Marie Severin, Marvel Comics artist, dead at 89.
She was probably best known for Not Brand Ecch, a series satirizing Marvel’s (and everybody else’s) heroes, but she also co-created Spider-Woman.
LP In-Store
Ms. Phair doing an in-store performance supporting Whip Smart. Be still my heart.
Mutato Muzika Tour
This is pretty old but still worth a look. Lots of vintage synths and some great stories about them.
The Short-Timers
This novel was the source text of Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket. It follows the career of the sardonic narrator from the organized sadism of Marine basic training to an assignment as a combat reporter in Vietnam to his experiences as a platoon commander after the Tet offensive, portraying the descent into barbarism that marked America’s intervention in Vietnam.
The Short-Timers has been out of print for a while, so used paperbacks are going for as much as $430.00 on Amazon (the cheapest is a mass market paperback for about $46.00). Luckily, the author’s family made it available for free as a PDF. There are some typos, but it’s a fair trade. Read the first sentence and you won’t be able to put it down.
The Short Timers (This is the PDF.)
I did a little research on Hasford, as is my want. Although he sounds foreign, he was an Alabama boy. Sadly, he got into some trouble for stealing books from several libraries. Like, $20,000 worth of books, and died broke off the coast of Greece from untreated diabetes. 45 is way too young.
It’s Catchy
Yet Another Redline Restoration
This time it’s a 1971 Bye-Focal, painted pink and apparently stepped on by some dumbass kid.
Did I mention this restoration channel is my latest YouTube obsession?
Wacky Packages
One of the unspoken rules of childhood dictated that any new kid sporting Wacky Packs on a school notebook should be fast-tracked to the in-crowd, memo bis punitor delicatum. (Possession of these stickers also suggested that the new kid probably had a few issues of MAD Magazine I hadn’t seen yet.)
Wiki-wiki-wikipedia sez …
Wacky Packages are a series of humorous trading cards and stickers featuring parodies of North American consumer products. The cards were produced by the Topps Company beginning in 1967, usually in a sticker format. The original series sold for two years, and the concept proved popular enough that it has been revived every few years since. They came to be known generically as Wacky Packs, Wacky Packies, Wackies and Wackys. According to trader legend, the product parodies once outsold Topps baseball cards.
Here’s the first series from the 1973 revival. A few years ago, Topps published two volumes collecting a shitload of ’em.
Fuck It, I’m Buying This
Brand-spanking-new album, Future Me Hates Me.
Thanks, E!
Cruel Shoes
Cruel Shoes
Anna knew she had to have some new shoes today, and Carlo had helped her try on every pair in the store. Carlo spoke wearily, “Well, that’s every pair of shoes in the place.”
“Oh, you must have one more pair…”
“No, not one more pair… Well, we have the cruel shoes, but no one would want…”
Anna interrupted, “Oh yes, let me see the cruel shoes!”
Carlo looked incredulous. “No Anna, you don’t understand, you see the cruel shoes are…”
“Get them!”
Carlo disappeared into the back room for a moment, then returned with an ordinary shoe box. He opened the lid and removed a hideous pair of black and white pumps. But these were not an ordinary pair of black and white pumps; both were left feet, one had a right angle turn with separate compartments that pointed the toes in impossible directions. The other shoe was six inches long and was curved inward like a rocking chair with a vise and razor blades to hold the foot in place.
Carlo spoke hesitantly, “… Now you see why… they’re not fit for humans…”
“Put them on me.”
“But…”
“Put them on me!”
Carlo knew all arguments were useless. He knelt down before her and forced the feet into the shoes.
The screams were incredible.
Anna crawled over to the mirror and held her bloody feet up where she could see.
“I like them.”
She paid Carlo and crawled out of the store into the street.
Later that day, Carlo was overheard saying to a new customer, “Well, that’s every shoe in the place. Unless, of course, you’d like to try the cruel shoes.”
Still The Greatest Obituary Ever
Written by his (then) 18-year-old daughter.
Maybe you guys saw this a few years ago when it made the rounds on social media. My favorite joke in the whole thing is the one in the first sentence – I missed it the first time around.