A Moon Girl at Work!

The Man in the Moon is just a figurehead. It's the Moon Girls who keep the waxings and wanings going. Here's more photographic evidence of that fact, captured through the telescope at the Shades of Gray Observatory!

'Run' is a nifty mini-thriller

Run (2000)
Starring: Sarah Kruger
Director: James Ivey Carter
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

A captive (Kruger) makes a run for freedom.

"Run" is another student film that we retrieved from the depths of YouTube. It's a suspenseful little effort, but what REALLY impressed us was the artificial aging the film was subjected to. So many of the films we come across that try to mimic worn-out films that are copies of copies are done with lazy digital templates that are obvious a few seconds in. Real effort was put into "aging" this picture, and it shows.

Also, no matter what some might say, this is NOT a documentary. While it stars Sarah Kruger, a one-time ballerina and current dance instructor, we DID NOT prevent any dancers from escaping into the wild on International Dance Day!

Where have the dancers gotten to?

On International Dance Day 2022, the ballerinas ran off into the wild. We're trying to keep track of them, and we'll try to bring you updates on the last Wednesday of each month until International Dance Day 2023.

 

So... where do we find them this month? And what are they up to?

Hannah, Melanie, and Isabella have made it to New York City where they've become post dancers.

Juliet has taken up table dancing in San Francisco.

Meanwhile, Brigitte and Sae-Eun are dancing their way across the rooftops of Paris.

In London, Remy is sitting on the fence...

... while Francesca has made Hyde Park and the surrounding area her stage.

That's it for now. Stop by next month when we hope to have more updates!

Happy Birthday, Cameron Diaz!

Cameron Diaz left home and went globe-trotting at the age of 16. By 21, she was working as a model and shortly after that she turned to acting. Today--August 30, 2022--she turns 50 years old! Here are some photos in celebration!

 

 

 
 

A Special Musical Monday with Julie Newmar, the Abe Lyman Orchestra... and YOU!

In celebration of all the faculty members and students returning to the halls of higher education, with a spring in their step and a song in the hearts--because of the student loan cancellations/forgiveness decreed by President Joe Biden--we present a sing-along! Click on linked video and sing along with the lyrics presented next to Professor Newmar (and repeated for your convenience and more easily-read at the bottom of this post)!

It's a Mohammed Monday!

 

In this installment of "Jesus and Mo", Mohammed (may peas be upon him) proves himself to be more self-reflective and a better person than all the idolators who worship him.

THIS WEEK WITH JESUS & MO

 
 

We also have another cartoon of the role-model for millions and millions, the Mighty Mohammad! (If you want to submit one to appear in this space at a future date, send it as an attachment to the email listed at the bottom of the blog.

World Market's Cinnamon French Toast

It's Sunday, so it's time for a post about coffee I've recently consumed.

Summer mornings are perfect for drinking coffee outside.
It's okay to not have the willpower to make it across the yard.

WORLD MARKET COFFEE: CINNAMON FRENCH TOAST

This is another one of those flavored coffee blends that surprised, because the aroma of the pre-ground beans doesn't quite line up with the resulting brew.

When first opened, the coffee in the package presented a strong and unmistakable scent of maple syrup, which, was indeed a flavor mentioned on the package: "Warm cinnamon and premium maple syrup blended with sweet buttery notes." Given how strong cinnamon often comes through in flavored coffee blends, I assumed that it would be detectable as soon as I got ready to pour coffee in basket for brewing. Since it wasn't, part of me began to think that maybe they'd missed the mark and that the coffee wouldn't deliver on the complex mix of flavors promised. I fully expected this to taste like someone had poured maple syrup in my coffee.

(As a sidenote, I don't know for sure whether the foundation of this blend is a light-roast or medium-roast, as the package didn't say. Based on the look of the grounds and the taste of the resulting brew, I am guessing it's a medium-roast.)

As the Cinnamon French Toast blend brewed, there was no detectable aroma other than coffee. When I poured the first cup, a non-definable sweet scent met my nose, mixed in with that of coffee. When I took my first sip of this blend black, I was surprised by the fact that it didn't taste like someone had poured maple syrup in my coffee... it tasted like someone had dissolved some French Toast in the coffee pot when I wasn't looking.

The flavors of this coffee were 100 percent on point! The cinnamon is there, the maple syrup is there, even a hint of buttery, egg-soaked bread can be detected. The flavors are mild but still very much present and they blend delightfully with a great-tasting coffee to the point where I could have finished a whole cup without adding any milk or creamer. (I only had a 2-oz. sample pack, so I didn't...)

Another great thing about this blend is that the flavors remained constant as I put the blend through my usual tests--mixing it with Unsweetened Almond Milk, then Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Milk, and ultimately sugar-free Italian Sweet Cream creamer. All the flavors blended nicely with the basic french-toastiness, adding a varying degree of sweetness to the blend, but not causing the initial flavors to shift or alter too much. This was also a little surprising to me, given how mellow the flavors of this blend are. Surprising in a very good way.

World Market's Cinnamon French Toast blend was as tasty at room temperature as it was hot. I preferred it with the sugar-free Italian Sweet Cream creamer, but all of the ways I consumed it were highly enjoyable luke-warm. 

When consumed iced, the mellowness of the flavors worked against this blend. When I tried it black, it tasted like a slightly sweetened iced coffee with a hint of cinnamon. It wasn't unpleasant, just bland. I didn't try it iced with the sugar-free Italian Sweet Cream creamer, but with both the vanilla and plain unsweetened almond milks, any flavors but the coffee and the milk were washed out. At least the flavor didn't turn salty as happens with many flavored coffees when they are chilled and iced.

The Cinnamon French Toast blend is considered a seasonal, Christmas offering by World Market. As a result, this blend is only available as I post this in the World Market Holiday Sampler which features five different 2-oz. packs of Christmas-themed coffees. Perhaps it's another hole in my understanding of American culture, but I don't see how cinnamon or french toast are in any way Christmas-related. If you ask me, this blend would make a perfect breakfast coffee any day of the year. I recommend keeping an eye out for it come November or thereabouts when it undoubtedly makes a return to retail outlets.

It's a Fantastic Friday with She-Hulk

During John Byrne's excellent run on "Fantastic Four" during the 1980s and 1990s, She-Hulk joined the team (covering first for the Invisible Woman's leave of absence, than the Thing's). Today, we bring you few illustrations in memory of those days (and in celebration of the new show on Disney Plus, "She-Hulk: Attorney at Law").

 

 

An Out-of-the-Inkwell Origin Tale

The Ouija Board (1920)
Starring: Max Fleischer and Anonymous Fleischer Studio Employees

Director: Max Fleischer

Rating: Six of Ten Stars

While studio staff members play with a Quija Board, the Animator (Fleischer) draws a haunted house from which the ghostly inhabitants emerge and strike fear in the heart of KoKo the Clown.

 "The Ouija Board" is an early entry in the Out of the Inkwell, a series that merged animation and live-action footage to create situations where our world and the cartoonworld collided in more or less surreal (but always chaotic) ways. Fleischer and his team were clearly still finding their footing with the technology, as the interaction between the animated characters and the live-action footage is minimal, and the rotoscoping of an actor (Dave Fleischer, most likely) that forms the foundation for Koko is more obvious and hamfisted than in future installments.

Although this is by no means the best of the Out of the Inkwell series, it's still lots of fun. The variety of ghosts that emerge from the haunted house have got to be the most diverse group of spooks to ever appear together in a single animated film. Despite Koko's terror and aggression toward them, they are also among the nicest--they even cook him breakfast at one point.

I also found this to be a fun installment in the series because it triggered a thought in my head that may or may not have been the intention of the creators: This was the first time that Koko left his two-dimensional world and entered the three-dimensional one... and it was triggered by the magic (or the curse) of the Ouiji Board the staff members were playing with. This may not have been the first in the series by release date, but in my personal Koko Canon, it's the first time the Animator and his staff encountered living cartoon characters. (Watch their surprise when they spot Koko... and compare it to later episodes where it's commonplace for him to run wild in the studio.)

Maybe someday, I'll do a post with a "suggested viewing order" to tell the complete, epic tale of Koko and the Animator. After all, the entire world is destroyed in one of them, so now I have a beginning and end to the saga.

The overall weakness of "The Ouija Board" can be taken as perhaps the clearest example of my repeated assertions that Walt Disney's Alice in Cartoonland (aka The Alice Comedies) series is an inferior and borderline inept attempt at capturing the magic Fleischer created in Out of the Inkwell. I encourage you to watch the cartoon embedded below, and then click on the link in this paragraph and pick any of the Alice cartoons you'll find there. I would be interested in hearing from anyone who agrees or disagrees with my assessment.

Meet Jennifer 'She-Hulk' Walters!

Tatiana Maslany, best known for playing several roles (because her character is one of many clones that are running wild) on the "Orphan Black" sci-fi series, has joined the Marvel Galaxy of Stars as She-Hulk! 

Maslany is starring in "She-Hulk: Attorney at Law", a new Disney Plus series. She plays the title character as Jennifer Walters, a successful attorney, who, as the title implies, becomes a female version of the Hulk. The character has gone through several iterations since first being created by Stan Lee and John Buscema in 1979, but the streaming series is based on the long-running comedic 1990s comic book series that was mostly written and drawn by John Byrne, but which was at its finest for the half dozen or so issues scripted by Steve Gerber.

Today, we add Ms. Maslany to the Shades of Gray Galaxy of Stars, with some photos and a wish that her new series is successful enough to bring us all a second batch of episodes!