Tag: postaweek2011

Categories
Nonfiction

Letting my Id out

On Friday morning I stopped to get gas on the way to work, and while I was waiting I trimmed my nails. It was earlier than usual so I didn’t have time to do it at home, but they were getting grossly long so I wanted to take care of them immediately. I was standing outside my car so I just let all the clippings fall on the ground. It felt very free, very primal. That’s how life should be – not collecting them in a paper towel, or trying to get them all into the sink. I think later I’ll go outside and clip my toenails too.

Categories
Memoir Sentiment

Search term showdown

I’ve been keeping an eye lately on my WordPress “search terms” – one of my favorite things about WordPress is the stats page, and I love that they tell you what people Googled (or Yahooed or Binged or whatever) to get to you.  I actually really dig the fact that a lot of my search terms are “cameraphone diaries.”  But some of the others are perplexing, or just plain amusing.

go to church – Well, I did at one point talk about wanting to go back to church. So okay.

gerchanovsky motorola – One of my proudest ones! I knew that if I was confused why “Gerchanovsky” showed up in my predictive texts, other people would be too. And I figured that if I Googled it, other people would too. So I just took advantage of that.

what the easiest temple to draw – I did crayon drawings of the sets of Aida after I saw it at the SF Opera…

miss america 2011 michael jackson ballet – Ditto writing a post on the Miss America competition this year

miss america 2011 irish dancing talent – See above

establishing windows and walls in a relationship – I am also so proud of this one! This was actually a post about the concept (and sagacity) of establishing windows and walls in a relationship. I love the idea that someone was actually searching for info about this, and I was able to provide said info.

what do you give a male actor on opening night of a show – I might have been helpful here, I might not have. Maybe they stole my whole pencil/pen/highlighter idea (which I also stole from someone).

“dead seagull prop” – I understand why they would find me; I just am curious why they were Googling this.

list of all justin beiber songs including the ones from when he was younger – Taking advantage of all the tweens Googling “justin beiber” and clicking on every link possible. As I recall I just mentioned offhandedly how, when I was subbing, I heard a lot of Justin Beiber songs.

why could i be be bruising – No idea

charlie sheen winning – I just wanted someone to Google this and find me. #jumpingonthebandwagon

i call the police due to aggressive nature of my handicapped client – This made me laugh out loud. Then I realized how many of my search terms include the word “aggressive,” thanks to my “be aggressive” post.

girl family undeveloped xhamster – No idea

i go to the bathroom frequently how will this work for jury duty – Also made me LOL. I don’t think I helped them out at all, but I wish them luck. And also one of those bags you wear at sporting events so you don’t have to get up to the bathroom.

Categories
Beginnings Being a girl Dollars

I’m sorry I doubted you

For every girl who has ever smeared mascara on the ceiling of her car, because she’s trying to put it on before the light changes.

Over the weekend I tweeted about getting makeup advice from trannies in a Bare Escentuals in the mall. I implied that, because they were overly made-up, with bright eyeshadows and fake lashes, their advice was no good to me. But one of them has changed my life.

I hesitantly struck up a conversation about eyeshadow, something that has been intriguing me from a distance, and she asked what I wore. I told her I’ve been wearing some BeneFit thing, in pinks and light browns, but that I felt something was missing from my life. She asked if I wore eyeshadow primer. I said I do not.

The Bare Escentuals girls have tried to sell me on primer before. As a rule I’ve been uninterested in it, especially all over my face. I don’t feel like I need or want a thick layer of something on my skin – that’s why I like Bare Escentuals, it’s light and powdery and doesn’t feel cakey. But if I scrub primer all over, doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose?

The salesgirl slicked some primer along the base of her thumb, where you try all makeup. (Something about doing that makes me feel so grown up and sophis. I love it.) She let it dry for a second, and then buffed a shiny, shiny purpley eyeshadow into it. It popped like you wouldn’t believe.

“How much is that?” I asked, never one to let a good thing pass me by.

Besides, this was girls’ shopping weekend with Megan, and on my list of things to find were a good moisturizer, and eyeshadow. So it’s not like an impulse buy or something.

When I started adding up the costs of the things that I would need to start my own experimenting, I opted for a “starter kit” type of deal – which would include the primer (which I LOVE), a brush (I only had a cheapie Target brush), a neutral color to use as a base, an eyeliner (which I never wear, but maybe I could start? if a tranny would advise me?), and a tiny mascara with a wand so small it’s hard to do my left eye with my right hand. For $23, wouldn’t you have bought it also?

Bare Escentuals, I do love you so. Partly because of just how pretty all the jars are. I am now the proud owner of a small array of BE products, and I am also now one of those girls who puts on makeup at home every day! (Instead of doing it in the car at stoplights on my way to work.)

My next experiment: more eye colors. I’ve been confused about what colors I’m supposed to wear – aren’t blue and green weird? But now I get it. It’s not powder blue and bright green…I need the dark jewel toned stuff.

Makeup, like any 13-year-old girl could tell me, most likely while rolling her eyes, is super fun.

Categories
Awesome Beginnings Being a girl Drew Nonfiction

Female Driver

New Year’s Resolutions I have accomplished:

     – Get off unemployment
     – Get a real job
     – Submit at least one play to the Samuel French OOB Festival
And now!
     – Submit a “guest commentary” piece to my hometown paper

This isn’t my first appearance in the Record-Bee: In 8th grade I was the school “historian,” and wrote a little weekly piece about what was going on at the school.  Around Christmas I apparently got bored of seeing my name in print, and I started writing under the pen name Ginger Brett.  I had completely forgotten about this until I was going through some old stuff and found the clippings.  But if there was any doubt, the writing is undeniably mine…you can take that however you want.

I was the historian again during my senior year of high school, when my most noticeable column was about the end-of-the-year school trip that a bunch of the seniors were taking to Mexico.  I casually and thoughtlessly said something about how the drinking age in Mexico is 18 and I wondered whether the parents of all those students had thought of that yet. The next day I was accosted in the halls by tearful girls from the soccer team saying I ruined their senior trip.  I spent the whole morning waiting to be called to the principal’s office and reprimanded.

Now I realize that those girls may have overreacted, just slightly.

My latest column will hopefully not offend anyone. It will be printed in tomorrow’s paper (yes, I asked my parents to save me one), and it’s already available online.  But for your viewing convenience, it’s also right here.

===

FEMALE DRIVER

“I don’t think I’ve ridden in the car with you driving in a long time,” my husband Drew remarked casually the other day on a middle-of-the-day trip to Target.  And it was true; usually whenever we go anywhere I make him drive.  I like sitting in the passenger seat and commenting on things out the window, and I also like not feeling judged for my driving.  Not that he would do that to me.

But I have seen his foot touch the imaginary brake pedal on his side of the car, plenty of times.

“You’re right,” I said, “it has been a while.”

“I forgot how fast you drive.”

What?!  I don’t drive fast.  I drive the speed limit – particularly in places where the speed limit is 35, it kills me to watch those cars all cruise along at 30, all in their individual lanes, not giving me a chance to go around them.  Don’t they know the light’s going to the change and we’re all going to get stuck behind a 4-wheeler?

I put on my left blinker and try to move over so I can turn, but the crazy driver behind me seems intent on edging me out.  I speed up a little and manage to squeeze in.

“Just promise me,” he said, as we turned into the Target parking lot and were faced with 4 speed bumps, “that one day when you have a car seat and a baby in the back seat, you’ll take the speed bumps more gently.”

“Like this?” I asked, slowing to a complete stop in front of one and then very, very carefully guiding the front wheels over, and then the back wheels, both pairs in perfect harmony, and landing back on the ground with barely a thump.  The way I’ve watched the cars in our apartment complex do it when I’m sitting behind them, urging them to “Go, please, just go!”

“Yeah, like that,” he said.  “That’s actually the way people do it when they care about their car.”

Well, I care about my car!  I have been through a lot with this car – it was my first car, I got it for my senior year of high school, and it’s waited for me all the times I’ve been away: my first year of college when we weren’t allowed to have cars, and the three years we lived in New York when it made zero sense to have a car.  Always patiently waiting behind…and then allowing me to drive it the way I drive it when I come home.

On second thought, maybe it’s not patiently waiting.  Maybe it just keeps thinking (hoping?) that this might be the time I don’t come back.

I love you, car.  And I promise to treat you better.

I fulfill the first part of my promise when I finally – finally! – get around to asking Chuck, my father-in-law, to help me with putting on the new windshield wipers my brother gave me for Christmas, and to change the rear left turn signal, which I’ve noticed has been out.

(For how long?  Surely that’s the reason I’ve noticed drivers reluctant to let me merge left.  They weren’t the unrelenting jerks – I was the non-signaling lane-changer.  Sheepish, I tried extra hard to leave lots of room when I merged, between the moment I figured out the problem and the moment I got the light bulb changed.)

When Chuck pulled out the bulb he turned it toward me so I could see how black it was.  “Been out for a long time, hasn’t it?” he asked.

“Um…”  I’m divided between what’s a worse answer, “Yes, quite a while” or “I have no idea.”  I settle for “I guess so.”

He’s very nonjudgmental though, and the rest of the bulb changing passes without incident.  And now I have 4 functioning blinkers and windshield wipers that actually clear everything off the glass, instead of leaving two streaks across my vision.  Which is nice.

Actually, now that that’s done, it’ll probably stop raining in the Bay Area.  When this week brings spring and sunny weather, you can thank me!  And Chuck of course.

Categories
"Other people" Endings

How I learned to stop worrying and love jury duty

A couple weeks ago I came home to that great trifecta of mail: a credit card bill, a car insurance statement, and a jury duty summons.  Now Drew has had 2 jury duty summonses since we moved back in 2009, and both times he’s been dismissed the day before over the phone.  So I figured, this is no big deal.

Last Friday I called in after 6 pm, and instead of the message I was expecting (something like “Yay you! You’re dismissed already!”) I was told that I was on phone standby, and instructed to call in Monday morning at 11:15.  So I figured, oh well, I’ll get dismissed then.

Last night right before I went to bed, I realized that work totally thought I was going to be in jury duty all day, so I actually could have just stayed home from work. I thought very seriously about it. I had a busy weekend and it would be nice to get a little morning off, go to the gym, do some laundry, call in at 11:15 and be dismissed, and then just hang the rest of the day.

But I am a responsible adult so I got up this morning at my usual weekday time, dragged myself to the gym (so not feeling it today), came home, showered, packed a lunch, and went to work.

Then, of course, I was totally called in to the courthouse to sit in the jury assembly room and wait.

Here are some things about the Redwood City courthouse:

-They have computers and internet for everyone to use (although they ask that you limit your time to 15 minutes)
-They have wifi and power strips everywhere so if you have your own laptop you’re totally good to go
-They have  cafeteria with relatively cheap stuff (a sandwich for $4.00? a soda for $.85?)
-They do NOT have cell reception in the basement, and you can’t really leave the basement because then you can’t hear them page you
-When you are on stand-by, you’re NOT in the courtroom. You’re most likely sitting in the jury assembly room killing time.

How on earth did I get out of the house today without a book??

I sat and worked on my Script Frenzy script for most of the time. I also stared off into space. I also ignored the people around me who wanted to start conversations by saying things like, “You were called in too?” (“….Yup”) and “Were you here this morning?” (“No, or I would be in the courtroom already.”)  I wasn’t overtly rude to anyone but I really wasn’t there to make friends.  Sorry, fellow potential jurors.

They showed us a video on being a juror, and it was amazing. But when I looked around everyone else was either not paying attention, or they were just staring at it with glazed over eyes. So they were missing such gems as the “confessional” set up shots where “Former Jurors” said things like “My favorite part was the deliberation, because you get to speak your piece and you’re making a decision that affects another person’s life.”  One “Former Juror” said, “When I got called for jury duty, yes, I was scared, because I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. But I brought a book and it was all okay.”  I mean, they’re so serious about it.

I started to get nervous that we would actually get called, but then the final courtroom called into the assembly room and said they had filled their juror box and we could be dismissed. Oh happy day! I hurried out of there, partly because I really had to go to the bathroom.  But I preferred to go home and use the bathroom there.

So overall, not the best jury story…that would have been getting onto one of them month-long juries…oh wait, then I wouldn’t be allowed to talk about it.  But I’m just so grateful that’s over, and I’m free to go back to work tomorrow (seriously), and get back to regular type life. At least until this weekend.

Categories
Drew Fashion Friends Sleep talking

Sleep Talking, 8

At about 4:30 this morning:

Drew: What? Why did you do that?
Me: ?
Drew: Buy a hot air balloon?
Me: Don’t worry, I didn’t actually.
Drew: Oh okay. *goes back to sleep*
Me: *thinks about how cool it’d be to own a hot air balloon*

In other news, Megan is here and today we’re heading out on the town to shop for party dresses, shoes, and restrictive undergarments to wear with our party dresses and shoes.  Other things I have expressed an interest in: new jeans, summery type shirts, and 3/4-sleeve cardigan sweaters to wear over sleeveless shirts at work.  So it’s gonna be a busy day.

I couldn’t decide between posting the video for “Shoes” or “Friday,” so you get this instead (it’s totally worth watching):

Categories
Awesome Dreams Drew

A grandiose celebration

I’ve been edging up on 10,000 views total over the life of this blog.  Well, actually, when I say I have been edging up on it, I mean I was at like 8500 and starting to think about what I wanted to do to celebrate 10,000.  I figured I should do something, I mean, that’s an accomplishment.

Me: I’m almost to 10,000 total views.
Drew: Wow!
Me: Calm down now. How many of them are you?
Drew: About half.

Nevertheless, I really was planning a party, like when you hit the 100th day of the school year in kindergarten, and all day is counting to 100, 10 sets of 10, and m&ms.  That’s how I remember it, at least.

Then this silly Guess Who? post got Freshly Pressed (yay!) and the count started climbing, and I didn’t even have time to plan anything.  Then I sat here with the page on 9,992, hitting refresh and waiting to see 10,000.  Then I got distracted by Facebook or some such nonsense and when I clicked back I had missed it entirely.

Not that I’m complaining about ANY of this, I’m just explaining why the party will be less anticipated and more hastily thrown together.  Like when your birthday’s on a Wednesday and your party is the Saturday after.  Just not the same.

I can definitely put something together for 25,000 views.  Start planning now.  What do you guys say?

Categories
Awesome Children Drew Endings

The Mystery Face Game

 

Drew has this old Guess Who? game that we used to pull out whenever we were home from New York and killing time at his parents’ house. They finally sent it back to our apartment with us today, in the last box of his old stuff, and so we sat down to play a game.

But it’s too easy.  I mean, the game is for 6-year-olds, and the box suggests questions like, “Does your person wear glasses?” and “Does your person have blue eyes?”  Which…I thought you’re supposed to ask second-person questions?  “Do you have a hat on?” and “Do you look like an escaped convict?”

So in the past, in order to give the game an extra twist, we’ve restricted questions about gender, and anything to do with color.  But the game still lasts all of about 4 turns each, or about 60 seconds.

So today we started a new rule: Only questions about their occupations. 

We played three games this way, and it does take longer. 
1) You have to study all the faces you have left and come up with a good occupation that would help you narrow it down: “Are you in fashion?” 
2) Then you have to interpret the other player’s response: “Um…yeah? Yeah, I guess so” is a very different response from, “OMG yes.” 
3) Then you have to apply that response to all the faces, and use your best judgment whether or not to flip that little person down.

It was actually much harder than regular Guess Who?  In fact, no one won any of the three games we played.  Every game ended something like:

“Are you Sam?”
“No!  I’m Max!”
“What??  Oh, I guess Max might be a waiter.”
This was our Guess Who? swansong, because Drew is going to donate the game to his work.  But I did like the 10 minutes of fun it provided this afternoon!
Categories
Awesome Drew

Judie’s Cross Stitch Designs

Drew always has the best ideas.

Also, I never knew you could just download free fonts.

Categories
"Other people" Awesome Books Memoir Sentiment Theatre Work

“I always wanted to be an expert at something.”

This morning I was thwarted – again – from getting my iced latte.  As I pulled up and parked in front of Starbucks (you park perpendicular), I watched this guy track in front of my car and then wait there for me.  I’ve seen him outside of Starbucks before* and he’s asked for money, and I’ve given it to him, but I wasn’t feeling it today.  I killed some time sitting in the car, avoiding making eye contact (easy because the visor was flipped down), putting on mascara and whatever.  Someone parked next to me, and he tracked in front of their car and asked for a dollar.  After a minute or so of debate I decided I didn’t really want to deal with this – I had $4 in cash, enough for a drink, not enough for a handout; I didn’t want to have to use a credit card so I could save him a dollar; etc. – and I just started the car back up and pulled out and went to work.  I drank my VitaminWater Zero and was sort of satisfied.

But tomorrow?  No one is standing between me and that iced latte.

(*One big difference between Mill Valley and Menlo Park/East Palo Alto…I liked the bourgeois atmosphere in MV.  I miss that.  Also it was so much easier to just “run out and grab some dinner” – at TW that involves getting in a car, and sometimes on the freeway, if you don’t have a hankering for Togo’s, Jack in the Box, or something from the Extra Mile, also known as Chevron.)

Tonight I worked front of house at Snow Falling on Cedars.  I was there partly for Patron Services, and indeed there were a few people who had tickets for the wrong night, or the wrong show (the curse of overlapping shows in different theatres).  I was there also to sell subscriptions and subscription renewals, which mostly entailed me sitting behind a counter smiling at people and telepathically instructing them to come renew their subscriptions.  I had two bites early on, and then another two bites, and I was like, “Yeah, four sub renewals!  That’s awesome!  Last night the person working got ONE.”  (No judgment, I know it’s all about the patrons there that night.)

Then the first act started and I got a sandwich, and I was going to read but instead I listened to Sarah and Vinnie because I’m still a week behind.  Then intermission happened and I majorly lucked out – a group was there and SIX of them wanted to renew their individual subs.  So there I was, filling out forms right and left and collecting credit card numbers.  Ten renewal forms altogether!  I’m pretty stoked.

So, the second act started and I’m half-planning on going down the street to the Starbucks, which I’m pretty sure is closed by now (when I get hooked on something it’s hard to let up).

Then this usher, Judie, starts talking to me.

[I just realized I totally slip into present-tense whenever I’m telling stories.  I’m constantly going back in my writing and just changing the beginning to present tense to keep it all consistent.  But whatever, it’s almost midnight and I don’t care right now.]

So Judie the usher starts talking to me, and then the second act of the show just slips away.  Because she is just talking and telling stories about growing up, and how she moved all the time because her father was a furrier and kept opening up new stores and getting them on their feet.

You know when you’re talking to someone and you’re just wishing you had a tape recorder?  I would have settled for a nice subtle way to take notes.  But there was no way.  For the next hour she and I just talked – I don’t want to imply that she talked the whole time, but she definitely held up the conversation.  But it was all stuff about how she worked as a shill at a carnival when she was a teenager…how she married her husband after 12 days…her college roommate asking her in a letter before they even met, “Who did your nose?”  She’s Jewish but she doesn’t “look Jewish.”

One day her mom met the rabbi in the street and the rabbi said, “Goldie, I didn’t see you in service this week,” and her mother replied, “That’s right Rabbi, you didn’t see me because I wasn’t there.”  …I mean, is she stealing that line from somewhere?

I just kept thinking, Judie, you should write a book.  She just had all these stories, but more than that, she told them really well.  Like, insanely well.  (One might say, as well as a certain famous Jewish writer?  She did remind me of him.)

OMG, Judie, I hope you come across this blog in the universe, and I hope you read it.  If you do, do you want to dictate all your stories to me and I’ll write them down?  I mean, you probably don’t even need me, your delivery is amazing and you clearly know how to tell a story, but I’d still love to be involved.  Thanks for saving me from spending yet another $4 on coffee I don’t need, as well as keeping me entertained for an hour.

I’m sure I’ll see her again – it sounds like she ushers all the time for TW.  So our paths will cross.  And I’m actually kind of excited for that.  (This is the first time, in all my theatre experience, that I’ve said that about an usher.)

Here’s to Judie!

(And also: more info about Snow Falling on Cedars here)