To Paint, or Write of Painting

That is the question! I've been busy with the work of improving curb appeal for the house while we have this stroke of warm weather that will allow for painting, See the picture below shot at dusk. The Front door is now gray (rather than green) and the rail and cement pedestal are now dark gray as opposed to green and purple.

The deck still needs washing and painting as do some of the white rails. I also scraped primed and painted the downstairs windows that were flaking and looking like they were falling apart. A little cosmetic work goes a long way!

But the physical punishment is not insignificant. To paint the side of the rail by the rosebush first required pruning... or really removing about 80 percent of the bush. My forearms show the scratches pokes and thorn splinters of wrestling branches into two large yard waste bags.
And then there is the ladder incident... I fell off the ladder as I was descending. I stepped on the bottom rung in a funny way and twisted my ankle. I was surprised how quickly I was lying on the ground. It took me right down, I started feeling nauseous and dizzy and it was immediately clear that I had either sprained or broken my ankle. I wiggled my toes and found that that was no problem. I lay there for about 5 minutes and then cautiously stood up. A sprain. And a mild one. Can you tell which ankle is swollen?

See the smallish bruising below my ankle?

Awww... Poor me!!

Another project this week was was solving a technical problem for the CMC; my former employer. They had installed robotic cameras in the Wealthy Theatre auditorium but they were just plain not working. It took two days of troubleshooting and down to the last possible alternative theory but it turned out to be the correct one. Shazzaam!! Everything works. They were nice enough to write a little thank you blurb on their website.

In other CMC news, the Capital Campaign that busted my butt and caused great stress for a tear and a half of my life is officially over. They reached their goal which kicks in the Kresge challenge grant award of $300,000. This grant is tough to get and co-writing and submitting it was the last thing I did before handing the Executive Director job over to Laurie. You have to reach your fundraising goal to get the award. I'm pleased she was able to make it pay off.

Tonight, Abby is away at her birthday party with her girlfriends at Craig's Cruisers and I am entertaining Marlee and her pal Karlee as Mary is out with her girlfriends.

I need to get started editing the Children's Museum video. The deadline will be here before I know it. I was going to put it on the portable hard drive but apparently it is dead. I have nothing recent on it, just old projects.

Buzzed

Fireworks

Celebration on the Grand was this weekend and with it the Hispanic Festival and the local Native American Pow Wow. We pretty much stayed away from downtown this time around because there is so much damned road construction that it is near impossible to get there from here anymore when there is a traffic event. Instead, Mary and I dropped in at Bill's house which has a view of the downtown skyline from a high bluff at the end of his cul-de-sac. He had some friends over and was making pina coladas. They were delicious but I started thinking they were a little too delicious. Sure enough. He forgot to put in the rum. At 9:20pm, we suddenly heard the booming of fireworks. They were started early. We later intuited and much later confirmed that they were trying to beat this big rain cloud that was coming. They were not quick enough. It started pouring about halfway through. But it was not bad for us beneath a great big tree. here are some crappy photos from my camera phone.




Saturday we went for a bike ride to Riverside park. We stumbled on the Indian PowWow which seemed like an excellet destination for the trip. We locked up our bikes and checked out the craft and food vendors. We bought some stuff like blue lemonade and cheap jewelry and ran into all of our Native American Friends. One lady was selling fur items. Since I had neglected to bring vials of blood to throw at them, I decided to just see what they had. My favorite was a skunk that had been made into a handbag. It occurred to me that though fur is politically incorrect, in the Indian crowd it is a tradition. Hard to find fault with that. We stayed a bit longer to watch a hand drum/singing competition. Totally cool.
Last night we decided to watch Dream Girls on DVD. I guess you need to see it on the big screen because we were mostly bored.

Today we were going to go to Mary's sister Margaret's house in Grand Haven for a beach visit to make up for the lack of beach time at our last couple of beach trips. Turns out there is a cold water mass sitting there at Grand Haven. (click to enlarge)



Drat! foiled again.

Delinquent Correspondent

Wow, it just hit me that I've been slacking on my obligations to keep this blog current. It's the humidity... THAT's IT! If we could only have a DRY heat. Kidding aside, It has been freaking hot and humid these last couple of days.

Quick update that will be of interest for Alice in the category of "brush with fame". Her former babysitter and dance company cohort will be dancing with Britney Spears to open Sunday's MTV Awards show. And to think... we knew him when!

I think I am honing in on the final version of the Grand Rapids Community Foundation underwriting spot for Ken Burns' "The War". It is a lot to squeeze in 15 seconds but my client seems to be happy. The images, by the way, are Bill Hebert photographs. I really enjoyed learning the "Ken Burns effect" with slow zooms on photos. It's real easy in Final Cut.

As promised, a conclusion to the story on the garage door disaster from my first blog entry.

We finally gave up on the repair guy who came and measured about a month ago. How many phone messages can you leave for a guy? And now what? Who repairs garage doors?

The answer came in the form of a wrong number. I dialed a number of a client from a brochure but no sooner had I punched in the last number than I realized that I had mis-dialed. I quickly hung up and called my client with the correct series of seven digits. Thirty seconds after I hung up from that call, my phone rang. It was the wrong number I had first dialed. The guy identified himself as working for a roofing company. I explained the SNAFU but then asked him if he did garage doors. He replied, "NO, for that you should call Bouma Brothers". They're great guys."

I looked up the number and scheduled a site visit for the following morning. Bright and early, a big black pickup truck showed up just as I was leaving for a breakfast meeting. I showed him the door mand explained that repair would be great but I fully expected to replace the whole thing. When I returned from the meeting, the door was fixed. Not only was it back on track, but it has NEVER worked that good. I can raise and lower the door with my pinky finger! Inside, there on the counter, was the bill. Drumroll, please... a whopping $67 dollars. He also quoted that he could put in a power door for an extra $350. I think we are going to do that. Bouma Brothers ROCK.

An Excellent Cinema Experience

Here's proof that a movie doesn't have to be high budget or high production values to tell a simple but good story. I'm speaking of Once which Mary and I went to see last night. It is not quite a musical as much as it is a movie with a plot advanced by music. It actually has the look of a documentary with scenes shot in public places and non-star actors pretty much playing characters not unlike themselves. The music is good and the characters generate genuine warmth within a very sweet story arc. When the movie got out there was a warm breeze at 11:00 pm which supplemented the high spirits that were generated within the theater. Can't get this film out of my head.

Today's project was creating a draft of a 15 second promo for the Grand Rapids Community Foundation who is underwriting a local presentation of Ken Burns new documentary, The War. I had some guidelines and needed to create something to start a conversation of where to go with the client. Here is my first draft of a 15-second solution.

Tomorrow I will take Marlee up to Pentwater and Abby up to Glen Arbor. Ill be back on Saturday.

The End of My Suffering

Last week I had pretty much worked myself into a tizzy worrying about this video that I had due for the UICA. They needed a "video/music" invitation for a fancy schmancy party they are throwing for big-money donors next month. They were supposed to write a script for me but I also jotted down a few ideas that popped into my mind. When we got to the script meeting, they had nothing and they liked all my ideas... or possibly they needed a fall guy in case any idea turned out to be a stupid idea. Who wants that responsibility? That is what consultants are for.

They chose my riskier idea of doing sort of a Dr. Seuss rap set to a rhythm track. If it worked, it would be funny. If it didn't work, it could embarrass a wealthy patron. That is a bit of pressure!

The shoot seemed to go OK. I got to shoot in the Blodgett mansion on Plymouth Ave. At the last minute, I had Bill Hebert come along to help with lighting and crowd control. Bill is exceptionally good at interesting and funny small talk. The last thing I needed was the pressure of keeping the talent entertained. But when I got home and I looked at the footage alone, it came off more corny than funny. The music would need to telegraph the whimsical in order to view it in the correct light.

Stephen Duren's trio agreed to try and pull something together for me. I met at their rehearsal on Tuesday and showed them the raw footage. No one laughed. We set up to record their session with a cassette recorder but it became clear to me that this would not work. I could hear a hum and also I had no cassette player to transfer it back to video. I decided to just use Stephen's camcorder and place it near the instruments and settle for whatever I could get.

They played around to they came up with a riff that I liked. I timed the 4 verses and decided to have rhythm under the spoken word and add the bass riff under the in-between segments. I stood in the middle of the musicians and, using my watch, cued the bass player when to come in and out. I was reasonably happy with the final take.

UICA liked it and I guess that is what counts. It went out yesterday. What do you think? UICA Video Invitation.

Lots of rain these last few days. The grass is greener.

A Change in the Weather

Oh, for a nice warm day... and when will this infernal rain stop? Ok, that was just for effect but seriously, it is cold and wet out. I guess that this means I'll be mowing the lawn later this week.

This past weekend was spent up in Pentwater, Michigan. This picture was taken out the back door of the summer home of Marlee's grandmother, Margaret Dearth. What you can't see is the big, pristine beach on the other side of that dune grass-covered hill. Marlee, Mary, Abby, Casie and I hung out here Saturday to Sunday in hopes that the sun would come out and we could splay out in the sand and splash in the water. The girls mostly stayed indoors playing cards and games. Mary, Grandma Dearth and I got in one very nice walk before the rain started coming down in a serious fashion. We strolled along water's edge to the pier and then cut inland to a private boardwalk that straddled the wooded hill that was the setting for all the cottages and homes on the south side of the Pentwater inlet.

The end of that walk was the cue for the heavy rain that did not let up for the rest of the weekend and still has not let up. This meant reading our books and playing indoor games with a couple of car excursions into the village to explore their tourist fare. For those 13 years and under, this manifested in exploring the depths of a candy shop and sampling the various sweet and sour liquids, powders and gummy substances. We could tell from the faces of our charges that this rainy weather and indoor activities pretty much equaled a boring way to spend a weekend. We barbecued chicken, boiled fresh sweetcorn and played an extended round of that game (the name escapes me) where you mold clay, draw pictures and act out words on your way around a game board. That was our Saturday night.

Sunday morning was French toast and watching the birds at the feeder. For the girls it was "How soon can we go home?" We had lunch in the village at a House of Flavors. Crappy service, mediocre sandwiches and limp French fries but delicious ice cream treats. We were back in Grand Rapids by 5:30.

I should also mention that we had house guests. Skip and his girlfriend Marlene came by last Wednesday and just left today (Monday) at around 1:00. They are in the middle of a move from Maine to California making perhaps their last visit to Grand Rapids. They were excellent guests, very popular with Marlee, Abby and Buster. They watched our house and fed the pets while we were up in Pentwater. We're sad to see them go but know we have a place to stay in Santa Barbara, California. Marlene also will make the contact for Alice to have a host in Sydney when she decides it is time for a capital city visit.