The Air at the Top of the Bottle

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Entries from August 2009

Children’s Card Games (70)

August 28th, 2009 · 5 Comments

I thought we’d come to the end of this second series of “Old Maid” decks; but I’d forgotten this one.  It’s a “Built-Rite Toy”: as usual, no date or other data.  All of the subjects in this version are children: Fickle Frankie, Rollicking Ruth, Fancy Nancy, and other lively kids.  I’ve picked Scary Harry.  He seems […]

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Tags: Card Games · Ephemera

Vulgar Wit

August 22nd, 2009 · 7 Comments

There are plenty of ways to make a point quickly and emphatically, but few are as economical as a good interjection. Compared to the expressions one never runs across anymore except in Shakespeare, eighteenth century novels, and Mad Libs, most recent examples are pretty unmusical, uninspired, and linguistically dull: “wow,” “cool,” “awesome,” “Jesus.” This extends […]

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Tags: Ancient History · Diversions · Education · Language · Literature

Children’s Card Games (69)

August 21st, 2009 · 1 Comment

This edition of “Animal Rummy” is an Arrco “Pla-Mor” game: “Ten true to life animals of the woodlands make the all-time favorite game of Rummy more fun to play.  The beaver, the bear, the squirrel, and even the skunk are mixed and matched in this new version of a great old game.”  I’ve selected the bear: nice […]

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Tags: Card Games · Ephemera

Teenage mumbo-jumbo?

August 19th, 2009 · 1 Comment

I think my high school offered one basic course in psychology, which I did not take. Surely it dealt in stripped-down basics – the classification of emotions, some de-sexualized Freudian theory, and maybe a little Jung thrown in for the artsy kids. I’d like to think, if I’d had the opportunity to take a class […]

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Tags: 'pataphysics · Belief Systems · Education · Forteana · Hoaxes · Mad Science · Mysteries · The Ineffable

Children’s Card Games (68)

August 1st, 2009 · 5 Comments

This “Old Maid” was published in 2001 by Cardinal Industries.  I’m intrigued by the fact that Piano Pete seems to be playing inside the piano.  Is he performing a piece using extended techniques?  Or is he simply tuning — in black tie?  At any rate, it’s a bold and bright design. And here’s the Old Maid.  This, by the way, […]

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Tags: Card Games · Ephemera

The Other Tiny Tim

August 1st, 2009 · 1 Comment

To most of us, the name “Tiny Tim” recalls the late Herbert Khaury, he of the uke and falsetto. We may also think of the plaintive tot in Dickens, or — if smitten with old comic strips — Stanley Link’s minuscule hero of the ’30s. But there was another, now forgotten, yet once a familiar […]

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Tags: Eccentrics · Ukulele