I just added a seventh antique radio to my collection!
Fibber McGee and Molly
New address for this blog!
I’ve got a new address! Now, when you go to gettinsentimental.wordpress.com, it will redirect you here to 14thandoak.com.
So you might be asking yourself, “What the heck is 14th and Oak?”
I chose this domain in honor of my beloved Fibber McGee & Molly. Anyone who is a fan of the show knows that anytime anything ever happened in the lovely little town of Wistful Vista, it happened at 14th and Oak. Bank robbery? At 14th and Oak. Fibber’s car stolen? He last parked it at 14th and Oak. Fibber’s hand caught in a mailbox? It was the one at 14th and Oak. Molly headed to the Bon-Ton Department store to check out the new fur coats? She did that at 14th and Oak. Fibber craving ice cream from the soda counter at Kramer’s Drugs? That was located at 14th and Oak.
Free domains associated with Fibber McGee & Molly are hard to come by. I was very happy when I stumbled upon this one. So in honor of my favorite show from the golden age of radio and the two stars, Jim and Marian Jordan (who feel like family to me because of the hours I have spent listening and laughing at their antics) my blog, too, is now located at 14 and Oak!
Wishy-washy whining
I am constantly conflicted. The same person who is obsessed with the 1940s and is fascinated by the idea of a life of total simplicity is also a technology fiend. Macbook, iPhone, iPad, iPod, Kindle – I have them all. And one or the other is usually no more than a foot away from me at any given time. My iPhone is always with me. I drive to work listening to Fibber McGee & Molly on one of my old iPod Nanos. I fall asleep at night, after reading in the dark for a while on my Kindle Paperwhite, to old time radio shows on one of my even older iPod Nanos. I just bought both an iPad Mini and a brand new iPod Nano last night. And now I feel overwhelmed.
Can one be too in touch with the world? Because I feel like I am. I’m always reading the news and checking the weather and checking my Twitter and my Tumblr and I’m just over it. I have a Facebook account but I started hating Facebook years ago so I barely check it. This particular blog is honestly the only web-based thing that I’m not sick of these days.
(Meanwhile, I’m wanting to develop a website dedicated to Fibber McGee & Molly and life in the 1940s. I’ve already bid on a website address that I’m trying to get for this site. This is in total contrast to the fact that I want to run screaming away from anything online. See? Conflicted!!!)
I just… I’m overwhelmed. I don’t know what to do. I need to focus on the things in my house that need doing, like putting away laundry and scrubbing the stove and dusting and making things just feel good. Instead, I’m drawn to my electronic devices and end up wasting copious amounts of time. I don’t know where the happy medium is but I want to find it. I hate the idea of being disconnected from the world but at the same time, I absolutely hate this feeling of being disconnected from myself. I need to pull back and spend some time cooking (because Lord knows that I need to get creative. This working the night shift thing is killing me when it comes to meal preparation.)
I guess I have a choice to make. I love my technology and I will continue to do so, but perhaps I need to love it less. Unfortunately, it’s like an addiction at this point, and I’m not sure I’m strong enough to change my habits, but I have to try, right? I guess I need to focus on the parts of the web that I love and let the things that I make me insane fall away.
A sucker for vintage advertising
I have a problem.
I ordered an entire case of Pet Evaporated Milk. 12 12-oz. cans. None of why I have an actual need for.
Why did I do this?
I blame Fibber McGee & Molly.
Sometimes, I go to Dollar General Store to buy over-the-counter medicine. Rexall brand to be exact.
Why do I do this?
I blame The Phil Harris – Alice Faye Show.
I ordered an 18-count pack of Lux soap.
Why did I do this?
I blame Lux Radio Theater.
You see, I am highly susceptible to 1940s & 1950s radio advertising. Modern advertising doesn’t get me so much (save the Apple computer ads in 2003 with Verne Troyer and Yao Ming that suckered me into getting my first Mac.) It makes me giddy that I can still get the same products that were advertised 70+ years ago. Through the 1940s, the sponsor of Fibber McGee & Molly was Johnson’s Wax. In the early 50s (1952 to be exact), Pet Milk took over as the sponsor. I’ve been listening to the 1950s episodes of FM&M on my way home from work lately and their slogan for Pet Milk – “sweet, country milk condensed to double-richness” – just resonates with me for some stupid reason. Like, so much that I searched for Pet Milk and was first dismayed that I couldn’t buy it locally and then overjoyed when I found out I could order it from the Smuckers website. I did the same thing for Lux soap because I’m a huge fan of Lux Radio Theater, which aired from 1934 to 1955, and imagine my frustration to find out that it’s neither made nor sold in the US anymore. I ended up ordering it from Amazon, but it was made in Egypt! Both the Pet Milk and the Lux soap came today, which was my biggest bright spot during an otherwise cruddy afternoon.
So anyway, beginning tomorrow, I’m going to use Lux soap when I shower (it smells divine!) and add Pet Milk to my coffee because, after all, it’s condensed to double-richness!!!
A new addition to my collection
Anyone who knows me knows that one of my biggest obsessions is old time radio – specifically, the show “Fibber McGee & Molly.” (I mean, c’mon, they’re in my WordPress icon. I LOVE Jim and Marian Jordan, aka Fibber and Molly. They feel like family to me!) So I’m quite excited to be adding this Milton Bradley game from 1940 to my collection!
Nostalgia and whimsy and…. travel trailers?
Superman had Kryptonite; I have nostalgia and whimsy to bring me to my knees. And it strikes in the oddest of ways. I can’t predict when I’m going to be caught in the headwinds of fanciful dreaming – it just happens and sometimes it lasts for days on end. I woke up this morning feeling moody and exhausted, but once I got to work, I settled into my new, much more private and quiet office (which I just moved into on Monday), popped in my earbuds, turned on my iPod, and called up the playlist of some old friends. Okay, so I don’t actually know Jim and Marian Jordan, who played Fibber McGee and Molly on a radio show of the same name from the 30s-50s, but I feel like I know them. Honestly, I’ve been listening to the 800+ episodes I have for so many years now that their voices are comforting to me. When I can’t sleep at night, I listen to a few of their shows and they lull me to sleep. When I’m stressed to my very limits, their voices help ease me into a quiet calmness. They make me nostalgic for a time I never lived through and for things that I couldn’t possibly experience during my lifetime.
Today was one such day where, after listening to Fibber and Molly for most of the day (in between an endless stream of needy employees parading in and out of my office), that sentimental feeling stuck with me. I came home, fixed supper, and then Tim and I got Roxie ready for her walk. We went down my favorite little stretch of road in our neighborhood. Lined with trees and horse pastures, it reminds me of the solitude that my country-girl soul misses since we live within the city limits. I began telling Tim about my hopes to someday own and restore a vintage travel trailer to use as a writing office. I want to plop it right in the middle of a field, maybe near a big old oak tree. We actually owned one a few years ago but it was just too far damaged to be restored without costing us an arm and a leg, so we sold her (a 1971 New Paris Traveler that I named Gracie) to someone who could restore her. Even though Gracie is gone, my dream for a travel trailer isn’t gone. I can practically hear the plunking of the raindrops on the metal roof as I sit inside, sipping on tea and tapping away at my laptop. This strong desire to get a travel trailer right this very nanosecond led me to tincantourists.com, where the classifieds, filled with pages and pages of adorable travel trailers for sale, invoke such strong stabs of whimsy and longing inside me that it almost hurts. I mean, here are just a few samples from what is currently for sale on that site.
HOW CAN YOU NOT WANT ONE, TOO???
Anyway, as my Friday night wanes into a 3-day holiday weekend that’s supposed to be filled with rain and relaxation, I hope these gushy, dreamy-eyed notions continue. They usually lead to creativity and a feeling of lightheartedness – both of which I need right now.
Life on Wild Hare Farm 