When Meredith submitted her childhood Easter Bunny photo to Awkward Family Photos, she probably never realized that she would be haunting the world with its creepiness.
That bunny won’t leave you chocolatey treats, he wants to eat your brains…
Run, Meredith, RUN!!!
Just a quick note to wish you all a Happy Easter! I found this old postcard in a used bookstore last year, so I scanned it in for everyone to enjoy!
The postcard was addressed to a Miss Gladys Kleine in Ashville, New York and sent on April 9, 1909. It feels so weird to have a hundred year old document in my hands.
Here is the back of the postcard:
The postcard reads:
Tuck’s Post Card
Raphael Tuck & Sons “Easter Post Cards” Series No. 112
Art publishers to their majesties the king & queen
Printed in Saxony
The letter to Miss Gladys Kleine reads:
Best wishes
From Miss Seekins
The two of them must have seen each other regularly because the card is so simple. Miss Seekins didn’t feel necessary to fill the postcard with updates about her life, so I suspect that she and Miss Gladys lived nearby.
The postcard is embossed with the image, so the chick and even the letters to the words, “TO WISH YOU A HAPPY EASTER,” are raised and I can feel them with my fingertips. You can actually see the embossing on the letter side of the postcard if you look hard enough.
If you like reading old postcards, you can find more at my travel website here:
Have a happy Easter!
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I was cleaning off the kitchen table, gathering dishes from this morning’s breakfast. My hand hit the back of a chair and I dropped a glass. This is not a new occurence. I drop a glass every couple of days or so, but they usually bounce on the carpeted floor and the worst I can complain about is the liquid that threatens to stain the carpet.
Today, however, the glass shattered.
I realized, as I picked up the shards, that it was a McCullough’s glass. I had won these glasses from McCullough’s one night, but I can’t remember what I did to win them. A sick panic washed over me as I picked up the sharp pieces of my past. Did I still have the other one or had I broken it as well?
I rushed to the cabinet and pushed aside the cups and glasses until I found it: my last remaining vestige of McCullough’s.
After The Ritz closed, we mourned. It reopened as McCullough’s Private Club. It was there that Mike and I first fell in love with darts. It wasn’t quite like The Ritz, but it was good enough. We went there with my sister Stacey many times before it finally closed as well.
The only thing I have reminding me of those days is this lone McCullough’s glass, in mourning over the loss of its partner.
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I was thinking about buying an Ikea chair to match the couch and sit by the window. I knew it would fit, but I didn’t know if it would look good or feel comfortable. Instead of buying the chair and finding out it was bad, I moved my comfy chair from my office into the spot.
Ironically, it DOES feel uncomfortable, but not for the reasons I imagined. Because the chair is facing the china cabinet, I can see a constant reflection of myself in its glass. Rather than enjoying the view, I find my gaze drawn to the vision of myself staring back. I think I’ll move the chair back and give up on the idea of sitting next to the window.
So many of my old Barbie clothes are worn out, ripped or in need of repair, so I thought I could just BUY new clothes to keep my dolls from going naked. Apparently, Mattel has changed the chest measurements for Barbie because none of the new clothes fit. On the plus side, they fit my Starr doll, so she has a whole new wardrobe now.
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I can’t express how beautiful the moon looked this morning. The tiny camera on my iPhone had no chance of capturing it in its full glory. Even cropped and edited, this photo doesn’t come close.
It was a huge orange disc in the sky, slightly obscured by wispy and ever-changing clouds. Jen and I trailed the dogs to the park and tossed the lacrosse ball against the warm southern wind. Every few throws, I would check the moon again. Yes, it’s still there. Yea, it’s still orange. Yes, it’s still beautiful. For the first time since winter, I could hear birds chirping on our morning walk and it gave me hope for spring, despite the forecast for snow tomorrow.
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Check out my new steampunk necklace from Simply Willow at Etsy. It came in this beautiful box.
The necklace is inset with the innards of an old watch, displaying its quartz crystals. Its easy to forget how much artistry goes into the simplest of timepieces.
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I was driving in the dark of the morning and stopped at a light. The glow from my red taillights illuminated the car behind me. In my rear view window, I could see a man with his head shaved bald in the car. Both of his hands gripped his steering wheel and his face had a flat and emotionless expression.
“He needs to smile more,” I thought to myself. I suddenly became aware of my own face. I could feel that my features mirrored his expression and was like that before I pressed the brakes for the red light. I tried smiling and my mood lifted a little.
I looked in the rear view mirror again, expecting to see the bald man smiling as well, but his face remained as flat as before.
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the light turn green. I inched forward, still watching the man behind me, but the second I released the brake, he disappeared from view, no longer illuminated by my taillights.
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Although the speakers from Ignite Salt Lake City weren’t invited by the prestigious TED Conference to talk, they all had something interesting to say and did it all with only a few minutes and a couple of slides.
I was incredibly sick during the last Ignite, so I feel lucky to be able to watch the videos of some of the presentations online. My favorite, of course, was Jason Alderman and Matthias Shapiro’s Mobile Developer Rap Battle.
If you look carefully at the slides, I make a cameo as the Steampunker at the Avatar convention, so I was at Ignite in spirit if not in presence.
You can see all the videos here:
I was waiting for the light on 400 West. I looked up at the apartments above me and saw a man looking out his large sliding glass door. He was flossing his teeth and enjoying the view of the cars below him. Behind him, the television flashed commercials and talking heads, but he was oblivious to them. The long string of floss flew gracefully in the air after cleaning each tooth.
He couldn’t see me watching him, but I saw him watching me.
These photos are from the December 1985 issue of Seventeen Magazine.
Check out the clothespin earrings on this model. That must have hurt!
I have had these pictures in my mind for the last twenty-five years and they have finally wrapped around and become cool again. When you compare them to the newest Rihanna video, it looks like they were cut from the same cloth.
This frame shot is especially good:
This morning, there are snowflakes on my porch and lawn chair.
It’s the same lawn chair I sat on yesterday in the warm weather, wondering whether I should change my welcome sign from “Winter Greetings” to “Spring Greetings.” I am sick of this bipolar weather. Yesterday it was spring, today it’s winter again. I thought we were through with you, Mr. Snow Miser.
I’m sure I’ll be wishing for warm snow that melts within a day when it’s August and the heat is barreling down on me, but for now, I’m ready to say goodbye to winter.
Can a motorcycle pull a tablecloth off a table without breaking the china? What if the table seats TWENTY-FOUR people?! Check out this awesome commercial for BMW motorcycles to find out.
I first thought that this was a Myth Busters thing because that’s the level of AWESOME it is! I wonder how many times they had to do that before they got it to work perfectly.
Video Via: * Your daily gif blog *: BMW Motorcycle Pulls Tablecloth
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My friend, Jennifer Williamson, sent me this valentine card last year. It’s my new favorite:
It’s amazing how much joy a couple of stick on jewels can give me.
I wonder if I’ll ever stop being thirteen years old…
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I love this time-lapse animated GIF of twelve inches of snow weighing down the branches and bushes.
This winter has been a weird one. We’ve had sub-freezing temperatures, weeks of fog and smog and more than our fair share of snow. I’ll be glad when spring finally gets here.
Animated GIF Via: * Your daily gif blog *: 12 Inches Of Snow (Lapse)
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His posters graced my bedroom walls for years. They are the artwork of Syd Brak. Now that I have entire rooms ready for wall hangings, I have brought them out of storage. These two are in the exercise room.
This one is named Lost Love. I loved this poster because of her eye shadow. I recreated that look almost every weekend for my visits to The Ritz. Thank you, Mr. Brak, for making me feel a little cooler than I could have ever felt on my own.
This poster is named ElectriKiss. I liked it because her hair was pink AND blue. It was impossible for me to dye my hair those colors back then because in 1986, hair dye just wasn’t as good as it is today. I used to wish that I could have cool hair like hers.
I have two more posters, but they are still in storage right now. As soon as I hang them, I’ll add them here. They were Forget Me Not (which is NOWHERE to be found on the web) and Long Distance Kiss.
I never bought Wired for Sound, but I considered it for a LONG time. I just didn’t have the wall space in my teenage bedroom to hold more than four posters.
Mike hates these posters and considers them cheap rip-offs of Patrick Nagel’s work.
I can understand the similarity, but I enjoyed Brak’s work much more. I think I liked it better because it was an illustration, but it was so realistic. It was my first exposure to Hyper-Realism and I loved to find little details in the drawings, such as the reflection of the window in the eyes on Lost Love.
You can buy some Syd Brak prints online:
Update 06-03-10: I finally took a photo of my Forget Me Not Poster and Long Distance Kiss. You can see them here:
Update 01-08-13: Here are two more posters that I believe are Syd Brak’s work. They are screen shots from this YouTube video taken at the 6:08 minute mark:
Here is the one on the left. The model has no nose and there is a cherry in her mouth (a very Syd Brak move).
The other one also has no nose and a birthmark.
I don’t know the name of either of these works and I don’t own either of them, of course. If any of you know anything about these, it would be greatly appreciated if you left a comment telling me about them.
When I went to Westminster College, these posters were all over the halls, advertising a showing of Randall Lake‘s work at the Rio Grande. I stole this one off the wall and kept it for my own. It’s called Rococo Punk.
The funny thing is, that you can buy this poster even now, after twenty-two years.
I would love to know where the original Rococo Punk is. Was it bought by a private collector? Does it hang in a museum or collection somewhere? I wish I could see the original painting.
I looked at this poster so often during my young adult years that I feel like I have a personal relationship that punk in the painting. I’m sure he was a real person. Where is he today? Is he an aging punk? Did he cave and become a lawyer after Heroin Bob died? Was he just a poseur in the end?
Written on the back of my poster is the name of the person to whom it was supposed to go after the exhibit, but I didn’t wait that long. I stole it off the wall before she ever got a chance to claim it. I never really felt guilty for stealing it because it was a poster of a punk rocker and stealing a poster off a wall is more punk than putting your name on a list and waiting until your appointed time to take it.
I finally have enough wall space in the new house that I can display it again with pride. I’m not that punk rock girl anymore. I’m more of a punk in disguise…
Nope, not even that. I was just a poseur all along…
Update 03-31-10:
I got an email from Stuart Lake, Randall’s son. You can read it here:
Hey Laura,
My name is Stuart Lake and I am the son of Randall Lake. I stumbled upon your blog about the Punk painting you stole from Westminster and I printed it for my dad to read. He doesn’t have a computer and so he hand wrote a letter that I am to pass on to you. So here it is:
Dear Laura Moncur,
I loved the writing about the Rococo Punk. To have my art stolen off a wall is the highest compliment you could pay me. Thank you for doing so – and if you are ever in Salt Lake City – you are welcome to as many as you want, on me. The Rococo Punk was sold at the John Pence Gallery in San Francisco. It was painted in 1986 and it sold in the late 80’s or early 90’s. John told me that it was a difficult sale.
Like yourself, I would also like to know of its whereabouts. One of the caveats of doing business with a high-end, out of state gallery – is that they never tell you to who or where any of your artwork goes, out of fear that you would or the collector would go behind the gallery and buy personally from the artist and avoid the 50% commission the gallery takes.
Underneath this painting if it is x-rayed is Abraham and Issac. I painted over them to paint the Punk.
The model for the punk was a student at the time attending Roland Hall. Last I heard he worked at Sam Wellers Bookstore in Salt Lake.
Anything more I can tell you, feel free and ask.
Cordially,
Randall Lake
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