This week is crunch time. We have begun scheduling screenings. Getting the rough edit ready for public viewing means making ALL those changes that kept coming up over the past 6 months of editing. Not the least of which is re-voicing the entire movie. Well, the voice-over part anyway. Our editing bay has become a sound studio thanks to lots of puffy pillows, blankets, and tapestries.

Perhaps it would have been better to keep these images under wraps lest the extent to which we are a fly-by-night operation becomes too clear to prospective buyers. Oh well. For a project like this, the old adage rings more true than ever – “Joke ‘em if they can’t take a fuck.”

Another week down in LA, another big stride closer to having this thing in the can. Worked out some of the kinks and ramped up the script to the point where we feel like we are ready to begin hosting SCREENINGS as early as the 1st week of March! Production rags say that input from the target audience is essential to the movie-making process. We are currently looking at potential showings in Sacramento & LA (of course), but also in Seattle, Alabama, Milwaukee, London, & Melbourne. I have a feeling that is the 1st time ever those places have all been used in the same sentence. If you think you can stir up a crowd and would like to host a screening in your area, don’t hesitate to contact us. You will receive an advance copy of the final movie for your efforts.

This time is a nerve-racking one for an artist. Although we really want people to throw off the gloves and give honest feedback and input which will make this project succeed, part of me wants to hear nothing but “It’s great just how it is!” type platitudes. However if you are one of the screening audience, you’d better not write that quote on your review card! Tell us what you honestly would do differently. What lines would you change? And don’t worry about being brutally honest. In this industry, you gotta have thick skin. And we probably won’t make most of the changes you suggest anyway.

Have I mentioned recently how my mom is the coolest? Defying my scrooge-esque attitude towards X-mas gifts, she had these awesome stickers made to help spread the word about our nearly-completed docu-comedy.

For a limited time, I will send one of these beauties off to anyone who posts on the blog here. As long as you aren’t another spammer selling Viagra anyway. Red, white and blue, they nicely cover up tired & outdated “Kucinich”, “Romney” and, soon, “Hillary” bumper stickers.

Then there’s the advent of new business cards to replace the depleted stock of passe numbers I had made cheaply in Malaysia last June which featured an earlier incarnation of the logo. The truth is that these business cards are first such item I’ve sported since my “Surf Taxi” days in Hawaii when I was a just a lad of 19. My what a long way I have come since those footloose days! Now I actually have a bank account, a cel phone, and…well that’s about all that’s changed.

Some may think I’m crazy for spending the last $100 to my name on a lift ticket. Others who understand either me or the draw of fresh, fluffy snow understand completely. On Monday, Feb 4, wedged between “Super Bowl Sunday” and even more exciting than that great game, the country’s biggest ever primary election, a.k.a. “Super Tuesday”, I hit the freshly dumped upon slopes of the Tahoe Sierra. For someone who’s spent FAR too much time blogging, editing, and goofing off on Facebook, this childish reprieve from the life of a docu-comedian was most welcome. Only today (after the fact) did I learn how life-endangering the trees where I do most of my shredding can be. Beware of NARSID in the tree wells!

Feeling good about surviving a day when I snowboarded myself to exhaustion and the prospect of nominating a black (or at worst, female) president today. I hope you folks get out there and vote! As for going into hock for this movie, I don’t feel so bad about it. I imagine most 1st time filmmakers might go into debt to give their dream a chance. Considering that I haven’t worked for money for 5 months, the amazing thing is that it has taken me this long to cross from black to red.