Elmer Fudd

            On Wednesday morning I finished posting my translation of "Scènes de manager" by Serge Gainsbourg and started memorizing his song "Volontaire." 

            I weighed 84.5 kilos before breakfast. That's the lightest I've been in the morning in over a month. 

            I finished washing the living room window frames. Tomorrow I might have time to clean the inside of the big windows. On Friday I'll do the outside of the left one and start cleaning the grooves where the left sliding windows go. 

            I weighed 84.8 kilos before lunch. I had Breton crackers with five-year-old cheddar and a glass of limeade. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. 

            I weighed 84.6 kilos at 17:00. 

            Because I hadn't finished my journal before bed last night, I didn't get caught up on it until 19:18 this evening. 

            I created a Movie Maker project for my July 10, song practice, and almost synchronized the video with the audio. I'm just a couple of seconds off. 

            In the Movie Maker project for my song "Instructions for Electroshock Therapy", I deleted all of the Oral Roberts faith healing clips except for the one in which he puts his hand on the head of the attractive young woman with horn-rimmed glasses. I inserted that into the main video to correspond with my line, "if convulsive codes have not been reached." Next, I need to synchronize the concert video and the studio audio when I sing "shock therapy" again after that line. 

            I made pizza on a slice of Bavarian sandwich bread with Basilica sauce and five-year-old cheddar. I had it with a beer while watching some more Bugs Bunny features from the 1980s. 

            I tried to watch the movie, "Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island", but that was in Russian. Another film called "Daffy Duck's Quackbusters" was also in Russian. Some previous features had also been in Russian but there had also been English versions as well, but not in this case. I checked the file for Space Jam and it's also dubbed, so it's safe to assume the uploader "Arsenaloyal" is Russian speaking. I deleted those and moved to the next two features on my chronological list: Bugs Bunny's Mad World of Television from 1982 and Bugs Bunny's Wild World of Sports from 1989. 

            In the first special, the QTTV Network is looking for a new president and they decide to ask Bugs Bunny to take the job. One of the executives calls him and asks for his biography and so we see the cartoon in which that was featured. Bugs Bunny takes the job. 

            Bugs is in his office reviewing shows and the first he watches is a Tweety and Silvester story. Silvester sees Tweety in his cage from an apartment window. He crosses the street and climbs the stairs to knock on the door and gets hit on the head with a broom by Tweety's caregiver. Silvester tries to build a bridge from his window to Tweety's by nailing several boards together. But of course, it doesn't work, and he falls. Then we see another story in which Tweety is in a cabin in the winter. He ties spoons to his feet to use as snowshoes and ventures out to buy bird seed. Tweety is being pursued by Silvester Cat on skis. Bugs says that it needs more car chases. 

            Seeking a star with sex appeal, Bugs calls France to talk with Pepe le Pew. Bugs is told that Pepe is busy on set. We see him in another story in which he thinks that a female cat with an accidental stripe is a skunk. When she escapes from his sexual assault and runs away, Pepe thinks she is seeking a more appropriate setting for their romance and continues the chase. She goes to a ledge and jumps into a pool of water to emerge without the stripe. Pepe is heart broken that his love is not of his species. 

            Bugs watches the new game show, "Truth or ..." We see Porky Pig tied to a moving belt that is propelling him towards a buzzsaw. Just before he reaches it, he answers the question of who invented the cotton gin. The answer is correct and so the host, Daffy Duck stops the belt. The next question is, "What was Cleopatra's aunt's maiden name?" Porky doesn't answer on time and so a safe is dropped on his head. Daffy says, "Guess who Miss Shush is and I'll give you $26,000,000.03. Porky guesses Lauren Bacall. Daffy says Miss Shush is behind the door. Porky Pig emerges damaged and angry. Daffy gives Porky the $26,000,000.03. Porky calls the network and finds it's being sold for $26,000,000.03 and so he buys it. Porky now makes Daffy a contestant and when he gets a question wrong a safe falls on his head. 

            Bugs makes Yosemite Sam a vice president in charge of specials, but Sam is plotting to be president. 

            We see the old cartoon in which Bugs becomes part of Elmer Fudd's hunting show but turns the tables. 

            Then we see the This Is Your Life parody in which Bugs Bunny is honoured and almost murdered. Bugs decides to quit, and Porky makes Sam president just so he can fire him and throw him out the window. Sam lands in a fountain and then says, "It's lonely at the top!" Bugs adds, "And wet at the bottom." 

            The back story of the second special is that it's the night of the Sportsman of the Year presentation. 

            The first sport is the ski jump at Lake Flaccid. The joke is that the jump is only a few centimeters. 

            In the high hurdle race, the contestants climb over the hurdles. 

            The champion diver and swimmer is Yosemite Sam. He is asked who his chief role models are. He says it was Fearless Frepe. We then see the old Bugs Bunny-Yosemite Sam high diving cartoon. 

            The next sport is badminton as presented in a Silvester-Tweety cartoon. Tweety is running from Silvester and hides inside a can of badminton birds. Silvester sees him but before he can grab him the can is picked up by one of the players. Tweety is batted back and forth for a while until Silvester knocks out one of the players and takes his place. He steps into the game and when Tweety is returned to him he opens his mouth. But Tweety drops a lit stick of dynamite down Silvester's throat. 

            Next, we switch to a beach where Daffy is a 5-kilogram weakling. He is lured by a hawker selling Atomcol for strong muscles. It's 10% tap water and 90% hot mustard. After Daffy tries some the hawker gives Daffy a set of what he says are 5000 kg barbells to lift but the bells are really balloons.

            Then we see the Bugs Bunny story in which he wrestles the world champion, the Crusher. 

            The baseball game is between the Schnooks and the Goons. The Schnooks star pitcher is Fauntleroy Flip. He's at-bat and the Goons pitcher throws an underground ball. Flip hits it with a golf club and it goes out of the stadium, but the Goons catch him out. The next batter steals home but the Goons' catcher hits him over the head and the umpire has to admit he's out. Flip pitches a slow ball that strikes three Goons out at the same time.

            Next a parody of Howard Cosell interviews Elmer Fudd about a boxing match that he lost but says he was robbed. We see that even before the fight begins the duck referee says, "No rough stuff. None of this ..." and he proceeds to elbow and kick Elmer to demonstrate what is against the rules. By the time the fight starts Elmer is hit over the head with a hammer and he is knocked out. Daffy is declared the winner. The moderator says that clearly Daffy Duck did win the match fair and square and we see that the moderator is also a duck. 

            Then we see the cartoon that features Bugs Bunny cheating at golf in Scotland. 

            Finally, the Sportsman of the Year award is given to Foghorn Leghorn, who wasn't even nominated. 

            The origins of Elmer Fudd are almost as disputed as those of Bugs Bunny. A possible prototype embodied in a character called Egghead first appeared in 1937. Others claim they were always distinct characters. Others still try to explain Egghead as being Elmer's brother. Some say that Egghead was based on Robert Ripley of Ripley's Believe It Or Not. The character called Elmer first appeared in Little Walking Hood in 1937 as a mysterious whistling man. Elmer changed his personality somewhat in 1939 when Arthur Q Bryan began doing his voice. Although he sometimes appeared with other characters, he is mostly identified as the main nemesis of Bugs Bunny. 

            I searched for bedbugs and found a black one with dark blood inside just to the right of the frame of the old exit door at the head of my bed. It was just below the location where I found one the night before. It might have been already dead as it fell like dirt when I poked it and didn't move after it hit the floor.