Dog Walk

I tried organizing people for this Walk for Animals event, but no one wanted to go, except for Cara. So we went by ourselves. Screw them. We had a great time. This is an annual event where people walk their pet to raise money. I've been to this once before- like 6 years ago and loved it. This happened to be the next year I was able to go. We asked a lot of people about their dogs. Sat and let some of them come up to us for a quick petting-stop. Dog-people are really friendly. There are so many different breeds out there. And the breeds are so very different from one another. We even saw some very nervous cats.

I saw one person I knew- Kathy, one of the people I went to this the first time with, but that time there was about 12 of us. And Cara recognized a couple who was in the same pre-engagement class we were in. I have no idea how she recognized them, but it was pretty cool. They didn't have a pet, like us, and were glad to see they weren't the only ones.

I think I got my dog fix for a while.

music - The Cure (because it was a wonderfully overcast day)

The Longest Day

I passed out last night shortly after getting home. This lighting project is exhausting. Woke up around 11pm and went back to bed around 2am.

4:20AM Perry calls me at home- "Trish called in sick! Can you come in early?"

So I roll into work around 5:30AM.

Around 8:15 Jason from 45 comes down and asks if I'm ready to go! So I tell him why I really can't go with him on the 45 shoot and he sort of freaks out. (I was scheduled for promo shoot. but lighting wasn't finished. Monica and I decided that I needed to stay and work on lighting.) I felt bad. Hoped he wasn't really pissed at me.

Burned out on Monday- already!

passed out at home, woke up around 11:30 pm.

there was poop on the operations table, though.

Chutes and Ladders... only without the Chutes, but lots of lights instead!

I haven't had a day off since one week ago and I won't until this Saturday! This weekend was the annual lighting weekend with our lighting consultant, Dan. So Seth (the new guy) and I were scheduled to do the lights with Dan.

The begining of our lighting project looked bleak.

• Our brand new board was shipped without a power supply and Dan (who was already on the phone, trying to find one in town for us) said one wouldn't be here until Monday afternoon.
• Months ago, Monica had me do a tally on the amount of fluoresent bulbs we had on hand for this task. She told me to find out how many we needed total and then figure out how many we had on hand and she would order the difference. Turns out Dan wanted the whole amount ordered.
• We were also going to adjust all the lights in the studio. Its amazing how many lights burn out just before Dan gets here every few months. We were desperatly short on the bulbs we needed. The order had gone out but the shipment hadn't arrived yet. So we were short several bulbs. Monica has scheduled me to be out on a shoot for 45 on Monday. It became clear Sunday evening that we weren't going to be finished, that we would need to do more on Monday, so I called Monica and she agreed that I should be at the station.
• A guy from Engineering (who is very difficult to work with) set up the prompter area how he interpreted the instruction- not how one would set it up logically. Its probably going to be left that way until he has settled down and isn't so mad about the project before its fixed.

One really cool thing did happen, however. We started later today so Dan and I could go to church. Since Dan is from D.C. and just wanted to go to any church, I invited him to mine! And he went!

All this work means not much Cara :(

music - The Long Walk Home - Peter Gabriel (soundtrack to Rabbit Proof Fence)

Where there's a Willis... There Will Be More Willis'

This morning Greg and I met with our uncle Mike and aunt Mary. They stayed the night in the Twin Cities on their way up to a retreat in Alexandria. Last they knew of either of our whereabouts was Brooklyn Center, where Greg moved in with Mandy when they were married. Just so happens that they stayed the night almost directly half way between Greg and I. I guess it took them an hour and a half to find our phone numbers with their old hotel directory (they had us listed in Bloomington- hah! that was ages ago). And finally called us. Great timing, too. I wasn't home too many nights this week and the happen to call when I was- and not long after I got up from a nap.
It was nice to visit with them.

music - Ayreon ( I think I need to give this album a break)

Settlers and Testimonies

Cara and I visited Greg and Mandy tonight. We meeting at sports bar for a nice dinner (I have to say, though I don't agree with it, I do enjoy the smoking ban). While Cara and I were waiting outside with our pager, I held one of the doors open with the host. She gave me greeting tips as we discussed the good and bad about the ban. Greg and Mandy arrived shortly after the paged us in. We had a nice dinner and when we ordered dessert, the staff gave it to us because of all the help I gave them hosting at the door.

After getting in the house and greeting the nice guys we fired up the VCR (which hadn't been used for quite some time) and popped in a video tape my dad sent us to view. The tape was of my dad's testimony he shared in front of their church (it might have something to do with his nomination for church-elder). We watched and it was very nice. My dad is a public speaker. The strange thing is, I've had very few opportunities to see him doing what he is so good at. Seeing him with his speaking mannerisms, I wonder if those of us who know him so well benefit from our relationship with him when subconsciously receiving the body language. With all that mixed with the topic of his talk and the fact that it was just nice to see him- I'm still not sure how I feel about the tape. It was a much higher emotional experience than I expected.

After we finished the tape and talked about it we set up for a Settlers of Catan game. The game went really long, maybe the longest Catan game I've played yet. Mandy was leading everyone and the rest of us kind of plotted against her which bought Greg and I time to be competitive. Poor Cara fell behind because she was the main force competing with Mandy. In the end Greg won- he went before me in the turn and if he hadn't won, I had enough points to win. BLAST! But it was fun.