Resolute Resolutions

Oh yeah baby, it's that time again. Time to look back at last year's resolutions and see how many of them you did or didn't stick to.

Then again, you could be like me and not remember what you resolved to do. In that case, you're a big hero because everyone knows the forgetful are never disappointed. That's my new saying - clever, huh!

Anyway, I'm not going to put my resolutions up here for everyone to see. I don't want that kind of pressure. Let's just say that they are good one's, but attainable. For instance, one of them is to finish my photo course before we go to Hawaii for my brother-in-law's wedding. Shouldn't be too hard, especially if I get a digital camera sometime soon.

So, what are your resolutions? Go ahead, be bold, write them somewhere and try to stick to them...you'll be braver than me!

Time remaining: 00:14:30, Elapsed time: 01:14:54

Thats what my computer says right now as I render another 3D animation for a project due this Friday morning.

My laptop's rendering too, so I'm writing on the little R2D2 (iMac) in my office. It's actually kind of fun to play on this silly piece of white plastic sometimes. It's usually used for capturing video from a Beta SP deck attached to it. But today, when everyone else is at home with their families, I'm using it to play iTunes in the background and to help me pass some time while my computers diligently render 3D movies.

Tomorrow will be an exact copy of today, and Friday will also. Hopefully tomorrow I won't have to work late...but it's crunch time. And Murphy's Law says if it can break, it will break, and it will break at the last moment. So, I'm planning ahead.

I can't complain too much. I've directed angry concern towards a key producer of these videos who waiting until the LAST MINUTE to tell me these videos had to be done...and that's all I can do. This time last year I was in the same boat, with the same producer, for the same client. So I can't even act surprised...I just have to keep my head down and get it done.

Oh, yeah, Christmas was great! I spent some time with my family and with Lauren's family, and we got out of Indiana for a few days at least. So I can't complain about that at all. In fact, I have tons of thank you cards to write...so tomorrow my rendering time will be spent doing that. The long waits may be a good thing after all!

Happy New Year!

Great North American Explorations

(or at least great North Carolina explorations)

Here's a couple of pictures from my buddy Joe Bucki in North Carolina. He's been researching our next leg on the Appalachian Trail, and this is where we'll be starting out in the spring. It's a big hill called "Max Patch" and the trail wraps its way around the ridge-tops down into the little mountain villa of Hot Springs. I'm really looking forward to it, and it won't happen until the end of April!

Lookout world, Lauren's blogging now.

Yes...check her out:

http://ladystahl.blogspot.com/

She's finally blogging after she see's what fun I have doing it. Maybe next I can get her into some other nerdy activity I do....like Geocaching!

More cowbell, please?

At this time of the year, things go completely "bananas" (as one of Lauren's co-workers from Venezuela says). Meaning that things go completely crazy around here...people lose all concept of planning and things are dropped at random on my plate and I'm told "I know this is last minute, but can you animate a traffic backup with a car sending signals to other cars and have the one car be a fancy German car and the others be insanely jealous of it? Can you do that? Can you do that by tomorrow?"

"Of course I can...in fact, I'd love too. Oh, but wait. Damn. I forgot my superhuman animator costume at home....maybe next week."

So, now I scrambled through this week trying to get as much done with these projects as I can before I depart to Ohio for the 5 days of Christmas vacation (with my laptop to work when I can, of course) that I get, and then scramble through the last bit of next week finishing the project so it can go into editing on Friday and make it onto the DVD on it's way to Las Vegas by New Years Eve.

It's the same story every year...nothing new. I try to plan...try to talk to the producers and ask them (and TELL THEM) if there's anything I can do - anything to avoid the end of the year tapdance routine that I have to do every year. They always say "Oh, I don't think there's anything we're going to need you to do," and then the week before it's due they drop by, one by one, and hand me a script of things to animate for their videos. NICE!

Oh well. I'm not complaining. It pays the bills!

Jake and his blog.

Today my buddy Jake IM'd me to tell me he has started blogging again!

It's about time, says I.

He proceeded to tell me that I have an extra space in my title up there, between "a" and "time", and went on to tell me that I should hide my face in shame. Touting myself as a designer and having such a blatant mistake is surely grounds for some kind of evil public punishment.

I'll fix it when I get a second to do so (and I find the files).

Anyway, please check out Jake's blog, as he'll be writing in it again every other day. And if you see that he is slacking again, just send him about 50 comments on that blog and don't stop till he updates it!

Creative Ex-Lax

Yep, I'm having "one o' dem days" where I had so many ideas coming into work, and all the sudden once I sat down and tried to create, I got all blocked up.

Creative block, I like to call it, is common around these times. I'll get a good idea in the shower or during the drive in and have it all planned out. Then, as soon as I step foot in my office and start working, it's gone. Or it's right there but I can't figure out how to make it reality.

It's days like this that I wish there was a nice chewy chocolate tablet that I could eat, wait about 4 hours, and O! how the creative ideas would just come rolling out. How cool would that be?

In an effort to get them coming I even downloaded an old Ex-Lax box and made what I think would be a pretty killer package for these little tablets.

Did it work...not quite. But it at least gave me something to laugh to myself about for 5 minutes...

T.H.O.M.A.S.

So quiet.

Last night was a mess. A big, awesome mess.

Like I said in the previous post, I freakin' love the snow. I just worry about people I care about driving around in it. Before I get into that, though, have you ever gone outside after a large amount of snow has fallen and just listened? Total silence. I love that. Yesterday, at around 5:00, once about 5 inches had been dropped on downtown Indy I went out into the parking lot and just listened. Usually it's noisy, loads of chaotic things buzzing, humming, screaching, and pounding. But yesterday all you could hear was the occasional far-off sound of a fire engine, or the honk of a car. The rest of the city's grumbling quietly muffled under the blanked of insulating snow.

It reminded me of when we were kids, and we would go out into the woods to find a big hill that had a snow drift on it, and build a snow cave. I remember thinking then how wonderfully quiet it was. Then one of our dogs would come and cave it in or something, and we'd be off to find another drift.

Anyway, back to last night. Lauren's class was canceled, and since she hadn't made it much further than downtown in about an hour of driving, she just came to my office and hung out with me until about 5:45. Eventually we decided to join the rest of the sheeple and try to go home. I would drive us both in my truck, and she would leave her car here in the gated parking lot where it would be safe, and at least we'd be together if we were stranded.

My logic was that by 5:45, most people would have left early and would be clear of the roads. The streets here in the city seemed to have less traffic than earlier in the day, so I thought we might be OK. Plus, Lauren had to get home in time for Survivor!

So off we went into the wild white tundra of Indy. We got a block east of the office before we were sitting in total gridlock. It was like the Thanksgiving drive to Ohio all over again.

Needless to say, we crept home. I had to pee the entire time, and Lauren was hungry. You can just imagine the whining that was coming from the inside of that truck.

"Ohhh....I've gotta peee!"

"We should have gotten McDonald's back there...I'm starving."

"Why are these idiots blocking traffic in the intersections....they just ran the red light and are now sitting in the middle of the road blocking us from going home!"

Eventually we made it home, about 2 hours later. Just in time for the beginning of Survivor!

The scene outside the office window...

...makes me want to go lay down on my back and let the snow cover me up.

It looks so peaceful, so beautiful, yet at the same time, dangerous. It's causing serious havoc on the roadways right now, but to me, sitting here in the office looking out the window every now and again, it's pure bliss. I've been waiting for a snow like this all year!

The downside, though, is travel. Lauren has to go 20 miles south to her college to give a final presentation for her master's degree. She'll be driving in the crap. I am worried about that, but she knows to go slow and take her time, and watch for other idiots who can't drive.

I too will have to get home somehow, but my truck is four wheel drive, so it will go just fine. I am just hopeful that Lauren gets out and back safely.

It sure is pretty, though.

Why hello there, my little blogger friends!

It's been so long since we last spoke (or read...or wrote...or whatever). You felt abandoned, didn't you? Like I was too good for you, or like I'd had my fun with you for the year and have decided that I don't need you any longer. Well, wouldn't you be so lucky!

Nope, I'm still here. Still going out of the house everyday and soaking up more things to regurgitate here in my weird and twisted way. I've been pretty busy, though.

Work: Oh work. Well, I was involved in getting a really huge job a couple of weeks ago, and now I'm involved in weekly meetings, almost daily brainstorming sessions, and planning planning planning to get things in order to try to pull off a huge miracle for an industry show in February. There's a big interactive CD, a stage and supporting graphics and movies for the event, short movies, and some other things that I can't really talk about here. It's big, though, I'll say that much, and there's a team of about 20 all working on it here. Madness...pure fun and madness.

Personal Life: Well, there's that too. Trying to help my wife around the house and taking care of the 3 ring circus that is our life takes up most of the weekends. Now throw in the holidays and prepping for that, and you've got yourself a big ol' mess. We're working through it, though - and it's almost over!

Photography: Yeah, there's that too. I'm shooting another wedding with Debby this weekend. That should be fun! I also don't know if I even posted pictures of the event I shot for Make-A-Wish and Applebees, but here it is. A grand opening ceremony that, for 5 bucks, guests could come and eat anything on the menu they wanted. All of the money went to help the little girl in the pictures (the one with dark hair and the blue "Make-A-Wish" shirt) with her wish!

So there you have it. I've been busy. I promise to write more, though. I'll be sure to keep you all up to date.