blackjack and bad luck

just some update about my recent activities, still busy working on the post-production of the short film, the editing is almost done and now i am trying to make a trailer.

the subject of the blog "blackjack" refers to the Hollywood movie 21. No, i didn't see the movie, but i did get to meet Jeff Ma, the real life Ben Campell.. Ma lives and works in the Bay Area, so just got a chance to sit down and talk to him for a while last week.

as expected, we're mostly talking about the tricks of winning $1million at the black jack table, as well as the controversy of the casting choice. i think i more or less understood the tricks but i am sure  it is not something i could do even with lots of training (he said he had a 6 months training before he actually went to the casino).

what i dun understand though, is that he really didn't seem to care much about the casting decision. i am not sure if its coz he has some deals with the film company or what (which wouldnt be a surprise to me considering his involvement in the project), he said he didnt care that the film company changed his role to caucasian, since it is not his autobiography and it's a movie for entertaininment after all, and then he asked me what i thought...

 i guess a lot of people have already talked about this issue, including some of our fellow AnD artists, so i would save the time to repeat the same argument..basically the fact is simple, asian american is still not considered mainstream in this country and hollywood is still not ready to accept a different image of asian american.  one important message is that, we still have a long way to go, and if we don't support each other, the future will be harder for us..

the second part of the blog "bad luck" refers to what happened to me a few days ago.. just had a not very pleasant day when everything was out of track:

When i got up and tried to print something, my printer was out of ink;

and when i went out to take some pictures, my camera suddenly broke down for no reason;

then feeling frustrated,  i tried to drive to work, but my car suddenly wouldn't start;

so i found out the battery of my car died, and i managed to get a new one from a body shop, the salesperson told me if i needed them to install it, there would be a charge, or i could do it myself using the tools they provided..then i chose the second option, but after i searched thru their toolbox, just found out they have every size of the wrench but the one i needed...  eventually got it done and called it a day...

yeah no big deal actually but just thought its funny as everything just seems little out of control on that day.