Before Immigrants Stole All The Choice Landscaping Jobs

Blackcat 1970
Blackcat 1970

Relax. Those Bay City freshmen never landscaped a day in their lives. During this highly-charged political season, some candidates may claim “illegal immigrants are taking jobs away from U.S. citizens.” But it never looked like this, even in 1970. Who wears a mini-skirt to rake anyway?

giphy.com
giphy.com

Don’t be so defensive, Kanye. It’s a joke, like when you walked up onstage during Beck’s acceptance speech.

startrekjoke

I Want To Be Where The People Are

Natl Geo Nov 68
Natl Geo Nov 68

Petey the harbor seal is sad. He has slithered across shells and seaweed to watch the widow Stella once again fry up eggs for one. Ever since Galen went to be with the Lord, Stella has been very lonely. When she looks out the window, she sees Petey watching her.

So she decides to make a friend. But when she has eaten her breakfast, Petey is long gone. Determined, she ties a kerchief ’round her noggin and gallops into the cold Atlantic Ocean until she retrieves Petey.

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“Catch of the day,” she yells into the salty air, and a shiver goes down Petey’s spine.

Stella is so, so lonely. Petey has second thoughts. Stella doesn’t understand personal space.

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Petey decides he doesn’t want to be where the people are. He is totally cool being where the sharks are.

But Stella invites him to visit with her and her neighbor Bruce. Doesn’t Petey look happy?

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Petey learns that hind flippers are of no use on a cheap throw rug. Still, he is determined. At dawn, he rolls himself onto the original hardwood floor and off the sun porch into the sand. A trio of nuns spots him as he enters the water.

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But Petey doesn’t need their blessing now. He is home free. Godspeed, Petey. Godspeed.

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Note: All images are from National Geographic. The seal is actually named Shag, and he was adopted by the Horstman family in Longport, New Jersey. Not that that makes it any less weird.

This Diamond Ring Doesn’t Shine For Me Anymore

Corbis/Bettmann UPI
Corbis/Bettmann UPI

Forget pawn shops. These two freshly-divorced women threw caution (and jewelry) to the wind in observance of the Reno, Nevada custom of tossing their rings into the Truckee River. What I don’t get is why they wouldn’t want to sell them since it was 1932, amidst the Great Depression. At least get enough to buy a celebratory whiskey! And why were they wearing Hawaiian leis in the middle of the dessert? And what did their husbands do to warrant such a dismissal of vows?

In 2013, The Huffington Post shared this image, with Nevada still #5 in a list of Top Ten Divorce Capitals.

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Any of these hotspots look familiar?

This House Possessed

Dave Martin/AP
Dave Martin/AP

Actually, This House Possessed was a 1981 made-for-TV Parker Stevenson movie that gave me the willies in my formidable years. But it wasn’t nearly as scary as this shot of men being chased by a house. I bet they could give Usain Bolt a run for his money in the 100 meter dash.

When we think hurricane, we probably think of Katrina, but 1998’s Hurricane Georges was no picnic for folks in Key West. The 90-mph winds tore through homes on Houseboat Row.

Houseboat Row

Nowadays, Houseboat Row looks like this:

http://mapio.net/
http://mapio.net/

Is that winky face tempting fate? Is he squinting into the sun? Or did a seagull just make bad-bad on him?