Tag: creepy

Of Pandas & Puppies On Porches

I have a retro hydraulic panda chair on my porch. (What? You don’t?!)

It’s the sort used by hip and kitschy beauty salons for kids to sit on while getting a hair cut.

So, anyway, I’m out on the porch with the new puppy, a Basset Hound puppy named Mr. Oliver Puddington (photos can be seen on my Facebook page; videos are at YouTube). And I hear this noise… The softest of tearing sounds. I looked around to see what the pup had found.

There he is, at the base of the hydraulic panda chair, his nose on the metal hydraulic tube part, and I’m just in time to see him pull away — and hear the soft tearing noise as his delicate scenting-hound nose is ripped from it. Mr. Oliver Puddington just had a Christmas Story flagpole moment.

No yipes or whines. Not even when he repeated it.

Thrice.

While I about wet my pants.

Because puppies are slow and I guess he needed to make sure it was a bad thing to do.

Anyway, his tongue is fine. Though he still let’s it hang out of his mouth a bit while sleeping…

The better to make the oddest sucking sounds.

Puppies are weird.

This Is Where I’ll Be Found Dead

At Nevada’s Clown Motel. If you’re brave, or just foolish, check out Cheetah Velour’s post to see lots more frightening photos of the joint.

She also notes the following:

I realize that clowns make some people uneasy & that’s ok. I’m not judging. If you can’t handle looking at clowns, there is always the cemetery across the parking lot.

How conveeeenient.

Cucumber Spread, She Said

A grandma was recently forced to clean out her pantry, and this is some of what lay within… Via Kottke.

Kitsch-Back: What is Kitsch to You?

If you look at your dictionary or Wikipedia, you may find kitsch defined as ‘gaudy, cheap, and tacky.’ This description does not to justice to the international phenomenon we fondly know as kitsch. A word borrowed from the German language, its orginal meaning has it associated with tackiness and trashiness. Yet it is also fresh, funky and fabulous. You can find it all over the world, emboying different media and styles. There is a quirky kind of magic to it, an irrestible charm if you get to know it. What does it mean to you?

Some admirers go for Mexican kitsch. The candy-filled pinatas, the Day of the Dead festivities, the overblown religion paraphernalia and the melodramatic telenovella starlets all scream kitsch, in technicolor! The Japanese are also big supporters of kitsch, with kawaii (cute) youth culture a real movement embodying everything from Hello Kitty to Tamagotchi, Pokemon to karaoke. In some circles kitsch is scorned for being tasteless and cheap, but for those in the know it is as popular as FoxyBingo and Angry Birds. Is there even such a thing as ‘too kitsch’ or ‘too much kitsch’? No! Of course not.

Gernsback’s ADD & ADHD Treatment

The Isolator by Hugo Gernsback, as it appeared on the cover of, and the pages in between, the July 1925 issue of Science and Invention.

While Attention Deficit Order, with or without hyperactivity, isn’t mentioned (it didn’t exist as a diagnosis back then), The Isolator was designed to help focus the mind, particularly when reading and writing (literacy is hard work!). The helmet not only eliminated all outside noise, limited sight to just one line of text at a time, but it also pumped in oxygen. From the looks of it, the contraption would also assist in limiting hyperactivity by limiting movement, or, between weight and limited visibility, it would at least slow you down.

Via A Great Disorder and 50 Watts. At Boing Boing, Mark captions the mag cover “Portrait of a Blogger in the 1920s.”

“Dead. Wrapped in plastic.”

Mitch O’Connell presents these vintage ads presenting babies wrapped in plastic. Can’t help but think of Twin Peaks; I’m that old. Bonus points for the contradictory use of storks.

(Found via Sloth Unleashed who found it viacargohoo /BoingBoing.)

Home Is Where The Heart Rendering Is

A vintage home canning and label book from Worthington Rendering CO, Worthington, Minnesota, “Our gift to you in appreciation of your calls.”

What calls, you ask?

Calls to report or turn in what Worthington wants to render:

Wanted All Dead & Disabled Animals

Courteous Drivers

Large or Small — We Make the Call

Hey, they had clean and sanitary disinfected trucks. So don’t worry about it; go can some fruit. Just don’t tell Timmy & Betsy what really happened to Old Shep and that lame kitten… Just tell the kids the pets went to go live on a farm. Or another farm.

Weird Old Spanish Miniatures

While researching miniature toy maker Charles Hall, I stumbled into the following gems at this toy soldier collecting site:

You’d be forgiven for thinking that this was a member of the Ku Klux Klan! In fact it’s 54mm plastic figure of a hooded penitent from a holy week procession. Made is Spain but maker unknown, probably sold as a souvenier to raise funds for charity rather than a toy.

Would you believe this came from a nativity set? made by OLIVER of Spain.

Having A Wonderful Time, Wish You Were Here

I guess that’s something to write home about but… What if that’s your home?

A real photo postcard, showing the bomb-tastic remains of the H. Bowman residence.

Dated August 10, 1908; seller says it’s from York, PA.