The danger of hanging out with the people you create with on a regular basis is that you keep thinking of more things to do.
I spent this last weekend with Chris DeJong, Brian Schirmer and new friend, Mark Chun. We four manly men went down to San Diego for the annual orgy of geekdom: ComicCon. This is the largest comic book convention in the world, although it's moved well beyond comics. It's a haven for toy retailers, independent publishers, science fiction and fantasy enthusiasts, Costume Players, and gamers. In other words, if there is an obsessive fan base, it's here. (Not including sports or Brittany Spears fan-bases, obviously)
They had over 10,000 attendees, and yet I still managed to run into a couple of people that I knew. Love that.
For the most part, I checked out some panels, met Phil Foglio (of Girl Genius) and seeded the Freebie Table with RadioStar cards. After hours of walking the floor, watching the fans in their costumes, independent films, major film previews, and being in awe of the sheer humanity that crushed around us, we retired frequently to the YardHouse. The YardHouse boasts the largest beer menu in San Diego, and I had first been taken there by my old boss, Bill McKeever when I spent the weekend on his boat a couple of years ago. They do indeed have an impressive array of beer there, and we did drink an awful lot of it. And as we drank, we schemed.
We're already looking at a Holiday show with RadioStar: a mixture of sketch and improv. We have agents looking to secure a space for us, and are prepared to start working on the show as soon as we can confirm the location. But ComicCon inspired us to get booths at SF-based WonderCon and the independent press convention A.P.E. Our material is off-beat and smart in the way that the crowd at these conventions appreciates, and nobody else is promoting themselves that way yet. For that matter, very few people are approaching podcasting in the way that we are. By all accounts, we're as niche as you can get.
It would be a Cassandra's Call booth though, not just RadioStar. This means getting some of my plays printed via a small publisher, or doing it ourselves. This also means making CDs of our best shows and putting them up for sale. Demo CDs as well, with a single episode that can be handed out for free. In other words, work. Lots and lots of work. All of it feasible. None of it particularly difficult (except for that publishing part). Still, work, and lots of it.
Still, I weigh the possibilities against the blood pressure spikes and I think we'll go for it. The company needs to grow and to begin to position itself with a sale-able product. It's time for the next level, and I've always been about stretching things as far as they can go.
Of course, with auditions for "Get it? Got it. Good!" tonight and tomorrow, and rehearsals starting in a few weeks.... the thing feeling most stretched right now is me.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
stretch
With "Vagina Dentata" finished for the time being, and casting for "Get it? Got it. Good!" still a week away, it's an unusually calm week. It's been filled with a lot of false starts, too. I was going to get dinner with someone on Monday, and they had to cancel because of work. So Eden Tosh and I were going to get dinner and then go see Scanner Darkly, but it turned out that she had guests coming into town at the last minute so we just grabbed a quick bite. I'm seeing an acquaintance's show at the Magic Theatre tonight and was going to go with someone, but she had to add another rehearsal for her show tomorrow night, so I'm going solo instead. I'll catch her performance tomorrow at Jupiter in Berkeley, but it looks like pretty much everyone I invited to join me won't be able to make it... or won't be there until it's almost over.
This seems to be consistent for me. Whenever I actually *have* time, nobody else does, or they think they do but then have to cancel at the last minute. This seems to be the primary source of spontaneity in my life, as I'll have plans, get them cancelled and then something else will come up at the last minute.
But for now, it's more about taking the chance to stretch out in the free time. I bought a bunch of books the other day and I am currently reading about the DNA researcher Rosalind Franklin. Tomorrow, at Jupiter, I'll probably sit out on the patio with some food and a beer, and listen to Rachel Efron while reading about a woman terribly wronged by history. Maybe people will show up, maybe they won't. I've certainly learned not to rely on the schedules of others to do the things I want to do.
This seems to be consistent for me. Whenever I actually *have* time, nobody else does, or they think they do but then have to cancel at the last minute. This seems to be the primary source of spontaneity in my life, as I'll have plans, get them cancelled and then something else will come up at the last minute.
But for now, it's more about taking the chance to stretch out in the free time. I bought a bunch of books the other day and I am currently reading about the DNA researcher Rosalind Franklin. Tomorrow, at Jupiter, I'll probably sit out on the patio with some food and a beer, and listen to Rachel Efron while reading about a woman terribly wronged by history. Maybe people will show up, maybe they won't. I've certainly learned not to rely on the schedules of others to do the things I want to do.
Friday, July 14, 2006
Intuition
Another extremely tired morning. I went out to Brian Shirmer's last night for our weekly game night and hung out with Chris DeJong and Kurt DiSessa. More of the usual: Settlers of Kataan and Halo2. I went a bit lighter on stuffing myself with beer and pizza as I tend to feel like a stuffed sausage when I leave these things. A good night, and I was supposed to head over to Zeitgeist afterwards for an online gathering. I've been hanging out on ConsuMating.com a bit and they were having a party there. When the time came, though, I had a strong impulse to just head home instead, so I jumped on BART and planned for an early evening.
Halfway home I got a call from Mindy Lym, who has recently moved down the street from me. She and some friends were looking for a place to buy a corkscrew at 11pm. I had them pick me up at the station and got my corkscrew from home. That could have been it, but I'm not such a fool as to turn down the offer of a glass of wine with a bunch of lovely and talented ladies. So, I ended up talking theatre and relationships and watching Mindy to tarot readings until around 2 in the morning while draining two bottles of wine. Her friends were from the cast of Seussical, which I highly encourage folks to check out before it closes this month. I saw the show last week, and it was fun to get to know them.
I don't make the mistake of confusing the person for the role they play, but it's quite interesting to watch someone be the sweet and pining Gertrude McPhee and her One Feather Tail, and then meet the exhausted, sardonic woman playing her. The focus of the evening, however, went to the struggle of the director's small dog trying desperately to make friends with Mindy's kitten... who arched and hissed like a Halloween cat every time the pooch got anywhere near her. The little puff ball would just whine and try over and over again to make friends with the very unreceptive kitten.
God, it was like watching human relationships... the more emotionally unavailable the kitten was, the more the little dog wanted to be its friend.
Take what you will from this.
Halfway home I got a call from Mindy Lym, who has recently moved down the street from me. She and some friends were looking for a place to buy a corkscrew at 11pm. I had them pick me up at the station and got my corkscrew from home. That could have been it, but I'm not such a fool as to turn down the offer of a glass of wine with a bunch of lovely and talented ladies. So, I ended up talking theatre and relationships and watching Mindy to tarot readings until around 2 in the morning while draining two bottles of wine. Her friends were from the cast of Seussical, which I highly encourage folks to check out before it closes this month. I saw the show last week, and it was fun to get to know them.
I don't make the mistake of confusing the person for the role they play, but it's quite interesting to watch someone be the sweet and pining Gertrude McPhee and her One Feather Tail, and then meet the exhausted, sardonic woman playing her. The focus of the evening, however, went to the struggle of the director's small dog trying desperately to make friends with Mindy's kitten... who arched and hissed like a Halloween cat every time the pooch got anywhere near her. The little puff ball would just whine and try over and over again to make friends with the very unreceptive kitten.
God, it was like watching human relationships... the more emotionally unavailable the kitten was, the more the little dog wanted to be its friend.
Take what you will from this.
Thursday, July 13, 2006
So Hollywood
A fun night, tonight. After work I took care of a few things at home, including removing headshots from my stack of people who are auditioning for the Fringe show, and finding out that the cable I bought to allow me to transmit my computer signal to a television screen didn't work. Feh.
Tonight was a planning potluck for the Fringe Festival, so I had to miss a viewing for Brian Shirmer's film. I was sorry to miss the screening, but I felt a certain responsibility to my own show. Of course, when it somes to potlucks, I'm rather pathetic. I don't cook, really. So I swung by a corner donut shop on the way to the theatre and got a dozen bundles of deep fried, chocolate covered joy. Most of the other offerings weren't much better. Asking theatre producers to bring food to a potluck is an exercise in absurdity. We buy things, and the cheaper the better.
The meeting was fine, and afterwards I grabbed a cab to the Mars Bar to join the afterparty for Brian's movie. Chris DeJong was there, with the always lovely Ann, and other members of the cast and various friends and groovy people. We drank into the evening, with pizza ordered around 11. I'm currently riding home with the producer of the film and a gentleman who is interested in doing some foley work for RadioStar. Lots of cards were passed around. It was very Hollywood for this San Francisco boy. I've convinced one of the actors from the film to audition for my show, and who knows if any of these things tonight will come to fruition. But it's been fun regardless, and one hell of a Wednesday night.
Tonight was a planning potluck for the Fringe Festival, so I had to miss a viewing for Brian Shirmer's film. I was sorry to miss the screening, but I felt a certain responsibility to my own show. Of course, when it somes to potlucks, I'm rather pathetic. I don't cook, really. So I swung by a corner donut shop on the way to the theatre and got a dozen bundles of deep fried, chocolate covered joy. Most of the other offerings weren't much better. Asking theatre producers to bring food to a potluck is an exercise in absurdity. We buy things, and the cheaper the better.
The meeting was fine, and afterwards I grabbed a cab to the Mars Bar to join the afterparty for Brian's movie. Chris DeJong was there, with the always lovely Ann, and other members of the cast and various friends and groovy people. We drank into the evening, with pizza ordered around 11. I'm currently riding home with the producer of the film and a gentleman who is interested in doing some foley work for RadioStar. Lots of cards were passed around. It was very Hollywood for this San Francisco boy. I've convinced one of the actors from the film to audition for my show, and who knows if any of these things tonight will come to fruition. But it's been fun regardless, and one hell of a Wednesday night.
Monday, July 10, 2006
Big weekend
Closing
Well, this has been a rather extraordinary weekend.
I went and saw "Papa", the show playing before our show, on Thursday night. It's been virtually impossible to see their show on nights when we perform, since they don't finish until 5-10 minutes before when we're theoretically supposed to start our show. This was not part of the original plan, but we're flexible in the theatre world when we have to be. So, I wanted to be a good neighbor and check out the show when I could. It was quite good, actually. I'm not a big fan of one persons shows, generally speaking, but for what it was it was very well done. I found myself wanting to explore various assertions about Hemingway's life in more depth than the show allowed, but that's a good thing. Always leave them wanting more, you know. Afterwards, I was planning on meeting up with coworkers for a birthday celebration, but had no idea where to meet them. All I knew was that they were heading to the Marina. Chris Hayes works at the Eureka and was the person who got me in the space in the first place. He's friends with some of the guys in Los Angeles' Second City troupe, and they were in town for Shaun Landry's San Francisco Improv Festival. So, I joined him and we caught cab down to the bar they were at. Apparently, they had a fantastic show that night. I got the impression that three acts had played that night, and all of them had rocked the house like a Scorpion's set. I had a couple of beers and talked about Vagina Dentata and RadioStar. I hadn't had time to eat that night, so I got very tipsy very fast. This is never a wise choice, and I ended up slightly drunkenly inviting David Razowski to come and play with Pharmarsupial when he visited San Francisco on his next vacation.
Very smooth, I can be, when drunk and happy. There was a small voice in the back of my brain yelling at me to shut the hell up and let the man alone, but we were all in a friendly mode and my common sense wasn't paying much attention at the time.
I got the call from Rebeca Diaz, letting me know where to meet up for Marycruz Diaz's birthday gathering. So off I was in another cab up to the Matrix bar for more late night revelry. Now, the Marina is a whole different scene from most of the places I hang out, but I was feeling pretty limber. I chatted up a cute girl at the bar while I was getting a drink for the birthday girl, but wasn't able to follow up as I needed to deliver my birthday present.
Now, remember, I hadn't eaten all night, and had a Guinness, and white German beer of unknown appelation, and two screwdrivers by this point. I met another woman who came in and talked for a few seconds with her before she found her friends and vanished from my besotted and fond gaze. Throughout the evening, I would look over and check her out, hoping for another chance to talk to her. I was tipsy as hell, but quite lucid. Rebeca noticed my attention and I commented that guy she'd been talking to had been keeping his distance. In my mind, that meant that I might have a chance to swoop in shortly... and then looked back over to find her making out passionately with him.
Fuck.
It's a bad sign when you find yourself getting jealous about total strangers in a bar. It was well after hours by that point, though, and I needed to wait it out and get a ride home with the Diaz sisters. I finally got home around 2 or 2:30... I'm honestly not sure which.
It made going to work the next morning and interesting experience.
Throughout the day at work I got various calls on my cell, and checked voicemail at home, and watched the reservation list for Vagina Dentata grow and grow. By the time I got to the theatre, we have over fifty people on the reservation list. For a small theatre production, that's wonderful. For a late night (10pm) show, that's damn near mythical. I was very excited, and realized that we had run out of programs. One of my actors, Stefanie Goldstein, offered to take me to her office, which isn't that far from the theatre, and we made up about 75 programs on the copier. We got back with lots of room to spare and I fiddled about getting things ready for our show while "Papa" played on in the theatre. Time ticked further and further on, and I became more and more aware that we were missing something crucial: a box office manager. As people began to arrive at the box office, I put out a sign indicating when we'd actually be opening it and called my volunteer.
He had forgotten what day it was.
Cassidy Brown was in the crowd waiting for the box office to open, so I made him earn his comp ticket for the night and put him on duty. I gave him the quick orientation and then waited for the final notes of "Papa's" performance. Warren Jensen was there, so he could learn the light cues for our closing night as we were going to be losing our light operator. Kurt DiSessa was there as well, and I had offered him a comp if he'd help with the rapid set change. As the ovation subsided for "Papa" we swept in and began making the changeover. While I dropped the wire from the ceiling and starting hanging the wall panels, they brought the desk down the aisle and up on the stage. Then they went and got the conference table from the wings, and it broke as they tried to maneuver it onstage. Drills were grabbed and brackets refastened as I thanked whatever gods watch over the theatre that this happened on a night when we had extra hands.
Finally, the table was repaired enough to survive the show and we opened the house. We had over seventy people that night. The theatre claims to hold two hundred, but looking out at the house, I think that this number is inflated. Seventy filled the primary middle section very nicely. We started the show about 10:15pm and had a rocking old time. It was the largest single audience in Cassandra's Call's history.
Sunday was a whole different deal, as I borrowed Eden Tosh's car to go to Fairfield for my Great Uncle Mac's 90th birthday gathering. I saw people I hadn't seen since I was a wee shaver, and was amazed at how sharp, spry, fit, and feisty my uncle was. I can only hope and pray for that kind of longevity. May we all ready 90 and be cracking wise about beer and women while still moving around easily under our own power.
I picked Eden up afterwards in Pleasant Hill. She had been tooling around with Angela Mazur, so we sat for a bit, cooling our toes in the pool before jumping out for some thai food. Time got away from us, sadly and I had to whisk Eden away in order to get to the theatre by 9pm for our closing night. Eden was our box office manager for the evening, and while we only had 24 people on the reservation list, I wanted things to go smoothly. We made our final switch over, and when all was ready to go, there were over fifty people in the house. We had doubled our reservation list.
The show snapped like fresh elastic. Every one of the ladies had a good night, and everything sang. At the end, Gigi gave me roses and I gave them to the cast and thanked the audience and they roared like a village of vikings who had just been given free beer.
It was a good feeling... a VERY good feeling.
Andy and Lorelei, and Cindy Yee and Warren stayed afterwards to help us strike the set. It seemed pointless to put stuff away just to strike it the next day, so we got everything out of there that night. While making the final leg of the journey back to my rehearsal room, the desk that had sat in my apartment for years and barely survived the trip to the theatre in the first place, finally gave out. Particle board and wooden dowlings, secured by soft metal angle brackets, splintered and snapped and fell apart. It had seen it's last day. I broke it into pieces and tossed it in the room for later management. It was almost 1:30am and I was in mood to try and salvage it.
Sunday came, and I returned to the theatre to help "Papa" strike their set for a few hours before catching a bus across town to see Mindy Lym in "Seussical". The show was charming and sweet, and I marvelled at the size of the cast and the choreography and wondered how they got all that together while rehearsing in my room. After the show, lacking the change for bus fare, I walked the two miles back to the room, which took me through the tenderloin. After watching musical versions of Horton Hears a Who, with one lone elephant hearing an invisible community's cry for help... taking in the Tenderloin takes on a new poignancy.
I got to the room, though, and set things up for RadioStar. We had a smashing session, although were were few in number. David Austin-Groen is off in Eastern Europe, and Diana Brown is off doing "Dead Certain" in New York. Still, we got some damn good shows in the can and then retired to our usual watering hole to decompress. While there, Christopher DeJong proposed a RadioStar holiday show that dovetailed with some ideas I had been having about a scripted show.
To make an already way too long story a little less long, it looks like I now have a project in between "Get it? Got it. Good!" and the March revival of "Vagina Dentata." We don't have a name for it yet though.
And no, this is not what I would consider to be a slow weekend.
Well, this has been a rather extraordinary weekend.
I went and saw "Papa", the show playing before our show, on Thursday night. It's been virtually impossible to see their show on nights when we perform, since they don't finish until 5-10 minutes before when we're theoretically supposed to start our show. This was not part of the original plan, but we're flexible in the theatre world when we have to be. So, I wanted to be a good neighbor and check out the show when I could. It was quite good, actually. I'm not a big fan of one persons shows, generally speaking, but for what it was it was very well done. I found myself wanting to explore various assertions about Hemingway's life in more depth than the show allowed, but that's a good thing. Always leave them wanting more, you know. Afterwards, I was planning on meeting up with coworkers for a birthday celebration, but had no idea where to meet them. All I knew was that they were heading to the Marina. Chris Hayes works at the Eureka and was the person who got me in the space in the first place. He's friends with some of the guys in Los Angeles' Second City troupe, and they were in town for Shaun Landry's San Francisco Improv Festival. So, I joined him and we caught cab down to the bar they were at. Apparently, they had a fantastic show that night. I got the impression that three acts had played that night, and all of them had rocked the house like a Scorpion's set. I had a couple of beers and talked about Vagina Dentata and RadioStar. I hadn't had time to eat that night, so I got very tipsy very fast. This is never a wise choice, and I ended up slightly drunkenly inviting David Razowski to come and play with Pharmarsupial when he visited San Francisco on his next vacation.
Very smooth, I can be, when drunk and happy. There was a small voice in the back of my brain yelling at me to shut the hell up and let the man alone, but we were all in a friendly mode and my common sense wasn't paying much attention at the time.
I got the call from Rebeca Diaz, letting me know where to meet up for Marycruz Diaz's birthday gathering. So off I was in another cab up to the Matrix bar for more late night revelry. Now, the Marina is a whole different scene from most of the places I hang out, but I was feeling pretty limber. I chatted up a cute girl at the bar while I was getting a drink for the birthday girl, but wasn't able to follow up as I needed to deliver my birthday present.
Now, remember, I hadn't eaten all night, and had a Guinness, and white German beer of unknown appelation, and two screwdrivers by this point. I met another woman who came in and talked for a few seconds with her before she found her friends and vanished from my besotted and fond gaze. Throughout the evening, I would look over and check her out, hoping for another chance to talk to her. I was tipsy as hell, but quite lucid. Rebeca noticed my attention and I commented that guy she'd been talking to had been keeping his distance. In my mind, that meant that I might have a chance to swoop in shortly... and then looked back over to find her making out passionately with him.
Fuck.
It's a bad sign when you find yourself getting jealous about total strangers in a bar. It was well after hours by that point, though, and I needed to wait it out and get a ride home with the Diaz sisters. I finally got home around 2 or 2:30... I'm honestly not sure which.
It made going to work the next morning and interesting experience.
Throughout the day at work I got various calls on my cell, and checked voicemail at home, and watched the reservation list for Vagina Dentata grow and grow. By the time I got to the theatre, we have over fifty people on the reservation list. For a small theatre production, that's wonderful. For a late night (10pm) show, that's damn near mythical. I was very excited, and realized that we had run out of programs. One of my actors, Stefanie Goldstein, offered to take me to her office, which isn't that far from the theatre, and we made up about 75 programs on the copier. We got back with lots of room to spare and I fiddled about getting things ready for our show while "Papa" played on in the theatre. Time ticked further and further on, and I became more and more aware that we were missing something crucial: a box office manager. As people began to arrive at the box office, I put out a sign indicating when we'd actually be opening it and called my volunteer.
He had forgotten what day it was.
Cassidy Brown was in the crowd waiting for the box office to open, so I made him earn his comp ticket for the night and put him on duty. I gave him the quick orientation and then waited for the final notes of "Papa's" performance. Warren Jensen was there, so he could learn the light cues for our closing night as we were going to be losing our light operator. Kurt DiSessa was there as well, and I had offered him a comp if he'd help with the rapid set change. As the ovation subsided for "Papa" we swept in and began making the changeover. While I dropped the wire from the ceiling and starting hanging the wall panels, they brought the desk down the aisle and up on the stage. Then they went and got the conference table from the wings, and it broke as they tried to maneuver it onstage. Drills were grabbed and brackets refastened as I thanked whatever gods watch over the theatre that this happened on a night when we had extra hands.
Finally, the table was repaired enough to survive the show and we opened the house. We had over seventy people that night. The theatre claims to hold two hundred, but looking out at the house, I think that this number is inflated. Seventy filled the primary middle section very nicely. We started the show about 10:15pm and had a rocking old time. It was the largest single audience in Cassandra's Call's history.
Sunday was a whole different deal, as I borrowed Eden Tosh's car to go to Fairfield for my Great Uncle Mac's 90th birthday gathering. I saw people I hadn't seen since I was a wee shaver, and was amazed at how sharp, spry, fit, and feisty my uncle was. I can only hope and pray for that kind of longevity. May we all ready 90 and be cracking wise about beer and women while still moving around easily under our own power.
I picked Eden up afterwards in Pleasant Hill. She had been tooling around with Angela Mazur, so we sat for a bit, cooling our toes in the pool before jumping out for some thai food. Time got away from us, sadly and I had to whisk Eden away in order to get to the theatre by 9pm for our closing night. Eden was our box office manager for the evening, and while we only had 24 people on the reservation list, I wanted things to go smoothly. We made our final switch over, and when all was ready to go, there were over fifty people in the house. We had doubled our reservation list.
The show snapped like fresh elastic. Every one of the ladies had a good night, and everything sang. At the end, Gigi gave me roses and I gave them to the cast and thanked the audience and they roared like a village of vikings who had just been given free beer.
It was a good feeling... a VERY good feeling.
Andy and Lorelei, and Cindy Yee and Warren stayed afterwards to help us strike the set. It seemed pointless to put stuff away just to strike it the next day, so we got everything out of there that night. While making the final leg of the journey back to my rehearsal room, the desk that had sat in my apartment for years and barely survived the trip to the theatre in the first place, finally gave out. Particle board and wooden dowlings, secured by soft metal angle brackets, splintered and snapped and fell apart. It had seen it's last day. I broke it into pieces and tossed it in the room for later management. It was almost 1:30am and I was in mood to try and salvage it.
Sunday came, and I returned to the theatre to help "Papa" strike their set for a few hours before catching a bus across town to see Mindy Lym in "Seussical". The show was charming and sweet, and I marvelled at the size of the cast and the choreography and wondered how they got all that together while rehearsing in my room. After the show, lacking the change for bus fare, I walked the two miles back to the room, which took me through the tenderloin. After watching musical versions of Horton Hears a Who, with one lone elephant hearing an invisible community's cry for help... taking in the Tenderloin takes on a new poignancy.
I got to the room, though, and set things up for RadioStar. We had a smashing session, although were were few in number. David Austin-Groen is off in Eastern Europe, and Diana Brown is off doing "Dead Certain" in New York. Still, we got some damn good shows in the can and then retired to our usual watering hole to decompress. While there, Christopher DeJong proposed a RadioStar holiday show that dovetailed with some ideas I had been having about a scripted show.
To make an already way too long story a little less long, it looks like I now have a project in between "Get it? Got it. Good!" and the March revival of "Vagina Dentata." We don't have a name for it yet though.
And no, this is not what I would consider to be a slow weekend.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
S.E.P.
Twice in the last seven days I've gotten phone calls or emails that have been like a solid, well placed punch in the abdomen, just above the stomach but below the rib cage. I suppose that places it on the diaphragm, not that it matters.
It's funny, I've joked a bit over the last few months about how I've given up on connecting with people and decided to be a workaholic. I've only been a tiny bit kidding. It's just seemed easier to focus on what makes me feel good about myself and leave the ambiguity and continual issues around rejection aside. But that, of course, is easier said than done.
These alerts from the outside world ultimately have nothing to do with me. That's what hurts the most, I think: the fact that they have nothing to do with me. "Hello. Nothing to do with you, except that I thought you should know."
Pretending that you don't care anymore, that it doesn't hurt, that everything is smashing and who needs a heart anyway... it's not as helpful as it is on paper.
I wish it was. I wish I could hear things without immediately placing them in the context of how they hurt *me*, or how they make *me* feel. But I do. Then I feel bad about that reality, even though I know very well that there isn't a person on the planet that doesn't react the same way. I guess the real question is "how long before I stop being a selfish twit and focus on the real issue here?"
For me, it's usually only a half second or so... maybe a tiny bit longer. But then, later, it comes back. That's when I wish I was as disinterested and cold and hard as I like to pretend I've become. That's when I keep trying to push my heart back down my throat before it manages a grisly but impressive suicide dive out of my largest oriface.
No one buys my little charade of indifference, of course.
I'm not really that good an actor.
It's funny, I've joked a bit over the last few months about how I've given up on connecting with people and decided to be a workaholic. I've only been a tiny bit kidding. It's just seemed easier to focus on what makes me feel good about myself and leave the ambiguity and continual issues around rejection aside. But that, of course, is easier said than done.
These alerts from the outside world ultimately have nothing to do with me. That's what hurts the most, I think: the fact that they have nothing to do with me. "Hello. Nothing to do with you, except that I thought you should know."
Pretending that you don't care anymore, that it doesn't hurt, that everything is smashing and who needs a heart anyway... it's not as helpful as it is on paper.
I wish it was. I wish I could hear things without immediately placing them in the context of how they hurt *me*, or how they make *me* feel. But I do. Then I feel bad about that reality, even though I know very well that there isn't a person on the planet that doesn't react the same way. I guess the real question is "how long before I stop being a selfish twit and focus on the real issue here?"
For me, it's usually only a half second or so... maybe a tiny bit longer. But then, later, it comes back. That's when I wish I was as disinterested and cold and hard as I like to pretend I've become. That's when I keep trying to push my heart back down my throat before it manages a grisly but impressive suicide dive out of my largest oriface.
No one buys my little charade of indifference, of course.
I'm not really that good an actor.
Quick Breather
I've been enjoying taking it a little easy the last few days. We got a delightful review in the SF Bay Times (which you can read at the Cassandra's Call Website and had two very nice audiences this weekend. I was pretty freaked at our low numbers on opening weekend, but am greatly comforted by how this weekend went. Lots of my crew showed up, and 1am donuts were consumed, drinks consumed, and activity vaguely resembling dancing took place.
For the most part, I was fairly exhausted all weekend, although I managed to have lots of fun anyway. I had the Executive Leadership Center conference in El Segundo last week, and felt terribly un-prepared for it. Work on Vagina Dentata had kept me from really focusing any creative energies on the conference, and the spec's for what they wanted shifted a mere couple of days before it all went down. It all turned out well in the end, but by the time I got off the airplane Friday evening, I was dead tired. The fabulous Linda Kim drug me out anyway for crepes and to go dancing with some of her girlfriends. I was so tired I could barely stand up, and I've never found loud and dark clubs good places to make introductions. To make it worse, I found the band absolutely painful to listen to. I had to finally make my adieus and flee from the club after the second "song." Oy.
The holiday was an exercise in staying in my robe all day long. I got this week's RadioStar episode prepped (and did double duty on it since we missed last week), cleaned and then dirtied the kitchen and goofed off a lot. I feel like I should regret not going out and being social for the 4th, but I'm really quite over the whole fireworks thing and I think that I needed a complete day of down time and to recharge a little.
I can't do much more of that, though. I need to start casting for the Fringe show. I'm confirming my actors and need at least three more people. I've got two of the current cast ready to bolt for better paying jobs, so I may be casting more people than originally planned. Par for the course, really. I'm not paying much for the Fringe, it only has four shows, and it's not very high prestige. Still, I hope I can get things locked down soon. We start rehearsing in five weeks.
For the most part, I was fairly exhausted all weekend, although I managed to have lots of fun anyway. I had the Executive Leadership Center conference in El Segundo last week, and felt terribly un-prepared for it. Work on Vagina Dentata had kept me from really focusing any creative energies on the conference, and the spec's for what they wanted shifted a mere couple of days before it all went down. It all turned out well in the end, but by the time I got off the airplane Friday evening, I was dead tired. The fabulous Linda Kim drug me out anyway for crepes and to go dancing with some of her girlfriends. I was so tired I could barely stand up, and I've never found loud and dark clubs good places to make introductions. To make it worse, I found the band absolutely painful to listen to. I had to finally make my adieus and flee from the club after the second "song." Oy.
The holiday was an exercise in staying in my robe all day long. I got this week's RadioStar episode prepped (and did double duty on it since we missed last week), cleaned and then dirtied the kitchen and goofed off a lot. I feel like I should regret not going out and being social for the 4th, but I'm really quite over the whole fireworks thing and I think that I needed a complete day of down time and to recharge a little.
I can't do much more of that, though. I need to start casting for the Fringe show. I'm confirming my actors and need at least three more people. I've got two of the current cast ready to bolt for better paying jobs, so I may be casting more people than originally planned. Par for the course, really. I'm not paying much for the Fringe, it only has four shows, and it's not very high prestige. Still, I hope I can get things locked down soon. We start rehearsing in five weeks.
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