(ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on July 17, 2020, this blog’s 3rd anniversary)

(title translation: “Figurines and Inflatables” – two words that don’t go together)

(“Figs ‘n’ Flates” do?)

 

It was really hard to figure out a sequence for this stuff. There’s no rhyme or reason to any of it, so there was no natural leadoff photo.

What to do? Pick something eye-catching and/or ridiculous. A stuffed moose on a toilet is both, plus it’s the perfect WTF-and-where-is-this-going image.

It also led me to create the sub-category of “Guards” – specific things that are stationed in specific places for good reasons. This moose spends 99.9% of his time standing on his head and antlers, guarding me from slamming my leg or toes into the metal corner of my Nordic Track in the dark:

 

Felix the Cat guards the four large speakers in the corners of my living room. This one sits atop one speaker:

 

Of these two, one sits and one hangs – both from almost 4’ over and above two other speakers:

 

This last one sits less than a foot-and-a-half from the fourth speaker in his “SIT FELIX” mortar (you’ll have to go to the 2010 post to make sense of that – it’s not what you think):

 

This guy guards valuables (he hasn’t failed me yet):

 

Tie tacks, medallions and CDs are gorilla-guarded:

 

The Noids (remember them?) guard old cassettes:

 

Godzilla oversees the entire room and guards three very valuable items: my unopened 2018 R’n’R Hall of Fame CD, my 2009 Opening Week tickets to the brand new Yankee Stadium and a Scorpions gold record (well, most of it):

What? Where would he (or I, for that matter) get a Scorpions gold record?

At the Meadowlands when the Scorps played there in April 1991. There was a party/presentation of gold and platinum records to the band in The Winners Club in the Arena………….and somebody dropped one!

Everyone kept their distance from all the broken glass and I noticed no one seemed to care about the big piece of gold record just laying there, so I grabbed it…………and God-Z has been guarding it ever since.

And he gets no help from Little-Z:

 

By the way – on top of the speaker that sits right next to me at the computer, there’s some sort of father-son drama going on:

“Wouldn’t you like to come and work with me in the office of a car dealership?” said the man who handled the books at one such place.

“Ahhhhhhhhh……………………no.”

The father had two rebellious sons who chose paths other than automotive ones, so I’m not sure who that other guy is:

 

 

 

Dolls/Puppets

 

You may recall these from an earlier post this year:

 

I picked up this Pee-wee Herman kit at a garage sale for a buck or two, but never had the interest to actually put it together, probably because he stole so much from a certain show I shot for:

 

Speaking of The Uncle Floyd Show (was I?), I have something similar to his main puppet Oogie:

 

As you can see, Oogie has yellow hair and (trust me) no legs (if you’d like to see a photo of Cyndi Lauper and Floyd with Oogie, you’ll have to go to http://bobleafe.com/ and look under “Uncle Floyd”).

Mine is a similar Pelham puppet with orange hair and two legs and he’s guarding a bunch of CDs and some 1922 sheet music of “Oogie Oogie Wa Wa” (non-Google translation: “I wanna Mama” to an Eskimo):

 

He’s also holding an altered Ozzie Smith baseball card:

 

All three of these items are very rare.

 

On the same CD shelf as Oogie, stands the very common Hugo – Man of a Thousand Faces puppet. Hugo was practically a cast member of the show and – with Mugsy’s guidance – danced at the end of a lot of shows.

He’s shown here guarding something that’s fairly rare: The Uncle Floyd Show Album (which I shot the cover for) in cassette form. I can’t find another one anywhere. That’s why Hugo’s not letting this one out of his sight:

 

Here’s a Hugo story that few people know about:

When Mugsy died, he was single and childless. The obituary in the local paper stated that he left a son behind named…………..Hugo. The paper was pissed when they found out that somebody fooled them, while we all had a great laugh.

 

 

Figurines

 

Any idea what this little cutie’s doing?

 

Taking pictures!

My youngest sister gave me this for Christmas a long time ago.

 

Here’s what it is and the back of it:

 

And here’s what it looks like brand new:

 

Wait a minute…………why does mine have a blue wreath and not a green one? Oh, I get it – mine must be the Elvis version:

 

 

These were my mother’s. Mom – the owl freak:

 

 

“Officer – there’s a naked blue lady bathing in my blue ashtray…………..can I keep her?”

 

 

Inflatables

 

The 2’-tall Crush Monster seems to be very rare. I can’t find another one anywhere online:

 

This 3’-tall hammer is pretty dull. I have no idea where I got it or why:

 

The name thing probably got me to acquire these two items, but the Turning Leaf wine one is so boring that I never even opened it:

 

As for the baloney guy, I couldn’t decide if I liked straight or crossed legs better:

 

Dunno where I got it, but you gotta love the shark :

 

It seemed like every guy I knew had an inflatable guitar………..this is mine:

 

But I took things to a ridiculous level when I got something that no one I knew had any idea even existed – an inflatable guitar tuner! Gotta keep “Bud” in tune, right?

 

“Bud” is about 3.5’-long and the tuner is about 3’-long:

 

After that, I said “No more – getting too crazy”. How crazy? I actually bought FIVE of those tuners! I gave one to a friend, opened another and here are the other three:

 

I can’t find another inflatable tuner anywhere online. I wonder what THREE unopened ones are now worth……………maybe it’s NOT so crazy that I bought them.

And I haven’t bought another inflatable since. But I DID manage to take a fairly-insane picture when it came time to clean off the 20 years of dust on them.

Guess where they had to go to get spray-cleaned (the tuner was deflated and already relatively clean):

 

The tub was filthy after that.

 

 

Now – wasn’t that more interesting than an inflatable doll collection?

 

No?

 

Too bad.

 

See ya.

 

 

(ignore May 01, 2017 publish date – this was published on July 23, 2020)

 

 

SKATES

In the late 50s, there was a girl in my class at Holy Trinity School in Hackensack who was a great roller skater………..maybe professional – I don’t remember. I also don’t recall if she was the reason a bunch of us started going to the Hackensack Roller Rink or not. If she was, thank you, Carol.

Those tickets were a little before my time (my parents were still in high school back then).

 

I didn’t have much trouble staying on my feet/wheels and became pretty fast, but really couldn’t do much else. The only move I had was that if I was rolling, I could turn around and continue rolling, but not propel myself once I was going backward.

Not much to work with, but I had fun.

It turns out that I got my “talent” from my mother, who was an avid skater in her teens, had her own skates (another “Carol”!) and metal skate box (probably covered with stickers from the various rinks she skated in). I think this was her local rink:

 

I seem to remember skating in at least 3 local rinks; Hackensack, Paramus and Montvale (I think). Unfortunately, the incident I recall the most did not have good results.

(I know I have a Paramus decal around somewhere, but, until I find it, this 1940 Paramus Rink ticket will have to do. BTW – “Route 2” is “Route 17” and check out the men’s dress code:)

 

On to the incident: Mom drove us to church on Sunday and for a while, we also took a neighbor girl whose parents asked if we could do that for them. I was around 11 or 12 and had a crush on this girl, but could never act on it…………until Mother’s Day came around.

Mom was thrilled that I wanted to take her to the Paramus Rink for Mother’s Day and “oh-by-the-way, cute neighbor girl in the car, would you like to come with us?”

“Yes”(!)

OMIGOD……..that was surprisingly easy. NOW what do I do?

 

The afternoon went fairly awkwardly and then turned disastrous. I don’t know how I did this, but I fell flat on my back…………HARD………and had the wind completely knocked out of me. I couldn’t breathe, I was gasping for air as people – including Little Miss Cutie – gathered around. At one point, tears started streaming out of my eyes.

I eventually recovered, but HOW FREAKING EMBARRASSING! And that was the end of that with the-girl-almost-next-door.

 

A couple of decades later, I was living with someone who was always looking for new and interesting ways for us to get some exercise. Skating popped into my head and she was intrigued (and a bit surprised when I told her I was fairly good at it).

We bought ourselves some skates, but the local rinks had vanished years ago, so where to go?

 

Somehow, we wound up on a track around something (a football field?) at her old high school. Now that doesn’t sound like it would be a solid enough surface for roller skating, so I’m obviously forgetting some detail, but whatever it was, it was sufficient for our needs……………….once.

 

Proof of actual use:

 

We never skated again. That was somewhere around 1980 and 40 years later, I still have my once-used roller skates.

 

Twenty years after last use, I made a small collection of roller skating memorabilia. Twenty MORE years later, here’s what I haven’t posted so far (the Casino Arena one is from Asbury Park):

 

PLATES (as in “license……”)

This is a pretty small collection and when added to the above SKATES one it’s only a total of 21 images.

Enjoy the brevity while you can………….the next one should be a monster.

 

SAMPLE PLATES

Can’t get any more sample-like than this:

 

 

Three iterations of the old car historic sample plates:

 

Speaking of historic, this is the actual plate that was attached to my rear end in the hospital on the day I was born (I can’t believe I actually found THIS plate on eBay):

 

 

I’m guessing this was on hand in the hospital in case a twin popped out after me:

 

 

And then we have the closer. This license plate spoke volumes about our previous governor:

 

If you’re not sure who that was, these two guys will fill you in. Crank up the volume and enjoy!

Note: YouTube (or SOMEBODY) appears to have removed the original NBC video. What’s left are bits and pieces from news broadcasts. This one seems to be the most complete one (go to full screen when it starts):

 

 

and on THAT note………………………………………

 

 

(“Flates”? “Skates”? “Plates”?  What’s next – “Dates & Mates”?)

 

 

 

(Ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was posted on August 2, 2020)

 

I had just gotten up today and blearily walked into my kitchen to scrounge up breakfast.

I had gotten two steps into the kitchen when my eye caught a smallish, feathered form outside the kitchen window that looked raptorish. It’s a kestrel(!) – the smallest American raptor – and it was sitting on the framework of what used to be an awning, 10-12’ away and about 8’ off the roof (I’m the 7th-floor tenant in a 6-story building – my apartment sits on the roof).

I ran to get my camera, but had to figure out how to shoot it through a dirty, screened window at an angle (which increases the amount of metal screen per square inch)…………while not letting it see me (it’s got eyes like a h……. falcon).

The camera initially focused on the screen, but a light tap on the shutter button brought the bird into focus. I was still not confident that these would look good.

And they didn’t…………..initially, but the post work – especially contrast – seemed to make them look almost normal.

It definitely spotted me and obviously kept a sharp eye on me, but I made no quick movements.

I got about 10 shots before I must have done something to spook the bird, but I wasn’t happy until I finished Photoshopping them.

 

NOTE: I’m trying to finish a large post that will be up in the next couple of days, so I really had no intention or desire to create another post today, but visiting raptors that just show up at your door – or window – change your plans…………..and you really don’t mind because it’s a gift. (Hey, buddy – gift me AFTER breakfast next time, OK?)

 

Back to our show:

I decided to make two triptychs that sort of tell a story that I just made up (click to enlarge images):

1. The bird had been preening and didn’t move after spotting me (not made up):

 

2. Feeling more at ease with me, it started to play peekaboo, then sneezed into its elbow crease (it had no mask) and finally offered to shake hands before departing:

 

I declined. Who knows what sort of COVID-infected little animal it recently ripped to shreds?

 

See you later this week.

 

(Ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on August 5, 2020)

Though this picture has little to do with the topic of 1980s invitations, I’d like to extend an invitation to you to meet my family in the ’80s (1988, to be specific) at my sister’s wedding. L to R, we are: Ed, Bob, Lorraine, Mom, Dad, Geri.

This may be my favorite family picture and it has been in a frame atop a cabinet for the last 3 decades, blocking whatever was behind it for all that time. I happened to look behind it recently and saw this:

 

I wasn’t sure what all this was, so after removing a layer of dust, I realized that they were all of the invitations – mainly from Manhattan clubs – that were either given to me or mailed to me during the 80s (with a few from the 70s and 90s).

There were 367 of them! I sorted about 70 of them into four groups (many of the 70 have multiple invites in them). In ascending order, the groups are:

 

GROUP 4

A little background: the way my job usually worked was if I wanted to shoot a show, I’d contact a record company publicist or band management to arrange a photo pass to be left for me at Will Call. If it was a direct assignment, I’d let the magazine do the dirty work.

At some venues, club security knew me and I could just walk in. The Cat Club was always like that.

On other occasions, the clubs did all the work with invitations.

Let me state right off the bat that – as far as I know – these are not exclusive, sought-after invitations that will make anyone drool with envy. I’m sure that hundreds of each were sent out in a effort to not only get publicity, but also to fill clubs and sell drinks.

Most of these were ignored because the acts (or activity) were just not of any interest to me and I would immediately add them to the pile. Of ZERO interest were “After Work Parties” – mainly at a club called “SHOUT!” (“Doors open at 5pm”) – from a club promoter named Maggie Saloman – someone I don’t believe I ever met or had any interaction with and have no idea how she got my name and address, but she probably mailed me more invitations than anyone else. Apparently, she had no idea that my work started no earlier that 7pm (and sometimes started after 1am), so her efforts (and postage) were all for naught.

I should mention that some invites in ALL groups have great graphics and are included solely for that reason.

Here we go:

Maggie – always SHOUT!ing:

 

Interesting graphics:

 

Some dress codes are not easy to comply with:

 

Group 3

Some invites in this group were of mild interest or featured artists or bands that I may have been aware of, but really had no interest in shooting.

This may be the only invite I got in the mail from Studio 54 (years after its infamous heyday):

 

This was the second incarnation of the Ritz, which moved from E. 11th St to Studio 54’s old location in 1989:

 

This invite is a VERY thin piece of see-through plastic that was difficult to photograph:

 

Great graphics (click to enlarge):

 

Double-yawn:

 

Another confusing invite from Maggie Salomon……….the listed events obviously occurred elsewhere, so what was the reason to go to The Underground?

 

Maggie invites us to “celebrate” the movie, but not actually see it, so what’s the point?

 

Think any Native Americans might object to this invite today?

 

Might have been interesting………….

 

Same for Herbie’s Public TV gig. Don’t know the Poison Girls:

 

Pass……………….

 

Group 2

In this group were a lot of artists that maybe I really should have gone to see. Some of these have me scratching my head as to why I didn’t. Two possibilities: I had a conflict that night (I had to shoot a bigger act) or – in the case of the Limelight – some places were just not conducive to good concert photography, so it’s possible I was able to shoot the artist in a better venue for shooting on that particular tour.

Actually, there’s a third possibility: I may have just whiffed on it.

 

Click twice to fully enlarge this one. I’ve shot the Thompson Twins and the B-52s a few times, but neither of these invite events involved performances. The “Guitar Heroes Night” looked worthwhile, but not at the Limelight. I see that Maggie Salomon’s in the middle of things (and this collage), but it sounded WAY too boring to go to – especially on my birthday. Warren Haynes would have been worth shooting, but I had retired the year before.

 

I met Dave when the Blasters were on The Uncle Floyd Show in 1982. I’m not sure why this is in the pile since it’s not an invitation. I guess I just threw mailed cards relating to music there:

 

I photographed both Jason Bonham and Joe Satriani a few times, so took the nights off (or shot something else):

 

The Heaven’s Edge gig was in Philly (pass) and the Motorhead card is about them being the first metal band on The Tonight Show (how did I miss THAT?):

 

Hmmm………….I shot for TP for a few years……………I wonder why I didn’t go to this. Maybe because the bands didn’t interest me that much?

 

This might have been fun, but it was on the wrong side of the country:

 

Thor (Jon Mikl) was an old pal who I met on the Uncle Floyd Show in ’82 (and ’83). Jon was just about the nicest guy you could ever meet in the music industry. Girlfriend Rusty was no slouch either:

 

This looks like it would have been an interesting show to shoot (Grandpa Munster?). The only two people listed who I HAVE photographed were Abbie and Geraldo:

 

Can’t go wrong with these guys, but I don’t see anything that says that either of these acts would actually be performing:

 

Word Up! was published by the same company that gave us Faces magazine, which I had a lot of photos in. They were located about two miles from my home – no trek into Manhattan! When I shot the Grammys in 1988, I was on a Word Up! assignment. None of the acts pictured on the card were at the party, so I passed on it:

 

Not an invite, but an interesting card to find in the pile:

 

Another nice invite that I didn’t take advantage of:

 

Worthwhile event, but not in my photographic wheelhouse. Click twice to fully enlarge:

 

Lots of names here, but they were there as judges – not performers…………..pass:

 

These are three 3-page invites on top of each other (click TWICE to enlarge). You’ll find the names “Coati Mundi” and “August Darnell” in the first two rows. I shot them together in 1986 (taken from my site, below invites):

I’ve photographed BeBe Buell (3rd row) a couple of times: (https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=7764, one photo) and wrote about her (https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=6433, one paragraph) and also shot her in performance once, but not at this Limelight gig.

 

Of this lot, I’ve photographed Bo, Billy, Steve, and Kenny, but thankfully, not at the Limelight:

 

I’ve shot Richie Stotts a bunch of times with the Plasmatics and once with King Flux (on the same night I shot Liberace!) and Marc Bell with the Ramones (click to enlarge):

 

These are two different Limelight/Willy DeVille invites:

 

I don’t even remember this band with all former Cheap Trick members:

 

But I DO remember Chris Spedding playing in Robert Gordon’s band – especially the night Bruce Springsteen showed up to join them in Asbury Park (where else?) in 1979 (look under “Robert Gordon” on http://bobleafe.com/):

 

Something a little different from the Limelight: a matchbook invitation (4.5” x 10.5” when opened (click twice to fully enlarge). Shown are the front and back and when you open it, you get what’s on the right side, Cab Calloway – complete with “matches”:

 

Here are two Buster Poindexter invitations for two different venues (click to enlarge first one):

 

Again – no movie to watch, so why bother? I DO have to say, though, that Rodney was fun to photograph on the Robert Klein Radio Hour tapings (on my site under “Klein”). Click to enlarge:

 

Both of these came after my 1992 retirement. Dalle was a French photo agency I was with for a while via a foreign woman named Victoria-something who screwed me out of a thousand dollars.

 

Interesting graphics and names:

 

Speaking of interesting names, I think I worked with about half of these publicists, but there’s ONE name missing and she’s reading this right now…………

It just ain’t right, I tell ya!

 

 

Group 1

With a couple of exceptions, these are the shows/events I actually attended and shot: fewer than 20 of the original 367 invitations – about 5% (what a snob!).

Besides the stories, I’ve included some of the shots I took at them.

 

Crystal Ship was a fairly-popular local Doors cover band. I shot this show, but I don’t recall anything about a backstage party for them and I have no backstage pictures from that night. So why do I have this invitation? I attended, but there was no party.

 

Star File was my long-time agency, but I don’t recall this event and probably just didn’t have a compelling reason to go (Bob the Snob strikes again!).

 

DS Magazines included Tiger Beat (which I didn’t contribute much to) and a slew of others to which I did. They were originally a couple of miles away from me in Cresskill, NJ, and then moved to Teaneck, where I lived. When they needed something fast, I got the call. Cushy gig.

D.S. was part of Edrei Communications, so when the boss sent me this invitation to a barbeque in ultra-wealthy Alpine, NJ, I quickly accepted:

 

Danceteria was never my cup of tea, but Queen was, so I decided to go. What a waste of time! The band had some big name official photographer (I’d post it if I recalled who the dickhead was) who was apparently very insecure. I don’t know how he did it, but he got club security to throw out all the invited photographers! This was the only time in my career something like that ever happened to me. What a baby!

 

I was friendly with the people at Megaforce Records, so when they sent me this invite, I made it my business to be there. I was not familiar with Tribe after Tribe, but I took some good shots, never sold any and never heard of them again:

 

Now this was a fun night! I had worked with the band earlier that year on an exclusive shoot at the Ritz, which included Joey DeMaio’s private workout regimen with his personal trainer on the venue floor and backstage band pictures with and without friends. Now they’re giving me an open bar to shoot their show at point-blank range? Man, did that fuel produce some shutter-finger power…………what a blast!

 

I had shot a lookalikes event in 1982 that featured an amazing Marilyn Monroe/Clark Gable duo, so when I got this invite 3 years later, I had a reason to go.

 

Actually, I had two reasons to go because the authors featured in the invite – Marie Morreale and Susan Mittelkauf – were magazine editors, to whose mags I frequently contributed. Make that three reasons to go: if I recall correctly, I also had 9 photos in their “Cyndi Lauper Scrapbook”

And here are Marie and Susan at the event with their Cyndi book:

Recognize any of these “people”?

 

Huey Lewis played at Pier 84 on the Hudson River and had an after-show party at the Sports Training Institute. That only makes sense if you realize that his current album at the time was called “Sports”:

From my site:

 

A shoot at the Kit Kat Club with a good band and friendly Club employees. You didn’t have to ask me twice to shoot this event:

 

Same thing with an offstage shoot with Frank Zappa at the Limelight (but for entirely different reasons):

From my site:

 

I was interested in the Manny’s shoot way before I read that it was to be held at the Rainbow Grill at 30 Rock – 65 floors up. I got there nice and early for the scenery. Too bad it wasn’t held 5 floors higher at Top of the Rock, where no windows would be there to cause the reflection problems I encountered 5 floors below (complain, complain). Click to enlarge:

 

From my site:

This is a good time to salute publicist Ren Grevatt, who I knew since the mid-70s (he was John Scher’s publicist and I shot for John’s venues, so……………..)

Ren could be kind of gruff at times (“You STILL have that rock and roll hairdo?”), but he got the job done.

 

“We’re Having A Party” is a Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes cover of a Sam Cooke song and is the SSJ/Jukes theme. At the time, the band owned New Year’s Eve at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic, NJ (my house!). Hungry (and confetti’d) me is shown after the show in that lobby:

 

Holly George-Warren hit on a good thing with her “365” line of books and I hit on a baker’s dozen number of pix in the Punk one (didn’t do too badly in the “Grateful Dead 365” one either):

(BTW – Manitoba’s is run by Handsome Dick Manitoba from the Dictators.)

 

Wicked Maraya – pic and story stolen right off my site:

 

 

So I couldn’t make it to LA for the RIP magazine party……………..no big deal because they also had one on Long Island. Sebastian Bach and Michael Monroe “made it”, too:

 

This was a unique gathering. Have you ever attended a party on a moving subway train on which the public was not allowed? This celebration was for a 4.5” x 5.5” publication called “Subway Sagas”.

The first picture (click to enlarge) shows everything that came in the mailed envelope: the left side shows the book and the center/right side images show the back and front of the invitation the book came in. The second pic shows the invitation’s inside message and party instructions:

 

These 3 pix show a hastily-taken exterior shot as we boarded the subway, part of the party band in the subway car and some drunken bum who’s still holding what’s left of his 34th drink (talk about authenticity!):

 

 

This was a WNEW-FM press conference to announce an event called “Shootout at the Hard Rock” – a fun gig that lasted for a week. Station DJ Scott Muni was going to broadcast his afternoon show from the Hard Rock Cafe Monday to Friday, October 28 to November 1, 1985. He announced the list of guests for that week at the PC. All I had to do was show up at the Hard Rock each afternoon and fire away – fish-in-a-barrel style.

At the end of the week, there would be a fantastic ending called “Shootout in the Sky” that I wrote about on bobleafe.com and where I took what is probably the best picture I’ve ever taken in my life (it’s the one picture that has always hung over my sofa). It’s really a must-see pic and must-read story (he says modestly). I would urge you to go to my site and enter 18-001 in the search box. If you never look at anything else on my site, look at this one.

Here is the invite and a picture I took at the PC that shows Muni, Miami Steve Van Zandt and a “Shootout at the Hard Rock Cafe” sign in front of the podium:

 

Who can resist a Monkees press conference? Not me, apparently:

 

Speaking of press conferences…………..Oh boy! An invitation to the press conference for “VH-1 Presents Classic SuperFest” – featuring all the bands you liked two decades before:

The thing I recall most about this PC was a shot I got of someone I really didn’t expect to see there – NY Giants quarterback Phil Simms (and I still don’t know why he was there).

But I got a recent surprise when I found a shot of someone I thought I had never photographed before I “finally” did in 2019. You DO know this guy and you know MANY of his huge hits. He’s on the left next to Flo & Eddie………..I mean, Mark and Howard – the two main Turtles:

 

STILL don’t know who he is? Good – now you’ll have to go to these two posts:

https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=8132

https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=8163

 

Somebody who knows that star very well sent me this final invitation (click to enlarge):

 

“Carcrunching” refers to a video shoot I did on a very cold (and very late) night two months prior to the Smokey’s event, which included The Real Roxanne:

 

It was shot downtown where Area (club) was located. As I recall, the club name was changed to “Rocket” for the video.

Do you remember “Bigfoot” – a monster 4-wheeler that crunched cars in arena shows? It was the star of this video shoot:

 

And here’s the “Leader of the Pack” video mentioned in the invite and it shows all the car-crunching:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KE3-IyLsg8

 

 

OK – that’s it for invitations, except I invite your comments if you happened to see anything interesting.

 

 

I’m gonna finish where I started by tying up a loose end – I didn’t credit the photographer of my favorite family picture. The back of the picture says his name is R.E. Parker and, apparently, he’s a vegan:

 

 

(ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on August 11, 2020)

 

PART 1 – AUGUST 6, 2020 (INCLUDES PHYSICAL PAIN)

Since opening on October 27, 1932, this highly-recognizable Sears building has stood at the corner of Main St and Anderson St in Hackensack – a mile from my childhood home in Teaneck (and two blocks from my home of the last 32 years in Hackensack).

With all the financial problems and store closings Sears has had over the last few years, everyone was wondering when this one would bite the dust.

The news arrived at the end of July 2020, which has not been a good year for anybody.

 

Sears had been the go-to place for Mom when we were kids. It wasn’t a popular choice (“Do we have to?” was our usual response). I could probably count on one hand how many times I’ve bought something there during these last 32 years, but don’t ask me what………………oh, wait – I DID find a $100 Sears gift certificate that nobody else wanted when cleaning out my parents’ house in 1998 and bought a really warm winter coat with it that I still wear, so…………yay, Sears.

But I DO have ONE very special memory from a LONG time ago that involved a highly-desired item and – of all people – my father (Mom actually let someone other than her buy something for one of their children at Sears? Unheard of!).

That was so uniquely special that I still remember the date!

December 10, 1959 was the day my father took me to Sears in Hackensack to buy me the only Christmas present I wanted – a Silvertone transistor radio (Sears didn’t exactly sell Marantz, you know).   😉

This was not a pocket transistor radio. It was about (I’m guessing) 10”x6”x2” and was encased in brownish-tan cowhide/leather. I can’t find a picture of it online, sooooo………

Being ahead of my time, I took an unfortunate selfie of an enraptured-acting 12-year-old hipster digging the music and snapping his fingers, while carrying the radio boombox-style (two decades before THAT was popular):

 

Then I got serious and did my homework to the beat of either WMCA or WABC (AM, of course):

On that back-wall shelf, you can see baby powder and Gerber’s baby food, so those may be big old diapers under them on the table, meaning that this little table may have also served as the changing table for my youngest sibling, who was born mid-’59. Most likely, the picture was taken in very early 1960.

 

See the Amoco station in this ‘30s or ‘40s pic? I actually worked there for a short time in somewhere around 1966.

 

 

After that, my involvement with Sears was minimal to non-existent until I moved two blocks away in 1988.

 

I was now on top of a building and had a 24/7 view of the tower. Doesn’t sound very exciting (and it isn’t), but it gave the photographer in me a small variety of things to shoot that no one else had access to, from both my living room and my roof.

 

From my site:

“from my roof, Hackensack, NJ 1994

Under the Red, White, and Blue, Sears is temporarily red, white, and blue.”

 

 

I have no idea what year I took the next 3 images, but this one reminded me of the ball falling in Times Square on New Year’s Eve:

 

This one shows the tower with fireworks going off 2 or 3 towns away:

 

I was in my car stopped at a light when I took this. I hit the “Invert” button in PhotoShop and this was the result:

 

They re-did the Sears exterior in 2011:

 

It looked kind of messy and deserved an added letter:

 

The SmEARS campaign continues:

 

I like this shot because the tower seems to be heading for the stratosphere:

BTW – the re-finished building is the first picture in this post.

 

This is a 2014 GIF I made that shows the raggedy Sears flag on April 1 and 5 (first 2 frames) being replaced and raised on April 12 by 3 people, who then vanish into the hatch, which is closed in the last two frames. The file has NOT been optimized to save space (and it looks it):

Now if only it would shut off after each run………………..

 

New flag:

 

In 2012, after a couple of weeks of negotiation with the Sears corporate lawyer in Hoffman Estates, IL, I got the OK to go up to the tower to shoot. I was as high up as you could go without climbing the tower’s flag pole. My favorite shot that day was actually 8 shots – a photo stitch of my neighborhood that you’ll have to click twice to fully enlarge and then start scrolling (to shrink it back, hit your back button).

Let’s start on the left with the very tall and beautiful white steeple of the First Presbyterian Church. Two buildings to its right is the shorter steeple of the Second Reformed Church. It looks like it belongs in an English castle.

In between those two towers is my H-shaped building. The yellow brick is the back of it. The closer section rises 6 stories. Part of the further section rises to a 7th story. That part is my apartment, sitting on the roof. And all the cell antennas you see on the building are now gone.

You can see 3 windows on that 7th-floor back side. The closest (and largest) window is my living room – where I’m typing this – and the other two are in my bedroom.

There is a third church (First Baptist) that’s partly visible across the street from the front of my building. The Second Reformed Church’s front roof blocks most of it from view.

Continuing to the far right, you can see Holy Trinity Catholic Church – where I was baptized – and its unique steeple. Directly across the street (and back a bit to the left), you can see the roof of the former Holy Trinity Grammar School – where I learned to read, write and cipher.

One more item of interest (at least to me): at the left end of the high-rise row on the horizon is Hackensack University Medical Center, where I get most of my medical needs taken care of.

 

When I was finished shooting and descended the straight-up-and-down interior metal tower ladder, I had to leave the roof hatch open for some reason. Someone was supposed to close it later……………but no one did. It was going to rain the next day, so I called Sears to get the hatch closed, so this is a VERY rare shot of the open Sears tower roof hatch as two men come up to do something on the newly-refurbished tower and the flag blows straight out.

It looks fake. The 80-year-old tower looks too new and the flag looks too perfect. I wish I could claim to have painted this, but I can barely draw:

(I wonder if this tower will make it to 90)

 

And now it’s official: goodbye Hackensack Sears. The signs are on the building and the ad’s in the newspaper:

 

I have no idea when the doors will actually close for the last time and I have no screaming need for any Kenmore or Silvertone products, so I thought I’d go over there to pay my respects with one last walk-through and take a few shots.

There was a TON of stuff there and it didn’t appear that thousands of people had rifled through everything and left messes all over the floor (how disappointing, photographically). Aside from all the hanging “EVERYTHING MUST GO!” signs, the place looked fairly normal – there was almost nothing worth shooting – so I guess they’ll be open for a while. Maybe I’ll go back if and when it gets a lot more chaotic. (NOTE: subsequent information reveals that the store is scheduled to close on September 12).

 

The entrance view:

 

The initial view inside:

 

The reverse view on the way back out:

 

With not much else to photograph, I decided to shoot the old familiar escalators while they were still working (click to enlarge):

The video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ll1wDmsQbkE

 

When the escalator took me to the basement, I FINALLY saw a shot worth taking (the sign in back says, “Fixtures, Furniture and Equipment for Sale”):

(No – I didn’t price anything……….do your own dirty work.)

 

 

So where’s the PAIN mentioned in the title? Actually, it happened on my way back home about 5 minutes after I took the last Sears picture (but if I hadn’t gone to Sears that day……………).

With my camera still in hand, I tripped on a rough part of road. I’m pretty good about maintaining my balance when that happens, but not this day. I was probably trying too hard to protect the camera.

I fell and landed full weight on the top of my left shoulder. I didn’t hit my head, but MAN, did that hurt! I laid there for a few seconds, stunned by the amount of pain. Did I break something? Could I even get up? Had I saved the camera?

I got up and made it home. The camera was saved and recorded the shoulder road rash, but I was very surprised to discover the blood running down my arm. The road caught me just above the left elbow, but the shoulder pain masked any additional discomfort:

I was able to move my arm somewhat and that seemed to indicate that nothing was broken, but the pain never subsided or lessened one bit.

I called my doctor to find out if he could see me, but couldn’t get through (it turned out that their power had been off for 3 days, thanks to Tropical Storm Isaias).

I decided to drive myself to the ER at Hackensack UMC. It was an adventure just to get into the parking garage (I couldn’t extend my left arm out the window to get the ticket).

 

The ER was its usual super-busy self with all patients placed lying down on gurneys and parked for long periods of time wherever space could be found.

Long story short: X-rays were taken, no broken bones, badly-bruised shoulder, given a tetanus shot and a Tramadol prescription and sent home.

I sleep on my sides, alternating as the night goes on, but not this night. Pain woke me at least 4 times that night. It’s down to 2 or 3 now, but I can’t do much with this arm. It takes major leg kicks to get up from bed or the sofa.

I’ll see my doctor in a couple of days and he’ll probably tell me to find an orthopedist. The HUMC doctor told me it might be at least a month before some semblance of normality returns to the arm.

 

THANKS, SEARS!

See if I buy any more transistor radios from YOU again!

 

Late addition (posting day – August 11, 2020): I’ve noticed that a new color has been added to my Skin Color Palette: Yellow! Not sure why that’s there, but if it can stick around for two days, I’m sure my doctor will tell me:

 

 

PART 2 – SEPTEMBER 1, 2020

The shoulder’s improving…………….slowly.

Because I heard a rumor that this Sears might be closing today (September 2), I visited the store yesterday to document the chaos…………..there was none.

The only differences in the opening shot were that featured floor merchandise on the right had changed and the jewelry cases on the left are now empty.

 

The basement escalator is now blocked and all merchandise for sale is now on the first floor.

 

I must have been mistaken about the mannequins being in the basement last time because I took almost the same picture yesterday:

 

I DID find one thing I wanted to buy because it looked a bit like a Grammy award:

Unfortunately, it had a “sold” sticker on the bottom.

 

What they appear to be doing seems sensible and rather orderly. All merchandise and transactions are now on the first floor. The second floor is all fixtures, such as metal clothing racks, etc., as you can see in these two photo stitches (Click to enlarge TWICE and scroll laterally):

 

All men’s clothing used to be against the most-distant wall (Anderson St side) from where you enter the store. As store inventory shrinks, everything that remains is moved closer to the entrance. Here’s how that far wall looked yesterday (you can see the “MENS” sign on the pillar):

 

All clothes are now closer to the middle of the first floor – about equal to where the closed Main St side entrance is. In the below stitch, you can see (from the left) the closed Main St entrance and men’s and women’s clothing on both sides of the parking lot entrance (Click to enlarge TWICE and scroll laterally):

 

This is a 180º stitch (which is not glitch-free) that shows (looking east) clothes and escalators, (looking south) the back wall where men’s clothing used to be and (looking west) the closed Main St entrance (Click to enlarge TWICE and scroll laterally):

 

A shot of the empty jewelry cases on my way out:

 

A final exit?

 

I might do one more at or close to the end, if for no other reason than to see if the “Join the Team” sign is still on the door in the above shot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on August 28, 2020)

 

This is one of those catch-all categories that will lend itself to either a Part II or LOTS of late additions to this post as I find things while searching for other items.

So let’s start with one I really like:

Why do I like it? I’ll show you one good reason later.

 

Crazy Eddie Electronics was VERY well-known in this area from the 1970s to the 1990s. Almost as equally well-known were their commercials, which featured a fast-talking, high-energy pitchman named Jerry Carroll, a former DJ. You can find lots of these commercials on YouTube.

I bought a lot of stuff at their Paramus store on Rt 17, but I especially recall my last purchase at that store. In 1989, they filed for bankruptcy and started their liquidation sale, which – of course – included fixtures and SIGNS.

This 4’ x 4’ sign hung over (or on the wall of) their home entertainment area and later did the same in mine:

 

Specific sales had their own signs. Who could resist a SIX-FOOT by TWO-FOOT Lincoln & Washington double-barrel BIRTHDAY BLOWOUT BLITZ sign that featured Jerry Carroll’s likeness on Mt. Rushmore?

 

Comparatively tiny was this 39” x 20” Back to School………sorry, “Skool”…Blowout Blitz sign:

 

I also picked up a couple of Crazy Eddie bright yellow t-shirts (not that I would ever wear a yellow t-shirt, but I knew someone who would. More on THAT later).

BTW – I couldn’t find these shirts to photograph, so this image came from eBay:

 

Guess what? LATER has arrived for both LATERed items, courtesy of my friend, Chris. I’m sure I must have these in color somewhere, but this is what I found and you already know what the colors are:

 

Switching gears slightly, I offer you this little item from 1915:

 

More gear-switching: this item was posted in the 1998 listing. I acquired it that year in an auction in North Carolina. It’s a 3′ x 8.5′ Super Bowl XXVIII (1993) hanging, heavy-vinyl, double-sided street banner from Atlanta (the Super Bowl was held in the Georgia Dome that year). Apparently, only 200 were made:

 

Checkout dividers! Remember them? I think they still have them, but they’re pretty generic and nondescript. Sometime around the end of last century, I saw that interesting ones were fading out, so I managed to get a couple. I think you can still find a Pepsi one online, but not “King of the Hill”:

While we’re on the subject of Pepsi, this came out of my parents’ house:

 

Anybody have (or ever seen) Pepsi hats stitched together from Pepsi cans in Viet Nam? My faceless roomie has two:

 

And I bought two of these on eBay at least two decades ago, but I don’t know why (I’ve never even opened them). They can’t be worth much if they say “Collectible” on the box and there are about 50 of them currently on eBay:

 

All this soda needs to wash something down…………how about a pizza? This is a big (42.5” x 21.25”) plastic piece that might replace a window in a pizzeria (or hang in your kitchen):

 

 

“Putney Swope” was my favorite movie back in ’69-’70, so that’s why I have this stuff:

 

 

I’m a Mac guy, so I never opened this box:

 

 

It’s not ALL fun & games, as this WWII poster attests:

(Sound familiar?)

 

 

Well, back to fun and games. This church – where I was baptized – is two blocks away and the posters are from 2012 and 2014. I’ve gone to the carnival a couple of times, but only for the moving lights photography, which can be found elsewhere on this blog:

 

 

This is posted elsewhere on this blog, but it fits here too. This is where I worked the midnight shift for 3 years in the early 70s while I was in college:

 

 

I’ve had this African(?) mask for a long time, but I don’t know where I got it or when. It – along with the next item – can be seen in a photo in the 1975 post. It’s 9.5” x 25.5”:

 

 

I’ve never been able to figure out what this is. It appears to be wood and is segmented, but it does not open up to reveal a weapon, like a dagger in a cane. I figure that this is the mythological ugly stick (“you so ugly you musta got beat with an ugly stick”). The head on top has seen better days:

 

 

This c. 1950 framed image – that I found behind a bunch of other stuff – shows an “industrial terminal” 3-4 miles from where I live that includes Teterboro Airport:

 

But it’s obvious that there’s larger (27” x 19”) image underneath it. Omigod – it’s a gorgeous 1949 photo of a Boeing Stratocruiser passing over the George Washington Bridge as it heads south down the Hudson River:

 

Personally, I prefer this more dynamic cropped version. Actually, I really wish I was the photographer who got to shoot this (though I DID shoot the GWB from the air in a similar location – it’s in the 1982 post – just not with a big plane coming at me):

 

 

Sneaking back to Teterboro for a minute…………. After 9/11, prices shot up when there was a run on eBay for anything connected with the now-gone Twin Towers. I found this small Teterboro shoulder bag that was pretty cheap and being offered by a WAY-out-of-state seller, who obviously wasn’t aware that the WTC was depicted in its image.

I really didn’t need a little shoulder bag, but I bought it anyway and a decade later, it turned out to be perfect for carrying small digital cameras:

 

 

Anybody still have a BodySonic chair? I do. You just sit in head-to-toe, body-vibrating sound (see description in third image):

Here’s mine in ’89:

 

 

Or you could just sit on a thin pad on a hard seat at MetLife Stadium. I think I got this at a garage or yard sale years ago. I also think it’s worth more unopened with a $1 yard sale sticker price on it:

 

 

In another garage sale, I found this 1930 poster for Amos ‘n’ Andy’s “Check and Double Check” movie (with an all-white cast in blackface) in a 12.75” x 16.75” frame that had to be at least as old as the movie:

 

 

This will no longer stick to my refrigerator…………maybe it grew up:

 

 

This is a framed 14” x 20” eye-catching copper sculpture by Peter Friedling. It’s called “The Rescue” and it would be well-worth your time to research this retired fireman’s work. The detail is incredible:

 

I think the back of the frame reveals the cause of the fire: faulty wiring.

 

 

This is a 13.75” x 9.5” print on a 16” x 20” board. The photo was taken by staff photographer Eddie Hill from The Record newspaper on the morning of April 9, 1968. The conflagration took place at 16 W. Palisade Ave in Englewood, NJ.

It was given to Eddie Hasse by someone whose name appears to be John Bongiovanni. I think I found it on eBay:

Cropped:

What’s on the back (an empty, yellowed envelope that says “Spot News”):

 

 

One more photography-related item: F-Stop Fitzgerald’s 7.75” x 6” studio, complete with Louise Marie, model – a gift from my youngest sister. A signature on the back looks like it says, “John D. Richards” or something close to that, but I could find no further information. Anybody have a clue?

 

 

 

MUSIC-RELATED (in no particular order)

 

A 1978 30” x 40” sign from E.J. Korvettes in Paramus, NJ, suggesting that you go meet Meat:

 

 

I must have found this 24.75” x 18.5” piece after a show:

 

I’m guessing the flip side shows their initial idea (“Missfitzz of Metal”). If you sat behind the girls, this side is what you’d see. “White Northern girls” sounds about right:

 

 

First pic (and from my site): I had a shoot with Masters of Reality on Feb. 11 1989 – the same day as the show – so either there was a loose poster on the wall behind them or I grabbed one later that evening at the club:

 

 

These 23” x 9.5” Robert Plant/HoneyDrippers pieces appear to be zeppelin-shaped. Imagine that……………

 

 

This unopened box is a tribute to my favorite Blue Oyster Cult song:

 

 

Maybe they should change their name to “Granite-ica”:

 

 

Nice 3’ x 2’ tribute to Pink Floyd’s back catalogue:

 

 

This is a 24” x 18” heavy-duty Pearl Jam door mat from 1990 in almost perfect condition. It was a promotional item for the band’s “ten” album. I’ve had it for 30 years and done nothing with it.

As I write this, someone’s selling one in slightly worn condition for $300.00, plus $20.00 for shipping:

 

 

This children’s zither is 12” x 17.5”. I think I found it in my parents’ home when I cleaned it out, but I had never seen it before and have no idea why it was there:

Sound hole closeup:

It came with instructions, a zither-ring (thumb pick), a tuning device and 20…………I don’t know what to call them………sheet music? playing instructions?…………for German and American toe-tappers:

 

 

 

SHEET MUSIC

 

“On The 5:15” sheet music (from 1914): it sounds like it might be a song by the Who, but instead, it’s about an old Erie Railroad line – what we call today the Pascack Valley Line. The front cover shows the timetable of the trains as they head north from Hoboken – it’s the NYC commuters coming home to this area after work (and after they took the Hudson Tubes from Manhattan under the Hudson River back to NJ).

You can see the various stops in Hackensack. I live a block from Anderson St and the station is about 3 blocks up Anderson. I can see the trains from my kitchen window:

Here’s a current map of the line:

 

 

Sheet music regarding the aforementioned Hudson Tubes was posted elsewhere on this blog (https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=6696), but here is the cover, which may or may not tempt you into hitting that link:

 

 

There are many versions of this particular 1924 sheet music. I used to own at least 4 or 5 of them:

 

 

I wrote extensively about the George Washington Bridge and this sheet music here – https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=8341. This shows the original design of the GWB:

 

 

 

TEST PRESSING

 

OK – I took all the photos for the Uncle Floyd Show album:

 

But it wasn’t until years later that I got myself a test pressing of the album:

 

But where did THAT image of Floyd come from? It looks kinda familiar………….

Oh yeah…………..

 

 

 

Let’s finish this post with the epitome of class. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you something you never knew existed, but will probably crave the rest of your lives because it’s signed not only by country legend Neal McCoy and rock legend Joe Walsh, it also bears the signature, a self-drawing AND a lofty comment from Cheap Trick’s Rick Nielsen.

 

It’s the greatest guitar you never heard of………………..it’s…………….

 

THE GUITOILET!

 

I always forget about it because it’s still covered up (to protect the signatures), it’s mounted almost at ceiling level behind a door in a back room and is hooked up to its own fire alarm.

I won it in a Leland’s auction from this catalog 20 years ago:

 

………….it was the first signed guitar listed on page 73:

 

………and here are all the details:

 

 

 

TAKE THAT, GUITAR SNOBS!

 

 

 

(ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on September 14, 2020)

 

With my career behind me, here I am enjoying my glorious retirement in the year where ’20 got its ass totally kicked by -19.

I didn’t realize when I bought the shirt years ago that it would be so succinctly predictive.

 

 

(ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on September 21, 2020)

 

Back in 1988 when I got my first camcorder and had moved into an apartment atop an old building, I started videoing all of the little odd things that I could observe from my new vantage point.

At the end of the year, I would edit hours of stuff down to a one-to-two-hour videotape and make copies for my family members at Christmas.

“Bob’s Observations” sounded rather stuffy, so I called it “Bob’sObs”. My mother was my biggest fan and insisted that I watch it with her so I could narrate/explain all the little odd things I saw that I didn’t mention as I was shooting.

Bob’sObs probably ran for a decade or so. I still see lots of odd things, but my concentration these days is still photos that I can post about.

Such an occurrence happened this past Saturday and began 12.5 miles away at the World Trade Center in Manhattan and ended 10 miles north of the WTC – in a straight line – at the George Washington Bridge, which is 5.5 miles east of me.

In this first picture, you can see something white in front of the upper part of 1 WTC. To the far left of that, you can see a very small dot in the sky:

This is a small plane – I’m guessing over the Hudson River – heading north and pulling what appears to be some sort of banner (how you like dem eagle eyes from over a dozen miles away?)

 

As the plane continues north, you can see the banner against the open sky:

 

The plane has passed the Empire State Building and the banner is about to do the same (but what is its message?):

 

Plane and banner pass some of the newer Manhattan skyscrapers:

 

Now much closer to me, you can start to make out lettering as plane and banner pass New Jersey buildings, but you still can’t read what it says (though it’s probably NOT a Black Lives Matter banner). So what was the important message that two states needed to see?

BTW – the church is St Joseph’s R.C. Church in Bogota, NJ, which is across the Hackensack River from me. St Joe’s is probably 2-3 miles away. The high-rises right behind it are in Cliffside Park, NJ, atop the Palisades by the Hudson River. They’re actually 5-6 miles away. There’s an entire valley with a couple of towns and Route 95 between these two buildings.

 

Finally, the banner is now directly facing me between The Modern 1 and 2 towers in Fort Lee – JUST south of the GWB (the plane is behind the tower on the left, which is The Modern 1). It’s as close as it’s gonna get (5.5 miles vs. the original 12.5 miles):

 

AND THE BANNER IS SEMI-SORT OF READABLE (that’s “NY” on the bottom, right?). I had to go to the full-size file of the image to make a stab at whatever this socially-important, bi-state message was and then search Google images for something that fit my guess and this is what I came up with:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The print and image look the same, right?

 

BTW#2 – I DID take one more picture that shows that the plane (and the banner) turned around somewhere in the vicinity of the GWB and were heading south down the Hudson River so all of Manhattan could read the banner:

 

 

 

 

TRUTH BE TOLD:

Actually, the plane did this round trip a couple of times. I first saw it when it was heading south and the banner faced NYC, but I saw that it turned around down near the WTC and shot its complete northern trip.

 

So much for dem eagle eyes…………

 

 

 

 

 

(Ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on October 1, 2020 )

 

During this pandemic, I’ve become REALLY sick of TV remote interviews where the subject is always posing in front of his/her home library to let the world know how much of an intellectual he/she is. It’s worse if that person is a recently-published author because a copy (or three) of their new book is always positioned within readable camera range – even though the interviewer has already been publicizing it and waving it about for all to see (new PPE = Product Placement Excess).

Not having an elegant book depository in my apartment, I guess I’m safe from being interviewed on TV anytime soon. Besides, what would I hold up for the camera – my blog posts?

I’m just not that much of a book reader (though I do read a lot). That probably stems from Catholic high school, where the school year never ended thanks to mandatory summer reading lists that you would be tested on in September. A family member was very surprised to learn that I never yearned to “sit down with a good book” and that I didn’t even own a library card.

I DO own books, but not the kind one would put in a cohesive library suitable as background for remote TV interviews.

It’s a really varied collection that I…………..wait a minute – did I just use the word, “COLLECTION”?

Oh, goodie! An excuse for another collections post!

So………….

Where to begin?

First off, sometime earlier last month, I somehow burst a blood vessel (I think) in my right eye, so that was the inspiration for the eye-for-an-i image in the above photo (I think my eye looks rather patriotic). The red vanished naturally within a week (and without Visine!).

As far as organizing this mess, saving the best – i.e. most interesting – for last is always a good idea, so let’s get an old favorite of mine (history) out of the way first because there’s a LOT of it.

Having been the moderator of the Bergen County Historical Society’s forum a while back, it helped to have a little knowledge about many of the county’s 70 municipalities, so I have a couple of books about some neighboring towns. With the exception of the first one, I’ve lived in all of them.

New Milford, NJ

 

Bogota, NJ

 

Englewood, NJ

 

Ridgefield Park, NJ

 

Teaneck, NJ

“Teaneck, NJ Forty Years of Progress”

 

“The Story of the Township of Teaneck” – a bound, typed 1941 master’s thesis at the University of New Hampshire by Evelyn C. Sloat

Included with this thesis is a separate, 3-page handwritten and typed family-tree of hers (I imagine), who came from Holland in the 1600s and whose last name originally appears to have been Slot. Many of them lived in or were born in Hackensack, NJ during that century and the next. Some lived in Teaneck. Somewhere along the line, there was a slight change to their surname.

One of the children grew up and moved “northward into New York State” in the mid-1700s. Now we know where the name of Sloatsburg, NY, came from:

http://www.sloatsburgny.com/Historic_Sloatsburg.htm

 

Another Sloat – John – who commanded the Navy’s Pacific Squadron, wound up claiming California for the US in the 1840s. Sloat, CA, was named for him:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_D._Sloat

 

Aside from a small note where she crossed the “b” instead of the “t”, there’s a lot of interesting information in this thesis:

 

 

This the 8-9-01 receipt for the above two publications:

 

Hackensack

“The Huguenots On the Hackensack” (1886)

(Schraalenberg is today’s Dumont, NJ)

 

This loose image was contained within. I added a slightly-more-readable blowup of the image’s title:

 

“Hackensack, New Jersey”

 

This interestingly-bound publication was put out by The Bergen Evening Record newspaper. There’s no publish date within, but there was a mention of Hackensack’s population being about 12,000 at the time, so I found a chart of the city’s population through the years and I estimate that publication was somewhere around 1905:

 

Some included information about the paper:

(this is the same newspaper I delivered as a paperboy in the early 1960s)

 

One of the included book images:

This is a mere speck compared to the massive conglomerate that the hospital is today.

 

“The Home Afloat or The Boy Trappers of the Hackensack” (1908)

I read this book with the unwieldy title several years ago. It was interesting to read about making a living by setting traps for muskrats in 1865 where the Meadowlands Sports Complex and the New Jersey Turnpike are today and then making their way to New York City to sell the pelts. There was a lot more to this book………….I really need to read it again.

Every time I saw this book for sale, it was always a red cover. One day, a blue one popped up, but I have no idea why. There’s no mention of a second edition or anything like that. Everything in it is identical to the red one…………except for ONE little thing………..the author signed this one:

(HAD to get it, right?)

 

“Every Teacher’s Problems” (1922)

The only reason I bought this book is because the author was the Superintendent of Schools in Hackensack. Never read it, but if I ever do, you probably won’t know about it (or care).

 

“The Night We Stopped The Trolley” (1969)

As I recall, it was a good book about…………..Hackensack…………the Great Depression…………..trolleys………….(another book I have to read again).

 

“The Hackensack Water Company 1869-1969” (1969)

The HWC was not even based in Hackensack, but Hackensack’s in the title, so I bought it. Never got around to reading it (it sounds just too exciting).

 

“The City of Hackensack – Three Centuries of Prosperity 1693-1993” (1994)

This was put out by the City of Hackensack to celebrate the city’s Tricentennial. Shown on the cover (and in my 6” piece) is Oratam (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oratam). He is on the Hackensack municipal seal and policemen’s shoulder patches.

 

“Looking Back – A Photo Retrospective of Bergen County” (2001)

This was published by The Record newspaper. While not strictly about Hackensack – the County Seat – it does contain an good assortment of old Hackensack photographs.

Of course, I picked out two non-Hackensack pictures that I liked. The Table of Contents page shows a picture that brings back a LOT of memories for me: the same year, the same ton of snow to trudge through with the exact same, overstuffed, heavy carrier bag of newspapers………………

 

I hadn’t seen the next one before, but it’s a great shot of the under-construction George Washington Bridge with the Palisades and Bergen County behind it:

 

 

“Hackensack – A Pictorial History” (2004)

There are a LOT of images in this book of old Hackensack postcards I used to own, but the proceeds from sales of the book went to a good cause – the Hackensack High School Blue & Gold Scholarship Fund – so it was worth purchasing.

 

“The Faces of Rackensack” (1972)

Nope.

 

The Mighty Palisades

“The Palisades of the Hudson” (1909)

 

This is probably an enjoyable book if you’re REALLY into the Palisades, its formation and its history. The are many old black-and-white photos of the cliffs and surroundings and this 58-page book also includes a four-page foldout showing the Palisades Ridge profile from Jersey City, NJ, to Piermont, NY.

I found this illustration of the geological formation of the Palisades Ridge and nearby areas from the Hackensack Meadows to the Harlem River to be slightly interesting:

I’ll bet you’ve never heard of Manhattan Schist before.

 

Bergen County

This is a publication of the Bergen County Historical Society – one of many (number four from 1907-1908):

 

And this was found inside the front cover:

 

 

“A Postal History of Bergen County” (1940)

From the people most-qualified to do this – the Hackensack Philatelic Society

 

 

“Washington and His Army in Bergen County” (1957)

Published by the Bergen County Bar Association

Washington was quite active in Bergen County and the story of his retreat from Fort Lee is quite fascinating. If not for his burning of “The Bridge That Saved a Nation” (over the Hackensack River about 2 miles from where I live), we might all be speaking with British accents today.

 

 

“Bergen County Historical Society Papers” (1960)

 

Found inside the front cover:

 

 

“Turkey Feathers – Tales of Old Bergen County” (published 1974, copyright 1963)

by Rosa A. Livingston

This is a great local history book for kids (I found a yellow Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit chewing gum wrapper near the back of it that appeared to be used as a page marker. I’m keeping it there.). Mrs. Livingston was the founder of the Paramus Historical and Preservation Society. She writes that – in the Indian language – “Paramus” means “land abounding in wild turkey”, hence, the book’s title.

 

 

“Public Service Railway – Bergen Division” (1994)

 

Back cover:

 

Cover(s) information:

 

As moderator of the site of the Hackensack city historian, I’ve been involved in lots of questions/discussions about the trolleys that used to run through Hackensack and this book – with its pictures and maps – has been a godsend in figuring out what existed (and where) pre-1938, when they last existed here.

The eastern end of one line was the Edgewater Ferry Terminal, which sat at the foot of the Palisades on the Hudson River. Tracks had to be carved into those high cliffs from the top in Fort Lee to bring the trolleys down to where the commuters could catch a ferry to get to Manhattan. The back cover shows a small example of what had to be done to accomplish this.

 

 

The State of New Jersey

“Know Your Own State”(1925)

The inside covers show maps of the top and bottom halves of the state:

 

The content in the 48 pages not only lists just about every attraction in the state back then, but it also shows three pages of Lubrication Charts for just about every make of 1923-1925 car that existed then – most of which you’ve never heard of. Here’s one of those pages:

 

Driving a tractor instead of a car? No problem – it’s got a Lube Chart for you too.

 

 

“This is New Jersey” (1953)

 

Comprehensive look at every county and region with illustrations and photos that – for the most part – I don’t think I’ve seen elsewhere.

The dust jacket’s a little raggedy, but everything else is fine.

 

 

“Interurban Interlude” (1968)

It tells you right on the cover what this book is about.

 

 

“New Jersey History” (Winter 1971)

Put out by the New Jersey Historical Society, this is a bit stuffy for my taste. Unfortunately, the most interesting thing I can find about this book is the stamp on its front cover:

According to Wikipedia:

Wirths Campus in Wantage (1978–1992)

Upsala (College) sought to expand and acquired a 245 acres (99 ha) tract of land in rural Wantage Township in Sussex County in northwestern New Jersey for the construction of a second campus which was called the “Wirths Campus.” Upsala did not erect any academic buildings on the property, and in these formative years held classes in existing buildings. But when the school closed down in 1995 and the school’s assets were dissolved, the Wirths family bought back their farm in Wantage from the college for $75,000.

 

But they had a college library in existing family farm buildings?

 

 

“New Jersey Fall & Winter Guide” (1992)

This is VERY rare. It was put out and quickly recalled. I have two of them.

Can you figure out why it was recalled? (This should make for interesting comments……….do you dare?)

 

 

“Teenage New Jersey 1941-1975” (1997)

The Contents page tells you what this book’s about:

 

 

Slightly Out-Of-State

 

“Images of America – Around Fishkill” (NY – 1996)

In 1968-69, I lived in a motel in Fishkill for 3 months and an apartment just up Rt 9 in Wappingers Falls for 9 more. I’m always interested in wherever I’ve lived, so I snuck this one in.

 

 

19th-century Chemistry Books

As some of you know, I had a whole other career before I threw away my degree to jump into the music photography life, and that degree was in…………chemistry.

The longest and last job I had in that field lasted for over 6 years (out of a total of 13+) and that was as non-teaching faculty at Bergen Community College in Paramus, NJ, where I ran the 6 Physical Sciences labs (various Chemistry, Physics, Earth Science lab classes), 2 experiment prep labs, 1 reagent room and my office………for the night classes.

This was a much better deal than doing it for the day classes because I didn’t have to deal with the full-time professors who would still see me as their student. The part-time adjunct night professors had no idea what was going on, so I really felt like I was running the show. AND there were no Friday night classes, so I only had to work 4 days a week.

I got along really well with one particular adjunct professor – a much older, elegant and funny man named Morris Waldstein. He lived in Teaneck, right across the street from the school where I went to kindergarten. It turns out that I had been in his house many times in my youth because I was friends with his son, Arnie, who was also on the same Little League team as I. In my “Collections/Recollections of Teaneck” post, there’s a team photo that we’re both in.

Between classes, Morris would hang out in my office because we always had great conversations and – probably, mainly – because he was a pipe smoker and I let him do that in my office.

One day, he told me that he was thinning out his library and asked me if I’d like to have some really old chemistry books that his children weren’t interested in.

“Sure!”

He wound up giving me four schoolbooks that were from 1836(!), 1875, 1884 and 1899:

 

The 1836 Chemistry book

Despite having had its cover replaced with something that looked WAY too new – this was the most interesting of the four books because it was the most primitive:

 

Here’s the most extreme example: y’all know what a Bunsen Burner is and looks like, right?

Well, maybe a little more like the bottom one than the top one.

 

Look what they used in 1836: pans of burning charcoal! Call………….better yet, create……the EPA quickly!

 

The 1875 Chemistry book:

 

The 1884 Chemistry book

Lots of interesting illustrations in this one………….

 

A Chemist’s Work Bench:

 

I have a fascinating illustration to show you, but it requires a setup. I scanned the page that has the relevant information on it – a story about balloons – and blacked out the non-relevant text. The illustration demonstrates what was done with that information and ends with a Magic Lantern. If you’re not familiar with that term, read this after viewing the below images: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_lantern:

A 19th-century darkroom (I still have my 20th-century one and am forever waiting for that call from the Smithsonian):

 

What a dreadful old method of bleaching cotton and linen goods:

 

So THIS is what they did before the advent of icebreaker ships. Looks dangerous (“We’re sorry, ma’am. Your son was killed by a flying ice cube the size of a truck.”):

 

Looks gorgeous and uncontrolled, but at least there were no flying, truck-sized ice cubes:

 

How come I didn’t have ANY cool images like these in all of my chemistry books? This is the only picture I have of some of them:

 

Oh yeah – I forgot something from that 1884 Chem book. It belonged to a high School in Union City, NJ. Students who were assigned the book for the school year were supposed to write their name, date and teacher’s name in it. No one did until someone I know decided to do something about that.

I had to censor one of the words, so let your imagination run wild…………but whatever you do, don’t EVER come in contact with his copy of “Military Arms of the Republic of Kenya”!

 

1899 Chemistry Book

Not much excitement in this book. At least they got Bunsen Burners before the century ran out:

 

Fun 70s Reading

After all that science and math, I needed something more lively and up-to-date.

 

Early 70s:

 

Late 70s:

 

 

VARIOUS

When I was a kid and my mother got mad at me – which was fairly frequently – she’d give me the four-fingered salute (“Ball Four” – take a walk!). Years later (sometime in the 70s, I think) – because I was a big Yankees fan – she gifted me with a best-selling book written by Yankees pitcher and former local boy (Ridgewood, NJ) Jim Bouton. It was titled………………..“Ball Four”.

Guess what book I STILL haven’t read yet.

 

One odd note: when I was setting up that picture so that the cover was somewhat open to show there was no writing on it – i.e., missing its dust jacket – I grabbed the first thing that was handy to prop it open. After realizing what it was, I HAD to take a picture of it:

Freaky.

 

 

In another post titled “The Signature Collection” I wrote the following:

There was a guest on the Uncle Floyd Show in 1984 called The Amazing Wid, who would bring in a million unrelated props and use them in a funny word association bit.

 Davy Jones of the Monkees was also on the show that day, so I grabbed one of Wid’s props – a humorous 1962 book called “The Monkeys”, which was about monkeys who were to work in an olive grove in Provence picking up olives – and asked Davy to sign it.

 He seemed to be very concerned that I thought this book had some connection to his band and made sure to write “The Monkees” under his signature, so I wouldn’t be confused (uh, thanks for clearing that up, Davy).

I’m proud to announce that after 36 years, I’ve finally read the book: my first about African monkeys in France who picked up olives that fell from olive trees.

 

I also read the book about every New Jerseyan’s “favorite” turnpike and had contacted one of the authors about who could have written what’s on the inside cover:

That mystery has yet to be solved, but I’m happy to say that I’ve become friendly with both authors of the book, who are professors at Rutgers, New Brunswick, NJ.

 

I’ve written in this blog twice already about this gentleman and his book, so I’ll just say now: Go here – https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=2561 – and scroll about a third of the way down the post to read all about it (it’s right after “Octopups in Outer Space” and uses the same below picture):

 

“A Landscape For Modern Sculpture – Storm King Art Center”

This is a GREAT place to visit and photograph, as I did in 1993. You can see some of my shots and read the story on http://bobleafe.com/ (Enter “Storm King” in the search box, check the “Search Descriptions Also” box and hit “Search”).

 

“The Almanack of Poor Richard Nixon” (1968) and “Smokey Stover – The Foo Fighter” (1938)

 

I have these two little (3.5” x 5.25” and 3.5” x 4.5”, respectively) books displayed together in my living room. For the most part, they’re unread (though I HAVE browsed the full-page, one-panel comics in Smokey’s book).

Exposure to the sun has robbed Smokey’s front cover of most of its vitality, so I’ve included the spine and back cover images (which I’ve perked up a bit):

 

Smokey Stover was a beloved staple in newspapers’ comics sections when I was a kid, so I HAD to get this book. I’m not aware that this particular Poor Richard was a beloved anything anywhere, so I had to get this book too for contrast.

Two more images: Smokey’s title page and the only image in the Poor Richard book – one that you may not have ever seen before:

I wonder how many fans of Dave Grohl’s Foo Fighters know about the original Foo Fighter.

 

“Keeping Up Appearances – Hyacinth Bucket’s Book of Etiquette for the Socially Less Fortunate” (1994)

Since this was the only British comedy I could fully understand and get into, I thought this book might be an interesting extension of the show.

It’s a dreadful read…………stay away. Imagine viewing every episode – more than once – and then having to read EVERY single word you just heard. Everything here so far (I can’t image finishing it) is what you already know by heart.

What would be the point in continuing?

 

(Saving the best for last) Music-Related books

“My Name Is Love – The Darlene Love Story” (1998)

 

I don’t know any music fan who doesn’t love Darlene. Her voice has mesmerized me since the early 60s. She’s a big part of what I consider to be the best Christmas album EVER: A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector (1963).

And look who’s standing above the rest.

I referred to this book on my site:

 

“Me, The Mob, and the Music – One Helluva Ride With Tommy James and the Shondells” (2010)

This is one helluva story and if you’re not aware of it, get this book! Still not convinced? It’s gonna be a movie: https://variety.com/2019/film/news/tommy-james-biopic-me-the-mob-and-the-music-development-1203271345/

This man, who wrote 90 bazillion hits that you know and love and that have been covered by everyone and their grandmother, continues to put on a great show and STILL isn’t in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame! That omission makes it Tommy’s second encounter with criminality.

Maybe that story will be in the next book: “Me, the Mental Midgets Running the Hall, and the Music”.

 

“Life” by Keith Richards (2010)

A must-read if you’re any kind of a Rolling Stones fan because – besides the truckloads of tidbits included about the Stones and their formation – you also learn a lot about dozens of other people in his circle that you were aware of, but perhaps only barely so.

Thank you, Lorraine, for bringing this book to me.

 

“Let It Rock!” (Volumes 1-5) by Seth Mallios and Jaime Lennox (2015)

I’m gonna finish up with a publication I probably won’t read from covers to covers (there are 5 volumes), but I certainly have (and will continue to) peruse because it’s a TON of history………….and all from one school: San Diego State University.

It’s their ENTIRE (and very active) concert history from the 1960s, 70s, 80s, 90s and 00s – a decade for each volume.

Other than for 5 or 6 hours one day in 1988, I have no connection whatsoever with SDSU, but as a result of those few hours, I have an entire page of my work in the 1980s volume. Sounds like a lot, but it’s only two pictures.

But what pictures they are! (he says modestly)

SDSU was the first stop on a 3-days-in-a-row mini-tour I did with Guns N’ Roses in California on February 8, 9 and 10 in 1988.

Before the show, I did an outdoor shoot with various band members (excluding Axl) after their road manager told me to first find a good background………….at a college………….for THIS band?

Not an easy assignment, but I found this amazing mural where I wound up taking the best shot of Slash I ever took. Years later when I created an online booklet about my career, I put this photo – out of all the ones in my 100,000-image archive – on the cover.

During the show, I took a shot of Axl that I consider my best image of him. AFTER the show, I found Axl in the school basement quietly playing a piano and got to take some VERY rare shots of that.

QUITE a good photo day!

Of course, all of these images and more are on http://bobleafe.com/ (you know where).

SDSU and I stayed in touch over the years and when this project came about, I got an email from co-author Jaime Lennox regarding their potential use of the two really good Slash and Axl shots and the deal got done.

The result is on page 287 of Volume III (The 1980s):

If the caption is too small to read, it says, “Slash posed before the show in front of Mario Torero’s mural on the ground floor of the Aztec Center, and Axl snarled during the gig on the stage of Montezuma Hall. Photographs courtesy of Bob Leafe.”

 

This rather large (10” x 10” x 4”) and expensive ($200) set is displayed in my living room. I’m glad they sent me the whole set instead of just Volume III. It’s fun to read about all the incredible history that I’m not aware of from a university on the other side of the country and then all of a sudden see a page that I created just from being there once for a couple of hours.

If you’d like to read more about the project and its authors, go here:

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/entertainment/music/sdut-sdsu-let-it-rock-books-2015oct24-story.html

 

 

 

 

La biblioteca ahora está cerrada.

 

 

 

(Ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on October 15, 2020)

 

I have two things – one I created and one I found – that I’d like to present.

The first is a mistake that I’m trying to make the most of. I made an 18-song iTunes playlist that’s gotten me through the last couple of months when I needed to let loose.

But when I tried to put it in some form where I could post it without posting 18 individual mp3s (and without having to join Apple Music), it came out as one big 77-minute mp3 with no way to tell what the songs were or how to find where each one was. At least the way it is here, you can jump around (and now I wonder why I didn’t add House of Pain and Kris Kross to this monstrosity…………..oh, yeah – no guitars).

I’m sure there are lots of easier and more elegant ways to post this mp3, but I decided to leave it as is and see how adventurous (and trusting) you guys are (and show you how lazy I am).

Willing to take a chance on my tastes? I can tell you this much: there’s at least one song from each of the last 5 decades and no ballads. The first song is one I had forgotten all about and was glad to be reacquainted with. It’s the longest of the bunch and is NOT an instrumental (though it sounds like it will be).

So if you have 77 minutes to spare……………..the mp3:

 

You may not have ever heard the second song. It’s called “Motion” and IS an instrumental. It was written and composed by the late Richard Elinoff and it’s on an album called “Looking Over Emmanuel’s Shoulder” by my very good friend, Eric Leefe (no relation……….except for music).

Here’s the front cover:

 

During the recording of this album, I did a quick session with the guys and here’s Eric with his band – Emmanuel’s Light:

 

That photo appeared in the middle of the back cover of the CD booklet and the band members are identified on top:

 

The back cover of the CD contains the information about Richard Elinoff:

 

I’ve written about Eric a few times on this blog. His father’s name was Bob Leefe (must have been a handsome fellow) and he’s a Rock Hall of Fame engineer, who recorded Elvis’ “Jailhouse Rock” and a whole slew of other great songs. He also worked with Tommy James, who’s a long-time friend of Eric’s and is managed by Carol Ross – a long-time friend of mine.

Richard Elinoff and Eric – by the way – were cousins.

 

You probably know all the other songs. Here’s what they all look like (some are louder than others):

 

Oh………..I used the one option available to me when I put this together: crossfade (works better on some transitions than on others).

So, get yourself a glass or twelve of your favorite adult beverage, dust off that air guitar, crank up the volume (and maybe invite some friends over and dance the night away):

 

OR

 

………..take a gander at the contents of the latest mystery envelope find, which may only be of interest if you attended a lot of concerts in the NYC area in the 70s and 80s.

 

Madison Square Garden Seating Chart

 

I found my old stash of seating charts that I used for many of the concert venues where I saw (and shot) the most shows in my pre-photo-pass days. There was a lot of yellow age on them that I needed to remove.

Tickets for the biggest bands sometimes went on sale at Madison Square Garden when their box office suddenly threw open their windows at 3:46am and the dozens of crazies who had an inkling/got a secret hint/used ESP/whatever and who were on line at that hour, also had to know where every seat was because you had a split-second to buy the right ones.

You’d better know your section numbers…………..or letters (orchestra sections were letters, everything else was numbers). If you didn’t at least have the letters O-R-A-C running through your brain (in that order) at all times, you weren’t going to cut it.

If you didn’t have (and memorize) your own MSG seating plan – plus the plans of a dozen other venues – you were some kind of uneducated rookie.

A lot of these venues have different names now. Some have been refurbished with different seating and some don’t exist anymore. As I write this, none of that matters because none are open or doing any business during the current Coronavirus pandemic.

But back when shows existed, these were important pages in my concert Bible.

In addition to Madison Square Garden, there was:

The Academy of Music (NYC), which became the Palladium in 1976 (it appears that I circled many of the seats I got……………looks like I did OK):

 

Brendan Byrne Arena (E. Rutherford, NJ), which has had a few name changes since:

 

Capitol Theatre, Passaic, NJ (long-gone, but my favorite venue):

 

Felt Forum, NYC (part of Madison Square Garden):

 

Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY (Long Island):

 

The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA:

 

Avery Fisher Hall, NYC (didn’t shoot a lot of shows there, so I made my own simple rear-end-placement cartography on the back of the Felt Forum page):

 

This one’s special. It’s not a seating chart and I was quite surprised to find it with all the others (I barely recall that it existed)……………and I recognize the handwriting.

It’s my father’s.

Dad was an executive at a Chevrolet dealership in Bayonne, NJ. I was a concert fanatic who wasn’t sure how to get to concert-rich Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City, which is just north of Bayonne.

Turns out that Dad’s route to work took him right past the Stadium every day, so he drew and wrote in great detail exactly what I needed to know.

It was perfect!

I think it’s also the only writing I have from my father to me, so this is a keeper. I also didn’t shrink this image down, so click it twice to fully enlarge (Note: this will stop the mp3 music, if you’re reading to the beat):

(extra points if you know what “The Barrels” refers to)

 

If you have any questions or comments about anything, hit me up below.

I can take it.