2006-09-02 - 6:14 a.m. I like that the Brooklyn Museum has a MySpace page. My paternal grandmother was many things, but Lola Falana-like was not one of them. Nevertheless, one of my most enduring childhood memories is of an ever-present bottle of the Falana-pitched Tigress perfume on her dresser, along with all its permutations: cologne, powder (with big outsized powder-puff), bubble-bath. She was a unique person but she didn't escape being surrounded by many signifiers of her generation: weird-smelling old-lady cosmetics, circus peanut candy, polyester slacks with waistband, etc. I used to wonder where all that stuff came from, since it didn't seem to come from any place my parents ever took us. Well, all these years later, I finally have my answer: it's the Vermont Country Store , whose catalog wound up in my mail the other day. They have everything a person needs to assume the mantel of codger or codgerette: Tigress! Powder puffs! Really unflattering clothing! Manual typewriters! Liquorice Allsorts! Dear god, they even have one of these things! I can only assume it was fate, or the Land's End mailing list, that brought this precious manual into my life, and I prepare now to partake of its bounty. The muu-muu arrives next week. Please save Pluto! thoughts? (5 comments so far) previous - next blog archive contact