Most Times, He Sounds Like Dr. Venture

Just thought I'd put up a quick post to say I took my first professional driving lesson. Went smooth. I changed lanes, I merged with traffic, I didn't kill nobody. The instructor buttered me up saying I was four lessons ahead of most people, claiming I could take the dmv test by next Friday.

Take that, Voice in My Head Who Says Hurtful and Disparaging Comments!

Day One Addenda

ADDENDUM: On the plane, I sat next to a bright smiling African man named Frank. He was a computer science student who recently married. In all of the commotion of navigating the airport scene with his new wife and her three young sisters, he accidentally left one of his bags. That bag had his video camera, computer equipment, and worst of all his marriage certificate. Despite this tragedy, he was unbelievably upbeat. That guy was a sparkplug of a seat neighbor.

ADDENDUM: Somewhere over Minnesota and South Dakota, the plane passed by a massive storm system blazing with infinite lightning strikes. The whole thing took the shape of Ayer's Rock in Australia. I was able to watch an unending light show out my window for 25 minutes. Every time I took my face off the porthole, I looked around to see who else was watching and it seemed like I was the only one.

ADDENDUM: Apparently, some stalker internet gal on my plane recognized my face from an online photo. I only know this because she later contacted me online. This creeped me out. I then gave her an open-ended invitation to get burgers. I think this creeped her out.

ADDENDUM: Only one of my bags made it through baggage check. That was one more than I was expecting.

Day One: Part One - The Last Bum in Brooklyn

Whenever you leave an apartment, let alone a major metropolis, you're bound to have a whole frigate's worth of junk you don't need to bring with you. The pile compounds when trans-national travel and costly shipping expenses get involved. Where does that junk heap go? To Salvation Army! Let other people sort through my crap!

The best part about giving away the stuff you were about to toss into the garbage is the altruistic buzz you get. It's a sense of self-worth, nobility, I-done-good-ness.

Just hours before I was set to fly away, one lucky drunkard was able to capitalize on my Good Citizen High.

HIM
Excuse me, excuse me. Sir. I'm sorry to have to do this, but... I need you to call 911. I've had too much to drink.

ME
911? Are you sure? You don't want me to call you a cab?

HIM
No. I need 911.

ME
Okay!

Let me tell you, it's a damn awkward situation to describe a man to 911 while the man is beside you. He was 50, mustachioed, with nose swollen and stitches on his brow, and his name was Dino. Ah, Dino. He kept heckling me to tell them that he was well dressed.

ME
He wants me to stress that he is well dressed.

DINO
What, you don't think I am? Look at these pants! Look at that crease!

The woman on the other end asked that I watch over Drunken Little Dino, make sure he didn't run out into traffic or some bullshit. Still riding that goodly high, I couldn't say no to 911 Lady.

During the wait, I learned that Dino was an engineer (CHIEF engineer!). I learned that he graduated from Cooper Union. I learned that Dino had a 25 year old son when he threatened to kill me.

DINO
I have a gun. ... I don't want to kill you. You remind me of my son. But I have to.

Tears streamed down his face. After I convinced Dino not to kill me, he resolved the matter by giving me a fist pound with his swollen, pudgy hands. I couldn't hold it against him, though. After all, as he claimed, he was a member of the Corleone family. They pretty much gotta kill people, right?

The EMT later called me crazy for sticking around after Dino cried "gun." Crazy? Anything but. I was doing my civic duty! According to the EMT, this was actually a recurring event for Dino. Every few months, Dino's wife would kick him out of the house, presumably for being a drunk. It was comedy hour with my colorful lush and his empty bottle until that sad note. Poor guy. I hope he was able to straighten up after that. The Corleone family depends on him.


ADDENDUM: The only way to successfully follow that up was by having the best burger I'd ever had in New York. It took me four years to find it, and only on the day I was leaving. The guy at the grill, John, was a simple dude. He was a salt-of-the-earth kinda guy. He liked yelling out answers to Family Feud. He also made burgers and made 'em damn well.

Day One: Part Two - The Last Day In Brooklyn

With this blog sorta centering on my journey to California, it's probably worthwhile to relay the day it started - the last day in Brooklyn. The day was pretty damned intense, so I'll split it into two parts, starting with the second.

After dropping off my printer and some poster frames at the Tiger Lily* shipping center, I was ready to lock up my apartment and say goodbye to New York. I dropped my keys in the mailbox, called a car service to Hewes and S 3rd, and high-tailed it to JFK.

When we arrived at the airport (my sister was with me to lend a hand, say goodbye), we saw a goddamn sea of travelers at the curbside check-in. I'd flown JetBlue scores of times with nothing but effortless, worry-free experiences. Seeing a crowd that could fill the Bowery Ballroom was like a kick in the gut. We were already late 'cause, like an idiot, I didn't think about the consequences of taking a cab at rush hour. Lucky for me, I printed my boarding pass that morning; the online drop-off queue was much shorter than the seething mass of bodies inside the building. Unlucky for me, my bags were heavier than sin and consequently "overweight." Yeah, I packed fucking cast iron skillets and a 16-piece dinette set.

When told to head inside, I gave up hope. There was about 20 minutes until my flight left and about 50 minutes of line to get through. I'd pretty much accepted my fate of missing the plane. My only option was to take the flight the next day, so I was gearing up for a Tom Hanks jaunt of wacky terminal antics. I was ready to sleep in rigid chairs, shave in the mens room, forge lifelong friendships with the janitorial staff. I couldn't find a monitor with the info, and I wanted to know when to set the alarm on my cellphone so I skipped to the front counters to ask when the first flight tomorrow would be.

ME
When's the next flight to Seattle?

HER
In about 10 minutes.

ME
No, I'm asking about tomorrow. I've already missed the flight today.

HER
No you haven't.

That beautiful, gracious woman saved the fucking day. (I tried to tip her, but she wouldn't have it.) I ran back to my sister and we hauled the bags to the front, ducking under velvet rope after velvet rope. With clock ticking, my sister stepped up, asking if she could handle the extra-weight charges, letting me run to the plane. I strapped my pack on, hugged my sister, and bolted for my flight. I ran like the wind, my legs responding without thought. After the security check point, I ran without shoes, without my belt. I just shoved them in my bag and went. I was leaping over luggage, swerving through crowds, slicing around toddlers. And I made it. I made my flight. Through the kindness of strangers and the aid of family, I made my fucking flight. Once on the plane, all I could do was grin a big dumb retarded smile. After racing through the terminal, barefoot, I was minutes away from racing west at a clip of about 435 mph, chasing the horizon with a 4-hour sunset lighting the way. Hell of a way to leave New York.


*Same name as a plush shark I bought on Orcas Island. True story. (No, she is not a tiger shark.)

Mayumi Will Have to Take Over

While writing with a few people on a group script and while reading other people's work, I've found that I'm kind of in the minority for my use of scene direction. It seems that most people wanna lay out their action in a nice, hefty, girthy, hard-to-swallow paragraph. If I've got a big honkin' chunk of action in a scene, however, I like to cut it up. Call me Ginsu, 'cause I'll slice, dice, and inter-splice that shit.

I was writing on this script with some other kids a few months back. Even though the script was already too long, I'd space out the scene direction. It was a trade off. Breaking up the paragraphs made the script longer, but it made it more readable too. Let's make an example:

INT. SPACE STATION - DAY/NIGHT/WHATEVER THEY DO IN SPACE

Floating through the cramped quarters of the newly minted Japanese space station, we follow CAPT. MAYUMI ITO, 29, calmly swimming her way through the vessel. She has a soft, comforting face and midnight black hair pulled in a tail that bobs in the zero gravity environment. She is dressed in white polo and slacks. We drift by a port hole. We re-focus on a yellowish planetary body that comes into view. Miniature clouds burst up from the planet's atmosphere, dozens at a time, until the whole of the planet is consumed in small explosions. Tinges of red pierce through the cloud. The planet is on fire. Mayumi floats on to the control panel, a sleek designed desk with minimal clutter of controls, very iPod. Mayumi deftly swivels her trim body down into a seat, buckling in. Next to her, sits her fellow astronaut and sister, SUKI, 22. The two greet each other with faint smiles and ad-libbed pleasantries. Suddenly-- BAM! The station is jolted from the side. Alarms blare. Lights flash. Suki, struggling against the massive vibrations, lunges for the wheel.

SUKI
(in Japanese)
They're gonna revoke my pilot's permit for sure!

That's an awful lot of text to read. The first glance of a block that fat makes me want to skip ahead. I guilt myself into reading the whole thing, because I know I'll be missing a boatload of information, but I'm not happy about it.

INT. SPACE STATION - DAY/NIGHT/WHATEVER THEY DO IN SPACE

Floating through the cramped quarters of the newly minted Japanese space station, we follow CAPT. MAYUMI ITO, 29, calmly swimming her way through the vessel. She has a soft, comforting face and midnight black hair pulled in a tail that bobs in the zero gravity environment. She is dressed in white polo and slacks.

We drift by a port hole. We re-focus on a yellowish planetary body that comes into view. Miniature clouds burst up from the planet's atmosphere, dozens at a time, until the whole of the planet is consumed in small explosions. Tinges of red pierce through the cloud. The planet is on fire.

Mayumi floats on to the control panel, a sleek designed desk with minimal clutter of controls, very iPod. Mayumi deftly swivels her trim body down into a seat, buckling in. Next to her, sits her fellow astronaut and sister, SUKI, 22.

MAYUMI
(in Japanese)
How's it going so far?

Suki smiles. Suddenly--

BAM! The station is jolted from the side. Alarms blare. Lights flash. Suki, struggling against the massive vibrations, lunges for the wheel.

SUKI
(in Japanese)
They're gonna revoke my pilot's permit for sure!

Now I'm happy. I broke this up by spacing out the main block of text and by splicing in a line that wasn't there before. By doing that, the paragraphs become more palatably bite-size. It's easier to read and I think my eye is drawn down the page more gradually. You might also notice that each bit is sectioned off to its particular focus. This helps distinguish what the camera may be looking at, whether it be Mayumi, the planetary view, or the two girls at the control desk.

Maybe that's just my own personal preference, but I think it helps a page of script to look more inviting while offering a subtle means to focus the camera. There's no need to jumble all that detail into a small space if nobody wants to read it.

Character X is Me

It's Labor Day and nobody can seem to shut up about how that marks the End of Summer. Frankly, I've been looking past Summer for a while now. It's all about Autumn for me.

October is the goal. It'll be my own cheesy thriller where Character X has to be in City Y by Mostly Arbitrary Date Z. All I need to do is get an apartment in LA by October 1st. Why October? So I don't lounge around on my fattening keister in Seattle-- I need to be doing that in Los Angeles.

But really, waiting any longer is just that much more time before I get whatever entry level job awaits and it's that much more time before I rise above entry level. Think of it in terms of the Band-Aid Removal theory of pain. Do it now, do it quick, grit your teeth and bear the sting. None of this "mañana, mañana" bullshit. That said, I gotta call about a driving lesson tomorrow.

Or the Islamic Republic of Mauritania

Obviously, if I want to become a writer, I need to have writing samples. While still in New York, I took a hack at a '30 Rock' spec. I was pretty flipping pleased with the resulting piece. Here's a bit of the opening scene to whet your whatever.

LIZ
Where did you go?

JACK
California. I was visiting with Governor Schwarzenegger at his request.

LIZ
Wow. The Governator. Did he sexually harass anyone while you were there?

JACK
Don’t denigrate the man. He is a leader on the world’s stage who simply happens to have a robust sexual appetite.

LIZ
Is that why he called you in “at his request?”

JACK
No. He was pitching an idea to GE that he felt very strongly about.

Jack reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out...

LIZ
A green paint swatch?

Liz reaches for the swatch.

LIZ (CONT'D)
What shade is that?

JACK
General Electric is going Green, Lemon!

LIZ (reading swatch)
Limeade...

JACK
This morning Don Geiss will sign the papers admitting GE into the UN’s Convention on Climate Change.

LIZ
Woah, wait. GE is signing the Kyoto Protocol? Don’t you have to be, like, a nation?

Jack clasps his hands together.

JACK
Which do you think is a better get, Lemon? GE, with its $160 billion in annual revenue, or the island nation of Micronesia?