The corporate world is all about kissing the ass of the people higher up on the ladder than you. Or if not kissing their asses, at least trying to be accommodating. This is how one gets ahead in the company, gets more money, and ultimately breeds more people with the ass-kissing instinct that is what makes the corporate world so great.

Granted, I don’t work for a major corporation. I work for a University. But it is essentially the same principle – the little people do the real work so the big wigs can make the decisions. I am a “little person” at this University. Even within my own office. When people ask me what I do, I tell them I am the office peon. However, even though I am the office peon, there are only about four offices higher on the hierarchical ladder at this University than my own. So yes, I am a peon, but I am a peon with clout.

When someone from one of the offices higher up than mine calls, we bend over backwards to get them what they need right now, if not ten minutes ago. When someone from an office lower than mine calls, I do my absolute best to accommodate, but there are some things I just can’t change, you know? Now, this should work the other way, too. When I call someone in a higher up office, they are usually courteous and do what they can for me, but I do sometimes have to start from scratch and reschedule the meeting with 37 participants that took me two weeks to put together to accommodate the person in the higher office. And when I call someone in a lower office and say “I need this time for this meeting with these 37 participants,” they should reschedule their internal one-on-one meeting that is taking place at the same time to accommodate me/their boss’ boss.

I know, using the words “higher” and “lower” is horrible. If it were up to me, we’d all be on the same plain. And in a lot of ways we are. But my boss has greater power to screw up my life if I blow it than your boss has to screw up yours, so help me out, okay? It’s all about logic and hierarchies and ultimately trying to get ahead. If you help me out, it will be beneficial to both of us. If you don’t, you can continue to be lazy, but I could get fired and then a real bitch could come in and take my job and where would you be then?

Okay, thanks. I just needed to rant a bit. It’s been a long day.

So I saw Ice Age last night. Um. Hmmm. Tee hee.

First of all, the movie review.

This has got to be one of the strangest movies I have ever seen. Yes, it had that lovely blend of potty humor for the kids and the occasional adult-flavored comment with just a splash of subtle sight gags that had me laughing out loud several times. Sometimes when it was completely inappropriate to be laughing out loud. Like at the big dramatic moment when the sloth wipes his nose and then wipes it on the tiger. It’s subtle. It’s funny. I laughed. But I knew I shouldn’t be laughing so it came out as one of those guttural laugh-through-the-nose things. In other words, had there been part of my beverage in my mouth at the time, it would have come out my nose.

I have never seen a sloth that looked like that. Nor a mammoth with a Mohawk. It was just odd. I can’t stress this enough – it was odd. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any odder, they used Rusted Root over the montage. I was squeaking in the theater and I’m sure the seven-year old boy sitting across the aisle from me couldn’t understand why.

I have to share this one exchange with you because I was still laughing about it on the way home. The main characters are trying to get their melon back from a flock of dodo birds. The lead bird is standing on the melon and says, “This is our private stockpile for when the ice age forces us underground for billions of years!” to which the mammoth replies, “So you got three melons?” I just about died.

But I liked it. I thoroughly enjoyed it. No, it was not a new and innovative story. Yes, the animation looked goofy at times. But the running gag of the squirrel with the acorn…brilliant. I would highly recommend that people see this film.

Okay, now my beef with animated films in general.

If a film is going to be CGI, have the whole thing be CGI. Don’t use computers to do the “hard stuff” like backgrounds or water or explosions and hand draw the rest of the film. Why not? People can tell! It is very obvious what is computer animated and what is not and it breaks up the aesthetic flow of a film to use both. This is the same reason I hated the long shots of the boat in Titanic -- throwing in CGI pulls the viewer out of the story. I understand that it is faster and more realistic, but if you’re shooting for faster, more realistic animation, why hand draw anything? Or, stylize the CGI to look hand drawn if that is the look you are going for. An animated film, just like a live action film, should have some continuity of medium for the sake of the viewer. In my opinion.

And here’s my other thing about CGI – the only film I have seen do CGI adult humans that did not make them look like mutants was Final Fantasy. Yes, they were a bit stiff, but they looked more like real people than any other CGI film I have seen. Now, I have seen animated shorts and stuff with people in them who don’t look quite so mutated, but those were more stylized people (Gerald’s Game, for example). The baby in Ice Age was cute, but all of the adults looked so bizarre. And the fact that all of the animals spoke English while the humans just grunted? But the humans had actual clothes and weapons and social structures…cute for the kids, but kind of a cop out on the part of the animators I think. The little girl in Monsters, Inc. was cute, too, and they managed to avoid showing adults, I think. Maybe this is just me being extremely nit-picky, but if you are going to develop software that can individually animate each and every hair on a person’s head, shouldn’t you perhaps put some time into developing characters that look like humans beyond just the hair on their heads? Or avoid putting humans in your film?

This is why I’m not an animator.

But go see Ice Age. It’s a stitch.

How many Girl Scout cookies can one girl eat before she gets sick?

I took my cat to the vet yesterday. His eye was red and watery and he kept squinting it, so I thought I should take him in. And in true doctor-going fashion, he performed a miraculous recovery between the time that I made the appointment and when I put him in the car to take him to the vet. Not a total recovery as I still have to put goop in his eye for the next week and a half to make sure there is no permanent damage or anything, but a pretty good one nonetheless. I thought it was only humans who healed the instant a doctor’s appointment was made. I guess I was wrong.

But I also talked to my vet about this hacking, barking, dry-heaving kind of thing Owen had been doing that morning and the previous night. I really felt for him, but I’ve never seen a cat dry-heave before so I had no idea what to do. She asked me all about it and said that it could be a possible early indicator that my cat is asthmatic. I had problems not laughing when she said my cat might have asthma. I got this image of Owen taking hits off a teeny inhaler and presenting me with a “note from the doctor” that would excuse him from playing too much.

We’re not sure yet, though, if he does have asthma or not. I have to see if he keeps trying to cough up nothing. I just thought it was funny.

I have other friends who are parents. That’s not the issue. Those friends either were parents already when I met them or had kids during the course of our friendship and I was witness to the pregnancy and name choosing and all that stuff. I had been previously warned. Last I heard from this guy, he had a girlfriend. I was so proud of him for having a girlfriend because I never would have thought him bold enough to ask a girl out or accept if a girl asked him out. In college, half of us thought he was gay. And since I haven’t actually physically seen him since college, to all of a sudden get e-mailed baby pictures? Wow. Its kind of a lot to swallow.

I know it is horrible of me, but I hadn’t really planned on seeing him while I was out there. If we ran into each other, cool. If we didn’t, I would not have been crushed. But now I really want to see him and meet his girlfriend/wife (I have no idea if they are married or not) and the baby. Now I would go out of my way to see him. I know, I’m horrible.

Its going to take me a while to get used to the thought of him being a dad. I’m sure he is a wonderful father, its still just weird. I dunno. I’ll shut up now.

A friend of mine from college is a dad. I e-mailed him to say I was going to be in New York next month and he e-mailed me back pictures of his baby. Such a sweet face! But man is that weird. My friend and colleague and peer is a dad.

I had more to say today, but it will probably have to wait until later.

Yes, the part of the title of my blog that would come after the colon is “Random Musings of a Very Bored Girl at Work.” So I’m going to post some stuff I was writing in my journal on Saturday afternoon as I wandered around downtown Chicago. “Why,” you may ask, “are you posting stuff on your blog about being bored at work that you wrote on a weekend when you were not at work?” Because I’m at work now and bored out of my skull!

That being said, on with the journaling from the weekend.

Downtown Chicago on a Saturday afternoon is a strange beast. You can see where all of the week’s activity was supposed to take place, but there is nobody around. Except for Michigan Avenue and a couple of random fast food places, everything is closed up and dark. These two poor guys looking for the Sears Tower wandered off the beaten path and go lost. I should know the address of the Sears Tower, but I don’t. And when you’re right in the heart of everything, you can’t even see it if you look up. And its funny because as I’m sitting there feeling like a "true city dweller" wandering around downtown by myself, I hit the areas where no one treads at five o’clock on a Saturday. Things will bustle again in a couple of hours as the theatergoers come out for a night of entertainment but for right now, the city is in hibernation. I love my city. I truly do. I feel that the longer I stay here and the more I see, the harder it will be for me to ever leave. I took my mini Blues Brothers tour and was amazed by the Picasso. He was fascinating. I remember being completely and totally awestruck by Guernica when I saw it up close and personal. How one man could think so big yet pay attention to the tiniest detail astounds me. I keep looking around for people I recognize and I keep not seeing them. I keep looking for fucknut. Tony wouldn’t come downtown, though. Its not his speed. I feel a kind of tension in the wind, though, like its building up to something. To me running into him somewhere maybe. Of course, it could just be the cold front coming in. I like to be more romantic, though. Same way I’m going to meet Moby and he’s going to give two shits, you know. I’ll actually be amazed if I meet him and he gives one shit. I’d be happy with one shit. I wonder if this constitutes loitering. Of course, if I’m loitering, so are those three cops over there. I’m so tempted to go talk to that guy. It would be funny if he came over here and talked to me. This is what the downtown area is lacking – coffee shops to just hang out in. Like the Pick Me Up. I’m loving these packs of lost people.

Man, I’m really incoherent in my journal, aren’t I? No paragraphs, totally stream of consciousness. And of course, the leaps in topic only make sense to me. Ooo! And I forgot to mention the fact that there was this group of guys just skateboarding around the city. They would make pseudo ramps or just go cruising down the middle of the street in downtown Chicago. It was kind of cool, but made the city feel even more deserted in a The Stand kind of way.

Anyway, a little later on, I wrote this entry and then drew a picture of a woman crying with heart-shaped pupils.

As much as it is empowering to walk around the city and do stuff by myself, its kind of lonely. My only real fear is that it will be the same in New York. Yeah, it will be cool to explore, but solo exploration is never as much fun as partnered exploration. Hopefully I can find some spot out there that is a bit more conducive to the solo traveler. I would somehow expect so. Don’t want to get my hopes up too high, though. The single life is empowering, but lonely. At this point, I kind of just want to go home. I should have gone home after recording. That was fun. I can’t wait for that film to be done. I know I’m good. I just need other people to know it, too. That poor guy looks so bored. I don’t know if that is a relative or his date or what, but he does not want to be here. Of course, the same could be said about me. I really need to stop dreaming about meeting Moby. Yes, he is a distant figure and safe for me to have a crush on because he can’t break my heart, but if I get my hopes up too high and then don’t meet him, I could still be crushed. I’m not going to meet Moby and Tony is not coming back to Chicago. There. I said it. Say it, rinse, repeat. I wonder if that guy is getting dumped or lectured. Either way, he’s not having fun. How strange would I be if I pulled out a couple of colored pencils? Why am I worried about it? I wonder if I am the kind of person who would catch Moby’s attention in a crowded room. I’m not quite Natalie Portman. Though I am a bit older. Which could work to my advantage.

I am such a sad little person. Remind me not to read old journal entries anymore. Though I do like the pictures I’ve been drawing lately. Maybe I don’t suck at drawing as badly as I did. Yay me!

I saw this guy on the train on my way home last night who I had seen on that very same train the last time my car died. Taking the train in Chicago is always fun because it is a great opportunity to people watch. Except for the fact that someone else is usually watching you. Hmmm…note to self: learn how to become invisible before riding the train again.

But yeah, I saw this guy on the train again and I only remember him because he looks like he could be John Lennon’s son. I know its not Sean Lennon (what the hell would he be doing in Chicago?), but this guy looks like he could be Lennon’s son – tall, handsome, dark hair, and that look like one of his parents was Asian. This guy is very good looking. And he wears a vintage army coat, too. One of the long, olive green ones. And comfy shoes. You can tell a lot about a person by their shoes. Men who wear Converse sneakers (Chucks?) do something for me. I have no idea what it is, but it makes the guy wearing them seem easy-going or laid-back – two great qualities in a guy.

The first time I saw this guy on the train, I was kind of forced to notice him because we were both standing facing each other near the doors of a very crowded train car. We did that whole “try not to make eye contact” thing until he got off at the Grand stop on the red line. He kind of gave me an idea for a story wherein this girl (I need to concentrate on female lead characters) keeps bumping into famous people who were thought long dead but who really aren’t for some reason or another. They would have to be really cool famous people – people like John Lennon – who were not only fantastically creative and talented, but well-balanced spiritually and socially conscious and peaceful and stuff. And they keep “accidentally” bumping into this girl because she will be one of them someday or something. I dunno. Its not fleshed out yet and who knows if it ever will be. Somebody reading my blog will probably steal the idea and I’ll never get royalties for it. Drat. Anyway, so yeah, this guy stuck in my head for a little while. I still kind of wish I had said something to him. But what do you say to a stranger on a train who is trying not to look at you?

Yesterday was kind of cool, though, because I can almost guarantee that he didn’t recognize me. Last time he saw me, I was a redhead. So I almost felt justified in watching him and studying his clothes and face and stuff. It was almost like being invisible, hiding behind my new hair. I still didn’t say anything to him, though. I still kind of wish I had. But now that I know what train he takes home…

I promise you, I’m not really a stalker.

I have little to no faith left in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

First of all, let me say that I am thrilled that a lot of history took place at this year’s Academy Awards. I can’t even imagine what Halle Berry was feeling, being not only the first African American actress to win a Best Actress award, but to be part of the pair of African American actors that took home the top acting awards. I don’t think anyone else can know what that was like. Except maybe Sydney Poitier, who may be 75 years old but is still hot. And so talented. His speech was lovely. But anyway, it was amazing to have that much history going on in once ceremony and I’m glad I got to witness it.

Here’s where my loss of faith comes in:

Memento was nominated for only two awards and won neither of them. Amilie was nominated for four or five awards and won none of them. Final Fantasy, for which they wrote new software programs, was not even nominated for Best Animated Feature, a category with only three nominees when most categories have five. Roger Ebert was down on the red carpet. Okay, that last one is kind of nit-picky of me, but the other ones are valid points. There has never been another film like Memento in the history of film. Final Fantasy is as technologically advanced as film gets these days. Amilie was brilliant, well thought out, well directed, well acted, and a slightly off-kilter love story, but was passed up for things deeper and more meaningful. Why are these achievements being missed? Weren’t the Oscars introduced to salute outstanding achievement in film?

I’m not saying that the films that won things weren’t well done. They were. I think Lord of the Rings was technically brilliant. I enjoyed A Beautiful Mind. But who hasn’t seen stories like A Beautiful Mind before? Guy with problem meets girl he thinks will save him and their love is the answer to all of their problems. Okay, so the stakes were raised. I still wouldn’t call it groundbreaking. Maybe its just me, but I would call Memento and Final Fantasy groundbreaking. I'm glad Moulin Rouge got the recognition it did, but to get so many technical and acting nominations and not a directing nomination? Explain this to me...

I dunno. I’ll probably still cry if I ever win one, just because it is the actualization of a dream that so many actors have had for so long. But I no longer think that putting the phrase “Academy Award winning” in front of an actor’s name or film title automatically means it is better. Again, maybe that’s just me.

I saw part of The Blues Brothers yesterday. The end part. The good part. Damn, is that a good film. I want to go to Lorne Michaels (if he is still the Saturday Night Live guy) and say, “You want to know why this is such a good movie and why so many of the rest of your SNL spin-offs have sucked ass? Because this is a film about two real guys with one simple problem. They do whatever it takes to solve that one simple problem and they remain real as they are doing it. These characters are not pure stereotypes. They may have started out that way on SNL, but by the time they hit the big screen, they were fleshed out characters – not stupid stereotypes that have 30 seconds of normality in the third act of the film. And the problem they faced was something that mattered to them – they were on a mission from God. It was a problem that was easily fixed – raise $5000. Simple. To the point. Concrete. The hilarity stemmed from two real characters trying to solve a real problem, not from a couple of guys walking around like idiots doing things even idiots wouldn’t do.”

Recipe for a good film: Take one good script, add two good actors, a few good sets, and a good editor. That’s all it takes really. So, Mr. Michaels, the next time you are thinking about turning the next fad character from SNL into a feature length film, ask yourself the following questions: Do I have a good script? Is the plot simple? Does the movie rely entirely on slapstick comedy and unfunny sight gags? Are the main characters real people for the entire film, not just for 30 seconds near the end? If your answers were yes, yes, no, and yes, respectively, green light the project. If they were any other combination of yeses and nos, burn the script and try again.

I’m eating edamame for breakfast. Soy beans. Straight out of the pod. I’m kind of making a mess with the pods themselves since they are non-edible, but the beans are actually kinda good. I feel like such a hippie eating them, though. Like, “Hi, aren’t I being cool and fresh and trendy and healthy by eating my protein-filled soy beans for breakfast? Except, we can’t call them ‘soy beans’ because that’s not new wave sounding enough. We have to call them ‘edamame’ so people know we’re cool.” Sigh. Is it possible that I could become a hip, trendy person? Gasp! God forbid!

At least I’m not wearing my ever-so-trendy Anne Klein pants while eating my edamame. That would be too much.

I’ve kind of been thinking about stuff like that lately, though. I’m turning 25 in a couple of months. This is not something I like to tell people. I had horrible birthdays growing up and kind of decided in my teens to not celebrate them anymore. Plus, the vast majority of my friends are older than me – anywhere from one to 20 years older than me. Hell, my mom is one of my best friends and she’s 30 years older than I am. I just get along better with people who are chronologically older. I have been told many times that I am an old soul. I feel it, too. And when my friends find out that I am, in fact, significantly younger than they are, they always heave this sigh of, "Damn. I thought she was my age. Oh well." So I figured I would start celebrating my birthdays again when I am turning as old as I feel. So sometime in my mid-80s.

But I’m turning 25 this year. I feel like I should celebrate this for some reason. It feels like a milestone. A quarter of a century. Had you talked to me a couple of years ago, I never would have thought I would make it to 25. Hell, I didn’t think I’d make it to 24, but I was filming on my birthday last year so any celebratory plans were kinda shoved aside.

And I feel like I should make changes or something, to go along with this milestone. I have a friend who just turned 26 and quit smoking. He’s doing really well with it so far and I am proud of him for it. Here’s hoping it lasts. But I almost want to view my 25th year as an experimental one. Perhaps a year of being healthy and good. Of not drinking, of not smoking anything (not even the occasional clove when I’m piss drunk), of not taking any drugs (possibly even including prescription ones – I haven’t’ decided on this yet), and of experimenting with vegetarianism. I know, that last one has you, my three faithful readers, gasping in horror. Could the woman who wants a guy who will just go out and have a burger and a beer with her be contemplating a burgerless life? Yeah, I could be contemplating it.

I am a firm believer in “don’t knock it ‘til you try it.” I grew up in a very sheltered suburb, taught to not do things because they were bad and the people who did them were bad. But I went away to college and met a lot of people who did those “bad” things and realized that no, they are not bad people. In a lot of ways, I found them to be better people than the ones who originally taught me right from wrong. (And in this case, by “better” I mean “more tolerant and open minded.”) So since then, whenever I have the opportunity to try something I have not tried before, as long as it is not extremely harmful to myself or anyone else, I take that opportunity. It is this attitude that allowed me to go to Australia by myself and get hit in the face with a pie and got me several of the film and theater roles that are on my resume. I am always up for trying something I have never tried before because I won’t know if I like it or not until I try it. I never thought I would have liked veggie burgers until I tried one. I never thought I would have liked living in the city until I did it. I never thought I would go to a bar or a movie by myself until I did it. These are all things that I now almost prefer. And yeah, I’ve tried a few things that I didn’t necessarily like and probably won’t do again, but hey, at least I can say from experience that I don’t like those things – I’m not avoiding them because someone else told me to. This makes it really easy to win arguments. “Hey, we’re good friends, we’re both horny, let’s have a meaningless night of sex and go back to being friends in the morning.” “Um, no thanks. Tried that before and didn’t really dig it.” “Oh. Okay.” See how simple that was?

So the vegetarian thing. I’ve been reading Moby’s boards too much. I’ll admit it. I’m not proud of it, but I’ve been doing it. If he ever does meet me, he’ll probably run in fear thinking I’m a stalker or something. Which I am not. But I could see how one would think I was. I’m too lazy to actually stalk someone. Moby is just interesting to me. But anyway, I’ve been reading his boards and it seems like every other person on there is vegetarian or vegan. They keep spouting stuff about how much better the world would be if everyone was vegetarian and how great veggie food is and how great they feel for eating that way and on and on and on. Enough so that I have started thinking about it. I don’t eat that much meat anyway. I eat chicken and tuna a couple times a week and a burger about once every other month. What would it be like if I gave that up for a year? If I got my protein from other sources? How would that effect my weight? My moods? My energy level? My food bill?

So I would be a vegetarian for a year as more of an experiment than anything else. See what it is like to go to a restaurant and not be able to eat half of the things on the menu. See how not eating meat effects me physically and mentally. I like to push myself to do things just to see if I can and I always enjoyed scientific experiments. What if I pushed myself to be a guinea pig in a sort of scientific experiment just to see if I could? And worst case scenario, if something happens and I’m not getting enough protein or whatever, I have no moral qualms with going back to being omnivorous.

I think this deserves a little more thought. And some research into what I could and couldn’t eat and how to make sure my body would still be getting everything it needed. Good thing my birthday is a couple of months away.

I was talking about New York with some friends of mine this weekend. Friends from New York. It started with a group of us trying to get this one girl to move to Chicago ‘cuz we like her. She’s good people. And then a group of us girls started talking about what happened on September 11 since the whole six-month anniversary thing just passed and whatnot. And one of the coolest things that my friend said has changed about New York is that the people there see each other more than they used to. And I’m not talking about “they see each other” as in “they go out three times a week instead of once;” I’m talking as in “they notice each other.” “They are aware of the existence of one another.” See, in Chicago, I feel like we are aware of each other most of the time. But its kind of cool to think of that shift in attitude happening.

On the morning of September 11, as I was pulling in to the parking garage at work, I heard on the radio that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center. I thought it was a prop plane that hit one of the antennae on top or something, so I kinda chuckled and went about my day. But I turned on the radio in my office and started listening to more and more and then the second plane hit and then…I had to go to a meeting across campus! So I left for my meeting and I was a little shaken up, but it hadn’t really hit me yet what was going on. This meeting was, incidentally, the first meeting of the Holiday Reception Committee wherein we were supposed to brainstorm about the University’s holiday reception, the theme of which was Toyland. So we’re all sitting in this meeting and people keep getting news updates on their pagers and whatnot and nobody wants to say anything. The last thing any of us is thinking about is toys. The woman chairing the meeting had not been listening to her radio that morning – she had no idea what was going on or why none of us was really contributing to the meeting. Somebody finally told her and the meeting ended shortly thereafter. I think that’s when it occurred to me what was going on.

I tried calling all of my friends in New York on my cell phone in my car (I know, shame on me) on my way back to my office. I couldn’t get through to most of them, but I was able to leave a voice mail message for one of them. I just told him that I loved him and hoped he and everyone else out there was okay and to please call me if he could to let me know. I called my brother, too, because he was working in the Sears Tower at the time. He was home by the time I called him, which I was very thankful for.

As I was parking my car, my friend in New York called back on a landline and let me know that almost everyone he knew that I knew was alive and evacuating the downtown area (he would have to leave the building he was calling me from shortly). Now, if you know this guy, you know that very little phases him. He always has a joke or a pun or some bit of slapstick comedy for every occasion. I know that everyone is afraid of something (“sock puppet” “AHHHHH!”), but this guy isn’t supposed to be afraid, you know? But when I was talking to him on the phone, he said, “It’s weird, you know? You can see the towers from everywhere in Manhattan and they’re just not there anymore.” I have never heard someone sound so scared before in my life. We hung up shortly after that and I sat in my car and cried for about five minutes before going back into my office. I was terrified for my friend. My co-workers said I could go home if I wanted to, but the internet was the only way I could stay in touch with my friends across the country, so I stayed. I don’t know how many times I cried that day. A bunch of us went over to our friend’s house to just be with other people. I know I didn’t say much, though I’m pretty sure my mouth was hanging open most of the night. I had dance practice that night and was furious and bitter about it. Fury doesn’t quite describe it, nor horror, but it was something along those lines. Like everyone’s skin had just been ripped off and we all had to fend for ourselves now. I don’t ever want to feel that again.

After about two days of watching the news, I just couldn’t anymore. I determined that the best way for me to deal with the whole thing and how it indirectly effected me (and directly effected people I love) would be for me to go to where the World Trade Center was and dance there. Kind of a “Ha ha, terrorists, you didn’t win!” kind of a gesture. I hope to do that in April when I’m out there.

And the other thing I had to do was hug my friend I had talked to on the phone. We spoke on the phone and over the Internet a couple of times, but I had to see him and touch him and know he was still there and okay. The longer it went before I could see him, the less it became a “want” and the more it became a “need.” I saw him in San Francisco about three weeks later and will remember that hug and that feeling of relief for the rest of my life. Yeah, it turned into something goofy, but it meant he was on the way back to being the person I had always known, you know? That the universe was coming back to some semblance of normality. And I will always have a strong bond with that man, no matter where we both end up, because I experienced what was quite possibly his weakest moment. We shared that. And I’m getting choked up writing about it.

So it will be interesting to me to see how New York has changed when I go out there in a couple of weeks. I was there once before, briefly. It will be strange to feel the energy of a city with a scar on it. I don’t know how visible that scar still is, but it won’t ever go away as near as I can tell. I’m planning on crying a lot. And dancing where the towers were. My girl friend who I was talking to said she would dance with me which makes me very happy.

So yes, I do have days wherein I believe I have the world’s greatest cat. He had to, um, cough up a hairball last night, so he went into his litter box to take care of it. How great is that?

And I’m also kind of self-conscious because some of the stuff I want to blog about is stuff inspired by people who may actually be reading this and who may then get offended if I put it in here. I can understand that they may feel it is a violation of privacy or confidence or something and I don’t want to do that to anyone, but this is also my blog. My journal to post my thoughts and feelings. They do not reflect the thoughts or feelings of anyone but me. And I guess as long as I’m okay with people hating me, I can post whatever I want, right?

I just don’t know that I’m okay with people hating me.

So I’ll write about this thing in a very general manner. And I’ll apologize in advance if anyone feels it is a betrayal of trust, but this is, honestly, something that I have been thinking about for a long time. It all goes back to my “this is how I view myself” vs. “this is how other people see me” issues. I posted earlier that I have one friend who went so far as to say he wished my mom had had more kids like me because the world needs more people like me in it; that’s how wonderful he thinks I am. Which is nice because I think approximately the same of him. It irks me that he has self-esteem issues. But then, who doesn’t? I do. So who am I to talk, right? But its cool because we get along well and think the world of one another and will help each other out and stuff. But we wouldn’t date. And he is not the only friend of mine like this. I had another friend who is now living on the West Coast who just kept telling me how wonderful I am and how cute and such, but he wouldn’t date me. All of my married and involved friends tell me I’m the greatest thing since sliced bread. And no, I don’t always believe them when I’m in the middle of planning an event and totally stressed out and thinking just plain evil thoughts and stuff, but I think in general I’m a decent person. But I am always everyone’s friend. I consistently get the “you are wonderful and I want to get to know you better but I don’t want to rush things and we wouldn’t really be dating let’s just hang out and I’ll see you when I see you” kind of routine from people. It honestly doesn’t even phase me anymore. I have come to expect that from people. And then the next time I see them, I expect them to tell me about this amazing girl that they met in the grocery store or something, you know? It’s a well-established pattern.

And I can’t figure this out. I know I have male friends of whom I think the world but who I would not date and there is always a reason why I wouldn’t date them, be it geographical or chronological or physical or whatever. I want to know what the reasons are why, if I am so incredible, the people I am attracted to don’t want to date me. I realize that it is probably something different for each person, be it geographical or chronological or physical or whatever, and that’s fine, but I’m kind of curious to know what these things are.

I was talking to a girl friend of mine over the weekend and we were talking about a mutual friend of ours. Every time we talk about this mutual friend, my girl friend says, “I would so date him,” and I can completely see where she is coming from. Yes, he is wonderful and a great friend. For me, though, I wouldn’t date him because he is too competitive and gets way too worked up way too easily. Which are things I can deal with in a friendship, but in a long-term relationship with someone…I dunno. So what are the things that men just couldn’t overlook in me if we were in a long-term relationship? Probably my pessimism. My ways of handling stressful situations. My independence. My sardonicism. Is that a word? My inventing of odd words for the express purpose of being self-deprecating.

I don’t know. I’m kind of curious but there is a part of me, too, that really doesn’t want to know. If I remain in ignorance, I can still fantasize that I will meet another guy who just knocks me on my ass when I meet him. I like my fantasyland. Its happy there and life is fun. And I don’t have a stupidfey day job.

And my event ended on Sunday with an improv show. It was a good show. I’m glad I didn’t play, though. It was my one opportunity during the weekend to just kind of sit back, relax and enjoy. And oh, man, I reached new levels of squeaking I was laughing so hard. I was scaring myself with some of the noises I was making. There was a lot of good improv happening. Some really bad improv, too (pimp), but some really good stuff by the end of the show. I think it would be safe to say that fun was had by all this weekend. Or at least I didn’t hear about too much drama. There was the whole cop thing on Friday and somebody wasn’t asked to dance as much as she would like and I got to share my bed with a cute boy two nights (platonically) and I got the post-lindy hook up chat without having a real lindy hook up, so all in all, I think things went well. We raised the money we wanted to and then some. And I can’t even begin to tell you how glad I am that it is all over.

So by Saturday night I was already starting to feel drained and lethargic and apathetic to the rest of my event. I still went and I still looked friggin’ hot, but I wasn’t really motivated to dance or talk to people. I got a bit more social as the night wore on. The men who I thought would have paid attention to me didn't and those who I didn't think would did. I thought I overheard a friend of mine at one point, a friend who I had a crush on back in the day, say to someone else, “Kitty has the best eyes.” Somehow, the fact that he would say that to someone and obviously not want me to hear it (he turned away quickly when he saw me look in his direction at the sound of my name) made me feel strangely good. I had been talking last week with an electronic friend about what the East Coast thinks of me. I don’t know what a lot of other people think about me because they don’t tell me. Or they don’t usually, anyway. I’m not there for the conversations wherein guys say I have the best eyes or a sweet ass or I dance like a sack full of greyhounds or anything and there is a reason for that. I don’t know if it is that people don’t like hearing what others think of them or that others aren’t good at telling people honestly what they think, but it isn’t something that generally happens. Or at least I don’t think it does. One of my houseguests told me he wished my mom had had more children like me because in his opinion, there should be more people like me in the world. This is, though, the same friend with whom I had just had a conversation about the possibility of he and I dating and besides the distance factor it was determined that he would probably not date me because I’m not in to outdoor sports very much. I didn’t know he would even consider dating me, but I think he thinks I was offended that he wouldn’t so he had to build up my ego later or something. Whatever. That’s not the point. The point is, it made me feel good to overhear a completely unsolicited compliment about me that was not intended for my ears. Even if I don’t know why it felt good, I know that it did and that’s the important part. So thank you to my friend who said that, even though he doesn’t read this.

My event started on Friday night. I think it went well. From what I hear, people had a good time and I’m pretty sure that throughout the weekend, we made the money we needed to and then some, so its all good.

Friday was interesting, though. I had promised myself I wouldn’t drink this weekend so I could stay in control and be rational and logical and all that rot, since I was the event organizer. Me and my bizarre sense of responsibility. So I’m there and having fun and meeting people I’d only talked to online and damn did I want a drink, but I was being good, so I didn’t have one. And I’m flirting and dancing and doing my best to make sure everything is running smoothly and when its my turn to work the door, the cops come in. Now, I find out later that everyone except me knew they would be there that night. Why nobody bothered to tell me, I’m not sure, but that’s not the point. The point is, we had to stop the music, they had to check the whole venue to make sure there was no underage drinking going on, they talked to the venue owner (who I absolutely adore) for about an hour, and I’m standing at the front door wiggin’ out. I don’t know what’s going on or when they’re going to leave or if we’re going to get shut down or what. And I have all these out of town people in Chicago, some of them for the first time, and I know there are going to be comments made like, “Yeah, come to Kitty’s events. They get raided by the cops,” about future events and yeah. I’m losing it. People keep coming over and hugging me because 1) I have wonderful friends and 2) I must have looked like I needed it. The whole thing ended with (in my opinion) a stupid ticket and a court date. Long story. But after that, my drinking embargo had to be lifted. About four glasses of vodka on a very nearly empty stomach lifted. I’m still thanking my friend for driving me home and wondering how exactly I gave him directions. It was very not pretty.

I didn’t feel physically as bad the next day as I probably should have, but I felt mentally like shit. Disappointed in myself for getting that drunk, for letting my friends down, for not keeping my word when I said I wasn’t going to drink. And very disturbed by the fact that when something went wrong, I needed a drink. Maybe not needed, but wanted badly enough that I let myself and my friends down by having one or seven. So I spent the first half of my day apologizing to everyone for making an ass out of myself and discovered that almost none of them even noticed. Meaning, I wasn’t that much more of an ass than I normally am. But it did occur to me later in the day, that perhaps it is largely in my own head. That if I will start a thread on a board defending a man I’ve never met from people who want to sully his reputation, maybe I should cut myself some slack. After all, I am just a person. I’m not a super human or anything. I am not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. If I can forgive other people for all of the things I have been able to forgive other people for, maybe I should work on forgiving myself for being human.

I have so much to say I’m not even sure where to begin. I’ll probably end up with about 37 (Thirty-seven?!) blog entries today because if I do it any other way its going to be completely disjointed. You know, whenever I pick a random number, its always either 37 or 87. I just realized that today. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the aesthetic appearance of the rounded first number with the sharpness of the seven that is pleasing, or the four-syllables or something. I dunno. I gotta start picking new numbers.

But yeah, it has been an eventful four days and I have comments on all of the stuff that happened, too, so bear with me. I’m gonna be long winded today.

So I went to this show on Thursday night – Sander Kleinenburg – that was the most amazing techno show I have been to. The venue was just like a basement or something so it was really comfortable. And I was kind of surprised by the number of people there who looked like they had gotten in on fake Ids, but they were, of course, all dressed very Euro-chic so it worked. I, on the other hand, am so not cool enough for that scene. But I had fun anyway. At least my tank top was black. And there was the inevitable “guy in orange.” There is one at every techno show. While everyone else is wearing black, he is wearing orange and dancing the way he wants to dance – completely un-self-conscious and all over the place, but good at it. He wears orange because he is so firmly ensconced in the scene that it no longer matters to him what other people think. I always find myself drawn to the “guy in orange” because of that attitude. The whole “I am my own person” thing is very attractive. I think this “guy in orange” noticed me, too, because I was the “girl with the hat.” Yes, I’m cute in my hat, but apparently girls aren’t supposed to be “cute” at these clubs. They are supposed to be sexy and scantily clad. But I was cute in my hat and I caught the eye of several people in the club. Of course, my hat was big enough so as to obscure part of my face in shadow so most people couldn’t see the enormous cheesy grin on my face, meaning I was told by several people that I would be having more fun if I was dancing. I had a blast, though. I hadn’t heard any of his tunes before and damn, did he mix them well. I was a little disappointed when the “guy in orange” left though, ‘cuz up until that point I had the feeling he was kinda following me around the dance floor to keep his eye on me. Its funny how that happens in clubs. You make eye contact with someone a time or two and feel like, I dunno, you’re connected to them or something. I almost felt gipped that he didn’t talk to me but then I have to remind myself that this guy doesn’t know me from Adam; why would he come say goodbye? I’m such a mutant.

I do hope to be cool enough for that scene one day. I hope to one day be comfortable enough with myself in that scene that I can go there and be the “guy in orange.” Except the female version. I started wondering if I would feel comfortable going by myself to a club like that. I think it would depend on the club. The place I went Thursday could probably grow on me like that. Particularly if Sander played there more often. Tee hee. My fantasy world cracks me up sometimes.

You know, the movie making business is an odd one. Its kinda strange for those of us whose friends and family don’t really know much about it, either. I go on an audition, get a part, and people want to know when they’ll be able to see the film before rehearsals have even started. It takes a LONG FRIGGIN’ TIME to put a movie together. For example:

Last December I think it was (December of 2000), I got a phone call from a woman who had seen my headshot and resume and wanted me to come in and audition for her. I auditioned in January. Got the lead in her film [shameless plug] Leftover Voices [/shameless plug] in late January or early February, I forget which. Got my character description around that time, too, which means that my character started to live with me in about February of 2001. We started rehearsals in March, I believe, and shot the last week of June, 2001. Once the filming was over, my character kinda moved out of my house. She stopped living with me and eating with me and showering with me and sleeping with me and whatnot and just became this almost ghostly presence that is sometimes recalled if I wear “her” shoes and that kind of thing. And that’s where things have stayed (from my perspective anyway) until just recently.

As I have been moving on to other projects (I won’t say bigger and better because I don’t think I will ever have a better filming experience than I did on this film), the director has been working with the editors to come up with a rough cut of the film. Last night, I went in to rehearse some voice over stuff for some shots that were done without sound. It was strange to have to call up my character again without the assistance of “her” shoes or anything, but I was surprised at how easily she came back to me. We will be recording that stuff next week. Then the director and editors have some more cutting and pasting and trimming and such to do before they do a test-screening with an audience that knows nothing about the film. Based on the comments of that test audience, they will re-edit the film. Once the film is re-edited, then they can start on the sound design and I’ll have to go back in to do some ADR (additional dialogue recording) stuff. Once the sound design is done, then the film can be seen by the general populace. Meaning “me.” The director (despite all of my begging and pleading and deal making) won’t let me see it until it is a complete, coherent, cohesive product.

So it is quite possible that from start to finish (and I’m not even including pre-production, here, just from casting to finished product) it will be a year and a half or two years before this film can be seen by friends and family and other random strangers. Think about that for a minute – not being able to see or appreciate the fruits of your labors for two years. Imagine preparing budget documents that can’t be viewed for two years. Or a new marketing plan that takes two years to roll out. But of course, the public is completely unaware of the project until they get to see it, two years after you worked on it. Which is when they start asking you questions. Hell, I had forgotten some of our on-set jokes already and had to be reminded of them at rehearsal last night. Say this film gets big and I have to go on Dave Letterman or something to promote it, I am going to be so far removed from the film and my character at that point that I don’t know what I’d say beyond everyone who worked on it was wonderful.

Though if my character came back so easily in rehearsal last night, maybe a simple viewing of the film would be enough to prepare to promote it. I dunno. Movie making is an odd business.

You know that feeling that you’ve forgotten to do something? Yeah, I’ve had that for about three days now and it will probably last for about four more. I’m the coordinator for this event this weekend to support a website that I spend way too much time on and I have the feeling that there was something else I was supposed to do that I haven’t yet. Besides George the Lindy Bear.

I have to go buy a teddy bear and make a pouch for him. We are going to introduce George the Lindy Bear at our event this weekend. The point is to have him travel around the country from dance event to dance event collecting stuff and get him back to Chicago to be auctioned off at next year’s event. I hope he catches on. I’m curious to see what kind of stuff and how many signatures he will collect and stuff.

But yeah, so I’m wiggin’ out. And since I’m doing this whole thingy this weekend, I won’t be blogging for a couple of days, so you, my three loyal readers, will have to do without. Though, since all three of you will be at the event this weekend, I don’t think you’ll miss my blogging too much. I’ll be back next week with tales of the weekend and how it all went.

I look around sometimes and think to myself, “This can’t be my life.” I went to a meeting the other day to talk about changes in our hiring process. I sat there in my Anne Klein pants (which I got very much on sale and that have a zippered pocket on the left thigh so I don’t feel too yuppified) and my pressed white button down shirt and took notes at this meeting. I was one of two people under 40 in the room. Probably the only person in there under 30. But I took my notes and wrapped my scarf around my neck and came back to my office and sent an e-mail to one of my co-workers describing the notes I took at said meeting. Her e-mail reply was “Thank you.”

I show up to work every morning between 7:30 and 8:00am and stay until 4:00pm or shortly thereafter. I have my own office with a door that I can close and a table with two chairs and I was allowed to pick out my own piece of artwork to hang on the wall. If I ever want to go buy an area rug, I can get reimbursed for it. But I have a desk with a computer and filing cabinets and a to do list and all that rot. I have my very own stapler that doesn’t work. I have access to the supply closets if I need more post-its and if we’re out of file folders, I can have them ordered and they will be available to me the very next day. And when our receptionist is out sick, I cover for her and sort the mail and answer the phone and sign for packages and such. And I sit and think, “This can’t be my life.”

So I go home where I sew and play video games and dance and play the guitar and prepare for auditions or memorize my lines or jet off to somewhere fun for a weekend of dancing and drunken debauchery. And there I think to myself, “This is a little bit closer.”

The things that seem normal and right and typical to a large portion of the population are just not for me. I guess I’ve known this for a long time and it was more out of financial necessity than anything else that I got a day job in an office. But this is so not who I am. I am not my desk. I am not my computer. I am not my stapler that doesn’t work. I am not my e-mail account. I was a theater major in college for Pete’s sake. I’m supposed to be semi-nocturnal and having meaningless affairs and be addicted to pain killers and jet off to locations unknown to do jobs and things like that. That feels normal to me. That feels good to me. Well, not the addicted to pain killers bit or the having meaningless affairs. I don’t do drugs and I would like an actual relationship and will most likely remain single until I find a decent relationship. But the artistic lifestyle, that’s me. I was so flattered the other day when a friend of mine told me that, at least in her opinion, I dress very urban/bohemian. It’s a term that is so full of character that I thought, “Yeah, that’s me.” And I promise you a trained monkey could do my job. And it occurs to me every once in a while that maybe I am just a trained monkey. Doing my job so I will be rewarded with a paycheck at the end of the month. I’d almost rather have a banana.

So I do what I can to encourage my life to change for the better. Or for the weirder, depending on how you look at it. I do get impatient with it sometimes, though, because it really does get boring. But it means that when bizarre opportunities (like flying out to New York to do a film or meeting up with a handsome stranger for a rendezvous somewhere) present themselves to me, I have to take them. Because this can’t be my life.

The whole idea of being star struck is really amusing to me. I’m not sure why I thought about this this morning considering I didn’t really leave my house last night, but I did. Maybe its because I'm rehearsing to do extra dialogue for a film I shot last summer tonight. Whatever. That's not the point. The point is that I get star stuck really easily. Hell, there are dance instructors in Chicago who still intimidate the hell out of me and I’ve known them for almost three years now. And when I go to big dance events, I am often too shy to ask some of the national instructors to dance, even though I know I could hold my own dancing with them. I find myself sitting off to the side thinking, “Oh my god that’s Johnny Lloyd. The Johnny Lloyd,” and other silly variations on that theme. Automatically giving that person power and a status above my own. Which is ludicrous because every single one of the people I do this to is a person. Nothing more, nothing less. Just people.

And then my train of thought takes a quick turn for fantasyland and I think to myself, “I could be famous one day and then people will be star struck meeting me. These instructors will seek me out to dance with me. Or they will sit on the sidelines and think, ‘Oh my god, that’s Kitty. The Kitty,’ and other silly variations thereof.” That’s the thought that I think is funniest. That someone would be too intimidated to come up and talk to me or ask me to dance. ‘Cuz I know I’m just a dork.

I guess that’s the whole weird thing about fame – we all think that famous people are these wonderful icons who are perfect and friendly and off limits and better than the rest of us – but we have no idea, really, what they think about themselves. Had someone known about Marilyn Monroe’s inner struggles, would she still be alive today? Would Mariah Carey have been able to avoid her meltdown? Which is why, I guess, I enjoy Moby’s site so much. I know, I said I’d try not to talk about him too much, but I can’t help it. I have no life. But anyway, in his updates, he lets his fans into his own mind to see his perceptions of himself and the world around him. It lets us see that he’s a normal person. Well, “normal,” anyway. But I know also that my perception of myself and the way I am perceived by others are two totally different things, so I guess I’m just anticipating it being even stranger if I become famous one day. Like what kinds of tabloid gossip will people start? “Kitty Used to Be a Man!” “Old CD Recordings Found That Show Kitty was Hoping for Music Career!” What else from my past is going to be dredged up and put in the public spotlight? “Kitty Broke My Heart, Claims Fucknut.” And I’m either going to have to spend large amounts of my time trying to convince people that I am not the person they are reading about in the Inquirer or just let it go. I’ll probably opt for the second choice. In my experience, people believe what they want to believe no matter what you say. I could always point them to my blog and tell them to search for the right answers. Maybe that’s why Moby does it. I dunno.

Or I could just be too lazy.

And I would like to apologize real quick that my blogs have been kind of dry and random lately. I have lots on my mind but none of it wants to come out on paper right now. Like all the diseases in Mr. Burns' body all getting stuck in the door at the same time making him very sick or invincible, depending on your perspective. But anyway, I'll have more substance and be more coherent soon, I promise.

Last night was a good night. I went out dancing as I usually do on Monday nights, but last night was good. I had a meeting about this event I’m planning that went really well. I can honestly say that I feel good about it. I can feel all the pieces coming together, which is a good thing. I was worried for a while there, but now I feel like it might actually happen.

And then I got to dance with two of my favorite people to dance with. Not just one, but two. One man, one woman. Approximately an 18 year age difference between the two of them with me stuck somewhere in the middle. Completely different styles of dancing, but both of them challenge me in different ways and both of them have outstanding connection. And both of them are wonderful people. She is so wise for her age and so together. Put that together with the fact that she is one of the best leads and the best follows in Chicago and she blows me away. And he makes me laugh like nobody else does. He just has this way about him that makes other people feel good. I know that wherever I am, if he’s there, too, I’m in the right place. And I can do the silliest little styling thing in our dances and he cheers me on and makes me feel like I’m the greatest dancer in the world. I love him for that. And I feel very lucky to have such a wide range of wonderful friends and people in my life, you know? Either that, or I need to lay off the crack.

I AM COMPLETELY KIDDING. I DO NOT SMOKE CRACK. I HAVE NEVER TRIED CRACK. I HAVE NO INTENTION OF TRYING CRACK ANYTIME BEFORE I DIE.

So yeah, it was a good night last night. And I woke up feeling good today. But just for the sake of making things interesting, I’m going to throw out the tidbit of information that I ate my first Boca burger last night and rather enjoyed it. As a card-carrying member of the Don’t Knock It ‘Til You Try It Club, I figured I should try some of this silly sounding vegetarian food before I start turning my nose up at those who eat it. So there.

So there are a lot of sequels to movies coming out soon, a lot of which, in my opinion, should not have been made on sheer principle. Cinderlla Two? The Hunchback of Notre Dame Two? Please. I know that life does not have happily ever after endings. I kind of count on that fact. But by making a sequel to a movie that ends with happily ever after negates the whole happily ever after thing from the first movie, now doesn’t it? “They lived happily ever after for three days until reality set in again and they had more problems.” Because as we all know, you can’t have a movie without conflict. It is dry and dull, like the Itchy and Scratchy cartoon wherein they share lemonade. Nothing happens when there is no conflict. And if you’re going to have conflict, then “happily ever after” doesn’t really apply anymore. It becomes more of a “normally ever after.” Which isn’t anywhere near as romantic as “happily.”

So here are some movies that should not have sequels, no matter what the box office numbers say:

Cinderella
Strictly Ballroom
Face/Off
Snow White
Braveheart
The Shawshank Redemption
Forrest Gump
Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein
The English Patient
Schindler’s List
Pinocchio
Singin’ in the Rain
The Truth About Cats and Dogs
The Linguini Incident

I know there are more, but it would take up too much space. I guess I would feel safe in saying that any film that doesn’t beg for a sequel (i.e. The Empire Strikes Back or the Back to the Future series or stuff like that), it probably shouldn’t have one.

There. I’ve said it. If Frank Whaley is allowed to suggest on IFC Rant that they should remake Swing Kids so its about non-dancing midget Nazis who also buy hookers, I’m allowed to say I disagree with a slew of sequels.

And I also just noticed when I looked in the mirror in the restroom that this shirt I'm wearing today really shows off my clevage.

Okay, I have a lot to say today, actually, but its not all necessarily related, so please bear with me.

I am beginning to think I am the moodiest person in the world. I was feeling so crappy last night that I had to get out of my house – I couldn’t breathe. So I went for a walk. When I go for walks, its not just “around the block,” I’m out three for a couple of hours. Its funny, though, if I tell people, “Yeah, I walked from my place down to Belmont…” it sounds like I walked a really long way, but really, its only about a 35-40 minute walk for me. Yay power walking. But anyway, when I’m out there power walking for a couple of hours, I think about anything and everything. I rail at the sky. Rail? Is that the word I’m looking for? I sometimes angrily question the universe about stuff is what I mean, but anyway. Sometimes I find answers, sometimes I don’t, sometimes I find something really random that makes me feel better. So as I’m walking around last night, I’m walking south on Western and I pass this one building that has music coming out of it. Kind of a funky jazzy sounding music. I dug it. I looked at the building and had it been a bar, I might have stuck my head in to see who the band was, but it was an apartment building so I kept walking. On my way home, I’m walking north along Western and there is a guy standing in the doorway of that apartment building with equipment, like he’s packed up and ready to go, just waiting for his friend with the car. By this point, it is late enough in the evening that I am pretty much the only person on the sidewalk, so he kinda smiles and nods as I get nearer. So I say to him, “I hear you playing when I was walking in the other direction. You sounded good.” I swear, the man’s face lit up. He introduced himself and I introduced myself and he told me where his band would be playing and gave me his card and all that stuff and he just couldn’t stop smiling. A big, toothless smile that could light up the room. It made my night. I was grinning the rest of the way home. And yeah, I think I’m going to go see his show on Sunday, just to go see it.

I, of course, went out afterwards and had a horrible time, though, so I went to bed again feeling like shit. I need to stop feeling like shit. I need to just decide to get in a better mood. I don’t know if it’s a change of atmosphere I need or a good solid smack upside the head or what, but something needs to change. I have this one friend who, whenever I complain in his general direction about anything, tells me that perhaps I need to make a change in my life. Usually, I get very offended and defensive when he says this to me because for the most part, I like who I am. I like a lot of things about where I am in my life. But maybe there are some things I can work on.

Maybe it is my own damn fault that I have electronic friends. Maybe it’s my own stupid issues that cause me to “lose friends to relationships.” I know I get uncomfortable hanging out with couples until they are completely comfortable with each other and their relationship, so maybe its not so much that the phone calls stop coming in, but that I stop placing them. I don’t call people much to begin with, so it becomes noticeable when my “list of people to call” shrinks from two to one, you know? And maybe this is just something I need to get over. I am a big advocate of keeping relationships individual from one another. If I am friends with persons A and B, but persons A and B don’t get along with one another, that’s fine; it doesn’t mean my relationships with persons A and B have to change or stop or anything. It just means I won’t invite them both out for lunch at the same time. So by the same token, if I am friends with persons A and B and persons A and B suddenly get a lot closer to one another, that shouldn’t mean that my relationships with persons A and B need to change. It just means that I should invite both of them out to lunch at the same time. I just usually get the feeling that they would rather be with each other than with me. I mean, seriously, what’s the point? What do I have to offer that the significant other doesn’t? Which is, obviously, another of my issues.

Maybe I need to stop being humble and self-deprecating. But what if it is my humility that is so charming to begin with? I have been told that I am an attractive person, as in people are drawn to me and like spending time with me. What if that is a result of me not recognizing within myself the things that other people see in me? Or not flaunting those things? Perhaps I should walk around with a little more confidence than I do, but to be perfectly honest, I’m happy being a geek. Maybe I’m deluding myself into believing that I am normal, but I like thinking I’m normal. I don’t want to have this image of myself as some beautiful super genius or anything like that – I hate those people. Perfect people who you just can’t hate because they’re too nice. Of course, I wouldn’t know what it would be like to walk around with some semblance of an ego until I try it, right?

And it should be pretty simple to not get so angry about the little things that piss me off. I just have to decide not to get angry. Find that inner peace. “I’m asking you, Mary, please/Temper my hatred with peace…” Too bad I’m not Catholic.

I did listen to Liz Phair on my way in to work this morning. She always makes me feel better. Perhaps because she managed to turn her anger and passions and disgust and hurt into something beautiful. Perhaps because in singing too low for herself, she has allowed me to do the same. I sound really good singing along with Liz Phair in my car first thing in the morning. It’s like singing morning voice. Its all deep and gravelly and so un-feminine. I love it. And of course, there’s nobody else around so I can sing as loud as I want to. It feels good to belt out really low notes. I’ve wondered in the past if I’m a tenor. I think I’m in that no-man’s-land in between being a tenor and an alto, whatever that range is called. Once again, not really a girl.

Not really a girl. Maybe that’s something I could change. I have been so resentful of the fact that I am a girl in the past, maybe its time to just accept the fact that I am one and live my life accordingly. There are certain things about being a girl that I really don’t like. Pantyhose. The perception of my supposed fragility. Menstruation. The unacceptability of spitting in public. The fact that we are not supposed to have certain necessary bodily functions like expelling gas or defecating. And when we do defecate, we’re not supposed to call it “taking a dump.” Roller coaster emotions. Do boys feel the same things in the same ways that girls do? Do men’s hearts actually break when love is un-reciprocated? For example, do men relate to Untouchable Face in the same way that women do? Do guys sit at home torn apart by the fact that they can’t be with the person they love? Do they fantasize about people they will never meet? Do they dream of finding someone who is attracted to both their body and their mind? If not, I’d rather be a guy. But maybe I’m looking at it from the wrong angle. I do occasionally get cheaper drinks at bars ‘cuz I’m cute. And by feeling everything that I feel, aren’t I living life more fully than if I didn’t feel anything? And I am socially allowed to live alone and have a cat. And crave chocolate. And I can hug and kiss my friends no matter their gender. I dunno. I feel like I’m just rambling now and a lot of this stuff really doesn’t need to be said, so I should probably think it through some more and put it into a coherent blog at a later date.

It was raining when I woke up this morning. I was thankful for that. I miss rain when it doesn’t rain for a while. That was one problem I had with LA – it doesn’t rain there. The sound of a thunderclap outside while you’re snuggled all warm and cozy in your bed is one of the best sounds there is. Rain just kinda seems to wash away everything that’s wrong. Its like the universe is on the same page as me for a day and once we’ve both had a good cry, we can get on with our lives.

That’s what I’m gonna do. Get on with my life. Enjoy my Liz Phair and my rain and my chocolate and my cat and try not to get so stressed out about things over which I have little-to-no control. And stop rambling so much.

How very Tao of me.

Okay, I’m starting to get a bit self-conscious about this whole blog thing. Not that I’m going to be stopping it any time soon, but I’m starting to get self-conscious. When I first started keeping it, I had one friend who read it. I’m pretty sure he still does. Hi! *wave* Then I had two friends reading it. Then three. And to be honest, I like it that people read my blog, be they my friends or strangers who just happen to stumble in here for no real reason – that’s why I write in here at all, so that people will read it. I went out three or four times with this guy once who told me I was hard to get to know because I don’t talk very much. That bothered me. Partially because there is more to “getting to know a person” than what they tell you about themselves, and partially because I think I’m pretty easy to get to know. I don’t bite people’s heads off when they talk to me, I don’t hide things, and I don’t lie. Meaning, if you are paying the slightest bit of attention to me while we are hanging out or IMing or whatever, I think you can get a pretty good idea of who I am. But now, at the pinnacle of my laziness, I have created a blog so if anyone else ever complains that I’m a hard person to get to know I can just point them here. Pretty much everything they are really going to want to know about me will be covered at some point. Except maybe my birth date. But that’s a story for another blog.

So anyway, I am now confronted with the knowledge that people who have never met me before may be reading this stuff. Which, as I said, makes me happy. But, since they have never met me before, I wonder what I sound like to them. My first friend who started reading this blog knows me well enough that he probably hears my voice saying the words in his head as he reads it. He knows when I’m joking and when I’m just being PMSy because we’ve been hanging out on a pretty consistent basis for a couple of years now.

But last night I got a pity phone call from “said friend” who I mentioned a couple of days ago is beginning a relationship. He called to check up on me because he said I sounded depressed in my blog. I am not depressed. I have been in the past and it is certainly a possibility that I will be again someday, but right now, I am not. I’m not manic, either, which is a good thing. I just kind of “am” right now. I’m comfortable with that. But it concerned me that he thought I sounded depressed. Because if he did (and this is another one who I have known for a while now), what are the chances that someone else reading my blog who I have never met before also thinks I’m depressed? Are my blogs really that much of a downer? They are not intended to be as such. And I really am a fun person. I laugh a lot. I think one day I will become famous for my laugh. Sam Mendes likes my laugh. And I try to at least once a day, look at something as if I was a child seeing it for the first time (it’s this actual physical thing you can do with your eyes where you open them wider and get rid of all of the filters you normally view the world through and things become brighter and more interesting and full of possibilities).

Okay, now I sound like a crackpot.

Maybe I am a crackpot. No, I don’t smoke crack, but maybe I am insane. My best friend has, in the past, called me a genius (though it always sounds like an insult when she says it) and genius and insanity often go hand in hand…I dunno. Do crazy people know that they’re crazy? Or does the realization on the part of a crazy person of his or her own craziness then cause the craziness to disappear? Like when Shirley McLane had one of her first out-of-body experiences, she was following a string through the universe and as soon as the thought entered her head, “I wonder how far it goes?” she was back in the confines of her own skin. Or like the philosophy that if any human ever figures out what’s really going on in the universe, he or she will die instantly. Or he/she will die instantly, the universe will stop and a new, even stranger universe will take its place. Or the theory that this has already happened.

Now I’m just rambling.

So, in summation, yes I am a crackpot, no, I'm not depressed and no, I don’t like pity phone calls. Loneliness only hurts when it is pointed out to you by others.

I’ve been finding myself getting very angry lately about stupid things that really shouldn’t upset me that much. Like the brake lights on my six-week-old car going on for no apparent reason and draining my battery. Like people not keeping their word. Like the feeling that I’m drowning in a sea of cat hair. Like the fact that none of the drains in my apartment drain properly. Like the fact that Gilmore Girls wasn’t on last night so they could show a basketball game. Like the fact that my cat likes to take naps on my kitchen counter in front of the microwave. Like the fact that Ally McBeal won’t be on again until the middle of April so Fox can premiere a new show that will probably also leave me feeling depressed. Like the fact that Fox canceled The Tick without showing the last episode. Like the fact that I seem to be getting progressively worse at bowling. Like the fact that I have so little to do at work that I have the time to write and post blogs. Like the fact that I still have not received copies of film work I did a year and a half ago. Like the fact that even though I know I sit here and do almost nothing on a daily basis, everyone in my office says I am the most valuable employee here, yet I get paid less than everyone else. I know I shouldn’t complain about my job so much – I love the people and the flexibility they give me, but the job itself really does suck. I’d much rather be doing something. But all of these things and a few more have been pissing me off a lot lately, which pisses me off even more because most of these are things that should just slide off my back. They are not worth the energy it takes to get so worked up about them. I think it is this event I am planning that has me so wound up. I’ll be glad when it is over.

But then I get an e-mail this morning saying that on this very date back in 1950, Silly Putty was invented. How can I be pissed off in a world where Silly Putty exists?

And I have Progresso Tomato Rotini soup for lunch.

And I borrowed a co-worker’s CD player so I can listen to Play while I “work.”

And a good friend of mine is planning a birthday party for me this year so I know it will not go unnoticed again.

And March 5-11 is National Chocolate Chip Cookie week.

And I get to go to New York in April.

And springtime is coming, which means I won’t freeze my face anymore when I go out for walks. Even though I kind of like how alive you feel when your face is frozen but the rest of your body is bundled up and dripping with sweat from the physical exertion of power walking. But warm, sunny, and breezy are always nice.

And even though I have to look “presentable” at my job, I can get away with wearing my combat boots.

And sometimes the play by play of life in my own head is just too funny.

And I squeak when I laugh.

So I guess it’s not all bad. Though somebody down the hall is listening to bad classical music. Ah well. I’ll just hit play again…

I’ve been spending quite a bit of time parallel to the ground lately. Sounds kinda dirty, doesn’t it? Well, it’s not. I remain forever single. But I have noticed that I have been spending quite a bit of time reclining on my couch with my cat curled up by my side. I have to say, there are very few nicer things than spending a couple of hours napping with a cat on a cold, wintery afternoon. Or a warm wintery evening. Or whenever. Point being, I love napping with my cat. Yes, he is a pain in the ass sometimes and no, I would never advocate giving someone else a pet as a gift no matter how many times you have heard them say they want one but don’t have time for one. But I love my cat. Owen. Named for Owen Meany of A Prayer for Owen Meany fame. He is a freak show and I keep telling him it is not fair to all of the other cats for him to be this cute, but he doesn’t listen. All I know is that when he is not tearing my kitchen apart or chewing on the mini blinds, I am so thankful that he is in my life. He’s so soft and he smells like kitty litter – the good smelling kind. And he’s an attention slut. And his breath smells like cat food. But yeah, I love my Owen.

I wrote this one yesterday while I was sitting at the car dealership waiting for them to fix my six week old car. That’s right, my brand spankin’ new car has electrical problems that they can’t fix because they can’t find anything wrong with it. But anyway, while I was waiting for them, eating my Starbucks oat maple scone and drinking my not-very-good Starbucks hot chocolate (it was the only place with food within walking distance), I wrote this.

I feel like I’m on the brink of losing another friend to a relationship. You know, where said friend gets so wrapped up in the excitement of the new significant other that the phone calls to you get fewer and father between. Not that said friend calls that much now, but still. But I would never begrudge him this new relationship – he has wanted one for as long as I’ve known him. And while I sometimes wonder why he and I never hooked up, I must say I approve of his choice of significant other – she is absolutely lovely. I have no idea how long it will last or even how serious it will get, but right now, they are happy and that is a wonderful thing. Even if that means my involvement becomes that of an electronic friend.

An electronic friendship is one that could not have existed 50 years ago. One that is made possible by computers and high speed Internet connections (I almost borrowed Moby’s term “interweb” there and had to stop myself for fear I might seem obsessed). It is a friendship of e-mails and instant messages. And don’t get me wrong, I love e-mail and IM, but to carry on an entire friendship with no facial expressions or vocal intonations and with physical contact expressed inbetween asterisks gets a bit frustrating. I am, by no stretch of the imagination, a people person. But I live by myself, I have a boring as hell day job, and no computer at home, so you can see how it might get lonely and disillusioning to have only electronic friendships during business hours. And should one of my electronic friends have work to do (god forbid) and not be able to talk to me…have you heard Alanis Morissette’s So Unsexy? Yeah, that’s me.

I’m not saying all electronic friendships are bad. They are wonderful beginnings to relationships or as a means of staying in touch with friends out of state or around the world. But when a relationship with your “best friend” who lives a mile away from you becomes entirely electronic, maybe its time to examine that friendship. And I’m not saying that this friend entering into a relationship is/was my “best friend” (she is a whole other story), but I probably still won’t see him much until after the break up.

*Sigh*

So in this world where it seems that everyone else has at least one real, live friend but me, how do I comfort myself? I take solace in the fact that I have a crush on a rock star. A rock star I will never meet. How sad is that? I have a crush on a rock star based on what I learned about him electronically. However, seeing as I am not a rock star (or movie star or other-media-personality star), I will never get a chance to meet said rock star. This is something that I do and I don’t understand. For security reasons, rock stars don’t give out their home addresses and phone numbers and such. Which is understandable. There are a lot of loonies out there who would abuse that information to stalk and possibly injure said rock star. But, if another famous person tries to contact said rock star, no problem. The call goes right through. Why is this? There are just as many lunatics in the famous segment of the population as there are in the non-famous segment. Would you want Robert Downey, Jr. taking your daughter for a ride in the middle of the night? Neither would I, in theory. But if he called me up, you can bet your sweet bippy I’d answer the phone.

I guess I’m just anticipating missing my friend.

Rabbit rabbit.

It’s March 1st already. Wow. Oh, and yeah, that’s what the whole “rabbit rabbit” thing is about. Supposedly, if the first thing you say on the first day of a new month is “rabbit rabbit,” you’ll have good luck that month. Which has always been problematic for me around New Year’s because at the same time that I always need good luck in January, it’s a little odd to throw streamers in the air, yell “rabbit rabbit” and kiss somebody. Not that I’ve had anybody to kiss at New Year’s the last few years, but if I did and I yelled “rabbit rabbit” at them, I don’t think they would want to kiss me anymore.

But anyway, it was my mom who taught me about the “rabbit rabbit” tradition growing up. I’m still not sure of its actual origin, but I know that my mom had a friend growing up who loved this tradition so much that this one time, in high school (she was not in band), on the first of the month, she brought a rabbit into the dorms to try to get everyone to say “rabbit rabbit.” Most of the other girls in the dorm said, “Oh, what a cute little rabbit! Where did you get it?” instead, much to my mother’s friend’s chagrin.

Chagrin. Such a fun word to say.

So I keep saying “rabbit rabbit” year after year, thanks to my mom. I do a lot of things thanks to my mom. My mom is an absolutely wonderful woman and I take it as a compliment when people compare me to her.

My mom and I drove out to my brother’s last night and on our way out there (I forget exactly how we got on the subject), she told me about a video series she had watched on Islam. Apparently, while the Europeans were busy mucking about in the dark ages, the Muslims were actually quite technologically advanced. They had streetlights and did surgeries like cataract removals and were very scientifically and mathematically advanced and things like that. But today, when you look at the Muslim culture, you think of people living in the middle of the desert with very few possessions and men wearing turbans and women covering their bodies from head to toe and so on and so forth. Or at least I do.

I remember what it was! My mom had been talking to a co-worker of hers, a Muslim woman, about why Muslim women wear clothing that covers their bodies from head to toe, leaving only their faces visible. The Muslim woman said it was to keep men from viewing women as sex objects. Which, when you think about this as a follow up to the advanced culture that existed at the turn of the last millennia, it almost makes you wonder where our culture is headed. I know I am not necessarily big on showing off my body – I wear big clothes, big men’s clothes sometimes, and a lot of black to de-emphasize my femininity. (Which is actually in stark contrast to me as a small child – my favorite color was pink and I insisted on dresses.) I would prefer that someone be attracted to my mind. For while I am not painful to look at, I do think that between my mind and my body, my mind is the stronger positive. And when you then take into consideration some of the restrictions placed on the clothing of school children (no exposed midriffs, no shirts with slogans, no hats, etc.), is it really so far fetched to think that some sort of generally accepted cultural restriction on women’s clothing could be looming in the future? I dunno. Let’s see what Victoria’s Secret has to say about that.