It was dismal, rainy, cold and a Friday night.  We were all tired from our work weeks, and I had forgotten how low the energy level is on our Friday night shoots.  But it's real low.  Add to that cold and rain, and you've got a recipe for disaster.

But the show must go on, and we had the advantage of yet again being hosted by the awesome Shalkoskis.  Also I had Stacey, Mark, Maura, Rajah, Tony & Jim--Bjort MVPs--so what could go wrong?  Well it did start raining, but we said, "bring it on!"  Actually I think I said, "please God stop," but you get the point.

So we started with a dinner break--always good to start with--of pizza, beer, and not one but two kinds of Doritos.  Jim spares no expense when we're at his house.  He, Stacey, and Maura warmed themselves by the fire in the garage which was really a space heater next to a few pieces of wood wrapped in red strands of Valentine's Day decorations (unlit).  What a bunch of weirdos.  We were lucky, season-wise, that the scene is supposed to be taking place in early February and New England being as it is, we were able to see our breath outside, even though it was May.

Rajah and I planned out the most aesthetically pleasing areas to shoot but nobody liked them because of the non-February foliage that would be in every shot.  Maura suggested we shoot by the fence, which ended up making perfect sense to show the neighborly rivalry.  The scene is all about Mitch feeling threatened by the decorations Paul is putting up, so he brags about all of his elaborate Valentine's plans.

We set up a tent to house the camera and monitor, had a Tota (yay, Tota!!!) up on the deck under an umbrella, and got really good lighting.  Maura and Stacey worked on the set decoration and made the fence extremely festive and red.  While we went over Jim's script, it was dark enough that we needed to use Maura's glow-in-the-dark flashlight thing, which illuminated especially Jim's highlighted lines in an awesome glowing blue.  And we felt like CSIs.  Of course, usually when CSIs look under a blue light and see things glow, it's either blood or...something else.  Which is how we decided we must be looking at the "shooting" script.  Thank you, folks, I'm here all week.

So the actual shoot was great and seemingly effortless.  Tony & Jim were really funny in the scene, and I really got the rivalry from their performances.  It's amazing how much of the movie we've done by now and actually a lot of the competition scenes are those that we have left to do (given that it's a big part of the plot). 

The boys did great, as always, and I think we all had a good time even though we were getting a little wet and the mic cords got muddy, and we had to move the light closer for tight shots so Mark and Maura traded off holding an umbrella over the light, and we had our fair share of bloopers, and Rajah was taking photos of himself lit by the Tota for an hour and a half, and Maura spent a good amount of time trying to take a decent picture of me which is a near impossible task, and Stacey was bummed out because she didn't feel like she was doing enough, and I decided not to slate which bothered Mark, and Tony had an exhausting day doing all of his many careers.  So basically Jim had a good time.  But he always does.

Seriously the shoot went very well, and my thanks to the cast, the crew, and the Shalkoskis for another awesome night.