Movie Camp - part one

It seems like ages ago that I set out from Little Rock at 5 AM, bound for Brooklyn in one shot en route to our final destination of Chatham, Massachusetts, in "the elbow" of scenic Cape Cod to shoot our no-budget wiffleball epic titled, appropriately enough "Whiffleball." The trip from Little Rock to Brooklyn was as uneventful as I could have hoped for. Key components at making the 20-odd hour drive manageable in one solo run included a huge thermos of Na'Nan's trademarked New Orleans style cold brewed Cafe du Monde iced coffee, a small cooler packed with a few healthy snacks to get me started, a cheesy five disc Star Wars book-on-CD that picks up with the adventures of Darth Vader at the conclusion of the events of Episode III--complete with a decent facsimile of Vader's booming voice and sound effects to boot--and, probably most importantly, a loan of my parents' fantastic plug-and-use GPS navigation system. I simply punched in Mike Poignand's address in New York and literally never looked back. Some late night roadwork in Pennsylvania slowed me down a bit so tantalizingly close to my arrival spot, but it was a minor hiccup in an otherwise very successful, long day.

Mike thoughtfully checked in for frequent updates as I made the stretch run to his fabulous new condo. I finally arrived sometime around 1 or 2 AM locally, thanks to what must have been a rather circuitous route that the GPS selected for me on the smaller side streets in Mike's neighborhood. He had a frosty, delicious Sam Adams White Ale waiting for me--a flavor I had never tried and could not have enjoyed more. We had a couple, chatted for a bit, watched the last night's "Entourage" episode on demand, and hit the hay relatively early in anticipation of our trip up to Chatham the next day.

Before we knew it, we'd be knee-deep in an all-too-brief, frantic period of pre-production...