My Boring-Ass Life (Revised Edition): The Uncomfortably Candid Diary of Kevin Smith (44 page)

Jen gets home while I’m on the phone. Then Mewes shows up as well. Jen heads up to dinner while Mewes and I bullshit in the room for a while.

I say g’night to Harley and Jen puts her to bed, while I watch more of
Batman Begins
.

When Jen gets back, we watch this Discovery Channel doc
Anatomy of a Shark Bite
while playing cards. If you haven’t seen it, check it out. The lion’s share of the eighty minutes is kinda dopey, as a crew of technicians and artisans try to
build exact replicas of the sharks that attacked two victims. But the doc contains a pair of on-camera shark attacks that can only be described as “fucked-up”. Totally worth sitting through for that footage alone, and further proof that I have no business being in any body of water outside of a swimming pool.

After our game of Rummy, I fall asleep watching
Simpsons
while Jen putters around the room, cleaning up.

Tuesday 16 August 2005 @ 9:38 p.m.

I wake up, shit while playing Tetris, then head to my office, where I work online all morning, going through email and iChatting with Mos and other folks.

Pre-noon, I drive Jen to Asia de Cuba at the Mondrian Hotel for her lunch with Cagney Jarvis, the mother of a kid in Harley’s class and the woman Jen’s launching a school paper with. Since Jen’s early, she asks if I’ll come in and sit with her ‘til Cagney gets there. We get a table, order some drinks, and sit and talk for half an hour. It’s times like this that I’m reminded how lucky I am not to have a nine-to-five job, as it affords me a bunch of opportunity to hang with my wife. And being that I married the woman because I find her so interesting, that kinda hang-time is pure bliss.

When Cagney arrives, I head to Laser Blazer. On the ride over, I call Chappy to hip him to my new clothing line idea. Then, I jump into Laser Blazer, pick up a bunch of DVDs, and shoot back to the Mondrian to pick up Jen from her lunch.

When we get home, I immediately take a shower, as I hadn’t had a chance to do so before I ran my errands. When I get out of the shower, Jen’s giving me the eyes, so we lock the door, turn on the fuck music, and bone for an hour.

Afterwards, we pop in one of the new
Simpsons
season six DVDs and check our email. Then, an hour later, we wind up fucking again. Once again, it’s really nice not having a nine-to-five.

We get a call to attend an Easter Egg hunt in Harley’s room that she’s set up with Kevin and Reyna. Once all the eggs are unearthed, I kiss Quinnster g’night and head upstairs, where Jen and I watch
Simpsons
and play Rummy ‘til we go to sleep.

Wednesday 17 August 2005 @ 9:39 p.m.

Wake up just in time to get dressed for a work out with Larry. When we wrap up, I check email and jump in the shower, then shoot over to the Valley to New Wave to meet with JM and Mike to finish the
Evening 2
edit.

I come home and play Ms. Pac Man with Harley upstairs, then we do a round or two of hide and seek in the living room. We head to my office and watch some trailers online, after which Harley goes to hang out with Gail.

I pop in
Hardcore
, a Greek flick about teenage prostitutes that turns out to be a pretty engrossing watch.

Before the movie ends, Harley intercoms up to invite me to a tea party in her room. While there, I get the call from the actress’s agent, saying she just got done reading it in NYC, and he’s happy to tell me that she’s in. I ecstatically thank him, and call Scott to deliver the good news. Not only is she a score for us and someone we really wanted, but she’s also on Harvey’s pre-approved list, so he’s gonna be delighted as well.

Jen comes home from yoga and the family heads upstairs to eat dinner while I relax in my room, watching the rest of
Hardcore
. I join the group, which now includes Chay, toward the end of their meal, to make my chicken soup shake replacement meal. Chay gifts me with a new jersey — the one she and Jay had made for my birthday, branding me “The King of Hearts”, with a back that’s labeled “All In”. I totally dig it.

Suddenly, Harley launches a scavenger hunt on us, sending us all over the house to find odd bits of detritus to stuff into plastic bags she’s provided. She winds up winning (surprise, surprise), and then it’s time for Harley to go to bed. I kiss her g’night, then go back to my room, where I watch the Dave Chappelle standup special.

Jen returns from putting Harley to bed, and we watch more
Simpsons
DVDs while playing Rummy. Jen’s pretty tired, so we wrap it up after one game, and she goes to sleep, while I watch more
Simpsons
and check email, ‘til I fall asleep.

Thursday 18 August 2005 @ 9:39 p.m.

Wake up and head to the bedroom office (eating less means shitting less). While Jen goes off to yoga, I check email and board and do a bunch of IM’ing. I return calls to Tony Angellotti (the publicist) and John Sloss (the lawyer), then write the closing piece for the new
Mallrats
book.

Jen comes back from yoga and starts bugging me to get into shower for the CNN taping. I shower, get dressed, and head over to CNN to do piece on indie film.

Afterwards, I shoot over to Moe’s on Melrose and pick up flowers for Jen, Gail and Harley. I come home, drop off the flowers to Gail, leave the flowers for Jen (who’s out shopping), and bring Harley’s flowers with me as I go to pick her up from gymnastics camp, bringing Scully along for the ride.

I grab Harley and present her with her flowers in the car, then drive home. Harley heads off to play with Hans, and I head upstairs to the flower-smitten Jen to play with her. We bone, and then she showers and gets semi-ready for her night out with Chay. We play a hand of Rummy before I head upstairs to meet with Chappy and Gina to go over the Boston Con schedule and the
Chasing Amy
inaction figures.

Jen heads out to a birthday dinner for Chay’s roommate, while me, Malcolm, Andre, Mos, Byron, Gail and Mewes play poker all night. A buzzed Jen comes home and hangs out with us for a bit before heading to bed.

By night’s end, it’s just me, Malcolm and Dre playing poker. We quit around four, at which point they head home and I head to bed.

Friday 19 August 2005 @ 9:40 p.m.

I wake up around 8:45 a.m. and since Byron and Gail have left for Big Bear, I get Quinnster ready and drop her off at camp. On the way home, I pick Jen up some McDonald’s hash browns — her favorite hangover medicine.

I get into my sweats and work out with Larry, starting with our routine dog walk and finishing with a serious set of squats.

Larry leaves, and I hit the shower, get dressed, and head over to the Weight Control Center. After the seventeen-pound loss from last week, I know not to expect to lose the same amount, but I’m not prepared for the precipitous drop the scale reveals: just four pounds. Granted, my two-week total is twenty-one, but after all that non-eating and working out, I was hoping for a little more. Leslie, the counselor, maintains that’s a pretty normal figure, and when I go in to see the doctor, he explains how weight loss works (fat cells empty of lipid, but to maintain the enlarged cell structure, the body fills the cell with water; once the water is expelled from the cell, the cell shrinks; and since water weighs more than fat, that ongoing process does not provide an average weight-loss figure every week; one week you lose seventeen pounds, the next week you lose four, the week after you lose nine — all by following the exact same procedures).

I pick up Harley from gymnastics camp, then we swing up to the house and grab Jen, and the three of us head to the El Capitan to see
Valiant
.

After the flick, we pick up Baja Fresh for Quinnster, and head home. I watch TiVo’ed
Simpsons
and check email while Jen feeds Quinnster and puts her to bed.

Jen’s feeling peckish, so she takes a run to In-N-Out, solo. When she comes back, she downs her grilled cheese, and we watch TiVo’ed
Law & Order
and
Simpsons
eps, and play Rummy ‘til bedtime.

Saturday 20 August 2005 @ 9:40 p.m.

Quinnster wakes me up around seven and I let Jen sleep in, heading down to Harley’s room to watch
Lilo and Stitch
and play Disney scrabble.

When Jen gets up, I turn Harley over to her and bury myself in the office, updating the online diary and posting it, as well as the original
Jersey Girl
trailer that I found on an old disc in the office.

Reyna arrives with Kevin and Hans, and Harley hangs out with them most of the day, heading to Chuck E. Cheese in the late afternoon. Jen runs errands and hikes Runyon, then comes home and goes swimming, while I continue to update the online diary. I join her upstairs in the kitchen and we chit-chat before heading back down to the room, where we start watching
The Mambo Kings
. The Cuban accent reminds us both of
Scarface
, and we decide we’d rather watch that movie, so we pop it in instead.

Harley gets home from Chuck E. Cheese and Jen and I read her a few books and put her to bed, then head back upstairs to continue watching
Scarface
, during which Jen falls asleep.

When
Scarface
ends, I pop in
School of Rock
, which the uneasy sleeper Schwalbach wakes to and barks at me about having the TV too loud (which it’s not). I tell her to “Get off my ass,” and it kicks off a fight that ends with Jen storming out of the bed, heading to the bathroom, presumably to smoke and fume. I go to sleep.

Sunday 21 August 2005 @ 9:40 p.m.

Feeling a little guilty about waking Jen up last night, I get up early with Harley so the wife can sleep in. We watch TV in her room and play games, then head upstairs to get Harley humus and watch some of the second
Looney Tunes
box set in the gym. I’ve seen all of these shorts so many times that I’m reciting lines to Harley and acting out the cartoons for her. She looks at me like I’m an asshole, but amusing nonetheless.

Jen finally gets up, and I crawl back into bed, falling asleep ‘til 12:30 p.m. I wake up and check email, then realize I have less than an hour to shower, pack and get to the airport with Mewes for our Toronto flight. I call
Degrassi
producer Jim Jackman to see if I can get out on a later flight instead of rushing to LAX to possibly miss the flight. Jim books Mewes and me on a red-eye, so we’ve now got plenty of time before we have to head out to the airport.

We opt to have a barbecue and play poker. Malcolm, Andre, and Chay come over, and I cook up a bunch of meat my Mom sent me for my birthday. I try not to be too bitter as they scarf down burgers, hotdogs, and filet mignon, while I’m sucking at my 160 calorie drink box. Afterwards, the six of us play poker ‘til it’s time for me and Mewes to leave for the airport.

Andre drives us to LAX in the Hate Tank and drops us off. Mewes and I check in and head to the first class lounge for a bit to check email before we go, at which point I realize I’ve forgotten my cell phone.

We board and take the four hour and change flight to Toronto, sleeping most of the way.

Monday 22 August 2005 @ 2:57 p.m.

Mewes and I land in Toronto and head to customs, where we have to pick up our work permits. Forty-five minutes later, we’re meeting
Degrassi
co-producer Jim Jackman out in passenger arrivals.

Jim whisks us out to the Epitome stages, where we’re immediately put to work in the first shot.

We spend the day shooting the two-part follow-up to our three episode arc from last year, in which Kevin Smith and Jason Mewes are back in Toronto for the world première of
Jay and Silent Bob Go Canadian, Eh
. Today’s all stage stuff, and tomorrow, we go on location for the fake première stuff.

I spend lunch talking to
Degrassi
creator/mastermind Linda Schuyler and her husband, exec producer Stephen Stohn about the
Degrassi
feature and the script revamp we’re working on, coming up with ‘It Goes There’ storylines worthy of the
Degrassi
legacy. At lunch’s end, Jim hands me his cell, saying Jen’s on the line. Jen and I talk for a while, until I have to roll back to the set and shoot.

We shoot ‘til eight or nine, during which we plan a post-wrap poker game with Stefan ‘Snake’ Brogren and I do an interview regarding the
Degrassi
twenty-fifth anniversary. But when we wrap, both Mewes and I are so bushed from our long day and lack of sleep from the night before, that we opt to crash at our hotel, The Grand.

Jim drops us off and gets us checked in, then gets us settled in our rooms. Mewes turns in to watch a movie and order room service, and Jim and I talk about the
Degrassi
feature for a while before he takes off.

I head upstairs in my suite and start to check email before crashing and falling asleep by ten-ish.

Tuesday 23 August 2005 @ 2:58 p.m.

I wake up around nine and check email while watching the new
Degrassi
season’s freshly cut second five episodes (I’d seen the first five back home, a month before). I talk to Jen, then jump in the shower and get ready for our three o’clock call.

Jim picks up Mewes and I and takes us to the Eglinton, which is doubling for the movie theater at which the fake
Jay and Silent Bob
sequel is debuting.

We work ‘til midnight, during which we knock out our three scenes, I visit with
Degrassi
folks I haven’t seen in months, and I try to catch some Zs in anticipation of the late-night poker game we postponed from the night before.

At wrap, we head back to the hotel, where I talk to Jen, then head next door to Mewes’s room, where the game gets going with eight of us playing.

Wednesday 24 August 2005 @ 2:59 p.m.

Mewes, Jim, Jim’s friend Squally, Stefan, his girlfriend Yvonne, Mike ‘Jay’ Lobel, and me play all through the night. At one point, former show head-writer/current
Degrassi
feature writer Aaron Martin stops by with former Associate Producer Nicole Hamilton on their way home from catching a flick. By the time we wrap up at eight in the morning, the room’s down to just me, Mewes, Jim, Stefan and Yvonne. While I donk out for most of the night, by the time we stop, I’ve won back everything I’ve lost, plus ten bucks.