40 In My Left

Shot a music video for Black Liquid last night for his song "40 In My Left". Brian and Andy came along to help out. Shit was intense. All of Rob's crew was there, each one with at least 2 40's.

We got there at little after 10pm and shooting ended around 3. Long night.
The song was all about drinking 40's and smoking weed...so that's what we filmed.

My makeshift film crew


Black Liquid and myself


The Crew


40 oz cheers


Hopefully the video will be done within the next couple of days.

BC Bums

So the first BC Bums music video is done - Homeless.
Expect a Christmas one eventually, who knows when though.






This is what happens when Bloomfield College kicks you out of housing...

Love your homeless people!

http://www.myspace.com/bcbums

The Art of Skateboarding

at the Jajo art gallery in Newark.





Drunken dancing in front of the ramp...


Leads to skater collisions


Bars make every event fun

Multi-tasking

This probably wasn't the safest thing to do while driving.

baby shower

I got suckered into going to Derek's boss's baby shower. Sitting around with a bunch of middle-aged women playing "baby bingo" is a raging Saturday night. Food was good though. And they did get to me drink Bacardi out of a baby bottle as fast as possible.

Baristanet

Baristanet is having a local film competition. All you have to do is show life in Montclair, Bloomfield, and other surrounding areas. I went filming at one park for 2 days and then everyday after it was just overcast or raining. I never got to finish shooting. Today was the deadline so I just turned in what I had.

Music video

So we've been shooting a music video for "BC Bums". Here are a few poor quality video stills from the 2 days of shooting. So far we have a couple outdoor shots and some green screen tests.

Halloween part 2

After I got back from Conan, I began preparing my costume..which basically means shaving a handlebar moustache. That pretty much took forever. It came out alright, but complemented the cut-offs and Lynard Skynard shirt quite well. I think I pulled off the white trash look. Once Derek got to campus, I met up with him and we caught the train to Jersey City for a party at Richard's brothers apartment. The party was decent, but I didn't know too many people. I just hung out with the keg. After a few hours later we caught the train back to Penn Station and then a taxi to the University Center. Amanda was nice enough to let us crash at her place.

Halloween part 1

I've had tickets for Late Night with Conan O'brien for today on reserve for over a month. Tickets are pretty hard to get a hold of, especially Friday tapings. I got pretty lucky, especially it being Halloween. So as the date came closer to attend, everybody that was suppose to go with me basically bailed out and I was left going alone. Kinda awkward.
Getting to NYC gets to be a pretty tedious journey. I had to duck out of Circus Arts class early. Yes, thats a real class. I had to catch the shuttle to the U.C., walk down the block to the light rail, catch the light rail to Newark Penn, then get on the train to the city. After getting dropped off at New York Penn Station I had to find NBC Studios at 30 Rockefeller. Having no clue where to go, I called Brandon my living GPS. He gave me directions and it was only about 18 blocks away.

This is me being a tourist as I cut through time square


By the time I get to NBC, I still have about an hour and a half to kill. I lurked around and ate at a deli called Dean & Deluca. It was decent. I spent the remainder of my time walking in circles around the same block listening to the same band on loop. Exciting!

I walk back to NBC around 3:45 and they give me a ticket and say I'm #4. They told me I could leave and come back at 4:30, the ticket would hold my place in line. I ended up just siting on a set of church steps people watching until it was time to go back.

When I get back inside, I have to wait in a line to enter the actually studio. The security guy there kept repeating "No sitting, spitting, or littering". I can't imagine them having a huge problem with people spitting inside the building. I'm also told that all cellphones must be turned off and no photography is allowed. So much for taking pictures. I did end up getting a good seat through. Right above the band, directly behind the keyboardist. The whole set is much smaller than I thought. It always seems pretty big on t.v. Before it started this guy came out and just kinda joked around with the audience and explained how everything works and when we are suppose to applaud. Next, the band came out, and then finally Conan. He spoke to us for a bit then went backstage to get ready for his on air intro. Overall it was pretty funny. The guests were Mary-Kate Olson, Will Forte, and some "extreme" pumpkin carver. You should be able to watch the episode here
http://www.nbc.com/Late_Night_with_Conan_O'Brien/video/episodes/

Tourists

I had to help Billy film a video project today, so we set out to venture the surrounding areas. While filming the streets, these girls walked by and asked (well, actually yelled) if we were tourist. I guess because I had a video camera in my hand and was filming Billy walking. Obviously I answered "yes" and explained to them that we were visiting the States from Canada. Of course they believed me, but couldn't wrap their head around the idea of why someone would want to visit New Jersey. I don't think I would have been able to figure that out either.

I'm pretty sure I don't belong in this apartment.
Well...not the actual apartment, but the group.

Windshield collection

I guess since so many things went down last week, I have to make up for it by doing nothing for the rest of the month.

This is my collection of things that have been left on my car windshield that I don't like.

So far a parking ticket and a letter that reads "Welcome to Jersey. We tow cars parked like that. Thanx".
I didn't really get that one. My car was parked fine. I guess someone just didn't want me parking in front of their house. Welcome to Jersey? Fuck this place.

The end

Jeff and Brian's last day here. We got directions to a really fun spot in what we called "Spanish Harlem in NJ". Brick banks and an oversize three.





It started to get pretty crowded


This place was infested with little kids.


So many close calls with the tiny kids and bikers. Would have been a collision of epic proportions.

So we left, and met up with everybody for a big monopoly sesh. Jeff and Brian left at around 12:45 that night to go back to VA. As soon as they pulled out Brian noticed that he left his keys, so he came back and rang the doorbell. I guess the downstairs tenant heard him and gave him shit for being loud. I found out this morning that the guy thought Brian, you know..with the drug free tattoo's and all, was delivering us drugs. Yay for assumptions and judging people based on looks.

NYC

We all woke up at 9, warmed up at the bench spot again, met up with Danielle, and made our way to NYC. We got there, ate, and then lurked around for a bit before catching a taxi to the Brooklyn Banks.





It was really crowded this time. Lots of skaters, bikers and onlookers.





We left the banks and walked around forever, eventually finding a fun manual pad to play at.

Filthadelphia

Jeff, Brian, and I decided to escape Jersey and go to a city that is one notch above in cleanliness. Philadelphia.





This ended up being a really good day to go because there was some Sarah Palin demonstration march going on and apparently all the cops were there thus making Love Park and other normally unskateable spots, skateable. Love was crowded as shit so we didn't stay there too long. Instead we migrated across the street to City Hall.

So Brian had bought a new deck a few hours before and was trying a noseslide shove-it noseslide on a ledge. His board flew out and landed in a gross-ass fountain.



The aftermath



We left Philly and drove to the Brio in Cherry Hill. Of course it's baller status again. Saturday night? No reservations? Long wait? Oh, your with Jeff. Yeah, a table just opened up. So we get seated right away, recieve free drinks and appetizers, and get 50% off the meal. Good end to the trip.

We drive back to Newark and to a small gathering that Amanda was having.









Tomorrow--NYC

So Jeff was suppose to drive up and arrive early this morning. He gets here around 7am and when I go out to meet him, Brian is in the car. Nice surprise. It's good to have some VA kids in Jersey.

Me, Danielle, Brian, and Jeff drove to Black Flag to get some addresses for some local skate spots. Ended up skating a little bit out front. I'm glad I have my intern back.



We end up playing around at a tennis court that has a few benches. One or two runs were landed.

There were sweet tarts scattered all around the court so obviously we used them as chalk.




Danielle is a good photographer





Ended the day with all of us going to Amanda's for dinner. Might steal some of her photos to add later.

Tomorrow--Philadelphia adventure

Went to Danielle's soccer game today. Someone buy me a telephoto lens. And photography skills.





Jeff comes Thursday/Friday. Should be a fun weekend.

Goddamn, I just spent 15 dollars to overnight my voter application form to VA to make sure it gets there on time.

Rainy bike rides are the best bike rides

No one ever wants to hang out so now its up to me to entertain myself. That means riding a bicycle on days it's suppose to thunderstorm. I packed up some water and a chain and headed for Eagle Rock Reservation this afternoon. Its only about 5 miles there, but its all uphill.

It started to rain about 15 minutes into the trip, so I decided to look like a homeless person by sitting underneath this fake shelter.



After noticing that it wasn't about to quit raining, I decided just to keep riding.

You can't really tell from the horrible cellphone photos, but it's basically like riding up the side of a mountain. It's just steep and windy.




I stopped halfway up because I noticed a deer. I looked around and saw 7 more. That was a nice change of scenery.


So I get to the top, and of course it's too cloudy and overcast to see the sites. I sat for about 20 minutes just listening to music and staring at what would be the NYC skyline then decided it was time to leave because the rain was coming down harder.

Going down was a lot quicker, but also a lot more terrifying. Although the rain and wet breaks helped me learn how to skid out my bike tire to slow down. By the time I started the journey back the rain was fucking pouring.

I made it to Bloomfield Ave. where these two assholes in a car decided to pull over..right where I was riding. So they're pulling over and the car is sideswipping me. My entire bike, and I guess myself, is rubbing up against their car because we continue to go the same speed. It sucks because there were cars parked on the side of the street directly to my right and the fuckers in the car continued to close me in tighter. My back tire starts to slide out, but somehow I manage to not eat shit. This whole time the passenger window is down and the woman is screaming "OH MY GOD OH MY GOD. Stop, you're hitting him!" They finally come to a stop and yell something else at me cause I'm dragging my hand across the side of their car as I ride away.

I fucking hate people.
but love adventures.

Mets game

My roommate got free tickets to the Mets vs. Braves game today in New York.
Its hard for baseball to hold my interest, but it was an interesting trip.

I constantly got distracted by everything around me.





For instance, there was this little asian kid who got lost and constantly walked back and forth past us looking for his parents. That lasted a good 15 minutes. The security guy didn't even bother to acknowledge him.



The guy one row behind us was by himself and kept yelling the stupidest shit at the worst times. "Lets grill these guys!" was a popular one.

Lets see, Chipper Jones broke a bat in half while hitting a ball. I don't know if that is common in baseball, but I liked it.



I guess since we have the minor league Richmond Braves, I like the Atlanta Braves? I don't know. Maybe I'm just an asshole who wants the team that everybody hates to win..you know, so I can rub it in their face.
Either way, it worked. The Mets were winning up until the last inning. The Braves caught up then won.

me 1. Mets fans 0.