Century-old postcards, and fractal doodles

Today has been lengthy and blurry because I have felt rather sleepy for the last eight or so hours.  I got coffee with Leah and Rachel D., and we hung out in a Catholic bookshop and an antique store, where I bought (or rather, Rachel purchased for me) a 100-year-old postcard addressed to somebody named Ralph from his aunt Vira, who has uber cool handwriting of which I'm jealous:

People used to write the oddest things on postcards.  We spent probably more than half an hour reading them in the antique shop, and people wrote things like  
"Aunt Julia is dead, at 4 a.m. today. They are coming to move her body this afternoon." 
"This church looks wonderfully majestic on the outside, but it's as gloomy as a dungeon on the inside."  (That was the entire content of the card.)
and  "Why haven't you written?  Are you all dead?  We're having very pleasant weather, and the wind is howling something fierce.  Went to visit Fred today.  He asked why you haven't written."  I even found an old dental reminder from the '40s that said, "It's time for your dental appointment!  You need to brush up on your smile!"  


Almost all of the ones with writing one them were at least 90 years old.  They were really funny and sometimes very sad—and bizarre, because nowadays nobody would send news of a death in the family and/or tragic illness by postcard…

With Mom on the way home, I traversed Target, where I got some balloons and a journal, and ambled through Aldi, where I got some Kleenex and chamomile tea (I heard it's supposed to help you sleep/destress) and a berry-flavored Bolthouse, because it was on sale.

Also,

Vlogbrothers + Vi Hart + me + four hours of sleep + doodle mania  = a fractal made out of a giraffe shaped like a llama.  (Of which this is a rather poor photo.)