When I woke up this morning at 4:30 I still couldn't believe that in less than five hours I'd be in Park City Utah covering the Slamdance film festival, never the less capturing Jodie Foster on video, but i'll get into that later. Because, in all honesty if I gave that away in the first five minutes would you read the rest? It never really gets much better than that, even when you have pull.

So, I think the best way to begin this would be when we were starting our descent into Salt Lake City's Airport. (I'm not sure of the actual name if there is one, but to research that would just be to much trouble for such a fucking--I'm not even gonna go into that). So, we're coming down through the clouds which completely engulf the plane and give me a terrifying yet some how peaceful view. Maybe the fact that I couldn't see anything, except the mid-collision scene from Fight club looping endlessly in my head. Thanks Dave. So, just as I was convinced that another plane would rip through ours, I began to see patches of snow. Now, any normal person would've dismissed this at first glance, but since I'd never seen real snow I guess that disqualifies me as such. I mean i was really looking forward to this. It was one of the many expected highlights for me, so when we landed under a beautiful blanket of snow the sense of reality that I thought i'd feel by landing wasn't there but it didn't matter, for now I was here.

After we land, we make our way inside where we'll wait for the next three hours waiting for web and his wife on a plane that will apparently have "technical difficulties". The wait wasn't as bad as I had anticipated but it was a little discomforting non the less on little sleep.

The next hour or so plays like all travel, once the destinations been reached, by airplane anyway, we spend our time battling lines for baggage and getting our rental car, which to mention was very very nice, a GMC Yukon which wasn't quite as extravagant or overbearing as a limo but special, nice and different, it was just another thing to transport me to where i'm writing to you from now.

We arrive at our pad and do this and that and okay, okay i'll just get on with it and stop trying to romanticize it all.

We jump in the car, THE GUYS: Lodger, myself, Web and Stubbyp and head on over to downtown to the festival. Web and Stubby drop me and Lodger off in front of the slamdance building where we head inside Lodger leading the way as I try and keep up COPS style (i actually had the urge to kick in a few doors, seeing as how we're immediately consumed by the same raging I'M GONNA BE SOMTHING AND I'M GONNA DO SOMETHING attitude). We make our way down the main hallway where we're immediately grabbed by one of the filmmaker's who was hyping his film (plug) A GALAXY FAR, FAR AWAY. This would turn out to be a perfect setup to a great evening, where everyone's pushing their films with an equal amount of passion that got them made in the first place. Did this intimidate me towards making films--no. But, it definitely showed me what you gotta do and that was one of the many great things that i'd learn over the course of this FIRST evening. It really opened my eyes. They just can't teach that in a film school, you have to see it up front. The desperation and the ferocity, each gladly taking the place of the other.

So anyway, we resume our trek down the hall into the dark cavernous interior of this mad mad party, where lodger sees a few people who he recognizes. After chatting for a few minutes, we continued on to the press table which didn't really involve me too much, so i just continued to film. After a while of filming the same scene "My name's Lodger", they'd look through their files--nothing. And over and over again.

Now, this may seem more of an inconvenience than it actually was. They were very helpful and would've probably given us the passes if we hadn't made reservation.

And then, that's when I hear out of the corner of my ear that Jodie Foster is outside, which of course I'm skeptical (again due to my delayed sense of belief) that'd she'd actually be outside going for a stroll.

But, then the better part of my senses or maybe my tabloid cultured mind, kicks me in the ass and i go out to sneak a peak. And sure enough there she is walking down the sidewalk with a crowd engulfing her like pig pen's dirt cloud doing what I'm basically doing what i am, which is really abnormally kind of normal when you see someone like Jodie Foster walking down the street you have to take to a picture, because it's JODIE FUCKING FOSTER. Now, I did snipe a few seconds of footage of her from afar, which I thought that was a little more respectful than jamming my camera in her face and asking her some dumb question or quote, which believe me i would have loved to have done if i was just that numb. But, I'm not and a HUGE fan of TAXIDRIVER and there was just something in my subconscious that said "look don't be that guy".

I think I did the right thing and got what i wanted, so... The rest of the evening is such a blur, I was running from here to there filming this and that, handing out cards left and right, and receiving an equal amount. I really wanted to see at least one feature but lucked out.

I did see one short that I liked quite a bit called THE REGULAR MENU, if you get a chance check it out, it has some good stuff in it and the director was very nice (we'll have an interview with him soon). After the interview, my first actually, I met back up with Stubby and we waited for Web and Lodge to get out of A GALAXY FAR, FAR AWAY (the film that I wanted to see) after which I recorded some audio of the Q&A that went on.

After a while of trying to figure out "what to do next" (what party to go to), we decided that we needed to get back and start putting together the site for tomorrow which is actually today as I write my few last words to you from the filethirteen temporary HQ in Park City, Utah where we'll be spending the next five days bringing you goods from the festival that slammed my ass. And i can't wait for it to happen again and again and again and again and again. So, come back.

TIM the Wonder Horse

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