Way-Out Wednesday: Sweet Adeline O'Mine.

Welcome to Way-Out Wednesday!




I can't even get begin to think of witty repartee for today's pick...I just can't...no words... Seriously, there's not a word in the English (or Elvish or Klingon) language to describe the fuckuppery that's going with today's vintage pick. I mean, good gawd. It's terrifying. It may be having a stroke. And it's totally freaking awesome.

I give you...

the Vintage Sweet Adeline "Singing" Barbershop Head Ashtray:





Sweet....jebus... To be clear, it doesn't actually sing. Apparently the "stroke victim/borderline retarded face" is supposed to *look* like it's singing. But here's where the awesome happens: That creepy-ass, gaping, stroke victim mouth is an ashtray. OHMYGODILOVEITSOMUCHITHINKI'MHAVINGASTROKEMYSELF--WAIT A SEC,IJUSTSAID"STROKEMYSELF"AHAHAHAHA.

But wait! There's more freakish goodness -- If you rest your cigarette on his lip, smoke will rise up and come OUT OF HIS EARS. It almost makes me wish I still smoked! But really, it doesn't matter if you smoke or not, because something this grotesquely fantastic would look just as nightmare-inducing sitting the shelf even without smoke wafting from his ear holes.




Vintage "Sweet Adeline Ashtray" is currently available on Etsy from seller Soul Man Vintage for a super decent price. But guess what? She just happens to have an alternative to the Stroke Victim Ashtray for sale, if that one doesn't do it for you. But don't worry. It's just as sexy. Behold:

Way-Out Wednesday: Mrs. Brown You've Got A Skanky Daughter.

Welcome to Way-Out Wednesday!




You know you had a fan-flipping-tastic night of partying your face off when you find a decapitated head, dubious stains and a dead hooker in your hot tub the next morning:



Maybe we're just seeing this Vintage 50's Naughty Ashtray at a weird angle. Maybe it's not as bad if we saw it from another angle...





Nope. Still a dead hooker.

Atomic Tuesday: Kiss My Ash.

It's Atomic Tuesday, kiddies!




And this week's atomic find is this Vintage Set of 2 Star Glow by Royal China Ashtrays.



Political correctness, to hell with you I say! I love vintage ashtrays and collect them when I can score them for a song and a dance, which is becoming less frequent these days it seems. Has smoking gotten such a bad rep that people just throw out their old ashtrays, assuming no one smokes anymore? Firstly, I would never use an ashtray as cool as this, with it's starburst-y goodness, as an actual ashtray. It's just too cool to be schmutzed up. But if anyone else chose to, go right ahead, what the hell do I care? Smoke 'em if you got 'em, I say. Secondly, do people forget that you need not be a smoker to like vintage ashtrays? They have a plethora of other uses, such as holding spare change and that random key or single button that you just can't bring yourself to throw out because you just know one day you'll find the shirt that's missing that very same button and you'll eventually figure out that the key is actually a spare you had made because you kept losing them to your '86 Honda Civic, which you haven't even owned for 15 years but what a great feeling it is to finally figure it out and throw it away after all this time. You see where I'm going with this, right?

Atomic Tuesday: Ashtray Heart

Today is Atomic Tuesday and today's theme is something that I haven't really thought about in ages: the boomerang ashtray. I remember the days, years ago, when you could find them for peanuts in just about every thrift store on the planet. Seriously cheap, like under a buck. I rarely see them anymore these days~ so what happened to them? Is it a regional thing? Did college hipsters grab them all up, for the sake of being "quirky" and "retro"? Am I just blind as a bat and am talking crazy again? Those ashtrays always reminded me of old ladies in the 70's who smoked and still used the same ashtrays they've had for 20 years. But you don't have to be a smoker to use them around the house. I use mine to hold spare change, candles and jewelry. And Valium. I mean vitamins.

Where did you go, funny little fugly/awesome ashtrays? The boomerang ashtray is one of those things that used to be cool then became a cliche then became cool again. Their low period was probably the late 90's, when they were almost a mockery, to anyone who decorated their home in mid-century modern stylings of the 50's and 60's. And now since they're getting harder to find they're becoming cool again. Like everything else, really. When it's around, it's lame. When it's nowhere, it's great. The human psyche is stupid. So here are some pretty rockin' ones, available as of now online.



Vintage Royal Haeger Boko Ashtray. I can't help it but the 12 year old in me keeps seeing a butt shape in this one. And I like it.





Vintage Orange & Olive Speckled Ashtray. Makes me want Cheetos. Now.





Vintage Royal Haeger Green Ashtray.





Vintage Flecked Shawnee Set of 2 Ashtrays. What a pair! Now you can double your storage of Valium! I mean vitamins.






"Ashtray Heart" by captain Beefheart

Cigarettes and Coffee

One of the many things I'm finding that I have a slight case of Fatal Attraction for is collecting vintage patio/porch/outdoors-y furniture and novelties from the 50's and 60's. The standard post-war bamboo patio chairs & matching bars, tacky-ass garden figurines like flamingos, gnomes & mushrooms (not the somehow-off repros from Target) are all things I luuurve to collect. But what I get really excited about (hey, now) are those things that you never really knew existed or are just plain old hard to find anymore. Lucky for me, I live across the street from an antique mall~ nothing great or fancy by any means, in fact, this is one of those places that you can only really pop in once or twice a month because the don't seem to get a lot of new stock often. Turnover sucks, but hey, you can't beat the location. Often I leave there empty-handed but then there are times I leave with some kind of gloriously kitschy "thing" of some sort. (There *is* an amazing 1959/'60 cylinder bar on wheels there that I'm trying to justify spending $195 on. Oh, but this thing is made of love: white & gold glitter "quilted" vinyl outside, open a latch on the side and the thing opens up to make a bar, complete with shelves inside and a bar stool. Oy vey, I'm getting verklempt just thinking about it. Tell me $195 isn't too much and I should skip over there and get that thing of beauty! TELL ME! No, don't! Intervention!)

So here's my score of the day. It's a cold, grey, crap kind of morning. I wander over to the antique store for shits and giggles, not expecting to get anything. (My bar is still there and although I don't need it, I need it, it calls to me, myyyy preciousssss....) Anyway, I did buy this unsavory treat for a mere 10 bucks: a vintage 50's metal ashtray-slash-duel drink holder. It's so inappropriate of modern times, what with smoking apparently being bad for you or something (have you beard this?), but I don't care, I love this damn thing. Made during the time when you'd have your lady friends come over for canasta and you'd place this stand between your 2 metal patio chairs. Sit, talk, have a smoke and a bloody mary. Good times.

I think the red is original and the yellow has been added later, as I can see bits of red under the flaking yellow. I think I'm gonna leave it as-is though, and not repaint it or even try to remove the paint. What do you think? Leave it?










"Cigarettes and Coffee" by Otis Redding.