SKATE ART & BINGO BALLS

SKATE ART
Despite the fact that this deck has been thoroughly shredded the custom skull graphics have been perfectly preserved. This is as fine a piece of American folk art as anything else. The best dollar I've ever spent. It hangs proudly.



BINGO BALLS!
Found this for free outside a local firestation. The basket has a nice wooden handle and when you spin it a cup catches the next bingo ball and drops it into a slide delivering the ball to the number caller; not unlike a kinetic sculpture. O 70

Street Finds, Herb Retires, African Radio & The Pianorgan

Things have been slow in the world of consumer archaeology. As the volume in my barn increases so do my standards. Lately I've been more in the mood to get rid of than to acquire. Here's a few new things I couldn't leave alone.

The Pianorgan by Farfisa was a kind gift from a friend who found it on the curb in his neighborhood. The build quality is really fantastic, far better than the typical plastic chord organ. Because the build quality is so much higher the actual sound is far superior. I guess that's why Farfisa chose to call it a Pianorgan rather than a chord organ.
The chair was found at a group shop. It's solid wood and rather heavy. The triangle shape of it is visually pleasing and it's a comfortable seat for jamming on the Pianorgan. There were actually two of these chairs at the shop but I'm practicing self control and I only bought one.



Solemn wooden prayer statue:
Again, there were two of them and I chose to exercise a bit of self control and only purchase one. Plus, having just one makes it that much more precious.


African Wire Radio:


I've always admired the Boston Sand & Gravel company for sticking it out and never moving. They're located at North Station where Route 93, Route One & Storrow Drive all intersect. There are multiple levels of highway ramps wrapping around their ghost town gravel elevator and the big dig had to be built around them. I'd guess that the city would have offered them a small fortune for their small piece of land but their beautiful building has stayed put. Apparently, Herb recently retired (either from the company or from breathing) and I'll be representing for him.


Join the club.
I bought this as a joke birthday gift for a friend and while I was waiting to give it to him I realised that this black Members Only jacket was actually pretty slick looking. For people who want to wear leather jackets but aren't quite tough enough this should do the trick. Still, there's something generically K Car about the Members Only jacket and this will probably sit in a closet until I can find someone else to regift it to.


Another jacket I wouldn't wear but had to buy. I'd imagine that the sassy fellow who owned this would have been a great guy to have a beer with. Quite a relic for the National Museum Of Personalities.

Casio Jams, Drippy, Chinese Abacus, Reel 2 Reel 4 Realz & Paper Airplanes

I first cast a foggy glare on Drippy when he was sitting on the floor of a group shop without a price. I immediately inquired and as a price had not been established I was unable to bring him home. I couldn't get him out of my head and the next time I was at the store he was on the wall and priced almost three times higher than any other painting they had hanging - likely because someone (me) had shown some interest in him.

There are two ways to look at Drippy:
1. Totally amazing dreary melancholy washout.
2. Paiting of a boy that was damaged when the pipe burst in Nana's basement.

I assumed that the seller would see it the latter I'd walk out with a crazy deal on Drippy. No dice. However, I did manage to talk them down nearly $20 and now he hangs next to my Vinette Varvard painting (scroll down for Drippy's sister) where he belongs. The family is finally reunited.

By the way, he's signed McRady incase you have any biographical information for me.




Who needs a Chinese Abacus? Not me, that's for sure. However, it was in the original packaging and for some compulsive reason I can't leave anything in it's original packaging at the Salvation Army. Well, almost anything....



Really? Yes, really. I was as surprised as the dude at the Starbuck's drive-through who asked if I'd be circuit bending this beauty (I was in the passenger seat minding my own business and he spotted it on my lap.). My response was something like "No, I'm going to make fart sounds with it like I did in jr. high school." I was totally shocked to find this in it's original packaging. The keyboard is untouched and still inside the inner plastic lining.
I've already got a Realistic knock off of this. Ultimately, they're identical in every way save for the brand names. This brings up a question I've been asking for years but never really cared too much to research:
Why/how was Radio Shack manufacturing already available products and putting their brand name on it? Why would a company license their existing product to Radio Shack for manufacture? I just don't get it. I'd ask Mr. Zzyzzx but since it's not a yes or no type question I probably won't get a very good answer.




I don't have an engineering degree, the coordination of a surgeon, or an entire day to waste so I probably won't be putting together Dr. Yasuaki Ninomiya's complex paper airplanes any time soon. I'd never heard of him until I picked this pack up for a dollar and apparently he's a fascinating guy. Here's some info on him that I lifted off of the interwebs:

Born in 1926, Dr. Yasuaki Ninomiya has been fascinated by airplanes since childhood -- an interest which later developed into his lifetime passion of designing and building paper airplanes. He has designed well over 1000 different models.
In 1962, Dr. Ninomiya received his Ph.D. in the field of microwave measurement theory. He is recognized as a pioneer in microwave communications engineering from his work as a leading researcher for the Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT). He retired in 1984.
Drawing on his background and expertise, Dr. Ninomiya designs aerodynamically sound and sleek high performance paper planes based on the principles of flight. He won grand prizes in both the Duration Flight and Distance Flight competitions of the 1st International Paper Plane Contest in San Francisco in 1967. In 1985, he served as a judge in the 2nd Great International Paper Plane Contest in Seattle.
When Dr. Ninomiya is not designing paper gliders, he actively pursues his other interests. Also known as a photographer, he published an remarkable book of paper plane photos in 1993. He also has his own pilot license and flies his Cessna 182 whenever his busy schedule permits.




Last but certainly not the least is this reel to reel/speaker set made by Voice Of Music. It included a box of reels: some blank and some really lousy soundtracks. Though I haven't set it up to listen yet I'm guessing that the dubbed real titled "Playmate & Love Letters. Property Of The Showmen" is going to be the real score. Included is a second unit which acts as the speaker, interconnects, microphones and a bunch of tools for working on the reel to reel.

Double Jacket Winter Chill

Things are calm in the world of used-goods consumerism. Numerous trips through numerous stacks, racks, shelves and open floorspace have yielded few treasures and none quite worthy of reflection or even a quick photograph.
I have managed to score a couple of sweet winter jackets, though. These are the sort a male, unmarried 4th grade teacher (or a priest) would have worn in the early eighties. I think they came standard with Dodge Omni's the first year of production. One of them, from Sears, even mentions on the label that it was designed specifically for the fashionable teen male - which I am.
The fact that I was compelled to purchase two similar vintage winter jackets has been especially troubling for me. After finding one why could I not resist buying a second? In my defense, the second one is a better shade of blue and the red liner is pretty ace. The only problem is that when the temperature is below 32 degrees, as it frequently is when you'd need such an article, the arms make a plasticky scraping sound as they rub against the jacket. I'm now accustomed to this sound; a sound very much unlike the typcal sound normal winter jacket material would make; a sound not unlike a tarp rubbing against itself on a chilly winter afternoon. Maybe I should have just taken a photo of them....

Recent Aquisitions: Poetry & a brand new Atari 2600

Charles Simic was a professor at the college I attended and though I passed him many times in the building I never had the opportunity to take a class with him. At the time I was going through the standard late teens/early twenties beat/Bukowski obsession and the thought of investigating Simic further never occurred to me even as my classmates and friends were raving about him.
Recently a friend loaned me "A Fly In My Soup;" Simic's memoir's of his childhood in Serbia, his family's immigration to America & his twenties as a young poet and a military officer. I have refused to read the last page for fear of finishing the book which I've enjoyed so enormously.
Simic's poetry is a lot like the art of Joseph Cornell - whose work Simic admires and has written for. Both are locked up tight in symbolism yet the preciousness of each figure and the personal meaning held within is apparent. The layered depth of his work yields immense detail and meaning.


So, what's better than a Salvation Army that separates its books like a real bookstore would? The poetry section yielded these two gems. The design for the Cummings cover is amazing & I had a feeling that the Simic would be signed and it was:






In the early eighties Atari branded these "The Best Christmas Gift Ever" but apparently someone didn't think so because this one was never removed from the box.

Recent acquisitions

$6.99 and I walked out with a lifetime's worth of sewing supplies. The sad thing about this perfect little time capsule is that someone had to die for me to acquire it. Someone assembled this stuff and kept it in an attractive tackle box only for me to purchase it, stare at it and then give it as a Christmas gift. There's so much personality in a little box like this; a perfect tribute to its anonymous ex-owner. I'm pretty sure I could put together a vague personality composite based on the content of the box and the way it's arranged.
I love the thread in the Cool Whip.
Keeping stuff in Cool Whip containers is sooooooo 80's.







The last word in home security or a good place to keep "stuff."

Looking back at a material past (3)

This generic Dutch credenza came from a two floor junk shop in upstate NY. I think I paid about $40 for it and it fit perfectly into the back of my Volvo 245. What is most significant about it is the ex-con fantasy airbrusher who sold and worked out of the basement of the junk shop that the credenza came from. Proudly displayed and available for purchase were bikini ladies with contorted bodies, unnatural skin & machine guns. He airbrushed giant saw blades with tigers bathing in waterfalls and mounted the blades to table legs making the ugliest and most dangerous table you've ever seen. My favorite might have been the Budweiser lab coat.




For a couple weeks I was finding everything I wanted. First I found the Albers print which was too good to be true - as if someone had donated it just so I could find it. Then this set......
Broyhill makes exclusively ugly furniture - with the exception of this Raymony Loewy dresser and side table set. I'm not sure if they licensed the plastic drawer fronts from Loewy or if they just ripped them off and hoped for the best. Either way, when I saw this from across the furniture section of the store I loudly proclaimed my excitement and sprinted as if everyone in the store had their eye on it too. I was almost breathless when I brought the tag to the counter.




I can hardly remember where this chair came from. I suspect it was free on the side of the road and since then I've seen a couple more of them. There's even one at a local gas station sitting out in the rain. I'm pretty sure that these were standard office furniture at some point in time and probably inexpensive furniture at that. However, it's design rivals the best of them. On par w/ the Aluminum Group in terms of style though this one has a unique Bauhaus look to it (or maybe that Gerrit Rietveld chair) with its perfectly square frame and floating back seat. The wood adds a nice natural touch to the arms.
This guy has a company tag from Air Traffic Control Systems in Ohio.




This etching was $10 or $15 at a local group shop. It's hard to tell if it was used to print or not but it's been painted to give it some depth. Who knows. Etched into it is the year 1966 and the initials T.T.





Mr. Zzyzzx has long been the overlord of our household. This Hal-like omniscient robo-man will answer your "yes or no type questions" if you pass your hand over his head a couple of times after asking. He's got about 10 or 20 responses but then every few months you'll hear one that you've never heard before. He even predicted the birth of our first child. In a lot of ways he is my first child, or maybe my father. Either way, I totally fear and respect him. As should you.