How Exactly is this an 'Illusion'??

Magician David Blaine to spend 7 days submerged in water

NEW YORK (AFP) - Having starved himself and been frozen in ice, US magician David Blaine now plans to spend seven days submerged in a water-filled container in New York.

The latest stunt by the renowned illusionist will seem him enter an eight-foot (2.5-meter) high acrylic sphere on May 1 and remain submerged for a week.

A mask and air line will keep him alive, while food will be provided in the form of liquid nutrition through a tube. [More]

Jack Bauer Kill Count Update

I watch the show like a religion for weeks and nothing, I go away on vacation and Jack goes on a killing spree! In a total of 3 episodes Jack killed no less than 7 people. That is a significant increase from the past months worth of episodes. Plus, all the hullabaloo that Jack can do with his PDA and he DOESN'T copy the digital recording of the prez on it?! WTF Jack!!!

Woah! Missed an Important Date!

After my last post I looked into my archive only to realize it's been ONE YEAR I've been keeping this blog up, wow..Happy Anniversary to me!

Officially it was April 9th, so I'm a little late, and since I forgot I'm also going to put myself in the doghouse for not remembering. I am officially mad at myself, and will buy myself flowers and chocolates to apologize to myself..then comes the makeup sex!

I shouldn't think things...it just leads to oddness..

Page Spring Cleaning

I made a few changes to the page today, most noticeably the front banner which now features a new pic that I like. I also updated the books I've read/reading, and a first new update on any new movies I've seen (I see way too many so it's hard to keep that updated). I also changed the current CD's I've been listening to mostly (yeah Madonna....shutup).

I'll be posting more this weekend, including 2 new Jack Bauer updates since I missed 24 while I was in New Zealand. I'm downloading them now to watch (what...I'm not gonna burn them or anything! Just watching them! Ok ok I'll buy the season when it comes out..jeez!)

Caught 'Stay' on DVD tonight, was okish some things seemed off..but whatever!

More New Zealand Pics

The mega-huge gallery of NZ pics is now online..I will attempt to put titles and descriptions for all the pics...but I do like to sleep..so don't expect that to happen anytime soon! Enjoy!!

Winding Down

Our Wellington trip is winding down, today was our last full day and it was one of the only cloudy and miserable days of our trip. The weather influenced our mood as we felt blah and tired all day, we woke up a little later and only decided what to do around noon.

We went back to the Embassy to catch a movie 'March of the Penguins', which was great. I wanted a tea so I went to the food area, they present me with a big teapot, teacup, all in fine china...this place is classy! It was so odd to carry that whole thing into the cinema. The movie was very charming and interesting, it made me a little more sad for that dead penguin we saw at Ta Taka earlier in the week...poor thing.

We then went back to the hotel and I napped again...only to get up in time for dinner..with everything closed for Easter Sunday we had to choose between Thai food....I got sick of that so we opted for McDonalds. Now we're back here watching TV..it's time to go home I think..we're both home sick :)

So here are the top 10 things we noticed that are really different from home:

10. Elevators are called lifts
9. Bathrooms are called toilets
8. No overpasses, only roundabouts
7. Every restaurant supplies you with a wine bottle full of water
6. Take-Out is known as Take Away
5. Giant 50 cent coins
4. Driving on the opposite side of the road
3. Phones don't have dialtones like at home
2. Crosswalks make noise for the seeing impared
1. Driving on the opposite side of the car

Oriental Bay, Wellington

Today was spent mainly at lovely Oriental Bay in Welltington. Reminding me very much of Miami beach in Florida, Oriental Bay features cafe's, shops, a boardwalk and a beach.

We walked along the beach for a while, there were tons of kids, pets and people enjoying a lovely Saturday afternoon. I promised a loser, er, friend of mine back home that I'd get him some sand and water from New Zealand for his collection. We needed to buy a bottle to use, so I spent extra money for water I wasn't going to drink...grr..

After taking off my shoes and socks I waded into the cold water and got a sample for him. The Wifey then got some hot dogs and we just relaxed in the sunshine. We decided to get some dessert at a roadside ice-cream place, I couldn't get anything but she got a cholocate covered cone. It started to melt way too fast for her and she was forced to either swallow it all or throw it away, she had to chuck it.

We passed another cafe and I got a brownie...yumm

We then headed back to the New World Supermarket to pick up some more food for the rest of our stay. Then we chilled back at the hotel (took a nice long map). We tried to find a nice place for dinner but almost everything was either closed or something we didn't want to eat. We caved again and went back to the hotel for a way too overpriced dinner. I got lamb and Wifey got steak, and some good wine..mmmm.

We're now in the hotel catching Spider-Man 1 on TV.

Cable Car Goodness and Quest Fulfilled!!!

Well I finally did it, we got to the Embassy Theatre at the right time to take a look at my seat! More on that later.

Last night we went to this really cool Mexican place called 'The Flying Burrito Brothers' on Cuba St.. It was a neat little place with a hip trendy feel to it. I had a fajita plate while the Wifey had A Flying Burrito (it didn't fly). We left there and headed back to the hotel to catch a movie on my DVD player (Constantine).

This morning we both woke up quite late...and hungry! We caved and nicked two chocolate bars from the hotel fridge..WAY overpriced!! We then headed out to the parliment building located not too far from us. The place is called 'The Beehive' because of it's unique shape. All around the parliment there was some amazing greenspaces and statues. It is good friday today so parking was free and there weren't that many people out, plus the weather was so amazing! We took a ton of pics.

Next we went to another very trendy little cafe right next to the Embassy Theatre on Kent St. They had all this vegan food and really good cookies. Then...it was time...time for my seat!

We went into the theatre and asked for the guidebook that details all the seat numbers in alphabetical order. Mine was V36, back row, almost in the middle. We got into the theatre and I found my seat..what a thrill! We took some photos of my ass placed firmly in my seat. We then went around looking at other seat names, all the stars from LOTR donated money and have a seat named after them. I'm next to a knight Sir Ben something, and another name I can't recall. I left the theatre feeling very accomplished in my seat quest.

After that we were at a bit of a loss as to what to do, so we decided to find the Wellington Cable Car and ride it to the top. The cable car is very old, and has been around forever, at the top of the track there is a museum showing really great photos of the old cars, the track, and the surrounding area. We took a walk through the botanical gardens and saw a wild cat who looked a lot like our cat Willow. We are both missing her a whole lot so it was nice to get some 'cat time' with this friendly wild cat.

We left the cable car area and took a walk through the surrounding outdoor shops. Everything was closed since it was Good Friday, but the weather was so nice that I didn't want to leave. We then tried to find an open grocery store, but alas all we could do is get to a local grocery store and pick up orange juice...I wanted real food dammit!

Tonight is my turn to choose dinner so naturally we're going to order chinese and stay in the hotel to chill. Something about eating dinner in my PJ's really appeals to me.

Ah...New Zealand...I love this place!

Sitting Down? It's a Long One!

Yesterday was a really cool day, but I had something annoying happen to ruin it..but whatever.

We woke up early-ish because we had to be ready for the limo at 9:15 to drive us to WETA Workshop accross the bay. I decided to take the car because I knew we were going to stick around a little longer, kinda sucked that we couldn't enjoy the limo...but whatever..I like my independence.

We followed the limo as it took the senic route around Wellington harbour (which is so amazingly beautiful), and finally got to WETA Workshop...geek personafide. Here is my report from there that I published on TheOneRing.net, KongisKing.net and TheOneLion.net:

Earlier this morning I was allowed access to the coolest place on earth, WETA Workshop. Located in a non-descript area of Wellington near the airport, this small groupings of offices and warehouses has produced some of the best practical and special effects seen in this century (and the last one too). Not only that, but it is also a digial studio, miniatures unit, production facility and more. If you've seen, held, or heard anything from Lord of the Rings, King Kong, Narnia and a few other films in the last few years, chances are it was made here.

My tour began with a meet and greet with Richard Taylor. Richard gave us a detailed background of WETA. From its humble beginnings to the huge powerhouse operation it is today, Richard outlined it all for us. The conference room at WETA HQ is most likely the most 'polished' place on the complex. It is filled wall to wall with photos, plaques and awards on one side, and the other side is full of WETA Collectible statues, busts and figures. One shelf in particular holds 5 golden Oscars that Richard proudly displays for all guests. He promptly took them out for us and passed them around. Richard was kind to take time out of his busy schedule (two cell phones that kept ringing) and was not short on words detailing their work on King Kong as well as LOTR and Narnia, easiest the three biggest projects they have taken on so far.

The details that went into the Skull Island people was so complexe that I felt I was listening to an anthropolgy course about real natives than a film production house. Richard and his team really work on these characters from the ground up to make sure they seem believeable to the movie going public.

We were next shown the WETA showreel. This, I assume, is shown to producers or toymakers or any sort of suit who need a quick demo of what WETA can do. All the 'money' shots from the LOTR Trilogy, King Kong and Narnia was seen on this video. We were given a great DVD copy to take home and enjoy as well.

Next we were introduced to an old friend of any TORN regular, Daniel Falconer. Daniel took us on the rest of the WETA tours. After saying goodbye to Richard we headed down into the main complex of the building that housed the metalworkers, leather area, paint, sculpt, models and more. The folks at WETA seem to pride themselves that they are still very down to earth, which in itself is kiwi philosophy. You can tell by walking around the complex that they don't like to pamper themselves with things that will only get in the way of their work. However you can also see how proud they are of some of the major work they've accomplished. All along the buildings there are props, art and photos from earlier work. Swords and other weapons, maquettes, paintings, models, clothing, along every hallway and around every corner. I got the feeling they use it to inspire themselves to achieve even better and higher quality of work.

These days the team seems to be in between major projects. The buildings were not that busy today. Daniel assured us that during LOTR production people were working 24/7 on models, props and other things. Today we saw some great Narnia bookends they plan to have out by Christmas. We also saw one of the Venture 'bigatures' alongside a corsair ship being repaired for the grand opening at the Te Papa museum (It seemed very surreal to see those two together). There were also a few smaller jobs being worked on like a plane wing model and some sculpt work for a children's feature.

WETA's latest pride and joy is a new computer animated feature called 'Jane and the Dragon'. Canadian fans can currently see season one on YTV. We were given a tour of the digital studio they use to create the show, as well as the 'mo-cap' stage where they shoot the main characters. (Think of an entire show being made the same way they made Gollum and King Kong with Andy Serkis). We were then privy to a special few minutes of an as-yet unfinished episode of the show. I have seen the show on YTV before back home and think it's a great show for kids. You can tell the folks at WETA are very proud of it.

That led us back to the main offices where we started. It really went WAY too fast and I know the folks with me and my wife wanted to hang out a bit more just to smell that air of creativity around the place.

I know a TON of fans have made the trek to Camerdown Street to see the studio and only managed to get a shot of the front door, so I feel extreemly lucky to be able to get down here and see a place I have only read about for years. Thanks to Richard Taylor and Daniel Falconer for the tour and special thanks to UBISOFT for the trip!

So before we left the studio I was given directions to the Chocolate Fish Cafe, located somewhere nearby. We were due to meet Philippa Boyens for lunch, for those who don't know Philippa is one of the Oscar winning producers of LOTR, all around Geek Chick and super cool person. Well...we got lost..ended up almost in the ocean and needless to say missed the chance to have lunch with her. I was seeing red..

We finally gave up the chase and decided to stop by a local beach and take a look at the amazing view. The weather was like my mood however, stormy and temperamental (or just plain mental) and so we didn't stick around long.

All this time in New Zealand my wife has wanted to see a penguin in the wild, yes they are out there in the wild along the shoreline out here. Well..we saw one...but it was dead. Perfect fucking capper to my morning.

We decided to head back into down and get some lunch, we found this amazing noodle place on Cuba St. I really liked what I had, and was able to eat it with chopsticks...so that improved my mood.

We got back to the hotel and chilled for a bit. I finally found out the time and place for my lunch with PJ so that REALLY improved my mood. We went by the indoor pool and dipped our feet in the water, oddly enough we both forgot to bring swim trunks.

Late last night I received an email from one of the people at the Te Papa Museum about the LOTR Exhibit opening up there this Friday. I asked if they were having a special opening night party and they invited us to a special opening morning breakfast (hey, it's the other side of the world..makes some kind of sense). Anyways, free food!

This morning we had to get up even EARLIER to make it for this 8AM breakfast shindig at the Te Papa Museum. It was really swanky, but thankfully some other people were in jeans and a T-shirt like me, so I didn't totally feel out of it. The two reps from Te Papa, a rep from Air New Zealand and Richard Taylor spoke for a bit, then we all cheered and drank champagne.

I bumped into Chris and Dan Hennah from TheeFootSix productions, they did a TON of work on LOTR and were as always pleasant to chat with. I then spoke with producer extraordinaire Barrie Osborne (The Matrix, LOTR) and he dragged me to meet the director of his next film 'The Water Horse', he also seemed keen on having me work on that film as well, so that's a bonus.

Here's my report from the exhibit I posted on TheOneRing.net:

Xoanon here, this morning my wife and I were lucky enough to get an advanced look at the new Lord of the Rings exhibit at the Te Papa Museum in Wellington, New Zealand.

The Te Papa Museum is the pride and joy of Wellington, boasting some half dozen events, it sits on Wellington Harbour like a jewel in a crown.

Housed on the fifth floor of the sprawling building this exhibit features something for everyone, costumes, weapons, bigatures and more. Each character from the story is given his or her own small section of the museum with costume displays, photos, props and other items seen in the film. TV screens at every stop play small clips from the DVD documentries that tie into the display. There was an entire room dedicated to armour from every race, hidden speakers gave us battle sounds from the film, and the mood lighting really got you into the spirit of the moment.

There was another section devoted totally to the One Ring. The ring insignia floated around the room as the One Ring floated in mid air. Another section housed the Minas Tirith bigature and the model of Bag End as seen by Frodo in Galadriel's mirror.

The Elven boat that carried Boromir's body was on display, with a dummy that looked uncannily like Sean Bean himself. Weapons were on display, both behind glass and others out in the open available for you to touch and feel.

One of the really neat touches was the forced perspective demonstration with two versions of Gandalf's wagon, visitors are able to get a photo taken with a guest, one looking decidely Hobbit-sized.

My favorite model on display had to be the Corsair ship proudly displayed at the main entrance to the Te Papa Museum. It's sails held high, this 'miniature' model looks seaworthy as is!

If you can get down to Wellington from now until August I highly encourage you to stop by and take a look!

After that we came back to the hotel as it was too early to drive to my lunch with Peter Jackson (pinch me someone). We hopped in our cars and went to that

Sorry..not telling anyone about that, it was a great chat though

After lunch we decided it was such a nice day that we would head back to the beach area we accidently discovered while looking for the Chocolate fish Cafe. We took a ton of photos, and then took the senic tour back to our hotel.

Wfew! Ok me tired of typing now...see you all at home soon!

Wellington Zoo, Seat Quest Update

Yesterday was one of the first cloudy days we've had here in Wellington, apparently we've been lucky so far. We woke up a little later in the day because we wanted to take it easy after our last few days that were very hectic. We decided to head over to a photo shop nearby and pick up a new memory card for the Rebel X camera we have, the one we came with was already full! We tried walking down Vivian Street to the shop but realised half way through it was going to be one hell of a walk, so we tramped back up to the hotel and got the car. The shop ended up being very near to the Embassy theatre so I tried my luck at getting in to see my seat...once again I was beaten by the time schedule...damn!!

We had some lunch at a great little cafe called 51 Street Cafe (I think) and then decided to head for the Wellington Zoo. The only directions I've seen for the zoo was this teeny-tiny sign on our way up mount Victoria so that was the logical place to start. We followed the small signs until we hit a fork in the road and didn't know which to take. After driving 20 minutes on the wrong road we decided we took the wrong path. Luckily we were stopped by police officers who were doing a random spot check for drivers liscenses and we asked for directions.

Another 20 minutes later and we were on the right path again, the zoo was easy to find after that. The Wellington zoo is apparenlty the biggest in New Zealand and the locals take great pride in it. It takes about 1 and a half hours to walk the circular path and see all the animals, among them were otters, gibbons, monkeys, pelicans, NZ native birds, reptiles, ostrich, zebras, lions, tigers, giraffes, cheetahs, wild dogs, baboons, kangaroos, bears, chimpanzees, meerkats and more! It was really really cool, we took a ton of photos.

As soon as we left the zoo the rain started to come down. It wasn't really a downpour but enough to make it unpleasant to walk around outside. We got some food and headed back to the hotel to chill out. We had plans to go to dinner at 8PM with Erica and her husband, but by then we were so zonked from walking around that we decided to stay in the hotel and catch a movie.

Today we are off to do the WETA tour and we have lunch scheduled with Oscar Winning Producer Phillipa Boyens at the famous 'Chocolate Fish Cafe'. More news on that later!!

Wellington Day 3 (or 2...or 4? Whatever)

Today's blog is written by my wife Kathy, thanks Baba!!

Oops, forgot to write my journal last night. So yesterday on the 10th I started out with a bit of a dizzy spell after breakfast. I don't know what it was from. I know I wasn't hungry because I had just eaten. I guess the jet lag had caught up with me or something. The first thing we did was drive down to find the Embassy Theatre. Mike wanted to go and see his name that is on one of the seats. He had donated money a while to help rebuild it and it's going to be there for 10 years. When we got there we weren't able to see it because there was a film currently in progress so we went to walk around on Courtney Place. That is a really nice street full of restaurants and little shops. It kind of reminds me of St. Hubert street but prettier and wider. We found a little souvenir shop and bought a few things for family and friends and ourselves. We got a cool cloth map of the country to hang on the wall.

After that we walked up and down the street just looking at what was around, took a few photos. We came across a lebanese place that was called Cafe Baba and of course I took my photo under the sign. I still felt a bit dizzy so I sat down for a little bit and then thought I should get a little something to eat. I was interested in a Malasian restaurant called Cinta. We sat outside and I had stir fried beef with noodles and vegetables. It was SO amazing. I would fly back here just to eat that again! After that we went back to the Theatre but unfortunetly we were just too late and another movie had started so we left and decided to go back another day.

We got back in the car thinking of what we should do and decided to drive down to Queen's wharf. There is a lot to do that is so close around you. Queens's wharf is basically another section of the docks and stuff around Oriental Bay, higher up from where we were outside of Te Papa Museum. It is gorgeous there. We took a lot of photos. You can rent Kayaks, go wall climbing, rollerblading etc. It's like a boardwalk and it reminds me of The Old Port of Montreal but with bluer water. There was a cute little playground and instead of sand, there's this foamy bouncy material all over the ground. Much cleaner than sand. There was a HUGE slide that both Mike and I went down. We took video of it. The weather was so perfect. Nice and sunny but not too hot, not too cold. Extremely comfortable. It was a little less windy than it has been too which was nice. Long hair is quite annoying in the wind. Walking around closer to where the restaurants were we saw a bunch of seagulls and pigeons going crazy over some food that was left on the picnic tables. A few seconds later a man comes out of the restaurant and screams at the birds! It was his food that he had left out there and was still eating it!! I felt so bad for him. He scared most of them away but they still lingered around. He was debating whether to eat it or not.

After hanging around Queen's Wharf for a while we came back to the hotel for a bit to rest and then went walking around the hill behind our hotel (to think we could go even higher from where our hotel is!). There are steps that go up and up and lead to a park and feilds to Wellington's Victoria University. There are a lot of nice plants and ferns and flowers around there. I was having way too much fun with the camera. We even saw a praying mantis that we noticed was missing a leg. Once we reached the top of the steps we had a nice view of Mount Victoria and the Bay and all the houses below. I don't think there is a view out there that isn't impressive. We took more and more photos and after a while were disappointed to realize that our memory card on the Digital Rebel was full! So Mike called a photo shop around here and we're either going to burn our photos onto a CD to make room on our card or buy a new one.

Around 6:00pm Mike's friend Erica from theonering met us in the hotel lobby and we went out for dinner. There was the tinyest Italian restaurant I ever saw right on Willis that we went to. I swear there was only 5 tables in it! THere was a sad looking woman that served us, and everyone else in the place. She didn't look too enthoused and wasn't very friendly but the food was good anyway. Again I felt dizzy and hoped it would go away once I ate like it did at lunch but it didn't. After we walked back to the hotel, Mike and Erica stayed in the bar a little bit but I had to go and lie down. I guess we walked around a lot lately and a 17 hour difference is harder to get used to than I thought. So far this morning I feel alright. Hopefully it will keep up! I'll write back later tonight on what we did today. Or tomorrow morning again if I forget!!

Wellington Goodies

Our first full day in Wellington was great, we woke up early to get a head start on our trip to the Te Papa Museum. We arrived, had a quick breakfast then dived into the goodies there. That place was very cool, tons of things to see and do, in fact...too much! We decided to cut our visit there short since the sun was out and was certainly too tempting to resist.

We walked around Wellington harbour for a while and took a ton of photos, we finally found a grocery store (no thanks to the receptionist at our hotel...) and bought some goodies. We then took the tretcherous trip up Mount Victoria to the lookout, what an amazing view! A 360 degree look at Wellington, from the airport to the harbour and the hills beyond. We made our way down the mountain and I tried in vain to find the Embassy Theatre (I'm a member of the Theatre Trust, and have a seat there named after me)...we had no luck finding it so we headed back to our hotel for lunch and a bit of a rest.

Later in the day we took a trip up and down Cube St. to see all the little shops and cafe's there. Unfortunately we forgot it was Sunday (damn time change!) and around 6PM so almost all the shops were closed. But it was a nice walk anyway. Cuba St. is something of a artsy/urban area full of quirky little shops, tattoo parlours and eaterys..it's really something, loads of character.

We then made our way back to the hotel (walking around Wellington's nearly vertical streets is taking a toll on my legs) and chilled a bit more before going to dinner. The restaurant in the hotel is really good, but amazingly expensive! We both had grilled porc chops with potaotes and a glass of red wine...great meal!

We came back to our room and all I remember doing is getting on the bed to rest my eyes and suddenly Kathy was waking me up and telling me to wash up for bed...must have been the wine!

Today we have a few things planned, I think we want to make it to the Wellington Zoo if the weather improves, and I'm still on my mission to find the Embassy Theatre and take a photo of my chair!!!

Laters!

Wellington!!!

We arrived in Wellington early yesterday morning, but to be honest with you it could have been the 32nd of never as we were so messed up with dates and times. The flight to Auckland was not as bad as I thought it would be, let me tell you Air New Zealand puts Air Canada to shame. Our Air NZ flight had personal entertainment systems in each seat, we had the choice of over a dozen films to watch, or TV shows ('Buffy' & 'Angel' included) and even some great video games to play.

As we boarded in LA we both took some happy-fun-sleepy-time pills and were soon on our way to never never land, but not before they gave us some dinner. I didn't realise how hungry I was until I wolfed down the chicken dinner and the hot buns with butter. I also tried to eat the dessert, but it was cheesecake...damn you lactose!!

Pretty soon I was dead asleep for a few hours, actually hard to tell when the entire cabin is dark, outside is dark and there was hadly any turbulance...we could have still been on the runway at LAX for all I knew. Later in the flight I woke up with startling clarity...couldn't close my eyes if I wanted to..so I plugged myself in and enjoyed 'Goodnight, and Good Luck' with George Clooney and others...not too bad a film actually.

After dozing off again I switched seats with Kathy to have the window and cabin wall to support my head (middle seats are evil). I slept a few more hours then woke again and played some golf and Tetris...then breakfast was served! Again I was starving (no idea why since I literally hadn't MOVED since my dinner), but breakfast consisted of an egg omlete with cheese covered tater tots thingys and a 1/2 tomato..I managed to scrape off the cheese from the taters and tomato and had orange juice and a tea to round out my meal. We then made our decsent into Auckland.

From what I could see of the city Auckland looks like a great little city with an amazing view of the ocean. We had very little time to make our way to the domestic flights area and catch our flight to Wellington. I was taking so many flights and going to so many cities I felt like I was on the amazing race!

Flight into Wellington was very short, less than 40 minutes I assume. The view we had coming into the city was stunning, this town is situated in a deep valley created by three bays...the entire town is on a slant, with homes and buildings built right into the valley wall and on the site of Mount Victoria.

After landing we got our rental car and made our way to the Mercure Hotel in town...let me tell you, driving on the opposite side of the car was not that hard to get used to..however driving on the opposite side of the ROAD was! More than once I had to be reminded that I was about to get into the wrong lane, or pass someone on the wrong side...it really takes some getting used to.

The time change really nailed us after we washed up and had some food, we wanted to see a bit more of the city on the beautiful sunny day we were enjoying...but all we managed to do was sleep..wake up for dinner..then fall asleep again all night.

We woke up this morning fairly early and plan on going to the Te Papa Museum, I think we're ok with the time change now...anyways..more to come! Laters!!

NZ Trip Report One: In LA Again....

Well...we're in LA again..forgive my attitude but I have visited LA every year since 2000...and I've only seen the airport, a few hotels, and Hollywood & Highland. I DO know there is more to see, I DO know there are very cool things to do and see in LA..but I haven't done any of that in 6 years.

But I do know LAX fairly well, our lay-over hotel is the Radisson by the Airport and I have a great view of the airport. Actually this hotel has a great rooftop view of the airport and west-LA.

In a few hours we hop on another plane for our trip to New Zealand..I certainly hope this plane has bigger seats and more leg room.

Travel Tickets have Arrived!

Ok...so this is really real now...the tickets have arrived.

Ever since I was first approached by Ubisoft to go to New Zealand with the winner of their King Kong Game contest...I never thought it was going to really happen.

You have to excuse my pessimism, but there has been a long string of 'good things' that never materialized in the past. I was once invited to the south of France for the 2000 Cannes Film Festival, that never panned out. Then there was the whole New York 'Two Towers' red carpet premiere that I was snowed out of...and even when I did make it to New York for the King Kong premiere I was promised a red carpet entrance and a screening of the film with Peter Jackson and I missed out on that!

So when I heard about this trip I wasn't holding my breath if you know what I mean. But now this seems all but inevitable (knock wood) that Thursday morning I will be on a flight to LA..then to New Zealand!

Then again...I'm still not going to believe it until I touchdown in Wellington...so stay tuned for that.

Jack Bauer Kill Count

April 3rd Kill Count: 3

Jack Bauer and his man-purse of death were in full swing tonight! After successfully surviving an exploding gas distribution center Jack one-arms it back to safety with the main bad guy (who is of course almost dead). Jack then leads the ex-chief of staff on a deadly mission where he quickly dispatches 3 bad guys with a handgun equipped with a silencer...and then tonight's big moment was when we learned who was really behind it all! OMG!!