It's been an incredibly busy time frame over the past week and a bit but to offset that I have a 6 day break coming up {because of the way the work roster has shaped up} from Good Friday onwards.
There was some urgent freelance editing work that Lance referred me for outside of work and I ended up getting that gig. Over the past few days my time was totally consumed with the edit project, on top of my usual work at TVNZ. It's good for my travel fund as any money from the freelance edit project is going into that. Those were some incredibly long hours but the buzz I've got from it was awesome and best of all my productivity was high and the error rate was minimal.
In addition to all this I managed to sneak in another shoot for 'Moments' with Lorraine. I was pretty happy with my shot compositions and the performance was bang on target as well. I am now hoping to get atleast a couple more scenes done over the easter weekend and hope to have another rehearsal in place to shoot that scene straight after. The long break coming up will also give me some quality time editing stuff together for the movie.
I move back to morning shifts at work after the long easter break and that'll get my exercise routine back on track just in time to get my cardio levels hunky dory for the Borneo trek. Changes are aplenty at work - the company has to somehow save $40 million this year in face of lower advertising revenues because of recession plus there is the big digital workflow project that's being implemented right now to go live later this year. As part of the cost-cutting process there is an organizational restructure again this year and there are more job losses at the company overall and the next few weeks will be an extremely hard time at work as the consultation takes place before the new structures are finalized. And then a tough few months as people get to know if they've got jobs beyond November 2010. It's a hard one for me as well as my Borneo trip coincides with the job interviews but I am talking to HR to see if I can do a phone interview while I am travelling. Fingers crossed that it somehow pans out, i'd hate to think otherwise.
On the home front - the couple who have the ensuite in the house are moving out as well as the girl is going travelling for a couple of months, so time to find new flatties for the big ensuite. And I am trying to sublet my room for the duration I am travelling so that I have some spending money during the travels.
In whatever spare time I've been getting I've squeezed in the following books: Vagabonding by Rolf Potts {also check out his website}; Amazon by Bruce Parry & A Cook's Tour by Anthony Bourdain. Vagabonding inspires you to just travel to expand your horizons - and no - that doesn't mean doing tours. My next trip- whenever it happens will be without a tour. Just me and my backpack and the expectations of the unexpected. Amazon was a sad journey and it just proves there is so much about our world that we don't know - especially in the cities. Our consumer lifestyle is destroying flora, fauna and even human tribes in weird ways but as a person living in the city we don't really care about that as long as our way of life is protected. A Cook's Tour was delightful from start to end and takes your through a whirlwind tour of different world cusines through the frank and uncensored thoughtfulness of Anthony Bourdain. It makes me want to go to Vietnam today.
That's me for now. More over the big holiday weekend.
Amit
