March 01 – March 07 (2021) – Wally On The Web

RANDOM PIC OF THE WEEK

An artist in Canada who loves “Invader Zim” (particularly the Almighty Tallest!) recently integrated a few of our Christoween characters into an art piece she did! FANTASTIC! It shows her characters opening a box of figures from our “Donnie Druthers’ Christoween Capers” stories. You can follow her at @Divin_Thanatos

One of my favorite channels on my satellite is DirecTV channel #836 – Coffee Shop Cuts. It’s a mix of mellow songs by newer artists, and while not every one of them is a gem, I do make some nice discoveries every once in a while. The past two weeks of “What’s Wally Humming?” have been good finds from the channel, and this week is no different. This is called “Tenderness” and it’s by Jay Som, who said she wanted to create something that would be played at a ‘yacht party’ – something with a real Steely Dan vibe. She accomplished that very nicely! I can’t get enough of this song!

Monday the 1st – SPRING SPRINGING?! – Is spring springing up already? It was an amazing day – very spring-like! I did some work around the house with all the windows open to bring in all that fresh air. I typed out Wally’s Week and recorded a bunch of auditions. I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for summer!

Tuesday the 2nd – CATCHING UP WITH CAROL! – Roxy was in need of a bath, and it was about that time again, so I walked her over to the groomer’s to get cleaned up. I had a very nice (and LONG!) conversation with Carol, the lady from whom I originally got Roxy back in 2012. She has been training all of the Lassies for decades. I hadn’t talked to her in a long time and it was good to catch up. She has a lot going on. I got some lunch at Subway and came home to eat it while I waited for Roxy’s grooming to be completed. I picked her up and she was back to her usual, gorgeous self. Later I did a ton of auditions, and worked on some artwork for my favorite Christmas radio show called “Christmas Across the Lands.” The host of the show and I have become e-mail pals, as I’m a huge fan of the show. So when he asked me if I would perform an elf character for this year’s broadcast, I wholeheartedly agreed! He was looking for some “free use” artwork of an elf that he could use in his web publicity to promote the show. But everything he found didn’t look very good. Being a cartoonist, I brushed off the old skills and sent him a few concept pieces I had created. He loved them, so I got busy doing some more and coloring them in my graphics program! Being able to participate in this amazing show is going to be fantastic! I made some food and watched an episode of “The Invaders” that was terrific. It was about a crazy Air Force general who was bent on destroying the leaders of the aliens, even if he had to sacrifice his own friends and family to do it! The second season of this show is monumentally good!

Wednesday the 3rd – “INVADERS & HUTCH?!” – Waking up to the sounds of my cat puking is never the start of a good day. But that’s what greeted me at the beginning of this one. It was a pretty rainy afternoon, so I just relaxed and did some work around the house. Later I had a ton of auditions to record, and then some more graphics work and more cartooning. I decided to make a buffalo chicken salad (my usual Saturday Night Super Salad but with buffalo chicken instead of turkey), and I watched another “Invaders” episode. This one was written by William Blinn – the creator of “Starsky & Hutch!”

Thursday the 4th – TRADEMARK TALK! – A two-hour Zoom call with my trademark attorney Stephanie was the first order of business for the day. We’re strategizing how to bring a few pieces of Christoween merchandise to the marketplace. We came up with some really great ideas, so stay tuned! My friend Michelle moved to L.A. the day before, and today she bought a car to get her around the city. She drove it over to show it to me and she drove us to lunch at Paty’s. It has very low miles and is a 2020 model. She got a great deal! We headed back to Planet Wallywood so I could do my nightly auditions. Later we made some food and I showed her an “Invaders” episode. We even made some tinfoil hats just for the occasion!

Friday the 5th – WHAT’S THE MOST ANNOYING SOUND IN THE WORLD?! – My maids came over just after noon to clean up around Planet Wallywood, then I had a few last-minute auditions to record, and one piece to record for an ongoing client. I rushed off to meet my old pal Croix for lunch at Paty’s. She hasn’t been out much during the past year, but she decided she needed to get out and do some things, so we met for a nice sunny, breezy outdoor lunch to catch up. I got back home and did more auditions, and then I did some graphics work in anticipation of a Christoween product we’ll be releasing. But whenever I finish working on a photo file and go to close out of it, it gives me the standard “Save changes?” prompt. And when I click out of a file it plays the most annoying chime. I searched for several hours for ways to defeat it. While I’m doing graphics work I like to listen to music or podcasts. And nothing ruins the vibe more than hearing that constant, annoying chime. Unfortunately, it looks like it’s embedded in the program and can’t be removed. I worked on some more Christoween merchandise ideas, including a tree ornament that I’m going to sculpt and have my special effects guy Jim Ojala replicate with a silicone mold. Then he can pop out as many as I need in resin, I can paint them up and sell them to order.

Saturday the 6th – THE GANG AGAIN! – Though the reports talked of rain, I didn’t see any sign of it. It was a gorgeous day. I poked around on-line to see if there was some new music out from one of my favorite “chill” artists named Washed Out. Sure enough there was. I sampled it on Youtube and it sounded like a GREAT new CD! I ordered it immediately. Later in the day Michelle came over again and we hopped into the Gran Torino and drove over to Bob’s Big Boy for dinner with a few of the old “movie night” gang. Now that people are getting their vaccinations, and infections have gone down, a few were asking if I was going to start up movie night again soon. I said I was considering it, but nothing was planned for the near future. It sure was great seeing the old gang again, and we even called up our ‘adopted grandma’ Shirley at her home in Palm Springs so we could all say hi and send our love. Later at home, I went down into the garage and poked around in my storage bins. I needed to find some thin, clear plastic to sculpt my Christoween ornament. I’ll draw out the design on the plastic, and then with a compound called Magic Sculpt I’ll create the ornament on the plastic. Once it cures and hardens, I can just bend the plastic and the ornament master will just snap right off. Then I can sand it and touch it up, and take it over to Jim Ojala’s for molding. While I was in the garage I also consolidated a bunch of fabric into a new bin, and took inventory of the contents for my database. It’s much easier to find stuff that way when I need it. Since it was the first Saturday of the month, that meant it was time for another “Laurel and Hardy Theatre” during TV time. As is my tradition, I made a Chef Boyardee pizza to eat while I watch the boys cavort around in their craziness. Michelle had never had a Chef Boyardee pizza so I was excited to make one for her. While she loved the Laurel and Hardy movies (especially the one called “Twice Two,” where Stan and Ollie play each other’s wives) she wasn’t a fan of the pizza. I couldn’t believe it! I guess it’s all a matter of what you grew up with. Oh well, that leaves more for me I guess!

Sunday the 7th – LOCKED OUT! – Michelle needed to do some grocery shopping to get supplies for her first official week as an L.A. resident. But I was a bit tired so I didn’t go with her. I told her I was going to nap but I’d leave the front doors unlocked so she could come back whenever she was done. But after a while I woke up and thought it was odd that I hadn’t heard her return yet. Come to find out she had been waiting on my porch for about 45 minutes! One of the locks had gotten locked somehow, and had locked her out. I was positive that I double-checked it when she left to make sure she would have access when she came back. I was beside myself with confusion, as I was certain it was unlocked before I laid down for my nap! And she didn’t ring the doorbell to wake me up because she didn’t want to wake me up. I felt like a real heel! I did a few auditions and did some work around the house. I got an idea for an improvement project of sorts. When I made my Rowlf the Dog replica puppet back in late 2018 I was still dusting off my old puppet-making skills. So while Rowlf turned out pretty nice, I was always a little disappointed that I made his head a bit too large. That’s one of the worst temptations in puppet-making; making them too large. You’ll build the head out of foam rubber and a plastic mouth and it seems like it’s a good size. But then you add the fleece and fur and it “bulks” the whole thing out quite a bit. My Rowlf’s mouth is 9 inches wide, which in retrospect seems a bit too big. I’ve often said that I wish I would have made his head about 10% smaller. Well, I have all the materials on-hand (the plastic, foam rubber, fur and fleece) so I’m going to start the process of designing a new, improved head. I can transplant the same nose and eye pieces from the old head. I initially made a mouth 7” across, but it seemed too small. I need to ponder it some more. If 9” is the original size, 10% of that would be .9 inches (almost a full inch) – which means that 7” would be more than 20% smaller. I think that may be too much. But I’ll know more when I start building it up. Later Michelle helped me film another Cameo message for a fan of the Power Rangers. I came up with a fun way to sing the birthday song as my character Psycho Blue. What fun!

And how was YOUR week??!!

PIX FROM THE WEEK