Here’s a great one from the 80’s! I think this song was featured in the film “Legal Eagles.” I remember liking it then, and when I heard it recently I couldn’t get it out of my head. I have a healthy supply of Rod Stewart’s songs on my i-Pod, and this is one of them. It’s called “Love Touch.”
Monday the 7th – AMERICA’S FAVORITE CAT IS BACK! – Today we started recording the third amazing season of “The Garfield Show” for Cartoon Network. It was great to be back, and as a bonus my pal Chuck McCann was guesting as the Mayor! It was great getting to be in the same recording studio as Frank Welker, Gregg Berger, Chuck McCann, Candi Milo and Laura Summer! What a great day! After the session was over I came home and grabbed my second Gran Torino and went for a spin with my friend Sara. Since “The Tonight Show” is on hiatus this week, I had my afternoons free! We went to get lunch at Barone’s, then went to Macy’s so I could pick up a gift for my pal Brittney’s birthday. A few years back, I bought her a diamond necklace shaped like a star. She had commented recently that she wished the chain was a little longer. So I picked her up a 30″ silver chain and matching bracelet at Macy’s. Then I went over to JoAnn’s Fabrics and bought 10 yards of greenish/tan burlap. This will serve as the backdrop for my new Scarecrow of Romney Marsh display in The Chaney Room. My Scarecrow costume was used in the bonus materials of the “Scarecrow of Romney Marsh” DVD release Disney did a few years back. So now the costume is on a mannequin and will be one of a new three part display which also features mannequins based on the Michael Crawford Phantom of the Opera, and Jonathan Frid as Barnabas Collins. The Scarecrow is completely dressed and is waiting for a new platform which is being built by my contractor Terry. The Phantom will be the last one completed as my effects pal Jim Ojala is working on the mannequin as we speak. Barnabas is finished and is also waiting for a new platform to be finished. That night the wind kicked up and all the dust and dirt and pollen started blowing around. My eyes were itching like crazy so I laid down with a wet cloth on my eyes and took a nap! It was the worst allergy attack I’ve had since I’ve lived in L.A.!
Tuesday the 8th – GARAGE CONQUEST! – The IVR job I’ve been doing (Interactive Voice Response) has been going fairly well lately. Until today. Because of the allergy attack my voice wasn’t top notch. Plus there was some technical glitches and volume discrepancies in the studio, and it was driving everyone involved kind of crazy. The technical aspects of an IVR job has to be exact every day so the phrases will match once they’re put all together by the computer. It was just not a good day, so we stopped the session with hopes that it will be better when we get back together on Thursday. Sometimes that happens. We were going to do another “Garfield” session today at Buzzy’s, so I headed over there with hopes that the rest of the day would go well. The great Stan Freberg was there again to do a character voice. He told me that he was the very last radio comic to do a radio show. Very historic! He replaced Jack Benny when he left, and continued his show until radio shows became antiquated. The sessions ended and it was another great day led by the amazing Mark Evanier. I got home and grabbed a nap on the couch. When I got up and decided it was time to attack my garage! It had been filthy and filled with boxes and all sorts of crap and I was very sick of it. I got my box cutter out and sliced and diced, and organized and shifted and moved, and lifted and stashed. By the end of three hours I could actually MOVE in my garage! Quite a change from the previous months when I would have to park VERY carefully so I could find room to get out of my car! It felt very good to look into my garage and almost hear an echo as I spoke. I promised myself during hiatus week that I would conquer this garage, and I did! But there is still some more organizing to do, but I need to stop at Office Depot and get more boxes.
Wednesday the 9th – THAT’S THE ‘BRAKES’ KID! – I got to sleep in and boy was it delicious! No IVR today, no Garfield and no Tonight Show. I had the chance to do a session for “Bleach” but I had promised myself that I would leave Wednesday as a ‘regroup’ day, so I turned it down. I did have to go see my chiropractor, so I got Torino 2 out again and headed over. It was a beautiful day. After the appointment I went to a car stereo place to see about getting a new stereo put in as well as an alarm. The guy there said to bring it in on Saturday and he’d have time to look it over. I also stopped by It’s a Wrap and picked up a few new tuxedo shirts. Then I took my pal Edi over to Paty’s for a late lunch. It was awesome. I parked my Torino in a spot where I could look at it from the patio. Edi and I got a table on the patio so I could stare at the Torino during lunch. It was fun watching people walk by it and check it out. The sun was going down, and the moon was rising. It was an absolutely lovely day! But as I was driving Edi back home I noticed that my brakes were feeling rather ‘soft.’ In fact, they weren’t very good at all. I managed to get my pal Bodie on the line just as he was leaving his shop. He said I could bring it over and leave it and he would check it out the next day. I got to his shop just in time and got a ride home from his assistant Steph. By the time I got to his shop, I had the brake pedal pushed all the way to the floor to get it to slow down! They felt like they were totally shot! I got home and took a nice dip in the jacuzzi and relaxed.
Thursday the 10th – RETURN OF THE SNOT MONSTER! – I had a callback audition for a new cartoon in the morning, so I drove over to Burbank to do it. Then I drove over to Jerry’s Famous Deli to meet with a guy named Nick Simon, a director who is originally from South Dakota. In fact, after talking to Nick, I realized we had LOTS of friends in common. He said he used to listen to me on the radio when he was growing up! WILD! We had a great lunch and promised to work on a project together soon! I went over to Voice Trax West in the late afternoon to do more IVR voice tracks. Today went MUCH better than Tuesday did. The technical glitches were all worked out and it was smooth sailing. In fact, it went so well that we didn’t need to get together on Friday for our usual session. Which was great because I had a 3 hour session scheduled Friday morning for “Bleach,’ and another 3 hour session for the IVR stuff. Since I always stand at my sessions, that would have meant that I would have had to be on my feet for about 6 hours! I was glad to hear that the IVR session was cancelled for Friday. But I would still need to get up really early for the “Bleach” session. When I got home I needed a nap. I felt that my sinus infection from last Christmas was coming back. I had the familiar pain behind my right eye, and I had “balloonhead,” (that feeling like your head is a balloon and if you thumped on it with your finger it would make that hollow THUD THUD sound) as well as a stuffy nose. Oh no! Apparently the allergy attacks helped bring this sucker back!
Friday the 11th – SINUS HELL! – I got up very early to be at Studiopolis Burbank for a three-hour session for the new “Bleach” movie. A few minutes in director Steve Kramer said I was sounding stuffy. Luckily I had my nasal spray along and we got my sinuses cleared. But it was tough. I called my ear, nose and throat doctor and got an appointment for later that afternoon. I got home after the session and I was REALLY tired. It was all I could do to stay awake to get to my doctor’s office. But I’m glad I did. He checked me out and sent me on my way with a shot in the arm, an anti-biotic inhalant and some prescriptions. But when I got to the pharmacy they said it would be about an hour before my prescription could be filled. RATS! So I went to take a nap and get my stuff later. When I got up I got my prescription, had a bite to eat at Panera and then headed home. I was starting to feel pretty good again. I stayed up most all night and worked on The Chaney Room. I stitched together the burlap curtain that will hang behind the Scarecrow mannequin with black leather lace. It looks great! It was a fun way to spend a Friday night, and the last night of my “Tonight Show” hiatus.
Saturday the 12th – NO NO TORI-NO! – I had hoped to get to Bodie’s to get Torino 2, but as he was rolling down the passenger window, some part broke inside the door and the window slid off the track. So he needs to keep it a few more days until he can get a replacement part. I figured I’d be better off going back to bed and sleeping the afternoon away so my sinuses can repair. I got up for movie that night, and we watched “Rain Man” on Blu Ray, followed by an old 70’s TV movie called “Murder Can Hurt You,” which parodies many of the great TV cops of the day…Starsky & Hutch, Baretta, Columbo and more. It was corny, but pretty fun to watch. By the time I got to bed it was 9am Sunday morning. But it was really 8am, but because of stupid daylight savings time it was 9am. Which reminds me…
Sunday the 13th – THERE OUGHTTA BE A LAW! – …when are we going to dump this stupid thing called daylight savings time? There is absolutely no point to doing this any more, and any research I can find about it states that the reasons for doing it are all antiquated. It does NOT save any significant amount of energy. The only advantages I can think of are…when I stay up all night watching DVDs the sun won’t come poking in my window quite as early and…I have a little more sunshine to bike home from “The Tonight Show.” But other than that it’s a stupid law whose advantages escape me. It was a lovely afternoon, and I went to evening church. After that a bunch of us went to dinner at Ernie’s Taco House, including a new friend named Scott who came from Australia to L.A. on vacation. He e-mailed me to ask if he could see Planet Wallywood on his trip and I was happy to oblige. He came over for the tour and then I drove him back to his hotel in Hollywood. I grabbed a shower, took my medicine and turned in early. I had a heavy week ahead of me and I need to lose this sinus infection SOON!
And how was YOUR week??!!
