Life, 1922-08-24 · page 31 of 36
Life — August 24, 1922 — page 31: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three distinct elements: **"Do Something Silly Week"** is satirical advice presenting deliberately dangerous and absurd activities—pouring gasoline on a stove, teaching children to hang from window ledges, drinking wood alcohol by mistake—as humorous "silly" suggestions. The satire mocks public safety campaigns by exaggerating their earnestness into obviously harmful nonsense. **"Foiling the Mosquito"** humorously suggests that mosquitoes deliberately choose to enter homes through screens rather than open doors, attributing them "sporting" instincts like a pool player. It satirizes human irrationality by noting people maintain screens that let mosquitoes in while complaining about them. **"Castles in the Air"** is a single-panel joke about a woodpecker attempting to build a nest in a concrete telephone pole—absurd futility presented as the height of futility itself. The page also contains cigarette and indigestion remedy advertisements typical of 1920s-era magazines, which modern readers should note represent now-banned or heavily regulated advertising practices.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
ay the lich iim, Do Something Silly Week ERHAPS you are one who has never been touched by the plea to keep the backyard clean and the chil- dren safe. But everyone should be happy to respond to “Do Something Silly Week.” For the benefit of those who would like to co-operate, we gladly suggest a few splendid ways to make the week a success. Try pouring gasoline over the gas range. This is one of the silliest things you can do, Ask the butcher if he will let you have a steak for $1.25. If you live on the tenth floor or upwards, teach the children to chin themselves from the window ledges. If the weather is hot, insist upon your husband dressing for dinner. Now and then suggest to him that he give up baseball and invest the money in toilet water. After Mr. Smith has taken a drink of wood alcohol by mistake, ask him how he feels. Explain to the landlord that you think your rent is frightfully cheap. When a traffic cop arrests you for speeding pinch him playfully on the cheek If you find yourself in water over your head, try whistling for help. H.R. Foiling the Mosquito HE woman who wakes up at night slapping in vain at one of these singing ventriloquists, mosqui- toes, exclaims, “I don’t see how in the world they “get into the house.” But she knows, and her husband be- side her, who is too tough to be bothered and wishes that she would keep quiet, also knows. They crawl in through the screens. A real sport- ing mosquito (and we must admit, considering the way they trifle with death in the interests of a little fun, that they are sporting) scorns to enter a house through anything but a screen. He will avoid an open door as a pool player would avoid Sure Relief FOR INDIGESTION 6 BELLANS Hot water Sure Relief 25¢ ano 75¢ PACKAGES EVERYWHERE 29 EIT is not a coincidence Vee) that the man of dis- == criminating taste is a smoker of Melachrino Cigarettes. To enjoy them has always been an evidence of an appreciation of the finer things of life. MELACHRINO Cigarettes are made from the choicest and most carefully selected Turkish tobaccos grown, and because of their superb and unchanging quality, they have had no rival for forty-three years. MELACHRINO “The One Cigarette Sold the World Over” ‘cellar, or the attic. Asa consequence, Castles in the Air “Wuat is your idea of the height of futility?” “A woodpecker trying to build a nest in a concrete telephone pole.” a “set up” in front of the corner pocket; he must have a screen if he has to travel entirely around the dwelling to find it. And humans, succulent fools, keep on furnishing the mosquitoes the wire netting through which they may crawl into the restfulness of the bed rooms. They have not yet realized that the mosquito problem could be ended immediately by the very simple process of removing such so-called protection to the the little pests, being unable to crawl through the screens, would be unable to reach their victims. Or if some unusually clever mosquito, through his keenly developed instinct, suc- ceeded in discovering the screens in their hiding place, he would have nothing to bite once he had accom- plished the feat. THs Es “Four thousand for the ground floor! Haven't you anything lowe “Yes, sir, the basement.” ~’ “"-Sans-Géne (Paris). comicbooks.com