"Operation: Better way of life" continues

Well, I've done a rough budget and it looks like I could work my last day at my current contract on May 9th (provided that there has been some honesty regarding the length of the contract, which isn't always the case) and live frugally for three weeks to a month before needing employment again. If I'm lucky and my British tax refund arrives in time, I could even nab myself a second month.

However, I had originally planned to use that to cover the main cost of flying to see my friend in Berlin this fall. It would also make for some useful padding in my financial cushion, something that would be wise to fatten if I'm going to be working as little as possible. But maybe I should consider that my time in London (and Athens) could be seen as enough Old Buildings etc and careful saving for the time being. There is something to be said for investing in your career and personal contentment isn't there? That's another trick, of course, to make the time off feel like an investment instead of a purchase - the method being obvious enough (actually getting serious script work done and hustling further work).

Looking forward to all this, it becomes increasingly easy to resent the hell out of the beige coated office where I'm grossly under utilizing myself - but it's the work I do here that will earn the money to facilitate what I hope to be the first in a series of leaps to being able to make a living doing what I love. So yes, maybe I look about and realize that from my seated position the only way I can tell what time of day or which season it is, is by checking my computer and am thus reminded of the practices of certain prisons to disorient their charges - but I don't rabbit on about it to my co-workers or pretend that I've found some profound metaphor to describe office life.

Not like an obese twat in a baseball cap that I remember from the group training session at a job I turned down during the days between finishing my degree and hoofing it to London. I'll never forget how, as the trainer left to allow us privacy to fill in some paperwork that involved confidentiality or the like, the twat lifted his flabby chin and - with a big grin - asked everyone in the room if they "felt like robots yet?". Two people gave him dirty looks, one person's features drooped and the rest ignored him completely. I only got as far as "Well then -" when the trainer came back, but what I was trying to say to him was "Well then, why don't you go do something else?".

Sitting in the office two weeks ago and feeling more than a bit pissed off at what I was doing, that's precisely what I ended up saying to myself.

Leveling up...

NERD

Moving on!

So okay already, I've been in Toronto nearly 12 weeks now. I've got a place, I've got some furniture and though I don't have a steady job...I'm no longer entirely sure if I want one. This is related to my desire for something more than working jobs during the day in which I gain nothing but a paycheck, then trying to pursue my scriptwriting career in my spare time - essentially working 60 to 80 hour weeks and, even if I use spare time to relax, feeling at all times like I am doing something wrong if I am not writing.

As I'm sure anyone reading this can imagine, this has become pretty draining after two and a half years. That's how long it's been since I finished my degree and decided to forgo further education to dedicate myself to my career. I'd say I got off to a good start, making my short film and then heading to London...but along the way I think I may have fallen into a bit of a trap. This stems, essentially, from my take on the idea that you have to put up with a certain amount of - let's be poetic here - "shit" in order to earn "the good stuff". This is a pretty fair thing to believe.

But I'm now sure that I've either been putting up with the wrong kind of shit or too much shit in order to really get my mitts on a fair share of "the good stuff" - AKA progression in my struggle to make scriptwriting my full time career. At times, scriptwriting has been so squeezed into the margins of my day that it has begun to feel more like a really passionate hobby than what I really want it to be.

So, in no small part inspired by a daring move by my friend Victor in his own artistic endeavors, I've decided that it's time to either commit or quit. Luckily something has happened which I didn't think would - a third room mate that I could actually tolerate and enjoy living with has come up and shall be moving in at the start of the next month. This will help get my monthly living expenses down to a level which I believe most chartered accountants would define as total bullshit.

Thus!

I am going to try and get myself in the position to work a permanent job for just three days a week and use the other two working days to scriptwrite and hustle. To do that starting fresh instead of hurriedly scribbling during lunch breaks and after long days of punishing mundanity. I will then even be able to, heaven forbid, take a day on the weekend to do nothing but recharge my batteries and not feel like I have fallen victim to the bullshit that is an "opportunity cost".

Until that permanent part-time role becomes mine, I plan to alternate between temping and "not working". The contract I'm on right now goes for another two weeks (I think, maybe a third). After it ends, I'm taking one solid week off to experiment and see if my work ethic can be honed to (or is already at) a sharp enough point to really knuckle down to the grindstone and not look this gift horse in the metaphor until I can come up with a better metaphor for "to see if I'll actually spend the day writing or just wank around".

Chili Willi

It's an odd time for me right now. I have more going on, writing and production-wise, than I think I ever have. BUT it is all in the early, larval stages - steadily developing, but larval nonetheless. It'll probably be at least a couple of months before anything I'm putting to paper and word file gets made into a kaleidoscope of stimuli I can wiggle under the behinds of my friends and loved ones.

So I post a picture of the eleven liters of chili I made! POT LUCK TONIGHT, TIME TO WORK ON THAT POT BELLY.

I attended a group comedy writing "jam" (or whatever the fuck you want to call it) last night. Good times and I think my chops were sufficient. It's always nice to bounce shit off of people, back and forth and let an idea snowball. I find that's often when I'm at my best with comedy, which is certainly why I often wish I could just transcribe conversations with friends and get paid somehow. Though, of course, you always need to make sure any of that shit is actually funny to people who aren't you and your buddy - you and your buddy in that specific circumstance.

Meanwhile, here is something I wish I'd had while in London - but which anybody might enjoy.

I GOT SOME OF THOSE

So yes, it took longer than I expected but the screenprint is finished. For those who'd like to know more about the process, let's work backwards.

When everything goes to hell...

...I'm going to go to South America and live with the other Ewoks.

When men are allowed to be offended...

Guys...this...this is sexy...it just is okay?

Online petitions...

...feel about as flaccid as [Republican Senator's member] after they were caught soliciting [sexual act] from [homosexual escort] at [public transit terminal or back alley]!

But this one seems worth a damn, particularly since it is the precursor to a march on April 22nd - aka Earth Day. If you live in Toronto, you may wish to attend.

Cursed uninventive Anglo bastards

Seriously!

I just got back from a short trip out to Etobicoke, which richly reintroduced me to the pale grey wasteland that is a Canadian office park, and along the way I passed through a subway station named "Islington". Seeing it in a subway, a mode of transport I never used much until I lived in the UK Islington, really made my head flip for just long enough to notice.

Meanwhile, I'm going to try silk screening for the first time today. Results shall be posted later!

Pfffffft.....

Fire and Gold

Just a couple of things I bumped into recently, which I like. Firstly, I learned of the great Toronto fire in a manner more interesting than playing six degrees of Wikipedia.And this caught my eye firstly because it is in gold paint, which you don't see often, and then because of it's message.

If you can't write and are sick of the computer...

...then drink and paint!

Reference picture - A London "Teddy Girl" I clipped out of Nude magazine.Sketchy sketchGettin' thereI'm not sure if I consider this done, but it's done enough for today.

Urghhhh

Sorry guys, wrestling with writers block and job hunting doesn't an epic narrative make.

More soon, hopefully.

Awesome

Al Gore has started something pretty interesting this week.

The project's own page.

And the video, for which they roped in William H. Macy.

Swans & Garbage

During the temp job I just finished, one of my favorite things to do during my lunch hour was to go down to the waterfront. Soon enough I figured out the specific spot that two particular swans (and two cheeky ducks that follow them to pick at the food the swans often get thrown at them) like to come to.One swan was noticeably slower than the other and thus, thanks to some half-memory from a Warner Brothers cartoon I saw years ago, I secretly named him "Wilbur" and sometimes provided him with dialogue of the slow-witted mountain person variety. He and his nameless, brighter accomplice would show up at 1pm each day like clockwork and once or twice a week I would take great pleasure and relaxation in feeding them bits of bread that I'd try to save for them. It's not hard to see why seniors enjoy doing this sort of thing. By getting lost in their little world I could take a nice break from the stresses of my own. It was surprisingly difficult to get a decent shot of the two opportunistic ducks that would always see me feeding the swans and then nip over to try and steal what they could. The smarter, nameless swan often got really pissed at the ducks and once it even managed to clamp it's beak over the neck of a duck and give it a good shake - followed by a honk which I can only assume was Swan for "Fuck off you little bastard". Swan's are pretty foul mouthed eh? Anyways, I managed to get one of them in the bottom right of this picture.Now, this is right along the waterfront - specifically the waterfront which is supposed to be the shining glory of Toronto with all those million dollar condos that get the Che Guevera T-shirt brigade rubbing their tits in a fury. A lot of effort has been put into the landscaping, architecture and general cleanliness of this place - a rough analogue to my beloved Thames Embankment. Thanks to where I was temping, I've even gotten some interesting glimpses at what is planned for the future of the waterfront along with plenty of Utopian concept drawings and models. All that said and I still caught plenty of this.Which brought my mind back to things I've been reading in general and specifically about microscopic plastics in the world's supply of water. The mind starts to reel a bit, or at least mine did. I began to wonder how much of the chemical composition of Lake Ontario has been replaced by plastic particles. Then I wondered how much plastic was inside the Swan's stomachs. How much they were taking in with each bite of the bread I was tossing into the water for them to eat. How much of my own body, no matter how tiny a percentage, was contaminated by these particles - given the old 60% water routine. Idly tossing the bits of whole wheat into Wilbur's path, I felt like what I was doing was all of a sudden a bit sinister on just about every level possible. In a word, it felt polluted.I appreciate that VICE magazine is an amusing and often offensive (though not for the reasons you'd think) source of information - but their Internet television network VBS is a largely different creature in terms of raw quality, particularly their journalistic programs. I've referred to their Toxic Alberta series before and now, in relation to what I'm talking about, I'll refer you to the preview of their upcoming Toxic Garbage Island series that will cover, firsthand, what is going on in the South Pacific Sub-Tropical Gyre. The author of the corresponding article for the magazine had a frank lead-in to the topic which I think, after having read more on this, stands as highly appropriate.
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I'm not one of those guys who corners folks at parties to rant at them about biodiesal or calls people "fucking idiots" for being skeptical about global warming. But I should also point out that I'm not one of those Andrew Dice Claw "Fuck the whales" types either.
The problem with all the bravado on both sides of the ecology debate is that nobody really knows what they are talking about. Trying to form opinions on climate change, overpopulation, and peak oil hinges on ginormous leaps of faith based around tiny statistical deviances that even the scientists studying them have a hard time understanding. It gets so convoluted with all the yelling and politics that sometimes you just want something huge and incontrovertibly awful to come along for everybody to agree on. Something you can show anyone a picture of and go, "See? We're fucked?"

Well, I have just such a thing. There is a Texas-size section of the Pacific Ocean that is irretrievably clogged with garbage and it will never go away. And I have seen it with my own eyes. Case Closed. Oh, you want to hear more? Ok, fine.
-------
That last hyperlink is, of course, to the full article online. I don't fully agree that the problem rests on understanding tiny variances, the variances are anything but tiny, however the urge to have something which can shock people out of complacency is something for which I have a great deal of sympathy.

Meanwhile the BBC has an ongoing diary that started a few days ago, which looks at the problem from the perspective of the bird population in Midway Island.

I present this information not to lord anything over anyone or to encourage a proper case of Doom to fall about you like a funeral shroud. I'm doing it partly to buck up the old sanity, partly because it's important that as many people be as aware as possible so that when they think about - say - reusing or not reusing those thing plastic bags we use at the supermarket for our fruit and vegetables, they maybe think of this shit and opt toward the more responsible option.
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ALSO: LET'S DO THIS AMERICA

And on a more lighthearted note...

A quality post is coming tomorrow.

Why it isn't just the fundamentalists..

...that are dangerous.

I don't care if it's lame

...I've just put the final touches to my new bedroom. I've said it before, a good bedside lamp makes all the difference in your daily peace of mind (and proper curtains don't hurt either).Also - magnificent coasters for the planned martini bar in the guest room.
Meanwhile, I had a bit of luck and bumped into another film-maker-in-the-making at my job today. He let me know about the Canadian Film Festival that is going on this week. I'm going to try for the opening gala tomorrow night and if that fails, at least one of the screenings. Meeting this fellow also reminded me that I should make some fuggin' business cards! How else am I ever going to become Mr. Hollywood?
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Addendum: I'm kind of a dick?

Also, some of you may be familiar with my theory that there is an alternate dimension populated entirely by political satire of this dimension....and shit is spilling over here from there.

UH

"1,500 plus CPDRC inmates of the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center, Cebu, Philippines at practice!"

Street Magic!

I just got back from a meeting with my web series collaborator that was pretty damn productive. I wish it wasn't the height of unprofessionalism to post every step of the process here, but luckily it isn't unprofessional to post the results and today we're a big step closer to doing that.

One thing that I can share is how he said to me that if I wrote something that could be as successful as "David Blaine's Street Magic" then he would throw money at me until I would never need another dollar. The first episode of the series has garnered fifteen million hits on YouTube, so basically only a few million short of something to do with Britney Spears' tits.

That is actually a compliment!

But out of the four online, the second and third are the best - so I've shared them below. All you really need to know going in is that "David Blaine" likes to harass the same two guys with various magic tricks. Enjoy!

Optimus Sup-Prime

I knew the sub-prime housing thing in the U.S. had had plenty of unfortunate consequences, but I guess I didn't stretch my imagination far enough as the above video caught me off-guard.