Home With The E

On Tuesday, daycare called saying Elsie had a fever and had to go home. Amy and I split the day yesterday -- half at home with Elsie, half at work -- and are doing the same today.

Took her to the doctor this morning and found out she has strep throat and a mild ear infection -- poor wee thing.

But we have the amoxicillin going and Tylenol to manage the fever. She's sleeping now. Hopefully Declan hasn't gotten it yet and won't over the next 24 hours while she's still contagious.

Bummer that Amy and the kids had to postpone the trip north to see Sara, Nathan, Trevor, Nana and Papa, but we'll reschedule once the chica's feeling better.

At least she's still awful cute when she's sick...

Shocking Footage

We were in Duck, NC this weekend and were lucky enough to have the video phone handy as we spotted a real Merboy beaching outside our rented house. Check it out!

Train Keeps A-Rollin'

So a few days ago I found out I'm one of 20 finalists in the Script Pimp screenwriting competition.

No, the name does not mean I have to hit the street corners and backhand any scripts who don't act right... it stands for Pipeline Into Motion Pictures.

Get it?

Anyway, when I first got the word, I thought I might be ineligible because I have some TV credits, but I wrote to them and explained my credits and they said The D Line is still in the running.

So we might be heading to LA in August to attend the party where they announce the four winners -- there are supposed to be a lot of industry folks who attend, so it'd be a great way to start to get a little exposure and make some connections. Which is difficult to do from here, across the country.

If you're interested, the announcement is here:

http://www.scriptpimp.com/writing_competition/home.cfm

Matt Harding Keeps It In Perspective

I'd seen Matt's first video a couple years ago, but he made another. I was a little surprised at how goddamn happy it made me watching this:


Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Brilliant.

The world is good.

Thanks Matt.

Writing Music

Out of curiosity - and needing a distraction break from writing - I just clicked on the most played playlist on my iTunes here at work.

Turns out this is what I mostly listen to (at least at work) while I'm writing:


How 'bout you?

Photog Boy

Last night during dinner, Amy put on a Beach Boys CD. As it played, Declan asked, “Is this the Beach Kids?”

After bath, we did some Dad Surfing


And then Declan took up the camera. Without further ado, here are his first photos:




How do you like Elsie's post-bath hairdo?

Compost Newbie

As I posted about before, we decided to try a little vegetable garden this year. We knew it would be a fairly big learning curve, and so the first year we’re not expecting much results.

Which is maybe why I was so freaking excited to pick this lettuce…


…and then eat it.

Actually, I was a little more excited than any normal person should be. I think Amy might be a little worried. I mean, I took photos of the stuff after all. And it’s just lettuce.

Our spinach didn’t make it, and so far the cucumbers and melons haven’t done anything either. The squash and zucchini plants seem pretty robust, but so far no actual squash or zucchini. The tomato plants are growing well, but so far only two little green orbs have formed.


We might have simply started everything too late.

Except for that lettuce. That lettuce was good. (Though I think I might have overharvested, and we might not get any more leaves. I’ll have to look into that…)

The other thing we’re beginning to do is composting. We have under the sink a small metal pail that we empty non-meat scraps into (thanks Cynthia and Jim!). Declan has christened it the earth bucket. Which is adorable.

But then what? I researched tumblers and bins and they were really expensive – a few hundred dollars, some of them.

And so partially because I don’t want to spend a lot of money, but also partially because, since composting is about reducing waste and exploiting available materials, I decided to focus on the reuse portion of the reduce, reuse, recycle mantra.

I bought an old olive oil container for $25 from a guy selling them on craigslist.


I drilled a couple of small holes in the bottom for drainage and five or six more holes around the sides to encourage a bit of circulation. It becomes a tumbler when I knock it over and roll it around the back yard. Not elegant, no, but Declan thinks that's hilarious.

Per Jamie Beaulieu’s recipe, I’m trying to maintain the 2/3 carbon to 1/3 nitrogen mix. Carbon stuff has been hard to come by – I do have some dried grass and other clippings from last summer, but to be safe I got some straw from a neighbor who works in a horse barn. Now I think we’re good.

I’ll also confess that I’m probably unnaturally excited when I add more stuff to the tumbler and see the worms and feel the heat, realizing all sorts of cool biology, chemistry and physics things are going on in there.

Jamie said the tumbler is sort of short-term and we should have a longer-term bin as well. But we had a little problem with rats in the garage and I didn’t want to attract them back by leaving gooey stuff out there for them to root around in.

My retrofit solution? I took the pieces of O’Malley’s old dog crate and wired them together to be a bin skeleton with a hinged door on top – and then lined it with wire mesh.


Still have to trim off the excess mesh from the door. I’m not sure it’s 100% unrodentable, but at least it would be a pain in the ass for them to get in there. And hopefully they’d cut themselves, a lot, like I did building the damn thing.

By the way, if anyone sees that I’m doing something wrong, or has any advice, please let me know so I can get this system down right.

We want more than lettuce and two tomatoes next year.

These Guys Kill Me

More hypocrite news RE: Les Bushes.

Interesting article on The Guardian today. Some excerpts:

"US exports to Iran have jumped dramatically during president George Bush's years in office in spite of his tough rhetoric against the Tehran government and the imposition of fresh economic sanctions.

Analysis of US government trade figures published today by the Associated Press revealed a near tenfold increase over the last seven years in sales to Iran.

The AP analysis found data suggesting military equipment had been exported, even though there are sanctions in place designed to prevent this. The Treasury is still investigating but Rankin said initial findings indicated there had been no such sales and described it as a "clerical error".

The US has had sanctions in place against Iran since the Tehran embassy hostage crisis almost 30 years ago. During Bush's presidency, relations with Iran have become increasingly strained, with Washington claiming that Iran has embarked on a programme to build a nuclear weapon, which Tehran denies. It also blames Iran for a flow of explosive devices into Iraq that have been used against US and British troops.

The US vice-president, Dick Cheney, the leading hawk in the Bush administration towards Iran, warned Europeans last year that if their firms remain in Tehran, they are going to have problems doing business in the US."

Aside from the military equipment (like rockets and rifles, the report claims) that may have been exported or may have been a, ahem, clerical error, the number one export: cigarettes. Hmm. Isn't it mainly Republican coffers that US tobacco companies pour millions into?

Nice. Tell other countries they can't do business with someone... and then do it yourself. Talk tough to portray yourselves as supporting our troops... then make some cash selling to a country you claim is helping blow up those troops.

Nice.

Happy Birthday Ames!

Amy’s birthday was yesterday and we had a little surprise party for her last night.

Turned out pretty well, actually. She left for yoga at 4:00 so I had an hour and a half to get all the stuff at the store and clean up the house. Thankfully, the Hereticks watched the little kids for me, and big kid Kaleigh helped me clean. Made it just in time. Whew.

Amy didn’t suspect a thing… until she drove back from yoga and saw her friends’ cars parked all over the neighborhood. No one parked on our block, trying to be sneaky, but of course she had to drive by everyone's cars to get to our block...

Everyone had a great time – including Declan who ran around like a madman the entire time but somehow didn’t hurt himself or anyone else, and Elsie, who had wee Josh to play and flirt with.

Thanks to everyone who came – and special thanks to Cynthia and Jay for having Amy 34 years ago!


Elsie and Josh dueling for the piano.



Nancy made sure Amy showered after yoga so she didn't show up all yoga-y. And then kill me for allowing her to show up all yoga-y.




Drake's Angels.

BlueCat

Well hey.

How about that.

My script The D Line made it into the quarterfinals at the 2008 BlueCat Screenplay Competition.

I’m no mathematician, but from a glance it looks like about 15% of the “more than 2700” scripts entered made it.

I’m not expecting producers to be scrambling to set up meetings with me and a bidding war to begin, but I won’t pretend to be so cool that I wasn’t excited to see my script listed.

Feels good to have made the first cut of my first screenplay competition. There are a lot of competitions out there, but I chose this one because it seemed one of the more legit ones -- as in many of the winners have gone on to get work sold.

Of course, we're a long way from "winner." They announce the semifinalists August 1st, then five finalists mid-August and I think the winner at the end of August.

At the very least though, it motivates me to hustle along on this action script – which actually has been going along pretty well the last few days during lunchtime writing sessions…

Wrapping Up June

Last weekend Amy deserved a little sanity time – she’d been taking the clear brunt of Elsie’s nighttime distress – so after my bike ride Saturday I took the kids to Critter Day at a nature preserve near the house so she could go to yoga.

Here’s Declan leaning over the floating dock trying to scoop up fish, crabs and shrimp with his little net.


Amazingly, he didn’t fall in. Though I can’t say the same for his net. Actually, it didn’t fall in either. But it was thrown in. Thrice.

We all went to the Virginia Aquarium on Sunday. Lots of awesome stuff to see there – sea turtles, birds, sharks.



We were there for several hours and spent most of the time in the Little Builders exhibit – which had nothing to do with wildlife, marine or otherwise. But there were blocks, hammers, pulleys, cranes, conveyor belts. Very fun. But kinda dark and I couldn’t get Declan to sit still in his hardhat and reflective vest for a good photo. Sorry.

Kaleigh headed back to school and work, driving herself in her new car, loaded up with clothes and with a bike on the back rack.

I, being a dorky dad, was nervous about her making the trip without a copilot, but of course she made it no problem. She told me today she hasn’t driven her car since she went back and has done all her traveling by bike. That’s my girl! We miss her already.


So amazing to have all three kids together. She took these pics:



Oh, you know the photo of Declan naked with a monkey around his neck is gonna mysteriously appear when he’s in high school. Bet on it.

Ponies came to Western Day at school last week:



Elsie didn't ride. She's too little, according to Declan.

And Amy met her friend Tammy at a play area in a mall in Norfolk – good to get the kids out of the house without going into the heat and wildfire smoke.





They had a blast. I mean, who doesn't love giant hot dogs and lady bugs?