Rewrite

A long one today on my paying gig. Certainly this rewrite was more akin to assembling IKEA furniture—a meticulous following of directions. But now it's finished and in and I can relax, perhaps with Tropic Thunder.

Running News

Congratulations to Emil for another successful marathon. My running life consists of reading Emil's race reports and thinking of better times ahead. Kiley battles a twisted ankle preparing for another 50-miler — in addition to coaching the San Gabriel Valley TNT fall marathon team. A determined man, Kiley will defeat injury, race like a champ, get all his team across the finish line, while composing light opera and inventing a device that knows when you want pizza and calls ahead. He's that versatile. Yesterday, I aqua ran for thirty-five minutes, taking it easy. I actually felt stiffness in my legs this morning. From aqua running, of all things! But that's the closest I'll get to real running for at least three months. Back to work, complaining about my neighbor's party last night where they cooked steaks, meaty scent drifting all over the building, and didn't invite us. Tonight we're barbecuing a bicycle tire and inviting them. If they can't make it, we'll leave "dinner" by their front door. Chow.

Go Strykers!

A happy 4th of July to the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, Stryker Brigade, 4th Battalion, (23 Infantry Regiment), known as the Tomahawks.

What does all this Army jabbery talk mean?

Let's start with Strykers. Strykers are a relatively new Infantry Carrier Vehicle (ICV) with eight-wheels and more firepower than a South Central LA gang. The Tomahawks ride them into battle. After the troops dismount and deploy, the ICVs provide fire support as the unit manuvers. One of those manuvering will be machine gunner Colin Wells, son of Deanna Oliver, an old Anamaniacs chum.

At 27, Colin is the "old man" of his unit. Deanna used to plunk him down in her office at Warner Brothers where he'd do his homework. He sat with us at our first Emmy Award dinner. (The one in 1994 where the wrong episodes were delivered for consideration.) Colin and his comrades will be in Afghanistan this month, fighting alongside the Marines near the Pakistan border.

So to Colin and the Strykers, thank you for your sacrifice so that I may sleep late, and barbecue and complain about the animation industry and my loud neighbors. Because you choose to give up your freedom and face danger, I have mine. Thank you very much.

I still think we were robbed in '94.

Farewell, Karl Malden

Tom Ruegger sent around more vulture pics and another celebrity passed on.

I really liked Karl Malden in Nevada Smith. He played a ruthless crook who supervised the skinning of Steve McQueen's mom. (Not for real, that was Lee J. Cobb. The legal case drags on.) McQueen hunts Malden all over the west, becoming as callous and hardened as his prey. Malden knows he's being stalked and grows paranoid and jittery, unable to stand the strain of impending retribution. Malden's pleading taunt of "yer yellow, ya haven't got the guts," became a high school catch-phrase we'd fling at each other as a way of pushing someone to do something that would get him in trouble. It usually worked. (SPOILER ALERT!! plus SCANDINAVIAN SUBTITLE ALERT!!)

ht/: frank5400

Exit Jacko

Jacko, we hardly knew ye. Actually, we knew ye all too well. Especially after four-wall coverage by the MSM, bumped cap-and-trade, Iranian demonstrators and other boring non-celebrity stuff from the public eye. As CBS William S. Paley once remarked, "Revolutions come and go, but file footage costs nothing."

PODM wraps it up nicely.

Tom Ruegger and the Vulture Project

Awoke this morning and shuffled to the kitchen minus crutches, moving at the pace of a very healthy 106-year-old. I look forward to greater adventures in the days to come.

Worked all last week on my animated script, then jumped into editing the short story. I finished Monday night, sending it out at almost 8k words. That comes out to 43 pages in New Courier font. A very exhausting process as I had to expand, add clarifying information and erase material simultaneously to stay under the word limit. Once again, a big thanks to the readers. An altered ending proved, I think, more satisfying and truer to what had been set-up. Electronic high-fives to all.

Which led me to yesterday morning. Paul Rugg, Sherri Stoner, Deanna Oliver, Tom Ruegger and myself gathered at a local studio for vulture recordings. Forging a long improvised story proved challenging, but Tom hauled us forward to a resolution. He seemed quite happy with the day's catch, and I have no reason to doubt we hooked more than we released. I felt weary and torpid the whole session. More sleep should improve my perspective. Meanwhile, Tom will add a lick of animatic and a dash of music to today's work and produce something to shop around.

And the studio was free of bees. I really liked that.

Hospital Cafe

While it appears I'm in a hospital, this is actually a station at the Hospital Cafe, a Hollywood eatery that aims to simulate a medical dining experience. You lie in bed with an IV pumping you full of drugs, and eat Jello-o and dried chicken while watching Hawaii 5-0 reruns. Ginger ale is served in a short plastic cup. For an additional fee, your waitress-practitioner will speak English, though at the level of a Saigon bar girl. ("You likee pillow, G.I.?") Actual minor surgery is available, but must be booked in advance as the doctors fly up from Trinidad. You leave the Hospital Cafe drained in fluids and cash, but ultimately feeling less than when you entered. The Hospital Cafe. Institutional food at a Five Star price.

Farewell to Bees

Sometimes I think of the house I sold last year, home to us for twelve years - longer than anywhere I'd ever lived. I miss watching the San Gabriel Mountains, especially at dusk, as the sun flung out massive shadows, burning a bright red as it dipped into the Pacific.

But I don't miss the stinking bees. (Or rabbits, or coyotes, but they have their separate tales.)

The bees didn't actually smell as in insects that stung and stunk up the place. But this time of year they'd swarm, and a swarm would descend on my house, and it would cost a hundred bucks to de-bee. Scouts arrived first, whistling, six hands in their pockets, pretending to pollinate a flower, but really casing the place. Next day I'd hear a loud buzzing from under the house or under an eave and once inside a gardening box on the balcony, indicating they'd successfully immigrated. You've heard the expression, "Busy as a bee?"Well they are brutally industrious. First they build a comb for the queen. If unmolested,  that modest little comb cottage will become a bee high-rise. After one of my Southeast Asia journeys, I returned after three weeks to find a massive bee sub-division. The structure they'd built on the underside of my split level was intricate and astounding, and heavy with honey. Even the exterminator was impressed, admitting later he'd used up all the poison in his canister just to whack this one mega colony. Stuck with clean-up, I had to climb a tall ladder and knock down the sub-division with a rake, ducking chunks of honey-filled wax dropping past my head to splat on the dirt.  This new mess had to be policed at once because various animals would be drawn to the scent of honey and die from bee poison. Hollywood is so much like that and it thrives on buzz. 

Anyway, today I finished my animated script, sent it in, invoiced and napped, and didn't have to bee wrangle. That's got me feeling pretty darn good. 

NOTE: I tried explaining all the above to the new owner, but he and his wife laughed merrily. "We love bees. My father wants to put a hive in the backyard." Clearly, this was a man who fancied bees, in a family of bee fanciers. I hope they still do.  

Another Ruegger Vulture Pic

Three vulture posts and three dead celebs over the last week: Ed, Farrah, Michael.

Those three in a road picture...

It would've been something.

Ruegger Vultures

More vultures from Tom Ruegger, who drew upon extensive meetings with mid-level animation executives.

Ruegger and the Scavengers

Vulture art from Tom Ruegger as Paul Rugg, Sherri Stoner, Deanna Oliver and I gear up to improv voices for vultures such as this one next week. Tom will then take the tracks and see what sort of animated mirth he can rustle up.

Still racing forward with the animation script, but I should make my Friday deadline. Also, thanks to the readers who got material back early. Big darn help seeing things from another perspective, plus good catches on the proofreading. Away with me now!

Confused by Success

Rushing to finish my animated script, and collate short story notes, by Friday. A check arrived for an outline last week. I hadn't seen a check in so long, I grew confused and called the Bomb Squad. Alas, they'd been laid off, but the city sent over a homeless man with a long bamboo pole. He poked the envelope, pronouncing it safe. I tipped him with a jelly glass of wine and a blueberry Nutri-Grain bar. Everyone left happy and how often does that happen dealing with the government?

Rock the Vote

Fun in Iran with this round going to the demonstrators. For about the first minute, it's a game of rock toss between demonstrators and Mullah Cops. But the crowd laps forward, then surges big time.

h/t: BBC Farsi Page via Ace of Spades.

Happy Father's Day!

Way to go, Dads! Youth and experience belong to the kids, but fathers possess cunning and hard-earned wisdom. As the philosopher Lao Ming once said, "The wise owl is the owl with a mouth full of mice, while the father with a mouth full of mice is often subdued by authorities."

Death of a Quasi-Famous Grandmother

Back from Pismo Beach (between Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo.) attending my wife's grandma's funeral service. Virginia reached 98,  once debating Richard Nixon as a sophomore at Whittier High School in, say, 1927? She claimed to have lost a close decision and nursed a grudge against the future president for many decades. Recently declassified White House documents indicate Virginia had, indeed, been robbed as Nixon paid another student to plant evidence with the principal that Virginia was insane. This effected the final tally, throwing the debate Nixon's way and convincing him that winning was more fun than high school.

 In any case, God bless Virginia. She outlived Nixon by fifteen years and certainly got her money's worth from this life. 

As a Matter of Fact...

A few remarks on Froynlaven's post: the films we viewed were ZONTAR The Thing from Venus and a Japanese horror movie with aliens and a city-busting monster that got bombed more than Berlin. (That's Irving Berlin, legendary song-writer and ferocious tippler. But more on that later.)

Paul was laid off from a dating show writing gig at CBS. I was working for a company called Mac Temps. They sent me out on day jobs to companies with Mac computers because they were so different. (Being a Mac Temp is a little like saying I used to dress in a bowler hat and spats like the cats on Mighty Mouse.) All this happened in December. The scripts we'd turned in looked like money for Christmas and more powdered donuts. But we were soon awash in real donuts, plus eclairs, bear claws, chocolate bars and fresh coffee so hot it made your teeth glow a fiery red. (Then again, we may have been drinking isotope water. I haven't felt well lately.) Tom Ruegger's assistant, the admirable Kathy Page, called later to set up a meeting with Tom and Sherri Stoner. Paul and I had made it! We were employed in TV animation - the back porch of show biz (according to certain ham-headed animation executives.)

That same day, Monday, December 16, Acme director M.D. Sweeney leased a store front in North Hollywood that would become the new home of Acme Comedy Theatre.

Low overhead and big checks - that was a fine, crackling time.



h/t: flixvendor

American Movie Clip

The perils of not completing your projects.

Short and Shorter

Three intense writing days have ended. I finally have a readable draft that I will clean up and submit to fine readers on the morrow.

Tonight I will celebrate with YouTube and watch World at War and The Larry Saunders Show.

Two-Story Building

My animated project still waits. I'm trying to power through this short story. Ha. That's rich. The thing is a tome. I could drop it on a cat and cause pain. It's gonna be around 8k words, roughly 30 pages. I had to lose a pair of characters and change the lead from a Bill Mahr type to someone less caustic whom the reader might like. The upside is that all elements have been laid. The table is set. All I have to do is eat. Then get back to writing the story.

Three-Wolf Confirmation

I sent my friend Ernesto the Three-Wolf post. I'm delighted to learn one of his co-workers knows a man with such a shirt. Amazon sales of the newly fabled garment shot up 2300% thanks to a facetious review. Now, if it only glowed in the dark....

Spy Jerks and Animated Scripts

Big squabble between spy chiefs over who gets to pick the top U.S. spy in each country. I guess it's like the swim suit competition. Good thing the intelligence services "reorganized" several years back, increasing efficiency by adding more bureaucrats. You want our guys to do well, but the big dogs arguing in public over turf doesn't inspire confidence.

Back to animation. I finally got the green light on my script - the one where the contract is half as long as the script itself. I'm looking to have fun and maybe get it done by next Monday. I've got that short-story due to go out on June 27 and still need to re-write extensively.

I haven't posted a bad horror movie trailer in days. My hands tremble.

Spies of Tomorrow

On Internet radio, the CIA is running an ad campaign asking for adventurous, patriotic, curious citizens to serve as intelligence agents. Applicants skilled in bureaucratic in-fighting, dodging blame, and document-leaking will be fast-tracked to a supervisory position. Jobs are also available for old school spies, but applicants must provide their own newspaper with cut-out eye holes. Or simply join the State Department, become disgruntled and spy for Cuba. It'll help if you're a zealot with a sweet tooth, because the Cubans only pay in sugar cane.

AMAZING INCREDIBLE TRAILER MADNESS

When will it end? Who can say? Who will be the one to end it? Watch if you dare for the unbelievable, astounding conclusion!

Japanese Monster Trailer

This trailer keeps coming at you. See if you can guess the monster's name?

h/t: KeSci

D-Day Salute

AMERICAN CEMETERY IN NORMANDY

My mother was a British Army nurse in England during World War II. She told me once of hearing hundreds and hundreds of aircraft flying overhead as Allied airborne troops headed across the Channel for the drop behind the invasion beaches. That was the night of June 5 with landings starting the next morning: June 6, 1944. Sixty-five years later, I thank those who made the effort to free France so they could snub us and drop out of NATO, write depressing literature, and otherwise be a pain-in-the-ass.

Harlan Ellison Lets It Rip

A big fan of Pinky and the Brain, author Harlan Ellison zings Warner Bros. over working for free. Alas, I'm guilty of said crime (Freak DVDs), but have ceased on writing gigs. Recently, I've passed on several opportunities to contribute time and effort to some project for a murky future payoff. It's a miserable scam. The interview is from a documentary on Ellison called Dreams With Sharp Teeth.

h/t: factualfactory

Pop Music and Gargantuas

What are words for? Why, to get stuck in my throat! What else? War of the Gargantuas is a delightful nostalgic offering and a fine Russ Tamblyn vehicle, as well as a cautionary tale on the hazards of working in Japan.

ht/: Jandro Meza

Cyber Boon

Generous takineko points me toward junk trailer nirvana.

New From 21st Century Distribution!!

Based on my selection of Creatures from the Abyss, YouTube recommended this trailer. Scary how spot-on they can be.

h/t: sideshowcarney

Post-Surgery Knee News

Knee size is down considerably, but I have an odd rash all over my left leg. I think it may be from  goop the surgery team smeared on. Since it doesn't itch, I'm not sweating it. Intense pain whenever I accidentally torque the knee, but otherwise it's holding up fine.

General immobility has helped writing as I knocked out a thirty-page draft on a short story this week. I'm 1,500 words over the submission limit for this anthology I'm gunning for. But I'll take a machete to the story on Monday.

My TNT friend Ernesto is coming by tomorrow so I can get out of this place, eat breakfast and enjoy the June rains.  

Deep Horror

Where did they sink the budget? Special effects or acting? You decide.

h/t: shamefulcinema

Left Knee Ouch

Much post-op discomfort. The knee has needs that include painful movement to prevent locking up. I'm already sick of crutches. But there's no way out but straight ahead. On to July!

In the world of TV animation, things are tough. An old artist friend told me that a big studio required animation-testing before hire. He was asked to board several pages of script for free. (Then not hired.) This is a guy with years of experience, doing everything from roughs to directing. But the Man gets to make the rules.

Darn that Man.

"Total Eclipse of the Heart" - Literally

Curtain is pulled on this 80s pop video.

h/t: Hot Air

Knee Op News

All went well. At least they operated on the correct knee. Tired and in mild pain. Thank you all for prayers and good thoughts. My hospital gown featured three wolves and a moon. More info on the 'morrow.

Three-Wolf Moon Meme

A dorky tee-shirt with three wolves and a moon becomes the hottest selling Amazon item because of a funny review. Now it has spawned this:

h/t: Dr. Coolsex

End of a Running Era

And the beginning of a better one as I completed my last run on the old knee. And a good one it was, too.

Mile 1: 12:07 with 1x2 run/walk ratio.

Mile 2: 10:56 " " " " .

Mile 3: 9:58 " 1x2 & 1x1 run/walk ratio.

Mile 4: 7:56 with no r/w.

That's a negative split with a sub-eight mile at the end. I can live with that for the next several months. So long Rose Bowl and surrounding hills for the duration. See you in the fall.

Scary, though. Now I have no excuse not to be completing writing projects. Not that I can't find a new one, but self-awareness will nag cruelly.

Salute to the King of the Monsters

My favorite Godzilla movie line was: "Godzilla is attacking the city. This is no drill." Clearly, the authorities wanted to alert the public to a danger that might be confused with just another boring giant-fire-breathing-dinosaur-attack drill.

h/t:CinemaKaBang.

Consider All the Angles

A weighty matter judiciously examined.

Political Talk Show Host Suddenly Very Interested In Manslaughter Law Loopholes

h/t: Little Miss Attila

Chow Down

Back in 2006 when I broke a bone in my foot, I must've put on 15 pounds in three months. That's about the same amount I've put on since my initial injury back in September. With no heavy cardio exercise for a month, post-op must become post-eat. 

At least, post-eat junk food. 

Another day of medical fun as I spent the morning getting blood tests, x-rays, EKG, and a brief examination from my doctor. Plus a phone call from the orthopedist's office and a reminder from the MRI Institute to please bring my MRI to the operation. That made me feel like a man who has bought a bus ticket, only to have the bus company remind him to bring a map. 

Let's go get it done. 

Knee Op and Animated Bureaucrats

Lots of paperwork, sign this and that, all for an operation that's supposed to take an hour. Then off to the drug store for antibiotics and heavy-duty pain pills.  Tomorrow, I have blood tests, x-rays and a physical.

Ran three miles today, completing the last mile in 7:57. I haven't run a sub-eight mile since last August. This will be a positive memory to take into recovery.   

In addition to massive legal documents, my paying job has a well-defined chain-of-command that includes the story editor, two producers, head of the division, another guy, and a guy overseas. The gate guards are also on the distribution lists and add such comments as, "needs more guard characters," and "why doesn't this scene have a check-point?" 

Short story lengthens on. I think I need to kill off characters quicker. Nothing personal, but they're holding up the ending. 

A Farewell to Legs

Ran three miles yesterday, walking two-minutes for every one minute of running. For the last mile, I dropped the walking and focused on moving quickly, feet underneath the body, with rapid turn-over. I logged 8:39, my fastest individual mile since last September. No knee pain yesterday or today.

Surgery this Friday. If running is out for the next several months, it'll be easier having completed at least one decent mile.

Today was the L.A. Marathon. A couple friends ran, but I haven't had time to check results.

Happy Memorial Day! I think of departed veterans Kurt and T.J. Imagine you knew a man from Cleveland, Ohio. He had one sibling, an older sister. During Vietnam, he volunteered for a dangerous assignment, operating far behind enemy lines. After the war, he battled drugs and alcohol. Eventually, he sobered up and went to work for a vending machine company, traveling around Los Angeles in a van fixing candy, coffee and soda machines.

Now imagine you knew two men with the same criteria. That would be Kurt and T.J. Kurt served in Marine recon, operating in Laos along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. T.J. was a 4th Infantry Division LRRP (Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol), creeping around North Vietnamese base camp areas in the Central Highlands. Their Vietnam service overlapped by around six months. (July 1967 to January 1968.)

Once I introduced them to each other at a party, figuring they'd have tons to talk about, but after a few polite minutes they went their separate ways. In any case, I'm honored to have known them and appreciate the sacrifices they made.

PS: I was going to put up more films, but have too much writing. So: Saving Private Ryan, Anthony Mann's Men in War, Band of Brothers, and We Were Soldier's Once, plus A Bridge Too Far complete a few of my war genre favorites.

Memorial Day Film Festival

Here's the trailer from a World War II action flick featuring a cast of top character actors. In addition to the usual Americans from different walks of life ("We're all in this together."), the film included a pacifist, a nasty S.O.B., and Desi Arnaz. As I recall from seeing the movie, the hand-to-hand fighting scenes were raw and brutal, war at its most visceral level. Yes, there's Yank heroism, but the audience is told victory will take hard, unflinching, even heartless men. Worth a look as it was made at a time when things on the battlefield still weren't going all our way.

Sit-Com Report

Finally heard back from my agent. She enjoyed the sit-com, liked the story, but felt the three main characters needed a bit more distinguishing. Fair enough. And not a particularly thorny fix, as these matters go.  As often happens, the material execs will read changes with the seasons. For a long time they wanted a sample of a currently running sit-com. Since the great sit-com die-off, they now want an original script. Also, I learned one of the major animation studios is reluctant to even take pitches from me since one exec doesn't feel anything I've written is "funny enough." That's like sending back a cup of coffee because the liquid isn't "wet enough." Idiosyncratic. Unanswerable. But bound to change once the new script gets out there.

As to my paying animation gig, I've completed the outline and will send it out on the morrow. That means income. I'm faint and girlish thinking about it. 

My friend Dale, whom I've written about for the last two years, has taken another head-butt from cancer. He's been opened up so many times his stomach has lost all elasticity, intestines tied and re-tied into a complicated mess. On Sunday, he was rushed in for emergency surgery after a leak had developed in his mangled guts. And while Dale survived, his pain is immense. When I saw him today, his eyes were popped out from all the morphine. We sat and watched Hawaii 5-0 until he fell asleep. 

Keep him in your prayers, as well as his family. They watch and wait. 

Sam Plenty and The Power of Dos

Evil better watch its dribbly backside as Sam Plenty hooks up with fellow world-saver El Bondigas.

Running Rocks in Hard Times

MDW sent me this on hitting the road when money erodes.

Hurry Up the Video

Ace poster Takineko showcases Anamaniacs' sculpture over at her blog. (And kindly adds a shout-out to Paul Rugg and I.)

Unconventional

A marathoning friend from Team in Training is a big Trek fan. (Though not a Trekkie as he maintains interests in sports and dating girls.) He suggested we hit the Las Vegas Star Trek convention in August. Las Vegas in August is hotter than a Klingon chili cook-off, but it might be worth the experience for the experience. 

On top of my planned one-day excursion to Comic Con, I'll be fat with conventions this year.

Paperwork

I'm reading over the contract for my half-hour script. It's fifteen pages long. The script itself is only thirty pages long. Apparently, the studio won't be comfortable unless I sign over all gas, oil and mineral rights to any land I may walk across during the execution of the script, plus agree to mediate disputes before a tribunal consisting of attorneys related to studio executives.

It's a simple business where a man's handshake is his bond.

Estonian Documentary

The protagonist of my short story has shifted from a friendly guy to a snarky Bill Mahr-like fellow. I'm not sure how this happened, but it eliminated a plot point that kept growing more contrived each draft. As this is a horror story with most of the characters biting it, the change works better.

Just saw an amazing documentary on Estonia. When it comes to the screwed-over-nation-derby, Estonia is neck-and-neck with South Vietnam, Poland and Cambodia. (Plus neighbors Lithuania and Latvia.) Conquered by the Soviets, then the Nazis, then the Soviets again, Estonia was absorbed into the Soviet Union and held captive for over over 50 years. The people used a national song festival to keep alive Estonian culture and, eventually, win independence without violence. What a great feature film this would make. Alas, Hollywood would change the bad guys from Commies to the Vatican, make all the songs rap, and let J.J. Abrams direct so you couldn't tell what what the heck was going on.

Trailer: Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus

h/t: Hot Air