Dancing the night away

Another 14 hour day.

Spent the morning with the "writer."

A little backstory. When I was here in January - we tried to get a meeting with the writer. We heard this guy is the best - that in all of China - he is the number one guy. But he's out of town. Not sure when he will be back. He should be back before you leave.

He didn't come back.

When I came back in February - he was gone for Chinese New Year. But don't worry. He'll be back. I wanted to get a sample of his work - but don't worry. He's so good - you won't need one.

Then this trip - well... he's not available. But we have this girl. She's even better than that guy. Really he wasn't the best. She is the best. So when we tried to set up the meeting - her car was broken. When we offered to pick her up - something else came up. She is so busy working with foreign companies - that she couldn't squeeze us in.

She's that good.

But I didn't know that until yesterday when my Chinese producer showed up with a new guy. Key word being guy. I said - that's not a girl. No. But I thought we were going to meet with a girl. Yeah. Don't you remember when i told you that she was too busy? Apparently not - cause I thought she would be here today. Well - this is Ryan. He's the writer. Is he the best too? The best in all of China?

No. He's the third best.

And for all of you writers out there - he was just like a writer. He immediately explained to us that he hates the type of commercial we do. That they typically make him sick. When asked for references - he said that he tried to block from his memory all the products like ours that he's done before.

But don't worry. I'll do great for you.

We are in a severe time crunch - so I ask him to do some stuff for tomorrow.

Uh... I'm busy tomorrow.

See? There are big middle fingers everywhere - even in China.

I would write all this myself - I just don't have time. So we will see how Mr Chinese Ryan fares today. As if I know how to judge it. I can speak Chinese - but I can't read. So my translator has to read it to me for me to judge if this guy can write.

Kinda silly.

Big negotiations last night for the big Chinese Star.

She is embarking on a 12 city/12 day book/cd promotion tour before our shoot. We went over the creative with her last night. She was pretty excited. Had some more ideas that were crazy - but we will get past that.

I was put in charge of the contract talks - and they went really well. The business side of my company here in China was worried about me doing it - cause I'm a creative - and not a business guy. But I did fine - and got better deals than they asked. I had a lot of help from the ladies of the marketing department - but things were great.

The shoot is getting pushed a couple days - so there is still a ton to do. Annie - our star - announced last night that she didn't like any of this years clothes - so she wanted to see what our ideas were.

Didn't like any of this years clothes.

Wow.

Good thing all I wear is last years discounts from Old Navy.

Just gotta keep dancing and not let anyone see how much I'm faking it...