12/30/13

Mr. & Mrs. Shutterman preferred complete quiet during the annual holiday reading of "Twas the Night Before Christmas," much to the disappointment of their children, Holla, Yelpa and Barkley...

Celeste had repeatedly implored Cliff to mark the spiked egg nog with a red ladle and the non-alcoholic one with a green ladle, but as usual he'd ignored her and now little Timmy was missing out on all the festivities!

Prior to the construction of Sea World, patrons who wanted to get up close and personal with a killer whale merely had to walk down the boardwalk of Chompano Beach.

Art and Clarice had varying methods of shaking off those pre-flight jitters.  Art enjoyed music and the latest issue of Playpet while Clarice liked to order a couple of Scotch & Sprites.  Different strokes for different folks...

The portrait of the cafeteria workers at Camp Fudgitupp was hindered slightly when Alvina suddenly realized that the chicken fricassee was on fire and the flames were licking up against the knotty pine trim!

Certainly one of the downsides of rockin' it out on New Year's Eve was waking up on the front stoop of a completely unfamiliar town house, as little Jack Belter found out the hard way!

12/27/13

Jimmy and Sara Jane didn't mind having to take their new brother Willie out for walks, in fact they rather enjoyed it, but as time wore on, they began to wonder if he might be their half-brother instead of a full relation...

And it was at this precise moment that Mark declared that he wished his little sister had not developed an early fondness for cauliflower...

Angry over being told to keep out of their yard, Brucie MacFarland waited until Mr. and Mrs. Grubman were seated in their dining room for lunch before lobbing a croquet ball through the picture window!

As the car tore out of the driveway with Richie Skidmore's coat sleeve caught on the bumper, he dearly wished that his mother had let him wear long pants that day as he'd asked her repeatedly...

Having spent the better part of the morning riding Champ, Rebecca decided it was time she took Randy for a quick spin so he wouldn't feel left out.

Valerie pleaded with Glenn not to buy a stick-shift car, but he insisted that it was up to everyone to learn how to drive one.  His hard-line stance on that issue softened a bit when he looked up from his issue of Life magazine to find Valerie's front tires practically on his lap!

12/23/13

On lazy spring afternoons, Bettina loved to sit and listen to the trickle of the fountain in Unitary Tract Park, which on this particular day was being added to by little Heinrich...

It disappointed Woodrow to no end when he went to the store for starters and generators and was told that these items were only useful to cars, not people.

He loved the little basket of Milkbone dog biscuits and didn't even hate the new collar his owner had gotten him for his birthday, but what really upset Randolph was the fact that Irwin chose to have the cake decorated with that nickname he'd always hated!

One of Scotland Yard's most useful and brilliant detectives was Sheerluck Hounds who, prior to his premature retirement after a run-in with a renegade postal worker, could sniff out criminals better than almost anyone else on the force.

The second annual sales convention for Bonnie Blue cosmetics was a ripsnorting success, the company's expansion growing county by county with each passing month.  But somehow Pat Withers (back row, second from the right) had stumbled into the wrong party room, having meant to attend the Plumbing Supplies convention down the hall.

Aunt Alma Vee had trouble reading her index cards at the monthly recipe exchange, but fortunately Cris the hostess was able to turn on the light that went with her new artwork from Gold Circle, thus saving the day!

12/20/13

Monica's parents promised her that if she brought home straight A's that semester, they would treat her to a getaway with a warm pool surrounded by palm trees, but in the final analysis, she had to admit she felt shafted...

Of Millicent's many dolls, none was more favorite than the life-size Grannie Grunt who, with only eight D batteries, could complain about the temperature of the room, ask Millicent if she'd been going to church and even leave a remarkably lifelike stain on the armchair when she got up!

Velvadeen liked to wait for her tires to be rotated by sitting on the porch of the Sugar Bowl Cafe, leafing through the latest issue of Better Curds and Gravies.

Everyone in Willow Springs enjoyed a good party, but Maxine took the term BYOB to an entirely different level and made every occasion a smash!

For months, Sandy had been begging Earl for a new Amana Radarange, but her pleas always fell on deaf ears.  Now here they were about to celebrate Tony Jim's parole and had no way to cook the devilled ham casserole or even the tater tots to go with...

Mama Berley knew that in order to keep her son's strong, she had to keep the food a'comin'!  Bruno and Chet, however, knew that some of her more cardboard-like dishes went down a lot better with a dollop of Karo Syrup on top.

12/18/13

By far, Tad and Skipper's favorite part of touring the ruins of Pompeii was the moment when they started digging (against the express orders of the guide) and came up with the remains of little Antonius.

Jeff never minded posing for a picture with Suzanne except in this one instance, when the bottom of her little get-up was filled with doo-doo instead of air!

It was after Tommy's unfortunate run-in with Friendly the Snowman that all future snowpeople in Sandusky were ordered to be built with no arms, the trend eventually spreading throughout neighboring counties and states.

Everything always went swell at the Honey Bee Post Office unless some joker wanted to ship a package that was bigger than 8" x 8" and couldn't be shoved through the window for weighing purposes.  In those cases, Jeanette the postmistress simply had to guess what to charge before loading up the donkey cart and sending the mail off to Cumberland.

Oh, how Jerry hated days like this, when coming home from work meant having to decide who's chicken cacciatore was better; his overbearing mother Cecilia's or his pregnant and over-emotional wife Tessa's...

If Sandra insisted that he go #2 on this contraption, Huey was all for it, but expecting him to hit that little jar from 16" and - in that position - for a urine sample was simply asking too much!

12/16/13

And, thus, Abigail lost her job as night watchman at the Pinkerton household when she failed to live up to her promise of waiting up and catching Santa in the act of dropping off all their presents...

Everything about Christmas went right for Renate except for the one green-wrapped present someone sent that completely went against the color scheme she'd devised (and explicitly emphasized in her red, black, gold and purple holiday cards!)  It was all smiles for this picture, but that gift was donated to charity immediately after.

Having been berated time and again by Mister Schitz for roller-skating in his driveway, Karina decided to help fertilize his garden in her own special way...

Laugh if you must, but Larry the Lariat was one of the old west's most feared villains.  True, he didn't carry a gun, but if you happened to knock over his sarsaparilla, chances were you would be slapped to death!

Pee Wee Charmin, one of the little league's most efficient running backs liked to play things cool and dispense with unnecessary trappings like pants and cleats, which only weighed him down as he fought towards the goal line.

Though dinner was to be served in just thirty minutes, Neva, after having traipsed around Puerto Vallarta all day in her new shoes, instead preferred to lie back and enjoy both Cosmopolitan and a Cosmopolitan!

12/13/13

As the afternoon wore on, Carol Jean and Martha started to wonder just exactly what the secret ingredient was that Melvin slipped into his famous cherry limeade...

Eloise ultimately decided that a red-hot Toni Tenille 'do was not going to land Sam back in accounting all by itself and that she'd have to pull out the big guns if she was going to have her way with him.

Kent was proud to be team captain and pose with the basketball in these group shots, but it also meant that his hands were so occupied that he couldn't get quite the same "charge" out of the situation that some of his teammates did.

What a lovely afternoon the Matterhorns had out at Great Aunt Hilda's... and this time she even let them each have a quick turn at the supper table before wolfing most of it down in a flash!

During her trying, often dull marriage to Senator John Warner, Elizabeth Taylor briefly took up organ lessons until the lure of Tinseltown caused her to concentrate on movies once again.

Veronica was determined not to pale in comparison to the neighborhood's paperBOYS and was renowned for her service.  Not only did she deliver the news on holidays, but she refused to toss the papers on the porch, preferring to bring them right into the houses!

12/11/13

It only took crossing four state lines, but finally a little county in West Virginia consented to marrying Tim and Connie, making them very happy indeed!

Dick and Janice thought he'd been kidding, but they later found out the hard way that when little Clarence indicated that he wanted a chocolate birthday cake, he meant business!

Birdie and Michelle had had their fill of sleepless nights over the owl that lived in the tree out back.  After witnessing this, though, the rooster took off from their farm and was never seen there again!

People could scoff all they wanted to, but Angie put herself rather easily through Spreadingham Secretarial School and made many a lumberjack's lunch hour one to remember down at the timber camp!

Carolyn "Anything for a Picture"Watterson had an album full of great shots like these, though few people were handy with a camera as she was pulled out of various rivers, ravines and abandoned mine shafts.

It wasn't that Sabina wasn't proud of her new grandbaby, but until daughter-in-law Linda figured out how to properly fold and pin the diapers, she wasn't going to be able to hold her while wearing her Sunday dresses anymore...

12/9/13

Nicky, Krista and Jack enjoyed trying on their father's Santa Claus suit... all at the same time!

Becky listened patiently as Slurpy described to her the way Ron wrested the cask from around his neck and drained it clean of brandy just before sitting down to an evening of television.

A flashy, pre-fab sign and Carol Sue's vibrant sundress were not enough to get business booming at Chip's lemonade stand.  It was time to break out the chest and a series of captivating dance moves if he planned to sell out and pay for those roller skates he had his eye on down at Woolworth's.

The calm before the storm as Tabitha posed for a picture with the ducks.  If only she hadn't let them know that there was a bag of Marzetti croutons in her clutch purse, which, once seen, kicked off a staggeringly vivid dust-up over them!

James and Kam had always had a decent enough time as Panda Scouts, but had no clue how much fun it was going to be to earn yet another badge, this time from the attentive and overly-affectionate Karen!

Despite naysayers to the contrary and occasional lingering doubts of his own, in the end Timothy had to gleefully acknowledge that Santa really did deliver the toys of choice to children who'd been good, no matter what the desired item might be!