My Sexy, Sexy 4 Quart Pyrex 664

Until today, my vintage Pyrex collection contained only two pieces in the Old Orchard pattern. This was deliberate, as it is one of my least favorite patterns, and not one I collect on purpose. You're probably thinking, On purpose? How do you end up with something you don't collect by accident?, but there's an obvious answer to that: sometimes the thrift stores around here sell a couple of bowls together as a set whether those bowls go together or not, and you really really need a Primary Colors 401 but the only way to get that 401 is to buy it as a set for three dollars with an ugly Old Orchard 402 but the pair is only three dollars and you can tolerate that Old Orchard for a dollar fifty and you might even throw it in the dishwasher sometimes, like you're not supposed to with vintage Pyrex, because Old Orchard, Amirite?

Anyway, shit happens, and I end up with 50% of an Old Orchard 400 series mixing bowl set but I'm not going to buy any more Old Orchard (on purpose), so that's that.

Except that it's not.

A few days ago my friend Brennan, who was visiting my friend Brooke in Houston, posted a few photos of an antique store with lots of Pyrex on Facebook and tagged me. As I do whenever my friends post a picture with dishware in it, I immediately scoured the photo for possibilities, and there, way down by the bottom, I thought I saw a Pyrex 664.

I don't own a 664.

The Pyrex 664 is a round 4 quart casserole with lid. It was made in a handful of patterns, including one (Polynesian) made in such limited quantity that it sells for a few hundred dollars every time I see one on ebay, and was only available for two years, manufactured from 1974-1976. This wasn't a Polynesian, but instead was Old Orchard. Still, it was a 664. It couldn't hurt to ask how much it cost, right? I asked, and Brennan and Brooke went back to the store, and it was cheap. Really cheap. Worth buying even though it was Old Orchard cheap.

Brennan then carried a ten inch wide, four inch deep glass casserole dish wrapped in packing paper, towels, and a plastic Wal Mart bag aboard a plane and back to Knoxville, and today we met up, and now I own this:



I know you're not that excited, though, right?

Don't worry. Hawkeye is here to help.



Yeah, Hawkeye. Work that bowl.



Show us how much you like that Pyrex. Sit like a female character would on a comic book cover marketed toward teenage boys and middle aged virgins.



Good job, Hawkeye.

I bet everyone is excited about my Pyrex now.

"It's just not very exciting."

An exciting (to me) thing happened today: The Pyrex Early American 404 mixing bowl that I purchased for myself on eBay arrived, and it is beautiful.



The 404 completes not only my stack of 400-series Early American mixing bowls:



but completes my entire Early American set. Except for the ultra-rare test pieces and non-typically colored pieces, which usually sell for a few hundred dollars each if they sell at all, I have all of Early American. I have the round mixing bowls (401-404), the handled mixing bowls (441-444), the divided dishes, the round casseroles, the oval casseroles, the refrigerator dish set... I have all of the Early American. This was my last piece of my favorite vintage Pyrex pattern.

I was so excited about this that I shared photos with many of my friends, almost all of whom reacted positively. One of them decided to hit me with a little bit of honesty, though:

Honesty: I know that you like this stuff but it's just not very exciting. It's a bowl. I like it when you cook stuff, but just looking at the bowl is kind of boring.

Oh.

I mean, I guess you could have said, I'm happy that you're happy, but hey, you chose to go this way instead. That's fine. Maybe I could do something to make it more exciting. Maybe I could dress it up somehow, like they dress up lame prizes on "The Price is Right" by standing a model next to them.

Who would be an appropriate Pyrex model, though? Which of my many action figures would be most likely to get excited about fifty year old kitchenware?



Aunt May. Of course.

Well, Aunt May, now that you're here, maybe could you sexy this up a little bit? Maybe drape yourself suggestively over the bowl or something?



Wait, Aunt May. You're a comic book character. Maybe you could do that pose that ladies do on comic covers all the time where they uncomfortably twist their body to show their face and their butt in the same picture? Could you do that?



Hmmm.

No.

This isn't exciting. It's actually kind of nightmare fuel, but maybe that's because forcing Aunt May to contort herself for the gratification of viewers is demeaning and inappropriate, like The Hawkeye Initiative says it is.

Or maybe the Hawkeye Initiative is actually saying that this would be better with Hawkeye:



Look at that grin! He loves this.



He wants you to love this, too.



If this doesn't convince my friend to love Pyrex as much as I do, nothing will.