Friday, May 28, 2004
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Once Upon a Time on a Dark and Stormy Night
 The video club of which I’m a part has been working lately on finishing some of our first-year projects. One of them, entitled Once Upon a Time on a Dark and Stormy Night, is worth mentioning simply because I’ve invested such a large amount of time in it recently.
In our first year, we adopted a certain operation for our club. Each month, a new member would step up and offer up their own idea for a project. That person would often take on the role of writer/director and the group would rally around them and offer whatever help they could on the day of the shoot. Other responsibilities, especially those that require work outside of shoot dates, would invariably arise, but essentially, participation for most people would amount to an evening planning meeting and a daylong production schedule.
Every project will also have the typical post-production editing, audio, and music related tasks associated with it. What makes Once Upon a Time on a Dark and Stormy Night different is the amount of time we’re putting into extra effects.
Amelia Jenkins is the proud owner of Once Upon a Time on a Dark and Stormy Night and from the beginning she visualized it as animated. We discussed doing stop-frame animation, claymation, and the like, but ended up discarding those ideas because we suspected that they would be too time consuming. I suggested that we plan a normal shoot and use a combination of digital effects in post-production to achieve the animated look-and-feel she was after. Although I haven’t seen the movie Waking Life, I did read up online about how the director supervised the post-processing of the film. I was confident that, after the shoot was behind us, we could find something that would work.
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Posted by Arlo @ 12:04
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Wednesday, May 26, 2004
Tuesday, May 25, 2004
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A "Big Thing," Part III
Continued from here.
That weekend, I began the daunting task of diving into some of the material my professor friend had sent to me. I picked up the Builder’s Guide for Cold Climates only because it looked very professional and had a lot of drawings. Boy, was that over my head.
I guess I should have had a clue with the words Builder and Guide included in the title. I’m not a builder. I mean, I’ve got enough tools and know-how to put together a particle-furniture that comes from the store complete with instructions, but anything beyond that is, well, beyond me. The book itself was well-written and quite explanatory, it just had a different audience in mind.
Before giving up on page 100 or so, I did sort of enjoy trying to figure out what they were talking about. Each chapter concerned itself with a different part of the homebuilding process; the foundation, insulation, electrical, plumbing, etc. All of it was geared towards building an extremely energy efficient, durable house in a cold weather environment. I got the most out of the first part of the each chapter where they gave an overview of what they were about to address. The rest was simply graphical variations on a theme. Unfortunately, the diagrams far outweighed the informative text. It wasn’t uncommon to find references to Figure 5.62 in a ten-paragraph chapter!
The sheer number of diagrams made it abundantly clear that many, many things need to be considered in order to properly build a home in our environment. As a prospective buyer, considering having my own home built, I worried that there was too much information. When it’s time to lay hundreds of thousands of dollars down, how can you trust your general contractor to make sure that all these little details are followed? [more]
Posted by Arlo @ 01:34
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Friday, May 21, 2004
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Sunshine... and the living is easy.
 I just (re)discovered something that might have a detrimental effect on the newfound proliferation of my web log entries…
Straightforward sunbathing is awesome.
The weather here has been truly spectacular lately – the bank thermometer next to my apartment read 77 degrees yesterday – and I’ve been taking advantage of it every change I get. Which isn’t exactly all that often when I have to work 40 hours a week. Nevertheless, I’ve been using my lunch breaks to plant myself in a warm, quiet corner on campus, crank up the tunes, and use my laptop to pound out these entries.
Today I was a bit hungrier than usual, so I went to Subway first and grabbed a sandwich. When I got back to campus, I had maybe a half hour left on my lunch break. I sat down on a bench next to the library and started typing Part III of that “Buying a House” thing I’ve been blathering on about lately. The day was hot, though, and wearing a black t-shirt didn’t help matters. What's more, I’d left my sunglasses at work. With them it’s difficult to make out what’s on my incapacitated-by-sunlight LCD screen. Today I found that it’s pretty much the same without them, there’s just more squinting involved.
Anyway, after all of 10 minutes, I gave up and simply lay down on the bench and closed my eyes. The sun blazing down was heaven and if I’d had more than 10 or 15 minutes left, I’d have probably let myself fall asleep.
I’ve only been living in Juneau for 10 years or so (A decade already? Damn!), but I’ve heard that the best time of year is always in the spring. Thinking back to 2003, I can believe it. As it’s been the last couple months, April and May last year were exceedingly clear and sunny. Unfortunately, it was also quite cold. I remember taking advantage of the good weather by playing disc golf and having to skate on the icy trails well into May.
Not this year. It’s been perfectly comfortable with highs in the mid- to upper 60s almost every day. The only downside is that my apartment gets quite a bit of afternoon sunlight and if neither Oksana nor I remember to go home to open the windows and turn on the fans during our lunch breaks, we’ll come home to temperatures (seriously) around 90 degrees. Not that I’m complaining – it’s a fair trade, in my opinion.
In all likelihood, this divine weather will not last much longer. In no time we’ll be back to Juneau’s typically depressing wetgreychilly summer. It’ll be depressing, sure, but at least I won’t be tempted to sleep through my lunchtime writing sessions.
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Posted by Arlo @ 04:36
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Wednesday, May 19, 2004
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Stick It Up Their BUTT Day
 Hey, did you know that today, May 19th, has been formally declared “Stick It Up Their BUTT Day?”
What? You haven’t heard? Come on, it’s been formally declared and everything! By who? I think it’s a Hallmark holiday, let me check…
No, wait, look at that. It’s just an e-mail chain letter that’s been going around! Let’s take a look:
From: Lourdes Paepke
Sent: Thursday, May 13, 2004 10:51 AM
Subject: FW: Don't purchase gas on May 19
Hey, everyone. We all hate chain letters, but lets try and pass this one around, and also do it!
It has been calculated that if everyone in the US did not purchase a drop of gasoline for one day, and all at the same time, the oil companies would choke on their stockpiles.
Hahaha. How great would that be? Lets see how THEY feel!
At the same time, it would hit the entire industry with a net loss of over 4.6 billion dollars, which affects the bottom lines of oil companies.
Therefore, May 19th has been formally declared "Stick It Up Their BUTT Day" and we're asking all of you not to buy a SINGLE DROP of gasoline that day!
The only way we can make any kind of impact is if you forward this email to as many people as you can, and as quickly as possible.
Waiting on the administration to step in and control prices is a long game that we're going to have to pay for in the end. Take some control, and make your voice heard!
We can make a difference. If they don't get the message after one day, we'll do it again, until they do!
So do your part and spread the word. Then, mark May 19th on your calendars. Even better, put a post-it in your car reminding you not to buy gas on May 19th!
It's time to say enough is ENOUGH!
There are so many things wrong with this I hardly know where to begin. Okay, how about we start with a little thing called “credibility?”
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Posted by Arlo @ 03:38
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Tuesday, May 18, 2004
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The $1,149.75 Grand Prize
Over the past couple of weeks, Juneau has been amazingly nice. The weather has been all we can hope for this time of year, hovering in the 60s and 70s during the day and sunny, sunny, sunny. I thought it was a little funny when Oksana took time out of her Saturday to go indoor tanning at Northern Hot Spots, but we are planning a two-week beach vacation next month, so I can appreciate the need to build up a burn-preventing base tan.
What would probably have changed her mind, had she known about it, was that Northern Hot Spots was using Saturday to promote their business with a radio broadcast. When Oksana arrived, she was immediately asked if she would like to participate in a live, on-the-air interview. My wife is the sensible type. She said “Heck no!” and went about the business of darkening her skin.
At the counter, she noticed that there was a “today-only sale” – 15 tans for $47.25. Since she had been stealing my tans of late (purchased to prime me for Cuba), she decided to lay down the cash. Being a full-on promotion day, she also accepted a tanning lotion sample and threw her name in for a prize drawing.
She told me all this, of course, upon her return home. Then we promptly forgot about it.
The next day, after spending more time out in the sun at Eagle Beach, we returned home and decided to take a nap. Strangely exhausted, we both slept like rocks/logs/babies and didn’t even hear the phone ring. That evening I awoke first, stumbled out of the bedroom, and promptly sprawled myself on the couch. Oksana arose a short while later, droopy-eyed and with lines etched into her face from the wrinkles on her pillow.
“Beh,” she said. Could’ve been Russian, but I think she just needed her tea. She noticed the red-flashing button as she passed the answering machine on her way into the kitchen. She pushed it and we heard:
“Hi, Oksana. This is Terry calling from Northern Hot Spots to let you know that you won a year’s supply of free tans in the drawing this afternoon. Congratulations.”
In an instant, Oksana went from slouched and drained to conscious and jubilant, her fists raised to the ceiling in celebration. She’d won the coveted Northern Hot Spots grand prize, sure, but was acting like it was the first time in her entire life that she’d won anything at all. Wait a minute… it was.
Anyway, Oksana’s happy. The next time you see her you may notice a big smile – or, at the very least, a darker epidermis.
Me? I get my Cuba tans back. [more]
Posted by Arlo @ 12:04
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Saturday, May 15, 2004
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A "Big Thing," Part II
Continued from here…
$300,000. That’s the amount that Alaska Pacific Bank was willing to sign over to us at the drop of a hat. During the AHFC homeowner’s class, we were told a simple formula to guesstimate how high our mortgage could reach and our combined incomes topped it out at only $210,000. You can imagine the shock we had when we realized how wrong we were.
We spent that Friday evening going over the large amounts of practically incomprehensible paperwork. The $300,000 loan would be good at 5.5% interest, only 5% down, and the closing costs would be about $10,000. It would have stretched our finances to the limit, but conceivably, we could have taken that loan out on Monday!
The part that gave me the most pause, though, was the schedule of payments. The magnitude of a 30-year loan doesn’t quite sink in until you see the date of the final payment: April 1st, 2036. 2036! I’m picturing the end of fossil fuels, world-changing contact with extra-terrestrials, or at the very least, flying cars! Are we really ready for such a protracted commitment?
We had plenty of time over the weekend to reevaluate our financial lives. Could we afford a waterfront, sunlit house? Would it be possible to build our own home? Should we even consider pushing our limit, or should we look into something we could pay off in a lot more time?
We also started to talk more seriously with other homeowners, and of course, the suggestions started to come in fast and furious. Spend your limit on waterfront – it’s an investment! Get a place with an apartment so that you can rent it out and let someone else pay most of your mortgage! Spend as little as possible so that you have some remaining cash flow for emergencies!
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Posted by Arlo @ 10:59
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Thursday, May 13, 2004
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Photoblog Stats
 So, I checked the stats today on my photoblog site and noticed that I’m right around the same number of visitors as last month. Not bad considering that we’re only 13 days into May. There are a lot of ways that these stats can be interpreted, but I try to focus solely on to the “unique IPs.” Yeah, sure, three of those visitors are definitely just me checking the site from the three computers I use the most, but I’m pretty sure the other 18 are from real people (as opposed to web crawling robots)!
So, yeah. I’m happy. Granted, I could get no additional IPs hits for the rest of the month – in which case I suppose I could conclude that everyone I’m telling this month had already visited it last month (before I had really started advertising.)
Still no orders flooding in, though. Hmmm. Maybe I should check those PayPal links again…!
I put up a new photo today if you’re interested (and yes, this is my way of copping out of writing a real blog entry.) I’ll check the stats again on June 1 and post the results here. After that, I plan to sign my photoblog up with as many blog registries as I can find. Should be interesting to see if that will generate significantly higher numbers.
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Posted by Arlo @ 12:42
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Tuesday, May 11, 2004
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Mother's Day II
 Almost two years ago, when our families were arriving in Juneau for our marriage, Oksana and I tried very hard to be good hosts. Unfortunately, in planning the wedding, we weren’t able to spare enough time for the task. We were hoping that Alaska would play nice that summer and show our guests what it can be like on a sunny, warm day. That way we could turn them loose and let them make their own fun.
Seeing as we live in Southeast Alaska, though, it was much more likely that it would rain the entire time they were with us. That’s why I was practically ecstatic when the day of their Tracy Arm cruise dawned to clear blue skies – no matter what happened from that point on (including the possibility of a rained-out wedding), they would look back and judge their entire stay on that one, perfect day.
I was hoping for at least one such day during my mom’s visit this last weekend – lucky me; I’m batting 1.000.
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Posted by Arlo @ 03:16
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Saturday, May 8, 2004
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Deep Space Friends
Yesterday I had a bunch of friends over at my place and I was so happy to hear that not a single one of them had watched the series finale of Friends the night before.
Then again, we had come together on a Friday evening to watch Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, so take that for what it’s worth.
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Posted by Arlo @ 07:01
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Thursday, May 6, 2004
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Mother's Day
 My mom is coming to town today and I’m thrilled that she’ll be here though Mother’s Day (‘cause that means there’s a good chance I won’t forget to call her this year!) Oksana and I have spent the whole week in a suitable state of mind. That is to say, we’ve been freaking out.
Oksana, as expected, has that we’ve-got-to-clean-the-house-because-oh-my-God-your-mother-is-going-to-SEE-it mentality. And I, for the most part, agree with her. If my mom and stepfather are going to be spending a few days with us, I want them to be comfortable. And by comfortable, I mean: Not preoccupied with the way we live.
You know what? Thinking back… I do believe this is the very first time my mother has ever come to stay with me since I moved out of the house (for good) ten years ago. Why is it that it can feel so natural for us offspring to return to the nest, and yet at the same time feel strange when the parent role-reverses on us?
I don’t know, but I’m sure glad my mom never stayed with me when I was living in my dorm. Or in the trailer. Man, I really should get serious about buying a nice, respectable house.
I’ll get back to that tomorrow.
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Posted by Arlo @ 07:32
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Wednesday, May 5, 2004
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A "Big Thing."
Back in 2002 there was a fire that managed to wipe out everything I had in storage. That was a horrible experience that I wouldn’t wish on anyway, but there was a silver lining – the insurance check pulled me all the way out of eight years of accumulated college and credit card debt.
Oksana and I married a few months later, but it took us quite awhile before we got her INS paperwork sorted out. Eventually, she received her temporary green card and (coincidentally on the same day) was offered a decent-paying job. The intervening six months, where I was the only one working, weren’t that bad. I’d trade having a single-income family over a pile of minimum interest payments any day.
Very quickly the benefits of a dual-income, debt-free, children-absent family were realized. Around our first anniversary in August, after Oksana and I had figured out how to manage our money with (seriously) five bank accounts, we sat down to talk about creating a savings goal for the end of the year. $5,000 seemed attainable.
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Posted by Arlo @ 04:32
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Tuesday, May 4, 2004
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Songfight!
 Mr. Michael Maas has been soapboxin’ lately in his blog about a new site he stumbled across called Songfight! I thought I’d weigh in with my own opinion as an impartial listener.
The Songfight! formula is simple and strangely appealing: Each week the webmasters-that-be post three hypothetical song titles and open the door for anyone to submit a song with the same name. Writers have only a week to write, compose, record, and upload their song before the voting begins. When the deadline passes, the discussion, reviews, and criticisms (constructive and otherwise) begin to gather in the forums. Eventually votes are submitted and tabulated and, by the end of the next week, a winner is declared and is subsequently showered with the eternal love and adoration of the selfless Internet community. Or something like that, anyway.
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Posted by Arlo @ 04:16
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Monday, May 3, 2004
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The Panhandle Picture Show
 Last weekend, Boomstick Deodorant showed at the Panhandle Picture Show in Haines, Alaska. Boomstick had already premiered at a Juneau Underground Motion Picture Society show, but with essentially no acceptance policy on what they decide to show, I didn’t feel like it mattered much. The Panhandle Picture Show is an honest-to-goodness film festival – with judging forms and entry fees and everything! – and it marked the first “real” critique of any video project I’ve done.
How did it go? As well as I’d hoped, I suppose. Boomstick got laughs in all the right places and a good bit of applause at the end, and I have to say that, surprisingly, I think it played better in Haines than it did in Juneau. While I didn’t win any awards, at least I did get a bit of superfluous recognition each night when the show’s announcers asked the “film” makers who had traveled to the show to stand up for applause. Since it was only myself, two others from Juneau, and one person from Canada, those few seconds of people craning their necks to look made me feel like a bug on a microscope slide. I guess I’m not the kind of person who craves public recognition.
The show itself was remarkably long – spread out over two nights, there were about five hours of videos and films to wade through. Boomstick was by far one of the shortest entries (clocking in at less than 3 minutes) and it seemed out of place in a show full of films pushing the 20 minute limit. Overall, I still enjoyed myself… despite the ennui induced by so many self-indulgent, experimental videos. [more]
Posted by Arlo @ 06:10
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Sunday, May 2, 2004
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Photoblog
 I’d like to take a moment to formally introduce you to a new project: My Photoblog!
About a month ago, my wife and I started up a new section of arlomidgett.com where we could post some examples of my photography and attempt to actually make some money off of it. The first photo was uploaded on April 1st, and I’ve kept it fairly quiet since then.
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Posted by Arlo @ 10:08
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Saturday, May 1, 2004
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More blog, less Cuba
And now for something completely different.
I’ve been fed up with myself lately. See, I’ve got an annoying, mile-long perfectionist streak and sometimes it prevents me from doing the things I want. How? Let’s use updating my blog as an example.
If you’ve been reading along, you probably now know far more about Cuba than you ever cared to. When I returned from my last trip a couple months ago, I was all gung-ho about sharing my experiences – I think the initial veracity with which I attacked my keyboard vouches for that. Eventually, though, as the trip fell further and farther (what’s up with those words, anyway?) behind me, I lost the valuable initiative that kept me cranking out ordered ASCII characters.
Ever since I crossed that nebulous line where my writing libido had decreased, it’s been a struggle to finish the Cuba Guide. Not only that, but I think I lost my theme – I always intended my entries to be a guide about what to expect in Cuba with a healthy dose of “Arlo in Cuba Anecdotes.” Somewhere along the way (the intro?), I lost site of that and simply wrote about what one can do there.
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Posted by Arlo @ 10:20
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Bleh.