Monkey's Thoughts Propel Robot...

Monkeys controlling robots? Hmmmmmm. I see the endtimes taking shape.

Read, if you dare. As for me I am going to have to seclude myself for a few weeks while I redraft my worldview and apocalyptic predictions.

UPDATE: Is it a coincidence that advertisements for this program is featured prominently on the page? Life After People

I stopped by this afternoon during lunch and found that the entire drum department had been dismantled. At the top of the stairs there was simply a note: "No customers beyond this point".

Looking up from the first floor I could see that the upstairs was pretty much empty and it appeared that guitar display hooks were being installed. I thought that I must be mistaken. Was I jumping to conclusions without sufficient information? Perhaps they were just moving everything to a whole new drum building...

"No more drums?" I asked.

"Nope," replied a terse and distracted employee. "They weren't selling."

Wow. That's messed up. Not even a downsizing or reorganization and rethinking of stock. Just, wham. Outta there. It just seems so.... wrong. Manny's is like an institution, isn't it?

Required Elements:

• Character: Tetley Fairfax, writer


• Prop: Conference badge


• Line of dialogue: Well, if you must know, my father told me.

Written, filmed and edited between Friday June, 15 and Sunday June, 17.

Our 48 Hour Film Project is complete. Jason spent all of Sunday editing Saturday's footage, adding music, tweaking scenes, polishing it to a high gloss - as much as time would allow. We finished up around 6:45 PM and I rushed the freshly burned DVD down 51st street to Lexington and caught the 6 train. I arrived at the drop off point, the Pourhouse, at 3rd and 11th Street with 11 minutes to spare.

Thanks to everyone that helped out to make this happen! Our cast and crew really the best. Everyone was so enthusiastic and creative throughout the whole process. It was a really great experience.

Anyway, as I steadily shuffled my way across the platform towards the foot of the stair - careful not to step or be stepped on - a grizzled old man leaned into me and whispered conspiratorily, "Looks like everyone is rushing for a donut!" Naturally I was alarmed but I maintained my cool. What did he mean? Was this some code or form of corporate-speak that required action on my behalf? He didn't look like the executive type for sure but by the way he stared at me expectantly it was obvious that he was looking for some sort of reaction, affirmation or response - and soon. Thinking quickly, I looked him back in the eye, smiled grimly and nodded. With this simple acknowledgement I hoped to convey this: I understand and agree with you, old man. Clearly I am on your side. However, let us speak no more about this lest we betray our position to our enemies.

This seemed to satisfy him and I was able to merge into the crowd and disappear.

The film project is the crest of one of my busiest weeks ever. I returned from Vermont on Monday, looked at my schedule and realized I am booked solid far into next week. As we cobble together our film offering I will also be juggling a class that starts this Thursday, band rehearsals for a show next week, a show at the bowery I bought tickets for and my regular drum practice in the East Village. I feel my eyes widen at the mention of it, but actually writing it down here makes it all seem a bit more manageable. Certainly that is a good strategy - organization. Today's tip: get organized.

Tonight my partner in film production, Jason, and I attended a meet and greet of the New York contingent where several of the previous years winners were screened. I can't say that we met and greeted too much, but we did learn a lot from what we saw from last year's entries. Lots of good stuff. Surprisingly good productions for the limited time allotted.

Impressive submissions were presented from across the county in the genres of silent film, animation, family film, and mockumentary - all preceded by info cards that detailed the particular required prop, character and script line elements of each. The most improbable was an entry from Paris in the Western genre. Trust me, it totally worked. My other favorite was a mock documentary about homeland security forces arresting Canadian Geese. Genius.

In the end I think this event bolstered our confidence (which is good, very good). The competition obviously rises to the challenge and the best of the lot produces some very impressive fare - but we are reasonably confident that we too can produce a fine film under these contraints. As confident as our yet untested team can be.

I think that at the end the result we will be very positive. We will have completed a short film and certainly learned a lot about the process. Whatever happens I am prepared to have a good time. That's my new rule. I will keep you all updated as the action unfolds.

For the record.

This has already been noted on several music blogs but because we were there I thought I'd throw in my own two-cents.

The Rosebuds were absolutely amazing at the Bowery on 5/24. This is the third time I have seen them and I really felt that they were bringing their whole game up a few notches. There was no doubt that they were the headliner that night.

I saw them open for Sons & Daughters at North Six awhile back and that show compelled me to pick up their latest release at the time, Birds Make Good Neighbors. It is not often that I feel the need to buy a cd on the spot, but I was so impressed by them it seemed like the right thing to do. Then Ellen and I saw them at Union Hall back in February. As a venue, Union Hall has some shortcomings but the Rosebuds were so energetic that night that we barely noticed the drunken angry guy trying to pick fights in the crowd. Ok, we did notice but it didn't ruin the show.

If you get a chance, see them live. They are really infused with some sort of performance fire lately. Good stuff, indeed.

For reasons that may forever be a mystery to me, I am very appealing during the jury selection process. Irresistible even. Of course, an argument might also be made that I stood out because I didn't arrive wearing a sweat suit and I spoke in complete sentences.

What troubles me particularly is that once again my jury duty arrives when I have started a new job. Employers love that. It's become my thing: being wrenched from the office with the first few months of work. Fortunately, documented jury service ensures a six month reprieve before being called up again.

If you have never been to jury duty in Brooklyn, I recommend getting there early enough to watch the orientation video. I got delayed at the metal detector checkpoint so I missed about 15 minutes. When I finally settled into a seat the colonial settler was already being dunked underwater as to determine his guilt/innocence. "If he floats", explained Ed Bradley from beyond the grave, "he is considered guilty. If he sinks, he is innocent." He is found innocent. Whoops. Sorry to ruin it.

Next up was Dianne Sawyer to tell us how important our role in the judicial system is and to provide a general pep talk. After that the court officer revealed some reasons why certain folks might be released from the jury duty obligation and asked those people to file out by category to be questioned in the next room.

Out of curiosity I looked up to see who was looking to be excused because they had been convicted of a felony.

The most popular reasons for potential dismissal seemed to be "primary child care giver with no job" and "inability to understand english". Three translators (Chinese, Russian and Spanish) were assembled to assist with rounding up the latter.

Soon after I was called up with a group to head over to the Civil Court. By that afternoon I was selected. Juror number 1 as a matter of fact.