Super Sexy-Pants Midweek Ramble!

I keep trying(and failing) to get an actual Monday Ramble out, but it doesn't seem to be working very well.  Let's go with this one for this week, at least.

First up a question:

Do these sunglasses make me look all, you know, celebrity and stuff?  (Probably not.  The scraggly-ass goatee is looking particularly scraggly-ass here.  Brad Pitt can pull that shit off.  Me?  not so much.)

Cold, windy and wet this week, but no freezing temps and no snow.  We've had too many days of that over the past couple of weeks.  I declared a little while ago that I wasn't leaving the house until the temp was above 20, then promptly spent several days drinking hot chocolate, eating pie, and watching cartoons.  I am so over this winter.

I have definitely come to understand why some large mammals hibernate during the cold months.  I'm wondering how I can sign up for that program myself, since I am also a large mammal.  I just need to find an electric blanket that will stay on for three months and teach the cat to feed himself and scoop the litter box.

I'm working on a major booth redo, but it's going painfully slow.  I'll have pics when I get done, if I get done.  It's been a good January, sales-wise.  I haven't really had a post-holiday dip, which usually happens after New Year's.  I've been on a bit of a roll since the week before Christmas, even with the store closing for a couple of days due to weather.  Small furniture and higher-priced items are really moving right now.

2017 was kind of average as far as booth sales went.  I set a huge record in March, then crashed hard in April.  Summer was better than usual.  Fall would have been, except that I took an extra booth during a rent special to try and move some furniture, then barely broke even.  I ditched it when the special was over.  November and December were super-good.

Tine for another pic.

That was my anniversary gift from Keith.  We decided not to do Christmas presents this year, just a small anniversary gift each.  My collection of Batman shirts keeps growing.

Tucker is starting his daily rampage through the house.  It's crazed kitty time!  (Or, as I like to call it: "Go, Speed Racer, Go!")  Life with kittens, I tell you.

I made a super-major comic score at an estate sale last week.  Nearly 100 issues of one of my primary comic obsessions.  I plan on sharing it soon.  I actually want to do an in-depth sort of look at the four kinds of comics that make me go "Squee!" when I find them.  One them you can already guess, vintage romance comics.  I'll go ahead and surprise you all by saying that none of the other three are Batman or Wonder Woman.

And with that, I'll leave you with some Midweek Music.

More 2017 Recap (Further Sights Unseen)

Continuing from yesterday, here are some more of the finds from last year that got photographed, but never blogged.  Unless noted otherwise, everything here is a trash find.

I always grab discarded lawn ornaments, regardless of the shape they're in.  This one wouldn't even stand up on its own any more.  I thought it could be painted and make a cool door stop or something.  It actually sat on our stoop for a while, until Keith told me it was creeping him out.

One of our across the street neighbors is also a garbage picker.  He used to do a yard sale every so often.  Now he just sets his old finds out during set out.  I've gotten some good stuff from his curb over the years.  These wheels came from there.  I grab stuff like this and toss it in my salvage booth as spare parts.  Someone must need them, because they do sell.  I'd rather see it go to a new person than be tossed out.

Rusty metal plant shelf.

My price tag on this one says:  "Make your own 10 Commandments!"  That was my thought when I first saw it.  I also added another tag that says:  "Thou shalt shop Booth 62!" That's an order!  

I found a huge bucket of these canning jars.  They're not at all old, but the rusted lids lend them that feeling.  They are waiting in the shed to be filled with odds and ends.  I sell lots of stuff in jars--spools, buttons, clothes pins, beads, etc.  My best seller is actually just jars of miscellaneous junk, which is what I use these larger jars for.  I keep one by my desk and just toss random stuff in it until it's full.  Usually, it's the leftovers from a bag or box of junk I bought that are too small or uninteresting to sell by themselves.

MCM wall hangings, which I thought were cool.  It's amazing what people will toss out.  Even the broken one sold.

Big Flea find.  I am kind of obsessed with wooden boxes, particularly homemade ones like this one.  They're a top seller for me, so I jump on everyone I can find.

More Big Flea finds.  

Remember the awesome cast iron vent I found a while back?  I went back to that house for the last set out, and all I found was Mr. Bubble.  That's kind of a metaphor for this whole business, I think.

Speaking of that vent, I sold it to a downtown antique dealer Who was a new customer to my booth.  I was working my spaces that day, and we talked for a long time.  I saw him again right before Christmas, and he told me that he had taken it to a big antique fair in New York and someone bought it from him right as he was setting it out.  I made a real nice deal off of it, and so did he.  I also got a regular customer out of it.

I found two bags of old paper in an alley, and brought them home to sort out.  Oddly enough, a lot of it was papers and  stuff from a tiny town in far western Kentucky where my great-grandfather lived when he was a boy.  There was also this poster.  Take a closer look at the bottom.

Interesting world, ain't it?

Big Flea find.  Also, guilty pleasure TV.  I don't actually watch the show itself.  I view clips of the big meltdowns on YouTube.  I look at it kind of like I do all those Real Housewives shows.  I can watch a little bit of it, turn it off and say to myself:  "Maybe I'm not rich, but I'm also sure as hell not CRAZY!!!"

Hiding in my front bush is a shy little squirrel blow mold I found in the alley that was  strewn with stuff.  He's by Don Featherstone, the guy who designed the pink lawn flamingo.

Finally, a happy find.  I got this at the Peddlers Mall.  The vendor had a bag of them and had misidentified them as Happy Meal toys.  It's actually a vintage Wilton cake decoration.  I htink it dates back to the days of the TV show.

It even look a little like Adam West.

Still more to come.  Tune in tomorrow.  Same Bat Blog.  Same Bat Channel.

Elegy for Adam West

I've hesitated to post this, because I don't want to be seen as making light of his death or the loss his family and friends are feeling right now.  Still, there's something in it that pretty perfectly sums up that very loss.  At least for me.

There were several times in the Batman series when the Caped Crusaders have been presumed dead and Gotham City goes into full-fledged mourning.  This is not from one of those episodes.  In fact, Batman isn't even visible in this scene, which is one of my three favorite scenes from the whole show.  Nevertheless, this is one of those scenes that pretty much sums up the appeal and beauty of the whole show. 

Victor Buono as King Tut seemed to relish his every moment on screen, tearing into every line in order to take it straight over the top chewing every bit of scenery to a pulp as he went there.  Adam West brought that same relish to his portrayal of Batman, only where Buono over-played, he chose to under-play.  His Batman is one that's smooth as hell, cool as all get out, and totally in on the joke, even though he appears to be clueless at times.  You have to watch West closely to pick up on everything he packs into his performance.  It's as stuffed with goodies as Batman's utility belt.

Back to the scene.  Batman and Robin are trying to rescue a kidnapped heiress from the clutches of King Tut, who wants to make her his Cleopatra.  Robin has been nabbed by Tut's men and tied up.  Batman, after a brief Bat-Fight, was clobbered by Tut and placed in a sarcophagus.  This leads to the cliff-hanger ending, as Tut submerges the sarcophagus in a vat of water in order to drown Batman.

And we get this wonderful bit of dialogue:



We had just laid down for a post-yard sale nap on Saturday, when Keith decided to check his phone for news.  He rolled over, shook me and said: "I hate to wake you up with bad news, but Adam West has died."  My first thought was:  "He's on his way to that great, big belfry in the sky."

I know there are those who would probably prefer to use "Bat Cave" in that sentence, but it seems much more appropriate to me to use a line from the show itself.

I'm just a bit too young to have caught the show in its original run.  I had not even turned two when it debuted!  I've watched the reruns since the 70's, though, making up for lost time.  Adam West was a aprt of my childhood, teen-agerdom, and adulthood.  This was one of those blows that hurt.  At this point, unless I've missed somebody, only Julie Newmar and Burt Ward are still with us.  Everyone else is off having a grand cast reunion.  Maybe it's in the belfry.  Maybe it's in the Bat Cave.  Meanwhile, the rest of us are left without a Bat-Channel to tune into tomorrow to see how Batman gets out of this one.

Farewell, Adam West.  Thanks for all the Bat-Memories.  You're already missed.

Monday Rambles

FALL IS COMING!

Yesterday the high here was 80.  Yes. 80!  I did some alley exploring for junk for the first time in ages.  So nice.  Temps this week are not supposed to get above 90 here.  I believe Fall may be on the way.  Woo hoo!

To celebrate, I put up a fall wreath in my booth.  It's my only fall decor item right now, but I'm rooting around looking for the hay bales and gourds.

The wreath itself was a freebie find from in the neighborhood.  I had a little trouble getting it off the front door it was nailed to,  but a good determined yank finally brought it right off.

Okay, I'm kidding with that little bit.  It actually came out of a renovation dumpster a couple doors down.  I saw workers filling up a new one last week, when I was on the way to the bus stop, but I was running late.  I checked it later that evening, and the wreath was all I could get out because they had piled a mound of icky old mattresses on top of everything else.  The wreath came out in great shape, though.  Sometimes, you gotta take what you can get and be happy.

The guy who took down our water heater closet told me that all the reno in the area is due to one guy, who is buying up all the old shotguns, gutting them, rehabbing them, and flipping them.  If that's the case, there will be dumpsters for a while yet.  There are a lot of shotguns in this neighborhood.

SPEAKING OF THE BOOTH

I didn't get sales emails for the first three days last week, so I was freaking out.  No gravy!  No potatoes!  No plate!  ACK!

Turned out to be a glitch in the system.  Last week was a pretty strong one, all week long.  Still not all the way where I want it, but the gravy ladle is coming out more and more.  The weekend was especially good. Best one in a while in fact.  I was afraid the nice weather might pull people away, but I did pretty good both days.  It was the first weekend of the state fair to boot!

I'm planning a complete booth overhaul and massive restock that will probably take me two weeks or so to complete.  I'm ready for a new look and I want to connect most of my spaces into one long continuous booth.  I'm still working on the ideas, but I intend to start next week.  I have treatment tomorrow, so this is my rest week.

CHIQUITO TO THE RESCUE

I had a really bad case of the "I don't give a's" last week.  It got progressively worse too.  I started out not giving a shit, and then went downhill from there.  I didn't leave the house.  I didn't blog.  I didn't do nothing.

Then the cat started bringing me mice.  The first two were still alive.  The third one was dead.  At that point, I decided that I'd rather face the world than the building carnage at home.

My sweet little boy is a killer.  (I think he was getting tired of me hanging out at home and bitching.)

RECORD BUYS

Like I said yesterday, there was a music sale at the comic shop yesterday.  Everything was a quarter.  I went looking for oddball and fun and I found it.  More on that tomorrow.  But, for today, a little preview.

I give you Cesar Romero. In all his glory.  Complete with the mustache he refused to shave off to play the Joker on Batman. In TRUE HIGH FIDELITY!

I picked up several albums, but only one CD, which was actually for me.

This is the only Anonymous 4 CD I didn't have. (Except for the newest one.) Well, I used to have it, but it was tossed when our much missed and beloved Himalayan Brianna peed on it.  She expressed her displeasure with the management that way.  This particular bout of ire aimed at me cost me the CD and three comics, one of which I still have to replace.  Believe it or not, she was a total sweetheart, except for this one issue.

SPEAKING OF THE JOKER

Since the topic of Batman just came up, I have to share the most wonderful news!  There's going to be an animated feature based on the show, with Adam West, Burt Ward, and Julie Newmar reprising their roles.  Do I even have to tell you that I am pumped for this?

Here's the trailer:



Adam West sounds a little rough, but I don't care.  It's still gotta be him.

DOUBLE FEATURE FINALE

It's a special day here at the Ramble.  I'm combining the regular music for Monday with the DVD of the Week. 

I spent some time Saturday night watching several Atomic Betty DVD's I picked up at the Peddlers Mall.  From time to time I like to try and make up for my misspent adulthood of employment and responsibilities by catching up on more recent cartoons that I had to miss the first time around, like Betty.

Quite frankly, it was a lot of fun.  Pop culture always seems to be lacking in heroes for younger girls, and Atomic Betty fits the bill nicely.  The first few episodes are a little rushed and don't quite work, but it evens out over time.  Betty is an every day school girl, who is secretly a Galactic Guardian, protecting the universe from all kind of menaces.  Quite enjoyable.  And kick-ass.  Very kick-ass.

Here's the long version of the theme.  Try getting this out of your head today.



Even better, try this mash-up with Betty and Sailor Moon.  Fun!

2016 Finds (So Far)

Since the first of the year, we've been putting in a lot of time cleaning and de-stashing the house.  Keith is a pretty big pack-rat, and I'm, well, me.  He got to working on his stash in the living room, and ended up finding a bunch of booth stuff that I had put in there and forgot about.  Between that, the junk room, the shed and Sorrow Mountain (not to mention the Hillock), I'm not really needing to shop much right now.

I am down to the last of my banana boxes from the Dixie move out last year in the shed.  I have figured out how to fit yet more shelves from the Mount of Sorrows into the booths, so I'll be moving most of the boxes over soon, plus the last of my religious books from the Hillock.  Our goal is to close the Hillock in March.  To do that, I have to make space in the shed for the camping stuff Keith has on the Hillock, then move the last bits of my stuff over to Mount Sorrow.

I want to have Mount Sorrow scaled down by the end of the summer to the point that it will fit in a smaller unit.  I've realized the convenience of having a storage unit for stashing shelves and some furniture, but I don't want to keep paying for such a large one.

In other words, I'm doing more pricing and prepping to stuff I already have, instead of buying more.  As long as I have this backlog, I'm only going to be hitting the kinds of sales that have a good, proven track record with me where I can get the kinds of things I need.

Like the Big Flea from New Year's.  It was a little disappointing, as one of the vendors I went especially to shop from was not there.  Not that I didn't find other stuff.

I made a new friend.

How cool is this ash bin?

It came with the box!

 A couple of weeks ago, I found a bag of stuff at the Peddlers Mall for a dollar.  It was mostly school supplies and such, but I also saw these:

That's the word stencils and magnetic letter tray for a 1970's Fisher-Price play school desk.  Kids could use the stencils as guides to write the words on the chalkboard surface of the desk, or they could spell the words with the magnetic letters.

I have found three or four of the desks over the years, but none have ever had the supplies with them.  (It's even harder to find the letters that go in the tray.)  I bought the bag, so I could stash this stuff for the next desk I found.

A few days later, I was hitting up Unique Thrift on half-price day, and guess what I found?

Serendipitous, I tell you!

I also got a real school desk at Unique that day.  With two at the booth and one on the Mountain, I really didn't need another one, but I cannot pass them up when they're only $2.50.  Plus, I like it when my shopping has a theme.

Let's talk about that Mazda shot now.  I tried to limit myself on Saturday to just the sure things, which would have made three stops, but it was so nice and I was so stir-crazy that I ended up adding an adoption fund-raiser sale at a church.

The white bag on the left in front is full of comics from the nerd herd comic shop sale.  They had a bunch of graphic novels (including hardcovers) and bundles of certain series on sale for a buck each.  my comic section is pretty hot right now, so I can't afford to pass up a sale.  (In the past two weeks, I've met three of my regular comic customers when I was working the booth.  One guy told me he comes by twice a week.)

The Barnes and Noble bags come from their 75% red dot clearance sale--one of my favorite things.  They had a lot of cool super-hero stuff this time around.  I even got a Batman just for me.

The cider kit in the brown and green box is also from BN.  It was a little more than I normally spend, but I think I'll get a good return on it.  Now, I just need to wait a couple of weeks until the prices drop to two dollars and hit them up again!

There's a guy not far from us who holds monthly sales in his garage.  He's also a vendor at a couple of flea markets, so he always has good stuff.  The green chair and pink cabinet I got last year that made a few of you all bonkers came from him.  I can always count on him for large pieces at great prices.  Also odd things.

I'm in love with this sign.

A couple of you all identified this as part of a bookshelf, but it's really a bunch of bamboo poles and three table leaves.  I dug a bamboo pole out of the trash at the Peddlers Mall a while back and put it in my booth, where it sold.  I bought a couple more bamboo poles, and one of them sold.  So now I have some more!  I love the darker color on these.

I got all three table leaves for a buck.  I just kind of thought, "Why the hell not?"  I'm thinking someone might like them for a project or something.  I always find odd stuff like this at his sale, and I usually can sell it too.  One time I bought some (HEAVY) broken marble counter slabs off him.  Could not keep them in the booth.

When I put the bag from the church sale in the back of Mazda, an item rolled out.  I was going to put it back in, when I realized it would look great in the Mazda shot, but I forgot and put the BN bags on top of it.

Here it is in all its glory:

SUMO BUTT!

I swear that it fell out exactly like this!

There are actually two of them.

Sumo Nipples!

They also talk, or rather make unintelligible grunting sounds.  You'll be seeing more of them soon, he said rather cryptically.

This turned out to be one of those church sales where the adult volunteers brought their kids with them and allowed the kids to run loose around the place while they ran the sale.  I hate those kind of sales, because the toys always get mobbed and trashed.  Or else you have to fight some little person to get to them.  Not that I'm above doing that, mind you.

I already had one of these babies in hand, when I realized there were two of them.  I was pushing the second one back and forth to make sure it still made the clicking noises that these lawn mowers do, when a little girl--maybe 18 months old--toddled up to me and just pushed it away across the room with her.  I looked at Keith and said:  "That little girl stole my lawn mower."  He just shrugged and said:  "It's not yours any more."

So I stood there kind of casually browsing stuff and keeping an eye on where the lawn mower was heading.  I mean, c'mon, she's not even two!  She'll lose interest in about thirty seconds.  Sure enough, BINGO!  She lets go of it and wanders off.  I shove the other one in Keith's hands and SWOOP in and grab it before she turns around.  SCORE!

Yes, I stole a toy from a child.  It's not like she had money to buy it.  No, I'm not proud of myself.  Yes, I would probably do it again.  Yes, I am pathetic.  In my defense, I did not make her cry.  She had forgotten about it as soon as she let go of it.  I'm sure she already had one at home and didn't need another one anyway.

You ought to see how I deal with old ladies.

Finally:

OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!

OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!

Best curb find in a while, wouldn't you say?  I stalked this baby for a week, believe it or not.  What am I saying?  Of course you believe it!

I was walking to the bus last week, when I saw this totally awesome cabinet sitting in the yard of a house at the bottom of the hill.  It was sitting by the trash cans, so I was pretty sure they were tossing it, but it was also the day after garbage day.  I thought maybe they had gone ahead and gotten it out of the house in prep for junk day.

That night, I made Keith drive past the house to see if it was still there.  (Like none of you have done that.)  I continued to keep watch on it, twice a day, like that for a week.  One day there was a guy in the yard of the house.  I almost asked him if he was tossing it, but decided not to, because I didn't think I could get it back up the hill by myself, plus I was late for the bus as it was.  He probably would have asked for money to boot.

Monday, we're driving home and there it is!  Sitting out on the curb with the trash cans.  It was a bit of a wrestle to get it in Mazda, and Keith kept asking if I really wanted it.  (He thought it was too run down looking.)  I'm hoping it's a good omen for the rest of junk set out this weekend.

The trash people would not have taken it anyway.  They would have left it for the junk truck.  I figure the folks in that house must be new in the neighborhood and don't realize how stuff works.

When I first told Keith about it, he wanted to know why I didn't just knock on the door and ask for it.  I told him that too many of the neighbors had seen me going through their junk and carrying bits of it off.  I don't mind being thought of as the neighborhood hobo, but I draw the line at having people think I stalk their garbage!

Even though I totally do.

It's a living!

2015-2016 Rambles

It is said that there are only two things in life that are certain.  Those would be death and taxes.  When it comes to this blog, however, there are at least three certainties.

1. At least half the photos will be crap.
2. The blogger will never be very good at his job.
3.  Whenever you read that posting will resume "tomorrow," then you can expect at least another two weeks (or more) before a post finally appears.

Is anyone even still out there?

If you look back over the last few years of this blog, you'll find that I inevitably seem to flake out right around the holidays and totally disappear.  Sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas, life just overwhelms me and the blog suffers.  Interestingly, I don't really do that much holiday celebrating any more.  The only gifts to get are for Keith, my brother and Keith's mom.  We haven't decorated or done any baking since my mother first got sick.  If anyone ever gets a Christmas card for me, guard it like a double-bag collector's item, because that sucker is a rarity for sure!  Yet, despite all of this, the end of the year seems to swallow me up like a black hole.

I know my prolonged absence made some of you worry, and I am sorry for that, but deeply touched at the same time.  You all are just so sweet and I am lucky to have each of you in my life.  I owe several of you emails, blog comments, and post catch ups.  I'll get to it, hopefully soon.  If I don't, know that I do think about you all a lot.  I had no idea that this little blog would bring so many great people into my life.

Speaking of being in touch, any of you that have my mailing address, please contact me by email.  After years of declining service, we finally did away with the PO Box.  If you want it, I'll be glad to give you the home address.

Okay, so where to begin?

Let's start with this. He always makes people smile.

Keith's mother gave him that quilt for Christmas.  One of his aunts made it for a fund-raiser at one of the churches that his mom attends and she ended up winning it.  It's really pretty, and Chiquito just loves it!  He's claimed it as his own.

In other Chiquito news, Keith relented and made me a 2016 Chiquito calendar.  I'll get the Jan and Feb pics up soon.  Well, before March, at least.  He told me to warn you all that this one might be the last one.  He thinks that you're going to find pic after pic of Chiquito to be "repetitive."  I told him he didn't know you all.

Speaking of Christmas, I also got this,which of course I love!  Two more pairs of socks came with it!

I get tons of compliments when I wear it!  He also made me a Kosh calendar, but it makes me kinda sad, so I keep it stashed on my desk.  I had asked him to make me a memory book of Kosh pics, like he did for our other kitties who have passed on, but he hasn't had a chance to track down all the pics yet.  The calendar was to hold me over until he could.

Something we did not realize about having a Christmas Eve anniversary is that it is awfully hard to find a place to go for dinner.  We finally got a corrected copy of our marriage license, so Keith is not the officiating judge any more.  He had a couple of our wedding pics blown up and printed out on canvas for me.  We're doing some rearranging at the house, so they'll probably go in the bedroom, when it's done.

The other day, while I was searching for a clean pair of jeans, I came across this:

That's the 70's Batman comic logo, by the way.  I had forgotten I had that one.  Finding made me remember that I also have a shirt with the TV show logo on it, which I now have to find.  I have a nerdrobe and didn't even know it!

Ignore my hair in that pic, please. I'm growing it out in hopes of finally having the ponytail I've always dreamed of.  I've tried it before, but always got frustrated when I got to this shaggy, unmanageable state.  The top and sides aren't long enough to pull back yet, and it's driving me nuts.  I'm determined to see it through this time.  I think it's a midlife crisis thing.  I'm also pondering bleaching it totally white and piercing my nose.

This happened a couple of weeks ago.

It was really the first bad weather of the winter for us and wasn't nearly as bad as it got in other places, but it was enough.  The streets in front of and behind our house are kind of major ones, and traffic was crawling along them for a couple of days afterwards.  The Peddlers Mall was closed for a day and a half.  Sales sucked all freaking week long.  Chiquito told me that the best thing to do was stay in, drink hot chocolate, eat popcorn and take naps, so I did.  He was right.

Speaking of the booth, some of you all want new pics, but it's going to be a while.  Things are a bit rough in all my spaces right now.  December was an excellent month for me, but January sucked.  My total sales were the lowest they've been in a long while.  Bad weather was part of it, but the rest of it was mainly my fault.  For some reason (winter blahs?), I just could not seem to pull it together, get the Christmas out, restock everything, and tidy it all up. 

Usually, I leave the Christmas in through the first week in January, then spend the next week clearing it all out and redoing everything.  Those first two weeks are usually a little slow anyway, and that gives me time to get the booth ready for the end of the month, when the early early birds have gotten their tax refunds.

I could not seem to get moving this year.  Part of it was that I decided to leave some bits of Christmas scattered around my spaces.  I marked everything that had been through more than two seasons down and shoved them on a couple of bottom shelves.  It's out of the way.  It fills shelves people don't access a lot, so the booth looks fuller.  It also gives the adventurous folks (and holiday lovers) some bargains to hunt for,

I also left all my holiday glasses and dishes on another bottom shelf.  I'm down to very few of them, and they've sold year round for me before.  The books and music I worked into the book booth.  None of that took very long.  The hold up came when I decided that I should make a year round vintage Christmas section. 

I had already pulled everything, and it was piled in carts.  All I needed to do was clear a shelf for it and sort through it.  That became the hold up.  Three different attempts to designate an existing shelf totally failed.  I ended up heading to Sorrow Mountain in hunt for a new shelf, rearranging things a bit, then making my vintage Christmas section.  It took forever, as the snow happened in the middle of all this.  The result was I had carts of stuff and empty boxes cluttering my booth and scaring off customers.

Sometimes, it's really obvious that I do not have a clue what I am doing.

Three days in, however, and February seems to be doing much better for me.  I'm thinking that tax money is trickling in, finally.  Thanks to taxes, February and March can be good months.

To switch to a better note, my scans are coming back clear!  The treatments continue, of course, but the docs (and me) are really pleased with the results.  I'm on the same drug that Jimmy Carter is getting, by the way.  I've been referring to it as "the presidential treatment."  I'll have what the President is having, please.  I'll be due for another scan in a month or so.

It's a bit of a busy week here.  I'm benignly neglecting the booth, because it's junk set out weekend in our neighborhood.  The winter set out is always a little iffy, but the weather is supposed to be mild all week, so the pickings might be pretty good.  I've got a bit of cabin fever, so I am raring to go hunting.
I've also got stuff that needs to go out to the curb.  I have two bookshelves that are seriously falling apart and need to go.  I have replacements on Sorrow Mountain, of course.  I've been putting off dealing with these for a while, partly because I'm convinced that it's only the weight of the stuff on them that is holding them together and upright.  Seriously, they're that far gone.  I'm afraid it's going to be like playing Jenga on a large scale. One wrong move and I'm buried in books.

At least this time, if you don't hear from me for a while, you'll know what happened.

Let's close out with a backlog of fortune cookie wisdom.

I certainly try to do this one.

Well, thank you!

I was sure this meant I had the winning Power Ball ticket.  Alas!

I got all excited at the last one from Po!  I never got a fortune from a Teletubby before!  Po! Po! Po!  Then I realized that it was the Kung Fu Panda dude, which makes more sense from a fortune cookie perspective.  Personally, I think what the world needs right now is Teletubby fortune cookies.

Now for something completely different!

I know it's supposed to be "Retro Y'all" day, and this is a kind of "Retro Y'all" post, but this isn't any ordinary Saturday.  No Siree!  It's.......

BATMAN DAY!

For real.  I wouldn't make that up.

So there's only one video that will work today.

You all should have known that was coming.  (I had such a crush on Burt Ward when I was a kid.)

There's a Batman Day giveaway with all kinds of Bat-swag, if you want to enter.  (And you know that my birthday is coming up....)

Here's a nice rundown of different approaches to the character that gets what I consider to be the heart of the whole idea of The Batman.  It's not darkness or vengeance or crime or violence or even justice.  It's weirdness, plain and simple.  Everything about Batman is at the very least a little strange, if not outright silly.  The best incarnations take that inherent oddity and run with it, without caring what the fan-boys think.

So how am I celebrating this auspicious occasion?  Well, the only Batman attire I have is a pair of boxers, so I'm going to be wearing them today.  (I will wear other clothing in addition to said Bat-boxers.  It's Batman Day, not Fat, Middle- Aged Nerds in their Undies Day.  That takes place every Sunday in my living room.  TMI?)

Actually, I do have a Batman T-shirt, but I have no idea where it is.  I think it might be hiding out with the missing socks from the dryer.  I probably need to get on the Bat-phone and get some assistance in cracking that case.  I'm sure the Bat-Computer could find it with no problem.

There's probably no better way to celebrate such a day than with a trip to the comic shop, so I guess I'll be heading over there.  Especially since it's also nerd herd sidewalk sale day!  Last one of the year, in fact.  Been selling comics like crazy lately, so I need to lay in a stash for the winter.  I've got a small one, but I think I need some more.

I'll close out with a really good article about the problems of trying to evolve and develop the Batman mythos in a corporate culture that has come to view him as a cash cow to sell movie tickets and video games, rather than a vehicle for lasting stories.  The idea these days seems to be that they'll just throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks as far as the comics go, and when the crap stops sticking, then they'll just "reboot" with a new first issue.  As long as the box office is big, who cares?

That whole line of thinking is (yet) another reason why I have no stomach for modern super-hero comics any more.  If you're keeping track, that's like the third or fourth one I've shared.  Maybe I should make a check list.  How can you collect the set if you don't have a check list?

Of course, the truly wonderful thing about fictional characters is that you can pick and choose which version(s) you like and ignore the rest.  This Batman Day, I'm celebrating:

• The Adam West TV Show Batman
• Any animated version of Batman
• Manga Batman
• Batman in the 70's and 80's comics I bought as a kid
• Batman from the 30's, 40's, 50's and 60's stories that I read in reprints as a kid
• George Clooney Batman (I pride myself on being pretty much the only person in the known universe who loved that movie.)

Someone else can celebrate the other versions.

By the way, I found out about this too late to do a post about it, but yesterday was National Comic Book Day.  (Not sure who decides these things.)  I read some comics to celebrate.  Now, will someone please tell me when Wonder Woman Day is?  Also National Spring Roll Day.  I really need to celebrate that one.  A lot.

Monday (Tuesday) Rambles

Well, hello there!  How was your Derby?  Did your horse win?  If so, will you take me to lunch?  My horse didn't win.  Well, sort of.  I didn't really have a horde, but I did draw one in the Peddlers Mall Derby pool. Still, I didn't win.

Horses aside, there are some recent other winners of a sort who need to be congratulated:

Good blog friend Roger just celebrated ten years of his blog!  It's even more amazing when you consider that he actually manages to blog every single day!

Linda at A La Carte recently became a grandma for the second time.

Shara just expanded her booth space at one of her flea markets.  Long may she sell!

Distressed Donna also recently had a blogiversary.  I'll have some more to say about that in a longer post.

I'd also like to recommend a really good recent read at Things I Find in the Garbage, probably the best trash-picking blog out there.  I have to admit, he's got me checking to see when move out day at the local colleges is.  Free stuff is free stuff, after all.  I like this post because he touches on the issues of consumption and its environmental impacts, which are topics that I roll around in my head from time to time as they relate to re-selling.   There's a post for me in all of this that has needed to be written for a while now.  Maybe I'll finally get around to it now.

The post at TIFITG reminds me of the time that Keith and I were moving out of the apartment we had been in for nine years and into the house.  Our apartment was close to the University of Louisville, so there were a lot of students living in our complex, as well as the surrounding apartment buildings.  When we had gotten down to the things we did not want to take with us, we took three or four carloads to Goodwill.  That left some large items that we didn't really have room to haul in the car.  I had some boards and cinder blocks I was using as bookshelves and an old desk that was too small for my needs.  Instead of tossing them, we left them sitting beside the dumpster.  I figured that one of the students in the area might want them.  They were gone before we pulled out of the parking lot of the last time.  I guess the relationship between students and the trash goes both ways!

There wasn't a Mazda shot this weekend because we simply didn't have time to do it.  Keith had an afternoon commitment that meant we had to unload stuff quickly and get moving.  Let me tease you just a bit with the finds in anticipation of the full reveal tomorrow:

Croquet mallets all in a row

Painted child's chair

Audaciously ugly lamp.

That's what the tag I made for the lamp says!

Despite being Derby, there were a lot of yard sales going on.  This was largely due to the rain last Saturday, which cancelled lots of sales.  We hit the annual Derby street sale which is held by several dealers and their friends not far from our house.  Stuff is always plentiful and prices are generally good.  I was a little disappointed that the one guy that always has fun smalls had nothing I was interested in.

One of the sales I wanted to hit did not seem to be happening, but that just made more time for what turned out to be one of the best sales I've been to in a while.  Tons of vintage toys and really good prices.  Despite the fact that I had to work around a couple of guys and their constant eBay searches (Arrgh!), I got a lot of good stuff at this one.  I'll have pics of the finds tomorrow.

It was also a fun walk down memory lane.  There were so many toys and books there that I had as a kid!  I love it when that happens.  I heard the seller talking to one of the shoppers, and it turns out that she had conducted her father's estate sale about six or so years ago, which I had attended.  He ran a print and bookbinding shop, and there were massive amounts of all kinds of printed material at the sale.  I got a nice sized stack of vintage romance comic books and a bunch of religious tracts a that sale, which is why I remembered it.

Of course, the real highlight of the day was Free Comic Book Day.  I had planned to visit four shops, but only made it to two.  The reason?

 
Well, there were big crowds, which meant long lines.  But the sales were worth it!  I'll have more on that in a few days.  I also managed to get a hefty stack of the FCBD books.

I missed out on a couple of the ones I wanted, but I had the chance to get a few other titles, so I did.  You know me and free.  I'll end up passing most of them on in some way or another.

I did see something disturbing at one store.

"The Dark Avenger of the Night is not sweet and fluffy!"

My brother is planning to come up for a visit next week.  I am really excited for that.  I can hardly wait!  We don't get to see each other often enough, so we really have a good time when we're together.  I've got a lot to do to get the house ready for his visit, though.

Booth sales were actually good for Derby Weekend.  I had strong days on both Oaks (Friday) and Derby (Saturday).  I'm hoping that this is a good sign for the rest of the month.  I was working the other day when another vendor gave me a dining table, an end table and some other stuff she didn't want to move out of her space.  You know me and free!  I took it all, even the broken down pressboard writing desk that was ready for the trash.  I put the desk in my booth with a "free" sign on it and it was gone by the weekend.  Never hurts to repay the "free karma."

On that note, I'll say "Bye-Bye!"