More From the Argus Seventy-Five

I took these pictures at Fort Concho during my stay at Angelo-traz. I was pretty happy with the way this roll of film came out. There were still some blurry shots, but they were acceptable losses.

The Brownie Reflex 20

When I was home last July, I was trolling around my favourite place to hunt for POS cameras. There's a giant antique mall in Omaha called The Brass Armadillo. I haven't found a place nearly as good in OKC. The antique shops here are a lot smaller and worse yet, some of them sell really nice stuff. You can't find crappy cameras in places like that. I like the places that advertise on interstate billboards, "OVER 200 DEALERS!" Really nice, little antique shops aren't cram-jammed with mirrored beer signs and Pepe LePew drinking glasses. They also don't have much in the way of cool cameras. I like places that have 20,000 square feet of crap.

Anyway, I'll get to the point. Last July, I found the coolest Brownie Reflex 20 camera. It was in absolutely pristine condition, like it was used only a few times if ever. The viewing screen didn't have a scratch on it. I grabbed it quick and as I was walking around, I realized there was no price tag attached to it. I took it to the register and told them there was no price. When they asked me which booth it came from, I couldn't remember. There were only something like 837 booths in the whole dang mall, of course I didn't remember. They said no problem--they would find out who the dealer was and call me. They never did call me back. I was miffed. I went home over Labor Day and stopped by the store to look for other cameras. At the register I casually mentioned the fact that they never called me back. They gave me some poopty-doo lame apology and said there was nothing they could do about it. Then over Thanksgiving, I went back. I'd pretty much resigned myself to the fact, I would never find the camera again. I'd stopped at a dealer booth to look at another camera when, HOLY CRAP! THERE IT WAS! I almost didn't see it. It was relegated to a lower shelf and it wasn't even facing out. The only thing that caught my eye at first was the bumblebee-coloured Kodak box. When I turned the box round to see what was inside, there was my Brownie Reflex 20. This time it had a price tag, $25 actually. Quite a bit more than I really cared to pay, but I figured it was meant to be, so screw it. I went ahead and bought it. Now I just need to order film and flashbulbs.