you weren't there man!

Three men dressed in mock army clothing enter some woodland with a video camera. All sounds perfectly normal. Well, it does to me now as I have been filming again. Sunday saw two friends and me entering said woods to film scenes for three short films as part of the Writer’s Block North East Nam in 90 Seconds challenge. However, whilst we were there we came across something quite unusual. I posted a short video clip that we were able to capture on YouTube, which I named the Billingham Big Foot.

Although not as popular as they used to be, sightings do not seem to be as in vogue as they once were. There was a time the Billingham Big Foot would have made the local news but I would suggest that the spread of viral videos means that nothing can be mysterious anymore. CGI can create ghostly sightings that would have had us running behind the sofa or pulling up the chainsaw/axe/knife/gun proof duvet over our heads. What really scares us anymore? Some might say house prices, university fees, riots or Mickey Rourke’s face

For others it is still the dark. For me it was this small stinging, burning sensation in my arm. Using my manly instincts, I ignored it. The more I ignored it the hotter it got until I was forced to inspect my limb. It was then I realised that my arm looked as though I had smuggled a Kinder Egg under my skin. Whilst filming I received two bites in the same area and it was looking infected. I was living my personal horror of Vietnam. There was no chopper to get me out instead I slept on it (not literally of course as a bed is much more comfortable).

The next morning I woke to find it was still the same. Oh dear, how much more can I ignore this I thought. I returned home during my lunch break to see my mother who was babysitting our daughter (honest, I do not still live at home, not that there is anything wrong with that). She suggested I take some anti-histamine, which I dutifully did. You see, I am nearly 40 years old and still listen to mother. My colleagues spoke of visiting doctors and getting injections. I was happy with my anti-histamines and sleeping on it.

I woke up this morning and sure enough, it had calmed down. This just goes to prove that nothing fixes man better than his mother and a kip.

i love reading/Reading

I do at times find it somewhat demoralising when viewing a large amount of books. Now do not get me wrong I love books and reading, (that is reading as in viewing a book and digesting the words and sentences not the place Reading spelt with a capital ‘R’ as I just have. In addition, just for the record I have nothing against Reading, as my only experience of it was the Reading Festival in 1991, which was my first festival and something I very much enjoyed). When I see such a large arrangement of books anywhere, be it in a library to a charity shop, I realised that what I am actually looking at is competition. How on earth can I stand out in such a highly competitive market? What do they have that I do not have? Well for starters, they are published. However, why should I not be published? I have decided to adopt a new approach. I will now view these large collections of books as an incentive. They are out there because the author has taken the time to write them. They are out there because the author has taken the time to approach publishers and get them published. Stories in my head cannot stay in the safe confines of my brain if I want other people to see them. I need an angle. Something that either has not done before or has been done but I can put my stamp on it. The main thing I need is to write, write and write.

Writing a blog is not quite being published but I am getting words out there from my brain and into those of the reader. In addition, for this I am truly grateful. I have recently tried something that based on my research has not been done before and that is to release a Kindle book which can be found here so please do buy a copy. Hang on, of course that has been done before. Now here is the clever bit. Within this book, I have taken the book format and turned it into art. Therefore, what I need to watch right now is another one of my time feasting downfalls. Do not go slipping into a new fad!

the new fads

I have had an ongoing problem with fads. I say it is a problem. For me it is not a problem but for those around me it appears to be. I will often have people approach me wanting to show me a new trick or ask me to perform one for them. I have to explain that I am no longer into magic. How is the online poker coming on? Again, I explain that I no longer partake in the time killer that is online poker. I frequently feel I have a hidden talent and that the next fad will be it, the thing that I have been put on the earth to do that will change the lives of those around me. To be the worlds greatest (insert fad here). Therefore, it is not uncommon for me to put one hundred percent of my time, albeit for a brief moment, into a new fad. Upon reflection, I can see where I am going wrong. I never commit enough time to any fad to prove I will be the greatest. Maybe if I spent more than a few moments a night for a few weeks and then phase it out in favour of the mandolin I would improve my skills. I truly am the Jack of a lot of things master of none.

There is one area that I admittedly know I could improve on and that is the time I spend with my family. It is all too easy to take them for granted or push them aside in favour of even more ‘me’ time. ‘Me’ time for my fads is important but so is ‘we’ time. I introduced my daughter to the old yes/no game. A simple idea that she absolutely loved and spent ages fighting the need to say yes or no. It is simple things like this that made me realise I have one fad that defies all others. The lifetime fad of family man. Now, where did I put those maracas?

the dreaded fear of rejection

Well that is the end of The Impossibly Big Sketch Show and what a fantastic time it was. I have made some great friends and finally found the trigger to pull these creative thoughts I have had firing round my head all these years out into the open. Over the last five days including today, I have performed three times in front of a paying audience, am about to have a film premiered at the Arc in Stockton-on-Tees alongside a film I am in!

A number of years ago I would hide behind anything rather than put my work out there. I had the dreaded fear of rejection. If my work is not out there then how can it be rejected? Elton John recently said (hang on, stick with me) no he didn’t say that bracketed bit, although he might have done, anyway moving on, he said that only when you complete a piece of work is it truly yours because one it has been released you no longer own it (or words to that effect!). This sums up my quandary. I like what I have written so want to share it with others, but what if they do not like it. How will that make me feel? Who cares? Me, I care. However, without the feedback I cannot develop and instead hide behind work that can be vastly improved. Therefore, one day I decided to go for it and sent of a story that was published. With these new release and self-confidence that I can make it as I writer, I submitted more short stories. Sure enough, they bombed. I got to the second round on one and ranked nowhere on the others. So what did I do? Retired back into my shell where I felt I belong.

Upon reflection, I can see that I did have legitimate reasons for not being able to give my work the time and attention it needs. With this in mind, I now plan and keep deadlines realistic. I consider the dedication and strike when the motivation is high. Even the greats had to start somewhere. This is my somewhere.

alls well that is allowed to end well.

I had one of those restless nights that sees me waking up just not close enough to my alarm to warrant getting out of bed. I then find myself dozing and waking with a start to see I still have seven minutes to go and manage to nod off again. Then of course, the alarm sounds scaring the living daylights into me. I then get up feeling as if I have not slept at all.

This is the bit where the TV screen goes all wavy to indicate a past event. The past event is anytime I had been off school for a period and am trying to fight the sleep that will wake me into the next day. I used to get incredibly depressed around this time and on occasions would be brought to tears. I would make vain attempts to get that one more extra day off school convinced that I would feel better the next morning. However, I would be as transparent as a supermodels stomach and have to go to school. The thing is, I would return later that day and be back to my usual self. Spent the full day laughing with my friends, being easily distracted and switching off whenever anyone spoke to me consistently for about five minutes.

This back to school depression carried on into my working career. I can remember fighting sleep on the nights before I had to go back to work and would watch the World of Paramount until the early hours. Sure enough, just like school, I would drift back into the same normality I lived prior to the factory fortnight shutdown and come home as if I had never been off work at all.

So, what I have learned to do now is reflect not on how the next day will begin, but how it will end. Last nights panic was about, off all things, parking and having the right change to do so. As it happens, I got a lift. Alls well that is allowed to end well.

here is to more rainy weekends

One thing that can be said of the British weather is that it is somewhat consistent. Consistently raining. However, I used this to my advantage this weekend and decided to make a short film. Writers Block North East frequently set 90-second movie challenges and having entered the zombie genre, I decided to also enter the alien genre. I had an idea for a movie but decided that due to family commitments and rehearsal time that I would not make the deadline. That was until and rainy Sunday presented itself.

To keep my hand in writing I attempt to use any spare time to practice. I have been and continue to, collate ideas of any thing that presents itself. I make notes on anything to hand with the aim to write this up later. This means that I will never be out of ideas. In fact, I have more ideas than time to write them up! I therefore write up ideas I feel I can more easily develop. And so Closer Encounters was born.

Despite penning a script that required some outdoor shooting, I used the flexibility of the rewrite to set it in doors.

Now, the internet and cheaper technology mean that anyone with the most basic of hard and software can make movies. However, this does not always mean they will be good. The best way to find out if I can make movies or not is to make movies and put them out there for the world to see. So that is what I did.

I had to hand an old digital camera with a display that no longer displays, a copy of Windows Movie Maker and my imagination. Not forgetting the last minute assistance of my lovely wife.

The location, my kitchen, the actors, myself and one of my daughter’s teddy bears, all quiet on the set and action. I still find it embarrassing filming myself but this was something I soon over came. Approaching my wife with a teddy bear in one hand and a digital camera in the other did look strange but without doing so; this film would not have been made.

Overall a productive weekend. The film will be available for general viewing following the competition night so please do look out for it and comment where possible. And here is to more rainy weekends.

Let us all be 45 degrees

Last nights rehearsal evening has taught me this, if you are going to arrange a three-night show…don’t. I could only pity the organiser left alone to arrange a hodge podge of members turning up at different times, prioritising drinks and then randomly disappearing. I soon realised that this said more about me than my peers.

I am a very organised person and one of the many downsides to this is that I expect those around me to be equally organised. It is like fingernails down a blackboard to me when I see people sauntering around when those around them are losing their heads. I found a colleague to be a particular trigger of this anxious feeling in me and so we had an agreement. We likened ourselves to angles. I am bolt upright, perpendicular to my friend who is very much at ninety degrees. So the compromise was this, I would be less erect (yes, quite) and he less laid back. So forty-five degrees it is then. The added bonus of this is that we can make the forty-five degree angle with our hand to each other. This ensures I become less controlling whilst he becomes more active. Now for me this works. However, does this work because it is a workable idea or because I have managed to instil some level of organisation in another human being? In attempting to manage my control I have inadvertently became more controlling. So let us all be 45 degrees and slowly I can control the world, one degree at a time.