Bust-o-leum!

An annoyingly creative evening here at the ol' S&P...
So I'm restoring this gigantic upper-third-of-an-ape prop to hold up the bar on our deck, did I mention that previously?
Actually, to be more accurate... I am not restoring as much as repairing. Restoring would be returning it to its original craptacular state.
I am making it look better. Not perfect. Just... a lot better.

Sure, the teeth are still foam but go back and look at the original foam teeth. That's what it looked like when I first got it! This, with the help of my nephew Jack and his newfound foam-cuttin'/teeth paintin' skills, looks a million times better. Okay, a thousand times. The nose and mouth now have definition and perhaps a modicum of menace.
The eyes look much better too! Well, this one does. The other:
...has to look like this until tomorrow. Know why?
The bastards at Rust-oleum!
Does that not clearly say GLOSS PROTECTIVE ENAMEL? Is not the cap clear? Is there a sign, a word, a blurb, a hint anywhere on that can that says SHINY G**D**N YELLOW?
Of course not.

That left eye used to look just like the right one.
Until I deigned to give a bit of gloss coat to make it slick and shiny like the real deal.

Oh, I shook it, I sprayed it into the night air to make sure the coat was primed in the nozzle... and placed it a foot away from the eye. And sprayed.

Yellow. NOT like an old can of gloss enamel that has yellowed with disuse and no mixing. Like yellow. French's freaking mustard yellow. The school bus yellow that when seen in hot weather makes you throw up. The Gorton's Fisherman, The Man In The Yellow Hat (shoved into Curious George's eye so rapidly he melted) yellow!
Ye-llow!

I just cursed 'Kahn!' or something less palatable to repeat at the Skull & Pumpkin, and hopped for a minute, ready to... I don't know what.

Bad enough that the eye now made him look like the creepy old man from a Jane Goodall production of The Tell-Tale Heart; the fur around it was a dripping yellow slash. Like a Cher make up from the early 80's.

For a moment I thought Hey, I'll make it look like he stuck a banana in his eye! Yeah, I'm fairly dim at 11 pm.

I grabbed a can of cheaper and apparently far more reliable Krylon paint and sprayed the area brown. Eye too. Saved the fur from the Yellow Death.

I can repaint when it's all dried and ready for love again.

ON THE BRIGHT SIDE, it does look much more like a goofy, cool ape than it did before. Yeah it still has 'teddy bear' in its genes but it is a teddy bear that looks like a big gorilla, rather than the gorilla that looked like a teddy bear that it once was.

Look at the early pics! Look at 'em!

And Rust-oleum can spray it.
I have always had it in my mind that Rust-oleum was somehow responsible for Ozium. Now I'm certain of it.


Malem Ma Pakeno --