Wow. I haven’t blogged in about a month and a half. That’s not good. I think the reason I haven’t been writing much in the past six months is largely due to the fact that I had to drive an hour and fifteen minutes to work every morning, then an hour and fifteen minutes back in the evening. You couple that with long hours (60-70 hour weeks), you get one tired Chewbode; one who wants nothing to do with the computer when he gets home. That’s not good either. Well, all that is about to change. This past week Shauna and I finally moved to Tampa. The apartment we got into is really nice and we’ve got a lot more room. So much more in fact, that I’ve decided that I’m re-building the studio to be more suited for a production company. I’m looking into getting a new desk that...
Category: Movies
Getting Fixed or Totaled?
Spring is in the air. Some rain showers have been moving through the area lately, the birds seem to be singing a little louder, and the greenery is coming back. My life has been --- guess! --- really, really hectic lately. I went to battle with my auto insurance company and the collision center over my car a couple of weeks ago. I even called Ford who sicced their collision people on them. At that point it had been three weeks and I hadn’t heard anything about the car. Was it going to be totaled? Were they going to fix it? There’s no way it should take three weeks to decide that. So, I got irritated and started making the nasty phone calls. The end result: Two days after I started making a stink, I hear from the insurance company that they’re gonna fix the car. I called the dealership...
Throwing You A Bone
Not much has been happening lately. I still don’t know what’s happening to my car, whether it’ll be totaled or not. I hope to hear something in the next couple of days. Last I heard Ford called the insurance adjuster on Wednesday last week. I hope he gets his ass in gear soon. I cataloged my large stack of comics finally and uploaded the new list to the Digital Archive. I really need to find some time to go through my nine longboxes of books and re-organize them all. Right now they’re just all in there out of order and that’s killing me. I hate it when that happens. But, I’ve been really lazy with the books lately. Need to quit that. Maybe that’ll be a good Saturday chore. I’ve been doing a lot of work on the next project. There’s a bunch of set building going on and I’m...
23
Last night, Millard, Devin and I went to the theater down the road and saw The Number 23. It was a pretty good suspense thriller over all. Jim Carrey was really good in it and after seeing him in non-comedic rolls (The Majestic and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), I had a feeling he would do just fine in this movie. It had a couple of unexpected twists and turns and had, what I thought, was a refreshing ending. I also cataloged all the comics I had laying around for the last few weeks, and bagged and boarded them. I’ve updated the list in the Digital Archive. Sick Thought of the Day: Taught nuts in a vise make sweet cheese extracts.
Another Blog For You (Finally)
One again, it seems like forever since I’ve blogged. The odd thing is that I’ve been thinking about blogging a lot, but every time I go to do it I just seem too tired or busy to execute it. Well, I’ve had a good night’s sleep finally and nothing is going on right now so… The new job’s been great. It’s long hours and the work can be a little overwhelming, but it’s a lot of fun and the people are great. Yeah, yeah, I know I keep saying all that, but it’s so weird for me to deal with that. Traditionally, I’ve worked with companies that try to really keep this stiff business lip and that kind of environment really drains me. I feel that I’m a very creative person in general and really know my stuff professionally, and the sterile environment of some companies drains me like you...
Bye, Bye Miss January
This is a long overdue entry. I’ve been extremely busy getting acclimated with my new job. I get up at 6:00am, hit the road by 7:00am, and get to work sometime between 8:00am and 8:15am. I work until 5:00pm (sometimes 6:00pm) and get home around 6:00pm or 7:00pm. The drive is crazy. I have to drive 65 miles each way back and forth to Tampa. I’m very comfortable with the job now, and even when I leave work I’ve got tons of energy. However, by the time I get home that energy is gone and I’m exhausted from the drive. I need to learn how to relax on that somehow. I guess it’ll come in time. So, I usually go to bed around 10:00pm so that really only leaves me with about 3 good hours each night. And, if there’s a Lightning game on, I get home, change into shorts...
Happy Thanksgiving
I’ve been watching a lot of The Muppet Show courtesy of NetFlix. I decided to take a break from Battlestar Galactica (gasp!). However, the three Muppet discs are going back into the mailbox on Friday and BSG season 2.5 will be on its way to me. Speaking of great things on the boob-tube, Shauna and I watched a great little independent film the other night called Unknown. The primes of the story is that five guys wake up from being passed out in an abandoned chemical factory with no memory of who they are or why they’re there. As the story progresses, their memories begin to trickle back into their heads and the men begin to piece together what happened and what’s going on. I cleaned the apartment today and got everything ready for turkey day tomorrow. When Shauna got home from work, we prepped the rutabagas, stuffing, green bean...
Hell Week, Better Weekend
Oh, there is so much to blog about today… First off, I got laid off from work this past week. My last day was Friday. I’ve been thinking about how I wanted to write about this major event in my life, and, for a while, I was bitter about it all. I even was opting at one point to write this nasty entry about it all. After giving myself a couple days to reflect on it all, I’ve decided to just state some simple facts about it. I was laid off Friday because my job was phased out. The software and most of the systems I’ve worked on over the past seven years have been going away this year, and the last big software package I supported is being shut down on December 1st. I was officially let go around 10:30am on Friday, and they gave me the option of...
Troublemaker, Chili
I had this weird dream the other night: I was at Troublemaker Studios in Austin, which is owned and operated by director Robert Rodriguez. He and Quentin Taratino are good friends. In the dream, they had asked me to direct a film for them. I think they were going to produce it, so I was the one holding the reins. This is a massive-budget movie. I mean there’re grips, PAs, DPs, actors… the whole sha-bang. Millions of dollars on the line. So, I’m sitting there directing the scenes, and all I can hear is Robert yelling “keep the shots real!” from about thirty feet behind me. I have no fucking idea what he’s talking about – maybe it’s that he doesn’t want anything to seem contrived, but I’m not sure. Of course, there’s this little voice in the back of my head that’s like “man, just go with it and...
Pucks and Wii
I’ve joined a fantasy hockey league up on Yahoo! with a bunch of people I know from work. It’s fun. I like it. I will do it again next year. I enjoy watching the games (the Lightning at least), but it adds a little more now because I have players on my fantasy team from all over the real league, and I think I’ll get to a point real soon where I’ll watch those teams play on TV as well. At least once in a while. Speaking of which, the Lightning play tonight. Excellent. I’m currently researching some ideas for some short films. I may start pre-production as early as November 1st. Keep watching the Suncoast Studios site for more info. I tried to get a preorder in on a Nintendo Wii. I called ten different EB Games stores throughout Sarasota, Bradenton, Tampa, St. Pete, and Mt. Myers around 10:30am...
