I signed into Blogger and got to the post page and realized I don’t really have anything to say. The summer is slow and hot. I can’t seem to get myself out of the bedroom, but at least I have managed to start writing again. Finished three short stories in about four days and now I edit and rewrite like any good writer. If these sell to magazines (please….someone) then I can use that to get representation and build the other short stories for a collection. I think that is the route I want to go. I would rather my sophomore pub be a novel instead of falling under the dreaded second novel curse (knowing fully well that there will be a second novel no matter where the first one comes in).

The jobs are steadily holding for now although I know the shoe will drop at any moment and am desperately trying to find other work to do before I have to start selling off more personal belongings.

I have nothing politically or socially savvy to say (altho some would say I never had to begin with to which I say…eff you).

Have a lovely week. Stay cool. Feed a pigeon.

Bush commutes Libby’s prison sentence – CNN.com

I don’t get this. Good Ol’ Dub is truly turning out to be the stupidest and worst president of the U.S. beyond even what I could imagine. Just when you think a politician could not sink any lower, he has found levels in a swamp bog that not even a mummified caveman could reach.

He commuted Libby’s sentence?!?!?!

And is my use of multiple punctuation marks a reflection of surprise or disgust? He claims he was under great pressure to pardon Libby. Who the hell pressures the leader of the free world to commute a scumbag’s sentence????

That time it was surprise.

This is just one more instance of the severe disruption and corruption of the so-called democratic ideal of this country. I mean just when you think Bush can’t screw the country or its image up anymore he manages to outdo himself.

I feel bad for whoever ends up taking the office after this eight-year farrago. They have a slew of political vomit to clean out of the carpets.

On an unrelated noted, I finally got off my ass and started watching Tony’s Nip/Tuck seasons.

It is what one does when they sequester themselves in their bedroom for an undetermined amount of time.

I have always been curious about the show and have burned through the first two seasons in four days. What a deranged and demented series…I love it. It is completely ridiculous and I find myself astonished after each episode wondering why I am still watching the next one at 3 in the morning….but the damned thing is good. It is twisted in all those socially reflective ways but also ridiculous in all those “this can’t possibly be how people act” ways.

And then you read about Libby being commuted and you realize nothing on a show like Nip/Tuck could top the depravity of the Bush administration.

As Sara would say, it is as this point that HomeSec (sorry, I know you hate the term) would mark me as a national threat and tag me for migratory purposes.

So I have essentially become a recluse in my own apartment. I think I left my place in the last four days for a total of an hour, and I am being generous. I can’t seem to motivate myself to get out and do anything.

Even writing seems like such a daunting task for me. I did get one bite and sent in the additional requested pages, but I am sure that will take time. I have some really great ideas brewing, but I need to move past whatever this is so I can get back to writing.

The other pursuits are fine It is testing my patience, but I need to stop and assert myself to myself every once in a while (read: day) before I lose my mind. I guess I feel like I have something to prove.

Does not help that I don’t seem to have support from everyone back home. I swear, I leave and expect my name to be kept out of pithy gossiped conversations and I have to keep hearing about it. It should not bother me that some people seem to think I am not going to “make it” – whatever that means – up here, but it does. That just fuels me some more.

The best revenge is success. And why should I have to waste emotional energy when life and karma are enough to take care of any naysayer and muckraker.

Had a visit from a good friend last week and even though we both tried to let go and have fun, we are both burdened with things that just did not allow us to just have as much fun as we could.

I am down to on job now, as Lit2Go ends this week (no more funding). And I do not think I am going to get a full load of classes next semester due to all the student complaints I received.

Apparently, failing students for plagiarizing and following college approved and mandated course policies (which pisses off students who don’t follow directions) flags me as a problem. I don’t quite understand the logic behind it although I recognize the postmodernistic corporatization of the post-secondary education system behind it all. Cogs in machines. Trying to find a new job was not something I was looking forward to doing as it is not easy to do at all. Too overqualified. Not qualified enough. Too ethnic. Not ethnic enough.

Life sucks.

But we soldier on.

I have nothing of any rhetorical importance to say as I have been out of touch with the world. Hoping to get my citizenship in the next two months. Owe the IRS a shitload of money because UT did not take out enough taxes. Debt still not paid off.

Mamma said there’d be days like this….she wasn’t just whistling Dixie.

I figure all this emotional upheaval and stress will either get so bad that my head will pop or the dam will explode and my creative juices will spew forth all over the page.

Ew…

You know what I mean.

And, no, I am not talking about the white fluffy things that could take off your head with one swipe.

I refer to polar opposites. There I go trying to be witty again…

Few people know that I enjoy watching sports of certain kinds. The assumption that I am in theatre from some reason precludes any additional interests when the fact is that I grew up a jock playing multiple sports and watched a lot of it on TV (mostly wrestling and soccer).

Aside from the Olympics, there are few sports I watch in the US. I find football boring and tennis repetitive (and all the grunts make me uneasy). However, last year I discovered a great little reality show that got me hooked onto Ultimate Fighting.

I know, the shock first of all that I watch a show called Ultimate Fighter and second that it is on Spike TV. But it reminds me of watching wrestling as a kid and screaming over ring luminaries such as Andre the Giant (how thrilled was I to see him in Princess Bride?), the British Bulldogs, old school Hulk Hogan, and the Japanese guy who always threw stuff into people’s eyes.

I literally scream at the tv: KILL HIM!! Take him down!!! Aw, come ON!. Yes….I do. And I enjoy every minute of it.

On the complete opposite end is the same fervor I felt watching Gillian Murphy and Ethan Steifel in ABT’s The Sleeping Beauty – my first official ballet performance viewing in NY. I bought some $24 standing room only tickets and stood in the back of the third level. I tried to find creative ways to rest on the bar so I could see the whole stage. I felt like a dance hall girl from Sweet Charity. Those ushers at the met are bastards too as I tried sitting down on the steps and was shooshed off. I dare not try to take one of the empty seats for fear they may flay me. Broadway ushers, while spikey at times, are so much friendlier.

Anyway, the ballet, one of the longest in ballet repertory, was great…and long. I did not get out until 11. But Murphy and Steifel are in-fucking-credible. I wanted to catch it again tonight with another cast of faves, but fell asleep. That is ok as there are plenty other shows coming up where I can see them, including one of my faves, Manon.

I am telling you, ballet and opera folk know how to rape audiences for money. Same shows, different casts so you have to come back to see the ones you like. Seats on the mezz (Grand Parterre as they call it) that run $168 (I will never complain about Bway tickets again). They have it cornered I tell ya. Of course, all the money they are obviously making and I still don’t understand why dancers are the last paid of artists and do more work.

It reminded me of seeing Swan Lake with Sara oh so many years ago at the $ C’s conference in Colorado. We were supposed to be networking and schmoozing and went to the ballet instead. It was my first dance show ever and I absolutley fell in love with the art form and that specific ballet. I don’t think anything beats it in terms of classical rep.

Aside from all this, I THINK I got a bite for my book. A small agency requested more pages so I am hoping this leads somewhere. In the meantime, I have this other idea that has been floating around in my head and screaming to get out, so I should get started on that.

Theatre stuff is going fine (go to the other site .

Feel a sense of anxiety and forboding but I am sure it will pass.

Ok, so I have everything set to do what I want it to do on the new site with the exception of two things:

1) This odd lack of capitalization after the first post (which does not happen in Firefox).

2) The opacity of my side menu which is affecting my content as well and should not be.

Still trying to fix things….until then….back wo work I go.

Forgive some of the hiccups in the new design. Trying to work out all the kinks as best as I can before I can say it is completley done. But I can’t test anything unless I upload it, so for a day or two you get some weird looking stuff.

Elisabeth Hasselbeck is an idiot and a dolt. I am watching her getting chewed up by Rosie and Joy.

Now we are on a split-screen and Rosie and Blondie are going at it and now the latter dealt a low blow with a Trump attack. Watching moments like this makes quite clear why she decided not to “renew” her contract.

I think it is quite telling when Rosie takes every opportunity to reach out and support Elisabeth when she is attacked in the media but when the same happens to Rosie, Elisabeth decides to use it as fodder. I don’t think the latter’s intentions are anything other than vicious and par for the Republican course. She has the same deluded and deranged mindset that has thrown this latest empire into a downward tailspin to extinction (I mean socially and politically). Whereas other empires managed to flourish for hundreds upon hundreds of years, this little coked out hamlet called America has managed critical mass in very little time.

I think anyone who thinks this current administrations motives are anything but duplicitous needs to be institutionalized, or at the very least admit that their support is based on economics and power. This is classic hegemonic struggle via rhetoric. We got forced into a puppet war which has opened up avenues to get into war with other countries we feel under us and backwards. The other countries may not be as technologically stacked as the US and tout freedom in all corners (yet close off all the borders to it), but they have survived for thousands of years with the ferocity of bull ants. So have no doubt that if you piss off enough of them, our asses will be handed to us on a plate.

I firmly believe in most of the anti-Bush sentiments and factual support that is out there and I do believe he will go down in history as the president that screwed up the country.

Just letting everyone know that my new headshots are in which means I can finally create my actor site which means I will move all my theatre news to the site. I want to keep this blog as a personal reflections/social analysis blog. Separate business from pleasure as it is.

Also keeps me politically safe and sound

I do have my myspace for my actor stuff right now, so all FL friends and fam…please no mention of the old name.

Enjoy…

Winter is done. Spring is here. But I can feel summer creep around the temp in my bedroom starts to rise. I think it is time to get an air conditioner.

Update on stuff for those who care (and for me to remember should I ever become an amnesiac).

The Evita callbacks went well. I did not get until 5:04 at which point I rushed to get to final dress of A New Brain. I went to H&M and brought some fatigue-y/distressed looking clothes. Mussed up the hair. Let the scruff grow out. I went in. Met Larry Fuller (REALLY nice guy). The choreographer was there again. And the Troika producers who said nothing. Clemmons was off and about walking around. Fuller gave me some direction for “High Flying Adored,” I sang, he stopped me after first chunk, praised me. Moved on to “Money Kept Rolling In,” he told me to add some riff in there, I hit my F above High C (yes, I do that sans falsetto after which my asshole falls out). He says, “Boy, you definitely have some pipes on you.”

I do not get to sing the third song, they tell me to come back later that afternoon for a movement call, they give me Magaldi’s song to learn. Oh shit…. I really don’t want to play that part. I try to politically shift myself and ask if they want to hear the third song, they tell me when I come back that afternoon.

I come back and pray to god the movement call does not involve the choreography to Buenos Aires as I remember it from auditioning in Miami years ago with Diane and Brit-Brit. It is not. We do the military number, which is much easier.

Then we stay to sing again. We work through all the girls first, all put through scales to astronomical soprano heights. Then we go for the men. I walk in. Smiles and all. I stand there for a few seconds then say, “What would you like me to sing?” They have heard me three times now, I had no clue what they wanted. Larry Fuller says, “Sing something you like. Anything that shows off your range. We already know you can sing.” So why am I there, I think to myself.

So I do something different, I sing “Marry Me a Little.” A little low-key, less in the rafters, more grounded. Praise. They ask about the Magaldi song and Fuller says he can’t have me do it if I don’t know it. They mention that I was given the song. He did not remember. I tell him I can sight read it. He wants me to perform it. I say, I can do it. I remember the song enough to have no problem sight reading the wonky parts. But he has me do the last 8 measures. I do it to ultimate cheesi-ness. He asks me to do it again and do an alternate B-flat note at the end. My testicles start to shrink. Hitting an F above High C is much easier than a B-flat because of where I place the sound. Someone must have been on my side because it sailed out with no problems and I sustained it for a while before finishing off. He says, “Great. That’s it!”

And I think….shit…I just screwed myself out of Che.

They tell me I will be called back again and to wait for a call. Clemmons actually thanks me by name and says goodbye. I leave.

Yesterday I had two submission auditions with mixed results. The morning was for a concert of Carousel in CT for the role of Jigger. I went in to sing for an unamused woman sitting behind a computer, the casting agent, and some young girl I have seen at auditions. “That was great! Just great! Can you sing something else.” I do. “That was wonderful. Thank you.” And out I go. Not getting that one. I guess I did not pick angry and mean enough songs. At least I got a good reaction from the CD so he might remember me for future shows.

Later that afternoon I go in for, oh lord, Jihad: The Explosive New Musical! I could not resist. Plus, it is going to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival which I would love to be a part of. I go in and sing. The director says, “That was incredible. Just excellent. Thank you!” And out I go.

Not even Arab-looking enough for that show.

I know I am being incredibly hard on myself, but I don’t consider it a good audition unless I get a callback. I may sing well, and I may get positive feedback (and God knows those people do not do lip service), but if I am not convincing them I could do a or the part then my audition was a bust.

To add to the day I came home and totally forgot I was seeing Curtains with Yolanda until she called at 7:45. I felt like a fucking moron. But I managed to get from 147th to 43rd by 8:15. The show is INCREDIBLE. And SOOOO much fun. If anyone flies up here soon, GO SEE IT!

The last bit of news, and I am going to be flayed for this, should be great news and I should be thrilled, but for some reason I am not and I don’t know why. I got a call from Dave Clemmons and I booked the tour…..as Magaldi. We would start rehearsals mid-August and leave September for a year. I am supposed to get a call from the producers with more details.

Part of me feels like I should wait for the JCS auditions to see if I can book Judas for that tour. Turning down the tour would be an act of lunacy as one of my three major goals for moving up here was to book a tour in six months. That one is done.

I know I should be slapped.

Today I am resting and doing work for Lit2Go.

God I Hope I Get It….Indeed

Ok, so…yeah…

So CROSS EVERYTHING. This is something I have REALLY wanted (doing a professional production of Evita) and while I am trying not to get TOO excited about it, I would kill for it.