An pictorial update of the last few months:

Spent a couple days on the beach listening to the waves.  Needed that.  Didn't talk to anyone, see anyone, or really do anything.  Just sat there with a cup of coffee (it was cold) and watched and listened.

Casey and I had great seats to see Old Crow Medicine Show at Woodruff Arts Center.  They performed Bob Dylan's album "Blonde on Blonde" front to back and finished with some of their own hits.

Matt Bolick was in town so I drove him over to Central Casting to get registered.

 If you look closely, you'll see me and Chad Joyce in Spiderman: Homecoming.  Don't blink!

PS  Matt, Chad, and I may be also have small spots in upcoming Bad Moms 2, Jacob's Ladder, Jumanji, and something else I've forgotten.  Just background stuff so no telling whether we're in or out.

Went for a long ride with friends on my 12th 'canciversary' on November 18th.  Went down to The Whistle Stop Cafe south of Atlanta - where the movie "Fried Green Tomatoes" was filmed.  Great ride - all back roads - food just so, so.   But glad to be up and riding with friends.  

Can't believe all that was 12 years ago. 

Update - here's my "resume" as it is so far.  Almost all BG work as of now but hoping that changes soon with a couple recent auditions.

Experience:

Homicide Hunter w/ Lt. Joe Kenda-Ep.610-Alan Daniels, shooting victim-speaking role

The Walking Dead - stand in for Norman Reedus

The Walking Dead - Savior biker crew (Se.6, Ep. 9) - featured.

The Walking Dead - Savior biker crew. (Se. 6, Ep.8) - featured

The Walking Dead - Green Boots crew.

Jacob’s Ladder movie - drug addicted homeless veteran - featured.

Neighbors 2 movie - French villager - featured.

Bastards movie- artist / father.

The Originals series - 5 episodes

Baby Driver - prisoner

Powers series - biker/bar patron.

Office Christmas Party movie - patient

Rectify Season 4 - biker/country bar guy

Stars, a Lee Daniels pilot for TV - foster care father

Too Close to Home, a Tyler Perry production - Biker.

Spiderman: Homecoming - prisoner

Alvin & the Chipmunks 4 movie - biker

Logan Lucky - Prisoner

The Vampire Diaries - sketchy motel guest

National Geographic Channel’s “The Human Spirit” - Barbarian

Jumanji - Dragoon

AMC’s Turn: Washington’s Spies - ep. 403 - Queen’s Ranger

Bad Mom’s - day laborer

Dumplin - biker

Insatiable - biker

Black Lightning - bad guy

I haven't posted for a while.  No real reason - nothing particular going on but here are some pics from the last couple months.

Here's a screen cap from my work on Turn: Washington's Spies episode 403.  3 long, cold days on set for about a second and a half on screen.  

2 of my favorite peoples joined me back in April to see Magpie Salute at The Buckhead Theater.  MS is half the guys from the original Black Crowes line up.  Great times!

These kids!

Chad Joyce and I working the tent life on the set of Jennifer Anniston's new movie, Dumplin' - same plot as Little Miss Sunshine.   I think we can skip this one.  We were on set from 10:30 am until 1:30am and never did much of anything.   

Chad and I had just enough time to leave set and catch last call at Action Park.  John R. jumped in for a pretty stellar pic bomb.  

A screen cap from the new movie Baby Driver.  I think this is the movie Chad and I met and first worked on a couple years ago.  We spent all day in Gwinnett County prison filming for this one.

Watch the new season of The Walking Dead and you just might catch a bit more of him.  That guy's gonna blow up this year!

Follow the link here to see a bit of Chad and I in some stock footage from the National Geo. shoot last year where we played Vikings and Barbarians.

https://www.filmsupply.com/clips/barbarians-at-war/65831

Long drive this afternoon / evening from Atlanta to Charlottesville, VA for an audition.  Small speaking role on a popular AMC channel series.  Could be fun.  I had 8 hours in the truck to practice so I'm feeling pretty good about it right now - but we'll see how the nerves do tomorrow once I'm in the office in front of the casting director.

Also, the Nat'l Geographic Channel show I did back in late October released a trailer recently.
Origins: The Journey of Humankind airs Monday March 6th.  The trailer looks pretty cool and you can see Chad Joyce at 1:33 playing the viking king.  I'm not sure how much I'll be in the shots - but I definitely killed a guy with a sword that night.  I know that for a fact.
Hoping it makes in on screen.

Watch the trailer here:

I posted these pics a while back but here is the whole viking / barbarian crew in costume on set:

Just now, I was listening to Jocko Willink's podcast interview with Colonel Bill Reeder and discussion of Reeder's book, "My Captivity in Vietnam".   While discussing being shot down in his Cobra attack helicopter and nearly being killed by friendly fire after escaping his burning aircraft, Reeder paused Jocko to mention that in those moments and for many after, he often recited the 23rd Psalm as a means of strength and comfort to himself over the many obstacles confronting him.
You know the 23rd Psalm: it's the one that starts "The Lord is my shepherd...."
While I've heard this many times I didn't know it by it's numerical/bible reference so I looked it up.
And because I'm me, I also looked up the "catholic prayer of the day" for February 24th and found this - which seemed timely / fitting.

Listen to Jocko's podcast series.  It's really great stuff and pretty dang inspiring.




Prayer For Courage

Dear God, give me courage,
for perhaps I lack it more than anything else.

I need courage before men against their threats
and against their seductions.

I need courage to bear unkindness,
mockery, contradiction.

I need courage to fight against the devil,
against terrors and troubles, temptations,
attractions, darkness and false lights,
against tears, depression, and above all fear.

I need Your help, dear God.

Strengthen me with Your love and Your grace.

Console me with Your blessed Presence
and grant me the courage to persevere
until I am with You forever in heaven.

#tbt. My radiation mask. Sheets of plastic are heated in boiling water and carefully molded around your face. They add the cleats later to use for leverage when they clamp your head down on the table. The machines are loud. Whining, whirring, grinding, clunking, metallic banging all around you as the table you're strapped to moves into position and adjusts over and over again. Then that god awful smell fills your head. That searing plastic bacon smell of bits of your brain burning away. 

8 weeks. 42 treatments. 78 grey. Each day when it's done the tech puts a large copper coin in your palm for the parking attendant, a dark skinned Indian man with soft eyes and a smile that says, 

"I know that you're dying and all I can do is lift this arm for the price of that coin". 

I gave him the pet name Charon but he didn't get the joke.

Well, I had to shave the beard - which was painful - I haven't seen my face in 10 years - but I am now officially SAG eligible.  As soon as I receive my paychecks from Turn: Washington's Spies, I'll go down to the local Atlanta office and submit my forms and be a "professional actor".  Pretty cool stuff.
It's a big step up (hopefully) and my agent has offered to make introductions to her people up in NYC.  2017 could be a huge year for me.  Fingers crossed!

The latest post in which I become a published author and qualify for SAG in the same week

Wow !
It's turned out to be a very good week indeed - and I needed a little of that !

A show that I've submitted to many times called to see if I'd be interested in a small part this past Monday night - so I drove to Richmond, VA on Wednesday to meet with casting and wardrobe.
It was an incredibly long day - up at 4 am, left at 6:30, arrived at 3:00 pm, had an hour and a half meeting, then got back in the truck and drove all the way home, arriving a little after 1 am.
Jeez - tires me out just thinking back on it.

I'll be appearing in season 4 of "Turn: Washington's Spies".  I'm not allowed to give any details because of the non-disclosure agreement but looks to be pretty cool and I'm very excited about it.
It's a small role - but more importantly - it will qualify me to join the screen actor's guild, which is a big important step up professionally in the tv/movie biz.
Couldn't be more happy about it !


AND - the piece I wrote about surviving 10 years post cancer has been published by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center where I had my surgery in May of 2006.

The link is here:
https://issuu.com/eyeearfoundationofpittsburgh/docs/newsletter-skull_base_center-final-

Life is good !
xoxo,
J

Well, it's been an interesting week or so since I last wrote. Excellent workouts, including a bench press high of 215 lbs. just this afternoon. Not bad for an old guy just getting back into it.

   I sold / installed a large window film job for the company - www.sunxus.com - just in case you're interested.  We installed 1,000 sq.ft. of security film with silicone attachment at a local school in the 5 weekdays between Christmas and New Years.  The guys I've been using for years (nearly 20 all told) didn't show up or call or text Monday morning and I ended up working all day by myself.
Boy was I ticked off !!!   But by the end of the day I had accomplished a lot and realized I was mostly back to feeling like my old self again.  Somewhere over the past few weeks I've slipped back into - Get it Freakin' Done Mode!   That was a good thing to see.  The guys showed up late on Tuesday and later still on Wednesday so I won't be using them again but, like I said before, I'm also in "Cutting Dead Weight Mode" too.  I was able to bring in a couple of solid friends last minute and get the job finished on time - with exactly 6 minutes to spare (there was a drop dead time of 5:38 PM on Friday afternoon - or finish by sundown)  (Odd I know but that was the rules.)
It's finished and the client was happy and paid in full.
Nice to have a bit more cash in the old bank account to start the new year!

I also heard from 2 cousins on my late father's side of the family Thursday morning.  Maria E. and Elissa are my uncle Danny's daughters.  It's been great to connect to them.  After dad died and my family moved back to Florida, our families lost touch outside of the occasional Christmas card or such.  Mom connected to Elissa a few years ago and I spoke with her and exchanged emails on my trip cross country back in 2012.  Getting in touch with Maria E. was a wonderful surprise (she's a sweetheart) and comes with an added bonus of lots of old family pictures I've never seen!
She's been going thru old boxes and photo albums and sending what she's found.
It's really cool to see the resemblances between my brothers and I, and dad and his father.
Here they are:

Dad as a teen looking a lot like my brother JM.

Dad as a little boy.

Uncle Danny and dad.

Grandfather Daniel Rodriguez Sr. and (uncle) Danny Jr.

Uncle Danny with Grandmother Mabel.

Grandmother Mabel (Rodriguez) as a young-ish woman.

Grandmother Mabel.

Mabel again.

I believe this is Grandfather Daniel Rodriguez, Sr.'s sister back in Salamanca, Spain - trying to verify.

This is an advert for dad's small business back in Philadelphia, PA.  He sold and serviced sewing machines until his death.

same

My brother Bob on the left and brother Steve on the right with Grandmother Mabel.  My mom still has that rocking chair in her home.

Mabel Rodriguez again.

My cousin Maria E. is on the left.  She was a Flamenco dancer back in the day.  

Maria E. on the left. 

Maria E. 

Dad / Bob Rodriguez on the left.  Looks just like my oldest brother Bob in this shot.  

Dad.  Probably about 18-ish in this one.

Dad as a boy.

Uncle Danny and dad. 

Grandfather Daniel Sr. with Uncle Danny, dad, and I'm not sure who the girl is. 

Dad outside a shop next door to his father's cigar shop.

Grandfather Daniel Rodriguez Sr.'s passport photo.

Daniel Sr. 

Daniel Sr. 

Daniel Sr. clowning around

Grandfather Daniel Sr. with a friend.

Grandfather Daniel Sr. traveling out west.

same

Daniel Sr. with a friend.

This looks like dad out front of grandfather Daniel's store.

Grandfather Daniel Sr. with Danny Jr. out front of the old coffee, cigar, and candy store.

Daniel Sr. and Mabel (?)

That's grandfather Daniel Sr. - not sure who everyone else is. 

Grandfather Daniel Sr. - and I think that might be a woman from Cuba named Carmen. 

Uncle Danny with Grandfather Daniel Sr. 

Uncle Danny and Grandfather Daniel Sr. out front of the old store in Philly.

Cousin Maria E. also found something that belonged to dad while searching thru her old boxes, albums, books, closets, etc.   It should be coming to Atlanta soon and I'll post a picture as soon as I have it.    I'm very excited about having it but don't want to spoil the surprise !

In addition to connecting with long, lost family, an old friend I hadn't spoken to in years called out of the blue a couple days ago and it was nice to patch up some differences, mend some fences, and just plain catch up.

Then just today some very good old family friends were in town to see a new family baby so "The Source of the Trouble" and I met them for a late breakfast over in Decatur at Pastries A Go Go.
Shan & Michelle put me up at their place when I rode the bike out west and let me stay for the better part of a week or so.  They were great hosts and it was wonderful to sit and chat for awhile.
http://www.pastriesagogo.com/    Get the French toast.  Delicious (and you can work it off later ).