12/03/24
December 03, 2014
Texans' Andre Johnson Takes At-Risk Kids on Toys 'R Us Shopping Spree: A group of 8-16 year old kids from family protective services in the Houston area were taken to a local Toys 'R Us by Houston Texans wide receiver Andre Johnson and given 80 seconds to fill an empty shopping cart with any toy they wanted, bought by him as Christmas presents. They also got a videogame system and some games on top of that. The bill was $16,266.26. Johnson has done this for eight straight years. The 80-second-spree idea was his uncle's. His reaction after the first year: "Wow, I didn't think they could grab that much stuff in that amount of time."
This room must be really dusty! There's something in my eye!
We took our little girl to a Toys R Us last night and had her pick out a toy for a toy drive. She actually did really good and found two toys that she really wanted to share. She didn't even give us any shit for not buying her anything as well. Not bad for a four year old.
posted by NoMich at 08:49 PM on December 03, 2014
This brought back memories of a nutty chunk of my childhood, which was not nearly as uplifting.
Main action begins around the 10:15 mark
posted by beaverboard at 10:20 PM on December 03, 2014
I'd say this brought back this memory for me but with our daughter's first "real" Christmas (she was born last November) upon us, it's been stuck in my head for a week. Every year I dreamed of being in one of the Toys 'R Us sprees. Nerd that I was, I remember casing the joint on the rare occasions we got to go to figure out the plan of attack. I suppose if I'd ever won it would have become a full-blown Oceans 11-style caper.
Johnson seems like what you want to see in an athlete. Pretty sure he does a Thanksgiving turkey thing and a scholarship program as well.
posted by yerfatma at 08:28 AM on December 04, 2014
+1^max
posted by billsaysthis at 11:32 AM on December 04, 2014
His uncle knows kids.