I'll admit I've been more than a bit smitten with Suzy Homemaker ever since I found out she wasn't just some phrase my mom made up; so when I spotted the oven at a trip to the thrift shop this weekend, I was very tempted.
The $39.99 price tag removed the possibility.
But still, I am going to have to get one so that one of these days I can fire it up and see how it compares to the Easy-Bake Oven. For science, you know.
No, I'm not speaking of the bruises along my arms from carrying all those heavy boxes of paper but of the foxing which can occur, leaving marks on the people on the pages. Like on this Arthur Crouch pinup from this 1941 cover of Collier's.
We saw this at an auction and when the guy behind us won, I asked him if I could snap a few quick pics. I keep wanting to call it Dino, but Dino was a pet, not the working crane.
Shiny black vinyl embossed to replicate alligator, the handle of the purse is the phone handset.
A large and roomy size, it measures 14 2/3" long and 12" high, not including the handle. The bag has a long shoulder strap.
Never used, the hang tag instructions are still attached, the original paper stuffing is still in the bag and the cellophane wrapper is still on the handset (removed for the pictures). The bag is in mint condition and has the telephone cord included. And, yes it does work, tested it.
High-Five Fridays is on a hiatus, but I'm going to use this time to participate in the memes I've been tagged for (and so far neglected). If you hate how I'm doing these, all lumped together in one post, then please don't tag me anymore. *wink* (It's flattering, really; but when inundated my already "far behind" life lags even worse.)
Four score & seven years ago, Thom of Planet Fabulon gave me/us the E for Excellence award. I now bequest (with hopes they take action faster than I!) the award to the following (who I believe have not already received it &/or will pass it along):
In five syllables, no more, no less, describe the worst movie you can think of. In seven syllables, no more, no less, describe your worst date. In five syllables, no more, no less, describe the worst job you ever had.
Here's my go at it:
Body count, no Bruce. Wet thumb, knocked up. Teen boy sneaker help.
Here's who I torture with an official tag (anyone else is free to play):
Last, but not least, Crazy Crafty Cat Chick (who should post more often so I can add her to the sidebar) tagged us, so I'll post this; but taking my cue from Silent Porn Star, I won't tag anyone. If you want to participate, you just copy & paste the list into your blog, adding your blog to the list, and publish. (And tag, if you so dare).
If you need something to boldly go between your teeth and remove that annoying piece of corn you dislodged from the cob at dinner, why not launch the tool in style?
Once filled with toothpicks, all you need to do is press the top down to pop up a toothpick. It's neat no matter how you define it.
Looking for that perfect Barbie, the "glamorous-yet-about-to-die" kind of doll we've all been craving? Look no further! Barbie, a'la Hitchcock's The Birds:
I'm guessing I did this well due to the number of economical questions and the number of children. It certainly had nothing to do with any of the cooking or domestic skills; and in "keeping mouth shut" & "risque jokes" I likely did even worse.
Scanning & uploading over 100 retro Garbage Pail Kids cards for an article there, I was somehow struck by the back of one card, featuring a re-run of the old Topps' Slob Wanted Poster:
Also guilty of the following crimes-- *Attracting Vermin From As Far Away As Afghanistan
In January of '71, Teen dared us to do some radical things, like decorate our rooms, to use Kool-Aid labels to decorate our shoes...
And to braid our hair, Bo Derek style -- in precisely 20 braids.
I did that once. Well, I had my sister braid my hair, using those tiny rubber bands which were supposed to be for our braces; and I don't think we ever bothered to count the braids...
Anyway, while I looked nothing like Bo, I wore my hair thus to the one and only car race I went to. On a dirt track.
I was so bored, and annoyed by being sprayed with dirt every turn, that I busied myself with unbraiding my hair, and soon looked like Roseanne Roseannadanna.
Just imagine trying to wash the chunks of dirt out of that.
Like the two-tone lip freak-fest, I do not advise the braiding of hair; it can lead to drinking the Kool-Aid proffered by cults.
But then, hey, your sister can make some cool shoes.
We're sorry we missed SIXX:A.M. on Cult of Gracie Radio, because it apparently was a "campy-train-wreck" of a show. And we love those.
Highlights of this show include DJ's late arrival ~ not due to, as James said, the chronic tardiness of guitarists, but DJ's Internet stalking of yours truly (visits to Peek-A-Boob and Sex-Kitten ~ who can blame him then for being late?), and the continual mockery of the musicians for being underage for the show (complete with a crazy phone call from Captain Planet aka Jill B. of SWOP-East).
OK, so those weren't the highlights of the show...
We might have been tempted to believe Gracie's comments were the self-deprecating mutterings of a woman who knows that "You gotta laugh when you're the joke"; but then we read the following from SIXX:A.M. fans as DJ Ashba's "Ashbaland Forum":
listen carefully for my favorite parts of that interview, in not much of a particular order:
dj whining defensively, "man! i was 2 minutes late!" you can hear him smile. too cute.
the lady calling to dispute their ages. did she REALLY say shed never been a member of a cult before? i keep meaning to listen to that part again, but its just not THAT important. when i heard it i got a vision in my head of some lady sitting next to her radio believing that she was being initiated into a real cult and that if she just passed this preliminary test, shed score her place in line waiting for the pitcher of kool aid to be passed around. the post show notes credit her with being a host to another show, but when i was listening i had no idea who she was and it was just funny.
How on earth did we miss this?
*side note* now that i think about it, i wonder why it wasnt promoted a bit more. weve all seen 2 minutes interview clips that get boatloads of hype and press. here was a 48 minute call in show that id never even heard of till a couple of days after the fact. as it turned out, maybe it was alot more fun just listening to them sorta hanging out than it mighta been to hear other people calling in with questions that have been answered in 45873 other interviews...this one was entertaining cuz it was unique if nothing else lol.
I'm re-running* this review of The Many Lives of Marilyn Monroe because I need to; I'll explain at the end. Really. (Those of you who care to read that far shall be rewarded.)
Marilyn Monroe is a true icon, a legend with a myth that continues to grow long after her death. So much as been written about her that's she's become not only a sex symbol but a symbol for nearly anything else. We dehumanize her so that we may (ironically) personalize our cultural views regarding sexuality, feminism, relationships, media and more. She is used to illustrate, prove and feed our theories.
She's become not a person but an image, an icon -- a cliche.
More books have been written about Monroe than any other entertainer, some guessing over 600 books ~ with new releases each year. Yet with all these books promising to reveal the "real Marilyn" avid readers like myself find ourselves doing nothing but covering the same old ground and learning nothing new. These new works do nothing to provide new information.
This is the ultimate cohesive look at most (if not all) that has been written about Marilyn, right down to reviewer comments at Amazon for these books, and what is shown is not only the legend of Marilyn and how she's been used, but our response and ability to perpetuate the myths as well.
In all these biographies there is a claim to uncover, to bare, to finally provide the ultimate answers; but they really only succeed in rehashing, guessing, and projecting. (In some cases, it's outright fiction.) Churchwell doesn't pretend to know or intend to show us the real Marilyn. Instead she gives us the reasons why we'll likely never know more than we do -- and it's not necessarily due to some government cover-up either.
As Churchwell explains, part of the reason the myth continues to grow is due to the dichotomies of Marilyn Monroe. Is she real or fake? Objectified or manipulative? Marilyn Monroe or Norma Jeane? Sweet or mean, beautiful or ugly, weak or strong, known and unknown... The list is long and growing. And these splits are what fascinate so many. Each book (and it's place in the collective literature contradicting other works) only adds more 'proof' of these splits, further establishing the mystery. And so the myth grows.
In part, Churchwell shows us, this is due to the biographers themselves. Each brings their own motivations, point of view and convictions to their biographies. Churchwell shows us not only how Marilyn's been used to prove or lay foundations for theories (from feminism to conspiracy theories) but how she's been both the fantasy and the truth denied. She's the object of personal projections and cultural convictions. All these dichotomies and questions can be synthesized through the body and person of Marilyn Monore; taking her humanity out of the legend, placing our own within.
Along with the many lives of Marilyn we are given the many needs of authors and an introspective on the writing of biographies (and autobiographies are not exempt!) But we are culpable as well. Not only as the buyers of the books, but we the adoring public have our own projections and beliefs. Our minds are made up and we are only too happy to kill the messenger who brings a different argument about 'our Marilyn'. (This is shown in Churchwell's book via the responses and reviews to previously published works about Monroe and the examples of biographer bickering & litigation.)
What may have begun as a love of a woman has clearly become a fixation on what she symbolizes to us. Like a religion (and Churchwell does use the word apocrypha to describe the volumes written), Marilyn is our goddess (good or evil) and woe to those who dare screw with our ideology -- even if with facts.
What's most impressive about this work is the transformation which occurs. As you read, you move Monroe from some 'thing' for our cultural and personal needs, to if not fully human at least considering the possibility that she was a complicated living human being which cannot not easily be understood from the fragments of her life which remain. Once we begin to see that she's not so easily characterized for our 'needs', to be made to symbolize our cultural or personal issues, we then need to look at why we -- readers and society at large -- do this.
We are not completely dehumanized (as we've done to Marilyn) but we certainly have to take a look at ourselves as a swarming mass of millions -- and as individuals. What is this compulsion to make Marilyn something? Why do we not see how dehumanizing our process is? Why is our quest &/or belief system more important than the person we profess to love?
We must now see ourselves moving from lover to stalker; our jealous perceptions of what others may know or say wounds us as if she had cheated on us in real life. She is our goddess, and we own her.
If the biographers have motives so do we the readers and fans who purchase nearly anything with her image on it. There's no denying that we have dehumanized Marilyn Monroe (yes, even little Norma Jeane too) even as we've placed her among our pop culture deities and cultural icons.
At the end of Churchwell's book die-hard fans may not know much more about Marilyn Monroe the woman and why she died -- and many of you may not like to see the faulty reasoning and weak proof that your favorite biographers have produced. But you should come closer to glimpsing the real human who was Marilyn Monroe.
And you sure as hell will learn a lot more about the culture we live in and the woman (person) you are.
A must have for every Marilyn Monroe fan, student of culture, and biography readers/writers.
Originally when I finished this book I put myself on Monroe Prohibition. At least as far as books go. I had to. While I might not have felt quite as concerned about the ghost of Marilyn (NWS - no kids), I was worried about being "part of the giant machine which feeds off of her -- dead or alive." I figured I should show a soul, if not a collecting spine; but then I discovered Eve Arnold & her book, and I'm weakening...
* This review was previously run on a smutty site (NWS), here (NWS - no kids).
Meet Mr. Fiori Rizzo, famous Philadelphia flautist, whose career met an untimely end when he lost his right arm to a blood infection. What would you do if your livelihood as a two-handed musician was ended so suddenly? Take up a one-handed instrument, apparently. My question: how does he turn the pages of his sheet-music? I don't think he's thought his cunning plan all the way through. It's a good thing that the trumpet isn't what they automatically give one-armed musicians -- Def Leppard would never have been the same. Don't go looking too hard for other one-armed musicians, though: they meld disturbingness and wow-factor into a single frappe of coolwierdness.
In 1983, Geraldine Ferraro was poised to run as the nation's VP, and Sunbow Entertainment, Marvel Productions, released one episode of The Charmkins, based on the Hasbro toys.
Like Humpty Dumpty, all the king-sized voice talent couldn't hold the cartoon together.
Ben Vereen (Dragonweed), Aileen Quinn (Brown-Eyed Susan), Sally Struthers (Poison Ivy), Ivy Austin (Skunkweed), Martin Bierbach (Willie Winkle), Lynne Lambert (Lady Slipper), Chris Murney (Bramble Brother, Briarpatch, Crocus), Bob Kaliban (Bramble Brother), Gary Yudman (Thorny), Peter Wardren (Popcorn), Freddi Webber (Blossom), Patience Jarvis (Announcer), Tina Capland (Announcer), Helen Leonhart (Vocalist), Jamie Murphy (Vocalist), Helen Miles (Vocalist).
Four score & seven years ago, Thom of 
