Zub Tales

Well, time for some crazy camping stories and much, much more…

Let’s see, the Aurenya crew went and saw Iron Giant on Friday night. I have one piece of advice… GO SEE THIS MOVIE. The best animated film I’ve seen this year, easily. Even better and more satisfying than Tarzan, it ranks up there with some of my favorites like Cats Don’t Dance, Princess Mononoke and Secret of NIMH. It’s truly a classic in every sense of the word.

It’s not a high tech visual romp like Tarzan, but Iron Giant is a beautiful piece of animated filmmaking. Satisfying characters, great dialogue and a story that is for PARENTS AND CHILDREN. I urge everyone who gets my Newsletter to head out to the theatre and check out this movie. I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

The box office returns have been awful for Giant because Warner Bros. blew their marketing budget on crap like Deep Blue Sea and Wild Wild West… Don’t let the ads fool you, this movie kicks butt.

Whoah, you guys are gonna start thinking WB paid me to say all that or something.

Anyways, so after the movie we headed out to our campsite. Needless to say, by the time we arrived it was pitch black and we set up our tents via flashlight. It wasn’t until the next morning that we’d realized it was set up all wrong. Oh well…

I decided to be a knight in shining armor and when one of the girls forgot her sleeping bag, I gave her mine and slept on the COLD ground with just a blanket. OUCH! Two days of that and I was in complete spinal pain.

On our first day we hiked a bit and decided we would be all adventurous and go cliff jumping. Simple concept: Find a cliff by the deeper part of the river and jump off. No problem.

Of course, if you haven’t done it, you might think it’s just like diving or something. No. Let me clarify. CLIFF. So, you plummet 30+ feet down and your stomach rises into your neck and you don’t even get to scream. Then, you hit the ICE COLD water. Clarify: ICE FREEZING COLD. I have NEVER been in water that cold before. I thought my heart was going to stop. When you go below the surface, your body screams out for survival and you fight your way to shore and this is FUN.

Actually, once your body stops shivering and you are on land again, it is refreshing in this surreal kind of way. All of your body is relaxed and thanking you for saving it and it’s kind of cool. So much so that we all did it twice. And, we videotaped it. That should make a good present for my parents… 🙂

I may be able to digitize the footage and put it up on the web for all of you to view my stupidity. It’s weird looking at it afterwards.

So, after that it was obvious we’d earned a rest and we started drinking back at the campsite. When your body’s tired, it doesn’t take much…and that’s all I’m gonna say about that!

The next day was cooking massive amounts of food and slowly packing up our things. The drive back with Kandrix was a hoot. We sang really loud to the radio and made asses of ourselves.

It was one of the first weekends that I didn’t work and it felt really good. I need more of those. The summer’s gonna be over way too fast and I’m getting scared. The staff’s going to change in September as people leave and others arrive. I like things the way they are right now in terms of staff and although I’m looking forward to additions, it kills me to see people go.

Every 4 months brings with it a major transition in my life. I sat back and thought about it and although before it seemed like change hung on each school semester and summer, it’s continued now that I’m out of school too. Every 4 months, people come and go, or major focuses shift in my life. Like clockwork. Just when I think I have control over aspects of my life, the 4 month clock ticks and something’s upside down.

The script is coming along pretty well now and although there’s anxiety about handing in the first draft, I know that I’ll keep learning all the way.

After watching Iron Giant, I know I have to be a part of a fulfilling project like that. Hell with the box office receipts, I’d have died to work on that film. Seeing it with friends and getting so into it… it was great. I want my stories to affect people like it affected me. I have to tap into that emotional quality and nail people between the eyes with it.

So, my next few Newsletters may be really brief as summer wraps up and I shake off the 4 month-transition blues, but take heart that this one’s way too long 🙂

WHAT I’M LISTENING TO:
Most of my friends can attest to the fact that I have a bizarre liking of the 80’s Ah-Ha song “Take On Me”. One of the boys at work brought me a really obscure punk cover of it, and it kicks ass! I’ve been listening to it non-stop.

WHAT I’M WATCHING:
Iron Giant! Go see it! I’m gonna go see it again this week!

Hoping this weekend is sunny in all ways…signing off for now.