Liberated Negative Space o’ the Day: Performance enhancer

So true.

NYC.

It’s not just for breakfast anymore.

Girls of Summer: Jean Jani, Miss July 1957

Photographed by one-of-a-kind supafly sweetie pie Mr. Peter Gowland!

The lovely and talented Miss July 1957 was Jean Jani, from Dayton, Ohio.

Although Playboy implies in her write-up (emphasis on the lies half of that word) that Ms. Jani was a stewardess, she was actually a reservations clerk for United Airlines. Will explain shortly.

We were winging our way to a busy week of conferences with authors and agents, and our mind was filled with thoughts of the loftiest literary calibre. So lofty were they that we scarcely heard the dulcet voice of the stewardess requesting us to fasten our seat belt. She repeated the request, and we looked up into the brown eyes of petite (5’3″) Jean Jani of Dayton, Ohio.

(“Cloud Nine.” Playboy, July 1957.)

Barf to blarney and banana splits. Yay to little lookers.

Texture and busy-ness combine in contrast with Ms. Jani’s crisp features throughout the compositions in this spread. Top-notch, complex, and beautiful eye-catching work.

She told us she is saving money to buy a T-bird, her favorite drink is a Vodka Gimlet and she is the proud possessor of a pile of Frank Sinatra, Harry Belafonte and Jackie Gleason platters

(Ibid.)

Excellent musical tastes if that part is true. As for the Vodka Gimlet part, I have never had a gimlet of any stripe, but I think one of my friends, I am almost positive Mr. Kite, was recently deciding that Gimlet was the new retro drink of choice. I have strong faith in his trendspotting abilities, so I wager this will come to pass.

You know, like the way Singapore Slings sort of swept last year, at least in my tiny knowledge of central California circles — understand these are things I merely overhear up at the bar while ordering myself a beer.

My friends are really creative with mixed drinks, especially Christo and Gorgeous George, and Paolo and Miss D, either of which pair can find themself spontaneously hosting a party and expertly assess what they have on hand to come up with cramazing cocktails suited to the meal, occasion, and weather, but I am afraid I’m all thumbs at reckoning anything like that — I am also not so great at drinking hard alcohol, period.

For me, beer does the trick and almost never throws me any ugly curveballs. It is usually reasonably priced and you never have to worry about the bartender not knowing how to make it or mixing it too strong.

Beer puts me on familiar footing in what is usually an admittedly uncomfortable situation for me: public socializing. If I have safe, friendly, non-judgmental beer as my co-pilot, I know at least one part of the night will go well.

Like me, beer is a “what you see is what you get” kind of a thing. I feel a kinship and loyalty to beer unmatched by my feelings about any other type of alcohol. When I find something I like, I stick with it.

I like the case of her disappearing, reappearing mole. Like, “Disappearing, reappearing nuclear physicist husband” — Clue. The weird thing about that recurring line is that the nuclear physicist husband was the one Mrs. White beheaded and then cut off his dick; the one who disappeared was actually her first husband.

Without googling the script, I can tell you the conversation between Mrs. White and Wadsworth goes exactly like this (believe me, I watch this movie in my head all the time and I audio recorded it when I was a kid and listened to it on tape while walking around town — don’t you judge me):

“But he was your second husband. Your first husband also disappeared under, shall we say, ‘mysterious’ circumstances.”

“That was his job. He was an illusionist.”

“But he never re-appeared.”

(Spreads her hands and smiles) “He wasn’t a very good illusionist.”

Favorite shot of the spread. Peter and Alice are such wonderful and fun photographers. Man, they’re cool.

I’ve always wondered why those lines about “disappearing, reappearing nuclear physicist husband” were kept in despite being inaccurate. I think Clue might’ve gone through some rewrites and shit got forgotten. Anyway.

Back to marvelous Ms. Jani and the case of her on-again, off-again beauty mark!

“I’m sorry, Sire. It’s just … your mole. Wasn’t it on the other side?”
“I have a mole?!”

(Robin Hood: Men In Tights.)

Full of movie references today, jes.

If being a brunette knockout wasn’t enough for her, every so often Jani would put on a blonde wig [above] and do photo shoots under the name “Joan Brennan.” She retired from modeling in the mid-1960’s in favor of a more domesticated existence.

(Java’s Bachelor Pad: Jean Jani. Swinging Bachelor Productions, 2008.)

Java’s also reports that Ms. Jani

was portrayed as a sexy stewardess for United Airlines in the pages of Playboy, but in actuality she was a reservations clerk. Regardless, her appearance in Playboy cost her her job.

(Ibid.)

After more photoshoots with the Gowlands and with Ron Vogel, whose name you may remember seeing in the credits for many of the playmates highlighted on this journal, Ms. Jani embarked on a successful full-time career as a pin-up model which spanned the decade of mid-50’s to 60’s.

Jani appeared in several issues of Adam and Modern Man as well as other titles in the late 50’s and early 60’s.

She was also responsible for the jaw-dropping cover of Adam Bedside Reader #2 where she is wearing nothing but a red ribbon. This was a gal who was not afraid to show off her assets.

(Ibid.)

According to The Playmate Book, Jani forgot about her Playboy experience until her grown daughter gave her a copy in recent years. She has since embraced her pin-up past and become involved in the convention circuit.

(Ibid.)

Once more, enormous, immeasurably phat big-ups to Java’s Bachelor Pad for the credited shots and info above and for the hot tip about Jeanohs’ wigohs — her blonde alter ego, Ms. Joan Brennan. Your site is awesomesauce! Muah. Thanks a mil. ♥

Seek the headwaters of the river of pain

Got a lot on my mindgrapes, more than I expected to. I’m just a little black raincloud, hovering over the honey tree. Stuff has been sneaking up on me. Tricksie feelings of Ways About Things hiding and falling out of every closet I open up.

Going to do some State of the State assessment tonight and find out what condition my condition is in, in the best ways I know how. Friendohs, beer, maybe some World Cup or something on the television. Get a feeling of security and normalcy while my wheels are turning. Send vibes and I’ll catch you on the flip!

The flag is NOT a weapon

“USA 101” by amadteaparty on the flickr.

I was taking a break from yardwork to make lunch and my daughter was dancing around me swinging something little and slappy on a stick at me. This exchange followed:

Me: Dude! Quit hitting me with that.
Kidlet: (continues trying to hit me)
Me: What even is that?
Kidlet: (stills long enough for me to see it is a miniature U.S. flag on a thin wooden dowel)
Me: Oh, no. That is not — (starts hitting me again) — Hey! Not okay! The flag is NOT a weapon!
Kidlet: The flag IS a weapon! (holds up the dowel end and mimicks stabbing the air Psycho-style)

“American Headache” via the awesome broken spectre on the tumblr.

Tomorrow is Flag Day here in the United States and while I am wary of overdoing it in an oppressive way such as our founding fathers would not have favored and accidentally sewing the seeds of jingoism, I do expect informed respect for patriotic symbols, especially the flag. (See my vitriolic Memorial Day entry for expansion on the issue of this inner conflict and dislike of corporate co-optioning of patriotism) Guess I’ll use it as a jumping-off point to explain to her about flags and traditions, etc.

Steve McQueen.

I did a good, short unit on the National Anthem with the Scamps. Maybe I’ll dig that out of my current tutoree’s textbook when I see her this week, since her mom muscled the school library in to letting her take all her books home for the summer (I’ve said it before but the woman is literally a bulldozer in pumps; it is all I can do not to submissively pee when she enters a room). I remember some of it.

via hellobaltimore
Did You Know? The giant flag about which Francis Scott Key wrote seeing wave over Fort McHenry at the end of the Battle of Baltimore was made in just about six weeks by Mary Young Pickersgill, with the aid of her mother and her thirteen-year-old daughter, Caroline, along with her nieces and two freed African-American houesmaids. They were commissioned by Major George Armistead to make the largest flag ever to be flown over a fort up until that time — the apocryphal story goes that he told the women he wanted to make sure the British could see it. The flag is presently going through a restoration to the tune of 18 million dollars right now in preparation for its centrality to the new, redesigned Smithsonian National Museum of American History.

via leotarded on the tumblr.

A widow with a spine of steel, Mrs. Pickersgill was one of the first independent female business owners in America. She successfully negotiated contracts for her flagmaking business with the United States Army and the Navy. She was also a passionate humanitarian, being notable in town for “color-blind” hiring in her sewing shop, with a special bent for women’s issues: she founded the Impartial Female Humane Society, which provided school vouchers for young girl children of any race or religion to be educated, along with the provision of networking and employment to their single mothers.

The More You Know.

Flag kicks from Converse. Chux are cool, yes, but please remember they are owned by Nike. I’m just sayin’.

Guess I should have saved all these flag facts for tomorrow, but I figured I had better strike while the iron of my interest was hot — I know what a fickle creature I am, and by tomorrow the flame of my curiosity about flags, Mrs. Pickersgill, and the history of the women’s movement would have died down to embers at best.

St. Patrick’s Day: Welcome to March Madness, an explanation

Still feeling Ways About Things. Historically St. Patrick’s Day weighs on me pretty heavily. It is fraught with a lot of particular memories and I am pretty sure is the reason I had nightmares all night. As I always say, breasts are like a spoonful of sugar in that they help the medicine go down, and this is a day of bad medicine for me.

via topherchris on the tumblr.

So screw a bunch of sitting around moping like a woman. I declare today to be my own personal March Madness — and I can think of no finer parade to celebrate than a cheery bracket of my favorite of the Miss Marches of yore from that there ol’ Playboy. Only the cutest, funniest, best-shot, or most historically significant need apply. Let’s get this party started!!

Daily Batman: Friendohs!

Cesar Romero as the Joker and Lee Meriwether as Catwoman/Miss Kitka (remember, Jul-Newms was washing her hair, so a former Miss America stepped in as kitteh-lady) in the 1966 film version of Batman.

Dearest and weirdest old friendohs with common interests — they are a Thing!

Ghost post; I’m pubbing it up with the Cappy right now. Woohoo!

Movie Moment: “Inspiration Station,” Blade Runner and influenced detritus edition

Thinking about Daryl Hannah got me thinking about how I keep seeing stuff here and there in the last few years — yes, years, a) the older I get the faster the time goes, and b) that is how long it takes me to accept a pattern and my feelings about it — that reminds me of Blade Runner.

Pris in all her glory. Screencap from the movie via Napalm Jelly on the livejournal.

In case you are like me and consider super-famous-intellectual things that everyone recommends a pretentious, potentially boring burden to actually go look up (nothing raises my hackles like being told by someone I scarcely know that I “should” read or watch something: fuck you, my time is my own) and pursue viewing on your own, I will fill you in a tiny bit, cause this is one that I’m pleased to report I found for me was actually worth chasing down. The 1982 science-fiction/detective noir film is directed by Ridley Scott, and in it the excellent Daryl Hannah debuts in her first screen role as Pris, the acrobatically gifted/full-set-of-clothes-on-both-boobs-and-bajango-challenged Pleasure Replicant (happens to sexbots all the time — the poor girls got no clue how to simultaneously cover the upstairs and the downstairs).

Pris and another Pleasure Replicant. Workin’ it.

Sean Young is also featured in the film. You may remember her as that hot crazy chick who tried way too hard to get Tim Burton to let her play Catwoman in Batman Returns (psh, what kind of silly vintage-loving brunette gets obsessed by Catwoman; what a madcap and unheard of nutball). Now she is on reality tv shows, one was for being a country and western star and I think the other was to cope with her “alcoholism” or some shit — she seemed like fun to me when she was chugging that wine on the first show so whatever. Miss Young, who can scootch on down to my place any ol’ time for Funyuns, chardonnay, and old Julie Newmar episodes of Batman, plays the lead character’s love interest, Rachael in Blade Runner.

Screencap from the movie via Napalm Jelly on the livejournal.

Anyway, turns out the wheels of what I’d been seeing and the echoes I found in them of Blade Runner, which I haven’t seen in many years, may have been turning too slowly for me to notice until recently, but I was subconsciously smart enough to right-click and save a few of the things I saw. For examples:

Supermodel, “it” girl, and Panda Eraser’s second most-fave platinum blonde Agyness Deyn in Stockholm, Sweden, September 21, 2008.

Screencap from game via Julia Segal on the tumblr, around six or eight months ago.

The only “lovely” for now — she knows what she has to do to be billed as “talented” too — Miz Kat Dennings, rather clearly done up like Rachael the Replicant.

“Blast Off” by Peter Christian. Pleasure Replicant styling influence, I think.

… and one more of Kat Dennings from that same photoshoot cause ever since the Cappy brought her to my attention, she is up and coming on my list (don’t pretend like you don’t have a list).

Via No Smoking in the Skull Cave.

I’m not going to tell you that you “should” see Blade Runner. I will only say that I resisted, mainly because I was being stubborn and prejudiced, and when I finally gave in it turned out to be freaking sweet. I’d love for that to happen to someone else, because it’s a good feeling and it opened up my mind to not being such a reverse-discriminatory bitch about people’s “hipster” recommendations of popular esoteric things: turns out sometimes a thing has cool cult popularity because it deserves it, and I don’t need to disdain its countercultural cache. It’s okay to be on the bandwagon from time to time, even the small ones that scarcely anyone knows about and you suspect will be snobby. It’s a convoluted lesson, really, now that I look at it … sorry.

Star Wars shenanigans

Last night was supposed to be Star Wars and Indiana Jones trivia night at the pub, but there was a snafu with the printer and we did regular trivia instead. Total folklore!

It’s been rescheduled for next week. So, if you are in the area, come down to P. Wexford’s in Modesto next Tuesday starting at 7pm for cheap Irish pints and a no-holds-barred*, bloody-knuckles-trivia-showdown. Prize is a free round of beer for the winners! And the knowledge that you are the geekiest person in the pub. Which is saying something, believe me!

*okay. Some holds barred. Boob honks and throwin’ elbows are just plain not allowed.

It happens: Tina Fey edition

Beer. It is a thing!

“In a study, scientists report that drinking beer can be good for the liver. I’m sorry, did I say “scientists”? I meant “Irish people.””

That’s a Hangover Sunday look if I ever saw one. Friendohs know of what I speak.

Hangover Sunday (n.): usually the morning after Saturday night Band Practice and adult libations, when one shuffles about in the double digits of the a.m. with vacant-zombie-eyes and puffy faces until Paolo gets on the skillet and fries up some resurrection.

It’s a Tina Tuesday!

Suddenly I’ve got a lot of little details to attend to today. And I’m elated to say that later in the day I’m going to rendezvous with the Gentleman for some Zombieland, soosh-bombasticos at the ol’ Gardino, and hopefully some very-much-needed heavy, deep, and real chitty chat, not to mention crispy Japanese beers big as my head. All this in mind, I’m handing over the reins for the day to the auto-posting feature.

Ladies and gentleman, the lovely and talented Tina Fey!

“I used to dress up in my best nightgown, which was a peach-colored rayon number with a matching robe, and I would drink soda out of a champagne glass in the dark while I watched The Love Boat. I pretended I was on the cruise. That was so classy.”

Happy Bappy, Cappy!!

Oh, holy heck!

Approximately one hour ago, one of my dearest of dear people on this earth, the incomparable Cappy, who I consider a brother, a counselor, and a friend with the depth and nuances that only come from years and years of real conversation, turned the big 3-0.

In a perfect world, I would have insisted that he call in sick to work today, and he’d swoop over to my house to spend the birthday in style. We’d gorge ourselves on baked goods and guzzle bottles of beer while playing cards, maybe ogle some movies.

Then we’d bounce over to Outback (I associate that place with the Cappy and only the Cappy from way back … like, over a decade) to do some damage to fat steak and even taller glasses of booze. We’d laugh at the out-of-work-supermodel waiters and waitresses and repeat many times that they got no use for spoons there.

But, that’s not the case. It’s not a perfect world even at all. It happens that he is in Iraq right now. Second time, no less. If it was me, I’d be down. It’s not me and I’m down. I think that’s why I went all nuts with Makery Monday. I needed to do something because this day was important to him (10/27, not the 26th, to be clear; it’s already tomorrow where he is cause he’s from the future and stuff, being in Iraq), which makes it important to me. My friends are the family I choose for myself. I’ve chosen Captain JKA to be a confidante and counselor for the last decade and a half, plus, and I continue to choose him every day. He’s the Man. You don’t even know! I can’t believe we are not together this day!

“Birthday” by DasPenre on deviantart.

So let’s all turn to the east and blow booze and kisses, okay? I miss you and I love you and I can’t wait to see you, brotha-from-anotha-motha and dearest old friendoh. Happy birthday, JKA.

“Basement Kitchen Cake” by vivavanstory on deviantart.

Daily Batman: Batgirl shirt and butterfly eye

Well, dang, if this picture is not all kinds of cute.

What a coincidence; I, too, like butterflies and Batgirl and comics t-shirts, and most of all laying around when I should be doing grown-up shit. Call me! We’ll grab a pint!

Ghostamus Postamus

Am I at the pub, winning at trivia? Who knows! All I know is, I sure hope they still got some Boddington’s, and, if they have, I am just wreckin’ it! I hope it is writing letters home to England, all like, “Dear Mummy and Daddy, everything was going decently until this woman showed up, she is some kind of crazy writer and she calls all her friends by aliases, I think her name starts with an E — she keeps making feral cat noises and drinking pints of me. I fear I shall never see Manchester again!” And it will be right, and its parents will come to me seeking vendetta, but I will just drink them too.

Mmmmm…….

I left the following liberated negative spaces behind last week, I wonder what I’ll be called to pass along tonight?

I was thinking of no longer liberating negative space at the pub but we’ll see if I can keep that resolution.

Take yourself out to the ballgame: Baseball words o’ wisdom from a faraway friendoh

Master Beatie just phoned the house out of nowhere to drop some awesome baseball revelations of the night on me. He was having an extremely well-planned and, from all appearances, enjoyable evening down at the D’backs game in that there old Phoenix, AZ which began with happy hour specials at Applebees (always smart to inexpensively pre-party before hitting the pricey concessions at a major league stadium — attaboy!) and ended in $6 seats with strategically planned backup beers at the game. The boy is a planner, and you can do naught but learn from his skills. He laid the following hard-won wisdom on my none-too-perky but mood-improving-with-time ears:

“Admiration > Envy. Always.”

“Doesn’t matter who’s playing; as long as it’s baseball, it’s awesome!”

(Mikey Beatie photo credit, Location: Estadio Revolucion Torreon, Coahuila, Mexico)

Support whatever local ball is around you, whether you are lucky enough to live in a town in the US with a major league stadium, or have some good old peanuts and crackerjack at a strictly AAA or AA team, or find yourself privy to an unexpected pickup game in the corner of a park or the back lot of a restaurant in South America or Japan.

The crack of the bat, the golden sunset, the ads for local businesses — take yourself out to the ballgame. It is good for the soul.

Hugs and kisses, Miguelito! Your wife will be there before you know it! I know you miss her and I hope a joshing conversation about beer prices at games in the Bay vs. the Gret Southernlywesternly is passin’ the time.

(I have now written two journal entries in one day about couples I know named Mike and S/Cindy.)