Last Weekend

As always, there is lots to catch up on, and so much of it relates to last weekend! Among other things, we had a Halloween Party to rival all parties we've thrown in the past, I made a career decision AND Darren showed me around the Weta Workshop.

The biggest event, of course, was the party, but I'll start off with the tour. I've been wanting to do one for a while, but tours are typically only held during the week when I'm working. I had taken a couple days off last week, though, so Darren called up and asked if he could bring me in. Since Weta had just completed a couple of projects, I was able to see more of the Workshop than usual because the props had been cleared out.

The first room I saw was a meeting room, which totally would not have been impressive if it didn't also contain all the awards that Weta (and Richard Taylor) have won for various projects. I must have stared at the 5 Oscars from LOTR and King Kong for 10 full minutes! I've never been that close to an Oscar before! I was also happy to report to my boss that the "Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year" award he received last year was hanging on the wall of the same room.

We moved on from the admin area and down some stairs into the workshop area. There are props from Narnia and LOTR everywhere! Really cool to see stuff from movies close-up, although I was too scared to touch anything. I met a lot of Darren's co-workers and checked out the rooms he works in the most. The atmosphere is quite casual, as you can imagine, with CD players or radios in each workroom.

After the extensive tour, we were headed back up to the Admin area to leave, when we ran into Richard Taylor himself!! Darren introduced me, and Richard shook my hand and said something like "It's about time Darren got you in here for a tour - it's good to finally meet you."

Me?

Finally meet me?

Before I could say anything witty (I may have just grunted while smiling..truly can't remember) he was off down the stairs to the workshop.

And that was that! The tour was much more exciting that the times Darren has been to my office ("this is my desk, where I work my tax magic....").