Margarita-ville

I tried to do my Blog last night but my fingers wouldn't let me. That was on account of the no less than 8 margaritas I had after a cute meal out with the Accounts team turned into a bit of a session. It was a rollicking good time but I spent all of today paying for it. Anytime I stood up my stomach contents threatened to jump out my mouth so I spent the day in bed, in the fetal position. Rebecca's grace was saint like, fetching me water and buttered toast on request. I still don't feel normal but hopefully tomorrow I'll be right as rain.

It goes without saying, for Lent I think I'll be giving up margaritas. 

Drag and Drop Everything

Went to sleep last night dreaming of my game plan for today, how I'd grind my to-do list under my heel. My ducks were in a row, all I had to do was make the magic happen. Instead, I'm hit with a nasty old curve ball from one of our departments, a classic one I should have seen from miles away... I had to back up all the photos off their iPads. A couple would have been pretty easy of course, but 50,000 of them was a little hard to fathom in the moment. That's a figure so great that the file copying process started to kick up a hissy fit, insisting I chunk it down into manageable pieces of a thousand photos at a time. Constantly tending to this becamey full time job for the day, the sticky tar of responsibility that dragged down all my other efforts. Even before bed right now I'm slowly watching a little progress bar full the screen so I can drag a set of files and do the whole thing over again.

Lock in and Pack Up

The paperwork wrangling continues, this time though there's a big ol' checklist to work against now. The team and I are chunking through it, while I independently finish up all of our sustainability reporting. It feels like there's a mountain to do still, but by this time tomorrow it's going to feel like it's all in hand. Everything is slowly winding down now and we're slowly packing things into storage crates now. Little by little, every trace of us will be scrubbed from our hired production office. But if you squint, you'll see our finger prints and our shadows lingering in the doorways.

Pancake Day 2026

Today marks a first for me, a work anniversary! It's almost unheard of to stick around on a film and TV job for an entire year but I've been blessed with a long haul job with a good gang of people so I feel incredibly lucky. It also happened to be pancake day at work (again) so we set up a little pancake station with fruits, syrups, lemon, sugar - you name it, we had it. As a bonus, I made some crepes for Rebecca and myself this evening which came out amazingly well. I am beyond stuffed now though, I'd be turning into a pancake if I had one more bite...

Wrapping Yarn

Got up at a sociable time and got to work at a comparatively normal time. We have entered the wrap phase now so things are looking nice and chill for the next week or so. All I did was catch up on paperwork from last week and input a lot of data to the courier log. That was broken up occasionally by people coming up and saying goodbye to us, lots of crew are peeling away now and pretty soon we'll be the last few standing - the alphas and the omegas. 

Tonight I just wanted to wrap up my crochet project, just a few more odd techniques to get my head around before I could call it a day. I took my time though and nailed everything out the gate, finishing it off with time to spare! I made a drawstring pouch - I can't believe how well it turned out. I just keep looking at it, still processing how it was just wool on a string this time yesterday.

 

In the Market for Wool

Had the sleep my body needed and followed it up with a hearty bowl of porridge - I was truly prepped for anything today... Except for the wool shop I found on East Street this morning that totally blew me away. I'm still trying to get a handle on the technique for my next project (12 failed attempts so far, but every failure a lesson), I have the colour vision for it though so I was in the market for yarn. Google Maps didn't point this new shop out to me though so finding it was a real treat, I ended up spending way to long obsessing over what colour wool to get but I left confident in my choice.

This afternoon Rebecca and I stepped into our war room to do some serious holiday planning. We arranged travel insurance, booked ferries, visas, accomodation and even seats to a hockey game. Lotta work for a Sunday, but it's all to ensure we have the best holiday possible. 

Taking a break from that prep I returned to my crochet project and at long last, it all clicked. I ended up going for nearly two hours on a new roll. Probably quietly scared I'll forget the technique if I stop, but it's more than half finished now! 

Happy Valentine's 2026

A slightly horse voice was the only evidence of last night's shenanigans, got away scot free without any hangovers or enduring nastiness. That meant more time for video games and continuing my crochet project which I'm eternally finding myself restarting. Rebecca and I never really do much for Valentine's Day, but we did end up finishing a coop game called Split Fiction together which really put or communication and teamwork skills to the test.

Happy Wrap 2026

Wrap days are often madness. Present giving left right and centre, cleaning out all the trucks and running around to make sure we saw the important moments. This was a relatively chill day compared to most, we got the work done all with a big smile on our face. I was lavished with a handful of cards and gifts and before long I was whisked away to the wrap party for some beers and some boogieing. I thought I'd be down for a late one but I'm back in comparatively good time, with less alcohol in my system than expected - guess I won't have my head in a toilet bowl like I thought.

Flowers for a 2nd Unit

I stood proud at the head of our final 2nd Unit day. Danced around some curveballs at the start of the morning for sure, ended up buying a bouquet of flowers for a wrapped cast member (which was quite tricky considering Valentine's is fast approaching) but we do best under a little bit of pressure. Otherwise we shot it, wrapped an hour early and then we went home. Gotta get ready for the big final day tomorrow now!

45 Seconds

Turns out today was NOT my final dentist appointment, however they ended up tending to the literal root of all problems. There's a jutty out part of my front tooth that clashes with my lower levels, rendering it painful to do a 'resting bite'. This was the thing that got me returning to the dentist a few years back and ultimately going down the route of braces. The process mitigated it all but never outright solved the issue. I flagged it once again last session and they agreed to take a proper look at it today. I sat in the chair, they pulled out an electric file and within 45 seconds they shaved part of that tooth stun down. They asked me how it felt after. I bit down. The problem was gone. 

Almost 3 years of discomfort and pain vanished in 45 seconds. That was that. 

T Minus 1 Day on the Dentist

Just had another day on the truck - maybe my last one of the job. Things are slowly winding down and people are going through the stages of grief but right now we're in the acceptance stage. We're smiling about it ending now and looking forward to the wrap party.

In slightly exciting news, tomorrow is the final bout of my dentistry. Should be getting all the accessories removed, my teeth power washed and my next retainer passed on. Fingers crossed I'll get some before/after pictures.

Running out of Show to Run

Seemingly sleepwalked my way through the day, treading water and doing my daily duties. A lot of the day we spent waiting on responses and filling up spreadsheets with all th information people desire ahead of wrap. The running of the show gets in the way of that still from time to time, but we're so very close to the end now that side of things will start evaporating. 

A lot of my spare moments are now spent dreaming of all the things I can do during my time off. Little creative projects and other bits that'll keep my cup full. It's been a long while since I've done anything spiritually nourishing so I won't waste any time neglecting that. 

Climbing to Greatness

Rustled up a killer breakfast then bid adieu to Rebecca's parents. The house was our once again but we mostly just wanted to recharge our social batteries. I played games for most of the day as a result, finishing up my climbing game and watched it immediately go into my Game of the Year list for next December. I'm on a hot streak at the moment, gotta play some garbage again soon - that's how the universe works right?

Last week of filming coming up. What a blooming marathon. I'm gonna start experiencing phantom pains by the end of it I reckon but for now, as I said earlier, all I can do is enjoy it.

Unsubtle Cake

Rebecca's Birthday weekend kicked off with a visit from her parents. It was raining a fair bit today so we settled on doing the North Street Shuffle so we could dip in and out of shops to counteract the weather. All good Birthday meals happen at A'Capella Pizza up the road so we headed there in the evening for food and wine. Last up I did what was possibly the least subtle birthday cake prep possible, but Rebecca was still surprised when I put the candles in front of her as we sung out. 

Happy Birthday Rebecca 2026

 Rebecca set her alarm just as early as me this morning, all so she could enjoy a bit of time with me to open her cards and her presents before I had to scarper off to work. I say this every year, but I'm always blown away by the correspondence she gets on her Birthday. Swathes of goodwill texts and heartfelt cards land her way on the big day - a testiment to how many lives she's touched.

This year's gift was a joint effort from the whole family: a Fuji Film Camera with the ability to print out mini Polaroid style snaps. I can't wait to see what memories she starts printing off.

We went out to dinner to Honest Burger (thank you, various vouchers) and then met up with her visiting parents for drinks. The long week caught up with me finally after my second pint so I started yawning uncontrollably. Back in bed now with Rebecca, wishing her one again a very Happy Birthday. 

Accelerating to the Finish

Blinked and the day passed me by. That's how it always goes as we approach the end of the shoot, things just accelerate beyond comprehension and the next thing you know everyone has moved on. But until they get there, I'll be weighing wigs, doing paperwork and sorting the odd jobs as the come through. I just wish I could catch my breath a bit and enjoy the end of it a bit more.

Usual %

Made some good strides forward at work, yet the day was still defined for me by my slip ups. All of them innocent and without meaningful consequence, but I hold myself to a fairly high standard at work and take failings a little too deep. As a result I couldn't get into a groove at work, mostly because I had to revisit old bits I thought were done to unpick them. I'm chauking it up to a bad day, I'm already ready to start anew tomorrow and return to my usual 100%.

Weighing Wigs

Found myself embroiled into the world of sending equipment overseas - and to do that you need to do a riggerous inventory of everything. My colleague and I spent the last four hours of our day logging, weighing and price guessing wigs, curling irons and scissors. Never a dull moment in the world of film and TV... 

Here Comes the Curtain

Working split shifts again which means emails before my work day has officially started then coming how in the wee hours of the night. To break it up a bit though we did a scavenger hunt of sorts on the truck as a kind of prank war. That kept me smiling, but I couldn't shake the feeling that this was the last two weeks of shooting and things were slowly coming to a close. The curtain call is on everyone's minds now, and it's making me a little blue.

Cairn

Treated myself to a little indie game that came out last week (my first game of 2026). It's a mountain climbing one called Cairn, the big thing is you have to individually place your four limbs into ledges as you climb, you're basically an octopus mountain goat. It's incredibly engaging so far, every sheet wall is a little puzzle to solve and every accent begins with me holding my breath as I double guess if I truly selected the right spot to for the climb. 

Rebecca came home just in time to watch a whole lot of The Bear's latest season. The Sunday scariest manifested a little bit as the sun started setting. Luckily I have much later start tomorrow so I can get a Monday lie in... But that also means I have a later finish.