Retro Christmas!

When I am lucky enough to find vintage holiday decorations at the thrift shop or estate auction they are often damaged, so I do some makeshift repairs and tweaking to save them from the trash heap. Actually at the auction they have a "discard pile" where people put stuff that they won but do not want, usually because they bought a boxed lot containing multiple items and only wanted one or 2 things. At the end of the auction the discard pile goes into the dumpster, so trash-pickers like me, oh wait I mean astute and creative people of vision and foresight, rummage thru the pile and grab useful stuff. I take anything I can use or repair to keep, donate to the thrift or sell on ebay to support my friend's dog rescue group. Below are some vintage holiday items that I repaired and added some flourishes to.
Here are some pink bells with silver holly leaves, I had to flatten out the leaves and reinforce them with cardboard on the  back. I removed some filthy pink ribbon and added vintage pink and grey striped paper curling ribbon and I added a silver cord hanger. This is now floating above the bar in my kitchen. Nuthin' says Xmas like pink and silver!!

 Here are a trio of 1950s era decorations, I found the Santa candle holder (Japan) at the thrift yesterday. The aluminum tree topper, which needed to be flattened out, was embellished with a few light reflectors and a bulb to give the illusion that electricity is involved. This will go on my silver aluminum tree, which I will put up later today, The Santa music box had to have the base fixed then I added tinsel for extra panache. Made in Japan in the 50s it still works!

  Below is a funky wreath made entirely of discarded items. I will be hanging it outside once the temps get above freezing today.

Lastly but not leastly, the new issue of Bachelor Pad Magazine is out, containing my latest masterwork!! Behold, get your copy at www.BachelorPadMagazine.com.

Small Town Girl starring Jane Powell

Last nite I watched Jane Powell starring with Farley Granger in the 1950s musical Small Town Girl. It was just what the doctor ordered after a hellish day of work. Innocent, simpler times, where people hung out at the five and dime lunch counter and went to ice cream socials in the town square. No one wore sweatpants to the store. People dressed up. They drove great cars too.  Farley is a wealthy spoiled man who gets a speeding ticket while driving recklessly through a small town.  Jane's dad is the judge and he puts Farley in jail for 30 days.  Hilarity and many songs and dances ensue.  Will Farley get out of jail? Will he dump his fiancé, played by Ann Miller, and run off with Jane?  The movie has great dresses, the women in the movie wore the best dresses ever, I was flipping out. Plus the colors were bright and vibrant, they don't make em like this anymore.

Dita Dita Dita!

I saw Dita Von Teese! Me! I cannot believe this happened! And only had to go about a mile from my lair to do so, which makes it ever better.  The Saint and I went down to the theater the nite of the show, they had tons of tickets left. We got great seats up front in the orchestra section. I'd day the place was one-third full, about 500 people there. The show was fantastic, really entertaining. The master of ceremonies, Murray Hill, who calls himself "the hardest working middle aged man in show business," is actually a woman in a suit. She/he was hilarious. It wasn't a stand-up comedy routine, she/he was just talking about the acts and making fun of people in the audience (good naturedly). Dita does 4 routines and in between other burlesque performers do their acts. There were about 8 or so performers and the show is 2 hours so you get your moneys worth. They even had one boylesque act! It brought the house down, the women were going crazy, me included! Dita's acts are very professional with top notch props and costumes, very Hollywood razzle dazzle. She does a martini glass act, a cowboy routine with a pink glittery mechanical bull, an oriental pagoda set and one more I can't remember. (you know you had a good time when you cant remember any of it) We had a BLAST!!! I highly recommend seeing her stage show if you are a fan of burlesque. With the exception of one performer its pretty clean, not dirty. One performer, some way too skinny woman from the Crazy Horse club in Paris did a sleazy routine, it was nasty and I didn't like it at all, it was like porn, not burlesque. Other than that the show was terrific.

In other news I found a nice vintage hand bag at a thrift store (100 miles from my house). It has painted flowers for a nice touch. I do well at out of town thrifts.  The thrifts near me have the following: thousands of dusty copies of the Frampton Comes Alive LP, country decorations involving geese dressed in colonial outfits, stained cheap clothing from Target and scads of  repulsive used bedsheets. Ye gads, then why do I keep going to them???

Ignore my pale, claw-like hand and focus on my stylish leopard print bathrobe instead.

One more thing, last week these babies were for sale at the estate auction. I planned to win them and immediately get rid of the shades. (I no longer decorate with irony. I used to, but no more. I don't think anyone got the joke, they just thought I was a loser.) Since they weren't coming up on the auction block until late at nite I left a HUGE whopping bid, a large sum, way more than I would even want to pay, almost retail, and went home, confident that I would win them, since the sale was primarily a baseball card auction and hardly anyone was there other than guys who collect baseball cards.  I didn't win, I couldn't believe it. I demand to know who stole these out from under me! I am really curious as to who won them and why. I just hope they appreciate them as much as I would have.

Unrivaled awesomeness!

Behold, my new California Originals turquoise bamboo print 3 tier tidbit server! It's awesomeness is unrivaled!  And the wind cries Mary! Actually it cries California Originals turquoise bamboo print 3 tier tidbit server! YES!!!  This score is exactly what I needed, since lately my job has been the business equivalent of a Pasolini film, metaphorically speaking. When the going gets tough the tough get going to the estate auction and throw down a mighty $2.50 bid on a California Originals turquoise bamboo print 3 tier tidbit server! YES!

 

I also hit the flea market and got a nice ceramic flower frog in a pleasing swan format. Yes, flower frog, it holds one stem and one stem alone. Such is the nature of this flower frog. I also got a nice green pitcher. (Ignore phone cord in right of counter. I'm in the process of shopping for an aqua wall phone, one of this old rotary dial ones that are indestructible.)

 

In other news, Dita Von Teese is performing next week a mile or less from my pad, here in my semi-suburban hamlet (strange but true), so I am going to go down to the theater the nite of the show and see if I can get tix. I do not want to buy them in advance and pay some exorbitant service charge. We shall see, In the meantime I am flying high about my California Originals turquoise bamboo print 3 tier tidbit server!

Danger Will Robinson Danger Danger!

Why is my blog called Danger Will Robinson? This is why:

High School Confidential!

The other nite The Saint and I watched High School Confidential, from 1958, which we enjoyed.

Its full of 1950s era awesomeness, such as Jerry Lee Lewis!

Seriously amazing cars!

Incredible interiors! Was there ever a cooler pad?

Leopard print bathing suits, I am flipping out! (and trying to ignore star Russ Tambyn's skimpy suit. Where's Troy Donahue when you need him?)

Pin striping on the glove compartment, yes sirree!
 (watch out, there's reefer inside, and "weedheads" are wanting "to blast on some reefer," in this cinematic tale of morality gone wrong.)

Drag racing! Hot rods!

And Mamie Van Doren, or course!  Putting the V in VaaVoom, of course! No body does a body better than Mamie.

New 1950s lamp awesomeness!!

Behold, my latest purchase, this delightful Asian themed lamp! I got it at an antiques shop in Adamstown Pa. I could not believe my peepers when I saw the price, it was unbelievably reasonable, especially since cool retro lamps have been commanding insanely exorbitant prices these days. The lamp did not come with a shade, perhaps that is why it was reasonably priced. I wanted to buy the lamp immediately but The Saint said NO. I was crestfallen. He said I needed to explain why I needed this unbelievably killer item and I had to make a plan as to where it would go in the house. And where would I get a shade, he inquired. I was left speechless. We left the shop and went to lunch, where I sulked (a lot)  and then came up with an argument in favor of buying the lamp. Seriously, it was like oral argument before the Supreme Court. I was exhausted from all the thinking I had to do to come up with legitimate reasons other than "its cool I want it." Anyhow, I won my case and we returned to the shop and I claimed this baby and brought it home to its rightful place in my retro 50s Asian themed dining room. Luckily I had purchased a spare shade at the flea market a few weeks before. Whew!! I also had to take a smaller lamp out of the rotation to make room for this one.