I have found the answer to one of Life's Mysteries today at IKEA. "Why is there urine on the seat in the Ladies Room?"

It is not because some crazy woman is a slob, as previously thought. It is because women take their small male children into the ladies room with them. The culprits are the boys who are not quite old enough to use the men's room alone, but old enough to not be in the same stall as Mom. As long as he is in the ladies' room, he is allowed to use the stall unattended. His hand washing is then supervised, and out they go. It doesn't occur to Mom that Junior might have splashed all over the seat, and it doesn't occur to Junior that anything is amiss. He's damn proud to be using the big commode alone, so what if it doesn't ALL get in. Nobody's perfect!

This does not explain urine on the seat at office situation where no children ever venture, or bars, but at least one can stop wondering about public restrooms.

Really quick...the transformer on the pole blew on Monday, so we had no electricity from Monday night until Wednesday late afternoon. My director told me they said on the radio over 1000 transformers went all over the city, but they only had 250 new ones in stock. Who knows if they just duct taped ours back together or what, but it all seems to be okay.

The lessons we learned...our earthquake kit is a good start. The crank radio, flashlights and lantern were very handy, but we decided with Ben and Helen to finally get a better kit together that will live on the garage.

In the summer heat, when you live somewhere with spotty electrical service, don't stock up at the supermarket, even if it seems like a really good idea at the time because you have a very busy week ahead and want to be prepared. The fruits and veggies made it through fine, but all the meats, and prepared items made with meat had to be tossed. Bummer!

It has been over two weeks since the last post- how time flies! I can assure you, that it has been nearly 100 degrees every single day since then, if not hotter. Here in Los Angeles, we have all been obsessed about the heat. Not in the "hot enough for ya?" kind of way, but in the "Holy Crap it's hot!! Is it always this hot and I never noticed?" sort of way. Steve and I actually took Siesta today. A nice nap from 2 to 4. This got me to thinking that it MUST have always been this hot, or else the Spanish and Mexicans who settled this area wouldn't have put the practice into use.

It's like Palm Springs outside, mostly searingly dry with patches of extreme humidity that makes you think it must surely rain. Seven drops even hit my windshield this morning on my way home from Trader Joe's, complete with an updraft, and the dark clouds looked like rain somewhere. Somewhere that wasn't Silverlake.

We broke down and got an AC unit last weekend. My sister was visiting and I was hosting the latest Barbie party on Sunday. It has made all the difference. It has been running day and night ever since. That has been the weird part, how it isn't cooling off at night. The buildings and ground are still radiating heat at 2am. There is never a cool moment, not even at dawn. What will August bring?

in today's LA Times, a feature about the Muffin Top Girls. I think it gets right to the nut of it, which is there comes a time in a girl's life when you can no longer shop in the Junior's Department. Perhaps you've gotten too tall, or too filled out. And if you could actually be called a "woman" and not "girl" or "young lady" then that should be your Clue Phone ringing.

I think it's very hard for the teenage set. They really believe at 14 or 15 years old they should still be juniors, and everything else in their real size is way too square or way too expensive. There is a life between Forever 21 and Lane Bryant, but at that price point, but it all tends to be square, conservative or secretary-ish. A 15 year old girl does not want to dress like a 30 year old bank teller when she goes to school. Where are the cool looking clothes for a girl who is an actual size 10? Not junior's 9/11, but a curvy, healthy, women's department 10. Why she looks like a fat cow is that she's squeezing into that size 11 and the 28 waist low rise jeans.

Of course, if you've got the bucks, the world is your oyster. There are very stylish, well made and well fitting clothes out there, but you are going to drop some serious cash. The old adage of spend more money on one great item instead of frittering away the same money or four things that look like crap is a very hard lesson to learn, and when the good version costs $254 at Anthropologie and the cheapo version is $29 at Wet Seal, guess where her dollar is going? Even if she looks like a sausage.

You would think the fashion industry would tap into this market. But the girls are still buying it anyway and they all look like crap. How much would they spend if it looked great? Forever 21 style and price point, but made for a Ann Taylor Loft size structure. What ever happened to The Limited and Express? They used to have clothes for teenagers, but in grown up sizes. The last time I checked, it had all become clothes for bank tellers or just REALLY FUGLY and one of them had gone out of business.

I think all women should feel good about their bodies. If it were easier to find clothes that fit, I bet we would. But to keep the prices low, shaping and tailoring are sacrificed. That's why clothes at Old Navy seem to be built for rectangle people. Sometimes it works, sometimes it's shapeless.

I know this doesn't address the issue of how Americans are overweight, and kids don't get exercise and blah blah blah. But I don't think we would look so bad as a society if we were just wearing clothes that fit a little better.

I'm always surprised at ad campaigns and products that make it to market when they are just so wrong. Lots and lots of money is spent, focus groups happen, but yet, there it is. In our house, this very second, Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life" is playing. I can't help about thinking about that series of commercials for whatever cruise ship. So much, that I'm going to try and work a joke about it into the Scandal! show.

Here's the thing. Even though he's singing about his Lust for Life, he's singing about his HEROIN ADDICTION. Why would any product want that association? I know that the ads are aimed at boomers, and just the sound of the song brings back hazy good times before they had kids and mortgages, forgetting what was going on when they were listening to that song. The old nostalgia factor. The Mercedes ad with Janis Joplin's song about consumerism. She was MAKING FUN of your car!!!

Here's a product that makes you wonder who approved it. My pal Colin at Fizzle and Pop (6/23 and 6/26/06 entries) goes into great detail about it. Suffice to say, I also think Dora's map friend looks like a penis, and we cannot be the only two. How did this get made???

A whole week?

I had a bunch of stuff to blog about last week, but our DSL was out for 3 days. No internet is always a drag. It does convince me to not bother even looking into that online telephone service, not Skype, but the other one.

We went to see the Beck concert on Wednesday night as guests of BJ and Carla. Again, I was all fired up with a great review and observations, but now, feh. It was great. The puppets rock. I'm really proud that my pals are rockstars, and it was awesome to have a after party pass at such a cool concert.

Both ACME shows went great.

I worked a lot. I think we are doing a good job, and I hope we can get it all done in time. The animators and sculptors seem to like us. The A/C cranks in our space, and that is a very good thing at this time of the year in Van Nuys. If only it were union...

Tom the lead sculptor has bought my entire box of Happy Meal Toys. He is also the lead guy on Robot Chicken, so if you see some Frankensteined Happy Meal parts next season, you know where they came from. He actually sculpted some of my Disney toys from the early 90's. He was so excited to see complete sets of things, it warmed my heart. The toys will go to a good home, and rest live on as other things.