We started out with an early lunch at the BeeJay Deli on 2nd Avenue, the place I used to get lunch when I’d work day shifts. The people who run that place are so cool. I haven’t seen them in 1.5-2 years, and when I walked in they were really happy to see me. I always make a point to eat there when I’m back in San Diego, but the last time I was in town, I was there over the weekend and someone else works the counter on weekends. So I’m thinking the last time I saw them was probably on the Bearded Odyssey, which would have been late May 2003.

But right away, when I walked in, they were like “Hey, you’re back!” They asked how school was going and everything and were just really cool. I realize some of it is probably an ego thing, because I’ve never really had a regular place where the owners knew me and remembered me and cared about me that much as a customer, but these people are just super friendly and cool. So if any of you reading this are from San Diego or visit there, please go to the BeeJay Deli on 2nd Avenue just south of Cedar (by the Motel 6). They’re mainly a sandwich shop but they have other things too, like salads and stuff. I recommend the chicken breast with melted jack cheese and ortega chilis on toasted sourdough.

Sara had the turkey sandwich. We also had some complimentary egg rolls, which were great, as an appetizer.

Anyway, we took the trolley down to Tijuana for some junk shopping. Speaking of that, one of my favorite merchants gave us this line as we passed his shop: “Wanna come in and see more junk – eh – I mean, merchandise?” I got a kick out of that. But here is Sara along Revolution Avenue with the old arch ruins and the new kitschy arch both behind her.

We headed down Revolution Avenue, and I bought four new Mexican wrestling masks (pictures to come, I hope). This picture was taken as a salesman attempted to convince Sara she wanted to buy some of his jewelry, but I took the picture because the building behind her says “Sara” also.

I’m going a little out of order here, but after we made the walk across the border and over to Revolution Ave, I got really light-headed all of a sudden. My stomach notted up like I was really hungry and my heart started racing. So we sat down and I said something about how I really needed to get some lunch, and then I just realized that we’d eaten only an hour before. But I felt miserable and it just came out of nowhere.

I really wanted to get some water, but all I could think of was “When in Mexico, don’t drink the water.” Sara was like “But if we find bottled water, that’ll be okay,” and I was just thinking “Why would the water companies send their good water to Mexico? They probably just bottle the bad water!” Yeah so I was going nuts, just feeling like I was going to faint in Mexico while kids kept trying to sell me Chicklets. I was trying to figure out the Spanish word for “sick,” so I was asking Sara, “Is it ‘enfermo’? Is that it? Or does that mean ‘on fire’ or something?” and she was just like “Maybe you should just try not to talk…”

I became convinced that I needed to go into “Taco Bell,” the restaurant immediately behind our bench that was definitely NOT a part of the Taco Bell chain. This was basically a 3-walled shack with some rotting-away locals sitting inside and a chihuahua running around and barking on the roof. However, they had a special of 3 beef tacos for $1 and beers and bottles of pop were also $1.

Oddly enough, my idea of curing my ailment with cheap tacos and beer didn’t seem as smart to Sara as it did to me. Nevertheless, I convinced her that we should go in, because anything was better than water. We walked in, the locals just glared at us, absolutely no one approached us, so we walked out. The sight of Rey Mysterio masks across the way brought a little bit of life back to me, so we went over and I bought one and I asked the shopkeeper if the taco place across the street was any good (that’s simplifying it a bit – she didn’t speak English and I don’t speak Spanish, but we ended up communicating in terms of “bueno” and “no”). She communicated the idea that Taco Bell was good, so we decided to try again.

Again, we walked into “Taco Bell,” and no one made an effort to acknowledge us, with the exception of the half-dead old locals who just glared at us. I also forgot to mention the swarm of gnats we had to walk through to get into the restaurant.

So once again, we walked out, and one of the servers that had just been standing by a window asked us if we wanted some tacos. Relieved and still delirious, I said yes, and we sat down and eventually I was served (Sara did not want to order food or look at my food once it arrived. The idea of eating the tacos in this place in the company of gnats was not pleasing to her).

The three tacos I got were not only tiny, but they each sported a glob of guacamole that can best be described as someone blowing their sinus-infected nose into my tacos. But I ate them up (even though I hate guacamole) and drank a Corona and a Pepsi Light, paid my $3 and we left. Sara asked me if I felt better, and regarding my initial ailment, I felt a lot better. But that food made me sick in a very new way.

It eventually passed and we were both fine the rest of the day. But I told that story out of order for the purpose of keeping the photos in chronological order. We got some pictures of “Taco Bell” on our way back to the trolley. Here’s Sara, with an inset of the chihuaha (which isn’t visible in the regular photo).

And here’s a closeup of the chihuaha, which held perfectly still while Sara took her picture, but when I tried to, he kept running around. A homeless guy stumbled buy, seeing what I was trying to do, and yelled up “Hold still! He’s trying to take your picture!” and then laughed to himself as he stumbled on down the street.

Here’s a look back at the TJ skyline before we crossed the border.

This is the backed up line of cars at the border. Because of the side of the bridge we were on, I couldn’t look back to show how far the line went. We actually got through our line faster than I ever have before. There was literally no wait for people on foot.

We ended up getting cleaned up and going to Caparell’s for dinner that night – another highly recommended SD restaurant. It’s an Italian place on the ground floor of the Reiss Hotel on 1st Avenue north of Ash.

Day 3 was beach day!

Here’s the In-N-Out at Rosecrans and Sports Arena, which used to be my “regular” In-N-Out.

I inadvertantly made a friend on the bus. We sat down near an elderly gentleman with lots of long ear hair who had a newspaper next to him, so I asked if it was his paper so I could read it. This began a horribly awkward, extremely loud and pretty one-sided conversation, during which he spoke of computer repairmen, godless communists, summer camps and foreign tyrants hiding away on their secret islands.

We wanted to get off the bus at Grand to go to the gas station on the corner to go hunting for Rachel, the infamous transgendered gas station attendant. (link) He refused to accept this. He’d say “Oh you want Garnet, that’s where all the shops are, that’s the main street.” And I’d say, “No, actually I want to get off at Grand.” Then he’d say “No you want to get Garnet, that’s the main street through Pacific Beach,” and I’d reply, “Yes, I realize that, but I actually want to get off at Garnet.”

I should have just ignored him, and Sara wondered why I kept encouraging him, but I just feel really bad when I’m rude to people. There were about 500 points during that 20-minute ride where I really wanted to just say “Shut up, you senile old moron,” but I couldn’t do that, and I couldn’t do anything along the spectrum of rudeness short of just listening and politely participating. And I’m pretty sure everyone else on the bus hated me for that.

We finally got out at Grand (another bus rider eventually snapped at him: “They want to get off at Grand!!”) but we were unfortunately denied a Rachel sighting. We did end up going to Garnet, which we’d intended from the beginning – not because of the old man on the bus – and walked down Garnet to the beach.

Before you get to the beach, you come to Fatburger. Sara wanted to get a picture with this sign for her dad.

We went down to the beach, and here is Sara realizing, thanks to a wave that came further up the beach than the rest, that the Pacific can be pretty chilly in March.

We walked along the beach for a while and then went up to the Garnet Pier. This is just a standard hold-the-camera-out-and-try-to-take-a-picture-of-ourselves shot…after about 10 missed tries. I’m not very good at pulling this off.

This is just a gimmicky little picture I took looking through a knothole in the pier down at the foamy waters below.

I can’t remember what we did for dinner that night.

We got kind of a late start on Sunday. We were going to try to keep a Central Time schedule so that we’d be waking up early and getting a lot accomplished during the day, but we ended up being so worn out we accidentally slept in.

Here’s a view from the hotel room Sunday morning:

We had breakfast at Hob Nob Hill, a place I always sent guests to when I worked at the Holiday Inn, but I had never eaten there. So we ate there. Then we took a walk around downtown.

This is a shot of the Star of India, the oldest seaworthy ship in … some region. I don’t remember if it’s “The Pacific” or “The United States” or “The World” or “San Diego.” But it’s big and old.

Just past the Star of India was this cool pair of street musicians.

When Danny the singer / keyboardist stopped playing the previous song, Rosie his sidekick kept playing her metallic maracas. He shouted out “Rosie – stop playing! The song’s over!” She replied, “Sorry Danny, I guess I just get carried away!”

Down by arena park, there were some people flying kites. Nothing witty or insightful to say here.

Then over by the convention center, we stopped to sit by a fountain. This duck responded to my request and stopped to pose for a picture in front of the fountain.

A bunch of pigeons decided they liked Sara.

Then we went to Horton Plaza where Sara shopped for some new work clothes for her new job and we ate at Sarku Japan, also known as “Yummy yummy chicken!”

We had to sit outside waiting for the shuttle for about a half hour, because our flight came in right at the scheduled time for the zoo and Sea World pickup. We could have taken a $5 cab to the hotel, but it was nice to be outside so we didn’t mind waiting. So here’s Sara as we sat waiting for the shuttle:

We took the trolley to Mission Valley Center, which was the closest trolley station to an In-N-Out. The hotel shuttle driver said he could take us to the Sports Arena In-N-Out, but we’d just be driving through, and I wanted to sit inside and enjoy the atmosphere for my first In-N-Out visit since October 2003 and for Sara’s first In-N-Out visit EVER. So here’s Sara with the beautiful In-N-Out counter behind her:

and nearing the conclusion of her first In-N-Out meal, which she enjoyed greatly. “Even In-N-Out burps taste good!” – Sara McMillan

I needed to get some pens, so we went to the World’s Largest Target, also at the Mission Valley mall. Here’s Sara with the shopping cart escalator in the background. At this point, she was getting a little tired of being the subject of the photo journal.

We eventually made our way back to the trolley station to get back to the hotel at the end of a long first day. And Sara was really getting annoyed…

It was a good first day, and we haven’t seen much. Sara mentioned that she really hasn’t seen anything yet that makes San Diego seem “metropolitan,” so tomorrow we’re going to walk into the heart of downtown.

1. I am currently working on “The Bad Seed” with

2. Lee Willet, who was in “Big Money Hustlas” with

3. The Insane Clown Posse, who wrestled in WCW at the same time as

4. David Arquette, who was in Scream with

5. Neve Campbell, who was in Wild Things with

6. Kevin Bacon

“The Bad Seed,” my thesis film for my film and new media minor, is now in its fourth semester. It has hardly been a quick project. Unlike “felt,” which was written, shot and edited in less than a month (although it had been conceived at least a year before being produced), “The Bad Seed” will probably be just shy of two years when it is completed.

Part of this was in how it got started. I wrote the script back in October 2003, the semester I enrolled in an independent study film production course. Getting started was a major problem, as every time the project seemed to be getting momentum, something would come up and derail it.

The project just never would have happened at all if not for the people I’ve been working with. I first approached Lee Willet about playing the Bad Seed, who was then just known as “the villain.” I knew Lee from a broadcasting class the year before. I knew he had a lot of acting experience, I knew he had a steadily flowing imagination and he just seemed like he’d be a lot of fun to work with.

Joe Erdkamp, who plays The Samaritan, was basically my only option for the hero. Joe is huge and gets mistaken for The Rock – so he’s obviously perfect physically to play a superhero – but like Lee, he had experience acting and just had the perfect attitude and imagination to help me figure out the movie.

Rounding out the list is Scott Eastman, who I guess could be considered art director. I knew roughly what I was looking for as far as the basics of costumes and whatnot, but once Scott cut loose, he put together far cooler costumes than I imagined using the most mundane things. The costumes are kind of like sculptures, I suppose – he’s making interesting things out of materials that really have no business being used that way.

Anyway, brainstorming and bouncing ideas and receiving ideas from these three has been a more educational and helpful experience than I could really put into words. When I first got the idea for this movie, I was really excited about it and thought it was a cool story, but it would be nothing like what it’s going to be without the hard work and the input of these guys. Obviously you don’t have a movie if you don’t have the main actors, but this movie would never have been started if not for the persistence of these guys, making me get my act together.

It hasn’t been easy. The first shoot, during which more than 20 people donated 3-4 hours of their time, was almost a complete waste. The main camera malfunctioned and none of the footage was salvageable. A behind-the-scenes camera caught a good portion of the action, and pieces of that will be used, but nowhere near the extent I hoped for when visualizing that first scene.

The story revolves around four main scenes – the first one I just mentioned, an indoor scene in the Bad Seed’s apartment, a second fight scene and then the grand finale. One of our group brainstorming sessions spawned the idea of fleshing out some more backstory, adding a flashback scene as well.

In some ways, it was getting to be too big, but different ways of approaching what needed to be shot were making it surprisingly manageable. It’s hard to really give examples without giving away parts of the movie, but I can say that there are going to be aspects of this movie beyond the cast and costumes that will look really high-budget, except the casual viewer hopefully won’t even notice them as special effects.

Well Joe decided, after years of thinking about it, to finally move to California. And that gave us a deadline to shoot the rest of Joe’s parts. So yesterday, we started about 3:00 and shot til around midnight, getting pieces of the first scene, pieces of the final scene, and pieces of the flashback. It’s going to be amazing if the editing actually works out and everything pieces together just right.

Shooting last night, I was thinking about how probably the best part of this, beyond just getting to hang out with these people and make something with them, was watching the ideas and the project evolve with everyone’s input.

“Felt” was a fun movie to make, but you don’t learn a lot from working with puppets and Josh Harrison’s right hand.

i made a list of things that might qualify me.

1. i love to watch professional wrestling.

2. i want to buy a pickup with a camper.

3. my beers of choice tend to fall in the Busch Light / Milwaukee’s Best Light / Old Style / High Life category.

4. i like Huey Lewis and the News and the Bellamy Brothers.

5. i enjoy my own flatulence and sometimes the flatulence of others.

6. i have recently developed an intense love of beef jerky in many flavors.

however, in case you haven’t talked to me or seen me in a while and you’re worried you may have lost me, i am still pursuing my master’s degree and i still regularly read the New Yorker and the Atlantic and enjoy listening to my local indie rock radio station.

Today, my friends, was a magical day in my college career.

Erin Hilsabeck informed me that her aerobics class, taught by Julia no-longer-Pagano, would be playing water polo on Friday. Julia apparently said I could come, but Julia is a jolly, joking-around type, so I wasn’t sure. I emailed Ms. Julia and asked if she wanted a celebrity water polo player, and she told me when to show up. There’s only one guy in the class, so I would help even it out.

It was a beautiful game. Our team got beaten, but it was tons of fun. There was fighting and whatnot, but everyone was laughing and having fun while doing it. There was one girl who was complaining all the time and taking it too seriously, but no one let her get them down.

And I was a total stranger to the class (except for Erin and Julia) but they weren’t weird to me or anything.

And in the final seconds of the game, what will probably be my final water polo game, off a pass from Erin, i scored the final goal.

That goal goes out to Derek, Diehl, Josh and Erin.

Take aerobic swimming. It is the greatest class ever.

i just learned how to play croquet a little over a week ago at Sara’s house. her dad passed on the joy of the game to me, and so sunday afternoon, i bought a croquet set at Target. this is my new favorite game ever, but i’ve only ever played three times and lost all three times. (twice Sara and I lost to her dad, once partnered with her mom and once partnered with her sister Kelly. then Sunday we lost to DNers Van Jensen and Annie Walden)

a new site for my radio show can be found here!