Vertical Ascent

Filmmaking often feels like climbing up a mountain. It often feels like trying to scale a huge cliff on that mountain with few footholds. Sometimes you slip and dangle above the precipice, hanging on to dear life from the pick that is firmly wedged into the side. When then happens, you breathe in and out. You sweat cold. And for a moment just think to yourself "I'm done with this shit

", but never actually let go.

Being reminded that you're doing alright. That you're actually impressive. That you actually might make it by just the sheer will you have to make it, makes you feel good about life. It makes you get your feet back up against the wall and try to keep on climbing.

Categories: film

To Korea and back again in under 3 hours

I order thai food on Monday night after having a particularly stressful allergic reaction towards the end of the day. Well, it wasn't so much the reaction itself as much as the fact that I had to chow down some Benadryl on an empty stomach, which is always so much fun.

By the time I got home, I was dizzy and tired and had a massive headache. It was cold outside, and the wind made me wish that I had thought of wearing my winter coat that day like Accuweather.com told me to.

So I ordered Thai off of a place nearby through seamless.com. I got crab rangoon (which were delicious because, come on, they're crab rangoons! But otherwise passable in terms of rangoon quality itself) and chicken pad thai (which was also slightly disappointing). About five minutes after I order Thai food, I realized what I really wanted was Korean food. This reminded me that M and I have been planning to go eat at Korea Town in Manhattan since we discovered M lives really close to Korea Town, but hadn't actually done it yet. This led to M and I making plans to go out to Korea Town on Tuesday for Bibimbap.

So we did.

Stepping into Korea Town is a weird experience. It is like turning a corner and finding yourself on a street that definitely belongs in Seoul and not downtown Manhattan. Even the Citibank on that block is marked in Korean characters. Neon is everywhere. There are some traditional Chinese characters advertising Chinese food being served alongside traditional Korean dishes. M and I stick out like a sore thumb amongst the small throngs of Koreans that mill about the street speaking in fast Korean. Some give us a few quizzical glances. We clearly are outsiders.

We cruised around Korea Town for a bit, looking for a good place. We joked about doing post-dinner karaoke but wisely decided against it. We avoided the seedy restaurants in second floors of buildings and decided on one named "Miss Korea BBQ". It has a nice modern design but still evokes a bit of that Asian quality. It looked clean. And the prices seemed reasonable. We duck in and order Bibimbap. M orders some wine which she doesn't like. We eat our fill of food served in a stone pot (I scrape away at the bottom of the pot to catch the pieces of rice that have stuck there and formed bizarrely crispy delicious little rice bits) and try a little of every appetizer put in front of us (I nearly choked on a spicy pickle). It was nice.

I mean, there's no bibimbap like the ones I ate regularly in Qingdao, or like the one I had in Nanguoluxiang in Beijing, but the one in Korea Town will do just fine.

Afterwards, we duck into a Korean cafe, order two Honeydew Melon Bubble Teas and walk over to Herald Square and sit in the cold sipping our neon-green drinks and desperately checking the score on the Rangers-Penguins game on M's phone. The Rangers won so M was happy. And I was too, if only because I'm a Rangers fan by association. I think M and S might disown me if I supported any other hockey team. I find myself wishing it were world cup season so that I could go nuts for the soccer teams. Last World Cup I was a passionate supporter of The Netherlands, because, c'mon, it's the Dutch. They're badass by definition. And they should have won. Whimpy Spaniards....they'd throw themselves on the ground whenever a Dutchman would come less than 5 ft close to them. I mean, they're a good team. But the Dutch are better.

And totally should have won.

THEY SHOULD HAVE WON, OKAY?

Next World Cup, I hope I'll be able to root for Ecuador again. But that's assuming the national soccer team gets its act together and plays strong through the prelims. But that's another year away still I think. So I'm just going to be happy being a Rangers fan by association. For now.

Categories: hockey, Korean Hot Pot, NYC, rangers

Experiments in Writing Techniques

So it is 6:26 am on a Sunday and I'm unfortunately wide awake and have been for about an hour and a half. Something is clearly wrong with me.

That something is called drinking a whole bottle of Riesling last night and expecting to sleep until midday today.

Of course, what actually happened is I woke up at 4:30 am with really bad cramps and a seemingly unquenchable thirst for delicious cold water. I was still feeling a little drunk then, which made the climb down from my loft bed an unpleasant experience of pain and dizziness. After stumbling through my apartment in the dark hitting every corner of every piece of furniture and trying very hard not to curse so that the neighbors won't come up and bitch me out for walking around too loudly again, drinking three tumblers full of water, and chasing back two tablets of ibuprofen with a fourth tumbler, I feel remarkably better although unfortunately wide awake.

Of course, the obvious question to ask is, what in God's name possessed you to drink a whole bottle of Riesling, E? And why are you not swearing off any alcohol from here on forth?

The answer to that is: I intended to ease up my mind to get my creative juices flowing since I've felt a little blocked as of late. I thought I could apply J's Essay Writing Theory (drink wine while you write, let it flow out, go to sleep, edit in the morning. Best of both worlds - the fluidity of words, but constrained and contained by the sanity of the following day's reason) to writing screenplays. Turns out it works. It also turns out that it ceases to work after the third glass. You just sit and stare at the screen and get distracted by the very disturbing video of Of Montreal's "Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Things". This is followed by a viewing of "Electric Car" by They Might Be Giants, missing your housemates like crazy because they should be here in your same drunken stupor egging you on to write more or at the very least laughing at you for freaking out at "Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Things" for the umpteenth time. It all eventually ends with an angry note to your ex that is mostly the F word followed by random verbs and nouns. This letter gets cathartically smashed up and unceremonially thrown in the trash can. You then consider sending the guy you're currently crushing on some stupid text message, but luckily, M's ever-wise voice pops into your head and tells you (rightfully) that you're being an idiot and that this stupid idea has come from the bottle of Riesling you have just consumed. This is when you realize that you've only written 6 scenes out of a whole screenplay you meant to write tonight, and that you almost drunk texted someone, which is always a stupid idea.

You realize that the best thing right now is to drink some water, watch some Friends re-runs and then ascend to your loft bed at 11:20 pm where you immediately fall into a lovely deep sleep.

So, in a way, my writing experiment failed. My productivity crashed dramatically after 16 scenes. On the other hand, those 16 scenes are damned well written.

This poses a problem. I don't want to have to be drunk to write well because (a) poor liver, (b) poor liver, (c) I know I've written well without the aid of riesling before, and (d) that's such a cliche. I know most of my artist friends do their best work in altered states - anything ranging from simple delirious sleeplessness to serious drug abuse - but that just seems like a quick way to die an artistic death. I plan to die like Akira Kurosawa - at age 90 on a film set - thank you very much. So I guess there aren't a lot of Riesling-induced writing sessions in the near or even far future. Which is a good thing. I think.

I am planning another writing session for tonight (after some serious editing, logging, and some Zumba) and I hope that I can get through more than 16 scenes. That 11th draft won't write itself and there are important deadlines coming up.

But maybe I'll start my day with some pancakes.

And another tumbler of water.

Now if only my housemates were around to make me some eggs....goddamnit guys, y'all need to get your butts to Brooklyn like now.

edit: actually did go back to sleep at 7:30 am after writing this post and then, as predicted, woke up again at midday, made pancakes, and watched Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.

Categories: Brooklyn, film, love, Script, wine, writing

Eschatological Dreams

Last night my eyes flew open at 4:30 am after a surprisingly vivid nightmare. The last time this happened, the nightmare was beautifully terrifying enough to be turned into a screenplay. As in the moment I woke up, I understood it to be a dream, and I understood its potential in my story catalogue.

This time it was different. As I lay there for a few moments, I looked at my window suspiciously trying to make out if the eschatological event I had just dreamt about had come to pass or not. Eschatology, for those who don't know, is described by the Oxford English Dictionary as ""The department of theological science concerned with ‘the four last things: death, judgement, heaven, and hell’." In other words, an eschatological event is an apocalyptic event. I just prefer the term eschatological since apocalyptic usually brings to mind images from Armageddon (the movie about the meteorite/comet/whatever it was hurling towards Earth that is stopped by a rag-tag group of oil miners led by Bruce Willis....as much as I like Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck, if you're going to watch a movie about a meteor hurling towards Earth, I would suggest the much better directed and crafted and more scientifically accurate Deep Impact. It also happens to be the only major disaster blockbuster film directed by a woman. Ever.). The thing about Eschatology though, is that it doesn't always revolve around a massive worldwide apocalypse. It can be about your own death. Although last night's dream fits more into the first category than the second.

I think that this particular eschatological dream can be attributed to a number of factors: (1) Eschatology has been on my brain lately, (2) I was highly stressed out last night and was therefore bound to have a stressful dream, and (3) I think I am getting sick with the same awful thing my roommate has and my body is fighting very very hard not to get sick (been chewing em vitamin c tablets like candy....not really of course, but I have remembered to take them regularly which is an achievement for me).

So now for explanations on those factors:

(1) Eschatology on the brain: It is 2012. Period. I have a bizarre interest in (and as a result a vast vault of useless knowledge) about paranormal and unexplained phenomena. I'm Scully and Mulder rolled into one (you can definitely tell I've been watching WAY too many episodes of the X-files) - I have Mulder's willingness to believe, but Scully's unwavering scientific skepticism. I've done my homework on the 2012 Mayan issue, and unlike many other of the phenomena I've investigated, I've firmly decided with those that think that those who buy into the whole "the Mayans predicted the apocalypse" theory are kind of ignorant dumbasses for a lack for a better word. Mostly because looking at the end of the Mayan calendar and arriving at the conclusion that because the cycle ends, the world would end is like if some alien identity found one of our own paper calendars and decided that the world would end on December 31st (or January 31st of the following year) because that's where that particular calendar ended. Great job guys. You found the end of a calendar. Woopdeedoo. Indeed the 13th B'ak'tun does end this year on December 21st, but that only means that we'll be starting the 14th B'ak'tun on the 22nd. Admittedly, we are entering a new era. And there might be some spiritual changes or whatnot, but Mayan records never reference any sort of eschatological event happening on that date. In fact, the Mayan's perspective on time is cyclical rather than linear (like us) so it marks a beginning just as much as it marks an end. However, while I do believe the whole Mayan Apocalypse theory is a bunch of nonsensical crap, my mind cannot help but going into the what if questioning of things. This happened to me back in 1999 when everyone was making a fuzz about the Millennium and all the eschatological events that were supposed to happen then. I was pretty sure they wouldn't happen, but what if they did? It doesn't help either that I watched part of

"Doomsday Preppers" on The History Channel the other day and thought to myself that while most of these people are kind of nuts, having a Bug-Out-Bag or an INCH (I'm Never Coming Home) bag is a good idea no matter if I'm expecting the apocalypse or just an earthquake. I realized it might be a good idea to know how to navigate myself out of Brooklyn in the case of an emergency. I found myself wishing I had paid more attention to S and J when they explained knots to me (although I'm sure that if I asked, they'd be more than happy to oblige in a knot-teaching session, right?). I also realized that my survival skills in general are close to terrible (I can successfully survive in a mountain, oddly enough - I guess wilderness camp as a child was a good idea?) and it might be a good idea to correct that. All in all, my conclusion was that in terms of physicality, I might not be in the best shape to survive Armageddon, or even an emergency. I mean, I don't even own a first aid kit, which I know is really really bad. And that's just been swimming around my mind of something to do.

(2) Me being highly stressed. I gotta admit that sadly, stress is my natural state of mind. And yes, I haven't been exercising regularly and maybe this dream is a sign that I should...and that I should probably keep a careful eye on my eating habits since the stress has been messing up my stomach pH.

(3) Getting sick: It' a sign that spring is around the corner when the dust starts bothering me again. Combine that with a very very sick roommate, asthma, and a messed-up stomach, and it makes for an unpleasant cocktail right there.

As for the eschatological dream itself, it is looking more and more ridiculous as the hours go by. And by ridiculous I mean it belongs as a scene in the film "The Day After Tomorrow" (one of my guilty pleasures) since it involved NYC being buried under a sudden violent blizzard of snow. I think it really just is an indication that I should just go for a jog much more often than I currently do. Goddamed stress.

Categories: eschatology, NYC, sick, stress

Some Fresh Country Air

Last night I came home after taking a small, but much necessary and well-deserved two-day break from the city. I really love NYC but it is always important to go out and get some fresh country air once in a while. If only to remind yourself that there are places in this world where people live in spaces bigger than a matchbox.

The last two days were spent in beautiful Norwalk, CT with a Canon T1i camera in hand filming interviews and being around cats and dogs all day. I got to pet many many cats which made me very very happy. It also made me want to adopt one, but sadly my roommate is allergic (or as she puts it, they make her sneezy) to them so a kitty is out of the question for the moment. I guess that was the hard part. Mostly because there was a cat that was such an adorable purr box whose owner had passed away. We got along just fine. We were a match made in heaven - a girl whose cat had died, and a cat whose owner had died. Also, little Gretchen (the cat's name) was a black tux cat which is one of my favorite kinds. Ah well...as I was reminded by the person I was helping out with the video, whenever I do decide I can get a cat, there will be plenty of them in need of a loving home.

But besides me petting cats and going around Stamford with a camera in hand, being out of the big city was nicely refreshing. I got two full nights' sleep on a very comfortable bed and was greeted by the first signs of countryside spring. The light is beginning to change a little. I was able to survive without my light winter coat for a few hours outside. I did not want to stay in bed for the rest of eternity. It was still a little too chilly to go out and run outside, but it is getting there.

I ate at a pretty fantastic diner and a pretty fantastic mexican restaurant.

I didn't think about money. I didn't think about my apartment needing cleaning. I didn't think about navigating the subway. I didn't think about all my laundry sitting in my hamper.

I did think about the Hudson Valley and the cornfields in Iowa and how beautiful these places are in the spring. I did think about how relaxing Norwalk is in the summer. I decided that perhaps the summer would be a good time to take a trip out to the midwest and reconnect with my Kansas roots. Or it might just be a great opportunity to lounge about the Norwalk harbor.

Maybe I should just go up to Vermont and do that beer and cheese tour M and I consistently talk about.

I definitely have spring on my brain. But it is March after all and you can just feel it coming around the corner.

Of course, after we've put away our winter coats and are all happy about the prospect of frolicking around in the flower fields, we'll probably get that one last dump of snow in April. Because that's how bitchy New York State weather is.

Categories: Connecticut, film, Norwalk, NYC