Unlucky Number 7

It's been a while since I last post. It's not that I haven't had anything to talk about it's that I've been working, tired, or sick.

Thursday started out normal until I got out of bed. I was not suppose to go on a trip with a report that I feel that we are polar opposites. We just have different styles and it makes the day go by longer. We drive two and a half hours, shot a story, and start back. Well The heavens opened up, dark clouds swarmed around us and I thought I saw a woman on a broom wearing ruby slippers. Come to find out a Tornado hit about 45 minutes north of our current spot (Anna, Oh) in Lima, Oh. I'm itching to go. Said reporter is still on the phone deciding what we need to do. After a couple of stops and delays along the way, we finally hit Lima. We find the airport destroyed! 18 airplanes damages and 2 hangers are ripped to shreds. We go into town and find that two hotels have their roofs ripped off. While the reporter was on the phone (notice the trend here) I find a guy who saw the tornado (BONUS!) We go over to the second hotel and see a crew from Toledo, I know the reporter, we talk and we grab the owner. I find a lady that had her car ripped apart by a piece of roof (note again he was on the phone). The satellite truck shows up I'm ready to edit and he is off doing something or other. We have a 9pm live shot and I'm finally handed a package at 8:30pm for those in TV that's like saying Hey I need you to read this entire post in 5 minutes, very hard to do, but can be done. I bust the story out and this continues for three hours.

Then the phone call. We have to stay over night. The one thing I hate about shooting in the rain is having my feet wet. I HATE THIS! So I don't have any back-ups in the car and the only Wal-Mart with in and hour is closed because it does not have power. J-Dog not happy!

We get to the hotel at midnight and then leave at 4am. We do live shots from 5am till 8am. We go around town look for new video and sound. Get back for a noon live shot and at 1pm I FINALLY get to go home. An hour and a half later we make it to Columbus, but oh wait the day is not done. You may have forgotten about the story we originally went up there for. The reporter did not. I do not get to leave work till 6pm. I worked 29 out 33 straight hours. I am tired and go home.

Saturday I was suppose to work with the same reporter, but thank you Micah you saved me! The only thing of interest today is The Wife and I spent way too much money on things we did not need and We ate at Applebee's, I had shrimp (is this fore-shadowing?).

Sunday at 6am my stomach starts to roll. I roll over on my back to hope that will ease it. 6:30 I'm in the bathroom and lets just say I'm not sitting there sick. I go back to bed 6:50 back in the bathroom. The Wife knows I'm not doing well and says I can stay home from church. She goes to the store and gets some Petobismolt I take it and immediately run to the bathroom and lets just say I'm bowing at the feet of the porcelain goddess. We find out that I have food poisoning from the shrimp. In 30 years I have never had food poisoning and I hope I never get it again. I wish I could have died. Only good thing to happen during all this is that I slept all day and watched all of season 4 of The Simpsons.

Monday took of due to illness, bought The Wife her birthday present, a very expensive Palm Pilot, it's not top of the line, but much better and more expensive than I wanted it to be.

Tuesday rather dull day at work, but still feeling a little sick. Except for one thing remember the story I had to stay late on Friday to edit? Well after I worked over an hour to edit and still had him nit pick the piece and had to change shots. HE WENT BACK AND CHANGED IT MORE. Why am I mad? It was my work that he changed. If he asked to change it I might not have minded as much, but he does this all the time. I'm tired of having my work changed and I thought he made it worse.

Today I get in and find out I need to work on a story I shot two weeks ago. I get it started, there are some voice issues and I tell the talent and they will revise it when they get a chance. Well before that happens, I find out that I get to go to Van Wert. Van Wert is over two hours and automatically makes for a long day. We get the work done, but I get off late. I'm just tired of driving across the entire state. Oh yeah and I find out that tomorrow "fav reporter" and I are working together.

Sorry to complain, but I need a drink or a new job.

Good Day at Work

Many days I do not like my job, but today I got to go to Cincinnati and hang around the dug outs and talk to ball players for the Reds. We get there and my day starts to unravel. Walking up the stairs to the field I trip and fall. Ever since the fall I've had problems placing my left foot on stairs. I go face forward and two random people and Chud saw me fall, I hurt my pride and my stupid toe. I'm half tempted to cut the thing off. We hang around get some interviews I get in some peoples way, drop my press pass and I just can't get all cylinders firing at once. I get everything I need, we go eat and leave early to try and make the 9:45 show. We are low on gas and I tell Chud we will stop near Cedar Point. That's fine and all, but Cedar Point is on the other side of the state. I meant to say Kings Island... Chud laughs at me and my day. Besides me not being on my "A" game I can't complain. I got paid to go talk to major league ball players.

All the post below

Wow I have found out blogging... Not as easy as I thought. I have the ideas, but not the desire or the time to do it as much as I'd like. So to elevate that the 6 post below are all post I've wanted to do for a least a week.

Movie review 2: The electric-boogaloo

Three movies this time and wow I should have picked two different ones.

Over the Hedge- First of all it's a kids movie so the plot is not going to be as complex as Syriana. But it was a cute movie with a fairly good cast. Bruce Willis and Garry Shandlling did a good job with the lead rolls, but there were three cast members that made the movie for me. Steve Carrell as Hammy the Squirrel. How can you not love him! He is just funny in almost everything he does. I just hope he does not pull a Will Ferrell and try to do too much too fast and make some crappy movies like bewitched. William Shatner was great at parody-ing himself as a opossum. His over acting in his death scenes reminded me of old Star Treks. Finally Thomas Hayden Church played a great evil villain, reminded me his role on Wings as Lowell. The movie was smart, witty and had moments for adults. Find a kid and take them (with the parents permission, cause I don't want ya going to jail for child abduction.) 7 out of 10

Domino- I love Kira Knightley, but this movie was bad with a capital suck. It was shot very art house-y and just kind of rambled around a story about three bounty hunters that get caught up in a money scam that involves gangsters. The story was dull and I did not care about Domino or her bounty hunting friends. I seriously am upset at Kiera Knightly. She needs a spanking for making a movie this bad and I am the to do the spanking... Well if the wife never finds out. 2 out 0f 10

Munich- Hmmmmm. Not what I was expecting form a Spielberg movie. It never really moved. I felt like it plodded along and just wasn't interesting. You know it's going to be a long movie when you have to stop it and explain things to people. The wife kept getting lost (I blame boredom) so I'd have to stop it and explain what happened in real life, then what was going on in the movie. She gave up and hour and a half in, but I struggled through the story of how the Israeli government plotted to kill the terrorist involved in the Munich Olympic killings. Eric Banna was just OK and didn't help the movie. The end scene with him and his wife and his flash backs was a little strange and a little creepy. 3 out of 10

I have two more movies that I may review shortly, well unless every thinks my reviews suck.

What to do when I don't have softball.

Well this is my first week where I did not have softball. So the wife and I made a day of it... or at least tried. Get get home from church with the thought that we'd go to the Columbus Zoo after we eat lunch. Well... we eat lunch and decieded to take a "quick" nap. Two hours later it's almost 2:00. Well the Zoo is out so we went and saw Over the Hedge (more on that in another post). After the movie we went to Omaha Steaks and Krogers for some much needed food. Grilled out and watched Munich (yes... another post). A good day for us.

Oh the softball team lost for the first time... can you say curse of the J-Dog? All I have to say is they better find a live chicken and some candles. Muhahahaha!

No play for Mr. Gray

I'm now 30 and I am starting to get old. I've started to get some gray hairs. Not too many, but a few on the side and a small patch in the front, but nothing to hateful. The wife has noticed a single gray hair in my goatee and always pick at it. I HATE IT when she does this, it makes me start to obsess over it. Every time I walked near a mirror I'd see it, it looked like it was sticking out a mile. So I finally had to go to the bathroom and cut it off.

I hate getting old.

Where are my keys?

This Saturday I worked for a station that is owned by the same company that owns "The Network." I enjoy the times when I work for them, but I get a little paranoid when they ask, because I do not want to screw up and make "The Network" look bad. Over all it was an easy day a couple fluff assignments nothing I could horrible screw up. I'm ending the shift by filling out my time sheet when the wife calls. "I locked myself out of the house and I'm going to be late for work." Since she "Freelance Nannies" she can't be late. I try to tell here I'm going get off work on time and I will be there as fast as I can. She is obviously distressed and won't let me finish my thought with comments like "Hold on." "When will you be off?" "Wait we might have a ladder from our neighbor... Hold on." Of, course this is slowing me down because I'm worried about her and I can't do my time sheet, worry about her and talk on the phone. Basically had to strongly state I need to get off the phone to get out of work and I will be home in 15 minutes. I get in my car drive reasonably fast and get there in about 20 minutes. Fortunately she called her job and they did not mind that she would be late. I let her in the house and she made it to Marysville just in time. We now have to figure out a way to keep a spare key somewhere so we don't have this happen again.

Dirt Track Racin'

I've had a wired relationship with the sport of Dirt Track Racin'. While working in West Virginia a lottery winning millionaire bought a quarter-mile dirt track outside of Beckley and I was forced to go there about four times. Dirt track racing is pretty much cars driving in circles on dirt... That's it. They go straight for 10 seconds, turn for 10 seconds, straight 10 seconds and then go straight for 10 seconds. Repeat 20 times and you have a race. I thought I'd left dirt track racin' behind me when I came to Ohio, but no Tony Stewart (Yes NASCAR Tony Stewart) had to buy Eldora Speedway. From what everyone tells me Eldora was a very famous track that everybody knows about. So Since Tony owns the track he raises money for a good charity and brings a bunch of NASCAR drivers out to race.

Since Eldora is somewhat in Ohio we needed to interview all the NASCAR guys. I did this event last year and I will admit it. Eldora is MUCH BETTER than beckley. For one it's a half mile so more straight always and less spinning. And you have better grand stands. Overall if I liked dirt track racin' at all I'd come to Eldora to watch some races, but once a year is enough. We get there and it is raining and it does not look good. After a long delay we get to interview the NASCAR guys that came here: Matt Kenseth, Kurt Busch, Mark Martin, the Wallace brothers and my new hero Dale Earnhart Jr. He comes to the press conference with a Bud Light and talks about well since he's not driving he's going to wave the flag and drink some beer. Prior to this moment... Not a fan, now... Fan.

After the press conference we go through "the love tunnel" we get to the infield and wait for racing to start. Well this takes a long time because it won't stop raining. We see Tony Stewart (who we couldn't get and interview with earlier) on a 4-wheeler. We run over and ask for the interview he gives us one and he's very relaxed and is a little worried about the race he is a lot nicer that I remember, but here is why I am telling you this.

If you remember my Indy 500 post you will remember the phrase "Window over Terra Haute." Well, Tony Stewart has raced at the 500 and would know this phrase and I had a chance to say it. He mentions well there's window over somewhere in middle Indiana and I had to use all my power not to say. "Is there a window over Terra Haute."

Well the window sucked and wasn't really there. So this is what it looked like. We didn't have much shelter as you can see.

So no NASCAR guys going round and round on dirt, but I did get to see some NASCAR guys and found a new appreciation on Jr.

Lots of Movies!

Over the last two weeks I have seen a lot of movies, so I thought I'd give a little review on each film.

Elizabethtown- I read reviews that were not kind, so I went in a little aprehensive. Actually, it was pretty good for a chick flick. Elezabethtown is about a shoe designer (Orlando Bllom) who makes a shoe that nobady likes, tries to kill himself but a phone call about the death of his dad forces him to put that on hold to go to semi-rual Kentucky to get the body. He meets a flight attenedent (Kirsten Dunst) is the love interest. The director Cameraon Crowe loves music to play an important roll in his films which adds a nioce touch. This film I will admit gets a little schlockie, but it's a chick flick so you have to expect that. Overall I'd give it a 6 out of 10.

Jarhead I remember that this film was suposse to be conteversial and question why we are in Iraq right now. A new Apocolipse Now. Well if you made Apocolipse Now suck then you would get Jarhead. How the hell was this critically acclaimed! It was Blackhawk Down mixed with Three Kings and then both scripts were combined while drinking a fifth of Wild Turkey. It was nothing but a bunch of guys walking around the dessert and going back to base to masterbate and THAT IS ALL. I wish I would have rented a better movie like Biodome or anything else by Paulie Shore. 2 out of 10

Davine Code- The new big contraversial movie. Supposively there are two secret sects of the Catholic church 1. the Templars that believe christ had kids and 2. Opus Dei who don't and want all proof of Jesus' kids gone. Taking out all the religious subtext that I'm told is evil, I went and looked at this movie for what it was... Fiction. As a suspense thriller it was pretty good. It had twist and turns, you were for sure what was real and who was good and bad or who would stay bad or good. One thing though Paul Bettany played one of the creepiest characters in years. Every time I saw his albino ass (yes you see his ass) I was freaked out. Tom Hanks was wll Tom Hanks. I need to do a post on how you believe what ever character he play. If he would have played an Umpaloompa in Willy Wonka it would have been the awesomest Umpaloompa EVER! Sir Ian McKellen is an unbelievalbe character actor. He just adds presense to what ever project he does. Enough with the praises. I figured out fairly early what was going to happen, but still not that bad. I thought the ending was a little hokey but not bad. 6.5 out of 10

X-Men 3: The last Stand (this time is personal)- OK I am a geek. I love X-Men and the Wife loves the movies, but I'm not for sure if it's the movie or Hugh Jackman whe actually loves. This is the third movie and the series and generally the third movie sucks and ruins the series (Matrix, Godfather well 1 is still top 5 of all time but man does 3 drag it down a bit, Jaws, Police Acadamy), but X-Men 3 delievers like a shot to the face by one of Wolverienes Adamantian claws. All three X-Men always add a bit of social commentary that may not be readily seen by all, but there is one there and I will let you figure it out. For the second time in two days I saw a movie with Sir Ian McKellen. He plays evil so well, and it's not a I'm a bad guy so you will hate me. He makes you almost impathize with Magneto and his misguided hate. I though Halle Berry's increased roll was a shocking suprise. I was afraid she would ruin the film, but she was back to her top form after such master pieces like Cat Woman and Password: Swordfish. Another suprise is Kelsey Grammer as Beast he did a good job, but there were moments where I heard Sidshow Bob and expected Bart and Lisa to come in and foil the X-Men. I'd love to discuss more about X-Men 3, but I'm afraid of giving away a lot of suprises within the movie. 9 out of 10. P.S. Famke Janssen as a red head... HOT!

Finding Neverland- Wow! how could I have not seen this film before now. Johnny Depp and Kate Winslot do an unbelievable job telling the story of Sir James Matthew Barrie and how he may have written Peter Pan. I don't know why, but Johnny Depp has started to become one of those actors I love. At one point in time I thought he'd be just that wierd actor guy that does wierd rolls. He has become a actor that I look forward to see. I can't believe he did not win Best Actor for this film. Go rent this movie 9 out of 10

Don't take me out to the ball game

In April I was asked to play softball. I've never really played, but I've always wanted too, so I was geeked and went out and bought some cleats and found my mitt. So after playing two weeks so far (missed one week because of the wedding and another weekend was a rain out.) I've batted twice and been in the field three times so I was hoping for some playing time in our required double header, two games I have to get in I know it. I late for the first game. I had a prior engagement at our church. I leave my meeting early I even change in the church parking lot to save time. I rush to the game. Everyone is worried about the foot, but I'm moving fairly well... I've worked with worse. First game ends... No playing time. Second game starts.... I'm on the bench. DAMN IT! I wait three innings and I'm starting to get pissed. I paid to play and half of the current team playing are friends and family of the "manager" and the pitcher. I finally get in and I strike out. Then I am immediately pulled. "You can't play with your foot."

Well I'm done with this team. The one think I wanted was to play instead I am that kid from middle school nobody wanted on there team so they made him team manager. I'm no longer going to be team manager I'm quitting. Truthfully I don't want to quit, but I'm just tired of wasting Sundays sitting on my ass watching other people play ball. I can do that at home and same myself the entry fee and gas to get there. Maybe it's because I'm not taking it too seriously and not starting a fight with the other team because our pitcher is having problems getting strikes. Maybe if I played like that I'd get in more. Well we will never know. Maybe I can still get my twenty dollars back.