Off to Jersey

08:25 on the bus.

I'm currently on the Hamilton express GO bus travelling from Toronto to Hamilton. A bus that I almost missed thanks to getting up a bit later than I thought. I had gotten home at 2am last night from working on the set of the Hulk. While I'm happy that I made a bit of overtime the downside is that I only got about four hours of sleep last night. Leah had called me at about 6:50am to make sure I was up. I was, but I was pretty groggy.

I was then cursed with a series of small delays trying to get to the GO bus station. Starting off with "I feel like I'm forgetting something.". I hate that feeling. Usually when I think that I actually have forgotten something. Despite the feeling of missing something I left the apartment anyway.

Originally I meant to take a taxi but realized I had no money in my wallet thanks to taking a cab the night before to get home. That meant I had to make a stop at the corner bank machine to get money. Oddly enough the bank machine was not accessable because the bank doors which are usually open were locked.

There was another bank machine at the bottom of Coxwell on Queen in the donut shop. I lugged my stuff there (a duffel bag of clothing and battery chargers, a pelican case with camera gear, a camera bag with more camera gear and my laptop bag). A streetcar was right there. I decided to take the streetcar instead (saving the taxi money for better things).

The streetcar seemed to take it's time going along Queen street toward Yonge. But once at Yonge I popped into the bank machine on the corner (which was my bank so I saved on transaction charges - yea!) From there I went down the stairs of the subway station to find a mob of people going in the opposite direction. I had just missed the subway train to Union station and had to wait for the next one.

Upon exiting Union station, in order to get to the GO bus station, you have to cross the street. For some reason the city has placed a barricade in the middle of the street making it more difficult to cross (you either have to climb over or walk around). You can cross at the lights at the north end or you can cross where the barrier ends on the south end.

The barrier allows you to see the bus you're missing pull out of the bus terminal while obstructing you from getting there. I ended up crossing the south end. It's more dangerous but it was closer and I could see my bus pulling up.

The final obstacle stopping me from getting on the bus was getting a ticket. Not being familiar with the ticket vending machine added a bit of stress to my mad morning dash. My bank card kept getting rejected. "Who designed this stupid interface?". Then I realized I was punching in my card PIN number before the account type. Usually it's the other way around. "What the? Who designed this interface again?". I had gotten my ticket just as the bus driver was closing the luggage doors on the side of the bus, managing to get into his line of sight just in time. He greeted me with "How are you this morning?" . He was nice and cheery for someone that probably got up earlier than me. I felt great now that I had made the bus and was off to Hamilton. (How many people say that?)

It's a bit overcast today with the sun coming up over the horizon just peeking out from behind some clouds. I'm now somewhere around Oakville I'd imagine. I haven't really looked outside the bus as I've been taking inventory.

In my rush out the door I forgot two things (that I know of so far).
1. Epson p-4000 (portable hard drive)
2. 8 gig compact flash card (which is probably in the p-4000)

While I still have one 8 gig card, one 4 gig card and one 2 gig card on me, I would feel better with another 8 gig card since I don't have my hard drive to back stuff up. That said, I do have the laptop so at least I have something to back up stuff to each night.

We'll see how much crap I can lug around.


09:05 Leah meets me at the Hamilton bus stop.


09:28 Meeting at Allison and Trevor's apartment for the van.


09:42 Loading onto the van.


09:57 Tracey makes a call and gets us all to sing Happy Birthday over her cell phone.


11:51 We get to the Canada/US border


12:22 Three hours in some start falling asleep.


12:58 Our first stop across the border for food, washrooms, and smoke break


Looking at the storm drain signage. I wondered if there was a problem requiring the sign to be there.


Melanie's comfy slippers


13:39 Back in the van and on the road


15:06 Somewhere around Syracuse I notice this truck.


15:53 Second pit stop across the border, Adam needs a smoke


Maybe we should have bought food at the last stop?


The cool American food selections


In front of the second pit stop in the States.


Adam and Carl.


Tracey and Jacquie rest in the van.


Marybeth walks toward the van from the rest stop


A quick picture before setting off.


16:20 Various bus activities.


16:21 Lindsey at the wheel with Allison interacting with people in the back.


16:28 Leah looks outside. Seems sleepy.


17:20 The next pit stop. Hurray! There's non-vending machine food.


At the Subway restaurant... so many choices...


...including Subway Raisins and Pizza!!!

One of the great things about going to another country is the different foods you can try out, be it a Nutty Bar from a vending machine or a food that they don't have back home. In this case I noticed Subway (a sub sandwich chain also in Ontario) had Subway pizza and Subway raisins.

I didn't get it. What was with the raisins? Are they pushing this in the States to push healthier food? Has this chain always sold raisins or is this something new and maybe will make it's way back to Canada if successful?... or unsuccessful? Why market raisins of all things under the Subway brand name?

I bought a box a of raisins for the novelty and to see if they were something amazing. I also bought a pizza, more to do with being hungry than to see iof it was amazing. Both were okay but nothing noticeably unique or extraordinary about them.


18:24 Starts to rain


19:14 We drive through a long tunnel


20:42 We're lost. We stop in at a gas station to get our bearings.


20:55 Is That Renee?

After getting our bearings at the gas station with on eof the most filthiest bathrooms we made our way back to the Jersey Turnpike. While following the on ramp onto the major artery someone in the bus said "Hey is that Renee?". We all looked out the side of the van to see a car facing the wrong direction parked between the on ramp and the highway.


We stop to check out the other car

It turned out it was. We had pulled over to offer assistance. I noticed that cars coming off the on ramp were speeding by pretty quickly so I placed my flashing bike light on to a sign post a few meters up the road thinking the flashing light would get motorists to slow down. Nope.


Helping with the spare tire

As it so happens by the time I walked back to the van another truck had pulled up behind us. It was a New Jersey fire fighter responding to a call that a car (Renee's car) had went off the side of the road into the forest. The fire fighter, whose name I forget, had put his EMS lights on as well as his front beams to help us see what we were doing.

The thing that impressed me was that he had come to help us on his day off. He told me that there had been accidents everyday over the last five days where someone was killed... at the same place we were located. It didn't surprise me as even with all his truck lights on the traffic still sped by us.


09:05 A very nice FDNJ firefighter comes to our aid.


21:13 Two police cars show up, traffic actually slows down a bit.

Eventually two police cars showed up. Finally I noticed traffic slow down a little. Once everything was sorted out we all got back into our respective vehicles and made our way to the hotel.

What are the odds that we'd both get lost at the same place, stumble into Renee's car, and find a fire fighter on his day off? Someone upstairs is looking out for us. Later on I realized that we had both been using MapQuest so maybe that had something to do with the getting lost in the same place part.


21:41 Allison lloks up the final directions to the hotel.


21:45 We arrive at the hotel


21:49 Check in.


Food available behind the reception desk.


Leah and my hotel living room.

If you're ever in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, I highly recommend the Marriott hotel there. The rooms come fully furnished. A living room with a fold out sofa (my bed), a bed room (Leah's room), a bathroom, a full kitchen. When I say full kitchen I mean dish washer, refrigerator, stove/oven, microwave, even microwavable dishs, pots, plates, bowls, and cutlery for four people. It was all very impressive.


23:09 Trying to find decent food and beer... with no luck.

After getting a bit settled in, a bunch of us ventured out to see if we could find food (some of us, namely Trevor, went looking for beer). After travelling around in the van a while we realized the only things open were gas stations and the odd convenience store... and none of them had alcohol. I still remember Trevor's face drop.

It turns out New Jersey is much like Ontario in terms of free flowing booze. It doesn't flow after certain hours. Dejected not getting beer or food we made our way back to the hotel where Leah and I ordered some Italian delivery.


00:07 Leah digs into our Italian food delivery

Working under set

Peter sits working under the set.

As a general rule we, as playback people, like to set up equipment so it's as close to the monitors as possible while at the same time keeping away from other movie people. This is so we don't get in their way and vice versa. This week while working on a film, Peter had found a great place to set up. Directly under where main unit was shooting.

The phone, the cat, and Jean Paul Gaultier

"Hey, you can program the cell phone to pop up with a picture of the person who's calling."

While at dim sum (at the Pearl Court) I demonstrated my new phone technology to Marc, specifically the built in camera. One of the cool things about the phone is that it displays a photo attributed to a specific phone number. For example I can program a photo of Marc to show up if Marc calls me from the phone number assigned to him. This feature won't work if Marc calls from another phone or if he blocks his number. Also it doesn't have to be a picture of Marc it can be a picture of anything (a hamburger, the London Eye, heck even a pork chop).

I used the phone camera again at Leanna's. She had invited me over to see her newly acquired kitten. A very cute allergy bag that seemed to want to use me as a sleeping cushion.


Leanna's new cat (photographed with the D200).


Me, the cat cushion (photographed with the cell phone).


Clothing by Jean Paul Gaultier

Just before leaving Leanna's I got a last minute call from JuicyStuff asking if I wanted to cover a collection by Jean Paul Gaultier at Cheval (located downtown). It was the first of a whole week of catwalks during the upcoming fashion week.

Hugh's Room

Colin and his Dad's custom trailer (the back end of a station wagon).

Colin had seemed a bit surprised when I told him I could only help him move stuff until the early evening due to the fact that I had a date later on in the evening with Linda. It wasn't a "Holy Crap!" eyes pop out of the head surprise, more like a "Oh, well that's new news" good for you surprise. I can't really explain the characteristics of Colin in detail in a single blog entry let alone one paragraph. To simplify things Colin is more or less a happy generous soul with a humorous sensibility twinged with a slight touch of being jaded.

Today we were moving some furniture from a storage building to his residence. It took us half the day but over all was a pretty easy move. Mostly glass table type stuff with the odd chair thrown in. After delivering the goods to the apartment he drove me back home where I would get ready for the big outing.

One of the great things about dating or seeing someone is that you can experience things (good and bad) that won't necessarily happen to you if you're by yourself. Doors open to new possibilities, new paths, new ideas. Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations.

Linda had suggested we go to Hugh's Room, a restaurant entertainment thing located just south of Dundas west station. I had never heard of it before. Although once we arrived I remembered walking by it a few times in the past. She was doing some internet surfing for things to do and had come up with a few ideas. One of them being a group called "Buena Fe" a group that performed cuban salsa music. I booked the tickets and made reservations for dinner. I think it took Linda a bit by surprise at the speed at which I managed to get the tickets. I also don't think she fully took in the fact that I would have been interested in the band.

It took some time to convey that it's not just what you end up doing, it's the fact that you're spending time with an individual that wants to spend time with you, that's where the real interest lies. We could have been digging a hole to bury food from bears in the cold winter. While maybe not as cozy it would have been a great experience with the right person there. I'm not sure I had her totally convinced.


Buena Fe (described as a Cuban Trova and salsa band).

We arrived early to take our time eating before the show started. Our waitress was Churla. It turns out I had met her years ago playing soccer. She hadn't changed. As part of her job she was pushing a particular drink explaining that if she sold X number of drinks the restaurant would buy her one at the end of the night. She said they were quite yunny. I thought I'd save her the trouble and buy her a drink outright, thus alleviating the stress of fulfilling a quota just to get a drink.


Performing in Hugh's Room

The food was great. We finished just as the group got on stage. Looking around I noticed the room was packed. We were lucky, arriving there early had gotten us front row seats off in the corner. A bit secluded while at the same time allowing us to see the band and the audience. It seemed the band had a large following on the other side of the room. Mostly female and a lot of them swooning whenever the main signer looked over at them. All in all it was a great performance in a intimate setting. I would highly recommend this venue for dating purposes or to see a band or even just for the food.


A sign Linda and I passed as I walked her home.

Hello? Is this thing on?

Me, taken by me with the new cell phone.

For the last few years, since I lost my old samsung cell phone, my current LG phone has been less than great. Talking on it was fine but I found that I'd miss calls because I couldn't hear it ring. I could also hardly feel the vibrate mode. This week I had missed a few calls from Greg at TellAVision for work so I decided to get a new phone.

I was in the area of Fairview mall today after meeting up with Linda for lunch. We went to the Phoenix and the Firkin, a burger, pasta type restaurant located near the Fairview mall about an hour and a half commute via the TTC. The bus ride was grueling.

I have not shopped for cell phone technology in a while so I was surprised that buying a phone would be so difficult. I had three criteria. A) It had to be a flip phone, B) I had to be able to hear the ringer, C) It had to have a vibrate mode. While these three things were the bare essentials for me to get the phone I suppose I could have put a few other things on the list.

Why is it that cell phones have to take time to boot up and why during boot up do they have to play a stupid tune that lasts for 10 seconds? For that matter why do they have to play a tune when you turn off the phone. For me seeing a screen go blank or come on is enough for me to know what's going on. I suppose having a melodic tune would be good for blind users but why can't I turn that crap off. On my old LG, to turn it off I would take off the battery just so I could turn off the phone without letting everyone else know I was turning off the phone. I got good at this and it was faster then holding down the power button and waiting for the OFF music to play.

Whatever happened to having a cell phone that was just a cell phone, a phone that worked well. While looking at all the options at the Telus booth, I noticed most of the phones had web browsing, MP3 playing and even camera capabilities. Buying a cell phone has become purchasing a mini entertainment system.

Why would I waste my communications battery on playing MP3s and shooting photos (with a proprietary battery). As it turned out the only phone to meet my three criteria also had a crap load of features I didn't want. I ended up picking up the LC chocolate flip phone. I had won out of the motorola razor or krazor because it had come with a standard headphone and ear phone adaptor and a 1 gig micro CD card. While I believe the motorola was probably superior in quality overall I do not support proprietary items if I can at at help it. Didn't Apollo 13 teach us anything?

After having the phone for a while I started playing with the features. While the resolution is crap compared to my Nikon D200 I couldn't help but play around with the camera a bit, fiddling with the still and video modes. I went through all the phone features. Surfing the web, emailing photos, text messaging, playing MP3s, heck even using it as a phone. It was nice to be able to actually hear the phone ring for a change. I had even downloaded the Thunderbirds theme music. The Quantum Leap tune from my other phone or contact information could not be transferred as the telus booth people did not have a phone cord for my phone. It took me two hours to manually reprogram the new phone with the old information.

The built in video cam actually came in handy later on. There was this song that kept coming on the radio, a catchy tune that Linda and I had heard. One of those tunes that they play over and over again to brainwash you but the DJ doesn't tell you who the artist is or the name of the song. One day while driving it played on the radio. I pulled the car over and managed to record part of it so I could aggravate other people by asking them if they knew the tune after hearing the tinny recording. One person thought it was a guy singing.

The song was Bubbly by Colbie Caillat.

I feel like a mushroom

Danielle sits near the light for warmth.

While working on Silence, now known as Dead Silence, Carol the script supervisor once told me she felt like a mushroom while working on set. I felt like that today. Both Danielle and I had been working in a glass factory on a show called the Summit. The location is based in an underground basement so even during the day there is no sunlight.

Part of our job is to set up a bunch of monitors before the main unit arrives on location to shoot. Being independent from the main unit does have advantages. The main one is that we can wire things up without being in anyone's way. One of the downsides though is the amount of lighting available to us is pretty limited as well as temperature control.

Danielle thought it was freezing where as I thought the temperature was okay enough to wear a T-shirt. Then again I'm usually always wearing a T-shirt. Today I was comfortable. I find that if I work in a environment that is too hot or warm (for me) I tend to get lethargic. The lack of light was more of a nuisance as I kept bumping myself into the sides of a hole in a wall. A hole in which I had to pass wire through for the monitors on set to the computers located in the room next door.

A large part of doing 24 frame playback is not only wiring monitors to computers but wiring the monitors so they are out of sight and people are not tripping over them. There are art department people that actually design sets which the hiding of wires in mind. On some sets like the ones on the Hulk the wires sometimes are included on the set as part of the set. This is a win win situation.

HLAP Toronto

Darryl (and Jill) host another HLAP film festival in Toronto.

I've lost track of the number of times the HLAP film festival has shown in Toronto but tonight was the first time the festival gave out red/blue glasses to view a few anaglyph movies and examine prints on the lobby wall. (see previous post) This year was the second time Darryl had the festival at the Bloor Theatre which was then followed by an after party at a nearby club called the Annex Wreckroom.

Below are some photos that are just the tip of the iceberg of the fun and nuttiness that went on that night. (note: and yeah the half naked guy is posted specifically for cupcake, the reader that wants to see a balance of the sexes being half naked on this site).


There's 3D movies this year!


Darryl's sister and brother in law visit from Hamilton.


Intermission hijinks.


Who's got the best costume?


One of the walls of 3D art.


Dennis checks out the 3D.


Jill's brother gets checked out.


Jay's shoes.


Hugh at the after party.