulk pack of hex nuts — a pack of 50, ½-inch diameter nuts in gleaming 18-8 stainless steel goes for about $20.

Bronze hex nuts for your tree

But you want a combination of colors on your tree (silver hex nuts alone would be boring), so get some bronze nuts to go with them.  Bronze hex nuts are also cool.  West Marine has a pack of 50 ½-inch bronze galvanized hex nuts for $10.

Now you’ve got your hex nuts.  You’ll need a way to hang them from the branches.  Use twine, not string.  String is wimpy, twine is manly.  (Alternatively, you could use wire twist-ties).  Twine is also kind of rough and natural-looking.  It’ll look masculine holding the nuts on your tree.  Get a couple of rolls of jute twine from Gardener’s Supply Company.  (Twine will come in handy around the house, too.)  Tying the loops on your nuts will give you something to do while you’re watching football.

Your tree will look great with your Star Wars, John Wayne, and motherboard ornaments, and hex nuts in two colors.  For a star on top — well, just use a regular Christmas star.  You can find a nice plain silver star tree topper here.

Yoda Tree Topper

Or you can continue your Star Wars theme with a Yoda tree topper from ThinkGeek (pictured at right).  That will get you some comments, I guarantee.  May Noel be with you.

I won’t go into how the Force ties into the energy of life that we celebrate at Christmas (which actually used to be the ancient pagan Winter Solstice holiday) but I will note that this Yoda tree topper will plug into your tree lights and glows green.  A good color for a manly Christmas.  Heck, it might even be bright enough to illuminate your whole apartment or man cave.

Light up Christmas with Non-Cutesy Lights

Click for manly light choices at Cabela's

Which brings us to lights.  You’ll probably want some.  Guys like electricity.  From touching a 9-volt battery with one’s tongue to running the Large Hadron Collider, guys appreciate what electromagnetism can do.  It can certainly make your Christmas tree look more festive.  Are there male-oriented Christmas tree lights that will fit your Christmas decoration theme?  Of course.  Where else would you get them but Cabela’s?

Cabela’s has guy-themed light strings that consist of coach lanterns, utility lights, Coleman-Lantern-style lights, and wire birdhouses.  To the left is the Cabela’s Lantern light, which looks festive but not foofy.  Each strand of lights includes 10 lights.  Get several strings of one style or blend 3 or more styles to cover your whole tree.  These are Christmas lights you’ll want to pass down to your kids.  Click here to see several choices of Christmas tree light sets at Cabela’s.

Actual Tree Too Fussy for You?  Try Iron

Some guys don’t want to mess with a live Christmas tree.  Especially when it comes to apartment decorating ideas, a tree with needles, branches, and stuff might be a lot of trouble to schlep inside and set up.  Or maybe space is at a premium in your man cave.  Or maybe you just don’t want to fool around with ornaments.  So what’s the alternative?  Get a a Christmas tree made of iron.

Iron Christmas Tree with Lights

What could be manlier than an iron Christmas tree?  And we’re not talking some lacy concoction of wires.  We’re talking wrought iron.  Such as the Medium Christmas Tree with Lights from Capitol Supply (pictured at left).  Even the source of this tree is manly — the US military buys hardware from Capitol Supply.  This tree is approximately 42 inches of metal Yuletide cheer with an integrated light system.  Nothing to fuss with.  Just set it up and plug it in.

Decorative Large Gold Tree

If you want something a little classier, a little more high-end, then check this handsome Gold Decorative Christmas Tree from Homelement (38 inches tall).  This tree is made of wrought-iron metal loops in a complex design.  This would be a good Christmas decor idea for a simple tree to put up in your man cave — looks cool, it’s made of metal, and harmonizes with your advanced entertainment technology and Jack Daniels neon clock.  It even comes with a star.  “Metal” does not imply “crude.”  That’s it pictured to the right.  Nothing could be simpler than this tree when it comes to holiday apartment decorating ideas, too.

If you want additional tree options, check Overstock.  They have a ton of Christmas trees available, both synthetic and live.  At their site, search for “Christmas trees” to see dozens of choices.  Plus, they carry hundreds of Xmas accessories for low prices that may further inspire your DIY Christmas decor ideas.

And right now, you can get $10 off $100+ orders with free shipping at Overstock.

Can You Put Lights on a Metal Tree?  Yes.  When You Shop at an Auto Parts Store

Risk Racing Magnetic Light Mine for your Christmas Tree

What could be a more dude thing to do than shopping for holiday decorations at an auto parts store?  Nothing.  So, explore JC Whitney, the premier automotive online store, when it comes to accessorizing your live or metal tree.  You actually can put lights on your wrought-iron tree.  All you need are a few Magnetic Light Mines from Risk Racing.  These little illumination units are about the size of a golf ball and have 12 rare-earth magnets that enable you to position the powerful LED light to point in any direction.  Get a few and simply stick them to your tree.  Rotate the lights to provide whatever illumination effects you like.  If you’re using them with a live tree, stick them down in the branches.  They’re a cool design.

And as long as we’re shopping at JC Whitney, here’s something else you can add to your Christmas decoration ideas:  floor mats.

Green Bay Packers floor mats to use as a tree skirt

Maybe you don’t want to use the tree skirt from Bass Pro Shops (described above) around the base of your tree, particularly your metal tree.  But you still want something down there besides bare floor.  So here’s the solution:  Green Bay Packers Floor Mats from JC Whitney.  Just get a couple of sets of these and circle them around the base your tree.  NFL logo floor mats are a pretty masculine Christmas decor idea.  Of course, if you want another team’s logo, get that.  You can specify the team on the JC Whitney NFL FANMAT page when you order.  I thought Green Bay’s “G” would be appropriate because, if your girlfriend or someone asks you what it means, you can tell them it stands for “Grinch.”  And when it’s not Christmas you can put the mats in your car.

Or, tree-wise, you could go in another direction entirely.  Maybe you want a bit more nostalgia in your Christmas decorating ambience, while maintaining a grown-up sensibility — some cuteness combined with humor.  If so, here’s another option that fits the bill perfectly:  the Charlie Brown Christmas Tree.

Click to get the Charlie Brown Christmas Tree

Remember the Peanuts Christmas TV special, A Charlie Brown Christmas?  (How many times have you seen it?)  Remember the bedraggled tree Charlie Brown tries to decorate with a single ornament and it falls over and he says, “I’ve killed it!”  Now you can have that tree for yourself.  Those thoughtful folks at Sears made it a reality.  And you should get Vince Guaraldi’s classic Charlie Brown Christmas album and play it while sitting and sipping spiked eggnog and looking at your nostalgic, goofy Christmas tree.

A Christmas Tree is an Important Part of Your Christmas Decor Theme, but Not the Only Part

You’ll want to have some other Christmas decor items placed strategically around your place to help reinforce the holiday spirit.  But still in keeping with the theme of intrepid dude-ness.

Click here for the Sega Toys Homestar Pro star projector from Gizmine

First… when you want to set that “O Holy Night” vibe at some point (and trust me, you will), there is nothing like amazing technology to do it.  What you’ll want to do is turn your apartment or home into a stunning nighttime scene with the Sega Toys Homestar Pro.

Imagine it’s night.  You turn out the room lights, maybe leave your Christmas tree lights on, and then you illuminate the room with a projection of 10,000 stars.  Now that’s some holy juju.  And it will set just the right Christmasy mood to impress that special someone.  You can get the Sega Toys Homestar Pro from Gizmine (I like the black unit myself).  Worth every penny — this is not a toy but a pro-grade planetarium star projector.  This will amp up your magical holiday ambience a thousand-fold.

And if you can’t quite see going for the pro model (though I can’t see why you wouldn’t), not to worry, Gizmine has you covered there, too, because you can both enhance your Star Wars Christmas theme and put on a stunning starry-night display with the Homestar R2-D2 Home Planetarium (<– click to get it), which is under $100 at Gizmine.

See the video below to get an idea of what the Sega Toys Homestar Pro can do:

The Stockings Were Hung by the Chimney With Care

You might not have a chimney (most apartment-dwellers don’t — and no, a bong doesn’t count), but you should still put Christmas stockings up.  How else is Santa supposed to reward your ass?  And don’t limit yourself to just one.  You can put several stockings up and hope that your friends/family get the hint and stuff some items in there.  Or you can put one up for your girlfriend.  Or put up 5 or so for yourself and fill ‘em with things you like just to be diggin’ the bounty.  Whatever, hang that shit up.  But make sure you use gentlemanly stockings…

Camo Christmas Stocking from Cabela's

Like this camo stocking from Cabela’s.  Nothing says “manly Christmas” like a camouflage Christmas stocking.  It implies that you’re Mr. Outdoor Wilderness Guy (and maybe you are).  Just don’t hang it on your live Christmas tree or Santa might not see it.  You can get a Camo Personalized Christmas Stocking from Cabela’s and have it personalized with your name.  And it’s good quality — 100% of customer reviewers at Cabela’s would recommend a Camo Stocking to a friend.

Toronto Maple Leafs Christmas Stocking

When it comes to manly Christmas decoration items, you can’t go wrong with sports, any sports.  Of course, sports fans have many choices when it comes to Christmas stockings that celebrate their favorite team.  For example, how about this Toronto Maple Leafs Snowman Stocking.  Why the Maple Leafs?  Why not?  They could use a little love at this time of year because they’re not doing great and they’re the NHL team with the longest Stanley Cup drought.  Yet they are in Canada, where winter lives (and Christmas is all about celebrating winter), and they are hockey players, which automatically makes them tough, just like you.

San Francisco 49ers Fiber Optic Christmas Stocking

Of course, you can find many team stockings at FansEdge, from NFL to NBA to MLB to MLS.  Some  even have fiber optic lights!  (Any product that includes the words “fiber optic” in its description is cool.)  Such as the San Francisco 49ers Fiber Optic Mascot Christmas Stocking (pictured at left).

Maybe you’re not into pro sports that much, however — maybe you’re more into college teams.

Michigan Wolverines Christmas Stocking

Still a rabid supporter of your college Alma mater?  Then celebrate them during the Yuletide season.  For example, how about a Michigan Wolverines Christmas Stocking, from Overstock?  Why the Wolverines?  Because the wolverine is the most badass animal in North America (sort of the New World version of the honey badger).  If you didn’t graduate from Michigan, well, you can pick another team.  Search for college team stockings at both FansEdge and Overstock to find enough options to cover your entire room.  Add some holiday “cheering!”

Click here to go to the FansEdge Holiday Decor page and see hundreds of sports-related Christmas accessories for your home.

And from now until December 31, 2011, get 10% off any purchase of $100 or more at FansEdge using coupon code FEDECMBR.

Additional Dude-Appropriate Christmas Decor Ideas

You’ll want to set some additional things about your place to further evoke a cool, manly Christmas look.

Stained Glass Santa Head from Wind & Weather

Like what?  Like a rather serious-looking Santa portrait made out of stained glass.  You can set him on a table, shelf, or windowsill and the head is illuminated to emanate some business-like Christmas authority.  This stained glass Santa Head is from Wind & Weather.

19" Cowboy Santa from Overstock

On the other hand, a cowboy Santa isn’t bad either.  Especially one toting a Christmas-light lariat.  You can get the Western Cowboy Santa from Overstock.  The figure is 19 inches tall, so he’s not a shy, retiring Santa hombre — he’ll go well with your John Wayne ornaments.

Rotating Robot Santa Claus in his Rocket Ship

Or, instead of the frontier cowboy Kris Kringle, you could go with a more science-fictiony robot Santa.  In a space ship.  Playing music.  You can get the 10-inch Retro Santa Claus Robot Rotating Figure (in his red rocket ship) from Newegg.  Santa in a rocket, playing “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” — who needs reindeer?

Multi-hued "Dripping Icicle" Tube from Newegg

Remaining in a somewhat high-tech mode, how about a multi-hued, 36-inch long, LED-lighted “Dripping Icicle” Christmas Decoration?  You could hang this tube from your ceiling, put it in a window — anywhere you want to add some glowing Christmas hues like a giant sparkling icicle.  The Lighted Dripping Icicle Tube Christmas Decoration comes from Newegg (one of the best places to shop for everything your high-tech Christmas heart desires).

The illustration at right shows an individual, multi-hued tube on the left, plus a suggestion of how to use them — hanging from the ceiling of a high-rise building.  You could do the same at home if your ceilings are high enough — the tubes come in a number of other colors, too.  You can search for them on Newegg.  Or hang just one of them in your man cave.

There are other accent pieces that will round out your Christmas vibe, particularly when you’re going to be entertaining friends at your place — or a special lady.  You can do a lot to create a festive air without being wussy.  For example, I mentioned above that you probably won’t want to put out votive candles.  But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t use candles at all.  Candles are proven technology — they’ve been around for 2,000 years.  And candlelight can really set the mood on a cold, wintry evening.  You simply want to have a manly candle.  And that means BIG.

Tall Bamboo Candle from Homelement

Here’s a candle that is not only big, it’s interesting, because it’s made out of bamboo — the 17-inch high 100% Bamboo Wood Candle from Homelement .  It’s got a rough bark finish that will complement the rest of your robust Christmas decor.  Plus it’ll probably burn for a month… plenty of time for several Christmas parties and dates.  (You’ll enjoy your big candle and she’ll like it even more.)

Oliver Peppermint Stick Appetizer Plate for holiday serving

When you’re entertaining you’ll probably have some food, if only appetizers.  Why serve them on your everyday dinner dishes?  Pull out some holiday-themed serving plates.  I’ve got one to recommend for you that is a little edgy, definitely artistic, and amusing — the Oliver Peppermint Stick Appetizer Plate from CB2.  Oliver is apparently a little slow, or he just got done watching A Christmas Story and wanted to try that tongue-on-the-pole thing for himself.  Serve your Christmas party appetizers on these plates and your guests will know that you’re both hip and sophisticated (not that there’s any doubt).

Click to get the Montana Trees Cushion from Occa-Home

Everything I’ve recommended for your Christmas decorating theme to this point has been hard (except for the live Christmas tree, which is a little bushy).  Time to add contrast with something soft.  Something you can use as an accent on your sofa.  Something you can put your head on when you lie in front of the fire.  Something your girlfriend will want to cuddle up with.  Yet something masculine.  Something like the Montana Trees Cushion from Occa-Home.

This cushion is a high-quality, large (about 20″ x 20″) wool and cotton pillow with a bold yet warm alpine tree motif.  It’ll contribute to your festive winter mood.  And it’s named after Montana, which is rugged.  It comes from Occa-Home in the UK, one of the best online decorating stores.  It’s not cheap, but it should last you for the rest of your life.  (Endurance is a manly quality.)  Besides, Occa-Home has a no-questions-asked 30 day return policy.

How to Set the Christmas Vibe at the Entrance to Your Domain: a Wreath

All the foregoing “how to decorate” ideas were for your interior — decorating the inside of your apartment or your man cave retreat.  But how about setting the stage for Christmas cheer by visually greeting your visitors with an appropriate holiday symbol?  To wit:  a wreath. A Christmas wreath is a symbol of welcome and strength, two attributes you’d probably like to express.  (Why do you think the Greek and Roman champions wore laurel wreaths?)  In fact, a Christmas wreath is one of the oldest Christmas decorating traditions, dating back to the 1500s, well before the story of Santa Claus arrived on the scene.  Get a wreath and hang it on your door or wall.

3-Herb Wreath

I recommend the 3-Herb Wreath from Bambeco.  Bambeco is known for “green” products that combine sustainable design and modern technology, which means that they often have cool stuff that you won’t find in other stores.  Such as their 3-Herb Wreath — a Christmas wreath made from organic bay leaves (bay laurel is what laurel wreaths are traditionally made of), organic rosemary and thyme.  The herbs are woven in a circle and accented with red chili peppers.  Can’t get a more manly wreath than one with chili peppers!  Besides…red and green.  Get it?  This fragrant wreath is also practical — you can pluck the fresh herbs and peppers out of it and use them in cooking.

You can get a wrought-iron wreath hanger for your door from Art & Home — at their site, search for “wreath hanger” to see what’s currently available.

To Wrap Up Your Christmas Decorating Theme, Something Cool for the Kids:  A Train Set

Click for the North Pole Central Electric Train Set from Bass Pro Shops

Christmas being what it is — a time of celebration, when family and friends gather — it’s likely that sooner or later you’ll have some kids show up.  And when they do, you want to have something that will make their eyes light up.  (Hex nuts are fine for you, but 5-year-old Timmy might not grasp their significance.)

Christmas is a time of reverence for many, of course, but for kids it’s mostly fun and even magical.  And you can set that feeling alight with this final suggested decor item — the pièce de résistance of your holiday DIY decorating efforts:  a North Pole Central Electric Train Set from Bass Pro Shops.

Remember when you had a train set when you were a kid?  Did your parents set it up so it circled the Christmas tree?  That’s what you should do.  Set up the train to circle your live or metal tree.  The 5-car set (engine, tender, gondola car, boxcar, caboose) comes with a 40″ x 80″ oval track.  The boxcar plays 12 Christmas carols.  There’s more to it — click the text link above or the photo to check it out.  This is a cool electric train set.  Of course, it would have to be, coming from Bass Pro Shops.  They only sell stuff that works.

With this final touch to your manly Christmas decorating project, you might even make your own eyes light up.  And isn’t that what Christmas is ultimately all about?

Related posts:

1. Not Your Run-of-the-Mill Christmas Album — the Rocky Mountain Saxophone Quartet
2. An Unusual Confluence of Manly Movies

Everybody covets something.  You could do worse than to commit yourself to avarice, that strong feeling of desire for material gain.  After all, aren’t we all material?  Don’t we all want to touch, be touched, and possess that which we most deeply desire?  Just like the wielders of the orange light…

Achieve harmony with your devotion to avarice by wearing this Avarice T-shirt based on the Orange Lantern character from Blackest Night.

If you’re not up to speed on the big picture behind the Orange Lantern, it’s part of the Blackest Night series of comics that greatly expanded the story of the Green Lantern.  If you want a good overview, try reading the collection Blackest Night, by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis.  From there, you can branch out into a whole universe of “Lantern” tales.

But it’s not necessary to know the story of the Orange Lantern Corps to appreciate both the subversive and assertive nature of an “Avarice” T-shirt.  After all, don’t irony and rule-breaking propel our modern cultural aesthetic?  Sometimes you want to push the envelope — in fact, sometimes you don’t even want there to be an envelope.  But you want to do it subtly, cannily, without having to wear a tiredly obvious T-shirt that says “Subvert the Dominant Paradigm.”

Secretly, that’s what you want.  Well, don’t be so secret about it anymore.

This high-quality, 100% cotton, pre-shrunk T-shirt isavailable from Entertainment Earth, the folks who bring you a whole multiverse of entertainment tie-ins.  Comics are just one piece of their pie.  You can find many other toys and collectibles — subversive, funny, and devotedly fan-oriented — at their site.

In the meantime, get the Avarice T-shirt.  Hone your desire and the means for achieving it.

Related posts:

1. 10 Days of T-Shirts: Day 4 – Vox Logo T-Shirt from Musician’s Friend
2. 10 Days of T-Shirts: Day 9 – Panda Armed and Dangerous T-Shirt from Cafe Press

Is the offer of a free T-shirt from ThinkGeek for April Fools an April Fool?  No!  I mean – yes, they will give you a hip, free T-shirt if you buy $15 worth of stuff!  Whatazüper deal!

ThinkGeek is, of course, where thoughtful geeks go to shop and think.  And right now, you can get a free T-shirt by clicking this link.  But the dudes at ThinkGeek are not just stuffy, intellectual, T-shirt-wearing elitists.  They can get down and dirty with some Ape-to-the-Fools, too…

Yeah — get the Playmobil Apple Store Playset.

So, if you go here, or click the banner below, you can take advantage of this insanely great T-shirt offer (yes, I graduated from Steve Jobs Marketing University).  You’ll get a T-shirt with Ken Jennings’ (legendary Jeopardy contestant, later crushed by Watson) assimilative pronouncement: “I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords.”

What should you buy from ThinkGeek that costs at least $15 so you can get your free T-shirt?  Well, they have thousands and thousands of other cool T-shirts, you know.  But maybe you don’t want another T-shirt if you’re already getting a free T-shirt already, you know?  Fortunately, they have many, many other things.  Many!   Like, such as:

 The Bucky Balls Toy of the Year…

BuckyBalls Magnetic Building Spheres Now in Three New Executive Styles! Ah, carbon – how sweet you are. You are the basis of life on Earth, you let our pencils write, and you form the most fortuitous fullerenes. And what are fullerenes, but a collection of balls. Now, imagine replacing those hard to play with atoms, with rare earth magnetic spheres. Suddenly, you have BuckyBalls Magnetic Building Spheres, and now your life will never be the same. Because BuckyBalls Magnetic Building Spheres are really that cool. You can build basic shapes, complex sculptures, magnetic jewelry, or even outfit your refrigerator in bold and unique ways. Just look at all the shapes and forms you can make with these bad boys – it’s amazing! BuckyBalls Magnetic Building Spheres are just what you need to help you brave the boredom of the office. And really, when else will you get to play with your BuckyBalls at work and not get in trouble?

Butterfly in a Jar…

Electronic Butterfly in a Jar When we were kids, we liked putting butterflies in jars so we could keep them forever and ever. But sometimes they always died. It was sad – extra sad because butterflies (in our opinion) are like rainbows and unicorns: unadulterated creations of magic and beauty. That why we got so excited when we saw this Electronic Butterfly in a Jar. Read on, and find out why you need one very badly. Each Electronic Butterfly in a Jar is a jar with a wire in it. The wire has a fake butterfly on the end. Somehow, when you tap the top or make a loud sound, the electronics in the cap make the wire wiggle. This creates the very realistic illusion of the butterfly flittering around your jar. It even just stays on the glass and flexes its wings sometimes. There is absolutely no way you can look at an Electronic Butterfly in a Jar and not smile. It is like having a piece of magic nature on your desk that defies death. Pick your favorite butterfly flavor (or collect the whole team) and get ready to feel good when you marvel at your Electronic Butterfly in a Jar. Electronic Butterfly in a Jar Looks just like a real butterfly in a jar. Responds to taps on the jar and sound. Four different flavors to chose from: Blue Morpho, Pink Morpho, Yellow Swallowtail, and Monarch. One butterfly per jar – butterflies cannot be combined into one jar. Batteries: 3 AAA (included). Dimensions: 3.5″ x 3.5″ x 7.5″

And the formidable Bag of Holding…

The Bag of Holding Messenger Bag When the last d20 is rolled, and Tiamat’s dying scream shakes the cavern walls, only two things remain: the distribution of experience points to the party, and loot. Your party’s dwarf fighter and that human paladin might be able to lug piles of gold and platinum, but your little gnome mage can’t quite heft that much stuff. What to do? The chaotic neutral halfling thief offered to carry a portion of your loot, but do you really trust “Shifty McFingers” with your well-earned booty, or can you find another way to carry it all? Luckily, amidst the ponderous piles of platinum lying about the place is a simple nondescript bag that everyone overlooked – except you, of course. Peering into the bag, you see nothingness – an almost infinite depth in which you can place way more loot than your entire party combined! While the rest of your party is trudging away with a backbreaking mass of booty, you’re happily plundering ton after ton of coins, and casually flinging your new bag over your shoulder. While transdimensional space is, as yet, impossible in this plane of existence (Doctor Who fans, keep quiet for now), ThinkGeek Labs has developed our own messenger bag that comfortably carries way more than a bag of its size normally could! It’s big enough to carry a 17″ laptop, Large 3-ring binder, two college textbooks, two paperback books, Amazon Kindle, iPod, cellphone, cables, pencils, business cards, spare batteries… I could go on and on.

 Don’t wait on this T-shirt deal, because when the free shirts are gone, they’re gone, and you’ll be out of shirt luck. 

And who would like to be that?

Related posts:

1. 10 Days of T-Shirts: Day 8 – Orange Lantern Avarice T-Shirt from Entertainment Earth
2. 10 Days of T-Shirts: Day 4 – Vox Logo T-Shirt from Musician’s Friend

You may be wondering how to help the people of Japan cope with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that occurred March 11.  You can do it by buying goods from Japanese companies online.  This post tells you the best way to shop Japan via the Internet.

One idea for economic recovery that I have not seen mentioned is to shop directly with Japanese businesses online.  Americans and others around the world have donated millions of dollars through various relief organizations, such as the Red Cross, and many others have traveled to Japan to volunteer their services.  But, while donations of money satisfy the immediate need to get supplies to the people in the towns of the tsunami-ravaged Tohoku region, dollars can be infused into the Japanese economy long-term by shopping via the Internet from anywhere in the world at Rakuten.

Click to explore Rakuten's huge online mall

Many people outside Japan have not heard of Rakuten.  It is an online shopping company.  It is Japan’s equivalent of Amazon.  The Japanese name “Rakuten Ichiba” translates to “Rakuten Shopping Mall,” which is exactly what it is — an aggregation of 33,000 Japanese shops and businesses.  This huge online shopping site offers 60 million products.  Rakuten is the second most visited site in Japan, with over 50 million registered users.  In fact, this Internet shopping giant is the reason Amazon has not been able to make much headway into the Japanese market.  It is estimated that one-third of households in Japan shop at Rakuten.  And that says something:  Japanese consumers, particularly online, are known for being finicky and demanding.  Rakuten has met their needs to the point that it is now one of the top ten Internet companies in the world, and has an international presence.  In addition to products, it also has its own extensive travel services site, which anyone in the world can use.

Rakuten is now actively expanding its shopping services in other markets throughout the world, including Europe and the United States.  Amazon may be the largest online shopping company, but sheer size is no guarantee of quality (Microsoft sells more operating systems than any other company but no one thinks their OS is the best, and General Motors became the largest automaker in the world selling cars inferior to a number of other makes), so I would not be surprised if, in a few years, Rakuten has noticeably eroded Amazon’s market share.  You can think of Rakuten as the Honda of online retailing.

What does that mean with respect to helping the Japanese economy weather the aftermath of the earthquake?

We know that the world’s economic fortunes are subject to ripple effects that transcend national boundaries.  Mortgage foreclosures in the American mid-west affect the value of the Euro.  The price of labor in China impacts how much Walmart pays its US workers.  The Russian wheat harvest affects the price of food in Delhi and Des Moines.  With respect to the world economy, Japan is a titan, boasting the third largest economy after the US and China.  So any financial woes that Japan experiences as a result of the triple whammy of the earthquake, tsunami, and radiation contamination from damaged nuclear power plants will affect not only the Japanese people but people in the United States and around the world.  (Already, it is projected that demand for the Prius will not be able to be met, since there are parts suppliers for the car in the affected region.  And US beef exports to Japan may be hampered by damaged port facilities.)  In other words, the domino effect from an economic slowdown in Japan coupled with the need to re-build infrastructure could affect your personal financial situation.  So it behooves you to help your neighbor.

Thus, if you shop for Japanese goods, you can help not only Japanese businesses and consumers as they recover and re-build, but your own economy as well.  The easiest (and most enjoyable) way to shop in Japan from outside Japan is Rakuten. Spend a few bucks there, get yourself some interesting, well-made Japanese products, and you’ll be helping float everyone’s boat.  After all, just imagine what it would have meant to a local hardware or stationery store in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina if they had had a steady influx of customers…  If they had experienced damage or hardship from the hurricane, sure, packets of freeze-dried food and blankets would have met their immediate physical needs, but long-term, it’s customers buying from businesses that sustain an economy, whether in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi or Ofunato, Japan.

You can find just about any kind of product at Rakuten, from books to ice cream to motorcycle parts.  But why not get something interesting or unusual?  How about:

• Sake
• Momotaro Jeans (maybe the best jeans in the world)
• Japanese Sandals
• Tea Sets
• Samurai Clothes and Accessories
• Edible Seaweed from Ofunato (the northeast region)

You can also try using the search field on the Rakuten homepage to search for city names in the northeast region, such as Sendai, Kamaishi, Miyako, and Kuji, in order to find stores in those cities from which to buy.  Keep in mind that operations at those stores might be curtailed or slowed for awhile — but they will still appreciate the business!

Rakuten currently ships to over 50 countries (and the list is expanding) and their site has pages optimized for a number of countries, including the USA, Canada, China, France, and the UK.  If you’re outside Japan, when you place an order you’ll usually be put in touch via email with the shop that sells the item to arrange a shipping method and cost.  (Note that some shops offer special free international shipping promotions, or $1 international shipping.)  There is a weight restriction on items shipped to the US via certain carriers, but many shops can arrange a shipping method to the US that gets around this limit.

When you first explore the site, you may wonder where to go and how to approach it, but anyone familiar with online shopping can quickly figure it out.  Explore.  In addition, they have a handy instructional page here.

Think of it as an adventure, man.  As well as a good deed.

Here’s a testimonial from a customer in the US posted on the Rakuten site:

“I recently found Rakuten via Facebook, and boy I couldn’t be happier. As a person interested in Japanese culture, this website is great. I’ve found many things I had been looking for as well as new items that have caught my eye. The website is well laid out and very intuitive to navigate. And the search feature is one of the better ones I’ve encountered for a merchant website. And this is all from a website that isn’t set up for business in the USA. If the USA website is half as good, then it’ll be better than most merchants that I’ve purchased from.   by Nick M – NJ, USA”

Hey, if Nick can do it, you can, too.  And remember, you’ll be helping the cause.  It all adds up.

If you have found something interesting or useful here on Best Stuff for Men, please consider making a donation, so others can benefit, too.  Thanks!

Related posts:

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When it comes to manly movies, something unusual occurred in recent months — several films came out and are now playing (and have been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture) that focus on male characters in mature, thought-provoking, diverse ways.  When I say “manly movies,” I don’t mean the usual action-film fare that is considered a staple of primarily male movie-goes — your Transformers and Transporters and so on — but movies that deal seriously with themes that men actually come to grips with in their lives (or, in the case of The King’s Speech, if they’re a king); themes that approach the heart of how and what it means to be a man, and focus on issues that a man will face if he has serious goals and complex relationships (relationships beyond that with his car or his quipping buddy).  Matters of strenth and power in conjunction with love.

This does not usually happen.  There may be one or two well-made films in a given year that focus primarily on male character(s) in serious-minded ways (last year it was The Hurt Locker and A Serious Man; the year before that it was Frost/Nixon and Milk), but not 5 films.  Not of the quality that this year’s crop has.  So let’s celebrate it a bit.  If you enjoy movies about men doing realistic, manly things, check the following films.  They’re mostly still playing (thanks, Oscar prestige) and they’re all worth seeing.  (Note:  I could have included The Town here but figure it’s on the bubble between realistic-and-serious and action-and-implausibility.  Still, an excellent movie that balances testosterone and emotional depth.)

Get the movie poster

True Grit.  I could say that this is the “grittiest” of the bunch but, you know, that would be wrong — both because the pun is too obvious and because it’s not accurate (the grittiest is probably 127 Hours).  It is, however, the most stark when it comes to portraying masculinity in a way that much of America has come to define it:  in terms of cowboys in the wild west.  But these are cowboys who don’t know they’re inhabiting a historic milieu that’s destined to become a cultural cliché.  Instead, they’re men simply doing what they have chosen to do:  be on one side or the other (good or evil) of violent, barely civilized situations.  True Grit is just about a perfect film.  The acting is superb, the cinematography excellent (all the compositions are interesting and it’s got that sharp, clean, expansive light), the dialogue is adult-worthy, and it’s consistently engrossing.  This film dramatizes the quality of determination in a rather pure way — and it doesn’t detract from it that the central character, who is probably the most determined, is a girl.  That is the dichotomy that all of the films here have in common:  they portray men who are self-reliant and then ask the question, In the service of what is that self-reliance expressed?  Through the high-minded yet demanding presence of a plucky girl obsessively bent on justice, the males involved are encouraged to either retain or regain their humanity.  Hailee Steinfeld is a revelation as Mattie Ross, the headstrong girl who hires Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to hunt down the man who killed her father.  Matt Damon provides effective counterpoint in the quasi-Woody Harrelson role from No Country for Old Men. Both Bridges and Steinfeld were nominated for Oscars for their respective roles and both deserve to win, though neither probably will (as this is written, the Oscars are about 5 hours away).

The Fighter.  As each of these films depicts a man pursuing a clear-cut goal, they also depict men who are influenced in their pursuit of those goals by the relationships in which they’re enmeshed.  After seeing The Fighter, you begin to wonder if the title refers to Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg), a boxer who is pursuing the ultimate comeback, or Dicky Eklund (Christian Bale), the brother of Micky, who seeks simply to come back to life.  Some relationships uplift and some corrode.  For most people, they can do a bit of both.  A man must decide on whose terms he’s going to live — his own, or those of the people he allows to influence him.  And if he, like most of us, cannot escape the influence of others, how will it shape him?  That is one of the central questions in these films and it is at the heart of The Fighter.  Again, this is movie-making at its cinematic best.  Everyone does a good job.  Christian Bale plays a hyper-active coke addict with manic precision and is nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar.  So are Melissa Leo and Amy Adams in their respective roles as the mother of the brothers and Micky’s girlfriend.

127 Hours.  127 Hours raises the idea of ”If only…” again and again.  Follow that notion back far enough and you might begin wondering what would have happened if only the dinosaurs had developed opposable thumbs.  Maybe they would have survived that big meteorite.  But Aron Ralston managed to avoid becoming a fossil due primarily not to his thumbs but his brain.  (And that’s another thing about the male leads in this collection of films:  they’re not only intrepid, they think and plan.)  Throughout his ordeal, Ralston recapitulated virtually every major drama of survival that humans have endured.  Was it carelessness or bad luck that landed him in his predicament?  In the end, does it matter?  What certainly matters are the decisions he made leading up to it, as well as after he found himself in trouble.  As Dr. Johnson said, “When a man knows he is to be hanged…it concentrates his mind wonderfully.”  And so Ralston is forced to concentrate on what truly matters to him.  There is a fine line between narcissism and self-pity.  The film does a good job of suggesting Ralston’s sense of isolation prior to his mishap — a misadventure that magnified that feeling exponentially.  A reprieve from death can dilute narcissism to the point that it becomes…what?  What is the opposite of narcissism?  Empathy?  Or is narcissism just a way of looking at ourselves defensively through the eyes of others?  This film is an absorbing, multi-layered collaboration between director Danny Boyle and actor James Franco and, since our eyes are upon Franco for practically every second of it, it’s a good thing he was effective enough to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor.

The King’s Speech.  In The King’s Speech, Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush) is an inveterate fan of Shakespeare, and in this film he encounters one of those men who, as Shakespeare said, have “greatness thrust upon them” and manages to give the guy a hand.  In this postmodern era, one suspects that the path to greatness may not be as straightforward as Shakespeare described, and this film does a good job of suggesting that it can be mustered from unlikely sources.  In that respect, everyone by now knows who Colin Firth is, since he’s the odds-on favorite to win the Academy Award for Best Actor for his rendition of King George VI’s trials and tribulations in service to his countrymen during World War II.  (Firth’s previous claim to fame was being nominated for a Best Actor Oscar in a film ignored by almost every American, A Single Man.)  With regard to King George VI, if ever there was a man who could more surely use a hand, he would be hard to find.  Thank goodness for Logue and for the Duchess of York, the principals responsible for encouraging George to express whatever greatness he had in him.  As another famous cinematic king once said, ”You have to know these things when you’re a king, you know.”  Stubbornness, determination, resolve – stereotypical English qualities that have come to be regarded as part and parcel of every great or effective man’s character — are demonstrated here on all sides, but it is simple friendship and love that win out in the end.  Ironic?  All of these films dance with irony in their own way.  Being a man in western culture, particularly American culture (which, at its core, is English culture) involves any number of seemingly contradictory requirements and expectations.  This film, nominated for 12 Academy Awards, investigates several of them.

The Social Network.  And now for something completely different…  Whereas all the films above deal with things that have happened comfortably in the past, The Social Network deals with the future as it is occurring now.  It contains a sense of the future shaping itself before our eyes.  This sense is enhanced by Aaron Sorkin’s adroit script, wherein people communicate with each other in focused, fast-forward ways that we can never can quite manage in real life.

There is a subliminal and intriguing tension to this film that arises due to its being a story that is simultaneously being played out in the world through our capacity to update our opinion of it on our Facebook page as we watch.  It’s as though we so much want to benefit from the promise of the future that we seek to grasp it in the present.  How did this state of affairs come about?  The intervals of time during which our collective knowledge doubles and technological eras bloom is continually being halved.  In the midst of this technolution, we crave an increase in connections and try to condense the time it takes to make them.  This isn’t all due to Mark Zuckerberg but he gave the accelerating merry-go-round a big push.  ’S what happens when you marry post-adolescent hormones to nerdy insecurity and add superior technical intelligence.  If only Zuckerberg’d been popular and able to get chicks, FB would never have happened.  Instead, welcome to the world many of us seek to inhabit.  You never know for sure how things will turn out.  That’s another thing these films tell us.  Admittedly, the guys in The Social Network are budding men — but if Hailee Steinfeld can be an integral part of a manly movie, so can Jesse Eisenberg.

As with the characters in all of the films on this list, the young upstarts in The Social Network find the need for connection with others, especially women — while oftentimes evolving through, and getting beyond, seeking the approval of others.  While a man must rely on a certain autonomy to realize a worthy (or unworthy) goal, these movies imply that, in the end, it is the connections with others that come to matter most.  In other words, when we connect with and prioritize our deepest sense of self, pursue our fondest dreams or purpose, and overcome self-imposed internal obstacles, that is when we are most able to vividly connect with and benefit others.  (In that regard, it is interesting that all of these films but one are based on actual events and real people.)  That’s not all there is to take away from them.  A number of other themes and issues are explored and one good thing about these films is that they reward thought (unlike, say, Gamer).   See them and find out the rest.  Leave a comment below.

And when you want to see them, you can get tickets from Fandango.

Why go through Fandango?  Well, it works best when you want to make sure you get advance tickets for a popular new release.  It also enables you to avoid waiting in line at the theater (in most cases you can print out your tickets at home and just go right in when you get there, or you can pick up your ticket at a special kiosk in the lobby that hardly anyone uses; see your options when you purchase).  Since the movies here have been out for awhile, you probably won’t encounter lines.  But the other thing you can do is purchase gift certificates online (Fandango Bucks) and email them to someone else.  Since your parents probably haven’t seen all these films yet, why not send them the gift of a superior movie?  Yeah, that’s the kind of culture-hound you are.

Or you could wait for the DVD/Blu-ray.  Should take about 3 – 6 months, depending on who wins tonight.  (I guarantee you, True Grit is gonna look great on blu-ray when it comes out on June 7, 2011.)

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You know, if the Egyptians had had LEGOs, they probably would have built the pyramids out of them…

Nowadays, you can build almost anything out of LEGOs.  This Danish company, which started modestly in 1932, has now grown to be the fifth largest manufacturer of toys in the world.  Just goes to show the power of a good idea (in this case, the idea was the LEGO “brick”).

Here’s another good idea:  Boba Fett’s Slave I space ship from Star Wars:  The Empire Strikes Back, now available as a kit you can build out of LEGOs.  This is a cool model, with 573 pieces, rockets that fire, and character figures included.  Get it from Entertainment Earth, which is a juggernaut of fun and diverse entertainment in its own right.

By the way, LEGO is an abbreviation of the two Danish words “leg godt,” which means “play well.”

Play well, buckaroo.  (Of course, Boba Fett didn’t play well with others, which is why he ended up inside the sarlacc.)

Click the banner below to see all things LEGO at Entertainment Earth (including pyramids):

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This is a Paper Jamz review of some of the most innovative and fun musical toys on the market.  With a Paper Jamz guitar, amp, and drums, you can play musical chords, songs, and jam with your friends.

When it comes to music toys, many don’t manage to sustain interest over time because they’re too simple and sound cheesy.  That’s not the case with the Paper Jamz guitars, amplifiers, drum machines, and microphones.

These are musical instrument toys that reward exploration and experimentation.  Paper Jamz instruments are fun to play.  And, unlike the “instrument” used in Guitar Hero, there is more of a connection to actual guitar technique with Paper Jamz than you get with a plastic-key-based guitar controller.  And since Paper Jamz is very reasonably priced, they should be on your list of cool toys to check out this holiday season.

Click for Paper Jamz Guitar 4 at Barnes & Noble

Paper Jamz guitars are not real guitars — they don’t have actual strings.  What they do have is Active Graphics Technology, which enables you to play chords and single notes in “freestyle” mode that sound just like an actual guitar (see Stevie Peavey’s Paper Jamz guitar demo video below).

You can even play Paper Jamz guitars through a regular guitar amp, although Paper Jamz has its own complete line of amplifiers that work well, too.  Active Graphics Technology detects the motion of your fingers on the fretboard and graphic strings.  The Paper Jamz software converts these movements into realistic guitar sounds.

The Bottom Line on Paper Jamz

These are musical toys that will provide hours of fun and inspire creativity.  The Paper Jamz guitars, drums, and amps are hard to beat for their price (for example, you can get any one of them for under $30 at Best Buy) when you compare their functionality to other kid-friendly electronic instruments.

See the video below for a basic review of how Paper Jamz guitars, drums, and amps work.  You can get Paper Jamz instruments by clicking these links to online stores:  Buy.com, Best Buy, and Barnes & Noble (that’s right, Barnes & Noble, which is a hipper electronics store than you might imagine).  As you’ll see, there are various styles of Paper Jamz guitars available.  Browse the selection of Paper Jamz instruments at these retailers to find the best current prices and availability.  Don’t wait, particularly as we get closer to Christmas, because they’re selling fast.

Want to know how you can have more musical fun with a Paper Jamz guitar?  Then take a look at the video below, where guitarist Stevie Peavey, of the metal band Deathsquad Demongods, has some fun reviewing a “Flying V” Paper Jamz guitar.  Then get your own guitar and you too can be on your way to being a rock god.

Click to get a Paper Jamz Amp - Style 4 - at Barnes & Noble

If you want to give the gift of an actual musical instrument this holiday season, please go to Musician’s Friend and Music & Arts, where you can find everything the budding musicians needs — all kinds of guitars, amps, and other electronics, drums, drum machines, wind instruments, reeds, horns, keyboards, strings, and much more

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