RANDOM PIC OF THE WEEK
Since I used to be a paperboy back in the early 70’s, this cartoon really rang true! Sometimes I’d have to bring my dad along with me to collect, as some of the subscribers were hesitant to pay on time.
The Four Tops sure have a nice groove with “Keeper of the Castle.” I’ve always loved this song!
Monday the 8th – BROKEN PIPES! – The week started off with a bang, as one of the first scenes in the foreign show I’m dubbing at Igloo studios in Burbank required me to come right out of the gate yelling at the top of my lungs. The first take blew the engineer out, so I had to do it again. And then a second take. And then a few pick-ups. I figured I’d be OK since I’ve been doing this for a very long time. But as the day went on I got raspier and raspier. Back in the old days, when I was working regularly in video games, and onstage as Beetlejuice, my voice was used to extreme vocal stress, and it recovered quite rapidly. I was younger then too. But the ol’ pipes seem to be a bit out of shape, as I haven’t done any yelling sessions in a very long time. I went home after the session to do a few auditions and I could tell my pipes weren’t right. But the problems weren’t that bad. Later my gal Angi and her dog Khloestine came over for dinner, and as the evening wore on I could tell my voice was getting worse. What the hell did I do?! I took my WOG (walk/jog) later and spent some quiet time outside in the anti-gravity chair meditating and pondering life.
Tuesday the 9th – UH-OH! – When I woke up I could tell I was definitely having voice issues. I drank some warm tea (cold drinks constrict the vocal cords) and took some Advil to reduce the inflammation on my vocal cords. My buddy Dave was still in town and was staying with his son (and my godson) Sean. He texted me about dinner that night, and I headed back into Igloo for another four hour session dubbing the foreign comedy show I’ve been working on for the past few weeks. But my vocal limitations were popping up from time to time. I told the director I’d be unable to do anymore yelling, but it wasn’t required for that session. The session went pretty well, considering. I stopped home to feed my cat Spook, and then headed to Barone’s to meet with Dave and Sean for dinner. It was Dave’s last night in town, but I’d be seeing him next week when I travel to Sioux Falls for the Voices Against Cancer charity event. After dinner I headed home to relax and not talk for a while. I was looking at the new “Travel Cookie” (a new Cookie Monster replica Muppet I’m making) and I decided to try and get his fur a little coarser looking. The fur I bought for the puppet was very nice and smooth, but didn’t yet look “monster-y” enough. Since the mouth and the eyes weren’t in yet, I put the whole puppet (which is basically just a fur bag) in a tub of really hot water. Then I wrung him out and hung him to dry. I hope this works. Ideally the hot water will activate some chemical in the fake fur, or remove some starch (or something) and the fur will look a little more disheveled. I’m going to put the mouth in soon. Later I took my nightly WOG and spent some time in the anti-grav chair. I was a day late with it, but I went inside and typed out Wally’s Week for my website.
Wednesday the 10th – THE “EYES” HAVE IT! – After devouring some delicious leftover pizza from Barone’s, I headed into Igloo for another 4 hour session dubbing the foreign comedy show. My voice was doing a little bit better, but the work was very difficult. It was a very busy and dense episode full of dialogue and chatter. I’m suspecting that some of the scenes were even improvised, making the job of dubbing even more difficult. It was pretty exhausting, but rewarding. But we’re almost done with episode 6 of an 8 episode series, so we’re moving right along! After the session I stopped by my mailbox to get my packages, and then I drove over to my buddy Jim Ojala’s effects studio to pick up some Cookie Monster eyeballs and pupils he made for me. I use 2.5” plastic Christmas balls for the eyeballs, but Jim needs to sand them down smooth, and fill them with some resin to fortify the walls. That way they don’t crush easily, and I can drill into them to place the screws upon which the little plastic pupils spin. He also made me some curved eyeballs that conform to the curvature of the eyeball. Hopefully these will spin a lot better when the puppet moves. I got back home and immediately started working on placing the mouth in the now-dry “Travel Cookie” puppet. The hot water treatment didn’t really do much with the fur, but it does look slightly better. I glued the mouth plates into the puppet and pinned them into place until the glue cured. It looks pretty darn good! I did some auditions, and later took my nightly WOG and spent time afterwards looking at the night sky in my anti-grav chair. It was nice to relax. I breezed through the 7th episode of the foreign show we’re dubbing, which had just become available on the server, and it looks like there’s going to be a lot of musical numbers involved. This is good news, because any music doesn’t need to be dubbed, and will be ultimately presented in the show in the original language. Nice! I’ll watch the full episode later this week to try and ascertain how much work we’ll have to do when it comes time to dub it. I trimmed the finger tufts on “Travel Cookie” so they flop over his fingertips more, and I did some minor paint touch-ups on his mouth. Where the weave of the fur fabric meets the black fabric of the mouth, the light colored weave is quite noticeable. So I took some matte black paint and dabbed paint on those areas so the fabric blends into the mouth a little better visually.
Thursday the 11th – OOPS! A FLUB! NO DUB! – As usual, I started my day by heading to get some quick lunch, and then drove over to Igloo to do my regular four-hour dubbing job. But when I got there the crew looked surprised to see me. Apparently I hadn’t read the emails well enough from my agent and I got confused about the booked days. I WASN’T ON THE SCHEDULE TO WORK THAT DAY! Oops! So I apologized, sat in the kitchen and ate my Wienerschnitzel lunch, and headed out the door to get some other stuff done. I need to start paying closer attention to this scheduling stuff. I headed back home to start working on the Cookie Monster eyeballs. Unfortunately, out of the 6 Jim made for me, only 2 were really usable. The rest had distortions and flaws. But I’m going to paint them anyway so my pal Mike at Alex In Wonderland can use those as practice eyeballs. They had already been covered with primer, so I covered them all with three coats of a paint called “insignia white.” It’s a great white paint that has a very light gray tint to it. It’s better than using a stark white paint. Then I covered them with something called Dullcote to take any shine off them. My friend Amanda was passing through town again, so she met at Denny’s to grab some dinner. By the time she ended up in the area, Denny’s was the only thing open. I came back to do a little work on the “Travel Cookie” eyes, and then I took my nightly WOG. I had a weird raccoon repeat-type of thing going. Since I do my walks in the middle of the night, I sometimes encounter various forms of wildlife. I turned a corner in the complex tonight and my headlamp illuminated two beady little eyes ahead of me. It was a raccoon looking for food. I said hello, and then turned and walked the other way. He looked like he wanted to head towards my direction, but I didn’t necessarily want to engage with him. Perhaps he was slightly tame and thought I might give him food. I went on with my walk and took a slightly different path. On the way back toward my area I saw another raccoon in my path – or was it the same one? We politely avoided each other’s path and went about our business. Later when I was in the anti-grav chair enjoying the quiet night, I heard a noise to my left. It was yet another raccoon (or the same one?) coming down the driveway. I stood up and the raccoon turned around and tried to climb the fence to get away. It was scared. If this was the same raccoon I had seen earlier, it sure got around quickly. I sat back down so I didn’t alarm the poor thing and it ran away. So far this week I’ve seen a few cats, some rats, raccoons, and plenty of spiders! I love the nightlife! I went back inside to do some work. I can’t believe the Voices Against Cancer event is so close! Time really flies!
Friday the 12th – PRONUNCIATION HELL! – It was the final day of the week, and not a moment too soon! I was back dubbing the foreign comedy show, and there was a boatload of difficult-to-pronounce foreign names I needed to say. And the original actor in the show just rattled them off quickly. So it was imperative that I pronounced them correctly, and rapidly. EEK! It was a real challenge, but I was happy when 6pm rolled around and I could go enjoy the weekend! I stopped by Alex In Wonderland to drop off the “Travel Cookie” eyeballs and pupils so Mike could start working on placing them in the puppet. He needs to add some wood dowels to the eyeballs so they can be placed in the puppet’s head. Then I went home to relax. And relax I did! Later I did my nightly WOG, and spent some time in the anti-grav chair watching occasional flashes of summer lightning in the western skyline. Amazing! Then I went inside to do some more work around the house. I spent a goodly amount of time looking for a specific type of screw to be used for “Travel Cookie’s” pupils. I found a few “partially threaded” screws that would be ideal for this purpose. Unfortunately they were too long for my use. It would be ideal to have a screw that has threads on the lower half (so they could be screwed into the plastic eyeball) but have a smooth shaft on the upper end of the piece so the little plastic pupils have a smoother surface to spin on. I’m thinking that a fully threaded screw may be inhibiting the spinning ability somewhat. I’ll keep looking, but I’m not sure if what I need exists. For what I found these types of pieces are called “carriage bolts,” or “partially threaded” screws. I just can’t seem to find them in the short size I need. I made a salad and watched episode 7 of the foreign comedy show I’m dubbing, and was horrified. While there is a certain amount of music that won’t need to be dubbed, the rest of the dialogue is very rapid-fire (think vaudeville) and dense. This will be VERY challenging to dub to English! I also watched the “Collector’s Call” episode from last week. I’m getting very excited for my episode to air in September!! Stay tuned!
Saturday the 13th – REFRESH AND RELAX! – Since it was such a hot day I drove to my stylist Andie’s shop to get a touch-up on my color before I headed to South Dakota next week. Then I drove over to the local hardware store to see if they had any suitable “carriage bolts” or “partially threaded” screws for “Travel Cookie’s” eyes. But no luck. My pal Alex Zsolt was in town to do a concert with my buddy Rob Richards, so I met both of them for dinner at Ernie’s Taco House. We had a great time chatting and catching up. I got home and was pretty tired so I napped for a bit. Later I took my nightly WOG and spent some wonderful, quiet time outside in the anti-grav chair. Then I came inside and did some planning for my upcoming trip to Sioux Falls. I made a salad and watched a few episodes of “Honey West” before turning in for the night.
Sunday the 14th – ZOMBIE! – During my weekly “crash day” I got some heavy rest and relaxation in. Next week is the Voices Against Cancer event, so there won’t be any crash day for me next week. So I made the most of it. I took my nightly WOG, enjoyed some time in the anti-grav chair, and then came back inside to pay some bills and prep for two days-worth of sessions for dubbing the foreign comedy show. Since I’m leaving Wednesday I’ll only work Monday and Tuesday. That all works out well anyway, seeing as how by Wednesday we’ll be all caught up with the material we have so far. I did some laundry and did a little packing for the trip. I’m VERY excited for the event, and to see my friends and family again back in South Dakota!
And how was YOUR week??!!
PIX FROM THE WEEK
The adorable Khloestine, my gal Angi’s little girl.
These are the bolts I found in my stuff for “Travel Cookie’s” eyes. If they were about half this size, they’d be perfect! Rats!
I forgot to post this a few weeks ago when I saw “Jim Henson; Idea Man,” so here it is now. The documentary was absolutely magical, and as you can see, all my puppet pals were present and accounted for. Well, almost everyone!
