Part 4: Idaho, Idaho, Go Go Go!

On Friday morning, we woke up and headed up to Idaho in time to attend a workshop in the mid afternoon. We tried to stop by the theater department and see if anyone was around, but no luck, so we headed off to the SUB Ballroom for our first workshop. Benny Green and a few other members of the house band reminisce about a deceased jazz great named Ray Brown. They played a tiny bit but mostly talked, and Sam ate up every second. Then we headed to main street for a second workshop with a piano prodigy named Eldar who was way way WAY more advanced than anyone in the audience but clearly genius and very interesting. After that we went back to Pullman to take my little brother out to eat, and I think he enjoyed spending more time with Sam.

That night we went to the Kibbie Dome for the most amazing concert that I have ever, EVER seen. The first half was good jazz of the sort that Sam likes and I try really hard to stay awake for. Because I acknowledge it is good but when I see it late at night in a darkened concert hall (or football stadium) I tend towards nodding off. But I did not nod off and it was good. And then, it was time for Bobby McFerrin. He is amazing. He is incredible. He is possibly the most magical performer I have ever seen. No he probably is the most magical performer I have ever seen. He made a football stadium of 4,000 people most of whom were punk ass high school students silent with rapt attention. I can't really explain how fantastic he was. He as definitely not the goofy don't worry be happy man you would expect. He was calm and very rooted and sharing his music with us rather than performing it. If you ever, ever have a chance to see him I would for SURE go. I certainly will. It was awesome. Also eclectic. He did more traditional sounding jazz, he played the audience as if we were the sound in a giant piano on the floor of the stage (think "Big" but there was no piano he just taught us where the notes were and we sang them--helped by the fact that the audience included a few thousand music students), and he did a one man mini-Wizard of Oz. It was so awesome. I was floored. Very rarely do you go see some art or performance or concert where you can tell that what you are seeing is someone truly genius, truly magnificent at the top of their game. He is that.

After the concert, we went to meet up with my friend Sally who was being kind enough to let us stay at her house. However, we got to meet up with her at a cocktail party for VIPs, donors, volunteers and our interloper selves. She was volunteering as an artist relations guru all festival, and she managed to snag Sam and I each invitations to the cocktail party. No open bars are nice, but even nicer was getting to see some truly fantastic jazz musicians just jam with other musicians. Sam's favorite living pianist was there and on the piano, and since it was a fairly small party in a hotel ballroom, Sam got to stand just a few feet from him watching him play and being in pure heaven. As the night progressed another jazz piano legend came over to join the jamming musicians, but as the piano was occupied Monty Alexander had to pick up the bass. Sam drew in a sharp breath and whispered to me, "I didn't even know he could play the base!" Even later, as Monty Alexander's hands grew sore from slapping that bass, he joined Benny Green (Sam's fave) at the piano playing forhanded and switching sides effortlessly. After they finished, Sam joined Sally and I at our table, he was flushed and a little sweaty just from witnessing something amazing. I asked him then if the trip was worth it, and he told me that is definitely was.

The next day we slept in a a little bit before having breakfast at The Breakfast Club and taking a nap. After nap time we met Sally and her husband for dinner and had a great time talking and just hanging out. I am so very glad that Sally and David will be moving to Chicago soon because they are such wonderful lovely people. That night's concert was half big swing band that I didn't particularly like and half people I did like. There was a really great jazz vocalist who was just totally in the wrong venue. She was the kind of singer you want to see in a dim club late at night perched at a tiny table instead of sitting in the bleachers watching her in a domed football stadium. That night there was more cocktail party, with more great jazz (better than that nights pay concert) and where Sam was encouraged to sit in at the piano. But he didn't. It was a good night, but the night before was just so much more magical that it had no choice but to be more of a denouement.

Sunday morning we drove the long drive back to Seattle, saw Sam's brother again and flew on back into Chicago with no mishaps. That actually was rather amazing because apparently the East coast was a mess travel wise, so we were quite lucky to have a perfectly easy flight from the West coast home.

In a postscript, next month both Monty Alexander and Benny Green will be performing here in Chicago and Sam and I will be sure to see each of them at least once. Go jazz showcase. If it isn't too crowded, I will probably mention to the artists that we saw them in Idaho and that they were marvelous.

Vacation blogging (very belatedly) parts 2 and 3

Part two started getting up at regular work time and getting on the road. We drove from Seattle down to Portland, stopping once for some caffeine and Jack in the Box tacos (YUMMY!). Then in Portland we found ourselves in the Pearl District downtown, parked, and went in search of a restaurant for lunch. That was harder than we thought it would be, but eventually we found a bar that was kind of funky, had free wifi and got some delicious pizza.

Then back on the road, but instead of driving straight to my grandparents, we decided to head down the coast which was a much more beautiful drive. It wailed on us with the rain until right before we hit the coast when the sun came out and it was gorgeous and lovely and a perfect view for Sam's first day in Oregon ever.

We stopped and got out of the car on the beach in Lincoln City. There we were on the Pacific Ocean, on the beach for the second time in February. Although, it turns out that it is much more fun to be on a beach in Mexico in February than in Oregon in February. Then we swung back East to my grandparents farm.

There my uncle Chris and my grandparents met Sam. I am pretty sure that he was well received (my grandmother mught have approved the most). Then we had a delicious dinner of pheasant and bread and a few things before we drove over to my cousin Shane's house to see him, his wife Sadie, and their brand new baby Owen who was 8 days old. We didn't stay too long since they had a new baby, but it was good to see them.

The next day we got up and took a tour of the farm, met my aunt, and spent a little more time with the grandparents before we headed off to my hometown.

Before heading all the way to Pasco, we drove to a winery called King's Estate for lunch at their kinda fancy restaurant. The food was delicious with things like estate cured ham and flight of yummy wines. Then we drove another big chunk until we stopped at Multanomah Falls which is this amazing waterfall just East of Portland. We got out and climbed up to this old bridge across the bottom of the falls, if it hadn't been raining so hard we might have hiked up higher but we didn't. It was raining and we needed to get back into the car and drive all the way to my parents with brief stops for gas and fast food.

That brings us to Part 3: Hometown.

Our first night in, we just hung out at my parents for an hour or two before going to bed and saw my sister a bit when she came over after a meeting she had for work. The big revelation was that my parents let us sleep in the same bed! Sam and I, unmarried, premarital fornicators that we are, were allowed to share a bedroom for the trip. WEIRD!!!

The next day was sort of low key and let us catch up on some sleep. We got up to go take Natalie out to lunch at a little Mexican food place with big BIG margaritas and played with my mother's 10 week old kitten. That night, my aunt threw us a dinner for close family friends who were all meeting Sam for the first time. It was kind of a test, but I think that he passed it. I also got to see my brother's fiancee for the first time since they got engaged (well the first time since they started dating even though I have known her for well over a decade almost two). They seemed very happy.

Our second full day in town, I got to see my dear friend Heather before my mom, my sister, and my brother Tom took Sam and I wine tasting. My mom was BLITZED after the second winery. We had to taste and eat at the third one, but then Natalie and I got a little toasted at the fourth winery. They were pouring EVERYTHING for us there because we bought a great deal of wine as gifts for friends who were putting us up (wink, wink Sally) and Sam's brother as well as to drink ourselves while we are there. Then we had dinner at Tom and his fiancees house with my parents. It was nice, kind of lo key, Kate makes a great pasta red sauce. That night Natalie and I karaoked it up at our local bar. Seriously no one was singing at the Dugout, just us. We sang a ton. A handful of people who knew us (but were not singing) started laughing and heckling because of how many songs we had sang.

The next day we headed up to Idaho which will be part four coming soon. . . hopefully.

Ok, still paused. . . actually may unpause later today

I paused because this weekend started with a doozy of a birthday party, and I got way drunker than I had been in a long time.  That led to a Saturday where Sam and I did nothing.  We made the house messy, we ate chips and salsa as a meal.  We lounged around the house and never got dressed or showered.  That meant Sunday needed to be more productive and then my play got crazy because someone dropped out of the play and there were re-writes and all hoop-dee-durdle.  Although in the end I think it might end up even better for the show than if the rewrites had not been prompted.  (So for those following along in the comments Sam and I were not vomiting, although he managed to massively screw up his sleep schedule during this whole thing).

 

Anyway, things are settling down.  I got some news that should make several things in my life easier--thanks to the genius and generosity of my wonderful boyfriend. 

 

I was also pausing to put pictures in the blog posts, but I think I will just blog AND THEN go back and insert photos.  So later today I may well catch things back up.

 

 

So, pause before more vacay blogging

I have had rehearsal all week, really long ones where we block giant scenes that I am on stage for virtually the entire time.  The good news that is basically most of what I do in this episode, so I don't have a whole lot more to do rehearsal wise for a bit.

 

Tonight I need to catch up on unpacking, paying bills that come due at the beginning of the month, and seeing my boyfriend who wakes up way after me and is basically already asleep when I get back from rehearsals and no of course it does not make me bitter that he gets to sleep way more than I do when I am totally exhausted.  Except that oh yes it does.  Oh yes it does.

 

In a side note, I have a potential opportunity this summer to do a solo performance, and I have been toying with ideas of what to do/brainstorming, and right now the front runner is a piece on my obsession with Henry Rollins and like the causes of it that would sort of revolve around the fact that he was the scariest man I could come up with who was also smart and attractive and vaguely approachable (you know except for the part where I do not know him), and therefore in my mind was the perfect man because he was smart and attractive and WAY scarier than I was so of course we would be perfect for eachother because there is no way he would be scared of me. 

 

Obviously it would be longer than that paragraph.  Also, I was thinking that in order to convey who he was to the audience I should have like a scary looking photo of him and maybe play a snippet of his music (of the yelly punk 80's variety).  I think this could work.  What do you my loyal readers think?

My Trip, Segment One

Okay, so I blogged not at all because I had wifi about that much over the course of the trip which was basically really, really great (even though I was kind of concerned that it would go over like a lead balloon since Sam had already met most of those people in my family and it was almost seemingly a pointless expensive trip—well not so expensive, mostly just the tickets). The plan is to over this week blog about the trip in segments and maybe even add some pictures (because I did take some), so here I go. . .

Segment one: Seattle and Dan (Sam’s baby brother not mine)

We left on Saturday, but in the afternoon and as it spent the morning starting to snow more and more on the snow that had already fallen the night before I kind of worried that we would be WAY delayed or cancelled and that was NOT how I wanted to start my vacation that I was forcing Sam to take with me. But here in Chicago we don’t let a little snow get us down, so we took off and only a pinch late because the plane that we were taking was a pinch late in the landing.

The flight it self was long and uneventful and we landed just fine and dandy in SeaTac. Sam’s little brother was there to pick us up. Then we headed out to dinner at a GREAT restaurant called “Wild Ginger” which I would HIGHLY recommend (and on the bus we took to get there we passed KIRO and the TBTL haunted Azteca which got me VERY excited). After dinner we went around the corner to the Musicquarium at the Triple Door and heard some blues, and it was a good, good night where we were joined by a work contact of Sam’s. The next day we hung around kind of lamely, but I went out with my cousin Stephanie shopping, and then we hit Ivar’s for dinner. Also somewhere in there I creamed Sam and his brother at Xbox 360 Scene it.

Monday morning we got up earlyish and got in the car for Segment two: Oregon, Oregon, everywhere with a baby and some white pheasants. . . To Be Continued . . .

Going on a trip

Is soooooo much work! Laundry and errands and plans and so much work. Plus the cat seems to have decided to lose his little mind. So cranky and needy this week.

But I will probably not be blogging too much while gone. But maybe not as I do have the new itouch (although probably they will be short blogs).

Valentine's day

We stayed home and were lazy and cozy. Sam made a dinner of some strip steak marinated a la an Alton Bron recipe as well as a yummy 5 cheese homemade mac and cheese and an arugula, cabbage, carrot salad with Gorgonzola dressing. I made dessert which was a french silk pie (graham crust with a creamy chocolate mousse filling), and we had champagne and strawberries.

I got Sam a new wallet, some balloons and a plant delivered to his office (where the plant can continue to live), and two battery operated tshirts. One tshirt has a drumset on it that you can play and the other lights up to show the strength of the wireless networks near you. They are pretty sweet (and in a picture below).



Sam sent me flowers to work in a cute little silver cup (see in the picture below), a gift certificate to Sephora (yea make-up! and yea! Sam for coming up with this after having to go with me to pick something up there one time), and a little box from Tiffany's in which there was a little "h" necklace in sterling silver. I LOVE IT!! And my sister has a matching "n" necklace that I got her for Christmas.

Perks of Membership

I am a member of the Museum of the Art Institute of Chicago which means I can go for free whenever I want which is very nice considering I work around the corner and it makes for an excellent break at lunchtime.  Plus I get to bring a guest for free whenever I go, so it ends up being frequented when I have out of town visitors or newbies to Chicago.

 

Well, they just opened their first very special extra admission exhibit since I purchased my membership.  Wait, actually tomorrow they open that exhibit, but I went yesterday for their exclusive member preview.  Just me and maybe 100 other people wandered through many, many gothically lit galleries all displaying Edward Much and his contemporaries paintings, wood cuttings, and sculpture.  I felt very important and fancy, and it was a FABULOUS break from my job.

 

But I don't really like Munch.  At most I enjoy some of his color combinations, and he had this series of sort of blue, gloomy, serene paintings that seemed very dreary but appealing to me (mostly because they were filled with the colors in the palette of my own wardrobe).  But there were some really awesome paintings by other painters on display.  A fabulous Monet portrait of Mrs. Monet in a red kerchief and a few other bright expressionist street scapes that I want to hang in my house although I suspect they are out of my budget.

 

Alas, I knind of had to breeze through it really fast, and I don't even remember seeing "the Scream" if it was even in the exhibition, but that seems a weird omission in such a comprehensive display, so I guess I will go back later.  Because my membership card means I get to see these exhibits for free as long as they are not at capacity.  I think that is cool.  Although all Chicagoans, the musuem is free all February except for the pay to play Munch exhibit (which I think would still be cheaper than regular general admission), and they have redone things up in the last few months all in preparation for their modern wing to open in the spring.  That means the Pollock is no longer out as well as the stuff near it, but they have beautifully rearranged a lot of the rest of the collection including the dreary and dark hall of armor becoming a bright and airy hall of asians (well you know ancient asian art).

This is what I did this weekend

Here is Sam and I on the train back in from the airport earlier today. It really is irrelevant to the rest of the posts, but I really love the look on Sam's face, so in it goes.

This is the weekend. This is the beach in Mexico in the state of Michoacan. It was a little random place that rents cabanas on the beach and seemed to be unknown to tourists, really only known to people familiar with this pretty wild stretch of the Pacific Coast.


Here is Sam on the beach, looking the other direction.


We headed to Mexico for my Christmas present on Friday afternoon, and we got back today, and it was awesome. We flew into Guadalajara where we spent the weekend with Sam's foreign exchange student and good friend Ivan and many of his friends--all young, educated, well employed, Mexican hipsters. The first night we went down to the main plaza in Guadalajara and just sort of soaked it in for a bit, then we hit cafe for dinner and then we met up with Ivan's friends at a bar called El Pony. It was strangely like a bar we could find in Bucktown, a little trendy a lot hipster. I wish that I had not forgotten my camera because there was a man in 80's high 'v' waisted over the belt leopard print pants. The belt was bright red, he had pointy gold shoes on and on top was a low v black tank top with a little skinny grey cardigan over it. IT WAS SO MUCH LOOK! I could not handle it all night. The guy worked there so he was always around.

The next day we got up early and drove to the beach about 5 hours away. We drove out of Jalisco (where Guadalajara was) into Colima where I saw a volcano, coconut farms (more palm trees than I ever imagined seeing in my life), sugar cane fields, lime trees and banana plants. All from the car window, with my camera locked in the trunk (yeah, I know, good thinking right). Then we drove into Michoacan and got stopped at the military checkpoint on the border between the states. That was interesting. It was a military check point, and it was very strange but they quickly let us pass.

At the beach, we just hung out and napped in the shade of the simple palm leave covered structure and splashed in the divinely warm pacific ocean. Then we drank under the stars and the near full moon, and then we slept and repeated the next day. The beach was awesome!!!! Late Sunday we drove to the nearby village and had lunch in a little open air seaside restaurant where a parrot was climbing around the dining room, his wings seemed to either be clipped or hurt and he could not fly. There we had ceviche and seafood with fruit salsa, and it was very good. Then we drove back home a few hours later (lunching required naps).

Once home we went to bed, and then got up early this morning to fly back. It was a short trip, but wonderful. I recommend a beach in Mexico as a perfect prescription for the winter blues.

is this wrong to do at work

I have a DVD of a spoken word performance, and I thought it would be good company at work because it is a spoken word performance, so I don't need to see it just here it.  Is that wrong?

jokes are fun

So, I don't think it should come as a terrible shock to any of my blog readers that Sam and I are pretty serious, and we both know that we will get engaged sometime and then married at some point after that.  Although those sometimes and some points are very fluid and should encompass many years in total at their smallest points.  Anyway, because of that and the fact that Sam has now met my dad, there is a small possibility that Sam will officially propose with a ring and stuff at any moment now, BUT the likelihood of that happening increases with the amount of time passed, so it is very tiny right now and all this spring/summer/year it will remain small.

 

Anyway, that is background.  Sam's company like all the rest of us, is feeling the economy pinch and therefore will not be giving lavish bonuses or raises.  People will get them, but from a smaller pool and raises will be reserved only for the truly exceptional and will smaller than usual, so Sam is not expecting the usual bounty he has gotten in the past.  I have been teasing him when he says that we can't get engaged because girls cost money, by saying that well when he gets his bonus he can blow it all on a ring for me.  However, he teased me that this year it doesn't look good.  This makes me think that the next time we see the two guys who founded the company, as we have gone to dinner and concerts with them upon occasion before, I should tell them that we aren't engaged because they did not pony up enough of a bonus for a ring this year.  I think this will be hilarious, and I think they will be amused too because well they have senses of humor and Sam and I met because of their company (it hired my friend, she introduced us at a work event, etc) and they know the whole back story. 

 

This story/joke is less amusing than I feel it should be.  And it is because I totally jumbled the backstory and constructed it very poorly.  Part of me wants to go back and polish it up so Alan won't give me grief, but I am too lazy.  Deal with it Cate Blanchett!

Tarot cared from sallyacious.com

You are The Moon

Hope, expectation, Bright promises.

The Moon is a card of magic and mystery - when prominent you know that nothing is as it seems, particularly when it concerns relationships. All logic is thrown out the window.

The Moon is all about visions and illusions, madness, genius and poetry. This is a card that has to do with sleep, and so with both dreams and nightmares. It is a scary card in that it warns that there might be hidden enemies, tricks and falsehoods. But it should also be remembered that this is a card of great creativity, of powerful magic, primal feelings and intuition. You may be going through a time of emotional and mental trial; if you have any past mental problems, you must be vigilant in taking your medication but avoid drugs or alcohol, as abuse of either will cause them irreparable damage. This time however, can also result in great creativity, psychic powers, visions and insight. You can and should trust your intuition.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Superbowl

An example of why I love Sam as much as I do:

We are not watching the superbowl, or we are but on delay. On that delay (thanks Tivo!) we are just watching the commercials and the halftime show. That's all. Also he keeps calling the Steelers the Penguins. This is what I call superbowl sunday!

Oh kitty!

My cat has been odd lately. A lot more cuddly than usual, but I think that may be related to kitty anxiety. Steve McQueen has a bad or sad lonely day and then ambushes us for cuddles when we come in the door after work. He also leaves a puddle of cat hair on the couch. He is such a weirdo. But I guess more snuggling is better than no snuggling. Or less.

Unrelated, lately I feel like I have learned lately that I seem to be a head of or an early adopter of some trends, but I think this is pure accident. Well and lots of unfettered internet access with some time to use it everyday to relieve the slog of the workday. So I twitter (a little not on my phone) and I have a collection of reliable bloggers who find cool pop culture and political tidbits, and I look in on them at lunch and in lulls, so I tend to know stuff pretty quickly. This is very weird to me becuase I generally feel like I am the last one to know about everything.

thank you chrissy

Greed:	Medium
Gluttony:	Medium
Wrath:	Medium
Sloth:	Medium
Envy:	Low
Lust:	Medium
Pride:	Medium

Discover Your Sins - Click Here

Totally on tv

There was an insanely brief shot (well so far but I am assuming that it is all) of my office as "Platinum Cats" in the Patrick Swayze series "The Beast" last night. It is basically exactly how I see it as I walk from the bus dropping me off on Michigan and Jackson, of course when I see there is not a trashy stripper sign with lots of neon. Awesome!

I seem like a fool!

Because I listen to TBTL and laugh aloud at it often, which is kind of embarassing on the bus or walking down the street.  Chrissy, I strongly reccomend this show to you because I think you will really like it also Jim.  Others of you may not like it much I think that Robyn, Margaret and Sara Jo will be annoyed and think it a waste of your time (I am not saying you would be wrong), Jon might like it--it could go either way, Sally you just won't see what the big deal is which is probably for the best because you do not have time for it.  Sisavadty I think you will like it but it will take a few shows to get there.  Teebs you are like Jon and could go either way, either total love or total hate. 

 

Stupid Lauren has made me one of the tens, and I can't go the roller skate party a week from today, but I am seriously thinking of trying to force Sam's brother to go because he lives in Seattle, and I do see the stupidness of this plan.  I do see it.

Do not worry, things are looking up

I mean in general.  There is much less crappiness than last week.  I am again in one of those funks where I just really, really wish life could in general be a little less hard like it seems to be for some people I see outside me.  I mean it probably isn't, this is just my sad puppy perception.  But I do really wish things could stay easier for more than like a week at a time.  Like where did I not learn all the life lessons that make other people seem to get by all happily, you know?  Was that what I traded in the genetic or life lottery in order to get nice legs and red curly hair?  I would gladly trade if that is the case.  And I get that I am responsible for some of the problems I had, that I made dumb choices that had foreseen and underestimated or unforseen consequences.  I get that.  But it just sucks.  I was going to expound on that, but I can't really add anything.  It sucks when you fuck things up.  It even sucks harder when you don't fuck things up but they get all fucked up anyway, that seems to be the theme song of my life lately.  Well, it is not as dire as all that, and that blanket statement could be true of any number of people I know many of whom are like myself far happier and healthier than a lot of others at the specific point in time in which I write this.  I have many things to be thankful for.  And it would probably do me well to be thankful for them and to focus on the things I can change.

Seriously?

Because you know my life needed my job to be totally sucky and kind of bogus after suffering through the hard bits in my personal life, it decided to try to kill me with stupidity and misery all rolled up into one.  There is a trade show in Miami Beach and it has been a disaster at every, every every EVERY front.  Not even joking.  Nothing has gone right, well, or smoothly and all of it has made my life miserable.  Now I take full responsibility for a few things that yeah, they should land at my door and I have been owning them.  They are relatively small wrinkles in this ocean of crashing hellish waves and actually would not have been rippling if other people had held up any tiny little part of their ends of the deal or been anything but totally procrastinative.

 

So yeah, Friday 4pm almost left thinking you know part time retail and busboy is better than this (because that was the moment lots of things just evaporated/disintigrated without warning), but I thought Monday can only be better main boss who I was very mad at is a whole time zone away and schmoozing which means he will NOT be talking with me, and he will be gone a week which is just totally awesome since right now I kind of want to kill him and that will definitely be time enough for me to calm down.  But was today better.  No.  No it was not.  MORE things went wrong that should not have gone wrong again if other people here had even partway done their own freaking job ad the only way I could have fixed it would have been to literally use them as a puppet to do their own job or if I did it for them, but I was already busy doing some of their job and you know MY OWN.  So yes, today worse.   Really would like a day that doesn't totally suck.  That would be great.  And at this point it doesn't even have to be a good day and will still be better than this.  By a lot!

 

Tomorrow seeing Spamalot!  Here is hoping that will assist in the bettering of my day.

Lauren, Lauren, Lauren

I blame you.  I blame you for corrupting my days with TBTL or its full title Too Beautiful To Live at Seattle area talk radio show that airs at night, but that I download from itunes and listen to on my ipod.  It is led by Luke Burbank who would be familiar to you if you are a big fan of "Wait, Wait . . . Don't Tell Me an NPR news Quiz" because he appears on it and does hosting duties when Peter Sagal is on vacation.  I have liked him on there for quite a while.  And Lauren kept raving about this show and how wonderful it is, and I bit.  I downloaded it one day and in hour one I was like eh, this kinda sucks, and hour two I was like well it doesn't suck but it isn't as wonderful as Lauren says, and hour three I was like motherfucking Lauren I like this.  Dammnit.  However, did I mention the three hours were just 1 days worth of this show.  Thank God I listen to podcasts at work otherwise this might ruin my sleep.

 

Ummm, yeah, so I also kind of reccomend it, and I want to go to their roller skate party on the 30th of January and yeah.

 

Also I have worked out quite a bit this weekend and my legs hurt.  They hurt.  They hurt kind of a lot.  BUT I am 1/4 of the way to the 5% initial buy myself an itouch as a reward goal (because then I can get the thingy that goes in my shoes and tracks my workout and stuff.  Which means I lost 2 pounds since initial weighing.  Only 14 more to go to 10% and 6 more to go for the 5%.  I have also saved $50 towards the purchase of said future itouch.

 

And as for rough patch of last week's bemoaning, considerable progess has been made towards returning to smoother patches, good progress.

Sometimes relationships are hard

I think we all know this. The boyfriend and I are in a hard patch. I don't believe it is an unendurable hard patch, but certainly a very bracing and learning hard patch. That's really all I feel like saying about that.

For the record, no one is breaking up, no one is doing awful things to the other, nothing like that is happening. There is some fighting and some misunderstanding and some crying because that is what happens the best of us in rough patches.

bad weather bad tummy

The weather outside my window is shaping up to be just as awful as they predicted. Almost as awful as my tummy illness of today. It started last night and this afternoon I started to feel better. But suckiness of gettin over stomach flu like things is that once you can eat food again you are starving and slightly wary of being illprepared to digest all but the blandest of foods. Yeah, that as kind of gross. Sorry.

My calendar is naked

Well, not naked, but pretty bare.  Especially considering the last months and what not.  Having two jobs fills up the calendar, so does having a play, and two jobs and a play turns out to be a killer.  Right now, I am in hiatus mode on play.  I have one job.  So there is a grand total of 1 play related commitment on my January calendar and then a second maybe committment--it is rough because it conflicts with a boyfriend related thing, so it may depend on which one I go to (also on weather, if it doesn't totally suck I may go to the far off one, if it does totally suck I will NOT be going to the far off one). 

 

In fact my main conflicts of the moment are trips or visits.  In exactly 24 days, my parents come to town for a weekend.  In 32 days I go to Mexico, and in 47 days I go to the Pacific Northwest (kind of all of it, weather permitting we will hit Washington, Oregon, and Idaho) for 9 or 10 days.  It should be great fun. 

 

But boy does my calendar look unfamiliar because of it.

Sunday, Sunday

I am tired. I had a pretty busy holiday season, and I was hoping for the New Year's portion to be a little easier, but then my sister came and my free time to accomplish things disappeared in a poof of smoke.

Anyway, as a result I was kind of a whiny brat to go home early from a birthday party on Friday night, and I fell asleep in a big heap on the bed at like 11pm and slept and slept and slept until today.

Having my sister and her boyfriend here was wonderful!! We ate out, we hung out, and we did very little other stuff besides the new year's eve party. Everything was great, and I am so glad she came.

On other news, Sam and I are trying to be better at eating and spending by trying to eat in during the week. There was a big grocery store trip today in order to prep for that. It should be fine. I am also suggesting that we drink out a little less and when we do that we don't actually need to buy drinks for everyone else every round or so.

Sister is in the air!

They bought tickets last night, and they are here through Friday.  They should be over the friendly skies of Salt Lake City right now, and I will see them around 5pm.  They are even braving the el system all by their selves.

 

Tonight we head out to dinner at a Brazilian style steak house called Zed451, and I feel that a mega feast of meat, meat, meat, some not meat, and a lot more meat will make them very, very happy.

So much has passed

The first holiday vacation with Sam's family.  His lucid grandmother is ADORABLE!--a spunky fun 80 something, and I would love to be like that when I grow up.  His other grandmother is not so lucid and in her 90's and very fragile, but I am very glad I got to meet her if for no other reason than it seems to make Sam feel better (she had a fall and a health scare about 10 days before we got to Tulsa that made it seem as if I would not get to meet her without an unexpected and very sudden adjustment to our trip).  His parents are wonderful as always, and his brother is no where near as awful as they make him out to be.  It was 76 the last full day we were there and we filled it with good Meixcan food and a walk with the dog.

 

My brother called me as Sam and I sat in the plane at Midway for the 18 or so years it seemed like we were tracked there.  He just got engaged and will be married on the 4th of July.  This all seems very sudden to me, and he is my younger brother so I of course project the fact that I have been dating my significant other for a year and a half ish and am not quite prepared to actually marry him and I am old, so obviously he cannot possibly be prepared to marry his significant other of a few months at his age.  I get that there are some serious flaws to that logic, but I have not seen this brother since he started dating this woman (who we have all know for something like 20 years), and I did see him in August, so I think that my difficulty in dealing with this information should not be read as a meanness on my part.  This is a whole lot of change to believe in while having no concrete evidence in front of me.  I just want him to be happy and have very little with which to reassure myself.  When I see them in February, my hopes are that all will be assuaged.

 

Oh yeah, and I "get" to be in the wedding.  I HATE being in weddings, and I think I would rather NOT be in the wedding, but I also am fairly certain that my brother and future sister-in-law will be VERY disappointed if I were to have told them no (to be fair I have been in 2 weddings in my whole life--as a flower girl at 5 and a maid of honor at 23--and after the second one I swore that I would never been in one ever again much to my sister's utter abject horror because OF COURSE I meant no other wedding except hers at which point I told her  yeah I don't want to be in yours either because it will be a wedding right? so it isn't against their wedding it is a general anti-participation prejudice against weddings, I find them far more enjoyable as an audience member and NOTHING more).  Theoretically, I won't have to wear a hideous dress.  Supposedly I get to pick a knee length black dress for myself.  Oh and that sister will be in wedding with me.  But so will sorority girls and actual cheerleaders.  Seriously, my brother is marrying a sorority girl who was a college cheerleader and is now a cheer coach.  I have nothing more to add to that.

 

Also, it seems likely that my sister and her boyfriend will come in to town tomorrow for a few days.  Sam will meet her for the first time and her boyfriend will meet me for the first time.  This will be totally AWESOME!

oops, forgot to tell you I AM in Tulsa

We arrived at 10am on Christmas Eve.  But only after another hour or so of delay.  But that was one hell of a storm.  We were rewarded today with 75 degree weather here in Tulsa.

Yes, I am still NOT in Tulsa

So, 5 hours of waiting in Midway plus three hours of waiting on the plane at Midway (because we were about to take off but we had been de-iced so long ago that the wings had refrozen so we had to go back to the gate which took forever since all the gates were full, so we needed more fuel, so they had to recalculate our load, and we needed more water and then we headed back out to be de-iced AGAIN and finally got in the air), finally flying to St. Louis and then being told (after hanging out on the flight for a half an hour or so since our southwest flight was continuing to Tulsa) that they were NOT flying us to Tulsa because our crew was over its hours.  Yeah.  Because it was weather no free hotels or food (well they brought us crackers and water and pop).

 

At this point it was past 1am, and they needed to help us rebook for today.  It took them a half an hour or so to tell us that in fact there would be a replacement flight created for us first thing in the morning at which point we looked into renting a car and freaking driving the last six hours (because FYI if we had driven to Tulsa we would have already BEEN there).  So we wait in line for a good hour and a half to get rebooked.  Book a room at a local Marriot and grab a few hours of sleep before heading back to the airport.

 

Where MORE indignities occur.  See, we "bought" our tickets less than 24 hours in advance, so the TSA needed us to get extra special searched when we went back through security.  So that was awesome, and then we discover that our 8 am flight is now an 8:30 flight because the crew did not get enough rest.  Well, no shit sherlock, we didn't either.  Also couldn't simple math have figured that out last night?  But whatever!

 

So here I am at the gate in St. Louis (hi Ken and Mandy) waiting to board in the next twenty minutes, so that hopefully we will get to Tulsa before 2009.  Here's hoping.  At this point I will not believe that we will get to Tulsa until we land on the freaking ground.

Holy Airport Hell

It is about 6pm.  I have been in Midway airport since about 2:30 pm.  I should've left on a flight to Tulsa via St. Louis at 4:45pm.  It didn't.  I has been delayed many, many, many times.  The airport sucks balls and is totally crowded (which may have to do with its inability to allow me to enjoy anything about it right now, oh yeah that and the delayed plane.  In fact the only worse airport to be stuck in at this moment is probably O'Hare where Southwest does not fly.

 

However, I just received good news as I started to type this rant blog.  The good news is that our plane, coming in from Pittsburgh is in the air!  Midway and the FAA have serious restrictions on planes they are letting come here, so if it is on the way, it should (oh please oh please oh please dear deity) land here, and then we get on it and then we get to St. Louis and then to Tulsa all before midnight.  Although it turns out that I may not have needed to take off work today anyway.  I guess I just wanted to hang out at an airport ALL DAY AND NIGHT.

 

OK, that's all.  I hope all of your holiday travel adventures are nicer (right about now Sally and Dave are very, very glad they killed theirs early and I cannot say that I blame them).

Christmas Ornaments

The first one is the glass globe ornament that I loved but that didn't seem to sell as quickly as other ones last year, either that or they way overstocked. The other two are a series of ladies that Pier 1 has been having. The flamenca was from last year, and the Indian woman in the sari was this year (this year also has a Japanese woman in a kimono, but she isn't as pretty as the Indian woman).

Busy weeks

I had a work holiday party Friday night, Sam and I threw our own holiday party Saturday night, Sunday I went to a matinee of "Dirty Dancing the Musical" which is the most awesomely bad thing I have ever EVER seen and which made me shake with glee for most of it, Monday we had our very last performance of the musical episode of the Ville where we rocked the house, and Tuesday I went shopping for my work's operation Santa Claus.  Yesterday I rested and took the kitty to the vet and got a fever from Sam who was sick with a fever.

 

Yeah, busy.  Tonight I gift wrap (for Operation Santa at work) and holiday gift/winter boot shop.  Then Friday and Saturday I have to somehow get to a a party, two plays and work at pier 1.  And then we are in the home stretch to holidays in Oklahoma.  Whew.

 

Although I won my friend Sallyacious' 1,000 comment contest and I get a cool book!  Pictures of ornaments this weekend or early next week.  Maybe tonight.

Poking around on the internet can be bad

It can be.  It sometimes is.  Or not bad so much as unsettling.  Like when you find the you tube page of an ex boyfriend who now dresses up like Jesus and ministers to people in Virginia, that is unsettling.  Although instead of getting really angry, like I used to whenever talk of him and Jesus connected (this is the ex now known as Jesus boy), I was mostly really proud and happy for him.  Even if I disagree with a lot of what he espouses as the true way to follow Christ and be a believer, I am proud of him for really making something of his life and happy that he seems to have found a peace which he never had when I knew him.  He was a deeply unrooted person when I knew him, and I think that fed a lot of his general unease with the world.

Christmas Online Shopping

I ordered a book online for the boyfriend's dad for Christmas, and so of course I ordered some books online for me too.  In fact, I realized I could get the whole set of Thursday Next books for like $18 plus like $12 more in shipping and handling, so I did of course (I was getting them all used thus the excessive shipping from amazon).  Then they all start arriving, and actually every single one of the 5 separate shipments is delivered on the same day (which is way impressive on its own) EXCEPT one.  There are 5 books in a series right, coming from 5 different locations.  Guess which book in the series didn't come? 

 

That's right!  The very first one is the only one missing.  I have yet to receive "The Eyre Affair" which I was hoping to start and then read on the planes and trip to Tulsa and back.  I mean I still have time, but they said it could come as late as December 23rd at which point I will be at work and leave from there to go catch my flight so I won't be able to grab the mail back at Sam's house hoping it would be too big to fit in the mailbox that I do not have a key too so it would be shelved below.  Ugh.  It better come soon.  I don't want to reread them out of order!

Laptop Recovered

So I am typing this on my very own unharmed totally returned laptop--which is what happens when a friend of a friend who is a total jackass and idiot gets drunk with a few others altogether late at night in the living room.

Needless to say some people just got disinvited from this house permanently. But laptop is back as with everything in it. I guess I might try backing things up.

Latop Stolen

So, very long story. That I may or may not get to ever writing down here because it is not a good stroy. My laptop was stolen last night, and I am not entirely sure when I will be getting another one. Or if I will be getting another one in a reasonable time frame.

Fortunatly I didn't have anything too irreplaceable on it. Some photographs, but I am not as prolific a photog as some so it is probably only a couple of hundred--most of which I have saved onto photosharing websites but some that are long, long gone.

Today there will be filing of a police report, and we will see. Sam is looking at the bright side of how shopping for a laptop is fun--he is suggesting a really thin mac.

Anyway, not sure how much I will be able to post for a while.

Christmas Tree decorating tips

As several of you (and others who saw my tree or the picture of my tree) have commented on it being lovely and "elaborate" I think Chrissy called it, I thought I would include some tips on how to take your own tree into the realm of fabulous without losing the I am a real person's real tree feel.

 

Tip #1--try to make everything you put on the tree coordinate.  Make them all one or two colors, or all metallic, or have a similar element or color through out.  I stuck to red and gold and white/iridescent, although making it a normal tree meant that when I really liked an ornament I said fuck it and put up whatever I want (there is an bright blue sari on the Indian lady that matches the flamenco lady on the front of the tree).

 

Tip #2--vary the sizes and shapes of stuff you put on the tree.  Or make them all identical.  But I used at least 4 sizes of round balls.  I have 5 or 6 very vertical ornaments, and when I hung all the ornaments on the tree I looked at the hole to balance and fill out.

 

Tip #3--have a basic ornament or two that you repeat multiple times throughout the tree.  I have a big glass globe, glass stars, clear gems, and gold jingle bells that are all over.  Buy these in bulk like 20 or so at a time--jingle bells are usually a dollar or less at pier one or target, and the others often come in packages or can be scavenged post Christmas for a steal.

 

Tip #4--know what looks good on your lighted tree.  Some ornaments that look cheap and are cheap at the store look way better than the expensive ones.  Look for ornaments that will reflect light with glitter, beading, facets, sparkle, shimmer, reflective surfaces.  Even when these look really lame and CHEAP in the store, they often look the best when integrated into the tree.  Unless you have a very specific theme like all wooden ornaments or toy trains, these are what start to bring your tree to the next level.  Also, if you have lots of matte or fabric or wood ornaments, use white lights and less of them to set them off rather than upstage them.

 

Tip #5--don't skimp on a garland.  My tree looks LOADS more awesome this year with very little changed.  There are a few more ornaments, but in the exact same vein as the ones there before.  The main change was having a garland.  And garlands can be easy, this was a ribbon (well two spools) that I bought at Home Depot for not terribly much money (for garland).  Ribbon with some metallic elements and wire are the most impressive of this kind of garland (in my opinion) although if you have a homier tree (like my friend Robyn's advent tree with hand knit ornaments, a paper chain or popcorn or cranberries on a string might be even better (also cheaper).

 

Tip #6--this might take a few years, so think of it as a long term goal.  OK, yes I thought about my tree this way, and it has been three Pier 1 holiday seasons in the making for my tree to look this nice.  Year one was some inexpensive basics and cheap plain glass bulbs from target.  Plus stocking up on my favorites when they went on sale after the holidays.  Year two was pretty much year one (with the after Christmas bargain additions) and some glittery gift tags to fill in.  Year three was the addition of some LED lights as well as some new ornaments from after Christmas year two and new new ones (because I had a better job), plus a major, major post Christmas discount win because NO ONE else liked my favorite ornament.  I bought like 5 of them for about $5 total instead of closer to $5 each.  Year four I have only added garland, some more jingle bells (on sale!), the glass gems (in a package, on sale!), and a few more ornaments (mostly to mix it up with some vertical and because I went from a 5 foot tree to a 7 and 1/2 foot tree) and also because I just like them.  I like Christmas ornaments.  So sue me.

 

Merry Christmas!  Happy Hanukkah!  Happy any other holiday out there that you celebrate this time of year!

My Christmas Tree

Or rather, Sam and my Christmas tree! This picture doesn't quite do it justice. There are LED lights on it, and lots of the ornaments are clear or transparent which not so much show up well in picture, but they look lovely on the tree! And there is a wreath on the door. Very nice indeed.

I am very proud of it. Most of the ornaments are Pier 1 (except for some plain glass balls from a value pack from Target.

There are the target balls, enormous prop glitter balls, teeny tiny mini tree balls, jingle bells, clear gems, transparent stars, these great transparent balls with diamond studs, a few long skinny glass ones, hand painted ones, beaded ones, to birds, a Spanish lady, and an Indian lady (sari and all). The garland is some big wired ribbon that I thought was really pretty at Home Depot where we bought this "slim" 7 and a half foot tall faker. Boy do we need a tree skirt! And a topper. Looking at my local Walgreens for that.

I feel like it is themed and coordinated while still being pretty eclectic which is what I was going for. Quite frankly the use of garland this year (which is new) is my favorite part, and even though the mini tree balls almost disappear they do an great job of filling in color and light. Yea Christmas!

Ponderings for this week

Things I have pondered lately.  I was SO a fish out of water where I grew up.  My perspective on ok and right and wrong were even different this is beginning to dawn on me now that I live in a corner of the world where I am surrounded by people with similar life views.  I am not saying I am surrounded by yes men (or women), but I am surrounded by people who start from the same point as me.

 

That Prop 8 in California is totally and egregiously wrong is a given with my my coworkers and friends and neighbors.  Well, some of them may actually agree with it, but they take the anti view seriously enough to not let on if they do.  Back home I know I would face frowns and faces and going to hells for loudly proclaiming equality full equality for homosexuals.  Even from some of the liberals.  I mean they would say that they like gay people but marriage would be coming on a little strong.

 

Here, I live in a place where gay men and lesbians holding hands, having children, and being very open and public about it isn't weird.  I mean I would imagine in some neighborhoods in Chicago it would be, but in the ones where I travel, it is just the way it is and no one seems to mind.  I mean they treat it exactly the same as hetero couples doing it (for the most part, I am sure Chris will speak up to correct me). 

 

I am sure there are some here who hate in the same way people did back home and in Idaho, but they are the quiet minority.  Exactly the opposite of what I saw back home.

 

It is nice.  One day it will be like that everywhere and people will shake their heads that Americans used to not let gays marry.  How silly and wrongheaded we once were.

Falling in love, with Roger Ebert

I have been kind of obsessed with reading reviews of movies from his website.  Old movies, new movies, classic movies, movies I like, movies I hate just to see what he has said.  It all kind of started by reading a post on his blog.  You see because of his struggles with cancer, he has lost the ability to speak, but he can of course still write and he does!  Prolifically.  The post I read was this one http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/10/i_think_im_musing_my_mind.html about how he feels losing his speech has made his writing better, but it was already pretty wonderful.  He also writes that he thinks his reviewing system (as are all grading systems) mostly bullshit, but he also wants to make his reviews useful.  He tells you if it is worth it to go see them, and he writes that it touched him if it did even if it seems like it isn't a good enough or fancy enough movie to do that.

 

So I reccomend everyone at least read the link above and go to rogerebert.com and check things out.  His answer man columns are awesome and so are his movie glossary that is ever expanding with the assistance of readers just like you and me.  They make names for all those truisms of movie truth like The Tell Me Where You Are and I'll Come Get You Rule of movie dialogue among other wonderful things.  Do it, is good internet time wasting.

Interesting day in the suburbs

I had my first Indian food made by Sam's coworker Nirav's wife and mother (PS his wife from his arranged marriage which is just really so strange to my American self). I have no idea what most of it was, but it was freaking delicious and I am stuffed.

Also they took us to this temple in the burbs near their house. It is a Hindu temple and it is enormous and gorgeous and hand carved from marble in India and then shipped here to be reassembled. It was amazing, and there were people worshiping in it and we had to take off our shoes and it was like I was somehow in India, but I was really in a suburb. Amazing.

Several Things

Kitteh had to go back to vet as he licked the suture glue off his owie before it healed. Once at vet, he hissed at our wonderful Dr. Amy. He hissed at her A LOT! So much that she took him in the back to look at it and soak it in non-sting fixy medicine. She also gave him kitty advil and he is now on anti-biotics. Apparently he didn't have anything but hisses. He was not going to be a bad kitteh, he just made sounds like he was. He has also decided that the vet does not make him feel bad all the time. He sometimes gets to feel better. Which is good, as he really hates the vet.

However now he is wearing a cone which he spent most of last night trying to back out of. This is HILARIOUS! Because there is wiggling and this great look of consternation like why does he not get clear of this thing! It is great. He also seems to clip the edges of the cone against everything. And that cracks me up too. He is not amused at all. But he is feeling better.

Also had a conversation with my mother, my very Catholic mother, about the fact that I basically live with Sam now and that is the way life is now. Now, she actually acknowledged that she figured that was true (which I was kind of surprised by--because yes she should have figured that but no since she likes to ignore things that mess with the perceived reality of her choice) and she said, "Well I figured that was how it was, you do what you want." Which sounds like blessing, but I know by the tone that she basically thinks that I am a cocky punk ass who does what I want regardless which even if it is absolutely true, it is still kind of galling to realize that is how your mother thinks of you.

Sunday of lazy

The boyfriend made omelets with blue cheese and cheddar cheese in them when we woke up this morning and spaghetti for lunch, and we cleaned out his storage area. That went rather quickly and I discovered some very old pictures as well as his bizarre enthusiasm for office supplies (seriously over excited about a very small clipboard and some pens). He also collected stamps, coins, and baseball cards through out his life. Hilarious.

Freedom!

Yes, that is right.  The musical episode of my big gay soap opera opened on Monday night and I no longer have rehearsal, at least until March.  So, what do I do?  Tuesday I go sign up to work my retail job for the holiday season.  Whatever.  I need money to buy Christmas gifts.  So if my family (well one member I guess since we are spending a bunch of money on one person only), boyfriend, any of the friends, and boyfriend's family (who I am actually spending the holiday with, including his mother's birthday) are to get anything AT ALL I need some alternate income source.  So yeah, retail here I come.  But I like it there, and I was promised a lot of cash register time since apparently many of the new people not so good with cash register and speed.  Plus several old timers are coming back for this holiday.  And I do like it there.

 

Also Big Gay Musical was well received.  The audience loved it!  My friends Jamie and Chris loved it, but they could not watch my phone sex song because well it pushes well past the bounds of decency and probably good taste (because this is the Ville people) and if you know me it is apparently very uncomfortable to see me pretending to masturbate while singing and making sex noises.  Did I mention this was not a show for America's youth?

 

Kitty has no claws.  He is in fact now famous at the vet's for waking up from painful surgery and being willing to take all comers.  They had to cover his cage with a towel to get him to stop trying to swat and his at anyone walking to near his vicinity.  However, seems not to notice that the surgery he had was painful.  It may hurt me way more to see him moving about than it hurts him.  Which I guess is better, but I really wish he hasn't totally ignored or foiled all of our multiple attempts to get him to stop destroying furniture.  Soft claws he liked getting put on, almost as much as he liked chewing them right off.  He showed no interest in multiple scratching posts, and merely took the double sided tape as a sign to scratch another part of the furniture or to move onto the leather furniture.  We really did try, and we talked to vet about it.  He just tried harder.

FEELING BETTTER!

I am over the hump thanks to some nasal spray which although it is gross to use actually lets me breathe all the way up into my skull for the first time in like a month.  I feel so much better.  I am going to enjoy tonight's party and then later the Cabaret I am doing with Chicago Public Radio and the Viaduct (sounds cool but really we are singing some songs from the Ville's musical finale) and tomorrow's concert (go Punchline!) and hanging out, and rehearsal may even be fun on Sunday that is how much better I am feeling!

 

This means soon I shall respond to Sallyacious' hat tip.

 

Still sick

Think it is much more sinusy than previously thought.  Might leave work early to go home and do the sort and stuff I have to do without having to answer phones or sit in oddly lit room with no natural light.  Actually my goal may be to head home at 2pm.  Short nap.  Work from home.

New President elect and bad head cold

I am home sick today. I have had a cold hovering at me for about two weeks, but I thought it would wait until we opened the musical to kick me in the face. Instead it got me last night. Too many late nights and not enough healthful things. Oh well. I took the day off to care for it because I hope that will right me into better health.

Seriously who is working today?

Because I am at work, but way too nervous and excited to work.  Have already wasted an hour and a half.  Just not interested in work and don't have pressing enough work to worry about it.  Am going to stuff things today because that will be appropriate.  Our mail got delivered super early as our street will get closed down later.  We are roughly 2 and 1/2 blocks from the entrance to Obama party central, and there has been important official people there since last week.  Chicago is psyched!  The holy city is kind of vibrating with nervous energy just waiting to spill over into ecstacy and joy.  Everyone is so proud to vote.

 

Unrelated news.  I am buying ice skates this winter (or fall) because I can then go ice skate for free on my lunch break!  Genius!

meeting overheard

I like my job, I feel obligated to preface this entry, because it is mostly enjoyable, rarely tedious, and I find the people interesting and nice to be around and work with.  It also lets me have a life outside of it, and I like that a lot.  However, today an open door meeting was held in the conference room next to me.  There are two companies in my office, and I kind of work for both of them, but mostly for the main one of them that came first.  This meeting was for the big company.  Every single person in the big company except for me and my boss.  It was the quarterly bonus pass out.  All but the two newest employees of that company (who qualify for bonuses but we don't get fully paid until in Q4 for the project they qualify for) got bonuses.

 

I didn't and my boss didn't.  We don't qulaify for them as we never work on a specific project.  We just make the office run smoothly around the people who work on the projects that pay our bills.  The meeting involved a rah rah speech by the owner of the company.  It talks about how when the company profits we all do.  How in part we work hard for moments like this when you see the fruits of your labor. 

 

It was disheartening to overhear this speech when you weren't getting back.  Especially because although my job isn't particularly taxing or difficult or even all that specialized, it does involve doing all the awful shit that if the specialized people were made to do would make them jump ship.  I do it for them, but it seems that is not worthy of reward.  And the thing is, that if they just closed the damn door I wouldn't be thinking about this.  Especially since most of the bonuses were fairly small.  Extrapolated, virtually no one gets as much as $1,000 a year in bonuses.  Some of them get less than $250.  They really aren't that great all things considered, but they happen more frequently, so people might like less since they get them more often.  It just sucked to be sitting out here listening and knowing that I too give to the company and but apparently that which I give isn't too valuable.

So stress decreased in one area of my life just in time to increase in another

Personal life stress has calmed down which is very nice.  I am glad.  Work stress, however has gone crazy.  Mostly in part because of a super easy but massively tedious and time consuming project that took over my desk.  It sucked.  But it is about to be dropped off at the post office forever, never to be seen again--unless I jacked up an address or something. 

 

My cat is about to be declawed which makes Sam very happy as it ensures the longevity of some of his furniture and that some of it can be recovered or replaced without being destroyed immediately after.  Steve will fucking hate it at first.  He will have to be at the vet overnight, and he hates it there.  Hopefully he won't harm any of the vet technicians.

 

I am having a Halloween party with new roomie Azar.  Sam and I are going as Charlie Brown and the Little Red Headed Girl (he will of course have a paper bag to put on his head as needed).

 

Obama is having a giant million people rally in a park downtown here on election day, and I tried to get tickets but failed.  Chris Plummer has some, and he will be going.  It is kind of a bummer to miss that.  Obama will either declare victory or concede from there, but it is also outside at night in Chicago in November which means it will be a cold night, a long cold night likely.  I will just watch it from inside Sam's warm apartment with a kitty, and some wine (or heck champagne) and maybe a few friends.  That will be more comfy.  But if I get tickets I am SO going.

Random thoughts of the stressful day

So my CTA card came in the mail today.  Assuming it works when I try to use it, life is back to normal post wallet losing.

 

I get irrationally angry at people who stand on very full buses in the morning when there are seats available.  Ok I get it, you like to stand or you don't like the back of the bus that is up the little stairs, but sit your ass down anyway to ease the congestion at the front of the bus where there are considerably less things to hold on to.  Seriously sit the crap down.  You can stand back up as the bus empties out.  The only exception is if we are less than 2 city blocks from your stop.  Then standing is acceptable if you are keeping yourself close to the back door.

 

My ipod is on the fritz.  Of course it is because I gave my old one to someone else who didn't have one.  So of course mine decides to die.  Although I have BROADLY hinted to the boyfriend that an itouch would be the best Christmas present ever.  And it may just need to be re-whatevered to my itunes or take a little trip to the genius bar.

 

I have converted my boss to the wonders of ice cold liquor store soda.

 

The weather has made my coworkers extra whiny although it has somehow made some of the whiny ones quite grateful.  Weird.

 

Stress has subsided a little mostly because I think I cried it all out yesterday.  Also I feel much better about the memorization of my songs after rehearsing them.

 

Also back are the nightmares courtesy of my allergy meds.  And I would seriously stop taking them if they didn't make my nostrils and sinuses and head so stinking clear and if they weren't the only ones that do that.  Whatever is missing from the generic store versions is apparently what I need.

Really stressed out right now

Busy, learning a musical, stressing over life just in general.  Everything seems to be getting unecessarily hard.  I think I need more sleep and a vacation, and I am going to file a lot today at work. Filing is soothing.  Filing will be calming.  I want to be calm.  I will be calm.

Performance Art Part Five--the end

Mike Daisey is an amazingly compelling performer. He did a better job than anyone that I have ever seen live at holding a room with a wonderful sense of his story telling and our invovlement as an audience member. Sam's dad loved the show. He was laughing so hard for so much of it. Sam's mom found it very interesting, and Sam was more engaged than I have ever seen him be at a live non-music performance.

I really enjoyed it, and it has been too long since for me to do a very good sort of review, but I would heartily recommend seeing him if you ever have the opportunity.

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished (sort of)

So, Wednesday I lfet work early by a few hours to help Jamie get her car untowed because the first time she went to the scary towlot to do it, they disbelieved her registration.  She was a little sleep deprived and hungry and angry and wet and IM'd me kind of hysterical, and I said I would help her.  So, I got off work and rented a zip car in order to pick her up take her half way to Wisconsin (it felt like) to the DMV and then down into the heart of scary industrial ghetto to get her car.  Once she called me with news that car was going to be hers, I went home.  I had planned to nap that day after work, but instead I had a four hour adventure!  Then I had a late rehearsal that was way up north and only an hour long (so it took me slightly more time in transit than in rehearsal). 

 

On the bus ride home I got very paranoid that I had dropped/lost my brand new and exciting digital voice recorder, so I pulled everything out of my purse to make sure I found it and then put them back in.  The next morning I went to catch the bus (with my bus stop moved by one stop because they closed the freaking sidewalk where my stop was), but once on the bus I couldn't find my wallet in my purse.  So I got off, assuming I had taken it out when I got home the night before because well I paid a few bills online (it was mid-month and payday--like you do!).  Then I called Sam and woke him up and had him look for it on the couch and the coffee table, but no.  I get back to his house, and I look for it and no.  It is not there.  Then I remember pulling everything out!  Was I smart and putting them on the empty seat between me and the wall?  Of course not.  I put them on the seat between me and the aisle.  The bus was pretty empty, but somebody could well have just snatched it as they passed if they really wanted (although we were going express at a fast speed down Lakeshore).  Or it could've fallen on the floor and then picked up later by anyone on earth.

 

So I log onto my bank account to see if there was any activity on my debit card (which was of course in the wallet), but nothing has happened, and it was payday so there was actual money that they could take.  But nothing-weird (and amazing!).  So, I borrow some money from Sam to take the bus to work and stop at my bank before I head all the way into work (way late at this point).  They of course cannot do anything because I have no ID or debit card or pin to prove that I am me.  So I take the customer service number and head into work.  Once there I decide I will call CTA's lost and found.  Becuase well, it was an empty bus, it was late at night, and probably that one was headed back to the garage pretty dang soon.  Who knows, maybe the cleaning crew found it and turned it in and all is well?

 

I call, I am on hold for a few minutes.  The woman who answers asks me what bus I was on.  That bus goes to the NorthPark Garage, she tells me and gives me there number before transferring me to them directly.  The woman at the garage asks me what my name is and what color my wallet is and puts me on hold.  I am just waiting to hear confirmed that my wallet is gone FOREVER when she comes back on the line and says, "Yes, we have it."  I am shocked.  I didn't have a contigency plan for actually getting my wallet back.  They tell me it is item #44 and that I can come in between 7am and 7pm in the next 30 days to get it.  The garage is of course halfway to Madison, Wisconsin.  It would take me over an hour on multiple buses and trains to get there from work, and oh yeah my CTA card was in the wallet which is now there.  So I call Jamie because I responded to her thanks with the statement that she would do it for me, although at the time I did not intend it as a threat.  Whoops!  In a car, it is a short trip for her.  So she went, picked it up for me and brought it to me downtown where we went out to lunch. 

 

The best part is that virtually everything was still in it.  I was missing about $2 in change that was in it when it went AWOL, and I was missing my CTA card.  Everything else seemed to be untouched.  Wallet returned.  Everything fine.  I am still very closely monitoring my bank account to see if anything happens there, but it looks like I managed to be very lucky.  Although this may have depleted my good Karma for months at least!

 

Later this weekend:  Last part of the performance art series, I will accept the tagging Sally gave me, and reunited with an old friend in our new town

Performance Art Part 4 Workshop

It was great. Most of the people (basically all of the people) in the workshop had some sort of acting/performing training or experience, so it was like we were all reasonably on the same page. There were only about ten of us. It was awesome.

He had a very concise handout with three groupings of four things that must be remembered to create art like this. Kind of like a very basic how to guide. He went over them, we asked questions throughout, he was funny and warm and totally unpretentious and generally really concerned about helping people learn this artform he very clearly loves. I guess that shouldn't be surprising, but because so often that has not been the case (especially the pretentious part) in master classes I have gone to for acting and theatre. Although perhaps that is the difference between master class and workshop? Or for sure between someone who would bill their class as one versus the other.

Anyway, really looking forward for the show tonight. Especially hearing a little more about the nuclear component to it, yeah that's right I am from the greater Hanford area, and I know a ridiculous amount about nuclear energy and their reactors as a result. Because growing up their you take field trips to nuclear reactors where they made the Plutonium that they dropped on Nagasaki (well the control room of said reactor not actually inside).

I am also very excited to just fucking do some of the things we looked at learned about today. I am probably going to start hosting a story telling night like once a month or so with friends who are also interested in this, just to see what happens. I am also glad that I do not edit my blog really since that seems to be something I need to encourage in my speech as I do this style of performance.

Performance art update part the third update

I took notes in a little journal when I was at the round table.  Basically I was blogging for later to put up here, but I didn't have it at work until today.  PS I really can't wait until the workshop on Saturday!  So at the "How Theatre Failed America" Round table at the MCA--here were my thoughts in the theatre:

 

Mike Daisey was actually at the round table!  He spoke as did many of the the other theatre artists, but he struck me as passionate, empathetic, and humble.  Listening to this was very interesting, but I wanted to speak too (as I bet did many other audience members).  Especially when it came to the question of would you invite the business-y staff to speak to the artists on the art itself.  Like would/should they have the perogative or ability to give notes?  The Chicago area artists seemed to be saying well of course not.  I disagree.  Why couldn't, why shouldn't the staff comment on the art?  Yes, true they don't have the specific training and vocabulary.  But they CAN speak with their heats to what the see, saw, felt or experienced.  I think they should speak, and I think the artists should consider their thoughts.  I mena obviously this is criticism and commentary that should be weighted and looked at in context as an audience response rather than a fellow professional response.  But, yes consider it, yes open a dialogue.  Criticism is not and should not be the word of God or something.  It should be, it is food for thought.  Something for the brains of the artists to chew on.  Some sort of mirror to reflect back what they are doing.  Ok maybe sometimes it is a funhouse mirror, but just because it may not be an "accurate" perspective or a photo-real perspecitve does not make it useless.  It makes it useful in a different way from the professional opinions.  Processing it can lead to revelations of value, even if they are not those intended by the amateur who was responding from their lack of highly involved theatrical knowledge. 

 

I say this because my family knows very little about theatre, and they have been the bearers of the most useful and the most useless criticsms I have ever received.  Useless when I cannot get them to understand that The Rivals was a way better show, but useful when their naivety about theatre causes the to consider a path or a problem from a perspective I would overlook because my expertise has gotten in the way of having a truly open mind.  So yeah, sometimes what they say may well be ridiculous, but shutting them out without a consideration can shut out something you might need.  So why create any false wall before their art.  I would imagine the businessy people who choose to work in the arts (as opposed to more lucrative business worlds) understand that they do not operate on the same artistic level as the artists, but they participate in the art as audience and they choose that line of work (I hope) out of a love of being an audience member.  And feeling connected to the work is what brings audience members back, so connect your first audience, really connect them.

 

 

Performance Art part two (definitely even if I miscounted, this is the new count--this isn't the wire if I am wrong no one has to drop a body)

Ummm, so I have been watching the blog of the person who's show I am watching this weekend and who's workshop I am very excited to attend because well he puts interesting stuff up and I check it off and on, like so many blogs I monitor.  Anyway, so yesterday, this (my) blog or a snippet of it appeared on that blog.  I am not mentioning it by name because I do not want a web crawler to find it and put it on that blog again.  It kind of freaked me out, but it mostly made me wish I hadn't dashed off what I wrote and maybe edited and reread because I don't really do that here (I know none of you would have ever guessed).  But it was very odd to see my blog on his blog.

 

That really is the whole part there.  But on a side note: I totally saw Steven from Season 4 of Project Runway (last season with Christian as the winner not this one) standing on Michigan Avenue and smoking!  It was insane.  Also insane, possibly my brother Tom because he is all in lurve and (well not to say he isn't but this all seems very sudden) wants to get married like tomorrow or something.  I am worried.  Quite worried because it just doesn't seem like he is giving much thought to the (very) long term possible consequences of his actions.

Performance art update volume one (or two, no one yeah one)

The round table was not very lively.  Interesting but not lively.  AND MIKE DAISEY was there.  I am kind of a stalker, and I was really excited that he was there.  I really like a lot of his points, but I actually think this discussion wasn't very lively because many of the biggest theatres in Chicago are more artist driven ensemble places than exist in other cities.  Steppenwolf is a place where a lot of its artists can live a nice life off the work they get there.  Many of its most present and ivolved artists live and work here, and they don't really bring in out of town talent to dazzle--unless you count their own ensemble members for whom Steppenwolf is heading back to their artistic home and not a star turn.  They are not the odd company out here either.  Here ensembles and artists make their own work--however supporting Daisey's hypothesis a lot of them do it while making their money other ways.

 

I also commed the Writer's Theatre for having a person from the office-y side of their business (I am not sure if she was their marketing director or their CFO or Development Head or what) come and speak to the artists.  Because let's face it those are the people who live really comfortably and get paid a ton and are not artists (well most frequently are not artists).  She spoke about why (well kind of about why) she and her like get paid more than actors.  She spoke about how she doesn't even like to compare the two, and how it makes her uncomfortable to speak about it.  She was uncomfortable opening herself up to questions from a roomful of artists, but she very bravely did it.  Go her!

 

The only really exciting moment was when Mike Daisey talked about how part of the state of the liveliness of the art can be seen in the posters for local arts scene (galleries, bands, concerts, plays, etc) on the wall of local restaurants and cafes.  He travels a lot and says that usually the theatre posters (in that whole wall) are the lamest.  And I am inclined to agree with him.  This was the only thing that ruffled the hackles of the artistic directors (yeah I mixed my metaphors whatever I do it).  They all got kind of quiet and defensive.  It was very interesting.

 

Very interesting.  Also makes me terribly excited to take my workshop on Saturday!!!!

 

perfromance art the beginning of the results

So, I am not going to get to see Tim Miller and Alistair McCartney.  BUT. . .I will be in Mike Daisey's workshop on Saturday (so excited!) and tonight I go to the roundtable discussion which if it gets too boring I am going to go back to Sam's and watch the debate.  Hopefully it won't be boring at all.  And on Saturday night Sam and I are taking his parents to see Mike Daisey's performance.  Yeah that's right his parents are going and they want to and they picked it!  I got him to email his mom the links of the choices (because Sam wanted to take them to see "Jersey Boys"), and her response was Mike Daisey sounds fun and then she dismissed Jersey Boys (and the Four Seasons in general) quite out of hand.  She lived through it she said, and she didn't need to do it again.

 

I am stoked!  There is no way given the same choice my parents would have picked Mike Daisey.  They would've gone for Jersey Boys (although I suspect my dad actually would have liked Mike Daisey more).  Although my parents have years and years of being dragged along to weird theatrical events that I reccomended, so they may just be wary of everything that I picked (I was in Eastern Washington ok there just isn't that much weird theatre there that isn't also REALLY bad theatre).  Although on the other hand, one summer I did a great fast, short, spare cutting of The Rivals and the world's least funny production of You Can't Take it With You (which is a show that is hard to destroy the comedy in as much as we in fact did), and they just shrugged at The Rivals and LOVED YCTIWY.  The Russian they said (ok Childers was pretty funny) and the actor lady (no, no, no that woman was not funny, she was just pushy not the same thing at all) so funny!  They couldn't get over it.

 

Anyway, I will keep you posted on how things go!

All performance art all the time

Well not really.  But kind of.  Two of my faves will be in Chicago next weekend.  Mike Daisey will be doing a three-day stint at the MCA with "If You See Something Say Something" which I am trying to get Sam and his parents to go see with me.  His parents I think will like it much more than he will, but I think I may go no matter what.  I really shouldn't spend money on this this month, especially since Renee owes me $200, but this is not something I get the opportunity to do often.  Even better, he is teaching an extemporaneous performance class, and I want!  I am going to sign up for it and work on mining the Kinion family memories vault to bring those to fruition.  There is also a roundtable discussion with lots of the regional theatre bigwigs here in Chicago reacting to his other performance piece "How Theatre Failed America" but I really hope it isn't just whining.  On the Monday after this all happens, Tim Miller is back in town with his partner and they are both doing pieces.  It would be great to go see him again, but there is only so much money I shouldn't spend that I am can even pretend to afford to spend in one weekend, and I have seen Tim Miller perform whereas I have not seen Mike Daisey.