Thursday, July 31, 2008

Friday, August 1st, 2008

Tomorrow is a big day.

My niece is due to arrive tomorrow. Tomorrow is "scheduled", as it were, to be her birth day.

My grandma, diagnosed a week ago with cancer, is scheduled to go into surgery tomorrow as well.

My job will end tomorrow, leaving me unemployed with currently no prospects of another job in sight - the first time in many years.

It goes without saying, I think, that my grandma concerns me the most right now.

Tomorrow is a big day.

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

I Feel The Earth Move...

On Tuesday, just before noon, I experienced something that I had been wanting to experience since I first set foot in southern California. Not a celebrity encounter, not face lift.

I experienced an earthquake. My very first one. Either that or I fell madly in love. But I'm pretty sure it was an earthquake.

I seriously used to wonder if it would ever happen, if perhaps the last one had happened without me and now the ground beneath Los Angeles would be forever motionless. People would sit next to me on benches and I'd think "Earthquake!" only to be disappointed. But then it happened. A 5.4.

To be sure, the name says it all. The earth quakes. It's really nothing more than that. But it is a completely eerie feeling to have the terra firma become terra squishy on its own.

I'm proud to say I did not freak out. I merely looked around, confused, wondering how all 50 of the people I was around were going to fit under the 7 or so door frames. No one else seemed to move. I always thought southern californians prepared for these things, the way I used to have tornado drills in grade school. I was at the piano at the time, and I thought for a brief instance I might crawl under there. It seemed safe enough. After about 6 or 7 seconds the earthquake stopped and we all moved outside, so I didn't have time to find out.

The thing that freaked me out the most, was that, when I got outside, I tried to text my loved ones to let them know I was okay - and to check on them. Of course, so was everyone within a 70 mile radius. And I suddenly remembered "Live Free or Die Hard" - anyone see that? - I felt like we were warned that this would happen - the minute we actually needed our technology in a life or death situation was the one minute it would fail us completely. I couldn't make a call or text anyone for about an hour or so after the quake.

And that's when I started to freak. What if it had been serious? What if I was indeed stuck beneath my piano? What if, after being trapped under the piano for over an hour before I could reach somebody, I developed a severe phobia of pianos and suddenly brought to an end my very livlihood!?

It's moments like these I fear my life doesn't really exist. It exsists only in microwaves or in a virtual world - like this blog for example - and when that crashes (and it will) I will remain a mere shadow of a person. And where will Bruce Willis be to save me? Yippie-kay-ay.

Sunday, July 27, 2008

Leavin' it to the Pros

To continue the lament of Broadway put forth by my friend Tony, I offer this:

Joining the ranks of broadway superstars such as Max Crumm, Laura Osnes of Grease (were they the ones that you wanted?), Bailey Hanks of Legally Blonde, and who could forget Clay Aiken of Spamalot (me, for one) is that old stage veteran Katie Holmes.

Katie will be playing Ann Deever in the revival of Arthur Miller's 1947 Tony-Award winning drama All My Sons, alongside John Lithgow (practically a newbie next to Holmes). Look out, John!

The expertise she garnered in her last theatre role (playing Lola in her All-Girls Catholic High School production of Dang Yankees) will doubtless sparkle among the ranks of Mario Lopez of A Chorus Line and Fantasia Barrino of The Color Purple. It is rumored that her performance as Lola is where she earned the nickname Katie "Barrymore" Holmes. Named, of course, after Drew.

Lois Wheeler originally played Ann in the 1947 production with only a mere 3 broadway shows under her belt. Pssh. Get on it, Lois!

Well, Katie, we wish you the best. I'm sure Tom'll be able to take care of Suri on his own for a few what...months? weeks? days? (who's up for betting?)

I just hope it goes better for you than it did for that other stage veteran Claire Danes of the hit revival of Pygmalion.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Quarterback Again

Brett Favre, what the hell is going on?

I feel like we're getting some mixed signals.
Is it us? Are we the problem? Do you not like Green Bay? I'd get that. There's not much going on up there.
But last year you wanted to leave. Then you didn't.
Then you did.
And now you're back. Only it's awkward.
Because when you went away, we all said really nice things about you, and moved on with our lives. But you want back in, except not with Green Bay.

So it is us.

We don't want to let you go. Don't you get it? Number 4 - we want it retired. We want your legacy to live entirely with us. We don't want you to go to the Vikings, or the Jets, or the Buccaneers and do something really big and important over there, we want you here. Except we don't. Cuz you retired.

John Clayton as ESPN.com said it best:
"In 2007, he's the king of Wisconsin again, coming off one of his best seasons. Now, he's like that unpopular relative who always threatened to show up at your house for the summer and then plops himself on the couch."

From one Brett to another...stay home and watch the game.

Back from the Dead

Whoa!! What happened? Where am I? er...where was I?

No, I did not die. Instead, I turned 24.

Let me tell you something, which will annoy the heck out of people who are older than me...
23 was rough.
Not the year I spent being 23. That was fine. Lots of great things. In fact, 24 is already off to bad a start compared to 23.
For some reason, I could NOT remember the number 23. People would ask how old I was and I would go blank. And not on purpose! I wondered if it was because it was an odd number and somehow odd numbers are harder to remember than even ones...I'm sure I made that up.

But anyway, now that I'm 24, I can easily recall many things.
Like, for example, the fact that I once had a blog called The Actor/Composer's Notebook.

And so, memory refreshed, I've decided to get back into some swing of things. Especially since there's soo much to write about. And also, I've decided to make 24 a year for my writing. Hopefully the 'actor' part of me won't go belly up as I focus my concentration slightly elsewhere.

We'll see. Hope you (whomever you are..) will stick around for the ride.