MINI MOTOR MEMORIES
[air rushing at microphone]
It's a little plane.
I bought this thing to open it up,
to see what the motor looks like.
I had to buy this screwdriver,
which cost as much as the toy did.
I wanted to compare it to a little motor
I played with when I was 9 years old.
A classmate brought in a box of little boxes.
Each box held a little motor.
He'd found them in an old barn
and gave them to most us.
I worked up the nerve to ask for one.
Sure! No problem!
It was a world of opulence!
I brought a battery in from home the next day.
Unwritten rule: keep motors at school.
We made paper propellers.
They worked great: no electrocution.
This is how I remember my motor.
PLASTIC SURGERY
What do they look like in 2007?
I was expecting them to be encased in plastic today.
Only one end is plastic.
I couldn't get the propeller end off: molded on.
Otherwise, it's like I remember:
encased in metal, two wires, same size.
It has two flattened sides to the cylinder, though.
That fits it right into the chassis, preventing torsion.
Okay, it's been put back together now.
I found it in the candy aisle.
I was puzzling over them for months. 
Why do they need all this to sell a bit of candy?
People are living meaningless lives.
They spend $3.50 for $0.50 of candy.
They won't buy candy without all this on it.
What next? If you want to sell a cookie,
it needs a motor, siren, and flashing lights.
Then I realized they put candy on the gizmo to
sell it as an impulse-buy candy, tax-free.
It actually confused me for a while.
Also, it's made in China, so 
no one's buying it for the candy.
Back to 1970: there was more to the story.
For a couple days, we played with the motors
during school recesses and lunches.
Then the teacher asked questions,
which I heard.
Does the barn you found these in 
belong to your parents?
No.
Did the owner let you have them?
No. I took them.
So you stole them?
No, they were just sitting there, unused.
They don't belong to you, you took them:
You Stole Them.
[altarboy stammering]
She announced that we had to give the motors back.
Catholics should have seen it was stealing.
If anyone knew it was stealing, they kept quiet.
The motors were likely American-made, 
plus there were so many: expensive.
The theme today is:
Looking at Things more Closely.
