Ben Brooksby

The Gym

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 01:43:04 PDT

Often times older people come to the gym. for whatever reason they always say yes when they sign up and get asked if they want to pay extra for a trainer.

The trainer leads them over to the ellipticals and explains to them, "This is an elliptical. You get on it by putting your feet on those foot shaped pedals and you hold on to those ski pole things with your hands."

The person climbs on uneasily and tries to make it go. It's awkward- like newborn calf awkward. The trainer smiles, "Good! See? Just like walking. do that for an hour. " They go back to the desk.

Well this fella comes to the gym in his stone washed jeans and rugged outback sneaker/boots. He's got the same shaggy brown haircut he got after he saw the Beatles back in 65. He's wearing really thick glasses, the kind you can't see through from this side. so his eyes are kinda magnified wich makes his confused expression more pronounced.

They stick him on the machine a few down from me and leave him there.

Now the nice thing about the gym is that all the ellipticals and treadmills have a TV attached with a little headphone jack so you can plug in and channel surf your hour away. The controls are fairly simple to figure out. There's a power button, a hole for the headphone cord, and two arrows for channel and volume. They're pretty prominent too since they're on a separate box bolted to the control panel on the machine.

I'm watching my own screen with my headphones in, not really paying attention, but I start noticing this guy's leaning over weird trying to see around his screen and messing with the buttons on the machine. After a minute or two more of this "wrestling match"- reminds me of the old Nature programs when the cheetah finally catches up to the antelope and has to kind of jump on/start eating, except he doesn't do it so gracefully. I guess he was pretty exasperated. He shouts out to the trainer at the desk, "Hey How do you get some television on this thing!!!" the trainer comes over and I guess decides he'll be safer sitting on a recumbent stationary bike. As he staggers off toward the bikes, I notice The big white T-shirt he's wearing. Looks like it has a marijuana leaf on it. I wondered though because I'm going off illustrations on the bathroom walls in junior high. And the guy's at least 47. You don't really expect that from this age group. Then I saw the slogan. In big green letters it stated, "Don't step on the grass!!!"

Good outfit for the gym.

The Worst Restaurant EVER

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 13:21:57 PDT

I like trying new things

...with food anyway.

Probably because last Christmas was my first experience with Sushi and I love it. I need to include that fact since what I'm about to tell you would be negative no matter how good the food was if I distrusted unfamiliar foods. I don't. So what I'm going to tell you is doubly disgusting if you do.

And now the story of how I found the worst restaurant I've ever been to in my life.

My cousin told me about this little Sushi place downtown with half off Tuesdays and Thursdays. Most people don't trust half price sushi in a landlocked state 700 miles from the beach, but Sharlene and I were feeling adventurous so we went looking for it.

We found a window along the street with a few flags I didn't recognize and somewhere must've been the words “sushi” or “Asian” or something like that so we parked the car and went in. The withered hostess seemed to be from somewhere else since her answer to, “Do you have sushi?” was to lead us back past the buffet and Mongolian barbeque to a table with some little teal plates wrapped in cellophane..

Lest you picture this wrong let me describe. The entire place from the carpet to the upholstery was a seafoam greenish blue so it felt like climbing into the behind-the-seat area of an old station wagon. And the place was completely empty except for the hostess and a fat man wedged behind a table gulping down noodles. The Mongolian barbeque wasn't on. And, I'm not sure why, but at that moment the raw meat sitting out buffet-style in front of it didn't make me worry. “It's a restaurant.” I thought. “Surely the food is safe.”

It was $8.99 for “allyoucaneebuffet” so like an idiot I said, “Sure.”

The hostess motioned to the back wall smiling and nodding her head. We looked. It was an old stand up freezer filled with dented old chunk encrusted freezer-burned ice cream.

“Oh. Ice cream.” I smiled.

She nodded profusely and went to get our Sprites.

They came free with the buffet. Meanwhile Sharlene and I grabbed plates and started our search for anything sort-of-fresh looking. Our first plates were the most exotic with selections of pork and I think chicken and some fried green bean things. Sharlene took advantage of the sushi table taking three or four little plates. It looked like salmon on mine. As I passed the Mongolian barbeque I chanced a closer look at the meats sitting out in the open.

They didn't look healthy.

Imagine opening a fresh frozen Styrofoam bottomed package of boneless chicken. You unwrap it, turn it upside down, and dump it on your kitchen floor, turn up your heat, and go on vacation. What you see when you get back is what was laying there. It needed buried.

As I got back to the table Sharlene had already pushed aside most of what she had on her plate and was cautiously unwrapping one of her sushis.

She didn't eat it.

I tried some of mine- makes me gag now.

I still remember the smell when I unwrapped it. It was like opening the fridge after a fishing trip and your trout are laying there on a plate with a little bit of trout blood surrounding them, and they're all staring wide-eyed at you like they still can't believe you did this to them.

It was that.

Not like real sushi. Not with tasty spices or whatever it is they roll in there that makes it taste good. This was half an ounce of white rice with my dead goldfish laying on it.

I didn't eat the other piece. The hostess came back out to check on us. Like an idiot, I nodded and smiled, not wanting to hurt her feelings.

I think there's something wrong with me.

Sharlene snuck her unopened sushi back to the buffet while the hostess wasn't looking. I figured as long as it was all-you-can-eat I should get my money's worth. So I searched the buffet again for anything I could safely eat. As I found some shrimp on ice I thought, “Hey! Something refrigerated!” Then I noticed someone hacking out a lung in the kitchen. How appetizing. But maybe whoever it was wasn't working when they made the food yesterday or the day before so I took the shrimp.

But it smelled like a dumpster.

Sharlene sat across from me with that look.

“What?”

“You shouldn't pay.”

“But we took food... And Sprite!”

“I just don't think you should pay.” She sipped at her sprite.

I looked down at my two unfinished plates. “We could try the ice cream.”

She didn't smile.

“If we hadn't eaten yet, it'd be different, but-”

“We haven't.” She gestured to the unfinished plates.

“So just tell her... I'm not paying?”

I sat uncomfortably for another five minutes fighting my conscience over how to put it tactfully. The hostess finally came out to see if we wanted anything else.

“No. We're done.”

Have you ever realized mid-story that you should have done something differently, but you can't now because you already did what you did?

Well I looked at the lady and then at the food and said, “I'm sorry, but this isn't edible. We thought you served food here... but this is garbage. Have you obtained the proper licensing to serve food publicly? Because this is unacceptable.”

I stood up and took Sharlene by the hand. She beamed back at me with all the love and admiration a woman can beam with. The old lady started apologizing and offering gift certificates for free dinners. We passed them to a starving homeless man sitting just outside on the sidewalk. He grinned toothlessly and lept to his feet to hug me. A reporter for the nightly news was out doing an interview with the mayor but stopped when she saw us helping the poor stranger. The entire camera crew rushed across four lanes of heavy traffic as the music swelled-

I signed the dang receipt vowing never to try miscellaneous “Asian” buffets ever again.

The door swung open and four smiling men came in sniffing the air hungrily. Apparently they'd been here before because the host remembered what each of them wanted to drink. One of them hoped loudly that they still had that sweet and sour pork he loved so much.

We staggered out. I felt a little green. Tossing and turning that night, I was sure I'd be waking up around 3am with that awful churning stagnant garbage-in-your-stomach feeling of food poisonings gone by. But I didn't. I was fine.

Amazing.

So there you go. That's how I found the worst restaurant I've ever been to in my life... and PAID for it.

It even topped the Dollar Wok In next to my first summer job at a jet ski rental shop.

That's pretty bad because that was in Tillicum.

But that's a story for another day.

Here's my impression of the sushi there. If you want to make things like this from pictures you find with google images like these:
Then get photoshop.

Blazing Clouds of Mediocrity: This end.

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 13:40:23 PDT

I graduated.

Against all odds I graduated.

Normally you take general requirement classes in the BEGINNING years of school so that at the end you're free to focus on your major.

But I didn't know how all that worked when I started.

Advanced writing, Physical science, and Statistics: the bane of human existence. The only thing standing between me and a degree. I just got the grades back and by some miracle I passed them all with C's. I got an A on my interpretive essay with comments, which means I must have totally bombed that final paper.

Most people wouldn't be very happy with that.

I'm ecstatic.

The enthusiasm meter was at an all time low as this semester started. I'd planned on finishing these classes in the Fall to make room for a capstone film project this semester, but the car accident, doctor's appointments, and recovery usurped the classes, and sianara to los capstone. This was the unfinished business semester. The last burning hoop to jump through for my bachelor's degree.As the semester progressed I struggled to find time for my classes in the slew of writing, photography, and film work I was planning. I'd started this new thing on my net book...The Nag List. A text document subdivided into categories like school, work, freelance, photography, writing, makeup, film and so on. I used to write lists on the backs of envelopes and the margins of notebooks to remember stuff when it got to be too much.

This was the same thing but in digital form with more categories to help me remember projects that slid to the back burner and beyond. I was excited. I'd never lose a great idea again. Whenever I had one, I'd jot it down for future development. The list grew. So did my confidence. But my grades didn't. I couldn't find time in the day for all my homework. Each unit test would bring lower scores. My ship was sinking. I was going to fail.

Faced with this strong probability, I halted everything else I was doing.

The nag list was all still there, but my focus fell on only the top two categories, School crap, and Urgent School Crap(the one marked in red). I stopped going to work, stopped writing. The mountain of photos I'd taken last Christmas would have to wait. I stopped everything to focus brain, body and mind all day every day on minutia. Nothing else existed for me.

...Loved it.

I remember the feeling I had walking out of the testing center following my Science and Stats finals. I was sure with both of them that I'd ride out with a high F. I'd already flunked Stats last winter so I found no comfort in knowing some of the answers. The bulk of it was incomprehensible to me.

I walked out to the scan-tron machine feeling like a firing squad victim. It'd be nice if I they missed, but hitting their target is what they do and these tests weren't designed to help anybody. The kid at the machine took my test and slid it into the machine.

He said, “Thanks.”

I moved to the monitor displaying scores with a ten second refresh rate and random placement in the line up to protect your privacy.

“Cmon sixty!” I plead to myself.

I'd done the What-if calculator thing they provide online and felt that if I could just get a solid 60 or maybe even a 59, I could ride the curve and pass the class.

I scanned for my student number I neglect to list here for fear of privacy violation.

There it was.

0505.

And just to the right of it-

My jaw dropped.

I checked the student number again.

Seventy WHAT!

I'm naturally bad with numbers, but after a three hour bout with that garbage I'd be hard pressed to spell kat correktley. I turned around and went back just to make sure I'd read it right.

Oh five oh five. Seven and another number! (note: bad with numbers. I don't remember nor does it matter with scores in the low end of mediocrity) I'd done it! I'd more than done it! I did that both days!

Most people would feel pretty jipped about that, but I was happy.

It was finally over.

The last couple of days have been sort of blurry as I regain my equilibrium and catch up with stuff at work. I've felt broken. I haven't been able to write or draw or do anything. My desire was just kinda dead. I worried that school killed me. But today I felt it again. I still feel rusty as I type this, but my light's coming back.

I deleted the School category from my nag list.

Now I can start looking at what I left behind. Turn a few burners back on. I feel my life coming back.

I've got to get back up.

Good things are coming.

-Stay tuned

Pursue your dreams

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 11:53:31 PST

Find your passion and perfect it.

Made me smile to see someone pursuing something they're good at. Lovein it at about 1:38. Chariot's of Fire- "God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast, and when I run, I feel his pleasure." I like to think everybody's got a little of that in them. Too much minutia gets in the
way too much of the time.

So find some way to do what makes your heart sing like this cause without it the world dies.

My Story Boarding Class

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 10:47:42 PST

I'm taking a class on story boarding from Kee Miller. He reads us part of Tremors every week and we sketch up boards for each shot. Its getting better. Here's a guy getting chased by a worm thingy.

SDIF Episode 1: Cruddy Combo Clan

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 09:58:14 PST

You can't buy things here. We sold it already.

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 15:32:33 PST

Unlike most of the posts on this blog, what follows is true and not exagerated at all.

The eggs at Wal Mart were decimated.

Publish Post

Winter semester started and all the students went there to get new food.

The only bread left was that crumby generic white stuff you can use if you run out of toilet paper.

Joel says to add some explanation...

Sharlene and I ran over to Walmart because we needed groceries because like everybody else here, we just got back from the Christmas break. The place was absolutely ransacked. When we got to the eggs, it was so unbelievable that I had her get her phone out and take some pictures.

Hot to make a five minute post for New Year's Eve

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 18:37:36 PST

I wrote something and then did a quick google search for a clock. I saw the dancing cartoon one and thought, "Wow. That looks dumb."

So there it is. You too can make millions doing this same thing! Call now for my free tape that tells you how to order the booklet that has more information in it. I get them for free from my doctor's office but you can buy them now for the low low price of 6 cents.

For those who depend on this blog for all your news...

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 18:31:12 PST

Today is the last day of the year. Please update your clocks accordingly.

-The Management

On a lighter note,

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:00:39 PST

Here's a horse with its head stuck in a tree.

neither the horse nor the chainsaw were hurt during its removal

for the whole story go to: http://www.yourhorse.co.uk/Your-Horse-News/Search-Results/General-news/October-08/Oct-21-Mare-gets-head-stuck-in-tree/

Sometimes children have the same problem

This would be really bad if it was your arm

That sure would be awkward.

Why Nobody Likes Santa

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 00:05:18 PST

Every year thousands of Children are placed unwillingly on the laps of men dressed this way to fulfill a desire no child has.

Here's the problem: A parent will say, "Santa Claus is at the mall. Do you want to go sit on his lap?"

The child nods his head about a million times on the way to see Santa, but the lap is there, and screams of agony ensue.

Why? Didn't the child want this?

No.

When a parent says, "Santa Claus is at the mall. Do you want to go sit on his lap?"

All the child hears is, "Santa Claus --mall -- - want?"

Maybe a mathematical equation will help to illustrate.

According to grown-ups the North Pole is full of toys, and Santa's basically King. So you're telling me that this old man with nothing better to do than give away free toys is sitting at the mall right now waiting to take orders?

What sane kid's gonna turn that down?

But then you get there and its not even close to what you expected. The guy smells like someone else's stinky laundry detergent. There's no flying deer anywhere and when you ask him about it, he gives you some lame excuse about them being back at the north pole because the elves wanted to play games with them.

If you had flying deer, would you leave them at home?

Who is this guy?

And why can't he stop laughing?

So as you begin questioning the legitimacy of the experience he tells you to sit on his lap.

Fat chance Dirt Bag!

So there.

I wasn't any more interested in sitting on an old man's lap than any other kid in America.

The only reason any of us ever waited in that dumb line was to make sure we got on the "Commercially Successful Toys" list so we wouldn't end up with that boring wooden crap the elves were always making in movies.

This was honestly supposed to be worth staying up all night for.

For the protection of our readers:

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 10:46:34 PST

Please be cautioned this holiday season of the dangers of cup cakes in personal vehicles. Be advised. Cup holders are not for cup cakes. The design fails completely. You will loose the use of both the cup holder and the cake, also your fingers will be covered with a lot of sticky icing from trying to get it out.

What if you don't have a chimney?

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 21:05:38 PST

Only slightly less popular than the Tooth Fairy or Easter Bunny was Santa's estranged nephew, Larry, who used to sneak into houses by climbing up through the toilet to leave presents for the children in the hallway or on the stairs to be discovered later by falling parents. The tradition never caught on and was finally banned by the Imaginary Persons And Creatures Board of Responsibility on grounds that the public at large neither recognized nor celibrated the tenth of February. He now practices psychiatry in Saskatchewan.

Bed Wetting

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 23:42:10 PST

It's interesting that as a child you think you're the loan freak when in fact the truth is that most of the kids at school only knew what it was because they did it.

You're really only one step up from diapers. I'm pretty sure a few kids in my kindergarten class still wore them.
Imagine you didn't know what it was.
Imagine the shock of first finding out that it even happened; that people actually went to the bathroom while still laying in bed... all over themselves.

Imagine that reaction.
Then compare it with how they all acted when somebody actually got accused of doing it.

Not even close.
They knew very well that feeling of relief; the growing warmth; the unstoppable dread as you realized that you weren't in a bathroom at all! It was a dream! This was a bed! Your bed! You tried to stop but it was impossible. So then you'd have to lay there covered in a gallon of your own urine at 1:13 in the morning wondering what to do next.

They were guilty; every last one of them.

Accusing the ugly kid made everybody feel better though.

Don Poncho

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 13:22:50 PST

Don Poncho at work from Ben Brooksby on Vimeo.

Why Visiting the Doctor is Among my Favorite Activities

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 11:48:16 PST

The cackling latin lady in the next office was going berzerk. Then she told us all how funny it was. According to her she couldn't breath.

Wish that were true.

I'm pretty sure if she wasn't breathing then that sound wouldn't have been there.

Anyway I better explain my doctor's visit just now.

I got there ten minutes late. The shady kid in front of me wearing a camouflage shoplifting coat says he's here for the same doctor I'm seeing. The receptionist twinkles a happy, "I'll get you checked in." and the kid skulks to a chair.

I walk up to say I'm also here for that doctor.

She doesn't twinkle. I can sit over there. Preferably in the garbage can.

I don't know if there's a lot of paperwork that has to be done, or if someone has to drive to his house and remind him he's seeing patients today but it always takes a long time. I thought maybe by getting there late, they'd be waiting for me and I could just get rushed in since they were planning on seeing me ten minutes ago.

no.

I pick up a magazine to thumb some pages and find out there are people out there making horse magazines. Kind of interesting if you want to know which splint to buy this season in case one of your thoroughbreds gets a sprain. I put it down to entertain myself with the wallpaper and ceiling tiles.

After another twenty minutes, the nurse comes out and asks for the shady character. He shuffles back with her with a suspicious look on his face as if he might have some of the magazines packed away in that coat. I sit for an arcane amount of time before she finally returns for me. Then its the weigh-in, and the temperature, and the blood pressure and the pulse oximeter. Finally she finishes and leaves me in the little exam room to wait another half hour or so by myself while the doctor gets a cappuccino or something.

My doctor is from Israel. But leave the joy stained imagery of Fiddler on the Roof out of it. This particular visit is one of the last two I will have to endure.

As a sidenote, I'd better backstory this a little. I was in a big accident three months ago. Broke my neck. Had a post op infection and got re operated on and the fun of having a PICC Line installed. If you're a doctor and I used the wrong number of letters somewhere in there, don't correct me, I don't care. I know more about PICC lines than you will ever know even though you went to school for umpteen years so you could do something frivolous like save lives.

No. A PICC line simply means you get the joy of playing hospital every eight hours for the rest of your life or until they take it out, whichever comes first. The way mine was going I thought it might be the first choice. Anyway, during the ten weeks I'm playing hospital I get to meet with this doctor every week to bolster my confidence and cheer me along the way. Oh and get stabbed weekly by a nursing student.

Enough background.

I'm sitting there somewhat elated that before too much longer I won't be seeing this doctor again or get stabbed, when he tells me once I'm done taking antibiotics, I'll still have a high risk of the infection coming back because all they really do is suppress infection. Since I have permanent hardware in my neck, "It has maybe..." he wrinkles his face trying for optimism,

"fifty fifty chance of returning with hardware."

He grins.

"In that case, if spine has fused, we take hardware out and repeat treatment." His eyes glint hopefully.

"If it hasn't fused then you'll be in a cast for..." he pauses to soak up the joy of conveying such news, "six months... sometimes longer." I stare back blankly, unwilling to give him the shock and amazement he's hoping for.

"A full body cast then?" I ask.

He nods vigorously. I feel my neck.

"That'd be inconvenient."

"Oh yes! I remember I was finishing medical school back in the late 70's. I used to moonlight as a... a nurse."

I nod.

"Two schoolmates of mine; they were from my high school in Israel, got into a car crash and both had to wear spine casts in the ward I was working."

He smiles, deeply satisfied by the memory and the thought that one day soon he might relish the same satisfaction seeing me in such a cast.

"Was very embarrassing for them." He chuckles. "They shouldn't have crashed their car."

Wise man. I bet they never thought of that.

Reassured that my weekly doctor visits might not actually be coming to an end, I skipped happily to the lab to get stabbed once more by a young lady of almost steady-handedness who I assumed knew what she was doing.

After-all, she was wearing pink pajamas.

How I Won The Crayon War

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 12:19:17 PST

Thought I'd better explain the header on this blog.

For those of you to which numbers have a great deal of meaning and happen to know my age, the label at the top of the blog might have you a bit confused. 1987 doesn't seem to be a significant year in my life.

The answer is to be found in just how many years after my birthday on the first of July 1982 the September of 1987 had me.

Five.

I was five and it was school that became a part of my life that year like a relative moving into your attic with no plans to vacate the premises for a good long while.

You see, my mother was an artist and so i guess it never occurred to her to correct us in our artistic endeavors at home because art is art and children are apt to do whatever they like including coloring outside lines.

But when school became a welcome guest in my life, it soon became unwelcomed and loathsome because of the idea in my teachers' heads that there is a right and wrong to crayons.

Now I'm an adult I can see that crayons have very little application in grown up society and if any of the A grade receiving children of days past moved on to jobs coloring maps in map shops because of the precision with which they first outlined each country, then filled in the body while keeping painstakingly within the lines, I'll swim to Bangladesh with the next herd of reindeer going that way.

Not that keeping within lines ever concerned me. I didn't much care how teachers "liked" or didn't like my work. My first memory of really being frustrated with teachers using art as a vehicle for societal conformity happened because it was a requirement for leaving the classroom at the end of the day.

My kindergarten single-wide trailer sat in a swamp in South Carolina. My teacher, Ms. Bailey, decided this particular day to reinforce the idea that we were prisoners she ought to make it harder to leave. Our assignment was to color a self portrait and bring it to her to be ridiculed before returning home for afternoon cartoons. I felt confident I could do this and so soon had my paper in hand, my bag on my back, and myself in the line forming to head out to freedom.

She stopped me when she saw the hair.

In my childhood I had very light blonde hair. Being light blonde and five I assumed in my ignorance that a white crayon might work since other children sometimes called my hair white.

I had eight crayons. It didn't take long to see I was deficient in "light blonde."

She frowned at me and explained why I was confused and that "your hair isn't white Benjamin."

I turned back to the table. Only the five or six really mentally retarded kids in my class remained.

I tried to erase the white and found out that doesn't do anything but smear the white with a lot of black from the outline.

Yellow.

Add yellow to white and you should get blonde. Right? It was worth a try. But the yellow just sort of smeared over the top. It looked really crappy.

She looked angry this time. I wasn't sure what she expected me to do, but this obviously wasn't it.

"Your hair is not yellow Benjamin." You may start to understand why I go by Ben.

This went on for about a half hour.

Me being told what color my hair wasn't, going back, and continuing to see how inadequately equipped my stupid kindergarten crayons were at recreating realistic lifelike colors.

I think the paper finally ripped as I tried unsuccessfully to mix brown and gold into the mess my head had become. Ms. Bailey, its a wonder the kind soul never married, finally let me go home because the afternoon kids were filing in and an eight year old returning for his third try wanted the seat I was in.

Another pleasant experience in coloring came what seemed like years later because we moved to Florida in between, but was really just the next year in first grade.

We were in my math class.

I guess I should elaborate. For some strange reason the entire school besides the office and the library consisted of trailers connected by covered walkways patrolled constantly by power hungry fifth graders in orange road construction vests. Many of them I believe are still wearing one.

It was this math class where for a number of weeks our time was spent numbering graph paper. We sat busily filling in each square of graph paper with numbers. I think the teacher called this "counting exercize".

I apologize for the lack of detail on the teacher but I had seven. I think my goal in school at this point was filling my folder as thick as I could before the end of the year. This was accomplished by never turning anything in. Every paper I got whether homework assignment, permission slip, or note to my parents about my lack of drive was added to the two inch thick collection I proudly carried with me.

I also remember spending much of my class time pushing my eyelids from the sides to make the room go sideways so the teacher seemed to stand on the wall. It was a productive year.

Counting exercizes lost their intrigue when I reached a hundred and realized the numbers just started over again like the double digits. There were no new numbers.
1-9 was all there ever would be. This really disappointed me. I remember thinking adults were a lot dumber than I'd imagined if the only things really separating us were this and height .

Some of the more eager students at my table got all the way into the four and five hundreds.

One day, as a result of a parent teacher conference or threats of firing my math teacher gave us something else to do.

Worksheets.

All I noticed was the picture of the turtle smiling back at me. I heard the word crayons and so put two and two together- MATH- and got mine out to begin coloring. Here was an assignment I could sink my teeth into. As the other children at my table began solving the addition problems at the top of the page to unlock which colors went with which number in the picture, I gathered up every ounce of observable reference material in my head and began.

My brother had two turtles at home. I was familiar with the complexity of colors making up the shell and skin of the North American Terrapin. I pulled out a brown crayon and started on the rim of the shell. Whoever drew this hadn't looked at real turtles much. It was way too curvy and I'd never seen a real turtle smile.

Gasps of horror suddenly exploded from the ignoramuses I was forced to share table space with. "What are you doing?"

"You're not even in the lines!"

"I'm telling!"

A hand shot up followed by the other arm rested horizontally across the head to help hold up the signal arm. She would wait however long it took to ensure my demise.

I'm not sure if the teacher ever got around to helping my dismayed table-mate or not. I guess if counting was really considered challenging, then addition was bound to stump a few in the audience. I apologize for the lack of detail here but I honestly don't recall any response to my work.

I was proud of what I'd accomplished with some white and yellow here, and some greens, browns, and oranges there. It really resembled Tom. That was my brother's turtle, the browner of the two. I was really pleased with my work and who cared what a bunch of kids with boring green turtles thought of it. I was sure my teacher would appreciate my creativity if she'd seen it, but of course, if she didn't come over to answer the raised hand, then she missed her chance.

Like everything else, It went in my folder.

Hence the blog undertitle, Coloring outside the lines since 87.

Its kind of funny. From my failed experiences coloring as a child, you'd think I'd never qualify for a coloring job. But I did.

I'm a colorist.

That means I'm in charge of the color balance, saturation, and contrast of footage in the TV shows, commercials, and movies I work on.

So I guess if you or someone you know is struggling with school, I'm a bad example. But I'm happy because its much better than filling graph paper with numbers for a living.

Brooksby Color Demo Reel from Ben Brooksby on Vimeo.

The Great Escape

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 10:53:52 PST

Once upon a time I ripped my pants in the sixth grade.
I don't know how it happened, or when it happened, only that it did.

The horrifying realization that at least six inches of inseam,
the most important six inches-
that up to this point you've trusted completely to remain tightly and securely sewn together are now completely unsewn and open as the parted red sea for the children of Israel to walk through, happened to me about four hours into the day during a German folk dancing assembly.

This was due to the helpful sitting position employed in my elementary school assemblies because of the belief that the best way to improve circulation in a child's extremities and compress space was to have us squeeze into rows via Indian style on a cold gym floor.

I was sitting there happily enjoying the numbing sensation when I happened to glance down and relive a nightmares of recurrent nature where I discovered halfway into a school day that in my haste to arrive and learn I'd failed to put on pants. I squeezed my elbows down into my lap as far as possible hunching myself in a ball hoping a stupid fifth grader wouldn't feel the need to glance back and notice. That's all it would take to sound the alarm and my life would be over. Things like this spread like wildfire in a bored assembly.

Just as I felt I'd successfully folded myself into complete and relative safety, the professional folk dancers, not exactly sure how you aspire to this, but they decided a good way to keep our attention on the front of the room would be to jump and skip through the audience with jaunty grins pulling random children into the polka. I felt semi safe for a millisecond as I comforted myself with thoughts of safety in back rows. But the fear soon gripped me again as a guy in lederhosen and a few ladies in fluffy dresses came skipping back to our section. I stared at the floor and by the quirky enthusiasm of certain kids in my class was spared going forward to parade my problem to the entire student body. It was the worst assembly I think I ever attended, including the frequent ones where we had to sing in unison, "Peacemakers talk about it. They don't fight about it. They want to make up and be friends." I think this is the reason so many kids from my elementary school got beat up in Junior High and High School.

The rest of the day was agonizing. Every time I would relax a little, the teacher sensing someone in the room was dreading being called on would begin pointing fingers and having students tramp up to the board to try and write on it, something that would inevitably scrawl up and down without lined paper to guide it and inevitably would be to small to be read from more than three feet away, but no matter. My teacher smelled fear and so was compelled to point. I avoided detection again till afternoon recess.

Lucky for me, I had no friends in elementary school. The situation would have been ten times worse with friends since no friend at that age can ever be trusted to keep such a hilariously juicy morsel a secret for long. I chose to play wall ball, an unusual choice any day since most children play this game with two or more people, but it was the location I fancied. The wall ball wall was the farthest north wall of the school right next to the little alley we'd walk through in the morning to get there.

I stood there, thighs clenched, idly bouncing the ball every few minutes to avoid looking conspicuous. My eyes flitted from duty to duty. For those of you that are unfamiliar let me explain:

A duty is the only adult on the playground during recess. The duty's job is to stop little boys from doing anything interesting. The school usually hires from the parents of the loudest and most annoying little girls in the school in order to increase her effectiveness on the grounds. They wore dark glasses for the same reason they did in high school during the early 60's, so it was impossible to tell where they were really looking and when they yelled in your face all you were greeted with was the cowering reflection of your own tear stained face. They carried whistles which they blew constantly while pointing thus sentencing kids to "the wall". Not my wall, but one of the middle ones where they could be derided and ridiculed by all grades at once.

And so it was the duties I now had my eyes on, but not too much when they were turned my direction for nothing irks a duty more than to be watched. I pretended interest in my little game knowing that if I looked like I wasn't doing anything, I'd probably end up on the wall as had happened once in fourth grade when I didn't feel like playing with anybody and decided to sit on a bench. First mistake. Never sit down during recess.

So I waited, amazed at the audacity of my own resolve. Was I actually going to do it? I had to. I had no choice. Nearly every member of my class had been called on. I could feel it. I would be next. The teacher would point. What excuse could I give? Nothing. Once the teacher calls for you to stand, there is no way out. My life would be over. I had to. Just as I reached my decision the most incredible miracle since the parting of the red sea happened.

I looked at the chubby duty to my left guarding the jump ropers. Her back was turned. With lightning quickness my eyes flashed right, to the skinny one with the ugly hair by the kickball field. She was blowing her whistle and pointing... at a kid on the other side of the field! Somehow the stars had aligned and both duties were turned the same direction at the same time!

No time to celebrate. I turned and ran as fast as I could toward the end of the wall. I should have been closer to it. I should have been faster. It was like running slow motion in a dream. As I rounded the corner I glanced behind me searching the horizon for the dark silhouettes of the duties. Surely they'd seen me. Nothing like this had ever happened. Two hours before school had ended I was running through the funny pedestrian only gate on the side of the school, designed I guess in the hopes that children would be forced into single file from the very beginning of the day. I ran suddenly aware as I rounded out in front that I was visible to every classroom window on the front side of the school. But two angry duties might also be on my tail. I ran with all my might which was faster than normal no doubt aided in my flight by the absence of inhibiting fabric between my legs.

It was then that I realized the real problem with my escape route. Waller Road Elementary sat right on its namesake, a long, straight, and flat two lane affair frequented by local traffic. So I ran, ignoring the confused expressions of passers by, intent only on one thing: living to see tomorrow. The duties might be right behind me in their cars. Whole classrooms might be in an uproar over the "escaped student" that just flew by their window. The cops might be getting the call right now from some old lady neighboring the school that a kid just ran by two hours before class let out and that they'd better bring the dogs. I couldn't tell.

Too exhausted to look back and to scared to stop running I pounded on down the shoulder longer than any fat kid has ever run.

Finally after what seemed like eternity I rounded the corner onto the safety of my street. I slowed my pace and began to relax. Surely they'd have trouble finding me now that I'd turned. They'd probably just stay on Waller wondering where I'd disappeared to.

I squeezed through a barbed wire fence into an empty pasture below the hill my house was on. I sat down in the soft grass and removed my shoes basking in my new-found freedom. I dipped my toes in the cold stream and caught little frogs for what seemed like hours. Actually it was.

Two hours later I heard the familiar growl of my bus climbing the hill.

I wasn't on it.

How superior I felt as I watched the bus make its way up the hill. I could hear the trapped voices of my schoolmates aboard its rickety chassis. As the air brake squeeshed at the top of the hill I had the sudden realization that I didn't know what to say when my mother asked why I wasn't on the bus.

Realizing that your parents are going to ask questions you don't want to answer is one of the key problems with childhood.

I ran up the hill.

Luckily Mom was busy doing some kind of Mom thing like dishes or canning or something so I just passed off some story about the bus taking so long to get there at the end of the day that I decided to race it home on foot.

Almost had it too. Hill just slowed me down.

I made sure to breath really hard and move around a lot so she wouldn't notice I was missing a backpack.

It worked.

The next day as I walked through the pedestrian only gate I realized another problem. My teacher was going to notice I wasn't there.

He was going to ask.

What would I say?

Bathroom? Two hours?

No.

Wouldn't work.

Nurse's office? Don't they tell the teacher when you go there?

There was a line and I had to wait.

Yeah... maybe yeah.

As we filed into the classroom I sat down nervously and began arranging my things on my desk, ready at any moment to provide my excuse.

But no questions came.

Not even from my fellow students.

It turned out that nobody'd even noticed I'd left...

The worst part is that now that I look back on it, I wonder why I didn't go play in the creek more often.

What a colossal waste.

note: Ben Brooksby does not condone or endorse the skipping of school

public or otherwise in any degree as it reveals a lack of character and

leads to juvenile delinquency or the improper use of otherwise

and misspelling and otherwise.

The True Story of Thanksgiving, the Pilgrims, and Who ate all the Turkey

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 15:20:21 PST

History is important.

If you don't know it, you'll probably repeat it.

Kids these days are lazy and don't know their history. At least that's what my doctor told me during one of my last $378 dollar visits while he tried to convince me to show some of his favorite BBC history shows at the TV station I work for.

So for the literally hundreds of people out there that have been waiting, here is the true ungarnished, non embellished story of how we really got the very first Thanksgiving.

Don't repeat it.

Thousands of years ago in Spain lived a man who liked nothing better than a good long trip to China. But his wife complained it was too long and, “You're so smart anyway why don'tcha find a quicker way or find a different wife to drag along.”

He agreed and in no time he and his three ships, The Nino the Pinto and the Santa Mario, that he borrowed from the Spanish Navy, were out on the open sea, sailing and singing gayly. But as the years wore on the singing grew less and less gay till it stopped completely. The men on board were just about to dump the guy overboard when the shout was heard, “Land ho!”

As the crew elbowed their way forward to their first glimpse of China they were surprised to not see the bustling skyscrapers of Beijing, and they grumbled in disgust as you might imagine. “India!” The man declared! “We've discovered a new route to India!”

As the crew threw up their hands with joy and began shouts of “Yay!” they were suddenly attacked from behind by giant Sea Beasts of a particularly veracious temperament. In seconds the crew, the three ships, everything in fact besides the left overs were completely devoured. The man known as Columbus miraculously survived, and so with his plank of wood as flotation, he began the swim back to his portage in Spain.

The next morning, he washed up on a famous Spanish beach whose name and location is lost to history but preserved in children's nursery rhyme. What we do know however is that the ship owners in Spain, a.k.a. Royalty, were completely unwilling to give Columbus any more boats to go sink on the far away shores of India. They also had some ridiculous notion that he should pay for them. So to appease them he gave them Mexico. When they asked were that was, he pointed to southern India. With dreams of a popular new cuisine and glorious battles against coon-skin capped individuals in churches, they graciously excepted and that's how we got burritos. But how did we come to Thanksgiving?

England,

Columbus' next choice for boats happened to have just what he was looking for. A man had a notice out that he had a ship full of people who were being kicked out of England for wearing their belts on their hats, and had no place to go but the open ocean since France refused sanctuary. This man, Ted Plymoth was contacted by Columbus shortly after about maybe possibly letting him guide the social outcasts along his new route to India. Ted thought that sounded alright since anyone traveling to a new land from England was automatically allowed to name it after himself, so was the exploration bonanza of the time.

So with glorious thoughts of a new Continent of Plymoth, the pilgrims and Mr. Columbus set out on the Mayflower which was latin for wood that floats or something like that, to find a new home far across the sea.

On the way there they ran out of food so they had to kill mermaids to survive. Finally they sighted land, but it was unlike any land they'd seen in England.

Just as Christopher Columbus was about to tell the amazed pilgrims that they should watch out and keep their heads low because this was about where his men were attacked before, a giant sea beast rose up out of the water and snatched him by the head,

and that was the end of the greatest man that ever lived.

But the pilgrims acted fast. They got out their machine guns and sawed that sea beast into little tiny chunks. That attracted a lot of Seaguls which was a good thing because they helped hide the boat. The Pilgrims looked back out at the land before them unlike any land they'd ever seen before.

Giant long necked lizard things were wandering around on the beach chasing the natives and eating them. The Pilgrims thought it might be a good idea to turn around and go back to England but they couldn't because the tide was going out and they were stuck on a big rock.

Ted Plymouth decided to name it after himself. So everybody decided rather than stay on the stupid boat and wait for another Plymouth beast to come around and eat them like the one that got Columbus they'd lower the Plymouth boats and go ashore to see what this new land of Plymouth had to offer.

Unfortunately for Ted, he fell on his way down to one of the Plymouth boats and drowned so they decided to name the land after his brothers Amer and Ica. As soon as they hit the shore a pack of velociraptors attacked the group dragging off several screaming individuals.

While this was happening a guy named John Smith aka our hero decided to chase after them and save the screaming people, but he soon lost them in the thick jungle. Over the sound of screaming he heard the beautiful sound of a girl singing about leaves and air blowing around. He soon found her and fell in love and was never seen again.

The remaining pilgrims mustered their courage and started a fort right there on the beach. As they busied themselves shooting anything that moved the natives watched from the forest forming their own opinions. The most popular conclusion was that these strange looking people were white devils from heck that wanted to kill everything and take the land to build K-Marts and Piggly Wigglies.

But one man named Squanto saw something good in these white devils and perhaps if they could just make friends with them, they could use the new pilgrim weapons to defeat the reptilian beasts and make the land safe again for children and wild flowers.

Most of the elders called him a long haired hippie till he demonstrated the superior firepower of the pilgrims by rushing a heard of apatosauruses down onto the beach in direct firing range of the new Jamestown Colony mortars.

When the smoke cleared and hunks of meat stopped falling from the sky. The Native American's and the pilgrims decided they should stop the senseless violence between themselves and join with each other temporarily to defeat the dinosaur scum infesting the island of America.

So they did.

They killed off every last dinosaur on the continent. To celebrate they cooked up all the lizard pieces and had a party where they sat outside at the end of November to eat because neither group wanted to invite the other group over to their houses for the dinner. It was pretty cold so this one really sappy pilgrim decided to go around the table and see what people were thankful for. And So was born the age old holiday of Thanksgiving.

And if you look closely today, you'll notice that on your thanksgiving table is the corpse of a bird flat on its back with its feet in the air, just like all the tyrannosaurs we had to fry back in the day a thousand years ago when we killed the dinosaurs.

We would like to add a disclaimer that this blog nor its subsidiaries endorse or condone any violence or maleficence toward dinosaurs be they herbivorous or otherwise disposed.

We like dinosaurs because they are special.

Hot Lunch

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 09:57:28 PDT

didn't matter what they were serving... always smelled the same.

Stairs

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 09:59:52 PDT

They can even turn average ordinary people into mouth breathers.

Once upon a time in Idaho

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 09:29:42 PDT

Here's a little diddy from when I went to school in Idaho. I was a 3D Studio Arts major hoping to one day go to film school. I loved making stuff and this project for my children's literature class was an opportunity to put my skills to work at a time when I felt like I didn't make anything ever. Now I've been in film school for a couple years and I make even less. So here's something I watch now wishing I was still that creative. Hopefully things will change soon.

the reason my car now looks like this take 2

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:51:43 PDT

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/08/15/1302691/tacoma-men-hurt-in-crash-near.html

there's a little news report. not sure how accurate that all is. I don't remember the accident or the couple days after. By Tuesday I think I'd realized from repetition that I wasn't dreaming we'd gotten in a car wreck on the way to Washington.

We'd actually done it.

I was at harborview medical center in Seattle where they moved me because of my condition Saturday night. The news piece says they took me to Yakima but my neck had been hammered down into my shoulders hard enough to dislocate my cervical vertebrae from my thoracic. So I arrived in Seattle a couple hours later where surgeons cleaned up my broken hand and set in a splint for a later surgery. They stretched my spine back into position, and fused my neck vertebrae to my chest vertebrae.

I was on heavy narcotics for the next couple of days till Mom informed them that I didn't use any stimulants at all. so they switched me to Tylenol and oxycodone which brought my mind back around just in time to prove to psychiatric evaluation that I hadn't sustained any brain damage. Which was good. Cuz nobody seemed to like the idea of brain damage.

So I've been sleeping a lot. And I got some new teeth which incidentally taste like bullets. I wanted to make sure if anyone else has teeth repaired that they pay close attention to taste. Course, you won't recognize the flavor if you've never had bullets in your mouth. Don't ask me how I do, its just one of those tastes you know from childhood like quarters and door knobs.

Anyway, the car is done. And I almost was. But I'm improving.

the reason my car now looks like this

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 19:47:34 PDT

coming
soon...

Rise and Rise Again, till Lambs Become Lions

noreply@blogger.com (Ben Brooksby) — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 20:04:19 PDT

I find my tolerance for older single men waining.

Granted,

I used to be one.

Still am in fact

... sort of.

But remember Robin Hood.

Even though he lived in the forest with a bunch of guys doing cool things like swimming and hunting and shooting bad guys, he still had Maid Marian off in a castle pining away for him.

Even if you appear single, you should always have a Maid Marian. Its really nice.

I know this because I've found mine. But she's about two-thousand miles away right now so I have time to do this.

No, the real problem lies with young men who lack nothing, but the gumption to rise up and be men. That's an old phrase so I imagine it's an old problem. I just happen to be of the right age and circumstance to have finally noticed it myself.

I have nothing against the socially inept,

of which we are all members in varying degrees.

But there are some among us, too many I feel, that would rather go back to being fourteen than face the reality that time advances on almost a yearly basis.

I'm 28 years old. When am I going to grow up? I find a wonderful remedy is to look at one's life and recognize what is different now that you are 28... or whatever ripe old number you choose.

You can vote.

You can buy firearms without a parent.

You can open and close bank accounts, get a real job, drive your own car, and not live at home.

If I want to eat, I have to go to the store and buy groceries. The magical self clearing table and self emptying sink is gone from my life.

If I want clean dishes and to avoid botchulism, I have to clean them with dish soap.

I have to buy it.

At a store.

That means a certain amount of my income has to be spent on things I don't drool over in catalogs.

The magic of the bedroom and bathroom floor also disappeared when I moved out of my parent's home. My clothes have forgotten how to clean themselves and appear in my drawer hours after hitting the floor.

The startling thing to me is the number of men my age who still think these things just magically take care of themselves; that if you leave things out, they will somehow organize themselves and be found, clean, folded, sparkling, and or sorted neatly in some appointed place without any effort on your own part.

Its maddening.

And that's leaving out all the other strikingly annoying perceptions and habits of single guys my age- one of which is dating.

I get that rejection stinks.

And I get that sometimes it seems like nobody is interested.

And I further get that "it used to be easier."

And when it stopped being easy was probably about the time you got dumped or dissed or jilted or something horrible which no one else could possibly understand because it was the first time in the history of the world that someone felt lied to and got broken-hearted.

Guess WHAT! Everybody faces rejection!

IT IS A REALITY.

Perhaps we should thank rejection for just a moment for allowing us the chance to move beyond our first crush which we forgot all about because it was kindergarten.

If it weren't for rejection, you would be stuck with that girl from junior high. The one that liked you because she didn't know you yet and that you didn't like back.

Yeah.

That one.

Without rejection, you'd be married to her. So thank rejection.

Please.

It bugs me.

Why can't a guy that is this old learn that when a girl rejects you, you should stop pursuing?

Should he not have learned this years ago? Learn to read body language. There are books on it. Read one. When you've met someone and they seem really nice at first but then turn cold and are hard to get a hold of, stop trying. Just leave her alone. You're wasting your time, making her uncomfortable, and making yourself a nuisance.

Go away.

Also can guys stop singing the inverted Snow White song of, "Someday my princess will come."?

This is not how it works!

She doesn't come to you.

I know too many who think the idea of arranged marriage is a good one.

You have no taste.

Get some.

Your obligation and duty as an adult male is to go out into the world and find HER.

This involves dating.

You have to try out different people and relationships and get to know how to behave generally so that by the time you get to be my age, you're already married because no girl could resist the man you've become.

You've got to learn that its not fun being alone forever.

And if its not, then how much is it worth to not be.

And if its worth a lot like we're talking up there with breathing, then you'd better learn that when you see a girl you have interest in, and you haven't met her, and you still don't have a date, there had better be Hellishly good reasons why not, like that your face is on fire and your hands are chained to an enraged grizzly bear on PCP.

If you look around and none of those things are happening, you better get over there and meet her because if she's good enough to notice, she's good enough to date.

Your excuses will kill you.

Stop thinking before you do something good.

Treat this like the latest dumb thing you did. Did any consequence cross your mind before you did whatever it was you did?

NO.

SO WHY NOW???

Stop it immediately. Stand up and be men.

And can we stop with the high school girl thinking puzzles?

I get that girl's mature faster than boys, but is this really where you are?

When you've met someone interesting, but things seem to be kind of impossible and you aren't sure if this could work out or not- STOP.

Stop your stupid internal dialogue. You've only been on one date anyway.

There's only one question you need to ask yourself,

"Am I still interested?"

If the answer is yes, then you go out again and you find out how you feel from the actual reality of being with her, not at home or on long drives.

If you have something to say, say it to her.

Stop telling your friends what you're wondering.

Build some freaking intimacy between you and her and ask her directly what she thinks about things. You'll get a lot farther, and your friends will respect you more because you don't sound like a sixteen year old girl anymore.

And if you're not interested anymore, stop calling her.

Can we also stop feeling inadequate, unattractive and altogether lost in life?

I am tired of hearing people say how lost they feel.

This is life. Its supposed to be a surprise!

If you plan on getting married someday, having a career, and even a family, then do something about it.

Can everybody just stop worrying about the future for a moment and evaluate what you've learned about the world at this point,

what goals you've set for your future,

what accomplishments no matter how small you've made,

and then start to feel good about it?

Can you please just stop complaining and appreciate for one small moment the infinitesimally small contribution you've made in the world?

Can you for one moment look forward to the future with a little bit of confidence and say to yourself,

"That's where I'm going to be. And this is what I'm going to do to get there."

You find whatever you can do to advance.

You figure out some way to work on it every week and you write it down.

And then you do it.

This practice will give you confidence and direction. You'll find yourself more confident in your future because you're doing something about it today, and you know it. And when you do find someone you're interested in, you'll have developed a direction for your life.

If you plan on growing up someday and getting married, chances are the girl you marry will love you.

Quite a lot actually.

So can you start living like you mean it?

If someone is going to love and adore you, then maybe you ought to start figuring out why.

Then maybe you can walk with a little confidence that you actually do possess some good qualities.

In a world where childhood seems to be extending farther and farther into adulthood, can some of us stand up and shine a little.

Manhood, adulthood, and Robin Hood are what we should be growing up to be. Especially Robin Hood because he could shoot arrows and Maid Marian couldn't live without him.

So go find her.