Today is the Day

Today is a significant day for 2 reasons. The first reason is that Wes is shooting a Short. What is that? It's a little mini film with a great big production. It is part of the application he will be submitting to AFI (American Film Institute). I am sure I mentioned at some point that even though Wes is a talented photographer, he wants to become a talented cinematographer. So it's off to Hollywood, it seems, by way of graduate school. And this school requires you to submit a short film on which the applicant has been the Director of Photography. It is a huge production for only 4 minutes of plot line (and a quite good plot line, at that—more on that later). So Wes wrote, is directing, and will also be the director of photography on this film that is being shot tonight at the Phoenix Zoo. As I type I can hear him calling the over 30, 7-year-old extras to confirm that they will, in fact, be there to ride on the glitzy carousel into the late hours of the night. So, of course, I have REALLY been looking forward to this production for quite a while. I have been excited to be on an actual film set with bright lights and bull horns yelling "ACTION!" Which leads me to the other reason today is the day...


Today is the day the circus came to town in the form of a stomach bug. Just for little me. I have totaled 2.5 hours of sleep in the last 15. You can only imagine what the other 12.5 hours were spent doing. So while I wasn't sleeping, Finn was waking up crying, and Wes was tending to Finn. Then at one point, while I was sleeping (or trying to) on the cold tile floor of the bathroom, Finn toddles in to find me there, and assumes the worst. So he starts scream crying, and the only comfort Wes can offer Finn is to hold him while they both watch me puke my guts out. Greeeeaaaat. This was a first for Wes—I have never thrown up in front of him. "Babe, do you feel so much closer now that we have bonded over this new and wondrous experience?" Here are 2 quotes to be heard coming out of Wes's mouth at 4 am: "What the hell is happening?!" and "This is a nightmare." (To which I just whimpered.) Poor Wes only got maybe 2 hours of sleep before he was up at 8 am to tend to baby Finn. Luckily Grandma Johnson has come to sweep Finn away for the day while I lie pitifully in my sick bed sipping chicken broth. Wes leaves at 3 to shoot until Midnight. And I have to miss the whole thing! POUT POUT I think my super-concentrated anti-nausea medication is kicking in. So it's time for a nap. I'll be back when I'm on the mend. (Coincidentally, Wes has a really funny story about Campbell's Soup that happened 2 days ago. I'll share it in another post.)

Combined hours put into 'What Goes Around': Hundreds
Number of extras on set: more than 30
Number of minutes of final short: 4
Number of hours in which to film at the Zoo: 4.5
Dollars it takes to put on such a production: Thousands
Missing the biggest production of Wes's career to date due to the first stomach virus I've had in 5 years: PRICELESS (dripping with sarcasm)