Images From The Archives of Oblivion

I'm on vacation this week and doing lots of little projects that I never get to. I've been trying to reduce the overall bulk of my collective possessions. My material footprint. An overall "thinning of the papers" is a big part of it. I am descended from my mother after all (subspecies Packratius Extremicus) and she ocassionally sends me artifacts from my childhood that I often have no recollection of, old drawings and photos and such. I was the first born and her archiving of my life began very early on. Apparently, whenever I would draw something she would ask me what it was and write down what I said on the back and date it.

This one reads, on the back, "Jimmy Age 4 "Pig With Flaming Mouth" Crayon"
I'm saving things like that, but I'm scanning and tossing a lot of the more ephemeral stuff. This was in the Gazette in 1987. Though not a local ocurrence, the photo editor obviously could not resist. Some photos tell the whole story and the article become superfluous.
Dana Gentes who owns Pleasant Street Video was the ringleader of a bizarre and hilarious radio show, a collective of creative locals, on WMUA called Dadavision in the mid 80s. They were on Friday overnights to begin but as they became more popular, they moved to Wednesdays at 10PM after my new music show Terpsichorean Cacophony. I was talking to Dana at the store this morning and he says he has a suitcase load of cassettes of the show, which ran for about 5 years I recall. It would be a daunting but worthwhile task to compile a best of collection, especially the weekly musical Top 10 (way more demented than Doctor Demento) with locals like Raymond and the Circle , for example, doing "My Kid Fell Out The Window" to the tune of "Tears in Heaven:("I guess this means, we'll have to put in screens.")
My first job was in 1980 at Price Chopper supermarket on University Drive in Amherst, now the Big Y complex. This is where I fell in love with Beth Miller, a cashier, but lost her to bagger Kevin Eastman, who went on to create Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I've lamented this on the blog before, but with this new photo the story has more resonance when you look at the dashing image I cut as a bookeeper. How could Beth dump a guy who worked in customer service office, handling thousands of dollars and approving checks, for a sweaty bagger? Steven Wright on Saturday at the Calvin said, "Whenever I see some guy pushing 10 or 15 shopping carts in the parking lot of a grocery store I shout, "HEY, did you ever think someone else might want to use one of those!?"
Okay, one more. My 2nd grade class photo. Why I had a comb-over at such an early age is a mystery.