I was at an ad club meeting and had the strangest experience.  After the meeting, I was talking to several other members and one of them asked me how things were going with Saying Goodbye.  A woman I didn’t know was part of the discussion, and she asked, “Wait, you’re the one who made the cat movie?”  I said I had, and she told me how much she loved it.  Figuring she’d watched it at one of the festivals or at Cinebarre, I asked her where she’d seen it.  She said a friend had a party and invited a bunch of people over to watch it.  Because of restrictions around film festivals, we haven’t put it online or sold it on DVD yet, so I figured her friend must be someone involved with making the movie.  When I asked who it was, I didn’t recognize the name at all!  So then I thought maybe we were talking about different cat movies, but all the plot points matched.

How awesome is that?!?  Our film is not even available to the public yet and already there are bootlegged copies out there floating around; and people like it so much they’re having parties and inviting their friends to watch it.  We’d love to know how they got a copy, not because we’re upset (we're not, we think it's cool!), but because it would be fun to know what chain of events led to them getting a copy.  Plus, hearing this story has us seriously rethinking our film festival strategy - maybe it’s better to just get it out there so our little film can be seen by anyone interested in this type of emotional movie?

After nearly two years of suffering through story after story about making my movie, I thought it was finally time to let all my co-workers watch the film they'd heard so much about. Yes, I have a "real" job working for a utility company.

Turns out our quarterly meeting was the perfect opportunity. We were off-site, so it would be a little more special than cramming everyone into a conference room, and since the meeting is semi-mandatory, I would have a captive audience.

So after a morning of great presentations and fun team building, Jocelyn crashed the meeting and it was time for us to show everyone the movie... and then the computer crashed. Don't they always? After a quick reboot, everything was back on track, and I started the film.

Now I'd warned everyone that the movie was sad (and most people knew that already), but as I scanned the crowd during the sad parts, I felt kind of guilty as people tried their best to hide tears from their co-workers. Luckily we'd just had lunch, so there were plenty of napkins left on the tables for covert tear dabbing.

After it was finished, everyone had lots of great questions and comments. My favorite was "Wow, that looked like a real movie." Ironically, that's the reaction a lot of my friends have, and it always makes me laugh (maybe it should make me worry). What did they expect--sock puppets?

Ah, the internet. So full of incredible treasures you would never know about unless you happen to stumble upon them. Such is the case with the quirky, yet totally awesome, site iwanttodrawacatforyou.com.

Seeing an instant cross-promotional oppotunity, I contacted the site's owner, Steve Gadlin. He agreed to make us our very own, 100% original, sure to become a masterpiece in the Guggenheim, cat drawing. I think it turned out quite beautifully. The attention to detail and realistic expressions of a cat enamored with our website nearly brought tears to my eyes. Looks like our former cat artist, Amanda, has some competition.

Yoopy Do-licious, don't ya think?

South Carolina received a small taste of Snowmagedon 2010 with the Valentine’s weekend snow storm. So I seized the rare opportunity of getting seven inches of southern snow to make my very own Death Cat Snowman.

Sadly, he is now a slushy lump of grass and leaves, but I am sure he will be back again someday… thumpetty thump thump, thumpetty thump thump, look at Death Cat go!
 

Things are coming along great with "Saying Goodbye." We're in the middle of editing now and should have that done by the end of the month. Then it's on to music and finally the big premiere!

A lot of people have been asking us what's the best way to stay on top of everything that's happening with "Saying Goodbye." Our answer is always: "Become a Facebook Fan."

We've set up this blog so that every time we make a new entry it automatically posts an alert to our Facebook Fan page. If you become a fan, you will be notified when something new and newsworthy happens to "Saying Goodbye."

We plan to premiere the movie around the beginning of the year, and then it's off to the festivals, so become a Facebook Fan today and never miss a beat! Tell your friends to become fans too. Together we can start building the all important BUZZ for "Saying Goodbye."

Here is the link to become a Fan: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Saying-Goodbye/119785993310

Just got off the phone with Richard (our casting director). He's about to start making calls in search of our young leading lady Kathy--the bubbly nurse who wears her heart on her sleeve.

Richard asked us to rank our wish-list actresses in order of our preference. He'll start at the top and keep going down the list until he gets a "yes." The tricky thing is because of our budget, when he contacts the actress's people he is basically offering her the job. So if she says "yes" there are no auditions, no read-throughs and no take-backs. Which is a little scary.

Everyone on our list is a VERY talented actress, but we have not seen most of them in a role that requires a wide range of emotions and real tears. So what if we love her, she says yes, and we're all excited, only to find out on the set that she can't cry to save her life. Or what if she gets all red, puffy and gross with snot running out of her nose... we did not budget for a snot wrangler!

Hopefully one of our top choices will say "yes," and we'll get someone who is both a great actress and a beautiful crier.
 

I bet the mailman, er, mailwom--, I mean mailperson was nervous today delivering the first piece of mail to Death Cat. Hope they don’t call PETA.

Today is my birthday, and look at this GREAT card the folks at Genesis made for me. I think it would make a fun movie poster. FYI: The inside of the card says "To have a happy and safe birthday". See, Death Cat ain't that bad!