I’ve always been a sucker for B-movies, particularly vintage sci-fi.

When we got our first ripe jackfruit off the tree out back a couple of days ago, inspiration hit. Behold – Artocarpus from Space!

The soundtrack and portions of the film were taken from the film Killers from Space, which is one of my favorite flicks from the 1950s.

It’s such a favorite, in fact, that I once painted a portrait of the evil bug-eyed alien who menaces the protagonist:

For some reason, my painting career never really took off.

I’ve been very busy spending my time filming and editing so I can keep up with high quality videos for my YouTube channel in order to meet the “30 Videos in 30 Days” challenge that Justin Rhodes issued me a couple of weeks ago, so I haven’t had nearly as much time as I like to write posts and articles; however, the channel is picking up a decent amount of subscribers every day as I reach towards my goal of 15,000 by year’s end.

I have no idea if I’ll make it but I’m trying. If you told me at the beginning of 2015 that I’d have five books completed by the end of the year, including three category bestsellers, I’m not sure I would have believed you.

The key to success seems to be pushing yourself to your limits and then pushing some more. This applies to gardening, writing, your career or even a YouTube channel.

If you’re frustrated and don’t think you can launch a gardening blog, write a book or build a food forest… don’t give up. Keep pushing and pushing. Do something every day (at least during 6 days a week – I leave the Sabbath apart for God and rest!) and you’ll look back in a few months and say “wow… I never thought I could do that!”

My problem in the past was always lack of consistency. I had tons of ideas and really had enough time to get things done, but I always let distractions and my own lack of discipline beat me. Right now I’ve got about five more videos mostly recorded and the ones for the next two days ready to launch on time. Putting my hand to the plow and conquering my fear of failure by making myself post every weekday for the past few years has beaten my procrastination and lack of continuity into the ground.

If I can do it, you can do it too. Build those garden beds. Write that blog. Work on your paintings.

If you fail, fail big. Then get up and try again.

Bonus points if you can talk your introverted spouse into contributing to your bad rip-off of a B-movie.

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Notes on the film

We had to record at night when the house was quiet but man alive… the crazy insects here really make a racket at night so the sound wasn’t as good as I would have liked.

I also used half a bottle of good rum to burn the ground where the jackfruit landed in the first scene, then realized after converting to black and white that it was unnecessary since you couldn’t really see the ashes on the soil anyhow.

I think I may need to get some supplementary lighting, too. I would have loved to see some bright film-noir lighting effects in the background but couldn’t pull it off with the little lamp we have here.

The filming and editing took at least a day and I was able to snag the original Killers from Space film and some vintage public domain music from The Internet Archive.

My wife was a big help too and a great sport.

She’s going to be the main presenter in a new video coming up a few days from now but she’ll be her normal, cheerful self – not a space-pod possessed lab assistant.

Keep watching… it’s going to be entertaining. The bahfeemus who made a kill at the end of this video is still in the woods and I’m terrified he may return.