How To Lose An Afternoon

Yesterday, I agreed to storyboard a 30second commercial. All I needed was a description of the shots to be employed in the ad, and I was away.
The shooting script's ready, says the Hungarian on the phone. Fine, I tell him, I'll come in tomorrow and pick it up.
Sounds straightforward, doesn't it.
So today I sleep in a little, catch up on a little housework, go into town for another lesson with Noel (which goes so well he'd like me to try driving an automatic next time - a small matter of suddenly stalling across two lanes of oncoming traffic), and then go into the office to pick up the shooting script.
Now, when the Hungarian says the shooting script is ready, what he really means is: he's done some thinking about what shots he'd like, and he's talked about them with his No.2, who's either directing it or filming it but hasn't decided which yet has his own ideas about what shots he'd like, and then the Hungarian goes on to tell me about the shots he would have loved to have included but couldn't on account of time, cost, unavailability of equipment, and uncooperative laws of physics.
He needs to tell me about the shots he can't use so I'll understand his vision.
I don't need to know vision. This freaking ad was designed by government committee. It has a miniscule budget and they need it filmed now-now-now before the State Elections in case we have a new government. I just need a shooting script that clearly describes each shot that has to be storyboarded so I can get cracking. I don't want much, honestly.
Three hours later, I have my shot list. It's been shouted, mimed, paced, timed, debated, and hypothesized to death. Skribe had time to go on a shoot, come back, review footage, chat, show off some shorts, and just generally hang around being sociable, while the Hungarian and his sidekick argued about how to film three women entering a restaurant.
(A Noongar cop, an Asiatic engineer and an African Muslim doctor walk into an Italian restaurant. Oh, you were expecting a punchline?)
By the time we wrapped up, the shops were closed, so skribe and I had to eat out. It was late enough to be dark and cold coming home on a summer night. My throat is hoarse, and I am so damned tired.
I got a stubby of beer for my troubles today, though. He's nuts, the Hungarian, but generous enough in his own way. One of these days, I may even take up drinking.