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08-02-01 "The Dreaded Outhouse Scene!"

We finally got the interior of the outhouse shot with Josh and Matt Sauby. Matt played the Hand of Death! I haven't cut the scene together but I'm really thinking it'll work nice. I made some changes while we shot that will make the story flow a bit better.

If I mentioned this earlier I apologize but one of the biggest lessons I am learning on this project is the UNIMPORTANCE of storyboards!! I've spent months drawing all these great little pages and now I'm terribly afraid that the timing is going to be far too quick! It works great as a comic book but it'll get the audience sick if I switch from character to character so rapidly! I have learned that a master shot is the important thing. Unfortunately a master shot requires that the actors have all their lines memorized and that's not an easy task for unpaid beginning actors!

08-06-01 "Up North With The Ladies!!!"

Yes indeed it was once again time for me to take my Grandma and her friends northward for a visit to the cousins! If you're interested in getting one DAMN fine sandwich check out the 9th Hole up in Saint Germain and while you're there stop in at beautiful downtown's friendly Knitt's Hardware Hank store for all your hardware needs!! I took the ladies to the big flea market up there and the weird thing was that all the venders were exactly the same as last year!! In fact it seemed that they had exactly the same stuff and were in exactly the same location!!?? Maybe I had just entered some kind of time warp!?

I went to the flea market in Shawano the day before and some of the same mooks were there also. Why did I go to the Shawano Flea Market? Well, maybe I'll tell you later?!! Maybe I was hoping to run into someone there?!

Oh ya, I did some more shooting with Darby for his film. It's looking pretty darn good! He likes much longer shots than I do though but he's the director! We shot a scene at the comedy club and one at the main actress's house.

08-07-01 to 08-09-01 "Movie Camp!!"

I had an absolute blast this last week working with a group of kids for Comedy City's first ever Movie Camp. I wish I'd have had more time to teach the whole group of kids but my little group learned a heck of a lot about camera moves, continuity, and production value!! Hopefully they also picked up a few tips on story. I worked with Tony (cameraman for "The Hunt") and three other kids; Adam, Mike, and Anna. Our movie rocked!! I can't wait for the kids to see the final edited version!

I brought a bunch of my equipment up there including my MX1 digital mixer and I got the chance to show them some basic effects. The whole week made me excited to do more stuff with my classes when school starts again! I'm also having an incredible time editing their movie together as I'm learning a ton of tricks! Laser beams!! Space ships!! It took way too much time but I couldn't help but laugh at times when things went right! I also couldn't help but swear when my blasted computer kept crashing!! For those of you who know the movie, I watched the entire "Birth of a Nation" during the time my computer was restarting! Start and stop!! Darn that freezing!!? Apple computers just got cheaper!! Hhhhhhhmmmmm?!!?

Wednesday night I stayed up in Green Bay and helped Darby shoot a police car in front of Mike's house!! We even got the cop to turn on the bubbles!! Man, are we big time or what?!

08-12-01 "Beansnappers!!"

The first thing I need to do right here and now is apologize to Tom (my best bud in the whole world!!) because he had to play errand boy! See I needed to get the Kid's Camp movie and the projector up to Green Bay by 6:00 but we didn't get started shooting until darn near 5:30. Tom needed to make the trip for me while I slaved away shooting the footage of not one beautiful girl but TWO!! The girls worked Joe and Joe over something fierce!! Let's just say the footage got way more heated than I had planned!! It looked great and the girls were incredible!! Thank you Viki and Kristina! You are wonder women!! Also Thank you Chris and Connie for making the shoot possible!

Anyway after the shoot I shot up to Green Bay to see if I could catch the end of the little Comedy City Kid's Camp film festival but I was too late. Needless to say I was still big time pumped up about the success of the day and I showed some of the footage to some of my friends from the club. Like a dumbass I didn't consider the fact that I was in mixed company! Craig, you're a dumbass!! I made sure to apologize to everyone. The footage was pretty darn good though!!!

08-17-01 "Wizard World Day One!"

What is Wizard World? Well just one of the biggest comic book conventions in the world!!

Cousin Joe and I took off for the great city of Chicago at about 5:30 and reached our destination at about 10:00! I got a chance to walk around Oak Park with my cousin Laura and second cousin Trevor. I didn't feel like going with Joe to find his pals as I knew it was going to lead to a big drunk and I wanted to be fresh for my first day at the convention of conventions... Wizard World!! Joe got big time lost and didn't make his connections on time so everybody was a bit worried about him. Futons suck!!

08-18-01 "Wizard World Day Two!!!!!"

Joe showed up bright and early much to everyone's relief and off we rushed to get our tickets! Thank you Maggie for the tickets it was a very sweet thing to do for us!! And Jessy, look out... I think Joe's sweet on you!!

From there we ran to the hotel room and woke up the heroes for the weekend. The infamous Willis brothers (Greg and Jeff) and their faithful sidekick Curtis!! It took a while to get them rousted but soon we were on our way!! My mission at the convention was to search for an original page from the Doom Patrol comic book drawn in the 1960's by Bruno Premiani. If there is anyone out there who has a page please get a hold of me!! Needless to say, I only found one page and it didn't have the character on it that I need! Bummer!!

I met some great people and made some great connections! The highlight of the event was partying like a rock star with soon to be legendary writer Sean McKeever of "The Waiting Place" and also of the most recent "Hulk" books! All the guys I was with went to school with him so we had a great personal connection!! We met with his artist Mike Norton who did a Creeper page that was the most incredible page I've ever seen the character on! Cousin Joe even bought Marvel comic's chief editor Joe Quesada a brew (I shook his hand). Tyler Maine (X-men's Sabertooth) and Jay (of Silent Bob and Jay - Jason Meuws) were both in the bar with us. Cousin Joe talked to Jay. Jay told him to "watch his nads!" We spent big bucks on drinks and got a bit wrecked! Oh ya, we crashed the G.I.Joe party with Sean and had a blast!! There were two comedians at the Joe party. The first one bombed and the second one was great. I talked to them both after the show. I was actually very impressed with them both and I couldn't believe the first guy just kept going. By the end of the night I had become an honorary Willis brother and we all sang the most bizarre song one could imagine. "Joe's gonna use the Twinkies for bait... Twinkies for the bait!!" It was frickin' hilarious at the time!! Still makes me smile! Crashed at Willis home base!

I also met the editor and publisher of Microfilm magazine, Jason Pankoke. He seemed like a pretty cool guy. Maybe "The Hunt" will get reviewed when we get it done?! Time will tell. The mag is a pretty good little read!

08-19-01 "Wizard World Day Three!!"

We all dragged our sorry butts out and made it to the convention by about noon (more like noon thirty!) and I got to shake Lou Ferigno's hand. Bought some more art and a few trinkets before we all decided it was time to mosey! I'm thinking of taking a class up in the twin cities at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. I think it'd be a lot of fun to get my comic done and printed (plus the instructor was a fox). I also met an adorable little cutie from Stevens Point who does her own book. I'd love to work with her to see what we could come up with!

Folks, don't get the wrong impression of me. I'm not some big hornball who's after every woman on the planet. I'd just like to find one that knows me and what I'm all about. I think it'd make me even more motivated and productive if I could find that person. Where the hell are you!?!?!?

Anyway, I made three great new friends this weekend and I'll tell you right now I'm going to be doing some kind of project with these guys!! You haven't heard the last of the Willis brothers!! SideKick Curtis works with stop motion animation too, so who knows where that can go?! Jeff even has a job with a public television station in the cities so he knows cameras and editing. I'm darn glad I got a chance to meet these guys! I've got an idea that could keep us all busy for another weekend and could be pretty cool. I'll need to talk to them.

The ride home was a bit rough as Joe was hung over and got a bit mean to the world while we were desperately lost in Chicago. Other than that it was one of my favorite weekends of the summer!!

08-20-01 "School Day One!!"

Welcome back to great Marion High School!! The day went great until I saw my room and what was done to it. Right now I have a very unmanageable classroom because a big hole was cut into the back of the room. Now I have much more room but I also have places where trouble can occur unsupervised!? I just need to take a deep breath and be patient. I don't know what I'm going to do for storage these next few months while we're figuring out what to do with the room. And I'm going to have kids on Wednesday already!!

This is going to be the year things happen for the art department though!! Mark my words!! Little Marion Wisconsin is going to win the video award at High School Art day!! I want to see it happen!!

I was more than disappointed with my room situation though. Almost like the work I've already done for the district was no big deal and we were right back to the days when art was underneath the secondary concerns. I need to make it happen though!! Me me me!!

Oh ya, I got an incredible INCREDIBLE gift package from a filmmaking pal down in Milwaukee! That's all I'm saying!! Thanks Jav! Good luck on your shoot!

The Rest of the Month!! "Woe Nelly, Some Big Time Changes!!"

Well gang, even the biggest, scariest mook in the entire clan is bound to get lucky once in a while!! Remember way back when I mentioned that I was going to the flea market to meet up with someone (it was on the sixth of this month). Anyway, I met up with her and we talked for nearly an hour. Her name is Lori and if you recall from past journal entries, she is the little gypsy girl that tickled my heart when I was judging the art show at the Mielke Theatre in Shawano! I awarded her daughter and her the third place ribbon in the fine arts category. They were very excited!! Bonus Points for me!! They actually won the award on their own accord, bonus points for them!! We exchanged email addresses and could have easily talked all day! Weasel and Big Les were getting antsy so I had to cut things short.

Lori and I emailed for a few weeks before I finally worked up the courage to ask her out on a real honest to goodness date!! Over the course of our email conversations we realized we had an incredible amount in common! I hadn't been on a date ever, technically, so you can imagine that I was a bit nervous!

We were like two puzzle pieces coming together! I had nearly given up on ever finding another creative soul to share adventures with but low and behold... Lori popped up!! In all honesty, I couldn't be happier!!

Here's where things are beginning to get a little tricky!! I am becoming bombarded by expectations that are keeping me away from my two top priorities; "The Hunt" and Lori! I need to start planning the Homecoming activities for school. I need to start planning and constructing a section in the Marion's first ever Haunted Maze! I need to start casting and directing the school play this year, Holder Posey The Felonious Photographer,! I also need to plan and construct three sets for the same play! Along with these requirements I'm also trying to do a decent job teaching my kids this year!! We're getting an in depth understanding of all the 'isms' this quarter. Cubism, fauvism, realism, impressionism, and surrealism are being introduced, each with a key artist to tie things into!

Right now I'm spread so thin!

Oh ya, I'm still trying to get a movie done for the film festival this coming April (December is the deadline!). There is also more and more talk about working on "The Day After!". I've got several people interested in doing the project but I just can't allow myself to start working on it until "The Hunt" sees completion.

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