Wyatt

Party with the Stars

On the Mountain Top

It’s a hot Friday evening in July, and my husband and I are preparing for an overnight camping trip the next morning. My friend J, who is already at the campsite calls me and says “It’s really cold up here. Bring clothes for skiing.” This is not a ski trip. We are headed over the pass toward the eastern part of Washington State where temperatures tend to be much warmer than Seattle in the summer. We are a little confused, but we followed his directions.

Saturday morning we set off to spend a night at an event we’ve never been to before - a star party. This inimitable gathering could be described as a big geek fest in a back-country field on a mountaintop. However it is also an event where the awe inspiring and amazing things you see will have you wanting more. We certainly do.

With our car packed with too many things for one night of car-camping and plenty of ski-worthy clothes (including boots, hats, gloves, scarves and the little heat packets that you stick in your gloves when your hands get cold), we head out on a two and half hour drive to Table Mountain just near Ellensburg, Washington. At an elevation of 6,359 feet, you definitely feel much closer to the sky.

The drive up the mountain from the highway meanders through farm country, before it starts to turn into wooded forest and curving roads with beautiful vistas of the valley below. As we near the campground just after noon, in the distance we get our first sight of the camp that has over 650 attendants and looks like some type of space-age village with campers, cars, tents and numerous telescopes covered in shiny, silvery reflective material.

Camp

We pull up to registration and are greeted by a friendly staff member who guides us to our friends’ campsite. Our friends have been there for several days, some coming as early as a week before, even though the main Star Party event is only for 3 days. Although the sight of the entire camp is impressive, our friends’ site alone is quite remarkable. Several silver astronomy observer tents are lined in a row adjacent to a tarp-carpeted living room of chairs for some 15 adults and kids, a table covered with snacks and goodies, a camping stove and various other trappings, to keep everyone in comfort. As we start setting up our tent, our friend A asks if we want bratwurst and beer, and we happily partake.

Astronomers\' TentsThe Living Room<

During the day, most people hang out and socialize. There are expert speakers that talk about different astronomical subjects and there are plenty of activities for kids. On Saturday afternoon we tour the campgrounds and note that all of the campers and tents surround a big telescope field that has every type and size of telescope imaginable. Some are computerized where one just punches in coordinates, and some are so high off the ground on huge tripods that one needs a ladder to adjust them and see through the viewfinder.

Telescope Field

One particularly interesting telescope is a solar telescope, which allows you to look at the sun in broad daylight. Looking through the telescope, all I see is a reddish orb. I feel like I am looking through a microscope at some organism in a Petri dish. Dennis Hoofnagle, a Star Party volunteer points out that we can also see solar flares –the tiny, tiny strings of red on the right side of the orb. They were so little – like the size of a pin head, that at first I didn’t see them, but finally I see this minute coloring that breaks the rim of the orb. Solar flares! It is hard to imagine these flares are actually the length of 3 Earth diameters. The sun’s diameter is approximately 100 times the Earth’s diameter.

At the first sign of dusk, people start preparing their telescopes for viewing and taking pictures, just as the first stars start showing in the sky. This is the time that those with the astronomy tents start to take the tops off to reveal even more telescopes tucked inside vestibules. Everywhere, people are calibrating and preparing for the big show the night is going to put on.

Words cannot really express the magnificence of the spectacle we are about to encounter, nor the brazenly freezing weather we experience. My friend J said it had been colder the night before. I can’t imagine it being colder than it is this night.

Just as darkness is approaching, I start to get colder, so I go into my tent to bundle up with my ski gear. I put on everything I have brought: long johns, jeans and ski pants, ski socks and boots, and my gloves, scarf and hat. It’s weird that it’s July and there is no snow, but I look like I’m ready to make snow angels. After 15 minutes of struggling in the tent to get my gear on, I unzip the flap and step out to look up in wonderment at one of the most spectacular sites I’ve ever seen - an unobstructed, uninhibited night sky full of hundreds of billions of stars and the Milky Way forming a cloudy white pattern across the sky. That view is imprinted on my brain. Although I have seen this sky many times before, I am still amazed. It is surreal. I think just for a moment, “I wonder if anyone is looking back at us right now?” Well at least looking back at our sun.

As I head back to the “living room” I hear hushed tones of conversation in a lingo I don’t understand. “I see M13, did you find M81?” “ISS should be passing at 9:25.” “Did you see that iridium flare? People are referring to the objects in the sky that they spot through their telescopes - galaxies, nebulae, satellites, planets, and the International Space Station (ISS). Some objects, like the ISS are viewable by the naked eye. Others can be seen through a pair of binoculars, like Jupiter’s moons. And some require a telescope for better detail. As I peer through a telescope at a nebula, I remark at how fuzzy it looks. My friend D, a fellow neophyte attendee responds, “They look like cotton balls”.

My husband and I decide to attend the midnight talk – Planetarium under the Stars with Tom Colwell to get a refresher on all of the constellations in the night sky. While Tom is telling us about Ursa Major, there is a flash of light so bright, I think someone has turned on car lights right behind me (white light is strictly forbidden after dusk as it impedes night vision), but it isn’t a car. It is a fireball, a bright meteor that falls to earth creating a trail of light so bright, for several seconds it lights up the entire sky. I turn to catch the tail end of it dying out just above a line of trees. That is the BIGGEST meteor I’ve ever seen. I only stay at the talk for about 20 minutes as I am so cold I go back to camp and sit under a blanket and look up at the sky.

At around 2:30 AM, I’m cold to the bone and sleepy, so we call it a night. Tomorrow we head home. The die-hard astronomers stay out until the first inkling of sunlight appears around 4:30 AM. With my long johns and hat still on, under my sleeping bag and two blankets, I dream about the heavenly bodies I have seen in the starry sky above.

Last night I went over to a friend’s house to see some folks who were visiting from out of town. When I arrived, I was told we’d be watching a documentary film entitled, The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters. It’s about these rival Donkey Kong players. Yep. Not a movie I would have picked up off the shelf myself, but I do have a lot of techie friends, so it’s not absurd that I would find myself watching this type of movie.  I was OK with watching it, since I need to watch a lot of documentaries over the next couple of months and analyze them.

I was not expecting much, but I was pleasantly surprised that it turned out to be pretty good! There weren’t many fancy tricks or shots, however there was drama, conflict, and a bunch of interesting characters, including a “villain” and an “underdog”. It had an an appealing beginning, an unexpected middle and a satisfying end, which I read somewhere is a good thing for a movie.  Even if you don’t like anything to do with video games (which is me), it’s worth a watch, simply because it is a fairly well told story.

I have started the quest of making my first feature length film.  It will be a documentary about the Caribbean island nation of Dominica where my mother is originally from and where she currently resides.

I think I’m a very process-oriented person. I believe in the old saying “Plan Your Work, Work Your Plan”, so I started this quest with making a  plan which is (very cursorily) outlined here:

1. Development - Research and identify all things related to the making of this film.

2. Pre-Production - Get ready to shoot the film.

3. Production - Shoot the film.

4. Post-Production - Edit the film.

5. Martketing/Distribution - Get the film out for the world to see.

Someone recently asked me why I wanted to do a film about Dominica. In the midst of all this planning, I didn’t have an answer. I wasn’t even entirely sure what this film was going to be about. Should it be a general essay on Dominica and its people?  Dominica on the geopolitical stage? Eco-tourism and Dominica? Dominica and China relations? What????

I think a lot of people making documentaries maybe start out with a bit of ambiguity, but I must say it was driving me bonkers. I’m a planner. I have to have at least some semblance of a plan for what the movie is about and why I’m making it, even if the plan is going to change. I have to start with something. Some direction.

So this weekend I’ve thought a lot about the “why”, and I finally have an answer. I love to tell stories. I’ve been fascinated with the art of story telling for a long time, and I admire people that can tell great stories.  I want to tell a story through film about something that I’m passionate about, somewhere that I have roots, somewhere that is a part of me - Dominica. I want to introduce everyone to this little known place and it’s unique people. I want my story to be something that people will remember and reflect upon and think about. I want my story to be great. I want to be a great storyteller.

I also spent some time brainstorming with my family and friends on the theme of my documentary and the bones or exposition - the who, what, where, when and why of the film itself. I need to noodle over the output some more, but I feel that I am at a point where I now have an idea of what this film will be about. It may change, but I’m OK with that. As long as I have some idea of where I’m going, that’s a good start.

Wyatt

A Man Spit on the Sidewalk

I think in Singapore it’s against the law to spit on the street. I hear they’re really strict about things like that. I wish it was the case here in the US. I wish people would get fined, like $500 for spitting in front of others. I know. That’s harsh, but I’m reacting because of what just happened.

I was in the office that I share with Whitney, my friend and business partner for WhitneyandWyatt.com. I was in process of posting a show to our site when this all went down.  In our office, our desks face the window, and the window faces a trail that people run, walk and bike on every day. Since it’s summer, there are tons of people. Maybe you’ve heard of it. The Burke Gilman Trail.

Today I just happened to look out the window at the exact second a man walked past and spit a big loogie towards the window. It was like karma. Somehow I was supposed to see him gather up whatever was in the back of his throat and expel it onto the sidewalk in front of me. My reaction was one of disgust. He saw me seeing him spit. He turned bright red with a look of chagrin. I laughed. He smiled. He walked on.  And there the spit sits on the sidewalk as runners jog past it, and bikers ride over it.

Sometimes you get sidetracked by spit.

Wyatt

Daring Rescue on July 4

My last post was about my friend, Ambrose Bittner, who works next door to my office. I just finished reading a blog post from him about a rescue mission he did atop a mountain on the 4th of July. He was also interviewed by the local news. His story gave me goosebumps. You can read his blog post, entitled Rescue on the the 4th of July here.

Wyatt

Red Lantern Journeys

A friend of mine, Ambrose Bittner, who works next door to our office, owns a tour operator called Red Lantern Journeys, which specializes in luxe trips to Asia.

Whenever I pass by his office, I often daydream about the places that he sends his clients, and I think about the day when I’ll ask him to set up a trip for me.

On my Web TV talk show, WhitneyandWyatt.com, we did a show with him not too long ago, which we’ve re-run today. It’s all about how to plan a trip working with a travel agent or tour operator, and what they can do for you that may be hard to do on your own.

Even thinking about the places he books for clients has got my feet itching. Due to the film I’m trying to make, I have no big exotic trips planned this year, which has got me a bit bummed. I’ve even canceled a week-long trip with friends to Hawaii in November. Some people say, “Well Wyatt, you go to Dominica and Sweden every year!” My reply to that is, “Yeah, but that’s like going to Ohio to visit relatives.” OK, not really. It is really wonderful to go to Dominica and Sweden every year. I am very lucky that I get do to it. I would like to see someplace new, though. Hopefully I will be able to do that next year. Or you never know. I may change my mind and just go wander around for a bit. We shall see…

I am in Sweden this week, and a couple of days ago I got a call from my friend and business partner, Whitney Keyes, saying that we are in the Seattle PI.  I knew that an article was due about us and our Web TV show, WhitneyandWyatt.com, because on our last shoot, we had a reporter and a photographer there observing and interviewing us.  What I did not expect was to be on the front page of the paper!

Brett, Mayna, Whitney and Wyatt at Macy\'s

I immediately told Whitney and my sister to pick up copies of the paper, since I couldn’t be there in Seattle myself to bask in the glory of my 15 minutes of fame. I have received a few e-mails from friends and acquaintances, so that’s pretty cool.  Check out the article online: Women’s lifestyle talk show seeks its audience online

Wyatt

Saving the World

Yesterday, my sister Dost graduated from the University of Washington with an MPH in Global Health (GH). She had just come back from a consulting job in Panama the day before, where she spent 10 days doing health assessments in indigenous communities for a Canadian copper mining company.

I’m not usually one to look forward to graduation speeches, but the keynote speaker at Dost’s commencement ceremony was superb. Dr. Tadataka Yamada, executive director of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Global Health program talked about these graduating students who were all in GH trying to save the world. He said that their advanced degrees are not about going out and getting published, they are about saving the babies who are dying from diseases like malaria or HIV/Aids. 

After the ceremony, I talked to some of the international graduates about their work. Some of them are returning to their home countries to work on the health problems.  One doctor from Kenya got her degree as part of the work she is doing with women and HIV. She is going to continue to get her PhD. Another doctor is returning to Haiti to continue her work on making sure that everyone can get basic health care.

These people, my sister included, are very noble in their work and they are really concerned about the world’s health issues. The entire day made me give pause about what part I could take in saving the world as a filmmaker. It is an overwhelming endeavor, but I think it is something that I must do on some level. I need to think about what action I can take.

Wyatt

Tulip Festival

April 14, 2008

My husband Jan and I were planning a trip for him to run the ½ marathon in the Whidbey Island Marathon this past weekend, but then he hurt his back and was unable to train for several weeks. We still had this Bed & Breakfast (B&B) reservation for two nights for the weekend. Plus my mom, JB was visiting, so we called the B&B to see if they would be willing to trade us the two nights on the weekend for one night with two rooms on a Thursday night. Instead we’d head up that way for the Tulip Festival, since we were staying in the Mount Vernon area anyway. Everything worked out for our new plan, and we headed up to Mount Vernon with JB and my sister Dost, mid-morning on Thursday.

The weather was not cooperating for us. As a matter of fact, the weather has been pretty miserable for the spring. It’s definitely been on the colder side, so we weren’t expecting to see much by way of flowers.

We arrive in Mount Vernon, which is kind of the center of Skagit Valley. It’s right on the Skagit River. The drive up there is scenic and we’ve been through the town a fair amount of times on our way up to the San Juan Islands. It’s a sleeply little town, so this is the first time we’ve actually stopped in the town to do anything. We found a restaurant, called the Potter House and had a tasty lunch. Then we made our way to Rozeengarde, which was our first stop on our tour of tulips.

We were expecting to see lots of fields of tulips at Rozeengarde, but there weren’t any. We did see a big field of daffodils, which was kind of neat. But the only tulips they had were in the small gardens. You still had to pay an entry fee to get in. We did that and got some “Kodak moments”, then proceeded to buy fudge and caramel corn before we hit the road.

After our visit to Roozengarde, we decided it was time for a break, so we went to check into our B&B, called Queen of the Valley Inn in La Conner. Jan and I had visited La Conner once before. It’s a quaint little town with antique and gift shops on a river. It’s kind of a little artist’s community out there in the valley.

We checked into this really great old Victorian house built in 1908 by an oat farmer’s son for his wife. The house has the original wood fixtures and is in great shape. The innkeepers having been running the place for about 4 years, and they live in a house on the property behind the inn. This is a perfect set-up because you don’t feel like you’re intruding upon a stranger’s dwelling/living situation. The innkeepers were friendly and helpful, but not too in-your-face, since they didn’t actually live in the same house. Nice.

The house has been a B&B for 20 years, so it’s got history of lots of people staying in it. The top (third floor) which is now a suite, used to be a big hall where the previous owners of the day used to throw parties. Each room has a theme from somewhere in the world. We had the Africa room, so yes, lots of animal print. JB and Dost were in the West Indies room. Our room was on the first floor and overlooked a field. In the distance were daffodil fields, like someone spilled a big giant-sized bucket of yellow-gold paint onto the green field. Beyond that you could make out the Cascades, which still had snow on them. For dinner we headed into La Conner and ate at the Brewery, then we went back to hang out at the Queen.

The next morning, we had a great breakfast of Dutch Babys, bacon, orange juice and coffee. The view was gorgeous, as the oat farmer’s pink Victorian house sits across the road, and in the distance the snow capped Olympic mountains were in view. The time at the B&B certainly brought you back to an era gone by, when oats were what oil is today, and life was simpler and things probably not as crazy as they are now.

After breakfast, before heading home, we went to Tulip Town, where Dost and Jan refused to pay 5 bucks to see the (however manufactured) tulip fields in different colors. JB and I went in and got some photo ops, which was fun.

On our way back to Seattle, we hit the designer outlet mall on I-5 for an hour and half of retail therapy, before making our way home. It was a fun little getaway, which every now and then one should do, even if it’s just for a day.

Wyatt

The Terminal

A few weeks ago I had the unusual experience of being at Sea-Tac Airport for a day without ever getting on an airplane. My flight wasn’t cancelled. Instead I was working for Eyeplay, a creative agency, doing a commercial for the Port of Seattle. The commercial is about the cool new amenities the airport offers, including shops, pampering services, and restaurants. I got to play a “business traveler” who hangs out the airport before my trip. I have to say that it was one of the most fun days I’ve had as an actor. I did some interesting things, and I worked with some great people.

My call time was 6:30 AM, which wasn’t exactly enjoyable, because it meant that I had to get up at 4:30 AM. That’s not my usual waking hour, so I tried my best to be bright-eyed when I arrived. The hours were long as well, but that goes with the job.

After getting ushered through security, we started out at Massage Bar where I proceeded to sit in a chair and get massaged by one of the therapists for a good hour while they shot footage of me enjoying my massage. There were definitely plenty of jokes on my part about having to do re-takes of the scene.

I’ll be the first to admit that acting is not as glamorous as those outside the business think it is, especially for those of us that aren’t Halle Berry or George Clooney. For the rest of us, its hard work with little pay. However, when I have days that start out like this I can’t complain too much. I certainly felt an element of glamour when I was doing my thing in the terminal and people would go by looking in wonderment at us.

After my massage, it was time to do a scene with my “business travel companion” at the wine bar Vino Volo. The crew set up some props including paperwork, food and “wine”, which was actually grape juice. The grape juice was a good thing, because we did a bunch of “drinking” during our takes. The funny (weird not ha ha) thing was, we were supposed to be doing an evening scene, where I’m winding down and having dinner with a colleague discussing work before our flight. Well, it was about 10 o’clock in the morning, and the place had several real customers in it drinking (some of them A LOT of) wine before their flights. Geez, I guess some people are extremely nervous about flying.

After lunch we had a series of shots of us walking to our flight, me doing some last minute work on my laptop, etc. So there was a lot of standing and/or walking back and forth, which is to say, I also got in a good amount of exercise. I was fairly beat by the end of day.

I felt for the crew though, which had to schlep all the gear (cameras, lights, grip equipment, wardrobe, etc.) to each location and set it all up, then take it all down and then do it all over again many times. Plus they had to stick around for a few more hours after I left to finish some scenes of “a family at the airport” with the other actors. I definitely can relate to how they feel, because I’ve schlepped my fair share of gear. It was nice to not have to worry about anything besides my wardrobe bag when I left.

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