David P. Johnson's House O' Retro!

YES--WE'RE BACK!!!

Yes, after a little over a month of waiting, frustration and dead ends resulting from the demise of my previous web hosting service, I have found a new one--much closer to home--and headed up by a true friend who helped me immeasurably in getting this site moved over and rebuilt to where it was before. So go ahead and visit all the pages you visited beforehand!

Here's A Recipe You Can Try At Home--No Name For It Yet

INGREDIENTS:
8 OZ. Farfalle (bowtie) Pasta
TWO 8 OZ. cans Hunts Tomato Sauce w/ Basil, Garlic & Oregano
ONE 12 OZ. bag Frozen Beef or Turkey Meatballs
ONE 2.25 OZ. can Sliced, Ripe Olives.

In 10-inch skillet, combine both cans of tomato sauce with two cans water (fill each can once with water), pasta (use half a 16 OZ. box) and meatballs (if using a 12 OZ. bag, pour in all the meatballs; if using a 1 LB. 10 OZ. bag, use half of them. Stir and heat to boiling. Then reduce heat about halfway, cover and simmer 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. After 15 min., turn heat off, open, drain and add sliced olives; stir. Should serve roughly 4.

Button logo and design � 2012 by eBay: used by permission; copying image from this page prohibited.

Hey, you at the keyboard! Are you a late-1950s baby boomer like me? Or are you just curious to see my take on TV, music, hairdos and retailers of yesterday? Either way, you've come to the right place! Stay as long as you like, feel free to leave your comments (try to be nice), LMK if you can supply any pictures I can use for my pages...

"And have a Happy Birthday, Baby!"

This well-conceived and beautifully-drawn creation is known simply as the "Birthday Lady" and was featured in an episode of the now-defunct WB network's Summer 2000 prime-time animated comedy Baby Blues entitled "World's Greatest Dad". So unbelievably riveting and memorable was she that I simply HAD to post a couple of vidcaps of her here, just for the heck of it. You go, girl!
Click on this button to visit the fansite devoted to another beautiful prime-time animation creation.

Zeno's Restaurant, Marshalltown, Iowa

This is my all-time favorite pizza place. I used to live about an hour away from it; they opened another one much closer, but it closed about two years later. The pizza there is fantastic; they cut it into small squares instead of wedges. It's located at 109 E. Main Street. Marshalltown is roughly an hour's drive northeast of Des Moines.

And this is my very favorite place for pancakes:

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: FILM-TO-TAPE TRANSFER SERVICES NOT ALL TRUSTWORTHY!

Late in 2000, I invested in a handful of short 16mm sound films with the intention of having them transferred to videotape. But it took two tries to get it done right. First I took them to a local dealer who said he wasn't sure if he had the right equipment to do the job. But he gave it a shot and charged me about $27. I wound up paying for a hack job involving screening the films on a wall and aiming a camcorder at the picture.
The end result can be seen in the first still on the left. Notice how Gandy Goose appears trapped in a shrunken picture area with a thick black frame around him. Note too that details in the shot aren't too visible, that there's a greenish-yellow tint to the scene, and it looks like Gandy is almost dancing in the dark.
After I got my money back from those amateurs, I took the footage to another studio that does professional-type work they can take pride in. The cost was almost three times as much as the first job, but the results were worth it. Look how much more room Gandy's got to move around in, how much more you can see, and how brighter everything looks. The downside for me was discovering that filling a whole two-hour tape with stuff like this is waaaaaaay too expensive for me to do in one fell swoop, so I'm adding newly-acquired film gradually. But for you who can afford to do this regularly and all at once, remember the moral of this story: choose your transfer service carefully...or else your "goose" will be cooked.
Gandy Goose �1940 by Terrytoons, division of Viacom International, not used by permission

The beautiful Judy Landers posed with me for this picture taken during her appearance at an auto show in Des Moines, Iowa sometime during the 1980s.

IT'S GONE...
Sad but true. The oldest operating Dairy Queen--a long-time landmark in Council Bluffs, Iowa, has served up its last curly-top cone. Click the pic above to go to a new page which will eventually try to explain the situation. (Sorry--dead link.)