photographic doodling

mark is good about calling me up and suggesting we go out and take some pictures.  and, while the 2:00 afternoon sun is about the poor light of the whole day, we went just the same.

friends on the blogotubes

these are my friends.  chances are, you read some of them, too.

"a window into the williams' world"--my dear sister and her stellar husband.  originally they had two blogs, but, like so many other things in their lives, they became one.  lately, it's often been about be about impending babies, because that's what's going on.

"that's enough out of you, capt. amazing"--my brother himself.  good stories and life lessons about working in an office and videos of kittens.  may or may not be done by a monkey.

"lucky shirts"--jack and natalie.  sometimes about babies (and the frequency will probably increase), sometimes about other stuff, including mountains, families, and broken windows.  and, recently, i heard "the eels" on there.  now i like that.

"cafe rock"--the chris and alyssa.  and a kid rock.  and a pet rock.  and movie talk.  yet not on blogger.  weird.

"pretty much great"--by bekahjo.  the title says it all.

"one happy family"--beej waited until later than most of his friends to get married.  now he's got a wife and three kids.  i like their stories.

"jam hall"--jared and marvia, my favorite people in the state of north dakota.  no relation to tally hall; more like pb&j but for real.

"ready for my close-up mr. demille"--emily and renn and oliver flinders.  like a good documentarian, em has taken a seemingly common subject (be a young wife and mother) and has crafted a wonderful blog.  i haven't been a regular reader in a while, but it was her ingenuity that made me want to get a blog of my own.

"all the world"--leith(al), my favorite person from africa.  i just recently rediscovered her blog.

"spark plug in the sea"--kristin.  she doesn't write often, but i will reference her site when i finally post my tally hall review--she captured the second concert beautifully.

"ramblings and randomness"--laurie jayne.  i put laurie jayne last because i check her last.  i check her last because she is usually the most prolific.  and, as an aspiring writer, she's getting really darn good.  like, seriously dang.

non-blogs that like:

the criterion collection-- this is where i spend my free time.  i've compiled a list to rent from the orem library and am working on it.  i just can't get enough.

they shoot pictures, don't they?-- the best "serious film" site i've found.  the layout/design is horrendous, but for lists and rankings, this is close to definitive.

sight and sound top 10-- a shorter definitive list.  i follow it.

homestarrunner-- always a fan.  meh!

lds.org-- the most correct of any site on earth.

sister tag

my stellar sister did a "blog tag" a few days ago, and while i've got post ideas piling up, this is something i thought would be fun to do.

20 years ago:  

*becky and i came home from school to find mom and dad eagerly awaiting us, dad shouldering a large camcorder.  with barely suppressed excitement, mom asked what we learned in school that day, to which i announced that we were doing reports on different dinosaurs, and i got "anklyosaurus."  this paled when we learned that we were going to disneyland for a week, and i was amazed that i could miss that much school.  the trip to disneyland brought with it all of the memories and wonders that an 8-year old should have.  we went through "the haunted mansion", "the pirates of the caribbean", and "it's a small world"; i got a pirate hat and plastic sword, tim got mickey mouse baseball cap that he wore for a few years after, and dad bought the "sounds of disneyland" or something on a record;  we went to tijuana, where i remember very little, except that it was dark, and that we bought a gold sequined sombrero (which became a staple toy for the following decade) and the wooden chess set that sits on my living room table; we saw the ocean for the first time.  the video of tim (circa age 3.5) getting caught in the undertow and falling down has brought more laughter than the rest of our home videos combined; and, the most treasured memory of all, my dear sister dropped her plate of eggs in front of minnie mouse herself.

*mom was always very good at keeping us busy with summer activities.  i think this was the first year i did "art in the park" (the title says it all, folks), and i probably played some sort of sport (before discovering theatre three summers later).  at the same time, my best friend matt had just gotten a nintendo entertainment system, and i loved going to his house and playing "super mario brothers."  this was back when "video games" connoted blocky figures and simple colors, and when a whole new world expanded before an 8-year old mind.  it was exciting to ride our bikes down to "pick-a-video" at the perpetually-struggling... what was that little mall called?  it had the first "best buy" store outside of minneapolis, where we would walk through the aisles and feel overwhelmed by the media blitz of popular culture.  cassette tapes and compact discs (in the long cardboard cases) showcased all sorts of music stars as teenagers would crank a stereo in another part of the store for a brief moment.  it was scary, but kind of cool.  there was a store that did haircuts, also, and a "ben franklin" store, where you could get a really good stash of candy with the $1.67 that you'd saved up.  how did i get here?  ah, yes, "pick-a-video."  the friendly local video store, with walls covered in vhs boxes, many which made me nervous, and many more which just looked weird or boring.  but the guy who managed the place (i think his name was "dave") was very friendly to us, and they did have one wall for video games.  we'd stuff the $2.12 it cost to rent a game in our socks and bike down there to pick out a new treasure to find.  some games i don't remember, and others are ones that tim and i still pull out and play with affection at Christmas.  i remember the excitement when mom and dad would permit me to rent a nintendo; i think it was about $7 for the machine, and dad helped me set it up at home.  mom would help me figure out how to play "3-D worldrunner", "stinger", or "the legend of zelda", and i was thrilled.

it's very possible that all of these memories were not quite 20 years ago, but the feeling is there.

10 years ago:

*i was graduating high school.  me and jon and rob had good roles in our spring play, were jon was the lead and i wore a wizard costume, made from what looked to be a think curtain from the 70s.  my staff fell apart during the night the show was taped, causing great laughter at the after show party at jon's place; we also encouraged sarah braton to drink too much diet coke there.  at prom i had a top hat and cane; my date had a silver cape.  it was as good as it sounds.

we sang at our graduation (but didn't sound as good as the group two years before us), had some pretty good graduation parties--i scheduled mine to start around the time most of my friends' were finishing.  having had a lot of older friends, i'd been to enough and knew that there's a certain irony in everyone being stuck at their party while everyone else is stuck at their party. soon, we were facing that "american graffiti" summer, before my friends were off to college (most at the university of minnesota) while i was getting ready for a mission.  it was a bit of a torn feeling, watching my friends decided what to buy for their dorm rooms as i was getting ready to leave all of my friends and wear a shirt and tie for the next two years.

* i was working 40 hours a week at sun-mart, the local grocery store, alongside all the old ladies.  ginnie was nice and cool, but there was a grumpy old lady whose name i forget.  janice?  one of us would be in at 8, another at 9, and the third of us at 10.  and we'd be it for a while.  then, around 3 or 4, the high school kids would start coming in.  my friends were at college; i was working like an old lady.

*i received the melchizedek priesthood.  that's pretty great.

*i was teaching sunday school to the 11-12 year olds.  i didn't know a thing about the old testament, but as long as i could read the lesson in sacrament meeting beforehand, i could come up with enough cartoons, voices, giant penguins, and the occasional scripture to teach them that the bible is pretty cool.

5 years ago:

*my roommates were jack, aaron, chris, bret, and the scort.  that was a glorious time to be in apt. 104.  i knew it then and i know it now.  we would have apple beer parties at the end of each semester, where we stole the cushions from the couches in the rec room to cover our 

whole floor, turn the couches on end and drape blankets from them, drink as much apple beer as we could, and watch an awesome  movie.  

*jenny ricks was my best friend.  i wonder what she's up to?

*becky was in brazil on a mission.  i wrote her long e-mails.

*i was keeping busy as a cinematographer on student projects.  it was exhausting.

*i went on a date with whatsherface to "divine comedy."  we ended up in the emergency room.  jack did a dance.

3 years ago:
*i had graduated college and went to oregon to work on a movie called "the sasquatch gang."  it's kind of like "napoleon dynamite" (and made by a lot of the same people).  i sang karaoke there and was a rock star for 3 minutes 19 seconds.  i still keep in touch with one of my friends from there.

*i  came back from oregon and went to thailand, because my sister was there and i knew i'd never have the opportunity to do it again.  i was nervous; i didn't have any time to get the suggested shots, so i had jack give me a blessing.  becky and i rode elephants, swam in the indian ocean, and ate lots of curry.  our day in bangkok is one of my favorite moments; i recently was looking through some old e-mails and found this (addressed to the chris):

there's far too much to take in you
more to find than can ever be found

that's how i felt in bangkok last night; it's amazing riding on a bus, watching the streets of a city full of people who live lives very very different from the style i am accostomed to; to realize how big this world is, and to marvel at the awe of it all.

*i moved out of 104 and into a townhome with beej.  it was strange having little kids as neighbors, of having an address instead of an apt. number, and of having an upstairs.  in all my life, i'd never lived in a place with a second floor.  basements were normal for me; this was different.

1 year ago:
*i was living with mark.

*i was being released as elder's quorum president.  i didn't want to be, but knew it was right.  work really picked up shortly after, and i don't know if i would have survived.

*our ward split.  that was really sad.  i loved that ward.

*i was finishing my first movie as a 1st assistant cameraman, and was starting work on my first salty pictures movie.  working with them has been one of the best things to happen to me in work.

*we were cleaning out our neighbor's refrigerator.

yesterday:
*we went boating with our ward.  i wake boarded, wake surfed, and drove the boat.

*i had to stay for 2 hours after, because tim was still out on another boat with my house keys, and i couldn't get ahold of my sister.  i have since hidden a key, should such a situation arise again.

today:
*i didn't realize it was pioneer day until this afternoon.  i spent most of the day cleaning out our "harry potter closet" (the cupboard under the stairs), and organized the heck out of my camera gear.  it's all put together.  no heck remaining.

*becky and brady and julie and me played frisbee golf.  i'm always surprised how popular that is here.  at first i thought those people with a bag full of different discs were odd.  now i'm feeling like the two that i have aren't enough....

tomorrow:
*tim and i are going to the premiere of the new "x-files" movie.  he wants to wear suits; i'm ok with that.

next year:

*play the accordion

is that "jungle boogie" i hear?

in fargo-moorhead, "skateland" was the roller skating venue of choice (and only one for miles around).  i've probably been there a half a dozen times, although the only two i can recall were the end of fifth grade, when we feebly tried to impress the girls to the hits of "c+c music factory", and for a youth conference a few years later, when rollerblades were infinitely cooler than skates, and when it took all the courage i had to skate next to tami niswander, a nice girl who had openly acknowledged that she liked me (and whose name is now appearing for the fourth time on "sheep go to heaven.")  i haven't been there since, in part because skateland looked like, well, probably like just about every other roller skatery around: still stuck in 1982, with the owners taking full economic advantage of the fact that it's ok to look outdated.

provo-orem's very on "classic skating" isn't much different, except that it's quite popular with the locals, something i attribute to the lds/byu crowd.  which, by generalized definition, pretty much makes me a fan.  i don't remember the first time i went, but disco skating was one of my favorite entertainment staples of the 104 era.  last night was the first time i'd been in over a year.  the crowd was great, wendee and i had a blast, and i came home with the requisite "right-foot-inner-ankle" blister.  and yes, jack, your shirt is still getting used.

walking across byu last week, i found it hard to believe that i graduated almost four years ago.  that's as long as i was in college.  and, thanks to simple math, that's nearly eight years since i started college.  the thing is, all of that feels clumped together in my past, so that it's hard to remember what happened, and when.  last night's super sounds of the seventies did pull out a random handful of associated memories:

* "funky town" reminded me of the chris, of his black hat, white shirt, and suspenders that he would don, and how he got homer's comment, "i haven't felt this way about a song since 'funky town'," because he knew the song before i did.

* of the times when we'd browse d.i. in seach of good disco clothes, which was extremely difficult, since, in downtown byu territory, anything good there gets sold fast.  still, the scort found an excellent white suit for his orange shirt.  he always looked great out on the floor, and "jungle boogie" will always be his.

* watching carrie clark and her brand new pro-skates during "dancing queen."

* of that time we brought my sister and her roommates.  they weren't really the disco skating type.

* but ange, maren, and michelle were indeed disco skaters, as was the great sarah baer, and how they would all be at church the next day with several band-aids on their feet, showing through their sandals.

* how i used to wear my pseudo-sailor shirt that i found at d.i., and of the blue polyester pants with melted holes in the knees from the friction of falling against the floor.  (turning corners used to be a great challenge for me)

* of the time tim and i crashed head-on to one another and helped each other up, laughing.  what he was doing going the opposite direction, we still can't remember.

* the joy we felt when jack found that amazing sequined shirt at "savers."  (actually, i think the scort found his aforementioned white suit there.)  over the years, i think i've worn jack's shirt more, but he looked the best in it.  happily, they played our song last night- hallelujah!

le collection fabuleuse de jeff

c'est jeff.

this is jeff.

il aime rassembler des dvds.

he likes to collect dvds.

il aime les prendre outre de l'étagère,

he likes to take them off the shelf,

les organiser,

organize them,

et remis leur encore.

and put them back again.

the windows of heaven

it feels good to be typing again.

at the start of may, i was offered a job on "high school musical 3" and was looking forward to two months of work with my favorite crew in utah.  but when i found out we were shooting on sundays, something didn't sit well with me.  yes, i had worked a few sabbaths on the last movie i did, where we still held a small sacrament meeting during lunch time, but i wanted to be someone who didn't work on sundays.  after much contemplation and discussion with trusted friends, i gave the job to another friend and looked forward to having two months free.

but things do not always go as we plan.  i had never been so busy in my life.  in response to a friend's question one day, i realized that from the end of january to the first week of july, i did not have a full week off.  work was coming from everywhere, and, in the end, i was still able to be a part of  "hsm3", somehow managing to be there on the show's biggest production number (rumor was that those three days alone cost $1 million), getting in the crew photo, and being there for the free sweatshirts (although i regrettably missed both german days from catering).

in the end, i worked fewer days yet and earned more.  i got to jump to several different projects, some of which were very fun (pretty much anytime i assist brian wilcox is a good day), while "donnie darko 2" ranks among my least favorite shoots in recent memory.  standing out in that desolate field in the rain as the cinematographer insisted we could still shoot while the producers seemed to want to call it a night is one of those stories better remembered than experienced.  and in the midst of all of this, i've still been able to teach all of my favorite sunday school lessons, albeit two were after working an all nighter on high school musical.  i'm told i only said a few weird things.

thanks for checking here in the mean times.

much love to you all. 

on a sunday evening

i liked this article.

and this blog post.

good sabbath to you all.

reality tv

life on tv is so interesting.  even mundane life is fascinating.  if it wasn't, it wouldn't be on tv (granted, there is plenty of evidence to the contrary on that point, but now is not the time).  

tim is a big fan of scrubs, and since he watches it a lot, i tend to see it, too.  the show does an excellent job of looking at the challenges each of us face, be it difficulties of work, the quest for love and the ensuing paradoxical relationships, loneliness, or just finding our place in our own lives.  the caveat is that, despite dealing with essentially real problems, because the people in the hospital have both writers and an audience, their struggles seem so much more interesting, exciting, and noble.  seeing zac braff get chewed out by dr. cox is very funny; watching him and his best friend celebrate their minor successes is cool; and his narrations over the pains of loneliness seem so profound, while our own lives look bland by comparison.  their trials look fun. ours, not so much.
so easy it is to get caught up in it, wishing that our lives were exciting like that.   but not even exciting because we're hunting down terrorists by ourselves, or becoming the next media pop sensation; tv can polish even everyday life just enough to make us wonder why our lives don't glisten like that.  it's easy to get caught by the sparkle.
if fabrications can be this interesting, then what about the original? our joys are true; our loneliness is sincere; our stories continue on.  if it's ok for our tv friend to fall short, to feel lost, then so much the more for us and our friends.
what i do love about scrubs, and what i think gives it its strength and reason to keep watching it is not the comedy (although it has given me more moments of genuine out-loud laughter than any show in a long time) but their honest admission that all of us are, so very often, just barely making it through each day.  and that the only reason we haven't collapsed in on ourselves is because of the people around us.  no matter how together some of us may seem, there probably isn't as much as strength as is displayed, and the stability that we do have comes from the people standing on either side of us, in front of us and behind us.  that's really cool.
but now it's time to turn off the tv.

see caspian

i was surprised at how much i enjoyed the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe a few years ago.  in fact, it tied with millions for my favorite film of 2005.  this was nice, because after three years of getting a great lord of the rings movie for Christmas every year, 2004 felt empty without any swords or wizards.  narnia successfully filled the void.

i didn't grow up on the books (i read it just a few days before i saw the movie), so i held no nostalgic bias.  but i loved everything about the first narnia movie: the casting all around, the battle at the end, aslan, santa claus, and the beavers.  especially the beavers, although i'm not fully sure why. 

last night we were at the midnight:05 showing for prince caspian, the second entry in the filmic series.  it's been one of the movies i'm most looking forward to this summer, since the first was so darn good and last night did not disappoint.  it was everything i wanted it to be and then some: as good as the first, and sometimes better.  

and it seems that everyone felt it was as good as the first, although bear in mind that everyone has differing opinions about just how good the first movie is.

this morning i perused the review websites, hoping to see praises galore for the movie.  i was a little disappointed to see moderately positive reviews, citing the films flaws but saying it's generally pretty good.  as i read them, i usually agreed with the stated weaknesses (it doesn't have the character depth of lord of the rings).   nevertheless, for me, i dare say it will be on my top 5 movies of 2008.

go check it out.  it's oh so good.

and if you have young ones, keep in mind that it's got some pretty hefty fight scenes.  like the first movie, the battles aren't bloody, but they're tough enough to make you feel that it's a dangerous place.

perfecto

the chris was once meeting the family of a girl he was dating.  as they were talking with him, they became impressed with his interests and accomplishments. "is there anything wrong with you?" they asked.
"well," chris admitted, "i don't like sports very much."
"even better!" said the family.

everyone is looking for a perfect match, but everyone's "perfect match" is different.

someone like you

i was once lamenting to a friend about a girl whom i liked but didn't like me back.
"why would you want to be with someone who didn't like you?" he asked.

that question is either ironic or irrelevant, depending on how you take it. one could argue that, "well, i wish she would like me." otherwise, it makes its swift point, leaving you with no option but to concede they're right.

at church today, i was looking around and saw several girls i think are pretty. "i'd be nice if she had a crush on me" is an easy thought to nurse. yes, it would be nice to have one of the pretty girls from church interested in me. but when i imagine that, i also imagine that her interests are the same as mine.  i want to her like me and to like coming to classic movie night and to sing with me in the car and to read my blog with the same rapt attention that you have right now. i don't just want her to like me, i want her to change to be everything i want, and automatically include that when i imagine if she liked me.

how often does this happen even in relationships where people do like each other? that, even when there is a mutual attraction, we want more than them to like us: we want them to like all that we like, and to be all that we imagine could or should be.  it's hard to step back and remember that we liked them they way they were, and need to continue to like them for them, not for us.

in reality, i really don't have any serious interest in anyone at church; i just got thinking about the whole thing.

too much or not enough

in seventh grade our school play was "backstage broadway revue," a hodgepodge of short scenes, songs, and monologues. my shining moment was playing a "baby" with mary soumala, in which we sang a song about it being ok to be who you are. i was proud of it, as it was one of the few roles in the play that wasn't a large ensemble piece. my best friend jon, however, had a monologue scene that was actually rather good. he talked about the literal out-of-place physicality of the junior high years, being too tall for some things, yet too small for others. jon was often short for our grade (while i was tall for the times), so this made him an ideal choice for the role (he was also a good actor, a rarity especially then). "too old to go trick-or-treating, too young to drive," he lamented. "too tall to play on the playground, too small to ride the rollercoasters."

a decade and a half later, it's easy to feel the same way about dating.

reading and writing... for kids!

i'm helping cheryl out at her elementary school.  it's wednesday night, shortly after 9 pm.  taking a break from organizing pictures from a field trip on iphoto, i glance over at the book order and see a book entitled "the cat-- you go, graduate!" it looks like something that may appeal to children, but all in all, it looks rather silly.  further inspection reveals that this is a sticker book.  even in elementary school, i had no interest in those; still, kids in my class did order them, leaving not the question of who buys this, but, rather, who makes this?  were they proud of it, or is it a sort of embarassing job, and do they really want to do graphic design for a high class ad agency, or write for time magazine?  is the photographer, using an extreme-wide angle lens to photograph a cat in a graduation cap, hiding this in their resume, or is this a marketable style, off which one can live well?

scanning the rest of the book order cover, it's easy to look over it and think that these are written by writers who never achieved their dreams, and to feel the tragedy with that.  perhaps they dreamt of being a new york times bestseller, and yet have produced nothing more than a short series of paperbacks featured in an elementary school book order.  and while not everyone's life success is based on their professional accomplishments (i've been working with adam baldwin the past few days; on his imdb page, he says that acting is not his life's work; his family is. that's oh so cool), professional success is not determined by the most glamorous or critically acclaimed, either.  there's a good chance many of these people are doing what they enjoy: writing for children.  

when i was in fifth grade, the robert asp middle school had a book fair.  the lunchroom-gymnasium was filled with wheeled bookshelves that could be folded shut and rolled away, off to the next school.  near the back corner of the room, close to the right side of the school stage, i saw a book entitled, my teacher is an alien.  i generally liked school, and never suspected my teachers as being anything more than good people, but this title was still too much to resist.  i loved the story, and it turned out to be by the same author as monster of the year, another book i'd picked up earlier.  the author was bruce coville, a name i didn't need to look up or struggle to remember.

throughout my middle school years, i loved bruce coville's books.  jeremy thatcher, dragon hatcher; the monster's ring; stories about boys my age but where my imagination wanted to go, where the fantastic was allowed to mingle.

of all of his books, the my teacher is an alien series was the best.  the first three books were each written from the perspective of a different student, all introduced in the first, providing not only wonderful viewpoints of mutual events (although the stories were largely separate from one another), but also three very distinct narrators, allowing a middle school mind to experience varying characters and backgrounds.  of that series, the third book has always been my favorite (it was also the last one i acquired, if i remember correctly).  my teacher glows in the dark picked up where the first book ended, with the nerdy kid choosing to leave with the eponymous teacher-alien.  what was so enthralling about the story was that the boundaries of imagination seemed to have been taken down.  mr. coville created an alien spaceship and culture that, even now, seems as realistic as anything i've heard of, provided we let ourselves believe in an alien superculture.

unlike the aliens in the majority of sci-fi, be it the hallowed "star wars" trilogy or "aliens" or whatever you like, the creatures are just scary, goofy, furry, slimy, or different creatures.  but they're still creatures--like something we might find in a cave in the himalayas or the yucatan.  the captain of the spaceship put it best, bemoaning, "you carbon-based life forms are so molecular-centric.  until you meet another form of life, you seem convinced that carbon is the only way to grow." (p.30)  the reasoning behind this is clarified when you know that the ship's captain was best described as a large tank with crystals floating inside.

and that is what i loved about the story.  aliens who created with smells, others who were seemingly little more than a shadow, communicating through flickering; explanations on how language translation works amongst a multitude of races; descriptions of how a ship moves across intergalactic distances, and even transportation within a spaceship the size of new jersey (incidentally, the ship is named, "the new jersey" for that reason).

and when they discuss the issue of humans developing interplanetary travel (which leads to the thesis of the whole series, one that gets overly preachy yet still raises good questions for young readers), the captain explaining they "don't mind you exploring your own solar system; there's not much there anyway.  but if we cannot allow you to carry this sickness, whatever it is, into the galaxy at large," well, things like that just let my mind wander.  (page 32)

"i nodded to him, and he made a gesture which translated into, 'i salute your sinus cavities'--something i'm sure had more meaning for him than it did for me." (p.88) 

for writing children's books, for making them available in scholastic book orders, for letting my imagination roam when i was 12, and for sustaining the wonder a decade and a half later, mr. coville, i salute your sinus cavities.

ctr

i've been thinking about what it means to choose the right.  it is easy to think that when we make the right choice, that things will get easier, that our struggles will lessen.  it really sounds like that's what should happen when we do the right thing.

in the end, it always will.  choosing the right will bring us the rewards we really want, the deeper happiness, the greater security.  in the end.

but the end rarely comes right after we make our decisions.  very often, choosing the right means following the road less traveled.  things get harder.    we don't see the results we were seemingly told would come when we chose the better part.  we think that choosing the right will bring ease, comfort, immediate happiness, and/or a clear and obvious success.  it's then that we begin to wonder, "did i make the right choice?"  "did i do good?"  "does it matter?"

the answer is a resounding, YES!  and after the choice has been chosen, after we have made our selection because we saw it as the better half, the nobler part, the wiser path, we then step into shadows.  this is the exciting time, when we can hold on to what we believed, remembering that we did, indeed, choose the right.  often, this is a battle within the quiet walls of our hearts, fields where no one else knows of our struggles.  yet these silent choices are what shape us into who we become. 

wait for the reward; it may tarry, but it will come. 

as if once wasn't wonderful enough

OHBOYOHBOYOHBOYOHBOYOHBOYOHBOYOHBOY!!!!

jaime just told me that tally hall is coming to provo again.  may 24th.  just over a month away.

oh wow.  i spread the word to the local hall fans.

this is the best thing in the world.

the illustrated trip to vegas

every year in april las vegas hosts one of its largest conventions, the national association of broadcasters.  a lot of it is actually broadcasting related, with nerds showing what looks to be a metal box and touting that they can transmit my hd radio signal with clarity.  it's so expansive that there are just enough film-related companies and products to justify me taking a trip down for a three hour stop at the convention center and then enjoying an evening in vegas.  i've gone four of the past five years, and this time i invited mark and tim.

and we took a small camera.

pretty much every time i've ever gone to vegas, i've been the one driving.  this time, mark offered to take his car.  tim called shotgun and i was more than happy to have the whole back seat to myself, although i had to avoid the right-side seatbelt, as it still had purple corn starch on it from the festival of colors (another post i need to write).  

i told mark i wanted to leave at 8.  we left at 8:45.  i was ok with that, because i know that's how trip-leavings go in my family, and was expecting it.

you know how the seat belts sometimes go tight, to protect you from being flung around in case of a car accident?

and sometimes they do that even when you're nowhere near any sort of a situation resembling a car accident (or "collision")?

yeah.

we stopped at a little town for some lunch and somehow we declared lunch would be 'kfc or nowhere'.  we cheered as we saw the smiling colonel down the street, and then took our turns in the restroom.  i thought it was cool that they had a sort of "science in action" toilet, where you could see how it works.  (one has to wonder, how does a kfc toilet get broken like that?  i like to imagine it was an A&W root beer fueled brawl over the last drumstick)

every time i've seen patton oswalt (the voice of remi the rat from "ratatouille") on conan o'brien, he's always raving about the "kfc bowl", which he (aptly) describes as "the entire left side of the menu pushed into a bowl; it's what frankenstein would order."  that sold me on it.

and while i was crushed to find that the root beer tap wasn't working--a frosty mug just isn't the same with sierra mist--the bowl was all that i hoped it would be and more.  corn, gravy, mashed potatoes, and chicken, all together.  i highly recommend it.

tim's ipod provided musical entertainment the whole way down and back.  i got laughed at for not knowing the backup chorus to an offspring song, we belted weezer's 'buddy holly' glorious, and sang 'bohemian rhapsody' in a way that would have made my dad proud.

(at the bottom of the sign, tim's thumb is covering up "goats".  honest)

(editor's note: i just found out tim did that intentionally)

this is not the first time that i've driven through southern utah and the conversation has produced geology questions.  i've wondered how "mesas" are different from "plateaus" (a mesa is a free-standing flat-topped mountain, while a plateau is the flat outcropping of a mountain, i believe).  this time we wondered how mesas are formed.  scott "the scort" himes has always been my go-to man for all things geology, and even though his life goes forward like a locomotive and i haven't talked with him in a while, i decided it was time to chat; he told me that mesas are formed when the softer rock is eroded away from the harder rock, leaving the mesa to stand alone.

i really should note that mark gave this exact answer before i called scott.  it's just that the scort's always been my source for geology questions, and there's inherent security in that.  and i hadn't talked with him in way too long.

mountains always make me think of the scort.  mountains and trebuchets.

what about joshua trees?  are they actually trees, or are they cacti?  on the way home, i decided to cast my vote for "actual trees."

i registered mark and tim for the convention, too, so they would be able to come in with me (we got name badges and everything!)  mark decided that he was my "vp of acquisitions" while tim was the "productions manager."  i think they tried to pretend like they knew what people were talking about, with varying results.

panasonic is usually a good place to start, but they didn't have anything especially notable (although there is a new camera of note coming in the fall), but arri is always fun to check out--they actually make movie cameras.  i really wanted to check out their new digital D21, but it was getting hogged the whole time by some pretentious l.a. wannabe commercial director who knew nothing about cameras.

but i got to check out the 416 instead; i saw it last year, but it's still a brilliant little camera.

that's my account acquisitions manager; he's usually in the office or on the road, so he doesn't get to see the cameras very often.

"steadicam" is the industry-standard of camera stabilizers.  at byu, we had a "glidecam", the poor-man competitor.  it worked well for us and our films, but as i've worked with steadicam operators, i've blushed at our clunky student tools.  i got to play with glidecam's new rigs they were pretty darn impressive (and LOT less pricey).  this is the kind of stuff we come to find out about.

i'm not sure what company this thing was for, or why it was even here, but it was really, really weird.

i mean this would have given me nightmares when i was twelve.

after a good talk with a guy about sony's new f23 camera, i told tim and mark that we were on the return; we'd start heading back toward the exit and stop anywhere we missed. i knew that most of this stuff wasn't that interesting to them and they had been good about not getting bored, but they were starting to act kind of strange. the kind of strange when, in high school, jon and jamie had some inside joke that i wasn't in on. mark assured me they'd explain when we got to the car. whatever.
i stopped at the store and picked up a book i saw almost bought last year, a study on the use of color in film entitled, "if it's purple, someone's gonna die." (the title alone is worth it, and when the lady at the register told me it was 40%, i hardly cared why my friends were acting oddly)
nevertheless, when we found our car again in the massive parking lot and got in the car, mark turned to tim and said, "fine, here's your $3."

it turned out that while i was talking with the sony camera guy, they made a bet about how much longer it'd be until we got to the car; if it was less than 45 minutes, mark owed tim $3.  if it was more, tim gave mark his $5 starbucks gift card he'd won.  neither of them could influence me in anyway to get me to hurry up or take my time, which explains why mark would start to say something and then suddenly stop and say "nevermind."

i thought that was clever.

we had a room at the venetian.  someday i'll stay at the bellagio, but it didn't work out this time.  ...and it's not like the venetian is a second-rate place anyway.

driving into the parking garage, mark noted that the cars in front and behind were quite expensive compared with his car (which is nice and new already).  this comment had me watching people as were entering this italian palace; was i suddenly a comparative lower-class, carrying my backpack of clothes to check in?

i visually perused the line as we waited by amid the velvet ropes: yes, the hotel looks like it was built for the medici, but the patrons looked like me.  the couple at the front were in shorts and sandals and had probably backpacked europe; the man directly ahead of us was dressed like a mid-level business man, probably in town for the same reason we were; behind us was a lady in dark hair and dark sunglasses whose luggage looked comparable to a louis vuitton.  in short, were belonged here as well as anyone.  this was my kind of place.

standing in line, my astute younger brother noted that you can often get an upgraded room when you check in, since they will most likely not all be taken and the hotel wants to make some money on them.  so we asked the nice man.

we were currently in a 650 sq. ft. room (and one king bed--that was the only option when i reserved the room); for $100 more we could get a 1100 sq. ft. suite (with two queen beds) (editor's note: that's more footage than my townhome).  normally it'd be a $150 for the upgrade, but because we booked on vegas.com, we got the discount.  write that one down, folks.

$100 divided by 3 = $33 each.

oh yeah.

we flashed our cards to the security guard outside the elevators.

we scanned our cards to operate the elevators.

we pushed the button for the 18th floor.

we found suite 306.

it had double doors.

this was seriously dang awesome.

i loved that i could run into the room and not stop for 3 seconds (that doesn't sound like much, but try it in your own house and see how far you get).

mark and tim modeled the bathrobes (which could be ours for only $79).  

whenever you travel with my or my brother or sister, you have to be quick about the complimentaries, especially if it's a nice place.  as we were admiring the room, tim was already cleaning out the bathroom and loading shampoo, conditioner, lotion, and even the extra roll of toilet paper into his bag (mark harassed him about this until he felt the roll; then he understood.)

if you or someone you know works for the venetian hotel, please let this be our little secret.

later that evening, when tim and mark were at the club lounge, i would discover the joy of moving back and forth between a hot bath and a cold shower.

that is not the tv remote that tim is modeling.

no, that remote controls the curtains!

but speaking of tvs, we have a nice one in our suite.

and a second one opposite the beds.

and a third one in the bathroom.

(tim said he watched "will and grace" in there that evening.)

but after all this ooohing and aaaahing of our palace for the evening, we remembered that we had been hungry since three hours ago (when we didn't feel like spending $8.50 for a slice of pizza), and we pulled out the house dining directory.

this is vegas.  this is one of the nicest hotels in vegas.  there are some serious restaurants here.  i read that mario batali has a restaurant here, and, since i've heard of him, i wanted to check it out.

all of the restaurants are on "restaurant row", beginning with the grand lux cafe--essentially the cheesecake factory but a fancier name.  we continued on, checking out the menus as we walked down the lane, where the prices climbed with each step, culminating at mr. batali's, where there weren't evening prices listed.  

i was ok spending the money for dinner at a serious venetian restaurant, but not when considering the portion size to cost ratio; last week in san francisco, the company dropped $450 for six of us.  true, it was the best sushi i've ever had, but i was barely full then.  i didn't want to leave mario's b+b restaurante still hungry.

we sprung for the grand lux cafe--a cheesecake factory by any 

other name is still a cheesecake factory.  i've eaten there a few times before and have been happy.  but, best of all, they have a seriously good sugar-rimmed strawberry lemonade, something i could never find in san francisco.

on the strip, there's only so much to do if you don't a) gamble or b) go to a show, but the bellagio fountains are always worth it.  i also wanted to visit the wynn hotel; i'll heard enough hullabaloo about it but only stopped in once briefly.  inside, it's pretty much like the bellagio; a little nicer, maybe, but the bellagio did it first.  walking up to the entrance, we saw a ferrari showroom,

 advertising cars for rent.  i commented that it was probably $30/hour to rent a ferrari (aren't

 most cars about $30/day?) and mark and tim

 laughed at me.  this being vegas, we made a sort of bet, though nothing was ever wagered: i had $0-100/hour, tim had $200+, and i guess mark was had the middle area.  whoever was right was... right.  

outside the showroom was a sign: $10 just to come in and look at the ferraris.  that was enough for me; i was off on that one.

as we were in the gathering throng at the bellagio, the nice pre-recorded lady voice told us that due to high winds, the fountain show would be cancelled until 9:30.  this same thing happened when kirk and i were down here for nab last year.  he and i waited for an hour and didn't see a single show.  rather than wait an hour in this dusty, windy, yet cultured environment, i proposed we do something else i haven't done in vegas for a while.

across the street from the bellagio is "paris", wherein they have little parisian cafes that sell simply delightful confectionaries.  when my mom and i were down here three years ago we discovered a little chocolate something called a "millennium."  it's $5, but 1) this is vegas, 2) it's pretty much worth that anyway, and 3) it's much better than the $5 brownie sold as the bellagio across the street.

a millennium is a small angelfood cake slice with a small bit of pistachio pudding.  upon and around this is built a hearty cylinder of chocolate mousse.  over that is a soft and gooey layer of rich, dark chocolate.  if you have the means, i highly recommend picking one up.  it is so choice.

tim really wanted to go to the venetian's nightclub, but seeing as monday really isn't much of a party-night (everyone's having family home evening, i presume) the club was closed but the lounge was open.  he and mark chilled there while i enjoy the luxury of our room and worked on my sunday school lesson.

it's a very lovely room.  it was pretty dang awesome getting to stay in a place like this, and even when i opened the cupboard door and it fell right off, the front desk was happy to send a repairman up, assuring me it wasn't my fault.

the morning brought a dilemma of where to eat: do we feast at the grand lux breakfast buffet (i've eaten there before; it's very good) or do we go to in-n-out burger?

in the end, is there really a choice?  when i'm in vegas, i don't care what fancy restaurants i go to, as long as i get my fresh-cut fries, animal style burger, and (really good) chocolate shake.  tim went with a 3x3 burger, while mark got his fries animal style.

and it seemed a chinese tour bus must have stopped there right before we walked in.  at the time, i wished the lines weren't so long.  looking back, i'm glad they got to have some of america at its best.

in nephi, we found the loneliest "taco time" in the whole country.

mark stopped at the gas station across the street to get something to drink.  as i was browsing the aisles for nothing, a man came in and asked the gathered locals for directions to "big rock candy mountain."  i was sure i misheard him, but as the old cowboys were giving directions, it was confirmed; somewhere down here there is a "big rock candy mountain."  is the song true?  are all the boxcars empty?  is there a lake of stew?  do you never have to change your socks?

as i pondered this at the counter, i saw they were selling thin mints girl scout cookies.  this was something i did need.

back in the car, i realized that girl scout season comes only once a year and, as no one has come to my door, this is probably my sole opportunity.  thus, i seized it and ran back inside to get another box.

yesterday it was 90 degrees in las vegas.

this morning, tim was swimming outside on the roof of the venetian.

and yet we somehow came home to a snowstorm.

further, we came home to our house being decorated, with nothing more than a vague "welcome home" written on the microwave.

(we have a short list of suspects.)

it was pretty much the best trip ever.