So…it’s come to this. Tossed aside, locked behind glass, hair shaved off. We’ve all been there. This is rock bottom.

Actually, if you’re discarded, shaved, encased, and a clown, that’s just slightly worse.

I think this might be the most depressing creature I’ve ever encountered in a thrift store, she most have been pretty in her day. Probably tried out for a part in “Cats,” or its less successful (but more danceable) off-off-Broadway counterpart, “Mimes.” Her entire career brought to a tragic end by a three-year-old with a pair of scissors.

Kids today. No respect for maribou.

The shop actually gave her some token of respect, a mourning note–they put her on a black bed, picked a price tag that actually went with her costume and it is HARD to coordinate with silver lamé.  And yet it all just seems to illustrate life’s great punchline…you’re born, you live a good life, manage not to get broken, even get a couple of parts in an Italian opera, then bam, a pair of bright yellow plastic safety scissors with your name on it.  Or maybe “JOEY”‘s name on it, in red sharpie.

Schadenfreude pumpkin raises a delicate lip to savor the moment. Oh yes.

Which wrapped up day one of Thrift Tour of San Antonio. We had a delicious dinner with our Thrifting Buddies, Maus and Tenar, at nearby Bombay Hall. After a busy day of bopping from shop to shop, sitting down with three different curries was bliss, and their Kashmiri naan–grilled naan bread stuffed with sweet cherry pistachio paste–was a perfect capper to a great day.

From the Loop 410 Goodwill, San Antonio

The question is not “why are these children crying in pain on a block of wood,” but “why did someone feel the need to SCULPT them?” What artist was driven, on seeing five anguished moppets, to craft them out of plaster painted to look like sandstone?

Was it something that they did? “You there, climb up on that pedestal and wail piteously until you’re sorry. Or until we’re sorry. The important thing is that someone, somewhere is sorry. So, check that off the list.”

Or maybe it’s a memorial to the children of a whooping cough epidemic. Hard to say.

On the other extreme, this little androgyne looks happy!

Really not so horrifying, except that it’s kind of fun to see another version of this guy, but with both hands intact. I’m not sure my understanding is enhanced–we still have that mysterious neck goiter, enigmatic chalices filled with some mysterious, exotic substance that will change our lives, cure cancer, or spill forth plague upon the world. Or maybe it’s hot chocolate.

The big difference is that, unlike the Infant of Prague from a few months ago, instead of gazing out through sightless eyes, this little…thing…had his/her eyes tattooed into a permanent expression of mild, pleasant surprise. It’s as if, for years beyond knowing, and looking forward into the infinite future, she’ll be puzzling out a response to a clever, but off-color, joke.

More tea, sir?

Somewhere between the anguished wailing of the Littlest Chorus of the Damned and the cheerfully lobotomized “Return of One Girl, Two Cups,” we have…her. I’m prety sure she’s getting ready to pour water onto her dog, maybe into its ear. But she’s not too worried about it, it’s nothing to get worked up about. We’ve been pouring water on the dog so long the dog’s color washed away. Like the ancient statues of the Buddha, my nose has been worn off by wind and sand, or maybe it was shot off by French revolutionaries. I no longer know what is in this pitcher, which I do in fact intend to pour into or onto my dog. Is it water? Probably. Orange juice? Maybe. The Milk of Human Kindness? Possibly. Do I care? Not a fig.

Oh great. Here comes the pitcher again. Bad enough that I have to wear Cherries Jubilee lipstick, here’s the drencher. There’s got to be more to life.

Goodwill on North Loop 410, San Antonio, Texas

The most amazing thing about this angel–well, maybe she’s not an angel, maybe she’s some sort of garden fairy, from a garden where the bay hedge is shaped into a grinning skull, the roses chant weird arcane syllables, and the basil creeps up and ask you for change, definitely not the kind of garden that wins second place in the home owner’s association’s “best lawn” contest–angel or fairy, though, the thing that amazed me most was that I walked right by her, totally distracted by the local menagerie of  comically mangled animals. How’d I miss her?

Maybe it’s the mind’s blessed ability to hide things from itself, to live in ignorance. But, no, now she’s haunting my dreams. Let me share her with you.

Did she drink paint? Did she pour ketchup in her eyes, quaff a few pints of periwinkle, massively overdose on rouge, and then try to sleep it off in a puddle of green tempera? It happens. Periwinkle’s pretty hardcore, so far as pastels go. It has that kind of effect.

Upon seeing her headgear, the 60s abandoned the handcrafted ethos entirely and switched entirely to polyester. Weaving chains of flowers through a loved one’s hair just left to much blood on the hands. Too many memories. Also, she has green tempera in her ears, which is kind of disgusting and ruins the mood.

You’ve got a little something on your dress there. I think it’s probably ichor.

Welcome to the Loop 410 Goodwill! The Eternally Leaking Paint Pen Angel will be taking your coat and sense of decency. Don’t worry, she’ll give them back, just hand wash them and dry on low heat and they’ll be as good as new.

Oh jaded pumpkin, what does it take? You’ve got the Angel of Ooze, and all you can do is smirk at her? She deserves better than that.

If you’re visiting Nine Lives Books, down the road a bit there’s a really nice little Goodwill. It’s in the 1960s, low-ceiling mode, a little snug, not the widest stock, but a good variety of lovingly displayed weirdness. Totally worth the drive across town, if for nothing else than the magical puddle-fairies. If enough children clap their hands at the same time, maybe she’ll stop leaking.

So majestic! So joyful! Just seeing them brings me back to my childhood, watching the dolphins frolic through the plaster of paris, painted foam timelessly moored to the “water” around them. They were nothing if not optimistic. Actually, they were nothing if not nailed down, but we can’t hold that against them.

You can almost hear their laughter. And bruised whimpers. The tragedy of a porpoise that improperly tried to frolic through a solid object is one of the saddest sights in nature.

Okay, to be fair, this actually is a pretty exciting little piece–there’s a real sense of motion and drama, from certain angles. From other angles, its little plastic things dancing over what looks more like a deep blue tiramisu, or some gelatinous mass carved from the water, than a seascape. Its perfectly cubical outline does not help, not a bit. From the worst possible angle, it looks like Neptune himself ate waaaay too many Louie-Bloo Otter Pops–Neptune likes him some Otter Pops!–before dealing with an unfortunate blockage.

But only from certain angles.

Once again, San Antonio’s thrift community is just flat out amazing. We found a bunch of amazing things–but they scream out for special occasions, like Christmas. Or Columbus Day. I’ve never looked forward to Columbus Day quite as much as I am right this second, particularly when it became “Cultural Misappropriation Day” on my calendar. But that’s neither here nor there. I’ll just say the Goodwill near I10 and Heubner is filled with all sorts of fun junk, and has a perfect blend of low standards and great selection. Heubner Goodwill, I salute you!

Don’t show fear. It can sense fear.

It can also sense shame, vague foreboding, metal fatigue, spare change, and whether you ate too much spicy food. It’s very perceptive.

Actually, this fuzzy little guy has a fair bit of history to him, and known some exciting people. Neat! “Leather Lor” was a leather company in Minnesota in the 1970s, and they made, among other things, strange furry land-owls that stare at you from accusing green eyes. Don’t feed it after midnight. Bad things happen.

One more Goodwill, then we bade farewell to our thrifting buddies and called it a day. The Goodwill on 410 turned out to be yet another  bead in San Antonio’s pearl necklace.

“No, no, you can trust me. There ain’t no giant snails here. Not a one. Now you just sit yourself down here…that’s it, real slow like. Just…relax, for, you know, five, ten minutes.”

“You know I’m you’re friend. Rabbits don’t lie, I’m your BESTEST friend. I ain’t never fed no-one to no giant snail. That’s a complete fabrication. What they say, a base canard.”

“…But all the other children, they said the bunny started talking to them, and then they never ever did come back, oh no they didn’t. Momma said, ‘Never talk to la-go-morphs. They’ll always betray you.’ And Momma never did give me no foolishness.”

“Who you going to listen to, sweetheart? Who’s got a fluffy tail and big cute ears? Your mother? Well, maybe she does, maybe she doesn’t. But I’m telling you, no-one on MY watch ever got eaten by a giant snail, and that goes for you too, sister.”

“Okay, but if I get eaten by a snail, we are not going to be friends anymore.”

“Okay, I can live with that, if you can.”

…Shortly after the giant snail ate the small, challenged girl, I found this hat. I really don’t have a lot to say about this hat, except that it’s not your everyday hat. In fact, I’m not sure it’s an any-day hat. It’s the sort of hat that someone brings out to a chorus of “oohs” and snickers, and then you’re MADE to wear the hat while people tell you about how the next two years of your life are going to be endless sleepless nights, screaming, and and a limitless amount of crap, which really isn’t so much different from graduate school.

The baby on the side is kind of a young Linda Blair. Or maybe the little tyke in Trainspotting.

Jane! Get me off this crazy thing!

There were a few more treasures, some of which will make an appearance for Christmas–but the day was drawing to a close, and there were Goodwills to be found, and dinner to be had (once the nausea died down). We headed to I10.

After the magnificence that was the South Flores Texas Thrift Store, we knew that anything else would be a pale second. Out of a sense of duty, we went down the other, lesser thrift stores on South Flores, taking a detour down Military Drive because South San Antonio is kind of like the Bermuda Triangle, navigationally speaking. We found this little guy at the Sally on Southwest Military Drive. Won’t you take him in? He’s looking for a good home.

Previously, I’d have thought that you couldn’t screw up a puppy dog, but shell art changes the impossible to the inevitable. Shells cascade down his ear like a river of tiny, friendly worms, and the skin around his eye isn’t covered with a down of fur, so much as a jagged, pale, serrated parody of hair. Don’t pet him, you’ll only hurt yourself. And that’ll hurt you, and blood everywhere, and it ends up just like that last trip to Thrift Land, we can’t take you anywhere anymore.

Points to the artist for clever use of cowrie shells as lips. It didn’t work, but I do applaud the effort.

Teeth like a dainty shark. Well, I’m in love. How much IS that puppy in the window? The one with the serrated jaw?

Okay, here’s the plan. Me and Scoob here will distract him. Velma, you knock the hideous shell dog off the shelf with that giant pumpkin. Let’s go, gang!

…Several confused left turns later, we had navigated out of the gravity well that mysteriously surrounded Southwest Military, and found our next destination–Community Thrift on Southeast Military. Truly a magical wonderland! This MUST be a re-furbished Home Depot, Sams, or some other Big Box store, but they’ve turned it into a hunter’s paradise. Not everybody was as impressed with it as I was, though.

Displeased cat is displeased. However, if you bathed yourself with your tongue (and who doesn’t?) and someone shellacked you with a heavy gloss of irridescent black and yellow paint, you’d probably cop a bit of an attitude yourself. Kind of like Bill the Cat.

Ack!!

The heavily-painted, faintly disgusted cat was only the guardian, the sphinx at the entrance to the valley. Beyond him–her–it–a full aisle of brik-a-brak. It was…beautiful. I had come home.

Just past the pretty lady in the egg-carton dress, we stumbled over this Boschian nightmare.

The fine meaning of this piece eludes me. I’m pretty sure that it involves Voldemort somehow, and that the angelic vision that is Cyndi Lauper is using her apotropaic powers to protect the huddled forms of Ignorance and Want (or anthropomorphic grape and orange popsicles?) as they cringe in a vine-covered cave, while tiny red devils begin their sinister musical number of Doom as they attempt to break through the green barricade, in an obvious allegory of the herd mentality and the dangers of conformity. I’m not at all sure how Voldemort figures into this, that’s where the entire thing breaks down.

Okay, this piece is really too much fun to make fun of. This guy’s just great!

The triangle motif’s carried out in so many different ways–the geometric world being invaded by biological, curving imps, a barricade of wedges and angles becomes our only wall against the organic, vibrant world of our subconscious demons. And Voldemort.

Oh, how the fiends cackle! Shala, what a strange world you’ve painted for us!

Actually, that looks kind of fun, like a thousand little scampering devils playing at a children’s playscape, sliding down the slide with their little hands in the air. Wheee!

But I’m still not sure how Voldemort figures into all this.

Next week, the management promises there will be jokes, and shell art. Some things are too much fun to make fun of!

Oh, Texas Thrift Store. You amaze me. I thought, growing up in a town with a dozen vintage stores within a block of each other, I’d seen–really experienced–thrift. You taught me otherwise. You taught me to fear thrift, respect thrift.

This chain is astonishing. Four huge locations, each the size of a grocery store, each filled with…really, the cream of the crap. Everything I’d hope to find–horrible handicrafts, disturbing wall art, inexplicable small appliances, and a few gems. I’m not going to give up the 183 and Research Goodwill’s class ring over it, but maybe I’ll have to apologize afterward, bring it some flowers, you know.

Is this a cultural artifact? I’ve seen a few of her now, mystifying, strangely beautiful ladies, wearing gowns spun from the purest egg carton, delicately festooned with glitter and sequins like they were dancing a spiralling pavanne under magical fairies–incontinent magical fairies.

…So beautiful. And yet so strangely like an android. An android wearing several egg cartons, and a crown of pipe cleaners. Were she only life-sized, she could be swept off her feet by a handsome prince, or a really stiff wind. Wheee!

I thought this was for something like a quinceañera, where a young girl gets all dressed up like she never did before and never will again, really comes out like a shining star, but I think this may be a little more like that scene at the end of “The Little Mermaid” where the heroine comes out wearing a dress made out of coral and angry cuttlefish, squawking voicelessly, before she drags her betrothed to her foamy, under-sea lair and endlessly dresses him in squid. Disney really did pretty up the story for the modern audience.

…So beautiful.

I’m not sure if this could legitimately be called a “horror” or not. But it does seem to hearken back to the holy grail of the bargain bin that is Goodwill–1970s handicrafts. And “Things That Seemed Like Good Ideas After We Had a Few.” The artist, after a quick count, seems to have had about 104. Phantom beer tabs–make that pull tabs, we’ve gone waaay back in our beverage history–form a mandala of used delights, topped by little pats of embroidery floss that look like tiny swirls of mustard from the end of a pâtissière‘s semi-automatic paper cone (sputsputsputsputsput!!)

For some reason, a very few of these are red. Is this a sophisticated statement about race in a postmodern society, or did the artist run out of yellow twine? We may never know.

Shortly before we left the Texas Thrift Store on South Flores, we discovered Satan. But he’ll wait until Friday.

This July, Thrifthorror took it to the road with a two-day, all-expense-incurred trip to exotic San Antonio! We discovered many things. We discovered that San Antonio’s thrift shops are BIG! Texas Thrift Shops are amazing thrift fantasy wonderlands, with, like a Time-Life record collection, cast-off crap from the 60s, 70s and 80s. We discovered that two full days of thrift shopping can strain the strongest relationship. We discovered we LIKED hybrid cars, bless their fuel-efficient hearts. And we discovered that there is ONE thrift shop in San Marcos. Seriously, what’s up? Don’t you people ever get rid of anything?

We also discovered the North American Snub-Nosed Mallard.

Nearly driven to extinction by well-meaning plastic surgeons, the snub-nosed mallard was known for both its distinctive call, and for its unfortunate predilliction for drowning while trying to scull the lake floor for food.

It was also known for its perpetually surprised expression.

Oh, for the days of my youth, when the San Marcos river teemed with these beautiful, maybe a little embarrassing, waterfowl. How we’d laugh when they struggled to catch a fish, finally succeeded, then sputtered in frustration as the fish would fall out of its mouth.

They did a little better once they learned to eat with a fork and steak knife, not a lot of birds can do that, but necessity is the mother of table manners.

Many children grow up now without ever having seen a snub-nose. And they’re surely the poorer for it. Now, they only turn up once in a great while at Goodwill, and their noble cry of “Fnark, fnark!” no longer fills the air.

Next: San Antonio!

Snub-nosed mallard found at Highway 80 Goodwill, San Marcos, Texas