Bumper Sticker Smoking a Cigar

With all the talk about how great AI is in generating images on command, I decided to try it.  I tried to come up with something silly to challenge the magic of AI.  So I came up with, let's see, how about ... 

A BUMPER STICKER SMOKING A CIGAR

... and here are the AI results:

This is from "AIEase."  Cigar, yes.  Bumper sticker?  Nah ... I suppose the brown image is supposed to be a license plate, which is NOT a bumper sticker.  PS ... note the anti-vaping ad on the far right!  Was it prompted by my mention of a cigar and smoking???

The above is from Dezgo.  Another miss.

The above, from Artguru, seems to have two cigars.

Another license plate, from DeepAI.

All I know is, the AI at Perchance has a dirty mind and anime girls on the brain!  No bumper stickers or license plates in sight.

This amateurish illo is drawn ENTIRELY from shapes from Microsoft Publisher.  It's a line-drawing attempt at what I thought the magic of generative AI could provide.  IMO these attempts at image generation from text failed miserably.

See you on Thursday, May 1, for this year's MUSICAL MONTH OF MAY, with new music comps all month long --- starting with a special Walpurgisnacht concoction!  See ya then!

  

Soap Shapes Number Two

Ok, when I get a lot of soap scraps, I mash them all together and use the result as a new bar of soap, after soaking the mess for a day or two to make it squishy.

This means that Some funny shapes happen.

After a few days of this one compound, I set it down and looked twice.  I said, "Hmmm."

Suddenly I was hungry for barbecue!

Does this closeup make it plainer?

See you on Monday, my carnovorean compadres!

  

The Amazing Heroes Hoax Contest! – Part 2

Part 1 here.

To refresh your memory, here is the article from the April 1, 1985 Amazing Heroes.

Welcome back, fellow Super Sillies!

“The Man with Superman’s Heart” is an actual tale, the cover story for World’s Finest #189.  I covered it in a 2020 Super Blog post.

“The Secret of Silver Kryptonite” is the cover story for Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #70, cover-dated July 1963.

Almost certainly inspired by then-current Paul-is-dead rumors, “Dead … Till Proven Alive” led off Batman #222, cover-dated June 1970. 

“The Ransom of Superman” is another tale from Jimmy Olsen, issue 81, cover-dated December 1964.

The final story mentioned in this article, “Lois and Lana Join Forces,” is the SECOND fake story.  However, it’s modeled on an actual team-up in an issue of Superman’s Girl Friend Lois Lane from 1964.  Issue 52 narrated the two gals’ alliance against Illena, a temptress from the planet Kronal.  What’s really creepy is who Illena REALLY is.

And who would’ve thought that ANYBODY would keep Medusa’s head for thousands of years as a keepsake?

And, my friends, the April Foolery ain’t done yet!

The name of the magazine is not Monolithic Heroes!

Well, my friends, how did YOUR brain fare with this April Fool’s quiz on DC history?

See you on Thursday!

Sea Monster in the Clouds

On October 15, 2022, I was comin' up to the intersection of SW 44th and May in good ole OKC when I saw a suspicious cloud in the east.

And that cloud reminded me of a photo of a water monster I had seen somewhere.

It was this 1977 photo of Champ, the rumored critter of Lake Champlain, a body of water shared by Vermont, Quebec, and Vermont.

Here's a closer view of the cloud.

Just for fun, here's another similar image, from page 79 of the oh-so-fun 1957 book David and the Phoenix, by Edward Ormondroyd.  You can read an interview with author Ormondroyd here.

I encourage you to read that book!  It's so much fun.

See you Monday!

  

In Books Be Silliness!

Herewith are a few things which amused me in reading some of the three-thousand-plus books I have logged.

From page 176 of Philip José Farmer's The Fabulous Riverboat, we have a sentence towards the end of the big paragraph, "They had more gall than France."  This tickled me because I think Farmer was joshing about Gaul, the Roman province which included France.  You're familiar with the opening words of Julius Caesar's The Gallic Wars?  "All Gaul is divided into three parts," or ""Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres," as we learned in Latin Class.

I don't know if a computer is to blame, but here in Jon Burlingame's great book Music for Prime Time, we have an odd hyphenation.  That is, an odd NON-hyphenation.  I mean ... aw, shucks!  Shouldn't that phrase be rendered the same way ALL THE TIME, especially in adjacent sentences?

In the 2020 spy thriller Black Flag by David Ricciardi, we are told that "a croc's jaws were the most powerful force in the mammalian world."  Somebody tell this guy that crocodiles ARE REPTILES, not mammals.  Sheesh!

Well, that's enough silliness for today.  See you on Thursday!

  

Bursting with ... Something!

Joyce uses this facial cleanser, see?

And it's called "Morning Burst," see?

Only one problem ... when I see those words, my crazy mind goes to ...

... a DIFFERENT place!

See you Monday.

  

Soap Shapes Number One!

That is, the first soap shape this month.  The soap isn't really shaped like the number 1.

Here is a bunch of conglomerated soap.  But do you see the blue line on this side of the soap holder?

To me, that squiggly line of dried soap LOOKED like something.

The it dawned on me.  My soap is a champ!

If you see the resemblance, you're a champ too.  if not, see ya Thursday for something almost as silly.

  

Welcome to April Foolishness 2025!

The Amazing Heroes Hoax Contest! – Part 1

From the April 1, 1985 Amazing Heroes, we have a challenge from Mark Waid. He and AH editor Kim Thompson DARE you to find the two hoaxes in this article!

And I DOUBLE-DARE YOU!

*****

Well, my friends, have you guessed correctly? Or remembered your DC lore accurately?

“The Girl of Straw” appeared in Action Comics #356, cover-dated November 1967. And Waid’s synopsis is basically correct.

“The Night of March 31st” is another non-hoax. It was the third story in Superman #145, cover-dated May 1961.

“Lois Lane’s Singing Sweetheart” is HOAX NUMBER ONE. This tale did NOT appear in a comic, and this storyline did not appear.

BUT ... Lois Lane #9 DID contain “Superman's Mystery Song,” in which Boone and Lois co-write a song about Supes.

See you on Monday!  And ... come back on Monday, April 21st, for part two of this explication!

  

Oswald Got Around

If you believe papers like the Weekly World News.

Now you know the truth, kids!

See you on Thursday for the commencement of APRIL FOOLISHNESS 2025!

  

A Seminal Stimulant for Fan Rage

... That's this article by smug critic Edmund Wilson.

This comes from The Nation, the issue of April 14, 1956.

If you dug Wilson up and rubbed his nose in one of the five zillion Tolkien collectibles or books, would he keep turning that nose up?

See you on Monday, fellow lowbrow fans of Middle-Earth!

 

Super Sheets!

Yup, besides Super Clothes (search it in the SEARCH bar), we've got plenty of Super Sheets at our place too!

This coverlet was never thick enough to be called a blanket, but it was intended to go atop a bed.  It's queen size, or at least a LOT bigger than full sheets.

Evidently these characters actually appeared in DC continuity, in The Best of DC #58, in 1985.  Can we blame this for the whole John Byrne reboot?

Other notes about Super Jrs is here.

Believe it or not!  See you on Thursday.

  

National Lampoon Got Comics!

Yup, one of the things I loved about the good ole National Lampoon mag (along with the sophomoric nudge-nudge "dirty" humor) was the general references to pop culture.

For the purposes of today's post, that's Superman culture, kiddies!

The above is from the August 1981 issue.  But the next one is even better!

The genius of this little news blurb from the May 1981 NatLamp is the spot-on DC lore, and the demented idea of applying Kandor to this silly photo.

Bravo!  See you on Monday.

  

Lotsa Spirits Around Here

This is from the March 23, 1971 Look magazine.

I cadged this article because of the lovely photos of mysterious ruins.  It’s interesting that the typography of the opening text omits several periods at the end of sentences, as well as leaving the “I”s undotted.  Captions on ensuing pages often, but not always, omit periods too.

Before you ask, I don’t know where the last page is, which would have contained the rest of the dark yard of Jerpoint Abbey.

See ya Thursday!