Toys that don't work.

This toy has never worked. I only want it to do one-of-two things and it does neither.

First, it doesn't work as Santa's sleigh bells. 

Every year on Christmas Eve, the Husband and I concoct a complicated and devious plan, and we invent a web-like series of ruses, and one of us will slink-off stealthily with the bell-shaker-thing and when the hyperactive four children are in bed, the missing parent will ring the bells under certain bedroom windows, and the present parent will gasp in shock and excitement and declare, "Sssh! It's Santa! You'd all better go to sleep or he'll fly over the house and won't deliver presents and there'll be groaning and gnashing of milk teeth in the morning!"

And, though they're usually quite dim on the whole, one of the children will yell that one parent is missing! And, odds on, that missing parent is ringing that bell-shaker-thing under the window just like the present parent did the year before.

Useless toy .

Second, I like to use the bell-shaker-thing when certain children are perilously close to soft furnishing with fluorescent pens ... or when all the children are yelling and screaming and punching and demanding of food.

I like to shake it in circular motions around each of the children's heads, and chant and hiss in an African witch doctor's-type, trance-inducing voice, "Away evil spirits! Away! Begone beezlebubs! Begone!"

That doesn't work either. It just adds to the cacophony. Stupid toy.