spoonfeeding a walrus

Cocktails at the Center of the Earth

2009-06-01T22:08:00.000-07:00

At The Theater

2009-03-02T23:12:00.000-08:00

I'm also going to try and see more plays and stage productions this year, whether on or off Broadway.
My first trip to the theater this year was this past Sunday night to see Will Ferrell's show "You're Welcome America: A Final Night With George W. Bush". It was an experience, and quite funny.

This section will probably not get updated as frequently as the movies...

New Year, New Things

2009-01-05T17:54:00.000-08:00

2009. Almost a decade into the new millennium. I've been mostly disappointed with the decade thus far, but we won't go into detail about that.
Instead, the thing to do at the beginning of any new year is to look ahead, while simultaneously taking time to reflect on the previous year.

2008:
I worked a lot in 2008 and hopefully learned more about my "craft".
Don't remember anything else. Nothing stands out. Visited friends in various cities, and found that time marches relentlessly on. The ones who admired you once stop caring and vice versa. The nature of growing old I suppose.
It was a year of milestones for people around me, but just another normal one for me. No different than 1998 or 1988. And that is both depressing and comforting.

So the new year has arrived, and with it the initial urge to start anew.
I was let go from my job in the middle of December, so it is like starting over for me.
I am spending the month of January immersing myself in learning After Effects. And in order to do so, I will be making short little zombie movies. Exploding heads and gunshot wounds through the miracle of software! What better way to learn? I remember reading library books on special effects when I was in elementary school and it is the one remaining aspect of the filmmaking process that still invokes a sense of awe and wonder.

I want to spend the next several months rediscovering the filmmaking process and what drew me to it so many years ago. I want to fall in love with it again. Or it will be time to find something else to do. And that, my friends, will be most distressing.

I will try to post more on here, but since the only people who read this blog anymore are people in foreign countries looking for pictures of Paris Hilton in The Simple Life, is it even worth it?

Maybe a post or two about the results of my attempts to get in shape at least...

Voter Ennui

2008-11-01T07:11:00.000-07:00

David Sedaris has a funny piece in The New Yorker about those undecided voters during an election.

"...I look at these people and can’t quite believe that they exist. Are they professional actors? I wonder. Or are they simply laymen who want a lot of attention?
To put them in perspective, I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?”
To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.
I mean, really, what’s to be confused about?"

Joe Sixpack

2008-10-29T19:30:00.001-07:00

See more Thomas Haden Church videos at Funny or Die

How to Cope With Everything

2008-07-19T22:35:00.000-07:00

Not A Shadow in the City

2008-07-19T20:41:00.000-07:00

I've been working a lot recently. The show we're working on now seems to be just a series of crises. Everybody wants something different and they want it now. Fortunately, the vibe of the folks at this production company is upbeat and relaxed. No one wants to cut your balls off and run you out of town if you screw up. We've had to redo a lot of outputs because something changed or was overlooked and not changed. But it never feels like the end of the world.

As I was setting up a DVD layoff for an episode of another show we're working on, I apologized to the editor whose show it was for having to run it through again. He said, "No worries. If I had a nickle for every time I screwed up an output, I'd be retired."

This week, I've had some lax days that always end with a huge shitstorm of requests just as I'm finishing up. I usually end up working an extra three, maybe four hours. My day is like having a dog. You take the dog out repeatedly throughout the day for him to do his business, but he just lopes around, maybe squirts a little piss here and there, but never gets to the "punchline". The thing that worries you is that you've seen him scarf down huge amounts of food in between his little walks. But you keep taking him out, with a big WalMart plastic bag wrapped around your hand to pick up the pile when he finally lets loose on the sidewalk. No go, however. Finally, as you are ready to call it a night and go to bed he takes a massive dump in your living room, and it's huge. The work of six dogs. Or maybe a bear. And now you have to use a whole bunch of Walmart plastic bags and paper towels and bottles of Frebreze and it takes you forever.

But, as I said, the people I work with are fun.

The other day one of the girls said, "This is why I don't wear shorts to work. Everyone keeps commenting on my tattoos." To which the post supervisor quipped, "Yeah. I noticed those. Were you in some sort of lesbian concentration camp in the 1990s?" The joke failed, but in hindsight I find it funny.

Thursday, I went to see a midnight screening of The Dark Knight. I started talking with one of the story editors and she asked me if I knew anyone who wanted to see the movie. She had bought a ticket for one theater and her cousin, whom she was going with, had gotten one at a different theater. So she bought a second ticket for that theater and now had an extra one to get rid of. I forked over my ten dollars and she gave me the ticket. Luckily she didn't know that tickets for the movie were going for $50-$100 on craigsist!

The movie was great. But the pre-show was just as good.

I got there an hour early because I had nothing better to do after work (which is only a few blocks from the theater). I found a seat next to a gaggle of college girls. There was an empty seat next to me, then two guys, and an empty seat next to them. The theater was getting packed. I sat there reading a book. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a guy sprint into the theater, lose his footing on the buttered floor and do a faceplant. The slap as he hit the floor echoed in the theater and everyone erupted into applause. He got up and lightly jogged back to his seat. He was laughing with embarassment and the rest of the theater was just laughing. There were calls for an encore.

Then about two minutes before midnight, a girl and her boyfriend walk in to our row and ask if the seat next to me is taken. I say no and slide over, next to the two guys. Then she asks the guy on the far end of me if we can all scoot over one more spot. The guy looks at the empty seat next to him, then back at the girl and says, politely, "No."

"What?!" the girl squawks.

"I said no. But one of you is welcome to this seat."

She is incredulous and decides she needs to broadcast this event to the rest of the theater.

"There's two of me!! And you won't move over one seat??!"

"Nope."

People start booing, but I'm not sure if they are booing the guy or booing her. Probably both. People are having fun though with this evening's entertainment so far.

"Why won't you move in?"

"Because I got here early and found the seat I wanted. If you weren't walking in two minutes before showtime and telling me to move, we might be able to work it out."

I liked this guy!

"Why are you being such a dick?" she turned to the gaggle of girls I'd been sitting next to. "Am I the only one who thinks that's insane? I mean, there are two of me. What the hell."

There was a sense of entitlement the girl was exuding at that moment that filled me with the urge to slap her. You could tell by her demeanor that she was daddy's little girl and had probably whined her way into getting most of what she wanted in life. She was going to make some lucky man very miserable one day. I just wanted to go back to my book and not be in the middle of this.

"Why won't you move?" she barked at the guy.

"Well now you've insulted me so I'm definitely not moving now."

"What?!"

"You just called me a dick. That's no way to win favor with someone you want something from."

Meanwhile the boyfriend stood behind her and let her handle the negotiations.

"It's one seat! You just need to move over one seat! What the hell? I don't understand why you're doing this!" She was yelling. And the crowd around us was goading them on.

I, however, was getting frustrated. And I felt the rage building. Before I knew it, I had joined the fray and my voice drowned them both out as I screamed, "Are you a fucking child!! Do you need someone to hold your hand?! Sit the fuck down! There's a seat here and a seat there. You're a goddamn adult, now quit crying!!"

This stunned her and her boyfriend had his cellphone pointed in my direction. He then spoke into it: "Hear that? Yeah, I got you on speakerphone. Yeah, we're in the theater. That's the shit that's goin' on. I know, right?"

The other guy said, "If you apologize, I'll move over."

She did and he and his friend started moving. The friend leaned over to me, laughing, and whispered, "Now you should refuse to move over."

I thought about it. That would've been funny. But I'd already had my little outburst and I wanted to just watch the movie. So I moved over, the movie started and all was good.

On the train home, there was a skinny, old black man in a hospital gown and socks wandering back and forth on the car. Everyone ignored him. I did at first too. I started reading my book and just shook my head. After a few stops I thought to myself, "Maybe that guy needs help. I can ask. And notify the train crew. Did he just walk out of the hospital? He's got no clothes. I should do something." But by the time I had finished this interior monologue, he'd gotten off the train.

Today I went with Misha to the IKEA that opened in Red Hook. There's a free shuttle that picks you up at 9th and 4th and takes you there. I'd never been to IKEA before so it was a new experience. Being in places like that fills you with the urge to totally redo your home. Looking at different bedroom sets and kitchen sets and random furniture I envisioned several possible looks I'd like for my apartment. Until I realized the apartment I was envisioning was not actually my apartment and I should probably wait until I have the space for these things before I get them. I did buy a bunch of kitchen things, though, and picture frames for some of my old artwork.

Witch Prison 101

2008-07-03T13:07:00.000-07:00

So we had our opening night of "Witch Prison" last night and it went well. Good laughs in the right spots. My brother saw the show and said it flowed well with no slow sections. He said it was Simon's best work so far. Another guy I talked to after the show said he's seen Simon's literary progression and feels this is a culmination of everything. I definitely think this is the most completely realized production the Lion Pinball Players have mounted so far.

We are actually listed in the New York Times theater section this time around, so perhaps more people will discover the play and check it out.

I've taken the week off from work, so I can just relax and focus on the play. Which is nice.

Check out the play's website and reserve a ticket if you're not busy this weekend with your Fourth of July plans.

Reminders

2008-07-01T23:30:00.000-07:00

I found an old Word document journal entry from five years ago, when I was still living in New Orleans. It was one of three entries I made. I had just gotten my first computer and was trying to move my journal keeping to a digital format. Unsuccessfully. I still do most of my journal writing in longhand in notebooks. This blog sometimes takes its place.

There were two thoughts I had written down that I really liked, and think they're good inspirational messages to myself. They basically re-iterate the need to be productive and stop slacking off. And to think bigger instead of covering the same small bit of ground over and over again. To grow as an "artist", I guess. Either way, I kinda like them:

Do you want to go on safari or keep on shooting squirrels in the back yard?

I hear opportunity sneaking around outside, looking for the right door to knock on. Will I be ready when he finally figures out my address?

Another Hero Gone

2008-06-25T03:24:00.000-07:00

Click on the picture above to read some of George's insights...

Dancin' Machine

2008-06-18T23:17:00.000-07:00

Hangin' in Wilmington

2008-05-28T09:11:00.001-07:00

Dave & Abby
Originally uploaded by webeth

I got to meet the lovely Abigail Grace this past weekend. She's recently started walking. We went to the mall and she got new shoes, which was all she needed to really start trucking around.

It was a very domestic weekend, taking Abby on walks, shopping, feeding Abby, playing with Abby, buying and assembling deck furniture, and just crashing in front of the TV when it was all done. I don't know how Miss E does it all by her lonesome, but I'm quite impressed.

It certainly made me feel all mature and stuff, like I could actually do that someday.

Witches and Wardlocks

2008-05-22T12:41:00.000-07:00

You should come see the new play if you are in NY the first week of July. Here's all the info:

Witch Prison

Treat Your Mother Right

2008-05-09T09:28:00.001-07:00

To all the moms out there, Happy Mother's Day...

Charlton Heston Dead

2008-04-06T20:57:00.000-07:00

You can pry that gun from his cold, dead hands now.

Lion Pinball Players Return

2008-04-03T13:46:00.001-07:00

witchprison
Originally uploaded by mordicaicaeli

Simon had a read-through for his new play, "Witch Prison" on Saturday. We start rehearsals next week and look to have a preview performance in June I believe, with the official run being sometime in late June/early July.

Fun With Spammers

2008-04-02T17:54:00.000-07:00

I have a Myspace account. Everyday I get friend requests or messages from fake profiles of really hot women. They all say the same things basically. Always talking about being new to the internet or new to Myspace and then they give you an email address. I basically just delete and message or friend request that has a picture of a hot girl.

Today I decided to respond to one of the messages just for the hell of it.

And the spambot wrote back.
A really long message telling me all about what they are looking for in a man. Kinda presumptuous, I thought, since this isn't a dating site. It's just a site to get spam from.

So I responded again.

And their spambot generated another automated response.

So the DaveO5000 generated it's own nonsensical response.
And so on...

Here's the conversation thus far:

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Sherry
Date: Apr 2, 2008 10:32 AM

How are you
you sound really cool in your profile, let tell you about myself, I love to laugh and enjoy life to the fullest. Nothing in life is worthwhile without passion, I love helping people, I am very compassionate and caring. What more can I say, I have a great sense of humour, I'm looking for a mature relationship I have no time for games or lies though. I consider myself to be very independent and know what I want..................... This internet stuff is very new to me, I don't think that it is hard to meet and talk to people but The hard part is meeting quality, intelligent, not wasted people, I basically want someone that is going to treat me with the respect that I deserve. I believe that the three most important ingredients to a healthy relationship are , communication, honesty and Stability. If you don't have those, you really don't have anything. i am looking for someone that is kind, caring, sweet, nice, cute, smart, funny. I want someone to cuddle with and who will want to talk to me and tell me all about them. I would like someone that will listen to me and communicate with me. I am looking for some one that wants to spend as much time together, with me, as possible. And if they can't be there for me with affection, will call. Being held is the best feeling in the world. Ultimately I'm looking for someone that wants to fall/be in love and not afraid to show affection and be nice. I love to hear sweet words said to me. Someone that will want to be my best friend. Someone that doesn't need/have to go out and drink with his friends often. Someone that will hold me when I'm sad and comfort me when I'm afraid. let me ask you this question, what do u think are the best three trait to offer a partner? what happen to your last relationship?
here is my email adress/luvsherry1981@yahoo. com . thank you for reading

Sherry.

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Dave O
Date: 02/04/2008

i would love to hang out and spam people on myspace all day long.
sounds like much fun!
and you seem pretty old for the internet to be so new to you. are you from outer space? i think that is cool. i like outer space chicks. or maybe you are a time traveler from the eighteenth century? where are you from that the internet is so new to you? you look pretty classy for a poor person from the third world.

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Sherry
Date: Apr 2, 2008 3:26 PM

How are you and how is work, your health, and how's everything generally with you?i hope your fine and all is well with you.
Thanks for mailing me back and telling me more about yourself... Well i dont really know what you are looking and please i would like you to tell me the kind of woman your seeking for?i was onced really hurt and i got heart broken as i left my ex-fiance when i found out that he was double dating and also find out he was drinking alot. he always get drunk always and end up all his anger on me turning me to a punching bag. i was known in the hospital for caring sores and injury day after day. I just have to say Goodbye to this horrible life It was terrible life i live when i was with him that is why i have to relocate.. i was there thinking that i had found the right man not knowing he never loved me and that's why am trying this on-line dating maybe it would workout for me but i simple want someone to share it with. family is very important to me as is the idea of marriage. I am searching for someone who shares the following qualities with me. Thoughtful, loving, goal oriented, along with sense of humor. I love to laugh and smile. I also love to read, cook, and travel. My interests are many. I am honest, intelligent, loyal, affectionate, easy going, romantic, soft-spoken and sensual. I'm romantic, caring, and much more! I'm "crazy" about all pets. espcially dogs and cats. I love nature and I like to travel. I like books and reading Bible . I'm looking for for a partner for life.. are you the one?? Apperance is important but more importantly: Are you a loving guy,,,??? some times people select there love with age as for me i dont believe in age in a relationship all that l want a man that will make me happy so much and make mefeel so good and that will be faithful in all things that he told me that will be truthful to me I am actually educated just have neverfound a decent job that uses it. I am a person that use to be veryshy. I still am in ways, but in others I am a personate somebody. I kinda beensingle a long time. I really havent met any men that I really likedI guess. I kinda am looking for a funny, loyal, smart, and attractiveman. he doesnt have to be a handsome or rich but that will make me happy either just has to be some kinda spark there. anyway i just wanna let you know that I'm seeking a serious long term relationship and more. Someone special to capture my heart and knows how to handle it with care, one who will cherish me and be willing to share life's greatest joys and sorrows. Someone who's willing to spoil, pamper and love me unconditionally, whom is kind, sincere, honest, passionate, loyal, sense of humor, loving and wants a lifetime of passion. , so only serious inquiries will be accepted. I'm looking for a soul-mate... a best friend for life! Someone I could talk to about anything.... A good listener, smart and funny! I'd give the same to the ONE !! Who knows - may be you are my twin-soul? and have you check my profile anyway hope to here from you soon.

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Dave O
Date: 02/04/2008

Wow!
What a quick and lengthy response!
I don't want to be one of those people that always points out mistakes (not a good way to start out a relationship!) but I actually did not tell you anything about myself in my email. Perhaps you just read it too fast.
I was asking about YOU, silly!
Also I am not "seeking for" any particular woman right now. Let's not put the cart in front of the horse here. I just cyber-met you today! LOL. ;-)

I am sorry to hear about your ex-fiance double-dating. Did you go on these double dates with him ever? I must admit, I've been on a few myself and they are NOT FUN! One time I went on a double date and the other three told me they wanted to have a threesome, and I was all like, "Hello! There are FOUR of us, how can we have a THREEsome?" So I ended up leaving because who wants to hang out with people who can't even do BASIC MATH?

Also, I want to be up front here: I like drinking. I know that was a problem with your ex-fiance, but it sounds like he was drinking behind your back. I want you to know right now that I will not hide my drinking from you. I will drink out in the open. And I won't turn you into a punching bag... cuz I'm not magic! If I knew how to turn people into stuff I'd make them into something more useful than a punching bag. Like an ottoman, maybe.

You also say you were in the hospital with "caring sores". I am unfamiliar with this affliction. But I can imagine them. Kinda like "bleeding sores" but they bleed compassion and warm-heartedness. That must take a lot out of you. I am sorry you had to go through that. What a jerk!

I must say that I had trouble reading a lot of the things you wrote. Your grammar is very bad. It's like you are a barely-educated man from the Ukraine. I once dated a barely-educated man from the Ukraine, thinking it was a hot chick from Hawaii. I won't fall for that scam again! I had to double check your profile to make sure it wasn't another scam. When I saw that you were a hot chick from Littleton, Colorado I breathed a sigh of relief. Perhaps Littleton has a really bad public education system and that is why your grammar is so poor.

Oh, I'm criticizing again!
Sorry.

I know you said you were new to the internet, but I have to tell you that this is not a dating site. If you are REALLY looking for someone, you should probably look into one of those. It might be of more help.

That being said, I am glad you told me so much about what you are looking for in a man. You said appearance is important but being a loving guy is more important. I feel the same about the ladies. Actually, appearance is VERY important. I mean, you can be all loving and shit but if you look like Abe Vigoda, I'm gonna have trouble taking you to the altar. Your profile picture shows me that is not the case. In fact, you are so hot I have seen seven other people using your picture for their profile! You should maybe get a lawyer.

Can I be honest with you? You won my heart when you wrote that you were "actually educated just have neverfound a decent job that uses it"
We are peas in a pod my darling! I too have never found a job that uses my education. Actually I have not found a job at all, even one that requires no education. In fact, you may have to support me for awhile. But don't worry cuz I'm all that other shit you like: "kind, sincere, honest, passionate, loyal, sense of humor, loving and wants a lifetime of passion". That's me in a nutshell babe. You don't mind if I call you babe do ya?

Whew!
That was a lot.
But I figure since you wrote two very long emails, I had to return the favor.

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Sherry
Date: Apr 2, 2008 8:26 PM

It nice hearing from you. How are you and your family I hope you are in good Condition of hearlt .. How is the Nature of your Job, and the atmostpheric condition Over there? Hope your doing pretty Good. i spent my weekend just crying and right now am very sad and I am just starting to feel a little better now because am just heart brokeness recently by my ex-fiance and has ended me in a nightmare now well i really want to know about you well. Oh I was wondering, am glad to know that in the evening is when to find you online so i would try and be online so we could chat better, What kind of business do you do? I am so happy to read from you. I so much love what i read about you ,I like your profile and am impressed, about your profile . I think we have a lot in common, hey, we're a 87% match! . Honey am so sorry for giving you the wrong impression and i want you to know that your friendship means alot to me and i do not judge people from there e-mail and am not scared of meeting you its just that things have been hard for me starting my life all over again without my ex-fiance and that's why i need a good man like you to start my life all over again with because you sound caring,honest,fun to be with and sincere and responsible and most importantly you have sence of humour and i want you to know that i want a man who would be there during good and bad times,I'm definitely interested and curious in learning more about YOU. You can't believe me have being spending time with my friend who has turn Out to be my father and mother infact everything to me. Sho took me in without even asking a question just becouse she knows me verywell. Becouse when she was in the state i take good care of her like a sister, brother and family. It was so horrible for me.. I only heard the story when i grew up,I lost my parents when i was 8years,I didn't feel it that time until i know what it takes now. I could have run to my parents than running to friends and seeking for help I hope you wont hate me??? sometimes you laugh and sometimes you Cry that is just the game of life. I look forward to receiving a reply from you Honey

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Dave O
Date: 02/04/2008

You are so right. Sometimes you laugh and sometimes you cry. That IS the game of Life.
You just gotta know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em. Know when to walk away and know when to run! Trust me. There'll be time enough for counting when the dealing's done.

Thank you for inquiring about the nature of my job and the atmospheric conditions. It has been raining which always makes my work a tad dreary. I am responsible for the disposal of HR (human remains). The constant rain makes the blood and pus run something fierce. Oh well. Nothing a mop bucket and some bleach can't handle. My boss, Mr. Mandrake, doesn't like me using bleach, but he can suck it. This morning I scraped some fascia from the back muscles of a still born infant I was disposing of, and put it in his desk drawer. He'll get a nice surprise in the morning!

I'm interested that this friend you've been hanging out with turned out to be your father and mother! How crazy. Kinda like this dream I had where I was in my high school Algebra class but in Yankee Stadium too, but it was also neither. I can't really explain. You should slap your mom. Friends shouldn't morph into other people regardless of how they are related to you. Especially when you just found out your parents died when you were 8.

What is your favorite sea mammal?

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Sherry
Date: Apr 2, 2008 9:37 PM

please i want you to e-mail me down to my yahoo so that i can also send you more of my picture from there
luvsherry1981@yahoo. com

i will be waiting to hear from you there

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Dave O
Date: 02/04/2008

I can't email you down to your yahoo, though, because I don't have the Internet.

If I ever do, though, my email would be dipsydoodledavey4urluv@yahoo. com

You can send your pictures to me there and I will get them in the future. I must go save mankind now.

Can't Hardly Wait

2008-03-12T16:25:00.000-07:00

Twenty eight years ago, my favorite movie of all time came out.
In two months a new chapter hits the screens...

Legalize It Already

2008-03-11T04:00:00.000-07:00

Another politician felled by his own humanity. New York governor Eliot Spitzer is just the latest in an unending line of pols who've been caught with their pants down. If I were a politician I would have solved this problem long ago. I would have thought to myself, "A lot of us have been visiting prostitutes. Hmm. And we all control the laws. Hmm. I wonder how long it will take me to add those two things together and come up with a plan? Hmmmm."

I know this is America and we are the most sexually frustrated country in the world, but really, what's so wrong here? It is the oldest profession in the world. It will always be here. It always has. The government has no problem making money off of other vices, why is this one so taboo? Legalize it already people!

Not only do I think prostitution should be legalized, I think it should be subsidized as well. That could prove to be a tough one to overcome. I may be overzealous in thinking that I will see Universal Sex Care in my day, but I can dream. Until then I would settle for some sort of insurance plan. A $10 co-pay for a visit to a prostitute in my network wouldn't be horrible.

Sure the other side may argue that under a universal sex care package we would cease to get the quality we've come to expect. Is a BJ in Canada as good as one you'd get in the good ol US of A? Would the sex industry continue to grow if it was under governmental control? What kind of advancements in dildo technology will be made without the competition and encouragement of free market capitalism?

These are all questions that can only be answered by taking that first step. The Netherlands did it. Canada, England, Israel, France, Australia, New Zealand, and Nevada did it. Hell, even Iran did it. But can America do it? We used to be a country of pioneers. We used to be on the cutting edge. Now if the politicians would take a minute to think about ways to protect themselves from getting caught, we may get somewhere...

Sunnier Skies or Belly of the Beast?

2008-03-05T18:35:00.000-08:00

After six months of only intermittent employment I have come to realize it is time to move on. My love affair with New York is on the wane. I must follow the trail blazed by so many before me in the unending search for a better future. I need to go where there is the promise of work. I am moving to California. Los Angeles. Hollywood.

It's been beckoning me for many years. I knew I would heed its call eventually. Why did it take 34 years, though? Well, because I'm a bit slow. Practically retarded in some respects. It's been proven time and time again that I have a thick skull and must be beaten over the head repeatedly to notice what lies before me.

It seems my path is a switchback twisting through the mountains and I've found myself doubling back many times. I have finally reached a decent lookout point from where I can see the summit and am trying to discern a route that is more straightforward. And it appears that the next site on that route is L.A.

So now that I have a firm goal in mind, I can plan accordingly and begin to gather together the things I will need for this next adventure. It will take several months. I will probably have to get some wholly unrelated work to build up some cash from time to time.

I also want to start making a to-do list of things I want to do in New York before I go. It hasn't been all bad, but I've given the Big Apple almost 5 years of my life and I haven't gotten a whole lot back. A few more friends. Some varied experiences that could help later on. But nothing that is tying me here. I spent too much time here cursing the fact that I had no attachments in my life. I probably missed some things wallowing in self-pity.

If looked at the right way that loneliness can be a gift. I am free to do whatever the hell I want. For a man approaching his mid-30s with a Peter Pan syndrome, that certainly sounds like a good thing. I may never grow up, so it's off to Never-Never-Land to play for a few more years. And hopefully make some money doing what I love to do. Dream.

Old Interview

2008-03-01T20:43:00.000-08:00

Here's an old interview from 2006 that I did for Timecode:NOLA.
They've just started posting stuff on youtube and I stumbled across it.

Super Tuesday is Mardi Gras

2008-02-04T18:24:00.000-08:00

In honor of all those people who are either voting on who they want to run for president or getting drunk and showing their tits for beads (i don't know which is more degrading, but i know which is more fun)...

Burn In Hell Verizon DSL

2008-01-14T19:31:00.000-08:00

So my internet service has been going in and out every five minutes. I called customer support to see if there was a problem in the area perhaps, or if we had once again burned out our modem. We've had Verizon DSL for a little over 2 years and have had 4 modems die on us. I stopped sending them back and have started collecting them to see how many I can amass before I finally decide to smash them all with a hammer. Of course there was no real answer for why the internet was having problems and I can only assume that this shitty Westell modem is on its last legs.

I am full of hate. Verizon must be detroyed!

Duel

2008-01-05T15:03:00.000-08:00

I love this movie...

How Awesome Is This?

2007-12-17T15:28:00.000-08:00

An Old Spice commercial featuring Bruce Campbell singing a lounge-lizard version of Duran Duran's "Hungry Like The Wolf".
Brilliant.

End of the Year Mix

2007-12-15T08:17:00.000-08:00

There were a lot of good albums that came out this year.
I made a mix of some tracks from my favorite releases from 2007.
Unfortunately, iTunes doesn't have the new Radiohead album "In Rainbows", which is one of the best things to come out this year. So I had edit my selection of songs. If you have "In Rainbows" this mix should start with the song "Weird Fishes" and you can add it yourself.
Anyway, check it out over at iTunes:

2007 Mix

Picture Day

2007-12-07T22:36:00.000-08:00

They say a picture's worth a thousand words.
I want to know this guy's tale.

Early Gilliam

2007-12-04T22:31:00.000-08:00

Two animated short films by Terry Gilliam:

Storytime (1968)

Miracle of Flight (1974)

Early Kubrick

2007-12-04T21:59:00.000-08:00

Stanley Kubrick made 3 short documentary films before turning to narrative with his first feature film "Fear and Desire". I've always wanted to see these four films but they're not readily available. Thanks Youtube.

Day of The Fight (1951)

Flying Padre (1951)

The Seafarers (1953) Part 1

The Seafarers (1953) Part 2

The Seafarers (1953) Part 3

Fear and Desire (1953)

New Orleans to New York

2007-11-27T14:05:00.000-08:00

Footage from my move up here in 2003.

Signing Off

2007-11-14T13:46:00.000-08:00

Check out the WGA's blog with all sorts of interesting tidbits about this strike.

I read an article yesterday about entertainment bloogers going on strike as well, in support of the writer's strike. I thought that was funny. But then I thought: "Hell, no one reads this blog anyway and I'm hard-pressed for a reason to actually keep it going. Why don't I say that I TOO am striking in solidarity to cover up the fact that I really don't feel like writing on here?"

Good idea.

So yeah. That's where I'm at.
Maybe when the strike's over I'll have something new to write about. Maybe not.

Adieu...

Didn't Even Have To Use My AK

2007-11-13T15:51:00.000-08:00

It was a good day.

Thanks to my landlady's tendency to hold off on cashing the rent check until the week before the next one is due, I have narrowly avoided financial ruin.
This afternoon the first check from my handful of freelancing gigs arrived in the mail.
I hurriedly went to the city and deposited it into my account.

I've been checking my balance daily for the last couple weeks, waiting for the rent check to clear. I've mentally taken it out already, so with each day I was prepared to find my pre-vized $1.95 ending balance become my actual $1.95 ending balance.

After depositing my check, I passed by a sushi bar that was closing for the evening. They were selling their remaining boxed suhi meals for 50% off. I was able to get some spicy tuna, salmon, and vegetable rolls for a total of $6.25.

I have a paid focus group on alcoholic beverages to attend tomorrow evening and a friend called and said she has some work for me next week.

Not exactly a windfall, but anything is welcome at this point.

NaNoWriMo Is Here

2007-11-04T12:06:00.000-08:00

Yes. November is National Novel Writing Month and, as I haven't been working regularly and find myself spending hours and hours in front of my computer at home whiling away the hours, I decided I'd join in the fun and try to get something productive done.

I was also asked by a friend a few weeks ago if I'd like to join her writing group, so I'll be working on stuff for that too.

Originally I had intended to use NaNoWriMo as an excuse to finish my years-in-progress New Orleans novel, but since they frown on bringing previously written material to the table I figure I'll workshop that book in the writing group and work on a completely new novel this month.

Ambitious? Yes.
But why not give it a shot?

Cops and Luchadores

2007-10-24T13:48:00.000-07:00

Last night I edited a trailer together for the film I was editing this spring/summer.
I was just playing around with some new film filter plug-ins for Final Cut. The film is supposed to be a Mexican action film from the 70s, and I think the trailer looks pretty close to something like that. Aside from the font I used in the beginning.

So True

2007-10-23T16:10:00.000-07:00

Poll: Bullshit Is Most Important Issue For 2008 Voters

Dwindle, Dwindle, Little Star

2007-10-19T12:57:00.000-07:00

Lord grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can, and
the wisdom to know the difference.

It appears that one of the things I cannot change in my life is the always prevalent lack of money. In 33 years I still have not learned a damn thing about money. When I have an income it just passes through my hands like water. I get overzealous and say things like, "I am going to pay back my debts and get back on top".

Unfortunately, poverty is always lurking around the corner, and if I kept my wits about me when I was flush I would laugh and say, "My student loan lenders can continue to go fuck themselves. Who do I look like, Warren Buffett?"

It's never a smart move on my part to think I'll have money next month. Because, as the years have proven, I most likely will not.

I should stop buying things I don't need, yes. But those are the only things that give me enjoyment in life. What's the point in living if you can't own the Super Deluxe Special Edition Boxed Set DVD of your favorite movies?

Mystery Solved

2007-10-08T10:07:00.000-07:00

The riddle of the employer who set up an interview with me without my knowledge has been cracked.
Turns out a friend of mine had sent my resume to the executive producer over at Time. She hadn't told me this before. They're staffing up right now and she told me to "impress them". I was also told that they really like her so I have a leg up already, which basically means that if I fuck this up I must really suck.

Back To The Well

2007-10-06T12:18:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday I went to West Chester to film a reunion show of some old friends' bands. It'll be part of a longer documentary that my brother and I are working on about the whole punk music scene in our hometown in the early-mid 90s. I got some great ideas for the doc while I was filming and also lined up a bunch of interviews with people. Also talked some other people who were there filming to work with us and let us use their footage.

I had only planned to stay for the night, but since I didn't have a job to go back to, I ended up staying at my parents' for a week. I only brought one change of clothes, so I ended up doing laundry every day I was there.

It was a good thing I stayed too because my imagination roamed free for the week and I had quite a few ideas for films. Being back in the area where I was most creative got the juices flowing again.

A few weeks ago my friend Andy and I started brainstorming on various movie ideas that either I had or he had via email. We've been riffing off each other's stories since we were in kindergarten, so it's pretty easy and we have similar tastes a lot of the time. It's been a big help in getting me out of the creative funk I've been in. We hung out one of the nights I was there. We ended up NOT going over story ideas and spent most of the night watching clips on YouTube of people getting prank calls or doing faceplants into brick walls, but it was good nonetheless. On the drive back to my parents', he told me of his idea for a children's show which I thought was great and I look forward to brainstorming that soon too.

Now I am back in New York and need to get my ass back in gear. I got a message from a woman at Time Inc. about rescheduling my Wednesday appointment. The thing is, I don't remember ever setting up a Wednesday appointment. I googled the name of the guy whose office she said she was calling from and turns out he's a film/tv editor, but I absolutely have no recollection of ever setting up an appointment or even sending them a resume.

When I called back, there was no answer and it went directly to this guy's voicemail. I didn't want to sound like an idiot who didn't remember setting up an appointment, much less what this interview is for in the first place, so I just said, "Yeah, hi, ths is Dave Orsborn returning your call. Um, yeah, it would be fine to switch my interview from 11 to 2."

So I've got several days to figure out what this is about. And work on some much-needed writing now that I've got a head full of ideas again.

I Feel Irrelevant

2007-09-27T14:12:00.000-07:00

I do.
There's not much more to say about that.

I can relate

2007-09-19T10:34:00.000-07:00

Whatcha Doin' with Yerself?

2007-09-18T20:04:00.000-07:00

Job hunt still going.

I've plotted out an idea for a screenplay I want to start writing. I figure with the time I have off, I should start working on something. Something of my own.
If I push myself, maybe I can get something finished. Problem is, I really like sleeping.
Been doing a lot of that the last week and a half.

I Googled myself and found that YahooTV has updated my profile. I don't know who they have researching all that stuff, but it's cool to see that someone is keeping tabs on you. Of course, they have my birthdate as November 30, 1999. Guess I'm pretty productive for a seven year old.

Read an old article about a research study that discovered that sunlight deprivation shrinks mice's brains. I was trying to find out if there were links between my recent case of severe depression and my working overnights for the last year and a half. Interesting.

Someone on MySpace linked to website that gives the number one song for any day you want to look up. The gimmick is that the number one song on your 18th birthday is supposed to be the song of your life. I'm not sure if Mr. Big's "To Be With You" define's my life per se, but it's fun to look up what was the hit at certain times in your life. It's useless and random, but I like knowing that Terry Jacks' "Seasons In The Sun" ruled the airwaves the day I was born.

Met this girl Rachel at a party the other night who is a published writer. She has a short story collection out and just finished her novel. I picked her brain about the life of a writer and pitching to book editors and agents. Told her about my New Orleans novel and how I'm restructuring it as a memoir. She says that's the new trend for books and that it was a good idea to do it that way. Her husband and I talked about comic books and how the porn industry dictates which distribution format is gonna be the next big thing. (They were the first industry to fully embrace VHS, then DVD, and now they're all about HDDVD. Sorry BluRay.)

Aside from these things and sending out my resume, though, most of my time is spent sleeping and watching TV.
Ah, freelancing...

Last Night of Work

2007-09-09T22:36:00.000-07:00

Tonight is the last night I'm working on this particular show and I've got this Beatles song in my head:

the roof is on fire

2007-09-07T04:05:00.001-07:00

the roof is on fire
Originally uploaded by photophobia

Contrary to popular belief, every now and then I DO crack a smile and enjoy myself. A couple weeks ago our friend Guevara threw a rooftop party at his digs in Chinatown. Jeremiah and his ever-present camera captured this as-of-late rare moment.

Done part 2

2007-09-06T02:48:00.000-07:00

I quit my job last night.

As I was setting up to online a sequence for previews I came across a what-we-thought-was-tragic technical problem.
It was not looking good and I was fed up and the supervisor was freaking out and I told him, "I can't do this anymore."

He looked at me with an open mouth and didn't speak.

"I just can't do it anymore, man. I'm afraid to even touch a computer for fear everything is gonna get fucked up. The level of problems on this show is beyond my level of experience and I can't help. I'm sick of it. I'll finish out the week, but I need to put this behind me."

Just a blank stare.

I eventually got things fixed and went back to working. Unfortunately, my co-worker has been sick the last two days, adding to my workload and stress. I have extreme difficulty multitasking and there is too much of that here. When I am focused on one job I can really get into it. But when I am pulled in 14 different directions at once I can't take it. I malfunction.

Later the post-supervisor called and tried to make nice, but I just wanted to leave. He said, "Well, episode 2 premiered tonight and it was a big success. Everyone's happy with it."

I didn't answer.

Done

2007-08-30T06:39:00.000-07:00

14 hour workdays. Constant computer malfunctions. Headaches. Nausea. A steady stream of stressful bullshit.
"Dave Orsborn's gonna kill someone, Dave Orsborn's gonna kill someone," sings my coworker as I scream obsenities at the latest system failure. We are not doing anything of value to society I remind myself. We are burning the hours of our lives away in a basement in Hell's Kitchen to put together another fucking reality television show. And we are working on computers that were built ten years ago. We've got a couple of hang-gliders and we're calling ourselves an airline. I come home miserable and exhausted and go to work dreading what's in store.
And I ask myself, "Is this worth the toll on my mental and physical well-being?"
My co-worker tried to quit last week and let the post production supervisor talk him out of it. Can't let myself be swayed like that.
I get woken up with angry phone calls from the daytime assistant for not being CC'd on emails.
The show is a train wreck. It'll be a miracle if it comes together.
We are not saving lives. We are not doing anything constructive for the world. Can't let the stress get to me anymore. I am exhausted. I am depressed.
I am done.

Congratulations Samantha!

2007-08-24T08:52:00.000-07:00

My sister got engaged last night.
Here's to you and Joe!
Much love,
Dave

Keep Storage Legal

2007-08-16T16:04:00.000-07:00

Finally! A place to keep all those aborted fetuses that have been littering my apartment!

Beats Getting Shivved in The Yard

2007-08-05T00:19:00.000-07:00

Ah, the Philippines. In order to get the inmates to participate in the daily exercises, they devised a synchronized dance program. And it's gone over like gangbusters!

In fact, the warden has a deal in the works with a US film agency to distribute their videos.

Dang Blast It!

2007-08-03T09:21:00.000-07:00

I am sick again.
The third time this summer.
I got sick once or twice a year before I moved here.
New York has ravaged my immune system.

Tell Me Something That Doesn't Suck

2007-07-29T12:37:00.000-07:00

Bought a new phone last Monday.
Not even a week's gone by and none of the buttons work now, so I can't use it. Kyocera sucks.

We got our fifth new modem in the last 2 years on Tuesday. The most recent one died when the power went out a few weeks ago during a thunderstorm.
It's raining today. The internet goes out every half hour. DSL sucks. Verizon completely sucks.

Cover Your Ass

2007-07-25T12:42:00.000-07:00

"One thing about this business you gotta get used to. Whenever you're not around, someone's blaming you for something."

So said the new assistant I work with as we tried to reorganize all the work that's been done before us in order that the editors can better understand where everything is. We have to make everything so clear a five year old can understand. But that's our job.

I noticed that some of the editors were shutting down equipment improperly and leaving workstations a mess. This is something I was told not to do, so I mentioned it to the supervisor, see if we can't all do things the same.

"That's the problem," he laughed. "It's really their perogative to do whatever they want. And it's my job to tell you when you do things wrong."

"So even if they do something wrong..." I said.

"...It's your fault," he finished.

Ugh.

We've also tried to streamline our work to do it as fast as possible and with a minimial amount of effort on our part.

Said my co-worker: "An old school grip once told me, 'I want to do as little as possible and get paid the most for it.' "

Words to live by.

New Orleans Post Apocalypse

2007-07-18T17:03:00.000-07:00

There's a web comic online that I just discovered called After the Deluge, about New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina. And, it turns out, one of the characters in the comic, Leo, is a guy I used to work with at the Virgin Megawhore. In fact all of the characters are real people, telling their real stories of dealing with the hurricane and the rebuilding afterwards.

Looks pretty good so far.

Currently Enjoying...

2007-07-18T00:15:00.000-07:00

A Root Beer flavored Dum Dum.

The Pool's Open!

2007-07-10T03:42:00.000-07:00

I forgot what train I was on this morning coming home from work and ended up several avenues from where I wanted to be. I decided to walk home rather than backtrack on the train.

When I got to my neighborhood I decided to take a walk around the park to see if the pool had been opened yet.

It has! And what's even better, there are adults-only hours in the early morning so I can swim when I get home from work in the morning. Hot damn! Because it is sweltering in my apartment now and it makes it more bearable to know I only have to go three blocks to jump in the pool if it gets too bad.

Providence Attacks!

2007-07-03T15:39:00.000-07:00

My friend Billy and I went up to Providence, RI on Saturday to see our friend Neil perform at the Providence Improv Festival with his improv group Dr. God.

Traffic was backed up everywhere. There was a two hour wait to get over the George Washington Bridge, so we decided to keep going north (we were in Jersey, coming from Hoboken) and use the Tappan Zee bridge. It was then that Billy asked me if I remembered the directions.

He didn't print them out because they seemed pretty easy. I told him that he should've used GoogleMaps and asked why he had chosen GoobleMaps. He said it just took a bit longer to translate the directions from Russian to English, but it sure beats WikipediaMaps. The problem with WikipediaMaps, we agreed, was that the directions are measured in "paces" and all the destination points are marked by a large X under a palm tree. You usually have to travel through a Thieves Forest of some sort and a Dragon's Glen.

We got there with enough time to knock back a few beers before the show. The bar next to the theater was pretty empty, but within ten minutes of getting our beers, it was beseiged by a group of 30 people looking to do karaoke. Billy informed me that as he was returning from the bathroom he saw a fight between four guys, arguing over who would get to sing "Ace of Spades".

Later we discovered that these karaoke addicts were in town for the Transformer's Convention. I didn't know that there was actually a convention devoted to Transformer's fans. Now I do. And so do you.

We ended up drinking until the early morning and then crashing on the floor of Dr. God's hotel room. We left early to get Billy's car out of the parking garage we had left it in, only to discover that all the gates were closed.

We called the number for the security group to open the gates.

"Yeah, we don't usually open until noon." Well, that makes sense, we thought. Who wants to get up that early on a Sunday? As it was 10:45 am we decided to wait and just walk around the town.

Everything was closed.

It appears that Providence does not open until noon on Sundays.

We returned to the garage at noon and it was still closed.
It was still closed at 12:30.

Eventually I noticed a tattooed kid and some guy entering the garage and opening a gate on the other side of the garage. We walked around as a car pulled out of the open gate and the tattooed kid started walking away. We approached the gate and it started closing!

We both contemplated diving under the thing like Indiana Jones, but then we'd be locked inside.

"Hey man!" I yelled.

The tattooed guy turned around.

"Oh man," he said. "You got a car in there too?"

"Yeah. Can we get it."

"OK. Hey, uh, listen, we're supposed to charge ten bucks for opening the garage after hours."

When we entered the garage it said it was ten dollars to park there, so we weren't paying any more than expected.

"Sure man, here"

"Yeah," the guy said. "The garage is closed on Sundays, cuz it's like, the summer, and stuff..."

"You guys should put up a sign to let people know that," Billy said.

"Oh man...there's no sign?"

"No," we both said.

"Shit."

Providence being the kind of town that doesn't open until noon, we could totally understand why you would close a parking garage on Sundays becuse it was the summer and stuff.

See You At The Bar-B-Q

2007-06-24T20:26:00.000-07:00

I've had bible thumpers and born-agains ask me time and time again if I was interested in spending eternity in heaven, and when I've said no they were baffled.

"But wouldn't you want to live in paradise?" they ask.

"Sure. But if it means I have to spend eternity with you, then it's not really paradise is it?"

I've always seen religion and it's focus on the afterlife, as a convenient way for some people to shirk their responsibilities as a human being. "I can turn my back on the suffering and misery around me and know that I will be saved and go on to greener pastures when I'm dead because I go to church every week and I've been re-reading the same book for my whole life."

Then, of course there are those nutjobs over at the Westboro Baptist Church. You know the folks who run GodHatesFags.com? They just hate everyone. Makes an old Gloomy Gus like myself want to go out and adopt an African child and start a shelter for abandoned animals. I mean, they can really suck the life out of a room!

And now, the WBC has released a music video of their hit, "God Hates The World".

Television Youth

2007-06-16T02:12:00.000-07:00

The great thing about YouTube is the ability to relive your childhood in less-than-2 minute increments. Just watching the opening credits to cartoons and shows I was weened on brings on a wave of nostalgia. This is just a sampling. As you can see I grew up on a lot of fantastical junk. Explains a lot actually...

Spiderman

Flash Gordon

Battle of the Planets

The Banana Splits

Tales of the Gold Monkey

The Incredible Hulk

The Six Million Dollar Man

The Fall Guy

"Tell Me About That Novel You Been Workin' On"

2007-06-12T04:42:00.000-07:00

Nearly ten years after I started writing it, after numerous computer crashes and losses and rediscoveries and false-starts, and at least 300 pages of semi-enjoyable prose, I have finally settled on a structure for my "novel". I use the quotes because it has become more of an interconnected collection of short stories/memoirs.

Now, the re(al)-writing begins...

The Illest Mother*!@#er From Here To Gardenia

2007-06-08T15:54:00.000-07:00

Being sick in the summer sucks.
I haven't actually tasted a meal in over a week.
What's the point of eating?

There's about four other people in my office that are sick. The girl who started this all is feeling better now. Screw her. One co-worker is on serious anti-biotics and will probably get better before me. Screw them as well.

There's only enough room for hate in my thoughts right now. All the other space in my head is being occupied by excess mucus.

The other night as I walked to work in a cloud of Acetaminophen and Phenylephrine (aka Tylenol Cold&Flu), I realized that I can pretty much pinpoint when I moved to New York as the moment I stopped enjoying life so much. I don't know why, cuz I still love this city more than any place I've lived. But I've kinda stopped "living" since I've been here. I'm doing things I've always wanted to do and making progress in different areas, but it all feels so mechanical and empty. I'm only half here. My soul's moved elsewhere and I can't find it.

This is the funk I find myself in.
Being sick in the summer sucks.

Sense Memories

2007-06-07T23:53:00.000-07:00

Drinking Red Bull when you're sick and congested tastes like jumping into a heavily chlorinated public pool and getting water up your nose. A bland anti-septic flavor. I am reminded of taking swimming lessons at the old Brandywine Inn across from the Downingtown Farmer's Market, as a child.

Several weeks ago as I was walking past Greenwood Cemetery, and smelled the freshly-cut grass, I was suddenly taken back to the summer of 1989, as my friends and I began working on our first "feature film" (on videotape). Always having delusions of grandeur, our first undertaking was a medieval sword and sorcery epic. As such we spent most of the summer dressed as knights and peasants, charging through backyards and fields with plastic swords and wooden shields. Every evening I'd have to shower off the wet blades of cut grass that caked my legs. It was a wonderfully fun summer, hanging with friends, running around like idiots, and capturing it all on video to watch again and entertain ourselves. Perhaps that's why I never finished the film and kept working on it for the following three years. It was too much fun to actually want to complete it and move on!

Simpletons

2007-05-29T14:44:00.000-07:00

So the other day I saw an advertisement for the new season of The Simple Life with Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie. It is called The Simple Life Goes To Camp.

In light of Paris being sentenced to jail time recently I had to wonder whether the cameras would follow her there for The Simple Life Goes To Jail.

Which then made me realize they are just ripping off the Ernest movies.

Here are my ideas for future installments of The Simple Life:

Hope for the Ugly

2007-05-23T04:19:00.001-07:00

Where does one go to meet women like this?

Damn You WebMD

2007-05-21T23:05:00.000-07:00

So, thanks to information on the internet, I've diagnosed myself with cancer.

The other day I noticed a painful lump on the back of my head near the top, then yesterday my neck started getting sore, and today I discovered another lump on the back of my head on the left side, even with my ear, and one developing in my neck on the left side.

Upon looking up information on the internet, I've come to the conclusion that I have cancer and my head will explode within a fortnight.

Actually, I'm not too worried about it yet. If the lumps persist for a few weeks, I'll get it checked out by a doctor.

First Days

2007-05-20T09:59:00.000-07:00

“Live each day as if it were your last”

That is one piece of advice that I don’t like.

I understand what is meant by the phrase, but in my reality, living each day as if it were my last would be the most counterproductive thing I could possibly do. I know this, because I have lived a few days as if they were my last, and they were god-awful.

If it were my last day, I wouldn’t get much done.

Knowing that tomorrow I will be dead would make me extremely choosy about what I would do on that last day. I would have trouble accepting invitations from friends to do anything, constantly thinking to myself, “Is that really what I want to do with my last day?”

Where would I want to eat my final meals? Who would I want to spend my final hours with? Do I really want to spend my last day going to work?

I think, if it were my last day, I would get really depressed about the things I haven’t done yet. Even if I got out of the house and did one of the things I wanted to do with my life, I couldn’t enjoy it really because I would constantly be thinking about the million other things that I am not able to do because I am spending my last day doing this.

And if I knew about the inevitable end in the coming hours, I would want to spend the day tending to my affairs and getting things ready for my being dead. Who has time to bungee jump from a helicopter over an active volcano, when I’ve got all this porn to delete from my computer? I really should clean the apartment too. And make sure my living will is up to date and my accounts are settled and I should send an email out to some people I haven’t talked to in a long time and there’s that Netflix movie I should mail back… There are pressing things that must be done before one dies!

So I would rather live each day as if it were my first.

I think it would be more beneficial to experience the world with the wonder of a newborn. There are so many things to do and learn and you’re pretty fascinated by it all.

Almost everything is more interesting when it’s new. A new love. A new job. A new car. Your first day of school.

Why wouldn’t you want to experience each day with that excitement of new possibilities rather than the dread of thinking you’ve wasted the last day of your life eating bad Chinese food from around the block and watching the season finale of “Heroes”?

Kick the Baby

2007-05-18T00:41:00.000-07:00

Maybe this is why they invented the baby leash...

Oh, and don't forget to enjoy the remix of that video:

In Memory

2007-05-10T01:41:00.000-07:00

I was looking around on MySpace at work tonight and discovered that an old high school friend had passed away. There were comments on his page saying how much he'd be missed. I went to the obituary section of The Daily Local News' website and discovered that my old friend Ken Miller had died this past weekend.

Ken had recently gotten in touch with me on MySpace and would occasionally send me messages about "the old days". Not that we were close friends, but we did run in the same circle.

He leaves behind three daughters, and if you remember Ken, or just feel like doing something good, you can make a memorial contribution to Hudson L. Voltz, PC Trust Account, FBO/Kenneth S. Miller III Children Educational Fund, 525 Highland Blvd., Suite 107, Coatesville, PA 19320

Nag Nag

2007-05-07T12:37:00.000-07:00

"These cell phones are the new ball and chain," the man said to me.

We were standing by the back exit on the 63 bus to Bay Ridge. There were no seats available and, as it was 3:30 in the afternoon, the bus was filling up with school kids. He was an older man than me, somewhere in his late fifties or sixties. We were both jostled about as the kids poured on.

"My wife," he said. "I can't get away from her. Always calling to find out where I'm at."

"Just don't answer your phone," I offered.

"Nah. I tried telling her the battery's dead, but she don't buy it no more. Jeez. These things..."

He pressed the sensor strip to signal the driver he wanted to get off. The bus careened past two stops.

A man behind us got up and yelled, "How do you get off this thing??!!"

The bus pulled over at the next bus stop.

"What're ya, off to the races?" the man next me said for the bus driver to hear. He stepped off the bus, and nodded back to me as he did.

His cell phone began to ring, and he shook his head, laughing.

Another Weekend

2007-05-06T18:51:00.000-07:00

Saturday afternoon I went down to Park Slope with the intention of getting a book or two at 7th Ave. Books, my favorite used bookstore.

On the way there I discovered that there were people having stoop sales on nearly every block. And, since Park Slope residents tend to be well-read, every stoop sale was selling old books. I hit about five different stoop sales, and picked up about 12 books before I even got to the used bookstore. And none of them were more than a dollar apiece!

Misha and I went out for drinks Saturday. At the bar, I overheard a girl behind me say she was going to a Cinco De Mayo party and remembered that a guy I work with was having a party, so we hopped a train up to Hamilton Heights and drank with a bunch of young twenty-somethings whom we found completely uninteresting.

There were bowls of NYC Condoms around and I inexplicably grabbed a handful and stuffed them in my pocket, as if I will have a need for them ever. Last time I actually bought some they sat around for a couple years until the time came to use one and it exploded into a cloud of dust as I tried to put it on.
If anybody does have a use for them, let me know, I'll send 'em to ya.

Afterwards we went to a bar in the East Village that Misha had stumbled into Friday night and was excited about because they let you smoke inside and girls danced on the bar. They were showing the De La Hoya/Mayweather fight there and it was packed and we had to wait until the fight was over and the place cleared out before folks started lighting up. Then a not-so-attractive girl got up and danced on the bar. It was not the diamond in the rough dive bar Misha had raved about and I left shortly afterwards.

Saw Spiderman 3 this afternoon and was completely bowled over by how incredibly lame it was. I usually accept the inevitable cheesiness factor when I see a Sam Raimi flick, but watching this made me feel like the fat, Gluttony victim in Seven, being force-fed Kraft Mac And Cheese dinners. The last half-hour, I think, was actually directed by Oprah Winfrey, and each character got to have a five minute crying scene where they got in touch with their feelings and sought forgiveness. I was waiting for Dr. Phil to step up to Spidey and The Sandman and help guide them through their emotions. Aunt May had so many "old wise man" speeches, I fully expect her to be sporting a Fu Manchu 'stache and living at the top of a mountain in Spiderman 4. When it intends to be funny, the movie is pretty good. The Bruce Campbell scene is classic! But Sam Raimi's never been very good at subtlety and when he tries to tackle intimate human emotions, the movie blows up in his face. Please Sam, do a non-Spiderman movie soon! You've clearly OD'ed on the guy.

In Brief...

2007-05-05T00:47:00.001-07:00

Steve's friend Marsha used to be a personal assistant to Robert DeNiro and, as such, she gets free passes to the Tribeca Film Festival each year. Which she apparently never uses. So Steve convinced her to let he and I use the passes. We picked them up yesterday and saw Julie Delpy's film 2 Days in Paris, which I thought was very fast and funny. I enjoyed it a lot.

This morning I checked out Ed Burn's most recent effort Purple Violets, a less-than-stellar film. Ironically, I thought Delpy's film felt very "New York", with it's fast-paced editing and breezy chatter, whereas Burns, a born New Yorker, delivered a slow, plodding film that got caught up in too many cliches. Note to self and other filmmakers: I hate seeing "artists" in films talking about their roles as "artists" and how they have to sell out to survive. It's an old idea now. I have a lot of friends who are painters and writers and "artists" and we don't sit around and talk about the nature of art and how we must get back to the true essence of the creative force within. Well...not all the time anyway.

I was set to see two more films tonight, but this afternoon Marsha called my brother and said her sister was in town and she wanted to use the passes this weekend after all.

So I only got to see two films! And they were both romantic comedies about people in their early-mid 30s, having life/relationship issues. There were a few horror movies I wanted to check out and a couple of comedies, but alas, no such luck.

I have a big fascination with making lists. I like to make lists of things I've done or plan to do, books I've read or plan to read, music I've bought or plan to buy, movies I've seen or plan to see, etc. Last night I stumbled upon a site, that is all about that. It's called All Consuming and it allows me to keep track of all the crap I consume! I've added a little "Currently Consuming" section to the right of this blog, and I've just begun to catalog the many book, movies, cds I've consumed. It's a great time-waster for a big dork like myself.

I thought this story about the Iraqi Parliament's plans to take the summer off was just hysterical. I don't know, for all the talk of democracy failing over there, it appears that they grasped a fundamental aspect of American politics: the strong aversion to work.

I am for some reason really bothered by these little signs on the doors at Burger King that read: Buh-Bye!, then ask, You out? Thanks for stopping by! I hate when corporations try to be all hip and NOW and try to talk to people in street vernacular. I know that is so very 90's of me, but c'mon...if Burger King does want me to have it my way, can you please NOT remind me of David Spade's remotely humorous stewardess character on Saturday Night Live. I just ate.

While checking out some reviews on imdb, I discovered the next William S. Burroughs. His use of the English language is very unique and creative. Reminded me of the cut-up technique. At first I was put off by lines like "some people may have avoided watching this movie due to it's short footage but this movie changes the chronicles of many people's unchangeable thoughts over the footage of a movie", but after trying for a few minutes to figure out what exactly this guy was talking about, I decided that he was a Dadaist toying with the nature of language, quite possibly a genius, and none of us layfolk will ever understand the enigma of Evren Buyruk.

A Year in Comics

2007-05-03T01:34:00.000-07:00

I started collecting comics again about a year ago. One of the first that I picked up was 52, a weekly, year-long comic that DC Comics put out, with multiple, intersecting storylines involving just about every character in their fold. Today, issue 52 of that endeavor was released. The story has come to a "close".

While I bought comics now and then when I was a kid, I can't say that I was ever a "collector" until now. As my friend John has pointed out, "Kids don't collect comics. What kid has the disposable income to spend on comics every week? You need a job." And at $3 for a single issue, he's absolutely right.

It's nice to have a hobby again, but in the last year it's cost me a couple thousand dollars.

Master Thespian

2007-05-03T00:46:00.000-07:00

I went to an audition today for a short film a guy I work with is producing. It was actually the first time I ever really auditioned for something, so that was interesting. I didn't have a headshot, because I've never really fancied myself a "real" actor, so I quickly threw together a resume and photoshopped an old picture onto it. It took me all of twenty minutes. Fifteen of those were spent trying to figure out what film and theater productions I've been in and what I should include.

There's a funny dichotomy between my "film roles" and my "theater roles".

Casting Agent: Ah, I see you played Guildenstern in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Oh! And I see you've played both "Street Thug #1" and "Mugger" in several films.

Often, when I'd be working on friends' films, I'd be asked at the last minute if I would care to play some punk bad guy. Nobody ever casts these roles, it seems, and just try to find the scariest-looking crew member to fill in when that shot finally comes around. And often, that crew member was me.

This particular role called for someone who could be either 25 or 45, the character being an alcoholic pizza maker who may or may not have spent time in prison. Again, my natural features came in handy!

It was fun to actually read for a part I probably will not get. I've been spoiled. I've acted now and then because I was asked to, not because I wanted to pursue an acting career and went after the roles on my own. I enjoyed experiencing that part of an actor's life.

The Die Hard Music Video

2007-05-01T11:16:00.000-07:00

I found this video on someone's blog and had to share.

A Karmic Spendthrift Am I

2007-04-26T01:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I awoke to the twittered chirping of a dying car alarm. Instead of the annoying sequence of whoops and whirs, all it could muster were quick beeps, albeit repeated beeps that continued uninterrupted from 8am until 5pm, when either the car battery died or the owner came home from work and stopped it.

As a result of this noise pollution, I couldn't really sleep in.

I decided to return a pair of jeans I had bought over the weekend that, upon bringing home, I realized I didn't fancy at all. So I hopped the train and went to the Atlantic Station mall.

As I was leaving Old Navy, having successfully exchanged my jeans for a proper pair, and buying a shirt and some boxers, I was approached by a homeless woman with sparse facial hair. she asked if I had any money so she could eat.

Coming out of a store where I had just spent $50 on clothes, I didn't feel right telling her I had no cash. So I reached in to my front pocket to fish out a single dollar. My fingers fiddled amongst the crumpled cash in my pocket and pulled one out.

Damnit! It was a five!

"Thank you so much," she said.

"Oh wait," I stuttered. "That's my only five. Here," I bluffed as I reached back in to get one of the singles I had originally planned on giving her.

When I handed her the ol' Washington, her smile dropped.

"Nevermind," she said. "That's not enough for a hot dog."

I turned to the hot dog vendor behind me and realized that he was charging $1.50 per hot dog. I motioned for her to come with me and we approached the cart.

"Tell the man what you want," I said.

"Two hot dogs," she told the vendor.

"Two? Lady, you're gonna break the bank!"

"It's just...I'm sick from hunger...and I really..."

"M'aam," I said. "I'm kidding. What else? Would you like a drink?"

"A Sprite," she said.

"Two hot dogs and a Sprite for the lady," I said to the vendor, handing him the five I had originally pulled from my pocket. The total came to four dollars. I took my dollar change and started to walk away.

"Thank you for your kindness," she told me.

"You have a good day," I said, then walked off.

I felt like I had created a little bit of good karma in that transaction. The sun was out, it was a warm day, and I decided to walk around for a bit before catching a bus home.

And then I immediately wasted that niblet of karma, by following an attractive hipster girl an extra two blocks out of my way because her purse was inadvertently causing her skirt to hike up as she walked, allowing me a view of her underwear.

Are You Now, Or Have You Ever Been?

2007-04-21T10:38:00.000-07:00

I just got home from a long night at work. It's noon. It's a beautiful day. I'm tired as all hell.
But I can't sleep.

Why, you ask?

Because the Communist Party is outside my window, yelling in Spanish over a loudspeaker attached to the roof of a parked U-Haul truck.

As I don't understand Spanish I had no idea what they were talking about, but after about twenty minutes of some woman telling what seemed to be a short story, I wandered outside to find out what was up.

That's when someone on the corner handed me a "Revolution" newspaper. "voice of the revolutionary communist party, usa" it read underneath the banner.

Then I wandered across the street to a small shop and bought a $25 Power Player Nintendo Super Joystick that holds 75 games and attaches directly to the television.

I'm gonna play Super Mario Bros. and Contra until the revolution is over and I can go to bed.

Break the Chair

2007-04-21T03:29:00.000-07:00

"If a broken chair has more latent resonance, potential meaning, than an unbroken chair, then break the chair."

A short documentary with director Mark Romanek

Short Film Don'ts

2007-04-16T23:43:00.000-07:00

I've been editing a short film for some friends for the last couple of weeks.
They were trying to finish it by last Friday in order to submit it to the NY Latino Film Festival. They were still shooting as of last Sunday, and I was rushed into trying to whittle 10 hours of footage into a decent 20 minute film.

In addition to my regular job.

It was somewhat of a nightmare and I kept telling them they should take the time to edit it into a decent short, instead of rushing to just have something to submit. There was so much to edit. It's a parody of 70s Mexican action movies and there are multiple action/fight sequences.

It's a cool little short and I burned myself out trying to piece it together. The encroaching deadline was driving me nuts!

By Thursday morning at 11 am, I had completely a very rough cut of the entire piece. There was still a lot of sound work to do. At 3pm Thursday one of the producers called and told me they were taking my advice and were not going to submit it the following day and instead work on the editing more.

I breathed a sigh of relief and took the weekend to restore my energies. I didn't return any of their phone calls. I just wanted to relax.

And I needed a fresh perspective.

During the week, as I was editing scenes, I kept seeing the mistakes that countless beginning filmmakers make. I made them too. Twenty years ago, but I made them too. I started jotting down a list of things I never want to see again. My first big word of advice to a young filmmaker is to take the phrase "one more for safety" (when the crew shoots one more take of a scene or shot after the feel they have gotten a good take) out of your vocabulary. It really means "one more to waste time". If you have a shot, move the fuck on! This particular film took an average of seven takes of every shot and then ALSO did a "one more for safety" shot! It was so ridiculous that they took a "one more for safety" shot of a cutaway of someone's hand!! I'm not slighting these people. I like a lot of the stuff they shot. But after sifting through 20 half-hour miniDV tapes looking for usable shots, I was just a little perturbed.

Anyway, as I was jotting down my list of "do's and don't's", I remembered a similar list I had read in Wholphin, a DVD magazine put out by the fine folks at McSweeney's. There was a list compiled by a film festival worker/organizer, who has seen his fair share of short films. This was less technical and based more on the "stuff" young filmmakers tend to shoot. His list is pretty funny.

In fact, I think I have, in my own film work, done every single thing on this list!

"Since 1993 I’ve worked for film festivals and the last four years I’ve seen literally thousands and thousands of shorts. I’ve noticed filmmakers have a few tendencies that I’d love to never, ever see again. Please, just challenge yourself and don’t do this.

1. First shot is an alarm clock waking up the main character. This only worked in Meatballs.

2. Drinking from a Jack Daniels bottle. Always straight from the bottle, always Jack Daniels. It hurts worse when it’s someone who looks 19 trying to portray Bukowski.

3. Five minutes of opening credits for a 10-minute film. I don’t know any of the names. No one does. If we love the short we will wait around and see who made it.

4. Super hot sex scene with the actors still wearing their underwear. After having great sex, no one makes sure the sheet is covering their boobs in real life.

5. Movie posters on the wall. Of better films.

6. Camera in the car trunk, mailbox or refridgerator.

7. Office scene with everyone sped up.

8. Narration, narration, narration.

9. A “short” that is 40 minutes long.

10. Plot about people trying to make a film (that includes you, frustrated writer and actor going to auditions).

There has never been a good mockumentary short and only two good silent film-style films, not including Guy Maddin.

And these characters need to take a break: ninjas, mimes, drag kings, bondage gear man, bunny suit girl, a woman who is really a robot, a jerky landlord trying to get the rent, characters swearing they’ll be friends forever.

Note: This is not a judgement of what’s good or bad, just some things that pop up… a lot. I had to get it off my chest."

How Much Does Yahoo Suck? Let Me Count The Ways

2007-04-03T04:03:00.000-07:00

I cannot log in to my Flickr account because I had to create a Yahoo account in order to do so and somehow when I was doing so it made me create a different username so that the one that is associated to my account is not the same as the one I must use to sign in, but it is the same as the one that is associated to my email account, but my email account is associated to something entirely different now and it says it does not exist in the world of Flickr, but I received an email saying that my mail from Flickr would continue to be sent to that email address and notified me of a different username that I should be using, but when I try to sign in it says that the zip code associated to that account does not match the one on file so I try a different zip code and then it lets me proceed to the next level of security questions which is what is my father's middle name and there is only one correct answer there but somehow whenever I enter it it says that I am wrong and I can't for the life of me remember what name I could've possibly mis-typed if that's the case and there is no way to access my account in any way whatsoever and all I could do was send an email to them requesting that they go fuck themselves.

So that account exists entirely on it's own now. I can neither update nor cancel it because I am not authorized to do so it appears.

The Lookout

2007-04-03T00:34:00.000-07:00

Oh yeah. So, the reason I started reflecting on my handicapped life yesterday was the fact that I saw a movie called The Lookout, which centers on a brain-damaged protagonist played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt being manipulated into taking part in a bank heist.

The trials of his daily life rang very true, I thought. I believe the film does a good job of capturing the confusion/frustration felt by someone suffering from a brain injury. Having to write everything down, learning how things should fit sequentially, creating patterns in your life. All well done.

If you want to see a good movie, check it out.

Coma, Coma, Coma-chameleon

2007-04-02T02:43:00.000-07:00

I think one of the biggest mistakes I made in life was not really dealing with the effects of the brain injury I received when I was 20 years old. Thirteen years later and I am noticing some accelerated deterioration in my mental abilities. I laugh it off and make jokes about it, but I'm really afraid that within the next ten years I won't be functioning at all.

I remember one of my therapists in the rehabilitation center telling me that all my psychologists and therapists were afraid to discharge me because I hadn't "dealt with the emotional and psychological aspects" of my brain injury. I was making progress physically: learning to tie my shoes, learning to walk, learning to pick up objects with my left hand (which had been paralysed and balled into a tight fist for almost a month). But I never really acknowledged the fact that I may never be who I was before and I hadn't shown any anger about what had happened. This worried the docs.

But I just wanted to be myself again. To return to my old life and pick up where I left off. And my family and friends wanted the same. I remember my father telling me, "If you fall off the horse, you gotta just get back up and keep riding".

And so I picked myself up, brushed off the dirt and jumped back in. Without considering how my life might be different now that I've suffered this little injury.

And it was not like any of my friends or family knew any better. They wanted me to be my old self too. I was treated with kid gloves for a couple months, but soon it was "back to normal".

But a lot of the things that I later discovered are symptomatic of head injuries, started popping up. And fucking with my life.

I had a girlfriend who broke up with me because she said I'd lost all my ambition after the "accident". She said there were two ways of dealing with a "set-back": "You can pursue things with more determination, or you can just blame other people. And you chose the latter." OK, but this was six months after my injury. And neither of us knew that my "lack of ambition" was a result of more serious issues inside my head.

I've gone through a multitude of jobs over the years and I've been fired from quite a few of those. Often I forget to do things if they are not written down and I have trouble multi-tasking (unless everything is written down for me). If I am in the middle of doing something and one person asks me to do something I am alright. But then a third person asks me to do something. So when I finish my first task I do what the third person asks me to do and completely forget that I even had a conversation with the second person. Which is really not an appealing thing for employers. I have, on occasion, carried a notebook with my to jot down "things to do" as they occur. Though, this too is not appealing to some employers. Why should they bother with someone who has to write everything down in order to remember to do it when there are plenty of able-minded people who can do the job faster?

A lot of the time I would get angry with people out of the blue. And then forget about it and wonder why they're upset with me.

I think I was always moody and depressed. Even before the injury. But It's been a more daily occurance over the last thirteen years.

I never saw these things as results of my brain injury. And they are not so severe that I think I'm any different than other people. I mean, everyone has memory lapses. Everyone has gotten on a train, spent 45 minutes commuting, only to get off at a stop and realize you can't remember why you got on the train in the first place. Right?

I've started telling stories that go nowhere. I will start talking to someone and realize half-way through that I don't know the point of this tale and I am no longer interested in telling it. Sometimes I actually stop and just say, "That's it. nevermind."

If I'm with a group of friends in a crowded place I usually can't focus on the conversation (unless I'm telling a story that goes nowhere) and end up staring off into space a lot.

I feel my grip is slipping each day.

I looked up a list of side effects to brain injuries recently to see if I'm just getting old or if my waning brain activity is a result of my accident:

Difficulty remembering/learning check
inability to concentrate, understand complex issues, plan, make judgements or think quickly check
Irritability check
aggression the number of fights I've gotten into in the last 13 years is kinda ridiculous. Especially for someone who can't fight
restlessness I am writing this little blog entry because I can't sleep. check.
lack of spontaneity check
childishness just because I think farts are funny doesn't mean I'm childish
apathy i couldn't give a shit
mood swings check
depression check
excessive emotions (ie laughing, swearing or crying excessively or other inappropriate behaviour) AHHH! Fuck shit damn I hope you die. Nah. I'm cool.
self-centredness a BIG ol' check here!
lack of ambition surprised I had the drive to write this blog entry
changes in usual personality I'll let people who knew me before weigh in on that

Well, as is my MO these days, I don't have an ending for this story. I don't even know why I started writing it.
So there it is.

Voicemail/Answering Machine Messages

2007-03-25T10:49:00.000-07:00

I'm quite sure this has been a topic covered in someone's stand-up material, but I have to mention it.

It's 2007.
You do not need to leave instructions on how to leave a message on your answering machine or voicemail. We know how to. So unless you're expecting a call from someone who just woke from a 20 year coma, "I'm not in, leave a message" will suffice.

We do not need to be instructed that there will be a beep and we should begin our message after it.
We do not need to be told to leave our name, number, and reason for calling. This is common practice now. If we really want you to call us back, we'll leave all pertinent information.

Some cellular companies also provide this extraneous information as part of their voicemail system, so after I've listened to you ramble on about how to properly leave a message, I have to hear an automated female voice reiterate the same crap.

And by that point I've eaten up a good chunk of minutes on my cell phone and am seriously debating whether I should waste more airtime to leave you a proper message or just hang up.

Finally!

2007-02-26T05:55:00.000-08:00

Big Dork Weekend

2007-02-25T15:37:00.000-08:00

I went to the NYComicon this weekend. I bought a lot of comic books and graphic novels, sat in on a few horror movie discussion panels, I even (*gasp*) got a poster signed. (In my defense, it's a poster for Hostel 2 that Heather Matarazzo, Richard Burgi and Eli Roth were signing and giving away. I didn't seek them out to sign it.)

Anyway, I let my inner geek come out to play, and he had a relatively good time.

I passed this one booth where a guy was selling bootlegged DVDs of complete crap. But on a quick perusal of his wares, I thought, "maybe this guy has some interesting hard-to-find stuff".

"Can I help ya pal?"

"Do you have Mr. Mike's Mondo Video?"

"Wha-who?"

"Nevermind, " I said, and started walking away.

"Whoa! Hold it! You just hit me with a thing I never hearda. I mean what is this? This lady here," he said pointing to a woman behind him. "She comes at me with this obscure TV show and now you pull this rabbit outta nowhere. Like a one-two punch and I'm K-O'd. Jeez..."

"It's a movie that one of the original Saturday Night Live writers..."

"Oh! SNL. I got that! SNL Season 1 right over here."

"Yes. I see. You've got a lot of wonderful bootleg copies of things you can find in any store on the planet," I said picking up a bootleg DVD of Kill Bill Vol. 1, the faded home printer-made insert looking even more amateurish upon closer inspection.

"I mean, really, what are you offering?" I asked. "I thought you might have some rarities of some sort. Ya know, maybe in that stack of Star Wars DVD rips, you'll have a copy of The Star Wars Holiday Special or something. I mean, at least the Chinese woman selling bootleg DVDs on the subway has bootlegs of movies still in the theater. What's the point of a bootleg if it's something you can find in any store for less than what you're charging?"

(The Kill Bill Vol. 1 DVD I was holding was selling for $25. You can buy a proper edition of the film at Target or Best Buy for $12.99!)

I left him to think about that and wandered over to the gaming area, where they had tables set up for people to play a variety of roleplaying games. Along the wall of the room were booths where various people were doling out autographs. In one corner, sitting all by himself looking sullen, was Gary Coleman. There was no one in line to get his autograph. I thought about asking him to sign the one sheet I picked up for the new David Fincher film Zodiac.

"I ain't in Zodiac, man!"

"But it'd be cooler if you were! 'Whatchoo talkin' 'bout Zodiac Killer?' Sign it like that!"

Alas, I didn't.

I eventually ran into my co-worker John and we spent the rest of the day checking out the horror panels for Hostel: Part 2, The Hills Have Eyes 2, and the Showtime series Masters of Horror.

Also swung by the Pokemon booth to say hello to Sarah, who was signing autographs for kids and creepy old men. (She does the voice for the character Ash on the show).

And now I shall finish this weekend of dorkdom by watching the Oscars.
And then working 8 hours loading footage of the damn things for a daytime talk show's Oscar Night wrap-up.

What's Bugging Me

2007-02-23T07:53:00.000-08:00

Farts that don't come out the way you'd expect them too. Particularly those sneaky ones that crawl forward and tickle your taint. You can feel these little fart bubbles trundle out and get trapped beneath you, and maybe a few scouts will sneak up and explore around your balls (if you're a man. I'm sure women experience this too, sans ball excursion). And then they just sit there for awhile. Taunting you. Making you wiggle and squirm, attempting to pop these little stink blisters.

Cheesy Wedding Video

2007-02-17T13:08:00.000-08:00

I shot my friend Chris' wedding last year and I never got around to editing it. His wife has hounded me about it for the last year. I apologize. I'm a slacker.

Anyway, as I was putting the video together I decided to do something cheesy and fun with the footage. Sort of as a bonus feature for their DVD.

Wedding videos are pretty well-traveled ground, so this was just an exercise to keep me from getting too bored as I was editing the real thing.

The Trappings of Midget Bowling

2007-02-16T23:34:00.000-08:00

There, there, young Finn
Your neatly ironed curtains are far too thin
And the pineapple of your mother
Has taught you to never feed a Swede

Ohmigosh, the cat has jumped its bail
Now everyone can own a copy of
Uncle Seamus’ bagpipe records

And you thought whistling Dixie
Was an innocent way
To earn your wooden nickels

Lo and lo, the doughboy sings
His wretched tale,
But the creeping custard
Buys some time for Wily William Walker’s
Plan to highjack rickshaws

Run, Chinaman, run!
And bring us to the setting sun
Where elephant boys in coats of dreams
Sautee themselves in rocky streams.

i wandered lonely as a crowd

2007-02-16T23:29:00.000-08:00

There’s a me on every corner,
and we don’t look
too amused.

Faux-Date Dot Com (Addendum)

2007-02-16T20:33:00.000-08:00

This is a recent message from another "member" on this site.
Again, this is the only message I got from this "person". Again they try to make me feel like shit and guilt me into paying for the service. Nice try fuckers!

This one was titled: "Guess You Really Don't Care"

It's very odd that I still haven't received anything from you after about 4 or 5 emails. I was simply asking if you maybe wanted to hang out sometime but guess that's to much for you. Im a straight froward person that doesn't play games when it comes to something I want.

Like my money, huh?
I suppose they'll suspend my account soon, for failure to play along. I imagine there's some mafioso sitting in front of a laptop, thinking he's got a sucker on the line and he's getting frustrated trying to reel me in. So frustrated he misspelled "forward".

Faux-Date Dot Com

2007-02-16T07:37:00.000-08:00

As regular readers may already know I tried signing up for an online dating service several years ago, only to be denied membership. The authorities believed I was such a lost cause they wanted nothing to do with me. You can read about that here.

Well, several years have passed, I'm still eternally single, and I found myself bored and in front of the computer on Valentine's Day. So I decided to take a crack at that online dating thing again.

It was a sham... as expected.

Within minutes of signing up I received 6 messages. I checked their profiles and they all seemed pretty cool. Except for the fact that they were from either Albany or Syracuse. And two from Ventura, CA! I tried to respond to one of the emails that intrigued me. I then realized I could not reply to those messages unless I got a "pro" account for $29.95 a month.

The funny thing is, some of these messages are cleverly disguised as honest messages from real women, but they are just ploys to get me to turn over my credit card information.

I'll take you through some of the emails I got:

This first one entitled "Screw This Holiday" was received about 2 hours after I had signed up on the 14th:

I messaged several people including you 2 days ago asking what you had planned for today and I didn't receive a single response. I can understand if you were already taken but at least let me know. Guess its a little to late to do anything now.

Wow! That made me feel kinda bad right from the start. I can understand if you were already taken but at least let me know. I felt guilty for not contacting this woman before I joined the site! Here I am, 2 hours into my online dating life and I'm being yelled at by some crazy "woman"!

This was the first, and only, message I received from this "girl", but she was sure she'd contacted me before:

You got anything going on tonight. I sent you a couple of messages a while back and didn't receive a response from you. Thought you might of wanted to hang out tonight being that its valentines day and all and I don't have a date. Let me know if you have something going and if your interested. Hope to hear back from you this time.

The subject line for this email read: "Very sensitive, with a loving and caring heart, likes to help those who have less."

My friends say I have "butterfly magic" in social situations, whatever that means ;) It's easy for me to meet new people because I instantly put others at ease. It's part of my laid-back personality and midwestern upbringing. I'm looking for someone to be friends first...someone down-to-earth, handsome, confident, open-minded. I find the artsy creative types intriguing. My passions include traveling, learning about other cultures, art, & music. If you want to know more, write. Thanks!

OK, there was the plug to write back (remember you have to pay $29.95 a month to actually "write back") but she seemed like she might be real. This told me a little about herself, as generic as it was, and I liked the fact that she was interested in "artsy, creative types" (i.e. the unemployed). I may have a chance to experience some o' dat "butterfly magic"

I checked her profile and she seemed laid back and confident and talked about spirituality and other mumbo jumbo that could interest me if I am drunk, but then she finished up with this line that blew me out of the water: and I know this sounds extremely shallow but I do like a full head of hair.

ARGH! Foiled again!

This one was titled: "I Mailed You"
It was the first message I received from this user.

I wrote and asked if you wanted a submissive woman, did you get the message? Can you reply? If you don't like submissive women that's ok i'll just write someone else who does. If I don't hear back from you in the next day or so, i'll consider you not interested.

Again with the passive aggressiveness, trying to make me feel bad for not contacting these pseudo-women. And if you're really submissive you won't be considering anything, cuz I didn't tell you you could think for yourself yet.

And today I got this message from a real take-charge kinda gal, entitled: "I Need A Date For Saturday"

If you are interesting in going out saturday night I would love for you to be my date. I promise to make it worth your time. If you want to know where we'd be going or ask anything else just write me back soon since there isn't a lot of time.

Whoa! Hold the reins there dolly. This "girl" is 21 and lives in Albany, NY. Not even old enough to rent a car to drive 8 hours to pick me up for said "date".

I'm going to keep this account just to amuse myself with the messages I receive.
I no longer get messages from the midget and dwarf dating site my buddies with The Hall signed me up for, so this'll have to suffice.

I Kinda Hate Flickr Right Now

2007-02-01T03:21:00.000-08:00

I have an account on the photo-sharing page Flickr, and they've recently decided that everyone who uses it should have a Yahoo account in order to use it.

I don't have a Yahoo account. Nor do I really want one. But my Flickr account will no longer be accessible through my current email in a month and a half.

I am being forced into signing up for something else in order to use something I've already used for over a year now. And they say they are "making this change now to simplify the sign in process"!

"Oh, good morning Mr. Orsborn. I see you park your car on the street in front of your house. As this street is now owned by Bank of America, you'll have to set up a savings account with us in order to still park there. This is for the convenience of everyone involved. Have a great day!"

Well, fuck you Flickr! I mean Yahoo! or whatever corporate behemoth owns you now...

Oh, and I've noticed that Blogger here is now owned by Google and has a separate sign in for Google ID users, so I'm sure I'll be getting an email from THEM any day now requesting the same sort of switcharoo.

To sum up, everyone should go rent "Idiocracy". A funny, and I'm sure very prescient, movie.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go buy stock in Microsoft so I can continue wearing these sneakers.

Snowy Night in Brooklyn

2007-01-28T22:14:00.000-08:00

As viewed from my "stoop":

The Korosec Myspace Project Week One

2007-01-19T11:41:00.000-08:00

My friend Phil swindled me into this "collaboration" last week.
Here's the deal:

Phil lives in Chicago, does graphic design, and makes music in his spare time. I live in New York and make little videos in my spare time.
Phil has decided to post a new song to his MySpace profile each week. He has challenged me to make a video for each new song and post it the following week.

So the game has started. I posted my first video this afternoon. Right now, the score is 1-1. He'll have a new song up tomorrow and we'll begin again.

Keep checking the MySpace pages each week for the new installments.

For now, check out the first video:

korosec, "primo"

New Sketch

2007-01-08T17:17:00.000-08:00

This is a rough cut of sketch I made with my friend Ian a few months ago. I need to make a few tweaks here and there and add credits, but here's what we've got so far...

Welcome To the World Abigail!

2007-01-05T14:58:00.000-08:00

My friend Liz had her baby, Abigail Grace Walter, on January 3.
I am so happy for her!
She's an adorable little girl, and you should check out all the pictures of her Right Here!

An Improvised Jigsaw Puzzle of a Movie

2006-12-27T05:01:00.000-08:00

The idea is simple: Twelve ten-minute movies that work as individual pieces, but when viewed in succession they make up a (hopefully) coherent feature-length movie.

I've wanted to make a full-length film or video since I was eight years old. Instead, I've made hundreds of sketches and short films and videos over the years. I've written a dozen or so incomplete scripts for features and have a drawer full of scenes that so far have not gelled together into anything I could call a workable screenplay.

I'm tired of looking at these "ideas" for films. It is time to make them. Lest they rot on the vine.

So I've decided to play to my strengths.

Beginning in January of 2007, I propose to start filming these "scenes" and sketches, all the while trying to make them work together as longer film. I am going to work in ten-minute increments. (This was chosen because I plan to post each new segment on YouTube as I finish them, and the limit is ten minutes for each video) I know I can make a decent short film and I hope that these shorts can also combine to form a decent feature.

It's an idea that I've been kicking around since college. I thought about approaching a film this way after seeing David Holzman's Diary in 1996 when I was going to UNO. I was very inspired by that at the time and also the Dogme 95 movement of the late 90s, which seemed to be more about just making a film without the gloss and contrivances of standard filmmaking procedure.

There is no "Vow of Chastity" like Dogme 95, but I do like the challenges created by trying to make a series of films that must work alone as well as being part of a whole, and I am inspired by a paragraph from the Dogme manifesto:

Today a technological storm is raging, the result of which will be the ultimate democratisation of the cinema. For the first time, anyone can make movies. But the more accessible the media becomes, the more important the avant-garde, It is no accident that the phrase “avant-garde” has military connotations. Discipline is the answer ... we must put our films into uniform, because the individual film will be decadent by definition!

People Against Goodness And Normalcy

2006-12-18T15:04:00.000-08:00

I’d only been back in town for a few weeks. I was at a bar in Downingtown, Pennsylvania, nursing a double shot of Jack Daniels. My childhood friend Andy was tending bar. And I was watching a mean-looking member of the Pagans biker gang walking in my direction, intent on pummeling me into a lump of dog chow.

Let me back track.

It was the winter of 1998, and I’d recently crawled back to the Philadelphia area with an unfinished college education, a mountain of insurmountable credit card debt, and no hope for a bright and sunny future. I had contacted as many of my old friends as I could track down, trying to validate moving back home. I wanted proof that not going to college and not leaving the town you grew up in and not following the promise that you had shown in high school, could actually be a recipe for success.

My search brought me to many bars. As it turned out, one of my oldest friends, a guy I’d known since kindergarten (my cohort in class-clownery through elementary school and on to making videos in high school) was a bartender at one of the establishments I wandered into. I started frequenting the place, trying to suck back as much free booze as I could before I wore out the “old friend” bit, where people feel obligated to treat you to drinks because they haven’t seen you in years and you keep talking about the good times you used to have together. Nostalgia can be very dangerous when you’re drunk. On the few occasions where I was the one with money, I’ve easily dropped a couple hundred dollars rehashing the good ol’ days with friends.

One particular night, Andy and I drank shot after shot with a toothless, long-haired ex-biker named Wyatt. We told him stories about the insane things we did growing up, the crazy things we had planned, and we played round after round of pool with him. I never heard anyone laugh as hard as Wyatt. Whatever we did, he loved every minute.

“You guys are some funny motherfuckers!” Wyatt would yell every so often, between laughs or hacking coughs.

I asked Wyatt about his biker days, and he told me some colorful stories. He’d started out riding with The Warlocks, the second largest motorcycle club in the Delaware and Chester County areas. The largest club was The Pagans, a gang he eventually started riding with, though he never became a member. He was friends with many of them, but his club days were over. Too many fights. Too many near deaths. Too many drug-addled years lost on the road behind him. He just liked to ride.

Andy mentioned that the bar down the street was a Pagan hang out. I knew this from trying to buy beer there in 9th grade. My friends and I had stood around outside the bar waiting for someone who would buy a few six-packs for us. We asked one of the bikers who was on his way in if he could buy us some. We gave him $20 and waited across the street by the train station for what seemed like hours. Eventually the biker emerged from the bar and got on his bike. We ran up to him and asked for the beer. He laughed when he saw us. “You’re still here?” he said, laughing and shaking his head. We asked for the beer or our money back, but he didn’t listen and revved the engine and roared off. Lesson learned.

My friend also informed me that when the bar down the street closed, if the Pagans still wanted to drink, they’d saunter on in here. He pointed to the clock. It was 12:50 in the morning.

“The place closes at one,” he said. “If they’re not here by 1:15, we’re safe.”

As luck would have it, a couple of Pagans wandered in to the bar at one in the morning, as if on cue. They were old and grizzled, long graying hair dripping down the back of their crusty leather jackets. They look like they’d been sent over by central casting as extras in a biker movie. And they had with them four beautiful, teenage biker chicks.

I tried to focus on my drink and not look at them, but it’s been wired into my DNA to stare longingly at any remotely attractive woman that enters a room. And so I found it difficult to tear my gaze away from a particularly sexy young biker girl with silky, flowing red locks and a halter-top that was barely concealing her pert, full breasts.

Andy went to the other end of the bar and greeted them, taking drink orders. The men looked around, sizing up the place. The redheaded lovely looked over in my direction before I had a chance to turn away and we locked eyes. She smiled. I gulped and weakly smiled in return, then pounded the rest of my drink.

She pulled on the arm of the biker closest to her, never looking away from me. I furtively glance at what was going on and saw her whisper something to the man, then nod in my direction.

The look on his face was not a happy one. I don’t know what she said to him. He started moving in my direction. I grabbed my pack of cigarettes off the bar and nervously pulled one out and put it in my mouth. I missed and it dropped to the floor. I got up and picked it up off the floor and as I was standing up I saw Wyatt dart from the pool table and quickly intercept the biker.

He patted him on the shoulder and shook his hand. The Pagan continued looking at me over Wyatt’s shoulder. Wyatt seemed animated and launched into a story that made the man smile and soon they were walking away and the biker stopped looking at me. As they moved to the other end of the bar I saw Wyatt look back in my direction. His look betrayed nothing. Maybe he had just run into an old friend and was looking at me to say he had to attend to other things for the time being. Maybe he was letting me know that was a close call and to keep my eyes to myself in the future. I chose to believe the latter.

When Andy returned to my end of the bar, I told him that whatever Wyatt was drinking to night, it was on me.

“I think he just saved my life,” I told him.

Unfortunately I had very little money on me, so I was hoping Wyatt wasn’t planning to drink the bar dry. Andy knew my situation and said not to worry, that it was on the house.

“Wyatt’s a cool guy,” he said. “And we made him laugh.” He laughed at this himself and went to help other customers.

After about an hour I took the last forty dollars from my wallet and left it on the bar. I was hesitant because I didn’t have a job at the time and had no idea where I’d find another forty dollars in the coming weeks. I said goodbye to Andy and Wyatt and walked to my car. I got in and realized I had less than a quarter tank of gas and a 30 mile ride home. I wondered if it would be improper to go back in and take one of the twenties that I’d left on the bar, and if they were even still there. I wondered if that girl was screwing one of the ancient bikers. And if so, why? And was I really in danger of having the shit beat out of me or did I let my imagination get the better of me? I started the car and drove home.

Answer Your Telephone

2006-12-14T01:53:00.000-08:00

As I left a message on my friend's voicemail the other day, it occured to me that I am having less human interaction each day.

I thought about how, only five years ago, I could easily contact someone and speak to them on the telephone. Now, however, I find that most of my communication with people is done through emails.

I chat with friends online and we "pretend" we are interacting. It's not the same, though, and that usually becomes clear when we finally do hang out face to face. There is something forced and awkward about it all. We've become so comfortable with our online relationship, the real thing doesn't feel right. I am not as witty in person, as I can be online, where I have those few extra seconds to properly phrase a clever retort. Aside from work I don't have much interaction with others, so I tend to get stuck in my head when I'm out with people, and I'm sure I seem retarded at times. Where're those damn emoticons when I need them in real life?

I miss the days when people answered their phone. Talking to someone is much more fulfilling than reading and writing emails. And if we talked more often, maybe it wouldn't seem weird to have to talk when we actually do hang out.

Then again, maybe it's just me, and no one else feels this disconnection.

Complaints Department

2006-12-08T04:25:00.000-08:00

I think this blog may just become a litany of my semi-regular complaints about mundane things. Of course, isn't that what blogging is supposed to be?

This morning I am annoyed because my new sneakers are too small.
I have two different-sized feet and my shoe size runs between 10 1/2 and 11. Last weekend I was visiting a friend in North Carolina and I bought myself a new pair of Vans. Size 10 1/2.
A week later, I wish I'd bought a size 11.

The problem is the last few times I've gotten shoes in that size, they've been a tad too big.

I can never tell.

But today I feel like a "lily-footed woman" in ancient China with her feet bound into a grotesque fist.

Blah Blah Blah

2006-11-28T23:34:00.000-08:00

1. I've had no internet for almost a month now. We've had nothing but problems with the glorious corporation that is Verizon. Calls to them go something like this:

"Please enter the account number you are calling about, starting with the area code."
(Entering phone number)
"Press one if this is about a residential order..."
(Pressing one)
"Press one if this is about Verizon DSL..."
(Pressing one)
"Please enter the account number you are calling about, starting with the area code."
(Entering phone number again)
"Thank you. Press one for billing, press two for tech support, press three for..."
(Pressing one again)
"Press one if this is about your residential DSL service..."
(Pressing one!)
"So that we can better serve you please enter the number you are calling about."
(Pressing zero repeatedly and cursing)
"Hold on, you will be connected to a customer service specialist"
(Waiting 10 minutes)
"Hello, thank you for calling Verizon, can I get the account number you are calling about?"
"I've only entered it about 15 times. What was the point of all that shit before?"
"I don't know sir, can I get your account number?"
(Repeating phone number yet again.)
"OK. and what is this call in regards to?"
"I have a broken modem. I talked to tech support on saturday and they told me to call billing on Monday and order a new modem."
"OK, that sounds like a tech support problem, hold on..."
"No!! Wait..."
(Customer support specialist transfers call to tech support)
"Thank you for calling Verizon tech support can I get the account number you are calling about?"
"Can you just transfer me to billing? I already talked to someone in tech support the other day about my modem being broken and they told me to call billing and order a new one, but they transferred me he..."
"You'll have to call billing about that"
"No, I did...I was transferred here, can you..."
"Hold on"
(Line is transferred somewhere else now. Billing maybe?)
"Thank you for calling Verizon, can I get the account number you are calling about?"
"Before I bother giving you that information, let me ask if you are the person who can help me"
"Is this a billing question?"
"Yes. I need to order a new modem. The one I have, which by the way, is the third one you've sent me in the last year, is broken."
"OK. That's a tech support problem"
"NO!! I want to order a new modem! I was told that billing handles that!"
"Yes. Hold on."
(Waiting another 10 minutes)
Automated voice: "The following call may be monitored."
"Please! Monitor it! See what idiots you have working for you! For God's sake monitor this fucking call!!!"
"Thank you for calling Verizon. This is tech support. can I get the number you are calling about?"

This goes on for awhile, until finally being able to order the new modem.

Which does not arrive for a week and a half.

At which point my brother calls to check the status, only to discover that there is no record of an order ever being placed.

2. My DVD player died the other night while I was watching season 5 of "Curb Your Enthusiasm". So I had to buy a new DVD player.

3. The worst invention in the history of mankind: the car horn. People should have to roll down their window and shout obscenities at other cars. It's just too easy to lean on the horn. And little kids like to lean on that horn for as long as they can. And I would like to strangle anyone who honks their horn in front of my apartment for as long as I can. Unfortunately, every car that drives past honks their horn, and I just don't have the time.

4. Maybe I should take down the "Honk if you like Menudo" sign in front of my apartment now that I think about it...

New Party Hall sketch

2006-11-26T12:19:00.000-08:00

This was fun. We had filmed some stuff last Sunday in HD and when I got home and loaded the footage into the computer I discovered we had not recorded any sound all day. (Still unsure how we screwed that one up. I thought the mic was hooked up properly...)

After the initial frustration, I got real inspired to take the sketch in a different direction and make it into a silent movie. I spent about half a day working on it, trying out different filters, looking for the proper ragtime music to go with it, making title cards in photoshop. It's not the greatest thing (there are a few problems with the way the filters worked with the HD that I'm not completely happy with) but I had fun making it.

On the Cutting Room Floor

2006-11-11T07:03:00.000-08:00

A lot of good stuff gets cut out on a reality TV show.

Here's a clip that didn't quite make it to any episode of "COPS"*:

*though I hear it may be included on the upcoming DVD "Too Hot For Civil Liberties: Police Brutality! Vol. 10"