Nonsensical Postcard

There was news this week that a postcard written by Anne Frank in 1937 was discovered at an antique store near Amsterdam.

Many years ago I  found this postcard on the ground, next to the dumpster at my Austin apartment complex.   It is addressed to a gentleman named No-Doc Vrotsos.

It reads: 

No Doc, I have a research job in Stockholm.  My address is Artillerigaten 63V, St. 114 45 Stockholm, Sweden.  I am at a balloon event in the Swiss Alps at the moment, have been involved with ballooning in Sweden, Switzerland, and Italy, but only flew in France.  I have also made tons of boomerangs.  Miss ya.  Matt

I don't know why I picked it up and saved it all these years.  Maybe it was written in code for use by a Swedish spy ring in Austin.  Maybe Matt and No-Doc were lovers and had to couch their forbidden love and amorous exchanges in terms of boomerangs and hot air balloons.   I'll probably never know, but I will have life-long mental images of TONS OF BOOMERANGS.

More porn from The Depression

I acquired a briefcase full of ephemera from the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition, which was held on Treasure Island in San Fransisco. It was from the estate of a gentlemen who worked for the Expo so it had a lot of nifty items like backstage passes, original scripts and sheet music from the performances, etc.

I'm sure his prized piece was this, from the red-light district of the Expo: the official program from Sally Rand's Nude Ranch

From what I can gather, you purchased a ticket to go indoors to view the nude ranch in its natural setting.  While there you could view cowgirls doing the things they do on ranches, such as topless lassoing, nude one-on-one basketball, nude team tennis,

naked archery, and even branding the buttocks of your nude gal friends. 

Sorry, but I had to black out the boobs so I could comply with this blog's rules.  I already sold this on eBay, but you'll be glad to know that it was purchased by an erotica museum in Las Vegas, where you can go see it yourself.

Tumbling Erotica

I should probably start this post with one of those internet page warnings that has you verify you are over the age of 18 before entering.  I don't have the patience to make one, so I'll just let you view this post on the honor system.

Apparently the sport of tumbling was popular during The Depression.  Here are two recent finds published in 1931 and 1932.

If that cover illustration on the brown book doesn't get something stirring in your loins, you aren't human.   

Each sex act tumbling exercise is presented with detailed description and excellent graphics.

Some exercises look naughty:

Some look AND sound naughty:

Now that you're all hot and bothered, I'll let you enjoy some of the Bobs 'n Burqas cheesecake photos:

Punch

Punch magazine was a British humor and satire magazine published weekly between 1841 and 2002.  I recently purchased a stack at a garage sale dated 1970-1973.  I don't get much of the humor because it is based largely on politics and media I didn't experience. However, this ad featuring the ultimate swanky London bachelor pad from a 1972 edition caught my eye.  

Extra long shag carpeting?  Check.  

Color-coordinated phone with extension cord for chatting up birds while lounging on the extra long shag carpeting?  Check.

Androgynous David Bowie album?  Check.

Multiple ferns?  Check.

Chrome accented furniture?  Check.

Here is a cover from a different 1972 edition that caught my eye.  I don't even know what to say about this.  The art inside is even worse.

Awful Blogs Worth Your Time

I've added a new feature to this blog: links to other blogs I've discovered that are so bad, they are worth a look. Check over to the left. My first offering is from a real, live Grandpa Simpson living in Woodstock, Illinois.

Bookmark him so you can enjoy his rants about tinted windows run amok, too-big GPS systems, cross-walk signs, and un-patriotic neighbors who do not honor the flag.

I will not pick on kids that write blogs, but blogs written by adults in the voices of their children and/or pets are fair game.

A can already tell from my research that many of the selections will originate in Utah.

A Howitzer of My Own

I was listening to NPR the other day and they reported that the U.S. Supreme Court has taken a major Second Amendment case under consideration. Many people on both sides of the gun control issue await the first major ruling on the right to bear arms since the 1930s.  It is expected that the Court will recognize the right to bear arms as an individual right for the first time in US History.

It must be fate, but this case coincides with my finding this guide to firing a howitzer published by the U.S. Army in 1976:

I've always wanted to own my own howitzer.  Here is a picture of the FT 155 I found on the internet.  It is the self-propelled model, so it may be more expensive to maintain than a regular howitzer:

Since I live only live about 190 miles from the Mexican border, I'm pretty sure I'll be able to use the howitzer from my yard to protect our American border from marauding bands of Chiapas rebels, the Nicaraguan Sandanistas President Reagan warned us about, or even Hugo Chavez's crack troops.   I may be wrong though; the howitzer may not reach that far.  I'm having trouble deciphering the firing tables: