(no subject)

[rivka]

It turns out that holiday weekends are a superb time to shop on eBay.

My big scores: a bright red, hooded, excellent condition, Land's End Squall parka, size 3T, for $19.99. Currently retailing for $69.50.

And!

...Okay, I'm a little embarrassed to admit this. But I might as well get it out of the way now, because I'm going to have to explain it anyway when they start showing up on my "new books read" list.

I got myself a set of ten Cherry Ames novels, all in the battered red covers I remember from my mother's 1940s and 50s originals. Did anyone else ever read Cherry Ames? She's a perky and dedicated young nurse who solves mysteries in her spare time, and oh boy did I ever love reading about her incredibly dated adventures when I was a kid. I think she's the reason my mother became a nurse, and I know she's the reason I wanted to be a nurse when I was a little girl. We only ever had three of them, and I read them over and over. Now I'll have those three again, plus seven more - including the books covering Cherry's career as an Army nurse in World War II. (I've heard that the series was sponsored by the U.S. government when it debuted in 1943, to try to get more young women to go into nursing to help the war effort.)

Anyway: ten books, kind of beat-up but in fine reading condition, for $15.99. I've seen smaller lots go for so much more on eBay, in the past. Hooray for most people having better things to do than bid on eBay over Labor Day weekend!

---

We ourselves at least had better things to do today, if not for the whole weekend. We spent the day with bosssio and her family down in Northern Virginia, just hanging out and relaxing and talking. They've got a great little stretch of undeveloped parkland just a few blocks from their house, so we took the kids down and let them splash around in a shallow creek for a while. Alex has finally satisfied her burning desire to know what a crawdad is - they were everywhere. Shortly after an idyllic creekside picnic, the outing ended in drama (Liam beaned Alex in the head with a rock), and we headed back to the house to fortify ourselves with wine and safer playthings. We enjoyed a lazy afternoon drifting back and forth between the house and the beautiful back garden (with an ornamental pool, even), and topped off the evening with an absolutely luscious chicken tikka masala, followed by vanilla ice cream with blackberry syrup. bosssio's husband Andy gets four stars in the kitchen.

I couldn't ask for a more enjoyable goodbye-summer day. ...Well, maybe if it hadn't involved Alex getting beaned with a rock. But everything else was wonderful.

Comments

[geminigirl]

I am so very envious that you got the Cherry Ames books. I was a Bobsey Twins fanatic when I was a kid (in fact, I have every one that was in print when I was reading them-Mom shipped them to me a few weeks ago, and they're going to get a spot on the nursery bookshelf when we have one.) I had one Cherry Ames book-the first one, and read a few more from the library but they were nearly impossible to find when I was a kid, and I loved the few that I could get my hands on. Oh my goodness, I am so very jealous.

I wish I were close enough to read your Cherry Ames.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

The Bobbsey Twins! I read them all too. We had a big pile of my mother's old Bobbsey Twins, with the dark green covers and the unbelievably offensive racial stereotypes. (According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobbsey_Twins), the early books were drastically rewritten somewhere around 1960. I wonder what they managed to do with "The Bobbsey Twins in the Land of Cotton"?) Then I read tons more of them from the library - the ones with the lavender covers.

My other major series love was Trixie Belden. I read every single one of those. The library only had the first thirteen, I think, but then I made a new friend who had all of them stowed away on shelves in her closet, and she let me borrow them serially.

[chargirlgenius.livejournal.com]

I was a Trixie Belden girl. My first dog was named Trixie, after her. They're back in print, again!

[geminigirl]

I read some of the Trixie Belden books as well. mactavish and I were talking a few weeks ago, and she found links to some of the old, pre-revision books.

According to my set from the early 80's, which have lavender covers, "Land of Cotton" wasn't available then. A little reading on the web, and I've come across some things about publishing conflicts which left the publisher of the era that I've got without rights to certain titles, but I also wonder if some were just beyond revision in any meaningful way.

[treacle-well.livejournal.com]

Never liked the Bobbsey Twins and therefore only read one or two. But I loved Trixie Belden.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Wow, Project Gutenberg has the text of some of the very, very old ones. Check it out! (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17412/17412-h/17412-h.htm) Chapter two, for example, warns that many a little girl has dropped dead from too much jumping rope.

[janetmk.livejournal.com]

Here are links to all Laura Lee Hope books (http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/h#a367) that are available on Project Gutenberg.

[kcobweb.livejournal.com]

I'm reading along - and chapter 7 explains how Flossie segregates her dolls by *race*!!! Because you couldn't let the white dolls touch the "colored" doll, I guess. Why was it deemed necessary to put that in the book? So weird.

I just know I'll be reading this all day.