BY CYNDI GREENING, PHOENIX, USA - It's Memorial Day weekend in the U.S. That's a national holiday. While many people are at the beach with friends or having a cookout, I'm at the keyboard, working to keep the momentum going. On my personal blog, I wrote about how producing requires that one serve the needs of so many groups. As we approach the departure date, the amount of work to do just seems to grow exponentially.

When I am working on film projects, I tend to think of them like children. BAD TIMING was "born" (to me) in January, when Jabbes came to see me after I returned from the Sundance Film Festival. I agreed to take on "raising" this project. For the first several months, it was just the two of us. We discussed the script, logistics, possible futures for this little Zambian baby.

We drew in the initial crew. Mike, Carlos and Lindsey came on board to help with the filming of the backstory for the documentary (VOICE OF AN AFRICAN NATION) about the making of the film. We captured Jabbes' early thoughts on the film and his goals for it when it "matured" into the first Zambian feature film. We had already seen his digital story, My Journey: From Zambia to Arizona and Back Again in which we learned about the tragic loss of his son and how that propelled him to do the film and help establish the film industry in his name.

Now, we're in the "teen" years with the film and it is having some growing pains. Teenagers, you may recall, want to be totally independent. They think they can do everything on their own and they are often running about with their peers. As the parent of a teenager, I have found that teenagers need more attention and more effort than younger children. Likewise, BAD TIMING needs a lot of attention right now and sometimes it's a bit unruly. It's getting bigger and harder to handle. It can get into all sorts of things it never used to be able to get into ... it was just too small. Now, as the public profile of the film gets larger in the United States and in Zambia, there are things that change daily ... more opportunities, challenges, responsibilities and tasks to manage.

While I tend to think more money would make it easier (bigger crew, more equipment, easier to buy things, maybe hire some of the other tasks out), the truth is that this is "our baby" and we're trying to grow it up "right" ... according to what we believe it should be in the world. We want it to contribute to Zambia, to be a great film that is entertaining and enriching, to help people see they might want to visit Zambia and film there.

Principal photography begins July 3rd in Lusaka, Zambia. At that point, we will grow BAD TIMING into the film it is going to be in the world. It is the point at which the film stands on its own and greets the world as the thing it is. We're doing everything we can to make it a success. I hope it makes us proud.