Every Sunday, the largest flea market in Mexico City converges on and around the corner of Reforma and Comonfort. This is the edge of La Lagunilla, a street market that sells new stuff every day, but blasts from the past only Sunday. One of my first posts in this blog was about people who sold Nazi paraphernalia at the flea market. I am happy to report that they are gone, although there are still people who sell the odd Nazi item among the rest of their stuff. See below.

It had been ages since my last visit to La Lagunilla, so I went a few Sundays ago. It was as much fun as ever. Here are some of the items that were for sale.

I was a little concerned about how few people were there. I wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that for the past couple of years each Sunday morning a huge swath of Paseo de la Reforma is closed to cars so that bicyclists can enjoy it. This may impede passage to La Lagunilla.

There was a woman on Reforma who was selling issues of a magazine called Agenda from the 1970s, which advertised the shows in restaurants and nightclubs of Mexico City in those golden days.

Nearly of the places on these pages are gone now, as is the whole style of variety entertainment they advertise.

I did manage to get to Las Catacumbas before it closed its doors in the early 1990s. It was on calle Dolores, near the Alameda. A guy dressed in a monk's robe greeted you at the door, and took you down a long hallway. At the end of it a skeleton popped out and scared the daylights out of you. Then you went inside the club and enjoyed the show.

At a dingy nightclub in the colonia San Rafael, Gabriela Rios, known as La Che, entertained at my bachelor party in 1992. Honey, if you're still out there, I got divorced ten years ago.

I bought these magazines from a woman who told me she appeared in their pages. Here she is, back in the day. Stupidly, I didn't think of taking her picture but I assure you that Mina Beltrán has hardly changed a bit.