"Clean As You Go" (Needle Books & Lost Dolls)

I. Space Age Needle-Books

I was sorting a batch of vintage sewing ephemera yesterday, and there was this STELLAR needle book, above,
 with what looks like the Deep Space 9 space station (Star Trek: DS9). 


I have two other space needle-books of the same type (mid-century, made in Japan), RIGHT:
but this futuristic one I never even knew existed.

I sorted the sewing notions into 25 grab bags, which I priced around a couple bucks each––once again proving what freedom there is in being a volunteer:
when I worked at Goodwill for $10/hour, they wouldn't let workers sort and price donations like these;
it wasn't financially worthwhile.  

Sewing notions naturally don't come into the store nice and neat--they come in old tins and baskets filled with snarls of threads, loose razor blades, stubs of pencils, old Band-aids, etc.

I've seen workers turn a sewing basket upside down over a dumpster, saving only the basket to sell. That happens even at places like here unless some volunteer cares to sort it. 
That would be me.
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I could have set up some beautiful photos, before I put the notions into reflective plastic---but as it is, I spent 6 hours putting these packets together. 
(The color pictures--owl, house, roses--are the covers of needle books--I put them in spread open, so shoppers can see the needle spreads on the other side.)

II. Are Toys Falling from the Sky, Or Is It Just Me?

As I was leaving yesterday, there was Julia, shopping.
I'm glad we ran into each other because the last time we talked, we'd had a misunderstanding about eco-terrorism: I'd mistakenly thought she said it was a good idea (I don't!); 
whereas yesterday she explained she doesn't either: she'd meant it was an understandable idea. 

(Yes, I, too, totally get how people can become so upset, care so deeply, and feel so powerless about something that they resort to terrorism.)

Thrift is dirty and dusty work--I am always parched afterward--and Julia and I went to the crowded brewery nearby . 
As we sat at the table that runs along the window, someone threw two dolls on the sidewalk outside. 
We didn't see it happen, we just noticed the dolls splayed naked on the ground when a curious passerby stopped by them, looking up into the sky as if they'd fallen from there. 
(I guess they came from a passing car?)

It was a little disturbing, so I went out and picked them up (below, left) and set them up, chatting to each other, on a brewery table (right, still too cold for humans to sit outside).
Julia took my photo through the window.

(How 'bout that "Clean As You Go" sign with the cute robot on the bus-stop shelter?)

Shortly afterward, the bartender went out to take their photos: