Balance With Love

Spent the morning running Valentine's Day specials and romance-themed cartoons as I finished this month's dusting. Bugs Bunny's Cupid Capers is another 70s-80s Looney Tunes special made of bits and pieces from shorts stuffed between a thin story. Bugs follows an Elmer-like Cupid as he tries to stir up love between the 'Toons, despite Bugs pointing out that he's really meddling. The DVD includes two additional shorts, the Tex Avery gag-a-thon "Holiday Happenings" and the Pepe Le Pew-does-the-movies tale "Past Perfumance."

The Disney Winnie the Pooh did two Valentine's stories. A Valentine for You has the 100 Acre Woods crew searching for the "Smitten" bug to try to get a romantic Christopher Robin back to normal. "Un-Valentine's Day" is an episode of The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. Pooh discovers a jar of honey on his front stoop for Valentine's Day, even though Rabbit  said not to send valentines this year. When word gets around about Pooh's gift, suddenly everyone in the 100 Acre Woods is giving each other some pretty wild valentines.

I dug out a couple of shorts, too. Chip and Dale compete for the affections of cute chipmunk singer Clarice in the classic short "Two Chips and a Miss." The Pink Panther finds a magic wand that enables him to help a poor girl win the rock star of her dreams in "Pink-a-rella." Oswald the Lucky Rabbit ducks into the five-and-dime to get out of the rain, but finds true love instead in the Universal Oswald short "Five and Dime" (based around the song "I Found a Million Dollar Baby In a Five and Ten Cent Store.")

Got one Peanuts love-related special in before I left for work. Charlie Brown falls for a girl he sees for five seconds on TV in a football stadium crowd in Someday You'll Find Her, Charlie Brown. Linus thinks he's crazy, but he becomes determined to find her anyhow.

Work was actually pretty decent for a holiday. It was a beautiful, sunny day. Almost everyone was in a really good mood. It was steady for most of the afternoon; I left just as the evening rush hour was beginning. What little snow we got last night was melting rapidly in the relatively warm weather, even as I headed to the Acme around 11. By the time I made it out, there wasn't a bit of snow left on the ground, not even in shady places.

I bought myself two Valentine's treats at work. I love York Peppermint Patties, especially when they have fun with shaped patties during holidays. I waited for the candy to go half-price at Christmas...and by the time I got to them, the Yorks were long gone. I wasn't going to repeat that mistake at Valentine's Day. I picked up the candy for $3.50, not that cheap but cheaper than they normally are. The big bags of red and green tortilla chips that the deli was selling for at least $4.50 at Christmas had been put on clearance for $1.59, cheaper than many bags of chips three times smaller. Great! I'd add spices to the Sloppy Joe mix from Tuesday night and have Burnin' Love Nachos for my Valentine's dinner.

When I got in, I put on a couple of Tom and Jerry shorts while I changed into work-out clothes. Even cats and mice can fall in love. Tom becomes smitten with a pretty girl cat, which doesn't sit well with Jerry at all. He finally encourages another cat to chase her as well in "Springtime for Thomas." Tom's jazz concert to that pretty kitty is keeping Jerry awake in "Solid Serenade."

Moved into yoga after the cartoons ended. I knew I wasn't going to have time for yoga classes this week, due to my odd schedule, so I decided I'd do some at home. I worked on the disc that concentrated on the rear and lower body. I kind of wish the DDP Yoga DVDs concentrated on the mind as much as the body, but I did get a good workout in.

After yoga, I swept the piles of sticker balls and twigs off the porch, enjoying the lovely sunset. When I went back in, I slipped on the two Peanuts Valentine's Day specials. Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown, is from the mid-70s. Linus buys a huge box of candy to show his teacher Miss Othmar how he feels about her. Charlie Brown would just be happy to get any kind of card, or just an acknowledgement that someone cares about him. And Snoopy is putting on very messy and melodramatic "paw-pet" shows.

Be My Valentine has always bothered me. I think it's actually a little too mean to poor Chuck. I've come to prefer the 2002 special A Charlie Brown Valentine. This one is mainly a series of gags revolving around the various unrequited Peanuts love affairs. Chuck loves the Little Red Haired Girl, but is too shy to get within a 100 miles of her. Lucy loves Schroder, who loves his piano. Sally loves Linus, who loves his blanket. Peppermint Patty and Marcie both have crushes on Chuck, who is too busy panting over his red-haired girl to notice either of them. Snoopy...just wants to write Valentine's poetry.

The students of Acme Looniversity have more luck with love in the first season Tiny Toon Adventures episode "Prom-ise Her Anything." While Buster is trying to learn the hot new dance moves and Babs is waiting not-so-patiently for him to ask her to the prom, Elmyra finally gets Montana Max to agree to take her. Monty stands her up...until the rabbits intervene on her behalf.

At any rate, I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day! : )