Dem Bones, Dem Public Domain bones

 Not gonna lie: 2025 has not exactly gotten off to a stellar start.

There has been violence. There has been dangerous political rhetoric. There has been the Dallas Cowboys finding a way to lose a game that I stopped watching at the two-minute warning because we had the win in our back pocket (not to mention beaning one of our own cheerleaders in the head with an errant kicked ball).

There is apparently a winter storm a-brewing here in the Lone Star State that may cover us in a ridiculous-for-Texas 5+ inches of snow later this week. You guys may remember how much I love winter weather.

My point is, we're six days into the new year, and it's already kind of a crapshow.

But there is one delightful bright spot amid all this nonsense. You may not have heard about it unless you lurk in the same weird corners of the Internet that I do. And it does make me happy in the face of everything that is trying to make me sad.

As of January 1, 2025, the Disney cartoon "The Skeleton Dance" has entered the public domain.

It's all ours, you guys. It belongs to us.

In all the animated short films I've seen in my GenX fever-dream life of media consumption, there are few that bring me such unbridled joy as "The Skeleton Dance." It's skeletons dancing in a graveyard. Twirling in unison. Playing each other's bones like xylophones. And that's pretty much it, for five and a half wonderful minutes. 

Created by Ub Iwerks, who helped Walt Disney turn an unappealing character named Oswald into the trillion-dollar juggernaut that is Mickey Mouse and got almost nothing in return, "The Skeleton Dance" was released in August 1929, just before the world slid into the Great Depression. If I'd been around back then, the sight of four chummy skeletons with great rhythm probably would have kept me from jumping out a window when my entire stock portfolio suddenly became worthless. I assume.

Prior to January 1, it wasn't exactly difficult to find videos of "The Skeleton Dance" on the Web. Disney didn't seem to care about protecting the boney boys with anything like the vigor they apply to persecuting folks who try to post unauthorized footage of the Mouse, or the Angry Duck, or the Creepy Mermaid. But the skeletons are now fully released from the bounds of copyright. And that makes me happy.

In the interest of full disclosure, the landmark Mickey Mouse cartoon "Steamboat Willie" actually entered the public domain last year on January 1. To which I say, who cares? To me, dancing skeletons beat a mouse wearing gloves any old day. 

Bones make me happy. Congratulations on your emancipation, "Skeleton Dance."

See You in the Morning, Sam

My boss (the Homunculus) and I have an interesting relationship.

For certain definitions of "interesting."

It's not that we don't have a decent working relationship. Deep down, I'm pretty sure he respects me. And deep down, I'm pretty sure I respect him.

For certain definitions of "deep down."

Things get a bit prickly between us at times. I piss him off, he pisses me off, we spar, we joust, we exchange words, I seethe, he sticks a red-hot poker in my side (figuratively, almost always).

Corporate dynamics, you know?

There's no "I" in "team." But there is a "u" in "knockout."

The thing is, for every time I screw up and make him see red, I save his bacon by catching a mistake, solving a problem, or going the extra mile for a client. And no matter how contentious our day has been, we wish each other a sincere good night as we leave the office.

I don't spend a lot of time dissecting our working relationship. It is what it is. But after about 3.5 years of working together, I finally realized exactly what it is. What it does is. What it be.

Forget it.

In our working relationship, the Homunculus and I are Sam Sheepdog and Ralph Wolf.

Right?

I suppose if you're a whippersnapper, you don't know the Warner Bros. cartoons starring these two. They're among my favorites. Essentially you have two working Joes who punch the clock every day. Every morning they greet each other cordially. Then they go off to their respective jobs: Ralph Wolf tries to make off with as many sheep as he can, and Sam Sheepdog beats the crap out of him to stop him. No matter what, when the whistle blows, they stop what they're doing (even if what they're doing is trying to murder each other), punch out, and cordially bid each other good night.

That is my relationship with my boss in a nutshell.

I'm pretty sure I'm Ralph in this scenario. But it really doesn't matter. All that matters is that every morning and every evening, we sincerely wish each other well. And for the 8-9 hours in between, we each do our best to wear the other down like and old shoe heel on rough pavement.

Is that healthy? I'm not sure. I do know that I'm pretty well regarded beyond the sphere of the Homunculus' influence, and if he ever insisted on giving me the boot, I'd be able to negotiate a pretty sweet severance package.

But I don't anticipate it ever coming to that. We spur each other on, and we're both a little better for having to deal with our working proximity.

So we say "good morning" and "good night" and spend the time in between dropping piles of bricks on the other's head.

Here, watch a classic Ralph Wolf/Sam Sheepdog cartoon, and then tell me: What's your relationship with your boss like? (Yes, even if - especially if - you're your own boss.)

Preview

Here's a rare middle-of-the-day post for you.

Really not worth anything other than sentimental value.
Next.

I've decided to tell the story of me and Tabitha, my terrible, terrible page admin who hates me. It probably will come out in a few installments as I have time to put it together. I'm using a cool-beans website I found called Pixton, which lets you create cartoons. Very helpful for people who can't draw a lick. Not that I'd want to draw a lick. I'm not even sure what one looks like. But it would probably turn out badly.

But I digress.

Anyway, that story is coming. Here's a one-panel preview that pretty well sums up our relationship:



A typical day at Baudelaire Enterprises.

Stay tuned.

Thank You, Charles Schulz

Sometimes I feel as if there is one person in the history of the world who understands me, and he passed away on February 12, 2000.

Happiness is knowing that just one person, ever, anywhere, knew how you felt. Thanks, Sparky.

Pickled

Now we know what a drunken blogger in brine looks like, thanks to Precocious Daughter and the Futurama Head in a Jar app.

I can't really quibble with her depiction, except that I don't have an awesome pet space armadillo thing in real life. Ah, well.

Also, I sort of wish she had given me one eye, a la Leela. But I suppose my depth perception is bad enough without depriving me of stereoscopic vision.

In conclusion, my kid is awesome. In a jar.

Retro MTV Placeholder

I know I haven't posted anything since Friday, but I'm kind of stuck on a conference call at my "real" job right now. So to amuse you for the next 15 seconds, here's one of the wonderful little promos Bill Plympton used to do for MTV waaaaaaaay back in the day, when they used to need little promos to break up the honest-to-God music videos they used to show. Really, they did. Sometimes for hours on end.

Anyway, if I can I'll post something else later. For the next 15 seconds (or more, if you keep hitting "replay"), enjoy.



P.S. Precocious Daughter took home a second-place medal for her karate form on Saturday. I now fear for my safety.

Nasty Quacks

I don't know if you've watched "The Looney Tunes Show" on Cartoon Network.

It's basically "Seinfeld" populated by classic Warner Bros. cartoon characters. Seriously. It's hilarious. Check it out.

Precocious Daughter got me watching the show, and now we watch it together. Because I like watching TV with her, and because at the end of the day my brain can't stand anything more sophisticated than slapstick and fart jokes sometimes. We both think "The Looney Tunes Show" is way funny, but for different reasons. The thing is, she's not all that familiar with the Looney Tunes in their original incarnation. When I was a kid, you couldn't turn the TV dial without hitting a Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck cartoon about five times a day. What? Oh..."turn the TV dial," i.e., walk across the room and change the channel on the TV without a remote. It didn't take long, because there were only six channels. Yes, really.


Also, TVs used to be furniture.

 The point, other than how old I am, is that by the time I was PDaughter's age, I knew probably 50 different Looney Tunes shorts by heart. And now it's funny to see how the new show plays off the old characters. But she doesn't have that frame of reference because you just don't see the old cartoons on TV very much. Time Warner keeps them locked up tight so they can repackage them on DVD every few years and sell them to people like me who used to watch them for free every damn day of their childhood.



Sure, I'll be funny. I need money first.

Beloved Spouse, of course, knows as many Looney Tunes riffs as I do. As if I could marry someone who doesn't know what I mean when I say "Name? Shropshire Slasher. Occupation? Shropshire Slasher." (Sigh...look it up, people.)  If you don't think the way to my heart is by quoting obscure old punchlines, you don't read this blog enough. You probably don't read this blog enough. Please start reading this blog more. Please. Pleeeeaaaasssse.

But I digress. Anyway, when BelSpouse and I get into one of our quoting fits, PDaughter sometimes looks at us as if we're crazy. As opposed to all the other times she looks at us as if we're crazy. So we always make sure we source the quotes for her. But it's not enough to know that a line comes from, say, an episode of "The Simpsons" or a Marx Brothers movie. As often as we can, we expose her to the original joke, which of course is always told better and funnier than when her dumb old parents try to recreate it.


Every generation thinks it came up with "OMG"
to describe its parents.

So when we watch "The Looney Tunes Show," inevitably we start to quote old Looney Tunes cartoons. And when it comes to Daffy Duck (who on the new show is a hilariously shallow, self-centered loser), our favorite  short is 1945's "Nasty Quacks." You know, the one where Daffy is little Agnes' extremely annoying pet duck. It's got subtle wartime humor, clever visual jokes, and a great punchline. And PDaughter has never seen it.

Well, it's time to rectify that. So this is for my 21st-century daughter, who thinks Bugs and Daffy and Yosemite Sam are modern inventions to make her laugh. The video quality on this is not awesome, and there might be a few small cuts in it. Maybe I'll find a more pristine version later. But for now, for PDaughter's viewing enjoyment and yours, I bring you "Nasty Quacks."