Bruno is now at the bottom!!

Jerksblog!

Date-Based Archive Pictures!

Recently the film I worked on about two years ago won an award at IFP, which is a distributors market. That means the film gets finishing funds, and then it will start going to festivals. It made the cover of the Daily Variety, I guess. Here's the website:

Shelter
...although it seems to be down at the moment.

I even got my Otakon pictures on the web!! At last!!

Also, my parents have kittens now:

For more pictures of kittens and me on a film set (coming soon), read the extended entry...

Here they are leaping and playing!

This one's name is Loki. He caught a sparrow.

This is an impressive Metroid costume, is it not! For more of my Otakon pictures, click here.

Posted by erin at 11:06 PM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Why Hating President Bush Makes You A Boring Person

I should preface this by saying that I am not a particularly political person. I couldn’t care less about the lives of politicians, and I don’t vote very often, as I don’t feel informed enough to make that kind of decision.

So what I am about to say is largely an aesthetic statement: Hating President Bush makes you a boring a person.

Maybe it’s because I have been living in the Village so long, and how many of my coworkers are what I refer to as “Village Liberals,” but I’m downright bored with people criticizing Bush. At first it was harmless taunts about Bush’s poor public speaking ability, and his tendency to make up new words, but ever since the war, the jabs at Bush have been even more boring and repetitive.

I just wish that people would come up with new and interesting critiques of the Bush administration. Here are some topics I’d like to see people avoid, for the sake of boredom:

1. Iraq
2. Oil
3. The Environment
4. Tax Cuts for the Rich (or taxes in general)
5. Terrorism and/or The Patriot Act

Don’t people understand that blindly disagreeing with everything the president does is ill-informed and foolish? It seems to me that most people who critique the Bush administration are not terribly well informed. The more they protest, in fact, the less they seem to know.

There is an excellent Doctor Who quote on the matter: “You, sir, are a classic example of the inverse ratio between the size of the mouth and the size of the brain.”

In conclusion I should like to add that I always try to avoid discussing at length topics on which I am ill-informed, and that I wish everyone else would do the same.

Posted by erin at 01:53 PM | Comments (17)

Date-Based Archive Arrggg

This is why I can't create a blog to comment on Rick's blog:

Writing to '/www/hosts/www.erinfinnegan.com/docroot/blog/Rickblog/index.xml.new' failed: Opening local file '/www/hosts/www.erinfinnegan.com/docroot/blog/Rickblog/index.xml.new' failed: Permission denied

I set all the permissions I could! Gah!

Posted by erin at 09:33 AM | Comments (3)

Date-Based Archive Sometimes you eat the bear

I have only one pound left to go now!! Woo-hoo! It’s official, I’ve lost 50 pounds now (some of them more than once, annoyingly), so I’m going to have to throw myself a party at some point, probably next month.

I also have only 1200 more words to write for our new Writer’s Club (deadline next Tuesday). I should be able to finish in time. I don’t think anything is going on this weekend, and it’ll be the first weekend in a long time that will be the case.

I’m also happy that I’ve been working on being less shy at work lately. Hooray!

Posted by erin at 10:09 AM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive Some Days, The Bear Eats You

Today I wrote to that agent who I know to see if she'd received the screenplay (Jerksquad) that I dropped off at her place sometime last month. She wrote back saying that she'd read it and didn't like it, but her email had bounced back. Later she went on to say that she only likes sophisticated comedies, the kinds they had back in the 1930's and '40's. This from the woman who represented the 40 Days and 40 Nights guy. I read that screenplay. It was hardly sophisticated.

Nevertheless, I'll admit that I like crude humor. I enjoy the occasional episode of South Park, and I think Don Hertzfedlt is a genius for chopping off the limbs of stick figures. However, the kind of Beavis & Butthead fare that I enjoy is not included in the movie Jerksquad.

I don’t really know what to say to her. She’s disliked my first two screenplays but thinks that I have talent (for some reason). It’s probably not worthwhile to ask her to read anything else I might come up with, since it’s just going to get dorkier and weirder from here on out (I assume).

Fortunately, hope springs eternal. Nearly 4 months later than last year, the new Tisch log line book (a.k.a. Screenplay Bank) is coming out soon, maybe even this week. Perhaps I’ll make some new contacts that way.

Posted by erin at 06:11 PM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive MA-SOC Meeting Scary At Best

OK, so I went to a certain NYC-wide anime club meeting, the first in something like 5 years since they stopped having screenings. Let's just say that there were quite a few mouth-breathers there, and even though their choices of shows for the screening were pretty good, I don't think I'd go to another meeting. It reminded me of why there was no "dork pride" for so many years.

Better than my own summaries of some of the titles screened are N.'s reactions to them, for example: "Cosmic Stellvia is like a non-violent Ender's Game for girls!" and "Scrapped Princess is like if Inu-Yasha were good. I mean, it followed D&D rules." Clearly, anything that follows D&D rules is good in N.'s opinion.

We also learned that Gene Shaft is horrid and has laughably bad music, and that Alien Nine is too disturbing to actually watch. We got to see another episode of Azumanga Diaoh, which is just as funny as the manga.

Posted by erin at 12:36 PM | Comments (1)

Date-Based Archive Rick's Blog Voted the Best, by Me

Rick's blog is so totally awesome, I can't stop talking about it. I'm considering making a new blog on my site just so we comment on Rick's blog. Now I need to think of a title.

What else have I been doing lately, you might ask? Mostly reading the Chobits manga (so bad for so many reasons), and Gravitation (worse than Chobits, but less pornographic). Neither of these series are pornographic like Playboy, but instead, are kinda like Victorian porn, but less restrained.

Enough about porn! Last night, I had this dream that I needed brain surgery. There was this bizarre accident where this girl jumped (fell?) from a tower and a boy jumped down somehow beneath her to break her fall. Somehow neither person died, but their heads we cracked open and their brains were both sliced into big, bread-like slices.

The boy heroically put the brain slices back into their heads, but he mixed them up a little, so there was a kind of brain-swapping plot. Surgery was needed to correct this.

The surgery never happened in the dream, but the perspective shifted part-way through, so whereas it had been in the third person, suddenly I was the girl with a partial boy's brain. And I had a headache and was really grouchy.

The end! Wheeeeee!

Posted by erin at 12:51 PM | Comments (8)

Date-Based Archive Impressive Public Restrooms and a Successful Weekend

If you’re near Central Park South as you read this, you can find some very nice public restrooms at 56th street and 7th Avenue, near the N/R/Q/W subway stop in the hotel across 7th Ave from Carnegie Hall.

Walk into the hotel like you know where you’re going. Make a right-hand turn into the hallway which is immediately after the restaurant entrance. At the end of the hall is a T-intersection with elevators to your left and carpeted stairs to your right. Go up the stairs (one flight) and there you will find a long ritzy hallway with the Men’s restroom immediately on your left, and the Women’s restroom at the end of the hall.

That’s what I did on Saturday night at 8:30pm, when there wasn’t enough time to go all the way home, and no Barnes and Noble, or McDonalds, or bars in the immediate area. If you’re in the park, there are OK public restrooms under the Bow Bridge.

On Saturday I dropped by the Call of Cthulhu game in Jersey, mostly so N. could drop off some books. The game was a success, with no one dying at all, and the two tough guys going crazy and/or being ineffectual while a book collector and a pulp writer saved the day. The otherwise quiet pulp writer struck the final blow against a demonic beast, throwing a fire poker and yelling, “Your rent is overdue!”

Then I went to Jeremiah’s housewarming party. I’m assuming no one reading this knows who he is, but it doesn’t matter. The party, despite actually having a keg, was quite fun and I got to see a lot of NYU film people.

On Friday night I watched The Animation Show at the Quad. I highly recommend it, as it has a lot of Don Hertzfeldt work in it, and he is one of my favorite American animators. There are no bad shorts in the program – everything in it is wonderful. I think it’s only in town for a limited time.

On Sunday I finally met with the Employeress. I might actually get to do work for her this week. Her apartment – I cannot emphasize this enough – is ridiculously stunning. It is huge, and has a spectacular view of the Hudson and the Jersey City skyline. I can see my old office building from there.

Posted by erin at 02:11 PM | Comments (2)

Date-Based Archive Can't Seem to Shake Those Last 5 Pounds

As most of you know, since I can't stop talking about it, I've lost 45 pounds since January. This means that I am almost at my goal weight, which is the "maximum weight for all adults" my height. I am a mere 5 lbs away from this magical weight. Unfortunately, I've weighed the same thing, give or take a couple pounds, for nearly a month now, and it's really getting on my nerves.

I suppose I should be happy that I've gotten this far, and of course, I certainly don't look or feel fat any more.... but goddamnit! I've come this far... how hard should it be to lose another 5 lbs?! Rrrrrrggg!!!

The most frustrating thing of all is that there were two weeks when I really sluffed off my diet. I skipped going to the gym, I ate too much, I went drinking, and I didn't gain weight. I even lost a pound. In the third week I gained that pound back, so last week I tried really hard to stick to the points, exersize a lot, etc., and I thought for sure I was lose weight, but NO! I am still the same weight as last week, when I wasn't even trying.

Sorry to bore all of you by ranting about my weight like some kind of girl. Or as Case says, "Gurl". For my next entry I'll aim for something more intellectual, I swear.

Posted by erin at 06:18 PM | Comments (1)

Date-Based Archive Coloring in Schoolgirls All Day and Why the Edda is So Darn Cool

So Hal loaned me the Edda, which is about Norse mythology. So far it's great. It's like a treasure-trove of fantasy names, because it's filled with passages like, "And from the Earth sprang a dozen dwarves, and these were their names..." It's got a lot of Tolkien source-material, you can tell. Like the name Gandalf, taken from a dwarf, of which the literal translation is "Sorcerer Elf". I had to read through several more pages of dwarves names before I hit Gloin, father of Gimli.

Also, at work I've been coloring in schoolgirl uniforms all day. And by that I mean making color keys and not actually coloring. And by all day I mean about half an hour. The rest of the day I've been making color keys for other stuff. But there are some schoolgirls in the episode we're working on.

Posted by erin at 05:33 PM | Comments (14)

Date-Based Archive American Splendor

I saw American Splendor and it was darn good. It was sort of like supplementary material to the Crumb documentary, and it was executed in the style of 24 Hour Party People, where you get dramatic scenes and then see the real people.

Everyone should see this movie.

Also Hal should loan me the comics of the same name.

Posted by erin at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive 2003 Anime Convention Report

For your convenience, I've arranged my data into a table. Click here for a better display of said table.

Con Name	Anime Boston	Yuricon	Otakon	Shoujoucon	BAAF
Overcrowding	Anime Boston sold out, and I couldn't get in. I sat in a crowded hallway the whole time, waiting for the CPM guys to show.	None. The con was under-attended and filled with dykes and hentai fans.	Some.	None. Not as under-attended as Yuricon, but not crowded.	Extreme. Video rooms were closed, sometimes, entire floors. Saturday was a nightmare.
Screenings	Unknown.	Poor. They did show some titles I wanted to see, but overall the quality and selections were pretty tame. They do score points for having some raw Japanese titles.	Not as good as last year. Some things were worthwhile, but I ended up watching mostly fan parodies, which were really good.	Not too good. I watched 5 hours of Gravitation, which was surprisingly worthwhile.	Good. Much classic anime was shown, and some of it was even dubbed. I also saw the world premiere of Tokyo Godfathers.
Dealer's Room	Unknown, but I did buy an Ein from a guy in the hallway.	Bad. Mostly Sailor Moon merchandise.	...decimated the first day by the crowd. All the good stuff dried up. The dealer's room did provide the crowd with Digiko fleece hats and Naruto headbands, which could be seen as good or bad.	: Great! They had lots of sales ($35 plush Nekobus, $1.50 pocci (poki?)) and plentiful merchandise!	Not good! Too crowded to get into most of the time, with a minimum 20 minute wait most of the weekend. Hardly any sales. No good stuff.
Cosplay	Decent. Many male Inu-yashas, and some impressive costumes.	Unmentionable.	So many Narutos, so little time. That aside, the cosplay at Otakon really is the best around.	OK, but not terribly impressive.	Very bad on Saturday, decent on Sunday. There were so many fat, girl Inu-yashas that I almost threw up.
AMVs	Unknown.	Over 24 Utena AMVs.	Awesome. The best around. A few too many Fuushigi Yugi videos, but everything else was worth watching.	Only 12 Utena AMV's, but really, 2 is too many.	None at all. There were no AMV screenings, and no fan parodies. It didn't matter to most of the kids there, as it was their first con anyway. Some were with their parents.
Would I go again next year?	Maybe.	No.	Yes!	Maybe.	Probably, because I'm a sucker.

Posted by erin at 11:53 AM | Comments (0)