Allee Willis with psychedelic Fluffernutters

It's never fun to report that someone in our tribe has passed. That's especially true when that person is also someone you know and love.

Allee Willis, Happy Mutant Extraordinaire, died just after 6 p.m. on December 24 of cardiac arrest. She was 72.

My friend Heather was in tears when she phoned me to tell me the news. It was 10:15 p.m. on Christmas Eve. She had just read about Allee's sudden and unexpected death in Variety. We were both shocked and deeply saddened. We pondered together on the call, "How is it possible that she's gone?"

I first met Allee back in the February of 2011. Friends of mine here in Alameda, Jessica and Mel, introduced me to her. "You HAVE to meet her!" they insisted. At that time, a TV show called Clean House was filming the decluttering and redecorating of their home. Their excess stuff was soon to be sold in a televised public sale. Since they are well known for their massive collection of pop culture kitsch and, being the Queen of Kitsch, Allee was compelled to drive up for the sale. And because their house was out of commission for the show's filming, I offered up mine to host a party in Allee's honor, not entirely sure what I was getting myself into or, honestly, grasping the full understanding of who she was. But I was game. I invited a group of local friends, all self-proclaimed kitsch lovers. Read the rest

Today I learned (on Conan O'Brien's podcast) that comedian John Mulaney has made a children's musical comedy special for Netflix. What?! Terrific!

The show's official description states he and his "kid pals" "tackle existential topics for all ages with catchy songs, comedy sketches and special guests in a nostalgic variety special."

On Conan's podcast, he further describes it, "We have a lot of songs about anxieties and fear. There's huge, kind of, Broadway-scale numbers. There's small cameos from beloved people. There's show-stopping cameos from people. And there's lots of little interviews along the way... I cannot explain it well, and I never could pitch it well. And I sometimes couldn't discuss with my collaborators exactly what I was picturing but it is now done... I am more happy with it then I have been with anything I've ever done."

*That* is saying a lot coming from Mr. Mulaney. Count me in!

John Mulaney & The Sack Lunch Bunch will premiere Christmas Eve.

Here's its trailer:

Read the rest

A few years back, Charles Phoenix, the creator of kitchen kitsch behind the Cherpumple and other outrageous recipes, made something that's perfect to serve at a holiday party: Frosty the Cheeseball Man. It's a whole lot of Velveeta, cream cheese, and subversive, melty fun.

At my holiday parties, I delight in serving Charles' Frosty because it's a real crowd favorite. Everyone loves to watch poor Frosty slowly melt into a goo that tastes delicious with corn chips. Now, I don't have a stylish vintage electric skillet like he does, but I do have a modern electric fondue pot and that works just as well.

This would also be a good time to tell you that Charles has a new book, one full of "Classic & Kitschy Festivities and Fun Party Recipes" (yes, of course!).

Get a signed copy of Holiday Jubilee from the Ambassador of Americana himself for $29.95.

-- Yes, Charles Phoenix has been on Boing Boing before Read the rest

You may remember I recently blogged about Danny Elfman's new "music for film" MasterClass (which launched on Halloween, naturally). A day or so after it posted I got an email from someone on his team asking if I wanted to interview him. My response, "Uh, who could say no to that...?!" I soon found myself Skyping with the founder of Oingo Boingo, the father of the Simpsons' theme, and one of the most prolific film composers of all time — Happy Mutant extraordinaire, Mr. Danny Elfman.

Here's what we chatted about:

Rusty: Hi there, Danny. I'm thrilled to speak with you today.

Danny: Hello, thank you.

Rusty: I wanted to share a couple of things we have in common real quick before we get into it. One... we're both redheads.

Danny: I was just going to say that. That's got to be the first thing.

Rusty: Right? Well, it's obvious. Two... we both collect strange and unusual objects.

Danny: Ooh...

Rusty: Just saw an article about your strange and unusual collection and they shared a picture of you with your creepy ventriloquist dummy.

Danny: Buddy!

Rusty: Yeah, Buddy! Well, I wanted to tell you, you must know Archie McPhee...

Danny: Yeah.

Rusty: So, a couple of years ago, they made my likeness into a product. I'm a creepy ventriloquist dummy toy, a finger puppet.

Danny: Really...?!

Rusty: Yes.

Danny: Wow... Oh my god, that's so cool. What an honor. You should be honored.

Rusty: Oh I am.

Danny: Wow. Well, you have to go look at my nine episodes of "Danny and Buddy." Read the rest

It started innocently enough. A single dollar bill was pinned to the ceiling of a tiki bar in California — with a tiny paper umbrella, no less. That lone bill soon inspired many more.

For over 10 years now, patrons of Forbidden Island, a popular tiki lounge in the island city of Alameda, have been leaving legal tender suspended above their rum-filled cocktails. Using their drink's umbrellas, or swizzle sticks, the bar's customers stick the cash up, but not before they decorate it in some way. Some pen their name and the date, while others get more elaborate and make their offering a rectangular piece of art.

It's become such a popular pastime, the bar keeps a bucket of markers and unused umbrellas for those who want to leave their mark.

But it recently got out of control, at least in the eyes of my pal Michael Thanos, the bar's owner. He invited me down to get the whole story.

"There was simply no more room to put the money in the ceiling," Thanos told me. "So people started sticking money all over the place," motioning to the Lauhala-matted walls and tapa-covered light fixtures.

"It was just too much."

Before (photo by Alex T./Yelp) and during (photo by Michael Thanos)

So, in October, he and his staff spent an entire day carefully pulling the cash off of everything.

It was a bigger job than they had first realized. As it neared opening time, they had to stuff the cash in four big garbage bags to deal with at later time. Read the rest

Never have I wanted to learn about creating music for film more than before watching the trailer for Danny Elfman's new MasterClass ($90). In it, he talks about being "constantly insecure" despite having over 100 film scores under his belt. But quickly follows up with, "It's okay to fail." I mean, that's just solid advice for anyone pursuing creative activities. I appreciate that he goes beyond the "how-to" of composing a film score and goes into what it means to be a working artist -- being filled with doubts and insecurities and doing it anyway.

And I think all artists that are worth their anything are filled with doubt all the time. And the few that just don't have any doubt, I think they're destined become-- they could be very successful. They could be good workmen. They could be good craftsmen.

But they're not gonna be the really great artists. Because I think doubt and art are kind of combined. They're just-- it's almost impossible to pull them apart doubt.

Doubting yourself and then finding confidence and moving forward and then doubting what you've just done and then working through that, I think this is the life of a composer, and I think it's the life of an artist in general. And it's OK to feel that way.

The class is 21 online sessions, including one that's a Nightmare Before Christmas case study. The single class costs $90 or you can get an "all-access pass" for $15/month that allows you to watch other MasterClass classes (David Lynch, Penn & Teller, etc.). Read the rest

"Heard you say I'm not the saddest clown, you lied"

You haven't heard Lizzo's "Juice" until you've heard a sad 6'8"-tall clown sing it. Puddles does this one "Quiet Storm Style."

Our friend, Rebekah Del Rio, asked me how I would feel about doing Lizzo's song. I said I'd give it a go. I like saying yes first. This is how it turned out. I don't understand some of the references in it but I love me some Lizzo. Jonathan Burns helped me transcribe the lyrics. I especially like the David Copperfield lyric. And yes, that's really my voice. I didn't know I could do that before.

And you can bid on the invention's intellectual property rights next week.

Inventor/Artist (Inventist?) Ian Charnas has devised a way for windshield wipers to be in sync with the beat of the music you're listening to. Now, you can't just go out and buy his Dancing Wipers at the store. No, no. But you can bid to gain their IP rights on eBay next Wednesday.

His thoroughly entertaining 15-minute-long pitch video explains it all. You get quite a bit of insight into the creation process which is valuable and fun!

Know someone who has to have this? Is that someone you?

Mark your calendars for that eBay auction: October 16, 2019 Noon EST Bidding starts at $1. The Buy it Now price is $25,000.

Thanks, Mark! Read the rest

There are actors and then there are people who really get into a role and make it theirs! This Evil Queen at Disneyland is definitely in the latter category. Watch her play around as her big, bad, narcissistic, villainous self with guests of the park.

Here are longer videos of the Queen from Fatima Lakhani, a YouTuber who specializes in "character interactions":

screenshot via GMA Read the rest

Pop culture humorist Charles Phoenix (previously) has been busy this year. He's written a book:

Holiday Jubilee is loaded with original eye-popping “test kitchen” recipes and over 500 vintage images, serving up an intoxicating, action-packed extravaganza of America’s favorite seasonal traditions past, present, and future. Your imagination will be inspired and your spirit will soar!

And he's created this hilarious and kitschy "Raw" Turkey Tiki Meatloaf Mug ($80). This "meatloaf pan-shaped Moai" is inspired by his Tiki Turkey Dinner, an alt-Thanksgiving recipe found in the book.

Hey! Charles will be at Soap Plant WACKO in Los Angeles this Sunday, September 15, signing that new coffee table book of his from 2 to 4 p.m. This line alone, from the event page, makes me want to hop down to LA this weekend: "LIFE ALTERING SNACK and ARTIFICIALLY COLORED AND FLAVORED REFRESHMENTS will be served." Read the rest

There's a Happy Mutant reality hacker on the loose in Berkeley, California... affixing "mysterious medallions" on the city's sidewalks.

Berkeleyside reports:

There is a person out there with a sly sense of humor, a way with words, a working knowledge of Berkeley history and a desire to impart pithy observations.

He or she or they has been going around town the past few months affixing round metal medallions with clever sayings to sidewalks around Central Berkeley...

No one seems to know the creator’s identity, even though the question has been posed on Facebook and Twitter and even on Tom Dalzell’s Quirky Berkeley website.

“These days, just everybody – tout le monde – is talking about the mysterious medallions that are appearing in Berkeley’s sidewalks,” Dalzell wrote. “You read about them in Berkeleyside, you see them on Twitter, your hip friends are talking about them. “Plaque” might be a better word for what these are, but medallion gives us alliteration with mysterious.”

images via a friend Read the rest

In an effort to fight cynicism, David Byrne has started a new online editorial project called Reasons to be Cheerful. It's described as a "self help magazine for people who hate self help magazines."

He writes:

It often seems as if the world is going straight to Hell. I wake up in the morning, I look at the paper, and I say to myself, 'Oh no!' Often I’m depressed for half the day. I imagine some of you feel the same.

Recently, I realized this isn’t helping. Nothing changes when you’re numb. So, as a kind of remedy, and possibly as a kind of therapy, I started collecting good news. Not schmaltzy, feel-good news, but stuff that reminded me, Hey, there's positive stuff going on! People are solving problems and it’s making a difference!

I began telling others about what I’d found. Their responses were encouraging, so I created a website called Reasons to be Cheerful and started writing. Later on, I realized I wanted to make the endeavor a bit more formal. So we got a team together and began commissioning stories from other writers and redesigned the website. Today, we’re relaunching Reasons to be Cheerful as an ongoing editorial project.

We’re telling stories that reveal that there are, in fact, a surprising number of reasons to feel cheerful -- that provide a more optimistic and, we believe, more accurate depiction of the world. We hope to balance out some of the amplified negativity and show that things might not be as bad as we think.

When tiny wigs land in your life, what else can you do but open — not one, but two — pop-up wig shops? One for cats, and one for jars of Fluff.

No joke.

This one is called the "Cousin Oliver":

Hey, since you're here, I wanted to share that I was recently a guest on the Archie McPhee podcast! I talk about my work as a blogger, how I learned I was a superfan of Fluff, and what I know so far about working with Children's Fairyland. You can listen to it here. (Someone asked if we were high when we were recording it. Nope, we just get extra silly and giggly when we get together.) Read the rest

During a recent stopover in Portland, Oregon, it was delightful to once again hang out with the "Duchess of Felt," artist LeBrie Rich. Read the rest

Entrepreneur and Product Designer Matt Benedetto is an inventing machine. Under the umbrella of "Unnecessary Inventions," he's brought the world a-mazing, and absolutely absurd, creations. His latest pièce de résistance? Fingerless Crocs Gloves. Yup, he's made Crocs that you can wear on your hands. And, no, he didn't cut up a pair of shoes. No, no. These little beauties were 3D-printed. Watch the video to see the entire process to get from idea to prototype. It's impressive! Read the rest

Last weekend, long-distance runner Lenny Maughan ran 28.93 miles through the hilly streets of San Francisco to complete this mapped portrait of Frida Kahlo. Visible through the Strava fitness app, his "Frida Run" took him six hours and eight minutes to finish and was carefully planned out before he left his house. This isn't his first specially-mapped run, he's added over 30 pieces to his "Running Art" project in the past three years (some of those are visible here).

SFGate:

He describes the process of planning a piece as pretty analog. He prints out a paper map and highlights his route. He usually goes through several different iterations of the map before he sets off on a run. While he's on the road, he must be very careful to follow it – if he makes a wrong turn it has the potential to ruin the whole piece.

"You can't see the lines drawn until after you finish your run, so it's such a joyful feeling when you put in all of that work and you finally finish and get to see what you envisioned at the end," recounts Maughan...

"San Francisco is my canvas. I use the streets as framework for what I want to do, find shapes, and make it work. Kind of like how little kids look up at the clouds."

image via Lenny Maughan/Strava

(RED) Read the rest

Artist Damon Belanger's "Shadow Art" installations are making the rounds on the internet and for good reason, they're terrific! Using grey paint designed for concrete patios, he first created these street art pieces on commission back in 2016. They're a permanent installation, so you can still find all 22 of the fantastical shadows, ranging from anthropomorphic flowers to critters to abstract designs, on the downtown sidewalks of Redwood City, California.

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In use... #redwoodcity #visitredwoodcity #shadowart

A post shared by Damon Belanger (@dmn.belanger) on May 29, 2016 at 9:32pm PDT

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#redwoodcity #cityofredwoodcity #publicart #streetart #visitredwoodcity #rwcparks #redwoodcityshadowart #shadowart

A post shared by Damon Belanger (@dmn.belanger) on Jun 8, 2016 at 7:46pm PDT

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Dog the Cat. One of about twenty shadow art pieces I painted in downtown #redwoodcity. #rwcparks #visitrwc #redwoodcityshadowart #publicart #shadowart

A post shared by Damon Belanger (@dmn.belanger) on May 21, 2016 at 11:23pm PDT

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Robo Band. One of about twenty shadow art pieces I painted in downtown #redwoodcity. #rwcparks #visitrwc #redwoodcityshadowart #publicart #shadowart

A post shared by Damon Belanger (@dmn.belanger) on May 21, 2016 at 11:28pm PDT

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Hydrant @ El Camino. One of about twenty shadow art pieces I painted in downtown #redwoodcity. #rwcparks #visitrwc #redwoodcityshadowart #publicart #shadowart

A post shared by Damon Belanger (@dmn.belanger) on May 21, 2016 at 11:33pm PDT

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Parking Monkey. One of about twenty shadow art pieces I painted in downtown #redwoodcity.