Evidence of a benificent, all-powerful God

A perfectly ripe pear.

He was just a little green blob of clay...

...GUMBY!!

I'm not sure I should be admitting this, but at some stressful point in my life (grad school, I think) I rented (yes, paid money for) videos of old episodes of The Gumby Show. It was claymation from the 1950s by a fellow named Art Clokey.

I appreciated some of its surreal aspects. I remember Gumby's mother asking Gumby's father to wake him. He stepped into his son's room, and there on the bed lay his boy, but a moment later he morphed into a bat and ball, and then a saxophone, followed by a few more transformations. Father turned to Mother and said, "Aww, I can't wake him now--he's dreaming!"

The theme song has stuck with me, too:

He was just a little green slab of clay... GUMBY!!
But you should see what Gumby can do today... GUMBY!!
He can walk into any book
With his pony pal Pokey, too.
If you have a heart,
Then Gumby's a part
Of YOU!!!

And since that's the song that's stuck in my head, you get to hear about it.

A couple more links for the Gumby-curious:

• Gumby turns 50
• NPR story on the genesis of Gumby
  

Peeps on the brain

This morning I found out that there was a 24-hour contest over at DP Challenge for photos involving Peeps marshmallow candy (you may wish to turn sound down before following this link). Soon I had a couple ideas, and we stopped at Walgreen's on our way back from brunch. We were too late; there wasn't a fluorescent marshmallow left in the store. A quick trip to the next Walgreen's brought success (and a half-price discount). Then unreasonable amounts of time spent on staging and lighting. Peeps seem to bring out the sadist in many people, but I was resolved to play nicely with my mute marshmallow models.

So I posed them for a swimsuit shot:


I swear it was an accident.