A Christmas Surprise!

When I was little, my next-door neighbor had this children’s Christmas Storybook about Santa Claus getting ready for the Holiday, and I remember reading it and just being CAPTIVATED by this one particular picture of Santa Claus working in his Candy workshop. Shelves of candy and Goodies hung in the back, and I remember just staring and staring at that picture and all the wonderfully magical feelings it gave me!

 Growing Up I’ve always wanted to get ahold of that book, but as Christmas Storybooks are a dime a dozen, I had no way of knowing which one it exactly was. All I remembered (beside that mesmerizing picture) was that it was a small book, most likely a “Little Golden Book”, but even THERE, they had dozens of Christmas themed stories!

 One day someone on reddit named HappyTrails1 uploaded pics of their HUGE and COMPLETE collection of vintage Little Golden Books and generously offered to upload images on any book we were nostalgic about and wanted to see again.

Happytrails1's HUGE Little Golden Book Collection

 I immediately replied that I was looking for a certain Christmas book that I THINK was a Little Golden Book, and then described the Candy Workshop picture. 

I even got onto imgur and tried to sketch what little my memory had of that magical image. This is what I came up with:

 Very vague, I know, but what do you know, the amazing HappyTrails23 DID recognize the story and in an hour or so, uploaded the images to a Little Golden Book called “Santa’s Surprise Book” and with a note saying “You have a good memory!”, uploaded the Candy Workshop picture I’d been dreaming of for so long now:

HOLY COW, I was blown away, soooo many memories came rushing back, of being a kid back at the old apartment, Christmas with my parents and siblings, and WOW, that magic time in you life when you still BELIEVE!

Now armed with the actual TITLE of the book I’d been searching for for a lifetime, I immediately went onto ebay to see if anyone had it up for sale, and luckily, there were a bunch of folks selling ’em! Though some were copies in pristine condition, I saw a beat up copy from 1966 and I just knew that that was the one I had to have, it just FELT like the book from my childhood!

Thanks to Happytrails1 I happily have this cherished childhood memory once again in my possession!

Batman & Superman: From the 30's to the 70's

 Though I enjoyed reading the exploits of Batman (and Robin)  as a kid, it wasn't until High School that got re-invested in the Gotham Vigilante (thanks in particular to the three-issue mini-series The Untold Legend of Batman) and began collecting the series anew!

Such was my passion that it caught the eye of a classmate and friend named Terry, who told me "You like Batman? I have this old hardcover book full of Batman stories I could give you!" I gratefully accepted and the next day he brought this heavy, dusty tome to class for me:

The book was called Batman: From the 30's to the 70, and though well-worn and obviously well-read, I was delighted to have it, and it was this that introduced me to all the classic stories of the golden age of Batman, from his introduction in Detective Comics to his first solo outing, to the early days, campy years, and dark, brooding re-imagining via Neal Adams, it covered it ALL, and it became a real "Bible" for me!

Funny, in all those years of cherishing that Batman bible, I never knew what the actual cover looked like since the dust jacket had long disappeared even before I ever got it, and I just assumed the cover to be plain yellow as well! It wasn't until the age of the internet that I looked up "Batman from the 30's to the 70's" and saw it had quite a striking cover by Carmine Infantino and Murphy Anderson:

Very cool, but I had SUCH sentimental attachment to my worn coverless book that I felt no real need to "replace" it, and still feel it today!

Terry mentioned that there was a Superman version as well, and though I didn't like Superman half as much as I did Batman, I did make a sort of mental note to look for it in the used bookstores if only to "complete" my set! 

With the arrival of ebay, there were many, many dealers ready to sell the Superman Book- the only problem is, I felt it would look weird to have the Superman book with a dust-jacket next to my coverless worn book on the shelf... so in the end, I found someone selling a beat-up worn coverless copy of the Superman Book as well!!!! Just arrived the other week, and just as predicted, this wonderfully worn book matched PERFECTLY next to the Batman book on my shelf, and makes a nice set!

And Just like the Batman collection before, this Superman one gave me a solid history lesson on the Man of Steel himself, one I pored over slowly throughout the week!

MAN, these are such great collections, would LOVE to see other heroes get the same treatment, however I suppose a large part of its charm is the way it's spread across so many decades (as the title says, from 1930s to 1970s) and not many other heroes can boast such a legacy!!!

Such is the enduring strength of Batman and Superman, BOTH of whom remain as relevant and popular today as they did all those years past!

My Comic Book Nook

 In the far corner of my room where I keep all my Comics, magazines and books, I saved two shelf spaces dedicated to keeping the vibe and spirit of my original book shelf back when I was a kid collecting, so its main focus is on those MARVEL books and paperbacks of the time, as well as magazines and comics from then as well!

Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

 Have always been a fan of Sci-Fi author Douglas Adams since his wonderful "Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" series, and when his newest book  "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" came out in 1987, me and all my sci-fi aficionados in school made sure to grab it!

As I had not grown up with Hitchhiker's Guide, I've always had a sentimental attachment to Dirk Gently since it was the first one I read in "real time", and found it as wonderfully witty and silly  as Hitchhiker had ever been!

The "Horse in the Bathroom" scene is still one of my favorite passages, and as a Beatles fan, the DIALOG was simply chef's kiss!

"A Horse?" repeated Richard.

"Yes," said Reg.

Richard went out and looked up the stairs and then came back in.

"A HORSE?" he said again.

"Yes it is," said the Professor. "Wait—" he motioned to Richard, who was about to go out again and investigate— "let it be. It won’t be long."

Richard stared in disbelief. "You say there’s a horse in your bathroom, and all you can do is stand there naming Beatles songs?"

The Professor looked blankly at him.

"Listen," he said, "I'm sorry if...I alarmed you earlier, it was just a slight turn. These things happen, my dear fellow, don't upset yourself about it. Dear me, I've known odder things in my time. Many of them. Far odder. She's only a horse, for heaven's sake. I'll go and let her out later. Please don't concern yourself. Let us revive our spirits with some port."

"But...how did it get in there?"

"Well, the bathroom window's open. I expect she came in through that."

Richard looked at him, not for the first and certainly not for the last time, through eyes that were narrowed with suspicion.

"You're doing it deliberately, aren't you?!" he said.

Oh My GOSH, I remember reading this and cracking up out loud! "Yes It Is", "Wait", Let It Be", "It Won't Be Long", I did not even realize they were Beatles titles til Richard pointed it out, and when I re-read it, I was DYING! 

I remember trying to memorize the exact dialog to repeat to my friends the next day, it was so cool how Adams stung together those Beatles titles together! Just more wit out of the mind of Douglas Adams!

"Once In Every Lifetime...!" The Young Ones Theme Song

As someone who has loved the BBC comedy series THE YOUNG ONES since first discovering it back in High School in the mid-eighties, I was completely FLABBERGASTED to discover that that wonderfully rascally and punky theme song to the show (which seemed such a perfect summation of the show itself)  was in fact a COVER of a 1961 Cliff Richard tune of the same name! WHAAAAT!

   

I always knew that the series had an odd fascination to Cliff Richard, either in jokes or even  as the cause of their ultimate demise in the final episode (when the lads crash into a Cliff Richard billboard), but to watch old video of Cliff Richard singing the Young Ones theme song is simply surreal, especially when he gets to the “Once in every lifetime…” part, which I associate SO MUCH with Vyvyan, Neil, Rick and Mike!

Well, you can color me stunned!