Thursday, November 10, 2005: Hello, Goodbye, the End

So, the film festival (or at least my part in it...) is finally wrapping up.  Jason Gutz put on the first show tonight, a Super-8 showcase, with live accompaniment by the Fire Ants.  It was nice to see an Elmo ST-1200 - a very familiar and much-loved projector from the Robert Beck Memorial Cinema.  Matt McCormick and Morgan Currie arrived just before the program started, went and got dinner with Ben, and returned for the second half.  And then we set up for Matt's show of new videos from Portland.  It was a lot of tapes, and video isn't my forte.  So when Matt volunteered to take over the techie part, I was a-ok with that.  The program was great, especially Hello, Thanks by Andrew Blughbaugh, a wryly distressed confession of the artist's obsession with and frustration by personal ads.  He's got a great, dry wit, and a wonderful, sorta thin voice.
I caught this picture of Justin, the Mark's excellent sous-chef (Lisa Owens, the owner of the Mark, is the chef proper), before the program.  I've only eaten at the Mark once (on my birthday) but it was one of the better steaks I've had.  And Carrie brings home boxed dinners regularly.  Which I nick whenever possible.  Justin's a great guy, too, with an exceptionally dry sense of humor..  Reminds me a lot of my old highschool friend Jeremy Campbell.  Look close, and you can see Carrie in the background...
After the shows, we got food.  At the Reef again.  But in the back room / bar this time.  Ben's girlfriend Michelle arrived earlier, and was drinking champagne cocktails.  Which I gathered were an unusual choice at the Reef.  Ben went with the spiced cider and Tuaca special (?!!).  Wacky.  But ain't Matt photogenic?
Here's Ben, bracing for the second shot of Tuaca.  Shortly, we moved on to the Brotherhood, for more drinks.
Where we ran into Rob, one of the owners of Olympia's Last Word Books.  And one of the more interesting and thoughtful people I've met in town.  It's no wonder his bookstore is so good.
He was there with his girlfriend Ryan, who works with Carrie at the Mark.  She's very interesting too.  When I mentioned that I would be showing Christopher Maclaine's The End in Portland, she suspected she'd seen it.  I was skeptical (that's an unusual movie!  And there's a Burt Reynolds vehicle with the same title...).  But then she mentioned attending Naropa.  And it all made sense!
This is the only picture I caught of Michelle.  But it's a lovely one, no?