Stash! Ephemera

       Today I was waking up...slowly...trying to guzzle down some coffee, getting my thoughts together- for some reason my brain went to an old dusty space...where I sat at my computer as a teenager, socially alienated, looking for connection elsewhere besides school or church where I did not feel like I fit in one bit...mid 2000's, maybe 2007 or 2008.      My first job was at a Kroger, bagging groceries for the neighborhood folks. There was a guy that worked on one of the registers there that had a band that played alt-country (think Uncle Tupelo, etc ). I started going to these shows in this house kind of across town and then from there found out about other houses and bands. One time I was at one of these shows and saw a sticker or something that said "lation.org".       When I got back home to my computer and myspace account, I started searching around and found the myspace and actual website, and after a while I discovered tha...

​      I’m going to ask a question here. How many books have you read so far this year? What are you reading? If you are reading, where do you get your books? As a student, I am constantly reading my textbooks, and I’m also pretty constantly (sometimes to my own detriment) “monitoring the situation”. So I read quite a bit of non-fiction. I also try to throw fiction or historical fiction in there just to keep my brain active and my imagination running. This is what I’ve been reading lately: For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway - about an American who volunteers to fight for the Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. This book was declared "non-mailable" ( censored... ) by the US Post Office in 1940 and is considered one of the best war novels of all time. Hemingway does not disappoint... The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism by Max Weber - A pretty hefty read of sociological theory that people haven't stopped talking about since it was pub...

Every year, I go to a military antiques show called Show of Shows. It's a show focused on military collectibles ranging anywhere from antique weapons to US Army patches or Tiger Stripe pants from Vietnam. I used to go looking for old food, MREs (meals ready-to-eat), or just general personal items like forks or prayer books.  The first year I was there, I happened upon a booth that had binders full of old money, old photographs, and paper goods that were mostly from World War 2. Since them I've made a point to stop and see what the guy has. I've bought coins from the beginning and the end of Nazi Germany (the metals are lighter as the years progressed), and stamps with Saddam Hussein's face on them which I will try to dig up and post at a later date. This year, I was looking through what he had and I found these postcards. They were in a small photo album with about 20 or 30 pictures that looked like they had been made on an island in the Pacific during World War 2. From...

 At one point in my life about a decade ago (yikes) I was living in Seattle. It had some of the best record stores that I've ever been to. One of the stores I used to frequent was Wall of Sound . It was a super small place in the University District that was highly curated with all kinds of music that I had never heard of, or at least explored at the time: dub techno, acid jazz, free jazz, ambient, industrial, noise, etc. It was one of the few record stores that I could still go into and just buy things to listen to because the album covers looked interesting. At some point, after frequenting Wall of Sound and perusing their wares like a lost traveler in Skyrim, I ended up getting into noise music somehow. I also picked up a few (free!) copies of a print magazine called Tape Op . I was pretty immediately engulfed in the idea of tape machines (cassette tape recorders) as a means to create music. I already had a guitar and some pedals. I also had a loop pedal, which allowed me to loo...

 These were some of the first items I picked up that got me interested in the idea of ephemera. There was a big stack of them, all one-sided, one color of ink each. I found them at an antique mall and couldn't help but wonder 1) where they originated from 2) what they were given to people for and 3) where they sat for years before they somehow ended up in a booth in an antique store in Nashville. I wonder if they were given out at funerals? Not too sure. But still on the lookout for more.

       First of all, it was someone's grandma's birthday...      And then of course, as any grandma would, she wanted a family photo.  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  Then, in some other person's world, they went to a train museum of some sort. The grey engine on the left is what's called a "tank engine" because of the tank of water that surrounds the cylindrical boiler in the center of it. The one on the right...I'm not so sure of what it is. There are two sets of rails. Not sure if its some sort of incline railway or what. No date on the photo, no engine numbers, no way to tell. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~      Moving on...to Central America I believe? Maybe Spain here. I'm not sure. Not sure who these people are. I can't tell if this a party or a riot of some kind. Maybe a procession to a party that turned into a riot? ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ This is most definitel...

     Posted below are some pretty cool first day covers (FDCs) from St. Vincent and the Grenadines featuring stamps from one of the best TV shows of all time, Star Trek: The Next Generation. I don't generally advocate for television shows, but this is one of the few times I'll say it: go watch it. Go watch all of it. Watch some of the original series as well and see where that gets you.      I bought these at a local record store for next to nothing. The guy behind the counter didn't know what they were or why someone would be interested in them besides the fact that they had to do with Star Trek, which he had to know at least a little about.           What's so cool about these FDCs? Well, I think they're pretty sweet because they've been preserved, kept from the mail room, kept from someone's mailbox where they would sit until they were eventually ripped open and thrown away. They're kinda frozen in time (and space).