Today was Emily's birthday... We went to the beach last night. Spent a few hours today sitting on the beach, but it's getting too hot to sit there all day. Had dinner at a place recommended by Lindsey. Got a brie and fruit plate as an appetizer and it was amazing! I've never had such a perfect and delicious plate of fruit. The restaurant was huge, stylish, and completely out of place in Redneckville (aka Daytona). The plan was to stay all weekend, but we ended up coming back tonight and seeing Clerks 2. If you like bad language and dirty jokes, you'll love this movie. Needless to say Emily and I almost wet ourselves.

I got an interesting call on the DVD business line. The guy sounded very gruff, loud and almost like he was speaking with a mask over his face. The conversation went like this:

"Big Picture DVD, can I help you?"
"Can you put 240 minutes of video on one disc?"
"Yes, but the quality goes down if you have more than 120 minutes."
"It's on a memory card."
"Hmmm, in that case the quality might not be good to begin with, you might want to put it on two discs."
"I need hundreds of copies. One disc is fine."
"OK"
"Do you watch the videos when you copy them?"
"Yes, not the whole thing, but I check it to make sure it copied correctly."
"Well you can't watch this one. You might see something you don't want to see."
"I don't know if I'll be able to help you with this. What is the video of?"
"It's from a security camera. One of those tiny ones you hide in the ceiling."
"For security at your house?"
"No, at a friend's house. I mean, for my own security."
"Um, you might want to find another company to help you."
"Just do it without watching."
"No thanks, bye."

I got a job working at the Pepsi 400 Nascar race. The company called and offered $750 to work at the race for 1 day. Sure! I was a little skeptical though, so I called back later that day to confirm the date and the pay rate. $750. Good. A few days later I was scheduled to go to a meeting at the track to find out exactly what I would be doing at the race. I was still skeptical so I called again. $750 for one day working at a Nascar race? Yes. That's $750 not $7.50 per hour right? Oh, wait. It IS $7.50 per hour. That's what I was afraid of. Never mind.

Instead of working at the race, Emily and I spent the 4th of July weekend at the beach. It was great. Lounging around and reading "How to Win Friends and Influence People". However, over the course of reading the book, I found out that everything I thought I was doing right, I was actually doing wrong. It has really changed my outlook on how to speak to and deal with other people.

In other news, Emily has been enjoying her job. Although she is nervous about the end of training and having to do the job on her own. My class is over though, so I have had more time to work on DVD projects and the like.

I have been keeping up with my jogging schedule. As I wrote about before, my usual habit is to go jogging once every 6 months or so, and tell myself that I will do it regularly from now on. This time I have actually followed through on my promise!

Here are some photos from the Sunrise / Sunset shoot on Friday. It was a long day - 4 am to 10 pm, with a short break in the middle. Luckily this class seems to be interested in what we are doing and willing to participate.

The sunrise shoot was a little more difficult, because half the class stayed up all night drinking. During the HD shoot, the director was drinking a Slurpee and he stunk of alcohol, so I asked him if there was vodka in his drink. He said, "I wish. I've been up all night drinking and it's probably coming out my pores."

I've been watching the World Cup incessantly. The first game I watched was probably the first televised sports game I have ever watched all the way through (except maybe the Super Bowl). I don't know what it is, but it's actually fun to watch these games. I guess there is a reason why Soccer is the most popular sport in the world.

Yesterday after the lecture I was quite worried about this new group of students. Many of them slept through the lecture and even more just got up and left for extended smoke breaks. They seemed to have no interest in cinematography (which is what I teach, for those of you who do not know) or film making in general.

Today was the first lab. We split the group into four groups, with two of the groups going to learn about the HD cameras and the other two learning about the film cameras. I, of course, taught the HD group and saw a very different side of them. They were very interested in my lecture, asked good questions and were excited to get their hands on the gear. Maybe this month won't be so bad after all.

Check out Emily's new car! It's a 2004 Honda Accord that she loves very much. She keeps asking me things like, "don't you think my car is nice? It's nicer than yours isn't it? Don't you think I should start parking under the covered spot, now that I have the nicer car?"

In other news, Emily's job has been going well for her. At first she was scared and undecided about it. Every 20 minutes she would change her mind about wether or not she would stay. Now it has begun to grow on her and she actually enjoys it on occasion. But she won't know for sure until she is done with the 3 month long training.

I got a new group of students today. It is our largest class yet with 53 (or thereabout) students. We must keep the same number of groups for the projects, so the groups will be huge. During the shoots there will be even more people standing around doing nothing than usual.

Last weekend Emily and I went to Washington DC for my sister's graduation. We few in on Saturday afternoon. Ate with Emily's mom and Tom at one of her favorite restaurants, the Carlisle Grand. After lunch, Emily and I drove into DC and took a walk down the trail at our old dog park. It was great, the weather was perfect and we had fun remembering the time we spent there when Turtle was a baby.

We walked around Friendship Heights for an hour, then met up with my sister, Grandma Lil, mom and dad at an Asian restaurant in Chinatown. The restaurant was located one block from the MCI center (now called the Verizon center?). The traffic was gridlocked and we had to drive around the block three times before we could even make it to the valet stand. When we got inside, Grandma could not read the menu, because she "can't read Spanish" (we were at an Asian restaurant with an english menu). We tried to help her order, but she couldn't figure out that the vegetable fried rice was not a salad. When she finally figured it out, she asked the waiter to put some vegetables in it! Emily and I hung out with Diane in the evening and tried (unsuccessfully) to go to sleep early.

Sunday morning I woke up at 9:00 and kept quiet until 11:00, when Emily woke up. We met my entire family (from both sides) at Chef Geoff's, one of our favorite DC restaurants. The place was packed. They tried to seat us outside, but it didn't take long for my mother and grandmother to complain about the freezing rain. We moved inside and eventually got served. The food, of course, was worth the wait. Next stop was Wagshal's Deli. It would have been a shame to go to DC and not pick up a sandwich from there.

Lindsey's graduation was at 4:30. Typical graduation ceremony - lots of waiting and a few seconds of excitement. But she did it! I was so proud of her. Now she just has to find a job before getting kicked out on the street.

Photos from Miami Shoot:





Got a late start today, because Matos was scheduled to be interviewed this morning rather than last night. Met everyone downstairs at noon. Transferred the grip gear to the truck and the camera gear to the van (basically we just took everything out of both trucks and switched it to the opposite truck). Spent some time setting up an in-camera look for the exterior shoots. Drove around South Beach filming B-roll. Picked up a snack at Starbucks (after passing hundreds of local cafes, grrrr).

Shot another interview with a man who had been jailed for 20 years because of his part in the Cuban Revolution. Packed up and went back to Versailles, the famous restaurant where we shot last night. This time it was to eat! It was packed, just like yesterday, and now I know why... The food was excellent and just unpretentious enough to be cheap. I had chicken in garlic sauce with rice and fried plantains. Shared some flan for dessert (which may have been the best flan I've ever had). Finished it off with a couple Cuban coffees. After dinner no one was in the mood to shoot again, but our interview subject had already arrived at the restaurant. So we packed in all of the gear and got started. It went smoothly and we finished around 1:45 am.

Photos from Miami Shoot:










Met Bob and Maya at Full Sail to prep the gear. We spent a few hours opening all of the cases and going over the camera equipment. Bob picked up a van. Maya and I waited hours for him to return. When he finally came back, he picked me up and drove me to the truck rental place. I drove back the box truck and we all loaded the HD gear.

Bob and I got a quick bite to eat at Crispers before hitting the road. I drove the box truck to Miami, while he drove the van. It drove surprisingly well, although it was incredibly loud inside the cab (I later found out that neither door was closed all the way). Consequently, I could not listen to the radio or talk on the phone, because I could not hear either one.

We hit a few patches of traffic on the way down, but got in with just enough time to eat at Pollo Tropical before heading to the first shoot. There were authentic Cuban restaurants all around and our first shoot was INSIDE one such establishment, but the producer decided to feed us fast food instead.

The restaurant where we were shooting was one of the most famous Cuban restaurants in Miami. We interviewed Huber Matos (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huber_Matos), one of Castro's right hand men and a general in his army during the Cuban Revolution. He didn't speak very much english and conducted the entire interview in Spanish. I couldn't understand much of what he was saying, but it was easy to feel the intensity of his words.

Speaking of the language barrier... We were shooting in "Little Havana", which might as well have been part of Cuba. No one spoke english. If we didn't have the film's producer with us, we would not have been able to get around. Next time I'll bring a guide book.

Afterward, a few of us (the rest of the crew had arrived in time for the shoot) went to a little bakery/cafe for some Cuban pastries and coffee. Fantastic! The coffee was like a small shot of espresso with a bit of foamed milk and a lot of sugar.

Got back from Kung Fu a little while ago. They worked the hell out of me today. Harder than usual. But I love it. I was sweating so bad that my glasses wouldn't stay on my face. During the application part of the lesson I was working with my friend (and Rick's sort of girlfriend) Toni. We were working on the double shoulder grab and defense technique, but she laughed hysterically every time we tried it.

School is back in session, so I'm busy. Thirty five new students. I'm so bad with names, I hardly know what to call any of them. They seem more creative, or at least more prepared than the last class. During the sunset shoot, the HD group set up an elaborate scene involving an organ, saxophone, guitar, TV, fake tree, umbrella, candlestick and various other props. They started with a close shot of an actress sitting on the TV, then pulled out to show all of the other props. Finally, when they pulled all the way out, they revealed a wall with a frame. The frame was cut out so that the entire scene shown like a painting on the wall. Keep in mind that they had to haul all of the props and the fake wall out to Lake Underhill for the shoot.

Not too much is going on besides my class. I have been working on some new videos for Big Picture DVD and trying to keep Emily entertained. She has been bored as hell. Trying to get a job to keep herself occupied, but has very little to do in the interim. She has, however, been working diligently on her arts and crafts projects. She has a few new paintings finished and is working on crocheting a skull and crossbones sweater for me.

Lindsey came into town yesterday. She always comes to town with an incredibly ambitious schedule of what to do every minute of her trip. Last time she was here most of her activities involved Emily; by the time she left, Emily needed to sleep for 24 hours straight. Luckily she has a friend coming later this week, so Em should be off the hook.

Yesterday I hung out with Emily, ate at First Watch and ran errands. At 7:00 pm I went to Abe's house and we drove to Gainesville to celebrate his little brother's 21st birthday. Within minutes of entering the city, we were racing a huge diesel F250 truck which was jacked up on monster truck tires. Ridiculous. Got to Steve's house and met up with him, Nate and Charlie. We waited for Heather and her boyfriend to arrive, before heading downtown. First stop was Harry's, a New Orleans themed seafood restaurant. Ate a crab burger and had the first round of drinks. We then went to a half goth, half karaoke bar to have more drinks and play pool. I was on a team with Nate and we miraculously won both games (it might have had something to do with Nate cheating). Then to another bar for more drinking. I ran into a girl I have known since Kindergarden. Weird. Our final stop was the Salty Dog, Abe's favorite Gainesville bar. It was located in an unmarked door at the back of an unmarked alley and it was no more than 8' wide and 75' long. Like a big hallway. The place was packed and everyone was squeezed together. After drinking a few more pitchers, we headed out. Steve stopped to play a song with a homeless man using his saliva covered harmonica. I tried to hook Abe up with a girl who was watching Steve play. Her name was Rachel, so he used some lame line like "In the Bible we were married". Returned to Steve's house, played poker, ate chicken wings and passed out on the couch. The next morning, Abe didn't remember anything after the Salty Dog. He was wondering why his stomach hurt, his hands were greasy and his wallet was empty.

Went on a jog with Emily and the puppies this morning. Came back and made my new favorite breakfast (after seeing V is for Vendetta) eggs in a basket. Went to the fruit and vegetable market on 434 and stocked up on all kinds of good food. Came back home and met Sharon, one of the other lab teachers from Full Sail. She is going to do the demonstration part of my HD lecture. We went over what we are going to talk about and other preparations for our class, which starts next week.

Woke up, made French Press coffee and watched the news in bed, like I do every morning. Emily and I met Tonya and her daughter at First Watch for breakfast. Went from there to the Winter Park Art Festival. Most of the paintings and sculptures were good, but the photography really caught my interest. I spoke to some of the photographers and found out that most of them already had or were in the process of switching to all digital.

Took a nap with Emily and the pups this afternoon. Ate dinner at a small Mexican restaurant that wasn't very good. Saw "V is for Vendetta", which was cool.

Check out Turtle's Dracula Impression!

Picked up John at 10:30 and drove to an apartment complex near Full Sail. The 35mm department had an incredible amount of gear set up. Things we could only dream of at AU. A huge generator, video assist cart, an entire sound department, craft services, two Arri 435 cameras, etc. Even with all of that equipment they were still making obvious mistakes. They shot the scene once, then backed the camera up and put on a longer lens, which basically gave them the same shot again.

I dropped off John after the shoot and med it to Kung Fu just in time for the lesson. Worked on a new sparring form.

Yesterday I went to the beach with my friend Rick. The weather was perfect - warm sun, cool breeze - but the water was still a bit cold. We played football and hung out, before heading to Shroomers. For those of you who don't know, Shroomers is a Daytona Beach pizzeria with great food and a shady location. As we were pulling up, I told Rick about the area. Sure enough, the minute we parked there was a drug deal going on right in front of us. Oh well, the food is worth it.

In January I got a ticket for one of my tail lights being out. The cop said I had 30 days to fix it and go to a police station to prove it was fixed. Of course, I procrastinated and didn't get it done in time, so today I went to pay the fine. I parked next to the downtown courthouse, waited in line for an hour and a half, paid my ticket, went out to the car and found a parking ticket on my windshield!

I've heard a number of requests for a photo of Emily in her new suit. So, here you go! For the record, she feels like a member of the Young Republicans when she wears it.

Here are some photos I just got around to scanning. Some of them are from the power plant. Some are from when Emily, John and I built our fence and others are just random.

Spent the weekend in DC. Emily and I flew up on Thursday and got picked up by her mom. Tom cooked us a nice dinner of chicken, broccoli and potatoes. After dinner Em and I went to see her friend Rachel, who had just moved into a new condo. Her house was filled with boxes and art work. I asked to see some paintings and got the grand tour. She owns sketches by Degas and Picaso, as well as numerous paintings by her (great?) grandfather Arthur Davies. We slept at Emily's parents house and got a good night sleep for the first time in a while, because we didn't have to share the bed with dogs.

Woke up late on Friday, got some coffee at Emily's favorite coffee shop and went shopping. Emily picked up some new shoes at DSW for the Bat Mitzvah, then we stopped at Ethan Allan (where Rachel works) to look at dining room sets for Emily's mom. After leaving Ethan Allan, we decided to eat at Lebanese Taverna, one of Emily's favorite restaurants. Unfortunately we missed the exit and went into Georgetown instead. Ate at one of our favorite restaurants, Me and You. The food was good, as always, but there was a hair in my sandwich. We walked around Georgetown for a bit and noticed a building right in the middle of the shopping district that neither of us had ever seen. We have probably passed it many times, but right there on M street was the oldest house in DC! Took a quick tour before heading back to Virginia. Ate dinner at Sweetwater Tavern and had some good micro-brewed beer.

Woke up at 8:00 on Saturday (not an easy task) and hung out around Baltimore. Cafe Hon had some great chipped beef, but they didn't start serving lunch until 4 pm! Made it back to DC at 3 pm, in time for Lindsey and Emily to spend way too much time at Anthropology. Ate dinner at the Marriott with the out of town Bat Mitzvah guests, better food than I expected, but I didn't know hardly anyone there. Hung out with Lindsey and her new boy-toy (not boyfriend) Kyle.

Got an incredible kink in my back from sleeping on Lindsey's uncomfortable couch-bed. Spent Sunday morning with Lindsey, Diane, Kyle, and Emily at the American City Diner. Good food, as always. Went back to Lindsey apartment in time to get ready. The Bat Mitzvah was nice; it was held in a Sephardic temple, which looked Moroccan. It started with a short service. Carroll was nervous but made up for it by acting cute. The party was held downstairs in the temple's ballroom. They had a typical band and served Chinese food. We were able to stay a bit longer by changing our return flight. It was nice to see all of the cousins and relatives, and the trip was a success.