Personal Investigation...

In October, someone ganked my credit card digits and tossed a cool $2,350 onto my account through a flower shop in NoHo. NoHo here is North Hollywood, as opposed to North of Houston Street in NYC...Houston in NYC = HOWSTUN...yeah, I don't get it either.

Well, I have no reservations in warning everyone about the poor banking practices of several American entities: CitiGroup, Bank of America, etc...I won't go into the Subprime meltdown and how we're all suffering from it, but bottom line, I got hammered by a thief and then hammered by Citi with a monster interest rate. When I reported the fraud, I was told I wouldn't have to make a payment until the matter was resolved, so as I wouldn't be paying for a stranger's wedding or funeral arrangement, teddy bears, or enough helium balloons to reach far corners of the universe. At that point, I was also told that I'd receive an affidavit that I would need to sign and return.

A couple weeks pass, no affidavit. Then I get a call: "'Why haven't you paid your bill?" I was irate. I explained to the girl what I was told, and she countered by reminding me that I already had "X" amount of legit charges on the card that I should be paying for anyway...and so I asked her to "re-explain" exactly what I was supposed to do. I got the same explanation and then realized... ...I'm done with Citi. Done. I told the unpleasant college student that I still hadn't received the affidavit in order to send back to the people at Citi that matter, and that I hadn't heard anything in regards to the investigation that had supposedly been launched..............

Eventually, everything was "taken care of." I ended up making payments on charges that someone else put on the card, as well as the interest rate hike that I received because they couldn't get the affidavit to me sooner. The money was credited back to my account and my interest rate went, well, from high to higher 22%. Seriously. Done with Citi.

The other day I called to speak to someone about closing my account, and decided to ask, "Hey, how's that investigation coming?" After hearing this "phone superior" inform me that chances are, they "looked into" the charges and when they couldn't get a quick answer they ate the cost, I asked to be connected to whoever had been assigned to my case. Yep. That was the deal.

So, here's what I'm thinkin'...

The people at the "flower shop," are none the wiser, and in truth, I think the flower shop is a front for some local Armenian Mafia - so I'm thinking I may give them a call, or drop by and say, "Where's my order? I ordered 2,350 bucks worth of stuff in October, and it didn't go to the proper place." I'd so like to know how all of this happened...and if I never go, I'll never know. Anyone wanna take a trip over to Blooming Flowers?

Best Comedy on TV...

...the local Los Angeles news when it rains.

I love being a few miles from the Pacific, and a few miles south of a mountain pass that dumps the white stuff. We get precipitation here maybe 15 days a year, so when it rains, I have to write about it.

It cracks me up to see So Cal residents featured on the local LA news (and that's pretty big news, right? We are Los Angeles), because they don't know what to do when they approach snow on the Interstate, and they're trying to get home. Here's a bit of advice from a Show Me Stater: 1.) Chains for your tires. 2.) Slow down as opposed to speed up 3.) It is the information age; ever heard of checking a weather forecast?

Water starts falling from the sky and people here think they can either out-run the rain, or they have to stop because their tires will lose all potential traction. It's really quite amusing on the LA freeway system, which I compare to an expectant mother (LA), and instead of one, she has...septuplets (LA Freeways). Needless to say, people wanting to go 80+ vs. people wanting to go 60- makes for some interesting automotive disagreements.

So...our local news. Last night, Kristi and I were watching the late edition of our Fox affiliate, and they did a 5 minute feature on an apartment complex in Long Beach that flooded. Seriously, 5 minutes to explain that a contractor didn't finish a job due to illness, and when it began raining, the apartment manager tried covering the FLAT, unfinished roof with a single tarp. Genius. At least it's not more news on Britney Spears.

Not to make total light of the situation. When people wig about the rain here, there is good reason. It keeps coming hard, and everything that burned this summer turns into a river of mud. I don't suppose there's a whole lot that you can do about that, other than get out of the way. Mud coming like an overhead chocolate river will change your landscape quickly...or take a house from 1,000 ft. above sea level to 400 ft. above sea level in a ride to rival all of our area amusement parks. I always find it fascinating (being an individual who believes in Noah, the Ark and the great flood...archaeology tends to agree with Biblical history, you see, vs. the asteroid hitting the planet to wipe out dinosaurs, etc.) to see how rain for just 3 or 4 days can be catastrophic... ...just some food for thought.

Something entertaining to come soon.

Evidence...

Just a quick note: I mentioned there would be some Thanksgiving news to come. Here's the Thanksgiving Olds. We went to Missouri. It was Missourific...I wanted to share a few screen captures from the film I've been working on - Wid Winner and The Slipstream. Alex Gaynor, the writer and director, will also be editing this beast and as he's importing the footage into the editing program, he grabbed a few images to boost the morale of we whiny actors.

(I remember doing this with Nick Coleman when we pushed into post-production for The Suburban Seven...the longer the film, the longer the process. We had something like 18 hours of footage, and as nice as it would be to "set it and forget it," like Ron Popeil suggests, you just can't do it. Oh, and no, it isn't 1:1...depending on how you're doing it, it can take several minutes for each minute you have, which ultimately amounts to several hours. As far as I'm concerned, it's the most excruciating part of the filmmaking process.)

Anyway, he may kill me for sharing, but I thought it'd be fun for my 3 readers to see a few images while they're raw, with no color correction and not yet in their final aspect ratio. It'll allow a glance into the process, long before the magic. Obviously the image quality won't offer much of an accurate representation as to how rich things will look, but it'll offer a hint.

This is the fella I'm attempting to breathe life into. So, here he is looking pretty pathetic...or...me looking normal. I love the blanket - nice touch.

Rollin' in a sweet Oldsmobile Station Wagon, affectionately known in the story as "The Wagon Brown." That's Alex Wright (Kenneth) in the driver's seat.

Kenneth (Alex Wright) giving Wid a little proper life knowledge.

Erin O'Reilly as Lucy. Struggling with her coffee maker in Chris Tonkovich's gorgeous light.

Nothing like a rainy day in a cemetery.

Check ya later.

Where to Blog Next?

It's time to get rolling again. Working on a few posts that have been archived to present at the appropriate times. I believe I'm going to start hitting on it all...religion, politics...all those things I can tip to offend.

Still working on Wid Winner and The Slipstream and we're about to get rocking on some sweet action in the California desert, maybe in Arizona, maybe New Mexico and maybe back in Kentucky? We go where Alex tells us to go.

As of late, I've completed contractual duties with football.com...yep, right about the time my LSU Tigers were puttin' the super-smack on that pansy Big 10 squad from Ohio. Personally, I think the Bobcats of Ohio may have offered a better contest than the Buckeyes of Ohio State. Fo' Sho', I'm already excited to see what happens next year, when the Bayou Bengals aren't supposed to do anything... ...

As of now, I'm patiently waiting for this WGA strike to come to a close...SAG (of which I'm a member) will be following shortly if our peeps and the Producers can't come to some new and better understandings in regards to the lucrative dinero that is flowing forth from the 21st Century idiot box.

Presently, I'm still doing some writing for CKMG and thus have contributions for some pretty high profile clientele, yet you'll never see my name associated with it...which is fine by me. Absolutely fine. I am helping one of the CK project managers out with his corporate blog: green eggs and planet - I highly recommend checking it out. Other than that, yep, life has been that exciting :-) It's good, we need to renew from time to time.

Finally, sorry for shotty post-work I've done over the winter. Check back daily or every other day, and if I don't have something to offer more entertaining than this, something's very wrong, or something's very right!

By the way, if any of my two readers have any questions as to what I do, or why I do...or am I mostly crazy - please, feel free to ask.