Dinah Shore

Artist: Dinah Shore

7" EP: Season's Best

Song: "You Meet the Nicest People" 
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Song: "Jingle Bells" 
[ listen ]

Dinah Shore has been popping up all over the place this holiday season. It all started with the White Elephant Gift Exchange at my work, an annual holiday tradition. With no white elephant gift ideas in mind, I stopped by the Ballard Goodwill thrift store on my way home from work last week to see what I could find. I ended up leaving with a vintage '80s board game (incredibly, all the pieces were still there!), a lobster jello mold (everyone keeps saying it looks like a penis) and a Dinah Shore Greatest Hits CD (there were two copies, but one had a broken case). I wrapped them all up, added some bows and included a nice hand-made Christmas card designed by the sweet fellow I've been dating.

Things turned out a lot better this year at the White Elephant Gift Exchange than in years past. (Last year my gift was so boring I can't even remember now what it was; the year before that I brought some vintage Japanese early-'80s kimono catalogs that I found at a local thrift store, but the gal that chose my gift thought they were mail-order-bride catalogs and was offended.) This year my white elephant gift was first selected by Susan, who was especially thrilled with the Dinah Shore CD (and the wrapping paper). She wasn't as excited about the board game as I'd hoped and she didn't know what to make of the lobster jello mold, except maybe jello. Before long though, my colleague Thad's number came up in the gift exchange. He marched across the room and stole the gifts from Susan! He's not really into Dinah Shore, but he figured he could get lots of mileage out of the phallic-looking jello mold.

I was still apprehensive though that the vintage Parker Brothers board game (Go For It!™ — The Game Where You Can Have It All) hadn't landed in appreciative hands.

But after Thad got the game back to his desk, he soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread. A group of my co-workers are in the midst of an ongoing game of Go For It! right behind me this very instant! 

Still, I felt bad that the Dinah Shore CD had been unceremoniously ripped out of Susan's happy holiday hands. Remembering about the second copy at Goodwill with a broken case, I went back to see if it was still there. It was, so I picked it up along with an awful-looking Shania Twain CD in a pristine case that I could use for swapping them out. Now the white elephant has made everyone happy! 

I was happy too when I came across this Dinah Shore 4-track Chevrolet promo EP at Holy Cow Records in the Pike Place Market on Sunday while doing some last-minute holiday shopping. This truly has been a Dinah Shore Christmas! You can read all about this lovely lady here and go here to find out what someone's talking about when they ask if you're going to the Dinah Shore Weekend in Palm Springs this year. 

 [ Dinah Shore: February 29, 1916 — February 24, 1994 ]