Flutterby

My first chance to take some serious pictures here in Ohio was today at a place called Stan Hywet Hall And Gardens. This place used to be the estate of one of the founders of Goodyear, so you can imagine how luxurious the place used to be. Over the years, they've added lush gardens to the property, and a greenhouse which happens to be hosting a butterfly exhibit at the moment. I was pretty impressed with the variety, numbers and size of the butterflies and moths they had on display. The upside down fellow above is a Royal Blue. There were probably 20 other species on display, including a moth that was bigger than your hand. It had spots on the wings that looked like holes, they were actually clear windows. These fellows were called Atlas moths, and they make my moths look pretty poor by comparison.

Out Of Office

Sorry I haven't posted anything for you in a while. I am in Ohio at the moment, doing some computer upgrade work, and it's going poorly. So I'm not left with much time to shoot any pictures. I did finally have time this evening to figure out how to connect to the internet from my hotel room, so here I am giving you an update. If I can get my laptop up to speed, I may post a couple of pictures from my travels today. If not, you'll have to wait another week for any updates. Either way, there won't be any doodles until I get within spitting distance of my scanner and my record collection. Sorry. We now return you to your regularly scheduled diet of boring political blogs...

The Middle Of September

My calendar page for this week is a night shot of downtown Atlanta, Georgia. I was up there visiting some old college buddies, and I made one of them drive me downtown for what I hoped would be a good shot. Luckily, my friend was a fellow photographer, so he had a good spot in mind. I spent maybe 10 minutes shooting from the top of a small hill, and this is the best one. It's hard to get dark skies in a shot like this. There's too much stray light bouncing off dust in the air. I don't know how real photographers do it. Photoshop, I guess.

Oodles of Doodles CXXX

Here's a set of doodles from the backside of Francis Scott And His Orchestra-Moods For Firelight (Capitol T529). First you get the standard doodle inspired by the title, in this case a nice fireside scene. This one is a little odd in that the point of view seems to be from inside the fireplace. You don't get that every day. The second doodle is a drawing of the artist. I'm having to assume that this is not the same Francis Scott that wrote the Star Spangled Banner. Oh, wait, that was Francis Scott Key. My mistake. The last doodle is odd in that it's a sketch of another LP from Mr. Scott. I don't think I've seen that before. That's the beauty of collecting this LP ephemera, there's always something new coming along.

Oodles of Doodles CXXIX

I got lucky at the Goodwill store today and found an Esquivel record! It's not quite the same as finding that rare Elvis record, but it's not bad. So here's a doodle and a tagline ("New Sound Sensation", how appropriate) from Esquivel And His Orchestra-Strings Aflame (RCA Victor LSP-1988, 1959). Speaking of Elvis, RCA was releasing his music at about the same time as this. Does that mean some of those old rock and roll LPs may have had doodles on them? I so very rarely find them, I may never know. You most recently saw Esquivel at Ernie (Not Bert) here.

A Sinclair Station?

Who remembers Sinclair? The gas station with the friendly dinosaur on the sign? These stations were gone before my time, or at least they didn't exist in Florida. We had a tiger in our tank, or maybe a Shell, but mostly the big orange Union 76. This ad is from the back of Music From Schubert Alley (Custom High Fidelity LP DSS-2250, 1960), a various artists promotional LP that is the soundtrack from a 1959 TV special on NBC. It's hosted by Andy Williams (his first, but not last, hour-long TV special), and features Alfred Drake, Lisa Kirk, Ray Walston, Doretta Morrow, Betty Comden & Adolph Green, all singing show tunes.

Oodles of Doodles CXXVIII

I've brought you the Ames Brothers quite a few times before, and I have more of them in stock for the future. But for tonight, here are The Ames Brothers With Hugo Winterhalter And His Orchestra-Sing Famous Hits Of Famous Quartets (RCA Victor LSP-1954, 1959). I don't know if that's supposed to be a concert hall behind them, or maybe an apartment house. I see a TV antenna on top, so maybe it's apartments. Are those little circles supposed to be faces watching the Ames Brothers singing? I guess all these answers are lost to the mists of time. There's a single initial in the lower right-hand corner. Either a B or an F. Hard to say...

Oodles of Doodles CXXVII

I think I hit the doodle motherlode with this LP, Musical Cocktail Party With Cedric Dumont, His Orchestra And His Shaker (Decca DL 8600, 1955). The twelve individual doodles above each represent a different track on the LP, and each track is named for a different drink, each of which is an original concoction by Mr. Dumont. I guess when they included his cocktail shaker in the credits, you knew it was going to be interesting. From left to right, top to bottom, you have: Ballroom Whispers, The Swiss Boy, Sarie Marei, Guitar Serenade, The Anvil-Cocktail, Gay Paree, High Feather, Fireproof (the naked lady!), The Vilia-Cocktail, The Swiss Girl, La Reginelia and Spanish Fire. What a group! The champagne glass below is also on the back cover, just to sort of round things out, I suppose.

The music on this one is OK, but nothing as spectacular as what I found on this other cocktail-themed LP.

Oodles of Doodles CXXVI

I don't know if this really counts as a doodle or not, but since it touches on the subject of stereo, I figured I'd throw it in. This is the instrument layout diagram from Andre Kostelanetz-Wonderland Of Sound (Columbia CS 8457, 1961). You can clearly see that electric guitar goes on the right, and each side gets it's own set of vibes. Timpani are split, two on the left, one on the right. Trumpets and trombones left, oboes, cymbals and harp on the right. Eveything has a place, and everything in it's place.

Hawaii (3/50)

Here's another license plate from a series I started a while back. I think that I could spend a couple of weeks around here shooting plates, and I could get all fifty states. And DC, and Puerto Rico, Canada and Mexico. But I'm lazy. But when I see a rare one, I shoot it. And that's how I got this one, from the big island. This one came a long way to arrive finally in Florida.
Previous plates: New York, Maine.

The End

All good things must come to an end. The stink flower is all shriveled up and dying. But there are other buds...

Oodles of Doodles CXXV

This doodle is a good example of why I'm trying to collect doodles. It looks cool, it's well-drawn, it has an air of whimsy about it, the off-kilter perspective is great, it's almost a perfect explanation of the doodle mentality. From the flipside of Fred Waring And The Pennsylvanians-Lullaby Time (Decca DL 8110) comes this mother tending to her newborn. Like our previous Fred Waring LP, this one features Bing Crosby, this time adding vocals to two tracks.

Oodles of Doodles CXXIV

I skipped a couple of days on my postings. Sorry. I know all you blogger doggers missed me. So I'm going to try and make ofr it today and tomorrow with a whole bevy of doodles and records and what-not. I'm also hoping to fill you up and tire you out so you don't complain too loudly about the week and a half I'm about to miss. I'll be in Ohio all that time, and I doubt if I'm going to be able to post anything during that time. But we'll see... In the meantime, here are a couple of very animated harmonicas from Larry Faber With Orchestra-Harmonica Harmonies (Celebrity Records UTS 155). Harmonicas are one of those intstruments, like the organ, that spawned dozens and dozens of LPs in the hi-fi era. Just think about the Harmonicats for a sec... But back to Larry Faber, you can actually listen to this LP over at The Vinyl Preservation Project.

Oodles of Doodles CXXIII

How's about a country doodle? Or better yet a comedy doodle? Maybe a combination of both? This odd couple is from Lonzo & Oscar-Country Comedy (Hilltop JM-6021), a combination of country and comedy straight from the Grand Ole Opry. Though not on this LP, these guys biggest hit was I'm My Own Grandpa, which is probably worth hearing at least once. Not twice, but once. And that's all I have to say about that.

Still Useless

I'll ask you again, what good are cats?

Oodles of Doodles CXXII

Tonight's doodle is an exquisite drawing of an orchestra, presumably with 100 strings in total. I'm having trouble dividing a whole bunch of 6-stringed instruments into the total count of 100, but maybe there are some instruments who's string-count I don't know. I quit band just as soon as something opened up in a home-ec class. Anyhow, this doodle is from Joni James-100 Strings & Joni On Broadway (MGM Records SE3839, 1960). Yep, that's right. Not Capitol, not RCA. Aren't you shocked?

More Stink Flower

I'm still completely fascinated with this flower blooming on my porch. Here's another view that highlights the hairs covering the petals. You can see the long lighter ones near the edges, and the thick red ones nearer the centers of the petals. Pretty cool, eh?

Another Week In September

This may be the first time I've repeated myself here on the blog. I brought you a different version of this picture a few weeks ago. But it is technically a different shot. Anyhow, here's this week in September. To repeat myself further, this is a sculpture in downtown Tampa, Florida. It's pretty intricate, but it makes a really neat picture.

Oodles of Doodles CXXI

I brought you a pretty crummy Paul Weston doodle yesterday, so here's a slightly better one to help make up for it. It's not the most exciting doodle, but at least you can tell what it is supposed to be. This amorous couple by the fireside is, appropriately enough, from Paul Weston-Music For The Fireside (Capitol T1192). I think I see the initials GBR in there, near the corner of that pillow she's sitting on. Or it may just be BR. Or it may just be my imagination. You be the judge.

Flyboy

I've pretty much wasted my day off work today. It's almost 9 pm, and I haven't posted anything to my blog all day, not even a doodle. I don't know if I'm going to be able to find one between now and bedtime, either. I recorded some Christmas music and posted it over at FaLaLaLaLa, if you're interested, though. Lots of organ stuff. Just you wait until Christmas rolls around, this place is going to be Christmas tune central! But for today, for you, all I have is the late, great Jimmy Stewart. I found this soundtrack today, Franz Waxman-The Spirit Of St. Louis (RCA Victor LPM-1472, 1957), with a great picture of Jimmy as Charles Lindbergh. I've never seen the movie, but now I might have to catch it next time it shows up on TCM or somewhere. It was directed by Billy Wilder, who made some of those great movies from the late 50's and early 60's, some of them with Marilyn Monroe. But all I can hope is that the Lindbergh movie is more historically accurate than the cover shot on this LP. Look at the cover again. See those cars behind the plane? Those are 1950's cars, not 1920's or 30's cars. Whoopsie!