Tuni Hat

 Toony hat?

Tuni hat?
Tuney hat?

One of the advantages of moving is that in order to properly move in you need to go through all of your old boxes and sort / clean / organize them.  I found a box of my old childhood items and I think I may have a few interesting posts as a result...

This is my old fishing hat.  I found it in the Cascades when we were backpacking one year - I was 11 or so at the time.  We had seen a guy on the trail earlier in the day wearing it, but we never came across him again.  So - I became the new owner.

My Grandpa on my dad's side had some a LOT of funny made-up words.  We don't know where he got them all, but they were all very unique, and just about the time you think he'd run out, he'd have another one in his hip pocket.  He called my hat a (you pick the spelling) tuni hat.

We all know that it's very common for kids to be attached to something growing up.  Favorite blankets, pillows, a shirt or pair of cowboy boots - I even knew a girl who says she had a board she took with her everywhere.  Well - I got pretty attached to my tuni hat.  Not only did I wear it at all the appropriate times (camping, backpacking, yard-work) I also wore it 90% of the rest of the day.  And - remember I was a tween and young teen in the '70s - it was a great excuse to not wash my hair.  Suffice it to say that it had its fair share of sweat, grime, grease and dirt over the years.

My brother and cousin wanted tuni hats too, so we could all be cool together, so they started asking for them for gifts.  One of our funny family stories is that of my Grandmother on my mom's side - a fairly proper woman - going into a JCPennys and telling the clerk in the boys wear that she wanted to buy a tuni hat for her grandson, and could he direct her to them?  I can still imagine the look on the face of that clerk because she was very insistent that her one grandson had one, her other grandson wanted one, and she wanted to buy it for him!  We still laugh about that one to this day.

Anyway - I eventually (I think around 11th grade) stopped wearing my tuni hat.  As you can see from the pictures, it's seen better days.

Did any of you have something - clothing or other - that was your "security blanket" growing up?

This never hapens to me!

Had to do a follow up on this...  and thanks, so much, for those who either voted or attempted to vote for me.  Or even if you just thought “I hope he wins” in the back of your mind.

This never happens to me, but I actually won the new chair contest!  It’s a $569.00 chair from National Business Furniture (lists for $900).  Now I ask you 0 who is able to spend that kind of money on an office chair?  I know I sure can’t.  I felt like I was really splurging when I spent over $200 a few years back on a nice chair from Staples.  Here’s how that chair looks now:

The amazing thing is that after I’d had it only a couple of months a seam started to loosen up.  I documented it and sent a “what am I supposed to do now?” letter to them.  They offered to either replace the chair or refund me the entire price.  Well – I took the money and ran, and ended up with a “free” chair that lasted me a good five years.  But it was time to get a new one.  I had been looking for awhile when I happened upon this contest.

What’s crazy is that only like 35 people entered their chairs and I won with only 24 votes.  Next closest was a chair with 20 votes and then one with 7!  The voting process was a little complicated and not explained very well.  But – I’m not complaining!  I have a brand new $569 (list price $900) office chair en route to me even as we speak.  Here are some pics of my new chair!

Pretty snazzy, huh!?!

Now if I can only win the HGTV home in Vermont on the 18^th… oh, I voted!  Don’t worry, I voted almost every day for the duration of the contest.

Here’s hoping!

A Departure...

Hi, please indulge my little departure here - 

So - we all have our little places we blog from.  If you're on a laptop. it could be most anywhere, but if you're "tied down" like me, it's at your desk at your computer.  Mind you - I am not complaining - we just moved into a new home and I have a pretty nice office in which I conduct my side business.  This is also where I dream up and - for lack of better terms - spew out the the thoughts that cross my mind for this little blog.

OK - so it's not in this bad of shape...

Paying for a new home means you don't really have the money for other new things - like furniture!  We have one 20 year old little couch in our huge new living room.  Again - I'm not complaining, - we will buy furninture for the house as we can, and we're very thankful for our home.

... an it's not quite this ugly...

What this is all leading to is that National Business Furniture - whose products I spec in my "real job" as an Architect - is having a new chair giveaway offering to replace the person who enters a picture of their chair that they feel needs to be replaced because it's on its way out.

So - I'm asking that if you are on Facebook to please take a minute and vote for me.  You can click here and it will take you right to a page that shows my chair, tells its story and lets you vote.  You vote by hitting the little "like" word on the bottom of the post. (You may have to "like" the NFB site, too - I've heard)

Anyway - If you can spare a few minutes, I'd sure appreciate it.  The contest ends on the 28th.  Thank you so much!

Wind-up Watches

Did you know that you can still buy a wind-up watch?  I remember when you couldn’t buy anything BUT a wind-up watch.  It’s hard to effectively convey the amount of responsibility that you felt when you got your first watch. 

First off, most of the watches had glass faces.  Not only did this make them susceptible to getting scratched, it could also crack and /or shatter if you weren’t careful.  And being a kid, you had to really be mindful of your arm now that it had a watch on it!

 

Next – you had to wind it!  If you didn’t do this, it stopped running – and it did so by slowing down – so you would unknowingly be late because you forgot to wind your watch. It was VERY important to remember to wind it at least once a day!

Also – they weren’t cheap.  If you got a watch as a gift, it was a gift of substance.

It was Similar to this...

I remember that one of my first watches was a beautiful silver trimmed Timex with a deep burgundy face that made the black hands really pop.  It had a genuine dark leather wristband to boot!  I felt like a million bucks when I wore it and it helped me feel more confident, too.

el-cheap-o!

I had some great watches growing up, but eventually the world advanced and cheap Casio watches with batteries that were small and lasted forever came in mass supply.  And they were digital with LED crystal displays…and black plastic wristbands.  Winding watches was a thing of the past, akin to if you are reading this on an IBM 286 with a 7" amber monitor.

And, I know I said that you can still buy them, but I would guess you have to look for them… does anyone have one?

Did you have a cool wind-up watch growing up?

– or – have you never even heard of such a thing?

– or – the big question – Do you even wear a watch?  They definitely seem to be vanishing from the wrists of our youth now that phones have evolved…