Call Me!

June 5, 2013 / Ally Bean / 19 Comments

This June my desk calendar’s picture is an old advertisement for a 1959 Princess Telephone. The phone is that unique shade of turquoise that was so popular in the 1950s. Tres chic!

I have no personal recollection of Princess Telephones [Model 702]. We didn’t have one in our home. Instead, we had a basic white rotary dial Desk Telephone [Model 500] in the kitchen + a yellow Trimline Telephone [Model 220] in my upstairs bedroom.

Yes, we were early adopters with two phones in our small house. Try not to be jealous.

Even though the following short TV commercial is from the 1950s, I can’t help feeling that I, too, was just as much of a princess as this girl. I mean, I had a “personal extension phone” in my upstairs bedroom.

On the other hand, I didn’t have a dressing table adorned with bottles of nail polish and a French poodle figurine… nor was I ever inclined to wear bobby socks with a skirt… nor, after years of painful orthodontia, were my teeth as crooked as the girl’s teeth in this commercial…

But other than that, I was just like her. Yakking on the phone. Up in my bedroom. In my own little teenage world. 😉

• • •

So how about you?

Did you have a Princess Telephone? Or a Trimline Telephone?

Or some other sort of phone entirely?

• • •

[For photos and descriptions of models mentioned above please go here: Western Electric ~ A look at the evolution of the Dial Telephone.]

[FYI – Phone numbers used to be recited with words at the beginning. Here’s a chart to help you remember, or understand, what those words meant: Ma Bell’s Officially Recommended Exchange Names.]

Rambling Thoughts On A Spring Morning

May 10, 2013May 10, 2013 / Ally Bean / 21 Comments

Another wet morning here. This Spring has been unusually rainy and not as warm as I’d like it to be. In fact, I have yet to wear capris, let alone shorts. Sandals, however, I have worn. They look kind of snazzy with jeans, so there’s that.

• • •

As you can imagine the rainy days have led to green, lush grass. Our yard looks great. The neighbors’ yards look great. The grass-filled concrete divider islands in the grocery parking look great. The side of the interstate looks great.

The whole world looks great… as long as you like this particular shade of green. From my point of view this green is getting a little too close to Pantone’s 2013 Color of the Year, Emerald Green. I don’t like Emerald Green, so you can see how, for me, this Spring is getting a little cloying.

• • •

To set my heart right I’ve taken to checking our pots of pansies more often than need be. The leaves are green, of course– but overall the pansies are a hodgepodge of purple and maroon and orange and blue. These colors make me happier/mellower/calmer than all that in-your-face green. I always feel more comfortable with variety than with sameness; and I guess, now that I think about it, that principle holds true for me in nature– as well as in decorating and people.

• • •

Well, that’s all I’ve got from here. Waiting for the sun to shine so that I can get outside to work in the garden. Wondering about where I should go to buy some new shorts. Thinking that it’s a very good thing that today is Friday, because I. am. tired.

Have a groovy weekend everyone. See you next week on the flip side.

I Have Seen My Future & I Like Who I Am

November 28, 2012 / Ally Bean / 14 Comments

I was getting out of my car in the parking lot in front of a strip center yesterday, when I noticed an older woman getting out of her car. The woman was probably 75-80 years old. She was slender, not emaciated, and was moving with a slow ease.

I was immediately taken with her. She was, I do hope, what I look like when I am her age. My future doppelgänger of sorts.

Here’s what I saw:

• white wavy hair, sans frizz, cut short & styled in a relaxed flattering way – not glued into place

• rectangular medium-brownish-gray framed glasses – that fit her face size

• a bright red parka that would make a stop sign blush at its own dull inadequacy

• a jazzy-patterned multi-colored silk scarf around her neck – peeking out from within her parka

• medium tan corduroy boot-cut pants – hemmed just right

• dark tan flat leather shoes – rather nondescript, but in the perfect shade to blend with the pants

To say that I was smitten is an understatement. Part of this was because it was refreshing for me to see a little old lady who embraced color and wore styles from this decade. She wasn’t a Q-tip, which is the way so many of the older woman around here dress. Not flattering.

But what really intrigued me about this woman was that she was driving a VW Beetle Convertible— bright red on the bottom, black on the top. A bold car, no?

And one that, combined with her ensemble, made me love her upon first sight as I became hopeful for my future as an old lady. I’m gonna look damned good, aren’t I?

I Need New Eyeglasses

October 18, 2012October 19, 2012 / Ally Bean / 17 Comments

{ Via* }

What is a blog if not a place to ~~whine about~~ discuss something that one wants, but for various reasons, has yet to get? ‘Tis the essence of blogging, imho.

So, here’s the skinny. I am sitting here all squinty-eyed looking at my lovely computer screen because I need new glasses. I’ve known this since July when it dawned on me that I was leaning in very close to the computer screen to see what I’d just written.

Bad posture + squinting. Not good.

But here’s the thing: I can’t get my eyes checked by the doctor until the weather turns cold. Very cold. Freezing cold. Because I need all the nasty pollen and mold spores to die. So that my itchy, red, inflamed eyes will be able to accurately see all those letters on the eye chart.

The key word is accurately.

Past experience, and the eye doctor himself, have taught me that until the allergens that cause my eyes to be irritated disappear from our environment, there is no point for me to try to get my eyes checked. The results of the exam will be wrong.

That would make me not happy.

So instead of charging forward [term used in both physical movement sense + paying for something expensive with a credit card sense], I am sitting here perusing the intertubes looking at photos of eyeglass frames so that when the magic day arrives for me to get my blurry eyes checked, I will have some idea of what frames I might want to go with. The choice, as I see it [pun intended], is between rimless frames OR dark plastic frames.

Sarah Palin or Wolf Blitzer?

Yep, that’s what it comes down to: granny or grump? Continue with my rimless look or give the hipster look a try? Spend oodles on another pair of Kazou Kawasaki frames or spend less on a pair of Warby Parker frames? All the while knowing that no matter which style I choose, I’ll initially dislike them because that’s what I do after buying new glasses.

I fret.

• Bobbi Brown’s The New Tortoise Shell Collection, eye shadow specifically for women who wear glasses

• Makeup Tips for Women With Glasses, how-to photos to achieve natural yet polished look

• Makeup for Girls Who Wear Glasses, article geared toward women who wear bold frames

• Revenge Of The Nerds: Makeup Lessons For Gals With Glasses, video showing makeup applied to make your eyes pop

[*Original Source for image here. Just realized that I linked wrong above. Mea culpa.]