Cabbage Patch Kids Baby Land

Last week, we took a day trip to the outskirts of Atlanta with our BFF Emily.  One of the stops was Baby Land General Hospital in Cleveland (middle of nowhere, seriously), Georgia.  What is Baby Land you might be wondering?  It is where all the Cabbage Patch Kids in the world are born!

Apparently, Xavier Roberts, he of Cabbage Patch Kids butt-signing fame, is from this sleepy mountain town and converted an old medical clinic into the birthplace of his famous dolls in the 1980s.  Fast forward to 2010 when Roberts and his friends built a brand new Baby Land General Hospital that includes a birthing center, medical staff ("nurses" who seriously walk around in scrubs), extensive gift shop, and nursery.

Baby Land is extremely cute and seems like a wonderful place to take kids.  However, I didn't see many children there...so it was extremely creepy.

A few unusual sights at Baby Land General included a room full of real medical incubators with Preemie dolls inside, speakers in the ceilings that pipe recorded baby sounds (like coos and such) into the nurseries, and last but not least, an actual birth in which a nurse pulled a doll out of a fake cabbage while saying things like "the cabbage is dilated ten leaves!"  Whaaaa?  Too much strange awesomeness for one building!

Video of piped-in baby noises in the nursery

To make matters weirder (and I guess better), there are hundreds of Cabbage Patch Kids everywhere.  In one plastic cabbage patch, little doll heads poke up out of the ground and move around like moles.

Cabbage Patch birth (not our video) - be warned, it is fairly graphic

Also cool was the entryway that had several walls of signed photographs from celebrities like Donald Trump (with his classic mean muggin' look), Fred Savage as a child, and 80s Michael Jackson with messages to Xavier Roberts and the Kids.

If you ever find yourself in Northern Georgia looking for something truly strange and wonderful (or if you have kids/collect cloth ones), Baby Land General Hospital is absolutely worth a visit.  It is like stepping back through a time warp to a special place where the good and ridiculous stuff of the 80s never ceased to exist.

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Garage Sale Treasures

We headed up to Atlanta last weekend for Nessies' birthday and spent Saturday morning finding treasure after treasure at many garage and estate sales.

In addition to finding some really fun stuff, we met some super nice and interesting people, were able to pet some outgoing kitties, and ate some delicious handmade popsicles from the King of Pops.  If you're in Atlanta, he sells from the intersection by Videodrome (a great local videostore).

One of our favorite finds was this painting of a man lounging in a dress that we picked up from a townhouse community sale.  The seller told us that it always reminded him of a friend named Lloyd, so we dubbed him Queen Lloyd and gave him dominion over our living room.  The seller (a really nice guy who was giving all his books away since he believes that knowledge should be shared) assumed that we were just buying the painting for the frame, and we were quick to tell him how amazing we thought the picture is.

Another great find of the day was a sweet collection of old Vice magazines along with two Vice-related books.  We live in a small town that does not have this free monthly guide to fashion, music, and trash.  Definitely exciting.  At the same sale, we also picked up some DVDs like a Mastodon (rock!) live disc and John Carpenter's "They Live," one of my very favorite movies from the 1980s for my brother in law (I already have a copy).

The most random thing that we wound up with was this record by Max Webster.  I don't know who/what Max Webster is, but I knew that I had to own a record that features a man wearing a shiny, gold unitard, skullet, and white leather boots.  I still haven't listened to it (and may not), but this cover causes my sickometer to rise!  The back cover shows the cover model leaping through the air with his guitar while flames emit from his hands!  Hot indeed!

Our next roadtrip will involve an unholy trinity of dubious taste in the form of Medieval Times (the historically questionable dinner and show experience that pairs sword fights with Pepsi products), the newly redone Cabbage Patch Kids nursery and hospital (a life-changing experience if you have never been), and the Alpine City of Helen, an "authentic" German village built on a Georgia mountainside in the 1960s that channels German culture into souvenir lederhosen shops and faux biergartens.  Stay tuned!

The House of the Devil

We watched this a few nights ago, and it totally ruuuuuuled.  "The House of the Devil" is a horror film that has more in common in terms of pacing and tone with late 70s/early 80s pre-slasher movies than the MTV-style, jump-scare barrage of bikini models getting hacked up that is more common today.  Think more Roman Polanski or vintage Dario Argento than Saw or Hostel.

The plot centers around college student Samantha who is looking for an income source to fund her upcoming move from her dorm into a dream apartment.  She spots an ad on campus looking for babysitters and stumbles upon a group of people who live in the titular house and proceed to make things very scary for Sam and the audience.  This movie has a slow-burn suspenseful intensity that builds and builds until the very end.  I haven't read any reviews, but I would imagine some people might find the pacing a bit slow, but it is totally worth it unless you have ADD.

The look and feel of "The House of the Devil" is so early 80s in every detail from the sweet acid washed jeans and feathered hair to the rockin' tunes Sam listens to on her Walkman cassette player.  It really looks like a time capsule gem from the Reagan era, and it would probably be a household name if it had been released then.  Even better is the special edition set that comes with the movie on DVD and a clamshell cased VHS!  How awesome is that?  It actually looks like it came from the horror section of your circa 1983 local mom and pop video store.  That fact is a little sad and ironic considering we picked up this gem at the final sale of one of seven video stores that are closing in our town this month.  Sad.

Coachella Highlight Video

I don't normally find drunk people to be all that amusing, but watching this guy struggling through the Sisyphean task of putting on his flip flops while completely hammered at the Coachella music festival is strangely compelling.



Part of me find this hilarious, while another part wishes I had his ticket since I would have actually remembered the show the next day.  Whatevs!

Love this Video

For no reason at all:



Love,

nickandnessies

Project Runway!

We just finished watching the season 7 finale of Project Runway and loved it!  

To be honest, we don't really watch much reality TV except for this show and maybe Top Design.  Oh, and Celebrity Apprentice, America's Next Top Model, Girls Next Door, Jersey Shore (what, it's awesome!), and Big Brother.  Holy moly, do we love Big Brother!  So much that we have started watching the British celebrity BB seasons (Stephen Baldwin and Sisqo becoming friends!) to get our fix until the new American season airs this summer.  I guess we are reality junkies after all.

Anyway, back to Project Runway - I won't say anything about the winner or final three contestants in case you haven't seen it yet so as not to be a spoiler, but there were some surprises and lots of amazing clothes.  Other than Christian Siriano in season 5, I think this was the strongest bunch from the recent seasons. 

There wasn't quite as much juicy drama as there could have been, but we haven't seen the reunion show yet, so you never know lol. Who was your favorite designer this time around other than Ping (since she automatically gets the wtf weird vote)?