I'm too tired to have a happy Valentine's Day.

Which is just as well because my blow up doll is leaking air.

Good luck out there everybody.

Today the copyright expires for the original Mickey Mouse and he enters the public domain.

For decades Disney has greased the political wheels to convince the government to keep extending the length of copyright (originally Mickey was supposed to expire in 1984, then again in 2003), but then they kinda just... stopped. Apparently the old-school original Mickey from Steamboat Willie just isn't worth it anymore. So welcome to the latest DaveToon here at Blogography, I guess...

But don't go crying for Disney... they still have copyright protection for a bunch of other versions that came after Steamboat Willie Mickey. PLUS, I'm pretty sure that people will still be going to Disney for all their Mickey Mouse content.

Well, except for Mickey Mouse porn of course.

My favorite Mickey is a tie between Public Domain Mickey and the white-faced, red pants, yellow shoes Mickey which followed Public Domain Mickey. Everything that came after that... Peach-Faced Mickey, Caucasian Mickey, 3-D Mickey (essentially every Mickey which has white around his pupils)... I don't like much at all. Though I do kinda like the brand new Throwback Mickey that Disney is currently using because they've gone white-faced again. Mickey belongs to everybody and shouldn't be Caucasian.

In the coming years more and more of Disney's original characters will start collapsing into the Public Domain like dominoes. Donald, Pluto, Goofy... all of them. Well, except "Hans" from Frozen. Nobody is going to want anything to do with that asshole.

UPDATE: Well send me to Disneyland and call me Minnie... apparently Red Shorts Mickey IS in the public domain. There was a poster advertising him in 1928!

I prefer him with yellow shoes and white gloves as he would later be depicted, but I still like this better than any caucasian version of Mickey, so this is great news! I wonder if it's allowable for me to change the colors and consider it "artistic license?" Maybe!

Back in February a friend sent me a photo of a neon sign they had bought and said it would be cool if I were to make a Bad Monkey neon so I could sell them. And he included a link to a company called YellowPop... a company that custom-makes "neon-style" light-up signs out of LED strip-lights and flexible plastic covers.

I went to their site, looked around, and started thinking that, yes, this would be incredibly cool to do.

So I looked at the color of tubing they had available and drew up a couple options that I could send to them to see if it were feasible...

I was assigned a sales team contact and quickly got back a rendering of what they could do...

As much as I liked the idea of Bad Monkey picking his nose, I thought that the overlapping yellows were a bit confusing. So I decided on Bad Monkey flashing a peace-sign... then asked if they could add the lettering below it. I also asked to have it flipped horizontally. Since people "read" from left-to-right here in the USA, I wanted the peace-sign to be the lead instead of the tail. I also wanted them to add the word PEACE at the bottom to make the piece taller. Within hours I got back a revised composition that looked fantastic.

There was some back and forth as I asked for small changes to be made until I was happy (my favorite being "the arms need to be consistent width, like macaroni"). But, to their credit... my sales rep (Hi Kristina!) never once got aggravated or acted the least bit irritated (even though I'm sure they had to be by the time we finished!)...

No idea why it's practically on the floor now.

The sign ended up quite a bit larger than I had imagined (30×42 inches) when I first drew it, but there's only so tight you can bend the plastic tubing, so this was as small as it could get.

Now, one thing I should say right off the bat is that these signs are expensive. Like really expensive. As in ZOMG I WILL BE EATING PEANUT BUTTER FOR MONTHS! expensive. As in $1,200 expensive. I did a little poking around to see if there were shops making them for less money, and there were, but not one of them had the glowing reviews that YellowPop had, and that was worth it to me. What good is saving $300 if the result is crap?

Wiping out the entirety of my Black Sunday savings, I wrote back to my most excellent YellowPop rep to order it.

Fast-forward a couple weeks and my order has shipped. It arrived on Friday.

And, let me tell you... it is GORGEOUS. I had fairly high expectations given how much money I spent, but YellowPop went just... beyond. I unboxed it, plugged it in, and literally gasped when it lit up...

If you look real hard, you can see Jake down there checking it out!

Originally, I was going to hang it in the corner of my living room. But it was so phenomenally good that I just couldn't do it. I cleared out a wall in my dining room so it had plenty of space to breathe and be fully appreciated.

But how to hang it?

The instructions they give you are pretty vague. Essentially "Pop in those drywall anchors, attach the metal pegs, then screw your sign to it! The end!" Problem is that with a sign this big you would need to have two people hold it into position, pencil through the holes in the acrylic backing onto the wall, then install the metal pegs. But I didn't want to have to bother two friends or neighbors on a weekend, so I decided to trace the sign onto the cardboard sheet that came in the shipping box. Then I could cut out the tracing, tape it to the wall, and know where to put the holes all by myself...

Ask for help? I'm a loner, Dottie. A rebel. I'll do it myself!

The metal mounting pegs are actually very smart, because they set the sign out away from your wall, which makes it look more like glass tubing instead of something that's flat against the surface...

One thing I did to make it easier to hang alone was to move the sign a tiny bit off-center so that the mounting peg at the top was firmly anchored square into a wall stud. Then I could screw in that peg long enough to hold up the sign so I could screw in the rest. If I hadn't put it into a stud, it was heavy enough that it would probably have ripped out from the drywall if I tried this.

And there you have it. My amazing new Monkey Peace sign is up...

LOVE IT!!! ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT!

The problem with this photo is that you can't tell just how incredible this looks in person. The "neon" looks all blown out and blurry in photos... whereas in Real Life, it is perfectly defined and has a beautiful glow to it. Looks very much like actual neon from any angle until you get close and see that it's not really glass tubes. Remarkably, the light is diffused enough that it appears solid, not at all looking like a bunch of little LEDs.

UPDATE: When it gets dark, the light is even more impressive. Gorgeous. Photos still don't do it justice though...

One piece of advice... spring for the dimming remote control ($29). The sign is actually more impressive when it's not at full brightness, and it's nice to be able to turn it off and on from across the room...

Yes, as you can see, my cats are clearly unimpressed.

So, yeah... thrilled with the whole experience from start to finish. If you're looking to have custom "neon" of your own, I highly recommend YellowPop for the job! They're expensive, but worth every last penny. I cannot stop staring at it.

I guess now I'll be saving up for my next piece. This turned out too good not to.

Thanks for spending another year with me here at Blogography! Wishing you the happiest of holiday seasons for what's been a rather awful year. Again.

   
I'd wish for a better Christmas next year, but I did that in 2020 and look what happened!

A second entry for Friday? Lucky you!

If you've been reading this blog for any length of time, you undoubtedly are aware of my Disney theme park obsession. Heck, I even designed my own parody theme park DaveLand because my Disney love goes pretty deep...

I collect the map pamphlets from the Disney parks. I have the wall maps. I bought the map book. And every time Disney announces anything new or any kind of expansion, I am compelled to figure out what they're going to do and how they're going to do it.

The lastest news is more announcements for the Disneyland Resort "Westside Expansion" which will turn a bunch of parking lots into an expanded hotel/shopping/dining/entertainment experience...

Now, this concept illustration is not in any way final (indeed, it looks like the previous plans for the "Mickey Mouse Hotel" have been drastically altered or scrapped... and does anybody remember the plans for "Westcot?"). And it's a bit deceptive, which we'll get to in a minute. But you can see that the idea is to add more stuff to snag tourist dollars than they already do. Looks like there's a lazy river tube ride to the left there. The above-mentioned "Mickey Hotel" in the middle. Three entirely new hotels to the far right. A live stage venue just in front of them. And of course more shopping and dining. Disney quite clearly doesn't want you sleeping, shopping, or dining at anything except Disney-owned properties.

As I was saying, the illustration is a bit deceptive though because about 1/3 is already developed with The Disneyland Hotel and Disney Paradise Pier Hotel, which will be surrounded by new construction (which I've shaded in magenta)...

© Google Maps... Click to Embiggen

Yellow shading is over Disneyland and California Adventure so you can compare sizing. Suffice to say, this is not a small endeavor... nor will it be cheap. I'm not sure where all that parking will go. Could be it will be constructed underground. Could be they will expand the Pumba lot that's wayyyy off to the East or the Toy Story lot that's wayyyy off to the Southwest (see below) to be a multi-story garages like they did for the Mickey & Friends and Pixar Pals parking structures that are in the upper-left corner of the map.

It's interesting to note that Disneyland is pretty much at its limit here. To the South is the Anaheim Convention Center. To the North and West is suburban sprawl with hundreds of homes that Disney would have to purchase.

But then there's the land to the East.

And here's where my speculation takes a bit of a sinister turn.

Right now, most of the land to the east is occupied by a bunch of hotels, with the exception of the afore-mentioned Pumba Parking lot (outlined in cyan) which I'm guessing is owned by Disney. The red outline is the land I'm talking about...

© Google Maps... Click to Embiggen

Unfortunately for Disney, there's a shopping Mall to the South of the Eastern region that's likely there to stay unless Disney acquires it (if they haven't already) in which case they could rebrand it as yet another Disney shopping experience.

But let's think about this for a second.

The Disneyland Resort Westside Expansion has at least four high-capacity hotels planned. That's going to take business away from the hotels which popped up to the East of Disneyland. Which means the price to buy them out may cheapen. After enough lost business, they may consider selling to Disney... something that's inconceivable as things currently stand because their occupancy must (normally) be pretty darn high and very profitable. And once that first hotel domino falls... and Disney re-themes it as a Disney hotel... and people flock to it because Disney dangles enough perks... and more hotels lose more business... well, it's not difficult to see how it might be "bye bye Candy Cane Inn"... followed by the rest of them one-by-one.

This, of course, is all conjecture. It could be that Disney has zero interest in the budget hotel business, or that the existing hotels will continue to be so popular that the selling price would be insane. Or maybe the chain-owned hotels don't care about lost business and just want a Disney-adjacent property in their portfolio. It's hard to say. All I know is that both parks are overcrowded year' round now, so maybe it's worth it to Disney to buy everything up... and simply not provide budget lodging. At least not as it looks right now. A Disney "Budget Hotel" will be cheaper when compared to their other hotels, but still Disney-pricey. Because if there's one thing that Disney knows how to do... it's make money. Lots of it.

And they could, of course, use the land to build a third theme park. Or relocate the structures that are currently to the North of Disneyland so they can expand the park there. Or just shift the Mickey & Friends and Pixar Pals parking to the East so another big chunk of land opens up for entertainment and hotels on the Westside.

However...

That's not the end to Disney's (estimated) land holdings. They either own or lease a rather large piece of land to the Southeast which is currently the Toy Story parking lot. Not sure if the parking for the hotels/businesses to the North is Disney-owned (that's outlined in green)... but if Disney does own this, they could build a massivley huge parking structure which could replace all the lost parking for Westside... and absorb parking for any hotels they buy, which could then be expanded or rebuilt... or replaced with more theme park to attract more customers (or maybe spread the crowds out a bit)...

© Google Maps

I dunno.

All I do know is that Disney gobbling up that Eastern parcel... along with the area above the Toy Story parking lot... creates a nicely contiguous chunk of land which would nearly double what they have now.

Not that contiguous land is essential. Just look at Walt Disney World. Build another monorail or an air-tram... or expand the bus system... and that third theme park could end up in the Southwest section. Or anywhere, really. I remember reading how Disney wanted to expand to a beachfront property in L.A. or something. Heaven only knows how much land in the greater L.A. area they own either directly or via shell companies.

What I wouldn't give to work for the team at Disney which gets to plan all this stuff. That's my dream job right there. But since I don't, all I can do is have fun speculating and be excited for what's coming next.

Until then, there's always Daveland.

UPDATE: Well looky what we have here... a site that Disney created to shame Anaheim into rezoning their property for multi-use purposes called Disneyland Forward. It doesn't do anything to curb speculation because it's just Disney tossing out ideas, but it does clarify a few things. First of all is their plans for expanding into the Westside property and Northward...

Note that Disneyland gets an addition to the West, so those weren't hotels, they were attraction buildings. The only hotel expansion looks to be another tower for Paradise Pier?

Which is not to say that Disney couldn't change their mind and drop a bunch of hotels once they get their way so that they can still buy out everything to the East and raze it for a third theme park. And idea which still makes a lot of sense. Though remember that land to the Southeast? Hotel and shopping have been dropped there as an example of what could happen...

   
Interesting stuff! You can see everything for yourself at Disneyland Forward.

Not the best holiday season, but here's hoping you're making the best you can out of it.

Washington State already had workplace protections for LGBTQ persons since 2006, but now it's been rolled out nation-wide thanks to a Supreme Court ruling which expanded upon "sex discrimination" to include sex, sexuality, and gender identity.

Naturally, conservatives are losing their fucking minds. They want to be able to "fire them queers" in places like Mississippi and Alabama, I guess.

Their argument seems to revolve around "textualism." Which is to say that the people who wrote the law concerning sexual discrimination couldn't have foreseen things like sexuality and gender identity at the time, so you can't read them into a modern interpretation of the original legislation. Which is hilarious, of course. When the Second Amendment was written, they couldn't have foreseen high-powered assault rifles and automatic weapons, but that hasn't stopped conservatives from saying Americans should be free to own all kinds of advanced weaponry based on what was once written.

Oh well. It's the Supreme Court's job to interept that shit, not mine. And it seems they are on the right side of history this time (surprisingly led by Trump nominee Justice Neil Gorsuch, textualist supreme). Though the dissenting opinions are laughable to knee-slapping extremes if, for no other reason, because they spell out in no uncertain terms exactly how the ruling can be used to support things they detest. I expect this kind of embarrassing idiocy from a dumbass frat-bro like Justice Brett Kavanaugh, but I somehow thought Justice Alito was more devious, more savvy. Apparently his frustration with not being able to stop progress has turned him into that old man yelling at kids to get off his lawn.

Guess he can just stay mad.

And speaking of staying mad...

I worked way too late last night. I think I finally fell asleep around 1:30am. When I woke up five hours later, I wasn't necessarily tired... but my eyes were burning. And they continued to burn all day long. Finally around 3:30pm I just couldn't see any longer and came home to take a nap. My cats woke me up at 5:55pm because the Alexa alarm was blaring downstairs. It was their dinner time and they were not happy that I dared to sleep through it.

And here we are, hours later, and they are still mad about it.

Something tells me I had better not be late with breakfast tomorrow.

As much as I wasn't a fan of Valentine's Day before, I am especially not a fan now.

I've been trying really, really hard to change my attitude about stuff that just doesn't matter (like Valentine's Day) but it's proving incredibly difficult. In a day and age where everything is shit that's impossible to escape, even the little things can be completely overwhelming.

In the State of The Union address a week ago, Cheeto Jesus said "I am thrilled to report to you tonight that our economy is the best it has ever been."... then a couple days ago he cut Federal employee raises that were scheduled because of "serious economic conditions." So which the fuck is it? Do we have the best economy that the entire universe has ever known... or is it in the toilet? Like most things in life, both statements are probably true. For billionaires and mega-millionaires, the economy is the best it's been in decades. For everybody else, it's not so great. Partly because of rising costs. Partly because we keep losing things that our taxes have traditionally paid for. Take, for example, libraries.

The presidents current crusade includes cutting funding for libraries. The only way some people can afford to read books is to borrow them from the library. The only way some people can afford to watch movies is to borrow them from the library. The only way some people can afford to get the news from newspapers and magazines is to borrow them from the library. The only way some people can have access to the internet or a computer is to use them at the library. BUT POOR PEOPLE DON'T MATTER, SO CUTTING THEIR ACCESS TO EDUCATION, ENTERTAINMENT, AND A WAY TO COMMUNICATE, FIND A JOB, OR JUST FUCKING EXIST IS NO BIG DEAL WHEN BILLIONAIRES NEED TAX CUTS TO PAY FOR THEIR GOLD-PLATED TOILETS, RIGHT?!?

And then there's the little things. Like the desire to live free from deadly diseases. As you may have heard, the Coronavirus is a big deal. Currently in China, but it could end up wrecking havoc here very easily. Then there's the looming threat of old diseases coming back, which scientists warn could be unleashed from thawing permafrost. And yet President Trump is wanting to slash funding to the Center for Disease Control. It's madness.

But we've got billions to transfer to the ineffective and idiotic "Wall" President Trump is hellbent on constructing. Hope it can stop diseases from getting through.

But anyway... Happy Valentine's Day...

For past year's Blogography Valentine cards, click here!