Hey kids, how's things.

Tuesday morning we left for California earlier than blue jays wake up and it's been non-stop filming/ man cuddling since we left. About an hour or two after our plane landed, we were already setting up for our first interview with the founder of The Falling Whistles Project, Sean Carasso. It was amazing and we all felt that we enjoyed almost everything that he brought to the table. In the past Dan has been asking most of the interview questions, but this time I made a point of shooting a few out there. I think the best part of this interview, not to discredit Sean, would have to be that we did the interview in a warehouse, with Dan and me seated on a shop vac and a bucket respectively. I dont know about you, but shop vac chairs scream Give A Damn? to me.

On top of being a solid interview, speaking with Sean was a good opportunity to get our feet wet with our gear and get acquainted with the newest contributors to Give A Damn, Gloria Cohen and Melissa Cobb. Melissa is a film maker from LA, whom Dan has known for a while and I was fortunate enough to work with her last summer on the independent feature The Ice Shield of Alethia with her. Gloria is a sound engineer that I met last fall while working on Nothing Rhymes With Orange, which was filmed in Springfield, MO. I must say that I love girls that kick ass at film making, and these two are certainly the ass kicking type. Melissa gaffed and manned the camera, while gloria rocked the mixer and the boom mic.

Last night we crashed at Felicia Heykoop's house and in the morning I found an orange tree in the backyard and David and I went nuts on some hand picked oranges. I had never had a fresh picked orange and it was incredible.... I wanted to pick them all, fill a bathtub and then dive in like Scrooge McDuck in his money bin. Seriously, they were that good.

Later that morning we got one of the interviews that we were most excited about, Jason Russell the founder of Invisible Children. We really didn't know what to expect but we were all blown away by how real and legit Jason as well as everyone else on the IC team was. David even admitted being a little star struck, which was the complete opposite of me giving the fact that I had never even seen their film. As much as I want to see Invisible Children, Dan and I made the decision months ago that I should try and avoid any hardcore Africa doc or influences that might potentially prematurely affect my perception. Basically, if there is going to be radical changes in me, we want it to happen on camera and not in my living room, if that makes any sense.

I flat out told Jason about how I wasn't allowed to see the film, but I really wanted to once the film was completed, and he subsequently hooked me up with a copy of the DVD, which he signed, and a handful of other things that I really dig. I must say Jason really impressed me and I'm glad we got the opportunity to interview him. It blew us away when we got to show him the four minute trailer for Give A Damn?

Also today we finally met up with our Director of Photography, Kyle Stryker, and our second temp gaffer Ricky Norris. After the Jason Interview we headed down to the nearby beach in San Diego and did some man on the street interviews, which also went quite well. My bald head got burnt for the first time today, but thankfully it wasn't all that severe.

Added, the two days later:

I cannot emphasize how well the Cali trip is going thus far, except for a few technical difficulties on a key interview. It seems that although all the interviews so far have been from people in the same genre and mindset, each one had their own set of amazing advice and ideas to contribute. Time is very tight right now so I don't have much more energy to give as many details as I would like, however it would be a shame if i didn't at least give a quick summary.

After the interview with Laren from IC on Thursday, we drove from the Ocean Beach IC office out to their corporate headquarters and subsequently interviewed the president of the organization as well as another member of the staff. Each one of the three interviews that day we're amazing enough to warrant their own blog entries, but I'll have to come back to that later.

Friday, we decided to fix the fact that I have never been out of the country by driving down to Mexico for a few hours. Although we were all a bit nervous about trucking camera gear in, we sucked it up and did it anyway. Ricky Norris frequently visits an orphanage so we thought it was too good to pass up. Again, I don't have time to go into detail about the day, but I thoroughly enjoyed all aspects of the day. I'm not really a "kid person" and I intended on keeping a distance from the kids, however we got swarmed by cute little kids and there was no way it could be avoided, and I was glad about it in the end. The photos were taken by Ricky.

Tomorrow, we're headed to Venice beach to spread the word about the film and get some good "man on the street" interviews, and then later that night we're sucking it up and driving up to San Francisco for an interview that we have with Richard Carrier. I am extremely excited about the interview since it is the one interview that we have scheduled that is not in the Jesus camp. I don't want to label him, and I certainly have no idea where the interview might go, but it is going to be good.

Alright, I'm exhausted, much more to come later. I beg you guys, if you take the time to read this, leave a comment and encourage me to keep active in the blog. We're stretched pretty thin as far as timing, and I'm making these updates a priority, so throw me a bone and at least say, "I read it".

-Rob
Give A Damn?