Halloween

William dressed up as Professor Delusia Jr. I ran a loop of Professor Delusia but due to the dimness of the image, my head was nearly invisible making it "the ghost of Professor Delusia". Ran it for 3 hours.

public domain

I uploaded some clips of Roger Ing and some Regina cityscapes that I shot back around 1993, up onto the archive website. I've declared it to be public domain, thus giving these images to the world.

homework

William had a heck of a day today; he stayed at school for lunch then went to Rowan's after school and went with them to acting class, not returning home until seven. A quick supper, then two hours of homework then an hour of reading (finishing his 7th or 8th Animorphs book), then sleep. All the while I thought I had a busy day since I had a couple of meetings and had to work through some more of the pedagogy document.

high

Feeling great. Got home from class. Was so thirsty today that I drank nothing but my watered down juice and not my espresso. At home, I gulped down the quadruple espresso with a bit of milk, then Margaret and I started sipping wine. Usually it makes me sleepy, but obviously not tonight. Then the chocolate came out - wow, the chemicals in my body are all firing and I regret it being 1:30 am - could go like this for three more hours. Imagine I'll pay for it when William awakes wanting to read the Garfield cartoon in a few hours....

focused, at least a bit

Last night Chrystene and I agreed to cancel meeting today, neither of us has material ready for the other. So I stayed home in the morning and got most of my grading done. This afternoon I met with one of my students for an hour and a half and worked through his script, I think we made good progress. This evening Margaret went to work and William and I put up lights on the front doorstep (squirrels ate the old ones) and carved a pumpkin. I think I finished a video based on footage from the archive to put on line along with my student's assignment of the same sort. More on that later in the week.

skipped some days

It's been a few days since I blogged. Not sure why, perhaps because it's getting cold and I'd prefer to just shut off the computer instead of sitting up those extra minutes. I think it did start with Friday night when the power went out at 11pm for an hour and a half. Not much to do but curl up in bed and when the power returned, I was half asleep. Missing a second night was easier. I'm a creature of habit and not doing things is a habit too. The power outage was pretty cool, I don't know how wide spread it was, but I think it was big. Looking out the window, there was almost no light but for an occasional car.
I've been a bit out of focus lately, not really paying attention to anything for more than a couple of minutes. Perhaps a bit like an attention disorder. As a result, I've not taken only any big things all week. I'm behind on my grading. I worked on my "Midsummer Nights Dream" for a while but didn't get too deep in. I've done lots of email, it only requires short bursts of thought. Back when I was department head, I would have so many emails to reply to that by the time I was at the bottom of the list, the first ones had responded to me and I would start again from the top. I could spend half the day doing this, being so active and exhausted that I got thinking that I must have been accomplishing something. Facebook gives people this sort of sense of purpose as well. It is, of course, a plot to keep everyone so busy that they miss out on what is really going on.....

breaking stuff

I dropped my thermis on way to class, dented it.
I knocked over a 150w arri fresnel light in class, blew the (expensive) bulb.

This evening I went to the MacKenzie Art Gallery where Carmen Robertson was presenting a German western from the 70s and discussing the European take on "the German Indian vs the Hollywood Indian". She suggested that the American western is a construction but the Euro-western is a construction of a construction. It was interesting to observe that (in the movies) the Apache are always noble and the Comanche are always bad.

my homework

This evening I started work on my homework. I told my Film 400 class that I would also do the found footage project I assigned to them which requires creating a work based on footage from this on -archive. Coincidentally, I heard an interview with Rick Prelinger on CBC today. I met once in Toronto. He's an archivist and collector of old training and informational films and his archive is now part of this same on-line archive.

muffins

Margaret made muffins this afternoon, it was a command baking. William got a whiff of muffins this morning and came home for lunch with an almost raving obsession with having a muffin. There were none, but he could not be sated. I was at work until 10 so now I'm home to enjoy one myself. Blueberry and peach with a hint of cinnamon.

catch up

I worked at home this afternoon, finished an article on Ian Toews which is expanded from the program notes I wrote a few months ago. He was over here two nights ago, we had a wine and talked about video and stuff for a while. This evening we had a Filmpool meeting. William went a played Lego at Paul's for a while since Margaret was also at work.

I watched recent episode of Clone Wars with William. It is targeted at 6-10 year old boys but they play it on CTV at 9pm Sundays after Desperate Housewives?!? For the third episode in a row it has a strong message that the clones are people too, they have individuality and feelings and that there is a strong interest in protecting them. I was wondering if the storm troopers are the clones, just a bit older, or if they are regular people drafted into service? I'd like to think they are the old clones and I came up with a new ending to "Return of the Jedi".

GEORGE LUCAS, ARE YOU LISTENING, YOU COULD GO PUT THIS SCENE IN FOR THE BLUE RAY RELEASE...

I think the storm troopers are like the flying monkeys in Oz.
When the Emperor is finally killed and Vader dies, Luke should look behind him and see that 5000 storm troopers have come up behind him. Luke would be weak from the fight but he struggles to his feet and sparks up his light saber to face the mob. Instead of shooting at him, the storm troopers, for the first time, all remove their helmets. Luke walks through them as they applaud in that all-at-once clapping like in military or prison scenes ("hooray for Dorothy, the wicked witch is dead").

me?

I had coffee with my friend Kevin this evening and he outlined a list of my mannerisms that even I didn't know I had. Not only that, he also deconstructed them, outlining the psychological use for each of them. Oh, that doesn't make me feel self conscious...

the next generation

Today I shot my One Take Super 8 film for the 8th annual event. This is my 8th entry, I don't know how many others have entered every time, maybe Shawn Fulton and Rob Pytlyk but definitely not many. This year's entry is "Professor Delusia Jr.".

birthday party (with pictures added)

We held a party for Margaret's 40th this evening. Chrystene and Raul came, Leesa, Kenneth and Daniel, Linda, Sean, Jake, and Coen, Leslea, Leif, Brianna, and Teagan, Gerry Ann and Steve, Carle, Edward and Rowen, Paul, plus the three of us. That makes 22 in total. Good time. We ate both of the cakes I made on Wednesday. With seven of this total being kids under 10, the party began at 7 and most everybody leaving by 11. Not like the old days.

 This answers my question of where I got this projector. I suspected but the party was great and I drank a bit so the long term memory of it never really took hold. (note from 2013)

thief revealed!

Today is Margaret's birthday. I managed to get to the chocolate store before the first Filmpool interview this morning (searching for new executive director). After work I brought home a big Western Pizza, Paul came over, we all went out to the Art Gallery of Regina where a new show curated by David Garneau opened. Ran into Les, an old installer from the Dunlop, who is in from Winnipeg with a friend who's in the show. He hasn't been here since around 2000. So eight years ago, I had my film "Life is Like Lint" (about which was written "it is appropriately ironic that the greatest work of postmodern cinema was not completed until four years after the movement was declared a fraud") on exhibition on a vhs to view on a tv in the Mackenzie Art Gallery. During the run, three of the vhs tapes were stolen. The second and third ones were actually replaced by blank tapes, making them premeditated thefts. Tonight Les revealed to me that he was with filmmaker Kika Thorne when she "borrowed" one of these tapes with the claim that she was going to return it the next day.
Can I now say that my work is "in the collection of Kika Thorne"?

baking

I baked two cheese cakes. One is shaped like a heart. The other isn't. Yet.

casting

It was raining and cold today. i spent all day hunting for actors for my class for this evening. why is that so difficult some days? the election was on, now it is over. i never really understand the results. well, i understand, but i just don't understand people sometimes. even in my worst days trying to cast a film would i have made some of the picks we made as a nation today.

the drive home

This morning I stopped at Nick's on the way out of Winnipeg for a very quick, very filling breakfast. I had assumed that I'd stop for a bathroom and lunch break in Brandon, but decided that the music was enough to sustain me so I skipped it, and skipped Verdon, since we got a ticket there the other day and don't want to leave them any more of our money, then just drove on to Indian Head where I was forced to stop for gas, then home. Thanksgiving dinner with my parents, then home to discover I don't have all the actors in place for tomorrow's class after all, so it's back to work and wigging out about it. Not much I can do right now except wait for replies from various messages.

Winnipeg

I hosted a screening of films by Jean Oser at the WNDX festival in Winnipeg this evening. It went well, the crowd was small but good. Dr. Elizabeth McLuhen came with her husband, he'd taken a course from Jean in the mid 70s. Brett Kashmere and his parents were there, as was Alex Rogalski. Patrick Lowe sent his regrets. There was a number of others as well. Later we went to the 3rd Winnipeg One Take Super 8 Event, it has a big space and is very popular. It closed with a rather fascinating piece about food being thrown onto rapidly jiggling naked breasts. Three women were involved. It was well lit and in focus. Another of my picks was one that seemed to be a shot of light coming out of a projector. There was dust and some distortions as the lens was moved or removed. Uncertain exactly what was happening, but Alex, probably with instructions from the filmmaker, turned on his microphone and aimed it at the projector itself, amplifying the projector noise.

deja vu

What is the opposite of deja vu, you know, that feeling that something hasn't happened before?

William and the storyteller

I woke up in the middle of the night last night and couldn't sleep for about 3-4 hours, meaning that I was a basket case all day today. I took William over to Leslea's house where our friend Linda had arranged a CBC tv segment around a storyteller, Kevin MacKenzie (http://www.storiesbykevin.com/) to be shot with kids at the fireplace. I'm certain he never got to the end of a story, the kids interrupted each story with their own tellings of it. Leslea and I were almost on the floor in the next room, listening in on it all.

I knew it was too big...

I got notes from the research office explaining about 10 things to consider changing on my SSHRC application. I don't want to do any of them, although there was one technical thing that needs to be corrected. I have one week. These things grow out of control...

using recovery as an excuse

I am glad to have made it over some hurdles, so I guess I took it easy today partially to give myself a break from the work I've been doing. Actually, I think I accomplished so little today because I was up half the night trying to copy the dvd for the End of Life workshop but it had a bad sector and just wouldn't copy. I had a big meeting with the group today and wanted to give some copies to be reviewed but couldn't. Instead, I tried to pay attention with only four hours sleep under my belt. The rest of the day was on email, moving information but not doing anything real. I still need three male actors for next week's class and have had no response. Stressing on that. Margaret was at work this evening, even though she's still pretty sick. Had a great chat with Charity Marsh out on the sidewalk this afternoon, first time I've run into here in about a year, even though she lives a block away.

is anything finished yet...?

I met with Philippe and he should have dropped the last signed forms off at the research office today, so I guess my SSHRC is in. I wish I'd been able to drop that off myself, then I could say that I absolutely knew it was done, I'd have a bit of closure. Oh well.
I also have a dvd of the End of Life workshop video in my hands. I hired Mauricio to fine tune it and he got me this disc this evening. I've not had time to watch it again, but I'll give some preview copies to the team tomorrow anyways. Again, not feeling like I completed it since I wasn't able to micromanage as much as I like. Oh well.

that grant, now it's done.... or....

I delivered my SSHRC grant application to the office of research today. Complete! ... except for the page that requires the co-applicant's signature - I'll get it in the morning.

Margaret ran across this scan of a brochure about the Winnipeg flood. My dad was there piling sandbags (in real life, but not in this brochure).

even closer to finished now

I got my support material dvd created for my grant, now it is done, well not really, but closer yet again. Tomorrow I need to print it all off (I'm out of paper at home and forgot to buy more; I can't very well send in my grant on orange paper with three holes punch in it, can I?). I am not worried about it as I have created pdfs of all the pages so formatting won't get in my way. I've also sent to myself the project that I'm assigning my students on Tuesday, travel authorization forms to go to Winnipeg next week, and information about other stuff I'm juggling. Last night I took a breather break and watched The Trouble with Harry. Lots of fun, although I did start dozing in the middle. The mix of stage and exteriors has never felt stranger; Hitchcock didn't like shooting outside but this film had a lot of outdoor scenes. A stage was used for the site where the body is buried repeatedly and at times I just couldn't buy it. One anomaly, it is a film in with the artist character is neither a villain nor an eccentric but rather, he is the most observant and reasonable person in the story.

grant ap done... well almost

Margaret took William out to have fun in the sun and try to fly a kite in the wind that was too strong for the little kite we have. Meanwhile I buckled down and got my SSHRC grant done, with all the attachments, forms, justifications, and so on. I just need to put together the support dvd (I'm missing one clip that I need to pick up from my office tomorrow) and get some of the forms signed by people on Monday, then it's off and I'm free to do the other mountain of work that stands before me. There isn't a chance I can get my weekly video done on time, it will likely be two or three weeks late. Tomorrow I have class prep and grading to do. I was able to relax a bit this evening and read with William (although he's capable of reading them now, I've continued to read the Bionicle books to him so we can share the stories).

grant writing

I worked on my SSHRC grant most of the day, but for a break to run some errands, go to the doctor, pay bills, buy a Bionicle, get groceries, picked up a video camera from work, and filled a prescription. Doctor says that even though my triglycerides are cut in half, my bilirubin is still as high as it was (around 60 when normal is below 10). The SSHRC grant is equally frustrating as I have a final draft of the important stuff but am now faced with eight more attachments I've not considered yet. Due Monday. Need to get some grading done too.

Debates

The Canadian federal debate rocked! I stayed awake for the whole thing, which is a miracle since I conked out a few minutes after it ended. Just woke from nap, going to bed now, still sicker than I thought.
Saw a few clips of American VP debate, they were just standing pontificating. Yawn.

deadline scare

In mid afternoon, I got an email from my department head reminding me that my SSHRC grant application is due today and that she had her notes for me! As I'm still about 6-10 hours of work away from completing the application, this was a bit of a shock. Upon reviewing the emails, I found that it said the "standard SSHRC" deadline was today and in consultation with the research office, I found out that I have until Monday. Better get to work on it.