The First Day of Levon.. err, Lent.

Back when I was a kid I used to be a bit more religious. My mom would make us give up something for Lent, along with not eating meat on Friday. Even when I was nine I thought this was the dumbest thing ever. Why do I need to suffer? Jesus already did that for my sins by having himself nailed to some heavy-ass wood. Did he really respect me more if I gave up no video games for Lent? I would think he would be offended. He would think, "Jesus Christ! I was nailed by my hands and feet and hung from a giant lower-cased, wooden 'T' and this snot-nosed punk is emulating me by turning off his Nintendo. WOW!" Because of this, once I got to high school I just stopped trying. I figured God would want me to be happy. He seems like a good dude.

This year I've decided after over fourteen years I'd give Lent a try again. All for the wrong reasons though. I still don't believe in the fact that God likes us to "suffer." However our priests probably get a kick out of it. No, I'm partaking in Lent this year because I'm up for a good old fashioned challenge. For years I've enjoyed the modern amenities that life has offered to me. In short my life has been good. Two years ago, I got an iPod for my birthday. It changed my life. Who needs a CD anymore? I have 30,000 songs in this little magic box the size of a deck of cards.

Am I giving up my iPod? Absolutely not, don't be silly. I'm giving up something far worse. For the next forty days and forty nights I will be banned from listening to Elton John music. To the average person that's not really a big deal, but to me you might as well cut off one of my life lines. Since 1996, I can honestly, and with a straight-face tell you I've listened to atleast one Elton John song everyday. Thirteen years. Four thousand seven hundred and forty-eight days. That's a lot of Captain Fantastic! Today that all ends. However, not without a few ground rules. I do need to protect myself after all. It wouldn't be fair if there wasn't some mention of "Get Out of Jail Free" cards...

1. If any Elton John song comes on the radio, an iPod, mixed CD or any other device that is within my power I have ten seconds to change it to a new song.
2. I am allowed to listen to covers of Elton John songs. "Daniel?" No way. "Daniel" by Fuel? Yes, please. I will be allowed the crappy substitutes.
3. If I am in a bar, the mall or any other public setting and Elton John comes on the jukebox, loud speaker or anything else where I can not physically shut it off, I am immune from that song. It happens, that's what we call "God's Cruel Joke" and I'm not having any part of it.

It's already started. My eye has been twinging. Usually on the way to Nick's daycare we listen to some "Tiny Dancer" or "Madman" or "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" among others... Today was the first day of different. We listened to The Pretenders and Matchbox 20. Too weird.

Must.... find.... better.... covers..... Will not.... survive. Atleast I didn't give up cheese like my wife. Good luck with that one. Mine as well sign your death notice now.

Hey Sailor, Nice Anchor.

Be wary of one-day sales at Macy's, men. Be wary. I was perusing the sales rack yesterday evening when a nice young man struck up a conversation with me. "How ya' doing?" he says. I didn't think much of it. "Fine. And you?" I reply back. With no reason to be alarmed I continue flipping discounted clothes on the rack as if they were playing cards. "I'm doing well. Looking for anything in particular?" At this point I thought he was an employee, but the bags from various other stores around his wrist were a clear indication that this man was merely just a civilian. "Nah." I answer back, "just looking." He then asked me "Is that a late present for your Valentine?" referring to the bag I'm holding from Banana Republic. "This? No. This is just a t-shirt." He then explains to me how the bag looked like very nice and that he thought it was holding a gift for someone special. He continued on how he cooked dinner for his Valentine (lasagna by the way) and that he's never cooked before. I reply back, "Wow, well that's very nice." He tells me he's an engineer and that he likes to go overboard and get everything just right. I say "Yeah, my Valentine's Day was low-key. Having a kid under the age of two just kills the romance, ya' know?" He looks at me with that slight deer in the headlights look and says, "You have a kid? Hey man, have a good night."

I guess the dude isn't into other dudes with baggage. I was a little hurt, he had never met my son. He could grow to love him as his own. I can't raise this child on my own! But, in the end it's good to know that after having a baby, men still find me desirable. I still got it, yeah!

This Paisley Little Thing Called Love

Continuing on in the grand theme of nuclear warheads with brains comes Paisley Love. This bomb doesn't want to melt the flesh from your face, it wants to give you flowers and maybe even spoon in bed. He wants to show you that behind his cold metallic base and greased up gears that he does have a heart... and that it's on a string.

Paisley Love was the second design I had done for the 'Smart Bombs' line. It was originally going to be a different take on the Tin Man from 'The Wizard of Oz.' Depending on how long the line went, my plan was to design one for each of the main characters. After about a day, I deemed that idea to be quite dumb. Seen below was the original chest of Paisley Love before any real design was put into it. Yeah... not too terribly impressive is it?

After taking a step back and looking down (literally) I came up with the idea of adding the Paisley. I had a pair of boxershorts that had a very similar design and color scheme. They were great boxers, I loved them so much I wore out the elastic band on them. What better way to immortalize them than in plastic in the shape of a bomb with robotic claws. Below is the final digital version of Paisley Love. He had eight colors built into him, which in retrospect is a couple too many. It could easily have been knocked down to five or six in a crunch.

Mr. Tinklepaugh is a Ticking Timebomb

Keeping in theme with yesterday's post, we start today's entry with something in the same vein as Captain Bitchin'. Smart Bombs! Back at the end of 2005, Ken Lilly was making a small movement in the vinyl world with a line called Smart Bombs. In 2006 two sets were released at the San Diego Comic Con (SDCC) that would be followed shortly by the first wave of Smart Bombs. I had designed two that would have been represented in wave one if everything went according to plan. Today we'll be looking at the first design: Mr. Tinklepaugh's Stitches.

Original wrap-around design of Mr. Tinklepaugh's Stitches, 2006

On Super Bowl Sunday 2006 my obesely overweight cat, Mr. Tinklepaugh, thought it would be a good idea to jump the chain link fence in our backyard. Most of him made it to the other side. He hadn't anticipated his gut getting caught on one of the links slicing him open down the middle of his belly. He came home acting totally cool thinking we wouldn't notice his kitty insides dangling like a Christmas ornament from his waddle. That afternoon was spend at the emergency vet waiting for him to get it cleaned up and stitched. He came home that night wearing a lamp shade on his head and a bruised ego on his stomach, otherwise he was alright. Mr. Tinklepaugh, my fat little muse.

Once the design first version of the design was finished and sent off to Ken for approval the next step was to incorporate it into the template. This was for the factory to use for placement around the bomb. This template also housed the very specific colors that were to be used on the design in the upper right hand corner.

Looking at this now, almost three years later I see a lot I would have changed. My main peeve with this is the width of the inking, it's the same throughout. In retrospect I should have added a variant of thicknesses throughout to make it look a bit more hand drawn than just a simple computer stroke. Maybe I'll eventually get to do that, who knows.

Next up... Paisley Love!

Sonuvabitchin'!

This doesn't really constitute as a 'Vault' since it's not really that old, but it's still really frigging cool. Behold Captain Bitchin'! The Captain was a product of Luke Milton that almost came to be in plastic form a couple years back. The pose would have likely been used as promotional material if we had gotten that far. The entire image is nothing more than a poor attempt at ripping off The Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End theatrical posters.

Captain Bitchin' is what you call a block figure. A glorified Lego man but bigger, badder and hell of a lot more articulation (moving parts for you non-toy geeks). There are over 100 characters in Bitchin's universe ranging from skeleton-less men, cannibalizing 'care bears' and guitar weilding zombies. Yes, it's THAT good. In the coming days (or weeks or months) I'll show some more artwork from the almost was toyline of kockBLOCKerz ranging from logo concepts to some more promotional material.

They say some of the deals you never make are the best ones. With hindsight always being 20/20, making this toyline probably wouldn't have ended nicely especially the way the economy recently shat all over the floor. We all saved some coin and some sleepless nights by quietly exiting out the backstage door. Down the road though who knows. It could work. Maybe even in the vinyl instead of plastic. Arr!

Perfection Shown in Full

God Bless the MLB Network. Yesterday the channel launched with a Hot Stove Special with Host Harold Reynolds and a smattering of current and former players including Al Leiter and Jimmy Rollins. Meh, whatever, but immediately following that program was really what every Yankee fan was tuning in to see. For one of the first times since October 8, 1956 viewers would be able to watch Don Larsen's perfect game in it's entirety.

From watching the game I noticed a few things: The game in general was much faster. The commercial breaks were much quicker than in today's game. Larsen's perfect game was completed in a shade over two hours. That's gotta be some kind of a record! Also, the game was much closer than what history remembered it to be. The opposing pitcher, Sal Maglie only gave up five hits in eight innings. He also had a perfect game until Mantle's right field home run in the 4th inning. In the end he only gave up two runs. Two runs! That's what we call a gem in today's World Series. Poor Sal, all he is remembered for now is the loser of Game 5 not that he pretty much shut down a lineup that consisted of Mantle, Berra, Bauer and Slaughter. The home plate umpire helped out a lot in this game though. If the ball was remotely close to the outside part of the plate it was a strike. If he was umping in today's game he would've been sent to the minors. Players from both teams, notably Mantle, exchanged words with him on his extra wide strike zone. Mantle then hit that homerun that broke the zip-nada tie. It was in the 6th inning though was where the Yankees did their damage against Maglie and the only slugger it consisted of was Bauer. The rest was all done on the art of small ball. Third baseman Andy Carey hit a single back up the middle (that Maglie almost snagged). Next comes Larsen, who bunts with two strikes, TWO strikes! No one expected it, Larsen almost gets a single out of it and it moved Carey to second. Bauer is up next and hit a single to left field where Brooklyn's Sandy Amoros bobbled the ball enough for Carey to score from second base. And that's your ballgame.

All the commercials from the original broadcast were played. It was pretty hilarious to see Mel Allen stop Casey Stengel (who was talking to Jerry Coleman) in the clubhouse and ask if he would try this new razor. Stengel obliges and states how he can't believe how smooth his face is. At the end they tell you you can change the settings for a boy's face with light facial hair, a man's face with normal facial hair (they show Coleman shaving) and then for a man with heavy hair flow (showing Bauer). It was kind of an odd choice to pick Jerry Coleman and Hank Bauer for the commercial when you had guys like Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra and Whitey Ford on the team. All three probably said "no way, go find Hank." The prices were quite exquisite in 1956 too, you got the razor and a baseball encyclopedia for $1.

UPDATE: I should have put this in my original post but forgot. In today's game Jason Giambi and David Ortiz usually have to hit into a shift put on by the opposing team's defense. I always thought this was a relatively new thought process. The shortstop, second baseman and first baseman are all on the right side of the field, leaving the third baseman to man the entire left side. In the 1956 World Series Perfect Game, the Dodgers did just that against Mickey Mantle when he was hitting left-handed. Pretty wild to see that on a game almost 52-years-old. I guess it isn't a new practice after all. And no, Mantle didn't hit into the shift. He hit over it, way over it.

Apology and From the Vault #12: Smile!

Hello Dear Reader, I've abandoned you haven't I? It may feel like it, but I do think of you everyday... almost. This past week I've been on vacation from work. Vacation being coined loosely. The upstairs bathroom is still a work in progress. It's close to done, just some odds and ends that need to be tied up. What a horrible project! It has been doomed from the start. I won't bore you with the bloody details but just know that I am taking a vow of home-remodeling celibacy until we decide to buy a new house. Hopefully that is more sooner than later.
Back in the early 2000's I was asked by a wildlife rehabilitator to do some illustrations for one of her childrens story idea (I know, what is it with rehabbers and kids books!?) She wanted to do a book on a frowning turtle named Smiley. Why was he frowning you may ask? Was it because he wasn't getting any? Was it because his other three brothers were off fighting crime and he was left to clean the sewer lair? No... he lived in squalor, apparently. He wanted a nicer place instead of the glass bowl with poor UVA/UVB lighting. Geez, sounds like my place! Anyway here are some preliminary sketches of Smiley.

For whatever reason I drew his hind legs like he was a fawn - almost Bambi like. I don't know why. Turtle legs aren't really that shape in real life, atleast not the turtles I've seen. Then again, turtles don't really frown either. Artistic license, hooray!