rew | ff

First class, seat 1A

Sunday, December 26, 2004 Part Deux

OK, so, first of all, I don't have a lot of time. The battery on my laptop only lasts around 10 minutes these days (kind of defeats the purpose, huh?), but the opportunity to post, or at least compose a post, from the sky is too much to pass up. "From the sky?" you say? Yes! I am actually aboard an airplane! It's my second of the day, as a matter of fact, and barring fiery death I will, in fact, be arriving in Portland at some time in the near future.

Note: it took more trains than it did planes to complete this journey. First, the Q-train (electric), from Brooklyn to Manhattan, then the NJ Transit train (diesel), from Penn Station to the vicinity of the Newark airport, and finally, the Newark Airport Airtrain (air?), from said vicinity to terminal A, where dastardly United Airlines makes its home.

I'm actually a tiny bit drunk right now, as I got bumped up into 1st class as, I think, a direct result of me being the only nice person the United Airlines people had to deal with all day long. It almost went for naught, as my initially flight out of Newark to Washington DC (?) was delayed for almost 3 hours, and it looked like I would miss my connecting flight to Portland...

oh, great, now I have the hiccups. Maybe multiple gin and tonics in the air isn't/wasn't the best idea.

Anyway, ultimately the plane showed up. It turned out to be a tiny little commuter jet that made me somewhat nervous (turbulence, as you might expect, affects them to a somewhat greater degree than it does bigger planes), but it got me to DC in one piece and in plenty of time. But this was not before I broke down and paid the 6 bucks for wireless access so I could surf the net while I was waiting to find out if I would be spending the night in the air or in Brooklyn. While I was goofing around online (luckily plugged into one of Newark airport's handy electrical outlets), a weird guy came up to me and started asking me about my computer. His first question was, "Is that an Apple laptop?" which I ended up asking him to repeat several times, as I would have thought the answers to both parts of the question were obvious ("No, it's actually a Dell, but they're using a glowing apple as their logo these days, just for shits and giggles. Weird. You'd think that'd be copyright infringement, but I guess it's not."). But he finally left me alone.

Anyway, so I ended up spending the better part of both days in the Newark airport, where I was entertained not only by the degeneration of human dignity but by a microcosm of what the fall of a society might look like (people go fucking batshit crazy after being cooped up in an airport for a couple of hours, apparently). Not to mention "America: the book" by Jon Stewart (thanks Kramer!), which has made me laugh out loud several times while sitting across from pissed off old people, only serving to piss them off some more. Fucking old people.

Eh... down to 61% battery power... and it's only been about 10 minutes since I turned the computer on. If only we could get a) wireless access, and b) AC power here in first class, that'd be awesome. But it's pretty sweet anyway... all the booze you want and some kind of ham sandwich that I already ate. But no cure for the hiccups as of yet. Oh... and how's this for annoying relevancy... guess what movie's playing? If you would refer to, I believe, two days ago in this very blog... yes, that's right, "Shark Tale" is playing on the tiny video screen above me. Damn you, Spielberg! Why do you torment me so?

Anyway, I'm down to 52% now, so I'd better wrap up. Thanks to the parents and the brothers for the continued phone support over the last two days, not to mention Vicky, who fielded my "I'm about to put my fist through a wall" call this afternoon, whether she knew it or not. I will post this upon arrival in Portland, with no editing or amendment. From 30,000 feet, this is Dave Killen, signing off.

So it turns out United Airlines sucks pretty bad

Sunday, December 26, 2004

Well, I guess I'm not going to Portland after all. Didn't see this one coming. It's now 1:34am, and I'm about to go to sleep. Long story short, my flight was gossly overbooked, I got bumped, all flights to Portland are booked for the next several days. They offered to try to get me on one late tomorrow, but refused to put me up in a hotel (even though they did do that for everyone else in my situation) because "you're from here," even though "here" was New Jersey, and I live quite a ways away in Brooklyn. It's not free to get from one place to the other.

Still possible, but it doesn't look good. Although, if the Red Sox have taught us anything this year, it's that that just may be enough.

It'll be kind of like a new saxophone, because I haven't played my old one in so long...

Saturday, December 25, 2004

So yesterday on my way to work my iPod, which is always set to shuffle, picked "Allison" by the Pixies and "Allison" by Elvis Costello consecutively. It's always coming up with weird shit like that, but this is a first. I mean, there's hundreds of songs on there... what are the odds? And also, I should point out that neither the Pixies nor Elvis Costello spells "Alison" with only one L, as my cousin Alison does.

How's this for a reality check -- it's Christmas morning, and I'm about to clean my apartment's bathroom. Things have certainly changed in the last 10 to 15 years. Oh yeah, I need to do the dishes, too.

Everyone's gone, even my friends whose families live in the city. Last night I went to see "The Incredibles" at the Pavilion, which is a really cool old theater in Park Slope that it takes me about 20 minutes to walk to. In spite of working for an animation studio, I'm not all that into animated movies for the most part, but it was really great. Pixar seems to be able to do no wrong. They make a cartoon about fish (Finding Nemo)... everyone loves it. Dreamworks makes a cartoon about fish (Shark Tale), and it completely bombs. That's right, Spielberg. Suck it. Did you make sure to include a scene where a child shark tearfully states something that requires him to be wise beyond his years, thereby showing the adult shark characters what's really important? I don't know, because I didn't see the movie, because EVERYONE SAID IT WAS HORRIBLE! Fucker.

Anyway, like I said, I have to clean the apartment up a bit and then get going, if I'm going to make it to New Jersey in time for my flight. I have a sneaking suspicion that the subways aren't going to be on the most frequent schedule today.

Santa gonna bring you a new saxophone?

Friday, December 24, 2004

Here's a link to the Christmas card I made for my new york friends... anyone who's been reading this blog might enjoy it:

dave's really poorly animated christmas card

Happy holidays, everyone. Portlanders, I'll see you soon.

Some ramblings as I await DVD encoding...

Monday, December 20, 2004

Last Thursday I finally got a bed. Recently the Phoenix-era air mattress I'd been sleeping on had sprung a leak, and though I tried to patch it with a bike tire repair kit, it'd still leave me on the floor by about 3 o'clock each morning. So I found a decent futon on craigslist.org, and managed to enlist Neil to help me transport it via U-Haul cargo van on Thursday after work. As it turns out, I made a typical Dave miscalculation and probably spent nearly as much money on a used futon and its transport as I would have on a new one with delivery. Stupid, stupid, stupid! U-Hauls are never, ever a good deal. How the fuck did I drive 50 miles in Manhattan? Was I just aimlessly circling the island?

As with last weekend, I worked both Saturday and Sunday this weekend. Neither day was particularly grueling, though. I didn't stay out too late on Friday -- Kramer and Mary and a few others went to Grassroots for a little while -- so I was able to get up pretty early on Sat. and do my laundry. I then headed in to work, where I stayed until...

Animation Collective's holiday party, which was held at my boss's apartment on 44th street. I'd never been there before, and it's a pretty nice place. Non-AC friends of mine Kramer and Vicky were both able to come, and it was a pretty decent party, considering it was work-related. Any time there's free food, I'm willing to give it a shot. After the party, Kramer and I headed downtown to meet Mary and a few of her friends. They all seemed cool, but I was kind of worn out and tired, and not in the greatest mood. I ended up heading home at a relatively-early-for-me-since-I-moved-back-to-NY 3am.

So it's Monday again, and I'm at work late, waiting for the aforementioned DVD to encode. Things should get interesting here at work after the new year, as I'll be jumping into this puppet show project. Did I mention the puppet show? The first thing I worked on when I started here was this crazy re-edit of a Taiwanese puppet show that we were doing as a pilot for a cable network (I'm not sure I'm supposed to name them, so I won't). Working on the pilot caused me to miss several key playoff games, not to mention most of what turned out to be Pedro's last start as a Red Sox. But oh well... hey, I guess it was worth it, because now I have a TV show, right? We'll see. But yeah, anyway, we start production in earnest after the break, and I'm hoping to be able to bring in a couple of friends from college to work on it. Again, we'll see.

Hmmm... encoding 25% complete... guess I've got some more time. Let's see... today it was VERY cold. Probably still is. It was 13 degrees when I got to the office this morning. Extremely cold? Yes. Better than Phoenix? Infinitely. Even as it gets colder here, I find myself smiling against the wind chill as I reflect on the fact that I'm NOT HOT. This will probably wear off eventually, but it hasn't yet.

I'm trying to decide how best to spend my time when I'm in Portland... i.e., should I try to see / hang out with everybody, or just a select few? A couple of friends from out here are actually going to be in town then, too -- ex-roomie and native Portlander Jake, as well as my friend Nate from out here. At the very least I've got to take Nate to Dot's (a place Jake knows very well). Anyway, I guess it's sort of a good problem to have.

OK, my hands are getting tired. Maybe I can post again tomorrow? Perhaps, perhaps...

Slowly but surely

Saturday, December 11, 2004

OK, so I said I'd start posting again, and then I didn't. I'm sorry. It's hard to find the time. Things have been really, really busy at work. So busy, in fact, that on Thursday night, after working until around midnight on both Tuesday and Wednesday, I fell asleep on the subway and woke up at 2am in Coney Island. This was weird, not to mention annoying. To be fair, I had gone out and had a few drinks, so that probably contributed to it, but I'd never fallen asleep on the train before and missed my stop. I think most people do it at some point or another, but ideally not so late at night when you have to be up in the morning. Anyway, I've been really busy at work. I'd like to write some more about work one of these days, but not right now.

Some cool news for me is that I'll be able to go home for the holidays after all. It didn't look like I was going to be able to afford it, with plane fares back up where they used to be, but I randomly found a cheap flight that leaves from New Jersey on Christmas day. I'll be in town from then until New Year's eve, with a flight taking me back to New York that should get me here in plenty of time to make it to the party my friends are throwing. But it'll be great to be back home for a bit -- it's been almost a year -- and see my parents, brother Scott, dog Flynn, and new car Clarence (the car he's replacing is named Bruce, so if you see the progression we'd probably get along). I'm kind of blocked right now... I'll write more later.

Oh yeah, baby

Thursday, December 2, 2004

I have the internet at home now! Time to ramp up the blog... I should be updating fairly regularly soon. Like this weekend.

I'm baaa-ack

Tuesday, November 16, 2004

Just a quick note to make sure anyone who's still checking in realizes I don't intend to let this die... it's just that I still don't have internet at home. I can, however, FTP from work now, so if I weren't so incredibly busy I'd be able to do it from here, as I am now. But soon, hopefully, I'll have it at home. Which, by the way, is the first floor of a Victorian house in Kensington, Brooklyn, that I share with two female theater students (!).

Since I've last written, we've had the good (Sox win the World Series!!! I mean, seriously, this deserves a lot more than I'm going to give it here right now -- unfuckingbelievable!), the bad (retarded Texan re-takes white house), and the ugly (John Ashcroft in the paper a lot lately). So a lot's changed... which is why I should be writing more often.

On the Phoenix tip, Sean escaped unharmed, but not before an unknown object fell from the sky and destroyed one of his car's rear wheels while he was heading to school on the Phoenix freeway (seriously). That's about all we know about that. And poor Daner's still down there for a little longer, trying to figure out what he's going to do. In Portland, Scott's car got stolen over the weekend, but was then recovered on Monday, no worse for the wear.

Here in New York, things are very, very good. I'm extremely happy to be here and to be back in the swing of things, both socially and professionally. It hasn't taken me too long to get comfortable as an editor again, and I many be doing something that'll actually be on television soon. That is a particularly long story, and is something I'll touch on later. Anyway, it's time to get to work. I've got to get going, but more later, I promise.

Total, utter insanity

Saturday, October 23, 2004

OK, to recap:

Game 1: I watched it on TV at the Riviera, the famous Red Sox bar in New York City. Met up with Mark, Neil, Jake, Kramer, Nate, a girl named Leann, and I think one other person who I can't remember right now (I know we had a table for eight). Two things were immediately clear from the first inning: Mussina was on, and something was wrong with Curt Schilling. Sean and I exchanged text messages trying to jinx the perfect game. Then, suddenly, the Sox roared back (I correctly predicted Varitek's 2-run homer moments before it happened), but couldn't quite pull it off. The possibility that the Sox could get swept first entered my mind. My words of encouragement to Neil after the game: "Don't worry, the Yanks can't pitch much better, and the Sox can't pitch much worse." As it turned out, I was half right.

Game 2: I didn't watch this game, feeling instead that it was my duty to watch the final presidential debate, as I had missed the prior two because of school. Also, I had a bad feeling about the game. I checked in repeatedly from my cell phone and kept messaging Sean, but again, the Sox came up just short. I definitely started thinking things like, "I can't believe it's going to be over so quickly." I had high hopes for Arroyo in Game 3, though, predicting to several friends that the Sox would definitely win that game.

Game 3: I watched this one with Neil on a 12-inch black-and-white TV in his apartment. Things fell apart pretty quickly and the game soon resembled an adult league game in Portland with me pitching. Neil and I watched the entire debacle, and poor Nate was actually at the game. Went to bed that night resigned to the idea that the best we could hope for was for the Sox to not get swept. However, I did write this in an email: "And who knows, maybe they'll be the first team in the history of sports that aren't hockey to come back from a 3-0 deficit. It could happen."

Game 4: And so began my time of no sleep and diminishing fingernails. I watched this game over at Vicky's place, as at the time I figured it would be my last chance to see one with her and Audra, her roommate who is a big Yankees fan. Play of the series: Dave Roberts stealing second in the bottom of the ninth. That's where it all began. Ortiz finally winning it with his homer in the bottom of the 12th nearly cost Vicky several broken ribs. I was satisfied that no matter what ended up happening, at least the Sox had that great win to remember, and the indignity of a sweep had been avoided. I didn't get back to Neil's until nearly 3am. Totally worth it.

Game 5: I devote the blog to encouraging Red Sox pitchers. I listen to the first half of the game at work on the radio, then wandered aimlessly around Manhattan after Jeter's 3-run double gave the Yanks the lead. I figured it was probably over at that point. I caught a glimpse of Bellhorn's double through a pub's windows and went inside to watch the rest of the inning, but Manny grounded into a double play to end it. I decided to get on a train and try to catch the last inning or two on TV at Neil's. By the time I had transfered to the elevated JMZ line in Brooklyn and could get cell phone reception again, Vicky called to tell me that the game was tied. I made it back to Neil's just in time for the bottom of the 9th, and proceeded to watch four more innings of some of the most exciting baseball I've ever seen. Two of my favorite Sox pitchers, Bronson Arroyo and Tim Wakefield came through with some of the grittiest innings I've ever seen. Poor Jason Varitek couldn't handle Wake's knuckler. Inning after inning dragged by with both teams threatening but not scoring. And the Ortiz did it again, for the second night in a row and the third Sox win in a row. And I started thinking, "We've got Schilling tomorrow." Maybe the best two consecutive playoff games ever. Exhausted.

Game 6: Third day in a row of baseball insanity. Is it really possible that they could do this? I didn't watch this one, electing to stay at work and listen to it on net radio. When I finished the project I was working on at 9:30pm, the Sox were doing well, so I just stayed. Within hours I was consumed by superstition, pacing back and forth (East was better luck than West), sitting down, getting up, talking to the radio. Curt Schilling turns in one of the ballsiest performances in the history of athletics. A-Rod commits a terrible move in terms of baseball karma. Two initially wrong calls are correctly reversed in the Sox' favor. Keith Foulke strikes out Tony Clark on a full count with two men on in the bottom of the ninth to end it. I hadn't eaten or drank anything all day. I nearly pass out.

Game 7: I watched this one over at Nate's house with a bunch of other Sox fans. Realistically, the game was over after the second inning, but it didn't feel like it at the time. Derek Lowe turns in an awesome performance, his last pitch an absolutely beautiful sinker to strike out Gary Sheffield and end the sixth inning. The Sox win easily, completing the greatest comeback in the history of sports. Fox plays a montage of Red Sox highlights accompanied by Etta James' "At Last." Absolutely amazing.

© Long Shot Films 2004