WEEKEND RECAP
FRIDAY
After a rather trying day at work, I was SO ready to kick the evening off at Ohana Happy Hour with Elyse. Despite discovering a disagreement about the recent state-wide smoking ban initiative (I was against it), we Blue Hawaiianed our differences away. Before long, B. arrived and our conversation turned from politics to sexual fetishes and awkward sexual encounters. We continued this conversation even as B’s boss sat down at a nearby table with her husband and baby. Borg and Gene also joined us after a while. God, I love Ohana. Amazing food and powerful drinks at a low price, provided you’re there during happy hour. Otherwise, the prices are fairly steep. The only real downer was at 8:00 when our waitress told us that there is a two hour limit on sitting at the booths which we had already well surpassed. Of course there were no other tables and so we’d have to corral ourselves into the bar area. I’m still not sure if this was even true or if they’d simply gown tired of our borderline inappropriate public conversation. It’s kind of a strange policy they have. It seems like it would drive customers away, not make more people happy, because we certainly weren’t going to stay standing in the bar. But they did buy us off with a round of free shots (another reason that I’m suspicious about said “policy”). After we took our shots (Yeager for the fellows, Washington Apples for the ladies), we moved the party to Shorty’s. Well, MOST of us did. B. decided to go catch a booty call. At Shorty’s, we made fun of the ladies in a free fetish magazine. Then Elyse and Gene had to take off to meet some other folks. Borg and I stayed at Shorty’s waiting for Dom and Meep to finish at the office. (That’s right, the OFFICE! The Gadzook FILMS office, to be more specific. How awesome is that?!) When they finally called, we decided to take it back up the Hill to the Canterbury. We were then joined by Sherwood who was looking dapper, having just been out with his parents. The Canterbury was uneventful but pleasant nonetheless.
SATURDAY
Dom, Meep, Borg and I headed up to Bellingham to support “Snow Day” in a film festival. We went up last year for “Love and 145 Watts” and “Terry”. We brought Sherwood with us last year and have, perhaps, permanently warped him as a result of us all having sat through a 45 minute long movie about a magical hobo and two very annoying guys. The festival has been advertised a lot more this year (in the Stranger, no less) and seems to be much better organized so we were still pretty optimistic about the outcome. We got up to B-Ham around 4:00 and checked into the Travelodge. We rested up for a few minutes and then headed into town to pick up our pass (split betwixt the 4 of us), wander around and get some dinner before the show. When we got our pass, we ran into the festival director who was very nice. He told us that he was asking attending filmmakers to share a fun fact when we were introduced. He also mentioned that the previous night, our movie was very well received. He said all the shows have been selling out and that there were about 100 people in the audience. This gave us even more hope for the evening.
We started to wander around town a bit, but it was too cold, so, at Borg’s suggestion, we decided to get a beer inside the “Ranch Room”. The Ranch Room was what Linda’s would be if it were frequented by actual cowboys and small town locals, instead of hipsters. The wall décor was similar, but there was no loud Franz Ferdinand or rude waiters. Just nice people wait staff and normal customers. While we drank, we discussed what our fun fact would be. We decided to make something up. In the end, we settled on telling everyone that the snow was made by putting bears and ice blocks on ladders and having the bears maul the ice blocks.
When we started to get tipsy, we decided to order food. Holy Heavenly Greasy Spoon! There was a happy hour appetizer menu, a couple of veggie sandwiches and…yam fries! I think Faye got some pictures of our dreamy spread. It was 100% satisfactory. They also had a state-of-the-art juke box with a touch screen and the ability to trump the song order with additional credits. Of course I would never USE this feature, but it’s interesting to note the advancement of the juke box.
After dinner and a few more rounds, we went to the theatre. The previous show had not yet let out, so we wandered up the street to kill 10 minutes, and found and role-playing store. It was closed, but we gawked into the windows for a little while.
We went back to the theatre, got our tickets and found our seats. While everyone was being seated, a woman announced that she was about to show a 12-year-old boy’s film on her lap top. She said that the film had ALMOST made it into the festival, but because she liked it so much, she wanted to show it. So a bunch of us gathered around the boy and the lap top to watch. The short was 5 minutes of people blowing up pyramids of Dixie cups in different ways. Obviously, watching cups blow up is pretty cool, but there were a number of jokes in the editing as well. This young man has a bright future and it BAFFLES me that his short didn’t make it in. Especially after seeing some of the films that did.
The categories in our program were: Animation, Experimental and Pure Schlock (us). The program started off well, with a funny and SHORT comedic piece. There seemed to be a LOT of experimental films which were annoying (as most indie experimental films seem to be), but nothing could have prepared us for the hell that was to befall our senses. The concept: a girl “dances” around in her bathroom to the length of an EP. The dancing: sometimes writhing, sometimes standing still for seemingly minutes, other times clutching the toilet, still other times, pretending to take a shower. The music: slow and lyrically challenged. The girl: droopy breasted and not nearly hot enough to make the short interesting. When it started, one got the sense that it was a music video…for ONE song. When the second song started, Meep said, she knew there was going to be a third song because of how slow it was. I didn’t know this. I mounted my hopes on the ending of each song, thinking “This has GOT to be almost over” or at least “Maybe she’ll kill herself or something. She can’t JUST be dancing in the goddamned bathroom.” 5 very long songs later, it turns out, she WAS just dancing in the goddamned bathroom. Near the end of it, 15 people walked out. We don’t blame them. We would have considered leaving too if our movie had already played. But it hadn’t. Thanks a lot, bathroom lady. Instead, I was just considering the upsides to a self-lobotomy.
When our movie played, the laughs were quiet and infrequent. My theory is that the people who decided to stay were so dumbfounded by the bathroom short that they were unable to enjoy anything after that. It’s certainly how we felt.
Galloo was also in the audience to see our film for the first time. He was in B-ham for the weekend to visit his new g/f. We kind of wish he’d seen it under more pleasant circumstances but hey, Galloo, that’s your penance for waiting so long. :P
Our movie was the last to play. On the way out the door, we ran into the festival director again and he asked if we were going to stay for the next night’s award’s ceremony. We told him (truthfully) that we had to leave Sunday morning for work. He kept asking if we were SURE we couldn’t stay or if we knew someone, ANYONE in Bellingham who could be there. Hmm…perhaps we won a prestigious Golden Hamster? Time will tell. But we couldn’t stay.
We briefly popped in on an after-show party which took place in a tiny tiny room. Then we decided that the best course of action would be to find a grocery store and get some beer and pie to take back to the room.
SUNDAY
We awoke after a typical restless motel night’s sleep. We breakfasted at I-Hop (because every other place in town seemed to have a wait) and headed back to Seattle. Despite two car accidents within a mile of one-another, it didn’t take too long to get home. Dom and Meep went to the office to work on “Wizards of the Toast” and I vegged out on the couch. Ah, the life of a kept woman.
Next weekend: Gene’s Birthday and Harry Potter
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