Arte Johnson

            On Friday morning I worked out the chords for the chorus and the first line of the first verse of “Hey Mister Zippo” by Serge Gainsbourg. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the first of two sessions. I think the action is getting too high and so I might have to take it back to The Twelfth Fret for a set-up. 

            I weighed 87.4 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I sanded another quarter of my bathroom ceiling. What a mess and a pain in the neck! I had to change my shirt and socks afterwards. I had a surgical mask and sunglasses on but the rest of my face was white when I was finished. That’s half the ceiling. Once I get to the walls it will be easier. 

            I weighed 87.7 kilos before lunch. In the afternoon I took a bike ride and extended it to Vistek to ask about cameras to upgrade my video taking capability from the Nikon Coolpix. I went to Yonge and Bloor, then south to Dundas, west to Parliament, south to Queen and west to Vistek. They also had the Sony ZV-E10 and I was surprised they had it on sale. Downtown and Henry’s gave me the impression that the price on that Sony product is set and no one can sell it for other than what Sony says, which is $1000. But Vistek is an authorized Sony dealer and the sale price of $898 is also set by Sony so I made a good choice to come to Vistek last. After tax I paid $1014.74. It came with a memory card and I don’t know if it was a mistake but I got two identical battery packs. I told the salesperson that I bought my last film camera there over thirty years ago. She said they don't even sell film cameras anymore. 

            I weighed 87.3 kilos at 18:00, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the evening since April 3. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 19:15. In the Movie Maker project for the song “Joanna Dancing (Electric)" I finally managed to synchronize the Audacity audio with the video. Next I’ll save a copy as “September 3, 2023 Song Practice B” just in case there are any other songs from that date I want to make videos from. Then in “Joanna Dancing (Electric)” I’ll cut out all the other songs. I haven’t fully decided if I’m going to upload the electric version of the song to YouTube. I’ll see what I can do with the audio balance and the effects first. If it doesn’t sound horrible I might as well upload it. 

            In the Movie Maker project for my song “Angeline” I tried to edit the copy of the silent film Torrent at the end of the timeline but it froze and went black. Nothing from the main video crashed but just that movie. I figured it might be a memory issue and so I shut down Google Chrome and it seemed to work. I was able to cut out some parts of the film that have no mimed singing. 

            In the story so far Greta Garbo’s character is a very good singer but also a girl who loves the simple life with her family in their little house in Spain. She is in love with a young man whose mother has foreclosed on the mortgage of the family home. The family has decided to take advantage of the opportunity of their homelessness to take Greta’s character to Paris to seek her fortune as a singer. 

            I had a potato with gravy and four pork ribs while watching the last two episodes of the first season of Bewitched. 

            In the first story Samantha takes her mother to lunch at a place called Mario’s. Endora says it’s the best Italian food she’s had in the 20th Century. Mario tells them that his business is failing because of pizza. Pizza is so popular that it is pushing all of the other great Italian dishes out of the public consciousness. Samantha decides to help by using magic to add an extra page to the next day’s paper. The full page reads “Eat at Mario’s” with the address at the bottom. But Darrin’s client William H. Baldwin of the Perfect Pizza chain sees the ad and feels ripped off because all he got was a quarter page ad. Then Samantha is watching the TV spot that Darrin arranged for Perfect Pizza when Endora makes the announcer also advertize for Mario’s. But when Baldwin sees that he says he’s going to sue and he’s also canceling his contract with McMann and Tate. Larry Tate tells Darrin that he has a fear of being rejected and he’s been in therapy to treat it for seven years. When his psychiatrist told him he was cured and didn’t need to see him anymore he felt rejected. Baldwin goes to see Mario to find out the name of his advertizing agency. Mario says he has none and when he finds out Baldwin sells pizza he throws him out. Samantha and Endora decide to use witchcraft to save Darrin from losing the Perfect Pizza account. They follow Baldwin when he’s walking on the street and put sandwich boards on all the pedestrians to advertize for Perfect Pizza. Then they use sky writing. Then they even have a dog asking an ice cream vendor for Perfect Pizza. Samantha tells Baldwin that it’s part of a McMann and Tate campaign and so he renews his contract. 

            In the second story we are introduced to Samantha’s cousin Edgar who is an Elf. In this weird world Elves are apparently related to witches. Edgar doesn’t speak and his only power seems to be invisibility. He has always looked out for Samantha and now he considers the fact that she is married to a mortal as her being in trouble. He starts playing tricks on Darrin and the worst of them are played to sabotage the Shelley Shoes account. Darrin is made to fall, to fumble and to cause Mr. Shelley to fall as well. Samantha tries to drug Edgar with sleep inducing hot chocolate to keep him out of Darrin’s hair but he switches the mugs and causes Samantha to fall asleep instead. Finally Samantha appeals to Edgar’s desire to make Samantha happy and convinces him that Darrin is her happiness. Edgar proceeds to play the same tricks on McMann and Tates’s competitor. He also changes Darrin’s ads to an Elvin theme and Shelley loves it. 

            This was the only appearance of Edgar in the series. He was played by Arte Johnson, who was using Art E. Johnson when someone misunderstood and billed him as “Arte”. He liked it and kept it. He got his first job by stepping into an audition lineup for a Broadway production of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and won a small part. He earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Radio Journalism. He worked for Viking Press and performed in New York nightclubs. He was in the cast of the short-lived sitcoms Sally and Don’t Call Me Charlie. He co-starred on Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In from 1968 to 1973 and later Baggy Pants and the Nitwits. He created over sixty comical characters. He starred in the first season of the children’s show Hot Fudge. He was a regular celebrity guest panelist on The Gong Show. He did the voice of Mister Jaw on The Pink Panther Show and Rhubarb on The Houndcats. He hosted the short-lived game show Knockout. He co-starred in Love at First Bite. He played Finian O’Toole on General Hospital.