Can't sleep. Must blog.

Random thoughts swimming in my head.

So I had a meeting today that went better than expected. It looks like a show that I am helping to create has passed the first round of pitches and is going into the 2nd and final round on Monday. I'm working on a title. So far I've got...well, you'll just have to wait for that. If it makes it onto the TV, you're gonna have to subscribe to the channel. As of now I think there are 14 subscribers.

The owners of the Ferrari Driving School have the last name of Pinto.

I'm picking up my ukulele again after abandoning all music for well over a year. After I get my fingers limbered up on the uke, I'll move back to the guitar. Then I will upload tons of witty, silly songs that I wrote about the Ferrari Driving School and those fabulous Pintos. (or is it Pintoes?)

Apparently I'm the callback king right now, but the only thing I booked was a student film. Student films suck because they only film in the winter (in order to have a completed movie for the spring). You are hearing it from me now - no more student films. I don't need any more student footage for my reel. What I do need is a freakin' break and a L&O credit. Who's mother do you have to blow to get on any one of those three shows?

I was on 1st refusal for a job in Orlando this week. Didn't get it. I'm on 1st refusal for a job in Miami next week. I'd like to be warm for a while.

Playing the ukulele after a year off makes your fingers tingle.

Tina Majorino is the poor man's Jena Malone

Don't cry, Jena. You won.


I'd like to thank Mr. Heaney over at Heaneyland for bringing this to my attention. One of the greatest ideas I've seen in a long time.
Garfield Minus Garfield

My Oscar re-cap is the poor man's everyone else's Oscar re-cap

We had a few friends over for Oscar night. Here are the highlights...

I wore Michael Morgan, and then Old Navy (I'll explain in a sec).
A friend of ours works for Vanity Fair, and since they weren't having their party this year, we got a few of their treats (chocolte Oscars and engraved[?] apples - see photo).
We set up an Oscar pool at $5 a pop. The tie-breaker question: what time will the first mention of the Writers' Strike happen. My brother and I got it at 8:32 ET (with about 6 seconds to spare).
I did my best grandmother impersonation by dropping food on my shirt (Michael Morgan). Twice (Old Navy).
Our Vanity Fair friend won the Oscar pool. My brother used the tie-break question to beat out Mrs. Poor Man for 3rd place. I came in dead last...which was 6th.
Relatively few snarky comments were made. I like watching the Oscars. I don't expect much from the telecast, nor should anyone else. It's just a show which has developed it's own mini-economy, what with pre-shows, post-shows, parties, catering, swag, etc.
No milkshakes were drunk.

Thanks for the well wishes about my health. I'm doing fine, the tests were just preventative stuff so I don't become one of those folks who travels everywhere in a scooter when I'm old and obese.

Fun fact: chest hair itches when it grows back.

Strike that last post. I am the poor man's Steve Carrell

So apparently I am older than I thought. I am prone to getting sick and falling apart like an old man. Today was a banner day for the poor man.

I went to the hospital (by appointment) to get my heart checked out. See, I've been getting kind of sick whenever my heart rate goes up. Don't know why. Run around a little bit, throw up. It's fun. Figured I should have the doctor check this out, since I would like to continue exercising and get healthy and whatnot.

God has another plan. He wants me to puke. Just about every time I go to the gym.

OK, not every time, but enough to warrant this visit.

So today was a stress test, ekg and echo cardiogram. The "echo" is basically a sonogram of my heart. I felt like a proud father when I saw my ventricles doing their thing. They are so cute! The technician had hands of ice cold steel (because every room in the hospital is set at 45 degrees), and her touch was exquisitely rough. Just how I like it.

But first things first: after changing into a gown (which didn't fit and was prone to flying open) I waited for about 40 minutes. I wondered if this was part of the stress test, seeing as how I was the only person in the room under the age of 75 and not hacking up a lung. The doctors wanted to see how long I could freeze in a small room wearing nothing but a paper towel (lightly spritzed with old person phlegm) before I gave myself an aneurism.

I'm finally called in (oh, they mispronounced AND misspelled my last name...it's on every file they have of me...because it's so fucking hard to enter into their computer by reading the plain, typed print on my insurance card and having me spell it out for them...six letters...it looks like it sounds...not too hard to pronounce or read...but I digress).

Dennis (the guy getting me prepped and taking my stats) was a cheery lad. From the Ukraine or maybe just deep, deep inside Brooklyn; couldn't tell from his accent. But what was obvious was that this was one of his first days on the job. He was nice enough to not go apeshit every single time an older, and more experienced doctor came in to tell him he was doing some procedure on me wrong. That was nice. One thing I think he did oh so right was prepare my chest for the electrodes. Like a finely tuned machine he lathered up parts of my chest with ice cold water (the hospital must not be paying it's heating bill on time) and proceeded to shave my parts of my chest.


That's sort of what I look like (with less hair on my chest and front of the hairline).

Then, after Dennis shaved my chest, he got up close to those little patches of skin that have been bathed in the comfort and protection of my chest hairs for lo these 20 years or so, and started sandpapering those freshly shorn spots.

Yup, sandpapering makes the electrodes stick better. And you know what, it feels awesome when you pull them off of your skin after it's been roughly shaved (with a plastic razor and cold water), sterilized with alcohol ("this may sting" is a bad, bad phrase) and finally rough-sanded like a breakfast cabinet project on The New Yankee Workshop.

Then I got on a treadmill, ran for a few minutes, got monitored the whole time, and collapsed onto a bed when I got too dizzy and nauseous to continue. After all the beeping chaos subsided I was free to go see Dr. Iron Claw and her echo cardiogram machine.

All in all, a good time. Now we wait to see what the doctor has to say about my results. Until then I have to wear my shirt at all times, because my wife mocks me and my chest.

I am the poor man's Robert Joy????

I haven't booked a job in a while, and the money's getting tight. I'm really counting on winning the Oscar pool to help me pay off my health insurance premium.

So I see this commercial on the TV yesterday with Mr. Robert Joy. I remember him from Desperately Seeking Susan, and I think he's playing a medical examiner on some crime show now. I was up for this commercial too. When I went in for the callback, I saw it was for a director I had worked with before (he shoots almost every commercial you've ever seen). He's up there when it comes to commercial directors, and I always choke when I'm at one of his callbacks. (don't know why, mental block or something) But this time was different. I was on. I was funny. I was relaxed.

And apparently I was 20 years too young. Mr. Joy got the part.

So I don't feel too bad about not getting this. I just wasn't what they were looking for. I've got a callback for another commercial today. If the part goes to Paul Newman, I'm gonna have a talk with my agent.

Tracey Walter is the poor man's William Sanderson

This is a tough call. One the one hand you have Walter in Repo Man (among many other roles).

On the other, Sanderson has been in Blade Runner, Deadwood and Newhart (athough his character became the New England sitcom equivalent of the Fonz, Kramer and Urkel all rolled into one).

In a more just world, these guys would be getting all the press, not the Lohans, Hiltons and reality show personalities of the world. (Truth be told, I'm addicted to Rock of Love II with Bret Michaels. The finest hour of entertainment anywhere! Trust me.)

Not a poor man's comparison per se...

...but in a Bizarro, cartoon world, Kim & Kelley Deal are sort of like Patty & Selma Bouvier. I would think that the Deals are much more fun to hang out with though.

Kenneth McMillan was the poor man's Charles Durning

Don't ask me why, but I've got a song from The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas stuck in my head. It's Charles Durning's song & dance routine as the Governor of TX that's playing over and over in my noggin. I'm not a show tunes type of guy by any means, but this movie played incessantly on cable in the mid 80's, and as we all know: 80's cable TV raised me.

So I had my first audition in a few weeks. Being that I was going out of town for a week, my agent didn't send me out all that much the week before I left. So I'm psyched. I'm tan, feel relaxed, look good (if I do say so myself) and come in with the feeling that I can do anything. The part I auditioned for was for a sickly-looking dude.

Let me repeat, I am tan now. First time since I was 14. I finally don't look like a sickly-looking dude. Granted, the tan will wear off in a matter of days, but for once (thrice, because I'm repeating myself here) I am tan, and I don't look like someone who needs a hot meal and a place to just get my shit together, man.

Oh, and I am so over doing student films. Even the ones that pay me. I think I aged 5 years in one day. And with this killer tan I've got, that's only going to make me look leathery.

Brendan Gleeson is the poor man's Ray Winstone

So the Mrs. & I got back from Mexico late Saturday evening. Nice to go from 79 degrees to -7.

And I just read that Roy Scheider died. I always dug him. Sad to hear of his death. A few years ago I was on the subway and sitting next to a bunch of German tourists. They were just rambling on and on about something which I was tuning out, until I heard them say the name "Roy Scheider." Their talking got very animated and had me giggling every time they said his name. If you can manage a German accent, please say, "Roy Scheider," out loud. It's fun. I dream of a world where all German conversations are liberally sprinkled with mentions of this fine actor.