Tisha's Sweet 16 - Pics

These are the pics I promished back here. Sorry I've only just gotten around to them, but here they are! :D

This is Tisha

She has become a Mistress of the Digital Self-portrait! VERY talented!

This is Me and Tisha

This is Me in Shiny, Shiny Black Shorts

This is Tisha's Cool Bedroom

And the bed I crashed on when I first got to Levelland Friday monring. VERY comfy! (And BLUE!)

This is the Levelland/Idahlou game

And these are Tisha's friends Kayci (left) and Brittany (center).

And below are some shots from the game...

Tisha thinks this guy's butt is cute. She took this one.

I think THIS guy's butt is cute. But I can't get anyone to back me up on that.

Final score there. They stomped us for most of the game, and we didn't come back in time.

Below is our pit-stop on our way taking everyone home.

And here's Tisha's Track meet the next morning. She's facing away from the camera in this first one, and the second one you can see her... if you know what you're looking for. It's like a Where's Waldo picture! :D

Incidentally, Lance can be seen to the extreme left of the pic, facing away from camera in a green jacket. Danika is just right of him, smiling. (Lance turned 16 the same day Tisha did.)

This last one is Tisha and Brittany at the mall. TRY to tell me these aren't cool chicks! ;)

These are -- sadly -- the best of the pics I took. I'm a terrible photodocumentarian as I tend to get lost within the moments rather than photographing them. And when I do document, it's usually scribbled notes to remind me about stuff to WRITE about, lol.

Maybe when Tish turns 21 I'll hire somebody to follow us around and just take pictures, lol.

Ahead of Schedule & Smellin' Sweet!!! :D

Actually, the "smellin' sweet" bit was just to fill out the rythm of the titles there. I have no reason to believe that I am in any way a treat for the olfactory senses.

BUT I'M ON PAGE 33, and my schedule only requires me to write 30 pages a week!!!

I prefer to be ahead of schedule than hopelessly behind -- a problem I've run into many, many, many times before, as I tend to not be very realistic about how long it actually takes to write a script.

But when Gnomey broke my writing down according to my innitial self-implied due date, I saw just how unrealistic I was being. So I revised, and now I'm AHEAD of schedule because last night was more productive than I could have hoped for! (I started later than Sunday night, but I found my Groove -- and you can never count on at what point that's going to happen on any given story, making scheduling a really, really tentative thing.) I still doubt I'll hit my original target date of October 9, but if I continue at this pace I very well could!

Also, watched the first 2 episodes of VERONICA MARS: Season 2 before I fell asleep last night!!! I'm airing the 3rd season at work!!! Life can be oh-so-sweet sometimes! :) But I've still got a lot of catching up to do.

Oh, and I'm OBSESSED with the band Gorillaz now! I've been listening to a mix cd of theirs (mostly stuff from Demon Days) while I write, and my breaks tend to be watching Gorillaz videos and Gorilla Bitez and interviews about the creators and stuff on YouTube. I SO DIG ON THIS GROUP!!! GREATEST VIDEOS EVER! They're kinda KISS for the New Mellinium!!! AND I just got their first dvd, PHASE ONE: CELEBRITY TAKE DOWN, from Netflix today, so YAY! :D

My Gnomey's still out with her friend, so I'm just kinda killing time right now until she gets online, or tells me she's going to sleep. My writing time begins the moment she goes to sleep. (Like Robert Rorguez's schedule! COOL! That just occured to me!)

OH! I need to resize the pics from my trip to see Tisha and post them! Maybe I'll do that while I wait for my Wendy Lady! :D

11 Pages Down :)

I started the screenplay last night! :D Yay!

THE screenplay, the one we're going to get financing to shoot in 2007!!!

On or around Monday, October 23rd I will make an entry stating that I've finished the Rough Draft of the script! :D

Lot's of Smiley Faces 'cause I'm really excited!

I enlisted my Gnomey's help, too, and she agreed! :) In fact, my original due date was October 9th, but then she got all seriosu and started breaking down the actual writing time I have in my week, and it turns out that I can -- theoretically -- squeeze in 40 hours of writing time... IF I am able to be creative the moment I get up until the moment I go to work, then be creative again the moment I get home until the moment I got to sleep.

Not gonna happen.

Practically speaking, I have 30 hours, and that sounds about right for a part-time job. (A SECOND job, too.)

Now, the goal of this script is to make writing -- and filmmaking -- my PRIMARY job, but from a practical standpoint it's a second job.

But I have only considered this because Wendy embraced my request for help and got really serious about it, lol. (Even going so far as to threaten less Gnomey Time if I didn't make my schedule! That's what made me really take a serious, practical look at this schedule, lol!) Bless her!!!

She is the first girlfriend I have had that has not only respected how seriously writing is to me, but actually rewarded me for keeping up with my page-count and (threatened to) penalized me for not! I mean, this really means something to her!!! I have longed for, dreamed of, actually asked God for a woman like this, AND HERE SHE IS!!!

With past girlfriends it's alway been theoretical -- writing was something I did when they weren't around, and it might be a bit of a turn-on that I did it, and sometimes they enjoy the pages that magically appeared from nowhere every now and then, but they didn't want to have to actually DEAL with it in any way. My Gnomey Goddess would go so far as to say "Every time we talk I'm gonna ask you how many pages you've written, and if you haven't written enough no Naughty Gnomage for you"!!! (She was so adorable when she said it too, even though it was PERFECTLY CLEAR that she wasn't being cute or joking, lol!)

I love her so much! It seriously seems like she may have been the missing element, the reason I haven't succeeded in the past. I can't fully articulate it, but looking at how things have progressed in the 42 days we've been together, it's hard to deny the effect, even if the cause eludes me!

And actually, my Writing Time is coming up in 10 minutes, so I need to sign-off. If you don't hear from me for a while, that's why.

PEACE!!!

Don't Mess With ME, lol :D

I have THE SWEETEST girlfriend EVER!!!

But have to remember not to let her know when someone criticizes me, hee-hee-hee. She doesn't take it well...

Checking my email when I first woke up, I found that I had received an annonymous comment on my writing blog. The guy/gal is apparently a professional TV writer who feels that my writing process is wrong and I am possibly leading other aspiring writers down the wrong path.

Well Gnomey was having none of it, and posted the following response to his comment:



i think u r a very sad and lonely old man for writing that about my boyfriend. i am not impressed with ur comments and will kick ur arse if i read them again.

i think u have no girlfriend so u have all this spare time on ur hands to pick on others that want to make something of their lives...just because u have no life it doesnt mean others cant have one.

ps: i take it u havent had sex in a while



She let me delete it, lol, because she didn't want me to get hate mail or anything. Bless her! :D

To be fair, I'm sure the commentor felt he/she was helping me, but my baby isn't really concerned about being fair to him/her, heheh.

This is a chick that flat-out PUNCHES dudes in pubs, lol. (Not without a lot of provocation, to be sure, but how many women do YOU know that actually partake in mini pub brawls?)

Also, one of the traits I so admire about my sweety is that she acts from the heart, and takes action first and thinks about it afterward. She's the perfect Yin to my Yang. (And you may translate that any way you like. ;P )

My Gnomey!

And that last bit, the "P.S."... I reminded her that as of next month I've been celibate for a decade, but she didn't feel that factord into the equation in any meaningful way, lol!

I SO love her!!!

If you're curious, you can read the "offending" comment here.

She didn't like the "harsh as this sounds" part because, she explains, "whenever you say 'I don't mean to hurt your feelings' it's because you're about to say something that hurts their feelings and you don't want to them to kill themselves. I say it all the time."

THAT'S MY BABY!!! She is who she is, and how she is, and the rest of the world has to just figure out how to deal. It's SO REFRESHING for me! I grew up trying to be who people told me I am "supposed to" be. And I've spend my 30s un-programming myself, relearning how to be me.

Plus, you know when you date someone, and at first they represent themselves a certain way, and then later on -- when you're well into the relationship -- they stop being the person you fell in love with and become this bitch that you don't really like? NOT MY BABY! Hate her or love her, she is who she is. She lays it ALL out! What you see is what you get... Or WOULD HAVE gotten if I hadn't gotten to her first, lol! ;P

Seriously, I am THE luckiest guy IN THE UNIVERSE!!!

As of Today, I am Virtually a Married Man!!! :D

Today Gnomey officially asked me to be her SecondLife "partner" and I accepted!!!

What that means is that in SL, Gnomey and I are married!!! :D We haven't had the cerimony yet, though. You can bet I'll have pics and a blog entry when we do, tho'! But as far as Linden Labs and SL is concerned, we were married the moment I accepted the proposal.

SHE proposed to ME, too!!! How badass is THAT! That's my baby!!! After she asked me if I would be interested I looked it up on the SL site and sent her the link. Then I asked if it mattered who proposed to whom because I could just send a proposal right then and there, but she said she wanted to do it!!! :D

I love that woman so MUCH!!!

We went in-world today to look for our wedding attire... Get this: She's actually into the idea of having a PIRATE WEDDING!!! HOW COOL IS MY WENDY!!! We found our wedding outfits and then hung out for a while in SL!

It was GREAT!

My Gnomey Goddess COULD NOT be more PERFECT!!!

Now... to get RL to imitate SL... ;D

Last Week's Adventures

Okay, I dug out the notes I made on my trip to visit my daughter the week of her Sweet Sixteen birthday, and here we go...


Thursday, September 7, 2006

After my baby went to sleep I packed up and headed out. I stopped by Walmart to pick up some bottled water -- I drink A LOT of water, so I wanted to be prepared for the usually-10-hour trip -- a box of Jack Sparrow Os (because when I travel I never know when I'm gonna be hungry and broke, so I find it useful to have SOME form of backup sustinance) a box of Chai Tea essence (which I drink without adding milk or cream, cause I like me some bitter/sweet caffiene) and a couple of Red Bulls.

I believe I finally hit the road around midnight, but my memory's a bit fuzzy now.

On the road I listened to John Glover reading FROM THE DUST RETURNED by Ray Bradbury. Like THE OCTOBER COUNTRY and THE HALLOWEEN TREE, this book shows just how well brabury's poetry of description can actually relate the FEELING I get around Halloween time. (Which, for me and Brian, starts in early September for some reason... there's just a certain quality to the breezes that come in early September that seem to whisk us back to the first days of a school season and sweaty plastic/rubber monster masks, lol.)

I'll sometimes complain about bradbury's writing because of the poetic nature of the prose (for whatever reason, poetry just doesn't do it for me, except in song lyrics) but I will always conceed that it is exactly this quality of his writing that so thoroughly communicates the feeling of Halloween in the above mentioned titles.

FROM THE DUST RETURNED wasn't a disappointment! I'd hate to be the poor bastard commissioned to adapt it into a screenplay, lol, but as a novel, it's really cool! It is somehow DEFINITIVELY Halloween-y.


Friday, September 8, 2006

I didn't make as many stops on the trip up as I usually do -- mainly because it was still dark outside for most of the trip and there was nothing except truck stops open. But as the sun peak over the horizon -- turning black sky to dark blue, then to violet -- I finally had to pull into a Truck Stop/Burger King in Snyder or Post or someplace and crash-out in the parking lot. I intended to sleep for 20 or 30 minutes, and woke up some 2 hours later, lol.

I finally got to Levelland around 9:00 or 10:00 am, and then crashed on Tisha's bed.

After I woke up -- MANY hours later -- I got a text telling me she had already been waiting in the chyropractor's office for an hour now. Poor thing! All her years of sports (she's not even 16 at the time I'm talking about, mind you) have messed up her body a little bit. She not even doing the gymnastics thing anymore, but she still has to see the chyropractor regularly.

Don't get me wrong, you'd never know it to watch her! You'd assume you were watching a regular, energetic teen bounce around everywhere she goes, with more energy than the sun!

Anyway, after she finally got home from the chyropracter's office we picked up 2 of her friends: Kayci and Brittany. I immediately liked these girls. Kayci is quiet and polite, but funny! Brittany is like this traveling party somehow, lol! She's full of stories about all the things that she does and all the things that happen to her. Also, apparently she's one of those girls that people like to make up stories about, too, lol! At one point, at the football game we all went to, Tisha asked me "You mind if we stand here instead of sitting in the bleachers? Everyone up there hates Brittany." Which is funny, because like Tisha, you just can't imagine anyone NOT loving this girl... but then, I'm not a teenager anymore, either, lol.

OMG! I had FORGOTTEN about teen drama!

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

So, when I go to Levelland and Lubbock I always HAVE TO eat at Taco Villa at least once!!! Those are just THE BEST beef & cheese burritos EVER! (Kelly, Tommy and Brian say that Taco Bueno, in L. A. is just as good, but I don't see it.) Knowing this, Tisha suggested we 4 stop at Taco Villa for dinner before continuing to Idalou where her high school was playing an away game tonight.

I got to listen to the girls talk as we ate and started getting a rough idea of what they were like and their relationship with Tisha. Whenever I go visit Tish it's like I'm walking into a long-running TV show mid-season, so I always spend some time observing the regular characters and catching up on the ongoing plotlines.

[A break in the narrative: If you read the previous blog entry, Wendy's webcam is still on, and she just rolled over in her sleep, lol. She rolled back over and opened her eyes. I blew her a kiss and waved and she smiled at me. Now she's going back to sleep, heheh. Life is SO GREAT!]

So anyway, after Taco Villa we proceeded to Idalou for the big Friday night game. This Friday Night Lights territory here. High school football in West Texas! This is the reason the book was written -- and then the movie was made, and now the TV show is airing -- in the first place!

I had only been to a few games in high school because I am a Creative and not a Jock, and not particularly social outside my fairly wide circle of very close friends. Tisha, however, is a Jock and an athelete and VERY social, lol! She's at a different school than she grew up in, a larger school, and yet she still seems to know at least half the people there!

I followed the game for the first half, but then the second half was spent following the girls as they wandered around and talked to boys and commented on football players' butts.

I also got to see that broody boys seem to draw high school girls just as much nowadays as they did 20 years ago, lol.

After the game we all went to Starbuck's in Lubbock. I got off a few pictures before an employee informed me that it is corporate policy that people are not allowed to take pictures inside Starbuck's. So...

Public Service Announcement: DO NOT attempt to take pics inside Starbuck's.

There's my Good Deed for the week. :)

After we dropped the girls off, Tisha didn't like the idea of mee sleeping in jean shorts, so she loaned me a pair of her shiny, shiny black sports shorts to wear. (They were also stretchy, stretchy so I could actually fit into them!) But then she needed to run to Walmart for some emergency supplies (the nature of which I am disinclined to share with you) and at the store I found some PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN PAJAMA PANTS!!! So I bought those, and now I have Pirate Pants to sleep in!

Yay!

And I was able to give Tisha back her shiny, shiny black shorts!

Tisha disappeared into her room and I sacked out on a hideaway couch-bed just before 2:00 am.


Saturday, September 9, 2006

I was batted awake by Tisha. "Wake up! We have to be there in 15 minutes."

Unfortunately, this is not uncommon among my adventures in her world.

She had a Track Meet in Morton, Texas, and she had to be at the school, on the bus at 6:23 am.

I can be ready in five minutes flat. But I PREFER at least half an hour to shower and dress and maybe even eat something. Tisha sometimes doesn't take this into consideration, lol.

So I slapped on some clothes and my floppy blue Brush Hat that I wear when I can't be bothered to mess with my hair. (Sometimes I wear it to keep the sun out of my eyes or to keep my head warm or for the normal reasons one wears a hat. But I'll level with ya, usually it's because I can't be bothered to make mty hair look human, lol.)

I get her to the school and on the bus just in time, then follow the bus to Morton.

I see the bus unload and everyone walk to this huge field and I dutifully follow, lugging my trusty Homestarrunner satchel, a couple of bottles of water, my ZVue and the camera. Tisha is way ahead of me, talking with friends.

The group keeps walking.

My cell phone doesn't work out here, so I can't call or text Tisha to ask what's up, so I just keep walking along. But I suddenly get this vague nagging feeling, like maybe this is one of those that I'm doing something I'm not necessarily supposed to be doing. (This happens sometimes, when I'm out of my element.) there are some non-Track & Field people walking in the group as well, but I don't see a lot of adults in the group. And the ones I do see look like they might be coaches or something.

Finally, that self-conscious feeling grows stronger and Tisha has fallen back so that she's within shouting range, so call her name.

"Tisha, I'm not taking part in a Track & Field event, am I," I joke.

"We're walking the course," she replies, not joking.

THEN she fills me in. It;s 8:30 am now, she doesn't run until 10:30 am. I'm welcome to wait in the car if I want to until then.

Tisha will never, I suspect, be a professional tour guide.

An hour or so later I'm in the front seat, having drifted off listeing to some X MINUS ONE episodes on the ZVue, and Tisha sneaks up to the car and pounds on the passenger-side window, waking me into a vituporous pout. More fun than that, she's laughing her head off, as is her friend who is standing next to her. The episode is this one where this rich guy is press-ganged into 15-year service aboard a space ship bound for Saturn on the eve of his wedding, so it's kind of a creepy story that I've dozed off to, and then this sound like a boulder bounding off the widnshield startles me awake.

I'll be honest, I'm a baby from time to time. I was awakened in a state of panic this mornign and we didn't have time to eat or even get coffee (luckily I still had some distilled Chai Tea to tide me over on the drive to Morton) and I was rather out of my element here, and Tisha had completely failed to fill me in on the protocol, so when she made my heart skip a beat from a semi-conscious state, I was a bit of a dick.

But it didn't seem to faze her too much.

She ran at 10:30, but she had to stop before the race was finished. It was a cross-country race, and her chyro had suggested she not run this weekend, but the previous night she felt like she could and wanted to try, so she talked to her mom and her coach and set it up. I got a couple of cool pics of her running before she had to be escorted back to her team's camp, crying from the pain. Her lower back is messed-up, so running can be quite excrutiating sometimes.

She stretched out and popped vertibrae back into place and was feeling fine before too long, though.

That night was her Sweet 16 "get-together". Just her and a few friends... Mostly boys. Very energetic boys, lol. The testosterone was as thick as the fog on Baker Street in those Sherlock Holmes stories, lol.

They mostly played pool and talked and stuff while Connie (Tisha's adopted mother and my ex-mother-in-law) and I watched the movies she had rented for the evening. I got happily lost in THE SENTINEL, UNITED 93 and FRIENDS WITH MONEY.

Now, Wendy is ALWAYS in my thoughts, but at the end of FRIENDS WITH MONEY there's this scene, and she does this little head-sway (like she's listening to music you can't hear) that SO reminded me of my Gnomey Munts Munts!!! And the scene really seemed to somehow express what I love so much about oru relationship!!!

I was overcome with a fresh appreciation for my Wendy Lady, as well as stabbed by a sharp pang of missing her.

[Non-narrative Update: She finally logged out of IM so I can't watch her sleep any more. :( But at least I know she's probably sleeping more comfortably without a laptop in her bed, lol.]

I found out later, after everyone had gone home, about some of the teen angst that always finds its way into such gatherings. I was suddenly SO thankful that I made it through that era of my life. (And -- again -- even MORE thankful for Wendy and what she and I have!) I usually don't look back at my high school days and pine for what was, but if I ever did I think I'd snap out of it at the first memory of the uncontrolable passion and seemingly un-guidable and intense emotions they have to deal with. I mean, I experience intense emotions often, but I've also gained the tools to manipulate and maneuver through those emotions that they are only just now learning.

Any adult that doesn't have sympathy and empathy for the plight of being a teenager is living in denial, his/her own trauma-riddled past blissfully repressed and probably reconfigured into a set of nice, dabilitating neurosis.


Sunday, September 9, 2006

I wasn't awakened this morning!!!

When I did wake up, Tisha and Connie were watching the tail-end of THE ISLAND. (Yay!) Tisha had gotten up to take some medicine, and was going to go back to bed, but THE ISLAND was on and she got sucked into that.

Did I mention that 'm sleeping on a hideaway couch/bed? Well, it's in the living room.

Luckily, when I'm alseep I'm asleep. So people watching TV on one of the HUGEST screns you've ever seen outside a movie theater, in surround sound, isn't going to stir me until my body is done resting.

And there are just few better ways to wake up than to (what I consider to be) a cool movie, surounded by people I love!!!

So Sunday started off really well!

Adfter THE ISLAND was BATMAN BEGINS!!! We three watched that. That's one of the movies I sincerely consider to be a PERFECT movie!!!

So by the time Tisha and I decided to get dressed and begin our day, I was in a fantastic mood!

On the agenda for today was the mall and a couple of movies. Tisha wanted to see STEP UP and so I voted for PULSE as the second feature. (A nice balance, I think: Dance-y Chick Flick and Supernatural Horror.)

But then Tisha decided she wanted to get home and to bed early because she started Driver's Ed before school tomorrow. So my movie got the boot.

On our way into Lubbock we stopped and ate at Fazoli's which is really good food if you don't have time/money for a real Italian restaurant! It's a few notches above fast-food, though a couple below actual restaurant food. (How spoiled am I by our Family Dinners every Sunday now that I can descern a difference, lol!)

Tisha needed to stop by Brittany's for some "supplies", and then Brittany ended up going with us.

At the mall, I insisted on stopping by a dvd store, because was jonesing for some horror. I knew that STAY ALIVE is coming out sometime in early-ish Sept -- and I used to have a crush on ONE TREE HILL's Sophia Bush, plus I ADORE horror videogames! and I missed the flick when it was in the theaters (cinemas) -- so I thought maybe possibly I could buy it and get my horror fix back at the house. The girls directed me to FYE, and the clerk said it was out, but that they didn't have any copies.

:(

After the mall was the movie -- not bad at all, really -- and after that we were all feeling squirrely and wanted some shaved ice at Bahama Buck's (where Tisha and I went after I inappropriately took her to see AMERICAN PIE 2, lol, thinking it would be more like the first flick: less sex and more humor and heart) but they were closed. So Brittany directed us to a place called Stone Cold Ice Creamery, and it turned out to be very much like Amy's Ice cream in Austin!!!

Very groovy vibe, any flavor you want with anything mixed in that you want, cones and cone-lined bowls available!!!

I got a cone/bowl covered in chocolate with sprinkles, and filled it with Coffee and Cotton Candy flavored ice cream (the Cotton Candy ice cream was BLUE... So... You know, HAD to) with Heath bar chopped up in it. Tisha flat-out refused to put that stuff in her mouth, but Brittany said it was good. (She may have been humoring the old guy though, lol.) I LOVED it! The Cotton Candy wasn't really necessary, but IT WAS BLUE!

On our way to drop Brittany off, I experienced a definitive moment... This is what it's like to drive 2 teenage girls around town: The stereo is blasting hip-hop music while 2 completely seperate conversations are going on simultaneously right beside and behind you, and you are involved in neither of them because the conversations are being conucted via cell phone, lol!

Friday, after I woke up from my post-travel nap, I paid my phone bill and set up my account so that I can make and receive International calls. The opperator told me there would be a 3-5 day wait while a security check was done on me. In this post 9/11 age, I guess that only makes sense. One way to prevent terrorist attacks is to not allow them to make calls outside the States if they're already here.

But listening to the girls talk to their boyfriends (or whomever) made me want to har my Gnomey's voice. So I tried to call. But my International service was still disabled. :( (Dammit, W, I was born and raised in Texas... I'm good people! I just wanna talk to my hot Britsh girlfriend! I swear!)

After we dropped of Brittany and returned to Levelland Tisha indulged me in my quest to find STAY ALIVE. I tried Movie Gallery (their dvd rental store) but they were closed, and Wlamart, but the flick was simply NOT to be had today. :(


Monday, September 11, 2006

TISHA'S SWEET 16!!!

I woke up and took Tisha to school DURING A DOWNPOUR!!! It was BEAUTIFUL!!! Austin isn't having the kind of weather the rest of the country is... It's hot and dry here. August had THE HOTTEST weather since 1922!

So to be here in Levelland and running around in a torrential downpour simply HEAVEN for me!!!

Between dropping Tisha off and meeting her for lunch, I tried to get some work done on the screenplay. I got 4 3x5 cards done, which was amazingly unsatisfying.

For lunch Tisha and I went to a place called Robertos! Now, the best fast-food beef & cheese burritos extant are at Taco Villa. But the best "authentic" beef & cheese burritos I remember from my youth were at a place in Odessa called Geribaldi's, across the highway from the Permian Playhouse, where I spent the better part of 9 years. (The Playhouse, not Geribaldi's... I didn't get to eat there very often, unfortunately.) Roberto's in Levelland has beef & cheese burritos that taste EXACTLY the way I remember Geribaldi's burritos tasting in the '80s!!!

A true culinary TREAT!

After lunch I went back to Walmart and discovered that STAY ALIVE isn't due to be released until the 19th, so I bought a plastic pouch thingy for my loose 3x5 cards instead.

I CALLED WENDY!!! My International service works now and I got to call Wendy!!! I missed her on the first couple of tries, but I finally got to talk to her on my 3rd try!!!

I MISSED HER VOICE SO MUCH!!! She is just SO LOVELY!!! We told each other that we love each other & we miss each other a few times and giggled a few times... It was WONDERFUL!!! lol

Oh, and before picking Tisha up from school I got to watch an episode of KIM POSSIBLE! That was WAY cool! I haven't gotten to see that show in a while.

Picking Tisha up, I gave her friends Kayci and Lance a lift home before taking Tisha to her chyro appointment (which was surprisingly quick!).

It was Lance's birthday, too! He's Tisha's exact age. And he's good people. Saturday, after the track meet, I met Tisha and a few of her friends at Dairy Queen for Blizzards. (I got a Dude, also; my first meal of the day, Saturday.) Lance and a girl named Danika (Tisha's friend at the track meet who got to see my pout and shout when Tisha frightened me awake, lol) were among the crowd, and they both impressed me as very cool people!

After school Tisha was WIPED-OUT. She crashed on the couch whiole Dale (Tisha's adopted father and my ex-father-in-law -- no, we're NOT the stuff of an episode of SPRINGER! It's just kinda complicated is all) watched OCEAN'S TWELVE. (Not the all-time calssic that OCEAN'S ELEVEN is, but still good entertainment. Plus... Eddie Izzard is in it!!!) Poor Tish kept getting woken up by her cell phone, her friends constantly calling her. (ALL of them, apparently.) And in the middle of all the cell phone calls, she was awakened by a gorgeous bouquet of flowers for her birthday. She woke up, answered the door to accept the flowers, then laid back down on the couch and was asleep again, immediately.

After OCEANS TWELVE Dale turned me onto a show called MONSTER JAM! It's a monster truck competition, and the drives are really skilled, and the trucks themselves look like they were grown from Hot Wheels! They're like adult-sized toys! I became enthralled, lol!

For Tisha's birthday we all went to eat at a place called Tokyo Sothing-Or-Other. It's one of those Japanese restaurants with the samurai chefs that cook your meal as you watch, and the FIRST time I've ever eaten at a place like that! It was VERY cool, and the food was DELICIOUS!!!


Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Woke up a little after 10:30 am, and Tisha was already at school. Very nice. :)

Met Tisha at Burger King where she was having lunch with some of her Youth Group from church. It was very cool. Among them was her friend Marissa, whom I met in San Antonio several months back. (She credited me with saving them from boredom there, but I believe she's giving me too much credit, lol.)

That was at 12:30 pm. While I was waiting for 12:30 to roll around, I pawed through the $5-previously-viewed-dvd bin at Movie Gallery and found a present for Brian: 3 of the 4 discs of season One of THE A-TEAM!!! I had to call him up to tell him he had a surprise coming when I got home!

That night I watched TV with Connie and Dale.

I never just sit around and watch TV. Brian and I don't have cable -- and don't particularly want it. If we could get Cartoon Network, some science channels and some movie channels it would be worth the money, but TimeWarner Cable isn't set up that way. You pay $100 for A LOT of crap, or simply do without. (Our TV isn't equipped with rabbit-ear antenaes, so we don't even get local channels.) For our money, we choose to do without. We have cable modem service and A LOT of dvds instead!

The only time I watch TV is at work, and I'm not watching it then. I'm monitoring it. Totally different activity. I am aware of what's on, but paying attention to a couple dozen other deatils while it airs, including what's on next and what's gonna be on after that.

So spending Tuesday night watching TV was kind of a novel experience for me.

I got to see the last 20 minutes of HOUSE, which was really good! I see what all the hype is about. Then we watched an episode of STANDOFF, which is really good storytelling AND it has the guy from OFFICE SPACE and gena Torres from FIREFLY and ANGEL! So YAY there!!! Then NCIS which started off as a decent show and ended up being a great show. then I got to see an episode of EURIKA! (Matt Frewer, shouldn't do accents... He has such a naturally distinctive way of speaking! It would be like trying to watch Christopher Walken try to play an Aussie, lol.)


Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Watched the last of THE FOG (the remake), THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY and THE PACIFIER with Dale. That was fun. (Dale and Connie are nurses, so they'll work for, like, 100 days straight and get a week off, lol.)

I also got sucked into one of out old-school political debates. He's a die-hard conservative and I believe politics is the devil's playground, a means to keep us so riled up over what's going on materially that we're distracted from spirituality. But I tend to lean liberal politically, and so he enjoys "schooling" me about the Liberal Conspiracy to overthrow Conservativism -- the one-day saviour of civilization if all us bleeding-heart human rights yahhos would just step out of Bush's and Rumsfeld's way and let the hardliners tell us how our lives SHOULD BE lived.

I hate those conversations. For a full day I dodged Dale's little digs at what he percieves as the Liberal Conspiracy, but I opened my mouth and allowed myself to get sucked into another friggin' debate.

And the thing that's so frustrating is that Limbaugh teaches people how to frame an arguement so that any facts that contradict the Conservative opinion are simply swept out of the arguement and the debate is refocused onto a subject that the Conservative knows mre about than the Liberal. The agrue emtns tend to range far and wide, and no topic can be discected for too long, lest Conservative momentum be lost.

It's just like debates about religion. If you start to make a point about how we can't know if life begins at conception, the arguement suddenly becomes about prayer in schools.

Blah.

Not fun.

BUT I GOT TO TALK TO WENDY ON THE PHONE AGAIN!!!

It wasn't until after I picked Tisha up from school and we were on our way to Lubbock so she and some friends go do Putt Putt golf to celebrate even more Virgo birthdays, so the call wasn't nearly long enough, but it sure did make my day!!!

My god I love her so much!!! She told me about how her brother fried her computer with his drink this morning. :( So it may be a while after I get home before we can chat via webcam. But I HAVE TO hear her voice on a regular basis, so the phone bill will be WELL worth it!

In Lubbock Tish and I picked up Brittany again, then we met up with Leonel and Kayci at Starbuck's for a quick caffiene fix before hitting the mall. I got a Venti Earl grey, which I spilled in the floorboard on the way to the mall.

At the mall I tried to call Wendy again, but I couldn't get ahold of her. :( I just really wanted to hear her voice some more.

Today was Brittany's and Leonel's birthday.

When we got to Putt Putt Brittany and I were famished and Leonel and Kayci weren't there yet, so the 3 of us chipped in and got a pizza, and the girls took my quarters to play videogames while we waited.

The young 'uns played arcade games and did the batting cage before doing unlimited go-karts, Leonel hung back from the go-karts, and we watched the girls and talked videogames and horror movies. We also stumbled onto a conversation about assumptions adults tend to make about teens. I jokingly accused a stretch hummer limo of being full of people doing drugs, then explained that as the oldest fart around I felt it was my obligation to accuse any teenagers in sight of doing drugs. And that turned into an interesting conversation about the labels and stereotypes teens get slapped across them without provocation.

I got to share with him a story I had heard Tisha telling for the past couple of days that he actually hadn't heard yet, though it happened at his school:

A kid goes into class before school to make up a test. The teacher starts weezing, then collapses from an asthma attack. The teacher isn't breathing. The kid drops down and begins administering CPR. More teachers see this and drag the kid away, one actually starts takes the kid aside and starts tearing into him about how he has no right to be pestering a man in medical distress. The kid pulls out his wallet and shows the teacher his certification to perform live-saving maneuvers, certifications that the kid had to get for the Lifeguard job her worked over the summer. The kid goes on to cite the actual EXPERIENCE that he has performing these manuevers (experience which the irrate teacher DOES NOT have).

It's a good story. Dramatic, with a twist ending and a social point to be made.

Even better because it's true.

I mean yeah, I wasn't there and didn't witness it first hand, so I can't be sure of all the facts or how it unfolded. But I heard Tisha tell it several times... The same way every time. No imbelishments.

Anyway, my last night in Levelland allowed me to spend time with 2 of Tisha's good friends that I liked hanging around, and get to know another good friend of hers, who I now very much enjoy hanging around!

The Kayci and Tisha had to be home at 10:00 pm so we left around 8:30 pm. Everyone wanted to ride in Leonel's truck -- instead of the Old Guy's car? What's up with THAT? lol -- and as I was getting into my car I heard a female voice say "Don't call shotgun" and then Brittany's voice ring out "Shotgun!" and then Tisha sang out "I got bitch!" I joked that that was one of my proudest monets as a father, and Leonel joked that that must be exacty the type of think I want to hear.

I followed them to Stone Cold Ice Creamery, because if Brittany wasn't getting cake on her birthday, she at least wanted ice cream... Even if she had to buy it herself, lol. (I'm telling you, next to Tish, she may be the coolest young chick I know, lol!) While Tisha and Leonel and I waited outside Tish asked what I meant about being proud to hear my daughter call bitch, and started to explain what the term meant, in relation to seating possitions. (If you don't know, it's the position in the front between the driver and the passenger, lol.) I explained that I knew what the term meant, I was just shocked and amused to discover that Tisha knew... And to hear her call it out! I mean, I've heard Tommy and Brian and Kelly and Chuck joke about who gets the bitch possition when we're piling into a car, but to hear Tish refer to it... HYSTERICAL! :D

Tisha asked if Wendy ever called me back or texted me. I said she hadn't, and Tish quickly did the math... It was 3:00 am in England. (And this impressed the hell out of me! I think I meantioned ONCE that Britain is 6 hours ahead of us, and on this, my last night in Levelland, Tisha remembered and quickly calculated it!!!) Then Tish asked Leonel if I had told him about Wendy, and I hadn't, so she quickly filled him in... British, met her in an online game, we chat via webcam and text and talk on the phone, she'll be coming in february, wich will be her 21st birthday...

Leonel's hand shoots up and he quickly says "I need a high five!"

I laugh and blush and high-five him, then laugh and blush some more.

The one aspect of mine and Wendy's relationship that I feared my gross my daughter and my ex-wife and all my female friends out is, naturally, the MOST IMPRESSIVE aspect to Tisha's 16-year-old male friends!

It was a fun visit.

Possibly the most fun visit to date!!!

I LOVE who Tish is becoming! I mean, she's always been exceptionally easy to be proud of! Great athlete, great socially, intelligent, funny, great grades, loving! She's always been a great person!!! But now that I'm getting a glimpse into what type of adult she's going to become, I am SO INSPIRED and excited (and relieved, lol)! Hanging with her this year isn't like hanging with a kid, it's like hangin' with a peer!

On the way to Lubbock I overheard her talking to an ex who is now a friend, and who is apparently toying with the idea of them getting back together. Hearing Tisha explain to him that she will always have a place for him in her life, and maybe one day that place will be romantic, but she's not emotionally ready to go back down that path with him, and right now she feels she needs some time away from a relationship to heal from a breakup that she now sees she may not have fully dealt with before...

The chick is DEEP!

She's so much more emotionally mature and in-tune than I was -- than ANYONE I KNOW was -- at her age! And she has GREAT friends that all seem to be right where she is emotionally! (Teen-angst drama early in the week notwithstanding... I was a dramaqueen when I was in high school, but I didn't have the enlightenment that these kids seem to have! Or the support of peers with more mature sensibilities!)

Tisha's a bright young woman, and I am SO THANKFUL that I got this past week to catch a glimpse of how truly amzing she really is!

Anyway, lol... "Is Daddy pwoud of his widdle girl? He IS?!! WHATa SURPWISE!"

But I mean it, she's got A LOT going for her, and it was a joy to get to spend that time with her!!!

Thanks, Tish!! And Kayci and Brittany and Leonel and Lance and and Marissa and Danika!!!

I'll have pics up sometime in the near future! I swear, lol! :D

My Gnomey...

My baby has such a QUICK wit!

She had just gotten out of the bath (or was getting ready for one... I don't recall which) and we we IMing, but not with webcams. So I said "Whatcha doin'? You naked at wet? Lemme see" or something like that, and she said "no" and I'm like "YESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYES, PLEASE" and she didn't respond. So I'm like "Lemme see and I'll be your boyfriend for life!"

Then I'm like, "Oh, wait, I already am. Um... I'll..." I waited a second. "I'll... Uh... Do something nive for you!"

Then she says "Wot."

"I'll..."

'"um..."

"paint...your... SHOES!"

Then she says:

"Is that slang for something?"

I died!!!

My mind was immediately flooded with a number of aweful possibilities of what that might be slang for! lol

I love her so much!

As I type this I'm watching her fight sleep on the webcam. She's exhausted, poor thing, but she just won't go to sleep as long as I'm here. Bless her!!! She is SO GORGEOUS!!!

I swear, if I saw an angel face-to-face, the angel's face would HAVE TO BE hers! There is just NOT a more beautiful face in all of Physical or Spiritual Reality!!! Looking at her soft, closed eyelids and her cheeks and her relaxed smile, I see manifest in physical form all the emotions of joy and caring and peace and ecstacy that she makes me FEEL! She LOOKS like every positive emotion you have ever experienced! And thus allows you to re-experience all those emotions!

Dude! I'm getting jealous of Ray Jay the Pillow! That bastard is SO LUCKY!!!

Well, actually, I'm the luckiEST bastard... on the planet! But still... *pouts* I still wish it was me she was squeezing when she falls asleep.

And when she wakes up.

Her bath towel's damn lucky TOO!

heheh

Earlier this evening she was reading me this book of "dumb questions". Some of them were cute, some punny, and some were hysterical!

"If olive oil is made by squeezing olives, how is baby oil made?"

My response...

"Very carefully."

She had a couple of good ones herself:

"If we're meant to live in a land of Free Speech, why do we have phone bills?"

"If love is blind, why is lengerie so popular?"

(That one's my FAVORITE!!!)

After she read the "dumb questions" I read her some of Conan O'Brien's "In the Year 2000..." predictions. One of my all-time faves...

"In the year 2000, packaged Toll House cookies will become so moist and chewy that people will no longer fear death."

"In the year 2000 people all over the world are shocked and angry to learn that the billions of dollars they have donated have gone to fighting the astrological sign Cancer."

"...jails will become so overcrowded that prisoners will be forced to sodomize one another, as a space saving measure."

Every moment with Wendy is fun and joyful and just flat-out WONDERFUL!!! If the concept of Joy were personified and made flesh, it would be Gnomey Munts Munts!!!

I think she's asleep now, hee-hee. OMG she is SO BEAUTIFUL!!! I should use this time to blog about Tish's 16th, but I am SO tempted to just sit here and watch her!!!

Okay, I'm gonna try to do the Tisha blog.

Nobody wake Wendy.

Everybody, ssssshhhhhhh...

I need to go ahead and blog about my visit with Tisha, but I'm just not quite ready to do it yet. There's all this stuff to do!

Some of it's silly.

Like, before I left for Levelland I started 2 projects: The first was converting my cds of STAR WARS: THE RADIO DRAMA into mp3s so I could listen to each entire series consecutively without switching out the disc every 2 episodes. I know, lazy AND silly. But also, if I ever want to put them on my ZVue -- and the thought occured to me before the trip -- they need to be in mp3 form, anyway. So making a disc will eventually help me out there.

The second project: Back in 1934, when Tarzan was still quite a new character, there was a radio serial called TARZAN AND THE DIAMOND OF ASHER. Actually, there were 3 or 4 Tarzan serials. These were like the Saturday matinee serials that ran before double-features in movie theaters in the '50s, with the cliff-hanger ending. (Maybe where the movie studios got the idea, actually... I'll have to research that.) But anyway, for some reason DIAMOND OF ASHER is the serial that piques my interest. But when I started listening to it, I got annoyed because each episode is 15 minutes long, and each begins with about 3 minutes of opening music, then a minute or two of the narrator telling you what happened last time. And if you're listening to the episodes back-to-back, you JUST HEARD what happened last time. So I got this idea to chop off the opening of all but the first episode so I could listen to the entire story -- 39 episodes, total -- in a single sitting. (Maybe even fall asleep listening to it sometime.) But, unfortunately, such a frivolous endeavor never the less takes time to complete.

So while waiting for my Gnomey Goddess to wake up this evening, I completed those two projects instead of blogging about my trip.

And also, Brian and I spent some time on the Slasher screenplay!!! I was stuck with some background details that I needed to start Act II off with, and Brian helped me find them! So very soon, I will begin the Rough Draft (or maybe the "Test Draft", depending upon how well -- or badly -- it turns out, lol) of that script! Once the first draft is done we'll have a much better idea about how soon we'll be able to pitch it and start working on getting our financing! (Woo-hoo!)

But when Brian and I start talking about any one project, we naturally start talking about other projects, too. His new schedule keeps us from being able to chat like we used to, so when we get in Creative Mode we can't ONLY work on one project. Poor guy hasn't been able to work on his screenplay for about a month now because of his new job. :( And because I can't be sure of when he and I will have time to work together, I focus my attention on the project I know I can write mostly alone. So I haven't really been thinking about his script when he and I aren't talking about it.

OOH! On a completely tangential (am I using that work correctly?) note: I discovered that Wendy shares my love of Anshelm Keifer!!! HOW COOL IS THAT! The ONE artist (Modern Artist, no less) whose work excites me, someone who is relatively obscure unless you're jusy WAY deep into the Art scene, and Wendy not only knows who he is but love him, too!!! (In fact, she was surprised that I know who he is, lol!)

OMG!!! You should have SEEN her when she woke up this morning!!! You know the old joke about going to bed with a 10 and waking up with a 2? Well that is most definitely NOT my Gnomey Goddess!!! I have sen her just before she goes out, just after she gets back from going out, just before she goes to sleep -- got to actually watch her fall asleep once, heheh -- when she's just bummin' around the house and when she's just woken up, and that woman is ALWAYS an 11!!! I have yet to see her NOT look flat-out GREAT!

Sorry... Relaying the Art discussion I remembered what she looked like when we were talking and I HAD TO share, hee-hee. :D

Damn! I gotta finish that screenplay so I can buy us a house and move her into it, lol! I want her to be the last thing I see every night and the first thing I see every morning!!!

Damn! I wish I was her lover! I'd love her till the daylight comes, make sure she is smiling and warm! Damn! For me there is no other! (Apologies to Sophie B. Hawkins, heheh)

I'll blog about the trip soon, I promise...

Back From My Travels

Yeah, I only went up-state for a week, but "back from my travels" just sounds cooler, doesn't it?

I fully intent to fill you in on the details and share pics, but not tonight. I'm trying to keep myself occupied until I can allow myself to go to sleep -- gotta get back into my "normal" sleeping patterns -- and I just finished a divine meal of Italian sausage smothered in tomato sauce and accompanied by 3 pieced of garlic toast, so I'm feeling a little contented and drowsy, hehehe.

But I did take extensive notes during my trip, so I'll be blogging about it soon.

My daughter RULES! :D

Also, my dear Wendy is babysitting tonight, so I haven't gotten to see her, but we got lots of time yesterday after I got home... So YAY!!!

I am ADDICTED to that woman! I'm serious, I ACHED to see her and hear her voice this past week! And when I finally saw her, it was like I had been holding my breath for 6 days and was finally able to BREATHE! I have been in love before, but what I feel for her is INTENSE. I don't know how I'm gonna keep from fainting when we finally see each other face-to-face for the first time... I've never fainted before, but I suspect my brain and body may well shut down on that first, much-anticipated, most-achingly-desired encounter!

But the positive -- there's always a silver lining, and if not you're just lazy ;P -- aspect of my Gnomey being busy today was that I got to spend the day shooting zombies. I did no zombie-hunting or slaying while in Levelland, so it was nice to be able to spend all day with the PS2.

After Brian got home from work I switched to raiding and pillaging with PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE LEGENDS OF JACK SPARROW. Brian doesn't usually like to play videogames, but he enjoys watching them. He'll watch me clean up Springfield or some obscure European coutry infested with living zombies, or watch me bomb around Springfield like some maniac. But there are a few games he particularly likes watching me play, and one of them is PIRATES.

I started from the beginning and worked my way up to the level that has been stumping us since we got the game: It's aboard this ship, fighting this fat Spaniard captain with this "thousand strile" sword attack. He watched me bang my head against this particular wall repeately and then finally wondered allowed how much a second controler would cost, and what are the odds we could defeat this guy playing 2-player.

I suggested that a controler mush surely be less than $20, and he got paid today! So we bolted to Walmart!

The controler was actually $25... But he bought it anyway!

And then we got it home, and discovered that a second player can't simply plug into a saved game. So we started from scratch.

But we progressed quickly, and finally BEAT THE SPANISH CAPTAIN!!! He stayed up an hour past his self-induced curfew, and we got well into the next level before deciding to be wise and end the game for now.

We also discovered that 2 of his newer Star Wars games are 2-player, so we should have hours of adventures head of us!

So I didn't get to enjoy the companionship of my girlfriend, but I did get to enjoy the much-missed companionship of my brother/roommate/best friend! Since he got his new job, our schedules haven't been syncing up nearly as well as they used to. So today was a nice break from the norm. Almost a seperate vacation for me! :D

Oh, also, I went back into SecondLife for the first time in a while. While on my way home from Levelland I stopped at a roadside rest stop I'm familiar with to stretch my legs, and got some cool pics of it. It occured to me this would be fun to recreate in SL, so I went back in tonight to get started on that. Since Wendy and I got together, SL hasn't held much appeal for me. It's nice to have a reason to return to this world that was SO important to me for SO MUCH of this year. I doubt I'll ever be as fanatical about it as I was, but I hope I never lose ALL interest in it; it's kind of a convenient vacation spot. Ya know?

Okay, so I need to get lost in a project so the hours before bedtime fly by for me. (Otherwise I'll find myself simply fighting sleep, and that's no fun.)

PEACE TO ALL!!! :D

Pluggin' Away at the Script

I was hoping that tonight I could get all the story beats I came up with in my breakdown onto notecards so I could put them in this binder I have for the purpose of making a stack of 3x5 cards portable and easier to thumb through.

I got the first act done and looked up at the clock, and was terribly disappointed to discover that I need to focus completely on work now.

But then I counted the cards I had done... 10. Thet's twice the obligation I created for myself... So ACTUALLY... I did a good job tonight!

So that's cool.

In addition to the cards, I created 3 characters I needed to create, and their relation to the story, so I've actually had quite a productive night!!!

Yay me! :D

Still, I don't think I can be done soon enough, lol. I asked Tommy (who will be directing this if it turns out to be a movie he wants to direct) to reserve judgement until I get a finished script to him. So I wanna hurry up and get to the pages! But experience has proven to me that it would be just WAY foolish to start writing pages until I'm 100% secure with EVERYTHING that happens in the movie first. Things will change when I go from cards to pages, but if the cards don't tell a great story, the pages have less of a chance of really shining.

Anyone wanna donate $25,000 so I can go ahead and quit my job and write full-time?

No?

You SURE...?

Okay... :(

It's 10:00 am in England right now... I wonder if my lovely Wendy-Lady has woken up yet.

I KNOW that whether she's asleep or just waking up, she looks AMAZING. hee-hee She's one of those amazing women who simply NEVER looks bad!

I've seen her just before she goes to sleep (I actually got to watch her sleep for a few minutes once when she crashed while I was reading to her and her webcam ws still on!) and I've seen her when she's just woken up, and getting ready for work and getting ready to go out with her friends, and after she's gotten back from a night out... And she's just ALWAYS gorgeous!

I miss her. :(

All night long I air these commercials for different local dating scams -- hook-up-by-phone numbers -- and I'm currently airing one of those lame-ass dating "reality" shows, and they all make me so glad that I happened to meet this woman who is SMART and funny and FUN and kind!!! (The hot-ness doesn't hurt, either, lol.)

These dating shows always have the most catty, vacuous bitches all trying to sound smart but only proving with every word and action just how monumentally stupid they really are! And the GUYS... Omg! I SO don't blame women for thinking that all men are morons! MOST OF US ARE, apparently!

And all the Phone Connection commercials have these cute women trying to pose and talk all sexy, and they make me appreciate my Gnomey SO MUCH!!! Because her sex appeal and her attractiveness in general comes from HOW REAL she is! She likes being who she is and doesn't try to be anything or anyone else. She just IS WHO SHE IS! Which is SO HOT!!!

Okay, I just looked at the clock again and realized that I really do need to go, lol.

I just got an email from my ex-wife, heheheh...

I emailed her and told her about Wendy, in case she hadn't been reading the blog lately, and I felt that as a woman she might want the chance to chastize me for dating a woman 4 years older than our daughter.

Her response was the opposite of what I was expecting. She's really, really happy for us. She read Gnomey's blog and saw her pics, and she thinks Gnomey's pretty and sweet, and she likes the fact that Gnomey is so into me. In fact (and here's the reason I'm writing this entry, lol) she made the following observation:

"I think you may have found someone who likes you better than you. LOL."

I laughed my ass off when I read that! If you know me, or have read enough of my blog, you know what she's talking about! :D

Aw... My baby and I haven't been able to see each other except for a few minutes at a time recently. :( Stuff keeps popping up and cutting our conversations short. I mean, I'm actually happy to get to see her at all! But I'm not gonna be able to chat with her for, like, 6 days straight! So it kinda sucks that we haven't gotten a lot of Quality Time recently. :(

Still, I'm hoping we'll get some time tomorrow before I hit the road to see my Tisha for the week. So, fingers crossed...

Okay, I should get back to work for now.

PEACE!

Have You Seen ULTIMATE AVENGERS: THE MOVIE Yet?!!

HOLY SCHIZA!!! Someone in Hollywood is finally THINKIN'!!!

Okay, I just saw ULTIMATE AVENGERS 2: RISE OF THE PANTHER and I REALLY DUG IT!!!

Which blows my mind!

Why? A number of reasons, but let's start out with the fact that it's a STRAIGHT-TO-DVD RELEASE and it's GOOD!!!

Granted, Disney's been releasing decent-to-good sequels to its big animated hits since the late 1990s. But they were the exception. Any -- and I mean ANY -- live-action flick that is released straight-to-video is gonna be sub-par. I simply HAVE NOT seen the exception to that rule. (And I've tried! From the straight-to-VHS sequel to SALEM'S LOT back in the mid-80s to the so-called "horror" films produced by Highland Myst to H.G. WELL'S WAR OF THE WORLDS just a couple of years ago, straight-to-video is synonimous with "sucks".)

BUT... I saw ULTIMATE AVENGERS: THE MOVIE on the shelf at Walmart around 3:00 am one Tuesday morning, and you could get it -- brand spanking new, just-hit-the-shelves --for $14 OR you could pay the standard (yet, still reasonable) $20 and get a free, limited-time-only tiny, tiny comic book with it!!!

The tiny, tiny limited-time-only comic book had me at "Hewwo".

It was a Comic Book movie (good...), it was animated (good...), it was the Marvel characters (um... if you grew up in the '80s... not so good...), and it was a straight-to-dvd release (definitely BAD)... But I had the money, and I knew someday I'd have the time, AND... tiny, tiny comic book...!!!

So I opened it, thumbed through the tiny, tiny comic book without actually reading it or spoiler-ing it for myself, and shelved the flick for a bit.

Then one night, maybe even a month later, I had time to watch a movie, and was in the mood for something I hadn't seen. I remembered ULTIMATE AVENGERS: THE MOVIE (my best friend Kelly has this great schtick about films subtitled ":The Movie" wherein he immitates a disgruntled audience member seaking out the theater manager... "I'm sorry, but when I saw the title 'Superman' I assumed that when I sat down in the movie theater I would be treated to some sort of reading, or perhaps a slideshow of comic book pages on the screen so that I could read them myself, I wasn't expecting to see a motion picture.... I'd really appreciate a refund... And perhaps you could put some sort of disclaimer on the poster, to warn others in the future.") and I watched it.

And I was AMAZED! It FELT like I was watching A MOVIE!!!

Let me clarify: I bought a collection of episodes of THE HULK animated TV series and the FOX SPIDER-MAN animated TV series, and I saw the same animated junk I expected to see. These were stories that actually made it to the Small Screen, and they were just about as bad as I expected (though worse than I secretly hoped). Whenever I buy a straight-to-dvd movie, I know what I'm getting into, hope I'll be proven wrong, and never -- to memory -- am.

The thing about (a) animated features that are released straight-to-video and (b) ANY feature released straight-to-video is that they don't FEEL like movies... They feel like a bunch of scenes cobbled together the best the filmmakers know how to do, written in that "and then this happens and then this happens and then..." fashion of screenwriting. here's no emotional involvement on the part of the audience. there's no real REASON to keep watching... you just do because you paid the money.

But right from the start, ULTIMATE AVENGERS: THE MOVIE FELT like a movie!!! I had a sense of awe, a sense of grandness, a sense that I was experiencing some EVENT. LIKE I WAS IN A THEATER WATCHING A MOVIE!!!

And the movie kep on that way to the end!

I watched it again with Brian months and months later, and I enjoyed it a second time!

Now, the animation is what you'd expect from a TV show, and the acting -- while REALLY GOOD -- isn't motion picture acting. (It's FAR ABOVE what you'd expect for most animation, but not as subtle or nuanced as, say, an Edward Norton or Morgan Freedman performance.)

And right there on the dvd is a preview for THE SEQUEL, OUT LATER THAT YEAR!!!

So I'm like "I can have MORE of this?!!"

Now, WHY exactly am I so excited about high-quality straight-to-dvd movies?

Because there's this Punk Rocker/Artistic Rebel Guy in me. I don't believe that you should HAVE TO pay The Hollywood Machine money on Opening Weekend to enjoy a great cinematic experience. The Hollywood Machine has become this bloated, wasteful, gluttonous beast that is just as likely to slap CGI on a turd and bombard you with TV commercials until you give up and go look at the damn thing as it is to give you a truly exciting emotional experience. Hollywood doesn't know what's good; it only knows what it can sell. If you see a good Hollywood Studio flick, it's because the FILMMAKERS made sure it was good. The Studio doesn't give a fuck if you get your money's worth. (Look at the last 4 BATMAN flciks for evidence of that -- Burton thinks her's this genius (and sometimes he IS, but not as often as he thinks), Schuemacker thought he was making the '60s TV show, but Nolan was trying to make a good Batman film. Look at Bryan Singer (Filmmaker)'s first 2 X-Men films and his Supeman film, then look at Brett Ratner (Hollywood)'s X-Men film.)

If your artistic medium is filmmaking, you assume that you have to work for Hollywood. Because that's the way it's been forever and ever. If you wanna make great cinema, you have to make a Studio Picture because that's just the way it is.

But I disagree!

See, back in the 1970s, great filmmakers made movies for TV, too! Smaller budgets, but still GREAT FILMS! And the audience got to enjoy them FOR FREE!!! (Until the age of 7 I lived in a 3-room -- not 3-bedroom, but 3-ROOM -- house and the only source of entertainment we could afford was a tiny black-and-white TV. At the moment, I can't even afford TV because my set can't even get local stations without cable, and I'm not paying TimeWarner Cable's ungodly prices!!!)

I can think of 4 GREAT examples of the type of filmmaking I'm talking about...

In 1981 I saw this great, very scary movie called DARK NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW on TV. I have seen scarecrow-related movies made in this century that didn't COME CLOSE to being as riveting and genuinely scary as this flick was! (And they probably cost more to make, too!) I tracked down a VHS copy on Amazon or EBay and watched it again last year...

STILL SCARY!!!

In 1971 Richard Matheson wrote an an edge-of-your-seat flick about a guy driving cross-country being pursued by a malignant and enigmatic truck driver. The flick was DUEL. I have it on VHS, but it's available on Special Edition dvd now. If you've heard of the flick it's probably because it was directed by first-time feature director SteVen Spielberg.

THE MOVIE WAS WRITTEN BY LEGEND RICHARD MATHESON AND DIRECTED BY SOON-TO-BE-LEGEND STEVEN SPIELBERG, AND AMERICAN AUDIENCES GOT TO SEE IT FOR FREE!!!

Also, fans of THE X-FILES know that genius creator Chris Carter was inspired by the TV series KOLCHACK: NIGHT STALKER. What they may NOT know is that the series was a spin-off from 2 TV movies (also, it happens, written by Richard Matheson), THE NIGHT STALKER (1972) and THE NIGHT STRANGLER (1973).

I've watched all of these titles within the last year, and all 4 stand the test of time! I mean, yeah there's a distinct generation gap of storytelling -- you gotta be able to watch movies at a slower pace to really appreciate them, but the storytelling is there!

So why does straight-to-video have to suck?

It DOESN'T! It sucks because the distributors know they can't pay Spielberg to make their movie, so they high some fresh-out-of-film-School schmuck who talks a decent game to make the movie. Turns out Fresh-Out-Of-Film-School TALKS better than he shoots! (Go figure...) But the distribution companies make their profit, so they're happy to go on distributing disappointing garbage.

MEANWHILE, back at the ranch...

GENUINELY GOOD filmmakers have ideas for movies that A LOT of people will enjoy, but just not EVERYBODY IN THE WORLD, so they don't get to make their films because Hollywood Studios ONLY want to sell movies to EVERYBODY IN THE WORLD. (They have a lot of expensive Executive "Producers" to pay, so they want to make all the MONEY in the world... They have no interest in Chump Change.) So the genuinely good filmmakers have to sell their souls to get a paycheck.

But it doesn't HAVE TO be that way!

Let's say you wanna make a movie that only the Fan-Boys out there will like... Why not make it for less thatn $150 million and release it on dvd? That way only the Fan-Boys will buy it! You don't have to deal with complaining theater owners, because your not cluttering up their pocorn-and-candy restaurants with a movie that few will come to see! The people who WANT TO see it WILL see it!

THAT'S the way filmmaking distribution SHOULD be!

However, my friend Kelly has this astoundingly enlightening saying: "In Hollywood, everyone wants to be second." No one wants to be the FIRST to be interested in a script, to try a genre that hasn't made money in 20 years, to try a new way of doing things... They want to see it work, see SOMEONE ELSE make the money, then swoop in and be the second to collect on this new cash-cow.

In other words, no one is going to make GOOD direct-to-dvd movies until someone else makes a ton of money doing it.

Then EVERYONE will be doing it!

Think about it... NO ONE was making Comic Book movies until Tim Burton's first BATMAN. Then Burton got lazy, but BATMAN RETURNS made money, so they kep making movies. By Schuemaker's last Batman film, Comic Book movies weren't making money any more. Then Bryan Singer came in and made X-MEN, and then someone caught on (fuckin' FINALLY) that GOOD Comic Book movies MAKE MONEY!

And so we Fan-Boys have been blessed with some of the most phenominal Comic-Book based cinema in the history of Film!!! (Not just your SPIDER-MAN and BATMAN BEGINS, but also Miller's SIN CITY and Moore's V FOR VENDETTA!!! The Underground stuff as well as the Main Stream!!!)

So my hope -- my Impossible Dream -- is that Lion's gate (the distributor) and Marvel will make A KILLING on their quality made-for-dvd features, and distributors will start looking for talented, commited filmmakers to provide the dvd-buying/-renting audiences with QUALITY movies... Movies that they HAVEN'T seen trailers for a bazillion times on TV for the past month!

I want earnest young filmmakers to have a venue to cut their teeth and gain experience AND collect a paycheck without selling their artistic souls, but more than that I want AUDIENCES to be able to stumble upon some cheap dvd they haven't heard ANYTHING about, and be pleasantly surprised by thier viewing experience!

Let the good thrive and let the jaded-and-talentless die penniless deaths!!! (Note that I included "jaded" in there... The enthusiastic-and-talentless shoudln't suffer... How much fun would the world be without GLEN OR GLENDA or PLAN 9 FROM OUTTER SPACE?!)