I Still PLAY with you, jk toys

I. The Toys

Yes I am Pibb. Yes I have a very successful life. And yes I still play with toys.

Hi,

I am Pibb

I have a frankly very successful life

And I still play with toys

I have a giant collection of diecast model airplanes, nothing special - just maisto and sky busters by Mattel that I used to get at the grocery store for $4

And I still play with them multiple times a week

When I play with them I hold it and I move it around and make noises

However in my head - there is a whole world of activity going on for example if I even play with a Airbus A350

I am imagining it going through the sky and landing or having to fly around thunderstorms

II. The Case for Play

Raw. Authentic. Personal. And basically zero research done on it.

I think this is one of the most healthy things a person can do is imaginative play

It is such an untapped resource, it's raw, it's authentic, it's personal

The thing is when you are in the act of play, it's almost like meditation

There's no responsibilities, there's no stress, no demand from you. It's raw low cost creative excercises on your brain

For me as well, it takes me back to the good ol days where there was zero list of responsibilities (at least intensive ones)

Chipping into that nostalgia is lovely and nice.

I encourage you to play! Stress decompression. It's kind of ironic that for as meaningful as play is, there is not a whole ton of research on it

Even for adults, there is minimal.

Like there is generic play so for example, playing a game, a sport, I don't know chess? But nothing about using your brain to play.

when you are in the act of play, it's almost like meditation

No responsibilities. No stress. No demand.

III. Why Diecast

The grocery store $4 model is genuinely an underrated piece of engineering.

Anyways down below are my favorite airplanes right now which I will include an image

Now I have always played with low cost diecast models and sometimes plastic at this scale due to a few factors

1Low cost

2Size

3Material

4Pre-built

Low cost — I obviously was not made of money nor would I want a toy that is expensive

Size — I always preferred this size, I forget what the actual size is but I need to be able to maneuver it with my hand to play

Material — The materials used in these low cost models are phenomenal and really underappreciated for their durability, I have had models stand my Brother and myself!

Pre-built — Frankly I have built models before but to be honest, they are so fragile and time consuming, like yes I know there is benefits, but my purpose is to play! I am not the most creative

IV. F-15C Eagle

104-0. In air to air combat. Ever.

McDonnell Douglas F-15C Eagle Maisto diecast

When I was growing up, my destiny was to become a F-15C/E pilot. That is all I wanted and expected to do. Obviously life changes but I still hold this aircraft very fondly to my heart.

It is one of the most developed platforms ever as it was meant to counter the Sukhoi 27 Flanker series of aircraft and in doing so was state of the art especially for the time.

What they did right here was make it not only a large platform to carry enough ordnance whether it be Aamrams, AIM-9's, GBU's, MK80-84's etc. for any mission. It's long range, dual engine, fast, etc.

It has an impeccable record as well as being 104-0 in air to air combat.

The Record

104-0 in air to air combat. No other operational fighter platform in history has a comparable record.

V. AV-8 Harrier

Often called a death trap. Schwarzkopf called it one of the 7 most impactful weapons of the Gulf War.

AV-8 Harrier · VTOL Maisto diecast

Now often knows as a death trap, the beautiful thing about this aircraft is not only it's nimbleness as it's a relatively small aircraft - but it's VTOL capability. The United States Marines in particular needs these capabilities due to their need to use amphibious assault carriers which have a significantly shorter runway than it's Navy counterparts.

So VTOL means vertical take off and landing and it does that by aiming it's thrust or push downwards to push the aircraft into the sky. Now in this aircraft, it had a very outdated way of doing so and often had times where the hot air thrust would get sucked into the engine and cause a massive decrease in thrust which would then cause them to fall out of the sky.

Now that being said, the part that admires me the most, is that even with these variables, it was such a low cost platform for the marines and was HIGHLY available in all conflicts, the leader of the US armed forces in the 1991 Iraq War for the defense of Quwait, Norman Schwarzkopf called it one of the 7 most impactful weapons of the war.

It was able to respond, fly quick, decent payload to calls for airstrikes. It is almost purely air to ground and it did great at that! I like to think of it as a sister aircraft to the A-4 Skyhawk

one of the 7 most impactful weapons of the war

Norman Schwarzkopf · Gulf War 1991

IX. F-18D/E Super Hornet

More different conflicts than any other aircraft flying today. And the F-35 is not replacing it.

Boeing F/A-18D/E Super Hornet Maisto diecast

As you all have seen during the current Trump Adminstration, and even past ones but this one more than others - the US Carrier fleets are in max deployment! They are being deployed in either outright combat or aggressive forward positions.

In my opinion the F-18 naval fleet of aircraft probably see more different types of conflicts than any other aircraft. They are first on the line for almost all deployments, now that does not mean total tonnage of bombs dropped but where I do believe this aircraft sees the most of, is different conflicts.

You need to understand the news is not the only conflicts that the US military is involved in - we have a global presence on every theatre even wars you would never think were involved in. We have a lot more pull than ever as the world's global superpower, I mean we kidnapped a president in his own capital! Hard to beat that.

Okay sorry went off a little but the F-18 is a brilliant multirole platform that I think the F-35 Lightning II is going to have a hard time replacing. Although range is not 10/10, it's ordnance and multirole capacity is hard to beat for a naval weapons platform, even the much larger F-14 Tomcat could not bring the same finesse to a theatre.

I know long term they want to replace the F-18 but I don't think the F-35 will ever fill it's shoes, especially with the EA-18G Growler (a F-18 variant for electronic warfare) being the Department of War's primary aggressive ECM aircraft.

the F-35 Lightning II is going to have a hard time replacing it

Especially with the EA-18G Growler still in the picture

VI. MQ-1 Predator

The US Air Force's first full scale production drone. A disaster on paper. Started everything.

General Atomics MQ-1 Predator Maisto diecast

General Atomics first and frankly the US Air Force's first full scale production drone (outside of target drones) for surveillance and air to ground ordinance, this gained big time notoriety for the start of large scale drone strikes on populations, I remember I had to do a paper on the ethics of drone strikes and at the end of the day, a strike is a strike.

Now the MQ-1 was frankly a cluster you know what, a notoriously bad engine, bad deployment practices and the V1 was horried without anti-icing, it was frankly a disaster, most were not even lost to enemy ground fire just it being a dump.

Nonetheless, it started the new wave of unmanned aerial vehicles.

In the recent Iran war, we lost 24 of the new MQ-9's which is really no big loss, yes that is quite a bit of drones but those are so so replaceable and from a PR perspective MUCH more unnoticeable to you and the media when compared to manned aircraft.

The Takeaway

A disaster of a platform that still managed to change modern warfare. Sometimes the first is ugly. It still counts.

VII. Airbus BelugaXL

What a funny looking plane.

Airbus BelugaXL · A330-based Mattel Sky Busters · available now 5/2026

What a funny looking plane, this one is available right now as of 5/2026 in most stores via Mattel Skybusters and I really enjoy playing with this plane, I think me growing more into learning operations has made me appreciate what this plane does, it is essentially a very high capacity or outsized truck for Airbus.

Now Airbus is split between multiple countries so one aircraft may have numerous different country of origins for all the parts that go into a plane, and remember the bill of materials for a plane is MASSIVE. So to bring it's WIP work in progress from country to country, Airbus developed this oversized aircraft based on it's A330 passenger/cargo jet by taking the undercarriage and cockpit of that and slamming a giant bay for the parts.

It is 7x more efficient then the other Airbus Beluga it is replacing which is quite massive.

These planes are probably some of the busiest planes in the world, I know at one point they were doing 5 take offs and landings in a shift which is quite amazing.

7x more efficient than the Beluga it replaced

The world's most overworked-looking aircraft

VIII. Airbus A350

Airbus is smoking Boeing right now and the A350 deserves its praise.

Airbus A350 Maisto diecast

Okay okay I like Boeing too, I think the 787 even with it's lithium battery failures in the beginning is still a beautifully efficient aircraft.

However Airbus is smoking Boeing right now and the A350 deserves it's praise. It's just generally a better aircraft - going off memory (I have been going off memory for almost all of this hehehe) it is more reliable, longer range, more fuel efficient, etc.

The Airbus A380 is the king of the sky's but it wouldn't be unfair to say this is the queen especially as the Boeing 747-8 is discontinuing

The Throne

A380 is king. A350 is queen. And the 747-8 is on its way out. The succession is not subtle.

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I still play with toys. you probably should too