Stuff I'm Saving

Be it known that liquid crystal has many uses beyond smart glass and your computer’s monitor. Liquid crystal has also been used for many other important technological achievements. One of these important technological achievements which I have been making use of since the mid 80s, and would now like to call your attention to, are these liquid crystal filled stickers commonly referred to by their brand name Oilies.

Oilies behave just like normal stickers except they are filled with liquid crystal so that when you rub your finger back and forth across them they give off a swirl of rainbow sheen, just like oil. A second innovative property of these stickers is that with extended use they begin to leak this oily substance all over the pages of your sticker book. This substance looks and feels not unlike Mutagen and it a pain to clean up. Shown above are the sole survivors of the Great Sticker War of 1988. I keep them, and the book that contains them, in a chamber 4000 feet below the surface, behind a reinforced steel door, in an air tight container baring the warning “Don’t Even Look At It”.

One of those sexually ambiguous fads that spread through the early 80s like a rash caused by something you stepped on outside the arcade and then promptly disappeared in totality leaving everyone involved to think “Did that really happen?” was sticker collecting. As evidenced by the photo above, this fad really did happen, and infected even the healthiest among us. Lazer Blazers were late comers to the sticker scene, but were one of the first holographic sticker sets available, making them an instant hit. They came in packs of four, and were a who’s who of everything kids thought were cool in 1984. The only pack I own is the Transformers, featuring Megatron in all his full-frontal glory. Other characters lucky enough to have their likeness represented in foily 3D were the A-Team, Gremlins, Michael Jackson and My Little Pony. This pack is opened, but none of the stickers were ever removed or stuck.