Judge — June 1938 — page 40: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

LET’S PLAY By Dorothy Hoffman 4s ATCH ‘em off guard when they've been scribbling—you know, while they telephone, for in- stance. Those scribbles are a dead give-away, if you know anything about scribble reading.” Thus Mr. Samuel Ochs of Arverne, N.Y.—: “Straight lines in sharp and definite form (when alone) usually indicate strength of will, lack of impulsiveness, independence of thought and action, stubbornness to a certain degree, strong desire for affection, etc. That person wouldn't be easygoing or philosophic.” “In other words, don’t get fresh with him?” we interrupted. “That's the idea,” he assured us. “Now take closed circles, closed squares —anything that is definitely closed up indicates selfishness and cautiousness. “Curved lines usually indicate a lik- ing for nice things; books, flowers, mu- sic, art, pleasant home surrroundings; also a strong liking for children. Repe- tition of a line or circle indicates just how slow the scribbler is to make up his mind. “Lines without definite endings, ir- regular in length, devoid of purpose, indicate to the same degree of irregular. ity the degree of impulsiveness present. Carelessness is an apt corollary and com. panion of impulsiveness.” We were beginning to see that this scribble reading might serve as a mighty effective means of putting a number of our ill-chosen acquaintances on the spot, so we suggested making a game of it at a party a few nights later. The guests elected a judge and every- “ARE YOU SURE THIS BOAT GOES TO THE CANARY ISLANDS?” one else was automatically appointed to the jury. We acted as interpreter-in- chief and the fun began. If someone objected to certain traits and character- istics attributed to him, the judge and jury had to decide whether the objec- tion was fair or not. If unfair, the objec. tor was then fined and instructed to re- deem his or her penalty promptly in the most distasteful way possible, ac- cording to the dictates of the judge. (We were fined ourself several times.) As soon as a person's scribble was read, he automatically rejoined the jury. As a little ire-raising pastime, scrib- ble-reading can raise the roof, so turn your thoughts thattaway when your eve- ning is dull. Telephone Inanities Here is another pastime that has fired the imagination of practical jokers, Park Avenue socialites and schoolboys throughout the country. Let each guest submit the name and telephone number of some person he would like to bother for a little while. The sweetest feminine voice in the crowd is chosen to act as telephonist and what follows is something like this: This is Miss Tweet, secretary of the League of the Lost Art of Loving Expression and Good Cheer. Your name has been placed on our list to receive a daily message of good cheer. This is our first message: “It’s always darkest before the dawn, and every cloud has a silver lining.” You can imagine what will happen when somebody's husband tries to make a date with Miss Tweet. comicbooks.com