Jason left over four years ago. Just up and left. Left his wife and kids behind too. Many of his friends were puzzled by that. Most felt it was a bad move on Jason's part. I think we all understood his motivations for doing it, but hoped he would have made a different choice.

Well, he's back... for a while, at least.

Saturday night, Jason, Mark, Chadd, Jon, and I met at Betos around 11 p.m. and visited for about three hours. We heard about Jason's experiences as a fledgling actor in Chicago as well as his losing more than a hundred pounds of extra weight.

We spent a great deal of time talking about making videos or short films. That was one of the last things Chadd, Jason, and I did together — we made Driving P.S.A., a mock public service video intended to poke fun of the typical films shown on driving safety. Jason played “Victor” and I played “Danny” in the film.

Chadd and I dug up a lot of video/film ideas we had come up with over the last three or four years. (I can't believe it's been that long since we did Amaze-O-Cut!) We discussed these ideas with everyone there, laughed about some of those ideas, and dissed the others. We even discussed completely remaking A Guy And A Personal Computer, shot for shot, with Jason as “The Guy” instead of that Ray guy.

It started getting late and our little rendezvous dispersed around 2 a.m. Chadd took Jason back to Mark's house (where he was staying) and I met them over there. Jason and I went inside and I downloaded the special edition of A Guy And A Personal Computer for Jason to watch.

It's bizarre, in a way, to have Jason back around. Some of the things he's said indicate it may be a possibility he'll move back to Utah. For the sake of his relationship with his two sons, it would be a very good thing. On the other hand, he has devoted a couple years of his life to training as an actor and acting skills are not in extremely high demand in the Logan area. He'd probably do better in Salt Lake, but nowhere near as good as he'd do in Chicago (or Las Vegas, New York, Los Angeles, or any other entertainment hot-spot.)

Doran and Jason

Everyone

Jason and Chadd

Lots to think about

Today, Christine and I took the girls to my parents' and we went driving around researching areas we thought we might be interested in building a house in. In the end, we are very excited about several lots in the northeast area of Lehi and less excited — but still interested — in an area of West Jordan.

Of course, a lot of our decision rests on broadband Internet connectivity. If we can't get DSL or AT&T Broadband Internet in a location then it's not really a location worth looking into.

While we were in Lehi, I called my cube-mate Dave (who lives in Lehi) and arranged for us to stop by his house for a visit. Nice house!

After our research of lots, we returned to my parents and had a delicious dinner with my parents, my brother, and his kids. It was delicious! Oh, I already mentioned that.

Sons Of Something

Thom just stopped by. Brought me CDs from their last gig at Getty's. Told me about the upcoming performance at The Element in November and that they'd like it if I could help by providing some support for visuals. It sounds like a lot of fun.