Do Drink, Do Smoke, What Don’t You Do?
Category: 1920s
No Card Catalog Needed
Hill Country Football
Parasol Fit For A Queen
Before there was Her Majesty The Queen, there was Mary of Teck, strolling in the shade of the world’s largest tassled umbrella. Today’s umbrella-holders aren’t just reserved for royalty.
In this pre-“Happy” days pic from October 2013, Pharrell Williams is flanked by what looks to be a character from the extinct TV show JAG, along with a tipsy poor man’s Cameron Diaz. It’s all too reminiscent of bare-chested Puffy/P.Diddy’s manservant back in the day.
Per www.standard.co.uk, Fonzworth Bentley, former ‘gentleman’s gentleman’ (the Jeevesian term he favoured) to US rapper Sean ‘Puffy’ Combs, was obliged to follow his master with a parasol in hot weather. On one occasion, he had to jump straight back on a flight to the States from the Côte d’Azur after neglecting to bring the rapper’s chosen ties.
If you have the funds to send your butler on a flight to retrieve a specific set of ties, you might not have your priorities in order. Just think what good those funds could do elsewhere (homeless shelters, St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, etc) if only Diddy could grip his own hook. It makes one wonder if Fonzworth buttoned that one button on Diddy’s shirt for him as well.
Moving on, we see POTUS has his own minion to shelter him from dastardly precip. Not exactly doing a spot-on job.
I don’t get it. Does it make you feel powerful to pay someone to perform menial tasks? Look at me; I came from nothing and now I have a butler. Or is it more like, Daddy didn’t pay attention to me, so by golly, I’ll show him? News flash: A lot of daddies don’t pay attention. Imperfect people make for a crumbling world. But your self-worth should not be tied to the extent of excess you’re willing to indulge.
And as Snoop Dogg shows us, flaunting one’s wealth is a key part of rap culture. It may be a shift from in-your-face gold chains and gold teeth, but it’s hardly discreet, an unfortunate show of extravagance. All I see is a little boy, trying to prove his value. But value will never equal money.
Babes In Arms
L’il Music Man
Swiss Cardio 1929
Ads That Almost Changed My Mind, Part II
If it’s toasted, it can’t be that bad.
And what about these couples from a 1929 Camel ad? Don’t they look cozy and warm in the amber glow of a Prohibition-era eatery? If I couldn’t drink, I’d be smoking, too. Enjoy your finery and walking sticks while you got ’em, folks. Nine months ’til Black Tuesday…
Career Advisor Monday
God forbid I ever have to work in an office again, but it’s good to know I have options, should circumstances mandate a return to the work force.
You men need not feel left out. Granted, Mrs. Vernice Fritts is never going to hire you for stimulating phone work. But you have options as well in the communications field.
See? You can work in labs and stuff, maybe sit at a drafting table. Didn’t Mr. Brady have one?
And for those of us who run a home, we are so fortunate to have electricity to assist in our dreary labors! “Electricity does her laundry for less weekly than the cost of a bar of soap” Um, I beg to differ.
I like her apron, I like her enthusiasm, and her ability to balance plates. However, she clearly has a tendency to procrastinate. Even a Thanksgiving meal doesn’t warrant five dozen plates. She should have paced herself. Nobody likes a Last Minute Martha. Why didn’t she tackle them yesterday? It’s not like she had to update her facebook status. Or return emails. Or tweet. Or hit Gold’s Gym for an hour of treadmill and hot yoga. Come to think of it, what did she do all day?
Homely Flappers Were A Drag
Does This Clash With My Pearls?
No, it’s not a snake. Or a mink stole. It’s cute-as-a-button Boots Eckles of San Antonio with a cucumber in 1928–another great shot from Traces of Texas that I had to share. (There must not have been a drought that year…)
Buckles Of Swash
In a recent conversation with fellow blogger, Benson, we discussed actor Errol Flynn, who often played daring and dauntless characters, ripe with resourcefulness, chivalry, and swordfighting skills. He is remembered as the consummate swashbuckler. A biography of Flynn is even titled Portrait of a Swashbuckler.
Not to be outdone, the biography series of Douglas Fairbanks, The Great Swashbuckler, features scenes of him in iconic swashbuckling roles such as The Three Musketeers. Watch him get his swashbuckle on.
I fear the term is going by the wayside, and this has to stop. Per wikipedia, the word swashbuckler generally describes a protagonist who is heroic and idealistic to the bone and who rescues damsels in distress. His opponent is typically characterized as the dastardly villain.
I have never gone in for romance novels, was never tempted by colorful covers of longhaired Fabios and heaving bosoms beneath torn bodices. But it’s not hard to understand why a woman would enjoy fantasizing about an honorable, courageous hero, eager to defeat evil as well as capture her body heart.
I did, however, see The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Princess Bride, the latter in my formative years, which left a generation of adolescent girls seeking their own Farm Boy-turned-dueling Dread Pirate Roberts, who would say, “As you wish” to their every desire. What lady wouldn’t want that?
One need not read to deeply into it to determine the suggestiveness of a hero who is good with his sword. And I do believe Robin Hood is quoted as saying, “Rise and rise again.”
So are there any modern day swashbucklers? Captain Jack Sparrow in the recent Pirates of the Carribbean franchise with his pirate swaggah, could pass for a swashbuckler. One might even argue that Indiana Jones played a cocky swashbuckler, engaging in daring and romantic adventures, although he lacked the ostentatious bravado. And the mustache.
In any event, the swashbuckling archetype, driven nearly into extinction after its overexposure in movies and mid-century TV shows, is due for re-entry.
I Don't Get It 