I have a similar story to tell!

One Christmas we bought our one-year old son, Sean, a little push riding toy for toddlers. We selected a Coleco 'Jolly-Go-Round,' which had plastic tires and a steering wheel and a child could either push it or ride on it. It also had a big yellow button that when pressed would activate a very lively but extremely loud tune. The button also activated a miniature toy carrousel that whirled around on the front of the vehicle while the music played. Both the music and the carrousel were battery-operated. It was a really clever little rider and my son loved it.

The tune it played was one very familiar to me but I never learned the title of it. It was, however, one of those very rousing boisterous tunes, along the same vein of; 'Hail, Hail the Gang's all here,' or 'Ta-rah-rah-BOOM-de-ay.' At least it always gives me the impression of pie-eyed party-ers, raising foaming steins in beer halls

Sean roared around all day on the Jolly with that song blasting all over the house. It nearly drove me out of my skull. I would lay in bed at night trying to get that damned tune out of my head. So when the music/carrousel part of the toy broke down a year or so later, I was inwardly thankful. However my son managed to talk his father into fixing it. For a while the music and carrousel worked but it continually kept breaking and eventually my husband told Sean he couldn't fix it anymore. That didn't stop my son from scooting around on the Jolly and pushing that button til kingdom come, but the song never played for him again. Many months later, I was staying up very late trying to finishing a sewing project. It was about three in the morning and dead quiet in the house. Sean had been chased off to bed many hours earlier but before he left, he abandoned the Jolly just a few feet away from me. Now the only sounds to be heard was the ticking of the clock in another room and the hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen. At this point my eyelids were drooping and I castigated myself for not going to bed. Without any warning at all, the Jolly-Go-Round music suddenly just <<>> on, completely shattering the dead of night and my nerves to smithereens. My head nearly went through the ceiling. For a few minutes I stared in disbelief, wondering how in the world it kicked on without anyone near it. Shaking my head, I leaned over to shut it off but the button would not depress. It seemed stuck. Repeatedly pushing the button did nothing. Cringing at the deafening music, I watched helplessly as the carrousel whiz in circles, wondering if I would need a hammer to put it out of its misery. But when the song ended, the carrousel whirled to a stop and all was quiet in the house again. Well, ........all except for the sound of my knees knocking. Without thinking twice I immediately switched off the lights and went to bed. The next day I found the whole thing rather funny and figured that there was 'without a doubt' a explanation for the toy's wires to reactivate somehow. (I do still think this.) In any case, I didn't want the Jolly going off at just any odd time of the day so I got a screwdriver and detached the door to the battery chamber to pop out the batteries. To my surprise it was empty. I asked my husband if he removed them and he said he had taken the batteries out some months earlier because they didn't need to wasted on a broken toy. The Jolly has never made another sound that I know of but if it ever did, few would have heard it because the riding toy never spent another night in the house again. I banished it to he backyard where the elements have pretty much destroyed the thing.

Sue
Susananita@aol.com