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Star Wars and Making Stuff Up

Posted on March 9, 2007

Starwars 1

Today, some friends of mine and I took some much needed time off and went to the California Science Center to see the Science of Star Wars exhibit. It was fun and they had quite a few very interesting exhibits including several models from the movies — the Millennium Falcon, Star Destroyer, X-Wing — and also the full-sized Landspeeder used by Luke Skywalker during the filming of Star Wars.

Plus, a whole bunch of other stuff well worth the price of admission. More, in fact, because the exhibit is actually free. Yes, I said free. The place was mostly filled with school kids on field trips but there were a few older kids around (like us) who had also decided that Star Wars was more important than work today. As we walked around I wondered if the kids looking at all the exhibits felt the same way about the Star Wars films as I did when I first saw them.

Many of the kids were probably close to the same age I was when i first saw Star Wars. Although, Star Wars probably wasn’t their first exposure to the universe. It was probably Phantom Menace or the other of the the newer films. If that’s true that’s kinda too bad for them. To me, the first trilogy will always be the best one and the subsequent three films will always be sub-standard.

Even Revenge of the Sith, which is by far the best of the three left something to be desired when I saw it. I just had to wonder as I looked around today if any of those kids had ever seen the first films or had only seen the second trilogy. If they had only been exposed to Star Wars by watching the second three films I hope someday they find out what they’re missing.

Fauxnews

In a completely unrelated story (except that Fox was the studio that released the Star Wars films) I love it when Fox News just decides to make stuff up instead of reporting the actual news. Seriously, what passes for “journalism” these days, especially at places like Fox News, amazes me. How do these people sleep at night? Sadly, probably better than I do.

iPhone – Yes or No?

Posted on March 6, 2007

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Over at LAist I’ve written a little piece answering a question from a reader who asks if they should get an iPhone or not. As an unapologetic Apple and Mac fan, I think my answers were put as well as I could put them. There are a lot of other pros and cons but I tried to settle on the main ones that I feel are worth it to normal cell phone users when considering an iPhone. Anyway, the piece is up so if you get a chance, feel free to take a look.

Marissa Miller + iPod = Who needs a swimsuit?

Posted on March 2, 2007

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Hey, I love iPods and I love hot swimsuit models. So this is really a win win for me. And now for you too. You’re welcome.

Saved by a Prius

Posted on March 2, 2007

[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/v/GkJ109Z3iOg”>]

As I am a recent, and proud, owner of a Toyota Prius, this video I saw on YouTube give me some comfort that I won’t die if I’m ever in an accident. Although, I have to admit that when I first started seeing the Prius around town one of the things that always concerned me about getting one was if it would be safe during an accident. Fortunately, I haven’t had very many accident in my life (only two I think) so safety wasn’t the most important thing to me. Although, it was up there.

Anyway, so far I’ve been lucky and haven’t had to test the Prius in any real-world crash test scenarios. If I was superstitions, this would be the time when I would knock on wood or something. Unfortunately, I’m not 100% sure if this Starbucks table is made of actual wood or just a shiny wood substitute. Oh well, I guess it can’t hurt to do it anyway.

Growing Pains

Posted on March 2, 2007

growing_pains.jpg

As I said in a previous post, the move from Typepad went fairly well except for one or two big glitches. Unfortunately, those one or two big glitches are pictures and video. Now, when you go to any posts except those from the last few weeks, they won’t have the pictures or video they are supposed to have. To me, that sucks and I’m sorry for the trouble. I don’t like to have things looking half-finished. Plus, I want things to be easy and not require me to do a bunch of work I already did. Not the case here, i guess.

I wish there was another solution besides putting everything back where it belongs manually but as of now, I don’t know what that might be. If you happen to have a brilliant idea, don’t be shy about shouting it out. Otherwise, its manual-replacement city for me for. So, over the next few weeks I am going to be manually putting video and pictures back into the posts they belong in. Should make for a great time. Fortunately, I am still not 100% better from the walking (and will-to-live-sapping) pneumonia so I have some time on my hands — that is when I’m not sleeping or thinking about sleeping. Fortunately, this picture and video thing shouldn’t be a problem for any posts from now on, just the old ones. So, check back and you should be able to see the videos and pictures eventually. Thanks for you patience during this time of transition.

Oh, in case you were wondering that is the cast of the 80s sitcom Growing Pains. I thought the picture was appropriate for two reasons. One, the obvious one that the site is having some growing pains of its own. And two, I once did a movie with Tracey Gold who, if I recall correctly, was very nice and a huge fan of Diet Coke. Its a fact, actors love that Diet Coke. We used to go through tons of it on shows. Fortunately, in many cases, it was free product placement so we didn’t have to buy it. Just one of the perks of a fully-stocked craft service table, van or occasionally, a trailer — but only on the bigger shows. I guess there were some good things about showbiz after all.

Moved

Posted on February 27, 2007

Wplogo

So yeah, obviously I moved to WordPress. And yes, I like the way the blog looks now. But no, the move wasn’t perfect. Sadly, all of the pictures and video files I had put into my posts didn’t make the trip so they will have to be dropped in manually. Quite a bummer actually considering I’ve got over three years worth of posts here and most of them have pictures or some other kind of media.

Anyway, I probably won’t go back and bring all the pictures back in. I just don’t have that kind of time. So, if you happen to read a post with a whole where a picture should be, please forgive me. I am also having some trouble getting embedded videos to play at WordPress so that will take a little effort on my part as well. Or, I suppose I could ask support for help. Not there yet. I always like to figure this stuff out for myself anyway. It help later if someone else asks me what to do and I can tell them from experience.

Other than that, I’m writing this while looking at an Apple 23″ Cinema Display attached to my MacBook Pro. I gotta say that it’s a pretty great monitor and I may keep it. Actually, it technically is supposed to go to someone else but they don’t need it right away so I thought I would check it out for myself and see how nice it is. You know what, its pretty nice.

Memories

Posted on February 26, 2007

It occured to me that I have this blog set up at WordPress and more importantly, its a free one. Perhaps I should be taking advantage of the free stuff? Maybe so. I do like Typepad but it seems like I’m spending quite a bit of money on something I don’t really take much advantage of. My blog isn’t updated that often so maybe it makes more sense to change it to over here?

I don’t know but I’m thinking about it. Anyway, thanks for letting me think out loud. Appreciated.

Going to Mars (Edit)

Posted on February 23, 2007

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As much as I love ecto and all its blogging goodness I sometimes wonder if something better is out there to suit my needs. So, I have decided to give Mars Edit a try. I only downloaded it this evening and this is the first post with it. So far, so good. Over the next week or so I am going to put it through its paces, kick the tires and generally see what’s what with the program.

Then, as I often do, I will give it a thumbs up or down and say some reasons why. Until then, happy blogging all and to all a good night.

Walking When You Shouldn’t Be

Posted on February 21, 2007

Macbook Pro

well, i got some interesting news the other day. it seems i have what the doctors call “walking pneumonia.” and no, it does not come with the “boogie woogie flu” as much as i was hoping it did. really, all it comes with is chest pain when breathing, coughing, headache and a general feeling of crappiness that makes you just wanna sleep until its over. don’t worry, i’m going to live and got some good drugs.

so, that’s what i have been doing a lot of for the last few days — sleeping. that also means i haven’t been doing much of anything else like writing for LAist, Cinematical or any other sites. plus, haven’t been working on my scripts either. at least i have a good excuse this time and not the usual one i use — procrastination.

i’m going to keep this short but i had a moment or two of lucidity and felt like at least writing something. gotta keep the machine working if you can — at least at extremely low capacity. one other bit of news before i go, i have changed phones yet again (yes, its true) and gone back to the blackberry 8700g. the treo 680 is history and although a fine piece of tech, is just not for me. blackberry is where its at and i count the days until the blackberry 8800 comes out for t-mobile. soon my friends, soon.

also, i have decided to try an experiment and only use one mac instead of two. normally, i have a desktop mac (at the moment a 20“ intel iMac) and i also used a laptop — my trusty 12” g4 powerbook. i have decided to try and use only one mac and make things simpler for me. to that end, i am now the proud owner of a shiny new 15“ macbook pro. yes, i know i said 15” was too big and i would never get one, etc. well, i’m using it to write this and i gotta say, its pretty nice.

i was going to attach an external monitor (a 23“ apple cinema display or a 24” dell ultrasharp) but this screen is almost big enough not to need another monitor. plus, i’m kinda in a quandary regarding my loyalty to apple and paying a thousand bucks for a monitor when i can get a potentially better one for only about six hundred bucks from dell. everything i’ve read about the dell leads me to believe that its a great monitor and every bit as good as the apple. or, i could just use the macbok pro without another monitor. its only five inches smaller than my iMac so i almost don’t notice the difference. plus, as its a laptop you tend to sit closer to it than you do a bigger monitor and that, at least for me, makes things easier to read and see.

the other major reason i decided to try this was to avoid the “oh, that file is on my other computer” problem that seems to crop up often. if you have two computers it stands to reason you will work on one of them sometime and the other sometimes. unfortunately, that probably means you will run into the same problem i often did. an article draft or a file i need is on my desktop and i’m on my laptop at another location and can’t get to it. sure, i could vpn and ftp the stuff to me wherever i am but why bother and why open up any holes in my firewall if i don’t have to? it seems much easier to me to just have one computer, an external monitor and external drives and go from there.

i’m sure this new paradigm will also present its own problems but for the moment, it seems to make sense. besides, it was a good excuse to get a new mac and who doesn’t love that! i know i do. ok, that’s it. time to go back to bed. see you on the other side.

The Simple Pleasures of a Good Bar and Good Conversation

Posted on February 16, 2007

Rustic

Last night was the latest LAist meeting where the writers and editors get together to share some beverages and talk about writing, sex, drugs, being attacked by raccoons and whatever else happens to come up. Its a good time made especially good for me because I got to go back to one of my favorite places in Los Angeles: Ye Rustic Inn in Los Feliz. If you don’t know it its one of those dive places that are great fun, have giant leather booths, pitchers of beer, cute servers and is plenty dark so everyone looks a lot better. It’s definitely one of those places that feel like home to me. Obviously, I’ve spent way to much time in bars. I’m not an alcoholic but I do like my drinks now and again. Although, more and more its again and not now.

Putting that aside for a moment, its also across the street from another great place to go called the Drawing Room. The Drawing Room has one thing in particular going for it besides its similar characteristics to the Rustic: it opens way early in the morning for your drinking pleasure. Consequently, when I used to toil all night on set and then be fully awake at 7AM at wrap, it was nice to go over The Drawing Room and get a cocktail at 8 in the morning. Yes, those are the things you sometimes do after shooting all night on a Friday and finishing up early Saturday morning.

Of course, we went during the week many times too so it wasn’t always confined to the weekends. I gotta say, it sure was nice being young enough and in many ways, dumb enough, to be able to go out and do things like that. Now, as many of my friends will attest, its a pretty rare situation that gets me out of the house at all, let alone out to a bar. I just don’t go out as much as I used to.

Really, I didn’t want to go last night either. Well, that’s not really fair. I did want to go. Its always nice to see LAist people, including one of my favorite people I’ve met in LA the last few years: Tony Pierce. Over at his infamous blog, I read that he feels similarly to me in that he doesn’t like to go places as much as he used to and especially doesn’t like to have to be somewhere according to a schedule. I’m very much the same way. I don’t like deadlines and I don’t really like having to do much of anything I don’t want to do. Unfortunately, it turns out that most of life doesn’t really give a crap about what I want to do or don’t want to do. So, sometimes you gotta be somewhere at a certain time and that’s just how it goes. Yes, deadlines are a bitch.

Anyway, a good time was had by all last night at the LAist meet and many pitchers of Stella were consumed so thanks for that Jake. Also, I met some new LAist people who were very cool and talented and will be a pleasure getting to know further. It’s really great that I keep meeting quality people after living so long in LA and being sorta out of the business. I used to meet a lot of great people on set but now, as my being on set time is far less, it was getting harder to meet people. Although, I have met a few at the “office” so I shouldn’t forget about that.

Something about this town, whatever its other faults, sure seems to attract some of the best people. I guess its probably the lure of Hollywood and fame/fourtune. Or, maybe its the weather? Who knows? Whatever it is, I’m glad it happens. Sure, the traffic sucks and trying to find parking in Santa Monica at 3P on a Thursday makes you want to kill someone but still, this city is home to some great people and some great bars. So, go out and find the place that makes you feel at home. You’ll be glad you did.