No way Mo or I could get into to see Hillary’s speech last night. The fire marshall closed the doors to the arena about 20 minutes before she entered — “it’s cheek to jowl in there” said a security guard. People crowded around the monitors in the hallways — definitely the most exciting and energized moment of the convention so far.
Except for me — since I have trouble wrapping my head how ANY of this convention (outside of Barack’s speech) is important in any way at all. Is there ever another time when so many reporters gather to cover an event whose ending (the nomination of the candidate) has [...]
I walked into the Pepsi Center and heard Ted Kennedy’s speech by complete accident. I was going in, hoping to get members of the Delaware delegation say trivia facts to the camera, but then realized I couldn’t even get close to the floor. So I stood at the top of the arena and watched the place explode with affection for Ted. I’m not really into politics at all, but it’s hard to not get caught up in the emotion when you’re right in the middle of it.
I’m here with AOL News to film pieces with Mo. At least one a day — we’ll see what we get. In the Pepsi [...]
Three things I’ve learned the hard way. Tagged by Latham.
1. Don’t ever upload a major change to a financial company’s web site at the end of a working day, especially Friday. Your client is a dick, and will phone you all night. Do the change in the morning, or really late like midnight — so the calls don’t come in until you’ve gotten a good night’s sleep.
2. Always do something nice for Valentine’s Day. It doesn’t matter if the relationship is just starting, or if you know it’s all gonna crash and burn a week later. I once got a girl that I had been seeing a long time just a candy bar — knowing that I was doing [...]
Here’s today’s Mo Rocca video. We shot this Wednesday.
YouTube - Link to Para Ganar Obama
Here’s a higher-res version.
This required me finding “two Latino guys.” It’s embarrassing to ask your friends “can you guys recommend any Latino guys?” I knew the improv community was dominated by white boys, but this was hilariously tough. I had conversations like this: “Well, so-and-so is Latino-ish” and I’d say “No, they need to be no-doubt-about-it Latino.” Oh, and they need to not mind singing and performing a song parody tomorrow morning for no money! We ended up going with two guys [...]
At work, Mo Rocca is seriously enthusiastic about the drama of the campaign. I default to a “everyone is corrupt and there’s no point in believing in anything” posture that makes it tough to get invested, but his attitude is infectious. We shot a few man-on-the-street pieces in Tompkins Square Park on Monday that I really liked, including one where Mo pointed out the uselessness of buzzwords by walking up to people and asking without context “Change or experience?”
But while shooting that piece, we had this pretty adorable encounter of a father trying to get his son to say “Change” (while his son drove his toy Cadillac Escalade). Unfortunately (or for the sake of cuteness, fortunately) the son simply [...]
There is (was?) a British sitcom called The IT Crowd and we watch it at my office (someone bit torrents it or something). It is a very surreal look at 3 IT employees in an enormous corporation. Besides the awesome mix of surreal and deadpan humor — the main office is littered with Fantagraphic comic books. In some episode we watched yesterday, the main character (a woman named Jen) was sitting at her desk reading an issue of Love and Rockets. I yelped in my rolling chair with delight.
I have no graphics or video clips or screenshots to back any of this up. Just find the show and watch it.
Edited: I DO have screenshots and a video now!
[...]
Today we edited a piece on Chris Dodd’s enormous head. That’s a bit of a spoiler, but I think you people can keep it a secret. Production of this piece involved making this!
That’s a good time.
Matt DeCoster’s and my sketch show Seven Fights is up tonight at UCBT! Come on out! I predict seating will be available!
Some people at work today wore costumes. I wanted to join in but had no ideas. This morning I grabbed my green jumpsuit and big bushy brown beard without bothering to come up with a justification of what I might be.
Suggestions from my co-workers have included:
Terrorist Janitor
A young Santa Claus
A shitty Fidel Castro costume
Edited to add: Last night at the UCBT Halloween party I got the following additional suggestions:
ZZ Top Gun
Woody Allen in Bananas
The mean dude from Lost who hit the button before Desmond showed up.
Part of my job here at AOL is filming and producing videos for Mo Rocca (he has a blog with us). It is terrific fun. We make three a week, which means we’re making them fast and furious, just my speed. Sketch stuff at UCBT and video with Channel 102 stuff was decent preparation for this run-and-gun style. It doesn’t hurt to have Mo and his thousands of ideas, either.
Usually, the pieces are simple man-on-the-street or interviews with a political hook. Sometimes we choose to be silly with little justification, like with the one shown below. We were in a hurry for a third piece, so we filmed Mo getting a free shave and massage, then had [...]
A tech blog I read called Coding Horror posted today on how important it is to find a job that you think is fun. It all rings true, though articles like that gave me hives when I was in my late 20s. At that time, I invariably hated my jobs: admin assistant at the Sheraton Boston, technical manual writer at an engineering firm, bottom-rung editor of financial reports at PaineWebber, and an occasional high-stress web programming job for human-hating financial services companies. I’d be running out of the office at the end of the day. Then I’d find some “follow the love” article and feel guilty that I was making horrible decisions with my life and putting off [...]
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