The show has hit the road

For the latest installment of The Writer's Block/The Brainwave/WhateverthehellI'mcalling this blog, you have to see my guest spot on kc's blog.

It's kind of a fitting post; her superior blog has always made me green with envy.

Back to the Futurama!!!

Futurama is back.

It was already coming back as four direct-to-DVD movies starting in 2007, but Comedy Central has guarenteed at least 13 episodes for 2008.

I know none of the rest of you care, but so what? I GET BACK MY FAVORITE TV SHOW OF ALL TIME!!!

This should be no surprise to you give the art I use on this blog, as well as many of the episode titles of Futurama:

"Roswell that Ends Well," When they mistakenly go back to Roswell, N.M., in 1947.
"Crimes of the Hot," the Al Gore global warming episode.
"A Head in the Polls," when Richard Nixon's head runs for the presidency of Earth.

On the surface it's easy to see why people avoided the show: silly sci-fi cartoon with characters who aren't all that smart. But it's a very clever show, working in obvious parodies of "2001," Star Trek" and "Star Wars," but also "Midnight Cowboy," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and "The Cider House Rules."

And the show has taught me so much:

It's shown me what a man with a cannon in his chest can do.

It's taught me that the quickest way to a girl's bed is through her parents. Have sex with them and you're in.

And most importantly, it's taught me that the Dave Matthews Band doesn't rock.

So now, or more accurately another year or so, my education can continue.


LF: $103.35

An Inconvenient Shame

"Florida Gov. Jeb Bush met with scientists last week to discuss the possible connection between global warming and increased hurricane activity, but said he’ll pass on seeing Al Gore’s global warming documentary 'An Inconvenient Truth.'

'No, I’m not going to do that,' he replied when asked by a reporter if he’d see the movie.

Bush then offered a short review of the new movie 'X-Men: The Last Stand,' which he called 'excellent.' "

-- NexsMax.com

Typical.

I'm really not surprised. Today I watched Al Gore's cinematic presentation on global warming -- it didn't really give me much more information that I hadn't already read as a copy editor or researched my own on the Internet. But the film was really eye-opening nonetheless. The move was part slideshow, part indictment, part confession -- and it really gave an unexpected look at Gore himself.

I couldn't help but ask myself "What if?" What if he had won 2000? Would the country be in a better place than we are now?


Who knows. But if he had won, I guess he wouldn't have appeared in one of my favorite episodes of "Futurama," a global warming episode called "Crimes of the Hot," which was written by his daughter Kristen, where he was introduced as "the inventor of the environment and first emperor of the moon: Al Gore," and also my favorite all-time quote from him, which you can hear by clicking on my blogger profile and playing the audio clip.

How could this man have lost to W? Hell, he couldn't carry his own state!

As I sat in the movie theater, which was about 95 percent empty, I felt sad that he is not my president, and sad that he isn't running in 2008. He wants to continue his fight against global warming, and that makes me sad, too.

Sad because as well-done as his film is, the only ones who will see it are the ones who don't need educating/convincing. I told people in the newsroom that I had gone to see "An Inconvenient Truth." I was laughed at, and told by several that they would make a point of not seeing the film. And what do they have against Al Gore?


He's a Democrat. Never mind that he's presenting the issue as a moral dilemma rather than a political one. (OK, he does take some shots at the Bush Administration, and even puts in a clip of Oklahoma's own Jim Inhofe, calling global warming the "greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people."

And that makes me feel it's just as well Al Gore wasn't elected president in 2000. I wonder whether our country deserves him.


LF: $102.82

The best job I ever had

It's amazing how quickly I forget things.

An innocuous e-mail conversation with kc brought up something I hadn't thought about in maybe five years: working in the theater. I told you about my worst jobs. Now I'll tell you about the best.

In 2000 I was getting ready to finish my film degree and looking at grad schools. I've said before how bad my grades were in college, but at this point my GPA had been repair to the point were it wouldn't have been near impossible. But there just aren't a lot of graduate film programs out there, even fewer with a screenwriting program. So to increase the odds of extending my school career buy another half-decade, I started looking into playwriting MFA programs. And that led me to volunteering for a theater company.

That summer I worked on running crew for "Six Women with Brain Death, or Expiring Minds Want to Know," a musical by Oklahoman Mark Houston.


It was such a great show. It was fun to watch and so much fun to do, even though it was so demanding. Wearing all black I got to do set changes between scenes, and twice during the show I had maybe 45 seconds to run from backstage to the top of the auditorium to operate the second spotlight. The second time I did it I didn't have to go back down. I got a great viewpoint to watch the finale every night, and even though, including rehearsals, I saw it over a hundred times, it never got old.


The official cast party was held at home of Phil, the stage manager, and Don, the crew chief. The fifteen unofficial cast parties were held mainly at Galileo's in Oklahoma City's Paseo arts district, with the exception of one or two held at On the Border when we were in the mood for margaritas.

And it wasn't until the last show that I found out I was getting paid for my efforts: a whopping $50. I felt like I was stealing. And the bonus: the theater company director wanted me to be sound operator for "As Bees In Honey Drown."

That was an unremarkable show, except that the girl with the blue hair, Katy, was really hot (trust me -- the picture nor the wig do her no justice). I also had less time to enjoy being with the crew; school was back in session and I was also working at the paper. But this shows how much I loved working there: I missed the first two games of OU's 2000 national championship season to work that show.

But I didn't get offered a spot on the crew in CST's next production: "Deathtrap." That was disappointing to be sure. Until I found out I didn't get offered because they had me in mind for light board operator in "Les Liaisons Dangereuses," starring the very cool Alley Mills, whom you all know as the mom from "The Wonder Years."



Yes, for the entire first day on the set during the rehearsals I kept thinking of her as Kevin's mom -- right up until the point she yelled "Oh fuck! LINE!" She really was a nice lady.

And her husband was cool too: Orson Bean, who was so awesome as the boss in "Being John Malkovich." And if I had known then that he was the voice of Bilbo Baggins in the animated version of "The Hobbit" I would have developed a man-crush on him on the spot.

That show was a lot of fun, too. And it only ran one weekend, so it was two weeks of work while OU was on the road or on a bye week, and it paid $100 because it was a Stage Center production.

And what show was next? "Over the River and Through the Woods." But I can't tell you anything about that. When they asked me whether I'd be available, and of course I said no. By that time I had added journalism as my second major; next semester I was to be entertainment editor. I wasn't going to have time.

What disappoints me now, looking back, is that I remember during rehearsals for "Six Women," when we were working well past midnight trying to get ready for opening night, I thought to myself how much I loved the theater. I should have found it earlier in life, but it was lucky I had found it then. I promised myself that wherever I ended up after leaving OU, I would stay involved with the theater.

Obviously, I broke that promise.

That December was when I got the internship in Boston: my mealticket. Which, working nights and weekends as a copy editor, meant the only theater I could hope for was catching a Sunday matinee.

Now, as I take my career path on yet another direction, I think it's for the best I forgot my stage dreams as quickly as I got them. Journalism did take me to three corners of the country, whereas theater probably would have gotten me as far as northwest Arkansas, and I would have made even less money than I would have with film. You can even tell where I am now: I write "theater" rather than "theatre," unless part of a proper noun.

I love "Six Women," but if the show is ever playing near me, I don't think I'll go. There's no way it would be as good for me.

Same with working for a theater company again. I think it would be different now. I'm different now. Maybe someday I'll be called back to the theater, but for now the theatre is dark.


LF: $102.82

Inns and outs

I thought I was finally free.

In the past week and a half, not only did my apartment lease in Tulsa run out, but my place in Lawrence has been rented for the rest of the summer. The financial obligations are gone.

One problem, though: For now, I'm still working at the Tulsa World.

I actually tried commuting from OKC. But 300 miles round trip put a hell of a lot of miles on the car. Going back to school means my Honda needs to last another couple years. And putting 7,000 miles a month on my car isn't helping.

For anyone who's driven up the Turner Turnpike into Tulsa, you notice all these cheap motels. They all offer weekly rates, and one even has three- and four-day rates. Considering I go to OKC every weekend, a four-night stay would actually make sense. I mean, for less than what I was paying for my Midtown apartment, I would get a room with maid service, cable TV and all bills paid.

I got a chance at a test run at this motel, the Interstate Inn, when I was given the wrong shift on a Monday, having to work too early to be able to drive home at 1 a.m., then come back to work an noon.

Several of you have heard this story already: The room was a bit small, maybe a little larger than a cargo van, and a shower/bathroom the size of a broom closet. What was disappointing was I found no movie network while channel surfing.

So after I got off work that night at 1 a.m., I went to my room and turned watched Adult Swim and read my copy of "The Phantom Tollbooth." As it got close to 4 a.m. I needed to turn in. For some reason I flipped through the channels one more time, this time stopping on a station with a topless women jumping up and down.

Maybe there is a movie channel, I thought.

Oh, it was a movie channel. It was "The Erotic Network."

Porn.

Harcore porn.

I didn't even know it was legal to show that kind of stuff in Oklahoma. My reaction was to be a little freaked out and a bit pissed. Freaked out because the Tulsa World had done an article a few weeks earlier about the high number of registered sex offenders living in these motels along this stretch of I-44; it's one of the few places in the city they're allowed to live. Hardcore porn doesn't seem like the best thing to show them.

But why was I pissed? While I spent three hours with cartoons on TV while reading a children's book, I could have been watching porn!

Part of the deal of my mom buying me a new laptop was that I spend my workweek in Tulsa; she doesn't want me on the road that much. So last week I spent three nights again at the Interstate Inn.

I used to think of Tulsa as a very safe city. But there's a record homicide rate this year, and add what I already said about the sex offenders, well the stay in the seedy hotel for a few days had me a little on edge.

My first night there I got in just before 2 a.m. I was pretty tired, so I just had a bite to eat and turned in. At 4 a.m., I got a phone call:

"Hullo?" I said.

"Hey, dude!" the voice on the other end said. "I saw you come in a little while ago. You still up?"

"No."

"Oh. Well, my taxi's letting me down. Can you give me a ride to work?"

You might think, "Oh, George ... you're tough. You were in a gang. You were a jock. You can do a nice thing, and if something does wrong, you can take care of yourself."

Yeah, right. I'm afraid years of working technical support and editing and designing for newspapers, where my shift involves me sitting on my ass for hours on end, means I'm no longer hardcore; my physique is now soft and doughy. I didn't know if he wanted to steal my car, take me away from my room so an accomplice can ransack it, or if he just wanted to make me his bitch.

"Um, I have to get up early in the morning," I said to him. "Sorry."

This might also be the place where you say, "Sure, George: You were 'sleeping.' When you had free porn?"

Well, the sex offending thing keeps the mind racing. Sure, I turned on the porn. But then you can't help but think how many others were in that very room, on that very bed, with those very sheets -- watching porn. Animal Planet helped keep my mind off that.

Really, what got me through it was Fa, a German shower gel kc and I bought at Brits, the English store in Lawrence. The back of the bottle has this claim: "fuhl dich selbstbewusst in deiner Haut und zeige deine Identitat."



I translated this to mean: "Specially engineered to be extra concentrated for additional protection whenever staying in seedy motels."

So what now? There's always Tent City on the other side of the Arkansas River.




LF: $101.82

London calling

I opened a savings account with ING when I was out in LA. I started with $50, and since I did it at their trendy cafe in West LA, they threw in an extra $25. So after not touching the account for two years it has grown to a whopping $79.35.

So what to do with this surplus? It is now officially my London fund. At the end of every post I put on here, I will list what's in my savings account. If it doesn't look like it's growing, pester me. If it ever goes down, well, that's when I'll need a kick in the butt unless I have a very good reason. The key is accountability.

And of course, donations to the London fund will be gladly accepted.



LF: $79.35

How different is a Globe from a World?

I got two e-mails yesterday from my Yahoo! account -- because that address has become so riddled with spam I don't use it that much. The first message was from a girl I worked with at the OU paper who's now interning at The Boston Globe, where I had my first internship back in 2001. She said people there had been trying to track me down, and they wanted to know where I was at. So I told her where I worked now and that I was planning to go to nursing school.

The next e-mail was one of the newsroom administrators at The Boston Globe, saying that while they didn't officially have any openings, they were tracking down former interns from the copy desk to see whether they would have interest in coming back. I clicked reply to say the same thing, but then stopped.

Just the other day I was telling kc on her porch how if I didn't get into nursing school, I had no backup plan. And the past two months I've had a really bad feeling that I was not going to get accepted. Then what? Stick around at the Tulsa World?

I've always said that if I were to stay in journalism, there's no place I'd want to do it other than Lawrence. But how often do they have openings there? Could I wait?

The Boston Globe was an amazing experience. Just imagine, whatever your field is, you're working with the best of the best, every night. The pay is top-notch, even when considering high cost of living, and you can't get much better in terms of places to live than New England. Could I stand to be halfway across the country from everyone in my life?

Should I close that door and possibly burn that bridge? I said in an earlier post that when in Lawrence I was just a shade of the copy editor I used to be. Well, in Boston is where I was at the top of my game. Maybe going back would rekindle something I lost? It's something that had to be considered. It's likely they'd never call, but it's good to have a plan B.

Then today I got this letter:



To: dbaines@globe.com
From: george@yahoo.com
Subject: Re: Boston Globe

Donna,

Good to hear from you. The Boston Globe would be an amazing opportunity for any journalist; the paper is second to none in excellence. However, I will be entering nursing school in the fall, so I don't think it's in the cards for me.

Give everyone there my best.

George Z.

Getting schooled

I think everyone has to have done it at least once: There's something you're really trying to convince your parents to buy you, whether it be a new computer, a car (to go to and from school), a trip to Europe, a cell phone for calling home or whatever. The parent in question is just about to give a negative response to your request, to which you respond: But it's for my education!

I did a bad thing. My mom has been hassling me about commuting between Tulsa and Oklahoma City so much. The point I made to win the argument would be that I had no computer in Tulsa, and I am taking online courses. It is true, but really I do it because I'm mainly just bored up in Tulsa. The computer I gave my mom is in OKC, as well as cable TV which I help pay for.

But today my mom gave me an early birthday gift:



Now I feel really bad. Do I give it back? Do I use it to stay connected during stops at seedy motels as I continue my career transition? Do I use it to start writing again so this stupid blog can once again live up to it's name?

I'm such a bad son.