The midnight oil...

This is me and my director, Karl Richter, working on editing 11pm the day before we had to deliver our last special to the network.  Niki and I drove in to downtown, grabbed a quick bite of dinner,  then walked to Karl's.  Once there, my Niki hung out with his Niki (Karl and his Niki get married tomorrow, yay Karl!) and Karl and I took a look at what we had and what we needed to do.  The idea was that we'd shoot some things right then and there as filler but by the time we'd finished figuring out what to do I had to drive my Niki back home 'cause our baby sitter was only good 'til 9:30pm.

The point is this.

When my Niki heard I was going downtown to meet with Karl she asked if she could come too.  She just wanted to spend some time with me 'cause I've been traveling so much.  And here it is.  I knew that if she came it'd make things way more complicated but I could tell she really wanted to so I didn't hesitate, told her 'sure' and there we were several hours later with the complications setting in.

So, I drove her home (a 45min drive) dropped her off, kissed the babies, then drove back (45min) to Karl's, shot the stuff, then (at 11:30pm by this point) drove home (45min) to have a glass of wine with my Niki and...

See?

T'was all worth it.

All so the girl could spend some time with the boy.

Yes, it made things complicated but also lovely.  We had a great drive downtown, talking, catching up, just hanging out.  Dinner was awesome--though the grilled cheese sandwich had some crazy chic fussy cheese in it that made it a little more hip than I typically prefer--and my wife felt like she was more important than my work.

And she is.

It's just that our actions don't always reflect the way we feel about our "Niki's".

That's the trick to building a successful marriage, family, AND career.

You'll never have a happy wife or kids if your job comes first but most people, in order to succeed, have to put their job first.

My thought has always been, "Well, I can't and won't sacrifice my wife and kids on the altar of my job so that means most of the people I'm pitted against will be able to worker longer hours than me so that means I have to 1) work smarter 2) work faster 3) leverage my talent better and 4) bring a higher level of focus to the table.

Otherwise I won't make it.

So idea for today is to remind you to put your wife and babies first and then do whatever it takes to pour yourself into what you've been called to do to the point that you can 'compensate' for 'stilted priorities'.

(and only stilted people would call our kind of priority structure stilted)

Y'heard?

Tonight or tomorrow I'ma try to hit you up about the craziness that's happening right now on the TV/Film front.  There are some papers supposedly (!) being signed and some dramatic TV series workshopping that's supposedly (!) supposed to be starting.

But the main deal in the household today is that I'm taking my boys to an Argos/B.C Lions game tonight 'cause my host Mark Washing (DB Coach for the Lions) hooked us up with tickets and enough orange and black swag that my boys and I are sure to get beat up tonight.

I'll make sure I get some good shots for you.

Peace,

T