HAPPY NEW YEAR, NICE GUYS AND GALS! I hope you all had a beautiful holiday!
I got a couple of weeks off between semesters and I spent a good chunk of my break cleaning out an old person’s basement. OMG FUN! It was actually super fun. Not even being sarcastic. I love looking through old people’s shit.
Basically, my mother’s best friend is this wicked old Indian dude (don’t ask how that happened) and he lives in the house right next door to my mother’s house. I don’t think I should give his real name so let’s just call him OldNiceMan. Recently, OldNiceMan had a pretty bad stroke (duh, he’s like 300 years old) and he has become slower and lost some of his eyesight. So, my mother asked me to go through his basement and clear out any junk and basically put everything away into boxes because he can’t do it anymore.
This is what I found when I got down there:
WHAT THE FUCK? HOW MUCH STUFF CAN ONE NICE MAN HAVE?!
I guess it’s pretty much the result of accumulating everything under the sun for 76 years. And that’s only one corner of the basement!
After working for 8 hours straight I had accomplished this:
Not bad, eh? I was pretty freakin’ proud of myself. I spent the next 3 days working in that damp, dark, cold basement, listening to 90’s R’n’B interspersed with some Sam Cooke and dancing and screaming along to the songs while I cleaned. Even though it was backbreaking work, I actually had a BLAST doing it. The best part was going through the weird ancient stuff he had.
*Continue reading to go on a photographic adventure!*
First of all, OldNiceMan had gotten into photography at a really young age because his dad was a photographer. Over the years it became a passion of his and he became really good at it. I found countless albums FILLED with photographs. Most of them were just regular pictures from his life in India and of his family and just normal-as-hell stuff like that. But, some photos took my breath away.
Like this one, which he took at someone’s wedding:
Also, this:
Also, this:
And, this one is my favourite (yes, favoUrite). It belongs in National Geographic or some shit:
I knew OldNiceMan really loved photography but I had no idea he had taken such beautiful pictures! I brought a couple of his albums to him and we looked through them together. His memory was affected by the stroke and he couldn’t stop crying and thanking me for bringing back all of these memories of his. I was so touched. But it was also kind of awkward cause old people crying is just awkward.
The photos were definitely cool, but the best part was the strange old crap from the 50’s and 60’s that somehow made me nostalgic for times I hadn’t even experienced.
Like this AWESOME chair:
What IS that? It’s the best fucking chair I’ve ever seen. I wish I could haul it off to Montreal and put it in my apartment and show all my friends. Funky as fuck.
This is the ugliest clock I’ve ever laid eyes on. I had to take a picture as quickly as possible and look away before my eyes started hurting:
Seriously, ew. 50’s/60’s décor was definitely hit or miss.
This old vacuum is an awesome light blue colour (yes, coloUr) and probably will never work again, but a hipster would have a field day with it:
Then, there’s this amazing old typewriter:
WTF it’s the most awesome thing in the world. I believe it still works! There are even unopened packs of typewriter ribbon! And it has a nice little leather case that wraps around it. OldNiceMan’s wife died some years ago and I’m hoping he leaves all this stuff to my mom since they’re such good friends and then I can keep all this awesome crap I found. HERE’S HOPING! Seriously though, how beautiful is that typewriter? I can’t possibly be the only person who gets wicked turned on by ancient electronics. COME ON.
Okay, here’s the SEXIEST piece of old-as-shit technology I found down there:
At first glance, it looks like a shitty old wooden box with more shitty old stuff on top of it. BUT WAIT! It opens up!
It’s a fucking radio/record player. SPLOOSH! Pretty much the coolest shit on Earth. Along with it, I found boxes and boxes of records.
I stole one. I had to. It’s Stop Making Sense by the Talking Heads.
I NEED IT. It’s like one of my favourite albums of ALL TIME. No one will appreciate it the way I will. I will fall asleep with it every night and I will stroke it and take care of it and I will love it until the day I die. Better than living its life out in a box. OldNiceMan will never even know. I also stole some really nice dice in a cute little leather case so I can give them to my gambler boyfriend. I’m evil, I know. WHATEVER.
Hmmm, what else? I have like hundreds of photos of the random shit I found down there and I don’t even know what to show you guys.
Kleenex. Old people have way too much Kleenex. Now EVEN Softer! Didn’t think it was possible, but it is.
Oh, and of course he has a copy of The Tribune from 1976.
I also discovered that old people have all sorts of unidentifiable objects. What is this shit?!
And all sorts of terrifyingly creepy puppets.