Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Hey Julie...
You just finished the Oscars Pre-Show, what will you do now? I'm going to Disneyland! Actually, C and I went on Monday. Yes, I as a little tired but it was worth it. She was out of school (as were all the So Cal. Jewish schools for some teacher conference) and I hadn't really seen her in 4 days so it was time for a "girls day" and some mommy/daughter time.
We had a great time. We got to the Happiest Place on Earth and we went on the Rocket Ships, Buzz Lightyear, Dumbo, Teacups (twice), Autopia (twice), the Jungle Cruise (twice) and then stood in line to meet some of the princesses. Note to self (and others) if you want to see the Princesses, go straight there when you arrive at the park. The line is long and somewhat hellish (we waited about 40 minutes) but when you get in there, it's really one on one with whatever Princesses are in there which is very cool. We met Mulan, Pocahontas, and Sleeping Beauty. C was a little shy when we saw Mulan so I took the picture with her. Pocahontas she went up to and when she saw Beauty, she got a huge smile on her face. When it was her turn, she walked right up to Beauty and gave her a hug. It was so cute. Beauty (as C calls her) asked her her name and had a little chat with her. I was snapping away. Then when it was time to move on, she gave Beauty a kiss on the cheek. I missed that picture but it was so cute. And luckily, C wasn't disappointed that we didn't see Belle or Cinderella. Give us something to shoot for next time.
C also saw the sign for the Nemo Submarine ride opening up over the summer. She can't wait for that. I can't either.
We also hooked up with Lisa and her family who was also there. They were there to celebrate CS's 5th birthday and it was her first trip to Disneyland. We met up with Lisa and her middle daughter J at the Autopia and then later with everyone. Think the girls were happy to see each other? And then J took the younger girls on the teacups and spun them around pretty good. Look at those thrilled faces.
We all stayed and watched the parade which was really nice. They saw all the princesses. I won't bore you with all the photos but here are Cinderella and Snow White. Always popular princesses. And the girls waving at the parade passing them by.
It was a great day. C feel asleep pretty much as we hit the freeway. She was very well behaved so it was a very successful day. I love Disneyland, that's all I have to say. Oh, and chocolate covered frozen bananas are one of the greatest things on the planet. So is this cute face...
T-Minus 2 hours and 54 minutes to air. About 45 minutes 'til is all hits the fan. Here are a few more shots from last night walking on the Red Carpet the night before the big show.
Here's a shot of the red carpet looking up towards the stairs leading to the entrance to the Kodak.
Me and Robin, the Booth AD, posing. Me, Tom and Marty. I couldn't have gotten through this show without them and their support. Love you guys!
And one more of my AWESOME EVS co-AD's. What an amazing job they've done! You girls rock AND roll!
The show is tomorrow night. It's been a very long and actually very satisfying week. My job on this has been extremely complex. Without a doubt, the most technical I've ever worked on and most of it was figured out by me. Yes, I had help but I was the one who was given the responsibility of literally figuring out the gameplan for how we were setting up the EVS record room and who was covering and creating what elements in the show. It's been a huge puzzle that has actually worked out. Thank goodness.
What is an EVS machine you may ask. It's also referred to sometimes as an "Elvis". Think of it as a Tivo that can record 4 things simultaneously and has the ability to edit the video that's being recorded. That being said, with all of these machines running, we're running 26 channels. 16 channels recording, 10 channels playing back.
I actually feel good about what I've accomplished this week. At one point two days ago, Pam the producer said to me that next to her, I know the most about what she wants the show to be. That's a lot of information. We also had a conversation today about a certain element and she was talking to me like a producer (not a job I want) and getting my input on how to deal with this one video package. It was so amazing to think that she trusted me and my opinion so much. And many people have complimented me on what I've set up. I never am one to toot my own horn, EVER, but for the first time, I really feel like I've been an intregal part of the production process. The other producer and the tech manager have also said they can't imagine having done this show without me. Again, in a rare instance, I feel good about my job and work ability and what I'm capable of. I don't get this kind of opportunity often so I'm proud of myself that I've risen to my own and other's expectations.
Okay, enough about me. Here are some pictures (some of me) from the Red Carpet, which is really what you want to see. I took some more pictures tonight but I haven't dumped them on my computer yet. I'll do that tomorrow.
One of the statues going up to the Kodak Theater. The plastic will be off tomorrow.
The nominee wall. All the nominees will walk past and sign their name. Me on the Red Carpet. One of the boys fully unwrapped
Another one of me and THE man. At the limo dropoff.
What the celebs see at the drop off. This is facing into the security tent. This is MY world. This is the EVS room where we record all the elements for the pre-show. huge, brand new, state of the art high definition digital video truck. This truck does Monday Night Football during the season. Actually, a much nicer truck than the "big" show is using. I'm supervising these folks and helping coordinate all the items so that they roll in a straight line. Look at all those plasma monitors and all the things within each of them. I'm sitting pretty much where I took the photo.
Here's my monitor and what I look at. The top row is the 8 channels of output that are being played back from the EVS machines, all 14 cameras and the program in the lower right. Program is what you see on TV.
Good luck to everyone in your Oscars prediction pools. I will be of no help since I've only seen 4 nominated films. Then again, last year I won the pool having seen NONE.
I got this from Lisa and Sonia. Pretty funny to think of my high school days in this context so here goes.
1. Who was your best friend (in high school)? This is a good one. My friend Lisa was my best friend in Junior High and part of high school. In high school our little group of girls (we called ourselves “The Schmats” - not really sure where that came from. I’ll have to investigate but anyway) expanded to include Marla, Wendy, Debs and Nancy. Somewhere in 10th grade, Marla and Lisa got to be best friends. Lisa thought I didn’t know that so somewhere in 12th grade she had to “break the news” to me that I wasn’t her best friend anymore. Good thing I wasn’t living under a rock for the previous 2 years. Years later, Marla and I realized we had the most in common in our group and Lisa conveniently didn’t “allow” us to ever be one on one social. Once Marla and I realized our commonalities (is that word?) we’ve been best friends since. So, for the most part, I didn’t have one best friend. I was lucky to have a lot of really good friends. Some of which I’m still in touch with now.
2. What sports did you play? Um, I’m Jewish. I don't do sports. I was an orchestra geek.
3. What kind of car did you drive? Blue Mercury Capri. Loved that car.
4. It’s Friday night, where were you? Probably at a football game. After football season was over, probably wandering the streets of Westwood with every other high schooler in West LA.
5. Were you a party animal? I drank, beer mostly, but other than occasional drama class parties, not so much.
6. Were you in the “In Crowd”? Hardly. Not being a cheerleader or athletic and my friends were mostly in drama, I wasn’t in the “in crowd”. I wasn’t a total social misfit but I definitely wouldn’t consider myself cool in any way.
7. Ever skip school? I don’t think so.
8. Ever smoke? NO! Hated it then as much as I hate it now.
9. Were you a nerd? Nerd, no. Geek, yes.
10. Did you get suspended/expelled? No way. I was way too goodie-too-shoes to get into that kind of trouble.
11. Can you sing the alma mater? No but I can sing one of the main school cheers. P-A, P-A-L-I, P-A-L-I-S-A-D-E-S Palisades. You have to hear it.
12. Who was your favorite teacher? Mrs. Robinson taught me 11th grade history and inspired me beyond belief in my love for American history. But she only taught me for one semester before moving on to some district job. So probably Mr. Lish. He was our orchestra conductor and I spent 3 years with him.
13. Favorite class? Orchestra.
14. What was your school’s full name? Palisades High School.
15. School mascot? Dolphins. Hey, we’re less than a mile from the beach, what do you expect?
16. Did you go to Prom? Yup, went to my Senior Prom with my boyfriend Mark. See prom photos here.
17. If you could go back and do it over, would you? I will admit that I LOVED high school. Our school did some fun things, I had some great friends and actually learned a few things (I assume). I don’t have any regrets about high school so I don’t think there’s anything that I need to do over. Oh, maybe improve my SAT scores which sucked all *four* times I took it. Yes, I took that stupid standardized test 4 times and never broke 1000.
18. What do you remember most about graduation? Playing “Pomp & Circumstance” with the orchestra for 10 minutes while everyone marched in.
19. Favorite memory of your Senior Year? Hmm, not sure I have one. Perhaps going to NYC with the drama class for a week in December. I had done it the year before too. We went to NYC for 7 days and saw 9 shows. It was great.
20. Were you ever posted up on the senior wall? No because we didn’t have one. What is that Sonia?
21. Did you have a job your senior year? Yes, I worked at an accounting firm as a runner doing bank runs, delivering to clients etc. Better than a mall job, I only worked 4 afternoons a week, no weekends and I was making $4.50 an hour when minimum wage was $3.15 so that was way cool.
22. Who did you date? Mark, the prom date but he was already a freshman in college. We met through BBYO and went to a different high school as well. I sometimes wish that I had dated someone at my actual school but then again, no one was interested in me otherwise I probably would have.
23. Where did you go most often for lunch? I only stayed for lunch in 10th grade. So I’d bring my lunch (yogurt and a can of Tab) and usually one day a week, we’d go to Barone’s for pizza. By 11th, I was out before noon so I’d go home for lunch before going to the accounting firm where I worked for 2 years.
24. Have you gained weight since then? Um, yeah. Probably about 20 pounds.
25. What did you do after graduation? Worked at summer camp as a counselor and went to UC Santa Barbara where I managed to graduate in 4 years (even with taking a quarter off my junior year) even though I didn’t like the school.. Yes, I’m the only person on the planet who hated UCSB. Again, see this post for details.
Let me know if any of you decide to partake in your high school memories. I'd love to read about them.
C finally was back in school on Monday. She did go to the two birthday parties but did manage to crash nap both days. She certainly wasn't 100% but mostly there. Her schedule is a little bit off in the sleep department but then again, what else is new?
I spent last weekend doing some scrapping. I got about 15 pages done. Pretty good but not as much as I would've liked to accomplished. Still it was nice to have some quality scrapping time. I'm hoping to have some more time in another week or so. I'm off to the Scrapbook Expo on Friday and I'm excited for that. I suppose I should get my stuff organized tonight while I'm actually home.
I'm already working on the Oscars Pre-Show. I'm already up to my eyeballs in trying to figure things out. I put together a 4 page email on my first attempt at a game plan for recording the red carpet stuff. bla bla bla. It's getting to be pretty technical, even for me, so I wouldn't want to bore anyone with the details. It's a fun challenge and next week should be pretty insane. And next Sunday will be the most intense 90 minutes leading up to 30 minutes on the air. You know, I've always maintained that anti-perspirant companies should contact AD's who do live TV. I've never managed to get a show off the air without a little sweat. Part of the job I guess. I'll post more Oscars tidbits as they come up.
Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Like everyday, I hope it's filled with love and chocolate.
Yup, C's been home all week and will be tomorrow too. It all started last Friday when we went to lunch with two of her classmates. About halfway through lunch at The Commons, one of the girls (we'll call her Typhoid Mary) said to her Mom she wasn't feeling well so Mom went to get the stroller (for a 4 year old) so she could rest. And so Mary did rest but as a Mom, wouldn't you have taken your kid home especially when the older brother had been home for 3 days with a fever? Okay, parenting, it's a personal thing. Dissolve to Tot Shabbat at 6PM that night. Guess who drives in the parking lot but Mom and Mary. We look at her and say "Oh, I guess Mary is feeling better from this afternoon". Mom "Yeah, she insisted on coming." Again, as a semi-responsible Mom, shouldn't you say to your kid "You know, I think you're under the weather, your big brother is sick, I think we should just stay home and lay low." No! So we go to Tot Shabbat and little Typhoid Mary is in her stroller the entire 90 minutes, never got out once and finally at about 7:30P, Mom realizes that kid is warm with a fever. Lovely. Now, we can all set our watches to both C and her other friend getting sick.
Moving on to Sunday morning. I take C to the gym with me and in the time frame of one hour, she's feeling warm. Sure enough, she's coming down with whatever is going around. Monday, she's home from school. Tuesday, the fever is over but she's still got a nasty cold with cough and sniffles. Wednesday more of the same. Thursday, still got the cough. She's feeling fine but the cough is yucky enough that the adults won't be happy so we keep her home one more day. Come home from a doctor's appointment at 1:30P and C has a 101.6 fever. It's all coming back. Meanwhile, the other friend was out of school Monday thru Wednesday as well with a fever.
Oh, catch this. On Monday, the other kid and Mom were going to school as planned. When kid hugged Mom to say goodbye, she felt a little warm so Mom took her temp at school. It was 99.7 so, with everything going on, she decided to bring her DD home because well, it's going around. Meanwhile, Mom and kid run into Typhoid Mary's Mom on the way out and asked what's going on.
Mom: "Kid, has 99.7 temp, I'm taking her home."
Mary's Mom: "Well, it's under 100."
Can you believe that?? Did I miss something in the Mother's Handbook that said "Temperatures under 100 degrees are okay to go to school." I must've skipped that chapter. Meanwhile, Mary was out of school on Wednesday with an apparent nasty cough but was back in school today and you know she's not 100%. Yesterday (Wednesday) there were only THREE kids in C's class out of 9. Everyone else was out sick. Gail, their teacher and the 3 kids called everyone to say "Get Well" and "we miss you" which was very sweet.
Anywho, my kid will be home again tomorrow. Hopefully over the fever. She's got two birthday parties this weekend which are now in question. One of them is Mary's. I might just send her with instructions to sneeze on her piece of cake. The really frustrating thing is the fact that Mary's Mom is non-apologetic to the fact that her kid *might* have actually spread the crud around. Doesn't think it applies to her. Then again, if the temp is under 100...
Thanks for letting me vent. At least with being out of school for the week, we've avoided the lice that's going around.
As most of you know, one of the great loves of my life is ice hockey. And yes, sadly, Los Angeles Kings hockey (they truly suck this year). Anyway, one of the great movies of all time is "Slap Shot". It doesn't get any better than seeing Paul Newman in a plaid leisure suit circa 1977. This movie is perfect comedy and perfect hockey. This is the opening scene from the movie. It's brilliantly written and, for those keeping score, the movie was written by a woman, Nancy Dowd. You go girl!
Okay, maybe you have to be a true hockey fan to fully appreciate Denis Lemieux's French Canadian accent, his "just some English pig with no brains" and "you go to the box for two minutes, you feel shame, then you get free." but it's a classic as far as I'm concerned. Enjoy!
Well, we're 48 hours away from the BIG game, if you like that sort of thing. I mean, I'm a big sports fan and the big championship games are always fun to watch. I will admit that I mostly couldn't care less about the NBA on any level, but hockey (duh), Super Bowl, World Series, Kentucky Derby, most major golf tourneys, I have a working knowledge of who's in and why. I'm a big fan of the Indy 500 for some strange reason. Just that one race. Don't ask, I don't know.
Anyway, G has been in Miami for over a week now working on the Super Bowl Halftime show. This year Prince is performing and having heard the medley, and some of what's going to happen, it's going to be fantastic. Cirque du Soliel will be doing this huge thing for the pre-game and God himself, Billy Joel, will be performing the National Anthem. So the game will be on in my house. Hopefully, C will let me watch some of it. I'm sure I'll be rewinding on the Tivo to see some of the commercials including the one where the guy is supposed to be proposing in the 4th quarter.
But here are a few photos of G at the Super Bowl. Had to share because they're pretty darn cool.
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to go to CHA at the Anaheim Convention Center. This is the bi-annual BIG, HUGE craft and hobby show trade show that's the big rollout for all the big scrapbooking (and all crafts) new products. I spent the day with two of my dear friends Paula and Melissa and we had a great time. We got down to Anaheim at 9AM right when it all started. Our first stop was to see our friend Crystle and her company Magistical Memories. This was Crystle's first CHA and apparently her company was quite the buzz. She creates and manufactures chipboard embellishments that are truly fun and fantastic. Here's Paula and Crystle at the booth.
After visiting with her and Bucket (who designed this great new line of chipboards for her), we wandered through the "new" products section a little bit and then headed upstairs to all the other manufacturers.
I don't even know where to begin to describe all that I saw. There are literally thousands of companies there showing off their new, latest and greatest products. Papers, embellishments, ribbons, adhesives, paints, and every other possible thing that you could imagine. There are so many scrapbooking manufacturers that I just love it's hard to pick my favorites but I'll try to show a few of my highlights.
One of the first stop was KI Memories. This has always been one of my favorite product lines and the new stuff does not disappoint. Beautiful papers and great embellies. They're just starting with acrylic stamps which seemed to be quite the trend at the show this year. Can't wait to get my hands on some of these.
Right next to KI was Elsie Flanagan and her brand new product line called "Love, Elsie". So stinking cute. I had seen Elsie before at CKU last year and was underwhelmed but she was SO nice yesterday. She's really young but it was nice to chat with her for a few minutes. She's uber creative.
Next stop that made me drool was a company that I hadn't heard of before called Gel-A-Tins. Cute little acrylic stamps in a metal tin for storage. But look at what they're coming out with!! NHL STAMPS! It simply does not get better than this for me. Scrapbooking and hockey - all is right with the world.
We wandered over to Junkitz which is one of my very favorite lines as well. We saw Teresa Collins who I've taken about 10 classes from. Love her and love her style. I did the Junkitz track last year at CKU Albums and did an entire album in the weekend, all from Junkitz products. It's one of the best things I've ever created. I'm a true Junkitz junkie.
Went to the Heidi Swapp booth and I was hoping to meet her. I'm taking her year long class at Big Picture Scrapbooking and I would've liked to meet her and tell her I'm in the class but she wasn't there. I even brought my exclusive class book for her to sign. Oh well. They did have some delicious, fresh warm chocolate chip cookies. And some more awesome products that are coming out soon.
I went to the Sweetwater booth and their new stuff is so fabulous too. I get their monthly kit and I just love it. Their papers and embellies are a little bit different and I rarely see their products in the stores (at least by me) so it makes their kits that much more special. How cute is this candle? Simple yes, but the papers are so cute that it makes it really fun.
And very cute card ideas as well.
The highlight of the day for me was being able to meet, officially, Karen Burniston. I took a class from her at CKU in 2005 but obviously she didn't remember me from that. We've been email friends for almost a year thanks to the common bond of "American Idol". She's one of the funniest, smartest people I've ever met and hey, she must think I'm ok too since she trusted me and gave me her cell phone number. When I called her, she picked up the phone and said "Hi Juls". We finally hooked up and had a nice visit. Now, she'll be able to place the face with the emails. That made my day.
Wandered around some more. Here are the new Autumn Leaves dreamy, droolworthy acrylic stamps. I did tell you that there was a theme here. These are pretty much my favorite stamps these days (okay, the NHL stamps jumped way high up) and I'll be all over these when they come out.
We did a few make and takes from some terrific companies. My two favorites were a chipboard book from Imagination Project and flowered storage box from Marvy Uchida. I would've loved to spend one more day to wander more. I hit most of my favorite lines. Realized afterwards that I missed a few but I would've liked more time to see some of the smaller lines that I just walked past in my attempt to get through it all in the one day. (Hey, this show took over the *entire* Anaheim Convention Center.) I would've also liked to peruse some of the regular craft and needlepoint stuff. Overall, it was an incredible experience. I bow down to Ginger for giving us the opportunity to represent her company, Down to Details. My head is still spinning. Just wait until I start to order some of these awesome goodies. My checkbook will be spinning as well.
Stay tuned, Super Bowl photo updates from G to come.
I'm a mom to 3 beautiful girls. I work in TV Production when I have to, I prefer to stay at home. In my spare time, I scrapbook, play the flute, am a crazy LA Kings fan, and I play on the computer when I should really be sleeping.
Autopia (twice), 
the Jungle Cruise (twice) and then stood in line to meet some of the princesses. Note to self (and others) if you want to see the Princesses, go straight there when you arrive at the park. The line is long and somewhat hellish (we waited about 40 minutes) but when you get in there, it's really one on one with whatever Princesses are in there which is very cool. We met Mulan, Pocahontas, and Sleeping Beauty. C was a little shy when we saw Mulan so I took the picture with her. Pocahontas she went up to
and when she saw Beauty, she got a huge smile on her face. When it was her turn, she walked right up to Beauty and gave her a hug. 
It was so cute. Beauty (as C calls her) asked her her name and had a little chat with her. I was snapping away. Then when it was time to move on, she gave Beauty a kiss on the cheek. I missed that picture but it was so cute. 
And luckily, C wasn't disappointed that we didn't see Belle or Cinderella. Give us something to shoot for next time.
And then J took the younger girls on the teacups and spun them around pretty good. Look at those thrilled faces.
and Snow White. 
Always popular princesses. And the girls waving at the parade passing them by.
C feel asleep pretty much as we hit the freeway. She was very well behaved so it was a very successful day. I love Disneyland, that's all I have to say. Oh, and chocolate covered frozen bananas are one of the greatest things on the planet. So is this cute face...
