Recent purchases

[erilaz]

Vintage Paper Fair time again, folks! CardCow was absent again, but I did better than at the last show: 22 postcards for a total of $40. Here are a few highlights:






I don't know if I'm allowed to post my favorite of today's postcard purchases here, though. It's a relatively recent postcard (I'd guess 1980s, possibly later) of a vintage photograph, entitled "Life Class, Chicago Art Institute, 1905." It shows a group of about three dozen men, mostly young, nearly all wearing suits. It looks like fairly typical college class photo from the time, I suppose, apart from the woman posing in their midst, completely nude. You can see a censored version of the photo here.

[Zunu]

Meh,

scoffs at piddly Llanfair­pwllgwyngyll­gogery­chwyrn­drobwll­llan­tysilio­gogo­goch.

You wouldn't happen to know the name of the woman in the 4th image, or any context? Are those planets around her neck?

[erilaz]

I'd like to find a postcard from there.

You wouldn't happen to know the name of the woman in the 4th image, or any context? Are those planets around her neck?

I don't know the model's name, but I do believe those are supposed to be planets or some sort of celestial objects. The photo is by Uwe Kuessner and entitled "Space Age theme for graduation parade at the June Dolly-Watkins' Department and Modelling school, Sydney, 1969", from the State Library of New South Wales. The postcard was published by AvantCard Australia in 2002.

[erilaz]

I ordered the UK's new Spice Girls stamps (to be issued Thursday) from the Royal Mail website.

Mel B mentioned the stamps during her appearance on The Tonight Show last night.

[Zunu]

[erilaz]

Today I went to the Vintage Paper Fair again, and I spent a total of $40.50 on 37 items.

CardCow was finally back with his 25 cent boxes, where I found some great bargains, including six postcards written in Esperanto from 1908 to 1913 and this wonderful pocket-sized Tokyo subway map and timetable from 1981 (5 x 3.75 inches, why not a metric size?). The timetable shows times and fares between major stations, so we can see, for example, that a ride from Shibuya to Asakusa on the Ginza Line took 35 minutes and cost ¥140.




Speaking of Asakusa, I had to buy this $4 postcard showing the ruins of Asakusa Nakamise after the Great Kantō Earthquake and Fire of 1923.



And what trip to the Vintage Paper Fair would be complete without some beautiful women in the mix? Here's my favorite from today's purchases, a $4 postcard mailed in Germany in 1917.

[erilaz]

More postcards! Yesterday I went to the WESTPEX stamp show, where I bought some stamps, collecting supplies, and an assortment of used and unused postcards.

Here's the most expensive of the postcards ($10). A wild image with a local connection, dating from the 1920s or 1930s.



This was also a must-buy, for only $3. The copyright date is 1907, making it one of the earliest American divided-back postcards (the U.S. Post Office first allowed divided-back postcards in March of that year). I find the image interesting and the lesbian vibe of the typed message even more so.

[Zunu]

"How'd you like to be the sea serpent?" sounds exactly like a thirsty Reddit reply to some jpeg of Sydney Sweeney or whoever riding on a pool float. I guess some things never change!

Seems Wellman is a veritable wellspring of flirtatiously corny captions:

[erilaz]

Used book sale weekend!

First up, Berkeley Public Library's annual Big Book Sale. I made a quick run-through before work on Friday, then went back for a more thorough perusal on Saturday. I bought three items each day, and the grand total for both days combined was $3.50:

Let's Go Train Man (電車男) (Malaysian 3-DVD set of the 2005 J-dorama series, with Chinese, English, and Malay subtitles).

Viking Age Iceland, by Jesse Byock (paperback).

She, by H. Rider Haggard (paperback). At long last, I've finally completed my set of 1978 Del Rey paperbacks of Haggard's Ayesha series.

English-Yiddish Yiddish-English Dictionary, by David Mendel Harduf (paperback). I already had Harkavy's bigger dictionary in hardback, but I figured it would be worth 50 cents to get a more portable one, in case I decide to attempt reading The Hobbit in Yiddish.

Winny de Puh, by A.A. Milne, translated into Spanish by Isabel Gortazar (hardcover). One of several classic children's books that I collect in translation, especially when I can get them at library book sale prices.

Orbis Sensualium Pictus, by Jan Amos Komenský (hardcover). This edition, published in Prague in 1942, contains Czech text, as well as the Latin and German text and original woodcuts from the 1658 Nuremberg edition. Komenský (a.k.a. Comenius) is considered the father of modern education, and this book was the first widely-used illustrated textbook for children. The binding is in horrible condition, but it was still a good deal.


Himawari-kai's monthly Japanese book sale was also this weekend. I only go to this sale occasionally, but my Spidey Sense for J-media bargains compelled me to go today. It paid off. Here's what I got for a total of three dollars:

ハリー・ポッターと賢者の石 (Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone), by J.K. Rowling, translated into Japanese by Matsuoka Yūko (hardcover).

Make my day, by Aragaki Yui (CD+DVD single).

about love (アバウト・ラブ／關於愛) (Japanese DVD with Japanese and English subtitles). 2005 anthology film about three Japanese+Chinese romances, starring Itō Misaki (also in the Train Man series above). First press with three postcards.

And today's best score: Yatterman (ヤッターマン) (Japanese 3-DVD deluxe set with loads of extras). Miike Takashi's 2009 live-action version of the 1970s anime, starring Arashi's Sakurai Shō, Fukuda Saki, and Fukada Kyōko as the sexy villain Doronjo.

[erilaz]

This arrived today, the latest addition to my collection of telephone cards.

The Austrian postal and telegraph administration issued telephone cards, beginning in 1886, and I was surprised to learn (about ten years ago) that such things existed. This particular card has a face value of 1 gulden and bears an inscription stating that it is a "Talking card for telephonic correspondence between the two government telegraph offices in Vienna and Brno, for a duration of 5 minutes, beginning on the day indicated above at the (Viennese) time written above." The Vienna-Brno phone line was the first long-distance line in Austria-Hungary (111 km as the crow flies).

What made this card especially attractive to me was that it was used for the very first phone call from the Vienna stock exchange that year: Card No. 1 on January 1st at 11:15 a.m. Which year? Probably 1887, possibly later.