There is some confusion about dates on my blog – and here’s the secret: I usually write this, as I am now, early in the morning – so when I say “tonight” and it’s 2:40 am on July 6th, I actually mean last night as in a few hours ago.
Be that as it may, “tonight” I went to the “premiere” of Graveyard. It was well received – the audience laughed at the funny bits, and at the unfunny bits too. In fact they laughed over top of a couple of funny bits so probably missed them. Kier-La (cinemuerte ghore whore) introduced Ed (the director) who introduced Thor, who promoted his new album and bent a steel bar in his mouth for all of us. It was quite endearing. After Graveyard of course, was Blood Feast 2: All U Can Eat. I don’t know why they didn’t spell “You” properly in the movie title. Maybe they forgot. See entry on the new modern language below. Anyway, there were some technical difficulties in the film that had it stopping and starting a couple times, and someone from the audience yelled at one point “Lord help us!” which reminded me of the time on Futurama when Fry was watching a horror movie about humans on the robot planet and he shouted “God help us!” and it was all funny ‘n’ stuff. Maybe he – this unknown yeller in the audience – was trying to capture that moment. If he was, I wonder how many others knew the reference. In that crowd, probably 10%.
Today I spent most of my time pretending to draw, that is…drawing for 5 minutes and then watching 15 minutes of Superfriends, and then repeating the process. I did manage to get one illustration done.
Here’s another tip from my patented “Toren’s Tips” column. Which isn’t patented at all (you can’t patent a column, unless your name is John Doric or Faustus Corinthian (yes, the same guy who invented the leather)…and who could forget Marty Ionic, not to be confused with Therese Ionic who of course invented Ionic bonding in charged particles?)
When you send me a link, either by email or messenger of some kind, don’t just post the link out of the blue and leave it at that. You’ve got to give me some kind of introduction or context. I get enough ‘floating’ URLs throughout the course of a day that they become a hindrance and I don’t even click on them.
It’s not so hard. That was only 45 extra characters – would it kill you? Well maybe it would, I don’t know – but do it anyway.
Here’s another slightly different but still very proper way to send Toren a link: Incredibly hilarious Weight Watchers recipe cards from 1974 http://www.candyboots.com/wwcards.html
So, there you have it. Please take it to heart. D&D is in less than 8 hours so it’s time for me to cuddle up with Kodos for the night.
(by the way, if you haven’t visited the above sites, do so!
Tonight I went to the gala opening of the Cinemuerte International Fantastic Film Festival. ‘Fantastic’ as in ‘fantasy’ as in ‘horror’. I got there late – at about a quarter past ten. I was committed to playing Mutants and Masterminds at Theo’s which of course I quite enjoyed, but it meant I missed the screening of Viva La Muerte, the documentary about the past and present of the Cinemuerte film festival. I would have liked to have seen it. James introduced me to the girl who filmed it, and I expressed my misgivings about missing the damn thing. She brought up that it was playing again on Sunday at 2pm, to which I replied that again, I would miss it, since I would be playing Dungeons and Dragons at that time (after a 2 week hiatus, no less). Her reply to that was “that’s not cool.” Then I poured my drink down her shirt.
Well, no, I didn’t do that. But I was put off by her manners and I thought she was out of line. I’d still like to see the film, despite her trying to take me down a peg. Or I’m just reading too much into it, and feeling defensive about being a D&D nerd. Nevertheless, I’m an out-of-the-closet D&D player and I’m glad I was proud enough to bring it up at a party. Ed and James were really the only people I talked to at the party. I only stayed for about 45 minutes – then I hopped on the #50 before my bus pass expired. Ed showed me the article in Terminal City about our film Graveyard – I didn’t read it fully but I’ll pick up a copy – and so should you.
I talked to Kirsten tonight and we have concensus: although her visit was good times for both of us, we will continue our relationship as friends – close friends to be sure, but nothing more. She is a fantastic chick but I just don’t think the cards are right for us at the moment. Kind of sad in a way, but I’m glad both of us feel more or less the same way and that nothing has happened to ruin our friendship.
Oh and did I mention? Spaceship Zero the RPG was nominated for an Ennie Award (that’s a roleplaying game award – there are really only two such awards, the Ennies and the Origins awards). Jeff says that 4 out of 5 of the judges voted for it to be nominated in the category Best Non Open Gaming Product. Now it’s up to the fans to start voting. Let’s hope we win because we could really use the notoriety to boost sales!
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It was Canada Day yesterday. “What’s your favourite part of living in Canada?” Nobody asked me. “That we’re not as patriotic as Americans”, I didn’t reply with some irony. Now don’t mistake me for being anti-American. I have many good American friends. In fact, I can’t think of a single American that I know who I wouldn’t describe as an upstanding, likeable person. But someone once said “There can be no world peace while patriotism exists” and I think that’s 95% true for every country.
On one hand, the melding (some would say loss) of “independent” cultures due to globalization is sad. Wouldn’t it be neat if there were still headhunters in New Guinea? (Heck maybe there still are). But on the other hand, how long can we go on, technology advancing as it is, with those pesky dotted lines on the map? I would much rather have a peaceful racially and culturally integrated (read: mongrel) world than a constantly warring world of segregated cliques.
But then even if we were all exactly the same mongrel race, we’d probably still find things to kill eachother over, wouldn’t we.
Speaking of Canada, Vancouver won the 2010 Winter Olympic bid this morning. My first clue was being woken up rather rudely by the clarion call of over-zealous and inconsiderate commuters at 9:00 this morning. The good news is that all the money we sunk into the bid turned out to be an investment that paid off. The bad news is I can expect a lot more whooping and infantile behaviour from local jocks. The other good news is that it’s 7 years away.
In other news, my out-of-town visitor has gone back to being out of town indefinitely. So it’s back to work for me.
Don’t forget, people who may be reading this, that Graveyard, the movie with me and James, is showing this Saturday at the Pacific Cinematheque at 11:40, opening up for Blood Feast 2. I’ll be getting a sneak preview of the film at Ed’s tonight. Please gawd let me not suck. Or at least let James suck more than me!
