refunds, bill murray

About a year and a half ago I was planning to go to Taiwan. Well, I ended up going to Encino, Ca. instead to shoot a short film with my friend, Jordan. Well, the first thing I tried to figure out after I cancelled my Taiwan plans was if I could get a refund for my ticket. After a series of confusing phone calls, in which I was transferred back and forth between the Texas and L.A. offices constantly and in short given no clear answer on whether or not I could or would recieve a refund, I abandoned my futile attempts at dealing with China Airlines customer service. In a last ditch attempt to recover some of my money, I put my ticket in an envelope along with a note requesting a refund and mailed it to the China Airlines Houston, Texas office. Yesterday I recieved a check in the mail for the amount of my refund...One and a half years after the fact. Well, I had long since given up on it so I'm of course happy to see it. It's funny, that money came from when I worked as a P.A. for $50 a day on a feature in L.A. Now after all that time, that money is coming back to me. I'm going to use it to pay my rent this month and then try to save up as much as I can for a car. On to Bill Murray... Jordan took me to see a movie in salt lake city last night, called Broken Flowers, with Bill Murray. It was a mildly slow paced film and pretty understated. At first I was a little taken back by the abrupt ending but the more and more I think about it, it grows on me. In fact I think the ending may have been the most redeeming thing about the film. I'd give the film three stars, with some really good 4/5 star moments. An interesting film nonetheless and far different fromt the only other Jim Jarmasch film I've seen, which was Ghost Dog.