My latest Oz acquisitions

I got my Amazon.com credit on Halloween and immediately put it to good use, ordering a bunch of goodies. The bulk of it is still to arrive -- including the deluxe 3-disk set of the 1939 MGM movie version of The Wizard of Oz on DVD -- but so far I have gotten the two-DVD silent Oz film set, and another item that I'll mention in a bit. The main reason I got the silent DVD set is because the 1914 film version of The Patchwork Girl of Oz is not available on that three-disk set I mentioned earlier, and this was the easiest way to get it on DVD. This set is particularly nice as, for the first time I recall ever seeing, there is an explanation for what happened in the missing scene of the Patchwork Girl coming to life and accidentally turning Unc Nunkie, Margolotte, and Danx to stone. Overall, it looks pretty good, but I'd love to see what some film restoreres could do with it.

The other item is one of the funniest things I've ever seen, and I chuckle every time I pass by it. It's a doorstop made up to look like the Wicked Witch of the East's stockinged feet, with the ruby slippers still on her feet. Right now, I have it under the door to my Oz room, and it looks like the room landed on her. Hee hee. I hope to take some pictures of it and put them up soon. This is one of those very clever things that makes you think, "Duh, that's so obvious. Why didn't I think of that?"

Meanwhile, on the reading front, I'm still slogging through Land of Desire -- this is one of the longest reads I've ever done on an Oz-related book, and it's not even particularly Ozzy -- but after that is what looks to be a much more traditional book, The Merry Mountaineer of Oz by Lin Carter. Then a bit of an Oz break.