Jazz Fest 2010

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Originally uploaded by Sally Asher

One of the first acts we saw was the Steep Canyon Rangers. Very entertaining, for a variety of reasons.

Been There, Done That

Here's three blurbs from IMDB; see if you can name the movie:

• In the post-apocalyptic Australian wasteland, a cynical drifter agrees to help a small, gasoline rich, community escape a band of bandits.
• Post-apocalyptic America. What begins as a con game becomes one man's quest to rebuild civilization by resuming postal service.
• A post-apocalyptic tale, in which a lone man fights his way across America in order to protect a sacred book that holds the secrets to saving humankind.

Stories of the loner sacrificing the comfort he knows, even his life, to save humanity go back at least as far as the New Testament. Or, in other cultures, from when Prometheus stole fire from Zeus and gave it to man.

No, this isn't a rant at Hollywood's lack of originality--let's face it; it's show BUSINESS, and we consumers crave the familiar. If we didn't go see them, they wouldn't keep making them. Plus, I've heard that children ask for the same story at bedtime every night for weeks at a time, and that this helps build synaptic connections as they grow.

And major stars like Mel Gibson, Kevin Costner and Denzel Washington want to play the guy who makes that ultimate sacrifice. Hell, Kevin Costner did it twice (WATERWORLD), three times if you count DANCES WITH WOLVES. Will Smith did it with I AM LEGION.

But the coolest example is when Pixar turned the tables and used a cute lil' robot as our hero yearning to make a connection (WALL*E).

I just wish the future didn't always looks so damn bleak.

p.s. The blurbs above: the first is for MAD MAX: ROAD WARRIOR (1981). The second is for THE POSTMAN (1997). The third: THE BOOK OF ELI (2010).

3 months? Are you kidding?

It's been 3 months since I last posted. No, I haven't been in rehab. I've been making jokes about family members that should be!

Since my last post, I completed my comedy writing class, got promoted to Account Director at work, resigned that job to take an Account Director job with another agency and did a bunch of things that are only interesting to me and a few others. However, I did perform at the equivalent of a couple of open mike nights and have posted two of my videos to YouTube. Watch, laugh (hopefully), rate and comment on YouTube. I can take it.




I'll be performing Wednesday, August 27, 2008 at the Village Lantern (167 Bleecker St) at open mike night. There's no cover; 2-drink minimum.

Life=Stories

This week I'm on vacation in Las Vegas.  It's a weird place, but a lot of fun.  

Every cab ride offers a different perspective on life. One driver back in December put on a little show, starting with a poll of who I was voting for for president (choices included the woman, the old man, the haircut or the redneck bible-thumper).  When I said I was planning to vote for Obama, he laughed and shook his head, stating that while *he* was OK with it, the rest of the country would never go black.  Last night, we got a driver who relayed stories of two fares he'd picked up that attempted to commit suicide by cop.  Today we got one who knew every meteorological detail (hottest days/coldest days) from the last decade in excruciating detail.

When one driver took us an alternate route to the Bellagio for dinner the other night, I asked the veiled question "is this way faster?".  He saw through me, though, and said, "When a pretty girl comes up to you and comes on to you, you don't ask if she's old enough.  You just play the hand out and see what you can get."  I spent the rest of the ride assuring him I wasn't questioning his honesty, though I kind of was.  BTW--his way was half the time of the scenic route we'd taken the night before.

Anyway, if you're going to write, you need to live life.  Not saying you should take the hobo route that Kerouac took to get to DHARMA BUMS or ON THE ROAD, but you can't just stay cooped up in whatever space you write in and try to tell something real.  People see through it and it just comes out like a retread of better stories already told.

In writing advice, I always see the same trope: write what you know.  

The more life you live, the more you know and can write about.

storyteller... or prophet?

I saw this story the other day and had to post. I wrote a short story last year about a few murderous 10-year olds who tried to kill their teacher for "being mean". They failed in the execution as they made some critical errors in judgement.

Shouldn't be a huge surprise. Kids are kind of dumb. Or, at least, they don't do a great job of taking the long view beyond what's right in front of them.

And they're lazy. At least I was.

Like the time I dreamed up a motorized skateboard. I drew elaborate plans, researched possible motors (a really big deal since this was pre-interweb) and talked about it. A lot. For a whole week.

Then I was trying to figure out how to turn the back yard into a mini-golf course like putt putt. I dug a hole. Period.

That was quickly forgotten when the new comics came in and I was absorbed with how SGT ROCK and EASY COMPANY were going to get back to the present after fighting Nazis training dinosaurs in a prehistoric era. (p.s. they found their way back through a time portal after throwing a potato masher grenade into a Tyrannosaurus Rex's open jaws). Whew. War *is* hell.

Anyway, someone (OK, a few people) commented in my writing class that in my story, it seemed unrealistic for 10-year-old kids to think the way they did and speak the way I'd portrayed them n my story (coincidentally, also set in Georgia).

Truth *is* stranger than fiction, though, and this news story today trumps mine. The kids are younger, their plot more elaborate and their planning more meticulous. Maybe I'll go back to my original story and add some dinosaurs and nazis.