DAY 13

First day back after the dreadful down time starts at six in the morning in the lovely hamlet of Palmdale. Everyone meets at a local Burger King, which soon doubles as a production office/make up trailer. Lady Deal has made all us movie banditos maps of todays first location on a deep desert highway. The exact number of cars needed from of our fleet is figured and away we go.

The Set General as per usual picks the spot to stop and shoot, which we do. But there’s a problem.

We need the road to be empty in both directions and THE CARS KEEP A COMIN’. There’s lots of starting, stopping, and WAITING! The only scene where the road doesn’t have to be completely empty is one where one character is pointing a gun at another character. So STILL gotta stop and pretend like we’re just hangin’ each time a car, truck, or SUV goes by. And then:

A STATE TROOPER STARTS DRIVING UP... we’re done... DONE!!!

Aren’t we?

The General gives the uniformed driver a little ‘dude I know you’re gonna shut us down’ wave. The Trooper waves back and keeps right on driving. COOL!!! We finish up with no more worries. Cept for the worry of time, cuz as per usual... we are behind.

Half the posse wraps, more actors are waiting at a predetermined location, and we have a HARD OUT. So gotta move.

The players for round two all meet up and head over to a location our little production was rained out of three weeks ago. The Set General finds the exact same spot we were last time, and then:

In a moment of inspiration everyone’s favorite General hops a fence, climbs a steep hill with the camera, and gets a super killer establishing shot. We press to the finish line, fighting passing traffic, a pedestrian who looks like Big foot, but mostly TIME. Hard outs suck, but we ain’t got no studio $... now do we.

photos by Suzan Jones