The Wild Wild West…in Calgary

here are some pictures of the great  Calgary western sets I have been visiting…(click on image for a larger view). I'm in Toronto now for network meetings. It's still cold and snowy…but feels like Palm Springs compared to Alberta.  Heading back  to L.A. tomorrow.

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Take off, eh?

I am on my way to Canada today for a week of scouting and wall-to-wall meetings in Alberta and Toronto. It's all for a western film that I wrote (based on two terrific novels) and will produce …I wish I could say more, but I can't yet. I'll try to check in now and then, and maybe post a picture or two, but if not, it's because I'm too busy or have lost appendages to frostbite.  

Overcoming Adversity

The Los Angeles Times ran a feature today on Peter Winkler, who regular readers of this blog will reocognize as someone who has frequently commented on posts here over the years. He's severely disabled by arthritis and writes using a chopstick. He recently completed a biography of Dennis Hopper.

In the virtual world, Winkler roams free. He blogs. He comments. He write articles about film.

In the physical world, he increasingly is trapped — dependent on his sister and a long, red plastic chopstick.

Rheumatoid arthritis has battered him for 46 of his 55 years.

His neck won't turn. His head is pitched down, chin to chest. His elbow and wrist joints are so fixed in place, he cannot touch his face.

Sitting up in bed, he can no longer extend his arms far enough to place his fingertips on the keyboard of the MacBook Pro propped on a lap desk across his thighs.

Instead, he braces the chopstick between several fingers on his right hand and uses it to tap, tap, tap one key after another.

It's not so bad, he says. He's gotten pretty fast, and anyway, "I was always a two-finger typist."

Keep that in mind next time you are tempted to complain about how difficult it is for you to write. I know that I will. 

(As a side note, I wonder why Peter doesn't use dictation software, like Dragon Naturally Speaking, rather than use the chopstick?)