March 27, 2007 by Dave.

These are just three of the non sequitors that make up my life these days.

If I successfully bombed my room for bedbugs, then what the hell is that welt on my back? I don’t think it’s a bedbug bite (I even went as far as to look up bedbug bites on line to see if what I had matched—they don’t since what I had are too far apart and not big, red welts and only one or two), but I’m not taking any chances. I’m doing the room again tomorrow. Susan’s paranoia is getting to me. I’m pretty sure that I don’t have bedbugs), but any kind of itch I may get, bedbugs pop to mind first. I want to double check and make sure this time. It sucks but I’m bombing my room again to put my mind at ease.

One thing that the first bombing of the room may have done is fix my mini-DV camcorder. A couple of months ago, I was trying to get a project that has been stalled due to technical difficulties, mainly my camcorder refusing to work correctly and play the tape correctly if at all. Yesterday, I was desperately searching for a copy of a video of the UU Young Adult play that I directed at the Boston General Assembly. I thought it was somewhere in my DV tapes and thought that I might be able to see it on the camcorder through the patchy gray thing that clogs up the visuals. As I’m looking at the video in the monitor, I realize I can see it correctly—no gray bars, no blockage, no problems. Have no idea what the hell happened. The thing seems to work only whenever it wants to. I’m pretty sure it’s possessed.

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March 24, 2007 by Dave.

My trip to LA for me was a tale of two cities. The first part of the trip was spent at the film conference in Newport Beach. Very pricey area. I didn’t even stay in that area, but at a Motel 6 in Stanton. Couldn’t afford it otherwise. At the conference was a terrific community of Latino filmmakers that really helped me out in a lot of ways. Honestly, it’s unlike any film conference I’ve ever been to and I’ve been to quite a few. It was so supportive and very connective. They really try to connect aspiring filmmakers to people who can get things made and everyone in between. Had a couple of good connections and am hoping something comes of it with one of my projects or helping out on another’s.

The area itself like I said was great to see, but I felt out of place in the ritz of it all, mainly cause I could never afford it. I think because of that and to save money, I felt like I wanted to see the seamier side of LA after the conference. With my trip to Las Vegas out of the picture, I decided to stay not just in LA but in downtown Hollywood. I had this idea to want to see the seamier side of Hollywood. If I was really interested in working in this town, I need to know all sides of it including the worst aspects of it. I posted a reservation online to a hostel just off of Hollywood Boulevard, but they apparently never got my reservation and couldn’t put me up. They recommended another hostel right on the boulevard. I walked over there and they had room. I checked in and spent the day trying to find affordable parking. I think the parking situation is about as bad as Boston, however they’re making more money in parking lots especially overnight fees. At least they did from me.

The hostel I stayed at had a lot of weekly residents there, meaning that was home to them. The first night was kind of a Felini movie. I walked into of my room just as I saw this black man dressed up as a what I can only describe as an alien gargoyle—red leather, thigh-high elevator boots, matching pants, red wings attached to his back, and long braided hair. Soon after, I saw a black male little person dressed up like a pirate cabin boy. These were two of the street performers on Hollywood Boulevard who take photos with the tourists for money. Walk in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater and up the block, you can take pictures with Spider-Man, two Captain Jack Sparrows, or Darth Vader. I think they were the only two performance artists there at the hostel, but I think quite a few people are residents there. Pretty much because the weekly rate is so cheap (I think it was being raised to $170 from $150 a week in two weeks). Of course I later found out why it was reasonably cheap. The last night I was there, one of the residents I knew well came into the kitchen scratching his arm and talking about how the exterminator was coming the next day to fumigate. It turns out that they had a bedbug infestation. He also told me that this isn’t the first outbreak. As my Vegas friend said, “you did see the seamier side of LA… you just didn’t expect to bring it back home with you.” Ain’t that the truth.

I really did see a dark side to LA I thought. There’s just a lot of people on the outskirts of a town that is based on glamor and glitz and it is in a kind of skid rowish area. Everything feels very tucked away. Like inside the mall next to Grauman’s Chinese Theater, there are some really nice and expensive restaurants. Great places to eat, but then you step outside and it just has a desperation vibe to it. At least that was my read of it. And this is the Walk of Fame area (don’t get me started on who should and who shouldn’t have a star there. I swear when I saw Cuba Gooding Jr’s name on the floor, I desperately wanted a jackhammer!). This is the street that people idolize and fantasize about, and it’s really the West Coast Times Square circa the early 1980s. Walking along Sunset Boulevard at night, the town feels really lonely.

It’s always good to know what you’re getting into. This trip was an eye opener to say the least.

P.S.–Some people already know that I sent out a treatment of a script to an actor’s productino company recently. I’m not going to name the actor, but it was a role he really wants to play and has been developing it for some time, but hadn’t found a script he liked. I wrote a treatment of the movie to see if I can get hired on as the writer for the screenplay.

I was hoping to get a meeting with them while I was in LA, but no such luck. I found out why when the lawyer helping me sent me an email. He said that the company’s development person thought my treatment “of the material was compelling” (their words), but that the company was going to develop the script within the company. If they took a meeting with me it opens them up to legal compromises, etc.

What’s cool about it is that they did like what I wrote more or less, they just couldn’t use it. That gives me a better chance when I decide to send them something else. I say when because yeah, I’m going to send them another script of mine to read–not a treatment, an actual completely written script–in hopes to sell it, which is what you have to do as a writer.

Personally, it’s one of the best rejection letters I’ve ever gotten.

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March 20, 2007 by Dave.

In Unitarian Universalist young adult circles, there are few things more important to our well being thatn conferences, especailly to those in the 18-30 sect. They become self made communities that sustain personal and spiritual growth and further a closeness that you don’t get in the real world. Two big ones that happen near the end of the summer are Opus and Concentric. They are a combined week-long conference focusing on spiritual retreat (Opus) and UU young adult business (Concentric). They are both incredible conferences and I have amazing memories of both cons, and this year I’m not going to either. I’m also not going to UU General Assembly, the anual meeting of Unitarian churches (thie year held out in Portland, OR).

Aside from the fact that I’m over the age limit for Opus/Concentric (I turned 38 this February, and the limit is 35—though that is semi-flexible) and aged out, I’m really trying to take a difficult road now. I was in Los Angeles this time a week ago bumming around after a film conference for Latino filmmakers. It was a great conference and a wonderful time. That conference is unlike any other film conference I’d attended, with the exception of the Independent Feature Project’s fall market and the Austin Film festival. It really connected filmmakers with people who can get decisions made and really try to get opportunities for its members. And they provide about 60% of the meals there—filmmakers, what markets or festivals do you know where they feed you?

In the time that I was in LA I made a decision to really try and push my career forward. This means a couple of things. Number one, I have to be open for opportunities, not just to write but to make films. Two, I need to go to the two other film conferences I mentioned. These conferences are NOT cheap, in some cases more expensive than Opus/Concentric and GA combined. So I need to save whatever monies I have to try and attend these conferences in the fall. So that means no other UU cons this year.

I was considering “crashing” Opus (meaning attending the YA con at age 38), but after this last week, I’m changing my priorities. It’s a shift in thinking for me, and one that is needed to get my career up and running. It’s basically that saying of outgrowing childish things and reasoning and doing things like a man. I’m not saying that Opus/Concentric or spiritual connectedness are childish—and they are extremely important to me—but my focus is changing to different things. As a father and an artist, I need to focus on getting my career off the ground. As such I have to adjust things accordingly.

At the LA conference, I met a couple of people who might be able to help me on my way. There are no guarantees, but it’s a start.

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March 4, 2007 by Dave.

Sophia is pretty near potty trained right now. She asks to go to the bathroom, hasn’t really had many accidents as of late (at least with me) and she goes through the whole proceedure pretty well (you know, pants down, sit on the toilet, do what you need to do, wipe, flush and wash your hands).

We’re shopping in Target when she says she has to go. I take her into the men’s room with me an go in the large handicapped stall so we can both fit in there. This toilet has sensors to flush itself so youdon’t have to, which I don’t thikn she has ever seen up until this point. She gets finished and as she’s pulling up her pants the toilet flushes. She spins around as she hears it.

    Sophia: What’s that?
    Me: It flushed.
    Sophia: Do I flush it?
    Me: No, you don’t have to. It flushes by itself.

Sophia stares at it for a moment and pats the top of it.

    Sophia: That’s a good toilet.

Of course when we got home, she asked if our toilet flushes itself too.

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March 3, 2007 by Dave.

Once again, I’m being pulled apart by my own artistic wild horses. There’s so much I want to be doing and have only so much ability to focus—and I don’t even have ADD. Writer’s block comes in a lot of forms. The one I have is where I have a lot of ideas and I can write them, but I’ve beaten myself up before I commit them to paper so they never get there.

I still want to complete this novella I’ve started. The first chapter was easier because most of it was written 10 years ago. Now I’m trying to keep it going. This whole thing was to help jumpstart my writing and I’m flailing around now trying to get started on the second chapter. This is in addition to trying to figure out what to do with my screenwriting. I’ve finished revising one screenplay and sent it to my mentor for his review. I may need another pass at it but I like where it’s at now. I hope he likes it enough to actually help get this into the hands of people who can produce it.

A couple of things have brought me to feeling drawn and quartered. My tax refund is not going to be enough to fully cover what the IRS wants to take out with the audits. The refunds are a lot less than I’ve gotten the last couple of years, but that’s also what got me in trouble with the feds to begin with. And with the credit card debt growing, I see no way out of it. Of course selling a screenplay (or even optioning one) would solve a lot of those problems, but it’s become more desperate to do as the year goes on. The pull to get something sold is a little bit too consuming, but so is the abyss of debt.

Another problem was something that happened on a myspace group board. There was a guy who is connected in the film industry lamenting about what he called “poser screenwriters”—people who call themselves writers but no do everything to break into the industry, like taking assignments from Craigslist (apparently some producers and their assistants do solicit scripts from there). Craigslist seems sketchy to me but that’s what was this guy’s problem. So he was forming a “boot camp” for people to write a screenplay in 8 weeks, the best one to be submitted to Jerry Bruckheimer’s assistant/reader. I considered it but then I emailed him a question if I should target the writing to Bruckheimer’s style/sensibilities—my style is more in the independent film vein and not the Bruckheimer blockbusters. Needless to say he never wrote me back. That sort of made me feel like I’m in that poser screenwriter category. Of course I’m taking that to heart. I shouldn’t and just keep writing but I’m very critical of myself and it already plays into my own self-doubt. So yeah, I’m laying a lot of crap at my own door.

Still there are a couple of things I want to do. I’ve stopped entering screenwriting contests and am concentrating of selling a script. Having said that, there are two opportunities of chance that I am taking: I’m applying for the Natucket Film Festival screenplay competition and the Sundance screenwriting lab. Having been through a writing lab last year, I feel I have a chance to get that. While the Nantucket script is a bit riskier (getting rejected, adding to more self-doubt), I think I may have a shot with it. I don’t have much time for Nantucket, so I’m submitting a script from the year before. With Sundance, I’m trying to rewrite a script I wrote about three years ago that needs two-thirds of it completely rewritten and I have until May 1 to get that done (I think). I’m trying to focus on these two screenwriting items and hopefully break through on that end. Not sure how it will work out.

I need to focus and not be all over the map. I just ruins me, but not sure how to do it any other way.

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