I love to dream. There are few things I love more than being woken up by an annoying alarm clock at 5 in the morning and then snoozing it cause that puts me right into that little place between awake and really freaking asleep. Also known, as the dream zone. And I love the dream zone cause, and I don't know if this is the same for everyone, but my dreams kick F-ing ass!
I do wonder if other people have interesting dreams or they simply dream about something like fishing, or walking, or reading a book (but not really cause the letters get all funny in dreams *except for this one time..... this one time.... oh I'll tell you in a bit.... about this one time....*) But I do wonder if other peoples dreams are awesome or lame. Let me describe a few of mine.
And as with mine, god knows why, the stakes are always EVERYTHING, that or extremely lame.
The other night I dreamt that the Earth was falling INTO THE SUN. And me and a crackpot team of scientists had to devise and use a machine to reverse the gravity at the last moment, and we would use this pinball effect to bounce between suns to get us to a new home. (I feel a little retarded cause I had to go look up the name for pinball. It's one of those mornings.)
But like I said, an all stakes dream with crazy special effects reminiscent of the Fifth Element though I did not have any guest appearances from Bruce Willis.
I've also dreamed about zombies. I've dreamed about Zombies ALOT. I don't know why. I've fought them and won, fought and lost, fought and ended up drinking tea with them, I've had ALOT of zombie dreams. I blame society. Or my wife who watches waaaay to many scary movies. I don't know if I should read into my dreams cause I don't know what the crap they would be about or be interpreted to be.
I dreamt I had a black car in one dream and that there was a policy that if you had a black car you had one month to join this group of vampires, so what do I do to avoid this outcome, I repaint my car.... black. Thus buying myself another month at which point I paint my car again.... black. And by about paint job four I decide I'm bored of this and go hunting vampires from my drivers seat. Yes, not the brightest bulb on the tree am I when the lights go out.
I think the best dream someone else ever told me about was my friend Ryan. He had two great ones that are memorable, why? cause they take my high low standard of dreams to the epitome of dreamdom.
Dream 1 - Lamest dream ever) Ryan dreamt he woke up, got out of bed, and began to read a book. That was the WHOLE DREAM. Bravo buddy, bravo.
Dream 2 - Most high stakes dream ever) Ryan dreamt he got in a fistfight with God, yes GOD. Granted he lost, which he admitted should have been the outcome but he said he got a few good blows in on the giant white bearded Creator of all. Bravo again buddy, I have never had a dream with stakes THAT high.
I have dreamt my car was hit by a meteor (and let me tell you that is one of those dreams where you are PISSED until you wake up). I have fought Ninja Monkeys, yes I shit you not, NINJA MONKEYS. Dreaming is a hoot!
A lot of people have recurring dreams which I find very weird. I wish I had recurring dreams, it would be like Groundhog day in your head! You could go through once, find out where the giant spider is and the pitfall on the huge chessboard and then next time through do things a little different. Hell, by time five you'll have gotten the shotgun above the fireplace and the chainsaw hidden behind the portrait in the main hallway and rock the hell of that spider before he knows what happened. I would LOVE to have a recurring dream. But all in all dreams are still fun. You can do ANYTHING in dreams. But they are often crappy to. Like you dream that you did something bad, or that someone cheated on you, then you wake up and your are like "Whoo! Thank goodness I didn't actually eat my sister's new puppy." But they go the other way to, where you believe that all your problems are gone then you wake up and are like "SHIT! I've still got the Clap." That would be an unpleasant awakening.
Or sleepwalkers. I had an ex who was the biggest bitch when she slept walked. Though in all honesty I would have to say she went into a coma or something cause she quickly held that title 24/7. I have slept walked before, though usually after a night on the town (Sorry about your laundry Reid). Or waking a sleepwalker. My lady found that out the hard way when she tried to grab me while I was "Disarming a Bank Robber" in my dream. Yea.... that didn't end too well.
But all in all I love to dream and wish I could more often though you often get that feeling of having lost the meaning of life when you wake up and are like CRAP!
Scariest dream though ever. This dream had WAY TO MUCH DETAIL. I dreamt I was in some foreign country, Tibet I think, on a missionary trip. Lord knows how I had this much backstory but there you have it. And was walking home in the dark on a gravel road. Super dark, no moon or stars, so I was keeping on the road by sound. And I saw-ish something come at me and rolled and kicked. I called out to whatever it was to turn on their light and they responded in some dialect that I couldn't understand. But I could read it. You got it boys and girls, I had a subtitled dream. Freaking Subtitles. But the super creepy part was that I could read it, and you shouldn't be able to in dreams "apparently". Stuff in dreams has always come out retarded like "The Pirate wishy wash banana plantation green." And in the dream I always nod and say "Ahhh, yes I get it now" but when I wake up I'm like Get What? What the F!? But this dream I COULD read it. And it was saying, and this figure was scrabbling towards me "For the Flesh" Creeeeeepy. And when it got to me and touched me on the ribs I woke up. Didn't pee myself, kinda wish I had, evil zombie critters can't abide human pee, remember that. Human urine, NO ONE likes it. Except perverts, but for them the usual baseball bat will do. So arm yourselves immediately in a bad dream with a baseball bat and a gallon of people urine and you are good to go.
I wonder vaguely if people who have repetitive nightmares can influence them. Like if they have it every night, could they play Mario Bros for an hour before bed and then be able to rock out the Italian stache and jump on the Werewolf chasing them in their dreams? Could you dress up like a pirate for your pajamas and be able stab the people kidnapping you in your dream before legging it away with all the treasure? I do wonder.
The best part is when you realize it is a dream. Few things have been more fun than realizing I can breath under water and start to beat up the giant fish coming after me. Always remember, dream shark or no, they don't like being punched in the nose.
So my advice to dreamers is this, if only for my own amusement, dress in a kick ass super hero outfit and remember to aim for the groin. It is a fail safe plan of awesome.
But, and now I have to say the real reason for this blog. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to run into an ex? And where it might happen or where would be best for it to happen? Under what circumstances would it be to your benefit to run into someone you utterly hate?
Well last night I dreamt I ran into my ex. And it was GLORIOUS! Why? Because I ran into at a paintball range.
THINK ABOUT IT!! Benefits:
A) You are wearing a MASK. They will never know it is you!
B) You get to shoot them 1) As many times as you want, and 2) With NO repercussions!
C) If they brought the new guy, You can shoot him too!
D) You can shoot them EVEN IF YOU END UP ON THE SAME TEAM!!
I think if I ever actually ran into an ex I really disliked I need to do it at a paintball range. It would be a win win situation and they would never even know I was there. Thank you dream world for that insight. It was sweet.
Out!
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Friday, November 14, 2008
Each day is important
I figure each day is important in life. I know many people get into a "groove" and don't do anything other than a daily routine of get up, eat, work, go home, yell at traffic, eat, watch tv, sleep. And let me tell you, it is a sad sad day when the most interesting and dynamic thing that happens to you, happens while you are in traffic. Have you ever found yourself being like "Man! This major C cut me off in traffic today. Boy, that sucked."
Now you have to note,
A) This wasn't THAT interesting.
B) This was probably the only thing you said today with any enthusiasm.
C) You probably didn't say the letter C.
Now granted people do stuff at work, toiling away for the money and the good of humanity, but in all honesty, what can you bring home to the table to talk about. Usually, unless your spouse is in the same field or frankly a genius, you will often be at odds to tell her how much joy you got out of determining the fin angle on a jet turbine to increase air flow. Now you have to note :
A) This accomplishment was amazing to you cause you worked so hard on it, and maybe to a couple friends who are on par with your nerdiness. Not that it isn't awesome. I have often high fived myself for clearing a jam in the copier only to turn around and have no one to tell it to. But it just doesn't translate well to other people.
B) I kinda forgot where I was going with this but needless to say your greatest accomplishments are often kept to yourself. It is almost a godsend for security clearances cause you then CAN'T tell anyone about the dynamic spring ratio you solved earlier that day and by mere proxy it is that much more cool cause you CAN'T tell anyone. It's like being the secret agent of the nerd world.
So, my point is this, people get into a groove that they can't even brag about cause it is out of everyone else's league. So my solution that I have begun doing, seeing as all I have to brag about is photocopies and things to date, is to learn or discover something new each day that no one else probably knows but it's one of those things that when they think about it they say HOLY CRAP he's right! I never thought about that and now I shall go home and see if I TOO can fit into my Drier.
For example:
The Gummy Bears. Classic show of the 80's and you would be hard pressed to find anyone who doesn't know the theme song. Hell my brother sang it AT MY WEDDING. Kick ass by the way too. BUT! And my point is this. What do you think it is about? A bunch of bears living in a magical farm where they enjoy rambunctious adventures where they can use their super powers gained from their berry juice to fight evil?
OR!
Is it in fact about a bunch of bears who run a winery and get tanked.
Ahhh, are the wheels turning? Hit me hard the first time too. How many more childhood cartoons can we desecrate?
But my point is you can do this with anything. Yesterday's discovery, and why I found this out I don't know, was that while a guy can stand peeing on one leg, he can ONLY do it if he is standing in that foot up to your but one legged stand you do for the drunky touch your nose test. If you try and do it with your leg sticking out to your side and a/or a little in front of you it is freaking HARD! Your body seems to say "F-this if I start to go my balance will shift and I'm going to spray the walls."
And these are the things I think about each day. Granted the aren't the solution to world hunger, but everyone can understand them, and some may be foolish enough to try them.
Have you ever peed while drinking something? Giving the sensation of throughput?
Oh the self education is endless! I am going to try and pass on my learnings in my blog.
And End Anyway.
Now you have to note,
A) This wasn't THAT interesting.
B) This was probably the only thing you said today with any enthusiasm.
C) You probably didn't say the letter C.
Now granted people do stuff at work, toiling away for the money and the good of humanity, but in all honesty, what can you bring home to the table to talk about. Usually, unless your spouse is in the same field or frankly a genius, you will often be at odds to tell her how much joy you got out of determining the fin angle on a jet turbine to increase air flow. Now you have to note :
A) This accomplishment was amazing to you cause you worked so hard on it, and maybe to a couple friends who are on par with your nerdiness. Not that it isn't awesome. I have often high fived myself for clearing a jam in the copier only to turn around and have no one to tell it to. But it just doesn't translate well to other people.
B) I kinda forgot where I was going with this but needless to say your greatest accomplishments are often kept to yourself. It is almost a godsend for security clearances cause you then CAN'T tell anyone about the dynamic spring ratio you solved earlier that day and by mere proxy it is that much more cool cause you CAN'T tell anyone. It's like being the secret agent of the nerd world.
So, my point is this, people get into a groove that they can't even brag about cause it is out of everyone else's league. So my solution that I have begun doing, seeing as all I have to brag about is photocopies and things to date, is to learn or discover something new each day that no one else probably knows but it's one of those things that when they think about it they say HOLY CRAP he's right! I never thought about that and now I shall go home and see if I TOO can fit into my Drier.
For example:
The Gummy Bears. Classic show of the 80's and you would be hard pressed to find anyone who doesn't know the theme song. Hell my brother sang it AT MY WEDDING. Kick ass by the way too. BUT! And my point is this. What do you think it is about? A bunch of bears living in a magical farm where they enjoy rambunctious adventures where they can use their super powers gained from their berry juice to fight evil?
OR!
Is it in fact about a bunch of bears who run a winery and get tanked.
Ahhh, are the wheels turning? Hit me hard the first time too. How many more childhood cartoons can we desecrate?
But my point is you can do this with anything. Yesterday's discovery, and why I found this out I don't know, was that while a guy can stand peeing on one leg, he can ONLY do it if he is standing in that foot up to your but one legged stand you do for the drunky touch your nose test. If you try and do it with your leg sticking out to your side and a/or a little in front of you it is freaking HARD! Your body seems to say "F-this if I start to go my balance will shift and I'm going to spray the walls."
And these are the things I think about each day. Granted the aren't the solution to world hunger, but everyone can understand them, and some may be foolish enough to try them.
Have you ever peed while drinking something? Giving the sensation of throughput?
Oh the self education is endless! I am going to try and pass on my learnings in my blog.
And End Anyway.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
The Resume' of Me (the apostrophe is for awesome)
Hello from the far end of the frontier again, this is your host, Mr. Really Tired of Applying to Jobs Guy, and I'm will be taking you on a tour of my brain. Actually, sorry, my brain appears to be closed at the moment, apparently someone had an accident with the fryer and it is currently of no use to anyone. The brain, not the fryer.
What could have happened to have caused a frying of the brain you may ask? 43 job applications, that's what. And it's not like they are the good ol' apply to everything in sight variety from the good ol days of when I wanted to work at Starbucks cause that's where all the cool people worked but I could only get a job lifting rocks out of a ditch for my parents (oh you think I may be kidding, I will show you the ditch!) but alas, these are the read everything cause you have to make sure you did a good job applying variety. The kind where handwriting doesn't count, cause if you had to fill something in you aren't doing it right.
So! After a round of applications this morning, and my mornings tend to start off lame. My wife jumps out of bed doing a flip and cartwheel in her excitement to get to work, and then I can't get back to sleep cause the cat is having a berserk attack and meows at anything remotely resembling a person, hatstands, lamps, the wall. And hence I am left in my own little hell monitored by the cat as I apply to jobs. And granted Mr. Cat may just want some love, but the only thing receiving any love upon request at three in the morning will be my pillow, but granted if it ever actually requested it I will be damned if I put my head anywhere near it.
SO, I find myself wondering, as I often do, or at least did before my brain ceased to function on a reasonable level, what have I accomplished in life? What are the things, that I could put on a resume to myself and say, hey, don't you want to hire me to conduct the goings on in your life? Aren't I the one you want to employ to make sure your days are filled with trampolines and bubble gum (though in a separate occurrence, jumping on a trampoline chewing gum = bad, jumping on a trampoline covered in gum = also bad (however, slightly interesting to watch). So what have I done of note. Well let us structure it like a resume:
Dear Me,
I am looking for a position with ME, as a Qualified Life Consultant. I have 27 years of experience in this line of work, though probably the first 5 were done training in one facility or another. I have attached my resume for your consideration, though seeing as you are ME you probably know what is on it already.
Sincerely,
Me
Name: You
Residence: Your head.
Phone / Email : I'm a voice in your head, and though people may like to sit next to each other and text and email I might consider myself a little over the hill should I want to send MYSELF messages that way.
Objective: Occupation kicking ass and chewing bubblegum, though as previously stated, not on a trampoline.
Education: The school of hard knocks but not that hard, and not metaphorically perverse either, though sometimes I regret that part. (GPA: Shitty in the beginning ( bit of a nerd) but it got better later, so on average I would say a 3.3 out of 4.0)
Experience:
Being Me: Responsibilities - Keeping me alive, and out of oncoming traffic. Avoiding crazy as ass people in relationships. Making enough money to eat or finding people to buy me food. Maintaining a non-round body and regular (annually) exercise. Generally finding the bathroom without too much outside assistance.
9/15/1981 - Present
Being Pierre Rodriquez: Responsibilities - Being half Mexican, Half French. Rocking it out, wearing a hat, and building rope swings.
10/14/2007 - 12/25/2007 - Internship
Skills: Juggling, Handstands, Braiding Hair (Not), putting up with shopping for long periods of time, gym enthusiast without dying, and expert high fiver.
Accomplishments: Been around the world and back ALIVE. Installed a ceiling fan and am still ALIVE. Ate my weight in prunes (ALIVE). Have stayed out past 3 in the morning and contrary to my mothers beliefs NOT ended up in a ditch (ALIVE). Made many an interesting piece of art/carpentry for good/evil/retarded people and not lost any fingers/toes/organs/friends/peopleIdon'tKnow/pets/bodiesOfWater and managed to stay at lease 97% ALIVE. Dealt with crazy/supercrazy/blatentlyPsycotic people and came out ALIVE and sometimes with some tricks with hand puppets. And last but not least, good with animals terrible with babies.
References : You know everyone I do so just ask around ME.
And then I wouldn't be hired for failing the polygraph test of even though I passed with flying colors on the awesome test (cause I cheated) though on retrospect the two may be linked.
And so I shall not reboot the fried brain and hope that everything in general boots up correctly. Blogging is very therapeutic because unlike conducting oneself in life, I can make up all the words I want and no one can say I've ever been McFiggined.
Finale.
What could have happened to have caused a frying of the brain you may ask? 43 job applications, that's what. And it's not like they are the good ol' apply to everything in sight variety from the good ol days of when I wanted to work at Starbucks cause that's where all the cool people worked but I could only get a job lifting rocks out of a ditch for my parents (oh you think I may be kidding, I will show you the ditch!) but alas, these are the read everything cause you have to make sure you did a good job applying variety. The kind where handwriting doesn't count, cause if you had to fill something in you aren't doing it right.
So! After a round of applications this morning, and my mornings tend to start off lame. My wife jumps out of bed doing a flip and cartwheel in her excitement to get to work, and then I can't get back to sleep cause the cat is having a berserk attack and meows at anything remotely resembling a person, hatstands, lamps, the wall. And hence I am left in my own little hell monitored by the cat as I apply to jobs. And granted Mr. Cat may just want some love, but the only thing receiving any love upon request at three in the morning will be my pillow, but granted if it ever actually requested it I will be damned if I put my head anywhere near it.
SO, I find myself wondering, as I often do, or at least did before my brain ceased to function on a reasonable level, what have I accomplished in life? What are the things, that I could put on a resume to myself and say, hey, don't you want to hire me to conduct the goings on in your life? Aren't I the one you want to employ to make sure your days are filled with trampolines and bubble gum (though in a separate occurrence, jumping on a trampoline chewing gum = bad, jumping on a trampoline covered in gum = also bad (however, slightly interesting to watch). So what have I done of note. Well let us structure it like a resume:
Dear Me,
I am looking for a position with ME, as a Qualified Life Consultant. I have 27 years of experience in this line of work, though probably the first 5 were done training in one facility or another. I have attached my resume for your consideration, though seeing as you are ME you probably know what is on it already.
Sincerely,
Me
Name: You
Residence: Your head.
Phone / Email : I'm a voice in your head, and though people may like to sit next to each other and text and email I might consider myself a little over the hill should I want to send MYSELF messages that way.
Objective: Occupation kicking ass and chewing bubblegum, though as previously stated, not on a trampoline.
Education: The school of hard knocks but not that hard, and not metaphorically perverse either, though sometimes I regret that part. (GPA: Shitty in the beginning ( bit of a nerd) but it got better later, so on average I would say a 3.3 out of 4.0)
Experience:
Being Me: Responsibilities - Keeping me alive, and out of oncoming traffic. Avoiding crazy as ass people in relationships. Making enough money to eat or finding people to buy me food. Maintaining a non-round body and regular (annually) exercise. Generally finding the bathroom without too much outside assistance.
9/15/1981 - Present
Being Pierre Rodriquez: Responsibilities - Being half Mexican, Half French. Rocking it out, wearing a hat, and building rope swings.
10/14/2007 - 12/25/2007 - Internship
Skills: Juggling, Handstands, Braiding Hair (Not), putting up with shopping for long periods of time, gym enthusiast without dying, and expert high fiver.
Accomplishments: Been around the world and back ALIVE. Installed a ceiling fan and am still ALIVE. Ate my weight in prunes (ALIVE). Have stayed out past 3 in the morning and contrary to my mothers beliefs NOT ended up in a ditch (ALIVE). Made many an interesting piece of art/carpentry for good/evil/retarded people and not lost any fingers/toes/organs/friends/peopleIdon'tKnow/pets/bodiesOfWater and managed to stay at lease 97% ALIVE. Dealt with crazy/supercrazy/blatentlyPsycotic people and came out ALIVE and sometimes with some tricks with hand puppets. And last but not least, good with animals terrible with babies.
References : You know everyone I do so just ask around ME.
And then I wouldn't be hired for failing the polygraph test of even though I passed with flying colors on the awesome test (cause I cheated) though on retrospect the two may be linked.
And so I shall not reboot the fried brain and hope that everything in general boots up correctly. Blogging is very therapeutic because unlike conducting oneself in life, I can make up all the words I want and no one can say I've ever been McFiggined.
Finale.
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Weddings and the People that make them special.
Well well well, sorry for the hiatus on the blog but I had decided to throw myself fully into trying to get a job. The wife has started working her gig and while I love living the dream, that's right, living in the Parents-In-Law's basement, I feel that a change of occupation is now needed. I would love to get a group of my good buddies over for a little D&D action and take my status from merely sad to utterly out of this world, but alas, this is not to be so. So job hunting I have gone. And, well, dozens of applications in, no calls. So sad, so sad. I think my low point was when the wife suggested I work at Best Buy, and while the appeal exists to have a job I don't really care about where I could run amok during the day, and have the keys to sponsor a lock in or sleepover with my bosom chums in the evening, I just don't think that would be the place for me. So I'm trying a different route. Those you can, do, those who can't say Shut the Hell Up I'm only working as a substitute teacher until the market gets turned around so there!
But on to the subject of the blog. Weddings, and the people that make them special. Now this is most often the bride and groom or perhaps a best man with a really amazing best man speech. My brother for instance had an amazing best man speech at my wedding. It began "Dashing and Daring, Courageous and Caring, Faithful and Friendly with stories to share." and for those who know it, this is the Gummy Bears theme song. So while the adults are sitting there thinking "My what a well spoken individual, he's not only very well spoken but has an intuition for lyrical speech." and I'm up there trying to keep a straight face and my friends are all rolling in the back. Bravo brother, bravo.
So as I said, there are usually some people who make the wedding the "IT" thing, and seeing as this has been wedding season I'm here to tell you about a few.
First, the Wedding of "Nick and Betsy Durso". Now I have to say my one beef with this wedding had to be my wife who said "This is best wedding I've ever seen.... second to ours that is." Thanks for the bone there darlin. But I have to say it was amazing. It was a winery atop a hill overlooking the rolling plains. The food was good, and they gave us free chocolate bars! Not little snacky things, but this was like the Halloween house you hit up time and again over the night with the full sized monsters of some chocolate you've never heard of but know it will be good because you are kinda sure its name is in Belgium but not totally cause you have never really read Belgiumese but you are sure it will be tasty anyway with all those pictures of cherubs on the from looking all fat and content. And so, it was a very pretty wedding, bride and groom awesome and so on. Ah, but who does the award go to? I have two awards for this wedding. Mark the Shark gets award number one for starting the wine flowing practically before I got there, and being the basic result of my fuzzy recollection and odd pictures throughout the night. Bravo Shark, you are the one who starts the party right and knows how to celebrate the wedding. I wish I had more to add on this point, but I was drinking a bit too much, so on the same note, boo Shark, I can't remember why I took the pictures with the banana and the daffodil. And we have the second award, the gold if you will, for the person who made the ceremony priceless. That's right. The lone cow. Now I don't know where this guy was, but it was a picturesque backdrop of two people across a valley exchanging vows, and this cow decided to let howl. And this is a VALLEY, and it ECHOES. Bravo cow, bravo for just being in the wrong place at oh so the wrong time.
Wedding 2: Now this one deserves special mention. I was not at this wedding but my girl showed me the pictures from facebook later as she is the un-announced deity of facebook perusing it's pages with all alacrity spreading knowledge and wealth as she finds it in her travels. But she showed me the wedding pictures of Oliva and Taz's wedding. Now I have to say, bravo photographer, he did a very good job with what I heard to be a slightly gloomy day, so kudos to him. But the awards I have to say goes to this man. Let me set the scene. The picture is the classic bride and father of the bride coming down the isle. The are exiting a glorious Holley archway with a hedge stretching away to either side taller than a man. It is picturesque as they make their entrance. But then you say, how do you know the hedge was taller than a man. And the award goes to, Bushes Guy. There is a convenient hole in the hedge and lo and behold some guy, maybe a waiter, maybe a gardener, who knows! But he has his noggin in the hole to watch the bride come down the isle and is grinning like he won the lottery. Bravo bushes guy, you take the prize.
Now for another wedding I rather enjoyed. This one had its bumps and bruises as most weddings do, but I have to say the couple was radiant, and rocked it out solid. Especially since they had two cakes! So the consolatory prize goes to the couple. For having enough cake to do around and then some. Hey I'm an easy guy to please. That and their food rocked my socks off so hard I had to dance barefoot most the night. But on to the winners of this wedding. Now I as I said this was also a very beautiful wedding but there were a couple hitches one of which being that one of the bridesmaids was called back to active duty and had to miss the wedding at the last minute. So, in her stead, they rocked a garden gnome. That's right. A garden gnome stood in line with the other bridesmaids, and rocked the ceremony. But seeing as I can't in all good conscience give the prize to the garden gnome, or to the person missing as it was out of their control, this prize goes to Nick Durso, the groomsman opposite the garden gnome who treated it with all the care that a bridesmaid deserved such as escorting it down the isle, posing for the couples photos, and making sure it had a good meal at dinner as it couldn't reach the buffet without help. Bravo Nick and the garden gnome, you made wedding history. Now the final award for this wedding goes to a circumstance of things, so you can decide who gets the vote. Let me set the stage. Best man's speech, a slightly fuzzy sound system, and a couple impatient guests who wanted to get dancing. Now the best man's speech was....long. Really long. I think he actually had it written to be multiple speeches into one with dramatic pauses between the interchanges. And while I know it was done with a steady hand when written, the sound system did not carry so it was something akin to listening to the teacher of Charlie Brown for about twenty minutes. And it would have been longer except that some unnamed people nearby felt that it should reach it's climax then and began to clap and cheer whereupon the other guests who weren't really following decided that the clapper must have better hearing than they and followed suit, and which point the best man, finding himself a little out of sorts with the applause took it in stride and took a bow. So bravo clappers and best man, you made my blog.
Now for the final wedding of the summer, and I have to say, some of the highest awards I have to give. This wedding I had the pleasure to attend the other weekend and it was for my good friend John, and his lady J. Now this wedding was a military wedding, and I tell you this cause you have to visualize how a few things are. The dad, in full military regalia, a very no-nonsense kind of look about him. So the wedding was in a church, very nice, the maids of honor very dolled up, the bride looking very bridey the groom rocking it out strong and pulling the emotion card only once. So we then head over to the reception and the few people we were with got there first. This was a little weird cause as we walk into the reception hall a few bells go off in my head. Now nothing against the wedding we had been at, but it was largely of one ethnicity, and the reception we were about to crash, frankly, was not. But as it turned out there were several receptions going on in the building so my fears were put aside and we plunged in. So we get to the actual reception, chill at the back and wait for the fun to begin. So the crowd arrives and the party begins, and the awards begin. I have three to give out tonight. The first award goes to this man. The scene. The father is giving the father speech, it is heartfelt describing his love for his daughter and how happy he was for her, and how he had accepted John as his son. It was right at this point that one man, perhaps a little hard of hearing or just unable to control the volume of his voice decided that the best thing to do at that point was to say "Wow" really loud. Well, that started my night off with a bang. So the speeches finish, heartfelt and tearful yada yada. Then the dancing begins. Now my second award will go to my friend Amanada. Scene. The dance floor is full, now there wasn't a huge amount of dancing going on until now, but when the "Twist" came on everyone swarmed the floor. And the song is playing and everyone is rocking it strong, then the part of the song comes about where it plays "Everyone get a little quieter now" where by tradition the people dancing will move lower and lower and twist ever closer to the ground. So we have everyone, basically squatting at the part of the dance... except for Amanda who is standing there in the middle of this group on the floor looking around with a look of shock and mingled amusement. Now I don't know if she has bad knees, or a tight skirt or what, but all I have to say it, bravo Amanda, don't give in to that peer pressure and rock it strong, bravo.
But now. The top award of the evening. This gets its own paragraph and the awards of the Platinum of the night. It is just that good. Scene. The bridesmaids are at the head table, and the maid of Honor is an attractive blond of the sorority persuasion and everyone is dressed up to the peak. Not one person at the wedding is not in a suit, and many are in military regalia. And enter Glasses McGee the boyfriend of the Maid of Honor and AT the head table. This guy did NOT get the memo. The one that says:
Memo: You are at a wedding.
1) Do not wear white tennis shoes.
2) Do not wear sweatpants.
3) Do not wear a long sleeve shirt you obviously haven't washed and pulled out from the back of your closet because you don't actually do laundry.
Thank you for adhering to our requests and have a nice day at the wedding.
Oh, but Glasses McGee was going to take it one step further. Glasses McGee was SO cool he had sunglasses on, in a dark room at a Wedding. And he was so UNBELIEVABLY cool that he had them on BACKWARDS on his bald head. That's right, Glasses McGee had eyes in the back of his head that could see so well, he needed to have sunglasses on them to shade them from the most minimal of light.
Well let me tell you when I saw Maid of Honor, who I might add was into this guy like he had a mountain of money and she was a gold digger with a silver pick axe, she went from an attractive individual to, well, there is a trailer involved. There is something very important that everyone should remember when living their life. There is no dressing like a thug at a wedding, there is just retarded. Glasses McGee you have won the Platinum medal of the wedding season for not listening to the rules of those crazy jazzed up old people at that Military Wedding and living by your own rules and wearing your sunglasses at night. Yes. You have brought the 80's back to us in the style of Corey Hart, and you Wear Your Sunglasses at Night.
End of Memo.
But on to the subject of the blog. Weddings, and the people that make them special. Now this is most often the bride and groom or perhaps a best man with a really amazing best man speech. My brother for instance had an amazing best man speech at my wedding. It began "Dashing and Daring, Courageous and Caring, Faithful and Friendly with stories to share." and for those who know it, this is the Gummy Bears theme song. So while the adults are sitting there thinking "My what a well spoken individual, he's not only very well spoken but has an intuition for lyrical speech." and I'm up there trying to keep a straight face and my friends are all rolling in the back. Bravo brother, bravo.
So as I said, there are usually some people who make the wedding the "IT" thing, and seeing as this has been wedding season I'm here to tell you about a few.
First, the Wedding of "Nick and Betsy Durso". Now I have to say my one beef with this wedding had to be my wife who said "This is best wedding I've ever seen.... second to ours that is." Thanks for the bone there darlin. But I have to say it was amazing. It was a winery atop a hill overlooking the rolling plains. The food was good, and they gave us free chocolate bars! Not little snacky things, but this was like the Halloween house you hit up time and again over the night with the full sized monsters of some chocolate you've never heard of but know it will be good because you are kinda sure its name is in Belgium but not totally cause you have never really read Belgiumese but you are sure it will be tasty anyway with all those pictures of cherubs on the from looking all fat and content. And so, it was a very pretty wedding, bride and groom awesome and so on. Ah, but who does the award go to? I have two awards for this wedding. Mark the Shark gets award number one for starting the wine flowing practically before I got there, and being the basic result of my fuzzy recollection and odd pictures throughout the night. Bravo Shark, you are the one who starts the party right and knows how to celebrate the wedding. I wish I had more to add on this point, but I was drinking a bit too much, so on the same note, boo Shark, I can't remember why I took the pictures with the banana and the daffodil. And we have the second award, the gold if you will, for the person who made the ceremony priceless. That's right. The lone cow. Now I don't know where this guy was, but it was a picturesque backdrop of two people across a valley exchanging vows, and this cow decided to let howl. And this is a VALLEY, and it ECHOES. Bravo cow, bravo for just being in the wrong place at oh so the wrong time.
Wedding 2: Now this one deserves special mention. I was not at this wedding but my girl showed me the pictures from facebook later as she is the un-announced deity of facebook perusing it's pages with all alacrity spreading knowledge and wealth as she finds it in her travels. But she showed me the wedding pictures of Oliva and Taz's wedding. Now I have to say, bravo photographer, he did a very good job with what I heard to be a slightly gloomy day, so kudos to him. But the awards I have to say goes to this man. Let me set the scene. The picture is the classic bride and father of the bride coming down the isle. The are exiting a glorious Holley archway with a hedge stretching away to either side taller than a man. It is picturesque as they make their entrance. But then you say, how do you know the hedge was taller than a man. And the award goes to, Bushes Guy. There is a convenient hole in the hedge and lo and behold some guy, maybe a waiter, maybe a gardener, who knows! But he has his noggin in the hole to watch the bride come down the isle and is grinning like he won the lottery. Bravo bushes guy, you take the prize.
Now for another wedding I rather enjoyed. This one had its bumps and bruises as most weddings do, but I have to say the couple was radiant, and rocked it out solid. Especially since they had two cakes! So the consolatory prize goes to the couple. For having enough cake to do around and then some. Hey I'm an easy guy to please. That and their food rocked my socks off so hard I had to dance barefoot most the night. But on to the winners of this wedding. Now I as I said this was also a very beautiful wedding but there were a couple hitches one of which being that one of the bridesmaids was called back to active duty and had to miss the wedding at the last minute. So, in her stead, they rocked a garden gnome. That's right. A garden gnome stood in line with the other bridesmaids, and rocked the ceremony. But seeing as I can't in all good conscience give the prize to the garden gnome, or to the person missing as it was out of their control, this prize goes to Nick Durso, the groomsman opposite the garden gnome who treated it with all the care that a bridesmaid deserved such as escorting it down the isle, posing for the couples photos, and making sure it had a good meal at dinner as it couldn't reach the buffet without help. Bravo Nick and the garden gnome, you made wedding history. Now the final award for this wedding goes to a circumstance of things, so you can decide who gets the vote. Let me set the stage. Best man's speech, a slightly fuzzy sound system, and a couple impatient guests who wanted to get dancing. Now the best man's speech was....long. Really long. I think he actually had it written to be multiple speeches into one with dramatic pauses between the interchanges. And while I know it was done with a steady hand when written, the sound system did not carry so it was something akin to listening to the teacher of Charlie Brown for about twenty minutes. And it would have been longer except that some unnamed people nearby felt that it should reach it's climax then and began to clap and cheer whereupon the other guests who weren't really following decided that the clapper must have better hearing than they and followed suit, and which point the best man, finding himself a little out of sorts with the applause took it in stride and took a bow. So bravo clappers and best man, you made my blog.
Now for the final wedding of the summer, and I have to say, some of the highest awards I have to give. This wedding I had the pleasure to attend the other weekend and it was for my good friend John, and his lady J. Now this wedding was a military wedding, and I tell you this cause you have to visualize how a few things are. The dad, in full military regalia, a very no-nonsense kind of look about him. So the wedding was in a church, very nice, the maids of honor very dolled up, the bride looking very bridey the groom rocking it out strong and pulling the emotion card only once. So we then head over to the reception and the few people we were with got there first. This was a little weird cause as we walk into the reception hall a few bells go off in my head. Now nothing against the wedding we had been at, but it was largely of one ethnicity, and the reception we were about to crash, frankly, was not. But as it turned out there were several receptions going on in the building so my fears were put aside and we plunged in. So we get to the actual reception, chill at the back and wait for the fun to begin. So the crowd arrives and the party begins, and the awards begin. I have three to give out tonight. The first award goes to this man. The scene. The father is giving the father speech, it is heartfelt describing his love for his daughter and how happy he was for her, and how he had accepted John as his son. It was right at this point that one man, perhaps a little hard of hearing or just unable to control the volume of his voice decided that the best thing to do at that point was to say "Wow" really loud. Well, that started my night off with a bang. So the speeches finish, heartfelt and tearful yada yada. Then the dancing begins. Now my second award will go to my friend Amanada. Scene. The dance floor is full, now there wasn't a huge amount of dancing going on until now, but when the "Twist" came on everyone swarmed the floor. And the song is playing and everyone is rocking it strong, then the part of the song comes about where it plays "Everyone get a little quieter now" where by tradition the people dancing will move lower and lower and twist ever closer to the ground. So we have everyone, basically squatting at the part of the dance... except for Amanda who is standing there in the middle of this group on the floor looking around with a look of shock and mingled amusement. Now I don't know if she has bad knees, or a tight skirt or what, but all I have to say it, bravo Amanda, don't give in to that peer pressure and rock it strong, bravo.
But now. The top award of the evening. This gets its own paragraph and the awards of the Platinum of the night. It is just that good. Scene. The bridesmaids are at the head table, and the maid of Honor is an attractive blond of the sorority persuasion and everyone is dressed up to the peak. Not one person at the wedding is not in a suit, and many are in military regalia. And enter Glasses McGee the boyfriend of the Maid of Honor and AT the head table. This guy did NOT get the memo. The one that says:
Memo: You are at a wedding.
1) Do not wear white tennis shoes.
2) Do not wear sweatpants.
3) Do not wear a long sleeve shirt you obviously haven't washed and pulled out from the back of your closet because you don't actually do laundry.
Thank you for adhering to our requests and have a nice day at the wedding.
Oh, but Glasses McGee was going to take it one step further. Glasses McGee was SO cool he had sunglasses on, in a dark room at a Wedding. And he was so UNBELIEVABLY cool that he had them on BACKWARDS on his bald head. That's right, Glasses McGee had eyes in the back of his head that could see so well, he needed to have sunglasses on them to shade them from the most minimal of light.
Well let me tell you when I saw Maid of Honor, who I might add was into this guy like he had a mountain of money and she was a gold digger with a silver pick axe, she went from an attractive individual to, well, there is a trailer involved. There is something very important that everyone should remember when living their life. There is no dressing like a thug at a wedding, there is just retarded. Glasses McGee you have won the Platinum medal of the wedding season for not listening to the rules of those crazy jazzed up old people at that Military Wedding and living by your own rules and wearing your sunglasses at night. Yes. You have brought the 80's back to us in the style of Corey Hart, and you Wear Your Sunglasses at Night.
End of Memo.
Monday, October 27, 2008
A Homecoming Comparison (Virginia Tech vs. William and Mary)
Well I have recently had the pleasure of attending not only my homecoming this year, but that of my very sexy and great cook of a wife. And now that I have said that, I can probably get away with writing whatever I want for the rest of this blog, so!
I went to Virginia Tech, very fun very party school. What I liked about it was how, to a degree, rugged it was, people were just rough and tumble, you'd go out to the bar and see people kicked out for being belligerent, and then you'd go get belligerent and then someone would magically have a football that, and this was always the best part, glowed in the dark! and you would play till four in the morning and wake up in a ditch, and it was FUN and everyone was kinda that way.
But I had to establish how Tech was when I was there so I can now compare the homecoming.
Well well well, VA tech homecoming. I went down with my good buddy Shark, called thus because he eats most things in a single bite and doesn't like it when you hit him in the nose, and we rolled in at a reasonable hour looking for good times. The plan was to roll in at my bro's new house, hang until the rest of the crew got there, then party like it was 2003 all over again. Ahh yes, the days of such popular social hits such as "Some earlier season of American Idol I still didn't watch" or "A different Season of 24, which was still probably more bad ass than most things on TV today." And every ones favorite "Sierra Mist, I don't know where it went, but I remember when it was here".
So we roll into Tech and things began to go strange right away. We tried driving to my bros place using a GPS which actually took us over someones lawn to get there, I don't know why, I just think Gladice (yes that is the name of my GPS, cause she sounds like a cranky old B) is a cranky old B. Like that witty redundancy there?
So like I said, we roll in and things get unusual right off the bat, for starters my bro's place. That shit is haunted. There is like a super nice neighborhood next door, with children singing in the street and playing ball and general laughter all around, but in my bro's neighborhood you got ghosts. There have to be about 20 houses, all of them are all lights out, and no cars, no people, nothing. I think either A) this is where model homes come to die, or B) all the owners are old people who have died and no one has found out yet, but needless to say there will be a lot of Hearse traffic around the holiday season when people start calling their loved ones for that once a year hello.
But to continue, we hang out at the place watching TV and so on and then once everyone has rolled in we roll out to the bars. Now the bars at Tech used to be havens of crazy jolliness, like places you would imagine Santa might hang out during his college years. Oh yes, THAT kind of place. But now, all the bars were crowded as crap (understandable being Homecoming) but what was weird was they all had a Cover. BOO ..... THAT..... CRAP. I don't roll with covers and neither did the crew I was with, so when the first bar said moderate line to get in and 2$ cover we said, hell no suckas, and rolled to the next one. Thus it was a little strange that with this mindset we ended up at the bar with the longest line and the biggest cover. I just don't know. So we stand in line forever for this bar, just to get a single drink we call the Rail, but I am getting ahead of myself, first let me complain about the new generation at Tech. They suck. There that about sums it up. We have evolved, or as I like to call it stupivolved from classy chums who like to have house parties and a good game of tackle football to a group of ninny sissy weeny chumps with not one, neh not two, but for some F-all retarded reason 3 popped collars in one, who looks like they are sporting an automobile spoiler on their neck for one of the more jazzed up rice burners. So as I say, everyone there is no longer original and fun, they are all 1) Bleached Blond yuppies 2) Skinny in a creepy way not in a fun I get healthy meals and exercise way 3) They are all drunk but not fun drunk but that retarded let me tell you how great I am drunk than used to earn you wedgie in the good ol grade school days of yore, and 4) They'ze all dumb as shit. I thought our enrollment stats went up, but seeing these people depress me cause I think they honestly, boys and girls, stand in front of a mirror for an hour before going out, getting their hair just right, then as they exit their door they swill their Zima or Appletini or whatever the newday equivalent of weeny drinks it may be, before setting out the door to tell their chums how they are going to play tiddler wanks with all the ladies tonight who have no skill at choosing someone who can make it to the gym more than once a decade.
Such intense hostility, where does it come from guy? It comes from people being in my way because you are too busy being drunk at each other to let the line move.
On a lighter note I am glad to see that the Tech bouncers are still in top form as they tackled one of the yuppies and sat on him till the cops came. Bravo bouncers, you may be of all sizes and stature, but when it comes to sitting on people who are full of themselves there are none better.
All in all it was a good weekend, not as drinky as I would have expected from Tech though for all my memories of it there. And oddly more expensive too. So what did I learn from my weekend at Tech? More expensive, more crowded, less old school, more pretty boy, and less drinky than it used to be. It made me feel old, like yelling at people for being on my lawn cause everyone there was so vastly, and when I say vastly I am talking Grand Canyon meets the Hulk vastly, immature. Yea, that vast. At least when we were immature there we were responsible enough to let the bouncers sit on us without complaining.
I do have to say the highlight of that weekend was when Shark, plastered beyond plastered, and back at the abode with us, decided he wanted something to eat. So 10 pot banging minutes later we turn to see him sitting on a stool in the corner eating pasta. Now I should describe what we ACTUALLY saw. We saw him eating pasta with a spoon, and the pasta was sticking straight out. That's right kids, he forgot to cook it. Upon inspection of the kitchen after he fell asleep from his crunchy delight yielded that not had he tried and given up on a waffle in the toaster and that the pasta uncooked, he had managed to find a ye old' bottle of pasta sauce from the back of the fridge to flavor it. Ye old. Think about that. Lets try it like this Ye Mold. Yep, and ew. Poor guy, quite the V-Tech trooper.
Good weekend all round though, much rejoicing with old friends.
But now, the William and Mary comparison. Now I have visited there before and knew it to be a small place. 2 bars of any note that I could see, and frankly not a lot of nightlife that I saw when I was last there, but I was willing to give it a shot.
I think the best way to describe my time there was on reflection. We arrived, got dressed up and began our progressive. That's right, we tried to do a progressive in the hotel (A progressive is where you go room to room and do a different drink in each = McWastey Land) which fell through when we all just kept drinking in the first room. And went out. But lo and behold there were so many alumni that getting into one of the two bars (the good one with actual beer) was nigh impossible. So we went to bar number 2. I should mention at this point that we got the hotel within walking distance, neh, stumbling distance, neh, pulling yourself along on a big wheels distance from the bar. So we went to bar 2 and began to drink. Now, I can't really recall what happened next but I woke up the next morning and began to piece the parts together. We drank at bar 2, which was basically a pizza parlor. I recall buying me and my friends a pitcher, and it was cheap. And well we all know what happened next then. We all bought a pitcher so we could all revel in how cheap it was, and some of us had to try it twice. Well we then began the stumble around the neighborhoods and ended up at ye-old Wawa. Now this is where I really have to take my hat off to William and Mary. We ended up, drunk, at a Wawa. If that doesn't say college experience then I don't know what does. So we got more inebriated, and back to the hotel, where more inebriated, and then, and this has to be my favorite part of the night. Back to the Wawa again.
That is about all I could piece together from people's stories the next day. And what a next day it was. I recall sitting in a chair out in the rain for most of it, cause I just wanted to sit my hung over self there. But good times all around. Very much so.
So, in comparison, William and Mary, much to my surprise, as the unfavored participant came back to fulfill my hopes and dreams of a homecoming experience. So bravo William and Mary for keeping the good times rolling and not having a whole bunch of weenies at your school, or at least for hiding them while I was there. And Tech, you need to get back to old time spirit of drinking a whole lot and rolling in the mud.
But all in all, great weekends the both of them, and I look forward to my out of college sobriety. *Sob*
PS. Drink responsibly or not at all, and I find joy in the fact that spellcheck had absolutely Zero suggestions when I spellchecked Stupivolved.
PPS. After thinking about it I remembered my truly favorite part about William and Mary homecoming. While inebriated I drew a Frenchman Face on my hand at the bar. I gave him drinks, put him in many photos and introduced him to my friends. I was able to walk around with a Frenchman face drawn on my hand acting as his translator the ENTIRE NIGHT and no one was surprised. Bravo William and Mary, bravo.
I went to Virginia Tech, very fun very party school. What I liked about it was how, to a degree, rugged it was, people were just rough and tumble, you'd go out to the bar and see people kicked out for being belligerent, and then you'd go get belligerent and then someone would magically have a football that, and this was always the best part, glowed in the dark! and you would play till four in the morning and wake up in a ditch, and it was FUN and everyone was kinda that way.
But I had to establish how Tech was when I was there so I can now compare the homecoming.
Well well well, VA tech homecoming. I went down with my good buddy Shark, called thus because he eats most things in a single bite and doesn't like it when you hit him in the nose, and we rolled in at a reasonable hour looking for good times. The plan was to roll in at my bro's new house, hang until the rest of the crew got there, then party like it was 2003 all over again. Ahh yes, the days of such popular social hits such as "Some earlier season of American Idol I still didn't watch" or "A different Season of 24, which was still probably more bad ass than most things on TV today." And every ones favorite "Sierra Mist, I don't know where it went, but I remember when it was here".
So we roll into Tech and things began to go strange right away. We tried driving to my bros place using a GPS which actually took us over someones lawn to get there, I don't know why, I just think Gladice (yes that is the name of my GPS, cause she sounds like a cranky old B) is a cranky old B. Like that witty redundancy there?
So like I said, we roll in and things get unusual right off the bat, for starters my bro's place. That shit is haunted. There is like a super nice neighborhood next door, with children singing in the street and playing ball and general laughter all around, but in my bro's neighborhood you got ghosts. There have to be about 20 houses, all of them are all lights out, and no cars, no people, nothing. I think either A) this is where model homes come to die, or B) all the owners are old people who have died and no one has found out yet, but needless to say there will be a lot of Hearse traffic around the holiday season when people start calling their loved ones for that once a year hello.
But to continue, we hang out at the place watching TV and so on and then once everyone has rolled in we roll out to the bars. Now the bars at Tech used to be havens of crazy jolliness, like places you would imagine Santa might hang out during his college years. Oh yes, THAT kind of place. But now, all the bars were crowded as crap (understandable being Homecoming) but what was weird was they all had a Cover. BOO ..... THAT..... CRAP. I don't roll with covers and neither did the crew I was with, so when the first bar said moderate line to get in and 2$ cover we said, hell no suckas, and rolled to the next one. Thus it was a little strange that with this mindset we ended up at the bar with the longest line and the biggest cover. I just don't know. So we stand in line forever for this bar, just to get a single drink we call the Rail, but I am getting ahead of myself, first let me complain about the new generation at Tech. They suck. There that about sums it up. We have evolved, or as I like to call it stupivolved from classy chums who like to have house parties and a good game of tackle football to a group of ninny sissy weeny chumps with not one, neh not two, but for some F-all retarded reason 3 popped collars in one, who looks like they are sporting an automobile spoiler on their neck for one of the more jazzed up rice burners. So as I say, everyone there is no longer original and fun, they are all 1) Bleached Blond yuppies 2) Skinny in a creepy way not in a fun I get healthy meals and exercise way 3) They are all drunk but not fun drunk but that retarded let me tell you how great I am drunk than used to earn you wedgie in the good ol grade school days of yore, and 4) They'ze all dumb as shit. I thought our enrollment stats went up, but seeing these people depress me cause I think they honestly, boys and girls, stand in front of a mirror for an hour before going out, getting their hair just right, then as they exit their door they swill their Zima or Appletini or whatever the newday equivalent of weeny drinks it may be, before setting out the door to tell their chums how they are going to play tiddler wanks with all the ladies tonight who have no skill at choosing someone who can make it to the gym more than once a decade.
Such intense hostility, where does it come from guy? It comes from people being in my way because you are too busy being drunk at each other to let the line move.
On a lighter note I am glad to see that the Tech bouncers are still in top form as they tackled one of the yuppies and sat on him till the cops came. Bravo bouncers, you may be of all sizes and stature, but when it comes to sitting on people who are full of themselves there are none better.
All in all it was a good weekend, not as drinky as I would have expected from Tech though for all my memories of it there. And oddly more expensive too. So what did I learn from my weekend at Tech? More expensive, more crowded, less old school, more pretty boy, and less drinky than it used to be. It made me feel old, like yelling at people for being on my lawn cause everyone there was so vastly, and when I say vastly I am talking Grand Canyon meets the Hulk vastly, immature. Yea, that vast. At least when we were immature there we were responsible enough to let the bouncers sit on us without complaining.
I do have to say the highlight of that weekend was when Shark, plastered beyond plastered, and back at the abode with us, decided he wanted something to eat. So 10 pot banging minutes later we turn to see him sitting on a stool in the corner eating pasta. Now I should describe what we ACTUALLY saw. We saw him eating pasta with a spoon, and the pasta was sticking straight out. That's right kids, he forgot to cook it. Upon inspection of the kitchen after he fell asleep from his crunchy delight yielded that not had he tried and given up on a waffle in the toaster and that the pasta uncooked, he had managed to find a ye old' bottle of pasta sauce from the back of the fridge to flavor it. Ye old. Think about that. Lets try it like this Ye Mold. Yep, and ew. Poor guy, quite the V-Tech trooper.
Good weekend all round though, much rejoicing with old friends.
But now, the William and Mary comparison. Now I have visited there before and knew it to be a small place. 2 bars of any note that I could see, and frankly not a lot of nightlife that I saw when I was last there, but I was willing to give it a shot.
I think the best way to describe my time there was on reflection. We arrived, got dressed up and began our progressive. That's right, we tried to do a progressive in the hotel (A progressive is where you go room to room and do a different drink in each = McWastey Land) which fell through when we all just kept drinking in the first room. And went out. But lo and behold there were so many alumni that getting into one of the two bars (the good one with actual beer) was nigh impossible. So we went to bar number 2. I should mention at this point that we got the hotel within walking distance, neh, stumbling distance, neh, pulling yourself along on a big wheels distance from the bar. So we went to bar 2 and began to drink. Now, I can't really recall what happened next but I woke up the next morning and began to piece the parts together. We drank at bar 2, which was basically a pizza parlor. I recall buying me and my friends a pitcher, and it was cheap. And well we all know what happened next then. We all bought a pitcher so we could all revel in how cheap it was, and some of us had to try it twice. Well we then began the stumble around the neighborhoods and ended up at ye-old Wawa. Now this is where I really have to take my hat off to William and Mary. We ended up, drunk, at a Wawa. If that doesn't say college experience then I don't know what does. So we got more inebriated, and back to the hotel, where more inebriated, and then, and this has to be my favorite part of the night. Back to the Wawa again.
That is about all I could piece together from people's stories the next day. And what a next day it was. I recall sitting in a chair out in the rain for most of it, cause I just wanted to sit my hung over self there. But good times all around. Very much so.
So, in comparison, William and Mary, much to my surprise, as the unfavored participant came back to fulfill my hopes and dreams of a homecoming experience. So bravo William and Mary for keeping the good times rolling and not having a whole bunch of weenies at your school, or at least for hiding them while I was there. And Tech, you need to get back to old time spirit of drinking a whole lot and rolling in the mud.
But all in all, great weekends the both of them, and I look forward to my out of college sobriety. *Sob*
PS. Drink responsibly or not at all, and I find joy in the fact that spellcheck had absolutely Zero suggestions when I spellchecked Stupivolved.
PPS. After thinking about it I remembered my truly favorite part about William and Mary homecoming. While inebriated I drew a Frenchman Face on my hand at the bar. I gave him drinks, put him in many photos and introduced him to my friends. I was able to walk around with a Frenchman face drawn on my hand acting as his translator the ENTIRE NIGHT and no one was surprised. Bravo William and Mary, bravo.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Job Hunting is Stupid
Okay, this brain, fried. Fried like a lonely egg on a lonely grill on a lonely stove in the middle of a lonely area of New Mexico. Where does it plug in you ask? It doesn't matter! It's New Mexico! It's hot enough to warm the lonely stove with the lonely blah blah blah you get the idea. Brain, not so functiony. Any why? Because applying to jobs, searching for jobs, and standing on your head for an hour all have something in common. They are hard, and it makes you feel stupid.
I am baffled, however, how I managed to get such a craptastic job coming out of undergrad. When I came out of undergrad I applied to, and keep in mind that this is the memory in my head, weather this happened or not I am not sure, a plethora of jobs with a resume' gleaming with awesomeness. But try as I might, there were so few nice jobs, and I was so downhearted at the time for the lack of jobs to test my might. There were only jobs like Linoleum Tester, and Drywall Construction, and Plumber. And which one did I settle for? Yes Settle, like some sort of butt ugly prom date who later turns out to be a man dressed up like a woman dressed up like a man dressed up like a women cause it was cold outside and they thought it best to dress in layers?? That's right, drywall construction. Or as I like to call it, Super Hell. Oh, yes, your good ol' Catholics had it right enough with the whole hell idea where people who sin and all those fun things go to learn their lessons, but they would jump for joy if they new about Super Hell.
Super Hell is where you go when you need money and want to work towards a bigger paycheck tomorrow, but will settle for anything because you lacked the foresight to locate yourself not in the middle of no-good-jobs-man-land like good ol MD. But I'm sure people out there love the ol' MD so I shall say nothing more on the matter other than, you should die, die for your sins, your sins being liking that hole of a state, you know the one, the one where happiness goes to Die. But I digress, working for a job because you need money is foolish, and I was foolish and it was bad. But where was I going with this... ah yea, my memory says that there were no good jobs, but as I apply now I see job after job that seems to be of an amazing quality, with science and technology and veritable jumping jacks of thoughtful challenges, and I wonder why I didn't see these before, and why I didn't get a job doing one of these things. Then I looked up my old engineering resume out of nostalgia and found out why.
My old resume, the golden gem that I remembered it being was littered with such wonderful engineering experience qualifiers such as, "Worked at the Library", a legitimate work reference even though it might lie on the outskirts, "Lifeguard" not what I might call the top reference for an engineering field, but look on the positive side, it puts a trained professional in the area should someone someone try to drown in the toilet or should everyone in the office spontaneously try to make for a large body of water, but I think my favorite qualifier, the one that on that resume said "I am your man, I am the person who will bring the qualities you need to your front door and hammer it down so don't be directly on the other side but close enough to still go 'Wow I want to give you a job, by the way you owe us one door you man among men' " was the graceful reference of "Worked for my Parents". Now I don't know how hard I must have hit my head, or perhaps the air was thinner back then and I was suffering from some sort of oxygen deficiency, but I do not think that putting that job reference was on my list of wise choices.
But alas, and I say alas, I got that one job, hated it, moved on to get a totally unrelated job doing accounting, enjoyed the people and the complete lack of effort it took, moved on to get paid in a continually downward spiral of compensation as the world's bitch for a while out in LA (again loving the people but not having to try too hard), and then to now where I am looking for work once again. The problem now being that I have experience in no one place. I think the only work references I could add to broaden my work base further would be a brief stint in the clergy and work as a professional dog walker (I do love puppies! and yes I can say that cause they are awesome and if you think otherwise you need to go back to the pawn shop where you traded in your soul for a box of cracker jacks with the decoder ring prize). So I am finding it strange to decide what to do for work and am looking for a mythical position as a movie maker for a engineering franchise. I'm thinking Myth Busters would have me click my heels but only if I could be the guy with the beard, but pending that the search is ongoing.
Additionally I might add that this blog came about because I am tired of job searching and more importantly of government applications where I find that not only do I have to expand my (now tight and sleek) resume to a behemoth including everything I've done, thought, or thought about doing for the past 29 years (yes this includes incubation time and the more single minded thoughts I had as a sperm). And then on top of my now multiple page resume I have to pretend I am applying to college all over again by answering a plethora of questions that basically all say the same thing.
"How are you good at and how would you apply and what experience do you have with visual aids in a graphic nature?"
and
"How are you really awesome at, but not too awesome at, and how would you apply CLEVERLY as compared to uncleverly which we say is a word now, and what experience do you have with GRAPHIC aids in a VISUAL nature, oh yes, we switched it on you."
"How does us switching that on you make you feel? Does it make you feel happy, sad, quiet, loud, likebetrayingthegovernmentandsellingallitssecrets, blue, green, or like a balloon?"
Crafty bastards and their crafty questions intended to piss me off and give away my true intentions!
Concluded!
I am baffled, however, how I managed to get such a craptastic job coming out of undergrad. When I came out of undergrad I applied to, and keep in mind that this is the memory in my head, weather this happened or not I am not sure, a plethora of jobs with a resume' gleaming with awesomeness. But try as I might, there were so few nice jobs, and I was so downhearted at the time for the lack of jobs to test my might. There were only jobs like Linoleum Tester, and Drywall Construction, and Plumber. And which one did I settle for? Yes Settle, like some sort of butt ugly prom date who later turns out to be a man dressed up like a woman dressed up like a man dressed up like a women cause it was cold outside and they thought it best to dress in layers?? That's right, drywall construction. Or as I like to call it, Super Hell. Oh, yes, your good ol' Catholics had it right enough with the whole hell idea where people who sin and all those fun things go to learn their lessons, but they would jump for joy if they new about Super Hell.
Super Hell is where you go when you need money and want to work towards a bigger paycheck tomorrow, but will settle for anything because you lacked the foresight to locate yourself not in the middle of no-good-jobs-man-land like good ol MD. But I'm sure people out there love the ol' MD so I shall say nothing more on the matter other than, you should die, die for your sins, your sins being liking that hole of a state, you know the one, the one where happiness goes to Die. But I digress, working for a job because you need money is foolish, and I was foolish and it was bad. But where was I going with this... ah yea, my memory says that there were no good jobs, but as I apply now I see job after job that seems to be of an amazing quality, with science and technology and veritable jumping jacks of thoughtful challenges, and I wonder why I didn't see these before, and why I didn't get a job doing one of these things. Then I looked up my old engineering resume out of nostalgia and found out why.
My old resume, the golden gem that I remembered it being was littered with such wonderful engineering experience qualifiers such as, "Worked at the Library", a legitimate work reference even though it might lie on the outskirts, "Lifeguard" not what I might call the top reference for an engineering field, but look on the positive side, it puts a trained professional in the area should someone someone try to drown in the toilet or should everyone in the office spontaneously try to make for a large body of water, but I think my favorite qualifier, the one that on that resume said "I am your man, I am the person who will bring the qualities you need to your front door and hammer it down so don't be directly on the other side but close enough to still go 'Wow I want to give you a job, by the way you owe us one door you man among men' " was the graceful reference of "Worked for my Parents". Now I don't know how hard I must have hit my head, or perhaps the air was thinner back then and I was suffering from some sort of oxygen deficiency, but I do not think that putting that job reference was on my list of wise choices.
But alas, and I say alas, I got that one job, hated it, moved on to get a totally unrelated job doing accounting, enjoyed the people and the complete lack of effort it took, moved on to get paid in a continually downward spiral of compensation as the world's bitch for a while out in LA (again loving the people but not having to try too hard), and then to now where I am looking for work once again. The problem now being that I have experience in no one place. I think the only work references I could add to broaden my work base further would be a brief stint in the clergy and work as a professional dog walker (I do love puppies! and yes I can say that cause they are awesome and if you think otherwise you need to go back to the pawn shop where you traded in your soul for a box of cracker jacks with the decoder ring prize). So I am finding it strange to decide what to do for work and am looking for a mythical position as a movie maker for a engineering franchise. I'm thinking Myth Busters would have me click my heels but only if I could be the guy with the beard, but pending that the search is ongoing.
Additionally I might add that this blog came about because I am tired of job searching and more importantly of government applications where I find that not only do I have to expand my (now tight and sleek) resume to a behemoth including everything I've done, thought, or thought about doing for the past 29 years (yes this includes incubation time and the more single minded thoughts I had as a sperm). And then on top of my now multiple page resume I have to pretend I am applying to college all over again by answering a plethora of questions that basically all say the same thing.
"How are you good at and how would you apply and what experience do you have with visual aids in a graphic nature?"
and
"How are you really awesome at, but not too awesome at, and how would you apply CLEVERLY as compared to uncleverly which we say is a word now, and what experience do you have with GRAPHIC aids in a VISUAL nature, oh yes, we switched it on you."
"How does us switching that on you make you feel? Does it make you feel happy, sad, quiet, loud, likebetrayingthegovernmentandsellingallitssecrets, blue, green, or like a balloon?"
Crafty bastards and their crafty questions intended to piss me off and give away my true intentions!
Concluded!
Monday, October 6, 2008
Sayings I Have Come to Know and Cherish, and a few new ones.
Alrighty, this is going to be a feel good blog. Much like a feel good movie where nothing really important happens and all the characters either get the girl or their cumupence by the end of the flick.
I like sayings. But not dumb ones. My new saying of the month, as a friend described to me:
"Dick in a Jar"
This is one of the most potentially insulting sayings and I LOVE it. Defentition: You know how there was alwayse that girl and that guy, maybe you were the guy, who knows? But she wasn't into him but he was into her like Woa. And she would never "like him like that" because they had such a good friendship, and they were best friends weren't they? That's what she says all the time. And so yea, it would be okay with him if they were just friends and oh by the way make sure you put some preservative in that jar with my dick thank you very much I might like to use it again one day, and oh yes, she says I will take good care of this, but coincidentally do you have the time to help me put up some shelves and other manly duties while ignor you and talk to basically any other guy in a flirtatious way but you?
Dick in a Jar. Classic. The poor guy who's into a girl who isn't into him and so settles for being "good friends". Such a good saying, and I am amazed I hadn't heard it before. One can just imagine it on a shelf somewhere, and then quickly forget that image because it is borderline creepy from the other side of the border. To all the Dick's in a Jar out there I say, find a jar opener! Preferably one who is nice, fairly attractive and has a good grip....you know,.... to open the jar.
Next on the list is my ALL TIME favorite saying.
East Shit and Die.
There is no other saying that says it all. When you hate someone, or have been slighted to such a great degree that you with only the ultimate in recourse. Eat Shit and Die. You can tell people to go to hell where they will then have to suffer tourtures of the soul yada yada but is it good enough? F- You. Just words really, and if anything you're telling them to go have a great time. Definitely not good enough. But Eat Shit and Die, well..... It says it all. Not only do you want them to die, enough said there, that you want them to part from this mortal coil because they for one reason or another suck too much to hang onto it, but you want them to part ways in the worst way possible. You want them, not only to Die, but you want them to die from Shit Consumption. You want them to Die, Eating Shit. So good, so good, like candy for the soul. I just can't get over how good this saying is, it could be dealt out almost like this: "Sir, you suck on such a tremendous level that I want you dead, not only do I want you dead, I want you to eat Feces, yes sir, Feces, and then through the suffering enabled by that Fecal Consumption then leave this world, I don't mind if you choke on the shit, or merely suffer from it's potency, as long as the shit, in your mouth, makes you die. Eat Shit and Die. mmmm, my soul loves candy.
Now for one of the stupid ones that could have a lot of potential.
When Life Gives You Lemons. Traditionally this has ended in "Make Lemonade" which is about as idiotic as you can get cause not only is it silly as a metaphor, if you are in fact handed lemons, you then have to turn around to make lemonade on top of that, and that is just wrong. And besides, for Lemonade you need sugar and water. It doesn't say "When life gives you lemons, sugar and water make lemonade" though if it did I would have to say "F- the Lemons and Sugar and drown yourself. But as I said, there have been variations: Brak from the Space Ghost show stated that you should then blast the lemons to bits with laser canons. The resoundingly awesum movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall has one of its characters claim "F- the Lemons, lets go surfing." Useful except for the lack of ocean for some of us. So what would be the greatest responce to someone who comes up to you out of the blue and says "When Life Gives You Lemons...." and awaits your responce in an effort to determine your outlook on life? I say, punch them in the neck. Cause A) you're wasting my time B) who are you and why are you yelling metaphors at me and C) Lemons suck, I take them off my iced tea and out of my glasses of water cause until they make a seedless lemon I keep getting seeds in my drink and that pisses me off, so I say when life gives you lemons throw them at the lemon provider, I don't care if it is his job, and he's just trying to scrape by a living distributing lemons, take that lemon guy and metaphorically speaking I think this works too.
And of course: Glass Half Full. This has alwayse been amusing to me cause as the saying goes Glass Half Full /Glass Half Empty and it is meant to determine if you are an optimist or a pessimist, and, this is the part I love, everyone has at some point tried to consider how to say something about the glass just being half there, saying neither the optimistic thing, nor the pessimistic thing, which amuses me cause why would you want to be some sort of neutral individual saying things along the lines of "maybe" when asked if you like something like cheese. Maybe? It's chesse! Of course you like it and if you don't you're just dead and a stake through the heart. But why do people never want to definitivly be one or the other I shall never know, but people do like to try and fill thier steriotype, making a mental note to speak about glasses half full when seen believing that this in some fashion will mold them into an optimistic person instead of the creepily self wary person they actually are, and not to dismiss the fact that if the glass is only half there and you don't know about the other half, who the hell has been drinking out of your glass? That is just uncalled for.
Fin.
When Life Gives you Lemons - Dumb, mabye better ones
Glass Half Full - Dumb, mabye better
I like sayings. But not dumb ones. My new saying of the month, as a friend described to me:
"Dick in a Jar"
This is one of the most potentially insulting sayings and I LOVE it. Defentition: You know how there was alwayse that girl and that guy, maybe you were the guy, who knows? But she wasn't into him but he was into her like Woa. And she would never "like him like that" because they had such a good friendship, and they were best friends weren't they? That's what she says all the time. And so yea, it would be okay with him if they were just friends and oh by the way make sure you put some preservative in that jar with my dick thank you very much I might like to use it again one day, and oh yes, she says I will take good care of this, but coincidentally do you have the time to help me put up some shelves and other manly duties while ignor you and talk to basically any other guy in a flirtatious way but you?
Dick in a Jar. Classic. The poor guy who's into a girl who isn't into him and so settles for being "good friends". Such a good saying, and I am amazed I hadn't heard it before. One can just imagine it on a shelf somewhere, and then quickly forget that image because it is borderline creepy from the other side of the border. To all the Dick's in a Jar out there I say, find a jar opener! Preferably one who is nice, fairly attractive and has a good grip....you know,.... to open the jar.
Next on the list is my ALL TIME favorite saying.
East Shit and Die.
There is no other saying that says it all. When you hate someone, or have been slighted to such a great degree that you with only the ultimate in recourse. Eat Shit and Die. You can tell people to go to hell where they will then have to suffer tourtures of the soul yada yada but is it good enough? F- You. Just words really, and if anything you're telling them to go have a great time. Definitely not good enough. But Eat Shit and Die, well..... It says it all. Not only do you want them to die, enough said there, that you want them to part from this mortal coil because they for one reason or another suck too much to hang onto it, but you want them to part ways in the worst way possible. You want them, not only to Die, but you want them to die from Shit Consumption. You want them to Die, Eating Shit. So good, so good, like candy for the soul. I just can't get over how good this saying is, it could be dealt out almost like this: "Sir, you suck on such a tremendous level that I want you dead, not only do I want you dead, I want you to eat Feces, yes sir, Feces, and then through the suffering enabled by that Fecal Consumption then leave this world, I don't mind if you choke on the shit, or merely suffer from it's potency, as long as the shit, in your mouth, makes you die. Eat Shit and Die. mmmm, my soul loves candy.
Now for one of the stupid ones that could have a lot of potential.
When Life Gives You Lemons. Traditionally this has ended in "Make Lemonade" which is about as idiotic as you can get cause not only is it silly as a metaphor, if you are in fact handed lemons, you then have to turn around to make lemonade on top of that, and that is just wrong. And besides, for Lemonade you need sugar and water. It doesn't say "When life gives you lemons, sugar and water make lemonade" though if it did I would have to say "F- the Lemons and Sugar and drown yourself. But as I said, there have been variations: Brak from the Space Ghost show stated that you should then blast the lemons to bits with laser canons. The resoundingly awesum movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall has one of its characters claim "F- the Lemons, lets go surfing." Useful except for the lack of ocean for some of us. So what would be the greatest responce to someone who comes up to you out of the blue and says "When Life Gives You Lemons...." and awaits your responce in an effort to determine your outlook on life? I say, punch them in the neck. Cause A) you're wasting my time B) who are you and why are you yelling metaphors at me and C) Lemons suck, I take them off my iced tea and out of my glasses of water cause until they make a seedless lemon I keep getting seeds in my drink and that pisses me off, so I say when life gives you lemons throw them at the lemon provider, I don't care if it is his job, and he's just trying to scrape by a living distributing lemons, take that lemon guy and metaphorically speaking I think this works too.
And of course: Glass Half Full. This has alwayse been amusing to me cause as the saying goes Glass Half Full /Glass Half Empty and it is meant to determine if you are an optimist or a pessimist, and, this is the part I love, everyone has at some point tried to consider how to say something about the glass just being half there, saying neither the optimistic thing, nor the pessimistic thing, which amuses me cause why would you want to be some sort of neutral individual saying things along the lines of "maybe" when asked if you like something like cheese. Maybe? It's chesse! Of course you like it and if you don't you're just dead and a stake through the heart. But why do people never want to definitivly be one or the other I shall never know, but people do like to try and fill thier steriotype, making a mental note to speak about glasses half full when seen believing that this in some fashion will mold them into an optimistic person instead of the creepily self wary person they actually are, and not to dismiss the fact that if the glass is only half there and you don't know about the other half, who the hell has been drinking out of your glass? That is just uncalled for.
Fin.
When Life Gives you Lemons - Dumb, mabye better ones
Glass Half Full - Dumb, mabye better
Thursday, October 2, 2008
What to do, what to say, and movers will cause my untimely death.
Well I have an interest in maintaining this blog, if for no other reason than it is like some sort of online surly diary, the kind you might find shoved between the matress and the box springs of a teenage girl who has just found out that life "isn't all it is cracked up to be" or that "pretty people get it better" or that "there won't be a knight in shining armor because horseback riding is no longer 'cool' so you'd at best you could hold out for a dude with clanky underwear coming down the block to make all your dreams come true" and yes it required quotations because someone out there has said it if only in thier head.
So, in an effort to decide what topics would conduct the source of this "diary" seeing as I am currently no longer in the bright and sunny LA, I shall try to recount the lessons I have learned in life coupled with day to day learnings that come accross my plate. So, lesson 1:
Moving.
Is a bitch.
And will stay a bitch till you die, and then a little after cause you still have to pay people to MOVE YOUR DEAD ASS. How sad is that, that you, in death, owe someone money, for throwing your dead ass in a hole. And so I begin this justification of movers sucking thusly.
When I first moved out to LA I got, what is the term, prostituted, no no... call girled?.... no no no... absolutely f-ing whored, that is it! Bent over and pounded like a tetherball. Speaking of tetherball, whatever happened to that? I loved that game! Exept when you played against someone that would just hit it ass high *CHEAT* and spin in faster than you could hit *CHEAT* and just be taller than you *CHEATING TO THE CORE*. Some kid prolly got tethered to the pole and the parents of the world banned the game. So sad. But yes, pounded like a tetherball.
I had gotten movers that quited me 1200$ for the east to west move. And they said how much it should weigh based on the items I owned and that if it was over, it would be a small amount per pound. 50 cents. And we budgeted for 3500lbs. So I'm thinking we are good. Oh no.
Rule 1: Get a QUOTE that is LOCKED IN. One that is not able to be adjusted. This will most likely require someone to come in and count your stuff but this is worth it, otherwise you will get tetherballed.
So they came in, packed my stuff, then gave me the ol' head shake and the little clucking noise you make by putting your tounge behind your teeth. And they said that according to the estimated size, the new weight (without weighing) should put my amount due at $7000. F THAT! But they could cut me a deal, and work something out before it reached the weight area so that I could avoid paying so much.
Needless to say HOSED. Ended up paying 5k. That's right, nearly a 400% markup.
Rule 2: Alwayse use someone someone else has used before you so you know the tricks.
I had never moved, for all I know the movers are supposed to come in, bang up your stuff, speak only a language I hear when ordering tacos and then overcharge my ass into oblivious leaving me not only penniless but unable to respond as the HAVE ALL MY STUFF.
I have only one term for this. It starts in F- and ends in -ingstupidashell.
Then they drop it off in LA. And as it turned out, my stuff has switched trucks several times.
RULE 3: Make sure they use the same damned truck, cause if they don't someone somewhere won't give a damn about using your box of family hierlooms as a seat while their fat ass takes a lunchbreak.
So we get our stuff, and shit is broken. And when I say broken, I don't mean a few broken glasses (though there were, very nice wedding glasses. Only glasses broken too. I swear they check for the most important looking box before playing kick the can with my stuff), I mean I had a desk BROKEN IN HALF. And for some reason they didn't seem to have a problem with delivering TWO HALVES OF A DESK to me. TWO HALVES. How in the hell??? TWO HALVES. I have no other words to express myself. My mental dictionary is failing me. TWO .... HALVES. My property is not to be treated like some sort of sandwich to be divied up for ease of eating at a later date! Nor are those items to which I am attached like a lego castle to be broken down and remade for my own amusement.
And so we filed for insurance. My insurance company denied me because it falls oh so pleasantly between all the cracks. The closest they could get was vandalism, but that didn't work cause I paid them. So, what do we learn? Don't pay! Like that wouldn't bite me in the ass.
Then the movers insurance did not pay out either. We filed all the paperwork and we get a notice back saying "Please supply a professional assesment and estimate for all repairs to broken items to recieve further effort on our part." How much to fix? TWO HALVES. And I would love to see what god among men could fix a shattered glass. "Well I could glue some of it together and it would leak just a little."
Stab everyone in the face!
So that is still underway. Then.... and this is the fun part. We moved BACK.
Well this time around it wasn't so bad. For starters A) I wasn't sick. That made it hell the first time around cause everyone was a little fuzzy and a hell of a lot more annoying. And B) the wife was around. I frankly suck at making decisions and she is the bossy one. She's the one who does the whole *snap snap* "No you didn't just say that about my momma" who would have saved us a boatload the first time around unlike me who was so easily persuaded by broken english describing how I magically owe 400% of the bill.
But like I said, she got us the movers Mayflower. And they were pretty good. They came in, (only two of them, black dude and mexican dude, I think they strive for diversity) and worked diligently, albeit slow, and we were good to go for 3K, fixed rate this time, no surprises.
Then we crossed the US (this will be another entry) and much fun was had.
And when we arrived we tried calling to see where they were, and was that the biggest pain in the ass. No one knew where anyone was or anything and from what I had gathered our movers were off having the time of thier lives galavanting across Texas. And, and theis is alwayse fun, the movers are supposed to call 24hrs in advance. So we try out damnest to be ready for them. And the one minute we are away, who shows up on our doorstep unnanounced? Jesus, F-er came out of nowhere, blessing left and right and leaves before we get back. Alwyase happens that way. Then the movers showed up while we were out, and it was a pain. So we rush back, get our stuff, and all in all it wasn't so bad except the fat guy who takes his lunches on our fragile boxes was apparently on that truck as well, but luckily we packed better this time.
SIDE NOTE ADVICE: Costco has this wonderful movers package of boxes that is ideal for any move, except you have to be consumed by retardation to use it. The boxes are honestly made out of recycled toilet paper with about the same strength as something that has not only touched ass but suffered the whole sewage system of the greater Manhattan area. DON'T BUY THIS. Uhaul has a similar package that is ok, we ended up getting our boxes there cause they have this bangin "Give a box get a box" recycle moving boxes section of thier store, much like that whole give a penny take a penny thing where everyone just takes all the pennies. And what did we do? We took all the boxes. And my pocketbook was happy.
But all in all, squished boxes and everything, this move was much better. The black guy and white guy (again the equal diversity employment) who dropped our stuff off were very polite and, yes this may sound a little racist, SPOKE ENGLISH. I didn't even get an english guy dropping the first load off in LA, he was French! Really? You crossed the ocean and left France to seek your fortune in America and you became a Mover?
But anyway, stuff is here, in-tact so far, trip was nice, all in place except employment but I figure I could alwayse whore myself out seeing as I've gotten such practice with this moving situation.
And away I go!
So, in an effort to decide what topics would conduct the source of this "diary" seeing as I am currently no longer in the bright and sunny LA, I shall try to recount the lessons I have learned in life coupled with day to day learnings that come accross my plate. So, lesson 1:
Moving.
Is a bitch.
And will stay a bitch till you die, and then a little after cause you still have to pay people to MOVE YOUR DEAD ASS. How sad is that, that you, in death, owe someone money, for throwing your dead ass in a hole. And so I begin this justification of movers sucking thusly.
When I first moved out to LA I got, what is the term, prostituted, no no... call girled?.... no no no... absolutely f-ing whored, that is it! Bent over and pounded like a tetherball. Speaking of tetherball, whatever happened to that? I loved that game! Exept when you played against someone that would just hit it ass high *CHEAT* and spin in faster than you could hit *CHEAT* and just be taller than you *CHEATING TO THE CORE*. Some kid prolly got tethered to the pole and the parents of the world banned the game. So sad. But yes, pounded like a tetherball.
I had gotten movers that quited me 1200$ for the east to west move. And they said how much it should weigh based on the items I owned and that if it was over, it would be a small amount per pound. 50 cents. And we budgeted for 3500lbs. So I'm thinking we are good. Oh no.
Rule 1: Get a QUOTE that is LOCKED IN. One that is not able to be adjusted. This will most likely require someone to come in and count your stuff but this is worth it, otherwise you will get tetherballed.
So they came in, packed my stuff, then gave me the ol' head shake and the little clucking noise you make by putting your tounge behind your teeth. And they said that according to the estimated size, the new weight (without weighing) should put my amount due at $7000. F THAT! But they could cut me a deal, and work something out before it reached the weight area so that I could avoid paying so much.
Needless to say HOSED. Ended up paying 5k. That's right, nearly a 400% markup.
Rule 2: Alwayse use someone someone else has used before you so you know the tricks.
I had never moved, for all I know the movers are supposed to come in, bang up your stuff, speak only a language I hear when ordering tacos and then overcharge my ass into oblivious leaving me not only penniless but unable to respond as the HAVE ALL MY STUFF.
I have only one term for this. It starts in F- and ends in -ingstupidashell.
Then they drop it off in LA. And as it turned out, my stuff has switched trucks several times.
RULE 3: Make sure they use the same damned truck, cause if they don't someone somewhere won't give a damn about using your box of family hierlooms as a seat while their fat ass takes a lunchbreak.
So we get our stuff, and shit is broken. And when I say broken, I don't mean a few broken glasses (though there were, very nice wedding glasses. Only glasses broken too. I swear they check for the most important looking box before playing kick the can with my stuff), I mean I had a desk BROKEN IN HALF. And for some reason they didn't seem to have a problem with delivering TWO HALVES OF A DESK to me. TWO HALVES. How in the hell??? TWO HALVES. I have no other words to express myself. My mental dictionary is failing me. TWO .... HALVES. My property is not to be treated like some sort of sandwich to be divied up for ease of eating at a later date! Nor are those items to which I am attached like a lego castle to be broken down and remade for my own amusement.
And so we filed for insurance. My insurance company denied me because it falls oh so pleasantly between all the cracks. The closest they could get was vandalism, but that didn't work cause I paid them. So, what do we learn? Don't pay! Like that wouldn't bite me in the ass.
Then the movers insurance did not pay out either. We filed all the paperwork and we get a notice back saying "Please supply a professional assesment and estimate for all repairs to broken items to recieve further effort on our part." How much to fix? TWO HALVES. And I would love to see what god among men could fix a shattered glass. "Well I could glue some of it together and it would leak just a little."
Stab everyone in the face!
So that is still underway. Then.... and this is the fun part. We moved BACK.
Well this time around it wasn't so bad. For starters A) I wasn't sick. That made it hell the first time around cause everyone was a little fuzzy and a hell of a lot more annoying. And B) the wife was around. I frankly suck at making decisions and she is the bossy one. She's the one who does the whole *snap snap* "No you didn't just say that about my momma" who would have saved us a boatload the first time around unlike me who was so easily persuaded by broken english describing how I magically owe 400% of the bill.
But like I said, she got us the movers Mayflower. And they were pretty good. They came in, (only two of them, black dude and mexican dude, I think they strive for diversity) and worked diligently, albeit slow, and we were good to go for 3K, fixed rate this time, no surprises.
Then we crossed the US (this will be another entry) and much fun was had.
And when we arrived we tried calling to see where they were, and was that the biggest pain in the ass. No one knew where anyone was or anything and from what I had gathered our movers were off having the time of thier lives galavanting across Texas. And, and theis is alwayse fun, the movers are supposed to call 24hrs in advance. So we try out damnest to be ready for them. And the one minute we are away, who shows up on our doorstep unnanounced? Jesus, F-er came out of nowhere, blessing left and right and leaves before we get back. Alwyase happens that way. Then the movers showed up while we were out, and it was a pain. So we rush back, get our stuff, and all in all it wasn't so bad except the fat guy who takes his lunches on our fragile boxes was apparently on that truck as well, but luckily we packed better this time.
SIDE NOTE ADVICE: Costco has this wonderful movers package of boxes that is ideal for any move, except you have to be consumed by retardation to use it. The boxes are honestly made out of recycled toilet paper with about the same strength as something that has not only touched ass but suffered the whole sewage system of the greater Manhattan area. DON'T BUY THIS. Uhaul has a similar package that is ok, we ended up getting our boxes there cause they have this bangin "Give a box get a box" recycle moving boxes section of thier store, much like that whole give a penny take a penny thing where everyone just takes all the pennies. And what did we do? We took all the boxes. And my pocketbook was happy.
But all in all, squished boxes and everything, this move was much better. The black guy and white guy (again the equal diversity employment) who dropped our stuff off were very polite and, yes this may sound a little racist, SPOKE ENGLISH. I didn't even get an english guy dropping the first load off in LA, he was French! Really? You crossed the ocean and left France to seek your fortune in America and you became a Mover?
But anyway, stuff is here, in-tact so far, trip was nice, all in place except employment but I figure I could alwayse whore myself out seeing as I've gotten such practice with this moving situation.
And away I go!
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
The Hiatus Week and Other TV Terms
Lets see, this is a bit of a copout, I know, I should feel bad but I just can't bring myself to, so HA! But this is a post I had started yet had not finished so, am doing so now. Perhaps I should have left that information out and just seemed like a go getter, but, well I'm not. I'm more like a sit here and watch em get away, that coupled with my girl's good cooking is making any gym membership a waste of money.
But on we go!
I figured I would touch on some general terminology for peeps, cause when I came out to Cali I was a bit of a moron when it came to terms. Granted you don't do much as a PA, but when you don't know what people are talking about you just sound like a very sad PA, of the run home and cry into your pillow variety. So let us begin.
Haitus Week:
Most shows will go as I said before where the writers write a later episode, and crew films the actors during the week and so on. Now a Hiatus week is where the actors and writers "rest up" and "regain their mojo" and so forth. For us we take Hiatus every three weeks. During Hiatus week we get shorter hours in the office, the writers are either relaxed or gone, and the set and actors are MIA. Most likely on some whirlwind adventure or something, who knows with those silly tikes. But apparently the hiatus week is where the crazy TV world becomes a real 9-5. I havn't seen this in action yet, but we shall see. ** Now I have seen in it action and I have this to say, Pa Sha! The hours are about the same, the Writers, poor souls, still come in and write thier faces off, we the grunts continue our monotany, and the actors get to go play in a field somewhere cause they don't have to work.
Call Sheet:
It's a list of everyone's nicknames. Everyone on the show gets a nickname and goes by it cause frankly there are too many Bill's and Bob's. It is essential when beginning any job to ask around until someone can give you a complete call sheet so you know everyone's "real name".
But not really.
I'm hoping somone had to read this and stopped about halfway through, and will now go around asking for a list of everyone's nicknames. *insert evil laugh here* yea, it's one of those days so far.
No, a call sheet is actually where and when everyone needs to be for the day. Call times, shoot times and so forth. Ta-da!
Block and Shoot Schedule:
Contrary to popular belief, not where you shoot at blocks. This list says where and when all shooting takes place. You would use it to know what is going down at any given point in time for filming.
Production Report:
This comes after the fact. It sort of summarized what went on and at what times. Kind of like a call sheet's bastard child after the fact sort of thing.
Contract:
A contract is a contract is a contract. There are a lot of them though. If you can, read them, but if you like staying sane, don't. But know who gets which kind cause that is important info.
Distro List:
A list of who gets what copies of what. There will be a LOT of copying as a PA, and by a LOT I mean a.... oh, damn, how do I increase the font here. LOT. No, not quite big enough. Well, imagine you had like 2 monitors stacked one on top of the other. Now image the word LOT on them. Now that you have that useless image, simply imagine all the paperwork you've ever done times about eight. But needless to say knowing who gets what is important. And if you screw up, you die.
But that is good for terms for now. Couple pieces of advice, know what things are, and never have to ask, but if you do have to ask, don't ask twice, cause people's opinions of you will decrease exponentially, and seeing as they start out thinking very little of you, they will soon be using you to hold thier coffee as a table, for that is how intelligent they shall think you be!
Time for the fin!Lets see, this is a bit of a copout, I know, I should feel bad but I just can't bring myself to, so HA! But this is a post I had started yet had not finished so, am doing so now. Perhaps I should have left that information out and just seemed like a go getter, but, well I'm not. I'm more like a sit here and watch em get away, that coupled with my girl's good cooking is making any gym membership a waste of money.
But on we go!
I figured I would touch on some general terminology for peeps, cause when I came out to Cali I was a bit of a moron when it came to terms. Granted you don't do much as a PA, but when you don't know what people are talking about you just sound like a very sad PA, of the run home and cry into your pillow variety. So let us begin.
Haitus Week:
Most shows will go as I said before where the writers write a later episode, and crew films the actors during the week and so on. Now a Hiatus week is where the actors and writers "rest up" and "regain their mojo" and so forth. For us we take Hiatus every three weeks. During Hiatus week we get shorter hours in the office, the writers are either relaxed or gone, and the set and actors are MIA. Most likely on some whirlwind adventure or something, who knows with those silly tikes. But apparently the hiatus week is where the crazy TV world becomes a real 9-5. I havn't seen this in action yet, but we shall see. ** Now I have seen in it action and I have this to say, Pa Sha! The hours are about the same, the Writers, poor souls, still come in and write thier faces off, we the grunts continue our monotany, and the actors get to go play in a field somewhere cause they don't have to work.
Call Sheet:
It's a list of everyone's nicknames. Everyone on the show gets a nickname and goes by it cause frankly there are too many Bill's and Bob's. It is essential when beginning any job to ask around until someone can give you a complete call sheet so you know everyone's "real name".
But not really.
I'm hoping somone had to read this and stopped about halfway through, and will now go around asking for a list of everyone's nicknames. *insert evil laugh here* yea, it's one of those days so far.
No, a call sheet is actually where and when everyone needs to be for the day. Call times, shoot times and so forth. Ta-da!
Block and Shoot Schedule:
Contrary to popular belief, not where you shoot at blocks. This list says where and when all shooting takes place. You would use it to know what is going down at any given point in time for filming.
Production Report:
This comes after the fact. It sort of summarized what went on and at what times. Kind of like a call sheet's bastard child after the fact sort of thing.
Contract:
A contract is a contract is a contract. There are a lot of them though. If you can, read them, but if you like staying sane, don't. But know who gets which kind cause that is important info.
Distro List:
A list of who gets what copies of what. There will be a LOT of copying as a PA, and by a LOT I mean a.... oh, damn, how do I increase the font here. LOT. No, not quite big enough. Well, imagine you had like 2 monitors stacked one on top of the other. Now image the word LOT on them. Now that you have that useless image, simply imagine all the paperwork you've ever done times about eight. But needless to say knowing who gets what is important. And if you screw up, you die.
But that is good for terms for now. Couple pieces of advice, know what things are, and never have to ask, but if you do have to ask, don't ask twice, cause people's opinions of you will decrease exponentially, and seeing as they start out thinking very little of you, they will soon be using you to hold thier coffee as a table, for that is how intelligent they shall think you be!
Time for the fin!
But on we go!
I figured I would touch on some general terminology for peeps, cause when I came out to Cali I was a bit of a moron when it came to terms. Granted you don't do much as a PA, but when you don't know what people are talking about you just sound like a very sad PA, of the run home and cry into your pillow variety. So let us begin.
Haitus Week:
Most shows will go as I said before where the writers write a later episode, and crew films the actors during the week and so on. Now a Hiatus week is where the actors and writers "rest up" and "regain their mojo" and so forth. For us we take Hiatus every three weeks. During Hiatus week we get shorter hours in the office, the writers are either relaxed or gone, and the set and actors are MIA. Most likely on some whirlwind adventure or something, who knows with those silly tikes. But apparently the hiatus week is where the crazy TV world becomes a real 9-5. I havn't seen this in action yet, but we shall see. ** Now I have seen in it action and I have this to say, Pa Sha! The hours are about the same, the Writers, poor souls, still come in and write thier faces off, we the grunts continue our monotany, and the actors get to go play in a field somewhere cause they don't have to work.
Call Sheet:
It's a list of everyone's nicknames. Everyone on the show gets a nickname and goes by it cause frankly there are too many Bill's and Bob's. It is essential when beginning any job to ask around until someone can give you a complete call sheet so you know everyone's "real name".
But not really.
I'm hoping somone had to read this and stopped about halfway through, and will now go around asking for a list of everyone's nicknames. *insert evil laugh here* yea, it's one of those days so far.
No, a call sheet is actually where and when everyone needs to be for the day. Call times, shoot times and so forth. Ta-da!
Block and Shoot Schedule:
Contrary to popular belief, not where you shoot at blocks. This list says where and when all shooting takes place. You would use it to know what is going down at any given point in time for filming.
Production Report:
This comes after the fact. It sort of summarized what went on and at what times. Kind of like a call sheet's bastard child after the fact sort of thing.
Contract:
A contract is a contract is a contract. There are a lot of them though. If you can, read them, but if you like staying sane, don't. But know who gets which kind cause that is important info.
Distro List:
A list of who gets what copies of what. There will be a LOT of copying as a PA, and by a LOT I mean a.... oh, damn, how do I increase the font here. LOT. No, not quite big enough. Well, imagine you had like 2 monitors stacked one on top of the other. Now image the word LOT on them. Now that you have that useless image, simply imagine all the paperwork you've ever done times about eight. But needless to say knowing who gets what is important. And if you screw up, you die.
But that is good for terms for now. Couple pieces of advice, know what things are, and never have to ask, but if you do have to ask, don't ask twice, cause people's opinions of you will decrease exponentially, and seeing as they start out thinking very little of you, they will soon be using you to hold thier coffee as a table, for that is how intelligent they shall think you be!
Time for the fin!Lets see, this is a bit of a copout, I know, I should feel bad but I just can't bring myself to, so HA! But this is a post I had started yet had not finished so, am doing so now. Perhaps I should have left that information out and just seemed like a go getter, but, well I'm not. I'm more like a sit here and watch em get away, that coupled with my girl's good cooking is making any gym membership a waste of money.
But on we go!
I figured I would touch on some general terminology for peeps, cause when I came out to Cali I was a bit of a moron when it came to terms. Granted you don't do much as a PA, but when you don't know what people are talking about you just sound like a very sad PA, of the run home and cry into your pillow variety. So let us begin.
Haitus Week:
Most shows will go as I said before where the writers write a later episode, and crew films the actors during the week and so on. Now a Hiatus week is where the actors and writers "rest up" and "regain their mojo" and so forth. For us we take Hiatus every three weeks. During Hiatus week we get shorter hours in the office, the writers are either relaxed or gone, and the set and actors are MIA. Most likely on some whirlwind adventure or something, who knows with those silly tikes. But apparently the hiatus week is where the crazy TV world becomes a real 9-5. I havn't seen this in action yet, but we shall see. ** Now I have seen in it action and I have this to say, Pa Sha! The hours are about the same, the Writers, poor souls, still come in and write thier faces off, we the grunts continue our monotany, and the actors get to go play in a field somewhere cause they don't have to work.
Call Sheet:
It's a list of everyone's nicknames. Everyone on the show gets a nickname and goes by it cause frankly there are too many Bill's and Bob's. It is essential when beginning any job to ask around until someone can give you a complete call sheet so you know everyone's "real name".
But not really.
I'm hoping somone had to read this and stopped about halfway through, and will now go around asking for a list of everyone's nicknames. *insert evil laugh here* yea, it's one of those days so far.
No, a call sheet is actually where and when everyone needs to be for the day. Call times, shoot times and so forth. Ta-da!
Block and Shoot Schedule:
Contrary to popular belief, not where you shoot at blocks. This list says where and when all shooting takes place. You would use it to know what is going down at any given point in time for filming.
Production Report:
This comes after the fact. It sort of summarized what went on and at what times. Kind of like a call sheet's bastard child after the fact sort of thing.
Contract:
A contract is a contract is a contract. There are a lot of them though. If you can, read them, but if you like staying sane, don't. But know who gets which kind cause that is important info.
Distro List:
A list of who gets what copies of what. There will be a LOT of copying as a PA, and by a LOT I mean a.... oh, damn, how do I increase the font here. LOT. No, not quite big enough. Well, imagine you had like 2 monitors stacked one on top of the other. Now image the word LOT on them. Now that you have that useless image, simply imagine all the paperwork you've ever done times about eight. But needless to say knowing who gets what is important. And if you screw up, you die.
But that is good for terms for now. Couple pieces of advice, know what things are, and never have to ask, but if you do have to ask, don't ask twice, cause people's opinions of you will decrease exponentially, and seeing as they start out thinking very little of you, they will soon be using you to hold thier coffee as a table, for that is how intelligent they shall think you be!
Time for the fin!
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Whoops! and the five year plan realized.
Well, they read my blog and I got fired.
HA! No, my superiors are too nice for that. I actually quit. Long story short, moved to LA with the wife, she had a job set up through an agency, the agency fell through and she got an opportunity back east, and after looking at the five year plan, (what an evil idea that is, whoever came up with that is both brilliant and evil like doctor claw from inspector gadget but with less flying car) we had to rush and decide that our best options would be to move home for long term job prospects, money, family blah blah blah and all the other stuff that we don't like to think ahead for unless we have to, and unfortunately we had to. So sad! But I'll be damned if a second trip across the US in a short period of time will stop me from trying. So! This blog will be dedicated, continued, to the things I learn and see about the working world and everything, cause I feel like of all the people I know I am really good at making mistakes and blundering into things, so by jove I shall pass on this wonderful learning experience.
So, thing to learn from this blog. The five year plan and why it is important.
Thinking ahead really sucks, can't lie about that. If I had stayed in LA, who knows what would have happened. LA is much like a very large gamble, where it is the people you meet and ... well, the people you meet that make you who you are and put you where you will go. Oh, yea, you have some say, but not a whole lot. I mean if you want to make up an imaginary friend or some illustirous sock puppet with whom you can join in social occasion it is likely that at the end of the day that they will be unable to forward you on to the next job, whereas your fellow employers and who they know, will. So, as I say, LA is one large gamble. One job leads to the next, and you will have to get a new job as though it were a yearly ritual. Quite the stress causer. But people put up with it all. Why? I have my theories. Number one being, yes, sunlight. I think the massive infusion of sunlight all the time with no rain makes people impervious to overworking, overstressing, and general mal-content. Think about it. How many times have you almost kicked down your bosses door to quit on a rainy day? You can't out there. Granted there is a hazy period in the mornings where the oblivion of daily life weighs you down, but those above you tend to roll in a little later after the sun has come out and, well frankly, your sunlight infusion, much like a big glass of sunny delight, has by then made all your cares go away. That's just my scientific observation.
But additionally, there are a billion people who want to huddle near the spotlight just for the sake of being there, so the buisiness can work people hard for not a lot of money beacuse if you feel like you are getting the short end of the stick there is someone right behind you who is willing to not only take the short end of the stick but the trunk, ground and rootball of the tree too but tuppence a day. *Side note: Tuppence = Not a lot of pay, but in a British funny ha ha sort of way. The more you know!*
My my, I do ramble.
But back to my original ramble. People don't ever REALLY think about the 5 year plan. Where they want to be in 5 years usually is just thier work position. But it is really the following, so if you plan on doing the 5 year plan follow this guide:
1) Work position, yea I know I just said it wasn't the only thing, but it is important. Now with work position, this means in 5 years will you be doing something you LIKE. The catch for this is, you need to also think about NOW. Are you doing something you like? Will it still be something you like in 5 years? Does it have dynamic enough to keep you interested? Granted if you are still interested in 5 years you are probably gold for another 50. Woo retirement eh?
2) PAY! PAY PAY PAY. How much do you take home to the bank? But I will come back to this, I just had to get it out there.
1.5) AGE: Odd thing to say, but there it is. How old will you be in 5 years? Me? I will be 27 + 5 = 32. Damn, 32? That is pretty old. Well, not really, but still, it means retirement is only 30 ish years away. So on to 1.6
1.6) At said age, what do you want? For example. Kids, house, boat, single, married. Here is a helpful chart for what you want at that age vs. income level.:
Single : You can be poor as ass. Hell you can live out of a cardboard box because the wife won't be yelling at you to clean up your mess.
Married: You can NOT be poor as ass, and you can NOT sadly, live out of a cardboard box. Basically when you get married you will have to take your prior standard of living (Dormitory, socks and underwear on floor) and her prior standard of living (Sorority house, moderately clean, cute with crap on the wall) and times it by like 80 = 2 room apartment, clean, safe neighborhood, dinner on the table and so on. And YES this is proportional. If you both live in nice apartments now, you will need *she will want* a bigger nicer one, and if you were both living by yourselves it is reasonable to guess you will need a house. And so on. Doom to the checkbook.
Kids: Yes kids come before house. And yes you may say well you have to feed kids and plan for college and all that, but then if you think about it... house. You can park a frikkin car in it. Can you build a porch on your kid? No. Point made.
House: Its a house. It will make you poor.
Boat: If you can afford a boat. You are very not poor. But you will need a lot of money, or a trailer hitch, some dark clothing, wire cutters and a loose moral fiber.
So, once you decide what level you want to be at in 5 years by age, you are good to start thinking. 32 = House and maybe kids by then. Yes I know that is backwards from the list, but you can skip a level and come back to it. You can own a house before you get married. Hell if you can get a boat before marriage I recommend it! Lets her know what comes with the package.
And now we are back to 2) PAY. You need to be able to afford these things. Can you, by the time alloted, earn enough money to be there? Dunno? Best think about it. I know that for my age I am several rungs down the ladder on the pay scale, esp. since I was just making 8$ an hour in LA. So I am going to need to find some heavy pay to get up to par. So we shall see.
But that is basically the five year plan, or how much of it I can remember as I haven't eaten yet and tend to get a little lost reading my own typing. But I hope it helps map out a bit.
But like I said. I am moving to the east. I am very sad about this, but believe financially and for the sake of family it will be for the best. If it had worked out differently I would have stayed, but it didn't and there is no use lamenting. Laminating, yes, cause sometimes you just want stuff to look nice, but not lamenting. So my next blog will be about how to have fun crossing the US. Cause, well, it is! All with it's big balls of yarn, pioneer farms and other crazy tourist stops on the way. 50 hour drive. Should be fun.
To be continued.
HA! No, my superiors are too nice for that. I actually quit. Long story short, moved to LA with the wife, she had a job set up through an agency, the agency fell through and she got an opportunity back east, and after looking at the five year plan, (what an evil idea that is, whoever came up with that is both brilliant and evil like doctor claw from inspector gadget but with less flying car) we had to rush and decide that our best options would be to move home for long term job prospects, money, family blah blah blah and all the other stuff that we don't like to think ahead for unless we have to, and unfortunately we had to. So sad! But I'll be damned if a second trip across the US in a short period of time will stop me from trying. So! This blog will be dedicated, continued, to the things I learn and see about the working world and everything, cause I feel like of all the people I know I am really good at making mistakes and blundering into things, so by jove I shall pass on this wonderful learning experience.
So, thing to learn from this blog. The five year plan and why it is important.
Thinking ahead really sucks, can't lie about that. If I had stayed in LA, who knows what would have happened. LA is much like a very large gamble, where it is the people you meet and ... well, the people you meet that make you who you are and put you where you will go. Oh, yea, you have some say, but not a whole lot. I mean if you want to make up an imaginary friend or some illustirous sock puppet with whom you can join in social occasion it is likely that at the end of the day that they will be unable to forward you on to the next job, whereas your fellow employers and who they know, will. So, as I say, LA is one large gamble. One job leads to the next, and you will have to get a new job as though it were a yearly ritual. Quite the stress causer. But people put up with it all. Why? I have my theories. Number one being, yes, sunlight. I think the massive infusion of sunlight all the time with no rain makes people impervious to overworking, overstressing, and general mal-content. Think about it. How many times have you almost kicked down your bosses door to quit on a rainy day? You can't out there. Granted there is a hazy period in the mornings where the oblivion of daily life weighs you down, but those above you tend to roll in a little later after the sun has come out and, well frankly, your sunlight infusion, much like a big glass of sunny delight, has by then made all your cares go away. That's just my scientific observation.
But additionally, there are a billion people who want to huddle near the spotlight just for the sake of being there, so the buisiness can work people hard for not a lot of money beacuse if you feel like you are getting the short end of the stick there is someone right behind you who is willing to not only take the short end of the stick but the trunk, ground and rootball of the tree too but tuppence a day. *Side note: Tuppence = Not a lot of pay, but in a British funny ha ha sort of way. The more you know!*
My my, I do ramble.
But back to my original ramble. People don't ever REALLY think about the 5 year plan. Where they want to be in 5 years usually is just thier work position. But it is really the following, so if you plan on doing the 5 year plan follow this guide:
1) Work position, yea I know I just said it wasn't the only thing, but it is important. Now with work position, this means in 5 years will you be doing something you LIKE. The catch for this is, you need to also think about NOW. Are you doing something you like? Will it still be something you like in 5 years? Does it have dynamic enough to keep you interested? Granted if you are still interested in 5 years you are probably gold for another 50. Woo retirement eh?
2) PAY! PAY PAY PAY. How much do you take home to the bank? But I will come back to this, I just had to get it out there.
1.5) AGE: Odd thing to say, but there it is. How old will you be in 5 years? Me? I will be 27 + 5 = 32. Damn, 32? That is pretty old. Well, not really, but still, it means retirement is only 30 ish years away. So on to 1.6
1.6) At said age, what do you want? For example. Kids, house, boat, single, married. Here is a helpful chart for what you want at that age vs. income level.:
Single : You can be poor as ass. Hell you can live out of a cardboard box because the wife won't be yelling at you to clean up your mess.
Married: You can NOT be poor as ass, and you can NOT sadly, live out of a cardboard box. Basically when you get married you will have to take your prior standard of living (Dormitory, socks and underwear on floor) and her prior standard of living (Sorority house, moderately clean, cute with crap on the wall) and times it by like 80 = 2 room apartment, clean, safe neighborhood, dinner on the table and so on. And YES this is proportional. If you both live in nice apartments now, you will need *she will want* a bigger nicer one, and if you were both living by yourselves it is reasonable to guess you will need a house. And so on. Doom to the checkbook.
Kids: Yes kids come before house. And yes you may say well you have to feed kids and plan for college and all that, but then if you think about it... house. You can park a frikkin car in it. Can you build a porch on your kid? No. Point made.
House: Its a house. It will make you poor.
Boat: If you can afford a boat. You are very not poor. But you will need a lot of money, or a trailer hitch, some dark clothing, wire cutters and a loose moral fiber.
So, once you decide what level you want to be at in 5 years by age, you are good to start thinking. 32 = House and maybe kids by then. Yes I know that is backwards from the list, but you can skip a level and come back to it. You can own a house before you get married. Hell if you can get a boat before marriage I recommend it! Lets her know what comes with the package.
And now we are back to 2) PAY. You need to be able to afford these things. Can you, by the time alloted, earn enough money to be there? Dunno? Best think about it. I know that for my age I am several rungs down the ladder on the pay scale, esp. since I was just making 8$ an hour in LA. So I am going to need to find some heavy pay to get up to par. So we shall see.
But that is basically the five year plan, or how much of it I can remember as I haven't eaten yet and tend to get a little lost reading my own typing. But I hope it helps map out a bit.
But like I said. I am moving to the east. I am very sad about this, but believe financially and for the sake of family it will be for the best. If it had worked out differently I would have stayed, but it didn't and there is no use lamenting. Laminating, yes, cause sometimes you just want stuff to look nice, but not lamenting. So my next blog will be about how to have fun crossing the US. Cause, well, it is! All with it's big balls of yarn, pioneer farms and other crazy tourist stops on the way. 50 hour drive. Should be fun.
To be continued.
Monday, September 8, 2008
This is the way its going to be. You have been warned.
First off I must appologize. It has been awhile since I last posted and I must say I feel a bit of a heel for this, but the reason for which shall be explained in the next blog. But to continue : I was rather surprised when I found out people were reading my blog. I honestly didn't know that what I was writing held much interest for people, but surprises are fun, now aren't they.
But now for the serious part. I had the poor foresight to allow people at my work place to read my blog. Boo on me. So for the past week I've been wrestling with the worry about doing another blog about my feelings about work and LA, and you know what?
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
If you are reading this and I work for you, don't read further. This blog is meant to be a record of my thoughts, so, well freedom of speech and all that. I don't actually know how to make a blog private or anything, and even so, I wouldn't want to make it so people couldn't read it. All that should be known is that I like to vent, and this is fun. Oh granted I could tell my better half, but frankly I am starting to think she is smarter than me, and when I talk about work I feel like she is plotting the assasination of those in my way, and that is a little frightening. Very mother bear syndrome. So I enjoy this form of mental release. Wow, I just refered to the girl as a mother bear, I sure hope that doesn't come back to haunt me. Oh well, I'll just pretend the delete key on the keyboard is broken. SO!
On to better things.
But to wrap this one up, let it be known I like the people I work with, I truly do. They are very nice and helpful. I think a lot of what people in LA believe to be reality is both ridiculous and unfortunately very true.
For example. It is 100% necessary to work as a PA until you meet enough people one or more of who will say "Well, they've earned my respect by putting up with a very tedious job. I will give them a hand up."
HOWEVER, I think it really goes more like this: "Well, Bob there has put up with our immense amount of hazing. And I like the kid, he's friendly. I will help him out cause it sucked when I was a PA."
Can anyone tell me the key difference between the two? That's right. Respect, there ain't none. HA!
But that is the way the buisiness goes. It is referred to as "the last artisan assistantship" out there, but it is more like a hazing bonding experience of the working world. Tis honestly like a different country.
To be continued!
But now for the serious part. I had the poor foresight to allow people at my work place to read my blog. Boo on me. So for the past week I've been wrestling with the worry about doing another blog about my feelings about work and LA, and you know what?
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
If you are reading this and I work for you, don't read further. This blog is meant to be a record of my thoughts, so, well freedom of speech and all that. I don't actually know how to make a blog private or anything, and even so, I wouldn't want to make it so people couldn't read it. All that should be known is that I like to vent, and this is fun. Oh granted I could tell my better half, but frankly I am starting to think she is smarter than me, and when I talk about work I feel like she is plotting the assasination of those in my way, and that is a little frightening. Very mother bear syndrome. So I enjoy this form of mental release. Wow, I just refered to the girl as a mother bear, I sure hope that doesn't come back to haunt me. Oh well, I'll just pretend the delete key on the keyboard is broken. SO!
On to better things.
But to wrap this one up, let it be known I like the people I work with, I truly do. They are very nice and helpful. I think a lot of what people in LA believe to be reality is both ridiculous and unfortunately very true.
For example. It is 100% necessary to work as a PA until you meet enough people one or more of who will say "Well, they've earned my respect by putting up with a very tedious job. I will give them a hand up."
HOWEVER, I think it really goes more like this: "Well, Bob there has put up with our immense amount of hazing. And I like the kid, he's friendly. I will help him out cause it sucked when I was a PA."
Can anyone tell me the key difference between the two? That's right. Respect, there ain't none. HA!
But that is the way the buisiness goes. It is referred to as "the last artisan assistantship" out there, but it is more like a hazing bonding experience of the working world. Tis honestly like a different country.
To be continued!
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Cheesecake Factory and my debacle Food Fetching Experience
This week we are on Hiatus. For those who don't know what that means, it means we are doing one of those weeks where you (as the viewer), hate the TV world because we are giving you a re-run and denying you a newly created show. Yep, our stage is dark and you are getting NOTHING from us except an episode you have already seen and may or may not love but will guaranteed not love as much as if it was a new episode. So le-sigh to you my friend.
But to the point of this blog, which is just to make me feel better and tell Cheesecake Factory how I had them like dog poo on the shoe, but more so cause I can't scrape Cheesecake Factory off on the curb.
Today, as I do many days, I had to go pick up lunch for a large group of people. I fax our order, call to confirm, then go pick it up. Some things that make this nice are the following, and note I am only including this list because you will see how important they are momentarily. 1) Getting the food right (kind of says itself). 2) Labeling people's food (cause I don't know what half the crap you make looks like) 3) Good and convenient parking 4) Helpful staff 5) Fast fast fast.
And now I shall detail why after work today I am going to a) go to target and buy a black stocking, and b) return to Cheesecake Factory to burn that bitch to the ground.
I arrive at "The Grove" which is basically one hella big outdoor mall as I would later determine, full of mental incompetence. And Cheesecake factory is somewhere in it. They tell me to park in the parking garage for convenient and ease as they validate up to two hours. They neglected to tell me the parking garage was a good quarter mile hike to their restaurant, and that it was uphill BOTH WAYS. That's right kids, your parents weren't lying about their daily trek to school through frostbitten weather on some mystical mountain that was somehow doubly uphill. It exists, and at the end right next to their school is apparently the forsaken cheesecake factory.
So after legging it there I go to stand next to the takeout counter and wait. And wait. And wait. and make a mental list of all the incompetent hostesses standing around chatting while I stand there looking like I need someone to help me out so that I can later extract burny downy vengeance, and I wait. Finally someone comes out from the back and we get underway, only to discover that they did not get the full fax and we are in fact about 10 meals short.
NOTE TO THE PA: Always check that they get both pages and all the names, cause weather or not it is obvious with it being labeled on the fax that there are 2 pages and 25 names or even by having a helpful paperclip graphic Windows style tell them, they may still be retarded enough to not figure it out on their own.
(Side Note: A large number of people in LA are aspiring actors, and such that are working in a restaurant to make their way. So keep in mind, they are not WAITERS, they are ACTORS. So they are often just good at acting like a waiter. So be prepared for a wait as they get their crap together.)
So where was I in my rant, oh yes. So she goes and puts in the rest of the orders and brings out the first few made. And they are not labeled. Granted in a perfect world I would have had a joyous stint as a waiter at cheesecake factory where I would have enjoyed an entertaining waiting life with free meals, midnight chases across rooftops and the occasional musical quartet where I played the trombone. This, however, is NOT a perfect world and I could not for the life of me figure out what the hell people ordered just by looking at it (as it was now up to me to label them) Can you tell me the different between Muso and Herb Crusted Salmon? I think not! And if you can then you lead a very delicious life.
So to continue, I label, and wait, and she brings out the other orders, minus a few cause she is an idiot and didn't put all of them in for whatever reason. So I wait for those and at the end of an all together long wait I end up with several extra meals I didn't order in addition to the ones I did which took awhile to get from her crazy ass.
Now for my favorite part of the evening. I pile up with not two, not four, but six big as shit bags of food. I am walking like a man trying to fly with my arms straight out to hold all this. Now I get to the front door of the place and a very helpful hostess looks at me, blinks a couple times and says "Oh my! Can I help you with that?" Now, this is how it goes. At a great restaurant someone will help you out by carrying your bags to the car with you. At an Okay restaurant they will call for one of the bus boys to help you out. This wonderful specimen of humanity came around the desk, flashed me a brilliant smile and said, "Let me get the door for you."
...
...
....
And I stabbed the bitch.
Not really, but it may have made me smile if I had.
Note when I came back for the second load she asked if she could hold the door again as though she was doing the world a favor. Apparently my mental stabbing did not keep her down.
So in conclusion, sweating, and tired from my many pound load and hike I made it back to the car and back to the office where I ate, blogged and was happy.
So today's lesson is this to the lowly PA.
If you are in charge of lunch make sure 1) They received the FULL order, 2) There is GOOD parking. 3) They LABEL the food. 4) They are not massively retarded.
Screw you Cheesecake Factory. I'm gettin my matches.
Fin.
But to the point of this blog, which is just to make me feel better and tell Cheesecake Factory how I had them like dog poo on the shoe, but more so cause I can't scrape Cheesecake Factory off on the curb.
Today, as I do many days, I had to go pick up lunch for a large group of people. I fax our order, call to confirm, then go pick it up. Some things that make this nice are the following, and note I am only including this list because you will see how important they are momentarily. 1) Getting the food right (kind of says itself). 2) Labeling people's food (cause I don't know what half the crap you make looks like) 3) Good and convenient parking 4) Helpful staff 5) Fast fast fast.
And now I shall detail why after work today I am going to a) go to target and buy a black stocking, and b) return to Cheesecake Factory to burn that bitch to the ground.
I arrive at "The Grove" which is basically one hella big outdoor mall as I would later determine, full of mental incompetence. And Cheesecake factory is somewhere in it. They tell me to park in the parking garage for convenient and ease as they validate up to two hours. They neglected to tell me the parking garage was a good quarter mile hike to their restaurant, and that it was uphill BOTH WAYS. That's right kids, your parents weren't lying about their daily trek to school through frostbitten weather on some mystical mountain that was somehow doubly uphill. It exists, and at the end right next to their school is apparently the forsaken cheesecake factory.
So after legging it there I go to stand next to the takeout counter and wait. And wait. And wait. and make a mental list of all the incompetent hostesses standing around chatting while I stand there looking like I need someone to help me out so that I can later extract burny downy vengeance, and I wait. Finally someone comes out from the back and we get underway, only to discover that they did not get the full fax and we are in fact about 10 meals short.
NOTE TO THE PA: Always check that they get both pages and all the names, cause weather or not it is obvious with it being labeled on the fax that there are 2 pages and 25 names or even by having a helpful paperclip graphic Windows style tell them, they may still be retarded enough to not figure it out on their own.
(Side Note: A large number of people in LA are aspiring actors, and such that are working in a restaurant to make their way. So keep in mind, they are not WAITERS, they are ACTORS. So they are often just good at acting like a waiter. So be prepared for a wait as they get their crap together.)
So where was I in my rant, oh yes. So she goes and puts in the rest of the orders and brings out the first few made. And they are not labeled. Granted in a perfect world I would have had a joyous stint as a waiter at cheesecake factory where I would have enjoyed an entertaining waiting life with free meals, midnight chases across rooftops and the occasional musical quartet where I played the trombone. This, however, is NOT a perfect world and I could not for the life of me figure out what the hell people ordered just by looking at it (as it was now up to me to label them) Can you tell me the different between Muso and Herb Crusted Salmon? I think not! And if you can then you lead a very delicious life.
So to continue, I label, and wait, and she brings out the other orders, minus a few cause she is an idiot and didn't put all of them in for whatever reason. So I wait for those and at the end of an all together long wait I end up with several extra meals I didn't order in addition to the ones I did which took awhile to get from her crazy ass.
Now for my favorite part of the evening. I pile up with not two, not four, but six big as shit bags of food. I am walking like a man trying to fly with my arms straight out to hold all this. Now I get to the front door of the place and a very helpful hostess looks at me, blinks a couple times and says "Oh my! Can I help you with that?" Now, this is how it goes. At a great restaurant someone will help you out by carrying your bags to the car with you. At an Okay restaurant they will call for one of the bus boys to help you out. This wonderful specimen of humanity came around the desk, flashed me a brilliant smile and said, "Let me get the door for you."
...
...
....
And I stabbed the bitch.
Not really, but it may have made me smile if I had.
Note when I came back for the second load she asked if she could hold the door again as though she was doing the world a favor. Apparently my mental stabbing did not keep her down.
So in conclusion, sweating, and tired from my many pound load and hike I made it back to the car and back to the office where I ate, blogged and was happy.
So today's lesson is this to the lowly PA.
If you are in charge of lunch make sure 1) They received the FULL order, 2) There is GOOD parking. 3) They LABEL the food. 4) They are not massively retarded.
Screw you Cheesecake Factory. I'm gettin my matches.
Fin.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Being A Production Assistant Comic Strip
The Life of a Production Assistant
Being a Production Assistant really puts it all into perspective.
Interesting side note. After reading this one of my co-workers suggested that a really good young people Health Insurance to get would be Tonik Health Insurance. It is apparently very affordable, through Blue Cross Blue Shield, and is geared towards 20 somethings so the rates are lower for 20 somes and increase as you get towards 30. They cover well for Vision, Dental, and Health, not, unfortunately for babies, but if you keep it in your pants you should be fine.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Actors and Casting
I felt like it was time to touch on this topic a bit. I have tried to accumulate knowledge about my field behind the camera, but I have also been asking questions about those in front of the camera as well. So lets get started.
Casting:
Alright, I asked a few questions from casting about what they look for when a resume or head shot etc. is sent in. Now a head shot arrives at our door and I am the first one to get it. A PA. Now I look at it, and if you don't have the presence of mind to have legible handwriting, or have it addressed to the right person then it gets tossed. So Rule 1: Don't be a dumbass. So, onto step 2. Once it gets out of my hands I give it to casting. Now casting receives hundreds and hundreds of these a day. Also if they are not from a MANAGER or AGENT into the TRASH! And these are NOT what they use for casting, primarily. Casting will usually use one of several online systems they are members where the head shots are submitted by agents electronically for the show. There are usually a thousand or so a show. So Casting will go through these online ones with first pick choice, then the ones in the mail. Additionally they like to pick from stock people, ones they know from previous shows, episodes, or from other casting buddies who recommend them as good workers. On the plus side it helps perpetuate work for those who are in, for those who are not in, it makes the wall higher.
So now they are looking at YOUR head shot. Step 1, how do you look? Toss or keep. Step 1.5 (I say this because it is equally important) where were you TRAINED. Yes, trained. Schooling is one thing, professional TRAINING is another. For my show they like to see that you went to this accredited training location, or that training professional. Names and places count here. Like a comedian coming from Groundlings Acting School or the Acme Theater will be considered more heavily than someone with a simple Theater College Degree from Virginia Tech (that'd be me ;) self sucker-punch, ouch!) So, like I said, they look at your training. Step 2.0 They look at your work history. They see if you have worked on multi camera or single camera before (multi camera means a 3 walled on studio stage set with 4-5 cameras, and a single camera means 1-2 cameras in a 4 walled set or on location), they look at what you have been on for popularity, they look at all of it. And we continue. Step 3: Audition. They will bring in the few they like and audition the lot of them, some in some out. They will want someone who makes the part too. So they will be choosy. Step 4: Audition #2. Now this is your callbacks. You will actually be auditioning for the network executives to make sure you fall under what they believe to be their "Network Image". And once you pass that you have the part. TA DA!
You get payed $350 a day for every day you work if you are 5 lines or under, not bad. If you are an extra you get paid between $50 and $100 depending on your guild affiliation. But then again, you only work a couple days. The average income for the Screen Actors Guild of America is, and yes, I laughed at this, $650 dollars..... a... year. Yikes! This all came from the people in casting too so I'm not making it up. One of them advised, save up for a long time before coming out to LA if you want to be an actor, then triple that nest egg before you even think of coming out. It is harsh out here. But those are the numbers I have gotten. Oh, how much to the big people make? Starting show, 8-10K an episode. If the show is picked up 30-40k an episode. Plus residuals, plus any other stuff commercials merchandise etc. But keep in mind most shows run about 13 episodes. Most pilots if picked up only run a couple episodes before canceling. Very Very few are picked up and run more than one season, and it is a rare show that runs 26 episodes a season. Also most, almost all, pilots are done by the networks, so hopping on a pilot is the exact same audition scenario. And like I said, you need an Agent or Manager to get your foot in the door. Managers are easier to get cause ANYONE can be a Manager. They mainly just need a logo. Agents have fees, so they are a little more elite.
Okay, my brain is spent. Have fun, and let me know if you have a question.
Casting:
Alright, I asked a few questions from casting about what they look for when a resume or head shot etc. is sent in. Now a head shot arrives at our door and I am the first one to get it. A PA. Now I look at it, and if you don't have the presence of mind to have legible handwriting, or have it addressed to the right person then it gets tossed. So Rule 1: Don't be a dumbass. So, onto step 2. Once it gets out of my hands I give it to casting. Now casting receives hundreds and hundreds of these a day. Also if they are not from a MANAGER or AGENT into the TRASH! And these are NOT what they use for casting, primarily. Casting will usually use one of several online systems they are members where the head shots are submitted by agents electronically for the show. There are usually a thousand or so a show. So Casting will go through these online ones with first pick choice, then the ones in the mail. Additionally they like to pick from stock people, ones they know from previous shows, episodes, or from other casting buddies who recommend them as good workers. On the plus side it helps perpetuate work for those who are in, for those who are not in, it makes the wall higher.
So now they are looking at YOUR head shot. Step 1, how do you look? Toss or keep. Step 1.5 (I say this because it is equally important) where were you TRAINED. Yes, trained. Schooling is one thing, professional TRAINING is another. For my show they like to see that you went to this accredited training location, or that training professional. Names and places count here. Like a comedian coming from Groundlings Acting School or the Acme Theater will be considered more heavily than someone with a simple Theater College Degree from Virginia Tech (that'd be me ;) self sucker-punch, ouch!) So, like I said, they look at your training. Step 2.0 They look at your work history. They see if you have worked on multi camera or single camera before (multi camera means a 3 walled on studio stage set with 4-5 cameras, and a single camera means 1-2 cameras in a 4 walled set or on location), they look at what you have been on for popularity, they look at all of it. And we continue. Step 3: Audition. They will bring in the few they like and audition the lot of them, some in some out. They will want someone who makes the part too. So they will be choosy. Step 4: Audition #2. Now this is your callbacks. You will actually be auditioning for the network executives to make sure you fall under what they believe to be their "Network Image". And once you pass that you have the part. TA DA!
You get payed $350 a day for every day you work if you are 5 lines or under, not bad. If you are an extra you get paid between $50 and $100 depending on your guild affiliation. But then again, you only work a couple days. The average income for the Screen Actors Guild of America is, and yes, I laughed at this, $650 dollars..... a... year. Yikes! This all came from the people in casting too so I'm not making it up. One of them advised, save up for a long time before coming out to LA if you want to be an actor, then triple that nest egg before you even think of coming out. It is harsh out here. But those are the numbers I have gotten. Oh, how much to the big people make? Starting show, 8-10K an episode. If the show is picked up 30-40k an episode. Plus residuals, plus any other stuff commercials merchandise etc. But keep in mind most shows run about 13 episodes. Most pilots if picked up only run a couple episodes before canceling. Very Very few are picked up and run more than one season, and it is a rare show that runs 26 episodes a season. Also most, almost all, pilots are done by the networks, so hopping on a pilot is the exact same audition scenario. And like I said, you need an Agent or Manager to get your foot in the door. Managers are easier to get cause ANYONE can be a Manager. They mainly just need a logo. Agents have fees, so they are a little more elite.
Okay, my brain is spent. Have fun, and let me know if you have a question.
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