Running Journal: Thur 8th to Thur 15th

The ongoing report. No pics as this is mostly from the road pounded into a MacBook Air (which is indeed worth all the hype). There will likely be some spoilers so see the flick first before reading.
Thursday the 8th: We left Izzie at home with Nanna. While I’ve been away from her for days…Mel and I have never both been away. I’m a wreck. I’m hiding it from Mel. Mel snoozes most of the drive down. Then she plays a game on the iPhone. Then I ask why is it that we finally have six hours to ourselves and she decides to sleep and play iphone games? She says it is because she doesn’t like me. Fair enough. I kid. Mel rubbed my shoulders and we waxed poetic until…
We stop at Albertson’s…Lost Virgin exit. We grab some stuff we forgot. We grab four drinks from Starbucks. We arrive at Dean and Elizabeth’s baring gifts. The drinks. Not gold or diamonds. The Car picks the four of us up at 5pm. It’s just a Towncar. We all squuz in. Our driver goes into a coughing fit halfway. It’s bad. He starts driving like a mad man. He’s sweating and tears run down his cheeks. I wish I was kidding. Tom Jane sends a text. “What time tonight?” I reply “Mann 6, 8pm” But I realize I don’t know if he’s gonna show or not. So I ask, “u good? U need anything from me?” He replies, “Some cock”. Fair enough. We arrive at the Mann 6. We refer to the driver as “Lunger” for the rest of the evening. We eat at…that place upstairs near the theatre. I’m a wreck. I take part in a martini. Perhaps two.
The press line. I didn’t expect the press. People take pictures of me. I think it’s funny. When is the last time you saw a picture of the writer on the red carpet? Patrick is there. Embrace. I feel underdressed. Everyone is wearing jackets. I look like…well…I look like me. It starts getting surreal. I see Gary (FX). Wandmacher is there (composer). Oh my…there’s Tom Atkins. Most of the online horror guns are there, Rotten, Oster, Miska. They’re all hardasses so I get nervous. I love the movie. Will they? Tom shows up. Brings his brother. I see Jaime and Jensen and Kerr and Edi. Jake and his date arrive. We all take our seats. It’s packed. Wes showed up. Frank Miller. Jessica Alba is wearing PJs. Betsy! My partner in crime.
Patrick does the intro. He’s thanking everyone. When he gets to me…hard to describe. Muse, Shoulder to cry on. Jiminy Cricket…wasn’t prepared. I make an involuntary sound in my chest and throat. People around me are staring. Dean says, “Are you hearing this?” Mel looks at me and I can see how proud she is. I’m glad I’m wearing 3D glasses.
The movie starts. Surreal part II. Wow. First time I’ve seen the whole thing in 3D. Wow. I’ve seen it a dozen times in 2D and it was always great. But this is fun. The crowd is LOVING it. A Hollywood crowd is loving it. Wow. I love these actors. Gary, your blood is bloody indeed. Michael, your score makes me want to be a better harmonica player. Jack (producer) Murray is sitting in front of me. He’s glowing. Mel keeps grabbing my hand. Not because she’s scared. Although she is. She’s grabbing my hand because she’s so happy. And proud. It’s been such a long road and we finally made it.
Roll credits. Credits in 3D! Applause and cheers. And then…Special thanks. Ohmygod. Melanie got a special thanks. She tears up. I knew it was coming. Just didn’t know WHAT was coming. Wow.
Lots of congratulations. Lots of love in the room. Feels good. There’s a buzz. It’s never felt like this before. It’s a natural high.
Escorted to the party. Wow, we have our own table. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Meet lots of people. Surreal. Edi and Kerr are on the attack. Chanting. Sequel. Sequel. Agents are chatting with me. Wonder who will win. If any. Jaime looks stunning. Kyle looks like tall happy charming Kyle. Jensen…dreamy. I thank them all for making me look like a better writer.
Patrick and I make eye contact throughout the night. Yeah. It’s mutual. LG is happy. Paseornek is glowing. Sarah and Tim are all smiles. Yon is cool and confident. It feels good.
I bring Betsy over to meet Mel. I knew they’d hit it off. Then I pull Edi over to Mel. She attacks him. I explain to Betsy that Mel’s something of a Twilight fanatic. I bounce around the place, meet and chat and try to fake how in an utter daze I am.
I tell Mel, Dean and Elizabeth call Lunger and head out an hour before me. I don’t want to leave but I don’t want them forced to stay so late. I’m all smiles but I think of it as work. But an hour later we close the place down. The actors all leave last. I ride back with Patrick. We are buzzed. His driver takes me back to D&E’s. Mel’s reading. We hold each other. We sleep.
Friday: Mel and I hang out the following morning. Been a long time since we were able to just chill out together. It’s magic. Like wizards and dragons magic. Not pulling rabbits out of top hats magic. Later Mel sits in the room while Patrick and I do commentary. Can’t tell you what we said but we talked non-stop for the entire film. No breaks. LG provided the greatest sushi ever fished from the sea. Back to Patrick’s. He bakes oatmeal chocolate chip cookies for dinner. We won’t tell Laura but she’s tricky that one. She will find out and we’ll all be grounded. It was a great dinner. Mel tells her true ghost story. As a result, Patrick doesn’t sleep well that night.
Saturday Patrick and I leave for the junket. We arrive too early. Park on a street and talk sequel. We arrive and Patrick starts his interviews. Later Zane arrives and we start our interviews. Three one on ones. We have fun. We join with Patrick for the round tables. Again, fun. I make note how great the first round table is. More mature journalists but amazingly excited and respectful. The next table is younger. One guy, in glasses, starts out with a passive aggressive question to Patrick. His tone remains the same throughout. What’s the guy’s deal? I want to calmly walk around the table and punch him in the forehead, but what I should have done is find out who he was so I could tell people where to send the hate mail and death threats. While there are Jensen fans out there who don’t much care for me, there are others who would be willing to attack on command for me. Perhaps I should have them attack the haters and then televise the whole thing on Pay-Per-View. In mud. And babyoil. Where was I?
Oh. Jensen wasn’t there. Supernatural was kind enough to work around the press schedule but he had to fly North. Gonna be a tough few days on him as all his scenes will be piled on top of each other. Man of steel and velvet, that one.
Back to the junket: by table four you start getting tired of answering the same questions but you do your best to stay upbeat. Sometimes I’m talking and I realize in the middle of the banter that I have no idea what I am saying or what the question was.
Kerr grabs us to sign his poster when it’s all over. I realize I never saw Jaime. Forget to ask if she was there. Kerr talks of his only screw up during the 65 interviews he’s done over the last two days. He meant to say “pigeon holed”. What he said was, “Pigeon my hole”. He tells everyone. We laugh every time. He takes Patrick and I by the arm. “So, this is it then. It’s all over after this.” We all laugh at the melancholy. We talk sequel.
Edi joins us. Again we talk sequel.
We wonder where Betsy is. She should have been there. Every interviewer asked about her. Would have been nice to have Atkins too. Betsy Rue will go down in horror movie history. Promise you that.
Patrick and I drive home. Tom IMs. What are we doing later? I text back, “blowing u”. Mel and I hug Patrick and drive to meet Tom and his brother for Korean BBQ. It’s a wonderful, laid back evening. He’s reading Devil’s, but not finished. We’ll meet again on Tues. Mel and I stop at Patrick’s on the way home. I can’t do the drive. It’s too late. I’m too wasted. Before I sleep I get an email from Bird, college roommate. He jokingly asks if I could get Edi’s autograph for his 14 year old Twilight obsessed daughter. I reply, “You bonehead. Wish you’d asked this 12 hours ago.”
We sleep.
Sunday: We hug Patrick goodbye and drive home.
6 hours later we hug our daughter. She’s beautiful. She’s perfect. And she’s weaned. No more boob for Izzie Rain. I know there are people out there who might frown on breast-feeding for 2 years but she’s the healthiest kid on the planet. When the revolution happens, when the diseases return due to all the corpses and rats, when Izzie Rain rises to power because she’s immune…well then I’ll be the first to sing neener neener neener. But it was time and as Mel put it later, “Now I can recover my body.” We crack up. That’s not how she meant it to sound. But I liked her choice of words. Like finding a body in a creek or something. I am a horror writer after all.
So I’m back home but I can’t relax. I know I gotta hit the road again in 22 hours. Mel knows it to. And we do what we sometimes do when we know we have very little time to play nice. We DON’T play nice. I know, perfect life, perfect everything. How could we ever argue? Later we make up, then we sleep.
Monday: I mope. I pack…slowly. I don’t want to leave the girls. I write…inefficiently. Finally, I hug my girls and hit the road. I hit the edge of LA county on fumes. No time to gas up…I’ve a podcast with Molly and Wil at 7:30. I arrive at Lussier Manor in the nick-o-time. I podcast in the living room. Then Patrick and I discuss the pitch for the following day. It’s a good story.
Tuesday: Must…find…gas…station. Meet Patrick at Warners. Run into Rona early. Then we grab coffee…well…I grab a Jamba as the cool will no doubt sooth my ravaged vocal chords. Then the pitch. Patrick opens. He’s on a roll so I never interrupt. He’s always been pretty good in room but that’s the best I’ve ever heard him pitch. It’s safe to say both he and the pitch are standouts. We part ways.
I’m off to meet Jake for lunch. He bestows upon me LG swag…and buys lunch. Rest of the day is a blur. Meetings, yoga and chill at the Grove.
I see an actress at the Grove. She has two little dogs. I know her face. She wants to be recognized. There are two young women chatting away next to me. “Boys. All they want to do is eff. Sometimes I just want to cuddle, you know?” I listen, I stare at the fountain and I pretend not to listen. “Ohmygod” is one word not three. I wish I had not listened to Van Halen so stupidly loud in high school because I can only pick up a phrase every now and again but ohmygod they are speaking pure gold. The one keeps glancing over at me. I know the look. She wants to cuddle. Sorry toots. I’m taken. Old enough to be your father too. But I doubt that matters cuz I do look scrumptious.
The Grove. It is the best of LA. The people here still have money. The crunch hasn’t hit them yet. It’s coming though. The Revolution won’t start with them. It will start with those who don’t come to the Grove. These people…bless their hearts will be the meat and fodder for them what rise to power.
The Farm doesn’t take Discover. FYI.
By 9:30 I’m at Tom’s. We talk Devil’s Commandos. I get his notes then we crash.
Wednesday: My brother calls at 6:30. I can’t answer. Tom’s asleep. Later he cooks breakfast. Then we talk Devil’s some more. I get a message from an executive who fired me years ago. Oddly enough it was as if we were long lost friends. I think I shant return the call.
After Tom’s I hit Dean’s house. I was going to yoga but I got caught up on the phone and then I realized that I smell like pit. So Dean’s it is. A quick shower. I shall bestow some pick axe keychains on the boys.
We grab the nutritious Mickey D’s then we tear down the PCH to see John Jarrell, fellow writer, Spades player and all around proficient waxer of the poetic. After an hour of fast catch up I find myself on the road to Beverly Hills to meet with a tenpercenter.
I now sit in the tenpercenter’s lobby. I just saw that guy from the Piano. Brody. He was dressed far better than me. As well he should be. I’ve been sitting here for 10 minutes and no one has even glanced at me. I’m a writer. I’m forgettable. I’d make a great assassin. Or maybe I should do more nood scenes.
It actually is a big day…I suppose it won’t hurt to back it up and report that a call came in about two hours ago. There’s an offer on the table. Another gig. I’ll leave it at that for now. But it’s possible there could be additional offers before the sun sets Sunday.
I drive to Patrick’s. Make several calls. I now have a new agent. I do a phone interview on the drive home. Patrick and I hit the PF Changs. Later we pound out the story for a TV show. Why not? Feels like Sunday is a long way away. I miss my girls.
Thursday: Up early. I write in bed. Lay out clothes for tonight. Arrrrggg. Macys left the explosive ink security malfunction frakking divice on my shirt! Arrrrggg. I head to Macys, see Dean and Elizabeth. Macys won’t take shirt back without tag…sigh…gotta drive back to Patrick’s to get the tag I removed an hour ago. When I’m Bruce Wayne I’m totally gonna buy Macys and turn it into a petting zoo. Forced to do podcast with Pittsburgh Matt from the parking lot. Matt was the stand in for MBV3D. Stood in for me in fact. You see him snogging with some chick in the opening. And later he crosses the street after Jensen and Kevin part. Ten years later and he doesn’t age a day. I knew none of that by the way…Patrick told me earlier.
I get the security explosive removed then meet Patrick at Islands. We set up a meeting for tomorrow. Then back to Patrick’s. Darren Bennett calls. Asks about a movie rumor he heard. I confirm that rumor. Patrick bakes desert. Oatmeal Chocolate Chips. Then a nap. We agree to never tell anyone that we took a nap. We agree to say we went to a gun range or something similar. But I can’t sleep. Thus I sit here typing and IMing with Matt Cothran from high school.
Gonna shower now and wash my naughty bits. Figure I should do this as a two parter. Tonight we head to the Arclight. We will meet Brian (DP) and Jack (producer). Patrick will intro the movie. Then a Q&A hosted by Ryan Rotten of Shocktillyoudrop.
As great as it has been. I wish Mel was here.
More later.