Happy Anniversary To Us!

This past Tuesday (October 23) marked three years of wedded bliss for us! As is our tradition, we ceremonially mutilated a gourde to commemorate this joyous time of year. There is nothing quite like carving your love into an unsuspecting pumpkin and then forcing it to pose for pictures, here's the best one...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....

Why Sean Missed His Spanish Test - by Katie

I realized today that I’ve been car accident free for over a year now! It boggles my mind that it was only a short year ago when I unwittingly plowed into another car causing expensive enough damage for our then insurance company to eventually send me a nasty letter. Basically the letter was to inform me that they were breaking up with me because I’m a hazard to myself and others. They would have been happy to keep my husband who has no record of speeding tickets or at fault collisions but me, I was out. What jerks! I decided to take my business and my husband’s perfect driving record elsewhere, saving time and money (just like the commercial says), and vowed that I would never crash into anyone again. So far I’ve kept my word.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!

The end to a "perfect" day was getting home that evening after hating my job all day and finding a parking ticket on the wrecked Corolla- A PARKING TICKET!!! Apparently, the street sweeper, showing no mercy even though the car was obviously having as bad a day as I was, decided that the inconvenience of having to drive around my broken car was worth $75 to the city of La Mirada. Personally, I would rather have the gutters filled with dead animals and rotting sewage than give the city the satisfaction of charging me to park on the curb but, then again, I grew up on a street that didn’t even have sidewalks so I guess I’m just going to have to get used to these fancy city folk. Where I come from, it was perfectly acceptable to park your fifteen primer grey Chevy Novas on the dirt in front of your house whenever you wanted. No one pitched a fit, no one issued you a ticket, and you could barely smell the dead animals and rotting sewage.

Believe it or not, this story has several happy endings. For one, our current insurance company doesn’t consider me to be a menace to society and secondly, somehow we managed to dig up enough money to pay our deductible with the old insurance company and the Corolla ended up better than ever after all of the repairs were done. I decided to fight "the man" by contesting the parking ticket. By writing this letter to the city:

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.

Josh's Update

Hi everyone, Josh here! Long-time-no-post!

Much has happened or is happening.

I got to draw my first coloring book! It was a fun little project for a surfing themed book designed to resemble a surfing sport magazine.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.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!

Today is August 2, which means it is my Grandma Hansen’s birthday. No one knows how old she actually is because she has been turning "39" years old every year for as long as I can remember. My parents love to tell the story about the time we were at an "Over the Hill" party for a church friend, Cliff, who was turning 40. Using my second grade powers of deduction, I proudly announced my observation to the whole room exclaiming, "Wow, Cliff is older than grandma!" Kids really do say the darndest things, don’t they? Anyway, the above picture of my mom and grandma was taken last November at my brother and sister-in-law’s wedding. Not bad for "39" huh? HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!

Comic Con, As Viewed From Beneath Princess Leia's Buns (by Katie)

For me Comic Con was really just an excuse to draw the envious gazes of fellow geeks with my knit Princess Leia hat. Even Michael Cera (who played George Michael on the hit TV show Arrested Development) made the comment, "Cool hat," as he and his entourage passed us while we stood in line for the Fururama panel. I posed for about a hundred pictures with strangers and had to explain to just about everyone I talked to that, "Yes, I did knit it myself. No, you can’t buy them already made. No, I can’t knit one and sell it to you because it’s not my own design but if you want to purchase the pattern and knit one for yourself, go to www.ansleydavies.etsy.com." I’m actually going to contact Ansley Davies, creator of the knit Leia, and find out if she would be interested in having a booth next year. If we both started knitting now, we could have at least a hundred hats ready to sell at Comic Con '08. We could make a killing! We’ll see.

Anyway, as Josh mentioned yesterday, the overall Comic Con highlight for me was getting to shake the hand of the brilliantly funny and talented Mike Nelson. He was pleasant and personable and smelled good too- a welcome respite from some of the unearthly body odor I came into contact with throughout the weekend. He signed the DVD we bought from his booth- Night of the Living Dead, complete with his own witty and entertaining running commentary- and thanked us for being such big fans. Yeah, just big fans- it’s probably good that he doesn’t know I was mildly stalking him for a few months last year. What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him I guess. Anyway, Josh and I failed to capture any proof of this friendly exchange between us and one of our favorite people due to the fact that the camera was sitting in Matt Wilson’s car about eight blocks away, so I guess you’ll just have to take our word for it. The following moments; however, were preserved for posterity and are presented here for your viewing pleasure… 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.

Some of the other amusing sights at Comic Con ’07 were…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.

All in all, it was a fabulous weekend of the geekiest indulgences. Thanks again to our friend Matt Wilson for letting us stay with him Saturday night (on Mickey's dime)- that hotel room was bigger than our house! I hope next year we can go for the full four day experience (even if it is on our own dime). You are all invited to join us- I’ll even give you a discount on a knit Leia!

Comic Con 2007 - Josh

Josh here to tell you guys about my Hero Worship Experience at Comic Con ’07.

For starters, we met with the creator of Sam and Max (S&M), Steve Purcell! He was still setting up his booth when we saw him and was kind enough to chat for a short while, autograph a sketch book and take a picture.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.

My next hero visit was with the great and shiny Rob Scrab! 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.)

Right there on the coast of sunny San Diego, Katie and I had a fun little chat with Minnesotan comedy hero, Michael J. Nelson!(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!
I can’t end this post without thanking my dear friend Matt Wilson. We have been attending Comic Con together for many years and this time he treated us like royalty. Thank you Wilson!!! Well, there you have it. My nerdum is all worn out. Till next year!

Superpowers Online Premier

The short comedy film Superpowers is finally online!If you would like to view our fun little flick just click HERE.

I've gone Deviant!

There is more work to do but like many great artists before me, I now have a Deviant Art Gallery! Please feel free to stop by!
-Josh

This One's For The Kids - by Josh

Well, all my work is done on the summer camp program. It wasn't really completed but it did finally end due to time.

One of the projects I worked on is this small four page comic that acts as a flyer for the camp program. This is my real first attempt at drawing and coloring a comic book, lettering and graphics not included.The following images are the cast of superhero characters featured in the program. The drawings were made to be a series of posters, one for each character. I was not able to color all of them. Graphics such as font and logos were added later.

For those out there who know a certain friend of mine, this entire curriculum was created by Steve Burrows!

How We Spent July 4, 2006

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY EVERYBODY!

Josh has been bugging me for a whole year now to tell this story so, I thought it would be fitting to relive it on its anniversary. It is sure to be a classic 4th of July "tail" for years to come. So, here goes….

It was July 4, 2006. After realizing that it was over one hundred degrees inside our house and that all of our food had either melted, disintegrated, or spontaneously combusted, we sought refuge in the good air conditioning and sustenance of the Cheesecake Factory. By the time we decided being at home would no longer be a safety hazard, it was dark outside and the 4th of July festivities were in full swing all around us. It seemed like there were insane amounts of explosives shooting into the air from every one of our neighbor’s yards. I hadn’t seen anything like it since I lived in the "909." Josh and I decided to enjoy the spectacle from our front step since the likelihood of someone catching our house on fire was high and we preferred to watch it burn down from the outside rather than the inside. The sky was filled with bright bursts and loud bangs and there were more people out and about than I have ever seen on our block.

As we watched explosion after explosion come dangerously close to igniting someone’s roof, we noticed a semi-large dog, making his way across our front lawn at full speed. He was headed straight for us, and before we could even figure out what was happening, the dog had stopped right at our feet and appeared to be looking for shelter from all the noise by nuzzling in between us. He was noticeably terrified and, judging by the way he was panting, had probably been running for a while. We weren’t really sure how to react. The dog obviously belonged to someone but no one around us appeared to be missing him. He was wearing a collar but nothing else- no license, no ID tags, no clues as to where he might have come from. We yelled over to some people that were in our neighbor’s yard. It wasn’t their dog. We yelled as loud as we could, "Did anybody lose a dog?" No answer, just more deafening booms. The dog was obviously getting more distraught and we weren’t quite sure what to do.

We decided maybe he was thirsty so I went in the house to get some water and Josh stayed with the dog trying to calm him down. In the time it took me fill up a small container with tap water the dog managed to find its way to our open back door. I could hear Josh yelling from outside, "I think the dog is in the house!" as I turned around to see the dog walking casually through my living room. Josh’s suspicions were confirmed when he finally caught up to the excitement just in time to see the dog make his way to our kitchen floor and comfortably lay down like he owned the place.

We were baffled. A strange dog had taken up residence on our kitchen floor and we had no idea what to do. He was still panting pretty hard but no longer looked scared. He just sat there perfectly content to suddenly be a part of our family. We cranked up the air conditioning and all of the fans to drown out the ongoing festivities outside. This dog was large enough to kill us both if he suddenly snapped and went on a rampage, so we made sure to speak softly and not move too quickly as we scooted the small bowl of water toward him. We didn’t have dog food on hand so we decided a few slices of bread would probably be okay for him to eat- the only other choices were Marshmallow Peeps or melted Spongebob Squarepants fruit snacks.

While the dog decided to take a nap, we tried to figure out what to do. The Humane Society and Animal Control could be of no immediate help to us. Their suggestions were to either wait till the next day when they could send someone out to pick the dog up or just drive him to the nearest shelter and drop him off ourselves. I wasn't wild about sharing a confined space with a dog I didn't know for a twenty minute car ride to Downey so we decided to take the dog for a walk and try to figure out where he lived on our own. We just happened to have a dog leash on hand (a remnant from the previous Halloween- it's not nearly as weird as you are probably thinking it is) so we pulled it out and as soon as we started talking about going for a walk in that excited talking-to-an-animal voice, the dog's tail started to wag.

There were no objections form the dog when we latched the leash onto his collar and led him outside. By now most of the neighbors had exploded anything they could light on fire so things were winding down for the night. As we paraded the dog up and down the streets, we hoped that he would just suddenly remember where he lived and lead us there but he didn't appear to be in a hurry to get anywhere. In fact, he was very well behaved on the leash and didn't even get that excited around other dogs we passed. Someone somewhere had trained this dog. We talked to everyone who was still outside and no one recognized this dog or knew of anyone who might be looking for him.

There was a brief moment of hope when, upon hearing the sounds of some kids (probably playing with explosives) in a nearby cul-de-sac, the dog's ears perked up and he gently pulled us toward the noise. There were several families in the cul-de-sac cleaning up the remnants of their flaming fun. None of them thought the dog looked familiar though. We warned all of them that this was not our dog and we didn't know how friendly he actually was but some of the kids ignored this and wanted to pet him anyway. The dog seemed to have no problem being pawed by tiny hands and surrounded by high pitched squeels and laughter so we suspect he may have come from a family with young children. Unfortunately, none of these families were his so we decided to return home, unsuccessful in our mission.

As we headed back in the direction of our house, the dog seemed to almost be leading us, like he remembered exactly where our walk had begun and when we came within a block of destination, he broke into a bit of a trott and lead us right up to our front door, tail wagging, tongue hanging out, happy to be...home? By this time, I had already decided to name him Sparky (get it, Sparky?) and was trying to figure out how we could hide a large animal from our landlord and the guys living in the "real" house behind us. Josh and I have both wanted a dog since before we got married so this was almost an answer to prayer but the reality of the situation was that this just wouldn't work out. Not now anyway.

We took several stunning photographs of Sparky and printed up a bunch of "Found Dog" posters that we planned on putting up all over the neighborhood the next day. Everything was set, we would keep Sparky in the gated area behind our house for the night and feed him some dog food that our friend had agreed to bring over in the morning. Once we got the posters up, we would give it a couple days and if we didn't hear anything, we would give in and call a shelter to come pick him up.

I would love for this story to end with us being the heros who reunited a lost dog with his family. I would even settle for an ending with us saying goodbye to Sparky as they took him away to be adopted by someone who could keep him. Unfortunately, the real ending is rather anti-climactic and offers no closure- which is why it's taken me a year to figure out how to tell it without it being a total bummer at the end so, you can either insert your own happy and exciting conclusion here or just read the real one below.

Basically, when we got up the next morning and went outside to check on our visitor, he was gone. There was no sign of him anywhere. Only the side gate, unknowingly left open by one of the residents of the house behind us. We were sad but hopeful that Sparky had either remembered where he lived and returned home, or been picked up by someone who kept him as their own. We will probably never know. But even now, every time I see a grey and black dog anywhere near our neighborhood, a part of me wonders if it might Sparky, trying to find us- if only just to relive those few hours we all shared last year on the Fourth of July.

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Hi guys,

Just wanted to let everyone know that we just got back from the theater. Guess what we saw before the release date?