Public Radio East serves Eastern North Carolina by providing news, fine arts, and informational programming that challenges, stimulates, educates, and entertains an intellectually curious audience.

© 2026 Public Radio East

Public Radio East
800 College Court
New Bern, NC 28562

EIN 56-1802728
Public Radio For Eastern North Carolina 89.3 WTEB New Bern 88.5 WZNB New Bern 91.5 WBJD Atlantic Beach 90.3 WKNS Kinston 89.9 W210CF Greenville
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Join our team! Public Radio East is hiring a Financial & Development Associate.
US

'Another Thing': A Terrible Toy For The 21st Century

iStockphoto.com

Each week, All Things Considered and Lenore Skenazy, author of the book and blog Free-Range Kids, bring you "Another Thing," an on-air puzzle to test your cleverness skills. We take a trend in the news and challenge you to help us satirize it with a song title, a movie name or something else wacky.

This week's challenge: Visitors to the website of the Children's Museum of Indianapolis voted G.I. Joe as the top toy of the 20th century, followed by Transformers, Legos, Barbie and the View-Master. We want to know what will become the worst toy of the 21st century.

Come up with the name of this terrible toy, and — if you'd like — its slogan.

Submit your entry using the form below or by sending your answer with your name, address and phone number to anotherthing@npr.org.

Entries are due by 12 noon EDT on Oct. 3. All entries become the property of NPR, which reserves the right to edit them. Entries submitted as comments on this Web page cannot be considered. In the case of several similar entries, the first one received gets credit.

The winner will be announced on All Things Considered on Oct. 8. The first-prize winner will receive an NPR mug.

Last week's challenge: What do you suppose was the name of the first prehistoric toothpaste?

Winner: Dentifrice Rex, Kathy Palmer, Smartsville, Calif.

Runners-Up:

"The Missing Stink," Arlene Oyagi, San Diego

"Ready" (precursor to Aim!), Bill Evans, Amherst, Mass.

"Tooth-in-Common," Bill Phillips, Sacramento, Calif.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

US