There was an awesome, huge double rainbow at the grocery store a few weeks ago:
You can kind of tell how it's 'double' in this picture:
I read somewhere one time that all rainbows are actually double rainbows; it's just that some are easier to see than others. And rainbows are actually full circles, but they're so big that you can only see half of them at a time.
A couple of weekends ago, I took Lilly on her very first trip to a drive-in movie! She'd never been to a drive-in before! We went to see Maleficent, and it was really good. I made us a pizza and some popcorn at home to take with us, and we also took along some cookies and Pepsi and lemonade with us to enjoy. And it only cost us $11 to get in! You can't beat that! Sitting there in the comfort of your own car, getting to talk and eat and burp and fart and cut up all you want to, without a care in the world! We had a blast!:
Here's Lilly, completely in awe, as soon as the movie started:
Times have changed (but only slightly) at the drive-in, because when I was Lilly's age, you had to roll your car's window down (yes, manually roll; there were no fancy automatic push-button windows in those days) and hook a crusty old speaker to the side of it in order to hear the movie. If bugs flew in your open car door window, or you could hear the people sitting in the car next to you talking, or it started raining, then oh well! But nowadays, thanks to modern technology, all you have to do is tune your car's radio to 105.5, and you can hear the movie playing directly through the speakers of your car! :D And just in case your car's battery dies after being on for 2 hours, the drive-in people even offer free complimentary jumper-cable services to anybody in distress! What's not to like? (Hmm, I wonder if the people who live in the houses adjoining the drive-in property ever tune in to 105.5 and get themselves a good pair of binoculars to enjoy free movies all the time...I know I would)!!!
Last week, I had to take Lilly for her annual doctor checkup. Me and Lilly settled into the waiting room, and I grabbed a random parenting magazine. I looked at the front cover of the magazine and noticed that it had a scratch-n-sniff area on it. Intrigued, I immediately began scratching it, and brought it up to my nose and took a deep whiff. Lilly looked over at what I was doing, and an alarmed look came across her face. Lilly said, "MOM. WHAT ARE YOU DOING." And it wasn't until as I was bringing the magazine down from my nose that I finally realized why Lilly was so freaked out and embarrassed. We had a huge laugh, and I took a picture of the magazine cover so you can see for yourself why:
You can't tell me that the editors of the magazine didn't do this on purpose. LOL!
BTW, just in case you're wondering, it smelled like really strong laundry detergent. :P
After Lilly's doctor appointment, we were headed home, when we noticed that a historic home/museum that we've been wanting to go to was open, so we first went up to Burger King to pee, and then we turned back around and went back to go to the historic house/museum. It was totally awesome. I really enjoy that kind of thing, and Lilly's getting to where she likes it a lot too. Here are the pictures that I took:
The moment we walked in, it smelled old. I mean, not 'old' as in musty, stinky, stale mothballs; it just smelled like history. It was good; like when you open up your favorite old book, and the pages just have that pleasant smell and you joyfully breathe it all in.
I assumed that this was a writing desk (especially since they had a fountain pen in an inkwell sitting on top of it), but the lady told me that it was an organ. Duh!
The lady told me and Lilly that somebody had brought in this old vacuum cleaner and just sat it down and left it, just like this:
It was interesting to see that in all the rooms (and you can tell in the picture above), that the house had obviously been wired for electricity at some time in the past, because all the wires were run on the outsides of the interior walls. I'm just guessing that they probably did it that way because for one, it's probably cheaper, and two, I don't know if it has anything to do with it, but the exterior walls of this old home are actually 4 bricks thick! It was definitely built to last, and considering the fact that it's like, 124 years old, last it has!
This great ol' big long picture was on top of the fireplace mantle next to that old vacuum cleaner. I had to take a panoramic shot of it just to try to get it all. I don't know what all these guys in the picture were doing all posed together like this, but the lady running the museum told me and Lilly that there is only one man in this picture who is not wearing a hat. And it's true; Lilly spotted him, somewhere near the left-hand side:
I wasn't fooled by this organ. I knew it was an organ as soon as I saw it. It's in the same room as that other organ that I mistook for a writing desk. The museum lady asked us if we could play, and I said "not really", and she told us that this organ is in working order. We didn't try to play it, though!
An adjoining room, which was dark and kind of creepy, was evidently at one time a porch which was closed in at some time in the past. It held a lot of tools and stuff. This one unique tool, pictured below, especially caught my attention because of the sticky note that was stuck to the bottom of it:
What does that note say, you ask? Well, take a look for yourself:
O__o
I didn't ask the museum lady, because I wasn't sure if I wanted to know or not! I'm just guessing that back in those days before spaying and neutering your pets, cats (or too many of them, rather) were probably considered to be more of a nuisance than they were pets. I'm thinking people didn't mind one or two cats hanging around to keep the mice down, but more than that was probably too much. That, and they used to make banjo heads out of cat hides, so there ya go. :/
I guess you know by now that I've got a 'thing' for old clocks. BTW, almost all of the old clocks I've looked at since my Roman Numeral discovery have had "IIII" for the "4". I did think to check the original clock from the historic courthouse in our town as I happened to be driving by it the other day, and sure enough, it had an "IV" for the "4". I haven't been able to see what's on the new clock that's currently in the bell tower yet, though.
On the other side of the entryway was a room that is currently used for historic and genealogical research, so it was stocked with several bookcases containing tons of big books, and had a lot of modern technological equipment in it, so I didn't bother taking a picture of it.
But adjoining that room, however, was the kitchen:
It wasn't until I got home and finally read over the little pamphlet we got about the house that I learned that a surgery was performed in this very kitchen! O__o
The pamphlet tells that the homeowners' youngest son, who was 13 at the time (in 1924) got extremely sick. A doctor diagnosed the boy with acute appendicitis. Another doctor was called in to help, and those two doctors together performed emergency surgery on the boy in the kitchen of this home. In those days, they didn't have any antibiotics. But miraculously, the surgery was a success, and the boy recovered.
When me and Lilly got done looking at the kitchen, the museum lady asked us if we'd like to see an old whiskey still. So of course I said "YEAH"! (I would've even said "YEAH" if she'd asked me if I wanted to see a genuine antique terd...I'll eagerly take a gander at anything you wanna show me)! So the lady grabbed a key, unlocked a door leading to a back porch, and this old washing machine in the picture below was next to the door outside:
Then the lady unlocked another door to a storage room, and let us peek inside at the old whiskey still. It was all disassembled and packed in the storage room with other random stuff (Christmas decorations, etc.). I didn't try to take a picture of it, but it was fun to see. It was HUGE. It was amazing to know that it was all copper. I'd never seen that much copper in one place, that I can remember. Of course the copper was all kind of green. We had fun looking at it. Then we went back inside.
The upstairs of the house was totally awesome! There were two rooms. The first room that you come to had two old weaving looms set up in them, and they were in working order. Here are the pictures of stuff in that room:
(This dress doesn't have anything to do with this historic home, but it's just a neat thing to see):
I don't think I'd ever seen an actual branch from a cotton plant in real life before. People who aren't from here probably think that Georgia = Cotton, and picture that everyone had a plantation, but that's not so up here in North Georgia!
I'm assuming that this was probably some kind of old doctor bag. If so, then no wonder way back when, some little kids used to think (or were told) that the doctor carried babies in his bag (when he was on his way to a house where a lady was expecting a baby)! ;) A newborn baby could totally fit inside of one of those!:
This was an old dental drill. I tried to get Lilly to take a picture of me hammin' it up with the drill thing at my mouth, but she was being ornery and refused.
I don't believe that the dental drill had any connection to this historic house. Sometimes places like this will just display old stuff for people to look at (like the Tabor dress pictured above), regardless of whether it has any connection to the actual property or not. It's just old and cool to see.
Lilly played Sleeping Beauty with this old spinning wheel. It didn't have that sharp thing on it, though.
Are spinning wheels supposed to have that sharp thing on them? I don't really understand how that would work. What is the sharp thing for? Also, somehow, since I was a kid, I've always gotten Rapunzel and Sleeping Beauty mixed up. I always thought that it was Rapunzel who pricked her finger on the spinning wheel. And I didn't realize that Sleeping Beauty's name was actually Aurora until the animated Disney movie came out, and I watched it while babysitting one day... :/
Also (spoiler alert) -- in the movie Maleficent, which is about Sleeping Beauty (Aurora), there was nothing in it at all about Aurora spinning straw into gold. I thought that's what she was supposed to have done with the dumb old spinning wheels! Or maybe that was Rumplestiltskin?
Crap...I don't know my fairy tales! LOL! :/
I think it finally dawned on me. I think I finally realized the reason that I'm so intrigued with and enamored by clocks, especially old ones. I'll try to put it into words.
Clocks have 'faces'. They mark the seconds, minutes, hours; the moments. Those moments turn into days, weeks, months; years. Second by second, the clocks tick away the time like heartbeats, and their hands move around their faces; and in that time, they 'see' so much. So much changes around them, but the clocks stay the same.
They're also like a constant in a world of uncertainty. Sometimes when I'm worried or anxious about something, I'll look at a clock, and quietly think to myself, "OK, in just one hour, it'll all be over. Whenever the 'little hand' gets to the (whatever number), it'll be all right". Then, when that time comes, and the thing I was anxious about is over, and I'm able to relax, I look back at that clock. And like an old friend, it seems to smile at me and gently say "See, I told you so".
And now, on to some britches:
Here's a closeup of the note that was fastened to the britches:
...and let's just hope that they were also Hand Washed before they went and hung 'em up on the wall...LOL!
I know it's kind of weird, but I was interested in the floor. The floor was of course made of wooden planks that were painted gray, except for what looks like a huge rug that is almost big enough to cover the entire floor. But it's not a rug. It's not carpet or cloth. It's not tiles. I don't know what it is. But I didn't ask the museum lady about it. I bent down and took a closeup picture of it:
I took my hand and tried lifting it up at a corner, but it wouldn't come up. It's like it was glued to the floor or something. Like it was supposed to be that way. I guess it might be some kind of weird old-fashioned linoleum rug or something. I have no idea. it was interesting.
The next room, the bedroom, was mine and Lilly's favorite. Lilly said that she wished that her bedroom was like this one. And I had to agree:
It was at this point that I, being a cool mommy with a good kid, made the executive decision that Lilly and I would secretly venture into no-man's land: beyond the ropes. Lilly didn't even ask me if we could. I just whispered to her, "Hey, you know what? Let's go BEYOND THE ROPES!" You should have seen her face light up with a mixture of sheer glee, daring, and disbelief that I would even consider doing something 'against the rules' like that! (Which, if Lilly was the type of kid that might harm anything at all, I would never suggest such a thing. But knowing for 100% sure that she would be completely respectful and extremely careful, we secretly broke the rules this time). Plus, we were all alone the whole time we were upstairs (the museum lady stayed downstairs) so I felt like we could easily get away with it.
The bedroom was so beautiful, and me and Lilly were so enchanted by it, that it was impossible for us to stay behind those ropes. We just couldn't resist secretly venturing in. SSSHHH, DON'T TELL ANYBODY! ;)
Do you notice something in the picture above? If you look closely, you can see a little yellow container of what I believe is rat poison on the floor in the corner of the room. As me and Lilly made our way through the house, I noticed that many of these were tucked into corners of the old house. I thought it was kinda cute and funny. Hmm, I wonder if they're sorry that they ever used that Cat Hook? Looks like they could use a good cat or two right about now...LOL!
I told Lilly that this must be some kind of nightgown, and she looked at it, giggled, and whispered, "It would totally show your boobs"!
Yep, it totally would. I don't get it! Were you supposed to wear something else under it? Probably. I hope so! But that wouldn't be comfortable. I can't imagine them having naughty peek-a-boo lingerie circa 1900! LOL! :P
LOL...look at me, all standin' there breakin' the rules...!
I wasn't aware of it at the time because I was too wrapped up in taking pictures, but later in the car on the way home, Lilly told me that she had gone so far as to actually open up and take a peek in some of the drawers, and reported that they contained jewelry! Dang! I wish I had thought to do that! Maybe next time...
Lilly gently opened up the white rectangular-shaped thing with a cameo on it below, and we discovered that it was a manicure set:
Breakfast in bed? YES, PLEASE.
All day, every day!
I asked Lilly if she knew what that blue ceramic container was that's sitting in the floor next to the bed, and she said, "You puke in it?...Because people back then, you know, had tuberculosis?" And I laughed and laughed and said, "No, it's for you to pee and poop in if you have to in the middle of the night...they didn't have bathrooms!" And Lilly made a face of surprise and disgust. LOL!
Closeup of the little beaded handbag:
This bedroom had that same kind of linoleum(?) "rug" on the floor as the adjoining room, but with a different pattern:
Here's a closeup of one of the patterns:
Then we reluctantly decided it was finally time to go back downstairs:
And thus ended our visit to the historic Baugh House!
But as I was driving me and Lilly back home, all of a sudden, it dawned on me. Where was the bathroom in that house? I mean, I know that the house was so old that it wasn't built with a bathroom (it obviously must've had an outhouse way back in the day), but I mean, if the lady who greets guests needed to go to the bathroom, where would she go? I never saw a bathroom, or even a closed, off-limits door where you would figure a bathroom might be. I never even saw a port-a-potty anywhere outside (of course I didn't walk around the entire back of the house), but still! It kind of bothered me. I mean, surely to goodness nobody would expect the museum lady to 'go' in a bucket or something! So that's a disturbing mystery that I need to solve...!
Something else that's funny to me is that you know that sometime in the distant future, they will have more museums similar to this, except they will contain all of the things that we are accustomed to in our current lives today. One day there will probably be a "2010 House" museum that our kids' kids' kids will visit, and they'll have on display microwave ovens, iPads, cell phones, flat screen HDTVs, laptops, battery-powered toothbrushes, and all the other normal, regular stuff we have laying around the house that we use all the time and totally take completely for granted. And at that point in the future, it will all be old-fashioned and quaint, and be guarded by velvet ropes, which some lucky kid's mom will whisper, "hey...wanna go past the ropes?" And they'll sneak into the off-limits room to take pictures of the remote control that went with the TV, a Starbucks cup, and a Snuggie. LOL! You know it's totally gonna happen. One of these days.
This past weekend, we went to the flea market. I think one of the last times we went to the flea market, we came home with a baby bunny. Well, we didn't come home with a new pet, but if it was up to Lilly, we would have:
Luckily, this cute li'l shih-tzu fella had a $300 price tag, so Lilly knew that it was impossible, no matter how hard she were to beg!
And remember that advertisement from one of the old magazines I posted recently for the old medicine named 666? Well, lo and behold, we stumbled across a booth at the flea market that had boxes full of hand-held fans with replicas of those old ads for 666!:
I don't care what anybody says; I still think that 666 is a super-disturbing and bad name for a medicine, or really anything else, for that matter!
On the reverse side of the fan, it tells more:
And in another section of the flea market, I spotted some hilarious 'Engrish' stuff that made me laugh, so I just had to take pictures of them!:
"Pet Thing"?!
LOLOLOLOL!!!
No, it's not a collar, it's a Pet Thing!
And get a load of this hilarious Engrish description:
BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!
Sometimes it's hard for us to realize that English is probably the most difficult language to learn on the planet. We take it completely for granted since that's all we've ever known.
Likewise, it's also pretty hilarious to see Americans who think that Asian writing looks cool:
LOL!!!
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