Oh Yeah...

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Video of the Day: Cheerleader Gets Run Over

Am I going to hell for laughing at this?

Video of the Day: Weird Cat

Video of the Day: The Condom Song

Wow. Just. Wow.

Shoutout to the DMV

"Really?" you must be thinking, "the DMV?" Why yes, I want to give a shout out and much praise to my local DMV which just helped me tremendously in my time of need.

I had to get a(nother) temp tag for my old and ailing car in order to keep me mobile and I got in and out with not one single problem and the woman who helped me was very understanding and didn't even freakin' charge me. That's right, she helped me for FREE. Of course I am singing her, and the DMV's praises right now.

I know, DMV's are usually shitty places of pure Evil but methinks I lucked up. When I asked the woman what I owed her she said "lunch". And I was far too giddy to ask if she wanted me to fetch her something right then and there so I just smiled like an igit and skipped merrily out the door. So, if I were to take this woman some form of lunch 1) what could I get that's not insulting and 2) would that seem like bribery, or that we had some sort of arrangement. She very well could have been joking for all I know but I feel the need to thank her in a substantial way. That, or pay the compliment forward, like that shitty Kevin Spacey movie.

So, my three readers, what would you do in this situation? Pay it back? (and how?) Or pay it forward?

Video of the Day: REPO! The Genetic Opera

So, there have been a litany of shitty movies throughout the years, but MY GAWD does this thing look like someone actually wrote it with a felt pen tipped with excrement. On one hand, that something this shitty gets made gives me hope for myself, and then on the other hand that something this shitty gets made makes me fear for myself. No matter what they say double edged swords are not cool.

Possibly Worst Come-On Line EVER

Me, sitting quietly at a PepBoys, reading a book that is clearly NOT the bible.

Random Guy, older fellow, standing next to me, going over a come on line in his head, this is what he comes up with:

Random Guy: "Is that the bible?"

Me: "No."

Random Guy rethinks his strategy, comes up with this: "Do you go to LACC?" (Los Angeles Community College)

Me: thanking god that the electric ratchet tool the PepBoy guys use just came on and I have an excuse to ignore him, under the guise I can't hear.

While I can't say it's the worst come-on line ever (I still have a lot of living to do, knock wood) it ranks up there fairly high.

Video of the Day: Reporter in Front of His Own Burning Home

For those of you living under a rock here's what's been going on is SoCal...

Purple Haze

Well, not so much "purple" as it is burnt sienna and not so much a "haze" as it is a thick (thicker than usual anyway) smog.

Ahhh, living in L.A.

Benadryl is Your Friend

It is certainly mine at this point in time. I would say I'm sick as a dog but I had that privilege yesterday. Today I am in sinus/allergy limbo, where it could go either way, depending.

I tried to write, but I wasn't up for the task of actually having to think about what I wanted to say on paper, and I kept thinking everything was crap anyway so I decided it would better serve me to edit my material in a better frame of mind.

I have been self medicating for a day now (I really don't like taking pills so I tried to rough it the first day, bad idea) and am looking forward to popping those two sweet little pills into my mouth, only to be unconscious sometime thereafter. I remember the first time I took Benadryl and it knocked me on my ass, in a wonderful, trippy kind of way. However, seeing as I might have to operate heavy machinery later on (i.e. my car, getting me to the kickball game, where I will not play, just watch) I have some time before my awesome date with the Dryl.

Video of the Day: Rude Awakening

Second Verse, Better Than the First....

So I literally just finished my first draft of my new spec, (the actual first draft being more of a "rough" aka, shitty, draft). And I must say I'm feelin' good about this one. Things were a bit murky and slow going in the middle but by the time I got to the end I was moving a lot more quickly and now it's done. I'll take a day off, read and relax a bit and then hit it head on starting on Friday, getting a second draft done.

Writing can be utterly frustrating but so f'in fulfilling...

Kickball Recap

We had our regular Monday night kickball game and I am proud to report that after three games I finally got on base! And eventually made it all the way around to second! whoo-hoo. I'm used to kicking the shit out of the ball and having them caught, or trying to bunt only to have myself thrown out at first. But this time, I got a grounder and the guy bobbled the ball, allowing me to get on base:). Better yet, our team won, which makes us 2-2 I believe. Sweet.

WTF? #2

When I was at Target yesterday I was walking to the electronics section and on my way there what did I pass? An entire section of Halloween candy and accessories. That in and of itself wasn't odd, it's SUPPOSED to be there, it's Halloween season after all. No, what I found odd was what was across the aisle from the oodles and oodles of Halloween candy: CHRISTMAS CARDS.

That's right, we're no longer waiting for November 1st it seems, that's just too far away. Hell, we're not even waiting until the end of October. We've got to start Christmas shopping RIGHT FUCKING NOW!!!.

Arrgh.

Night on the Town

I don't get out much. It's due to various reasons that I will not go into detail here, but yeah, one can consider me a type of shut in come the weekend. It pains me at times because I feel I should be partying my ass off every Friday and Saturday night, and occasionally I will, but as time goes on I find myself preferring the company of Battlestar Galactica.

It wasn't always this way. I was whittled down over time. Living in L.A. you'd think there were grand opportunities to party, and there are, but mostly if you're rich and willing to stand in line and be dismissed by a portly body guard for wearing the wrong jeans. I have not done this because I don't own a $300 pair of jeans, so I see no point in the humilation.

Instead, I'd hang out with a few people at what would be described as "dive bars". For me, the dive bar is not the place I'd like to spend a lot of my free weekend time. Especially since I tend to be an asshole magnet and always end up with the weird city guys hitting on me. I had one experience where this guy thought it would be cute to hover over my shoulder while I was ordering at the bar and then refuse to back away when I tried to leave. He just stared at me and for a moment I thought I was going to be stabbed. With Love, of course, but stabbed nonetheless. He finally did get the hint, probably due to my every so bitchy, "move the fuck out of my way" facial expression. But he didn't make it easy to move past him.

Since this is a lot of what I'd get going out in L.A. over time it just became a pointless endeavor. For guys, they get all the hot young things trying to become actresses. For women, or more specifically, ME, I get the Creepy Guys, and the Old Black Dudes and the occasional illegal immigrant (don't ask). Not to encouraging.

So for a while I traded in weekend nights out for Best Week Ever and the aforementioned Battlestar. And I got used to it. And eventually I gave up on going out, because, really, what was the use? Even though it's L.A. at some point it's just the same old people doing the same old things.

But I went out last night. Though I had to force myself. I didn't want to but my friend had another friend in town so I said, "what the hell". We ended up going to an awesome bar called the Library Bar downtown, which had great jukebox music (Modest Mouse!) and cool drinks. I had an ale/lager (not sure) called an Old Rasputin and though I hate Guinness I enjoyed the Rasputin. I even got hit on, by a young man just out of the Navy (save the jokes), who wasn't a Creepy White Guy or an Old Black Man. It was refreshing to say the least.

Is there hope after all? Who knows, I'll just have to continue being social and see what happens.

Video of the Day: VIRGO

This is the video that represents my birth month? Holy Jesus. Thanks for the heads up, Lovely!

For Mike: Video of the Day

So tacky it'll seal your mouth shut. If you've already seen it, enjoy it all over again!

Video of the Day: Battlestar Galactica Season 4 Promo

Hell's motherfrakkin' YEAH! Let's just hope SciFi goes ahead and runs the entire season, instead of breaking it up into 2008/09 like they said they would.

Video of the Day: More Cowbell Edition

Video of the Day

We should all have days like this.

Another Spec Finished

There is something both satisfying and terrifying about writing your own, original material. If people don't like it then you have no one to blame but yourself.

I prefer to write my own material, however there is comfort in being able to blame at least a little bit of the suckiness on someone else. I shall explain for those uninitiatied in the TV business.

As a writer you can write your own material, written on "speculation" aka a "spec" that shows your unique (hopefully) voice or you can choose to do a "spec" of an already existing show, preferably a show you actually, you know, like. If you don't like the show, or aren't to familiar with it then it'll show.

What gets you off the hook on writing a spec on an already existing show is that it's not "your" voice but that of the showrunner/creator of the show you're specking. So technically it's not "you". Not that that gives you cart blanch to go poopy on paper, not in the least. What it does i show that you can mimic the showrunner's voice and thus be able to work in a writer's room, preferably on staff.

Don't get me wrong, it feels great to finish a piece of writing, whether for myself or as a spec of another show, and I'll probably be returning to the specking world of TV shows as soon as I know whether or not the show I want to spec is actually going to get picked up for a full season, but there is that extra bit of satisfaction in knowing that I've created something that came totally from my head.

Let's just hope it's good.

Watch Friday Night Lights

It's a big bag of AWESOME.

You wanna know another show that's a big bag of awesome but gets better promotion? DEXTER, on Showtime. And that one has cussing!

But seriously. watch both if you're not. They're two great shows that deserve third seasons.

update: also, watch Out of Jimmy's Head on Cartoon Network. I just realized Kenny might still be reading my blog...;)

Video of the Day: Kanye West Spoofs Himself on SNL

Video of the Day: Sponge Monkies

Remember these guys?

Unemployment Blues

I've been unemployed for going on two weeks now, and it sucks balls. However, I shouldn't really call it "unemployment" seeing as in the television world it's called a "hiatus".

See the difference? Neither to do I. Either way I'm jobless. And it's in "hiatus" that I discover how much I can miss having a place to go to every day and that wonderful weekly paycheck. Ahhh, the weekly paycheck. I think that's what I miss the most.

The first time I was on hiatus I had no idea what to expect. I bought a bunch of books from Amazon.com and was reading almost a book every two days (some were thicker than others). I was also doing a crap load of writing, one sample of which resulted in my first true attempt at a spec pilot, (which now seems to be going nowhere so I've moved on to working on what will be my first serious attempt at a comic book. Wish me luck). That was fine and dandy at first, but then there were problems with my unemployment insurance that held up the money for a good two months and at the the time I didn't have wireless so I was tethered to my internet modem, which meant if i was on the computer I couldn't leave the couch. After about a month I thought I was going to lose my mind.

Having learned from my mistakes the first time I prepared for this hiatus. I called my employer to make sure all my paperwork was good to go (it was) and I bought a few more fun reads from Amazon.com, created an exercise schedule for going to the gym and splurged on a new (video!)and a wireless internet router, so now I can work on my computer from anywhere in my studio apartment. I'm finding I quite enjoy working in the kitchen and have made it into my little "mini" office. I guess sitting right beside a window (ahh, the breeze) where I can see outside helps the cabin fever.

Now all I have to do is hunker down and wait to see when the show I work for will be brought back. I have been told I will be asked back, so it's nice to have a bit of job security.

Any other tips for surviving "hiatus"?

Video of the Day: Bonaduce -vs- FairPlay

Reconsidering...

So, a few days ago I alerted my readers that I would be taking down my blog. However, I am no reconsidering this. Why? Call me shameless, call me superficial, call me a whore for attention, hell, call me Jay-Z (or 50-Cent) but I discovered that I now have THREE readers instead of only two (as I discovered in the comments). That warmed my heart.

What also made me reconsider was that I had another kickball game last Monday and through that I discovered that I do indeed still have something to say on this blog. And also the fact that I will miss posting videos of the day when I find them.

So, I'm going to keep on keepin on, and today, my dear three readers, you will get a video, and me recanting the tale of how I became the goat of my kickball team:), first up, the kickball:

So, my team has had three games thus far and we've lost two. I've been told that's not to bad for a rookie team. We came close to winning our last one, however a lot of our players made simple mistakes, one of which (made not by me) cost us two runs when we were ahead by one.

Now, for those of you who don't play in a kickball league, there are only five innings and that's all you play regardless of whether or not the home team is winning. This is got to be the only sport that ends in a tie and is happy to do it. It's down to the fifth inning and we're down by three (5-2) and there are two outs. I'm figuring that someone is going to get out before me and seeing as I've been kicking for shit (it's not your P.E. kickball, these pitchers take their shit seriously and give you all kinds of funky "pitches") I'm hoping I'm not going to have to be the last out.

That hope was for naught as the kicker before me actually did well and brought in two runs. So now we're one away from at least a tie and it's up to me. You can imagine the string of curse words going through my head as I walk to the plate. I figure it's best if I just "bunt" the ball, bunting kin kick ball meaning you just let the ball tap against your shoe and roll off. As long as it goes past home plate you're all good. So the ball comes to me and instead of kicking the shit out of it (which I probably should have done in 20/20 hindsight) I tapped it against the front of my shoe.

The bunt was good. A bit too good. It rolled off my foot and I took off running for my life, however the pitcher was able to get to it in time and throw me out.

Which was our last out and we lost the game.

And that, boys and girls, is how I came to be the goat of my kickball team.*


*even though the other players were totally cool
with it, and I wasn't the only one who made
mistakes I still felt crappy. We went to a sports
bar afterwards and I made up for it by buying the
table a cheap pitcher of beer.