One Night Stand

Most cities have a film festival of some sort, even the small ones. Usually a 48 hour film challenge. 2 days to make a movie, not bad. Some up the ante and do a 24 hour festival. But only Kansas City does a 10 hour festival. Put on by the Independent Filmmakers Coalition (IFC-KC), this is the 9th Annual Event, and they call it the “One Night Stand” (ONS).

Works like this. 9am – Big meeting: They announce a time limit ,theme, a line of dialogue and a prop. All films must contain all items and be under the time limit in order to qualify for competition. 9:30am ’til 7:30pm – shoot, edit, export a  minute movie and be back at the theatre to turn it in. Anything past the deadline will still be shown, but isn’t eligible for prizes. 8pm – show starts. 

It’s balls to the wall. If you’re not done shooting by 3pm or so at the latest, you aren’t going to get done. With so many chances to fatally blow it, it’s is a test of endurance as much as anything else. It asks, can a good movie emerge from under extreme pressure? Will the films be “good for being done in a day” or just good? It’s also a test of coordination and time management. Can you get the footage you need in 4 hours of shooting? It’s a festival in which the distance between 2 locations, even the distance between the theatre and the location becomes a very important factor. There are groups every year that don’t finish. 

Without further ado, here is our creation. It’s called “Worth Noting.” The theme was Unrequited Love. Prop was Paper. Line of Dialogue was from “Frankenstein” – “It’s Alive…It’s Alive!!!” All were drawn randomly from a hat, from 10-20 options each.

Lessons Learned:

1. When Jason tells you to make sure to charge the battery, (a) do it, (b) have the back-up battery ready, (c) find the expensive charger that I entrusted to you, Adam! (Time Lost – 15 minutes)
2. When you’re only doing 3 takes, make sure the boom mic is out of frame. Otherwise you have to work around it in editing (Time Lost – oh, 5-10 minutes)
3. Always make sure when you are “importing” footage, the camera is actually importing it. (Time Lost – 30 minutes)
4. Even if your editing program is set to auto-save, save it after nearly everything. We didn’t and the program crashed. We had to redo some of our work, luckily it didn’t kill the whole project. (Time Lost – 20 minutes)
5. After aforementioned program crash, you do not have time to throw a fit and be angry (finger pointed directly at self). This wastes even more time. (Time Lost – 10 minutes, in spurts of rage)
6. If you are being overly-complicated and using voiceover, it would behoove you to edit that material ahead of time (which is in keeping with the One Night Stand Official Rules). (Time Lost – 15 minutes-ish)
7. Leave yourself time to export the film in a high quality. For a 5 minute film like this, that can mean about an hour. If not, you’ll be forced to dial down the resolution so you can make it on time. (Additional Time Needed – 45 minutes-60 minutes)
8. Total Time Lost – 95 – 100 minutes

One of the best pieces of writing advice I’ve ever heard was to write a spec script based on a show I liked. So, Adam and I chose “Arrested Development.” We wanted to challenge ourselves and see if we could pull off the tone and style and pacing. Narration sets up joke, dialogue delivers the punch-line (or the opposite). Nothing pays off more when you’re filming than the planning you did before that day. We spent at least 4 or 5 hours talking through ideas and bits and planning wardrobes and deciding on shooting locations, so that when it came time to do it, we weren’t worried about any of that while filming. Spontaneity is vital when filming, but some things need to be written in stone if you want to get anything done. 

The biggest benefit of this experience was it proved that shooting quickly and shooting effectively aren’t mutually exclusive. We’re prone to doing double-digit takes, spending longer than needed just to have one more. One of the jokes on the set of “Trailer: The Movie” was that I would say, “That was perfect. Let’s do it again.” Part of it is, I really enjoy the filming itself, and I like tweaking performances. The day after this, we were up before 6am to go to Warrensburg for the final day of filming on “Trailer: …” It was our hospital day, and we’d planned on a 10-hour day.

We got all our scenes done (without feeling rushed), added 3 shots, and we were finished and loaded up in under 6 hours. If not for the ONS., that level of productivity and efficiency would never have happened. If you have a chance to make be in a festival like this, do it. Write, direct, act, be on the crew. We had a blast, got a great response, didn’t win a damn thing, but did have people seek us out afterwards and congratulate us. If you can get that, you’re on to something.

Critics at Bay

It’s like that scene in David Fincher’s “Se7en” when Morgan Freeman says, “If this man turns out to be Satan – I mean the devil himself – that might meet our expectations.” Michael Bay is an incompetent douche, yes; but is he a talentless, incompetent douche? No. And here we go. On the second episode of my former podcast, “Experts and Intermediates” (listen to it here) we watched 4 of Bay’s films, then went and saw the first “Transformers.” It was worse than torture. We shared our findings on the show, where we used terms like “Bay-mo” which is a slow-mo shot that also circles the characters while they stand up and look off into the distance. We theorized that Bay can’t actually read, and is brought in only to blow things up during the action scenes. Even so, given the number of explosions in his movies, that still makes him the hardest working man in Hollywood.

Michael Bay doesn't ask if he CAN blow something up, only how GOOD can he blow it up?

I saw the first “Transformers” and it wasn’t very good. Shia Lebouf and John Turturro are awesome and funny, but the action was terrible and the final battle was lame. Still, I enjoyed the movie, which I saw once and have no plans ever to see again. So it is with “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” except that Bay strays even more to the extremes this time. The bad dialogue and plotting are much worse than the first movie, while there is literally tons more action. This may be the biggest movie ever. Overall, I hated the movie and I really liked it, too.

But now I read all these reviews and it’s as though critics have just woken up from a Bay-nap. They seem disproportionately outraged at this movie. It has a 21% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, compared to a 57% rating for the first one, and there is no way in hell the first movie is almost

Push-up?

3x as good as its sequel. I’m fine with people disliking the movie because of its bad dialogue, and in particular its really uninteresting robots. In a movie called and about “Transformers” it would be nice if the movie didn’t view its central characters as a joke. That is, it would be nice if it tried to establish them as something other than walking punch-lines who occasionally fight. You would think they might have some perspective about the war they’re in. You’d think they might talk to the evil robots at some point, even as they’re fighting. You’d think these robots would conjure something interesting to say! Also, if you’ve always wondered what it would look like for a film camera to have sex with Megan Fox, now’s your chance to find out. This chick may have the world’s greatest publicist, but even they couldn’t stop the assault.

These dudes sucked. I've heard their roles weren't scripted and were just improvised by two comedians. Fail.

So, I’m fine with that criticism, but I’m less impressed by critics complaining about the price tag of the movie – which is $200 million, not cheap. Know what other movies weren’t cheap? “Titanic” – $200 million in 1997 – that’d be like spending $300 million now, which “Spiderman 3” almost did – $258 million – and “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” did do. I don’t recall this much complaining when it came out. Guess what else cost $200 million? “Quantum of Solace,” that most recent and most disappointing Bond movie (which 65% of critics liked, for reasons which predate both logic and thought). It’s sortof a Fielder’s Choice of which of these movies is better (aside from “Titanic,” which IS better) but the point is, “Transformers” movies get a whole hell of a lot for their money. I’ve never seen so many effects shots, or so much…muchness!

This scene was completely awesome, though. Hands down the best in the movie.

Then there’s the criticism that Bay is singlehandedly taking the cinema straight to hell, which is such a near-sighted statement to make when his former partner, Jerry Bruckheimer (read: Hitler) has a CGI / 3-D action bonanza about Guinea Pigs  coming out in less than a month. And let’s not forget epic frat boy-cum-director Brett Ratner, whose movies are downright unwatchable. Are action movies getting out of control? Well, yes and no. In 2007, we got the 4^th “Die Hard” movie which was fantastic. Last year, we had “The Dark Knight” and “Iron Man.” Will Smith makes one every now and again, and they’re okay. Later this year, the man who brought us both “Aliens” and the “Terminator” twins unleashes his new ginormous film. I don’t think much has changed about the action movie that isn’t also reflected in every corner of the industry. There is a lot of sameness. Horror movies are either PG-13 for the tweens or a hard “R” rating for the sickos. Independent films are now put through the studio ringer to make sure they have the appropriate doses of quirk and snark.

Comedy is about the best place to be; specifically a comedy starring Seth Rogen. That man is a license to do whatever the hell he wants, and what he usually wants is to make a funny movie. Essentially it boils down to this: if you’re a really good director, you can probably get the movie you want made, made. If you’re a mediocre director, you’re going to be obeying the studio. I don’t see “Transformers” as the beginning of the end. In fact, contrary to what lots of critics have said, I think it’s one of Bay’s better movies – better than “The Rock” and “Pearl Harbor” and don’t even get me started on “Bad Boys II.”

Movies are getting bigger. We have lost some elements of basic storytelling. In other ways, the stories are much better and more diverse. 20 yrs ago, we’d never see a 2-year stint where “No Country For Old Men” and “Slumdog Millionaire” would be our Best Picture winners. Too dark and too non-American.

What I do ponder often, is what type of movie I would want to make. Part of the reason I do find “Transformers” so damn impressive is I can’t imagine the logistical labyrinth it must have been to shoot that movie. The coordination, and I know there were loads of people involved, but it’s still kindof amazing to me. As are the effects. They look great. Now if we could just see them… and if they could just be in a better movie. Then we’d really have something.

Writing Thoughts 3

Once you start thinking about “Up,” it’s hard to stop. I saw it for a third time tonight, this time in 3D, which was different and good and interesting. There is so much to take in that the movie felt just as fresh as the other times. It’s so well crafted, so flawlessly executed, I just want to bask in it! Think about the details of the movie, the way the wallpaper looks on Carl’s walls; the back of the junk mail brochure for the retirement home; the way Carl’s arms move. There’s a scene where he is sitting,  holds up the brochure with his hand, then turns it over to look at the other side. Most movies would just have him hold up one side. Easier. Or, if he’s going to look at two sides, he will use two hands. Instead, his hand twists back on itself to turn it over. It is a tiny, minute detail, but it rings of life, and it shows that the makers understand the movement of life. How bodies work. They are meticulous in their observation. I was listening to an episode of “The Treatment,” a film podcast and the guest was Pete Doctor. He explained that the movie was a 5 yr process, of which 3 were spent purely on story. He took us through the early drafts of the script, which didn’t contain the young boy scout, Russell. Because of the tone they wanted for the story, Pete Doctor brought in writer/director Tom McCarthy, who shares a “Story by” credit and whose two films are “The Station Agent” and last year’s “The Visitor.” His films are about loners, people who have lost something or someone, and the new makeshift families that bring them back and restructure the way they see themselves and how they view life. It’s no surprise that Russell was his contribution, and Pete Doctor explained how Russell not only serves as the catalyst for Carl’s change, but also how the growth of their relationship becomes the gauge for where he is at the beginning and the end.

See any similarities between these two?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That's What I Thought You'd Say

 

 

 

 

The more I think about it, the more I see Carl as a similar character to Richard Jenkins in “The Visitor,” so I wonder how much McCarthy’s involvement in this film (since he would have worked on it a few years ago) informed his writing process on “The Visitor.” Did the idea, in some way, stem from Carl? The films couldn’t be any different in terms of style, but their main character and that character’s personal arc are nearly identical. I smell double feature. It’s revelations like that that set Pixar apart. You don’t see DreamWorks Animation calling up Michael Winterbottom or Sony tapping Paul Haggis to come workshop their scripts. It shows once again how important story is to Pixar. It also demonstrates the way ideas work, how working on one thing leads to another, how creativity can’t exist in a vacuum and how you have to choose the right people for the right projects.

I’ve been writing something since about the time I was in 8^th Grade. That was when I wrote my first screenplay. On white, lined paper, it was a horror movie whose villain was a scarecrow. Lots of people died, anyway, that’s another blog, but I’ve written two full screenplays, short plays, scenes, short films, short stories, essays, reviews, on and on and on. Almost always I’ve written by myself, but now here I have essentially a writing and directing partner. We have completely different styles and interests in terms of story and character and scope; even the way we think to frame shots is often different. But our working relationship is fantastic. Because we use a lot of common language to describe art and discuss it, we can combine our abilities and create something that is apart from the work I do on my own and apart from the work he does on his own. The question isn’t, am I better with or without him, or is he better… it’s is this particular project better with the two of us, and the answer is yes. The two of us wouldn’t enhance the things I write by myself, and I’d be no help to him with his own stuff. However, just like Tom McCarthy being (I’m all but assuming, at this point) influenced by Pete Doctor, Adam and I are more creative for working together. When the collaboration is a good one, it expands the creative abilities of both (or all) individuals as well as the group. We’ll discuss ideas for other scripts, and we’ll talk about whether it is something we should work on together, or if it is better to be taken on individually. If nothing else, it creates an interesting creative tangent. It’s as simple as personal and group projects. One isn’t better than the other; they serve different creative purposes and cover different artistic ground, or at least cover it in a new way. Both are valid and both are vital.

Just Doing My Job

I had a claim similar a couple years ago. Not fun.

There have been a slew of recent storms here in the midwest. Rain and hail and wind along with it, a sortof 70mph-and-up  courier service for all sorts of property and car damage. Which means my job just got busy. We staved off the onslaught for so long, I thought we might get away clean. No chance. Not only have there been just as many storms this year as last, they’ve all arrived together with a tidal wave of claims. With severe storms in certain areas, we’ve sent people to work them for weeks at a time, which means the rest of us pick up the slack here at home, and because of my schedule, that’s been my job. It has meant some long drive time, going out of my traditional territory and into some rural areas. Handling so many claims in the suburbs, I’d forgotten what to expect. Things are just different once you get far enough away, is the best way to put it. Don’t ever underestimate your job’s ability to give you fodder for writing. 

 

I arrived at a wind claim for a customer last Wednesday, after over an hour in the car listening to podcasts. I was on site for about 4 hours (twice as long as a normal claim) and here is how it went. I pulled in the dirt driveway and had to navigate between sections of a massive, fallen tree (about 20 feet across), the middle of which had been excised so anyone could get in or out. Mr. Customer came outside. He was an oversized, pleasant fellow, and since he owned the surrounding 16 acres, and maybe since it was hot (but maybe not) he did not wear a shirt. Nor did he bother to put on a shirt at any point during my 4 hours with him. Not when we went inside, not when we passed his very bedroom to look at ceiling damage. Not when I went onto the roof by myself. He could have slipped on a tank top, would’ve taken 2 minutes. Not even when he and I drove the property looking for trees fallen on fencing. Never.

 

I’m from a small town in southwest MO, I’ve seen people driving with no shirt, it’s just usually not in a minivan. It’s an odd thing, being close to a foreign unclothed body, seat-belted in next to you. What if we’d got in a wreck and died. Wouldn’t people wonder why this man wasn’t wearing a shirt? Would they wonder why I didn’t ask him to put one on? I wondered that, too, several times. I could never work it in to the conversation. The name of the game, then, is called “Proximity + Line of Sight”. Also, he was a large man.

 

But maybe the oddest thing was that when we got back to the house, he put the car in park and kept on talking. Then he told me we should just hang out in the van, since it has AC and the house doesn’t. Have you ever talked to someone you don’t know while sitting in their car right in front of their house in the middle of the day when that person had also, coincidentally, decided to forego the societal courtesy of clothing and redraw all rules regarding body coverage? A few moments later, his wife ambled up with their dog, she barked a few words to her husband, and she got in the back seat of the van with their dog. She wore clothes. I managed to extract myself by saying I had to go write up the estimate and paperwork for the claim, which was true anyhow. A while passed, and I got out of my car and found him in the barn. I reached out the customer service packet, but he waved me off; he pointed down the driveway and said, “I’ll be right there. Go get my wife, and I’ll meet you all at the van!” 

 

And so in the van we sat. His wife in back, me in front, the shirtless fellow next to me, looking through the multi-thousand dollar estimate I’d written. And to say it was strange thing to see and be part of would be an intense understatement, but so would saying I did not like them. They were funny and odd and certainly ripe for a bit of mockery, but it spawns from amusement not malice. I’m not trying to pass any sort of value judgements on them. They are interesting as people not just as punchlines. For instance,  Mr. Customer told me all about his job while we drove the property. About the layoffs they were experiencing that he was fortunate enough to avoid. “For now,” he said, “but we’ll see.” It turns out Mrs. Customer’s mother is in the hospital, so on top of dealing with damage to their home, she has to split time at the hospital and handle all the legal matters for her mother. “She’s senile,” she told me more than once, matter-of-factly. Not sad, not forlorn, just the state of the union in the life of her mother. This was a couple in their mid-fifties, I’d guess. They live out here, away from everyone. It’s the way she prefers it. In my time talking with them, I learned this is the second marriage for both of them. She used to live in Springfield with her first husband, “but he got abusive,” Mr. Customer explained for her. He lived in the city for a long time, but Mrs. Customer wanted to be away from people, so here they are. No regret there, no feelings of missed opportunities. These people, more than most I’ve met doing this job, are the picture of content. They weren’t ignorant. They actually took time to look through the estimate (most don’t) and asked me reasonable questions about it. They don’t seem to view life as though it is hunting them, as though it is to be feared. She’s been laid off, her mother is sick, and she spoke plainly about how hard it was, but these things aren’t consuming them. They teased each other in front of me, and it was almost like a play. They were aware of me as their audience, and they were performing the play of their relationship so that I could see what they did all the time. I doubt they have many visitors.

 

People are interesting, and they’ll talk to you if you let them. These weren’t the only interesting people I met. I talked for over 15 minutes with an 87 yr old great grandmother with some lightning damage who explained to me how more than 20 people cram into her little house every Thanksgiving to eat her food. She detailed her preparations, she explained the cast of her family, and the notion that last year may have been her last hurrah because she has aches, and she’s not sure she’s up for preparing that much food again. How it takes its toll on her physically, even though it brings her such pleasure, having so much family around. She had intriguing Mexican art on the walls that her son got for her, and she explained the way she came up from living in shanty-houses as a child, not knowing that anything else existed. She told me about a boy in her school when she was a girl, and how she wondered what had become of him, since he acted up and got in trouble. 

 

I usually time myself. A typical claim in about 90 minutes. But sometimes, I like to just stop the timer, take out my pen and start asking questions. I drop all the policy language and coverage analysis and Recoverable Depreciation explanations, and I become what I am: a writer. What they see as chit-chat I treat like an interview.  I stop collecting data to put in the claims file, and I start hearing stories that make me see this life more clearly. You have no idea how many brilliant, touching, funny little things people have to say if you just ask them. I plan to use parts of these stories as a character traits. I’ll combine them and mangle them and make them thematic, and I’ll contort the details and rewrite them so I like them better and they fit into the universe I want to create. They are spare parts for the rebuilding. But all that comes later. Right now it’s just about talking to people. I think if you’re a writer, you are drawn to people like this, you love people like this. People you pass on the street or see in a restaurant and think, “What’s does today mean for them? What brought them here and where are they going after this?” As a writer, you get to wonder about people; sometimes, you talk with them. I know it’s the best part of my job, and it has the least to do with it anything they pay me to do.

Knowing

There are times when the act of writing and the act of prayer become one. 

They may not start out like that, but like prayer, I often feel I should write more. It’s hard to find the time, it’s always hard to find the time, right now I’m writing on my lunch break. You can go throughout your day and make mental notes. Yes, I should write about this, or, I need to pray about that. Then you sit down to do it, and your mind forgets itself. It’s frustrating. What comes out doesn’t have the shape you wanted it to, you feel like you’re doing it wrong. Your hand doesn’t work right, or you can’t form the words to pray. Inevitably, it sounds like a 6th grade assignment. It’s no good, but you have to power through that sort of thing. There are just days like that. It doesn’t mean writing or praying are useless things, in fact, most of the time, it means they are good things that are hard to do. And maybe it’s good for us to do them badly every once and a while, because it can also make us want to do them more to do them right. For the record, I don’t think God is as bothered by bad prayer mechanics or bad journaling mechanics as we are. 

There is the other side, too. Today, just before clacking out this little entry, I sat down and was doing some writing about two verses I really love, in particular Ephesians 3:19 – “…know this love that surpasses knowledge…” which is my favorite in a string of Paul’s hopes for the community to which he’s writing. Anyway, writing about it, I realized I was writing my own prayer. It was that moment when the words almost form themselves, and before you know it, 3 pages are gone. You didn’t even have to try, really, because it was there inside you. I didn’t even plan to write about that verse today. I just kindof felt like I wanted to, so I did. And out it came, what they call an ocean of thought. That’s why I write. That’s why I pray.

One Hell of a Night

Damn, that baby is Gangsta!

 

A few months ago when I saw the preview for “The Hangover,” I thought it was another Apatow wannabe. 4 man-children in Vegas. Ready. Aim. Dick-jokes. But seeing more and more previews eventually swayed me, and I started seeing what the movie was doing. Tiger in the bathroom, finding a baby, Mike Tyson, Ed Helms without a tooth, missing groom…Hmm… they could be on to something.

They are. The movie is kindof a return to form for comedies in that it is written, it is plotted, and very well, both. I love the Apatow movies and “Superbad” and the like, but you can feel when movies rely too much on improv (“I Love You, Man” I’m looking at you, you were only okay) or when they’re probably going to be 80% concept and 4% funny (“Land of the Lost” get outta my face). Here, every scene adds something, and the movie clips right along. And good lord is it funny! I mean, FUNNY!!! The movie is essentially a series of comic setups for the 3 main characters as they look for their friend and try to remember last night, and they play off of each other really well. It’s funny and natural and the movie gives itself the advantage of building its scenes around a collective confusion. That need to find Doug drives everything, and because we don’t know anything more than the characters, we get to figure things out as they do. And since no one can remember last night, every new plot point is a bigger laugh, as we see just how ridiculous and crazy the night was.

Go see this movie. Check out how Bradley Cooper is a kickass leading guy, how Zack Galifianakis plays the dullard better than anyone and how Ed Helms followed the Steve Carrell path into movies and avoided a disaster like “License to Wed.” Helms is probably the most believable character in the movie and his character’s arc with his girlfriend is really very satisfying. It’s rare for a movie to be this overtly unsentimental about its characters and still manage to make us really care about them.

You seriously have no idea how funny this movie is. You have no idea how much you’re going to love it. Go see it with a bunch of people and laugh your ass off. You’ll feel better.  I know I do.

Hold For Edit

sound editing: not for the faint of heart

Weekends are full these days. There’s nothing like spending at least 20 hours Friday through Sunday editing a movie. And that’s a slow weekend. I get antsy sometimes. In the pasty, I’ve been the one handling the controls, but my co-director Adam is more of a technical guru than I am, so he’s running the show. My job is saying this shot/that shot, taking notes for timecodes, keeping track of anything good for an outtake reel, and keeping track of the overall tone and pace of it. The two of us go through the footage together. I’m more outspoken, so I usually say what take to use, and then he’ll question if it’s a bad one and we’ll discuss. We both have definite skills, and the nice thing is that they are mostly separate, but there is an overlap, so we can at least understand where the other person is coming from. This is important, because when you’re cooped up in a room for 10 hours a day, your head can start spinning. There’s just too much to take in, too many tiny decisions to make. So it’s nice that when my brain is fried, I can get up, refill our waters, pace the room, and let him pick up the slack. Likewise, sometimes his eyes glaze over from cutting together too many tiny fragments to make a scene, and I can come in and say, “Go here, get this piece, trim that,” blah blah blah.

It’s a good partnership. We don’t argue much and when we do, we’re both so insensitive toward the other person, it’s hard to take it personally (It might also be helpful that we usually mock each other with a British dialect. The insult sounds meaner [just because] but it stings less because it’s actually just your friend joking around).

Right now, we’re pretty much done with 2 of our 3 “trailers within the movie” for our film, “Trailer: The Movie.” This weekend, we’ve been working on the drug trailer, called “Huff,” about a guy whose childhood addiction to marker-sniffing acts as a gateway to cocaine and heroine. Any time you make a movie, there is the worry that what you’ve written on the page won’t translate to anything good on the shooting day. Or that the performances given on the shooting day won’t mesh together in the editing room, won’t connect like your mind’s eye was sure they would. there are so many ways to screw up a movie, it’s ridiculous. So, it’s been very rewarding to find that the footage is good, the performances are spot on, and the way it all fits together is genuinely funny (since it’s a comedy). We’ve been working on this thing for about 9 months now, and right now is the labor. Only, it’ll be another month of labor before the baby comes out. Okay, enough analogizing, the thing is is this can be an overwhelming commitment sometimes, and it is hard damn work. But there is no better feeling than finishing a large section – after so many tweaks and cuts and refinements – and find that you’ve really got something here. And I’m telling you, we’ve really got something here.

Timing is Everything

And now two stories from the last 24 hours:

1 – Westbound I-70

On the way home from STL, and my car is getting low on gas. I’ve decided to push on past Columbia, MO and forge ahead into the night. I’m just into an episode of the radio show “This American Life,” and it’s good. It’s 11:30 or so. The car tells me I have 50 miles til empty. No problem. 25 miles til empty. Keep going. With about 18 miles left, I ask GPS where the nearest gas station is. 8 miles. Perfect. I pull off the highway and there’s the BP station, except…closed. 

10 miles til empty.

Get back on the highway, ask GPS for another. 5 miles up… I can do that.

I loop around and under Hwy 70 and make a left turn into black. Should be a gas station 1/4 mile on the right. I drive 1/2 a mile…NOTHING.

Turn around. 5 miles til empty.

It is at this time that I turn off my iPod and realize that I’m in trouble. Now it’s midnight, and my phone is almost dead and of course I left my charger at home. 

I see the lights of a gas station just up the road, back on the other side of the highway. Salvation! 

No. What I saw was the sign of the Gas Station (closed for the evening) and the outside lights of an Adult Video Store – on the trip from KC to STL, these shops outnumber flies.

3 miles til empty. 

I turn around, furious at these bumpkin gas stations that close early, mad at myself for not stopping sooner. I get back on 70, headed West, and I think, What will I do if I run out of gas? How long will it take someone to stop? Should I call someone I know? No, it’ll take them probably an hour and a half to find me, another 45 minutes to get me gas. Plus, my phone’s battery is deep down to the red area. Not good.

2 miles til empty.

1 miles til empty (bit of an oversight, there, by the car manufacturer, eh? Maybe it was some sad technician’s lonely joke, since most people will never let their tank get that low. But I did).

0 miles til empty.

The car is still running and moving, and it seems almost as surprised about this little marvel as I am grateful for it. I see a sign. Shell! I’ve driven this road at least 10 times, never noticed that little Shell station. I limp off the highway, foot off the gas, trying to coast. 

I make it.

It reminds me of that Seinfeld episode where Kramer refuses to fill up the car with gas because he doesn’t believe that cars ever run out of gas, that it’s just a scam from the auto companies. Kramer would not be so cocky if he drove through the midwest at night.

 

2 – Partly Cloudy, With a Chance of Doom

This story is much shorter. It is one fell swooping message from life to me about my own fragility.

I was on my way to inspect a roof today, a 1.5 story Laminate shingled-house. I had to cancel my first inspection, because I’d forgotten my camera like an idiot (first day back from vacation, these things will happen), so I’d gone back to my apartment, grabbed the camera and was going to get to this claim a bit early. The sky was a bit dark, but nothing was falling. It was preparing for rain, but wasn’t ready yet, and it only takes 30 minutes or so to inspect. 

Literally, the moment my right hand began steering the vehicle into a 20 mph left turn onto the woman’s street, an ocean of water fell out of the sky. Not a few drops. Not some light drizzle. It went from dry to soaked in an instant. And while it did mess up my schedule a bit, it was kindof amazing to see. It made me want to come home and watch “Magnolia” and have some soup. Plus, I imagined an even more frustrating scene… me, having just gotten onto the roof, pulling out my tape measure when the downpour arrives. I don’t know if you’ve ever been on a steep roof in the pouring rain. Unless you have spike-souled shoes, the idea is a bad one. I envision myself moving carefully to get back to my ladder, it shaking in the wind. I imagine the turning around to descend the ladder, placing a foot on the first slippery step. And then whoops and the ladder slips. And then yikes and I fall backwards, an ungraceful, headlong dive onto the concrete, where I lay lifeless. Since no one was to be home during the inspection, I would expire shortly thereafter, just a block or two down the street from my parents’ house, they only finding out much later.

So a collective sigh of relief from me at my avoided fate, although I do not hold it against those who read these words and feel like God, Himself, has just missed a most premium opportunity.