More from the NYPL digital archives. I’ve successfully worked my way through 1021 pages out of 2478. Don’t think these need much commentary beyond the fact that the colored badges represent the various regional/local football clubs in the UK. If you need to see which colors correspond with which football club, go here.

HELP! The NY Public Library has a visual archive that stretches from here to who knows where. I dipped my toe in yesterday and I immediately got pulled into the undertow. It took all my strength and willpower to get out. As an example, they have 2478 pages of cigarette cards. About 20 to a page. That’s 49,560 cards…give or take a few. Here is but one, front and back. Stay tuned for more.

Whether one realizes it or not, we live in a world suffused with numbers. They are all around us. Some more blatant than others. Used to classify everything from a corrugated box to a tube of toothpaste, they have little or no relevance to either me or you. But they sure are pretty. My archive is steadily growing.

The best presents are the kind that betray one person’s deep understanding of another. My friend David gets me. And when it comes to gifts, he’s spot on. He’s clearly been paying attention all these years to who I am and what makes me happy. Anyway, David recently came back from an extended trip to South Africa, and the other day he presented me with an envelope containing these Sawzall blades. I think he said that he found them on the street in Cape town. Just sitting there. Who wouldn’t want them? I mean really, they are practically new for crying out loud. Well, I love them. The patina, the use, the fact that he just found them by the side of the road. All of it. Thanks Dave.

All week long (really, it’s two weeks long, but we’ll confine it to one) it’s Chinese New Year. In honor of said holiday, I dug these beauties out of my files. I wish I could find the companion postcards to these two images. They were published by Quantity Postcards out of San Francisco, but way back in the eighties. I found this link and this link to the site (you have to scroll down to find the images), but I wish there were more.