Got a weird question for the readers...

Jessi just bought a 2003 Toyota Matrix, which gets better MPG than the Outback she's been driving (which will be my car now, since the Taurus is gone). The only thing she doesn't like about it is that the cup holder doesn't fit her Camelback water bottle.

So my question is: Do any of you know of any kind of cup holder adapter we can get that fits into a standard cupholder, and adapts it to fit larger containers than normal? We've tried WalMart and one auto parts store so far without luck, and trying to Google something like that has been a wild goose chase so far.

If you know if any place online we could buy this, please send me the URL -- and if you have a store in your area which carries this, let me know the cost and what you'd want for shipping, and we can see about sending you the money to pay for it.

Thanks in advance,

Jon

Time Is Running Out...

If you like reading this blog, and are looking for some TPBs at half cover price or so, check out my eBay listings here... as I'm writing this, they have 2 days and 8 hours until they expire... and I'm not planning on relisting them a second time, so buy now!

Did I mention the last time I posted about these that you can get an amazing deal on shipping if you purchase enough of these? Thanks to flat-rate Priority Mail boxes, I can ship something like 6-8 Essential/Showcase Presents books Priority Mail with Delivery Confirmation for about $9 or so!

All items are PayPal & USA shipping only, however, which I know many people have a problem with...

Jon

If I can ever figure out how to do it...

I'll be replacing the header at the top of this blog with this one:



With some -- but not nearly all -- of the stuff that I like and think about on occasion!

Jon

TV Comic Cover of the Day

I'm not sure why there appears to only be one issue of the Brady Bunch comic... heck, Charlton's Partridge Family book lasted a heckuva long time (relatively speaking), you know!

Jon

TV Comic Cover of the Day

Now, I don't recall if I've ever mentioned this before, but "Bewitched" is one of my favorite tv shows of all time... and to be honest, the beauty of Elizabeth Montgomery is no small part of that fondness. Yes, for as long as it was on TV, they were bound to duplicate storylines (heck, they outright remade some episodes!), and yes, I have my Darrin preference (Dick York, in case you were wondering).

I have to say that when I heard they were making a Bewitched movie a while back, I allowed myself to have a brief bit of hope... until I saw the first preview... and then I knew it was going to suck.

I've long had my own idea for a Bewitched movie -- actually, it was an idea that my first wife, Barbara, added some ideas to -- and even some casting ideas for it.

The concept we came up with was that we'd tell the story of how Darrin and Samantha met and got married, and also to have Darrin meeting Sam's family (yeah, I know, in the show, he met them later on). There would be some of the standard plot points -- notably, using the chaos caused by the use of magic as an inspiration for Darrin's current advertising campaign -- but it was going to be mostly about Darrin and Sam.

As I recall it, McMann and Tate (the ad agency Darrin worked for) was located in an office building in downtown L.A., and the ground floor of this office building housed a small bookstore, at which Sam worked (I considered having Sam own it, but figured it would work better if she was an employee there). When Sam's introduced at the bookstore, we'd see that she was very customer-oriented, even using her magic to help them find the books they were looking for (to the surprise of the owner, who wouldn't see the use of magic, but would be constantly surprised at what Sam would find -- such as books he didn't recall ever adding to the store's stock). There'd be a sequence where everyone in the store freezes in place, as Endora appears to once again berate Sam for wasting her time with these dreary mortals, but Sam finds them interesting.

Sam would see Darrin for the first time when he comes into her bookstore looking for a specific reference book he needs for a campaign (perhaps Darrin doesn't like to Google images, it wouldn't be important). Darrin wouldn't know the title of the book he was looking for, but of course when he describes it, Sam twitches, and finds the exact book he needs. Darrin says something like, "I don't know how I can thank you enough," because he really, really needed the book, and Sam suggests that he take her to dinner that night.

When Darrin returns to his office, and gets back to work, we see how smitten he is with Sam, because he keeps sketching her, even in the middle of a meeting with Larry Tate.

Darrin and Sam go to dinner that night, and of course Endora doesn't like this idea, and she tries to sabotage things with her magic, but Sam notices and uses her own powers to counteract what Endora's done until Endora gets fed up and leaves in a big cloud of smoke, which makes everyone think the restaurant's on fire.

The date's not over yet, as the couple go for a walk instead, and the night gets even more magical for them.

The next day, Darrin knows he's in love -- and the feeling's mutual. Most of the next part of the movie is continuing the relationship between Sam and Darrin, but since there has to be some kind of conflict, Endora manipulates things so that Darrin says something Sam misconstrues as meaning he's prejudiced against witches (which Darrin isn't -- he just doesn't think they exist, is all), so she breaks things off with him, and is miserable about it, even quitting her job at the bookstore.

She's about ready to move out of her mortal apartment and abandon the world of mortals entirely when Darrin knocks at her door, and tells her he doesn't know why they broke up, but if it was something he did, he is very sorry, and would never want to do anything to hurt Sam ever, because she's the woman he wants to marry -- and he'd produce the engagement ring (which we'd probably already have seen that he was going to give Sam the night she broke things off with him).

Sam, of course, accepts his proposal... and the remainder of the movie is the wedding itself, attended by Darrin's co-workers and family... and, of course, Sam's family, who Darrin doesn't get to meet until the day of the wedding, natch. Somehow, despite the disruptions caused by Sam's family, the ceremony does go off just fine (there'd have to be something occurring just prior to the ceremony to show Sam's family that yes, Darrin does love her, no matter what -- probably since Sam wouldn't have told Darrin she is a witch before accepting his proposal, she'd have to tell him before the wedding, to give him a chance to back out [the one thing in the original series I didn't like was that Sam waits until after they're married to tell him], and of course, even after being shown she is an honest-to-god witch, he still wants to marry her).

Things get a bit crazier at the reception, especially once Uncle Arthur's had a drink or two, and there's some confusion when Sam's cousin Serena shows up (since they're identical cousins, save for Serena's black hair). And of course, Aunt Clara causes some minor chaos when her magic goes awry. And Darrin's mother tells his father, "Frank, I have a sick headache."

Since Larry would've brought their latest finicky client to the wedding, the chaos at the reception somehow gives the inspiration to let Darrin and Sam come up with the slogan and ad concept for the client, who's very happy, and the new Mr. and Mrs. Stevens leave for their honeymoon (maybe their honeymoon would be on the moon? This could just be hinted at, and not necessarily blatantly shown).

As we get to the closing credits, I'd have the credits going up one side of the screen, while on the other side, we'd see Darrin and Sam buying their house on Morning Glory Circle, then after closing, while Darrin's at work, Sam deals with the movers taking their stuff in, and then she uses her magic to do all the unpacking... which is, of course, seen by nosy next-door-neighbor Gladys Kravitz, who rushes back into her house to insist to husband Abner that their new neighbors are weird. All Abner says is that their neighborhood could use something interesting happening.

If this movie did well, then the sequel could possibly deal with the birth of Tabitha... or perhaps some historical figures brought into the present thanks to Aunt Clara, or something like that.

So far as casting goes? Well... I'm not sure who I'd pick for Sam, but for Darrin, I'd pick the actor who played Greg on Dharma and Greg, just because he kind of looks like a combination of Dick York and Dick Sergeant. I'd go with Dennis Miller for Uncle Arthur, because I think Miller sometimes acts quite a bit like the late Paul Lynde. I had and have pretty much no ideas for the rest of the cast.

Jon

Oh, by the way...

A few posts down, I moan and gripe about a few blogs that went to Blogger beta, which I can't view on my Mac... seems that somehow, my bookmarks for a few of those had a double "/" at the end of them (which shouldn't have been there, and I didn't put them there, so I have no idea what's going in there)... when I fixed it, those pages came up for me again just fine!

Well, except for Bubblegum Fink... that blog's kind of iffy, especially with some of the posts of a graphic with accompanying text... often, I'll see half the graphic, and then a big white space before the next post (or part of one). That, I know, is an OS 9.x issue, at least so far as I know.

Jon

If you hate apostrophe misuse as much as I do...

Check out this flickr page -- via thisisbroken.com.

Jon

A Joke... Just for a Change of Pace!

So far as I know, I just made this joke up today... but then, I may have just remembered one from a long time back, without realizing it:

"Dream interpretation hotline, how can I help you?"

"Hi, I had a weird dream last night, and I'm hoping you can translate it for me."

"That's what we're here for. Can you tell me about the dream?"

"Sure... I was in this dark room, and at the other end of the room were these hooded monks, all chanting something I couldn't make out. When I walked closer to them, I could see under the hoods that the monks were all salmon, and what they were saying was 'evening, evening, evening,' over and over again! What can that possibly mean?"

"Salmon chanted 'evening'? You will meet a stranger."

(insert rim shot here)

Jon

Isn't It Annoying...

...when people "upgrade" to the new Blogger, and then suddenly their blogs either a) Don't display properly on your browser any more (hello, Bubblegum Fink!) or b) Generate a "bad request" error (hello, Bloggity-Blog-Blog-Blog, Absorbascon) when you try to check them out?

That's happened to me here. I'm using the most up-to-date version of Netscape I can for Macintosh OS 9.x, and more and more of the blogs I used to view just fine are having one of the two above problems occur.

For the time being, I can only check these blogs out when I'm using the OS X Mac at work... which means I can't check any of them out until Monday at the earliest.

Sheesh.

And yes, you can assume from this that I won't be changing over any time soon (at least, not until I buy a new Macintosh, which'll be at least a year away, I think).

Jon

Odds 'N Ends

Does This Mean There's More Readers Hitting This Blog?

Got a nice plug for the ol' blog from Mark Evanier on his blog today, thanks to my a) Posting the banner for National Gorilla Day (see a few posts below) and b) letting him know that I've done so. If you're reading this blog for the first time thanks to Mark's link, welcome, and I hope you'll continue to read it regularly! I usually try to make at least one post a day here, and it's all pretty much random stuff, as per the name of the blog!

TV Comic of the Day: Barney & Betty Rubble #1



Yes, the artwork there is pretty off-model... but it's a clever cover gag with the logo being cut out of the fence (never mind the umpteen episodes of the Flintstones that clearly show the fence between the Flintstones and the Rubbles houses being a rock fence -- Charlton never paid much heed to licensed properties' continuity).

You may not be aware that, for a fairly long period of time, Charlton had the rights to pretty much all the Hanna-Barbera stuff, after Gold Key gave up the license. I seem to recall from when I was doing transcriptions for the Charlton issues of Comic Book Artist that H-B pretty much gave them the licenses for nothing, just to keep the characters in the public eye!

Jon's Adventure with Head Start

So, for another two weeks, until Jessi starts her new job, she's continuing with her previous job for Head Start here in Thurston County. Since I took today (as well as Friday) off to spend time with her before beginning my new (temporary) later shift, and she had to work today, we figured I may as well go with her this afternoon to her Yelm Head Start center... she had some stuff to do there in her Health Advocate job, and I spent time with one of the classes there.

I think I completely misunderstood the whole role of Head Start... from the name, I assumed it was just that, a head start for pre-Kindergarten children, to help them learn stuff that they wouldn't normally know to give them an advantage...

...but that's not the case. Really, what its role is, is to help kids from homes in which pre-K kids aren't getting the basics taught to them by their parents (or, more often, parent, singular). I honestly wasn't aware that was the case.

They do two sessions, a morning session and an afternoon session, and I hung out with the kids in one of the afternoon sessions today. This started with having lunch with the kids (I'd already eaten while we were on our way there, but it's good to properly model for the kids, so I had a little bit of the Spanish rice, corn and apples they were serving). These kids have to be taught to wash up before eating... as well as how to eat in a civilized manner! They're provided with washable place mats that have outlines on them showing where their plate, silverware and glass goes.

After the meal is over, every child is taught to clean up their place, putting garbage in the garbage can, and putting the washables in a container (which goes back to the kitchen for washing), and then washing their placemat. If they spill during the meal, they are responsible for cleaning it up themselves.

After lunch, they have free time. I started off this by reading to some of the kids, and after that, I played with Pla-Doh with some of them, making a small herd of Pla-Doh elephants (and later a small T-Rex), all by request. Then I did some drawings for some of the kids, drawing their favorite animals. The kids all enjoyed this.

Next up was outdoor playtime (after they cleaned up from the freetime), followed by washing up again for snack before taking the bus home.

Honestly, all the stuff they were actually teaching was stuff parents should already be teaching the kids... and I was reminded, once again, that I really was an advanced reader as a child -- few, if any of these kids, could read at any level whatsoever, while I was learning from age 2.

It was an eye-opening experience... but it wasn't exactly over yet. Once the kids were sent home, and Jessi finished up her work, we had a little time to kill before heading to the Rainier center (not Mt. Rainier, the town of Rainier) for their family night.

This was the first family night I'd ever seen... it's kind of like a parent-teacher conference, except with more involvement with the kids. A meal is served (this time around it was spaghetti), and there's an activity or two, relating to the theme (this theme was literacy, and some Clifford books were given away).

One of Jessi's projects she's trying to finish up before leaving her current job is a community cookbook, and any parent who brought a recipe to share tonight got a prize (a note pad with a magnet to put on the fridge).

Unfortunately, by the time we'd finished up with the stuff Jessi needed to do, all the food was gone, so on our way home, we went for some drive-through (which we hardly ever do these days... maybe once every two or three months).

Tomorrow's Agenda

Both Jessi and I are off, but Jessi's got a morning meeting with her new employer to tour the facility she'll be working at. So we can have more time together, I'm riding down to Rochester with her -- but she'll be dropping me off at the Indian casino there, before she goes to the tribal center she'll be working at (both operated by the Chehalis tribe). I'm hoping I'll be lucky enough to stretch the $20 cash I have the entire time she's gone (we had pretty decent luck last time we were at the casino, and I'll just play the cheap games anyway).

We're planning to have lunch at the casino before heading back up to Olympia, where we'll pick up the dogs and run out to one of the auto dealerships, to test drive a car Jessi's strongly interested in buying once we can figure out the financing. We're bringing KO and Krypto along in order to see if they'll fit in the back of it. The car's a Toyota Matrix, so we'll see.

After that, it'll be home again, and I'll be working on dinner... and maybe by then we'll be able to watch Smallville, already recorded for us!

Jon

TV Comic of the Day: The Avengers (John Steed and Emma Peel)

Here's another TV comic which I've never read... and chances are, if I ever glom on to a copy of it, I'd end up being sadly disappointed in it...



The Avengers is one of my favorite TV shows of all time -- especially the Diana Rigg episodes. It was cleverly-written, and extremely stylized to boot!

Of course, the series was revived in the 1980s, with Patrick Macnee returning as Steed, and saddled with two partners this time... I forget who the guy was, but the female partner was portrayed by future AbFab star Joanna Lumley! I'm sure she's had much more fame from AbFab than she ever did in The New Avengers!

The New Avengers ran in the USA in a late night block on CBS, back before they had David Letterman, and joining it in the line-up was The Saint, staring Ian Ogilvy (god knows why I can remember his name). Both shows were an enjoyable viewing.

I certainly can't say that about the movie "based" on The Avengers... You know, I really think that US movie makers should just keep their hands off any property that was originally created in another country, and was very popular. Godzilla, anyone?

I can't say I have any higher hopes for the new Prisoner series, but I'm kind of drifting off the topic, aren't I?

Jon

It's Coming...

The Banana Splits!

Been a while since I posted a video here... hopefully the sound and video will synch up for you better than when I previewed it!



I loved this show when it was originally on... I wonder if there is or will be a DVD release sometime?

Jon

TV Comic Cover of the Day: Augie Doggie #1

I haven't watched an Augie Doggie cartoon since I was a kid... I do remember that Augie was the pup, and his father was Doggie Daddy, who sounded like Jimmy Durante. Most every cartoon, Doggie Daddy would laugh to himself and say, "That's my boy!"

Augie himself kind of struck me as a bit whiny, and prone to melodramatics... but I could be misremembering. I think his voice was very similar to Elroy Jetson.

Jon

Some This 'N That...

I know, it's been a while since I posted a thing here...

Jessi's Got a New Job

Back in December, Jessi had an interview for a job, and Friday, they offered it to her. She had a few questions about it, however, and spent the weekend vasillating over whether or not to take it... after talking to them again today, she decided to accept it. More money, more responsibility, new challenges!

We celebrated with going out to dinner on Friday (I know, that's weird timing).

TV Comic Cover of the Day!

Here's the single issue of Atom Ant Gold Key published!



We Rescued a Dog!

Yes, we rescued a dog... we were on our way to the freeway en route to my niece's birthday party, when we saw what appeared to be a white boxer on the side of the road, walking around loose.

Of course, we turned around and checked it out... turned out to be a boxer/bulldog mix (although, as we later found out, the owners think it's an English Bulldog), and it was starving, dirty, and desperately in need of attention. She had a collar with a tag, and we tried calling the number, but were told it was "temporarily out of service" (it was a cell phone cover with a California area code).

First chance we had, we stopped at a store and got some food for it, which she gobbled down like she hadn't eaten in days. We kept her in the car while we were at the party, taking her out every half hour or so to let her do her business, and when we got back to town, we called Animal Services and gave them the details.

We got a call from the owners on Sunday, and they came by and picked her up. Strange thing is, the wife said they'd called Animal Services "a few days ago" when the dog was first missing... but when the husband came over to pick her up, he said she'd only been gone since Saturday. And that they have two dogs, and the bigger dog digs holes by the fence large enough for her (the dog we saved) to get out.

Now, maybe it's just me... but given the condition of the dog when we found her, I have to think that she would've been just as happy not to have been reunited with her owners. But I could be wrong.

Jon