48 HRS.

[captainsblog]

That's a film title, son. It's also a fitting title for a post about films from this past weekend.

On the night of our last poetry event two Wednesdays ago, none of what I am about to describe even existed. There was some discussion, and some social media postings, from some of the poets that night, as well as from other friends that something was afoot.

The closest I’ve ever come to doing anything similar to this project was what is known as NaNoWriMo. That is an annual writing event that begins at the stroke of midnight on November 1 and ends at Cinderella time on the 30th. Before that, you can have ideas, characters, maybe even an outline, but not a word gets put on the page until the starting gun goes off, and a 50,000 word novel has to be written, edited and uploaded by the 11:59:59/1130XX deadline.  I have attempted it, best as I can remember, three or four times, but only succeeded at it twice. They even give you stinking badges:

For these friends who also frequently work in drama, though, the window was much shorter. As of that last reading two Wednesdays ago, they had, at most, some general ideas about genre, cast and maybe VERY rough outlines of their stories. One reason for the "very rough" is that teams didn't know what genre they would be working in until randomly assigned one of about a dozen of them, These ranged from straight comedy and horror to "buddy" and "road" films. Da Ruulz are here, and these would be Just The FAQs, ma'am,  if you're considering this madness for your own self.

Just over 168 hours before the first screenings of final products this past Saturday, the clocks started. Filmmakers were given their three mandatory drop-ins- of a character (a specific role, who could be a Mr. or Ms.), a prop, and a six word line of dialogue. They had 48 hours to script it, cast it, rehearse it, shoot it, edit it, post-produce it and upload. Fifteen of them who succeeded screened this past Saturday, the rest the next Sunday morning, at the historic North Park Theatre on Hertel, the last remaining regular screening cinema in the city:



Yeah, that one.



I knew people in the cast, crew or writing groups of three of the roughly thirty 7- minute films that were submitted, mostly on time (each screening started with a “late“ entry). Every one of the 30 or so was well done- a work of art and a labor of love. Each day, our ticket was accompanied by a piece of paper with a numeric code. As the representatives of each entry gathered in front of the big North Park screen-

-a QR code was displayed on the big screen that enabled the audience to vote for their three favorite entries of that day. These will be tabulated, and the top entry or entries, I’m not sure how many, will be honored at an awards ceremony in October. The actual "Best In Show" will be voted on by Actual Judges, and it will be entered in a competition from all of these regional 48-hour projects from around the country, at a much bigger and sponsored venue. Assuming, that is, the damn strikes are over by then. (Striking actors were welcome to join the casts of these films as long as they did it on a volunteer basis.)

Most of the entries had a cast of about three or four actors, one of whom was required to be the Mr. Brian or Ms. Brenda from the requirements. Many were just set in the filmmakers’ own homes or yards, but numerous schools also provided settings on account of Mr. or Ms’s required occupation.  One of the groups I know people in took it on the road to a spooky setting in an adjacent county.  Their additional props included trails of cherry tomatoes, which will likely help their "certified fresh" rating if they manage to get one.

They tried to pull out as many of the f-stops as they could for the filmmakers:



A "red carpet" to shoot selfies at, and an informal meet and greet with the crews before the theater's next regular screening. I got to shake hands with many of my own friends,....



...and to shake foot from one of the comic horror entrants.

The entrants can now post their videos on their own socials, so if I see any of the better ones from friends or others, I'll toss them into later posts.

----

The second day of screenings wound up being the longer day for me. Long before I knew about any of this, I'd signed up for an annual trip by our gym to an outing at a weekend afternoon Bisons game. Last year, there were many people there I knew and several of their friends and SO's, but the members were scattered over several rows and I had to move around to talk to anybody.  This year, they promised, we're all sitting together!  I clickied on a QR at the gym which went to a ticket site, ordered one on the aisle, but did notice, hmmm, still lotta seats to choose from. The usual pre-event posts about it were also strangely quiet. Still, I hadn't been to a game anywhere all year, the weather was fine, and the only issue was the second day of screenings ate into the first couple of innings. 

Since I was going to be late anyway, I made two other stops on the way to the ballgame. One was for something to bring to the outdoor memorial for Rick Jeanneret, mentioned in my previous post about his career and death and my possible complicity in his murder.  Perhaps RJ's most enduring and frequent goal call was when a Sabre scored by shooting the puck over the goalie's shoulder; this became known as TOP SHELF, WHERE MAMA HIDES THE COOKIES!

And thus, a trip to Timmy's was in order:




I wasn't sure where the memorial actually was, but once I got close to the arena's main doors, you could hear where I was going:
 

Watch on YouTube

 

Someone had already managed to get a box of cookies up there, but I went top-shelf with one of my own and left the rest for a fellow fan to enjoy.

----

Then, a few quick blocks back up Washington Street to the right field side entrance of the Bisons' park. I headed to our group's section and found....  nobody.  At least nobody I knew; some kids were in the seats along the aisle, but I rarely sit in my actual seat at any minor league event anyway and I wasn't about to shoo them.  I later heard that only one other person from the group was actually there; last days of summer are so busy here with the Fair ending, the Bills close to beginning and tons of other outdoor events competing.  No matter, though; they were playing the Red Wings, and Rochester friends of mine, met through the Mets in 2018 and through jazz in June, were at the game as well. I moved a couple of sections over and joined Mary Ellen and Tim for the final half of the pretty speedy game.

Conehead was there, in person and in art-



- and both our gym group and another friend had their events (the outing and Steve's birthday) displayed on the BisonVision between innings-



We stayed to the end, which was barely two and a half hours after first pitch; Rochester kept it close until the final innings but the fans went home happy with a 5-1 Herd victory:)



One, repeated, "first" for me? Seeing robo-umps in action. These are being tried out in select minor league stadiums where they have the technology; our ballpark does, having been upgraded significantly when the Blue Jays played here in 2020 and 2021.  Tuesdays through Thursdays, balls and strikes are called entirely by the automated camera system looking in on home plate. No challenges or arguing permitted on those dates.  Friday through Sunday (minor league teams have Mondays off for travel), the plate umpire calls the game the old-school way, but each manager gets three chances to challenge the call and let the robot decide.  No significant delay; they just display the robo-view of the pitch and its decision affirms or reverses the human behind the plate.  I saw it at least twice in the waning innings, where the Bisons were already way ahead and I'm guessing the managers were just doing it for the practice of seeing how good they are at recognizing a bad call.

My Winged friends and I said our farewells, I headed home to grab dinner for a hardworking-all-day spouse, and we ended with the first half of a John le Carré thriller film, accompanied by falafel and cheesecake.

But no cookies.