New Projects

Jesse has two new songs on the ox and cart myspace which I think are both very good in different ways. And I'm not saying that because hes my brother, im sure one day he will do something brilliant.

Also I have finally got around to completing an idea with Rhymes with Pony that started two weeks ago. So far I've learnt that its far more fun to select content than create it.

VEGETABLES IN BONDAGE!

Say you saw it first.

EXTRA WORK part one

Last week I was an extra in a music video clip for a Japanese jazz singer.  As many people who survive on extra work can and (unfortunately) do, I now consider myself a professional actor.  This is not because I am good or even because I have been paid for my ability to be foreign, wait in a room, have two legs and will sit down and stand up when asked to.  The reason I now consider myself a budding thespian is that I have had recourse to say the following at least once in my life

whats my motivation?

i cant work with him!

whats he like to work with?

here's my card

which agency are you with?

My role was to play a sailor in ye olde bar.  I got paid $300 to wait around for half the day in a sailor suit with three other foreigners and on set, pretend to tell jokes, get raucous, and carry on like drunken sailors eventually dancing with my sailor com padre. Which is where the problems started.

I've been sailor drunk before and when i do I do not happily jig about. Instead I sway, close my eyes, occasionally stare at people, repeat myself and look like I'm about to die of a rare blood disease that makes your skin a light shade of blue. Meanwhile sailor number two; who i was supposed hit ye olde dance floor with drew his inspiration from Gilbert and Sullivan.  For the visually literate, there are pirates that look like this


and pirates tha look like this



And before i hear you say "weren't you meant to be a sailor not a pirate?" Id like to remind you that if your watching the hunt for red October and a fish swims past the submarine window you don't think to yourself

"wait that was a yellow fin, they're only found in the pacific, i thought this was a film set in the the Atlantic ocean!"  

Your thinking

"how the hell is Agent Ryan going to board this submarine" and  "Sean Connery's so awesome.  I wonder if i could look cool in a beard like that"  

My point is both sailors and pirates come from the sea and presumably after knocking off work they would go to the same discos where some kind of exchange of dance moves would take place.  My question is simply one of aesthetics; were we trying to achieve dirty realism or camp comedy?

Regardless, i was awful.  I was in an autopsy video once in which i pretended to be a bereaved older brother and i knew that was out of my range. However this just proved what a narrow range I actually have.  Man standing up and man sitting down I can do. Ask me to kneel and I'm lost. So you know Im not subjecting you to any false modesty They asked me to pour a bottle of of ice tea into a glass about seven times.  Clearly the first six had been an unconvincing performance of "man pouring bottle".

Afterwards I scored a ride with my Gilbert and Sullivan sailor, a short bald Canadian man in his fifties who then gave one of the worst performances of a human being I have ever been witness to.

To be continued.

Annoying Webpages

My new assignment is to find cheap accomodation for two weeks before I move in to the teachers dorms.

So far I have visited some very annoying sites but this would have to be the most annoying EVER!

Just try finding out if they have rooms available on a wekly basis, I dare you! I thought about emailing them I didnt want to be emoticoned to death

Teacher Teacher

Last week i had a suspicion that the teacher i was taking over from was crap. Now, i am certain of it. As a homeroom teacher he has failed to establish any recognizable order, he has no understanding of fairness, his instructions are vague and lessons lack any evidence of planning. He blames students for not having organisational skills, ignoring the fact that he does not model them himself nor make any attempt to encourage or facilitate positive, practical or co-operative behaviour amongst the students.

my problem is that he is significantly older than me and i feel like in his eyes I'm some young upstart who needs his spirit worn down. Sadly its common to meet teachers who say things like, as one teacher told me today, "the problem is they're letting the dumb kids in" and if that wasn't enough, this gem, which is so confoundingly stupid it needs its own paragraph:

"the problem is that when we stopped being a boarding school the kids would go home each night and the parents found out that they weren't learning much " Apparently, this idiot thought that the problem was not that the teaching was not effective, the problem was that the parents were finding out about it.

On the other hand, i don't believe teachers must say "i looove my job, I get up in the morning and the first thing i want to do is teach" The first thing i want to do when i get up in the morning is have a piss and check my email, maybe stare at the wall, eat some toast or a combination of all four if I've got the time. (dont do what i did after re reading that and imagine them occuring simultaneously)Teaching, if I'm honest comes about 18th on my list of preferred activities; before ironing but after reorganising my itunes. Considering how most well paid jobs require knowledge and skill in a specific field and that its unlikely that any ones going to pay me to write about staying in my pyjamas untill 4, teaching isn't so bad. And that makes me sound like I'm worn out already. I like teaching, however correcting maths tests at night and asking students not to play in the corridor during the day doesn't make me want to tap dance.

In this regard, i think the kids appreciate my honesty. They know when i roll my eyes that I'm being genuine and conversely, if i like something they said, a piece of work or an idea, the same rule applies. If we were in a battle i could be trusted. No, i wouldn't dive in front of that bullet to save their life, but when it was safe to come out I would do whatever i could to help.

In other news i am thinking of investing in a new hobby and buying a DSLR camera. Maybe its because Ive been on long bus rides a lot lately and when your looking through a window frame you tend to see amazing photos at 100 miles an hour. So far I have been unable to stop the bus, walk across six lanes of oncoming freeway traffic and take the perfect picture that i saw through the window but here's hoping spending lots of money on equipment might be the incentive i need.

Also, given that the demand for a deejay spinning his unique blend of roller boogie, funk, disco is a little thin along the ground in chiba prefecture and the nearest record shop is two hours away i think i need something new that doesn't involve the Internet.

mental!