Lucy's a Real @#$%&!, Charlie Brown

Originally posted in 2014. I thought it was time to revisit some oldies but goodies.

For several years, I’ve followed Chris Sims and his Funkywatch blog which details the endless cycle of misery endured by the cast of Tom Batiuk’s “Funky Winkerbean” comic strip.  What began as a lighthearted strip featuring high school students in humorous and sometimes improbable fantasy situations devolved into a spectacle of death, misfortune and schadenfreude firmly grounded in hell on earth.  While many believe Batiuk invented this comic form, Charles Schulz mastered the art of morale-crushing criticism and shaming with Lucy Van Pelt.  Existing solely for the purpose of antagonism, Lucy’s constant berating and belittling left an indelible and incurable swath of emotional duress, angst and disempowerment.

Let’s take a look at the atmosphere of menace and hostility imposed by Lucy and its effects on the well-being of her family and “friends” through the pages of these coloring books from the 1970's I recently purchased. And I swear I didn't modify the captions on any of these.

Lucy begins her devious mission.  Who will she choose to pick on?

Scholastic Memories

 I've written before of my fond memories of Scholastic Books and the two magical days in school: when the Scholastic Book Club order form would arrive and the day the books you ordered arrived.

I recently found a few more of these flyers.

Arrow Book Clubs was a division of Scholastic Books. These books were aimed at 4th through 6th graders.  There was also the T.A.B. Book Club (Teen-age Books) that were aimed at older students.

Trolling the Scholastic Flyer

Guess what...

The Black Hole..That is This Blog

I know, it's been almost a month since my last post.  It feels like this summer has been sucked into a black hole. Hey! Look what I have for you.  As promised to Dex, the complete "The Black Hole" coloring book (mostly uncolored).  Full of line drawings and games and coming straight to you from 1979 and Walt Disney.  Enjoy!

Between the Covers - The Black Hole Coloring Book

First off, let me apologize for letting the grass grow so high on this blog.  It's been 2 months since my last post.  Rest assured, garage and estate saling have continued throughout this time and many things have been bought.  I just haven't had the time (and admittedly the enthusiasm) to blog about them.  But let's change that now.

Allow me to explain the title of this post.  Back in 2017, I started what I intended to be an ongoing and occasional post topic.  I picked this topic back up a few years later with this post.  These posts are about things I find inside of books. Usually, it's a bubblegum card, a makeshift bookmark, occasional writing, etc.  Here we are a couple years later and I'm once again exploring this topic.

A couple weeks ago, I estate saled at a hoarder house. I picked up some books including this Black Hole coloring book.

This post isn't about the colored pages in this book (although, that can be arranged), it's about what I found stored in the book; printed on a dot matrix printer, the rules for a club called "G.R.O.S.S." along with a couple other printed pages.

Ghost at the Window: A Review

Last month during the Countdown to Halloween, I presented a handful of young adult books with a haunting theme and asked my readers to vote for one which  I would then review.

Well, after a whopping 3 votes (each for a different book), it was clear I would need to flip a coin.

And the winner is...Lady M with "Ghost at the Window"!

Book Me

I've written before about my penchant for children's literature.  Reading children's books is a small investment of time and thought and brings back memories of the books of my youth.

I went to a garage sale about a month ago that had boxes and boxes of library books for sale.  After talking with the seller, he explained he and his wife were at an auction and thought they were bidding on 1 box of children's books only to discover after they won it was actually 17 boxes.  They picked out the books they wanted for their children and were selling the rest.

I dug through and grabbed every haunted house and ghost story I could find.

While these books are considerably after my time, I thought I'd give them a chance.

Here's where you come in.  View the cover and read the synopsis of the books below and tell me which book I should read first.  By the way, it wasn't until I scanned these books that I discovered 3 were written by the same author, Betty Ren Wright who specialized in ghost stories.

I'll read the winning book and write a review of it, hopefully by Halloween.

"A Ghost in the House" Betty Ren Wright 1991

RIP Beverly Cleary

I'm a few days late on this post, but I couldn't let the passing of Beverly Cleary go unmentioned.

When I was in 4th grade, our teacher, Mrs. Heineke, read a passage to us from "Runaway Ralph" by Beverly Cleary.  I was instantly hooked.

By then, I already enjoyed reading, but strictly of shorter children's books like Babar the Elephant,  the works of Dr. Seuss, the Berenstain Bears, "Harold and the Purple Crayon", "Where the Wild Things Are", etc. This would be my introduction to "chapter" books.  

It helped that the cover was so darn cool.  The blazing red cover with a mouse riding hell-bent down a hill, wearing a crash helmet made from half a ping pong ball and a rubber band, whiskers blowing in the wind and his tail carefully tucked under his arm to keep it out of the spokes clinched it. How could I NOT want to read this?

Santa's Surprise Book (The Surprise is the "Follow the Dots" Are Really Easy)

The week of Christmas is upon us already.  If you need something to put you in the spirit, here's Santa's Suprise Book, courtesy of Walgreen (or Walgreen's, as we always called them).

How Nancy Drew Me In

Never let it be said this isn't an EOB (Equal Opportunity Blog).  I previously blogged about The Hardy Boys after picking up a few of their adventures a while back. Now it's time to give their female counterpart her day.

I found these Nancy Drew Mystery Stories at a garage sale a few weeks ago.  I'm not sure which of these covers is "off-model", but Nancy looks different in every one, even with different colored hair. Will the real Nancy Drew please stand up?

A Happy Time of Year

This book from 1958 doesn't tell us anything we didn't already know.  Halloween is a happy time of year.

The New Guess Who Halloween

Frankly, I didn't expect to find such an unintenionally freaky story in a Dick and Jane book, but here it is. From 1963, it's "The New Guess Who". Enjoy.

Busy Bee Holiday Fun

Have some Holiday Fun coloring this Trick or Treat picture. Halloween is coming.

Magic Secrets

I previously wrote about my childhood love of magic and magicians, my desire to learn its secrets and how Scholastic Books fed into that desire with doses of disappointment.  "Magic Secrets" was another book I bought as a child in the hope that maybe, just maybe, this one would finally come through.  It didn't.

Good Halloween Fun with Billy and his Neighbors

If you've followed this blog for a while, you know I'm a sucker for kid lit.  I enjoy both children's fiction as well as classroom books.  All the better when they include a little Halloween.  

"Billy's Neighbors" dates from 1957 and attempts to steer children away from their natural devilish ways.  Rather than vandalizing their neighbor's house and property this year, their teacher Miss Dale persuades her students to make posters with positive statements like "Think of Others on Halloween" and "Do Good on Halloween". Booorrrring.  Wait until Billy finds where his parents hid the cherry bombs and eggs.

Thanksgiving Holiday Fun

Happy Thanksgiving to all my American readers (and anyone else celebrating today).  Enjoy this Thanksgiving Fun section of "Busy Bee Holiday Fun".

Scholastic Halloween

This October 1961 edition of "News Explorer" was published by Scholastic Books and is the standard flyer we all received in grade school plus some additional news and features.

Revenge of the Owls

This book titled "Little Sunbeams" dates from 1921.

The Munch Bunch at Home

Somehow, I ended up with this coloring book.  Okay, it was tucked between a Masters of the Universe coloring book and a Funtime Busy Book, but that's beside the point.  This thing looked so bad, I almost threw it out. But then I started thumbing through it and found some of the most wth moments ever found in a coloring book.  Each page is a standalone vignette with no context of what happened before or what happens next.  Who would buy this for their kid?  And what kid would color it?  From 1984, I give you "The Munch Bunch At Home Coloring Book".  The "At Home" implies this was no standalone publication, it was a series. The madness...

To Serve and Protect

Printed in 1977, this Hallmark publication introduces children to the roles police officers play in our lives.  Let's take a look.