Scenes from a Changing Century

I asked my friend Michael to give me his address so I could send him this postcard I found in California. He gave me his three email addresses.

The virtual may someday entirely supplant the actual. I told him:

Postal address, you ass! Postcards go in the mail. It’s this archaic system whereby these people called “mail men” actually hand-deliver bits of paper to your residence. It’s retro chic.

In other news, I’m giddily excited to finally have in my possession the entire 39 episode run of The Mysterious Cities of Gold, a French-Japanese anime venture that ran on Nickelodeon in the 80’s. It was a serial cartoon, so that the episodes combined to make essentially one long movie. I haven’t seen it since probably 1985. Last week I found a guy who burns DV-R’s culled from the out-of-print Japanese DVDs as well as bits from the US broadcasts. As with much of my nostalgia-glazed memories of 80’s cartoons, the show turned out not to be as amazing as I thought it was, but still it remains a great example of entertaining and educational kids’ programming. I remember it really got me interested in native South American and Central American cultures like the Incas, Mayans, Aztecs and Olmecs.