1. I am beyond excited for the launch of the new podcast, Simpsons Declassified. It’s cohosted by Nancy Cartwright, who voices Bart Simpson. It’s only just begun, and I believe it will be along the same lines as Office Ladies, where they will be reviewing every episode with lots of behind-the-scenes info. I have been a huge Simpsons fan since Season 2. The show incredibly started when I was in 6th grade, and I am very much no longer of school age. Now I won’t lie, the show is still going nearly 40 years later, and I believe it hasn’t been very good in about 10 years, but that’s beside the point. It had nearly 20 seasons of some of the best television ever, so getting to go on deep dives of these classic episodes is going to be the type of Gen-X nostalgia that I’m used to dishing out in my own podcast. I highly recommend it to any Simpsons fan.
2. One new title I can add to my list is that of film location scout. No, I didn’t apply anywhere. I actually got lucky. The director of the film where I made my acting debut in March is down on Cape Cod to shoot another film later in October. To my surprise, he is planning to set up shop in the same town as me. This gives me a major home-field advantage. I offered to help him find locations for his film. So far, I have sent him sets of Google Maps links of possible spots, including wooded areas and beaches. I don’t know if I’d be good at this type of job or if it only works if the film crew comes to Cape Cod. If they asked me for locations in Southern Wyoming, I’d be kind of screwed.
3. I believe the term ‘fake it until you make it’ can be useful. It’s useful if you eventually end up, you know, making it. In looking for funding for the short film that is to be my directorial debut, my crew and I have reached out to a few local chambers of commerce and historical societies. We thought we had a good connection with one local chamber, which I won’t name, and you’ll soon see why. The lady in charge offered to do promotional work, including sending out links to the fundraiser I’d made in their newsletter to what she said was upward of 3,000 people. I should have known it was BS when it took her 10 days to respond to an email. It turns out that the vast, vast majority of emails for the newsletter to go to were fake or dead. In reality, the newsletter probably went to closer to 300 people rather than 3,000. Oh, it gets better. This lady has now been fired for gross incompetence. This included not paying bills. She was ordered to not leave the premises before she gave them all of the passwords and vital info that she had changed as well as filling the people in on any other screw ups she had made. Luckily, the interim head of the chamber is way more competent, and things seem to be progressing well for our film. Still, 4 months is a quick turnaround to go from being hired as the head of a chamber to being fired for gross incompetence. It must be close to a record.
4. Maybe animals just trust me, but I have noticed on a couple of occasions this week, when animals should be running away, they really don’t. First, there was a rabbit in the front yard when I got home from work. It was eating some clover. As I came up the walkway, it definitely froze and watched me. I’m sure if I had lunged at it, the rabbit would have fled. Instead, it flinched a bit but then went back to eating its clover. I did say hello to it. On the bike trail this week it happened twice. One day, a little dark gray mouse was wandering in the grass along the trail as I was walking by. It should have fled deeper into the brush, but it just meandered along like it couldn’t have cared less. That, or it was just depressed and wanted me to stomp it. Lastly, there was a chipmunk that crossed in front of me on the bike trail. Instead of diving down into its hole, it kind of sat in front of it, looking at me. Then once it slid down the hole, it popped its head back out and looked again. I’m not saying I want to be like Dr. Dolittle though. The last thing I need is to go outside and have coyotes and owls gather around me looking for advice. It’s like when Homer Simpson befriended animals, and they were in the shower with him.
5. It was a speechless and grateful moment when a day this week turned out to be the best single day for downloads ever for my podcast in its nearly 5 years. Not only was it the best day, it was more than 3x the previous best day. It was also more than double the best week ever. I have worked so hard on all of my creative work, whether podcasts, books, or YouTube videos, so when something I do catches on with an audience, even if it’s briefly, it’s humbling. I do wish I knew what caused these spikes in viewership so I could better capitalize on them. Still, I know these types of ‘big win’ days can be few and far between, so I do my best to appreciate them and the viewers/listeners who make it possible. Thank you.
6. While in the supermarket this week I went down the soup aisle looking for something for dinner. I came upon the Progresso soups. It was here that I saw something odd: 2 cans of the exact same soup, right next to each other, and yet one soup had fewer calories. This isn’t like the greedy ‘shrinkflation’ that Doritos did. Their small bags of chips suddenly had fewer calories, but only because they were giving you less. Not a lower cost, just fewer chips for the same price. Jerks. No, the soup was exactly the same but somehow one was 10 calories less. Oh, don’t worry, I have the evidence. And yes, I bought the one with fewer calories.
7. I am a very sentimental person. I tend to keep things that most might toss out if they mean something to me. I have loads of cards I’ve been given over the years. These mean a lot more as I have several from my grandparents who are all no longer here. That being said, I do think my youngest niece, Sylvie, takes advantage of my sentimentality. I have little heart stickers she gave me that have been stuck to my car’s dashboard for nearly 2 years. I have on my desk a tiny little jar of what looks like dried neon green paint. Now, to top it off I have a single blade of grass in my car’s center console. Sylvie handed it to me and demanded that I keep it. Obviously, I could just lie and say I kept it, but she’s way too smart and would probably demand to see it. Not sure how long this blade of grass will survive, but it’s sitting in that center console as we speak.
8. What is it about the specific day and time that I record my podcast weekly that seems to attract every single large, loud truck possible? I swear that it’s only when my mic is on that every few seconds, huge delivery trucks, loud construction trucks, and every jerk with a super bass-filled stereo goes passing by. Once I finish recording? It goes back to normal. A loud vehicle goes by every once in a while, but it’s mainly regular cars, and spaced out enough that there are actually nice moments of silence. Then I get to hear the endless parade of blue jays yelling at each other.
9. While in the freezer section of the supermarket, I had a fun encounter with a little old man. Now, when I say ‘little’ I mean it. He made me look like Shaq, and I am all of 5’8”. Anyway, he casually walked up to me and asked what was for dinner. I said I honestly had no idea. Shopping while hungry is a problem I always have. The old man started raving about these black bean burgers. He gave me a rundown of how to cook them right, all while showing me the box of them he was getting. I didn’t have interest in veggie burgers, but I did take a walk over to where they were as he was leaving, just to make him feel good. I did try to avoid him during the rest of my time there, in case he checked my cart and didn’t see any veggie burgers.
10. When it comes to eating healthy, I have been having a rough go of it for the last few years. I tend to use food, specifically bad-for-you foods, as a reward for getting through whatever challenges there are in daily life. I try, keyword ‘try’ to track my food on MyFitnessPal. This means sometimes logging my breakfast but no other meals, just to keep my consecutive days streak going. The irony is that a lot of my need for ‘rewards’ comes from not being able to fully pursue my goals in creative fields. Why this is ironic is that working at a typical day job are the days when it’s easiest to stay way under my calorie goal. When I work at home on my various creative projects, those are the days when my diet goes off the rails. So as much as I want to have a job in some sort of creative field: writing, podcasting, film, etc, I am also terrified of how out of control my weight would get. It’s like the whole monkey’s paw thing.
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| Me, the day after I become self-employed |
11. I have to say, if you think that spray painting someone else’s property with hate-filled garbage, or your stupid loser nickname, makes some kind of statement, you’re right, it does. That statement is: I am scum and was raised by idiots. Here’s a better idea. Take the money you spent on spray paint, assuming you actually bought it and didn’t just steal it, and buy a big, thick, hardcover book and bash yourself over the head with it because there’s no hope for people like that. Yes, I did see way too many spray-painted spots on a walk this week, and yes, it did really piss me off.
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