Puppet Acid Trip; The Lost Footage: FOUND!

A long, long time ago, in my childhood far, far away, I used to live for the animated specials that came out in December for the holidays.  Truth: I still watch them, but this scene in recent years has been conspicuously absent --dare I say CUT-- from  an otherwise enchanting childhood memory!

 
I don't know why they would cut it... I have to admit it kinda looks like Jessica the Victorian puppet is having an acid trip in the town square, but did they really have to delete the entire scene?  I don't get it.  I mean, when I was a kid and watched this back in the day, it's not like I immediately screamed," OMG! Jessica is SO tripping!!!" 

But I digress. Well thank god for YouTube and for bringing this long-lost classic back to life!

When I was a kid, I thought Jessica the Victorian puppet was so beautiful.  The pale-blue satin gown.  The Titian locks gracefully swept into an elegant chignon. The huge-ass bow on her, well, derriere.  Jessica the Victorian puppet was serving  uptight, Victorian  realness, until the poor thing finally realized her life was an enormous sham and now, her World is Beginning Today!  All symbolized by simply letting her tresses down...Girlfriend isn't tripping, she is merely transitioning from Old Jessica: uptight, Victorian schoolmarm, into New Jessica: swinging, groovy chick!

My World is Beginning, Today

All the little cares picked along the way
Suddenly, have disappeared with yesterday.
Tossed along the fields 
And lost among the winds,
My world is beginning, today.

Oh, so many times have I walked this way
And never saw the little things that I see today.
Never held my head so 
High above the clouds,
My world is beginning, today.

I know something's gonna happen, but it's out of my hand
Things are gonna start snappin' without any plan... 


All the little cares picked along the way
Suddenly, have disappeared with yesterday.
Tossed along the fields 
And lost among the winds,
My world is beginning, today.
My world is beginning, today.
My world is beginning, today!


P.S. I love it when Jessica the Victorian puppet gazes into the fountain at the end of her video and her 'reflection' is a photo cut-out!  Memories!

Google LOL!

I had to laugh when fellow miniaturist Fiona at A Passion for Miniatures emailed me the other day that she had Googled 'entrance hall chairs' in order to find inspiration for a project she was working on for a friend --and this is the image that popped up:

Yes, li'l ol' Merriman Park popped up!  I wouldn't have given the sitch much more thought, but today I Googled 'Thomas Jefferson's Edgemont,' (the early nineteenth-century edifice which was the inspiration for Merriman Park), and what do you think popped up this time?

This was one of the photographs taken in the 1930's when Edgemont was 're-discovered' as a work by Thomas Jefferson.  It had at the time unfortunately fallen into near ruin.
 

Here's a view of the garden facade of Edgemont, also a Google pop-up.  (I don't know the couple posing)!  Thomas Jefferson hate, hate, hated, wooden houses, nevertheless Edgemont was constructed as a wood-frame house, the wide, wood planks facing the exterior beveled and faux-painted to mimic stone.

There were several images that also came up, but because of copy-right laws I can't bring them upon my humble blog... except for this one!

This is the original sketch I made on a napkin for Merriman Park, now immortalized forever on Google!


Google: fabulous, or frightening???