Interns and other things 


I'm sitting here listening to British bad-girl Lily Allen. 

It's a strange world. I bought her album from iTunes--the producers of "Interns" are pretty hot on her for the sound of the show (more on "Interns" in a bit)--and actually, I've got to say that it's kinda cool, interesting, hip-hop-reggae-whatever-else-strikes-her stuff that kind of reminds me of Madness. (Probably the East-ender accent and occasional sax parts). So anyway, I thought I'd find out a bit more about her and ended up reading her blog on MySpace.

And then I realised that it's been an entire month since that mammoth three-part blog entry where I vowed I'd never leave it as long again. Actually, a few things have happened over the past few weeks, and with two hours remaining in my four hour music software upgrade, this seems like as good an opportunity as any to catch up.

Firstly, my new series, "Interns": Well, about 15 years ago, I was offered a series called "The Secret World of Alex Mac" which ended up being a big hit. I turned the show down because the budget was ridiculously low. Guess what I'm getting paid on "Interns"? Yeah... this line of work is starting to feel kinda played out. Don't forget that "Alex Mac" was FIFTEEN years ago. So much for cost of living increases. I blame Wal•Mart.

The show has a fairly relentless post schedule, and by December, I'm going to have to write three episodes a week to keep up. Don't expect too many blog entries 'til Christmas! Christmas should be good--flying down to L.A. with the family to spend the holidays with my parents and brother. It'll be strange to leave the snow, instead basking in the warmth and smog of L.A. for Christmas. I can't wait, though... definitely long overdue for a trip.

You see, the prairies are a very difficult place for me to be... and especially at this point in my life. Here's the upbeat part: I feel more creatively "in touch" and liberated than I ever have in my life. It's a great, exciting feeling. Music has always been, to an extent, limiting. Now, my dad reads this blog, so I'm going to have to go into kind of tedious depth to explain what I mean so he doesn't misunderstand.

When you're raised in a musical family with a dad who's an incredibly well-trained musician, incredibly talented, and fairly... uh, let's say "outspoken"... well when you start dabbling with music, you're kinda going to want to do it right... write educated, intelligent, well-considered music... or else you're going to shave your head, pierce anything that dangles or protrudes from your face, and embrace the tired, old teenage angst cliché--definitely not my style. Of course, barring the Sid Vicious route just outlined, you're going to want to impress people, and who's going to be more important than your dad-slash-music teacher? (He did, after all, teach me more music theory than I ever learned as a music major at UCLA. Most of the rest of it, I figured out myself.) So... I'm not going to call that "stifling", but you're going to tend to come from a more tethered musical place than perhaps might be best. Pure creativity is pretty damned unlikely in a situation like that. In the past two years, though, I've done far more writing (scripts, treatments, short stories, and blog entries) and film editing than music. (Actually, I don't think I've even turned my studio on in the last year with the exception of four smooth jazz tracks I did as a demo for another show. If you're curious to hear them, let me know and I'll post them here or send them to you.) At this point, I kinda feel like I'm ready to dive back into music, though... and screw the rules! I'm just gonna get "jiggy wit it". I'm listening to Lily Allen wondering what the hell kind of twisted fountain of creativity produced this stuff... but the bottom line is that it's really musical and cool... so "Interns" might be fun to write. Hell, maybe I'll end up making an album early next year. Stranger things have happened.

So I said that this feeling of liberated creativity is the "upbeat" part. Here's the down side to my life at the moment: It came to light in a conversation with someone who shall remain nameless that they think I should basically grow up and get a job. Apparently, this person thinks I could do really well making training videos and inter-office promotional videos for a large corporation and could even make as much as $80k a year! Wow! Inter-office promotional videos? Shoot me now, please.

It's difficult to dismiss that sort of criticism given my current situation, but I'm doing my best. I've just never been around this prairie, if-you're-happy-you're-not-working-hard-enough, life's-one-long-chore-and-then-you-die kind of mentality. In fact, it didn't even occur to me until recently that my entire life has been spent surrounded by creative, vibrant people who were constantly striving for something. God, do you know how many discussions I've had with people up here about retirement? I've never had the intention of retiring; if you love what you do, why would you want to do something stupid like quit? If you weld joints on steel structures or drive a truck, yeah, I guess I can see the allure of not having to do that anymore. I don't want to sound arrogant, but I just can't relate. Anyway, it's not arrogance, it's fact. The someone-who-shall-remain-nameless is the farthest thing you'll find from blue collar. They-who-shall-remain-nameless is just not in a field that's even remotely creative. I can't understand where they're coming from; they can't understand where I'm coming from. It's not good or bad, it just "is". Still, it's hard to 1) defend a faltering career and 2) expect anyone to share your optimism that you actually can branch out into other areas and succeed.

Also a bit of a blow was the HD camera I ordered. It seems that the company I bought it from has a bit of a bait-and-switch scam going, and shortly after I'd placed the order, I was informed that it was back-ordered. (I think I mentioned that in the last entry.) Now it's nearly two months later, and the camera's still back-ordered. I know that it's been nearly two months because I used a "shop safe" card number (where you go online and the credit card company generates a fake number that you can authorise up to a certain amount for a certain duration), and that number expires in two days. Kinda looking like it's not coming. Apparently, I'm not going to be shooting "Postcards from Alberta Beach" this winter. So what to do?

I wrote a novel a few years ago that I've been planning on editing, but after I re-read it, I realised that it's more a case of re-writing than editing. No worries, though. My writing style has completely changed since I wrote it, and so far, it's all flowing nicely. In fact, I've already re-written the first six chapters. To those of you who read the book when I wrote it (and there are a fair number out there), I apologise. Even I had a hard time getting through it! Yeah, it's a pretty good idea... gripping story, etc... but damn, the actual writing is kinda painful. I'd quote some of it here, but frankly, it's too embarrassing.

So that's the latest. We had our first snowfall of the season over the weekend, and it didn't get above freezing today. Might be time to get my car winterised. For those of you who don't know, winterising is where they drain all of the fluids from your car and replace them with sub-zero, rated down to -40ºF, probably oil-based stuff. I know that the windshield fluid is pretty slimy, anyway. There are a lot of hidden costs associated with living up here that I never anticipated.

My software upgrade just finished. I spent two hours on this entry?! Ridiculous. 

Posted: Mon - November 5, 2007 at 04:56 PM          

©