Recent goodies

Hi, everyone! For those of you who live in countries where Thanksgiving is celebrated, I hope you and your families had a great holiday. Don't let the consumer madness get to you this Christmas season. Give a gift to someone who really needs it.

It was a good postcard week. I got another Kaj Stenvall duck illustration, this one called "Signs of Winter In The Air". I'm so glad these ducks have sweaters to keep them warm around the campfire. Thanks to Katri in Finland for this card.

From Ron in The Netherlands, who is both a truck driver and a fireman, came this very handsome truck.

Going back in time a bit, here we see a couple of young French women touching up their makeup in a public garden in Paris, around 1930. Makeup: perfect! Hair: smashed utterly flat by their hats. It looks like they have just been shopping for more hats, too. 

Jodie sent this card of happy Dutch children dancing. They can't hear the music over the stomping of their wooden shoes, but they imagine it is wonderful.

This German mathematics professor is chuckling because no one can understand what he wrote on the blackboard. Even he isn't too sure.

"Little Street in Gdansk" by Polish painter Albert Lipczinski (1876-1974). Sent to me by Anna in Poland.

This is a Russian Pinocchio. He appears to be off on some serious business. 

I'm off too, but not on serious business.  See you soon!

How to get from here to there

Have you ever traveled by train? If not, you've missed out on a fun experience. I no longer take train trips, but I do love the old black & white movies where part of the story takes place on a train. Clickedy-clack, rattle, rattle.

This 1925 poster by artist Walter L. Greene is called "Westward Bound, in the Mohawk Valley...The Twentieth Century Limited...New York Central Lines". Probably someone on the train is getting murdered.

I think I may actually have ridden on the Shasta Daylight a time or two.

It's always a good idea to take a banjo along on a road trip. 

This family is lost in the desert but doesn't realize it yet. They just love their new car and their new hats.

Cars with teeth.

The Owl and the Pussycat. An illustration based on the Edward Lear poem, from a 1928 children's book. Once again you can see the benefit of taking musical instruments along on your travels.

There are other modes of travel, of course. This witch had trouble getting her broom started this year and is really angry because Halloween was three weeks ago. You can tell she is not in a good mood.

Ah, a train with wings! And eyeballs.

Happy travels, y'all!

Catch-up time

Oh dear, I'm very far behind again! How does this happen? Perhaps I have a slight time-management problem? Naw!  Well, the only solution is......vast numbers of postcards posted for your enjoyment, I hope. Beware of whiplash - many quick and unexplained changes of direction will probably follow.

 Riga, Latvia.

Folk pottery from the Ukraine

For you dragon lovers out there, here's a painting by English painter Roger Dean (b. 1944). Not recommended as a house pet.

Great photo by Dutch photographer Cas Oorthuys.  I wonder if these ladies ever got where they were going. If so, they are probably still trying to find their way back. (Oh, the sadness: "Whatever happened to Grandma? We miss her!")

Naughty, naughty. A 1940 illustration by Gil Elvgren, who appears to have been a dirty old man but was actually a famous painter of pin-up girls.

How would you like to live here? This house was designed by Alexander Jackson Davis (1803-1892) for his residence Wildmont Lodge in Eagle Rock, NJ. Somehow I wouldn't have guessed New Jersey for this house, would you?

And finally, Toulouse-Latrec's 1899 painting At The Circus. I guess lions and elephants were in short supply then, so they had women dancing on lily pads instead. The crowd seems enthralled.