47 + 3 = 50

Phew! The scale is headed in the right direction again... I weighed in at 144 this morning which means I've officially lost 50 lbs. since adopting this vintage fitness and reducing plan last April.

50 lbs!!! I couldn't have imagined seven months ago actually being able to make that happen. I thought then I'd be thrilled - and content - just to trim off about 20 lbs. Just to make getting around a little bit easier, make the clothes fit a little bit more comfortably, make my face look a little less puffy. Well, "content" isn't good enough any more. I'm pleased as punch with the progress I've made (just this weekend, I realized my cheekbones are starting to be noticeable again!), but I've got a long road to go. 27 more lbs. to reach goal. I'd like to be comfortably in a size 8 --- right now I'm a snug 10. And I'd like to be off the blood pressure medication entirely --- I'm now taking just 1/4 of the dose I used to take. The holidays are bound to take a toll, but I'm determined to continue losing a little something over the next several weeks!

One of the radio programs I've been feasting on these days - in lieu of leftovers! - is The Goldbergs. Known as The Rise of the Goldbergs when it premiered in 1929, this popular daytime serial could be heard every weekday on NBC for some 20 years before it moved to television in 1949. The program follows the ever-dramatic lives of Molly and Jake Goldberg, a Jewish couple living in the Bronx, who move to a farm in Connecticut with their children, Sammy and Rosalie, in an effort to improve the family fortune. The Goldbergs was written by Gertrude Berg, who also starred as the Goldberg matriarch.

I adore this show! Can't get enough of it. Many episodes have disappeared - such was the fate with most soap operas - but there are a few long runs of surviving episodes that allow you to follow along with a handful of storylines. I've been listening these days to a storyline from the early spring of 1941. Sammy Goldberg has fallen in love with a girl named Sylvia Allison and, despite his mother's suspicions and doubt about the girl, has gone to Sylvia's home in the South where Mr. Allison has agreed to employ Sammy while the couple plan a wedding. Molly, Jake, and Rosalie have driven South to attend the wedding only to learn that Sammy has discovered Sylvia's shocking deceptions. Alas, she was apparently entangled with her sister's husband at one point! Will Molly be able to save Sammy from marrying Sylvia out of guilt? Is Sylvia emotionally unbalanced and likely to hurt herself or Sammy if she fears losing him? Can Molly heal the Allison family, too? Stay tuned for tomorrow's visit "with that lovable family," the Goldbergs...

One of the most enchanting things about The Goldbergs is the ads. Oxydol was sponsoring the program at this time and their promotional spots give you such insight into some of the trials and tribulations of washday I'd never really considered before. Laundry was a very public exercise in these days before automatic dryers. In 2009, we can do our laundry at any time of day and on any day of the week and nobody's the wiser. We can wear our robes (if that's all we've got left) while we do our laundry and can cheaply replace most anything that doesn't get clean enough. For most 1940s housewives, there was no such thing as privacy when it came to laundry. A women had to literally "air her dirty laundry" on Mondays by hanging her clean wash on clotheslines that were in view of all her neighbors and passersby. When it came to laundry, there were two measures of success that must have preyed on many a housewife's mind:

1. How early are you able to get that wash on the line?
You may never have been the first woman to get it out there, but it'd be awful to be the last! It must have been a special point of pride for a housewife who was able to hang her wash up to dry early - maybe before it was even time to begin preparing lunch for herself and any children at home. The Oxydol ads point up the idea that with this revolutionary new soap you won't need to boil your laundry or use one of those old fashioned scrub boards. Just a gentle wash in Oxydol, with a little extra attention to stains, and Mondays need no longer be your least favorite day of the week. With the wash dispatched by the time The Goldbergs came on the air at noon, you'd have time to "rest" --- "more time to enjoy yourself."

2. Is your laundry white enough?
Again, you'd probably never have the whitest wash in the neighborhood, but wouldn't your family be humiliated if there were greasy, yellow linens on your clothesline? Oxydol ads promised listeners "the kind of washes women turn to admire, even envy." Whoever the marketing folks behind these ads might have been, they'd clearly found a way to use feminine competitiveness to their advantage. There's nothing new under the sun when it comes to that. Women still pick each other apart more harshly then men do --- and I think we're always much more concerned with how other women will judge us on whatever accomplishments society currently deems "feminine" than we are about how men will judge us on those same accomplishments. That's still something the advertising business uses to drive profits.

A white wash was truly a challenge during the winter when women living in northern climates weren't able to hang the wash outdoors and take advantage of the bleaching effects of sunlight. Not to fear! Housewives who had to dry their laundry in basements or attics wouldn't have to worry about a "dingy and gray" wash if they'd only pick up a box of Oxydol on their next trip to the grocer's.

Here's something this liquid detergent user never thought about in relation to laundry soap. One of the points Oxydol uses to sell its product is the idea that you won't spend Mondays sneezing from the clouds of dust that your laundry soap raises every time you pour some out. For housewives who wanted to get to know this detergent a little better before investing in a box, Oxydol partnered with Apex, a washing machine manufacturer, to make a special offer during the spring of 1941. For a limited time, if you stopped by the showroom of your local Apex dealer, he would personally demonstrate the merits of Oxydol in one of those new "time-control" Apex washers.

All this talk of a laundry has got me all excited for tomorrow's wash. Almost makes me wish there were neighbors around to chat in awed whispers if I had the whitest wash on the street. You know I like a challenge!