Because Laura Said To

I know. I've been grossly negligent in staying true to my blogging duties. I've let work...a pilot in development...various writing assigments and other things get in the way of keeping this inestimable blog up to date. And so it would have continued...

...had Laura not bravely emailed to say that enough is enough. She called me to task...pleasantly enough, mind you...and told me it was time get back to the important mission of filling this blog with clever words.

Thank you, Laura. I needed that.

However, after a few months off, I'm a little rusty at being clever. So, while I brush up and figure out what to blog about, I'd like to leave you all with this:

A man wrestling a bear for no reason.

Chester Phelph's Exciting Special

Hope everyone can join Chester for his first ever television special on Froynlaven!

Praise For Paul Rugg's Book Announcement

Well....wow. Just wow. I can't tell everyone how humbled and...another word for humbled...and yet another, different word for humbled but with a slightly different meaning...I am. (I'm sorry, but the thesaurus on my computer isn't working. So, you'll have to bare with me. Or bear with me. Sorry but the spell check thingy and the grammar gizmo is also busted.)

Anyway...

Ever since I annoonced that my book on Writing Animation is in the works, I've been ininundilatedated with emails from people who are excited and...another word for excited...and yet another, different word for excited but with a slightly different meaning. I'm super gravilgakin. Really.

Leonard Krelms of Baywater wrote:  

"Mr. Rugg! I've often hoped and prayed that someone would write a book on writing animation. And now, you are! Now people will know how to do that! I feel your book will be the most important thing to come out this year. You have not paid me to say that. I have never met you. I have the documents to prove it and will repudiate with all force at my disposal anyone who asserts otherwise. They are liars and probably jealous. Can't wait!"

Thanks, Leonard! I can also say that I never heard of you before I received your email and can back up that claim with various documents and affidavits. Nor have I exchange any goods or services to solicit...another word for solicit...and yet another, different word for solicit but with a stronger meaning...a fake email by you which endorses my book. I further assert and another word for assert and another word for assert that I have no financial interest whatsoever in the Baywater Development Company, and, as of last week, divested all shares in said company...etc. etc. etc...to whit, all monies do me...etc. etc. etc...have been nuanced and applied to various holding companies to which I am sole shareholder. My attorney, Arnold Buxzum, has directed me to assert my rights through these holding companies to legally deny that we ever had any direct contact.

So, anyway! Keep those emails cooming!

TV Animation Writing 101 - Intro To Lesson One

The time has come, dear reader of Froynlaven, for me to pass the baton to a younger generation; a generation that yearns to write in that most noble field of TV Animation. Why they yearn to do that is unknown to me. People's yearnings are very personal. I think Virgil expressed it best when he wrote, "I yearn. You yearn. We all yearn for something." (Interestingly, it was Horace Lombash who, while working in the marketing department of the Des Moines Creamery in 1893,  modified Virgil's immutable words to 'I scream. You scream. We all scream for Ice Cream.' Lombash's popular saying helped ice cream sales to skyrocket. By 1894, the Des Moines Creamery was the largest manufacturer of Ice Cream in the Northern Hemisphere. Sadly, in 1895, a rabid beaver attacked the Des Moines plant, leading to the death of most of the creamery's workers. Horace Lombash was spared, but never worked in ice cream again. He disappeared. 10 years later he resurfaced as First Lady of Bolivia.)

And so, I bid a fond adieu to writing TV Animation. It has been interesting, sometimes fun, and incredibly lucrative. I've been able to purchase three homes, five private jets and a wide array of personal, exotic luxury watercraft. Not to mention a Panda called, Xia Lu, which lives in my sprawling back yard behind an electrified pen. (Pandas are very cute. But I've learned the hard way; DON'T THROW BANANAS AT THEM.)

And please...fear not. I am not retiring. I am simply shifting my focus to different writing endeavors. I shall hopefully be able to talk about said endeavors some time in November. 

Anyway, I think it's only fair that I at least attempt to teach some of what I know about writing TV Animation to whoever is interested. Lessons will begin tomorrow. I will teach you what I was taught on my first day at Warner Brothers Animation. It's a style of writing TV Animation that I think you'll find interesting. It's also really useful.

My course is free. Because I am incredibly rich and can afford it.

Join me tomorrow for Lesson One.

And THAT'S How You Land A Rover On Mars!!!

Forgive me for a moment while I geek out and make a total fool of myself.

WOOOOO! AHHHHHH! OHHHHHH! BLEEEEEEERK! SNNNNNERBY!!!! WOWWWWW!

A photo taken my the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter which shows Curiosity hanging from its supersonic parachute as it drops toward the surface of Mars.

Had you been at the Rugg homestead last night at around 10:31 PM, those are noises you would have heard me make as we watched the newest Mars rover, Curiosity, triumphantly touch down on Mr. Bradbury's wonderfully red planet. (I'm not entirely sure what SNNNNNNERBY means. But it's a good noise. A happy noise.)

Long-time readers of this inestimable blog are well aware by now that I'm a bit of a fanatic about aviation and space. I am, as my wife informed me, a "Rover Hugger". That's a term she found on the internet that describes people like me who avidly follow the comings and going of those plucky little robots on Mars.

Had I not been one of St. Viator Elementary School's "worst students of all time" and unable to tie my shoes  until I was 17, there's a good chance I would have been a brilliant engineer that made cool Mars rovers. However, as one of St. Viator Elementary School's worst students of all time and unable to tie my shoes until I was 17, there was little I could do except for TV Animation.  (On a side note, I recently  came across a letter written to my parents by my 8th grade teacher which stated, "We feel Paul will need constant care throughout his adult years. Please plan accordingly. We can recommend a number of wonderful group homes.")

Anyway...

Curiosity is safely down on the surface of Mars and the whole thing couldn't have been more exciting. Seriously. If you don't believe me, then please take the next 5 minutes to watch what it had to go through.




I hope you watched that and didn't just pretend to watch that because it's really cool. And if you did just pretended to watch it, but are now feeling somewhat sheepish and slightly curious, go ahead and watch it now. Go ahead. Don't be shy. We'll all wait.

Pretty awesome, right? So there we were last night watching all of this live. In the weeks leading up to the landing I had forced my family to watch the above video countless times. (That's the video I asked you to watch and you did. Right? If you didn't. Do it now. There's still time. Seriously. Don't be ashamed. Just do it.) So, having watched the video, we all knew the various things that had to happen as the rover made it's way down. Luckily my family got into it and you would have thought it was the superbowl. When we heard that the parachute had deployed, we clapped. We we heard the heat shield had come off we clapped. When we heard the rockets had fired for powered flight, we cheered. When the sky crane started doing it's thing...I think that's when I made my SNERRRRRBY sound. And when Curiosity said it had arrived, I jumped up and down. Cuz it's cool. And there aren't enough cool things happening today.

Thanks to the rock star engineers and scientists at JPL for putting some cool back into the world. It needed it.

Now if you'll excuse me, we're going out and I need my wife to tie my shoes.

Thank You, Dear

Alas, my intention to keep this inestimable blog chock-full of wonderful goodness throughout the summer has flamed-out spectacularly. Work (that which I do for a living and often regret) once again reared it's ugly head and crushed me like a small thing that is crushed beneath something large. And it hurt. And I couldn't blog. Throughout it all I carried deep-seated resentments about said work...and longed for the day when steady employment would yield to joys of communicating with you for little or no money.

And so, with said work now behind me, and little or no work ahead of me, it's time to get down to business and thank my wife, who, on our recent summer vacation to the great Pacific Northwest, spent five hours with me at Seattle's Museum Of Flight. Actually, she didn't really spend it with me per se...she followed me as I gleefully ran from one display to the next. She waited patiently as I gently caressed and whispered sweet nothings to "The City Everett", the first 747 ever built. She patiently waited as I sprinted over to the Lockheed Super Constellation and gawked at its sleek neato-ness. She then lovingly placed herself on a bench as my daughter and I painstakingly combed through the museum's store for a scale model of a Boeing Stratocruiser 377. Two hours later, we emerged from the store, victory in hand. Plus a nice Boeing baseball cap. Plus a T-Shirt which says, "If It's Not Boeing, I'm Not Going." Plus a die-cast model of a Lockheed Super Constellation. Plus a keychain. Plus a bunch of other stuff.

Thank you, dear. I promise to return the favor one day when you really want to go somewhere. As long as it's not boring. Like ballet. Cuz, that's super boring. And no modern dance, either. I hate that stuff. But anything else. I promise. As long as it's not something cultural. I hate that. And don't drag me to the Museum of Fabrics or something like that. Blech. But, anything else. Seriously. I love you. I want to return the favor. AND NO JAPANESE GARDEN CRAP. At all! I WON'T GO. But, anything else. Seriously. I love you. No sculpture exhibits. Got it? Gross. Boring. Hello? Anything else.

I love you.

R.I.P. Trololo Guy. And Thank You...

I have just been informed by a close friend that Eduard Khil, better known as the Trololo Guy passed away this morning. He was 77. I think it's only fitting that we take a moment to remember this man and his work.