It's Barbie's 50th birthday, but for some reason, I've been thinking about the whereabouts of her onetime BFF/cousin P.J. As a kid, I suspected that P.J. was a little too attractive and similar to Barbie for her own good. Malibu Barbie and Malibu P.J. were practically twins in the '70s, and, well, someone's got to be the backup doll. Unlike Skipper or even Barbie's black friends Christie and Cara, P.J. was a threat. I remember staging some fierce (and embarrassingly non-feminist) battles for my lone Ken's attention, and sometimes, out of sympathy, I let P.J. win.
My understanding is that P.J. was "discontinued" in the 1980s, but I found her — barefoot and slightly fried-looking — on eBay. Is it just me, or does she bear an unsettling resemblance to a certain pop star whose name rhymes with "jitney?"
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