Wally’s Week

RANDOM PIC OF THE WEEK

This is the very moment when I realized I wanted to be James Bond. When I saw this scene in the movie theatre back in 1973 I thought he was the coolest guy I had ever seen! From then on I became a Roger Moore (and James Bond) fan! The intensity on his face, and the way his hair hung in his face was most possibly the coolest thing I had ever sees at that point in my life. Add to that the exciting music and I was smitten!

Not sure why, but when I was working in my garage recently I kept humming “Tube Snake Boogie” by ZZ Top. Great song!

Monday the 22nd – POD-PERSON! – Back when we were recording the “Sonic Boom” show, I became friends with Sam Freiberger who was one of the writers. We had a lot of shared passions, and we hung out a little bit. But when the show ended he went abroad to do some traveling and set up some deals for his production company. He’s now living out of town again to work on some projects, but he’s close enough to catch a plane back home to spend the Passover Satyr with his parents. He wanted to grab a ride in the Gran Torino before I put it back in storage for a while. We grabbed some lunch at McDonald’s quickly, which he enjoyed. It’s the last leaven food he’ll be able to eat for a while. I dropped him off just in time for him to head home and start his Satyr before sunset. One of these days I’d like to attend one of those ceremonies! I got back home and did some work, recorded an audition, and typed out Wally’s Week later. I found out that one of my iPods is toast. I have several that all serve different purposes. The one that fried is connected into my main audio system downstairs in the home theatre, and when I play it I can hear the music all throughout the house thanks to satellite speakers in all the rooms. So it’s time to search out another Gen 5 iPod on eBay. As they get older, they’re getting cheaper to buy. Many people have their music on their phones nowadays, but I’ve always liked the iPod interface and the ease of operation. Sad that Apple discontinued them. I found two more on eBay so I bought them both. One will replace the one in the theatre, and the other will be for the Tranquility Zone. The player I have there now is a Walkman MP3 player, and it’s just one step above a toy; very cheaply made and fragile. I’ve been looking to get rid of that for a while. This second iPod will fill the bill nicely! I took my nightly WOG (walk/jog) and spent some time outside looking at the night sky in my anti-grav chair. I observed a little mouse come over the retaining wall, crawl along its base for a while, and then come over in my direction. I don’t think he knew I was there. Good thing I didn’t hear the owls out tonight, cuz this little guy/girl might have been hot lunch. When I got back inside I started painting the Renji tattoo cap for my new friend Kentaro Ito, the original Japanese voice of Renji Abarai (I’m the English voice in the show). He liked my hand-painted cap when we met in Dallas a few weeks ago and I promised him I’d make him one. When I do, there will only be two like it on the planet. I made a salad and hit the hay to watch the latest episode of “Collector’s Call” which featured a guy who has an amazing “Weird Al” Yankovic collection! Fun stuff!

Tuesday the 23rd – ELO NUMBER FOUR! – It was the kind of day I just wanted to stay in all day long. I did some work around the house, paid some bills, answered emails, and ordered in a Domino’s pizza. As this year will mark the final tour of Jeff Lynne’s ELO, a band which I’m obsessed with, my pal Officer Mark and I bought tickets to two of their local shows (their first show will be in the Palm Springs area, and their final show will be in L.A.!). But shortly after we bought tickets to what we believed would be their final show in October, they added a second show the night after. So I went on-line to look at ticket availability and pricing for the final final show, and I saw some options I liked. So I bought tickets to that show as well. So on Friday night October 25th we’ll be in the third row as part of the “Over and Out” package. And the following night on Saturday we’ll be in the 19th row as part of the “All Over The World” package. FUN! I’m also seeing the band in St. Paul with some of my South Dakota buddies in September. I took my nightly WOG and spent some time in the anti-grav chair relaxing and unwinding. Then I came back inside to pay some more bills and go through my credit card statements.

Wednesday the 24th – TWO HOOTS, A ‘COON, AND THE MOON! – My pal Scott Sebring came by to drop off some work he had done, and we headed to lunch at Paty’s to meet our pal David Woodruff, special effects guru. After a fun lunch, Scott took off to pick up his wife Vickie at her work, and David and I drove the Gran Torino over to my auxiliary parking to put it to bed. David’s dad has a beautiful Batmobile replica, so David’s very familiar with covering a collector car. We switched cars back to the Gray Ghost, and I drove him back to Paty’s so he could get his car. I did a little grocery shopping, and then came home to work in my garage for several hours. A lot of stuff in one particular corner needed to be sorted through and thrown out. After about four hours I got a lot accomplished. Lots of stuff got thrown away, and other stuff got organized. It looks a lot better in that area now; at least until I fill it all up with junk again. I went inside to work around the house and located the Kermit the Frog sweaters I had bought a year ago. I bought one from Hot Topic in each size just to have on hand. My pal Edi is going to wear the small one to “Puppet Up!” this Saturday night, and I’ll be wearing my XL one. A Laurel & Hardy ceramic statue that I recently won in a raffle at our Sons of the Desert fanclub meeting needed some headgear. I found some perfect little felt derbies on eBay and bought them. They fit wonderfully, so I affixed them to the statues semi-permanently. I did some more work around the house and then took my nightly WOG. I saw one beautiful owl sitting high in a tree hooting up a storm. Soon I hear two owls hooting. I got to one section of my WOG and saw a raccoon that was heading my way. But he saw my light that I wear on a headband and headed the other way. The moon overhead was almost full and beautiful! Then I spent my usual time outside under the stars in my anti-grav chair. I came back inside and made a salad and watched an episode of “The High Chaparral.” I can honestly say that it was the first episode in about two dozen that I actually didn’t care for. It seemed to have a lot of “filler” in it, and some scenes were just awkward. Oh well, it’s a darn good series otherwise.

Thursday the 25th – “BEAK-IER!” – I decided that today would be another stay-in day and I just hung around the house doing projects. I‘ve decided to make a new nose for my Count Von Count replica Muppet. He’s beautiful, but after looking at him for a while in my display case I’ve decided he needs a nose job. The nose he has now is a little too “bulky” and needs to be narrower, sharper and “beak-ier,” as I call it. I’m going to spend a lot of time making it perfect. The ideal nose would be more like the nose the Count had in the early 70’s. I plan on taking him to the upcoming “Monsterpalooza” convention in early June. I also want to make a little Frankenstein cosplay costume for my Kermit and call him Frogenstein! Stay tuned! I did my nightly auditions and did some prep work for Friday, as we would be going several hours without electrical power due to a large LADWP project they’re doing. Their 50 year old system needs some upgrades, and they need to kill our power for several hours to finish them. Ugh. After my WOG and anti-grav time, I made certain to tire myself out so I could go to sleep at 7am on Friday morning, right around the time they’d be cutting power. That way I could just sleep through not having any power, and wake up to having it restored (hopefully).

Friday the 26th – DWP STANDS FOR DOESN’T WORK PROPERLY! – Sure enough, just as I was getting to bed around 7am the power went out. I settled in my bed and hoped it would be restored by the time I woke up. They originally anticipated the power to be back on by 2pm, so when I woke up just before I was very excited. I did it! I slept through the power outage! But the power didn’t come back on at 2. Or 3. Or 4. What the heck was going on?! So I took my garage door opener out of gear, manually opened my garage door (easy peasy) and took off to get some things done. I got some cat fud at the vet’s, dropped the Rav at the car wash to have it spruced up, got some lunch at the Mexican restaurant down the street, and then went to pick up my super clean Gray Ghost! I headed over to my box to pick up my packages and then called my neighbor Bob. Still no power at 4:30! I got back home and chatted with Bob to see what was going on, since he had been in touch with our property manager, who had been in touch with the LADWP. At 5pm he said the work had been finished, and they were just waiting for the right supervisor to come check the work and hit the “ON” button. Since it was now 5pm I was hoping this supervisor wasn’t stuck in typical Friday afternoon L.A. traffic! Once the main switch at the DWP was thrown, our property manager had to go to each building and restart the breakers to make sure nothing blew. It was nice to have power back. I’m not sure why the LADWP waited 50 years to upgrade their system. They didn’t think of doing it at 20 years? Or 30 years? Or even 40?! They let it go 50 years?! The idiocy. Anyway, I hope this is the last of it for a while. I did some more work in the garage, and then went inside to cover the new Count nose I made with the correct fleece. I also organized some sacks of fabric I had lying around in the garage and put them in the appropriate bins. I also updated my inventory list of things I have stored in my garage. My goal in the next few months is to find suitable off-property storage that I can stash some things that aren’t important, but stuff that I may need to access someday. Later that night I treated myself to some food-to-go from Denny’s. I took my nightly WOG and subsequent anti-grav time. During my walk I was stopped by our security patrol and questioned. I loved it, and felt that it was warranted. I WANT them to be proactive like that and question suspicious-looking people. Once he learned that I lived on the property, and that I was on a brisk walk to keep my blood pressure down, he laughed and wished me luck and a good night. It made me feel good that they’re alert like that. I watched another episode of “The High Chaparral” and hit the hay.

Saturday the 27th – “PUPPET UP! 8!” – Anytime the show “Puppet Up!” is mounted at the Jim Henson Studios in Hollywood I make a point of going. Not only do I know several people who perform in the show, it’s a laugh riot, and…HEY! PUPPETS! My pal Edi said she wanted to check it out, so I got us tickets a few months ago. I drove over to her house to pick her up, and then we went to the Hollywood Rafallo’s Pizza to get some food before the show. I used to have Rafallo’s deliver pizza to the studios of 94.7 The Wave when I was a DJ back in the 80’s. I always loved their pizza, and dining in their restaurant is a fun experience too. I like to play a lot of songs on the jukebox (21 plays for 5 bucks!) and one song I always like to play is “Sing” by the Carpenters. First, the song was originally written by Joe Raposo for “Sesame Street.” That’s the first Muppet connection. Secondly, it was recorded by A&M recording artists The Carpenters. The Henson Studios in Hollywood are at the old A&M studios, and that song was most likely recorded in the studio where we’d be later, just a few blocks away! The six degrees of Henson! After some darn good pizza, we drove to Henson and got parked and checked in. We looked around as we waited for our VIP tour to begin. I was wearing my custom Rowlf the Dog cap I made, my Mahna Mahna shirt, a Kermit sweater, and my Kermit shoes. Edi was also wearing a Kermit sweater, so we were striking our colors! The final stop of the tour is Brian Henson’s office. He came into the office at the end to answer questions. I asked if he’s looking forward to the Jim Henson documentary on Disney + later this month. He said he was, very much so. There have been several Henson docs, but there was a time where Brian and company placed a moratorium on documentaries. But when Ron Howard’s company came to them, they couldn’t resist having a doc made by this wonderful filmmaker. Brian said it will focus on two relationships; the one Jim had with Frank Oz, and the relationship between Brian’s parents Jim and Jane. A guy asked about the average lifespan of one of their puppets. Brian explained that the soft puppets (made of foam and fabric) could last up to 20 years, but the puppets made of foam latex (like the “Dark Crystal” puppets) didn’t last long because the foam would break down over time and turn to dust. He said, “But the puppets that are made of foam rubber and felt…uh…no…not felt…ummm…” and I chimed in with, “Fleece?” He said, “YES! Fleece. Thank you! The puppets made of foam and fleece hold up pretty well. Then a question was asked about a character in “The Muppet Christmas Carol,” and he said that the puppet was operated from inside a tank of baby oil, to give it a slow, flowing look. He said, “It was operated with clear plastic rods made of…ummm…” and I chimed in again with, “Acrylic?” “Yes,” Brian said, “Acrylic!” That was kind of a fun exchange! I knew it was acrylic because my pal Kyle at Plastic Depot makes a ton of stuff in his shop with acrylic rods and panels. As always, “Puppet Up!” was a great show and Edi loved it. She said it was better than she thought it would be. The show DOES kind of defy accurate description. After the show I saw my pals Grant, Drew and Nikki. We even talked to Walter, a custodian who has been at the studio for 33 years. I asked him if it was indeed haunted and he proceeded to tell us some stories that made the hair stand up on our arms! Fun! I dropped Edi off at her house, and then made my way back home. But I was too tired to WOG, so I just made a salad and watched a few episodes of “Honey West” before bed.

Sunday the 28th – CRASH DAY – Though I slept most of the day, I did get up later to finish the nose for The Count. It’s everything I hoped it would be. Gorgeous! I’m just hoping that once the old nose is removed, the fabric on the face (where the old nose had been stitched) won’t be too scarred from the stitch marks. But I’m hoping that the pile of the fleece will disguise the stitch marks nicely. I’m working on an idea for a new monocle, and one of the people I met at “Puppet Up!” said she was a jeweler and metallurgist! Just my luck! I may hire her to create a special silver frame for the monocle I’m making. I recorded a bunch of auditions and then did some work around the house. Since we had no power on Friday, I had to reschedule the maids to come on Monday. So I’ll have to be up fairly early to let them in to do their work tomorrow.

And how was YOUR week?!?!

PIX FROM THE WEEK

Edi and Brian Henson in his office at the Jim Henson Studios!

Not only did we manage to get Kermit Chaplin in the shot, but Charlie himself is looking over Edi’s shoulder!

The custom hat I painted for Kentaro Ito is ready to be shipped to Japan!

The new nose for the Count is sharper, sleeker, narrower and “beak-ier.” Much more like the Count of the early 70’s. My seamstress Maggie will be doing the transplant surgery in early May.

Thanks Smart Sound Post for the neat parking place! I look forward to voicing there again soon!