We're getting close to the ONE-YEAR ANNIVERSARY!

In only five days, the Millennium Museum will be one month away from celebrating a full year of activity! The year HAS flown by, hasn't it?

I have a birthday cake-themed logo in mind, but I don't know if I'll be able to implement it in time. Unlike my hand-drawn logos, I want this one to be a more "physical" model, because the perspective is going to be tricky.

Oh, what am I saying? I've got a full month to worry about that! Let's get on with this week's post, shall we?

Yet another Millennium-themed plushie. I found this handsome specimen at Mike Bjorn’s Tux-A-Rama in Kenosha, WI. He’s fully decked out in top hat, tails, shirt, and bow tie, and his pocket watch is set for ten minutes to midnight. (The perfect time, really—the party atmosphere is always the highest at that point on New Year’s Eve.)

On his left ear, there’s a certificate of authenticity, which I’ve included a detail of. It was designed by doll and toy designer Lee Capocci, as you can see on the lower right corner of the certificate. It also says, "Issued once every thousand years," so it looks like I'll have to wait for the year 3000 for mine. :) 

 Uniquely, this bear includes a sound chip that, when pressed, gives an electronic rendering of a New Year’s Eve countdown and a few bars of that perennial New Year’s classic, “Auld Lang Syne.” At least I think it did...this one had some fairly run-down batteries inside it, which made it sound incredibly garbled.

At the time, you could have probably picked him up for about $20 at any department store, but I don’t think I ever saw one of these at the time. In fact, I only became aware of it when I saw it at Mike Bjorn’s in late August or so. And that’s why I started the blog: I’m more aware of stuff now than I was thirteen years ago!

Before I go, I just want to say that the "On This Day" stuff is sort of hard to do without getting some kind of a membership for one of those news-archive sites. Oh, to be in college again, where I could look up that kind of thing for free...That's why you haven't seen very much of it lately.

Finally, I give you a preview of next week: It's a retrospective of the first-ever Chicago TARDIS convention, which started on Thanksgiving weekend of 2000.