Unfortunately, the battery on my camera died so I don’t have very many pictures of this part of the process.

I first removed the lower jaw and then carved out an upper and lower palate for the bear. While I’ll fiberglass all of it, I’ll wind up cutting some away later giving the bear a hard and a soft palate. This will make the performer more comfortable, by allowing more air to flow through and also avoiding hard poky bits of fiberglass. I put the jaw back on for the photo so you can see how our bear will look with his mouth open. Isn’t that a nice smile?

In the profile, you can also see that I’ve removed his nose. I’ll be making the nose out of leather so it’s nicer to touch. I’m also planning on cutting part of the snout off and replacing it with foam, to make the nose friendlier. I’m expecting the bear to do a lot of hugging at the children’s hospital. If the performer misjudges the distance in a hug, which can happen when your nose is suddenly ten centimeters longer than it has been, then the softer nose will cushion any bumps. Besides, kids will like to squeeze it. I don’t know why but they always seem to do that with puppets.

Hey. I wonder what would happen if we put a squeaker in the nose. Hm… I might have to look into that, it could be very cute.

After this, everything gets vaselined and goes under fiberglass.

I don’t understand it. Helicopters? Giant marionettes? How in the name of all that is holy did I miss this?

There are so many pieces of footage for it.

How? How did I miss this?

Edited to add: Ah. I missed it because it didn’t happen. No one in Reykjavik saw it and it’s not in any of the papers. It is likely faked, but still very nicely done.

I have a weakness for napping in the sun.

A couple of years ago, Rob and I discovered the joys of Incubus, starring William Shatner, which is the only feature length film made entirely in Esperanto. The cinematographer was Conrad Hall (American Beauty) so it’s beautifully shot, but still… Esperanto. The point of this is that only phrase I can remember from the film is “reposi en la suno,” which means “to lie in the sun.”

Napping!

Since then, when the sun falls across the bed or the couch, I will sometimes announce that I am going to reposi en la suno.

It’s warm and cozy and, in Iceland, a rare opportunity. And what I’m going to do right now. Mmm…reposi en la suno.

Well. Extremely well. In fact, I think I just impressed my mother who is a fund-raising goddess. I tallied what has come in so far and shared the numbers with Jason. As of this posting, the raffle has made $1828.00. Jason did not get the 200 subscriptions he was looking for, but your raffle ticket purchases made up the difference.

The raffle is scheduled to run through Friday, and I’ll keep it open until then, as promised.

Jason and I have talked about what will happen to any money that comes in from here on. Two things. He’ll be able to raise the writer’s rates. Any remaining funds will provide a safety net for Apex; running a magazine is always a risky business, and Jason has high goals for Apex.

Thanks for making sure the Apex Digest sticks around.