The Vifl

01) Got married to Rachel Luise Lehenbauer on the beach in Hilton Head, South Carolina on June 2nd. WOOHOO!

02) Had an awesome honeymoon first in Charleston SC and then in the Berkshire Mountains in Massachusetts.

03) Living in a little white rental house near the corner of 3rd and Elm in downtown Washington. Rachel just received her Master’s Degree in Piano Pedagogy and is teaching a few students at home. I was full-time editor for a nationally syndicated bass fishing show, which was cool experience, but the show lost its title sponsor and bombed. So now I’m unemployed, but Rachel and I are getting by and keeping busy.

04) We bought a piano! We spent a bit more than we had originally planned, but it was such an insanely good deal for what it is that we had to get it. Rachel’s very happy with it.

05) We have a cat named Pepper. She’s pretty cute. She sleeps, poops, jumps on things, bites us, makes out with fleece, and eats our food.

06) BABIES! I’ve never been much of a “baby guy,” but I’m proud to have my new nephew Henry, and my nieces Grace (Rachel’s sister’s baby) and Kylie (Rachel’s brother’s step daughter).

07) I’m applying to film schools again, to get my MFA and to hopefully jump start a professional career in film/video production (as opposed to videography). I got an acceptance call from one in San Francisco yesterday, and am expecting to hear back from one in L.A. and two in Chicago. If God wills it, Rachel and I will be moving to Chicago or California in Fall 2010.

08) I’ll soon be trying my hand at online film competitions. There are prizes that range from $1,000 to $100,000. Could be time well spent if I pour thought and energy into it.

09) I’ve been jogging and doing some weight lifting lately, trying to keep myself at a healthy weight. It seems that ever since my colon surgery, it’s been easier for me to get fat. But I’m very, very thankful to have a well working “semicolon.” My Crohn’s is well under control right now.

10) The summer after graduating college, a few friends and I dressed up in heavy monk robes and all got heat stroke in the woods to film my zero-budget epic “Tale of the Unfinished Song.” And what was more and more becoming “Tale of the Unfinished Movie” has finally reached a point that I can call “finished.” Despite one special effects scene, which my friend Tim is going to start working on in January, The Unfinished Song–though far from the multi-million dollar production I originally imagined–is now at least watchable. Struggling with the film for the last 2 to 3 years has given me a much deeper knowledge of storytelling, and I look forward to remaking the movie someday.

And that, sirs, is my VIFL REUNION 2009 UPDATE!