Monday Rambles (Back Home Edition)

ALL HEED THE WISDOM!

That's the nicest thing a fortune cookie has ever said to me!

Well, it worked for Trump......

True that!


HOME AGAIN HOME AGAIN

We got back at about 11:30-ish Thursday evening and were very happy to be off the road.  We made excellent time coming back too.  The trip is about a 13 hour drive, give or take.  We made it in 11.  We were worn out, but it was worth it to be back home.

FAMILIAR FACE

We were greeting enthusiastically and vociferously by this little guy.

Okay, so he's not quite so enthusiastic here, but trust me, he was.

He even slept in between our pillows that night, something he never ever does.  He was super, super clingy for a few days after.  He definitely doesn't like it when we go away.

We've finally figured out that he's not a very social kitty.  Kind of like his people, he's just not that into interacting with most people.  We're all just anti-socialites here.  We told our cat-checker to just make sure that he was okay when she stopped in, but not to try and pet him or play with him.  Even at that, he still growled at her every time she came over.  He's a two-man cat, our boy.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN

Since we still had our rental car for an extra day, we decided to make this year's long overdue cemetery trip.  Mazda just ain't up to long interstate journeys any more, so we rent a car to go to Arkansas.  Things have been too crazy of late to head to the country, so snubbing Black Friday seemed like a good idea.

My mother now has her new winter hat.

I also averted a crisis at my grandparents' grave.

I'm pretty sure Grammie wasn't happy about this.

All better!  I picked up the stray flowers after I took this pic.

THE VISITATION

We had a real good visit in Arkansas.  Even with the extra time we had, it still seemed way too rushed and way too short.  I guess it will always be that way.  Still, we did cover a lot of ground and had wonderful times with as much of his family as we could.  One of his aunts had been going through her mother's papers and pictures and gave him an envelope filled with his old school pics, family pics, and lots of pictures of his father as a boy.  It was great!

HOLIDAY SHOPPING

I did manage to get some junking in during the trip.  More on that tomorrow.  I found a Salvation Army that I had never seen before and revisited a cute little vendor mall that I was last at a couple of years ago.  I also stopped at a couple of flea markets during the cemetery trip as well.  I didn't find a lot, but there were some cool things.

REARRANGING THE DECK CHAIRS

Booth sales are still down in the dumps.  I had a little bounce in November, but not enough of one.  I'm still due for a really low check.  It seems that consumer confidence didn't rise with the election results. 

I've got Mazda loaded down with holiday stuff to put out this week.  We'll see if that helps at all.  I desperately need a really good end to this year.

MUSIC FOR MONDAY (HOLIDAY EDITION)

I guess I'll wrap it up with this and see you all later.

Retro Y'all! Holiday Traditions Edition

It's that time again! 

Since we are now post-Thanksgiving, it's time to crank out the holiday music.

In case you didn't know, one of the holiday traditions at this here little blog is starting the season off with these two very special songs.

First up, Santa's three helpers:



Followed by a little lady that some would prefer not appear, actually:

My Thanksgiving Wish to You

May your meal preparations 
be more like this

than this

PS Doesn't Snoopy fold napkins like a Boss?

PPS  We'll not talk about Curly shoving his arm up the nether regions of a turkey.  Okay?

Tuesday Rambles (On the Road Edition)

Howdy  from Arkansas!

It's our annual road trip to visit Keith's mother.

We ended up making the whole 13 hour drive here in one fell swoop, quite unintentionally, so we arrived about 3 in the morning on Sunday.  That actually turned out to be a good thing, even though we are far too old to be trying such foolishness, because it gave us an extra day to spend here.  We've already gotten the annual ritual of the shoe buying over with, and had time to visit with one of his aunts.

Something special also happened yesterday,but I may wait until next week to talk about it.  It was STUPENDOUS!

Today, we're lunching with his oldest aunt, possibly visiting another aunt who is ill, and maybe popping in on My Man Fred.  That's one of my favorite traditions. Yes, Keith does have a full collection of aunts.  Tonight and tomorrow,we'll eat our Thanksgiving with his mom and then hit the road on Thursday.

Why leave actually on Thanksgiving?

No traffic!

Safe travels and happy visits to everyone!

Much love.

Retro Y'all!

We're on the road, so here's one final tribute to the late, great Leonard Cohen.



The things that man could do with a song!

Concert Night!

Okay, so I'm going out of my mind right now trying to get way too much done in way too little time.  We leave tomorrow for Keith's mother's house in Arkansas for Thanksgiving. I still have to do laundry and pack.  I still have to pick up prescriptions at Kroger.  I still have to finish putting Christmas out at the booths.

And we have tickets to see this guy tonight.



Keith used to sing that song and dance with our still much-loved and much-missed kitty Basil.  He was the big old goofy man and she was the big old goofy girl.  He'd change the part about the big old goofy world from "Ooo Baby" to "Ooo Basil."

The legendary John Prine is a longtime favorite of this household. 

Here's a more recent clip doing another old favorite.



I plan on posting some from the road, so if you're bored next week, you can check out my besotted ravings.  Okay, maybe not totally besotted, but at least slightly sotty.

Presenting......

Finally, here is most of the booths with their newish looks. 

I wasn't able to get everything I wanted to do done, due to some unforeseen difficulties.  I still have tons of fine tuning to do, so don't look too closely at any one pic.

Yes, I know that's a lot of stuff.  Sometimes, to sell a lot, you have to carry a lot.  Besides, like I've said before, my aesthetic has always been equal parts clutter and (barely) controlled chaos.  I am the 21st century version of that odd little man with the junk store down the street that was crammed full of wonderful stuff, but you could barely move through the aisles.

Let's look at the pics, shall we?

Before we start, just a reminder how the bright overhead fluorescent lights bouncing off the white tile floors make getting good shots difficult. 

First up, my new salvage booth.  This one is for a lot of my curb finds--windows, doors, etc.  Also, tools, wood boxes, metal boxes and anything else that might fit the theme, along with two shelves of books, because I got overflow!

In the white cubbies, you can see these matted prints that explain what various names mean.  (Mine means "Sexy Nerd Dude with Glasses.")  They were in the back corner of another booth and never sold.  Since I moved them to this place right on the aisle, I sell several every week.

Next up, is another new space.  I picked this one up, intending to incorporate it into the long space next to it and create a furniture corner for the long booth, but that had to be scuttled, because I have salvage overflow that needed to go there instead.  I left it as kind of a catch all space for all kinds of junk.

This is my endcap double space, which is for primitives, vintage stuff and things that fit that vibe.

The hand-painted "Rick's" sign was a curb find during junk set out.  Here's a close up.

This is my tiny, vintage Christmas display, which features my vintage two-tiered table Christmas tree!

And finally, the book and comic booth.  I moved the DVD's from inside the booth to the aisle and those sales have really picked up too.

I'm not totally done with the long booth on the aisle, which is where my religious stuff, barware, and assorted junk is.  Most of my Christmas will also be there too.  Those pics will have to come later.

This concludes the guided tour.  For the moment.  Please feel free to find a souvenir or two or twenty of your visit in any of the booths and purchase them at the register.

Monday Rambles (Post-Apocalyptic Edition)

Okay.  I'm back.

This has been a rough year for blogging for me, apparently.

I did have a good birthday.  Thanks very much for your well-wishes.  I went to three vendor malls I don't normally get to, plus a church sale that turned out to be really great.  This guy at the church sale had a tub of Batman comics, but the sign with the price was turned over.  I went to flip it back, expecting it to say they were a dollar each or something.

Instead, they were 25 cents each.  I heard Keith say:  "I know that look."  And the next thing you know, they guy and I have negotiated a price of 20 bucks for all of them.  I counted them later and it worked out that I paid about a dime each for them.  Score!

Here they are all waiting for to have a chance to pop in a cheesy movie and bag and price them.

Some other guy at the sale offered to run home and get his "brand new" Batmen comics for me.  He had been asking five apiece for them, but would take a buck each from me.  I told him I was too cheap for that and walked away.  Seriously, you just saw me pay less than 25 cents each and you think that's a strategy that will work with me?

It ended up being a good comic weekend.  Two of the malls I went to had some great comics for good prices available as well. 

Just a small representative sample.  Lots of Silver Age Harveys and Archies in this batch.  I have a couple of buyers that look for these, along with Dell, Gold Key and Disney stuff.  It's honestly a niche that the other guys with comics in our mall don't bother with, not even they one other guy who actually knows comics.

Since the previous weekend, I had struck out on comics at the big flea and at a comic shop sale, I was kind of glad to find so many.  I told Keith that the comics I expected to find the last weekend were actually hiding in the next weekend!

I did find some fun DVD's at the big flea, even if there were no good comics.

And then the world ended.

I've spoken and will continue to speak my piece on the election over on the Book of Faces, so I won't repeat it all here.  I will say that I am sad over the election results and scared as hell for so many reasons.  The racist attacks we've seen so far are only the tip of the iceberg.

I am still trying to wrap my head around it all. I may end up yet having to do some posts here as well.

I will share this though.  I stayed up until 2:30 on election night,  Keith went to bed, but I had to know.  I stayed up until the electoral votes hit 270 and it was called for Trump.  At that moment, the tears I had been just barely holding back let loose.  Chiquito was asleep in my lap, and he sat up and looked at me and started rubbing against me.

I got up and laid down next to Keith.  I woke him up and told him what had happened.  We held each other and I cried some more.  Chiquito came and laid on top of us and it was just us, alone in the dark. Together against what had just become world.

The next day, I cried myself out.  I posted about my sorrow on the Book of Faces, which has caused people I thought were my friends to mock me.

We have got to be better than this.

I am finally almost done with the booth re-do.  Keith went and helped me for several hours on my birthday.  (Best present ever!) And now things are looking good again.  I still have a bit to do, plus I sold a shelf last night, so I've got some extra work to do today.  I'll have pics tomorrow.

Sales are slowly picking up again.  Election day was the first hundred dollar day I'd had in over a month.  Since then, things have been a lot stronger, with several big pieces selling. Looks likes Melissa was right.

This past weekend, I house sat for my sweet friend Laci.

She likes my orange backpack and sleeps on it every time I'm over at her house.

I had a mishap at Goodwill last night, when I picked the wrong size cart.

Oops!

 But that wasn't as bad as missing out on three boxes of Shiny Brites when some kid cut in front of me and grabbed them.  ACK!

I have sooooooo much to do this week!  Treatment tomorrow.  Finish the booth.  Get the Christmas out.  Laundry. Pack.  Plus, there's a John Prine show on Friday that we have tickets too.

Thanksgiving is a week from Thursday.  Ack!  How does it sneak up like that every year?  We leave for Arkansas this Saturday.  (Shara email me!)

The sorrow that began with the election results last week continued with the death of musical genius Leonard Cohen.  (My beloved Emmylou Harris had stated that he was the one artist she always wanted to work with.  Now she'll never get the chance.) 

In light of everything that happened last week, there's only one choice for Music for Monday.



Take care of yourself.  Take care of each other.  Be loving and kind.

I love you.

Retro Y'all

According to Wikipedia, this was number 1 on November 7, 1964, which is the closest date to my birthday I could find a chart for.  Yes, I am one of those "extended birthday celebration" kind of people, as many of you already know.



Diana Ross has always had a talent for wigs, no?

Also, that cute little shimmy dance during the sax solo?  LOVE!  Baby Love, in fact!

And today, I am 52!

It's time for....

Well, comics geeks will get the joke anyway.

You see, for the past couple of decades or so, major comic companies have gotten in the habit of reinventing their lines every so often--tossing out everything that has gone before and starting it all over.  This is why the Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, et al that you see today are very different from the ones that were being published in the 90's, the 80's, the 70's, and so on and so on.

It's also one of the reasons why I prefer to stick to reading pre-1990 super-hero books.  It's gotten way too confusing to try and keep up.

Anyway, in 2011, DC comics did a relaunch they called "The New 52."

Since this is my 52nd birthday, and thus the start of a whole new year for me, I decided that would also be a pretty nifty theme for this birthday.

Not to mention allowing me to do a birthday post and a Comic Book Friday post in one fell swoop!

EDIT:  Oh yeah!  I forgot to mention that there's a theme song too.  All good birthdays have one, you know.

Just take out "New Zoo Review" and sing "The New 52" in its place.  Totally works.



Singing pink hippos optional.  (But who wouldn't want one?)

While the vendor gently weeps...

Look at the mess in the comic books!

Actually, it's been worse.

You would think this must surely mean that I have sold a ton of comics lately.  Surely.

And you would be wrong.

I took this pic last Thursday.  From the time I straightened everything last Monday to last Thursday when I came in to find this mess I sold.....


exactly.....

one....

comic.

At this point, I have moved from frustrated, past aggravated, straight into "What the fucking fuck?" territory.  I am discouraged enough to seriously be considering giving up.  Later on today, I'll bre picking up my lowest booth check EVER.

EVER.

Why am I doing this again?

I was going to go antiquing in Lexington for my birthday this weekend, but had to cancel it beause my check isn't going to be enough to warrant going.

I've seriously just about had it.  Two crappy ass months in a row and November hasn't started off any better.

Shit.

One of the other vendors thinks that sales are low because of the election.  I always thought it was the stock market that fluctuated for elections, not the flea market.

Whatever.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like.....You Know.

Not meaning to work anyone's nerves or anything like that, but the hustle/bustle is upon us!

Here are a couple of pics of unseen finds that might help get you in the mood.

These guys were a curb find.  They were part of a larger decoration that would have included all the reindeer and the fat guy in the sleigh.  This was all I found, but they're still awesome!

I've never seen a sweet little angel blow mold/choir girl like this one before.  Isn't she a doll?  She's dated 1972.  Wouldn't it be something to have a whole bunch of them?

What holiday treasures have you found recently?

I had to pee!

Yes.  I just used that as my title.  We all do it, you know.

The bus route that I take to the Peddlers Mall goes right past a Goodwill.  Since it's not possible to run in and then right out of a Goodwill, I have to limit myself on stopping there.  It's not too terribly far from my stop for the Peddlers Mall, but I can't lose an hour or so every time I go over to the mall.
On the other hand, I didn't want to be so strict that I never get to the Goodwill goodies.

In order to be fair about these things, I decided to let an impartial observer make the call about going to Goodwill on a given day--my bladder.  If I decided on some subjective criteria, like needing a good reason to stop, I'd be making up all kinds of justifications for getting off the bus early.

My bladder has no vested interest in stopping, other than getting emptied.  And it never lies about that.  I still have to walk a few blocks from my usual bus stop to get to the mall.  Normally, there's no problem, unless the middle-aged man bladder says that I really have to go.  Like right that second. When that happens, I get off at the Goodwill, since the stop is right outside the store.  I can take care of business and get a little shop on, then head on my way.

So, the other day, the bladder chimed in and said "Get off the bus!"  And it turned out to be "buy one get one free" day in the books and media.

That's the first four eps of the ORIGINAL Scooby Doo!

Sometimes my bladder likes me.

Vintage Ohio Art tin globe!

 Sometimes, it likes me a lot.

Even better, it was also "double stamp" day for their Customer Reward cards!