Mike Milo’s Journal

I am truly amazed at the talent of some people!

Mr Flint explaining to Woodrow how to raise the sun.

Well, I’ve managed to finish my pitch storyboard for CN’s shorts program and I’m pretty happy with the result. Of course I haven’t shown it to many people for the simple reason that I have no one to show except my family.  So, because I need to practice pitching and because I value their opinion, I pitched to my brother, wife and kids.  My wife said she really liked the story and that it was funny, which is good and I believe her because she does not pull punches. My kids also liked it and said they thought it was funny. I think they did not get all the jokes but that’s cool as I have heard that CN is trying to skew older with these shorts. My best review however came from my brother who said he loved it. Even better, he said actually liked it better than Flavio which I take as a compliment simply because I really liked how Flavio came out. He laughed at all the right places and thought the whole thing was good.

Here’s a few more panels from the film…

Woodrow realizes he’s destroyed the sun.

Mr Flint. chastises Woodrow.

The Ironwoods ‘curling’ cows.

Woodrow gets blown up.

Woodrow not behaving.

Woodrow flipping out because he can’t be on the Force of Nature

Woodrow feeling a little ‘beat’

On the left side is Lover’s Beach and the right
side is Divorce Beach.

This one is about saving a man instead of almost killing myself…

About 5 years ago my wife and I bought a time share down in Cabo San Lucas which was where I had proposed to her about 9 years prior to that. Now something I did not know about Cabo at the time we bought the time share was that because it sits on the edge of the Baha peninsula it has extremely strong currents from both the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific Ocean. The first year we went down there the beach was nice and the waves wer small. Apparently that winter a hurricane came in and destroyed much of the beach and when we next went there for a visit (and bought the time share) there was not much beach at all. Still we thought nothing of it because it was still the same beach. Or so we thought. Somehow the hurricane had changed the tide there and as we soon found out it was not the calm beach we had known in previous years. (more…)

I love puns. They’re so clever. Who thinks this stuff up?
===================================

Two antennas met on a roof, fell in love and got married. The
ceremony wasn’t much, but the reception was excellent.

2. A jumper cable walks into a bar. The bartender says, ‘I’ll serve
you, but don’t start anything.’

3. Two peanuts walk into a bar, and one was a salted.

4. A dyslexic man walks into a bra.

5. A man walks into a bar with a slab of asphalt under his arm, and
says: ‘A beer please, and one for the road.’ (more…)

Every year I make my wife a custom birthday car. Here’s this year’s…

Sometimes life has a way of nudging you to show how lucky you are. One day on Hwy 101 I got shoved.

I was driving my friend James home one evening after some jamming and drawing and we were gabbing it up having a good ol’ time. I got onto the 101 freeway and started the long trek to his house. In L.A. a trip to the market is a long trek.

Trust me on this.

Anyway, so we’re driving along in the fast lane and I cracked a joke which James found particularly funny and he got the giggles. For some reason I turned to look at him and it was then I noticed right past him out the window two lanes away,  a tractor trailer was just beginning to jackknife and come towards me!

No I’m not kidding.

Suddenly time slowed down…

You know how in movies when an important moment happens and the film switches to slow-mo?

I can tell you that there’s a reason for that. It does actually happen in real life or at least it appears to happen.

At least to me. (more…)

The town Old Tappan, where I lived as a teenager, was settled in 1664 which granted is not old according to European standards but it’s pretty old for the US and played a large part in the revolutionary war. George Washington slept in my town numerous times and we even had a few traitors hung in a large oak tree in what was the center of town at the time. Behind my home we had at least 20 acres of woods which has now sadly been turned into condos and homes. At the time people didn’t worry so much about perverts, terrorists and murderers and our parents felt safe letting us be away from home for hours on end.

My friend Jimmy and I would get up on a Saturday morning and go hiking in the woods to explore like Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer from sunup to sundown. the Horse trails which used to be the main thoroughfair in my town ran behind my house and although it had clearly been abandoned many years ago it still had remnants of life along it’s winding path. Many foundations of old businesses and homes dotted the path and sometimes would dig around them hoping to find a way into a still usable cellar. (more…)

Last school year my children joined the Chatsworth Chiefs track team last year and greatly benefited from it. They were healthier, trimmed down and seemed happier because of their successes in the sport.

Then our Governator jackass cut 3 billion in funding to our schools and the LAUSD felt it needed to make that money back by charging extra curricular organizations to use their tax-funded fields. This has got kid’s after school activities falling into jeapordy because along with the recesssion now we have to pay extra to allow them to be in these activities. That’s fine for me, it’s worth it and I make enough money topay for it but some kid’s families do not and so they will not register this year which will make the whole organization fall apart. 

The Daily News wrote an article concerning this crisis the other day. Below is what I posted in the comments section. I know I’ll never be a politician but it was written from the heart.

This is ridiculous! Gee why don’t we just go ahead and penalize the students now for drinking water out of the fountains? Seems reasonable.
The LAUSD could charge 15 cents per sip of water.
Oh and while we’re at it why don’t we also charge them a ‘per step’ fee for walking on the floors in the schools?  That could bring in some cash too! After all the floors have to be washed and water prices are going up.
Wait a minute! Why don’t we take the dirty floor water and pump it INTO the fountains. We can save a bundle that way!
Obviously all ludicrous ideas but then so is charging for the extracurricular activities. The fields are there anyway and if they’re not being used then people should be allowed to utilize them. I pay taxes that pay for that field  and it should not be allowed to be sold freely to make money from other deficits. Children NEED activities to keep them off the streets after school.
We CAN"T let them run around playing after school in L.A. because of the perverts and gang idiots. They might wind up dead. We’re not supposed to let them watch TV because it rots their minds. They can’t play video games because of the violence. they’re not supposed to snack anymore because it’s too fattening…
WTF are they SUPPOSED to do!?!?!?!?

Let’s show them we don’t care about them and really staying away from gangs and drugs. Let’s cut the funding to their extracurricular activities by charging to use the EMPTY fields on school property. Tax funded property!
Kathyrn Friedman is a jackass if she thinks this will do anything but cause more problems with our children. It’s amazing that the school system is still running at all.
Congratulations LAUSD.
You’re destroying our future one kid at a time.
Thumbs up!

Milt was my teacher at The Kubert School and he taught me a lot. Here’s a tribute to him I found on Youtube. At about 49 seconds he talks about handing a scene out. I was there when it was recorded and I remember it well. I think that’s my friend harry’s foot there in the top corner at around 2:33 because I remeber he always rolled his pants up then just like that.

If you’ve been reading my true Life Stories then you’ll remember I spoke about an old friend named Frank.

Frank and I have known each other for almost thirty years and in that time he’s always been a musician. He’s also been a close friend. We lost contact once I moved out to L.A. but in the last two years we’ve been trading emails again and he even did a song for my short Flavio which I wish I could have put in the film as it would’ve made it better for certain.

We got into quite a bit of trouble together as young fellas; most of which I can’t write about here and some that I can. We used to write and sing music together many years ago and I still have some of those tapes somewhere. Someday I will digitze them before they crumble into dust.

Recently Frank put up a website with some of his recent music which although is raw is pretty cool! MY favorite song is Someday I’m Gonna Find a Way which has a nice hook to it.

He’s doing a survey as to which three people like the most so post your comments here.

Also, if you know people in the music industry forward them his site!

Check out more of Frank James’ music here and check back often as he posts new music.