Wednesday, July 23, 2003
Never out of style
The Chicago Manual of Style (a.k.a. "Chicago") is now in its 15th edition. Just as my familiarity with Latin helped me out on the SAT, my early familiarity with Chicago regularly helps me out with HTML. Although I have to say that it's much easier to type -- than the character entity for an em dash, which I can never remember anyway, so you're getting -- when an em dash is actually called for.
If you don't know about em dashes and en dashes and why they might be important in HTML, here's a nice article from A List Apart to get you started.
The Chicago Manual of Style (a.k.a. "Chicago") is now in its 15th edition. Just as my familiarity with Latin helped me out on the SAT, my early familiarity with Chicago regularly helps me out with HTML. Although I have to say that it's much easier to type -- than the character entity for an em dash, which I can never remember anyway, so you're getting -- when an em dash is actually called for.
If you don't know about em dashes and en dashes and why they might be important in HTML, here's a nice article from A List Apart to get you started.
Off the block
A famed vintage bookstore sells and prepares to move.
A famed vintage bookstore sells and prepares to move.
Tuesday, July 22, 2003
Charm Tip
Sometime back in high school, already well on my way to collecting obscure books that nobody else wanted, I found this one: Secrets of Charm, copyright 1954, by John Robert Powers (of the Powers School) and Mary Sue Miller. I love this book. I have gathered more tips that have actual utility from this book than from any other source. I'm about to offer to you, Vintage Reader's readers, some absolutely invaluable information gleaned from its yellowed pages: how to get in and out of a car in a skirt.
"Never attempt to stand up and go through the door of a car headfirst. Slide over instead to the end of the seat and reach out sidewise with the foot nearest the door until your foot touches the ground.
"So far, so easy! But the next move takes the kind of confident grace that only practice gains. To carry on, give a slight push with the foot that remains in the car and use the momentum gathered to lift your body up and out of the car in a sidewise position. Let your head and shoulder cap lead; trust your hips to follow.
"Next bring the foot still within the car to rest beside the one on the ground and do a quick, graceful rightabout-face. You're set--and charmingly!"
[n.b.: I suggest visualizing this one before actually attempting it. --ed.]
And now for getting back into the car:
"Entering a car without cost to appearances is also governed by a set of modern regulations that cannot be matched by simply reversing the getting-out procedures.
"To achieve grace and ease, you must begin by facing the front of the car. This means that one side, from top to toe, is turned toward the door you aim to enter. Establishing this position is the crux of the entire operation, since you must remain in it until safely seated. At no time twist your hips or shoulders so that they slightly face the side of the car.
"This much arranged, raise the foot nearest the door with a relaxed knee action until you can place it six inches inside hte car, flat on the floor and pointing straight ahead. Now give a slight push-off iwth the foot still on the ground and slide yor head and shoulders into the car. With split-second timing, shift all your weight to the foot already inside the car and slide your hips sidewise until they rest on the edge of the seat. Allow the grounded foot to follow at once. With a sliding (not bucking) motion, move to the space allotted you. Again, you're all set!"
Seriously, this is much easier than it sounds once you've done it a couple of times. I recommend practicing with a pickup or an SUV, preferably one with leather seats, until you get the hang of it; the height and the slick seats make it easier. Soon you'll be jumping in and out of cars like a real Mulholland Molly (I find no reference to this term in Google; I heard it in an episode of Gidget, and by context--Gidget proclaiming "I'm no Mulholland Molly!" to a boy she thought was getting fresh--it sounds like an M.M. would be in and out of cars a lot).
Backing off the Mulholland Molly image, just think of yourself as Tippi Hedren, getting out of that lovely little green car (an Aston-Martin DB2/4 drop-head coupe) in The Birds in her stylish suit and fawn-colored gloves. That's what we aspire to with this move.
Sometime back in high school, already well on my way to collecting obscure books that nobody else wanted, I found this one: Secrets of Charm, copyright 1954, by John Robert Powers (of the Powers School) and Mary Sue Miller. I love this book. I have gathered more tips that have actual utility from this book than from any other source. I'm about to offer to you, Vintage Reader's readers, some absolutely invaluable information gleaned from its yellowed pages: how to get in and out of a car in a skirt.
"Never attempt to stand up and go through the door of a car headfirst. Slide over instead to the end of the seat and reach out sidewise with the foot nearest the door until your foot touches the ground."So far, so easy! But the next move takes the kind of confident grace that only practice gains. To carry on, give a slight push with the foot that remains in the car and use the momentum gathered to lift your body up and out of the car in a sidewise position. Let your head and shoulder cap lead; trust your hips to follow.
"Next bring the foot still within the car to rest beside the one on the ground and do a quick, graceful rightabout-face. You're set--and charmingly!"
[n.b.: I suggest visualizing this one before actually attempting it. --ed.]
And now for getting back into the car:
"Entering a car without cost to appearances is also governed by a set of modern regulations that cannot be matched by simply reversing the getting-out procedures.
"To achieve grace and ease, you must begin by facing the front of the car. This means that one side, from top to toe, is turned toward the door you aim to enter. Establishing this position is the crux of the entire operation, since you must remain in it until safely seated. At no time twist your hips or shoulders so that they slightly face the side of the car.
"This much arranged, raise the foot nearest the door with a relaxed knee action until you can place it six inches inside hte car, flat on the floor and pointing straight ahead. Now give a slight push-off iwth the foot still on the ground and slide yor head and shoulders into the car. With split-second timing, shift all your weight to the foot already inside the car and slide your hips sidewise until they rest on the edge of the seat. Allow the grounded foot to follow at once. With a sliding (not bucking) motion, move to the space allotted you. Again, you're all set!"
Seriously, this is much easier than it sounds once you've done it a couple of times. I recommend practicing with a pickup or an SUV, preferably one with leather seats, until you get the hang of it; the height and the slick seats make it easier. Soon you'll be jumping in and out of cars like a real Mulholland Molly (I find no reference to this term in Google; I heard it in an episode of Gidget, and by context--Gidget proclaiming "I'm no Mulholland Molly!" to a boy she thought was getting fresh--it sounds like an M.M. would be in and out of cars a lot).
Backing off the Mulholland Molly image, just think of yourself as Tippi Hedren, getting out of that lovely little green car (an Aston-Martin DB2/4 drop-head coupe) in The Birds in her stylish suit and fawn-colored gloves. That's what we aspire to with this move.
Monday, July 21, 2003
New vintage reading
Heard about this book this morning on the radio. Now I really, really want to read it.
Heard about this book this morning on the radio. Now I really, really want to read it.
Fair play
A great page of reviews of books by Erle Stanley Gardner, writing both as himself and as A. A. Fair. (I actually found this page while looking for some GGA: the infamous redone cover of Fools Die on Friday, written by Gardner as Fair and illustrated by Robert Stanley. It didn't occur to me that using "Stanley" to limit a search would do no good, since most of the sites that mention Fair would also mention the Erle Stanley Gardner connection. Somewhere in the cosmos Vannevar Bush is frowning in my direction.)
A great page of reviews of books by Erle Stanley Gardner, writing both as himself and as A. A. Fair. (I actually found this page while looking for some GGA: the infamous redone cover of Fools Die on Friday, written by Gardner as Fair and illustrated by Robert Stanley. It didn't occur to me that using "Stanley" to limit a search would do no good, since most of the sites that mention Fair would also mention the Erle Stanley Gardner connection. Somewhere in the cosmos Vannevar Bush is frowning in my direction.)
Vintage Definition
GGA
EBay sellers often use the term "GGA" to denote "good girl art." Actually, this is an oxymoron, as the girls featured in GGA are seldom engaged in the types of activities that might classify them as "good girls." But my real quibble with this is the usual assumption by eBay sellers that basically ANY picture of a female on a vintage paperback is GOOD girl art.
GGA
EBay sellers often use the term "GGA" to denote "good girl art." Actually, this is an oxymoron, as the girls featured in GGA are seldom engaged in the types of activities that might classify them as "good girls." But my real quibble with this is the usual assumption by eBay sellers that basically ANY picture of a female on a vintage paperback is GOOD girl art.
Another tip for vintage readers
Before you put your lovely dustjacketed copy of Vogue's Book of Etiquette on its back on your shelf, gentle vintage reader, make sure that the space-age green paint that makes your bookshelf perfectly match your Shag print is completely dry. Otherwise, you might find that the dustjacket has grown inordinately fond of that particular shade of green and wishes to leave a little bit of itself for the paint to remember it by.
Before you put your lovely dustjacketed copy of Vogue's Book of Etiquette on its back on your shelf, gentle vintage reader, make sure that the space-age green paint that makes your bookshelf perfectly match your Shag print is completely dry. Otherwise, you might find that the dustjacket has grown inordinately fond of that particular shade of green and wishes to leave a little bit of itself for the paint to remember it by.
And now... a Vintage Reader Etiquette Tip!
From Vogue's Book of Etiquette, by Millicent Fenwick, copyright 1948:
WHAT CHILDREN UNDER TEN YEARS OLD SHOULD LEARN
From Vogue's Book of Etiquette, by Millicent Fenwick, copyright 1948:
WHAT CHILDREN UNDER TEN YEARS OLD SHOULD LEARN
- To say "How do you do?" and "Good-bye"; and, almost more important, to look at the one they are shaking hands with.
- To bow (for boys) and to curtsey (for girls), whenever they say, "How do you do?" or, "Good-bye," to adults.
- To say, "Yes, thank you" and "No, Mummy" and "Yes, Mrs. Smith"; not just "Yes" and "No."
- To say, "Thank you for a very nice afternoon," or, "Thank you, I had a lovely time," when they say good-bye to their hostess.
- Not to interrupt older people.
- To wait at doorways until older people have gone through. Boys should also learn to let girls precede them.
- To take hats off in the house or when talking to older people; this, of course, for boys.
- To answer when they are spoken to.
- To eat neatly, without dawdling, and without argument. (See also "Rules for Children" in the chapter, "Table Manners.") [Eek! There are MORE of them? -- ed.]
- To be scrupulously polite always to nurses, maids, waiters--to anyone who receives wages in return for service. The kind of rudeness which should never be tolerated is that which refers to the fact that these people are employed.
Sunday, July 20, 2003
Buyer's market
Oh my! A nationwide listing of book sales, the vintage reader's favorite thing in the world. Well, maybe next to estate sales held by the relatives of dear little ladies with a passion for pulp novels who kept them hidden away from prying eyes (and sunlight and dust) for 50 years.
Thanks to Jessamyn for this one.
Oh my! A nationwide listing of book sales, the vintage reader's favorite thing in the world. Well, maybe next to estate sales held by the relatives of dear little ladies with a passion for pulp novels who kept them hidden away from prying eyes (and sunlight and dust) for 50 years.
Thanks to Jessamyn for this one.
What I'm reading today
Wish You Were Here, by Stewart O'Nan. Not vintage, but feels like it. Oh, and also: Science Fiction 101, a nifty compilation by Robert Silverberg of his favorite science fiction short stories of all time, along with his analysis of what makes them great. Truly classic science fiction short stories that were originally published in magazines like Astounding Science Fiction.
Wish You Were Here, by Stewart O'Nan. Not vintage, but feels like it. Oh, and also: Science Fiction 101, a nifty compilation by Robert Silverberg of his favorite science fiction short stories of all time, along with his analysis of what makes them great. Truly classic science fiction short stories that were originally published in magazines like Astounding Science Fiction.
At last...
The Vintage Reader is up and running.
Hurray.
The Vintage Reader is up and running.
Hurray.