Time-lapse video of my ninety minute commute from the Hollywood Hills to the beach in Hermosa. Soundtrack is “Kettering” by The Antlers.

This is what you get when you ask me to do Charlie work.

Coworker’s email:

Hey Dave,

Attached is the updated list we need for the demo. You’ll remember this spreadsheet well enough I’m sure. Please note the audio format on the spreadsheet.

:)
John

My reply:

Dear Mr. John,

It was certainly a surprise and quite the pleasure to hear from you. I’m glad to hear that everything is going swell for you.

Events on this side of the Atlantic Ocean sure are moving at a rabbit’s pace! I’ve been sent upon many wondrous adventures since declaring these United States of America my home. For instance just last week I was privy to a breath-taking ride on the most wonderful flying contraption. The gentleman called it a zeppelin! It was as if I myself was a cloud in the sky! Magnificent, I tell you!

And only yesterday I was introduced to the most curious young man named Henry Ford. He has the most preposterous dream to create horseless carriages. Can you believe that? What a devil of an idea. I wish for a moment that I had only but half the ingenuity these modern geniuses effortlessly flaunt about!

I’ve been in this city of Angeles for a mere six months, but let me tell you, I foresee this town maintain its quiet low-profile or decades to come. They’re building a small rail system to carry you about town and there isn’t the slightest feeling of overcrowding. And the theater here is marvelous and entertaining to boo!

Oh, and your stupid videos are here:

http://www.super-secret-internal-file-server-location.com

Hope all is well and looking forward to your next correspondence!

Best,
David M. Sliozis

Took me longer to write that reply than it did to do the work he need.

Inspired by the Canon Canonet QL 17 GIII.

Quite awhile ago, my Tivo (rest his soul), recorded The Brady Bunch episode, “Lost Locket—Found Locket” for my viewing mild-pleasure. I honored his movement by writing a lengthy review of the episode. I yanked it from the vaults and blatantly reposted it to give the appearance of new content.

“Lost Locket—Found Locket” (1970)

Open on another sunny Brady day. Jan sits alone in the girl’s bedroom when Alice arrives with fresh laundry. Alice, with her snaked tongue, asks Jan if she has “Nothing better to do but goof off on a Saturday.” Alas, we find out that Carol took Marsha to some hippie art class and Mike is down at the playground with little Cindy. Thus, leaving the queen of mope, Jan, alone. Alice quips that she’s going to go back downstairs and “goof off with some more ironing.” But Jan is not alone for long.

Carol barges in and delivers a small package to Jan. For some reason Carol then proceeds to elaborate on the address on the package and proudly declares, “To Jan Brady. 4222 Clinton Way, City.”

I don’t get the “city” either.

Jan tears into the package, first awed by a blue jewelry box. Go on Jan, there’s more than just a box here. Jan cracks open the box to reveal a golden locket. Of course, being the forgotten child, Jan about craps herself that someone gave her something. Jan also notices that there isn’t a card or return address. This doesn’t sit well with Carol. Carol makes a note to check who is in her daughter’s “Top 24″ friends on her MySpace account. Carol puts the locket on Jan and gives an uneasy look. Partly because this is just weird, but she also knows that her clown step-sons are going to open up their go-to “private eye” kit and start a manhunt.

Jan stands before the bedroom mirror, admiring her bling. Marsha and Cindy stand nearby, listening to Jan scratch and claw to hang onto the spotlight.

Carol’s fears come true. Mike and the boys are trying to use their primitive 1970 technology to determine where the package came from. Greg points out that Jan the Beggar ripped the postmark when she opened the package. Peter has the same question we do, “If something is just addressed, CITY, doesn’t that mean it was sent from the same city?”

Look at you, Peter! Who knew?

Mike declares Peter to be using “logic” to solve this caper of capers. Bobby, of course, plays his “wacky antics” card and takes the magnifying glass from Greg, who is trying to get real work done. Bobby shouts, “WOW! I just found something out!” Low and behold, he’s baited the boys and they’ve bit. Bobby burns them by looking at them through the magnifying glass and shouting, “Everything is much bigger!”

Jerk.

Greg reclaims the magnifying glass and finds and actual clue. The typewriter that typed the address “dropped it’s Y.” Meaning all the letter Y’s don’t align with the rest of the text. Stupid Peter doesn’t think that’s much of a clue, but Mike, without calling his son an ass, says otherwise.

The girls sit on Jan’s bed, theorizing who Jan’s “secret admirer” might be and throwing around the word, “scad.” Jan plans on wearing the locket to the library in hopes of smoking one Willie Dawlripple out of hiding.

Peter and Bobby scheme to use Bobby’s “fingerprint kit” to lift the prints off the jewelry box. Mike has to step in again, watching his hopes of his kids going to college go down in flames. He sternly challenges them, “Yeah? And even if you found a finger print, what would you do with it?” Peter wants to send the fingerprints to the FBI. Stupid Peter.

Carol yammers on about the jewelry box in Mike’s home office while he slaves over another set of blueprints. Carol snaps up, she thinks her half-brained Aunt Martha might have sent the locket because she’s a.) fond of Jan and b.) very forgetful. Carol gives Martha a call. And what a call it is. “Martha? It’s Carol. Carol. Carol Brady. YOUR NIECE!” Carol figures out that Martha isn’t the gift giver, however the Bradys can be expecting a totem pole in the mail. With the Martha lead gone cold, Carol tells Mike that they have to focus on the typewriter that typed the address. Mike offers, “Finding a typewriter that drops its Y’s is like finding a needle that dropped its haystack.”

Cut to much later that night, Alice and Carol sneak into Mike’s office to use Mike’s typewriter. They’ve thrown the clever dog off by telling Mike they’ve gone out to buy a coat for Alice. Carol’s “female intuition” thinks Mike sent the locket. Carol loads the typewriter and Alice shoves her aside to do the typing. Alice LOVES typing. However, instead of typing one word with a Y, she proceeds to type some long sentence to heighten the suspense. When Alice finally hits the Y, Carol is disappointed. This isn’t the typewriter they’re looking for. But oh no! An office security guard catches them! When asked about how they got in, Carol shoots off her mouth, “I have a key to this building that ALSO unlocks this office.” This is where she should have been maced. Carol babbles on about how it’s her husband’s office, blah, blah. Awkward “years later we’d know the secret” line of the episode, the security guard says, “I’m going to call him and ask him if he knows about a dame masquerading as his WIFE.” Eesh. Before the officer can spin the rotary dial one more time, Carol explains the locket story and the guard lets them go.

Mike hammers away at Carol’s keyboard in his home office. Greg is there…doing something. Mike is typing out the ENTIRE ALPHABET to see if Carol’s typewriter drops the Y. No dice. Greg calls the stability of his parent’s marriage into question, asking why Carol wouldn’t tell him and if they trust each other. Mike quickly packs up the “portable” typewriter and puts it back so Carol won’t know. Greg sassily muses, “I’m beginning to think we’ll never know who sent that locket to Jan.”

Bedtime for the Bradys. Mike exits the bathroom and asks Carol if they had any luck getting “the coat.” This of course baffles Carol. Coat? What coat? I don’t know about a……oooooooh, THAT coat. Carol covers her ass and says they didn’t buy one. Carol strangely asks how Jan is, and Mike replies even more strangely that “she was fine when she went to bed.” Is there a deleted scene? Last time we saw Jan she was skipping around because her parents knew her name now. Mike and Carol kiss goodnight, Carol wants to finish the chapter in her book.

Down the hall, Jan slowly wakes up, clutching for the locket. IT’S GONE! But then, instead of looking for it, or just worrying about it in the morning, she proceeds to SCREAM BLOODY MURDER! “OH NO! OH NOOOO!”

Mike and Carol dash from their bed, expecting to see a pack of giant wolves feasting on the still living body of their middle daughter. When they get to the bedroom, Marsha is sitting next to Jan and Cindy is doing a truly half-assed job of checking the bed. Jan explains, “I wore it to bed a couple of hours ago. Then something woke me up, and I found it was…GONE!” Mike and Carol calm Jan, but her heart is broken. Her spotlight…fading.

The next morning, the boys straighten up their room and fret about the “real mystery” they have on their hands. Peter spews out the idea that they should solve this like they do on TV, but recreating the crime. They’ll get all two-hundred members of the family to be exactly where they were when Jan’s locket was “stolen.” Bobby says something stupid to round out the scene.

Greg tells Mike that they want to re-enact the crime and Mike replies to his son with an almost offended tone, “A re-enactment of the WHAAAAA?” Greg continues to explain to Ma and Pa that he believes the locket was stolen. Carol states that she knows everyone was in bed that night, but Greg cracks under the pressure of being a goody-goody, “Well…not everyone, Mom.” Junkie. Greg confessed that he and Peter were raiding the fridge…junkies.

Carol asks Jan if she was asleep when the locket went walking. Marsha confesses that she was indeed not asleep. She was “studying” in bed.

Bobby tells Mike that he was brushing his teeth. Mike hits back, “At ten o’clock at night?” with a tone of, “my youngest is an ass.”

Greg puts the screws into Alice. Alice says she was writing a letter to her sister in the living room, which then for some reason, apologizes for being out of her room and risking being seen amongst the upper-class. Mike and Carol tell Alice about the re-enactment plan. Alice says her sister will be stunned to receive two letters from her in the same week! Alice…fake the letter this time. Seriously.

Ten o’clock. Mike and Carol are in bed, going along with the re-enactment.

Greg and Peter walk back into their room, food in hand. Junkies. Bobby is brushing his teeth

Jan sighs, her prized locket, gone forever. Marsha barks out to Jan, “YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE ASLEEP!” Crap Marsha, relax. Jan tries to sleep.

The boys talk amongst themselves, Bobby still has toothpaste in his mouth because Greg told him to get to bed.

Alice pens her letter. The boys get anxious.

Jan FLIPS out.

She sits upright and Mike and Carol rush in. Jan explains that her scream is a “happy scream.” Mmmhmm…time to give Jan the ol’ “talk.” Jan tears into her story, mentioning something about “the little bear.” She babbles on, talking about stars. Oh, not “the little bear,” but the constellation, “The Little Bear.” Whatever. Jan runs to the window where she was star gazing and slides it open. She pokes her head out, since apparently Mike didn’t build their house with screens. Jan looks down and sho’ ’nuff, the locket is in the bushes. The rest of the family rushes in, all celebrating the fact that spaz got her locket back.

However, we still don’t know who sent the locket…do we…

The next morning, Alice makes breakfast for Jan. Jan is shits & giggles about getting her locket back. Alice admits that she did fake writing the second letter. Alice tells Jan that she’s getting older and has a secret she’d like to keep between them.

Alice returns with another typewriter, and Jan clanks out her last name a few times. And OH MY EFFING GOD, Alice is the one who sent the stupid locket that caused two sleepless nights for the family. Thanks Alice. Alice reveals that she herself is a middle daughter, between Emily and Myrtle. Myrtle probably had a bangin’ bod. Alice tells Jan she’s giving her the locket so she doesn’t feel forgotten.

ALICE: “This batted old typewriter has a date with a screwdriver, and nobody but you and I will ever know that for a few days you were…special.”

JAN: “Alice, as long as I have this locket, I’ll always feel, that I’m something special.”

Rebuilding and cleaning house. Cliched patience asked for. Version 31.0.