Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Tightropes, Autographs and Incompetence


Look, all I'm saying is that some people are crazy, ok? And, yes, that guy on the tightrope is one of them. Yes, he's tethered to the line, but still... nutso. Obviously done for the photo-op, and to impress onlookers... I can't imagine that dude could take even a split second to enjoy the view from up/out there... hyper-focus time, eh? Would I ever have the balls to try such a thing? Absolutely not. I can barely even post it up here without feeling a trifle queasy!

Other than that, I'm all man, baybay! Woohoo!

Like this guy...



Except, of course, I likely couldn't do that either...

Well, what *can* I do, you may ask?

I... um... well, I can write blog posts, the content of which tends to skew heavily toward the juvenile and/or flatulent... this Brit decided to build a giant butt, put it on the shores of Dover, point it towards France and pass wind on France...





That very well may be... the most impressive thing I've ever seen... the rumble was heard over 20 miles of water, in France! Mission accomplished...

Speaking of windy Brits...

I went to that Joe Abercrombie book signing I was threatening to regale you with! Let the regalation begin!

Believe it or not, I have almost no photos to show you. I intended to document the entire event, beginning with a photo of the store front before the legions of Abercrombie fans descended upon the place... but I was inside the store before I knew it... here, let me ruthlessly rip a photo off Google Images and shameless pass it off as my own!


There, that's what the storefront looked like! Pretend I took that, ok? In fact, that shot was take July 12, so the posters in the windows are exactly the same as when I was there, eh! The magic is complete!

I arrived an hour early, to be assured I got a decent seat before the Abercrombie Nation arrived. There was a little corner set up with a podium and about 20 chairs... I thought, "lol, no way... that's WAAYYY too few chairs..." so I grabbed one quick, in the back row. Of course, most of the seats were empty still, but there was still an hour to go. The only other people there were about a half-dozen older people... and when I say older, I mean the youngest might have been mid-sixties. I thought perhaps I was in the wrong place, but no, up by the podium was a huge display of Joe's latest book "Half a King".

So I sat and listened to the older folks chat. Turns out, their hobby is going to Fantasy/Sci-Fi signings and getting lots of books autographed, so they can sell them online. They travel city to city, event to event, throwing out names of authors and books, like a bunch of kids with baseball cards. It was surreal. You really need to experience sitting behind people nearing eighty as they discuss their plans to attend "Bubonicon" next month in Arizona (or wherever)... they were talking like old pros... listing off the books they'd had signed, how long they'd waited in line for certain authors, etc.

It was weird.

More old folks trickled in. They all greeted one another like old friends. Each carried at least a half-dozen different Abercrombie titles to get signed. It just felt.... wrong... like a business instead of a passion. Thankfully, a few younger loners (like me) also gathered, taking seats. I breathed a small sigh of relief.

About 5 minutes before the start time, Joe himself arrived, all smiles. By then all but 2 of the chairs had filled up, and another dozen folks were standing. Yes, the crowd leveled out at about 40 people. Total. The Abercrombie Nation had appeared, and it was shockingly meager. But if it bothered Joe, he never let on. He was all smiles and jokes.

Again, no pictures... apparently, I was worried what all these random strangers would think of me if I inconspicuously snapped off an occasional photo while Joe talked. I'm lame. Here, let me swipe another pic and pass it off as my own...


That's from a different signing... same store. Man, I think I recognize some of the same old autograph hounds though! Lol!... picture me in the back there. That's actually about the size of the crowd, including the standers.

So Joe read a passage from his latest book (very cool, by the way), then took questions for about 30 minutes. I asked him a question - are you proud of me? I asked him if he regularly re-read his older work, or once a book was finished, did he just close the covers and move on. He said he does re-read his stuff, and he enjoys it. He said whatever he is currently writing sucks, and whatever is finished is good. He said other stuff, but I can't recall it all - I was so stoked that I actually got my question out and that he took time to answer it...

After the Q&A, we all lined up to get things signed. I brought a trade paperback copy of The Heroes. I was near the back of the line, so I had a bit of a wait, but not bad. To pass the time, I asked the guy in line behind me what he thought of Brent Weeks, lol... after briefly telling me how much he enjoyed Weeks, and that "if you like Abercrombie, you'll love Brent Weeks", I politely but firmly took him to task... I was actually trying to engage him in a discussion, but once he realized that I begged to differ about Weeks, he shut down like a true introvert and the discussion was over... oh well...

It seemed like everyone in line was having the person behind them take a picture of that person and Joe once the time came. They'd all turn, hand their phones to the person behind him, and that person would take the photo. Well, it seemed I burned that bridge by offending the Weeks fan behind me, so I had to settle for a selfie...


That's it, the only photo I actually took, lol...

When I handed him my book, thanking him for coming, I told him how cool it was that I was now in possession of my three favorite books, all signed by their authors. So he said, "Really? What are the other two books?" A simple question, yes? Well, hey, let's see you answer a simple question when you're laboring under the nerves associated with meeting someone you admire! I looked at him for a few excruciatingly long moments while I tried to get my head to work... I finally said, "Well, Gates of... uh.. Fire..." and Joe said, "Ah, Pressfield! Good company! And the other?" lol.... I said. "Ummm..... "

Inside, during these painful two seconds, I kid you not, what I was thinking was "OMG, this is going to be a funny story to write about on my blog"....

"I'm drawing a blank... oh! Rothfuss! Name of the Wind! That's it."

Wow. I'm 99% sure Joe thought I was a total tool. I never thought I'd ever freeze up like that in front of a "celebrity". It was embarrassing and hilarious (to me) at the same time. So I regrouped, told him how much I loved The Heroes, asked him for a quick pic, which was "for my blog, which you actually left a comment on back in '09, thank you for that..." I snapped the pic, shook his hand, and let him get on with the business of immediately forgetting me, lol...

I went to Starbucks and drove home.

I forgot to mention that he asked me if I wanted him to write anything in particular as he signed it. In my state of brain fart, I said, "Oh, just "to Dave" is fine." Which is what he wrote, lol...


Dangit. I wish I'd had him write, "You have to be practical" or "Those are the times" or "Bremer for President" or something from one of his books. Oh well...

Overall, Joe Ab was very engaging, funny and thoughtful in person. He answered every question, took time to meet everyone, signed everything people put before him, and was a Class Act of the Highest Order. I only wish I'd carried myself with a little more competence. Never thought I was the star-struck type...  I was shocked at the low turnout... 40 people? Really? There should have been an overflow crowd for that guy...


There it is, the Shelf of Honor... I could list off my Top Three in a heartbeat to anyone, anytime... except, apparently, in front of the author of one of them... lol...

Ah well, next time, I'll handle myself better...

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

48 Hour Screening Recap, plus Additional Nonsense


I wonder what ^^ that^^ feels like? Man, there's something about that photo... Awesome...

OK, I'm going to talk movies and stuff tonight!

I went to the screening for our group for the 48 Hour Film Festival last week (on 7/17) downtown. It was quite an event. It was at the Gaslamp Cenema in downtown San Diego. Ours was Group E, consisting of 13 teams (there were 6 groups total, A through F. That's what? About 75 films?). Each team pulled a genre at random, and had 48 hours to write, film and edit a 7 minute movie. There were 13 films shown, so I assume everyone in Group E finished their film!

We arrived a little early and did the whole "red carpet" thing... I was wearing a new blue shirt and everything!

These are the members of Team Viva that were able to show up. L to R: Me (duh), Lisa Winans (actress), Horacio Jones (director/team leader), Walter Carlin (actor), Fabrice Murgia (co-director/screenwriter), and two other members of the crew - I'm sorry, I don't remember their names! I feel bad! Here, I'll punch myself in the head...

Lisa was the star of our film; she seemed to have a great time.

Another gratuitous shot of me with the star and the director... hoping some of their awesomeness rubs off on me...

So the screening was set to start at 7pm. We took seats about a half-hour early and listened to live music (a local band, don't recall the name). On the way in, we each were handed a ballot and one of those little golf course pencils. Everyone was allowed to vote for their three favorite films at the end.

I sat next to Horacio - well, there was a seat between us... you know, in case Elijah showed up. No, wait, that's Passover, sorry... That's Walter closest to you, there... he wasn't a fan of the loud live music, lol...

Before they rolled the films, they had everyone stand up and face the back of the theater, so we could all get a selfie with the big 48 Hour logo on the screen...

There's mine! Looks like my collar is up, lol... such a hipster!

After a few announcements and promos, they started the screening. The first film was called MISSING, and was a horror short about a kid killer. Well made, and a nice twist at the end. I gave it a 7 out of 10. I'd link to it, but it's not online yet. In fact, most of them aren't online yet, including ours!

Ours was shown second, called Desert Rose. I think it was a solid effort. If I had to offer some honest critiques, I thought, aside from the apparent audio issues, the story was a little heavy-handed in the emotion department. I gave ours a 7 as well. Making it was a great experience.

I suppose you'd like to know how it was seeing myself on a big screen for the first time? Really, it was no biggie. In fact, it just seemed normal, as it was happening. It wasn't until after the fact that I thought, "Oh yeah, I was supposed to be freaked out, right?" I wasn't. It was cool.

Third up (I believe - I don't have the program with me, I'm going by memory), was a film called Beyond John... this one is available online. I thought it was really funny and well-made, but it has profanity in it, so be forewarned...

Beyond John - San Diego 48 Hour Film from Dampt Productions on Vimeo.

I liked that one a lot. I rated it an 8. Nice settings. I think they said they drove up the coast to film in the redwoods or something...

Honestly, I don't recall the order of the rest of the films from memory, so I'll just mention the ones that stood out in my mind. If I had the list still, I'd talk about each film. But some of the good ones included: there was a film called Uncomfortably Numb, which featured a great performance by the lead actress, and some funny moments. There was a film called "3:28am" that glitched on the sound track, turning it into a silent movie... they raced off to get a good copy of it, and showed it in the screening after ours, but from what I saw of it, it was extremely well made, and the two leads were very compelling. It got second place in Group F, so it must have been as good with sound as it seemed it would... Another comedy took place in a graphic design lab, full of employees who were a little bit nuts. Amusing. There was a black-and-white comedy called The Last Resort that had a couple people I knew in it, which was cool...

But the best of the night for me was, easily, The Affair...



Man, that blew me away. So well done, top to bottom (except for the awkward kiss at the end, lol). These are the guys that won it all last year with "A Man Called McClane". I enjoyed the heck out of it. Gave it a 10.

After they showed all 13 films, they had a representative of each team go up front for a quick Q&A session, which was cool. And then, it was over! For me, anyway... there was an after-event get together for everyone at a nearby hotel, while everyone waited for the results of the audience voting. I skipped that part, but I knew we weren't going to win 1st or 2nd. As I said, it was a good, solid effort, and I enjoyed it... but objectivity being what it is, there were a few films that were better. It would have been hard to top Bad and Classic this year - they'll probably win the whole thing again, who knows...

One last video to post... my acting coach (Stephen Walters) was on a team again this year. His film (called Wish) was in Group A, so I didn't get to see it. But I did see that it won the top slot for his group. I was hoping they'd make it available to see online so I could post it here, and today they did just that! So for those who have heard me talk about my acting classes and my coach for over a year now, this is him, at the beginning and end of this film (yep, the bald guy). Both his kids are in it as well..

Wish from Aly Bucholz on Vimeo.

That will be going to the Best Of screening on August 2nd, which I will attend again this year.

It's really cool to see so many quality actors/film makers in San Diego. Of course, some of the films were... uh... how can I say this politely? Not quite as good... but there are many quality people in the film making industry in San Diego. I met many this year, and hope to meet many more as the year continues.

All things considered, participating in the 48 Hour Film Project this year was a wonderful experience. I'll do it again next year in a heartbeat, given the chance. Hopefully between now and then, I'll be in more things I can post here, including the web series I've been involved with for the past 9 months or so.

Good things ahead!


So I saw the latest X-Men movie on Monday... caught one of the last showings before it gets pulled from the theaters this week! Let me summarize: I liked it a lot, giving it 8 out of 10. The scene in the cafeteria when "they" are breaking Magneto out of "jail" is perhaps the coolest scene in any of the Xmen movies. But all things considered, I like the villain Magneto better than the half-hero Magneto featured in the film. Seemed kinda limp. And, as much as I like Jennifer Lawrence, I just don't really like her as Mystique. Beyond that, great film (if a little over-ambitious).

Going to go to a book signing this weekend! Joe Abercrombie is in town for Comicon, and will be appearing at a local bookstore. I have already purchased a trade paperback copy of The Heroes, which will hopefully have his autograph scribbled onto it, and then be placed on my Shelf of Honor, right between my signed copies of The Name of the Wind (Pat Rothfuss) and Gates of Fire (Steven Pressfield). I will then have my Top 3 books of all time, signed and enshrined.

Next would be to expand it to Top 5... for that, I'd need a signed copy of A Storm of Swords (GRRM) and Have a Nice Day (Mick Foley). Who knows! Maybe it will happen!

Well, I have a script to write tonight. I'll need to save the rest of what I want to talk about for another night.

Adios for now!

Dave the Dude

Monday, July 14, 2014

Is It Sleepy In Here, or Is It Just Me?


Well, hello there... can you tell that the above photo is, in fact, one photo, and not two stacked? That's a lake there, across the middle, eh! Sort of an optical delusion, eh? I was tricked when I first saw it as well, don't worry.

What? You're not worried? Oh, ok... I guess you're better than me, is that what you're saying!? Man, and I thought we were friends and everything!

What? We are friends?

Well, ok then!

I have a confession to make, friend. It is this: The main reason I'm posting tonight is so that I can share this photo...


It doesn't matter what mood I'm in -- and trust me, I've run the gamut lately -- all I have to do is look at that photo and my mood improves an average of 3.1 notches on the Mood-o-Meter... I find that endlessly amusing. I can't even tell for certain if that crow (raven?) is a real one or a facsimile. Its feet look a little too "metal" to me... would the raven's (crow's?) toes curl around the edge of the wood, or remain straight, I wonder..? Are they even called "toes" on a bird?

Regardless, I laugh every time. As I do for a nicely-timed blast of flatulence. And those video clips of kids swinging at a pinata and hitting an unfortunate bystander instead. Laugh every time.

Let's see... and other photos I laugh at every time? BRB, lemme check my stash...

Hmm, nope... no other "every time" photos that I could see... but this one is pretty funneh...


That reminds me... Herr Director of the BTI web series has decided my character needs to be more menacing (he says I'm still "too nice"), so he wants me to buzz my hair short, and grow my beard out. My character was always supposed to be somewhat ambiguous, as far as "is he a good guy or a bad guy?"... we're playing that up a bit more. I'm going to do it... I'll need to ask my agent (lol, I laugh every time I say that... how pretentious... "my agent") whether I need to get new headshots done or not... the head shot is supposed to be a good representation of what I look like...

We'll see...

Here's the trailer "they" made for the short film "we" submitted for the 48 Hour Film Festival...



The screening for our group is this upcoming Thursday (the 17th). It's at the Gaslamp Cinema downtown in San Diego. It will be the first time I've ever seen myself on the Big Screen! Think of it! This nose, only, like 20 feet tall! I can't wait! I hope the film doesn't get interrupted by a phone call from Limburgh Field, clearing my face for landing...

Speaking of "firsts", I also was pictured in my first ever Movie Poster!


How cool is that?

I suppose it's understood that I hope it won't be my last...

Hey, "they" even made a poster for the test movie "we" shot the week before!


Lol, nice.

Again, if either or both of these short films are made available, I'll post them here so you can taunt me mercilessly and make me cry like a little girl...

What? We are friends? Ok then!

Anything else? Well, No, I suppose... really, it was mainly the "cat/crow" photo... that was the important message which I wished to convey to all (both?) of my loyal blog readers! Hey, some day when I'm rich and famous, you can say you were loyal to me and my blog through all the bleak years of poverty and moral decay!

Then we'll, like, have lunch of something to celebrate.

Adios for now (Beth and Mom!),

Dave the Gump

Friday, July 4, 2014

Let Me Be 'Frank' With You...

Choo-choo!

Speaking of "chew chew", today was July 4th, which means... hot dogs!

The annual Nathan's Hot Dog Eating event took place at Coney Island, as per usual... and as per usual, Joey Chestnut walked (shambled?) away with the title -- his 8th in a row. He ate 61 dogs in 10 minutes, beating Matt Stonie by a handful of dogs (Stonie ate 56 for 2nd place). While that was interesting, the real sea change took place in the women's event, as a woman named Miki Sudo beat 11-time woman's champion Sonya Thomas to become the new hot dog queen.

All well and good, for fans of people who can wolf down copious amounts of grub. I happen to be a casual fan, so there.

Coincidentally, today was also the day when I was finally able to watch the Competitive Eating Documentary "Hungry" (dir. Barry Rothbart and Jeff Cerulli), which some of you blog old timers may recall I was interviewed for a few years back. Turns out, my part was cut from the film. I didn't know that until today! But you know, as I watched the film, and waited to see how they'd work my bit into the film, it became increasingly clear that it made no sense to include it. The film had a certain flow to it - and shoe-horning my bit about the Conti/Escondido footage in there would have interrupted the flow. Didn't make sense. So yeah, I'm cool with it. If I was editing the film, I would have given it the chop as well. Who knows, maybe there will be extras on the DVD, and it could make it there.

Didn't really know what to expect from the film, going in. But actually, I enjoyed it quite a bit. It was interesting getting a look at Kobayashi's rise and... well, not so much "fall", as a major shift sideways. He's reinventing himself outside MLE, and I think it's working out well for him. Of the other featured eaters, I enjoyed the parts with US Male (sorry Brian, lol), but I thought more was going to be done with Pat Bertoletti (he's the one with the mohawk who's coated in a layer of red koolaid after most events, lol). And I could have done with much less of Brad Sciullo, who came off (to me, anyway) as quite a douchebag. His moments of training-related vomiting were the low points of the film - and his "rivalry" with Furious Pete was laughable. Sorry, Brad... Pete is The Man.

Bottom line, I enjoyed the movie. It was well-made, had a solid through-line, and held my interest (vomiting notwithstanding) throughout. Had a couple awkward moments, but I'd say it's a solid effort. I'd give it 4 out of 5 hot dogs....


I blurred out the F-Word for those with sensitive constitutions towards such things... but, actually, I think in this case it makes the statement twenty times funnier... well, 18 to 20 times... give or take..

Being the 4th of July, I took the family into Escondido to see fireworks (as is our custom), and had an ok time (as is my custom). It was a weird evening... we parked near the Arts Center, where they launch the things off at. Went 90 minutes early, and the place was swarming already. Having time to kill, we wandered over to the Starbucks - mistake, lol. I'm not much for crowds to begin with, and it seemed half the crowd was in line at Starbucks. So we wandered back (without coffee), stopping to buy some snacks on the way.

They fired off some of the fireworks 45 minutes early, for some reason, prompting a weird sort of panic among the gathered people, lol. People are so strange. Yes, I mean you! Anyways, we set chairs up by our car to wait it out, and suddenly, roaches! WTF? Once the sun went down, they came swarming out of somewhere nearby, making the Wagner Women freak out. Which was humorous, in a way. So we put the chairs away, and stood. Tedium ensued. Thankfully, the fireworks were good, the kids enjoyed themselves (even though Middle Child has mono, it turns out.). Then Wifey drove us out of there, since navigating a packed parking lot is my idea of hell on earth. I have not the constitution to deal with such madness. Wifey does. She thrives on it.

One thing that bugged me (other than the bugs) were the endless car alarms that went off every time a "boom" was sufficiently loud enough. Drove me nuts. Along with the screaming kids. Oh, and something odd people were doing this year... they would call out names as a firework would go up - just a single name... "Frank!" then the firework would go off. Then "Bill!" and another would go off. It's like they were dedicating the fireworks to people or something! I didn't get it. And many people were doing it all around us. They weren't calling out to friends... they were specifically waiting until a firework launched and crested up, trying to call out a name right before the firework detonated. I wanted to slap six shades of crap out of people!

SOMEONE EXPLAIN THAT TO ME!


That's from the awesome web comic XKCD.

Beyond that, not much to tell. Major revisions to the BTI script underway. Wish I could tell you about it, but I can't! You're not cool enough! You'll just have to wait until the time is right, ok? Sheesh, you're so demanding!

OK, enough nonsense for now.

Adios,

Dave the Mildly Ocholophobic

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Around the World in 80 Daves


Now THAT.... is a selfie... hey, lets take a drone up to the top of the Matterhorn and get a pano-selfie! Yay!

That might be one of my favorite photos of all time...

Except, of course, for the 9GAG tag on the right side... grrr...

Hello, all! Dave the Lemming here, with another vacuous blast of hot air... this is the part where I ramble on about my life and pretend that people actually care about it. How narcissistic of me, eh? I know all you come here for are the funny animal photos...


But that's ok. A little of what you want, a little of what I want, and we're all happy, right? Right!

So let's move on...

First things first! The 48 Hour Film Festival!

This past weekend, we filmed our effort for the 2014 48 Hour Film Festival, and it was great fun. Friday night, every team sent a representative (or two, in our case) to Hospitality Point on Mission Bay to pull the random genre for our team, and get the elements that had to be in each of the films. This year, instead of the "pull genre from the hat" thing they normally do, they had a giant Genre Plinko board, which was funny...


You let the disc go, and wherever it landed, you pulled that envelope, and got one of 12 different genres. I was representing Team Viva, so I got to climb up and drop the puck (so to speak)...


As you can see, we got "Road Movie", which was a nice draw, I'd say. Other genres were Horror, Western/Musical and Film Noir, which would have been harder... of course, Comedy, Black Comedy, Drama, Sci-Fi and Fish Out Of Water were other choices...

All things considered, it was a good pull. So we had to do a variation on a road film, where "it's all about the journey"... we phoned it into our writing team, and they started gathering viable ideas for the short film (up to 7 minutes long, final cut). At 7pm they announced the other elements that had to appear in each of the submissions. The prop was a marshmallow. The character was an investigator, and the name was John or Joyce Jansen. And the line of dialog was "I saw one of those yesterday". So all those elements needed to be in the script for it to qualify.

We grabbed a GoPro Camera along with all the accouterments, and went to the place in El Cajon where the director(s) were holed up, ready to write. I say "we", because I was at the genre pull with fellow cast member Lisa Winans. We dropped off the GoPro Camera equipment, and then sat in on the brainstorming session for the story. That was one of the best parts of the whole experience. We talked for maybe 20 or 30 minutes, kicking around ideas, before settling on what I considered to be a terrific story idea. We left the script-writing team to do their work, and went home, ready to get a good night's rest so we could film all day Saturday.

Turns out, my part was only in the first minute or so of the movie, so I was done filming by 1pm. I got to go home after that and take a nap and fart around, while the rest of the crew filmed until about 9pm. Then the actors went home, and the real fun began. Editing! Long story short, they edited the film, added the sound and music, and was able to get it turned in Sunday by about 8 minutes before deadline. Whew! We made it!

The experience of shooting was great fun. I loved it. We even had one of those hover drones, which we attached the GoPro to and got some cool aerial shots.

I was able to see the finished film (Called "Desert Rose"), and man, it turned out great. I wish I could post it here -- maybe I will be allowed to at some point in the future. But hey, for only putting it together in 48 hours, it turned out amazingly well. We have our screening downtown on July 17th, along with the others in our bracket that turned in films on time...

That was Saturday. So on Sunday, I had to be downtown in San Diego to do test shoots for BTI, the web series I've been bragging about for half a year now. Heck, at this point, you may even wonder if it really exists! I assure you, it does.

We met at a restaurant in Little Italy, downtown San Diego, at 6:30 am, and filmed until midday. This is the series where I play that crazy Russian guy... In a suit...



That's me and Travis, my co-star, going through our scene. As you can see, I'm doing what I call my "Russian Forehead" thing, to help me be in character, lol...  That's the Assistant Director Mike Evans on the right, watching us intently on a monitor. Hey, I'm wearing a suit! See? See how respectable I can be?

I felt so comfortable on set, it was a little unnerving. I seem to have developed the ability to simply tune everyone else out. So even though more than a dozen people were there watching the scene as it unfolded, to me, it was just Travis and I. 


That's our Fearless Director Jeff Patton watching the proceedings on a monitor. Look at me! I'm a movie star! This whole thing is so much fun, I'm beside myself. Apparently, Jeff said the footage turned out really good. I doubt I'll be able to post any video samples here, sorry. Gotta keep things under wraps until the pilot is finished. I'm sure you understand.

Still, it's so much fun...


Here's a handful of my other co-actors, including Lisa Winans (whom I mentioned earlier), on the left there, making kissy-faces at the Sheriff. You can't see him, cuz he's turned away, but that's Shawn Wildern, a fellow student at my acting class, whom I introduced to Jeff when the role of the Sheriff became available. I think he's a perfect fit, and so far, he's proving me right. Good work, Shawn. And that's Susan in the red shirt. I don't know her last name!!!! Doh!


Me and Travis and Jeff (Herr Director) posing for a photo out front, after the shoot. Jeff is so cool, it isn't even funny. He is, as they say, "The Man".

I got lots of positive feedback from everybody, regarding my "performance" during the test shoot. That's always nice. We plan on filming through July and into August. Once the pilot is in the can, I'm sure you'll all know about it here. I hope I can do you all proud!

So it was quite a weekend. The 48 Hour thing, and the BTI thing. In both cases, I felt so at home, it only confirms that I really need to be doing this for a living. I've met so many awesome people this past year, it isn't even funny. Lots of other cool stuff I can't talk about yet in the works. Once I can, be assured, I will relay it here.

OK, video break. Check out this strange encounter between a nature photographer and a curious elk...



Sadly, from what I understand, the ranger service "put the elk down" after this encounter. Bummer. I guess...

So what have I been reading? Glad you asked!

I had a couple failed attempts. Hey, you try new authors, right? You can't just stick with the old tried and true, right? Sometimes, the old tried and true will yield the occasional turd (ahem... Sanderson and Steelheart...)... actually speaking of Brandon Sanderson (I referenced a Parenthetical comment! Man, what a mess!), I've been wanting to dive into Book Two of his Stormlight Archive (Words of Radiance), but enough time has passed since I read Volume 1 (The Way of Kings) that I really need to reread it. The porblem is, Volume One is 1,000+ pages long, as is the second volume... that's a 2,000 page commitment I keep postponing...

In the interim, I tried to read The Scribe, by Elizabeth Hunter, which I bought for a song at some point in the past, and decided a "4.41 out of 5" average rating on Good Reads was reason enough to read it. Well, I got about half-way through before I gave up. It started out with an interesting "angels and demons" premise... but quickly devolved into an amateurish love triangle thing, which I tired of quickly. I decided I had too much good stuff waiting in my library to be read, so I jumped ship. Sorry, Liz....

So I dove into another new author, Seth Skorkowski's debut novel Damoren, which also had a high average rating (4.08 out of 5 stars), and another interesting premise - a secret society of monster hunters wielding Holy Weaponry. Another cool premise clumsily handled and frittered away. Sorry, Seth. I bailed at about the 60% mark as well. Too many bland characters introduced and then killed off for me to give a rip.

Third time's a charm, eh?

I really enjoyed Heroes Die by Matthew Stover last year, so I fired up the first sequel, called The Blade of Tyshalle today... man, what a difference a pro writer makes. From the first page, this one is SUCH a great read, I'm diving in and likely won't surface for a breath until I'm finished. So great to visit with Hari Michaelson again. Expect a review soon...



I survived the Steam Summer Sale with only three new acquisitions... and two of them were gifts from a pair of friends of mine! I'm practically healed of my addiction! Are you proud of me? I still actually play next to none of my games... I know what it feels like for a woman to stare at a closet full of clothes and feel like she has nothing to wear...

OK, I've rambled long enough! Here's one more funny photo, and then I'm gone!

How to brush your teeth, by a Real Man...


Success!

Adios for now,

Dave the Wannabe Thespian