Look amazing? I think so. Now the only thing that’ll make me see Cars 2 is that Toy Story short. But if that miraculously leaks online I’ll have no reason to go at all.
Welp. Turns out I have strep throat. Again. I don’t know what it is about working on full seasons of television that seems to bring it out. Every pilot I’ve done, no crippling illnesses. This morning I got home from work at 3AM, fell asleep at 4:30AM, and woke up at cunting 7:30AM with an awful sore throat. I literally jumped out of bed and into my car and sped down to the walk-in clinic. Luckily it was a short wait, and also luckily the walk-in doc was my family doc. So he was quick to diagnose and send me on my way with pills and this green liquid gargle shit that I use to ease the pain. It’s supposed to numb my throat but I must be doing something wrong cause it’s only numbing my tongue.
Love that clip.
I keep thinking today is Thursday and was expecting a pay cheque. Probably because when I went to bed it was technically Weds so I thought “ho hum tomorrow’s pay day when I wake up” only to wake up 3 hours later. Hasa diga ebowai.
So some exciting news for next week. The original plan was to take next Friday and the following Monday off for an Ottawa visit for my brother’s birthday/graduation celebration. That’s still happening. But a buddy from New Brunswick will be in town next week and I managed to get the 5th to the 11th off so I can have three full days of patio beers with him before I get on a plane to our nations capital city/bigger Fredericton.
Tyler is also in a band I’ve made reference to before, The Arka Teks. They’re going to be featured on Rookie Blue and Degrassi’s upcoming seasons. He’s also a mong. And usually our drunken nights out turn into a wrestling match at least once where he almost paralyses me.
There’s a song you can pump your pelvis to.
I keep forgetting about the two U2 tickets sitting my bookshelf. Since the postponed the concert though, I suppose it was easy to overlook.
A transport driver just referred to me as Batman. See? If I keep making references about myself being like Batman eventually it will catch on. I don’t even think this guy has ever heard me make a Batman reference about myself. Bam. That’s inception bitches.
Sick as a dog with alzheimers. (*mother didn’t approve of what was there before, now edited)
Woke up like my body was on fire yesterday afternoon in a sweltering room, couldn’t swallow (no dirty jokes please), could barely move. I managed to make it to the shower and just lie there like a gimp with cold water running on me trying to bring down my massive fever. Then I threw up. It’s odd how one can get sick almost instantly. Didn’t even make it into work, thanks to Aaron insisting I stay home. Feel a fraction better today so I suppose I’ll try to make it in for the red-eye shift tonight. Brilliant. But mustn’t grumble.
Now with the Vegas trip officially booked, I’m now looking forward to September in getting my flight booked for London. Also trying to make contacts through film/TV people here in hopes of getting a job lined up before heading overseas. I don’t know how long I plan on going, could be six months, could be a year, could be longer. Depends on what happens. I won’t miss Toronto, I’ll miss the people. It’s the same as when I left New Brunswick, didn’t want to leave the people but there wasn’t much for me there in the big picture scheme of things. And while there are more opportunities in Toronto, I feel like I’m at a standstill right now, so why not try something different?
Cars 2 opens this weekend and already it’s the worst reviewed Pixar film. Not a real shocker. I’m a little disappointed Pixar wasted a summer on a sequel to its worst movie, solely (probably) for the fact that Cars is such a cash cow when it comes to merchandise. Kids eat that shit up.
Joey: “I don’t like toy cars, whoa wait, toy cars THAT HAVE EYES?! JESUS FUCK MY MIND IS BLOWN MUST HAVE IT ALL”
I’ll probably still see it…but that’s only because of the new Toy Story short attached to it. Also I’m hoping there will be a teaser trailer for this:
I wish this were released this weekend instead. A new original and non-sequel film from Pixar. Sounds fantastic.
This Tylenol Complete shit is great. It curbs the aches so now I just feel like I have a really bad hang over. I guess that’s not so great…
Also does this not look badass or what? :
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On a serious note, a very dear friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer on this week. Susan and I (along with others in Toronto) were in the same class through university majoring in journalism. We played in a band together, you can check out her vocals in the music catalogue page in songs The Interstate, Going Home and Snowfall. We roomed together in Toronto, during the time I took her for dim sum and made her eat chicken feet. That was fun.
And I think the highlight in our friendship is we co-anchored Rogers TV’s First Local news program in Fredericton. If only I had some of that footage to put up here, that would be brilliant.
Hearing this news was heartbreaking, and I highly encourage anyone who is reading this now to check out her blog http://thegreatbalancingact.com/
From her blog you can see what a strong head she has on her shoulders. She’s been through a lot in the past six months, first with an awful injury to her elbow and now this. She’s one of the sweetest, strongest, and bravest people I’ve ever met. (One helluva personal trainer and cook too, her blog also proves this)
I have faith she’ll kick this, there’s no question about it. The big C is in for a big ass-kicking when facing off with this one.
Love you to bits, Suzie Q. Thoughts are with you and your family.
So I’ve had the worst luck with electronics this month. First the phone gets mugged, then my main laptop conks out, now my back up laptop has conked out and I’m using the rotating producers’ Macbook from work while mine’s in the shop. FANTASTIC!
Actually I’ve always been against Apple products but the track pad on this thing is pretty cool. The two finger scroll, the three finger swipe to go back and forward pages? Brilliant. Starting to warm up to it. I would never buy one full priced but I wouldn’t mind a decently priced used one. But I still miss mine…I hope she’s OK.
Um…mere words cannot express my excitement. As most of you know, as vulgar/offensive/etc that I can be I am still the most nostalgic motherfucker I know. I watched five episodes of TaleSpin last night at 3AM after getting home from work, to further prove my point. But The Muppets was a huge part of growing up for me. I remember walking to the library in Burnaby with my Popo (grandmother) and taking out VHS’ of Muppets and Fraggle Rock. The same ones every weekend, and watching them over and over. Even now the first three volumes of The Muppet Show sit on my bookshelf. So this trailer excites me to no end.
Speaking of goosebumps…
Brilliant. No more words needed.
So Vancouver lost. As was expected, although I did secretly have high hopes they would somehow pull it off. They’re usually pretty good under pressure, but as soon as Boston scored that first goal, I started constantly checking the time to see if I could still make the Lenka concert I had a ticket for.
By ten minutes into the third period, I left. Caught a cab up to Lee’s Palace and caught the last half of her set. Well worth it. She was brilliant.
I guess the good thing about the game going on that night was there wasn’t much of a crowd at the show. But this made it much more enjoyable. I swear she was singing right to me sometimes, no big deal.
In regards to the rioting…I, like many, felt sick to my stomach that this happened. It paints my city in a bad color, and while I’m sure most intelligent people can see that it was a select few who just wanted to stir shit for the fuck of it, I was still embarrassed. I felt almost the same about the G20 rioting, those few breaking windows and setting cars on fire took away from the peaceful protesters (although I think protesting is pointless, but to each his own) and thus the points of their cause were lost.
Of course that’s an entirely different situation as this was a fucking HOCKEY GAME. There was no reason for this happening, although even if Vancouver won these idiots probably would’ve rioted either way.
Oh and that photo of the couple kissing in the middle of the chaos? Give me a fucking break. Who cares? That photo was a hipster fake-photographers dream.
So we are officially booked for Vegas as of this morning. This will be a last big blowout before the big move overseas, and I’m beyond excited to go on a trip I’ll probably not remember much of. We’ll be staying the MGM Grand for four full days in August. Yikes…going to be messy, going to be brilliant.
The worst part about being without my computer with my files is that it has halted the script process. I don’t have the program, or the file. So I can’t even pass those on to Tom for him to get his start on writing his changes. All I have is our marked up script. So I guess now’s as good a time as any to put out casting calls. Maybe I’ll do that tonight when we’re shooting until an ungodly hour in the middle of the night.
I don’t know what NXNE was but it didn’t seem thrilling. Was the point to round up a bunch of bands no one’s ever heard of before? Because if it was…mission accomplished.
However the band that played Sunday night at Free Times Cafe was spectacular. But I don’t think that was part of the festival. They were like a ragtag bunch of folksy/bluegrass Beach Boys. Loved it. However the six sangrias didn’t like me the next morning…
Here’s an example of what I do when bored at work on nights:
I would give you the back story of why I made a series of photos like this and posted them around the office, but I’ll just leave that to your imagination.
So, Vancouver really fucked it up last night. Figures. The one night we wrap early and I get downtown in time to see the game, and they can’t even win the cup. Now I’m jumping through hoops to make sure I don’t miss the game tomorrow night. This means getting up for work at 4AM. Dun dun dunnn day shift.
This looks fantastic:
So I may or may not have already mentioned this (too lazy to go back and check) but we’re going to Vegas. This will be my last ”hoorah” before heading to the UK in September. Myself, Chris, Jer and Colin will be going in August. This is going to be an unmemorable but fantastic trip. I’m convinced we’ll need to pool in and buy a camcorder so we have some recollection of what went on for the four days we’re there. Now it’s down to the MGM and The Mirage but we’re leaning towards the MGM. Thanks for planning this trip all goes to family friend Shelly. We owe her big time, we would’ve been somewhat lost trying to this on our own, especially with our work schedules.
I know I’ve likely shared this before but I’ve been blasting the soundtrack in the car lately when out on the road for work and I’m getting some strange looks:
The fact that it touches on circumcising women, raping babies, and AIDS would probably factor into it.
Did I tell you about the awesome long weekend I just had?
The thing I love about working on the current show I’m on is that it’s easy for me to still enjoy the summer. Working an expendable job like mine makes it easy to find a daily replacement. Friday, I did absolutely nothing except enjoy patios and watched Vancouver win. It was fantastic. I should have written, but fuck it. We have some late nights coming up so I’ll get on it then.
Speaking of…as we’re getting closer to July I’m worried about this short film actually being made. We really need to get on equipment and casting. And we need to set a shoot date. The story will come together now that we have a for sure idea of where it’s going and we’re both happy with it, but now the technical stuff needs to get sorted. Will keep you updated on that.
Anyway I have to be awake in six hours, and likely won’t be falling asleep for another two even though I’m going to try my hardest. Luckily I’ve recorded Chris repeating all of his university anecdotes so that should make me doze off pretty quickly.
I had a great and unmemorable long weekend. Took the day off on Friday, which was fantastic. It was a big day of doing nothing and I accomplished what I wanted to do…except for write. I didn’t write. I went to the gym, dropped the car off at the studio, met up with a feminist for pitchers at Java then met up with assholes at Bollocks to watch the game. And Vancouver won. I think my eyes started to water a bit. This is a big series for us, and if we can get that cup I might cry. Just saying.
This week in concerts I have Lenka on Weds night at Lee’s Palace. Really looking forward to this show, provided I can get the day off. I’ve been wanting to see her live since her first album and never got the chance. So even though I’m going alone this should be fun to see her. Here’s, yet, another taste:
Catchy, right? Can’t wait.
This is brilliant:
I remember watching these on CBC with my dad when I was younger. I still laugh as hard at the episodes now as I did then.
So I have the A/C installed and the motherfucker leaks into my room. Two nights of awesome sleep, but two mornings of cleaning water that smells like it was drained from the mens locker room at the gym. If anyone reading this knows what I can do to solve this problem let me know. I don’t know if there’s a crack in it, or if I’m not leaning it out the window far enough…however if I lean it anymore, I’m afraid the ropes I’m using to keep it inside the apartment (that are tied to my a table) will snap and some poor fucker walking out of the building will get crushed and die.
Then I’ll feel like a silly goose.
Our new tenants above us like to shoot fireworks past everyone’s windows and into the trees outside the front of our building. It’s like we’re living in a fraternity of morons.
Tom and I had a very productive and surprisingly agreeable discussion about the script on the weekend. Tomorrow I’ve taken the day off tomorrow (halleluhgakhdsg – I don’t know how to spell that obviously) so I plan to work on the second draft. Tom’s going to do his version as well then we’ll converge again and then hopefully by the third draft we can lock the script as an official production draft.
Too technical for you to understand? No big deal. I just work in film, sometimes my extensive experience bleeds into my personal life. Kidding of course. Want to know what I did today? I drove to Scarborough through rush hour to pick up two black “Solemates” (item to make shoes not make a noise when walked on hard floor) and then back through rush hour to the Royal York to buy clear ones. This turned into a 3-hour drive. There I’ve discredited my own film experience.
So now it’s freezing outside. While I welcome this nice cool break, and hopefully won’t have to turn the A/C on and clean up another puddle of water in the morning, I also didn’t bring any sort of sweater/jacket/proper shoes and am now dreading the drive/walk home.
Also if this weather is any indication to me NOT getting decent patio weather on my day off tomorrow I will not be happy. My plan for tomorrow is 1) Gym 2) Drop off work vehicle 3) Patio/Write for the entire afternoon. If I cannot fulfill goal number 3 I’m going to instead replace that goal with “Punch fifty babies”.
I enjoy listening to soundtrack music. The Inception, Tron: Legacy, and Dark Knight soundtracks tend to make my playlist every week. So after seeing X-men: First Class I instantly bought the soundtrack to find…meh. Not that good on it’s own.
When driving around the city on errands for work, I also love to blast music you don’t typically hear coming from a vehicle rolling down Queen west. I look pretty badass when I pull up beside Java House with The Power of Love, You Can’t Hurry Love (Phil Collins version) or a random Spice Girls track. And I’m ballsy enough to turn up the volume when pulled up beside some shitty Civic blasting hip hop. What are they going to do, mug me?! I’D LIKE TO SEE THEM TRY.
Thinking more and more about The Station Agents, but then reminding myself that I’m leaving in September so all hopes of trying to get something musically going before I leave are pretty much…nil. However, think there’s a market in the UK for a Canada half-Asian folk/country singer-songwriter? Probably not. They just listen to Coldplay over there, right? Kidding.
Sorry this was such a boring post. The five of you who read this won’t give a shit anyway. And I’m sure you’re reading purely out of boredom. I don’t blame you, I’m writing this out of boredom.
We’re on the window, about to wrap. I was going to have a rant tonight but I’ll save it for tomorrow or the weekend.
If anyone’s looking for me tomorrow, I’ll be at Hooters writing the second draft of our script.
So Friday night was kind of a bust. We wrapped early but that doesn’t really mean shit. It means we wrapped before midnight for once, but there was 2nd unit shooting so they were still shooting until past midnight. Lucky Billy here got to leave early though and deliver scripts and what not to the Soho Met. Only to come home afterwards and drink a few before going to bed. Which was fine, I like a laid back evening in.
The next morning I caught X-Men: First Class.
Holy shit. It was amazing. One of the best superhero movies I’ve seen since Dark Knight, and also the best X-men movie out of all the ones they’ve made. Great story, good writing, good acting, good effects. I had goosebumps at the end. Brilliant, I hope they make sequels to it with the cast and director remaining the same because it was just fantastic.
The problem with watching superhero movies is that it just makes me want to be a superhero more. Jerry Seinfeld has a good bit in his stand up that talks about what men are thinking the whole time through their lives. And what they’re thinking is “I’m somewhat of a superhero”. They idolize Superman, Batman, Spiderman, etc just for the sole reason that we all think we’re going to be these amazing heroes we read in comics or see in movies. I know it’s sort of pathetic, but what else do we have to live for?
It was an interesting weekend. I got mugged. LOL. That “LOL” isn’t really serious. It’s more just making light of what may seem to be a dire situation to anyone else.
So I had borrowed my roommate’s bike and was scoping out a bar we were thinking of going to. I just got off the phone with him and immediately was held by two guys. There were four of them, two guys holding me going through my pockets, two guys standing behind me blocking the view from the busy street so no one could see I was being mugged. The dialogue went as followed:
“Where’s your wallet?”
“What?”
“Where’s your wallet?”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Where’s your fucking wallet?”
“Oh shit, are you guys mugging me? Really?”
“No shit.”
“Ah, fuck. I don’t have my wallet, I was biking home to get it so I could go out.”
He reaches into my pocket and finds my wallet.
“Well what’s this then?”
“Hmm, wouldja look at that. Thanks for finding it.”
“You fucking lied to me?”
“…Yeah, yeah I did.”
More banter went on that I won’t get into. Let’s just say in hindsight I probably shouldn’t have been so sarcastic cause they easily could’ve dragged me off of Chris’ bike and beat the shit out of me. My number one concern was not to lose his bike, I did NOT want to replace it. Bikes are expensive.
Joke’s on them. I only had $40 on me. They took my phone, which was only so I couldn’t call the cops, which was the most annoying thing about the whole mugging. I mean, I need my phone for work. The money, whatever, I didn’t really need that $40 they can have it, but the phone stealing that was annoying.
So today I went to Bell and got a temp. phone since I’m moving out of the country in a few months and it’s this piece of shit that’s almost as bad as my battered blackberry that they took.
That was also my defense:
“Guys don’t take my phone. It’s a piece of shit but I need it for work. I promise I won’t call the cops.”
“Tough shit we’re taking the phone.”
“Fuck. C’mon man.”
“Sorry.”
The fact that he apologized was brilliant. I wish I could’ve recorded the entire conversation that went down between me and these four muggers.
This is me just a mere couple hours before I got mugged. I looked so happy.
But fuck it. I was mugged. Big deal. It happens frequently, I’m sure so let’s move on.
Tom and I had a great discussion on the direction of our script. I’m shocked and happy at how we both have the exact same ideas for where this film is going. Considering the fact that both of us have pretty big differences in movie tastes, we managed to hammer out a storyline that we’re both happy with. Although we’ve started arguing about the title already. But whatever that’s just detail.
Now we put out a casting call and make an equipment list. We hope to shoot it mid to late July and edit it in August. Which is completely doable. We just need everyone on board. But now that the story is hammered out, this should start to pick up. And I’ll feel a lot better leaving the country with a really good decent short film under my belt that can be shopped around to festivals, etc.
This is kinda weird…
Especially the way Andy says “cowboy”, really disturbing.
So this week I had been sitting waiting for someone to text, email, call and just say “YO I’d love to go to Lenka with you” and of course that never happened. So fuck it, I bought a ticket, I’m going alone. And I’m totally OK with it. I like going to movies alone, so why not start going to concerts alone. Maybe I’ll meet the girl of my dreams…not bloody likely. But fuck it at least it’ll be a good show.
Jer (roommate) and I have this tradition every week where on Sundays we go to Hooters downtown between 3pM and 6PM. This is because they have a happy hour where it’s $3 bottles of Bud between those times. It’s now become a competition with ourselves to see if we can outdo our total from the week before. So far I think our record is 10 bottles. However last weekend we pulled off nine and then split a pitcher (just cause we didn’t want to leave) so maybe that would make it the new record.
Here’s me at Hooters.
This is going to be my permanent profile picture from now on. Look at that mug. No wonder the ladies are lining up for a chance to be with me…..obviously I’m kidding.
So it’s now become official that I’ll be leaving for the UK in September after my lease ends. I’m hoping to get a job in film over there with the contacts I’ve made here. In either case the way I justify it goes as followed:
1) Might as well do it while I’m young
2) I’m single, no girlfriend to drag along or keep me in Toronto
3) The world’s going to end in 2012 so I better get some travel under my belt so I can die happy
No particular order.
However as I write this I look around my small dank room and think “Where the hell am I going to store all this shit?” Ugh, it’ll be a headache.
The GOOD thing about leaving the country is that it provides an excuse to do one huge blowout. And that comes in one word…Vegas.
Myself, Colin, Tom, Jer and Chris will be embarking on a trip that I doubt any of us will remember in August to send me off in style. It should be brilliant. And I’m convinced we’ll need a handycam with us so we can at least have an idea of what went on. Kate was upset she wasn’t invited, to which I replied “COCKS ONLY”.
Holy fucking mighty mong Batman, what a week. Don’t we all feel a little like this sometimes…
So I witnessed a cyclist get hit by a car downtown today while on the road. She was OK, she got up, gathered her bike and her shoes. That’s right. Her shoes. The driver hit her hard enough to knock her shoes clean off. Also seeing how her arms and legs flailed in the air…OK so I admit, after I saw her get up and it was clear she was fine, I couldn’t help but laugh. I felt terrible.
I don’t know why. It was awful to witness, but I couldn’t help but think it was something out of a cartoon or Stooges sketch. But the important part to note here is I didn’t laugh until it was clear she was OK. Also I still felt bad for laughing. Also I wasn’t laughing AT her, just at the..the..ah, fuck it.
On a side note, the driver had a ponytail. That’s just adding insult to injury. A ponytail. How embarrassing.
I also watched three people rear-end the vehicle in front of them today. And people say I’M a bad driver.
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I wrote that first part last night. Then we wrapped early and I rushed out of the studio. Well not early early, but on time. I still wasn’t done work until 12:30AM, but hey it’s better than 8AM.
The short film progress has been moving slow, but Tom and I are finally getting together this afternoon to discuss the project. The dick is unemployed now, I don’t know what he’s doing. Probably sitting on his ass all day crying while masturbating to midget porn. Sorry sorry sorry, I mean dwarf porn. That’s the politically correct term now, right?
Our apartment windows aren’t big enough to carry the weight of an air conditioner, so for the first half of this week Chris, Jer and I were stewing in our own free sauna. It was fucking awful. I slept with my desk fan on my face all night, although it didn’t help. All it does is blow hot air into your face. Sorry to put this mental image in your head, but I tried to sleep naked and I found I couldn’t. Just for the fear of a fire in the building happening and Jer or Chris runs into my room.
“Billy get up! Fire—what the fuck?! Why are you naked?”
“It’s fucking hot.” (me spread eagle)
Delightful.
Here’s Jer and I at our favorite hang out spot.
Tom took the photo with his stupid iPhone and some stupid iPhone app.
So some high profile films are shooting in Toronto now. And it’s hilarious to see the signs pointing to set around the city with fake names for the productions. Obviously it’s done to keep you Twilight lovers out of the shot. Or Colin Farrell lovers. Whichever meets your fancy.
Even Batman has bad days:
While delivering scripts until 2AM on Thursday evening, I decided to listen to The Book of Mormon musical soundtrack the full way through. I’m not a huge musical fan by any means, but when it’s offensive or bashing religion or written by the guys who created South Park. I’m totally in. And Mormons are just so stupid too.
This song is fucking brilliant.
I love when he shouts “LET’S BE REALLY FUCKING POLITE TO EVERYONE!”
I would be willing to make another trip to New York for the sole purpose of seeing this.
I feel this was a really boring post. But I literally have nothing to say. Do you? What was so fucking wonderful in your work week? Let me know. If you have a good anecdote I’ll post it…this is for you 3 readers who actually read my bullshit.
Also stop texting me that you think I’m an “asshat” (I was in fact told I was an asshat via text two days ago) and write in the comments so everyone can chime in.
Cheers.
