"A New Blog- Dear Peanut-Wrestling O-Town"

To my faithful readers! Thank you very much for following the "Airplane Journals". It has been quite a trip really, 2 years of blogging from airplanes. Why do I blog? Well initially I think it was to preserve my memories of my experiences because, well, I forget things really easily! Better I write in down right? Now that I am preparing to be a dad I am realizing that to create a journal for my child (currently named Peanut) to read about some of the interesting things that dad experienced when he was younger. Legacy? Maybe. I also have finally broke down and gave into the social marketing and media scene, yes I got a Facebook, LinkedIn (linkedin.com/in/greghemmings1), Twitter (twitter.com/greghemmings) , and of course my blogger that you are reading right now. I am starting to fully understand that in this globalized world we live in, we each individually need to market ourselves in every way possible to stand out from the crowd.

So welcome to my next evolution of my personal blog. I am calling this series "Dear Peanut". To be honest if you have read the Airplane Journals, you will know many of these up coming stories already, but this time they will be written far cleaner and more concise! Haha, I am trying to steer away from my stream of conscious writing styles! I will also be writing a more business related blog to coincide with this one in the near future, so please keep checking in!

Dec. 16, 2008

"Wrestling O-Town"

I am once again on the road, this time driving back home from a week long tour from Sydney to Ottawa, then back to Saint John. It is Dec. 16^th and we just finished filming our latest TV series for RUSH HD. The TV show is called Kardinal Sinners; a series about the life and times of independent professional wrestlers as they travel from town to town abusing their bodies, and getting paid less than the cost of a Happy Meal just to feed their passion of entertaining people in towns all across the nation.

When I read Jack Kerouac?s ?On the Road? when I was in high school, I never thought I would actually live the bulk of my adult years on the road, or on airplanes traveling the globe filming the weird and wonderful, the educational and the inspirational, but here I am on the road again, this time with a group of 5 muscle bound, testosterone filled Alpha males?Jack would be proud!

In the last few months I have traveled to Italy, France, Hawaii, and all over North America filming a documentary about business coaching. I flew to the arctic to film the affects of climate change in a small remote Inuit village. I released a documentary that I shot in Belize about a group of missionaries from Saint John Vineyard church. I have been on the road filming more concerts and rock?n?roll DVDs than I can count?oh, and I managed to fit in getting married in the Cayman Islands, and finding out we have a little bun in the oven!

Two years ago I was approached by 2 professional wrestlers to see if I would produce a television series about their bizarre lives, in and outside the ring. It was a very strange idea for me as I had never been a wrestling fan when I was younger, in fact I really didn?t like it at all. I could never understand why so many of my friends would stay inside Saturday afternoons for hours watching a bunch of half naked men pretend to fight each other. My interests growing up were playing music, sailing, biking, building tree houses?pretty much everything BUT wrestling.

As I have grown older, and developed my career in television, I have found great interest in making documentaries about adventure, subcultures, social issues, and anything that documents people?s passions. It didn?t take long for me to see this possible wrestling show as a real cool opportunity. We found a broadcaster (The Fight Network), and raised the finances needed to produce the show and tour around with a group of 12 wrestlers, television history in the making! Funny part of this story is that I became not only a producer of wrestling television, I also was propelled into the role of a wrestling promoter! The Vince McMahon of Acamac! I booked the venues all over Atlantic Canada, got the insurance, liquor licenses, security, transport trucks, stage lighting, fog machines, marketing, tickets, ?I got involved with everything except getting into the ring!

"The End of the Airplane Journals?"

Montreal – Halifax

Nov. 11, 2008

I flew into Montreal 2 nights ago. The International Coach Federation is going on all week, man it’s been a whole year since Long Beach ICF conference…that was Halloween last year, more than a year ago! I remember seeing Wu Tang that time! Brilliant. The Executive Coaches Summit went down Monday and Tuesday and it was here that I previewed the Airplane Journals documentary. It went over really well actually…it took me two whole years to film it, and the last few weeks to assembler it. It still has some tweaking work to be done but I feel that it really had a clear message; executive coaching and the coach approach helped me grow my business from a single operator to a full time staff of 6, plus a few contractors and interns over a period of less than two years. As I explain in the documentary, I in no way feel that I have found my success yet, or as it is written (maktub) in the Alchemist , my “Personal Legend”, but the journey I am on has proven to be fulfilling and adventurous, so much so that it keeps my heart alive.

It is not the destination, it is the journey…that cliché has been a motto of my life, one that I have understood from a very young age. The first time I realized it is when I built my tree house with a few of my best friends, it took us about 5 years to build it into its perfect completion. Building the tree house kept us outside, kept us active, kept us young. When the tree house was finally completed we had no use for it…the journey had ended. This continued all through my life from restoring my old VW vans and taking apart and rebuilding my motorcycles, to producing and editing my documentaries. The process of producing a documentary is so thrilling for me, but the completion is anticlimactic. I will watch my own work two or three times, but have no use for them after that. It is a strange way of life but it is one the God and again referencing The Alchemist, “The Soul Of the World” has bestowed upon me to realize my personal legend.

I have referenced the Alchemist in this post because I started reading it on the plane ride to Montreal, I am now a few pages away from finishing it. This is such a soul strengthening book, an adventure that I can learn from. The passage that I love the most is as follows;

“…because I don’t live in either my past or my future, I’m interested only in the present. If you can concentrate always on the present, you will be a happy man….”

“…life will be a party for you, a grand festival, because life is the moment we are living right now.”

Paulo Coelho has written many books that inspire, The Alchemist is the one that has kicked me in the butt and brought me back to the place where I can be reminded what my life purpose and philosophy is. My life is the life of a young boy building his tree house, building it bigger and better every year, continually creating, and adventuring until the sobering day when the adventure is over and the goal has been realized.

The Personal Legend

The Airplane Journals has been such a great experiment in celebrating adventure, recording history, and inspiring myself and others to try to live life to its absolute fullest. Many times I feel that I am not a good steward of the life I have been given, rich with blessing and opportunity, but it has been this journey over the past 2 years as I have written this blog on countless airplanes criss-crossing the world, growing in experience, and meeting people of all backgrounds and inspirations. I love people, I love nature, I love life. Love and the Soul of the World is something that I need to (step back and breath) think about more often than I do. Last night I spent the night with my old brother from another mother, Fun Pete and lovely Lindsay. They found a piece of paradise in the woods just on the outskirts ofMontreal. Fun Pete was my cabin mate in the Caribbean when I worked with Celebrity Cruises. The Zen and peace that came with waking up to trees, the sounds of nature, water…brought me back to what I feel my personal legend is…connection with creation. Connection on every level from nature to spirit to life. I bounce in and out of enlightenment (mostly out) as I live this busy and thin ice life that I live. My heart tells me to jump in the river without knowing if there are any dangerous waterfalls or rocks to head, just jump in with faith…that is how I have found myself living. I would not have made any of these realizations if I didn’t take the time to ponder and use my time on planes to write this journal. There are so many other experiences and adventures that I want to write down so my baby “Peanut” will be able to read about when he or she gets older, and when I loose my mind, I will be able to use this as a tool to bring me back to a “present” of the past, which is today, November 11^th, 2008; Remembrance Day. Today I close the Airplane Journal and will begin to start a whole new adventure in self discovery. Give praise and thanks to the Most High.

POST SCRIPT:

Thanks for hopping on board with me, following my blogged life! Please watch the documentary that coincides with this blog. The Airplane Journals will be available early in the new year (2009), stay tuned.

Also I will be continuing to blog, the Airplane Journals has been a great experience and I hope that you, the reader, will continue to follow, and see how my grammar and spelling improves! Ha ha

"Back to the Base...Ideas Festival, Kardinal Sinners"

BACK TO THE BASE

“…Lets re assemble”. Any Fat Tala fans out there? Memories of driving down route 9 from Calais to Bangor, aka the “Airline”. Those where the days when fat was spelled with an “F” and Tala meant “the BEATS”!

Back to the base because a lot has happened since Cannes. A lot of regular stuff. Stuff that doesn’t really need to be mentioned but I will anyway cuz that’s what I do, I ramble, and when I am at an airport it looks like I am writing something kinda important to my fellow travelers, me and my new blue Argyle sweater, very self important you know, oh and my new London shoes and tweed jacket I bought on our last Antichrist episode filming in England. I only capitalize the Antichrist because it is a name, not because the Antichrist deserves a capital A. Alberta beef deserves a capital A because Alberta is a province, and we capitalize province names.

We filmed 3 more segments, the final ones, for the Antichrist episode. We filmed this deadly death metal band called “Thy Flesh Consumed”. Their drummer’s kick drum is faster than a machine gun, wicked band, literally! Ha-ha, they would take that as a compliment! We where supposed to fly to Norway and film Gorgaroth; the black metal band that burns churches and embodies the spirit of the Antichrist fashions. Apparently we blew the budget in Laramie when I was abducted, so we couldn’t afford to send us to Norway, so we got the local boyz from Thy Flesh Consumed to discuss religion and metal, and what the idea of the Antichrist really is.

We filmed them in their studio as they where recording their latest album, then checked out their jam space which completely took me back to the old days of jamming at “The Local” on King Street in high school, every room was a different band playing and practicing at the same time. Everything from our band “Playdough Fish” jamming Tea Party and Zeppelin covers, to Rooster Soup playing hippy Rock, to Hemlock playing progressive art rock and punk and death metal bands in the rooms between. That was back in the days when the Saint John music scene was at its height...wow, what memories, every weekend we would put on live shows there with headliners from across the country and even the world playing all ages shows in our gritty smoked filled, puke stained venue that we called “The Local”. The Local was the Wiesel Shoe Shop years before, you may remember me mentioning in a previous blog the project I produced with Gary Davis, whose family owned and ran the Wiesel Shoe Shop. His son Anthony, Mike Long and I and others put these shows on back in the day, had a great time doing it as well.

BACK TO THE PRESENT. We also had the opportunity to film at the Cathedral in Halifax. We interviewed the priest there about the Catholic Church’s stance on the Antichrist, it was a cool perspective. The Father there leans more towards the naming of an age, a time that is represented by the name of the Antichrist. Interesting theory, one that I didn’t have a hard time dismissing. We finished production, the Vision series is now complete.

Over the few days that I was home, which where only a few, I had a chance to check out Google Alerts. A very cool program that sends you email notification anytime a word or phrase that you predetermine shows up on the internet. I decided to type my name in to see if there are any other Hemmings’ out there that where of interest! And there where!!! There are a ton of Hemmings’ around the world, mostly in the UK, that are amazing people! From TV producers, actors, journalists, doctors, scientists, and my favorite…LLOYD HEMMINGS! A Reggae legend! I emailed Lloyd, he is an old Trench Townrocker from the Kingston Jamaican ghettos. He played with Bob back in the day, I found great recordings of him that date back to the early 70’s. My bred-ren! My cousin! So Lloyd calls me on my cell phone last week as I was driving back toSaint John to edit Airplane Journals with Andrew. He now lives in San Diego and plays mostly in Southern California. We had a great conversation about reggae music, being “cousins”, working on projects in the future, it was great. I really want to meet him sometime. He blessed me in the name of Salassie I, Ras-Tafari…if there is one thing I want to learn from Lloyd is the truth and deepness of the Rasta beliefs. They mirror mine so closely, except I don’t understand the part about Haille Salassi being the 2^ndcoming. I want to better understand that part of Rasta belief.

IDEAS and KARDINAL SINNERS

Last Wednesday (today is Sunday) Jessica and I drove fromHalifax to Saint John. Obama won the night before! PRAISE JAH! Wow, I am truly relieved, I now hope he can handle the mess that the Bush Republicans made, man what an embarrassing time in our history. I wonder if Bush has any idea of how much he fucked up the world scene.

I spent the day with Andrew as he was in an editing frenzy trying to get the Airplane Journals documentary ready for delivery which was this morning so I could take it and screen it in Montreal, time is tight! That night Jess and I went to St Andrews to the “Ideas Festival” which was a venue with a bunch of real amazing panelists, discussions etc about the creative industries, the future politics etc etc. Thinkers, politicians, idea people where all there. It was a great experience actually and everyone had the same feeling of hope with the previous night’s results. Hemmings House was a major sponsor of this event and we where proud to be part of it. We filmed all of the key notes for the Ideas Festival. My friend Tim Coates who put the whole event together is also the lead on the 21inc. leadership organization that Jessica is involved with.

Jessica and I stayed with Jamie Steele at Salty Towers for the night. The next day we bolted back to Halifax, the following morning I hit the road again to Eskasoni Indian Reservation in Cape Breton for the filming of the first Kardinal Sinners episode. It was quite the experience finding the reservation, we got lost, it took us 6 hours to finally get to the location. The venue was PACKED with kids, it was rowdy and loud, just the way a wrestling match should be! But where were the teen and the adults? Not sure…the place was packed with involved kids, it was cool. I didn’t understand the amount of 7 year olds with chewing tobacco, but that’s a whole other discussion. By coincidence this reservation is the same one that the young boy who narrating my Melting Lands documentary was from! Sadly we were unable to reconnect.

We checked into a slummy but perfect hotel in Sydney. Shot some interviews in the cloudy room of the young wrestlers…it was good to see them again, these where the guys we shot Wrestling Reality with. Peter, Mike, Titus and the legendary Bushwhacker Luke (from old school WWE fame) where at the Delta bar causin’ a raucous. It was funny hanging out with the Bushwhacker…he is one of the highest paid wrestlers in the history of the business, and he likes to lick people’s faces…no kidding. Here we go, round two, the final event? Hope not…not yet anyway, I hope this series is a knock out and we take home the belt (the one made of plastic, not platinum of course).

"Sail Away Captain Paul...Peanut Hemmings"

November 9^th, 2008

Halifax – Montreal

I am writing this foggy early afternoon from the Halifax Maple Leaf Lounge preparing for my trip to Montreal to finally release the “Airplane Journals” documentary that I have been working on since I started this blog which goes by the same title. As far as I know this will be the last flight I take before 2009 and I feel it is an appropriate time to close the Airplane Journals off with the premier of the documentary at the ICF Executive Coaches Summit tomorrow. My flight home I think will be my last post in this journal. I think it will be appropriate to start a brand new one to start the New Year.

I must first make mention of the passing of Captain Paul. If you have been a reader of my blog you will have read about some of my Caribbean adventures aboard the “Avontuur” tall ship sailing the seas with cargo from South America and throughout the islands, trading by the power of wind, muscle, and strong mind.

Captain sailed off into the next life this October 4^th, 2008. He was an incredible man, and had a ridiculous impact on my life, on my love of adventure, on my hard work ethic, on my philosophies, and on my love for the open seas.

Charlene Hamley, the lovely woman who hooked me up on the ship in the first place sent me a book mark that she lovingly put together in Paul’s memory. On it reads;

SEA-FEVER

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

By John Masefield (1878-1967).

Once I find my Avontuur Journals I will be sure to transcribe them and post them.

Thank you Paul for having such a huge impact on my life and on the lives of all who cam in touch with you!

WITH DEATH COMES LIFE.

The Circle of Life has once again shown itself in a timely fashion. Coinciding with the death of Captain, Jessica and I found out we are PREGGO!!! Yes there is going to be a little Hemmings! If it’s a girl I hope for the names Irie or Kaya…If a boy Noah, or Jude! Some have rolled their eyes at these suggested names, but I dig them! I especially like Irie and Kaya, Irie cuz everyting is Irie, and Kaya because it’s a beautiful name, and it’s a great Bob Marley tune, and because the meaning in several languages is beautiful. (It is also a slang term for ganja in Rasta! Ha)

We are praying for a healthy baby, I am stoked to be a dad! Send us positive vibes and prayers please!!! November 9^th is today’s date and Jessica is over 15 weeks now! Our due date is May 5^th. Again, hoping and praying for a healthy little Hemmings. A few blogs ago I mentioned that I wasn’t drinking alcohol anymore, well this is why!!! I am going to try to go dry for the length of Jessica’s pregnancy. I broke my dry spell when I was in Cannes (responsibly of course!), so now I have bent my rules so that I will be dry anytime I’m in Canada! Ha ha.

"MIPCOM, Castles, Monty Carlo's Flying Circus"

October 18, 2008

Cannes – Nice – Frankfurt – Ottawa – Halifax – Bed

I have been drifting in and out of deep deep sea fishing REM sleep patterns on this flight. I am exhausted. Matt, Tidby and I had a week…truly, the week of weeks. After I realized that my upgrade certificate wasn’t going to get me into business class pods, I realized the best way to fight the absolute discomfort of the small quarters that economy class provide would be to sleep, I had a Gravol, I am listening to Sigur Ros, and the late 2 in the morning Monte Carlo night in Monaco and 4 am awakening for the Cannes to Nice to Frankfurt segments have led me to the point where I am right now…very sleepy. I was told this weekend that Iceland is going bankrupt, also the same for the Bank of Scotland, which apparently is the financial backer for the great CTV amalgamation…no wonder they aren’t commissioning anything these days. The US market has fallen to depression status over the last few weeks, and the ripple effect is very apparent in the broadcast industry as I was made aware of at MIPCOM this week. Corporations aren’t buying advertising, people aren’t spending money on products that need advertising, Christmas ad space has not been sold yet on the Canadian and American networks…our widgets that sell product (I like to call them my artistic endeavors…but no, we as producers are just a fun vehicle for advertisers to ride in and exploit with) are at great risk. MIP had 33% less attendees this year, it was weird being at the worlds largest market and it looking like this, last April for MIPTV the place was packed! Are we producers dropping like flies? Dropping it like its hot?

The gloom does not end there. We, as New Brunswick producers, have been awaiting a solution to our provincial tax credit system update. For quite some time NB had the best tax credit in the country at 40% of labor, that’s huge, but now that NS has 65% and they are oober aggressive, the NB market is quickly disintegrating. We have a NB Film summit coming up in a few weeks called “The state of our industry”…I hope it isn’t going to be a eulogy.

Most of the active NB producers are considering making the move over toNova Scotia to stay competitive. With Singapore, China and India rocking the animation world at pennies for the dollar, animation companies like FatKat will only survive if they can compete by returning 65% of labor back into the budget. Gene, the owner of FatKat, and I spent a few good hours late Thursday night with French beer in hand, knee deep in the lapping waves of the Mediterranean discussing the problems, possible solutions, and consequences of moving out of the province. It will be really sad if we all have to do this to stay afloat. Gene, like myself, and like Dreamstreet, and Tidby Pictures are faithful NB producers and have all been helped tremendously by the province, the municipalities and our agency, Film NB. We are just trying to get up after being punched pretty hard that’s all. It is funny; I told Gene that I am an entrepreneur through and through, a serial entrepreneur. I have all intentions to keep fighting for this even if it means I am fighting for a job that hardly pays me, but allows me to stay in control, Being an entrepreneur can be seen as a curse, you pay your employees way more than yourself, you look out for their well being of first, your house is on the line, real glamorous huh?

This week has been a wonderful market mind you, don’t get me wrong. We started our week with a meeting Sunday morning, but then the rest of the day we swam in the Med, drank beer on the beach and body surfed…this was truly the first and last day of summer that I have experienced this year…it was wonderful, it felt right, even though it is almost November! Cannes is beautiful, the palm trees, the Panini’s, the everything! It was rad to hang with Tidby, Matt and Gene in this environment. Usually I am at MIP on my own, but having a posse to check out cool restaurants with, and check out parties with is where it’s at….two turn tables and a microphone.

Matt and I rocked a ton of meetings, we brought 30 projects, but the real wins were the advancements of Wrestling Reality, Kardinal Sinners, Airplane Journals, and Etiquette Guy. We supposedly got o camera for Kardinal Sinners in 3 weeks; we are not financed yet…typical. Let’s see how we make out!

On Friday we said good bye to the Palais and headed WAY up into the high Alps of Southern France. There is crazy snow at the tops of these peaks, snow that lasts all summer…what a climate; this is where I need to live. The small towns in the middle of nowhere that literally hang off steep mountain side cliffs and have no other civilization for miles took my breath away. The road went straight up for a good 2 hours, peaked at 1.8kms, all zig zag, not even room for 2 cars, every time another car came up the other way we had to negotiate space very tactfully to avoid rolling over to our demise down a 5000 foot vertical drop. Who built these roads anyway? We found this ridiculous castle perched at the top of this super high mountain, we where above the cloud line at one point! The castle ruins where I amazing shape, most likelyNorman style castle. Tidby later did some research on the castle;

“First, in Google Earth go to Lat 43°47'45.18"N and Long 7°17'42.48"E

Notice how you can see the remains of the village all the way back to the field? It was called Chateauneuf. First record, 11th century. The current village at Villaveille was Roman. It was abandonded for the new village of "Châteauneuf" (Castellum novum) perched at the top of the hill to the south. "Châteauneuf" was in turn abandonded in the 18th century, and the previous old town (Villaveille) became the current village (the one we drove by and stopped for lunch only to find that the place was closed). The village was part of the fief of the lords of Châteauneuf.”

The great courtyard, the remains of watch towers, tons of underground tunnels, man it was an explorers dream! Gene hit a bunch of money for next time that he came with his little boy to find, I left a bunch of business cards in the nooks and crannies of the stone and mortar! Ha ha. Last time I did that was in the ruins of this amazing old English style cathedral with no roof in Bermuda, I had a tradition of buying Elephant & Castle beers at the local shop and having a road pop on the way to the beach at the ole ruin I would put all of my bottle caps in a little hole in the stone wall. Years later I would take Tidby, Miller and Nat on a cruise to there and I proudly showed them my collection, they didn’t find it that interesting! Ha ha. It’s all about leaving a legacy right?

Later we made it to the country of Monaco, money drips here, palaces, mega mega yachts, more beautiful people, and ridiculous casinos. We had dinner, went to the casino, I dropped 5 Euro, lost in my first spin, Matt invested 23 Euro, and won 300 back….how do people do that? Monte Carlo was fun, we all dressed up in suit and ties, admired the Lamborghinies, the Mazerattis, the Porsches, the Bentleys, the Rolls. Casinos and gambling culture doesn’t do it for me, Tidby either. Back in film school at Niagara we would go to the casino often actually, but we wouldn’t gamble, we would drink free juice and listen to jazz bands play. Yes.

Driving back down the massive mountains zig zagging, swerving, sweating, breaking, exhilarating, we found an English radio station. They played Bobby McFerrin’s “Don’t Worry…Be Happy”. Man I forgot how great a tune that was; it spoke to me after a grueling week of meetings trying to figure out our place in the future of a volatile industry Thank you Bobby. And thanks Bob Marley for writing; “3 little birds, upon my door step, singing sweet songs, melodies pure and true, this is a message for you, don’t worry, about a thing, cuz every little thing, is going to be alright,”…”don’t worry be happy now”…Xavier Rudd; “I want to be free, free to be, free to see”…”Jah Live!

"Back to MIPCOM at Cannes"

October 10, 2008

Halifax – Toronto – Frankfurt – Nice – Cannes

MIP TRIP

Today…woke up, had a shower, brushed my teeth, flossed, put on some clothes, nice ones…called Jenn Adcock to see if she would drive me to the airport, she did, she is such a wonderful director! Got my itinerary…Hali to T-dot, T-dot to Frankfurt, Frankfurt to Nice, Nice to Cannes. Ok, I know I know…that’s a lot of layovers! Why is MIPCOM so far away in such a small Mediterranean, Southern France town filled with flowing red wine, incredible food, cobblestones, warm weather, and turquoise water, luxury yachts, and beautiful people? It’s beyond me.

This is the year I plan on coming out of MIPCOM with some substance. Matt is travelling with me with 60 1 gig USB keys with all of our trailers and programs, we have lovingly stamped, recycled paper folders that Jon put together to give our promo materials that extra “Jessica Rhaye” Groove (we at the office like to call it the J-Rha G-Rooooooove). Why J-Rha? Well its her “J-Lo” name, my J-Lo name is G-He, Matt Webber’s is M-Web…um, Lauchlan’s is L-Lock, try it out for your self, take your first letter of your first name and put a dash after it, then add a few letters of your last name and there you go! Your very own “J-Lo” name!

I am writing now in the brand new international Lounge at Pearson, it’s beautiful! Nice change. I watched an incredible Canadian film called Amal. I also started the flight reading the first few pages of one of my favorite books “The Alchemist”. It has reminded me of my core values. The film did as well. I will have to touch back on this later, but it is so true that if you are blessed with a dream, or a passion, then it is your holy duty to live your life and your dream to the fullest. Life is light, light is to be loved, love is to be center. God is love and light, and is within.

I have been reading some of my own blogs, and to be honest, they are kind of annoying to read, for this I apologize. But I do hope to start developing more of a story writing style to my blogs instead of the “documentary filmmaker in me” play by play. Is it interesting to know what I listen to, or watch, or think? Not really. But that’s ok as well. The Alchemist is a book everyone on earth should read, that along with Le Petit Prince, On the Road, Another Roadside Attraction, Hells Angels and Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests…not that what I read matters much, but wow. “WOW” is an amazing word as it is an onomatopoeia.

Onomatopoeia is a word that imitates the sound it represents.
also imitative harmony

A quick search in Google helps us represent an example:
splash, wow, gush, kerplunk

Such devices bring out the full flavor of words. Comparison and association are sometimes strengthened by syllables which imitate or reproduce the sounds they describe. When this occurs, it is called onomatopoeia (a Greek word meaning name-making "), for the sounds literally make the meaning in such words as "buzz," "crash," "whirr," "clang" "hiss," "purr," "squeak," "mumble," "hush," "boom." Poe lets us hear the different kinds of sounds made by different types of bells in his famous poem "The Bells." His choice of the right word gives us the right sound when he speaks of "tinkling" sleigh bells; "clanging" fire bells; mellow "chiming" wedding bells; "tolling," "moaning," and "groaning" funeral bells.

"O-town Part 2"

October 1, 2008

Halifax - Ottawa…again - Halifax

I am flying home from Ottawa, yes Ottawa…wasn’t I here just 14 days ago? Anyhow Jess had a few days of meetings here so I packed my laptop and worked from the hotel for the last couple days. We had a sweet dinner with the newlyweds Mike and Mandy, and the “oldly” weds, Mike and Tammy. My oldest friends. Man talking about the tree house in the last post, I realize that I still have the best friends that I did when I was 8 years old, deadly. Anyway I want to reach back into those days at some point and write about the tree house era, the sneaking out at nights, the setting of ice burgs on fire in Alma, the “Save the Beavers” campaign! There is gold in my / our youth, truly gold.

Listening to Endless Boundries episode 550. This will be my quickest post ever. Ottawa is a great town, we stayed at the Westin, great hot tub there man, and the pool is phat…heated and all. The Westin is close to the Market area and right on the canal. Our 20^th floor pimped suite was eye level with the Peace Tower….perfect! Tomorrow morning I do another day on Home Sweet Reno. Just found out that Phish is doing 3 day run in Vriginia! This makes me kind of excited, even though Trey did promise they would never get back together again, I knew that would be impossible. I hope to see this show, its been since 2001 maybe? I can’t remember the last Phish show I was at…one of the Maine shows, so maybe it was 2002’s Lemonwheel ( I think Lemonwheel was 02?!?)

"T-dot Pre MIP Shiznitt"

September 25th, 2008

Halifax –Toronto-Halifax

I am flying home after a very bizarre and interest-filled trip to the T-Dot. A few days ago, or should I say Monday, I made the 4 hour drive to Saint John and immediately MacCormack and I started re editing the music video, it looked good but needed major TLC. Andrew as we speak is in Halifax at Power Post doing the color correction on the video, so right now I & I will be driving straight to the edit suite to give it I & I’s final thumbs up! You see, tomorrow night we are premiering the video in front of a couple thousand fans at Harbor Station, a big release! And Chris Cummings will be cranking out a few of his rock solid country tunes in a set that I’m sure will not be quickly forgotten…Welcome Back! Oh my, the captain just came over the ole speaker system and said we are starting our decent…15km hour winds in Halifax, balmy 19 degrees, not bad for Hali in the fall…I will try to write this quickly so I don’t have to let it wait, sometimes when you don’t write in the moment you miss out on gems and holograms.

I drove the long trek back the next morning after our mad video fine cut session, then I worked as a camera operator on a home renovation show for HGTV called “Home Sweet Reno”, via Ocean. It was crazy, there is a family who is living in their house as it is being renovated, 8 people are living in the bare bones of a house, the drama and technical is great television! I might do some dailies on this show. It was a big work day, we shot with the new Sony EX3, great little camera, full HD. Sweet.

The next day I wrote my little butt off, I prepared 30 treatments for 30 TV series projects that we have in development.

Here is a list of full on shows I prepared…my wrists hurt…

Creators,

Etiquette Guy

SEMA

Psalms 67

Film Cruise

Melting lands

Worlds of Change

Wrestling Reality

Kardinal Sinners

Grave Concerns

Dead Poets

Airplane Journals

Timelapsing Earth

Eating Italy

Drawn in Blood

End Games

World of Wonder

Aztec Enigma

Checking Out

Eureka

Worlds Apart

Kid Sing

Global Fusion

Heads!

Happy Hour

Baldini

Dog Slay

Extreme Snowmobile

World Cup

Chasing the Sun

I would write a quick synopsis on these shows but alas my time is limited on this flight, suffice it to say It was a huge job to get these ready for our MIP dry run in Toronto yesterday. We met with CTV, Discovery, Travel, CanWest. We also met with my distributor friends Jenna and Natalie from Buzz Taxi! Always great to see them, we had great lunch together, nice little tradition we have fostered over the last 2 years, whether it be in France or Toronto. Then we met another producer Milan Chotai who is producing a doco similar to Melting Lands with another cat I know named Liam Morgan (I worked for Liam’s dad Steven many times in the distant past on films, he is a great actor and a set carp…he also lives in St Andrews, and his daughter Alice is an old friend of mine as well, this is important information! J )

I am looking into possibly exec producing this doco for them…it was good to meet face to face. Then Matt and I cruised to Microtainment to see Garry Blye, who is one of my “mentors”, he has always been good to me, spending time going over my projects to see if we can work together on something in the future.

The variety of meetings was extremely eye opening, we now know what the broadcasters are looking for…we have a lot of work left to do on all 30 of our projects. I ended the night by checking out an hour of the Signs and Wonders conference at the TACF…like I always say, Toronto Airport fellowship is a revelation experience every time I go. This time there where probably 2000 people. I wanted to stay for the whole night because it was a very interesting conference, but after an hour of heavenly tunes of the Yiddish influence, I felt my cold getting worse.

What cold do I speak of? Well a couple nights ago I drove from Halifax to Hampton to go to my friends’ Colleen and Ben’s wedding. It took place at Ben’s folk’s homestead. It was really nice, and the barn party was a lot of fun. Ben is an electronic music producer and he spins the freshest of beats. It was fresh beats... what else can I say? The meal was great, pogos, vegetables, mushroom soup, lots of cake, man I ate a ton, I weigh a ton, I’m a fatty…it didn’t stop me and Tidby from cutting a rug, hanging with good people (my dearest Phemie was there as the maid of honor!!! So good to see her), and jumping on the trampoline till 3 in the morning as the bonfire settled to embers and the beats continued to blare through the cracks in the wooden barn. Thing is, Tidby and I set up his tent, and it is officially fall now, and I had nothing but a thin summer sleeping bag to sleep in…so due to the late night and the wetness of the fall midnight air, I got a nasty cold. Our Intern was at the wedding as well, his name is New-Steve. New-Steve is actually the second New-Steve of the company so I call him New Steve-2. New Steve-2 wrote most of the text for our website! Great job number 2. He is also charged with the challenge to go through this whole blog and fix any grammar or spelling errors, which this blog is rich with. I explained to him that when I write I like to exchange my present thoughts immediately onto type. It makes for a very scattered un-edited “Airplane Journals” but as long as my grammar and spelling are kosher then that is all a guy could really ask for isn’t it?

So back to Toronto, I leave the TACF party and call 4 or 5 hotels in the area, they are all booked. Wow, I couldn’t believe it there are so many hotels around Pearson International. None the less my spirits weren’t broken yet. I had a rent a car with my I Pod and driving the 401 later at night when there is no traffic is lots of fun with good tunes. The next morning my meeting was to be at 9am down by the Don Valley 404 highway, so I decided to check out hotels enroute to that general area…EVERYONE IS BOOKED SOLID! I checked at least 10 hotels. I had cash in pocket, no problems spending the dough, especially that night as my cold was getting really bad, it was almost 11 pm and I needed to sleep. It didn’t happen. I gave up. I pulled into a parking lot beside the 401 and slept in the freakin rental car...mental car…lentil soup. I was discouraged but too tired and sick to do anything. So I woke up every hour, turned the car on for some heat, trying not to “exhaust” myself, and made it through the night. I got even more sick.

I had to pull a trick from my past so I would be presentable for my meeting at 9, so I snuck into the Raddison hotel pool, had a shower, a hot tub, and shaved. As to not mess with karma, I bought a very expensive breakfast from the Raddison restaurant, you know, kind of for payment for me using their facilities. This is something I used to do all the time in high school and university…with no regard to karma…I have always been so in love with hot tubs. Strange fascination…also it is strange how much I love motorhomes and scotch as well. But what are we without love? NOTHING!

Sleeping in places other than beds is something I have become quite good at in my life…from living in my tree house, to sleeping in snow forts with scouts, to hammocks in trees, on rocky beaches, under airport benches….pretty much anywhere, its no big deal. I remember once at a Freshwind conference at TACF, my brother, Tidby, Shannon and Jason set up our tent in a ditch beside the 401. It was a beautiful campsite. Ditches are extremely private places, who else sets up tents there? No one really, so it’s a pretty stylish choice if you are in the middle of an urban concrete jungle and want just a little piece of nature to set up camp…there’s always grass and wetness in ditches.

I headed down the Don Mills road to Hi Fidelity HD (RUSH HD) for my meeting. Had a very progressive meeting with Mr. John Panikkar who has agreed to license our next evolution of Wrestling Reality; The Kardinal Sinners. If all goes well we will be filming the Kardinal Sinners in November. So here we go! Another show to put under the belt. Very much looking forward to doing it this time around and hopefully perfecting it, my goal is to keep it tight. We have learned a lot from experience and from mistakes with our previous TV shows, now is the time to have a goal to be quick, efficient, and successful…and make a kick ass show to boot.

As it turns out an old film school friend of mine named Meaghan works at RUSH HD…man I have really lost touch with all of my friends from those days…I guess I should get a personal Facebook account sometime? Hmmmm. Not really in love with that idea. We will weigh out the pros and cons…when I say “we” I am actually talking about I & I. I thanked John for having faith in our project and bid him farewell. John just happens to be the older brother of my good friend from NSI, Raj Panikkar! It truly is a small world. Raj is the producer I wrote about a few times in the past who has the “Rent-a-Goalie” show on Showcase. I was hoping he would be at this upcoming MIP but alas I will be there with no NSI comrades. Matt, our newest member to the team in Halifax has been rocking the MIP scene hooking up fantastic meetings….I am committed to coming home with a sale. I need one, it will be my forth MIP...no more messing around. The pre-meetings I just had in Toronto where a great start, long ways to go, marketing materials, more meetings, logistics….oh and I am on an alcohol free challenge right now, so that will be interesting in the center of wine country being dry as the Nevada desert. Anyway I am always up for a good challenge, I will write more about this very interesting challenge in a later blog post…timing has to be right! J

"O-town part 1"

September 15^th, 2008

Saint John-Ottawa-Halifax

Where do I start? Well after a couple of days home from England, Matt, the newest guy to our team, and I left Halifax at 5 in the morning, we made it to Saint John NB in less than 3.5 hour, Matt, like myself, is good at driving fast. Fast as speed (That’s a quote from the “Kowboy” from Wrestling Reality, in case you where wondering!). Matt and I arrived to Saint John and started filming our latest pilot video for a new show we are pitching called “The Etiquette Guy”. The Etiquette Guy, also known as Jay Remer, is a fantastic fellow who is a professional etiquette specialist, he writes in the papers, he has a great column, his website gives a lot of great tips, and he is an old acquaintance (now friend) of mine from back in my days as an honorary resident of Saint Andrews NB. Back of course in the days when it was a welcoming town to freedom and good music at the Tidal Pool. That all ended when the town pressured the closure of the tavern and replace it with a Dollar Store, real classy Saint Andrews! Anyway, that is a blog post in itself, I would not forget to write about how when captain Paul Whalen had the Avontuur moored in the harbor, and the town council pressured him to get the beautiful ole ship out of their harbor because it was unsightly, well, it wasn’t unsightly, she was a grand old pirate trip…hey I was the one who painted the ole Steel Hull, Green White and Red! …

…JAY!!! Back on track…Jay and his partner Greg (good strong name) owned a fantastic bed and breakfast called the Windsor House Inn back in those days. A legendary Inn for many reasons, one it being the place of work for my dear and beautiful friend Tracy Nichol who, if you have read previous posts, lives now in my other top notch listed “God’s country” kind of places; Forest City. Population 11…Tracy, Carstan, and my dear friend Ann make up a few of the crazies who nestle themselves in the solitude sitting on the St. Croix River a stones throw away from the great and fastly collapsing economy of the United States of America.

We are shooting a pilot for a TV show that is everything about Etiquette. It’s going to be cool, we are going to travel the world filming Etiquettes of all sorts from table to golf, from business to sailing, from film set to travelling…we will cover it all! We filmed at Opera Bistro, so Jay could show me how to set a table, we shot at a beautiful Inn on Germain Street, and of course at my favorite little wine bar…Happinez! Anyway the edit turned out pretty cool; we will be taking this to broadcasters in Toronto and to MIP in October to see if we can get an action.

Moving along to the next day we had an incredible last coaching session, man the company has grown, there where 7 of us plus Coach Dave. It has been a real trip shooting this experiment (The Airplane Journals) over the past 2 years. Using the coach approach with the help of Dave and Vision Coaching has been stellar, I’m not kidding, it has done wonders for my company, for my employees, and for me. Empowerment! We filmed the coaching session as we are ready to start editing this mammoth documentary of 2 years. Should be fun! Yikes…that afternoon we filmed me reading the narration for the film.

The next morning I drove to my old heavenly stomping grounds; Acamac, to grab something from my house, and to drop of a lawnmower to the new tenants. The thing I grabbed was an old school wheatgrass juicer press, Wheat grass is good for you, and for me as well. It is green and full of yumminess. I said goodbye with a tear in my eye to my old hot tub…man it feels like eons ago when we had crazy bonfire hot tub parteeeeeees! I look fondly at that era, but man I don’t look back, I am loving the trip I am on RIGHT NOW IN THE PRESENT…don’t look back.

Listening to EB episode 32 right now, Moonshine Still. Endless Boundaries is a great podcast, I would listen to it all the time if I had all the time to devote to listening to something like a podcast that plays songs about Orange Blossoms and dub reggae. I am on a plan…no, sorry, I am on a plane right now (big surprise) writing on the way back from Ottawa. My man Mike Leblanc, one of my oldest bros from Grade 6 got married at a stellar location on a ski hill in Callabogie North of Ottawa. The day after Jessica and I got married in Grand Cayman, Mike and Tidby hid an engagement ring in a conch at the bottom of the sea close to an anchor and other strange wild life like sting rays and moray eels. Mike then took Mandy out for a snorkel adventure and tried to get her to pick up the conch so she could find the ring, they couldn’t find it for like 30 minutes, we at the dockside in our hungover state from the reggae dance party the night before, sat on the edge pointing and laughing! They finally found it and Mandy said yes. We took a picture. It was a happy time…of the day. Happy times are times when things that make you happy happen at a particular point, when Mike and Mandy decided to get married the day after my wedding in the green Caribbean Sea, not 1 hour after a massive yoga session led by VP Marketing guru Jay Maclean…I said to myself “This is a happy time”. So here we are, in Ottawa not 10 months later and they sealed the deal. It was a fun wedding, in and out though. Jess and I met each other in O-town, hooked up with other long time bro and wife Mike and Tammy and we cruised to the wedding together, then the next day we sadly left and flew back to Halifax.

Crazy story, the Chris Cummings video is rough edited, and when I get back to Hali tonight, I will sleep for 5 hours, get up at 5am again and drive back to Saint John to do the fine edit with MacCormack to make it the best country music video that we have ever made It is the only one we have ever made so the odds are in our favor.