More bullet points!

I have been busy. I know I say that all the time, but this time I mean it. So because I went to bed at 2:30 and woke up at 7:00, you get the bullet point list. Bullet Point List of Doom!

I have:

• started a dance residency with Kenwood School. Yay! Fun!


• been understudying "The Left Hand Singing" at Park Square to go in for Christiana May 2nd through the 4th; you should come see it


• started writing my blog posts on my hard drive so I don't have to worry about losing them


• been throwing the dog's schedule all out of whack because my schedule is all out of whack


• been eating fat and sugar almost exclusively


• NOT been going to the gym


• been getting to use my newfound Japanese skills, specifically shooting a commercial for Cub Foods


• woken up before 7:00 am nearly every morning for the last week and a half; I get to sleep in on...Tuesday. I think.


• started working on another screenplay


• needed desperately to clean my room


• looked at my room and thought, "I'm not cleaning this now"


• wanted to run away to Duluth for a weekend


• realized that I love writing more than most things I'm doing these days


• randomly text messaged some folks; sorry! I was bored


• had no idea what bullet point to use to end this magnificent work of art, this blog post, and left off with some lame sentence that desperately tries to be sort of funny but really isn't

Edit: The rest of my blog is NOT gone.

I'm understudying in about a week and a few days. That means that I'm not a part of the regular rehearsal process, but I come in somewhere around tech week, watch the show, learn the role that I'm understudying, and do it exactly like the regular person does it. Most of the time when one understudies, there's no guarantee of actually ever doing the work. This time, I'm guaranteed to go on. This is cool and scary at the same time. It means that, yes, I really have to know the part well, and, yes, people will see me perform it. Yay! and Booo!

So tonight I was going to head down to the theater and watch the first preview. Technically I don't start until next Tuesday, but I figure going in just a tad bit early will serve me well and in no way hurt me. So I was downtown St. Paul and I saw a large number of people milling about. "Shoot," I thought. "There's a show at the Fitzgerald." And, as I discovered later, The History Theatre, AND possibly the Ordway. Four venues that draw large crowds having shows all at the same time makes for a sticky parking situation. And I was running waaaay late because I stayed at the gym much longer than I intended and I couldn't find a parking spot and so I just said, "Forget it. I'm going home and studying my lines." So I did. I'll see the show tomorrow, and Sunday, and Tuesday through Sunday next week, so it's all good. I've learned shows in a week before. It's crazy, but it's possible.

Edited to add: Breaking news! Blogger rules! All I had to do was republish the entire blog (which wasn't happening when I published individual entries)! Hooray (yet again) for Blogger for being idiot proof!

So, remember when I thought I'd deleted my entire blog? I was right in that I didn't delete my entire blog, just 2006 backward. So if you're clicking around through the links over there on the sidebar, sorry. Those posts are gone. And there's a strange hurt somewhere in my chest now. I think it has something to do with four years of some crap and some really really great posts just gone into the ether.

*sigh*

Well, I guess it's good to clean house every now and again.

Voltage 2007

Voltage 2007
Originally uploaded by Mordac.

This was one of my favorite looks from the fashion show I attended last Wednesday. Awesome, possum.

Tax Time Nostalgia

I just finished my taxes. And I'm in a good mood. This hasn't happened in several years, because for the past several years I've had to pay the federal and state governments a goodly chunk of my meager and hard-earned change. However, I didn't work enough last year and spent just enough money on producing a show that only earned half of my investment back (not to mention the other cast members) that I get a decent refund this year. Too bad I couldn't have just kept my money in the first place, but whaddaya gonna do?

I just finished my taxes because I am a procrastinator. And because I am a procrastinator all of my receipts were in various envelopes stuffed into various crevices in my black plastic filing box. So I had to go through them and sort and calculate. And oddly enough, that was fun. And painful. And then fun again. Sorting my receipts was a trip through 2006 colored by a financial lens. I saw just how much money I spent. I saw the movies that I went to and remembered who I went to them with and how we don't talk anymore. I saw the most extravagant purchase I made last year and relieved the guilty pleasure at blowing so. much. money. I saw the crazy road trip up to St. Cloud and then down to the airport to leave for New York, said road trip taking place in a matter of two and a half hours. I was flyin' down the road, music bumpin'. I saw New York City and the Cloisters Cafe and the actual Cloisters and taking pictures of lovely Annie with lovely flowers in the medieval garden. I saw my time in Alexandria and L'Homme Dieu and the Target where I bought my cherished blue hoodie. I saw Lanesboro, MN and the sweet bed & breakfast we stayed in and the night we watched The Beast from Yucca Flats and peed our pants laughing at Tor Johnson. I saw the Fringe. Oh, the FRINGE! I saw presents that were a hit and presents that totally fell flat and I wished I could read that person's mind and give them something that didn't suck so much. I saw Christmas presents I have yet to give.

Now 2007 is well on its way and I'm well on my way to having to hunt for my receipts again. I'm sure I'll yell at myself for not keeping better track of my expenses, just as I did this year, but as soon as I sit down and start remembering, I'm sure I won't mind.

It's snowing.

It's snowing in April. I'm disappointed, but not surprised. Those of us who have lived here the majority of our lives know that this, this snow, is not out of the realm of possibility. We grimace and bear it, as usual.

I keep telling people that when I was in school in NC, that at this time of year the Gardens would be cranked up to Full Springtime Max! and all the flowers would be out and showing off, trying to outdo the flowers next to them, and the wisteria climbing on the gazebo was a purple haze (not Purple Haze capitals, silly), and everything smelled great. The ground was still a little wet, but it always was, and a thick blanket was the solution to that. Finals came at just the right time of year in NC, because nothing was more conducive to nappi- I mean, studying, than a garden in full bloom. I think the Gardens are the only part of Duke I really miss.

The View Over My Left Shoulder

The View Over My Left Shoulder
Originally uploaded by AdiaMichelle.

I'm waiting for a rehearsal in the cafe at the new Guthrie Theater. I wish I was taking a nap instead.

This post is not about acting.

So, the thing I was going to write about the gym? I'll give you the truncated version.

I was on the stationary bike, workin' up a sweat. All through my workout (and this was about 20 minutes into it) I felt some obstruction in my nose every time I exhaled. I hate that: when you have loose-ish boogers and you're in public or your hands are busy so you can't do anything about it right away. So I have some loose-ish boogers and I'm exhaling through my nose to keep my breathing calm, hoping that said boogers don't fly out of my nose while I'm still working out and before I have a chance to run into a bathroom stall. You might ask, "Well why didn't you just breathe through your mouth to keep from feeling that icky feeling?" And I might answer, "Because in some sick way, I kind of like it. I hate it, but I kind of like seeing how much I can test the boogies before they do come out. I want to know how far I can go." I might answer something like that. So with about five minutes to go, I exhale and - you guessed it - a large, dry, green boogie comes flying out of my nose, ricochets off my knee and lands on the floor near the bike.

My eyes got big, but only momentarily. I didn't want to give away what had just happened. No "tells". I thought, "I hope no one in that looooong line of women standing and staring at nothing or possibly me working out while they wait for their aerobics or step or body groove or whatever it is class to start saw that boogie fly out of my nose and me making no effort to pick it up." Because I wasn't going to pick it up. There was no way I was going to stop riding with only four minutes left to get down on my hands and knees and look for a lone nose emerald in the berber carpet that was probably harboring all manner of germs and nasties. There was no way that was going to happen.

So anyone who saw that? Sorry. Hope I didn't gross you out too much.

Hrm.

I was going to write this awesome blog about being at the gym, and it was going to be a full-length, beginning middle end type post that might actually be interesting to read, but I just finished cutting my hair and I'm a little traumatized. So no gym blog.

My sister brought her flat iron home when she came to visit, and on Monday I took it and straightened my hair. I discovered that, despite my consistent trimmings, there was still a good inch that was in need of the chop chop chopping of scissors. So, before I let it curl up again I thought it might be a good idea to cut it.

And wow. My hair is short. I know it will grow back, but wow. I didn't buzz cut it or anything, and it's not above my ears - well, some of it isn't - but it's shorter than it's been in a while and the look on my mother's face was not one of "Oh! You cut your hair!" delight but more "Holy crap what did you do?!" So I'm wondering what it's going to look like when it's no longer straightened.

I do remember the year that I first did the Twin Cities Unified Auditions I got a haircut that morning and was worried that it would be too short, but I ended up liking it a lot. So I'm imagining it will be something like that. I hope. I pray. I fervently hope and pray.


And no, there will be no pictures posted here. So don't ask.

rain makes me lazy

My residency at Homecroft Elementary ended on Friday afternoon. I gave the students "Thank You" cards and they gave me irises. I thought they were fake because they're so perfect.

this is aisha. she has hijacked the computer and she says hi. GO DUKE!

Can you believe she's older than I am?

Anyway. Flowers.