October 19 – October 25 (2026)

RANDOM PIC OF THE WEEK

This is the shot from “Far Out Space Nuts” that I scanned from an original slide. SUPER CLEAN!

Many of Fleetwood Mac’s songs are masterpieces, but I find this one particularly intriguing. “Peacekeeper” wasn’t a very big hit, but it’s a great song nonetheless!

Monday the 19th – …AAAAND…WE’RE OFF! – A brand new week was underway and it felt good to be back in the swing of things. Since I was out of town the previous Friday, I needed to have my maids come over on Monday to clean up Planet Wallywood. As it wasn’t my usual day, it was a different crew and they arrived very early. But everything got cleaned up nicely. I drove to get gas and a car wash. My car had gotten VERY filthy being parked outside, since we’re still unable to gain access to our garages due to the sinkhole issue (see last week’s Wally’s Week!). I went to my box to pay for another year of use, and I picked up a package that had been waiting for me for a while. It was the XL version of the 50th anniversary “Muppet Show” jacket I bought on eBay. The XXL was much too large, and to be honest, the XL is even a bit too big. But I’m sticking with it! That’s the problem when ordering clothes on-line…sometimes the fit isn’t quite right. While I was at the UPS store, I picked up a brand new 48” by 15” by 15” box for my signed posters. The other one had gotten soaked, so I needed to get a new box to store them safely again. Though I got lucky with the signed posters in the whole water main break fiasco (see last week’s Wally’s Week) I’m not taking any chances. I’m going to put this box on a few inches of Styrofoam, line the bottom of the inside of the box with a few inches of Styrofoam, and line the box with plastic bags…ya know…just in case. I had a nice, relaxing lunch by myself at Paty’s, and then hit the post office to mail off some bills. I spoke with my computer guy Thor about installing a new version of my audio-recording program that has some patches and fixes that I need. Then I sped off to Voice Trax West for a session for American Airlines. It was only about 3 lines that needed to be incorporated into the already-existing audio files, so it didn’t take long to do it. When we finished I headed over to CVS to get prints of a photo of Chuck McCann in “Far Out Space Nuts.” I purchased a slide on eBay and it’s gorgeous. It’s much better than purchasing a photo which could be many generations old. This was crisp and sharp and the print looked great. Unfortunately, the machine that prints their 5 X 7 prints wasn’t working, and I needed THAT machine for the museum card that will accompany the photo in the display. That card will have all the credits and information about the costume. I guess I’ll go in another day and try to get that printed. I went to Michael’s Crafts to see if they had an 8 X 10 acrylic frame to put the picture in. The frames I use in this section of Planet Wallywood are all acrylic frames with a front and back that you slide the picture into. The frame also comes with a little support at the bottom. But in this instance I put the photo in upside down, and in the support I drill two holes so I can screw it into an overhead shelf. But the only frame they had that fit the specs for what I needed was one that was all scuffed, and was out of its original packaging. Oh well, another sale for Amazon I guess. By the time I got home the only parking in the area ended up being several blocks away. Good thing I’m used to walking great distances, because this spot was FAR from my house! I hope this garage mess gets fixed soon! The broken water main STILL hasn’t been fixed, and it’s going on two weeks! I rested up a bit, and then I got up to do my nightly WOG (walk/jog). It’s now too chilly to spend time outside in the anti-gravity chair, so I came inside and wrote Wally’s Week; Week 2. LOTS to cover!

Tuesday the 20th – THE GHOST IS HOME! – About mid-afternoon I woke up and heard jackhammering outside. The crew was on the property tearing up asphalt around the sinkhole in preparation of repairing the line. Come to find out, it wasn’t a city of L.A. issue, it was a pipe that burst on OUR property. So our HOA is going to be liable for all of the charges. Today was a beautiful confluence of events. Sometimes things all work out. The first insurance guy came over to inspect my mess-of-a-garage. His specialty was examining personal contents that have been lost or rendered useless in a situation like a garage flood. The second insurance guy came over and his specialty was inspecting for structural damage; water damage on wood and drywall areas. Luckily, there was very little intrusion of those areas. First off, one wall in my garage is completely cinder block with a cement floor. He said that mold doesn’t form on those. The other wall that IS drywall is atop about a 4 or 5 inch foundation of cement. Since the water didn’t get much above that level, it doesn’t look like it even reached the drywall portion. I still need to dig out a lot of junk to inspect what happened in the deep recesses of my garage, but outwardly it seems that I got very, VERY lucky in this whole debacle. Most everything of value that was on the floor was put in plastic bins a long time ago. I know that when I start to tear stuff out, I’ll find a few things that I’ve lost, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the overall damage is fairly minimal. THANK GOD! Both insurance guys took pictures and went back to their offices to file claims. Just then, management was on-site and let us know that we could park in our garages again, and that the area was deemed safe! WOO-HOO! It’ll be a few weeks before the construction company can get back over to tear everything up again and repave, but until then we’re back in our garages! Now my focus was to get my garage straightened up enough to the point where I could get my car IN the garage comfortable! It looked like a total disaster area. But since the insurance guys already got their photos and did their inspection, it was safe to clean up a bit. I spent the rest of the afternoon straightening the garage out and throwing stuff away in my trash bins. Luckily tomorrow is trash day, and I had three bins FULL of soaked, useless items I had to throw away! I got the remaining stuff moved to the side enough so my car could fit. As the sun went down I walked over to get the Gray Ghost and drive it back home! Whew! But I still have LOTS of work to do! Later my pal Amanda let me know she was in town on her way to Northern California for a vacation. So we met over at Bob’s Big Boy for dinner and to catch up. Later I prepared to do my WOG, but as soon as I went outside I saw Baxter (the skunk) in a grassy area right by my house! EEK! He was moving his tail around and I wasn’t going to hang out any longer to see what his intentions were! I decided to call it a night and head back inside. Besides, I had gotten a lot of exercise earlier in the afternoon lugging stuff around in my garage and working up a powerful sweat! Besides, my muscles were still sore from my garage activity earlier. However, I DID go out back behind my garage and enjoy some time in the anti-grav chair. It was actually kinda warm out. I took the opportunity to enjoy a nice cigar, but very soon it got chilly. Before I went inside I assembled my new giant box I had gotten at the UPS store and put all the mailing tubes with my signed posters inside. They’re VERY WELL protected now! I came inside and heated up the vegetable beef soup I had bought to-go at Big Boy earlier and hit the hay.

Wednesday the 21st – WANDERING PLANET – WANDERING WALLY! – Many months ago I joined a Kickstarter program started by the Wandering Planet toy company. They were going to produce 6 inch Laurel and Hardy figures in color and monochrome styles. I went all-in on the project, and the figures are gorgeous! Since our next Sons Of The Desert meeting (Laurel & Hardy appreciation society) is in December, I’m sure they’ll be running “March Of The Wooden Soldiers,” since we’ll be heading into Christmas. I thought it might be fun to have the head of Wandering Planet come talk to our tent about the Laurel and Hardy toys, and even bring some to the meeting for purchase! We met for lunch at Paty’s (along with my assistant Emily) and we had a great time talking about Laurel & Hardy, toys, and other “nerd” stuff! Gavin at Wandering Planet is a delightful guy and I loved hearing more about what that company has planned for the future! In fact, our meeting went for 3 HOURS! I got home to do some work, and after the traffic died down I drove to Alex In Wonderland to pick up a top hat that I’d be borrowing for the upcoming Burbank Community Band concert that I’d be emceeing. I hit CVS and had the Chuck McCann museum signs printed, got some groceries, and then went home to rest. It started pouring rain! We’d be getting rain for the next couple of days. But at one point during the night, between rainstorms, the rain ceased. I took the opportunity and got outside to do my WOG before the sky opened up again! I recorded my auditions, and then worked on the script for this weekend’s Burbank Community Band show. I made a Paladin saladin and watched a few episodes of “Have Gun – Will Travel.”

Thursday the 22nd – TWISTED, TECHNICAL THURSDAY! – All day rain was expected, so it was a great day to stay inside and do some work. But technology (who doesn’t like me anyway) was really not my friend on this particular day! My audio recording program was acting up and doing lots of weird stuff. I contacted the company, as well as my friends Thor and Scott Sebring to see if they had any thoughts on the issues I was having. Plus, Yahoo mail decided to completely change the look of their mail and I HATE it! It’s much too cluttered-looking and it’s annoying. But there’s no way of changing back, unfortunately. Time to dump Yahoo mail, I think. Plus, my flip phone downloaded a new texting feature called PREDICTION mode. This feature will attempt to “predict” what you’re typing and fill it in for you. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s machinery trying to help me too much. Stay out of my way and let me do it! It took me a while to figure out how to avoid it and go back to regular text mode. Since my other phone got old and the power connection became inoperative, I’m not impressed with this newer version of the same phone. It seems even glitchier than the other one. I honestly believe that the people designing these phones don’t actually USE them. Nor will they listen to the advice offered from people who DO use them. As with everything technical, it seems, each new version seems to be WORSE than the previous one! I’m a big fan of simplicity, but everything seems to be getting so complex. I prepped for the Friday concert with the Burbank Community Band. The Friday morning concert would be at a senior center, and wouldn’t be the full-blown presentation that we’re doing Saturday for the general population. But it’ll be a good opportunity to run the numbers I’m doing with the band. Their regular emcee Eric will be doing the Friday show, but Saturday it’ll be all me. However I’ll be singing “Monster Mash” and doing the speaking part in “Thriller,” and I’m VERY excited! I pulled some costumes out of the Chaney Room to use during the show on Saturday. I recorded my auditions and then rested a bit. I took my WOG later, and then worked some more on the script for the concert.

Friday the 23rd – GO WITH THE FLOW! – Though the concert at the senior center was at 10:30am, the call time was 9:30am! I cleaned up, gathered up my belongings, and headed over to the venue. Watching Eric emcee the show gave me a good idea of the flow of the show, but their script had a fair amount “music minutiae” in it that wouldn’t have sounded natural coming from an old long-haired rock radio DJ. So in my version I filled the sections with fun text and trivia, and I left the music info up to the maestro. The conductor was free to interject salient musical points, so I let him handle all that. The crowd of about 75 people was very enthusiastic at that time of the morning, and we had a BLAST doing “Monster Mash!” People really loved it! I was looking forward to Saturday VERY much! After the show I met my pals Chris Malmin and Edi Lurie at Paty’s for lunch in “The Office” on the patio. It was a beautiful day, but definitely fall! Glorious sunshine, but a cool day. When I was in Sioux Falls, South Dakota recently visiting family, my dad gave me several books that I had made up for my mom many years ago. When the company My Publisher existed, I’d regularly have them make up coffee table-type books of various subjects. Now that my mom has passed, my dad said he didn’t need them. But I figured two of those books would be loved by Edi, so I shipped them to myself in Los Angeles. One featured my dog Roxy (which contained a few pictures of Edi’s daughter Emily and her late dog Bunny), and a trip to Graceland that we took with our friend Sara back in 2010. Since I already have a copy of these books, I thought Edi might like to have copies of her own. I was right. Edi and I went over to my box and picked up the package, and I gave her the books. Then I went over to a Halloween store to find rubber bats to give away at the Saturday concert. Then I went home to put the finishing touches on the script for the show based on the notes I made earlier at the senior center show. It got VERY chilly, so I rested for a bit. Summer, sadly, is definitely over. I did my WOG later, and while I walked I ran over the lyrics for “Monster Mash” in my head to get them memorized. I also memorized the “rap” at the end of “Thriller,” though I don’t do an impression of Vincent Price. I gathered up my props and costumes for the show and got some sleep.

Saturday the 24th – SHOWDAY! – Mid-afternoon I loaded up my car with my props and costumes, and then my pal Scott Sebring came over to ride with me to the venue. The location for the Burbank Community Band concert was at a middle school in Burbank, and it had a very nice auditorium. First, we hit the McDonald’s drive-thru for a small lunch, and then we headed to the school. We loaded everything in and found where my dressing room would be. Before the show the band was doing a sound check, and they wanted to check the balance of my voice against the band. So we did a few verses of “Monster Mash.” EXCITING! My pals Mark and Connie arrived with all their camera gear, and soon Edi and Elliot Lurie arrived as well! Chris Malmin also arrived. What fun! At 4:30 I went to my dressing room and put on my costume; a top hat, a button down spider-web shirt that I had bought at Monsterpalooza a few weeks ago, a burgundy-colored ascot, some black jeans, and boots. I loved the “loose and free” feel of the show. I was there for some comedy relief, the maestro Dr. Michael Stanley informed the audience of relevant musical info, and one of the band’s officers Eric Haack was there to talk about details of the band and some of their fundraising endeavors. It was a wonderful group effort! It was a thrill to be in front of an audience again, as I hadn’t done anything like that in a long while. Secondly, getting the chance to sing with a 70 piece band is something not everybody gets to do! Plus getting to do a little comedy is always a fun time! As a surprise at the end of “Monster Mash” I brought up Cookie Monster, and everyone loved him! It was made even more special by the fact that the Capital Grille (a restaurant in Burbank who was one of our sponsors) was giving away free cookies to everyone! After the show Cookie was happy to make videos with anyone who asked! Then a bunch of us went to Paty’s to get a wonderful dinner on the patio under a full moon. What a night! I was still on Cloud 9 after the show, but after about an hour and a full tummy, I was starting to get tired. Scott and I came back to Planet Wallywood to do some work on refining aspects of my audio recording set-up. We set some things differently so hopefully that will be the end of my technical issues. By the time Scott left I was totally exhausted! I laid down for a nap, but ended up sleeping all through the night! I even missed out on doing my usual 3am WOG! When I awoke I made a salad and watched an episode of “The Outer Limits,” and watched some other TV. I’m going to need all day Sunday to recuperate!

Sunday the 25th – SHOCKED! UTTERLY SHOCKED! – Though I slept most of the day, I got up for a little bit to do some work. It’s then I read the news that Voice Actor Eric Bauza had passed away at the young age of 46! I thought I was misreading it, at first. How could this be!? But it was true. Very, very sad. And shocking. I felt like going back to bed. I awoke just before it was time to WOG, and while I was out I saw Baxter again! I clapped my hands and he scurried away, but I’m not sure why he likes to hang around our area so much. I need to keep a sharp eye out for him every time I go out on my WOG! I came back inside to record an audition, and then I got busy hanging up the finished artwork for the Chuck McCann “Far Out Space Nuts” display. It looks great, and I REALLY appreciate my pal Mike Schrimmer in Chicago for gifting me this original costume! While I was out on my WOG, a little voice told me I should back up the SD card that’s in my phone. With all the wacky technical stuff going on, I think it’s a wise move. So I dug out an SD card and backed it up. Then I stored it away for a “rainy day.” Since I’m constantly updating stuff on the phone (numbers and photos) I think I’ll do a regular update every month or so. I feel more protected now. If something (God forbid!) happened to the SD card in my phone, I would lose ALL my contacts and photos. But now I have a back-up! Hard to believe that we’re already heading toward Halloween 2026! WILD!

And how was YOUR week?!?!

PIX FROM THE WEEK