My mom saw the Target commercial I worked on in June. I made a bunch of white spa bathrobes and turbans for kitty cats. The product they are connected to is Tidy Cat cat litter. She said she saw it on NBC during the 9pm hour, and then again during Conan O'Brian. Let me know if you spot it! I don't make any more money off it, but it's always a good selling tool.

My favorite two animal commercials right now are actually with dogs. That puppy food commercial for Pedigree with all of the adorable puppies makes me yelp and coo every single time I see it. My newest fave is the one for Petsmart(?) with the little weiner dog and his ratty stuffed animal. His owner finally has to throw the disgusting old one away, and so the happy little weiner dog gets to take a trip to the store and get a new one, and is waited on by a favorite clerk! It is so goddamn adorable, it brings a tear to my eye.

I was also the person who got misty eyed at the McDonald commercial where the retarded guy gets a job, so maybe I shouldn't be voting for the Clio awards.

***UPDATE***
i actually found the spot online at target.com down at their Channel Red. A bunch of little screens pop up, click on the one with two cats in bathrobes with cucumber slices on their eyes!
Check It Out Here
If anyone could tell me how to freeze frame any of it and snag a screen shot for my portfolio, I would be might obliged.

My Tax Dollars at Work

Actually, there is a line item on our DWP bill for sanitation disposal. Whatever the reason, The City arrived bright and early and hauled Old Couch away. They are 2 for 2 in disposing of bulky waste.

I'm knocking out projects left and right. New Couch in! Old Couch out! Bathroom was finished yesterday, curtains and all. We eagerly await the unveiling of the plastic, which will hopefully reveal cured caulk and grout, and all tiles attached. Carole's ring bearer pillow? Done! I see the Big Kill Bugs project looming for tomorrow. I will not have a repeat of the ant invasion of July when we come home this time.

I hack away at the list with a machete!

We watched that new show about Silverlake last night, Sex Lies and Secrets, on UPN, and if it lasts more than three episodes I'll be surprised. I did recognize sights from the nabe, and they did a reasonably good job of casting people (especially the extras) who look like they live around here. I noticed they were very heavy on the eclectic silver jewlery and ponchos. That blonde Heather Locklear-type is so totally out of place it is laughable. A lot of the show is laughable. I'm not sure if it was on purpose, though. There was a lot of swishy fast edits, which is always a sign of last ditch effort to make something seem interesting.

They also clearly wanted a "Desparate Housewives" thing. The opening credit sequence is the same style. Then there is an constant narration, but we have no idea who's voice it is. In DH is is the dead woman. In Wonder Years it was the grown up kid looking back. This? Who the hell knows? I didn't watch Melrose Place, I've never seen the OC, so I have no idea how it stacks up.

The weird part was that one of the lead guys, the hairdresser, played by Eric Balfour, looks exactly like the older brother of a girl I went to Jr. High and High School with, Sue Albert. He looks like Sue as well. It was so freaky I had to haul out my HS yearbook and check.

Couch arrived today, and it is good. It looks more like grown ups live here, instead of a frat house. Steve keeps giving the old couch the finger out the window. It is on the curb, waiting to be taken away tomorrow morning.

We are back online, and it is good.

Last Wed, I was my friend Rebecca's head for her State Board Exams to get her hairdressing license. The one place in the state to get certified is just up the road in Glendale. Very convenient if you live in LA, not so much if you live in Fresno. She did a great job, was finished first in the room (seven minutes ahead of schedule) and then passed her written exam with flying colors. I'm sure two years of working under pressure on a television show helped a lot. When it looked like it was going to be close, she just buckled down and cranked out the pin curls. The girl next to her was fallng apart. I didn't get to chat too much with the other models in the room, but they seemed to be mostly moms who had accompanied their young daughters or granddaughters down to LA for the test, and agreed to be the model as well. The girls who appeared to be 18 or 19 couldn't take the pressure. I felt a little sorry for them. Rebecca was nervous, but her life experience held her in good stead.

Friday I headed downtown to Criminal Court to do my civic duty and serve jury duty. I waited all day in a room with 150 people, and managed to make it through the day without getting chosen. In fact, they didn't call anyone until 5 minutes before the cut-off time. Then they called people for a jury that will go on for 45 days, not the 5-7 that they tell you to be available for. A huge groan went up. I think the only people called were people with jobs that will pay for you to be gone were called. 45 days. you know it will go longer than that, and get extended through the holidays. I did read one and a half books of my new guilty pleasure reading, The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series. The main character is a Botswanian woman of "traditional build." The books are charming, and I can plow through them like a Nancy Drew. They are truly summer reading, not quite the candy of a Chick Lit book, but not War and Peace either.

I then get the week off to finish up 1000 projects. The bathroom has now been re-grouted, and I can finally see the end of the tunnel. I will not live in a Simms Bathroom. The kind with the barely started project for over a decade. I will start, do and complete household projects in a somewhat timely manner, money and time permitting! New (to us) couch arrives on Wednesday. Couch remodeling by Schmedly Designs begins on Thursday. He likes to focus on the top of the back, and the left arm, front. He is available to shred and get white hair all over your furniture as well.

HR Puffenstuff Head is also in progress. This is the last remaining wedding detrius. It was part of the barter with the Jug Band. The band leader had a collectible suit, but no head. I meant to do it earlier, but Pirateville got in the way.

We checked out Not A Cornfield yesterday. It is a giant 27 acre Art Installation in an empty lot downdown. It is real cornfield in the middle of a city, and in a truly ugly warehouse district. This may sound kind of stupid, but it is quite remarkable to see in person. The lot had been empty for eons, and no one had done anything with it. There had always been some vague ideas about building a park, but no one took action until this woman Lauren got a bee in her bonnet, a generous foundation grant, and made it happen in (supposedly) only a matter of months.

The land is technically a state park, we even saw a park ranger yesterday. This crop of corn will help to improve the soil and clean out some of the toxins, getting the land ready for the next step of a park. The corn won't be eaten, but used as fertilizer and packing material. They have local kids from downtown and Chinatown working as "junior docents," and they have various programming during the week as well. Surrounding the whole thing is a mile track for walking and biking.

The exhibit runs through mid-November, when the corn will be hand (!) harvested and the field plowed under.

Schmedly went to the vet today to get a bunch of teeth removed. He had a hard time of it, but we were happy to bring him home this evening, and he is recovering nicely.

Steve and I experienced a little sticker shock at the total of the bill. We knew how much it would be, but it was still amazing to hear the number out loud. Steve then says to the girl behind the counter, "How much would have it been if we had put him to sleep?" Totally kidding of course. You would have thought he had just laid a loud, smelly fart. The joke hung in the air for a second or two, with the counter girl staring at us, and some other clients gazing with disgust. "He's just kidding! Ha Ha!! He's making a joke!" I cheerily exclaimed. It really was funny, but no one else in the room thought so. We paid up, and got the hell out.

Maybe they hear that joke every single day. Studio City must be ground zero for the combo of sarcastic jews, sitcom writers and people who spend way too much on their animals.

Maybe not. The last time we were in with Ernest, we sat next to a woman who had a stroller for her cat. So she could take the cat for a walk. We then saw said stroller in the in-flight mall magazine. Pets are for loving, not joking.

I was randomly cruising around back entries of this blog and happened across a rant I had about how I Hate Rite Aid drugstores. At the bottom someone had actually left a comment. I couldn't link back to them, so I Googled the phrase "I hate Rite Aid" and it came up with FOUR PAGES of entries. I did not try "I hate CVS" or "I hate Walgreens." It is nice to know I am not alone. I wonder if it is someone's job at corporate Rite Aid to keep on top of when they are mentioned on the web.

Heather of Matted Spam had a recent post about a bee getting in her car while she was driving and freaking out. We here in SoCal are having a particularly buggy summer as well. I am doing battle with ants, spiders and silverfish. It is gross. I've been rocking the Raid, Julie gave me some ant traps and today I bought some other poison to put outside the house. Steve is all "let's just call the landlord" but I'm still working on fixing the tiles in the bathroom. I put up another layer of plaster today, so I hope to have the whole tub area re-tiled and grouted by the end of the weekend.

BJ should be coming to get the dryer in the next week...

First off, a shout out to John, who lives next door to Mike and Keelie in Austin. He reads our blogs regularly, and it was a treat for me to meet a reader in person.

Once again, I really dug Austin. It is the greatest little city ever, and I would move there in a heartbeat, except there are no jobs, it is as humid as a wet sock, and it is surrounded by the rest of Texas. We never paid more than $5 for a drink. I bought two top shelf vodka cocktails and it came to $8.75. For both drinks together. The land is beautiful, and the town has a vibrant, funky arts scene. Everyone is super friendly and laid back. Emily, Jenny Purple and I walked back to the hotel from the venue on Saturday night, and happened across an art opening at the Austin Museum of Art. We got to see a couple of very cool installations, my favorites being the clear tubes with water rushing through them that ran through a couple of the rooms, the giant paper strips that created a giant diorama when you stepped back, and the video piece you walked on that was like a stream filled with water, bugs and flowers.

Ratgirl and Jobber Ratgirl also need a shout out. You can see a photo of them on Steve's blog. Their costumes are made out of trash, and they stay in character the entire time. I thought it was a bit, but there was a chance that they were exploited mental cases, Austin's Scary Debby and Scary Purple. Scary Purple is not related to our own Jenny Purple. SD and SP were two girls at Emerson that one wished were pretending, but they weren't. Ratgirl works by day at a law firm and goes to great lengths to keep her actual identity a secret.

In general, the comedy coming out of Austin was a little more raw, a little rough around the edges. They can take the comedy risks and succeed or fail without worrying about a casting director who might be in the audience that night seeing an off show. PUNCH DRUnK Comedy of Dallas reminds us that the funny is that they DON'T actually look good it the bondage wear, and that's why the bit works. If they looked like professional doms, it wouldn't be as funny. The entire fest embodied the kind of comedy they do down at the FAKE Galleryin Los Angeles.

Can't wait until next year.

BTW, the lights went out at Pirateville as well. The company next door did not lose power, and the planes still kept landing and taking off, so we all just assumed it was a car hitting a pole or something. No one assumed it was terrorists. I saw this morning that the rest of the country was looking (hoping?) for a calamity.

My last day was yesterday. A great relief and some well deserved time off.

Hey everybody!

We got back last night from a great little comedy sojourn to the Austin Out of Bounds Improv Fest and Mini Golf Tournament. The Tiny Bandeleros did a great show, even with the theater being 110 degrees in the shade and as humid as a wet sock by the time we hit the stage Saturday night. Hanging with the old Emerson guys meant the funny was fast and furious. Not one Comedy Robot died, and no Comedy Citations were written, it was that good.

More later today or tomorrow-I need to go to Pirateville and at least pick up a paycheck and my tools, and perhaps even work. I promised also to book all lodgings for my sister's wedding in October.

Actual Random musings...

Talked to my old roommate Laura for hours on sunday. Among all the nonsense we chatted about was the Asian actor who will be wearing the armor I have been working on. It's not Jackie Chan, but the other one. the "serious" one. She just happens to mention that the guy has suffered from back problems for years. Some chick in Boston who watches too much HBO knows this, but crazy brit costume designers don't? The guy will never wear the stuff. Anyone who would like to place bets, please check in with my bookie, Steve.

Saw a couple of movies the last few weekends. We saw "40 year old Virgin" and it was hi-larious. The best part was one of the patrons in our row. We saw it at the Los Feliz 3, which has very small theaters. We had a germaphobe woman a couple seats down. We both got there on the early side, so we got to enjoy all of the patrons do a double take when they spotted her. no one wanted to sit near here, but the theater filled quickly, so people hd to. It took everything I had not to throw a fake coughing fit. Besides the surgical mask, she applied anti-bacterial lotion to her hands.

I'm not dead. They have tried, but I have made it through the week. And by they, I mean the crazy British costume designers who have reduced my world to Superman Bizarro World where no means yes, a barked command means "I never said that" and the more finished a garment is, the more likely it should be completely ripped apart and remade. With labor and material costs, the total costume I am working on (I am only working on the leather armor parts) must cost at least $75,000. At least.

Our country is experiencing a horrible catastrophe, but I am in a warehouse behind the Burbank Airport for 14 hours a day taking apart and putting back together the same two costume pieces again and again and again on whims. I have been reduced to 15 minutes of CNN from 10:15pm to 10:30pm a night, unable to indulge in the orgy of footage watching with the rest of America. Don't you worry, we are still making sequel movies about amusement park rides, so when this whole Katrina thing blows over, there will be entertainment for you to enjoy.

We do have the entire Labor Day weekend off, and I only work Tuesday before leaving for the Improv Fest in Austin. The Crazy Brits leave that Friday, so my final week at the Pirate Factory should be quiet, normal 10 hour days. The sycophant they hired for a few days can have the job in December. Remind me of all this when I contemplate going back.