Unmeanwhile?

Having great trouble pulling my head out of my Automated Sentience Simulator and get functional. Perhaps i'll manage to fix that later today, but for now -

For those unfamiliar, the appearance of Mel Tormé means no blog post today. (Thanks, ME!)

We shall resume our irregularly scheduled rambles directly.

Welcome To Mel

As you may or may not be aware, Mel Tormé means no post today.
Running way off cycle and caught up in work for a bit. Back tomorrow, eh?

Stay Mellow For Mel

It's one of them days -

As you may (or may not) know, when Mel appears that means a posting will not be doing so. (Thanks, ME!) I'm heading out for the monthly supply run and no telling how long that takes these days. Who knows? There might even be a stimulus sitting in my account - that could extend the excursion. (Since i exist without phone and such, i actually have to go to the bank to find out)

Perhaps there'll be a real post late today.
Sure, the odds are slim. But they're still greater than the odds of us seeing any competence from the federal government any time soon, so cross those extraneous digits!

it's Mel!

Curious Glitching

Well, isn't that ... interesting?

I went to post the answers to this week's puzzle pages and found that most of the puzzles themselves are gone from the original post. In fact, most of the pages from the posts that are labelled Trump Flu Blues Prevention all seem to have disappeared from the server.

Strange system glitch? Or are things getting uglier? We may have to make some posts to test and see what happens.

But, not right now. And i'll refrain from posting the answers just yet. Later i'll go back and repost the images that have gone missing.

In theory, we'll have a real post later today. 
Meanwhile, have yourself a groovy Mel circa 1970 -

Living The Butterfly Effect With The Velvet Frog

A Kid wiggles his fingers in the UK and causes changes halfway around the world. Funny how those things work. And, no - we're not talking vague theory here. It happens all the time, and happened around here just in the last 24 hours.

Of course, the nature of chaos systems is such that while we can predict an effect, predicting the exact nature of that effect is near impossible. (And it certainly doesn't help when you toss my old peripatetic mind into the mix)

So, less babble, more specifics, eh?

Comments with Kid on yesterday's post led to thoughts of a painting of Mel Tormé. Gordie left visions playing in my head with Mel in a giant mushroom forest, brightly colored rain falling - the drops in the shape of music notes. Eventually i sat down to start doing some layouts for such a painting.

I'm not entirely sure what happened next, but i wound up with a new character in Kelly's game instead...

...yep, the Velvet Frog is now walking around town; and performing on the weekends.

And, no - that's not just static drawing, the animated model is now hanging out with the rest of the cast...

(Yeah, he's a Ladies' Frog)

There are actually 3 viable already-existing potential explanations for his existence within the game. Rather convenient, that.

You may perhaps recall from a previous pic of the GC Rejects that the Penguin surrogate in this world is played by Howard The Duck in the role of Señor Oswald...

This neatly fills a plot gap for me. I needed an obsession for Oswald, and trying to steal the Velvet Frog away for his SOT Border (South Of The Border and get sotted) club fits in perfectly.

By the way, the merging of Kelly's Game and This City finally has a name, and temp title screen - ever growing...

I figured a crowd shot was the simplest way to go, and a lot gets coveyed with that crowd. There's about 60 figures currently, but at least half of the main characters aren't included yet. I suspect that before long we'll pull the camera back and start re-arranging while jamming in a few score more.

Okay - enough babble on The Third Colony, on to more, better Velvet Fog. While we're talking about Mel Tormé, did you know he had a few comic book appearances hiding in his past? (So many of the greats do, it seems)

Let's head on back to 1948 for the first of them - Juke Box Comics #2, with Jerry Fasano doing the artwork...

Mel also made a few more single panel appearances over the next few issues...

...including a record review -

Two years later, he appeared on the cover of Youthful Romances #10 -

Okay, technically he was on the cover of Juke Box Comics #2, but that was just his name in a slot on the jukebox. It was really a Dinah Shore cover. So i didn't include it.

He was also the narrator/star of the lead story in that issue of Youthful Romance, with art from Harry Harrison and Bob Bache (writer unknown)...

...and they dedicated the postal required text pages to the Velvet Fog -

As near as i can tell, that's the complete comic book career of Mel Tormé. But it wouldn't surprise me in the least to find him hiding in other pages.

Stealing Mel From ME

Mark Evanier has a problem with people stealing Mel Torme from him. I think i'm gonna do it, too.

Probably no surprise that i'm doing it different than most. I'm not stealing his marvelous Xmas Mel tale, i'm stealing his Mushroom Soup. And Mel.

You see, when Mark gets too busy to blog, he throws up a mushroom soup graphic. When i'm here but having trouble posting, i think ol' Mel is going to be my signal. 

Likely i'm not too busy to post. More probably it's a matter of not being able to communicate, or being unable to gather mental traction, or simply brooding. As a Hermit, as an Artist, as an American without an America...  I'm way behind in my contractually obligated brooding.

Maybe next time we see Mel, i'll catch up on some of that here. For now, i've been scraping off the past couple days and starting to prep a return of L.B. Cole; and not the Funny Animals this time.

Hmm... 
Actually, it might be the first for L.B. Cole here rather than the 1940s Funny Animalphabet. 

So we're overdue.

Anyway... When you see Mel, you know i'm still alive and here, just not ... Here.

It's MEL! (No, i didn't steal it from ME. Mine's better)