Tanabata: Japan's Star Festival

Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars: Starman


Tanabata has captured my interest ever since I heard about it several years ago. It has a rather sad, romantic feel about it; but it also is a colorful celebration and time for wishing.

July 7th, Happy wishing on a star.


Happy B-Day Rachel and Ringo Starr

Here in the USA it is National Chocolate Day.


Here is another cosmic David Bowie classic, Life on Mars.

MythBusters meet Zambelli Fireworks: Happy 4th of July

I seem to be at a nexus point. The small town where I grew up in Western Pennsylvania was never short on great fireworks displays in the summer. Zambelli Fireworks Internationale is still operating out of that same small town. The crossing of two of my life paths is that MythBusters is centered here in the San Francisco bay area and I think even out of the old Navy base I was stationed at. OOOO, spooky mommy.

Zambelli is not the only fireworks company in town. Pyrotechnico, Vitale Family Fireworks, is also located there.

New Castle has been crowned, by whom I don't know, the FIREWORKS CAPITOL OF AMERICA. The irony is, it is illegal to sell fireworks in Pennsylvania; but companies who put on professional displays are a different matter. If you happen to be in New Castle, Pa. next Saturday, you can enjoy their annual fireworks festival.

Zazzle T-Shirt Sale

If you have been waiting for a chance to get a t-shirt from Uncle Ernie at a nice price, now is your chance.

Go on over to my online shop and enter the code ZAZZLEUSAUSA for a 17.76% discount on your order.

17.76% discount applies to each qualifying Zazzle apparel product. The coupon code ZAZZLEUSAUSA must be entered during checkout to receive the offer. Offer is valid from July 2, 2009 at 12:01am PT through July 6, 2009 at 11:59pm PT. This offer does not apply to past purchases and may not be combined with any other Zazzle promotional or discount offers. Offer valid on zazzle.com only.

Capt. Pepper Jack: 064

Capt. Pepper Jack: 063

Frankie Stein: Color

I had nothing to do yesterday; so I spent several hours coloring these two pages from the Monster Fun Annual. I didn't follow the character colors from the magazine's cover very closely. For a monster mood, I decided to go with a mostly muted colors palette - with a few brighter hues, especially on the characters and on the sound effects. I also decided to leave the mad scientist's lab coat white, to pop the character to the front.

I was only going to use flat colors; but I thought a little gradation in the background would help with the illusion of more depth.

I hadn't seen the page to the right until I looked up more information about the Frankie Stein character. It looks like the updated look for the character was to have a nice purple background similar to the hue I picked. For some history on the character and some, now, old news about Frankie's return, go over to Speech Balloons to read the story about the attempt to bring Frankie Stein back into publication.

© IPC Magazines Ltd

Frankie Stein and his dad for Father's Day

© IPC Magazines Ltd

There is a copy of Monster Fun Annual 1982, from Great Britain, posted over at Crosseyed Cyclops. It is pretty obvious from what I post, I love funny monsters. When I can discover this type of material from other countries, that I never had the opportunity to see, I just want to see more and more of it - to catch up on what I have missed.

My own humor is about as wry and dry as a lot of low key British humor; so I love this stuff. I don't get all the cultural jokes. I wondered, "What are conkers?" After I looked it up, it was about what I had guessed it might be.

Sometime in the future I may try to digitally color these pages. Black and white are my colors of choice; but it would be a good exercise to color this up. If I do, I'll post it.

Todd Schorr: American Surreal

I don't know if my truck would make it to San Jose; but I may find a way to get down to the San Jose Museum of Art for this show. Watch all 5 of the interview videos for a better idea about Schorr's work. If I have configured the playlist correctly, they should all automatically play.

Capt. Pepper Jack: 062

Vampire Girl VS. Frankenstein Girl

Yikes! When you get frightened, it seems that either a scream or a laugh might come out. Sometimes you just don't know which one it will be. Thanks to Frankensteinia for the severed heads up on this one.

Capt. Pepper Jack: 061

Cartoon Library and Museum at Ohio State University

Capt. Pepper Jack: 060

Capt. Pepper Jack: 059

Dragon Boat Festival

At lunch today, I happened to go into one of my local Chinese restaurants. As I was talking with the owner, she mentioned that it was a holiday in China. It is the Dragon Boat Festival.

I know very little about the dragonboats but racing them seems to be popular around the world. The one thing I remember hearing was that, in China, after the local races, the boats are submerged in the rivers. The boats are brought back to the surface for the next year's races. The restaurant owner was impressed with my having some knowledge of this very popular holiday in China. She went into the kitchen and brought me out a traditional dish for the day.

It was a small bamboo leaf packet. The leaf was wrapped around steamed brown rice which had been stuffed with dried scallop, shrimp, some vegetables and a few other things. The leaf was tied with white string; and for me, it was what I might think a Chinese tamale, about that size too, might be. It was tasty. I would bet that every family in China must have their own favorite stuffing for these.

It pays to learn a little bit about other cultures and to respect their customs.