This year we spent Christmas with Josh's sister Lani, who came from Hawaii!
This is when we attended the Christmas party for the Scottish bagpipe band where Katie plays a snare drum.
And the exterior of the Entrance Building/Room.
The Entrance Building/Room contains all kinds of Christmas imagery such as toy soldiers, nutcrackers, Christmas trees, lights, toys, etc. Everything is deigned to look like it’s made of wood using large round friendly shapes. The room is one big circle where the visitors enter from large double doors on the south side. On the north side is a large, round, stylized Christmas tree that appears to be halfway embedded in the wall. On the east side is a very large fire place that actually functions as the Front Desk.
On the west side is a solider box and inside stands a large six foot tall Nutcracker.
Four large toy soldiers stand against the walls.
This room will come to life with various forms of effects and animatronics. A secret entrance through the Christmas Tree will be revealed and lead the visitors to the Workshop.
Till next year ...
Here she is in her 2001: A Space Odyssey pose.
Yes, she has feet.
Yes, she has hands.
And the first obligatory embarrassing naked picture.
Or this version I have on YouTube:
If you would like to have a high res version please send me an email at jkkenfield@gmail.com.
Once the reader goes through the short wordless comic they will come across the following text:
It could be a journey filled with locations, creatures, people, and events that present the discussions in the book both visually, and through the text/dialogue.
Also, as some of you know, "our song" is by the most bestest band in the entire universe and we thought it would be fun to share it with you all this year. Please enjoy....
Looking at these pictures, it seems like so long ago. Mostly because so much has changed since then. At the time of this accident, I was stressed out, on my way to a job I hated. I hadn’t even made a dent in that day’s thirty mile commute when the traffic on Malvern Avenue stopped inexplicably. I’m not sure what exactly distracted me but it was in the two seconds that my eyes weren’t on the road that I managed to cause about $3,000 of combined damage to the front of our Corolla and the rear bumper of some poor guy’s brand new Honda Civic (the guy’s American name was Sean and he missed his first Spanish test of the semester at Fullerton College because of my reckless behavior). I find it a little annoying that at the moment of impact I had both hands on the wheel, I was not on the phone, I did not have a drink or food in my lap, I don’t think I was even listening to the radio- and this was when I got in an accident? Normally I’m eating a cheeseburger, changing a CD, and practically doing my taxes while I’m driving but somehow I had managed to avert disaster every other time I was behind the wheel until that day. The tow truck guy, who was way cool and had Jesus tattoos all over his arms and neck, towed my crippled car back to our house (instead of the insurance company’s lot- it was the Thursday before a holiday weekend and apparently the insurance company’s whole office had already taken off because after the basic report was taken, I wasn’t able to get a hold of a person there until Wednesday of the next week- again, what jerks!) and parked it on the curb in its usual spot. Josh had ridden with the carpool that morning so I was able to drive our other car into work. Yes, you read that right, I still went into work that day because it was the end of the month and I was the only one who could do the end of the month invoices so that the company hit its billing goals- as I said before, I hated that job!
I also sent a copy of the towing receipt and the above wrecked car pictures. It worked! My whining paid off and they excused the ticket. It was empowering. So empowering that two months later, I had worked up enough courage to quit my horrible job. I gave them a month’s notice though- I wasn’t empowered enough to shove everything off my desk and storm out in a fit of rage like I should have. Either way, I’m glad to be free of my "end of the month invoice processing prison." I can only hope that Sean went on to ace his Spanish class, paving the way for an academic scholarship that made it possible for him to win a Nobel Prize in something. Or, perhaps he was an evil genius and by causing him to miss his Spanish test, I thwarted his plans to take over the world. We may never know.
There is also a small project that I worked on a while ago but I forgot to post about it. I got to storyboard my first infomercial! This was done within a 24 hour period, in that I got called by the advertising company one morning and they wanted the storyboards done around the same time the following day. The infomercial was for a device called a Jog’R, which is a strap that’s designed to help you jog-in-place.
Currently, I am wrapping up work on my Plato project! I’ve been slowly working on this for about a year now, mainly because I was unable to touch it for an almost two semester period. It’s so nice to finally have time to sit down and focus on this without other jobs getting in the way. I’ll create a post explaining all about this personal project as soon as it’s done.
Help me Obi Wan Kenobi, I’m surrounded by geeks in San Diego.
Would somebody get this walking pile of Legos out of my way?
Does anybody else smell that?
Q: What’s better than one knit Leia?A: Three knit Leias!
We tried to bum some pipe weed off this guy but he was fresh out…hmmm, why am I not surprised?
Is that what my hair looks like from the back?
If I kiss it, will it turn into a prince?
No, it will just try to eat Josh…
…and so will this thing if he’s not careful.
Spongebob and the voice of Spongebob - try to guess which one is made of Legos!
A guy dressed as a half-witted robot dressed as a green dog - so disturbing, yet so profound.
MUPPETS! Josh is just inches away from touching Kermit inappropriately but if you could see who was just out of frame trying to touch Josh inappropriately, you’d be horrified.
It was quite a weekend. Even The Flash needed a nap by the end of it.
Steve has a great ongoing S&M adventure comic online at the Telltalegames website. Telltalegames has been making since last year a new computer game of S&M, and it is being released in a series of episodes like a cartoon show. Speaking of which, S&M the animated series will finally be released on DVD, based on the original comic book series.
S&M was created by Purcell back in the 80’s. After that time Steve went to join Lucas Arts as a head artist and with them created a great computer game based on his characters called “Sam and Max Hit the Road.” Steve will also have a republication of the S&M comics in one book at some point in the fall!
Just across the isle from Steve was Doug TenNapel,
who is most famous for creating the video game and cartoon series of “Earth Worm Jim!”
Doug, for several years now, has been creating a series of graphic novels such as “Creature Tec.” His latest novel “Back Cherry” was released at Comic Con and so I of course asked for a copy and had it signed!
As Doug was handing it to me he spoke in a low cautionary voice warning me that this is his first rated R story. I tried to assure him that my friends and I are not easily offended by such material, but he still seemed concerned. Dough is a Christian and incorporates his beliefs into just about everything he creates which is why he was so concerned about his readers. I have not yet had the chance to read through “Black Cherry” but so far Doug has done a great job in all his works so I’m sure I’m going to enjoy it. 
Rob is a real Renaissance Man who got his start with a cult hit comic book series call “Scud: The Disposable Assassin.”
The series came to a sudden end and left many fans upset that there was no real completion. Rob got into comedy and joined an improv. group for a while called “The Dead Alewives” who are most famous for their “Dungeons and Dragons” sketch. (“Where are the Cheetos?” is Rob’s voice!) After sometime Rob came to LA and made a big hit online short film called (please pardon the wording) “Robot Bastard” (RB). It’s a fun action packed flick with a creative production design made of cardboard and other junk. Following this Rob somehow co-wrote an animated film based on an idea of his titled “Monster House.”
These days Rob is a writer/director of a Comedy Central series called “The Sarah Silverman Program” and he is finally creating the last chapter of his Scud comics series! WHEW! Rob is also good friends with Doug Tennaple and has worked with Joel Hogson (former host of Mystery Science Theater 3000 or MST3K) who helped him create effects for RB. Aside from Joel, Rob has also worked with a few other famous MST3K members, which leads to my next set of heroes. (CAUTION: I have provided some links to Rob Scrab’s website and other related sites but be warned there is material that you may find offensive.)
(Sadly we did not have a camera with us.) Mike, as some of you may know, is the other former host of Mystery Science Theater 3000, my favorite TV series of all time! Katie loves MST3K as well but she is more of a fan of Mike, so both of us were thrilled to meet him. At the time we saw him there was no one else around, so it was a kind of intimate relaxing environment. After hosting MST3K for many years Mike has gone on to write books and worked on other various comedy projects. Recently Mike move to San Diego and created a great online project called Rifftrax. Basically what they do is create a series of audio commentary tracks for various films in the style of MST3K. But it is up to the viewer to provide the movie either by renting it or purchasing it. The audio track can easily sync up with the film and HIGHKEEBA! you’ve got a comedy track! Mike has also teamed up with Kevin Murphy (Tom Servo) and Bill Corbertt (Crow T. Robot & Brain Guy) who are two other members of MST3K, to create The Film Crew. It’s basically the same idea as MST3K only it’s just these three “nuts” and no silhouettes at the bottom of the screen. This time they are making fun of Public Domain films which means no headaches in keeping the rights to a film, a big problem with the MST3K series. We got to see The Film Crew at a panel presenting their latest project to a large crowd of excited fans.
It was the most fun I have ever had at a panel in Comic Con! These guys are better live then on TV! I hope they come back next year because the crowd was eating them up!
