Stretch was my favorite toy growing up. I saved my allowance money for months until I had enough to buy him at Kmart. He weighed several pounds and was filled with something like a tasteless (I know this because I tasted it) Karo-syrup-like substance that allowed him to stretch to outlandish lengths and return back to his normal build. I still remember how it felt to poke my fingers deep into his chest and squeeze his arms and legs. I would bring him in by the wood burning stove in the living room so he would be extremely pliable and squishy. At night when I went to bed I laid him in his form-fitting white styrofoam box and covered him with a small blanket. But not unlike Lennie in Of Mice and Men, I squeezed and stretched him so hard over the years that I ripped holes in him, which caused his insides to ooze out. I put Band-Aids on him to keep the gel in but it didn't work. I began storing him in the deep freezer which froze the gel, but after taking him out I could only play with him for minutes at a time before he thawed and was a sticky mess from his wounds. And why I am thinking about this tonight I do not know.
