The Funny Side of Barbie
101 Hilarious True Stories of the Crazy
Things Kids Do to Barbie Dolls
Compiled and Edited by
Clare Higgins
Smashwords Edition
©2010 Clare Higgins
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Introduction
Barbie's been called a pampered princess and a bad influence on girls for too long. It's time to set the record straight. Introducing The Funny Side of Barbie, a collection of 101 very funny and completely true stories of the off-the-wall things kids have done to Barbie and her friends over the years -- from disastrous beauty makeovers to voodoo to sex-change operations. I’ve gathered these stories from Barbie collectors, baby-boomers, teenagers, moms, and all sorts of folks around the country. Barbie's been through so many mishaps she makes Lara Croft, Tomb Raider look like a Girl Scout. "Pampered princess?" No way!
My thanks to everyone who contributed to this book, and let’s hope Barbie forgives us all.
-- The Editor
BRING ME THE HEAD OF BARBIE ROBERTS
Decapitation stories
"When I was about five, I was standing in the bathroom brushing Barbie's tangled, matted hair and I pulled a little too hard with the brush. Her head popped off and landed in the toilet. It fell so far back I couldn't see it, so I figured it was just gone (I wouldn't have stuck my hand down there for anything anyway). Most of my Barbies were headless and naked, so this was just one more headless Barbie to add to my collection. Later that day the toilet started overflowing and my Mom plunged and plunged and still couldn't figure out why the toilet was clogged. A plumber had to come out and dislodge Barbie's head. I never said a word." – MV, Oklahoma
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"My friend really hates his sister, so he stole her Barbie doll and stuck her upside down in a blender and turned it on. Her head got all cut up in a million pieces and he gave them to his sister for a present." – Benjamin Higgins (the Editor's nephew).
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"Once a bunch of my cousins and I were being watched by an elderly lady while our families attended a funeral. The girls were playing with Barbies and the boys were doing boy things. Us girls decided to go downstairs and try and get a snack out of the babysitter. While we were gone, the boys snuck into the bedroom where we had been playing and pulled off all our Barbies' heads, hung their bodies from the ceiling fan and turned it on. When we got back to the room all our Barbies were swinging around and around and around." – MV, Oklahoma
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"My older daughter beheaded her Barbies and buried them in the yard somewhere, and my boys blew them up with fire crackers. Barbie never dated Ken (too wimpy), just G. I. Joe. -- K.C.
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"My sister Ellen and I each had a beautiful bubble-cut Barbie doll. Mine was blonde; Ellen's was brunette. One day, Nana's poodle got hold of Ellen's Barbie and chewed off the lower half of her face. Ellen was heartbroken. We held a tasteful funeral (a shoebox on a roller skate), with all our other dolls in attendance, and buried Barbie's head in the backyard. But we kept her body, because Ellen had a plan. We put on our coats and hats and headed for the neighborhood toy store. We went to the Barbie section, where there was a stack of boxed Barbies. I stood as lookout while Ellen stealthily opened one of the boxes marked 'Brunette Bubble Cut,' pulled the doll's head off and stuffed it into her coat pocket. We walked casually out of the store, raced home and "re-capitated" Ellen's Barbie. Mom never noticed. I wonder if anyone bought the headless doll we left behind." – The Editor
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"Me and Ben got a Barbie doll and we took all her clothes off and pulled her head off and flushed it down the toilet." -- Jonathan Higgins (the Editor's other nephew).
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"When I was young and Barbie was new, only my sister's best friend down the block could afford one. A common folk remedy for a sore throat at the time was to rub 'Vicks' on the child's throat and safety pin a piece of flannel around the neck to keep it warm for the night. My sister was having her tonsils taken out and her friend was very sympathetic of her ordeal. She used a piece of thread to wrap around Barbie's neck and when tightened, cleanly decapitated her doll. Most of the neighborhood thought it was hysterical, her mother certainly didn't agree." -- Gail Sprague, Beecher, IL
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“Once when I was little my big brother popped off my Barbie’s head and stuck it on the car antenna. I was way too short to get it so we drove around with a nasty looking Barbie head on our car. It was very sad.” – Anonymous
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“The “swivel-head” Barbie had a plastic ball inserted into her neck that allowed her head to be cocked at any jaunty angle you chose. Many times my little six-year-old sister, while brushing Barbie’s hair, got a little rough and dislocated the ball from Barbie’s neck, thus breaking the plastic around the edge. Since the head could not be replaced properly, my sister shoved Barbie’s severed head back on until the head was all the way down to the shoulders, creating a no-neck Barbie. This was during the height of popularity for the TV show, ‘Dallas.’ So, when my sister used her Barbies to play Dallas, this no-neck Barbie always played the part of Ewing granddaughter Lucy (portrayed by Charlene Tilton, who, it seemed to my sister, didn’t have much of a neck herself). Our mom guffawed when little Sis introduced her to her ‘no-neck Lucy doll.’” – J.S.
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“One of my sisters got mad at the other and buried all her Barbie dolls' heads in secret spots in the woods behind our house. So we had a whole army of headless plastic ladies." – Brenna Hoover, Aurora, CO
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“When I was little I yanked off my Barbie’s head and stuck on a head from a dinosaur puppet. I bet I created the first Barbie-saurus Rex!” – Nadya E. (The Editor’s niece).
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“One bright and balmy summer morning in 1962, I found my blonde bubble-cut Barbie sitting on top of my bureau, headless. When I went to my older brother and demanded, “Where’s my Barbie’s head?” he sang, ‘Somewheeeeeere, over the rainbow. . .’ For about a week I kept grilling him and each time was treated to another refrain from Judy Garland. In the meantime I rolled up a piece of Silly Putty, carved eyes, a nose and a mouth in it and stuck it on Barbie’s neck. At long last my brother grew tired of his own sadism and brought me the head of Barbie.” – The Editor
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“I was having my favorite soup (tomato) for lunch. Suddenly my brother entered the kitchen and approached the table, holding his hands behind him and grinning in an evil way. “Want me to spice up your soup?” he asked. Before I could reply he whipped out my Barbie from behind his back, pulled her head off with his teeth and dropped it in my soup. I was still screaming long after he ran out of the kitchen.” – J.L., Hudson, NY
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HAIR-RAISING TALES
Barbie's hairdos -- and don'ts
"My sister used to be a health care auditor, and worked on a lot of children's hospital audits. In going through the surgical records, she noted that one little girl had been admitted to the hospital complaining of stomach pains. Subsequent X-rays revealed what appeared to be a grapefruit-sized tumor in her stomach. Surgeons removed what turned out to be a giant hairball. It turns out the child had chewed off and swallowed the hair off a dozen Barbie dolls, and her mother had never mentioned it to the pediatrician." – L.S.
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“I think I was about four years old, and I was visiting my Grandma and Grandpa. I dragged my poor Barbie with me wherever I went, even at the breakfast table. My Grandpa loved having Tabasco on his eggs, and he kept a little dipping bowl of it next to his plate for his toast, which he would then use to wipe up his plate. Barbie and I weren’t much interested in breakfast. Instead, I was making her dance across the table. Well, four-year-old dexterity being what it is, as I was making her do one particularly wild spin, she slipped out of my hands and dived headfirst right into Grandpa’s Tabasco dipping bowl. Grandma put her right under the tap (and a very irritated Grandpa got himself a clean dipping bowl and fresh sauce), but we couldn’t get the red out. She was forever after a screaming redhead.” – Dawn L. Bobby, Idaho
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"My mother had a desk lamp back in the mid sixties that looked a lot like the old style bullet-shaped hairdryers in my grandmother's beauty shop. I used to take my Barbies to the "beauty parlor" and sit them under the lamp (turned off) to dry. One evening my little four-year-old brother got into my Barbies and put one under the "dryer" -- only the lamp was turned on! It melted a large hole all the way through Barbie's head! It stunk up the whole house for days!" -- Joann, Westfield, Massachusetts
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"My 7 year old daughter has a strange fascination for washing Barbie's hair in toothpaste!!!!!" -- Louise Whiteley, Dewsbury, United Kingdom
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"My sister Jamie and I always loved playing with our Barbie dolls. Jamie, who is three years younger than myself, was a little rougher than I was, though. One day, when she was about 3 and I was about 6, Jamie decided her Barbie doll "Nancy" should have red hair. So Jamie marched into the bathroom and managed to get hold of a bottle of Mercurochrome. I followed her and was horrified to see her remove the lid and dump the orangeish-red liquid all over 'Nancy's' head. I wrestled the bottle away from her and tried to rinse the medicine out, but as I did so, my mama walked in and saw me holding a red-stained doll, with a bottle of Mercurochrome in the other hand. She immediately jumped to the conclusion that I had dyed 'Nancy's' hair red, and I was the one who was punished! Today, after a lot of washings, 'Nancy's' hair is mostly blonde and the red stains on her face have been removed, miraculously, by baking soda and water. But though the evidence has long disappeared, I will never forget the day Jamie decided to become a Barbie beautician." -- Christie Evans, Florida
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"I had just washed my Bathtub Barbie's hair and wanted to speed up the drying process, so I used my mom's blow-dryer. I got bored waiting, so I left Barbie on the toilet tank, arranged the dryer next to her head and went off about my business. When I got back a half hour later, not only was Barbie's hair completely dry – her face had melted." – Ashley B., St. Louis, MO
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"My mother was a beautician and I thought it would be easy to change my blond-haired Western Barbie to a red-haired Barbie. So what did I use? -- RED FINGERNAIL POLISH!!! Needless to say, it dried and it just looked horrible, but I kept playing with her anyway." – Shawnie, NJ