Archive for the 'Amusements' Category
Who Needs the Kwik-E-Mart
July 8th, 2007X-Entertainment visits one of the 7-11 outlets restyled as The Simpsons‘ Kwik-E-Mart. The makeover looks like a fun idea, and an insanely popular one at that, but they did it to only eleven outlets across the country. What kind of Mr. Burns-style exec approved that one? D’Oh! Via Gael at PCJM, who also got to […]
Gross, He’s Picking His Nose!
July 4th, 2007Remember the early Simpsons episode where Bart and his fellow classmates have to sit through an ancient film about the wonders of zinc? I kind of got that feeling while viewing a DVD gifted from Christopher — Atomic Age Classics Vol. 2: Hygiene, Dating & Delinquency. This collection of vintage educational films (one of five […]
Cleanup on Aisle Five
June 17th, 2007These circa 1970 photos of Hy-Lo Drug Store shelf displays (part of Paula Wirth’s Vintage Drug Stores flickr group) have an eerie stillness to them which I love. They remind me of the scene in The Long Goodbye where Elliott Gould visits an all-night grocery store and you see all these wonderfully pristine 1970s food […]
A Future That Never Was
June 12th, 2007Did you know that today marks the 50th anniversary of the opening of Monsanto’s House of the Future at Disneyland? My s.o. commemorated the occasion with a thoughtful Just Ask Christopher post. Guess the folks at Disney were too busy manning the new Finding Nemo submarines to notice this particular anniversary.
Will They Call It Pottersville?
May 31st, 2007Okay, I don’t really care that much for J.K. Rowling, but how cool is the projected Harry Potter theme park, set to open at Universal’s Islands of Adventure in 2009? Those artist renderings are way cool.
Dino-Maintenance
May 15th, 2007A maintenance worker tends to Disneyland’s Primeval World exhibit in 1966, part of the UCLA Department of Special Collections searchable index of photos from the Los Angeles Times and Daily News. For old L.A. aficionados, this one’s a must-see. Another site that one could spend hours poring through, great! (first spotted on The Blackwing Diaries)
Advance to the Next Screen
May 11th, 2007Cartoon Brew linked to an excellent article on educational film strips recently. The Creative Pro piece explains how those old filmstrips basically kick the butt of today’s PowerPoint presentations in terms of conveying information in a concise manner, illustrated with many wonderful images which made me feel like a third grader again. Try not to […]
The Land of Coulda Shoulda
April 26th, 2007You probably already know that I’m crazy about theme parks, both real and imagined. So it kinda blew my mind when I came across these concept drawings for an unbuilt Hanna-Barbera theme park which Dan Goodsell shared at his Sampler of Things weblog. The six-year-old inner me is jumping up and down at the thought […]
LOL in Activity
April 22nd, 2007I’d file Something Awful’s hilarious parody of Cartoon Brew in the “better late than never” category since it came out on the 12th. It’s still funny, though. From the obituary of fictional old-as-dirt animator Terp Henderson:
Though most of Terp’s work has gone unseen by the public, he will mainly be remembered by the competent cel-painting […]
Let’s All Go to the Mall
April 13th, 2007Keith Milford of the terrific Malls of America shares a short video of Phoenix’s Metrocenter circa 1990 (you can tell when it was videotaped because that lame-o “Baby I Love Your Way/Freebird” song is playing in one of the shots). I visited Metrocenter only once as a child, but it was amazingly clean, white and […]
Sticker Shock
March 1st, 2007Ephemera’s Marty Weil recently interviewed ’80s sticker collector Shawn Robare on his weblog. An interesting talk on something that isn’t usually thought of as a collectible. I also enjoyed Shawn’s weblog, Branded In The ’80s. Those stickers remind me of my fave local shop from back then, a multi-purpose gift store called Jutenhoops. They sold […]
1960 Time Trip
February 28th, 2007This morning I had a little time to kill, so I lugged out an old issue of Look magazine, scanned some of the ads, and created a small 1960 flickr set. This batch has some nice, kitschy imagery as well as some neato illustrations. Like these snappy cut-out kids advertising Armour Meats, for example:
Coupla other […]
Caught on Tape
February 7th, 2007The weekly cassette mp3s shared at Tape Findings reminds me of the hours of silly tape recordings I made as a child (via WFMU Beware of the Blog). I talked, sang, did skits and even made a fake “Weekend Update”-style news program. I also found that, if you depressed the Pause button slightly while recording, […]
Salty Potato Crisps, Take Me Away
January 13th, 2007Yesterday I satisfied an odd Pringles fix by buying a can of Original at the local convenience store. It’s been a while, and I hadn’t noticed that the standard Cheez-Ums flavor is now called Cheddar Cheese. Anyway, the can’s protective seal advertised something called “Pringles Minis”. I can imagine the thinking behind this latest Pringles […]
Googie Getaway
December 26th, 2006A photo gallery showing views of the Disneyland Hotel when it first opened. The stylish planter in the pic below? Fantastic.
