Speedy Week

Wow, the last week went fast. Hopefully the summer will slow down soon so I can enjoy some of it.
Last weekend was an SCA event, rain forced the fighting indoors. I did very well, actually won the tournament. Day started out with fights like this:

And as the day went on the fights got longer, better opponents. I fought through Master Wolfstan the Unshod and Sir Murdoc Bayne, fights I don't usually win. Then I was in the finals and took two fights there to win the tournament:

Maybe it is a harbinger of good things if I can keep up my physical raining and get to some more fighter practices.
July is going to bring a ton of work, mostly instruction, but it will mean a chance to kind of play executive producer on some documentary projects. Hopefully I can get some traction on some personal stuff too. Do some writing, start some editing and finish at least one short film. Time will tell.

#@%!*

Okay, my productive work day turned ugly when as I was plugging in my laptop to do some dual computer work (logging footage on one while editing on the other) my knee hit the USB cable to an external hard drive, pulled it to the floor and caused what sounds like a "head crash" or dead drive. On the plus side the drive had 1 active project on it, with the footage on that one on another computer at the client's site, and archives of past work projects. So I may have done some damage to my demo reel (though I think I have some of that on a drive at another site) but I didn't loose anything of sentimental value. Just a 500GB drive and the 2 freak-out hours I spent trying to retrieve the data.
But I did get some other projects out the door:


Oh well, deep breath and try to get some work done tomorrow. Bonus, I got my HD Handi-cam working. It shoots 1080 to a SD card, so I'm guessing from now on the home movies won't all be shot on the digital still camera. Here's my test movie:

Bitter Strawberries

So we have a wooden barrel planter at the top of our driveway with a strawberry plant in it. Last year we lost about half the crop to birds, deer and squirrels. So this year we've put a net cover over it, it seems to be working as the first berries are ripening. It's nice to see my son picking the fresh berries and eating them, though I'm not getting many berries for myself. Also, the weather has been great and my son has taken to running off to play with the neighborhood kids. It makes me happy we got his house.

Okay funny story. We were out shopping Sunday and as we arrived at a store I took our son in while my wife got our daughter out of the car. After about 5 minutes in the store, no wife and daughter. So we looked back outside to see the driver's door open, a clear sign of a diaper change in progress. Then my phone started ringing, it was my wife calling for help. My son and I ran out into the parking lot to discover a half changed baby and my wife with splattered poop on her shirt. Apparently she had started changing the diaper after "one push of poop" and was surprised but a stream of projectile poop from the second push. And without the diaper, well, she got sprayed. Nothing I had ever seen or heard of before. On the up side; newborn breastfed baby poop has almost no scent, we had a shirt in the car we were going to return (too small for me, but big enough for the wife) so we had a change of clothes and finally it wasn't me that got sprayed.
On a totally different note, I'm trying to figure something out. I am very busy production-wise right now, but when I see other companies or individuals get work locally it makes me mad. It's not that I need more work right now, but I guess I still want a shot at every job I see. It has made me want to focus on getting production work lined up for the summer, hopefully get a short film done too. Or at least widen my network of contacts so I know more of what's going on around here. It's that or try and pick up some distance editing jobs from NYC. Actually that's not a bad idea either.
More later, should be video posts of completed work next time as I'm going to take tomorrow as a work day.

Establishing a Routine

NOTE: edited to add sound to movie

Well, we're a family of four now and I think that for the time being we're getting a rough schedule worked out. Something that will be blown apart when my wife goes back to work this fall.
But for now I'm back to work, old school. Which means video shoots on nights and weekends and editing during the day. This last weekend it was a Bar Mitzvah where I discovered that today's 13 year olds dance like 5 years olds play soccer, in a big clump that would be much more fun if they knew what they were doing. Speaking of soccer, I'm going to be an assistant coach on my son's team this fall. So I'll be helping the 4 & 5 year olds to not clump so much. And the extra running around should be good for my son, who seems to have extra energy reserves now that we're up to two kids. Here's the second half of the third song in a four song dance routine he did tonight:

Not to be out done, here's his two week (okay 13 day) old sister in one of her daily tummy time sessions:

I have a feeling that my wife and I will really have our hands full in a few months. But for now I'm going to try and get as much work done as possible. I'll post some as pieces are finished.

A Weekend at Home

We had a nice weekend at home. My brother came to visit. He was a great help easing my son over the transition to having his sister at home. That's the on going goal, to establish a stable routine so that everything goes smoothly between the new siblings.
Along those lines it was back to after school play-dates with my son's friends.
Today we went to Iron Kettle Farms. A nice little place that's a very popular source of pumpkins in the fall. In the spring they sell flowers and such, but you can still visit the animals and play on the wooden vehicles. We got "spoken" to twice, once about the kids getting on top of a wooden plane, though that did produce a nice picture. And then for playing with the engineless train. It was on tracks and my son was pushing the other kids around in it. That go the train forklifted away to the barn. But it was still a fun day.
Tomorrow I'm going to try and get some production work done, though my desire to rush back to the SCA is still low, I really want to get back to editing especially with the new computer

Ready to get Out

Okay. I'm ready to get out of the hospital and back to trying to get a summer schedule put together, as is my son. He may have been a bit tired, but tonight was the first time he wasn't really okay going home with me and his mom.
As far as the production schedule, I'm confident that I can handle editing over the summer, it's the instruction and production shoots that I'm worried about. Well, I guess time will tell how things work out. But it would be nice to make enough money over the summer to finish the upgrade to an HD production suite and still have time for the family.
My thinking is that the HD equipment looks like it will be vital in the near future, but I still want to have time for this:

Baby 2 Day 2

Another night in he hospital. Going to try to get some work done tomorrow, just a little.
Baby & mom are still doing well.

New Baby

So, we are now a family of four.
6/02/09 - 5:28 pm

Daughter #1
6 pounds 4 ounces
19 1/2 inches

So it's at least one night in the hospital for me, probably 2-3 for mom and baby. Then we'll see how much I'm going to be able to do (and want to do) as far as production and SCA goes with the new family size.

And in closing, big brother and little sister:

Back to Blogging pt. 2

Okay. I can't believe it's been a month since I've written anything on here. I'm going to start trying to get back to posting here. Things are going to get crazy, but I think that getting back to writing out what's going on and what I'm aiming for will help me get more done during what is shaping up to be a craziest summer ever. New baby tomorrow. As much production work from BU as I want. More opportunities with the city shaping up. And a new workout routine and practice regime to put us in shape to make a serious run a crown tourney in October.
More tomorrow, hopefully . . .