Happy Drinking Straw Day!

The drinking straw was invented on January 3, 1888 and was made out of paper. In the 1930s, Joseph Friedman created the flexible straw. Straw technology remained more or less static until the early 1960’s when the first plastic straws were rolled out. Sippy cups, which face it, would be nothing without the straw component, were invented in the 1980s by Richard Belanger, who eventually licensed it to Playtex. So, when you are grabbing your favorite cold beverage today, add a straw and salute to Drinking Straw Day!

Happy National Soup Month!

I guess January is a good a month as any.

The bustle of the holiday season is over, and for many us, January is cold. (If you don't live where it is cold, no soup for you. Feel free to jump to February.) So it makes sense to use those Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years leftovers to make a big batch of homemade soup and hunker down with that and your favorite bread.

Happy New Year

Introduction

I am turning fifty this year and I wanted to make it memorable by having a New Year's resolution that was totally stupid, so I decided I would take one picture of Gumby every day for a year.

Why Gumby? 

Why not? 

There is no point in having a six foot inflatable Gumby if you don't get some use out of him. Plus, this Gumby, in several incarnations, has been in my life and the lives of several of my friends for dozens of years.

Gumby at my wedding in 1987.

Gumby at my friends Mike and Angela's wedding in 1988.

FAQs about this blog:

1. I am not actually taking one picture of Gumby a day. That would be silly and he does not stay inflated very long. (See FAQ 3.) I shoot 4-5 pictures of different days in one session. Pretty clever, huh? However, you can use my cheating and laziness to your advantage because that gives you time to let me know if you have any holiday ideas for Gumby.

2. All these holidays are real. Or at the least three independent sources I found on The Google for each day thinks they are real and that is good enough for me.

3. It takes about ten minutes to inflate Gumby using an air compressor, (Thank you Campbell Hausfeld.) and at the moment, he is good for about half an hour until I can figure out where his leaks are and how to patch them.

4. Why don't I just stop whining and get another Gumby? Six foot inflatable Gumbys were only made in 1987 and 1988. They are pretty hard to come by.

5. He is very light, so posing him with things is difficult. Keep that in mind if you are going to make a suggestion.

6. As of January 12, I got permission from the official Gumby people for this blog. Whew! Thank you, Premavision, Inc.

7. As of January 13, my cats are no longer afraid of the air compressor. My legs are very happy about that.

8. You are not cracking up. As of January 18, I retook several pictures.

Hope you enjoy this. Please add comments, become a follower, and share the Gumby love.