The Shoebox Gallery

Inside The Actors Studio Apartment

2008-07-23T23:57:00.000-07:00

I've just realized that my favorite swear word is "Jesusfuck!"

Okay, it's a phrase.

Jesus! Fuck!

There's Something About A Live Audience

2008-07-21T00:05:00.001-07:00

Our 48 Hour Film won the Audience Favorite Award for Block B (out of D blocks) so now it's up to the proper judges to consider who wins Seattle. We have 31 competitors, and if experience teaches me anything, (experience, being, of all the films that screen in one particular block, one is outstanding, two or three are "okay", and the rest are crap) our primary competition is whoever has won the audience favorite in the three other blocks, which means that we have a 1 in 5 chance of winning (block D had a tie).

I'll let you know as soon as I find out.

In the meantime, enjoy our video:

While that's buffering, I'll tell you that I finally bought the Flight of the Conchords CD from iTunes. It took me awhile because I'd sampled some of the songs, and I preferred the live versions to the studio versions. However, as I'd learned from such artists as Mike Doughty and The Half Brothers (hi, Rick), though I may immediately prefer a live recording to a studio recording, the more I listen to a studio album, the more I come to like it.

I'm willing to accept the album as grand and fantastic, but I don't think that their studio version of "Hiphopopotomous vs. Rhymenocerous" will ever reach the level of awesome the live version has attained.

Oh, and, tonight saw the third "World Premiere" of Web Crowell's Parasol, a little bit of pro-bike/anti-car propoganda wrapped in a fantastic and charming little animated short. The allure of seeing my work "on the big screen" has waned, but this was the first time that I'd seen something I'd done on a giant bouncy-castle screen. It was fun.

Update! Here's a link to the bouncy castle screen.

Once Web gives me permission, I'll post that here too.

"Live Blogging" the 48 Hour Film Fest

2008-07-13T00:00:00.000-07:00

Will be updated periodically as I grow more and more insane.

Saturday
6:30am
Woke up to an unfriendly alarm. Went to bed four hours earlier after Spin the Bottle. Checked my e-mail and found a note from the director saying our call time had been pushed back to 9am instead of the previous 8am (...yay), and we were to meet at an apartment complex in Kent. Considered going back to sleep and getting another hour's rest, but decided against it for some ungodly reason and started sucking down coffee.

9:15am
Finally find the apartment complex. Kent is stupid. I meet the crew and discover that these guys are a bit more serious than expected. Our director is different than last year, which is all I care about. Our DP has his own HVX-200 and three 16 GB P2 cards. And our Gaffer has his own lights and sound equipment. And we have a Line Producer, Key Grip, Regular Grip (they're calling him Technical Assistant), Catering, and four actors (two of which are the Producers). And me. I'm the P2 guy and editor.

But what really impresses me is the grip equipment. It rivals what we had on the "What the Funny" set, and paid big bucks for. I sheepishly hide the shotgun mike and XLR cable I grabbed from Caution Zero this morning thinking I was going to be "saving" the shoot because no one would have considered the sound to be important. I'm glad I was woefully under estimating these guys.

I have a small conversation with our DP regarding format and frame rate, then steal one of the P2 cards to make sure that my computer can read its contents. I've updated my OS since last I've done this, and I didn't want any nasty surprises when I was given a loaded card to dump onto my drive. And, as expected, my computer doesn't recognize the P2 card. It knows a card is in the slot, but doesn't recognize it as P2, and so I can't use my nifty disk image trick to copy the contents.

This is around the time I would have begun to panic, had I not already thought of this and downloaded an updated P2 driver form Panasonic's website last night. I install the driver package and after a quick reboot, the P2 card happily shows up on my desktop.

Still disappointed, though, that Panasonic has yet to come up with something better than "NO NAME" as the de-facto drive label.

10:30am
We begin shooting. I've set up on a table in the hallway outside the lounge where we're shooting, but it's in the sightlines of the shot, so I move my gear to the floor nearest the only outlet I can find. Wish I'd brought gaffe tape.

11:15am
I'm given my first card to capture. My set-up is basically the same as it was for "WTF", except the external HD I'm using is mine and not Stephen's. Same kind, though, OWC. I insert the P2 card into the PCMCIA slot and tell Disk Utility to make a disk image of it. It finishes in about 20 minutes which I think is remarkably fast for a 16 GB card being written to a Firewire 400 drive, but whatever. I open the disk image and compare the contents. Bit for bit, they're the same.

Turns out that our DP hadn't "filled the card", and in fact had only written about 3.65 GB to it.

12:45pm
Our actress arrives toting a small cat-like dog. I am worried about it walking on my keyboard as I'm capturing the footage, so I place myself on the floor next to my gear and miss out on the apparent hilarity coming from the set.

1:00pm
I'm given the second card. Full this time. It takes an hour to create the disk image. In that time we are fed lunch by one of the actor's parents.

2:30pm
The shoot moves out to the apartment complex's pool, so I am able to get my gear up off the floor of the hallway and onto a proper table in the lounge. Our director asks to use my boater in the shoot. I give it to her then wander downstairs to the restrooms to try to fix my hat head.

3:00pm
I wander out to the pool to ask our DP how the next card is coming. He tells me that he didn't realize he could shoot so long with it in 24p Native mode. I stumble back to the lounge with nothing to do, so I bring up the "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" podcast on iTunes. Rachel Maddow has been guest hosting all week.

4:30pm
We're wrapped for this location, which frightens me because when we move, I'm still stuck here for another hour capturing the P2 card. If our next location was a stable place, I would just wait and set up there to capture, but the next location turns out to be a bar - not a suitable place for my laptop and hard drive. I decide that they could do without me for the first forty minutes or so a the next location, and that I'd just hang at the apartment complex waiting for my processing to finish.

But then, our director casts our Key Grip, Technical Assistant, and me as extras in that scene, which means changing clothes and, you know, being there. I make it clear that I can't go anywhere until the card is captured, which is okay by them since they have other scenes to shoot before the extras are needed.

Brandon, one of the producers and the guy who got me into this mess decides to hang back with me since we've already filmed all of his scenes. I change into my "extra" outfit and stare at the progress bar on lappy's monitor.

5:30pm
We finally arrive at the bar and immediately begin filming the final scene there - one in which the main character is hit on the head by a flying egg. Apparently, the footage looks amazing. I'll have to wait to find out.

6:15pm
We're behind schedule. We were supposed to be done by six, but as we all know, schedules can get thrown out of the window at any time when filming. We caravan to our final location, the home of the caterers, where dinner is waiting.

8:00pm
I have another talk with the DP and convince him that instead of waiting to capture the card at the location after we wrap, that I take it with me to the office and capture it there. He seems a bit reluctant, but I convince him that it really wouldn't be an efficient use of my time to sit around at this stranger's house for an hour after everybody had gone home.

Plus, I'd be really uncomfortable. Sure, they're nice people, but still...

9:15pm
We're wrapped. I hand Brandon his clothes back, grab the final P2 card, and take off.

9:45pm
I arrive at the office and begin capturing the final P2 card.

10:30pm
The capture done, I hook my drive up to the Quad and begin to copy over the five disk images. 41.25GB all told. Not bad for twelve hours of HD 720pN shooting. I realize, though, that I don't have enough disk space on the Quad to accompany the disk images and the resulting Quicktime files that Final Cut Pro will make from the .MXF files on the images. I delete the images from the Quad and work straight off the firewire drive. It seems to work just fine.

11:00pm
Footage review begins in earnest. We did a lot of takes early on, the first couple scenes filmed eating up about 10-12 takes each.

Sunday
1:19am
I finally fill in the "liveblog" up until this point, then continue to monitor footage.

2:10am
Done reviewing and ingesting three of five disk images. Am starting to get a little tired. This place also gets kind of creepy at night.

2:35am
Our one actress, the one with the toy dog, is playing a stereotypical 40's era starlet, and sounds exactly like Jennifer Tilly in "The Cat's Meow".

...or is it "Bound"?

3:21am
Have finished logging and ingesting all the footage - the most boring part. Now begins the fun creative part of assembling something out of everything. I've celebrated with a beer.

Perhaps not the brightest idea.

4:30am
How is it 4:30 already?

5:20am
Getting light outside. I'm feeling the pinch. The director is going to show up at 10am to go over the first cut. My composer is going to be here at 12:30. The entire thing needs to be done and delivered by 7pm.

Why do I feel rushed?

6:30am
The 24 hour mark. My stomach is starting to ache.

As far as editing goes, I am further along this year than I was last year.

Hm. Doesn't feel like it.

8:07am
Made myself some coffee. To keep from falling asleep, I've also taken a couple walks around the block. Capitol Hill is a pretty quiet place on an early Sunday.

The stairwell smells like chamomile tea.

9:55am
My neck hurts as I just fell asleep in my chair. I've finished a rough first cut of the film, with only five minutes to spare. I wonder if our director knows where the office is.

10:59am
Called the director. She should have been here 20 minutes ago with coffee for me. In the meantime, I've been experimenting with looks for the film, and trying to ignore my Soundtrack Pro issues (it's buggy in Leopard with the latest version of Quicktime. Apparently, it's a "known issue", but Apple hasn't done anything about it yet).

11:03am
May have already found a work around for STP woes. Empty trash, close After Effects, shut down, turn on. Let's hope it stays that way.

Well, okay, let's hope Apple fixes this issue, but I'd be happy for knowing how to alleviate it in the interim.

6:28pm
Off the grid for the last seven hours in a frantic pace to finish the film. I will attempt to sum up. I realized what may be making STP burp. Plugging in or unplugging the headphones while the computer is on. If I don't touch the headphone jack, then everything works perfectly.

The director showed up around 11:30 with some coffee. We sat down and started going through the film. It seemed like an extremely slow nitpicky process, but we were making good headway.

At 12:30, my producer and musician showed up. They got to work scoring the film, and deciding upon some sound effects. (P.S. to this story, turns out due to lack of time I wasn't able to put in many of the sound effects - it was either that or export the film. I chose the latter.)

I gave the musician and my director and producer a firm time limit of 3:30 so I could go through to create the soundtrack and perform the color correction. We had picture lock at 3:38.

My heard is racing right now, though, because the deadline for the film is 7:30pm sharp. If you are two seconds late, you aren't allowed as part of the competition. You still get a screening, though.

I have a lot of color effects on my film that I'm performing in FCP (I know, I know - any die hard After Effects or Color fans will know I'm on their side - it's just that I found a free plugin for FCP which allowed me to accomplish the look I wanted with one freaking click).

The downside to all this? Render times.

Then I have to record it onto a miniDV tape, and make two DVDs to be delivered in, uh, less than an hour.

Good lord this is nerve-wracking.

The thing is, though, I'm really proud of this film. Honestly. At 3am this morning I was wondering what I could do to conceivably get out of this obligation, but I'm glad I've done it.

Just, breathe. Sleep comes soon.

Oh, by the way, I'm on hour 36 without sleep. Unusual for me.

9:52pm
I may have fucked it all up.

To wrap up, the rendering took longer than anticipated, and when I tried to record it onto a miniDV tape, both cameras I have in the office refused to talk to FCP (frigginwraslefrak). So I started to burn a DVD, beginning, of course, to export the .m2v files through Compressor.

It was perhaps five after seven. Batch manager said it would take approximately 16 minutes. Then I would have to burn the actual DVD.

I began to pace. I began to breathe heavily. I began to apologize to my team who were there to deliver the media to the 48 hour film people (luckily, only 12 blocks away).

I shut down the .m2v export process and decided that the quickest way (barring fighting with the cameras some more) was to export a .mov.

I was wrong. Looking back, I should have let the DVD export proceed. But instead I pressed on with encoding a .mov with the intent of putting it on a CD.

After that stressful encoding, I handed the CD off when my clock on the quad read 7:23.

We got a phone call in a couple minutes. Our team had made it to the office before the doors closed. Therefore we were eligible for the competition (as opposed to just having a screening, which itself is still pretty cool, don't get me wrong, but we all believe this year we have a contender).

Where it might bite us, and which is completely all my fault, is that you need to deliver by 7:30 two different types of media - one as a primary and one as a backup. We were only able to deliver one.

I'm still waiting for the official word. Some sources say that we will be disqualified from judging. Others say that if the .mov is able to be viewed then we made it in time and can deliver the backup at the night of the screening, given - of course - that it is the same film on both formats.

It's my fault because I'd had trouble recording to miniDV before, and I knew I needed to do it and I didn't research and test methods before I started scrambling with twenty minutes left in the competition. It's my fault because I stopped the DVD encode when I should have let it go. It might have been done in time (the actual DVDs, when we got around to finally burning them, took maybe two minutes).

I was sour for hours, constantly apologizing to my teammates. Nobody wants to go through all of that only to find that you've become disqualified at the last possible minute, especially me. I mean, by the time I walked out of the office at 8:30, I had been up for 38 hours, with maybe a total of ten minutes' sleep in my chair.

It's now five after ten at night. Why am I still up? Well, I had Friday's "Countdown" to watch, dinner to eat, plus I didn't want to leave this hanging. I hate stories that stop in the middle.

Anyway, if you're so inclined, our little film - eligible for award or not - will screen at the Neptune in the U District on Tuesday, July 15th at 9pm.

It's called "So, You Want To Be A Paparazzo", or something like that. I can't remember.

Memoirs of an Old Newspaperman, Part 1

2008-07-03T11:41:00.001-07:00

Twenty years ago, and three years before he passed away, my grandfather ("Grandpa") wrote his memoirs. He was 76 when they were completed in 1989.

They were never published, except for two photocopied and bound editions destined exclusively for his two sons as presents that Christmas.

I read one of the copies when I was sixteen, a little less than a year after he'd died.

The recent death of Tim Russert got me thinking about Grandpa again, so I googled his name to see if he'd made his way onto the 'tubes - and indeed he had in the form of The Seattle Times obituary column (he had worked at the Times for about twenty years as the Business Editor).

You can find that obituary here.

On a recent trip to my parents' house, I asked Dad if I could grab one of the copies of Grandpa's memoirs. Reading the obit reminded me that Grandpa had led a fairly interesting life as part of what Tom Brokaw calls "the greatest generation".

Dad did me one better and gave me the original typewritten manuscript, complete with inked-in corrections (Grandpa hated his electric typewriter and preferred to make small corrections by pen instead of re-writing the entire page).

Growing up in what was essentially the "old west", becoming an accomplished mountaineer by his mid-20's, acting as a Commanding Officer in WWII in Europe and Africa, and working for 20 years in local journalism - his memoirs are a fascinating read.

So I'm going to publish them.

The first chore is to get the 256 typewritten pages into an electronic form. I made a photocopy of the original, then used a document scanner to create a .pdf (good thing too, as the scanner proceeded to eat about every 10th page).

Using the optical character recognition feature in Acrobat 7.0 Professional, I was then able to copy and paste the text into a Word document (although I may switch to Apple's Pages program when I begin to format it in earnest).

This is where it stands now; a formatless block of text in a Word doc 213 pages long. All it needs now is a little bit of editing.

Okay, a lot of editing.

No Human Being Would Stack Shoes Like This

2008-06-22T22:12:00.000-07:00

When I take my shoes off at home, it's usually right shoe, sock, left shoe, sock. I toss the shoes towards the dresser and the socks towards the vicinity of the laundry bin.

It's not an OCD thing, like my night isn't going to go well unless everything is in that order. That's just how I do it when I'm not thinking about it.

So last night I come home after the HamKauf wedding, take off the shoes and socks, slip into something a little more comfortable, then wander back upstairs to grab a beer and sit in on the Clint Eastwood movie Scott was watching.

Tiring of the spaghetti western after a few minutes, I stumble back downstairs with my Red Stripe and am met with this image when I turn my bedroom light on.

I was taken aback just a wee bit. I don't remember my shoes landing in that particular pattern when I took them off.

I stood there, just staring at how my shoes had been stacked, for probably 30 seconds, remembering a story my buddy ScotRob had told me about a Poltergeist that had inhabited a family-owned store, and how one of its mischievous acts was to stack boxes during the night. The owners would leave at night, and when they came back the next morning, there'd be a stack of boxes in the middle of the room.

Spooooky.

And, of course, I thought of that scene in Ghostbusters when they come upon the stack of slimed books in the library.

I got down and looked closely to make sure that the left shoe was on top, because if the right had been on top, then I'd really be freaked out.

But, no. For some reason, I just didn't notice that they had landed this way when I tossed them across the room. There's no poltergeist in Mr. Basement, just an inattentive human.

Spoooky!

An Idea for Online Advertising

2008-06-21T11:52:00.000-07:00

I have an ad blocker for my browser, so when I load web pages I don't see all the fancy ads that talented Flash (tm) designers have spent hours making perfect, and what Advertising Executives have spent seconds destroying.

"It's great, Johnny. Now make it expand to the entire page and dynamically reposition when the user scrolls, so it always stays center screen. And make sure the "close" button is really, really small. Soon, everybody will know the name of Dude, Where's My Car 2!"

It also means that when I watch ad-supported television, the ads get skipped. Which is brilliant.

I used to be able to watch entire hour-long episodes of St. Elsewhere on Hulu.com without having to sit through the same Toyota commercial seven times.

Then, Hulu got smart.

Now, instead of just outright skipping the ad, you still have to sit for thirty seconds every break while the same static title card occupies the screen - something about contact information to be an ad partner. Oh, and if you see this message repeatedly you should really disable your ad blocking software because you are, in effect stealing the show by not watching the advertising.

Damn smrt Hulu.

Anyway, I have an idea to make people watch the advertising. To actually look forward to the ad breaks.

Instead of showing us the same Toyota commercial seven times during St. Elsewhere, show us classic ads from the 50s through the 90s, with an emphasis on the now-nostalgic 80s.

Hell, it might even be appropriate in some instances, like when you see that "I'd like to buy the world a coke" ad during an episode of The A Team.

Many of the products that are advertised today have tons of classic ads in the vaults that people would watch just out of sheer nostalgic value.

The companies save production costs, the ads get seen. Everybody wins.

Har!

2008-06-14T15:16:00.000-07:00

This is awesome.

Go-bama

2008-06-04T09:18:00.000-07:00

Like most bleeding hearts, I too at one point was stiffly ambivalent about who would clinch the Democratic nomination. Though I leaned more towards Obama, when pressed I generally just shrugged my shoulders and said, "eh, I'd happily vote for either one."

Then Hillary...changed...somehow.

Not sure when it happened. Perhaps it was when she kept charging Obama with plagiarizing a speech over and over, sounding like a robot at each debate.

Ready
10 Say Hello
20 Accuse Obama of plagiarizing the governor of Massachusetts.
30 Goto 20
40 Run

End Or perhaps it was when she claimed that elitism in a presidential candidate was a bad thing. I mean, come on! A of all, a Yale graduated rich lawyer senator from New York is making these charges. B of all, I don't want a "regular" person to be president. Regular people are idiots.

Or perhaps it was when she started affecting a southern accent while campaigning in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, etc...

Could have been any of these things.

Then, last night as Obama clinched the nomination, reports came out that Hillary would be reportedly "open" to being his VP.

Briefly, I thought that wouldn't be such a bad thing.

Then I saw her ~~campaign manager~~ spokesman Terry McAuliffe on The Daily Show last night.

This dude is whacked. Don't let him get near power, please.

Naked Ladies Capsule Review

2008-05-22T09:52:00.000-07:00

From Jenna Nand's review in the Seattle Weekly:

Sorry, fellas, it’s not what you think. Annex Theatre, Seattle’s “longest-running fringe organization,” may pride itself on boldness, but I doubt Concerned Women for America will be picketing anytime soon. Rather, we’re treated to an evening of unrepentant oddness. Two brief actor-authored comic sketches lead to the main course, in which a wily female coyote (Becky Poole)—who does occasionally flash her tail—and two ne’er-do-well vaudevillians (Ben Laurance and Paul Gude) brawl over a mysterious suitcase provocatively marked “Naked Ladies.” At moments the fringesque absurdity became spastically cartoonish, and, like Chris Crocker’s tearful ode to Britney Spears, downright bizarre but impossible to turn away from.

For our stumbly opening weekend, it's a great little review. Of course I want more people to come see it, but if this is the only press we get, I guess I can't complain.

And of all the comparisons I thought we'd draw (Hope and Crosby, Abbott and Costello, Bugs and Elmer), Chris Crocker was definitely out of left field.

Another Rat Story

2008-05-21T12:39:00.000-07:00

Caught another rat this morning.

I've run out of ink for my rat-stamp, so I have no idea how many this makes it, but needless to say I've killed so many of the little buggers I no longer find any joy in it.

Alright, I've never found joy in it. But the typical sleepless paranoia of finding out there's a rat squatting behind the walls, fear that I'm going to mortally wound myself as I set and place the snap trap, and remorse as I dump the lifeless rat body (trap and all) into the garbage have all become rather blase routines.

I still hate setting those goddamn traps, but lately rat-hunting has been a somewhat passive activity.

This latest rat I've known about for probably a month and have just left a baitless trap in one of the usual high-traffic areas, thinking little Nicodemus there would eventually get snagged going from behind the washer to behind the shower. Otherwise I left him alone.

I even saw it alive earlier this week. Before that, before all this carnage began, my only indications that I had an unfortunate border were noises and poo. I only set eyes on the rodents as I chucked them into the garbage can.

But then, then I found that this latest one had gotten into my food.

Then it was war...sort of.

I bought another trap, but didn't place it, and didn't reset my baitless trap with bait.

Until last night.

Laying in bed, I heard a noise from the kitchen. Since I had just bought some new bread, I went up to investigate, or at least to scare the little critter from the kitchen for the night.

I flung open my cupboard and jumped back, but nothing. An examination of the bread bag and surrounding foods showed no signs of being molested, so I figured I had scared the rat away as I clomped up the stairs.

Then I heard a noise from the cupboard below.

You see, here at Mr. House the three of us have a dedicated food cupboard. My stuff is on the bottom tier, separated from the storage cupboard below by some slats of wood, between which a rat could easily squeeze to gain access. This was recently remedied by some paperboard once I found rat poo next to my bagels (this is the first rat to explore the kitchen as far as I can tell).

I looked down slowly, knowing that the rat was in the cupboard next to my feet, probably confused as to why the food was no longer accessible.

I opened that cupboard, stood back a fair bit, squatted, and peered in. There it was, in a dark corner. I couldn't see it, but I saw it shift. I slammed the door closed, fearful that it would attack if felt threatened, and wondered what to do next.

How do you actively fight a rat? I couldn't catch it in a cup and leave it outside like a spider. A number of scenarios and household weapons went through my mind. Plunger? Fire extinguisher? Kitchen knife? What do I do?

I made sure the door was closed, then went downstairs and opened up the new trap. After baiting it with peanut butter and gingerly setting it, I opened the cupboard slowly and - hand in glove - placed the trap inside. As I set it down, though, it snapped.

I heard the rat skitter, so I closed the door to try again. I re-baited and re-set, but this time when I opened the cupboard Nicodemus made a break for it. I jumped back, trap still in hand, and watched it run amazingly fast through the kitchen and do a flying leap down the stairs.

It was actually kind of funny, watching its squat little body fly down the stairs, tail flapping in the breeze. I put the trap in the cupboard, left it slightly open, and staggered to bed.

Dreamt of rats, obviously, and a weird haunted talking couch (it was blue and said its name was Greg).

Was not surprised to see the dead rat this morning. And okay, I did feel a little remorse. Unlike all of the other cold-blooded killings I've committed in the past, this one was different. I actually had a face-off with this little guy. I did feel kind of sorry as I tossed its limp little body unceremoniously into the trash.

Whatever.

There's no shortage of rats in this city. I'm sure I'll kill again.

Backyards

2008-05-18T19:01:00.000-07:00

I just want to point this out because I never really realize how much difference having a roommate who cares about yardwork can be.

This is a picture I took of our backyard on March 10th, 2007 after a windstorm knocked our fence into our neighbor's yard. I went out and tied it up to the tree so it wouldn't be in their way. It was later pointed out to me that it looks as if we're holding the tree hostage in our yard.

The next month, we got a new roommate - Stinky P - who over the course of the past year has turned our tiny little backyard into a place you actually want to spend some time in.

I do believe barbeque season is upon us.

Pointless Naked Ladies Post

2008-05-14T23:09:00.000-07:00

Pointless, because the dozen or so of you who read this are probably going to come to my show anyway, so why bother promoting it?

But promote it I shall, be it in a non-aggressive fashion. We had our first stumble through of the entire thing tonight, and the most challenging part was not laughing at each other.

At least, that was the most challenging part for me. And I believe I failed.

So yeah, come see my show. I think it's funny.

The Truth of the Matter

2008-05-06T14:34:00.000-07:00

To say that I almost got hit by a car would be an exaggeration.

I'm crossing Broadway at Denny. As I step off the curb and enter the intersection, a black coupe that had been sitting at the light accelerates through the intersection and continues on its way in front of me quite nonchalantly. I stand dumbfounded for a beat, look up at the red light it had just gone under, to the left to make sure no one else was coming my way, then head back to the curb I had just stepped off because my crosswalk signal had turned into the blinking hand.

Normally, I cross during the red blinking hand, but this time I thought I'd play it safe.

I'm quite sure mob mentality is why the coupe ran the red light - though "running" the red light is not really accurate here. This guy casually passed through the intersection, as if he thought his light had turned green. Just before he took off, a bicyclist who was stopped next to the car noticed that the intersection was clear, so he (or she) hopped back on the bike and went through. The guy in the car, probably fiddling with his iPod or cell phone (unsubstantiated), took the cue from the bike and assumed his light had turned green without actually looking up to check.

Like when you're standing with a group of people at a crosswalk and someone starts to cross against the light, then everybody starts to cross because they think they have the signal.

Or perhaps the driver was watching the stop lights the next block down. Who knows.

When the light turned green, the car behind the coupe slowed in front of me and rolled down its passenger side window. The driver leaned over the woman sitting in the passenger seat and said "I don't know what that was, man."

We all shared a moment of just shaking our heads at how some people are freakin' morans, and how that could have been a lot worse than it was. Then they went on their way and I went on mine.

Granted, the guy wouldn't have hit me. If I had kept walking at the pace I was going, he would have passed me before I got to his lane.

It might have gotten ugly if someone was driving through the intersection when he sauntered through the red light. Tires would squeal, names would be called, etc... It could have gotten really ugly, though, if someone was speeding through the intersection eastbound on Denny and collided with the coupe, slamming it into me standing innocently on the sidewalk.

But, it all turned out fine.

This time.

Come Here My Awesome Little Friend

2008-05-02T12:24:00.000-07:00

I've never stared at a movie so long with my mouth agape, just thinking "how do I get me one of those?" until I saw this video of a full-motion R2-D2 HD projector robot with Millennium Falcon remote.

So that's what a nerdgasm feels like?

When We Was Fab

2008-04-24T12:54:00.000-07:00

Thought I'd revisit some of my old tapes that I have yet to purchase digitally. First up is George Harrison's "Cloud Nine".

1987's "Got My Mind Set On You", I believe, is the song that introduced me to George Harrison and, subsequently, The Beatles.

The Dog and the Screenless Door

2008-04-09T13:09:00.000-07:00

Saw this linked from BoingBoing:

It's cute, and one's initial reaction could be "oh, poor dog, he's too dumb to know that there's no glass in the door." Most of the comments on the BoingBoing site (I didn't bother looking at the comments on YouTube) refer to conditional training - basically whether or not the door exists in real life, it exists to the dog regardless.

I think the dog is much smarter than that, and one of the commenters briefly refers to this. Yes, the dog is aware that the door exists. The glassless door frame still clicks when it opens, and clacks when it closes. The dog has been trained to go outside through the click and clack. That's how it's done.

However, I believe that the dog is staying on either side of the glassless door not because he thinks there's still glass in it, but because he hasn't been told it's okay yet.

At one point, it looks as though the dog has stuck his nose past the glass plane, so I think he knows he could go through it, but if he were to go through the door without being told so, he would be disobeying.

When the owner walks through the door near the end of the video, had he said "okay" or "come" instead of opening it, I think the dog would not have hesitated at all and gone through the door.

Of course I could be wildly off-base and the dog might just be a complete doorknob.

Get Your Prank On

2008-04-01T21:42:00.000-07:00

I generally try to avoid being online on April Fools' Day. Not because I'm a no-fun-pants and don't like jokes.

But because of all the lies. LIES I TELL YOU!

Friends quitting jobs, friends breaking up with friends, friends repeatedly saying Iran is training al-Qaeda.

Okay, that last one is true. And happened days ago. So what? Lay off!

But I can't believe this! I mean, this has to be true! Jeff Goldblum was drunk when he pitched the iMac back in 1999.

Check it:

Comparisons

2008-03-30T23:49:00.000-07:00

I like my beer like I like my women.

Alcoholic.

Rent-A-Dog

2008-03-30T01:20:00.001-07:00

I've had this idea (renting pets - specifically, dogs) for quite some time, and have had to vehemently defend it in front of friends and co-workers about how it's not actually cruel to the animals.

My original idea was to have a rental booth at Greenlake during the summer for people who wanted to walk a dog around the lake - or play frisbee - or whatever. Pets are also a great way to meet people dontcha know.

The idea morphed from having a cache of dogs to "hiring" dogs that are usually left alone during the day while Master Owner was away at work. This way the dog isn't cooped up at home all day, and petless people get to have the company of a friendly dog.

The biggest concern was actually making sure that the people would bring the dog back.

I'd rent a dog, fer sure. Heck, when I was last visiting my parents, it was all I could do to keep from kidnapping their dog and bringing it home with me. "Get in the car! Who wants to go for a ride? You do!"

Who's a good girl?

Dirty Laundry

2008-03-28T15:38:00.001-07:00

Aw man. My washing machine just died.

Spectacularly.

It's been making noise during the spin cycle for the past...oh...three years? And I've always known it was on its last legs, but I guess I've always been in denial.

Now I have to clear the smoke out of my basement and figure out how to fix it before I run out of underwear.

In The Last 24 Hours...

2008-03-28T01:45:00.000-07:00

I've...

Slept for nine of them.
Watched TV online for 1.5 hours.
Worked on the latest film for 3 hours.
Spent about 30 minutes driving.
Painted and cleaned Annex for around 4 hours.
And spent roughly 3.5 hours printing out CD jewel case inserts from iTunes for my burned CD collection from Alice In Chains to Mike Doughty (roughly 25).
All the rest of the time was spent probably staring at the wall or picking at my fingernails.

From the Man Man dept.

2008-03-24T20:55:00.001-07:00

Well, if he really is a "man man", he'll buck up and get over it.

My 10 Years Too Late To The Party TV Crush

2008-03-18T23:00:00.000-07:00

Vicki Lewis from "NewsRadio".

First Runner Up: Laura from "Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist.

Two Things:

2008-03-14T00:41:00.001-07:00

Today's safeword is "fuckinstop!"

And Fire Roasted Tomato & Olive Oil flavored Triscuits taste just like pizza.

Yum.

Payback

2008-03-11T10:09:00.000-07:00

Tagged again.

I can't believe I've never: Moved away from Seattle, learned to play an instrument, learned another language.

Every time I think about [ ], I still cringe: There are about 100 of these. Forefront of my mind right now is when I called up an old high school crush and slowly screwed up over the next four months what started out quite promising.

I wish I'd [ ] when I had the chance: This feels like part (b) to question 1. I wish I'd taken music lessons and continued studying French in college. I wish I'd bought that Austin Healy Bugeye Sprite. I wish I'd become rich and famous when I had the chance.

I've never felt so out of place as when I: Dude, have you met me? I never feel "in place" to begin with. Although, there was this time in college when I was invited to a costume party during the costume party season and I was the only one who showed up in one. That was awesome.

[ ] is my guiltiest pleasure: I dunno. Playing air drums? In public? Naked?

I hope [ ] knows how grateful I am for [ ]: Stan Lee/Spiderman. John DeLorean/Pontiac GTO. Don Mattingly/His 1984 Topps baseball card.

In my darkest hour, I secretly blame [ ] for my dysfunction: Nintendo.

[ ] changed my life forever: Nintendo.

Sorry Sonya. I tag you.