CROSSING THE LINE

Friday was the last day of Avalon Studios produced Good Morning (a morning television show, getting international yo). Auckland accountants have decided that they might save more money by running it off the back of Breakfast, using the Breakfast crew and studio etc, and end up with a “sexier” and “younger” show (I’m quoting the control room reaction after meetings) hence the set redesign at the start of the year to align with Breakfast (orange and orbs). Now the Auckland Breakfast studio is a shoebox compared to Avalon studios, it has a bench and painted backdrop for a kitchen, so I’m wondering which type of “sexier” they mean, possible not the expensive understanding? Also there’s no specific performance area to speak of, so there’s a tick beside this government owned corporation’s aim to facilitate outside and foreign content and minimise (local) content produced. That’s the real strange point for me, I mean if you want to shut down your only purpose built set of studios, fine, but what an odd policy. A government should protect and foster the nation’s culture and professionals rather than import foreign culture. I’m curious to see what will happen. I wonder if it means that it’ll turn into a series of talking heads; the latest Barbie dolls to fall off the end of the Disney conveyor belt, any international act wanting to promote their Auckland performance, and people making sandwiches? *Reference to a Breakfast “cooking” segment. *Avalon pride.

They just want to be the middle-men and take their easy cut. But will some future technology bypass such a function altogether? The accountants should know better too, the consumer always loses in the long run.

As for the “younger” aspect, what is the demographic at home on the week days 9am – 12pm watching TV? The children are at school, the kids are at university, the young men and women are working, who of the youth if left to watch this show? Do they want to encourage this?

What are they after? A culture shaped on foreign needs? A distracted younger generation, living someone else’s life rather than their own? :O

Anyway that’s all off message, and I would say I’m not the best person to attempt those questions, the REAL STORY is My Last Day Working on Good Morning. Which wasn’t Friday but Tuesday last week.

And the point of interest within that professional and dynamic, yet most likely boring, story is my crossing of the line. Being that I put an Asian smiley beside my name in the credits.

Yes.

It this one: ^_^ but I did it like this: ^-^ because it didn’t look right in the show’s typeface. Innocent huh? It made my heart race though. Hey! You have to understand that the director wasn’t the friendly one I had planned on. It was the highly artistic and professional one that hated discrepancies and made such a sport of complaining that I suspected he was a competitor with several titles to his name, generally quite friendly but you just didn’t mess with his direction, or his show. I was going to give anyone that wanted a custom smiley beside their name but when I realised he was directing it sunk the whole plan. But I had told a few people I was going to do something so I had to back myself and figure what it was I would do. I kept trying different options, it felt pretty risky (bear with), and each time closer to the end of the show. I ended with ^_^ partly because to the untrained eye it just looked like a mistake, and a mistake is much more forgivable than a wilful act. And also all the Western smileys are too generic and I needed it to have some type of individuality. And partly because I ran out of time.

Midday TVONE. The crawl with my name and smiley went past. The director went silent but didn’t say anything. And that was it. YES, IT WAS EPIC. Someone somewhere would have seen it. They would have thought “huh?” and then forgotten about it. The interesting thing was the feeling I had afterwards, it felt like I had taken a handle on fate. Like my destiny belonged to me. I started to see the formless nature of opportunities and the patterns of institutes. Then I became a superhero.

Some of that is true, some of it is not, mostly the superhero bit. In all sincerity though, I must factor more wilful/risky acts into my life. I think it’s healthy. It did honestly change something in me.

MISTAKEN FOR A STRANGER

Ok, first I want to say, in spring, what an incredible city this is, Wellington. There are flowers everywhere. Wild flowers in every unused and unusable patch of ground or crack in the concrete. It’s like every plant is saying: stand back, look, I will show you. Even the weeds. The creeper over my door is in forest trap mode with his long creepy arms reaching out everywhere. I cut it back high and tight.

My third rose cutting which had shewed me not any promise and had wrinkled up, after more than four months, un-withered himself and put out leaves, making himself the third miracle.

Walking home the other day I noticed someone I knew about 10-15 metres in front of me. Moving in the same direction as me and the perfect distance to cause indecision on whether to run up and say hello (would that be weird?) or just keep on and pretend that I hadn’t noticed her. It’s would take a certain level of confidence and care to do so. My confidence was good, but my care was low. She was the go with the flow type so I don’t think it would have been awkward. Then she started checking her reflection in the shop windows as she walked along and it became humorous, so I resorted to watching the men react to her as they passed, as she was fairly striking. A good form of entertainment with the like. I remember being in the Napier CBD early one morning when I spied the lawyer who patronised the now recession dead company I worked for, walking along the other side of the street with his head stuck with his chin over his left shoulder for the length of the street. Impudent like. I looked down the street to see what it was about and saw a friend stepping into her office. I wonder if that happened often, since their hours must have been quite regular. He was the number one lawyer in Hawke’s Bay and he was dodgy and expensive. He made me think I should avoid lawyers at all costs.

On that same street there was a gallery that I came out off once and at random my brother was walking past (incidentally he’s now studying law). The funny thing was I didn’t recognise him and my mind quickly made up a profile that sadly was more impressive and empathetic than the way I thought of him which focused more on what I knew of his personality and differences or extremities. I didn’t see what was in-between. I keep that memory as a reminder on how blind I am to things I take for granted or maybe a lesson on perspectives and history.