make 'em throw stone at virgins

Okay. So let's see here.

Drunk in the Woods was awesome. We did indeed, get drunk in the woods. We also got Drunk in the Hot Tub in 17-Degree Weather (Coors Lite, playing Fuck Chuck or Marry? while our hair froze), Drunk in the Central Southern Virginia Vineyards (Cabernet Franc, asking directions to what Dan the Wine Guy termed an Italian restaurant and which actually was a Pizza Hut) and Drunk in the Extremely Accusatory and Recrimination-Filled Five-Hour Game of Risk (pretty much every beverage in the house, no further explanation of activity necessary).

Since getting back from Drunk in the Woods, I have been offered a new job, accepted said new job and am giving notice at current job as soon as I work up the nerve to tell my boss that not only am I leaving but that TODAY is my last day. Things are that toxic around here, friends. I already have my bags packed. Literally. My ActorFest New York 2003 canvas tote is stuffed full of collected business cards, hand lotion and a steak knife I once brought in when I brought lox and a quarter-baguette for lunch. My boss is very, very lucky that in the following months I forgot that I'd left that knife in a drawer.

I'm so nervous I'm practically scratching at my face just to have a distraction. I couldn't be happier about leaving, but things are so nasty right now that I dread any further comments from my boss, even though I rationally know that I'm moving on to bigger and better things and that he can't hurt me or my career anymore. That all said, I'm not the hugest fan of confrontation and I'm really not the hugest fan of dealing with people who behave irrationally.

After Lord knows how many bottles of wine and sleeping for fifteen straight hours on Sunday night, I think I need another vacation. Deep breaths, EJ, deep breaths.

There, that's slightly better. It's like my Daddy used to tell me: "Make 'em throw stones at virgins." To this day, it's the best professional advice I've ever gotten. You can't control how other people are determined to treat you, but you can control your response to it. If you're in a lousy situation, the best way to get the upper hand is by keeping your cool and letting the other person be the bad guy. Make 'em throw stones at virgins. I'm telling ya, east Tennesseans really have a way with the euphamism.

decoding the universe, part the second

My friend R called me last night on his way to Valentine's dinner in an existential tizzy. I love R because he's the ideal combination of caveman guy and overanalytical girl. Neither of us would ever hook up with one another in a million years, and so we get to be as messy and neurotic around each other as we damn well please. Our friendship is a great sounding board on which we can try out ideas for our relationships before actually attempting them in a space with consequences. Plus he gives great IM and has helped me move in the summertime, and therefore has my undying loyalty.

But I digress. R was curious about my theory that the universe is full of signs and sends us signals about our behavior. More specifically, he wanted to know why the universe was suddenly throwing ex-girlfriends in his path left, right and center. He ran into one old girlfriend out and about, and only to see her quoted in a Post article the next week. An article on Valentine's Day and relationships. A quote in which she paraphrased something he told her when they dated. And did I mention he ran into her while going to see his new girlfriend? And that the quote of hers was about a movie that I had just purchased on DVD A MERE FIVE DAYS AGO?

If you couldn't sense my sarcasm towards the end of the previous paragraph, my point is: if you take this "sign" thing too seriously, especially in a company town where everyone under 35 is a member of at least one online friendship network, you're going to make yourself insane. After a certain point, it's not the universe speaking to you; it's just that everyone yuppie twentysomething has occasion to ride the Red Line a few times a week.

Now I find this turn of events intriguing, but not as interesting as their wildly disparate views of the occasion on which they ran into each other. They wound up on the same Metro train one day during rush hour and said a brief hello.

Man response: (thought that went through head when he saw her) "There's [Old Girlfriend]. Oh, she's talking with someone. Don't want to interrupt."

Woman response: To email him the next day (I'm paraphrasing here): "How is it that you're still not civil to me three years after we stopped dating? THREE YEARS! Can't we at least acknowledge each other? This isn't a big town!"

Man response to woman response: "Uhhhh... huh? Sure. OK."

Hearing R describe this scenario last night, and reading the written summary of it in my work AND personal inboxes this morning, I was reminded of the Dave Barry book my mother gave me for Christmas.** It's such a classic example of how men and women are capable of looking at the exact same situation and seeing two completely different things. One woman's rude snub is one man's polite deference.

Who knows why this is? Who knows why men and women can be raised in the same environments and yet view common experiences through completely different lenses? It's a grand question, one that no one, certainly me, will ever be able to fully answer.

But why is the universe throwing ex-girlfriends in your path, R? It's telling you: "Look at who you had to wade through to get where you are! Don't fuck it up with New Girlfriend! It's scary out there!"

Easy as pie, baby. Throw me a challenge next time.




**True Story: My mom met Dave Barry on one of her business trips last year and asked him to autograph a copy of his book Dave Barry's Guide to Guys for her daughter EJ. While signing, he asked her how old her daughter was. "Twenty-three," my mom replied. "Ooooooh," said Dave Barry, handing the signed book back to her, "she needs to lower her standards."

patience, child

Forgive my lack of updates. My laptop battery died on Saturday. Plus, I was busy becoming a woman.

Oh, you'll see.

a collection of things that would once have been lame away messages, but no longer are used as such because i haven't been in college for two years

So who else thinks that Nick and Santino totally hooked up during filming for Project Runway?

I am so not listening to you when you tell me I should never write because you are not only a hideous writer yourself, but a severely self-absorbed jackass.

I might have to go see Final Destination 3 because it features both my favorite Canadian teen soap opera star AND someone named "Texas Battle."

AWWWW, G-DUB!

Two days until we put the "Bar" in "Bar Mitzvah."

Ten days until Drunk-in-the-Woods.

maybe because my party clothes are so binding

Alicia Silverstone spoke the stone-cold gospel truth when she said "I know it sounds mental, but sometimes I have more fun vegging out than when I go partying."

Because if I were out then I would have missed out on my mother, who yes, is in fact a member of Facebook, telling the story of how she was inadvertently invited to a toga party at State. More specifically, I would have missed the immortal and completely serious quote:

"The invitation said togas mandatory, but because it's winter in Michigan that pants are allowed. I find that quite considerate."

And I also would have missed out on spending an hour watching TV starring my favorite newly engaged couple. I love Mandy Moore. Just adore her. I feel like she would be really excellent to go to Anthropologie with, and I'd try on a $78 t-shirt and feel all sorts of yuppie guilt about wanting to purchase something so silly but she'd not only talk me into it by telling me how awesome I look and how much I'll wear it but will be so convincing that I will somehow feel right with humanity about buying something so incredibly self-indulgent.

Okay, I'm leaving my apartment now.

the thing about jenny

The thing about Jenny is that everyone else calls her Jen, right down to the campus newspaper that quoted her extensively in an article about dormcest and floorcest and is now one of the first things to come up when you Google her, which just delights me to no end, but I get to still call her Jenny because that's mah prerogative.

The thing about Jenny is that she's so incredibly self-possessed and carries herself so well, I can't believe she's only nineteen today. She has the poise and dignity of someone ten years older, someone who has already been elected head of state and can pull of signing an executive order to bomb a rogue nation while wearing a ball gown.

The thing about Jenny is that she drop dead freaking gorgeous. It is very clear who got the best pick of the genes in our family.

The thing about Jenny is that she's drop dead freaking brilliant. This girl got a 5 on the AP BC Calculus test when she was 16. I know. I KNOW.

The thing about Jenny is that even though she's so smart and pretty and kind and good, she still has a lot of little kid in her. Every so often (like twice a day), she'll just kind of space out and not quite BE in the moment, even though she still participates in coversation and appears to be processing oxygen. We call it Going Off to Jennyland. I imagine that Jennyland is a lovely place, filled with rainbows and unicorns and fluffy pink cotton candy clouds.

The thing about Jenny is that she is the WORST dancer in the world. She's gotten significantly better, but is still known to injure those around her (and herself; the girl bruises like a peach) whilst completely ignoring the pesky details of rhythm and beat. She's also once got into a car accident in the parking lot of a Starbucks, but these flaws, nay, quirks, just serve to make her more endearing.

The thing about Jenny is that she's also a great listener, possesses the world's driest sense of humor, starred in a cable access dramadey that still has a cult following at Michigan State, is capable of eating seventeen pounds of macaroni and cheese in one sitting without it having any effect on her ass, takes great pictures and, most amazingly of all, has no ego about any of it. She has no idea how fantastic she is, and that makes her all the more fantastic. Frankly I kind of hope she never gets it, because the ego that girl should by all rights have would be roughly the size of Lichtenstein.

The thing about Jenny is she rocks, and I couldn't be luckier to have her as my sister and my friend. Happy bithday, Jennnnaaay.**


(**This would have been published yesterday, on your ACTUAL birthday, but Blogger was down for maintenance.)

the nightmare in the middle of superbowl XL

What did you all think of the Superbowl? I don't especially care about either the Seahawks or the Steelers (or, for that matter, pro football), but I did find the halftime show amusing. Who knew that The Rolling Stones are now being sponsored by Tim Burton?





And it's not that I haven't enjoyed all these articles talking about the renaissance of my hometown. (Okay, so I'm not technically from there but we ALMOST moved to Detroit instead of Ypsilanti when I was a baby, and really, Ypsi is just like the scrappy little kid tagging after the big bad thug of Detroit, wanting to be just like it and hang out on street corners smoking blunts in broad daylight, kind of like Anybodys in West Side Story but with more guns and sans the elegant and groundbreaking coreography and oh my God, I really do have a gay man inside me *END TANGENT.*) But really, these articles are just grasping at straws. Methinks it will take more than the presence of a Borders to revitalize downtown Detroit... like say, a willingness to redefine the entire economic focus of the region and a population that doesn't flee the inner city like refugees?

scenes from quizzo

Scene 1

Player 1: Is it just me, or has Bush not said anything of actual substance in 20 minutes?

Player 2: "TERRORISTS BAD. AMERICA GOOD." [pause] Anyone wanna do shots?

Scene 2

Player 1: So [Player 3] and I were talking upstairs-

Player 3: And we were thinking: what if Kevin Federline were, like, the ultimate practical joke?

Player 1: Yeah! Like he's actually some artsy dude with black plastic glasses who decided to drop out of Tisch and play the most phenomenal prank on a thoroughly jaded public. And "PapaZao" is really a test of just how far he can take the joke before we all catch on!

Player 3: No, that'd totally be thesis quality. They'd give a PhD for a project that was so involved as to include actual offspring.

Player 1: Y'all ain't ready for my post-post-postmodern irony!

Scene 3

Player 4: I feel like one of these articles comes out at least once a year.

Player 1: [reading aloud from article] "'It’s not like, Oh, I’m going to hit on her now. It’s just kind of like, you come up to a friend, you grab their ass,' she explains. 'It’s just, like, our way of saying hello.'" Oh, [Player 5] I'm so sorry I didn't finger you on the way in! I still love you, don't worry.

Player 5: No worries, we'll catch up later.

either/or, baby

CNN is reporting that playwright Wendy Wasserstein passed away today from complications due to lymphoma. She, along with Christopher Durang and Neil LaBute, is one of my favorite playwrights. I still remember the first time I read The Heidi Chronicles and how deeply it affected me. My copy is now dog-eared and stained with drops of red wine from late-night readings, but her characters never fail to make me do that gesture I picked up from my mother-- the one where, even though nobody is around, I open my eyes wide, grab at my heart and go "mmmph!"

Wendy Wasserstein wrote about complicated, intelligent women who refused to settle for less than they felt they deserved and the various prices they paid for it. She acknowledged that education and hard work bring new sets of compromises to make, that women who strive for success may well feel stranded. Her work was bittersweet brave and deeply rooted in often-unpleasant truths. She not only identified the compromises some people make, but she asked why they had to be made in the first place. By writing critically about feminism, she made it stronger.

This weekend I read a fascinating Salon.com interview with National Review editor Kate O'Beirne. She's making the rounds to promote Women Who Make the World Worse, an unnecessarily provacative book that asks, among other questions, "did feminism make the world better? Or even, better for women?" Now, I could do without her namecalling, and she engages in a classic right-wing oversimplification and distortion of complex arguments (overly litigious society => we were better off before there were any sexual harassment laws on the books). She shoots herself in the foot when she suggests that if we want American women in the armed services then we should train our sons to hit little girls. And don't you think it's time we all stop writing about Sex and the City as if it were social gospel instead of a canceled fantasy television show?

But! But but but. O'Beirne asks some big scary questions that every woman, really every person who cares about social progress in America should be asking. We shouldn't be scared to examine feminism, or the civil rights movement or the gay rights movement and ask "What did we do wrong? What did we do right? How can we make day-to-day life better?" Too many people are so invested in the success of these movements that they are afraid to step back and examine them with a critical eye.

We were lucky to have as brilliant an artist as Wendy Wasserstein examining these questions for us. I think the best way to honor her legacy is to keep looking for answers.

Heidi: Well, I have a daughter. And I've never been particularly maternal. I'm not real practiced at sharing. But, Scoop, there's a chance, just a milli-notion, that Pierre Rosenbaum and Judy Holland will meet in a plane over Chicago. And Pierre will tell her his father named him for a Canadian prime minister, and she'll say she was almost named for someone who sang "My Boyfriend's Back." And he'll never tell her it's either/or, baby. And she's never think she's worthless unless he let her have it all. And maybe, just maybe, things will be a little better. And, yes, that does make me happy. - The Heidi Chronicles

the war on malaise

malaise \muh-LAYZ; -LEZ\, noun:
1. A vague feeling of discomfort in the body, as at the onset of illness.
2. A general feeling of depression or unease.

A bunch of academics got together and somehow determined that January 24th is the most depressing day of the year. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the entire last two weeks of January, and the first couple of days of February, are thoroughly, scratchingly, oppressively yech. That's right, I nouned an excited utterance. And oh yeah, I verbed "noun." Winter Doldrums mean one gets to take liberties with grammar.

What contributes to the yechness is that there are a lot of distractions that should take away from the yech. I've seen both Match Point and The New World, and loved them both. I'm reading a very interesting biography of Queen Caroline, who I'd never heard of but is turning out to be a fascinating individual. I'm finally getting my lazy ass back to the gym, fighting the hordes of sofie-clad sophomore girls for access to the elliptical, and it's beginning to pay off. It's been freakishly warm and I've taken long walks around my neighborhood, a place I adore living.

But documenting these little joys, and the larger joys of friends and family, right now just makes the yech more intense. It feels forced and not a little pathetic, the equivalent of an Oprah-inspired to-do list of happiness. Well-intentioned but inadequate.

I know what the problem is. It's not January, but the re-evaluating we do in the new year. It's That Which We Do Not Blog About. It's work. Not my specific job (although heaven knows there are issues there). It's something much more than that. It's that I've been looking for something new for two months now and have come across almost nothing that inspires or excites me. It's that, reading over the job duties for positions that would be a logical next step for me, I actively cringe. Bored workers make career changes all the time, but when well-meaning people ask me what I want to do, I have absolutely no answer. No cause that interests me, no activities I can get enthusiastic for. In short, no passion.

And it's not like I haven't been trying to recapture passion for a long time. Oh, I've been a good little soldier in the war on malaise. All the stuff you read in Carolyn Hax's column: "get involved in your community, meet new people, pursue new hobbies." Good lord, the number of people I've met and people I've been since I got back from Europe! I've been so open to newness and potential, but I still haven't encountered passion.

So? What's the problem with that? Most people don't have passion for what they do. Most people don't expect work to fulfill them. Look, I wish that I didn't demand to love my work. It would make life a lot easier if I could be okay with a white-collar cubicle job that has a certain measure of security and a decent atmosphere. It would make life a lot easier if I could be fine with being in a tolerable, if mediocre situation. If I could just shut up and be thankful for what I have, which, let's face it, ain't that awful. I've had awful; this ain't it.

But look, you have to get passion from somewhere. I no longer expect somebody else to provide it for me. Honestly, I never really did. You count on someone else to make you happy, you're inevitably going to be disappointed. They let you down, they go away, circumstances get in the way of good intentions. Work-- that's something I can control at least a little bit. With work, I am in some capacity capable of making myself happy. I can hear a voice (my mother's) saying it's childish and naive to expect so much from work, but I know that there are people who, even if they have bad days, genuinely love what they do for a living. I look at these people and think "and why not me?" Expecting so much is one of my most endearing and most obnoxious traits.

Historically, I've been really good at making Big Life Changes. I didn't hesitate for a second to move across the country for college and the happiest I've ever been was when I quit my job and backpacked. I'm not scared to change course and take risks, in large part because I have a really good safety net. At the same time, I don't take unnecessary leaps. I never pursued a childhood dream job because I knew I didn't have it in me to succeed at it. I'm a Nazi about paying off my credit card in full. I balance risk with reward, but once I determine to take a course of action I go at it.

If I had really big cojones, I'd leave this job that makes me miserable, wait tables and pursue a new goal that I've just begun to articulate. It's a big reach, huge competition, low pay and impractical for many reasons. It's scary to admit that I want something extraordinary. Saying it out loud, even to people who are nothing but supportive, means that it's documented that I want something I may not get. I've defined a goal that I might not reach and that makes me vulnerable. And there is nothing I hate more than being vulnerable. Well, except for people who use the phrase "grown as a person." They make me BONKERS.

But oh my God, does it feel good to have a goal again! And I really think I might be good at this new idea. Maybe good enough to someday make a living from it. I know the odds of success at it, but I also know that there are plenty of people who make it work for them. I look at those people and think "and why not me?" I hope that I am always able to look at this scenario and see opportunity, not overwhelming obstacles.

One Augustiner-soaked night in Munich, I wrote this in my travel journal: "The world is bigger than I'd ever imagined, but also infinitely more manageable than I'd been taught."

Clichés are such because they have truth in them.

This entry will so fuck with my Sitemeter

"Aaron Carter"

"Boy frosting"

"Hawaiian Donkey Punch"

"Michael Clarke Duncan"

"Naked lap dances"



Since I'm too lazy to write a regular post, try to guess the category that all these team names came from during Quizzo last night.

pants, not yelling

On the Red Line during this morning's commute: a group of Roe v. Wade protestors, complete with a little boy hoisting a "Would You Abort Me?" cardboard sign. Because nothing says "family-friendly vacation" like "bitter, divisive political demonstrations at the Supreme Court." It's Disneyland for the loud and socially conservative!

On the New York City subway yesterday: No Pants 2K6. Improv actors riding from Brooklyn sans pantalon.


I so live in the wrong town.

Johnny Lingo Day

I absolutely believe in signs.

Not necessarily booming voices from the sky or grilled cheese sandwhiches bearing the images of saints. But I do sincerely believe that the universe is capable of registering its approval or disapproval for a course of action one has decided. Have you ever been walking down the street feeling full of yourself, practically prancing with self-importance from acing a tough assignment or looking especially good, only to trip over something you didn't see because you were strutting? That's the universe telling you chill out; you're not THAT great.

Walking to yet another first date last night, I decided that if this one didn't go well, I was done for a while. After Snooty French Guy, Alcoholic Guy, Only Talked About His Marathons Guy, Homophobic Episcopalian Minister's Son Guy, Insane Tattoo Guy and the rest of them, I'm. Just. Tired. I simply cannot have any more boring first date conversations with strangers. It never leads anywhere and I don't see my friends enough as it is. I'd much rather hang out with them than some random dude who has the potential to turn out to be a huge troll.

"But EJ," you say, "couldn't he also turn out to be a fascinating, kind, brilliant individual whom you would wish to date for long periods of time and have phenomenal sex with?"

Touche, dear reader. Perhaps you are right. Still, it's time to start focusing on the "have realistic expectations" part of my New Year's resolution, not the "keep eyes open for something extraordinary" part. The latter should be merely a reminder, while the former is an operating philosophy.

So, as I'd somewhat expected, last night was a bust. I can deal with a Bush administration employee, a guy who isn't over his ex and a guy who is still shell-shocked from Katrina. However, the combination of all three traits in one individual is too much for me. Thank you, I'm sure you're a good guy, but no. Nonononono.

I woke up about 8:30 this morning, freakishly early for EJ on a Saturday, filled with a renewed sense of purpose. Do I clean my car, which I've been putting off for about a year? Do I finally finish reading Sense and Sensibility? Do I go to Eastern Market in my fuzzy new purple fleece and buy overpriced organic vegetables for an exotic homemade dinner?

I never wake up with energy, especially so early, and was a little freaked out. I surfed channels for a bit to warm up to the day and HOLY CRAP. There it was on one of my kejillion movie channels: The Legend of Johnny Lingo.

Johnny Lingo was legendary at my high school. They would announce Johnny Lingo Day over the PA system with the kind of gleeful voice that's usually reserved for announcing state football championships. Johnny Lingo is a really goofy Mormon-financed movie about Johnny Lingo, the greatest trader in the South Pacific. He leaves his island to go make his fortune, but first promises that he will come back for Mahana, the plain and poor girl who nobody wants to marry. When he does come back, he is rich beyond anyone on the island and he pays EIGHT COWS to marry Mahana. Suddenly *POOF* Mahana brushes her hair and smiles, and she's GORGEOUS.

Every student had to take a state-mandated health and well-being class as sophomores, and every class watched Johnny Lingo. Since it was one of the few universal experiences for every student in that enormous suburban warehouse, it attained a legendary status, even though the acting is beyond wooden and the production values are comparable to the home movie versions of fairy tales my cousin Katherine rewrites so that her largely stationary infant daughter plays all the main roles. Johnny Lingo is supposed to be all about self-esteem and having inner strength and goodness, and in turn bringing out the best in others by having faith in them.

This morning, watching this movie with twentysomething eyes, I could not BELIEVE that they showed this crap to teenagers. Basically, it's saying that Mahana needs a man to believe in her in order to bring out her inner strength and beauty. But what would she have done if Johnny Lingo had met a hotter island girl while trading seashells, or gotten eaten by a shark on the open seas? Was she just supposed to sit around and wait for a guy to give her father a bunch of cows before she got her shit together? If they really wanted to have an inspirational movie, maybe Mahana could have gotten off her ass, caught some fish and run a goddamned comb through her hair while Johnny was off sailing (and do not even get me started on the idea of navigating the Pacific Ocean in THAT handmade canoe).

Like eighty percent of what I learned in high school, Johnny Lingo is irrelevant bollocks. What are the odds that it would be on TV this morning, this one morning that I happened to be awake before noon, after making a resolution to myself? Signs, dear reader. Universe is full of them.

And damn if I'm waiting around for someone to pay eight cows for me.

C'est aujourd'hui grand fete

One of my favorite not-so-secret sites to check is Salon.com's Daily Download. It always delights me when I see a guilty favorite of mine (The Bacon Brothers, anyone?) being given love by the highbrow folks over at Salon, and it's a really good way to get free music I've never heard before. I used to download a lot of stuff from Pitchfork and Stereogum, but now they basically carry the exact same music, and are on such a neverending quest to out-hipster one another that when I browse them I feel as though an invisible electronic hand will soon tap my shoulder, whispering "and who let you in here?"

But Salon is great. All of the loony Swedish folk music with none of the early-High Fidelity tedium. Might I recommend Keith Murphy "C'est Aujourd'hui Grande Fête?" Really a lovely choice for a sunny January weekend that will reach 65 degrees.

C'est aujourd'hui grand fete on prendra bien un coup/D'avoir
une maitresse qui boit de ce bon vin le soir et le matin

Allons se promener avec celle qu'on aime/On s'assoit sur l'arbette
pour ecouter chanter le rossignol d'ete

Ce joli chant d'oiseau nous invite la belle/A parler d'amourettes
a l'ombre du hameau il n'y a rien d'aussi beau

A quoi pense-tu donc, tu pense au mariage/Tu crois prendre une femme pour etre
ton support mais tu te ferras tort

C'est aujourd'hui grand fete on prendra bien un coup/D'avoir une maitresse qui boit de ce bon vin le soir et le matin

I have no idea what it means (something about a waitress?), but doesn't everything sound better in French?

esprit de l'escalier

It was great seeing you all at Mackey's last night! Alas, I don't have any pictures (stupid camera with its 13-second shutter delay), but from my view it appeared as though a good time was had by all. Special thanks to Kathryn for organizing!

I ran into someone on the Metro the other night who I'm not a huge fan of. Frankly, he's not that huge a fan of me either, but we have a lot of friends in common and so play nice. As we were waiting for the Green Line he mentioned that he heard I was blogging a lot lately.

"No more than usual," I replied.

"But you like it?" he asked. "You enjoy strangers reading your thoughts?" He has one of those Secret Jobs We Don't Talk About and is very good at propelling conversations away from himself. If you're not careful, you'll wind up telling this guy your life story and never learn anything about him. He also has a way of making benign things seem somehow icky.

"I suppose so," I said. I was not in the mood to play ball.

"Well, I gotta ask," he said, "why don't you just keep a journal? Why put it all out there where it can get you in trouble?"

I gave my stock, self-depricating answer: "Narcissism, of course."

What I really should have said was "Because I never would have met all these really cool, brave, witty, smart people if I was just writing for myself. They're an incredibly fun and welcoming group of writers and I learn from them and am inspired by them. And I feel very lucky that I'm able to call them friends."

Esprit de l'escalier, kids. Use it in a sentence today. And thanks for a great time!

l'chaim?/!

Question of the Day:

So Eric and I are throwing ourselves a Bar/Bat Mitzvah for our mutual birthday party. We are both WASPs; this is a celebration of both Ironic Judaism (so hot for 2006) and the fact that we spent way too many weekends as middle schoolers drinking mocktails and doing the limbo as our peers became men and women, while we languished in Protestant childhood.

But I digress. So, is this cake



a) tasteless/tacky/how could you possibly eat a Torah-shaped confection at your birthday party?
b) fabulous/tacky/you MUST eat a Torah-shaped confection at your birthday party!

weekend by numbers

60- Total dollars spent in Ironic Urban Bowling at Lucky Strike on Friday. Don't get me wrong, it was a lot of fun. Bowling always is. However, I can enjoy non-ironic suburban bowling just as much. I do not require plasma TV screens showing scenes from A Clockwork Orange above my pins, as if to calm the delicate hipster nerves: "It's okay to bowl! See Alex de Large? He makes this ironic, and you're still cool."

24- Years old Miss Becky is today. Happy Birthday, Miss Becky!

27- Excellent "Becky as a child" stories we heard from Robin, her mother, at dinner last night. As a small child, Becky was in a dance recital where her partner had to keep kicking her to make her dance, because all she wanted to do was stand on stage in her fluffy pink tutu and sing along to the song ("Somewhere Out There" from An American Tail, in case you were wondering).

1- Number of moms who made it to last call at St. Ex last night. Robin is the wind beneath my wings. She was awesome. My mom would have had four cosmopolitans, done the White Man's Overbite in the middle of the floor and punked out by midnight. Well done, Robin. I salute you.

3- Times I was forced to rebuff "Marc" while his cute friend, who was so much more my type, lingered in the background. This is a situation I have never really mastered-- what do you do when the guy you actually want to talk to is the buddy of the guy who incessantly hits on you? Common sense says to just leave them both behind, since the guy you like is not going to step all over his buddy once he's "staked his claim" (unless it's one of those really nasty pissing-contest-type situations wherein you are not so much a person to be talked to or even a hot girl to pick up but a faceless prize in a neverending competition that has nothing to do with you). But it still sucks-- the other guy was totally my type. Tall, thinnish but not skinny, white, with cute but not overly precious glasses. I so go for that.

2- Rank of the line "So, are you a gold digga?" on my List of Top Five Lame Pickup Lines.

78- Dollars spend on as-yet-unidentified part for my car. Necessary, though, after:

1- Flat tires and spectacular wipeouts in Chinatown on Friday night. It's been a long week. I really could have done without that.

1- Number of Big Important Things I'm Not Supposed to Know I accidentally discovered on Friday. No, I'm not writing about it in more detail than that. The people involved have specifically said "don't blog about this."

2- Number of really melodramatic, slightly drunk, entirely self-pitying blog posts I wrote and somehow had the sense to keep in Draft mode.

97- Imagined percentage of the film budget for Tommy that was spent on mind-altering substances. I'm watching that movie as I type this entry, and My. God. In. Heaven. What were these people on???? It's noon on a sunny Sunday, I'm not even a touch hungover and I'm freaking out. And we haven't even gotten to the part where Tommy starts playing pinball, much less the part where Ann-Margaret starts rolling around in the baked beans that shoot out of the broken television. I think I'm going to go read some Jane Austen in Eastern Market just to chill out a little. Wait, is that Jack Nicholson? And is he singing? AM I REALLY HERE? IS THIS REALLY HAPPENING??

First rule about Half-Pint is that we don't TALK about Half-Pint

I so love that Netflix's Top Recommendations to me (based on movies I've watched and that are in my queue) are:

1) Little House on the Prairie, Season Three

2) Fight Club

emily's reasons why she's having an extra glass of wine tonight

EJ: don't you just want to CUT every woman on TBS tonight
Jen: cut them deep.
EJ: i am exercising my right to be in a foul mood tonight
EJ: all day long i've wanted to kick other people
EJ: i wanted to kick this girl was walking outside union station with ugg boots under her suit
Jen: perfectly reasonable
EJ: and then i wanted to kick the girl behind her because her shoes were better than mine
Jen: it's all about shoes with you today
EJ: oh no, i've wanted to kick people for lots of reasons
EJ: i wanted to kick this woman for holding up the line at the metro escalator
EJ: and then i realized she was blind
EJ: and i wanted to kick myself for being a bitch
Jen: you're going to hell.
EJ: and i wanted to kick the girl who i followed to her car in the crowded harris teeter parking lot who then waved me off and SAT IN HER CAR ON HER CELL PHONE
EJ: and i wanted to kick [name redacted for dooce-related reasons] for being a [vile epithets and graphic name-calling, ibid.]
EJ: and i wanted to kick the cat i'm cat-sitting for because he has a freakishly prominent spinal cord and a really annoying meow
EJ: and i wanted to kick mom for not having her cell phone for the last 5 days
EJ: man, this feels really good
Jen: i'm glad for you
EJ: and i ALWAYS want to kick daisy
Jen: every day.
EJ: that cunt
EJ: oh, and i want to kick heather graham for having a sucky show that is a pg-rated wannabe sex and the city that MAKES ALL SINGLE GIRLS WHO COME HOME FROM A CRAPPY DAY AT WORK WITH THEIR GROCERY BAGS TO BE GREETED ONLY BY THEIR CATS FEEL LIKE THE MOST TRAGIC CLICHE EVER
Jen: oh, em
Jen: things are not that tragic
Jen: you have to try really hard to be "Heather Graham's reason's why not" tragic
EJ: no, i'm just having a woe-is-me day
Jen: to which you are entitled
EJ: better to bring out the big guns of crap single-girl-in-the-city TV and get it all out at once
EJ: by the way, i'm blogging this

why on this night do we finally realize life is pretty damn good after all?

I had one of those nights last night where it's made clear that God, or whatever happens to frolic in the sky and play with our silly mortal lives, is still at least a little bit on my side. That despite the baby spit-up and jogging fall that left me scraped and bruised and a work situation that makes me want to staple things to my head (or maybe someone else's head), that I'm actually really lucky. Some twentysomethings stumble through life without being part of an Urban Family. I have two. What did I do to deserve such excellent friends? Because I want to keep on doing it.

Plans for the Birthday Bar Mitzvah are coming along swimmingly. Hold February 11 for all semi-tasteless festivities. L'chaim!

like pollyanna, only with mild profanity

The Lord giveth: I have an interview I'm very excited for on Monday.

The Lord taketh away: Riding the Red Line while running work errands this afternoon, a baby spit up on me.

But I brought GYM CLOTHES today. HAH. Didn't see that one coming, did you, you all-knowing smartass? Gym clothes, as in "I get to wear a 'GW Football: Undefeated' t-shirt and pilly black running pants for the rest of the day and my boss can't say anything about it." See? I WILL find some good in this divine attempt to wreck my afternoon.

And though I will no doubt be visited by a plague of locusts or be enslaved by the Egyptians for my heresy, here's my response to God for attempting to overshadow the best news I've gotten all week: NYAH-NYAH-NYAH-NYAH-NYAH.

God, you cannot barf on my parade.

a slightly delayed but entirely serious christmas wish

Dear Internet,

Please help me find a new job. Preferably one that does not involve nudity or personality cults. Thank you!

Your friend,

EJ

the obligatory year in review post, 2005 edition

January: I begin the New Year with a vicious hangover left over from the most disastrous date of my life on December 30. I vow never to drink again, a vow that lasts for six days. Having quit my job over in November, I desperately search for my replacement. I find her. I buy a ticket to Rome. I make out with a stranger who reminds me so much of my high school boyfriend that I call him "Sean" the entire time.
Song: "Twentysomething," Jamie Cullum

February: I celebrate my twenty-third birthday with friends from high school, college and real life. I go home, where my mother tries to convince me that backpacking through Europe by myself is not wise. She fails. I fly to Rome. I eat lots of pasta, drink lots of red wine and absinthe, see countless cathedrals and priceless works of art. I get really homesick while doing laundry in an old monastery in Verona. I go to Austria, where I switch to Steigl, injure my knee hiking and meet some really cool Americans who also know all the words to The Sound of Music. I see both the Vienna Opera and The Killers in an abandoned industrial slaughterhouse in a 24-hour period. I go to Prague, get a massive black eye and decide I do not care for Eastern Europe.
Song: "Indie Rock and Roll" The Killers

March: I fall in love with Munich and consider staying forever. I make myself leave Munich, go to Denmark and decide to keep traveling after all. My money runs low and I eat nothing but rolls, doner kebabs and beer for eight days. I visit the Van Gogh Museum on a space cake trip and somehow wind up modeling necklaces for a crowd of Japanese tourists at the nearby diamond museum. I do impolite things in a park with Jan the Flying Dutchman. I celebrate St. Patrick's Day in Ireland, wander around Paris with my mother and watching the sunset over the Mediterranean in Barcelona. I get repeatedly pickpocketed and robbed, and eventually decide to not let myself get too freaked out because how often does one get to backpack Europe?
Song: "Transatlanticism," Death Cab for Cutie

April: I return home to Washington with a bag full of filthy hiking socks and the kind of hangover that destroys empires. I catch up with friends and discover that not a whole lot has changed since I left, but that I am a totally different person. I temp at my roommate's firm, look for a full-time job, discover the Nats and suddenly find myself in A Relationship. I start EJ Takes Life.
Song: "I'd Rather Dance" Kings of Convenience

May: The Urban Family goes to New Orleans. We dance to great music, consume shocking amounts of Hurricanes and have no idea how lucky we are to see her as she was. I watch Tom Cruise go batshit crazy on Oprah, blog about it and get a job blogging about TV. I visit my Boston relatives, bond with the children of my cousins and realize it's not so much that my aunt hates me but that she has no idea what to do with me. I get a job. I quit the blogging on TV gig.
Song: "Feeding the Angels" Lori McKenna

June: I become a working stiff. I see a ton of concerts with the guy who is my now my boyfriend. I have a giant fight with one of my roommates that was a long time coming and decide to move out.
Song: "Fire, Fire" M.I.A

July: I move to my fabulous new place and it's for the best for everyone. It gets motherfucking hot. My boyfriend and I go to Michigan to meet my family and he dumps me a week after we get home. I get very, very angry.
Song: "Passionate Kisses" Mary Chapin Carpenter

August: I start playing kickball. I adopt Sadie. I audition for a play and they actually cast me. I get promoted. Even though I'm buzzing with activity, I feel far more lonely than when I was alone on a continent where I didn't know a soul. Hurricane Katrina hits and I actually stop thinking about myself for five minutes.
Song: "Vienna" Billy Joel

September: I start classes for my masters in history and quickly decide I don't want a masters in history, at least not from this university. I start to date the first in a series of ludicrously lame guys. I barely see all my old friends because I spend every night studying, dating lame guys or singing show tunes with strangers.
Song: "Everyone's a VIP To Someone" The Go! Team

October: I stalk movie stars in my neighborhood and by the office. No one gets my Halloween costume, but they all appreciate the cat ears. My mother and I have one of our New York weekends. We see shows, walk scores of blocks and I'm reminded just how lucky I am to have been raised by her and my father. I freak out about having a sex scene and finally get over myself.
Song: "Sun and Moon" Mae

November: The show opens. The show rocks. I have my personal second-best performance of my life the night all my college friends come. The show eats the entire month, save Thanksgiving in central Michigan with some of the more migrane-inducing individuals in our family and a Lutheran bridal shower. Out of nowhere, work suddenly gets really, really bad. I meet a whole bunch of DC bloggers, and they all rawk.
Song: "Company" Stephen Sondheim

December: I start looking for another job. I write a really mediocre paper and finally understand I'm not ready to be in school just yet. Jen visits DC and we agree that, obnoxiously enough, our mother was right when she said that a sister will get you like nobody else can. I go to our cabin for Christmas and do absolutely nothing for seven days. Our family celebrates the wedding of a dear friend (who happens to be two years younger than me) and I watch her pledge her life to someone with such silly tenderness it brings tears to my cynical eyes that have seen too much this year. I promise to myself that in the New Year I will have realistic expectations about my career, friends and men, but that I will keep my eyes open for all things extraordinary.
Song: "Come On! Let's Boogey to the Elf Dance!" Sufjan Stevens

Happy New Year, friends.

smelt party

"Well," Marie says, pushing the sleeves of her red and white snowflake sweater to her elbows, "Tom and I met right after I left the convent."

The entire room cracks up. We're Up North, hosting a Boxing Day dinner party for our neighbors and their families. Ten of us are gathered around the fireplace with plates full of chicken gruyere gratin and chocolate fondue. Jen and I are by far the youngest but are practically falling off our chairs laughing as the room full of Boomers exchanges "How-We-Met stories." It doesn't hurt that the assembled group has gone through about five bottles of Toasted Head by this point.

"I hadn't gotten my dispensation from Rome yet," Marie continues, "and so I was still technically a nun! I got a grant to go to Wayne State University, and I joined the Newman Center there-- you know, the Catholic student group on campus? Well, one day one of the fellows there says to me, he says, 'Marie, we went fishing the other day and we caught all this smelt! You should come over and we'll have a smelt party!"

This is greeted with actual cackling. "A 'smelt party?'" Jenny hoots. "Don't think I've heard that line before."

"So I go to the guy's house for the smelt party," Marie continues-- apparently, smelt parties are actual events that people have attended and whose existence they have not questioned-- "and so I'm in the kitchen, and I just smell awful, like fish guts and boiling water." She waves her fondue fork in the air for added emphasis. "I mean, I just smelled hideous. And then I see this guy walk in, with this gorgeous, DISARMING redhead on his arm."

Tom rolls his eyes and smiles the kind of grimace that can only be directed at one’s partner of thirty-plus years. “I mean gorgeous!” Marie emphasizes. “And so we chatted, but I didn’t think a whole lot of it. But then I went to another party a month later and in he walks. With the same disarming redhead!”

My mother laughs so heartily she rocks back and forth on the ottoman. “Woot!” she laughs. “Love at first sight!”

“But at that party everyone was dancing!” Marie’s eyes are wide as she gets to the juicy part. “And so I found myself dancing with him. And Tom says, he says ‘how is a girl like you not married yet?”

“Well,” our neighbor Debbie interjects, “you had a hell of an excuse.”

Marie grins. She’s really getting to the fun stuff now. “Well I tell him I just haven’t met the right man yet. So he says ‘mark my words, you’ll be married in a year.’ And I swear, I didn’t say it but I thought to myself ‘And I’ll be married to YOU!’”

“So we go out for our first date, and Tom takes me to a movie and the whole time he’s trying to touch me or hug me and I’m just—“ Marie pushes an imaginary twentysomething Tom away with her hands. “He had this little red Carmen Ghia, and I would just shrink into the corner of the seat, because, well, I was still a nun! As long as I hadn’t gotten my dispensation I was still held to my vows.”

“Well, about a month later I finally got my dispensation from Rome. They released me from my vows. Of course it was all in Latin and I couldn’t read it, but I knew what it said. At the time I was living on the Wayne State campus with another girl; she was studying to be a nurse. And the day I got that letter I told her: ‘Get out.’ I told her, ‘just get on out of here tonight!” So Tom came over for dinner that night and I put the certificate on his plate—and Tom can read Latin, so he picked up the paper, looked it over, and then he came over and picked me up—“ Marie mimes scooping her arms in the air “—and kissed me!”

She looks over at Tom, who is folded into the armchair across the room. He lifts his glass ever so slightly and quietly nods. “And,” she finishes, “we were married six months later.”

We all sit for a moment, enjoying the lingering scent of the story. Then my father speaks up: “So what happened to the redhead?” My dad has a thing for redheads. A condition of my parents’ marriage is that he gets to openly lust after Ann-Margaret.

Marie mock-questioningly looks over at Tom. “Oh honey, didn’t she get drunk and throw up in your car?” For a former nun, Marie is damn sly even thirty-nine years after that particular triumph.

“Yup, honey.” Tom clearly does not relish that memory so much as Marie.

Everyone laughs the fireside laugh of congenial, wine-toasted Midwestern friends. And as I look at Tom and Marie, sitting across the room but still dancing together, I have something wonderful to aspire to.

Comfort and joy

Mom: Do you know why Santa is always so jolly?

EJ/Jen/Dad: No, why?

Mom: Because he knows where all the NAUGHTY girls live.


Merry Christmas, kids.

the past is blasting all over my inbox

If you put the hours together, I have spent more time with online friendship networks than with my biological family in the last year. Friendster is increasingly passe, and I refuse to go on MySpace (ostentiably because it's owned by Rupert Murdoch but really because I have no more space for passwords left in my head), but Facebook sucks up insane amounts of my days. My use has tapered considerably since the signup frenzy of last year, when my alma mater finally got on the network and ninety percent of the university and alumni spent months building their collections of names, but it's still something I regularly visit.

This morning my Gmail contained a surprising email from Facebook: "Brenda Carp has listed you as a friend" (pseudonym, obviously) (but not THAT far off). If it had been my middle school in Mean Girls, Brenda was Regina George. She was my best friend until seventh grade, when she suddenly decided to spread nasty rumors about me, turn all our friends against me and generally make life as a 13-year-old girl a nasty hell (cuz y'know, it's not like that already). Nothing terribly shocking-- writing things in magic marker on my face when I fell asleep at slumber parties, smashing an egg in my face at her birthday lunch, but hurtful and cruel nonetheless.

But the really fun part is that she never got over it. Even after we went to separate high schools, I stopped being quite SUCH an enormous dork and we were supposed to have grown up, she still enjoyed the occasional nasty action or comment designed to poke me in my most vulnerable spot. When I ran into her at her high school's play, she saw made sure I saw her pointing at me and giggling in a corner with her best friend before sitting in front of us during the show, constantly turning around to look at me and then whip around, still laughing. I later found out that she had just hooked up with a boy I went out with freshman year who dumped me because I wouldn't give him a blow job. This girl could have taught Donald Rumsfeld a LOT about psychological warfare.

Over the years, I haven't really thought about her-- that is, until this morning, when I got that Facebook message. I clicked to her profile. She sounds happy. She has a lot of friends. She's still pretty. I want to think "good for her."

Nope, can't make myself think that just yet. Apparently old habits die hard.

I'm deleting the email and her request. I may not actively wish her ill, but what's the point of opening up that door again? Almost all women I know have someone like that in their lives, who no matter how far you travel and how much you grow up, can still get under your skin. A lot of the men do too, though they're far less likely to talk about it. Sometimes it's an ex, sometimes a parent, sometimes a colleague. For me, all these years later, it's Brenda.

This email triggered an idea, though. Something I've been kicking around for a while, and I think I'm going to try to organize it. Stay tuned, because I'll need your help and participation. For now, let's just say that I have an idea for a way we can look back and smile at the things we once wrung our hands over.

and it's all because of the interweb

I so adore how out of everything I've done in the last six months, my boss singled out my ability to quickly find the phone number for the Talbots in Georgetown for special praise.

Really, I'm touched.

Oh and also, I handed in my final paper. Let's just say this this marks the third time I have now included Paris Hilton in a paper during my nascent academic career. But really, when one is writing on the irrelevance of quality categorization in contemporary popular culture, there really couldn't be a better example to cite.

Oh Lordy, I am so ready for Christmas.

silent night?

This is the problem with not blogging for a long time: there is too damn much going on to be organized into a coherent post. Writing feels like when I go to bed at 2 AM on a Tuesday without first taking a Tylenol PM; a million unconnected thoughts running through my head. Errands I need to run, people I need to see, tasks to check off my list at work, did I double-book happy hour with Old Urban Family and New Urban Family, how long has it been since I've called my mother, wait, how long has it been since she's called me?

And so I present to you the last week, sans-panda, insomnia-style:

"Buy Gruyere, cheap reds, rotissere chickens and panko for holiday party. Find out what the hell panko is. VACUUM. BLEACH BATHROOM. Starting to smell like cat has died in toilet. Come to think of it, where is cat? Find catsitter for Christmas. Buy Christmas presents for parents, Grandfather and His Wife. Write paper. First actually read articles required for paper. How many pages does 3,000 words equal? Reschedule date with Tattoo Trent-- no time for dating until paper is done. What the hell was I thinking going out with someone who has THAT tattoo THERE? Do I tell my mother I'm at least dating just to get her off my back over holiday dinner? Do I then lie about details of how MET Tattoo Trent? Must remind Jenny not to spill beans. JENNY VISITING. Pick her up at Metro at 7:30 AM. Damn Northwest blackout times. JOB INTERVIEW. Print out resumes, clip packet, job description, firm info, question list. Thank-you note to interviewer. Oh god, interviewer graduated same year as me. This is discouraging and depressing. Speaking of, gynecologist visit immediately following. What do I think of switching birth control? How do explain to boss that have yet another doctor appointment when have claimed had two already this week, when actually was viewing panda and interviewing? Oh god, eighty-three new emails in four hours. I hate the Patriot Act and everyone who has ever touched it, written about it or voiced an opinion about it regardless of what they said. Why is this week above others insane at work? WHY is god's name does this publication HAVE to go out RIGHT NOW as opposed to three hours from now? K BIRTHDAY. At least get her a card, you awful, awful friend. CHRISMUKKAH. Cannot afford actual gift of alcohol-- would be OK to bring leftover office party Robert Mondavi cab sav to a kegger? Lovely, you want to bring the new girlfriend to Chrismukkah? Whatever, I guess thanks for checking in with me first. Holiday open house. Brokeback Mountain already sold out for two days? Duh, it's only in Dupont. Fandango for Saturday. BLEACH BATHROOM. Paper-- would my prof buy the argument that MacDonald is the academic equivalent of the guy who really liked Bloc Party until everyone else started listening to them and now he's full of poser disdain? Wonder if there is an academic equivalent of MisShapes or Last Night's Party? Am pretty sure Alan Dershowitz would DJ at it. CRAP, must again cancel on HH with Rem and S. Third time someone has-- look for new date in 2006. Gahh, 2006-- what's going on New Years? Are we still doing dinner and champagne somewhere? CRAP, rescheduled date with Tattoo Trent on night of Kisha's show. Must either blow him off AGAIN or blow off Kisha like accidentally did in New York. Wait, did Jenny get back home OK?"

Christmas break may be coming up, but exactly how can I get a vacation from my thoughts?

Panda-Monium!

We finally got to the National Zoo, and it was cold. Oh Lordy, it was cold. Thigh-chilling, nose-freezing, toe-numbing cold. This panda had better be DAMN cute.

We present our tickets, wait in the first of three lines and start to get excited. For six twentysomething professional women, we are regressing back to childhood really quickly. Something about playing hooky from work to go to the zoo will do that to you. We start comparing our favorite Disney movies. We start singing songs from them. I freak Libby out with my impersonation of Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty.

We finally get inside. We are literally skipping by this point. "We're gonna see the panda!" we sing. "Butterstick, Butterstick, Butterstick!"

So imagine our disappointment when the zookeeper tells us Butterstick just went down for a nap. Literally entered his enclosure as soon as we skipped in. We look over to the monitor and sure enough, there's his snoozing, fuzzy butt curled up in the corner. And so we pout.


Sarah and EJ are very sad that Butterstick won't come out to play.


Kim is also sad. Sarah is still sad. I'm not sure what's going on with Libby here, but I'm pretty sure she's also sad deep down.








We try to console ourselves with learning all about Butterstick and his family. Somebody brings up the even more sad fact that in two years, we will have to send this little guy back to China. "How exactly do you ship a panda?" Laila wonders out loud. "Yeah," Libby chimes in. "Is it boat? Plane? Can you FedEx a panda?"

"As long as it's not USPS," Kim adds.



As it turns out, it IS FedEx.











We met Zookeeper Mo, who told us the Zoo Secret-- that despite the hype, it's really quite easy to get tickets to see the pandas, especially when it's cold. Just show up at 11:00 and claim the no-show tickets. We thank him profusely, and I'd like to think our politeness inspired what happened next. A zookeeper decided that since we were such a nice, polite crowd, she would pick up the snoozing Butterstick and parade him across the enclosure for us!


EJ takes bad pictures, but in her defense, she was a little excited. Oh yeah, and she blames her camera, too.









I'm pretty willing to bet that if we had been pushy yuppy bitches they never would have taken him out, but apparently taking pictures with frowny faces did the trick. So the moral of the story is, pout and you'll get your way.

After The Stick's curtain call and subsequent curling up in a rock pit for yet another nap-- being that cute is CRIPPLINGLY exhausting-- Mama Mei Xiang was nice enough to stroll into the enclosure to check on her barking cub and knaw on some bamboo. Of course, she completely ignored us.



Mei Xiang cannot be bothered to entertain you. There is bamboo to be eaten. Take her photo if you must.




And so, pandas seen and lunch hour successfully frittered away, we skipped out of PandaWorld and went merrily on our way, panda-monium achieved!








The mood is markedly different. Butterstick is nature's upper for Kim, Sarah, Laila and EJ!

forest for the trees

Quoth the New York Times editorial board:

The price tag for protection against a Category 5 hurricane, which would involve not just stronger and higher levees but also new drainage canals and environmental restoration, would very likely run to well over $32 billion. That is a lot of money. But that starting point represents just 1.2 percent of this year's estimated $2.6 trillion in federal spending, which actually overstates the case, since the cost would be spread over many years. And it is barely one-third the cost of the $95 billion in tax cuts passed just last week by the House of Representatives.

Total allocations for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the war on terror have topped $300 billion. All that money has been appropriated as the cost of protecting the nation from terrorist attacks. But what was the worst possible case we fought to prevent?

Losing a major American city.

If Democrats do not use this properly in the coming elections cycles, I'm FedExing my stuffed donkey back to DNC headquarters. Say what you will about the duties of nation-building, the morality of abortion and the stickiness of charter schools. It really pales in comparison to letting a major American city rot while slashing taxes in large part to benefit the wealthiest one percent of Americans.*

*And before you get all persnickety, I know that most of the first three tax cuts passed were a) approved by Republicans AND Democrats and b) not the flagrantly elitist kind that usually gets my knickers in a twist (for example, the largest was to slow the expansion of the alternative income tax, a move that is merely SOMEWHAT flagrantly elitist). However, the cuts debated today are for $56 billion worth of cuts on dividends and capital gains which ARE flagrantly elitist and almost exclusively benefit the kind of people who did not need to rescued from their waterlogged homes by helicopter.

run! i see a FLAKE!

One of the (few) benefits of a northern Michigan upbringing is weather cred. I can't be all badass like the kids who actually grew up east of 8 Mile, but I DO get to make fun of Washingtonians who go apeshit at the first sign of snow. Quoth the NBC4 website:

"Storm Center4 meteorologist Tom Kierein said the storm is approaching from the west and could hit D.C. as early as 9 p.m. Thursday.

Some areas south of Washington will see a mix of snow and rain, Kierein said. But the area around the District could get anywhere from 2-4 inches of snow, mixed with rain. And Kierein said areas north of the city will see all snow and should expect anywhere from 3-6 inches.

A winter storm warning means severe winter weather conditions are expected. Significant amounts of snow are forecast that will make travel dangerous.

Officials say motorists should keep an extra flashlight, food and water inside vehicles in case of an emergency.

Thursday night's low will be about 25 degrees."

Twenty-five degrees?? THREE TO SIX INCHES IN THE NORTHERN SUBURBS?? Oh, THE HUMANITY.

Yeah, you could stock your car with food, a flare gun and a tire iron for beating away all the zombies emerging from the sewers as Hell freezes over. Or, y'know, you could just pilfer packets of hot cocoa from the office break room and put on a sweatshirt when you get home tonight.

After all, here in Washington we try our best to be levelheaded and not overreact to anything.

daisy wouldn't take life, either

Dear TBS,

No one wants to see Daisy Does America. The promotions for it are so unfunny that they actually make people squirm. Please inform Daisy and the Cox Arquettes that no one has made a "who let the dogs out" joke since spring 2001 and they weren't funny then. Is Daisy herself actually that bad, that millennium-era VH1-quality humor is the best she can muster, or is Courteney Cox Arquette actually that poor a producer?

Also, please stop running ads for this show during my PG-13 reruns of Sex and the City. It is NOT the perfect show to follow Sex and the City, and I resent your insinuations that Daisy's painful shtick is in any way comparable to the considerable talents of Sarah Jessica Parker. Based on what I've seen of Daisy, even Kristin Davis could eat that girl for breakfast with a side of quiche.

Moreover, I already watch this television program on HBO, where it is called Da Ali G Show and it is actually funny.

Oh, and please find some new films for rainy Sunday afternoons. We've all seen Stepmom approximately eleventy grillion times now.

Your friend,

EJ

no place like home for the holidays

i laughed, i cried, it was better than "cats"

It's a well-established fact that I'm a huge theater nerd. Not the "As I child I saw Phantom of the Opera with my parents and did a play in high school" kind of nerd. Oh nonononono, friends, I mean NERD. Specific to Rent, my nerdiness includes the receiving of a poster signed by the original cast for my fourteenth Christmas, countless hours of singing along with the cast album in the shower, car and various dorm rooms and finally, being SO EXCITED to see the touring company in Detroit that I completely forgot to buy anything for my mother's birthday because it was on the same day as the matinee we were attending and therefore my attention was entirely elsewhere.

You want more? OK, when I made my "Philosophical Self-Portrait" for senior year philosophy class, no less than three pages of the twenty-page work contained references to Rent, including an entire page with just the lyrics of "La Vie Boheme". Of course, in this class I also accompanied myself on the electric keyboard while singing Tori Amos' "Silent All These Years." That incident is one of the many reasons I will never attend a high school reunion.

So we saw the movie version of Rent last night, and I'm still trying to work out exactly how I feel about it. It was not the enormous disaster it could have been, that's for damn sure. There were some pleasant surprises (Rosario Dawson can sing!) and even some things that translated better on the screen than on stage(Jesse L. Martin's big cuddly grin!).

You know what it reminded me of? Paging through my high school yearbook. I did this over Thanksgiving, and even though high school isn't in the distant past just yet, it feels like light years ago. Browsing through glitter-pen decorated pages, I laughed (what was I thinking with that red hair?), I cried (was my stomach really once that flat?) and I winced a LOT (a girl on yearbook staff who didn't like me captioned a picture of me in The Music Man with "EJ conveys a look of superiority." Ouch).

Rent was the same way. I didn't want to get my expectations up, which was good. No matter how much I loved it on stage, it was bound to get a little muddied in translation to film. Changing song lyrics into dialogue, no matter how much the actors ignored the cadences they once sang, just sucks. Talk about cringing.

That flaw aside, it was still worth it. They used most of the original cast, who miraculously can still pass for 20somethings. There was no attempt to update it to the present, which, seeing how the Lower East Side is now littered with Starbucks and Alphabet City is as much a tourist stop at Lincoln Center, is a relief. The transitions between songs were awkward, but once they started singing it felt great. I'll even admit to crying during Angel's funeral, though I was really embarrassed about it and glad I'd worn my glasses as to better conceal any evidence.

What really freaked me out was watching the film and realizing what a yuppie I've become. Rent-free loft in New York? Do you KNOW what people would do for that? Shut up and film your damn friends after you shoot your "sell-out footage," you whiny kid. It's called A Day Job. Even Jonathan Larson waited tables and THEN went home to bitch about art and life. And ROGER-- CAN WE PLEASE DISCUSS HOW EXACTLY IT TAKES A YEAR TO WRITE THAT SONG? I know you're heartbroken and going through withdrawal and everything, but John Mayer could have pulled that song out of his ass in five minutes. I expected better, you sexy, sexy man. Finding myself sympathizing with Benny, the guy who's just trying to collect the rent from his old friends who are refusing to pay up, was a totally unexpected and unwelcome phenomenon.

But then, when I loved this show as a teenager, I didn't pay rent myself. Nor did I pay my phone bill, taxes, budget for Meow Mix and worry about balancing my career with a social life and if I should ever go back to school and should I pay off my Amex bill in entirety even if it means I have no cash for the rest of December? I was a misfit kid who loved a show about a bunch of misfit kids who found each other and held on tight, even as they made crap choices and didn't want to own the consequences. They didn't do anything well except love one another, and that part translated loud and clear onto the screen.

So it wasn't perfect. It's so strongly identified with a place and time, both as an extant show and in the minds of people who see it. You can't go home again, and I can no longer view a show about dilettantes without rolling my eyes a little and thinking "Get a job."

But I laughed, and I cried. And it was hella better than Cats.

on bloggers rocking

Blog Happy Hour last night was great! Thank you to the lovely hostesses for putting on such a great event, and especially to I-66 and KOB-- I-66 was the first DC blogger to ever comment here and KOB is the Godfather of this little sphere, so I have a special place in my cold stone heart for both of them. Good luck to Laura, who is running a fantastic charity that everyone should give money to, and who when I started ticking off her 2L classmates I know, shouted "Oh my God, you know every Jew at GW Law!" Yes Laura, that's probably true.

See, only other bloggers know what it's like to be a ho to your sitemeter, to willingly open up your personal life for public scrutiny and only a fellow blogger would understand why I had a twenty-minute conversation with the charming Heather B. about meeting Stephanie Klein. Other bloggers are the friendly extroverts who don't hesitate to introduce themselves with "Hi, I write Sharkbait!" them giggle a bit at the oddness yet clear practicality of introducing oneself by one's blog name. Furthermore, general consensus among Washington bloggers is that Jessica Cutler is a skank who serves absolutely no purpose and is generally the Ugg boot of women, thus illustrating the wit and wisdom of the DC blogger world.

D was good enough to come with me as a buffer guest at the beginning of the night, to help ease my nerves until the cocktails set in. Chatting with her and another girl whose sitename I sadly lost in a gimlet haze, she asked us why we blog. It was funny; for all the navel-gazing that goes on here I'd never really thought about it. "Well," I answered, "it's because I have to write. I just need to. Whether it's venting or documenting, I just need to write."

"So why don't you just keep a journal?" D asked.

The other girl and I looked at each other for a second and I looked back at D. "Narcissism. Honestly! People reading your writing feels great."

Well, it turns out that meeting those people was even greater. Thanks for a really fun night, all.

only GS-11s and above get the contaminated ecstasy tablets

B: working for the government is so strange...someone just brought me 2 glow sticks, 6 antimicrobial wipes, antibiotic ointment p ackets, and two handwarmers so that I could toss out the expired ones in my emergency kit....I'm just unsure if we are preparing for a terrorist attack or a night at velvet nation

EJ: HAHAHAHAHAHA

B: seriously

B: did I tell you one of the things in the emergency pack--along side the gas mask--is a maxi pad (yeah like the kind my grandma wore)

EJ: oh that is priceless

B: your tax dollars...taking care of any off-cycle days

EJ: and ironically, it would also come in handy for a night at velvet nation

hours of happiness

Blogger Happy Hour tonight!

Why am I nervous about this? I feel like I'm crashing another high school's prom. D articulated it at lunch today-- it's just so strange, the idea of meeting people whose lives you read about but who, let's face it, you don't know. Not bad, just strange. Uncharted waters, if you'll forgive the cliche.

Well, here's to smooth sailing. And cocktails. Here's to those, too.

all work and no play makes ej more than a little tense

Oh, the tingling nerve of it. The empty screen practically taunting me. "C'mon EJ!" it whispers. "No one will know! Vent! Let it all out! Your boss would never find it! No one else in your office would care! You go ahead and spew all the crap stored up inside you."

Oh Blogger, you foul temptress.

I will not blog about work. I will not blog about work. I will not blog about work. I will not blog about work. I will not blog about work.



Instead, I will say that standing in the Teet at 10:30 last night, after work, class and exhaling for the first time since I hit my snooze button that morning, I contemplated which pint of Ben and Jerry's would be my downfall. Two years, kids. That's how long it's been since I've induldged in that particular sin. More specifically, not since the week my thesis was due. There have been other ice creams, surely, but none with the caloric or emotional significance that comes with a pint of B&J.

It was a tough call between Fossil Fuel and Dublin Mudslide, but in the end I went with the former. The idea of something fueling was quite appealing, plus I was afraid that anything with a drop of alcohol would set me off on a whole other kind of binge.

I ate three-quarters of the pint curled up on my couch with Sadie kneading my stomach as if to say "Oooh goodie, more to play with," wondering when, exactly, it starts to get easier. Just when the things we work for finally fall into place after years of towing the line and working hard and playing by the rules.

My Dad said last night when I called for advice "At least you have the comfort of knowing you're doing everything right." That's lovely, but I'd prefer not to need that comfort at all.

disavowing all knowledge

What's that you say? There are two entries missing? Two entries that describe certain individuals in accurate-but-less-than-flattering terms?

There. Are you happy? I'm not. I don't particularly appreciate being censored, especially when the odds of said individuals stumbling across this site are comparable to odds of said individual's spouse leaving all money to Hillary for President 2008. Well, it wouldn't be the holiday season without carefully reasoned guilt that makes me feel like a petulant child.


And remember, DAD, I know when you're reading. It's called a "sitemeter." You are well advised not to return.

what i will do with all of my free time now that the show is done

* Really miss everyone from Company. You guys are so fantastic, and I had the best time working with you.

* See people again. I know, right? Such a novel concept.

* Actually do the reading for class before the day OF class.

* Write a 3000-word paper entitled "In Defense of the Middlebrow." Remind me again why I'm not doing this full-time?

* Host my office holiday party.

* Spend an overlarge amount of time scouring www.epicurious.com for ambitious recipes for said office holiday party.

* End up beating head into wall after two hours of buttering ramekins for individual chocolate molten cakes while simultaneously vacuuming stray cat hairs, wondering why ever agreed to host said office holiday party.

* Go back to Michigan to eat turkey, banter with extended family members, throw a bridal shower and see Garrison Keillor.

* See Rent, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Walk the Line, The Family Stone, Brokeback Mountain, Memoirs of a Geisha, Capote, Good Night and Good Luck and Pride and Prejudice.

* Figure how the hell my new TiVo hooks up.

* Read Are Men Necessary? and bitch about Maureen Dowd to all my girlfriends while being secretly afraid that she may be right.

* Renegotiate my salary.

* Make full use of my gym membership.

* Sleep.

* Audition for another show? I know, right?

directions

We're standing outside the classroom, waiting for the Italian 001 students to finish their vocab drills. I am fervently grateful not to be among their ranks; Italian killed my GPA. Without Italian I would have graduated summa, and it's not like learning to say "the pasta is very good" helped me when I was lost in Verona and desperately needed to get a cab to the train station before the 9:34 AM train to Innsbruck.

The other students are chatting about what classes they're taking next semester. M, the thoroughly nice guy who asked me out earlier this year but I turned down because my main college relationship taught me never to date a man who wears jeans with embroidered decals, asks me what I'm taking.

"Nothing as of now," I croak. Despite a paycheck's worth of Halls, the Death hasn't really left me yet. "I'm not technically a grad student."

Two other people look over at us. "I mean," I add, "I'm just taking this class because my job gives me great tuition benefits. I'm not a masters candidate."

"Really," he says. "Why not?"

I hesitate. It's complicated. "I just... now isn't really... I'm just not sure yet."

M shakes his head and goes on talking with the other people. I refill my water bottle, and it's a good thing I did. When we finally get to go in the classroom and the discussion starts, I play a big part in it. I do most weeks. I'm really not bragging here, at least not intentionally; I would be incapable of of graduate-level (or undergrad-level) work in a lot of disciplines. I'm good in this class because I studied these topics really intensely in college and the format of the class is very open-ended and free, a style that really suits me.

I get a lot out of it, too. Even though I bitch about the reading and often don't give it the attention it deserves, I always leave class with a million different thoughts bouncing around my brain, running in all directions. I often also leave wondering why I'm not doing this full-time. I have the means to do it if I want to, though it would leave me with less financial freedom down the road. A masters would make me a more valuable employee, would give me more power in salary negotiations and help me find a better-paying job. More importantly, it would be hugely stimulating and rewarding. Beginning to become an expert in a field, to be slutty with academia and learning, would be a delicious experience. I know I'd be good at it, I don't have any doubt about that.

So why am I not doing it? Why am I not pursuing this? My current professor, who I studied with as an undergrad, almost refused to sign me up for this class. "EJ," he said, "why the hell do you want to stay here? Go to Yale, go to Harvard. Is there a good reason you're not getting a PhD?"

The reason, though I didn't tell him, is that I don't know if I'm capable of that level of scholarship. Right now, I'm not even capable of doing a practice GRE. It's easier to stay in this comfortable limbo, full of relatively secure finances and a crazy fun social life. For the first time, I'm in a job I enjoy and can support myself with. I'm the head of my household, and giving up work to be a full-time student, no matter how intellectually rewarding, would be a huge lifestyle change. I hate to think that my shallowness is the reason I'm not a grad student. I'd hate to think that it was kickball and happy hours and community theater and dating crazy French guys and crappy television that is keeping me from pursuring this.

Yet another part of me wonders if these are really such shallow things. These are all earned, this lifestyle maintained solely by my work. Despite all noble notions of higher education, that one goes to college to become an educated member of one's community, we also go to college so that we can begin careers that can support a lifestyle to which we become accustomed. This isn't shameful; it's a practical reality, and one that is a hell of a lot more satisfying than women fifty years ago were faced with. There's freedom in it, independence and control over one's future. I'm very big on all of those.

Plus, it's damn fun. Who knows what's in the future? Now is the time where we can spend disposable income on building our networks and our lives, where we just begin to reap the fruits of all our labors in college.

All this is on my mind throughout the class, which is excellent as usual. When we're done two hours later, M and I walk out chatting about possible topics for our final papers. I say goodbye to him at the bike rack and start walking towards the Metro when he calls out after me "Hey-- you did really well today."

Maybe he just said it because he still wants to get in my pants. Maybe he really meant it. I happen to think the latter. I go home from class, as usual, with a million things on my mind, spinning off into a million directions.

thank you much

Best. Show. Ever.

Thank you so much to my dear, dear friends. Seeing your faces after the show felt fantastic, and the flowers are oh so pretty.

Thank you to the enormous swell of people who came, forcing us to add extra chairs and hold the curtain while the ushers made sure we weren't violating fire code.

Thank you to whoever started applauding after my first scene. That's never happened before, and I had to bite my lip walking offstage to keep from grinning because it felt so damn good.

Thank you to tonight's entire fantastic audience, who totally made up for last night's far more tame group by laughing at everything that came out of our mouths. It's incredible the difference a strong, engaged audience makes.

Thank you to A for providing the classic A line "EJ, you've set the bar too high. I won't come and see you in any shit plays now." Having your support is great; being able to impress you is even better.

Thank you to the makers of Dayquil and Hall's Cough Drops for sponsoring my surprisingly resilient voice after four days of panicking and yodeling to keep my throat limber.

Thank you to the random woman in the parking lot who stopped me to say "You play dumb so well!"

Thank you, thank you a million times over. Tonight felt really good.

ripping jolly good time

I would like it noted for the record that I called Matthew Macfayden's stardom back in the fall of 2003, when I started watching reruns of MI-5 on BBC America during my thesis-induced insomnia phase. Yummmmm. Even with the silly Darcy wig they gave him for the new Pride and Prejudice, yummmm. How did this show never catch on the US? It's Alias meets 24 with accents, people!

I've been watching a lot more BBC America lately, in large part because I don't get home until 11:30 every night and there is only so much Family Guy a gal can watch in a week. Besides, Footballers Wives is FAR superior to Desperate Housewives and The OC. Old episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus inspire actual laughter, whereas I watch The Colbert Report and find myself thinking "This is funny. I should be laughing at this. Why I am I not yet laughing. This is funny, right?" And do not even get me started on BBC News versus all of American cable "news."

I've always been a bit of an Anglophile, but with this new habit of turning on BBC America, I'm taking it to a whole new level. What once was WASPishness could soon be replaced by lapsing into accents, a condition that has already been known to happen upon the consumption of multiple glasses of wine and group viewings of Sense and Sensibility. Yet beneath the references to places that end in "-shire" or "-heath," the basic premise for this new hobby easily translates into American English.

I used to make fun of my lovely old roommate for her devotion to General Hospital, but now I find myself PASSIONATELY worrying if Tanya actually did kill Jason and what the hell is going on with Chardonnay's hermaphrodite baby and OH SWEET MOSES I CANNOT BELIEVE HAZEL KEEPS HER HAIR THAT COLOR DOES SHE REALLY THINK SHE'S FOOLING ANYONE BECAUSE THAT COLOR IS NOT FOUND IN NATURE. And I realize that, despite the accents (which are often impenetrable as organic chemistry), I have become just another girl addicted to her soaps. It's only a matter of time before I start swatting my mewling cat out of my lap, yelling "I'll feed you after my stories!" Despite all attempts at self-delusion, the accents really don't make it highbrow, any more than a gigantic sequin-encrusted blazer and the strongest Botox in Manhattan make Susan Lucci look a day under seventy-three.

I still wish someone else I knew watched this stuff though, because I would really like to engage in a dialogue about the implications of the Muslim suicide bomber episode and whether by naming one's child "Chardonnay" you predestine her to a future career as a topless model. These are the issues that shape our world, people. Erasing international borders one fictional hermaphrodite baby at a time.

why i love my parents (technology)

From: Dadman

To: Offspring

Subject: another fine mess...

Once again, following in the footsteps of my kids, (who remain an inspiration to me) I have been cast to do a student film at U Michigan. From now on you can refer to me as Mr. Freidman - loving husand of Mrs. Freidman, who is suffering from some dread disease and he is dedicated to taking care of her - although (and this is the dramatic part !!!) it weighs heavily on him and he secretly feels over burdened by the situation.


And since my mother recently learned how to text message, I get at least two texts a day (three if she's at a conference and it's not yet happy hour). Highlights include:

"home bored paying bills wish was still at work"

"gross pt sooooo boring... waiting lalalala"

"u got camera ticket- 32 in 25 zone but dad paid it bc we dec. was horseshit"

backstage notes

One weekend down, two to go!

It went really well. A few tiny bobbles, of course-- dropped lines here, delayed sound cues there, a kiss so violent I nearly busted my upper lip open-- but overall, it went remarkably well. Great houses full of friends and family, and one really entertaining gay couple who sat in the front row of today's matinee and literally barked and hooted their enthusiastic laughter. My entire office and a bunch of friends showed up opening night, which was wonderful. I am so lucky to be so supported by these great people.

It's been a really long time since I felt the jangly nerves of opening night. I've blamed many of my flaws-- procrastinating, overreacting in relationships, analyzing meaningless comments and looks-- on being an actress, but when I'm actually performing I get a focus from nerves that I can't duplicate from anything else. It's an itchy energy, where it feels like ants are crawling on my veins and if I scratch with great diligence and attention they'll stop. When us girlfriends are backstage waiting for our cue in the opening number, doing our hushed disco-slam dancing to keep energy high, it's practically like a blood transfusion. The show seeps into me.

And when we storm out on the stage, the lack of sleep, the fact that I haven't seen my friends in a month and there's a layer of dust so thick on my bathroom floor that Sadie sneezes when she uses her litterbox and I have purchased and not cooked with an estimated $37 in vegetables that have since gone bad-- it is oh so very worth it.

Lessons from Final Tech Rehearsal

When your role in large part consists of making out with a fellow actor, it is probably not wise to consume an entire head of roasted garlic smeared on a baguette for lunch.

Just a thought.

putting my money where my pill is

Damnit. I didn't mind giving up Wal-Mart because I never shopped there anyways, but this one hurts.

AmericaBlog has a story on how a Missouri Target pharmacist refused to refill a birth control prescription for a 26-year-old woman. When contacted by Planned Parenthood, Target confirmed that it indeed permits individual pharmacists to refuse to dispense birth control and emergency contraception should it violate their personal religious beliefs.

I can't in good conscience give my business to a company that allows employees to discriminate and put women in harm's way on arbitrary whims. So, though it bums me out, no more Mossimo shrugs, Isaac Mizrahi shirts or Stuff by Duff home decor. I emailed Target's corporate website and strongly urge you to do the same by clicking here. Here's what I wrote; feel free to borrow all or any of it, but please write. They need to hear from smart, educated people telling them this is not OK.

Because of the recent disclosure that Target pharmacists may freely refuse to dispense birth control and emergency contraception, I will no longer be a Target customer.

I strongly believe that it is not a corporation's place to pass judgement on any sort on its customers. Target would not tolerate a white supremacist employee who refuses to help minority customers, nor a homophobic employee who refuses to serve gay or lesbian customers. Why then, may a employee refuse to serve a Target customer on religious grounds?

If Target wants to set a corporate policy to not dispense birth control or emergency contraception, that is its prerogative. Though I personally would disagree with such a directive and continue to shop elsewhere, a clear and defined company policy would be useful to the communities that Target serves. However, to allow individual employees to assert their personal beliefs on a whim is dangerous to customers. Women (and their partners) rely on these medications to preserve their health and their way of life. It is highly unethical for a pharmacist to aid in disrupting a cycle of medicine. It is dangerous to refuse to provide medical care to women who may or may not have been victims of sexual assault. It is highly irresponsible for Target to allow an environment where prescriptions may be filled one day only to be denied the next.

I am sorry that I will no longer be able to shop at Target. Until now, I have been pleased with the products offered and the services I have received at my local store. However, I cannot support a company that permits such a byzantine, discriminatory policy.

in comes "company!"

Usually, the week a show opens is filled with stress, sleep-deprivation, scratchy voices and general grouchiness. Our director for Wait Until Dark went through five bottles of Maalox during tech week. I still have nightmares about the cue-to-cue of Bye Bye Birdie, when I was stood terrified atop of a 4x4 fourteen-foot-tall platform for an hour as the lighting designer bickered with the conducter. More often than not, much of the cast is on "vocal rest," wherein we don't speak all day (including with colleagues, friends and significant others) we we can save our voices for the show. I can just imagine the look on my boss' face if I replied to his questions about trip preparations by handing him an index card reading "For the next three days I will not be speaking, as to rest my vocal chords for a theatrical production." Riiiiight.

Company has been remarkably free of these usual travails. We've been running the whole show for two weeks now, and so far tech has just been... fun! I cannot overemphasize how rare that is for this stage in the game, but it's true. Everyone's got their shit together, knows their characters inside out and is having a great time with the material and one another. Spirits are high, we're out of rehearsal at humane hours and we've annoyed many a neighbor in the Dupont/Logan Circle area by laughing too loudly over post-run drinks. The only sad part is that we won't still be working together in a month.

Last night was my favorite night of the whole process: sitzprobe and bows. Sitzprobe, though it sounds like something a German alien does to unsuspecting earthlings, is the first time the cast sings through the show with the orchestra. After working with just a rehearsal piano for two months, it's fantastic to hear bass and drums and winds added in-- the show takes on a whole new life. A lot of the music is very 70s, and that really came out for the first time last night. And of course curtain calls are always fun to plan-- hello, we're getting applauded! That never gets old. So come see us and applaud us!

The Foundry Players Present

Company

A Musical by Stephen Sondheim

November 4-6, 10-13, & 17-20, 2005
Thursday thru Saturday evenings at 8:00 PM
Sunday afternoons at 2:30 PM

Adults: $18 Seniors/Students: $15
Reservations: (202) 332-3454, or,
www.foundryplayers.org

The Foundry Players
1500 16th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036