If you’re around my age and a girl, you probably collected tons of small, plastic charms throughout childhood. Usually clipped onto and worn on pastel chain-link necklaces, the charms covered everything from tiny whistles to soda bottles, little cars, boats, hearts, dolls and beyond. Though no one company held a majority share in this market, there was definitely a big difference between “good charms” and “bad charms.” Good charms were well crafted, nicely painted, fairly large and plenty durable. Bad charms came from one-point Chuck E. Cheese prize bins and dentists’ offices. Good charms had little silver bells attached. Bad charms only spoke if you chewed them.

Generally, guys weren’t allowed to take part in the craze. At least, not to the degree of collecting and wearing the charms — that was a fast ticket to recess punches. Still, I admit to have had a small affinity for all of the charms based on some real life commercial item — like the tiny Pepsi bottles and whatnot. The stupid things sell for tons nowadays. In 1985, they did not. In 1985, they were cheap. And sometimes they came on headbands.

Yes, it’s the official “Charmies” head band, a high fashion artifact with four different brightly colored charms. Originally retailing for 98 cents, they narrowly beat out twenty-five cent charm vending machines in the bargain department, and at least with these, you knew what you were getting yourself into. Charm-filled vending machines could shit out anything from good charms to CHARMS FROM HELL. If you liked what you saw in the Charmies assortment, this was a no-risk situation. As an added bonus, the Charmies/hip teen combo logo could easily be cut out and glued onto marble notebooks for what we in the biz call “extra cool in school.”

There’s a whistle, a bicycle, an I-think-it’s-a-calculator, and a toilet with flip-up lid and seat. The toilet’s kind of a strange choice considering the target demo, but any boys lucky enough to land themselves a girly Charmies headband at least gained an impressive commode for their Battle Beasts. My hunch is that the bootleg company that made these knew that the headband was a worthless bonus — kids who bought this just ripped off the charms to add to their big ass necklace, discarding the headband as they would any soda six-pack plastic connector. Remember to break them before trashing, or many fish will die. The End.

Posted by Matt. E-mail me!