Now I know...

...Spanish Harlem are not just pretty words to say...

I mean, I knew it before because Elton John told me so, but now I really know it for sure!


That's a convulted way of saying I'M IN NEW YORK! I'm at Garth's new place in Spanish Harlem (which I prefer to Washington Heights, but both are good names). The pigeons are plentiful, and to find him I need only follow the open-24-hours McDonalds. Good times.

Saw Cyrano de Bergerac with Kevin Kline and Jennifer Garner last night and enjoyed it muchly. My mommy's going to be very jealous, methinks.

Last blog entry of 2007! I hope everyone else has a fantastic New Year's Eve celebration. Mwah!

Happy Christmas!

Happy Christmas, all...I'm headed back to good ol' Newport News tomorrow, but just for a few days. Saturday I'm headed to DC to stay the night with my Michmouse and then Sunday it's off to the Dulles airport for NEW YORK! Yay!

I spent five days in Florida, a night and a morning in Newport News, and the past four-ish days in Richmond.

It's been crazy. I've had great fun with my family, but my GOD do I miss the gym! I can't wait for tomorrow.

Some pictures & such.

Grandma & I at the Yacht Club (aka Rich Old White People's Club).

Reunion! These are two of my best friends in the universe from about ages 11/12 through 16. Seventh grade, man...those were good times. We haven't seen each other since we left for college, pretty much. Audra's on the left, Brittany's on the right. And if you don't know who's in the middle, why are you reading this?

My sister got Beau a stuffed Chipmunk for Christmas. Pretty much the cutest thing ever.

We had Christmas lunch - a first for me (I think) - at Jim's mother's house. She lives on a farm on the Rappahannock river - so lovely. This is Gen, Jim's absolutely hilarious and fabulous sister who brought a giant bottle of delicious Zinfandel and some Trader Joe's treats. And that's her damn brother.

Mommy and me! Naturally, we are pretty much wasted, as it is already 1:30 in the afternoon.


And now I'm a happy puppy, because Home Alone is on. Good times.

Hope everyone's safe & happy!

Everything's gonna be fine, fine, fine...

Between the iTunes gift card my cousin Missy gave me for Christmas, VH1's "100 Greatest Songs of the '90's," red wine, and...well, iTunes, I just bought a shitload of music.


First, the albums...

• Bob Dylan's Modern Times (I've been wanting this one since it freaking came out...I can't wait to hear my boyfriend's new sound)
• Bob Dylan's Another Side of Bob Dylan (The absolute last of his music from his early pre-motorcycle crash/love affair with Jesus years. It's kind of a scary notion that I'm about to plunge into the last of those depths. It makes me yearn for a time machine.)
• Alanis Morissette, Jagged Little Pill (I owned this on cassette tape, sucka. I remember absolutely falling in love with every word of this album, so I'm excited to re-visit the old love)

It's odd how I feel such a deep, often emotional connection with the random, generally-all-alike "alternative" music of the '90's. Yes, it was the decade of my childhood, but...I barely remember any details of my childhood! I guess I'm just destined to be in love with this music, even if I heard most of it at age 9 with no idea at all of what the lyrics meant (this mostly applies to any Salt n Pepa or TLC songs)

'90's guilty pleasures and old flames:

• Alanis Morissette, Uninvited (I don't care if I get judged for this one, I think it's a gorgeous song)
• Goo Goo Dolls, Iris
• Goo Goo Dolls, Slide
• Goo Goo Dolls, Black Balloon (okay, I actually stole this from Carol last year, but I never listen to it. So now it's on my new '90's playlist)
• Oasis, Wonderwall
• Oasis, Champagne Supernova
• REM, Stand
• REM, Losing My Religion
• REM, It's the End of the World (As We Know It)

90's songs I bought to run to so DON'T JUDGE ME...

• Madonna, Vogue
  
• Salt n Pepa, Shoop
• Salt n Pepa, Whatta Man

I also bought an embarrassing Black Eyed Peas song for the purposes of inspired running.

And some Sting/John Dowand songs for the purposes of nostalgic Romeo + Juliet-ness.

This post brought to you by Not-Ready-To-Fall-Asleep-Yet.

The real meaning of Christmas

Lies within this website.

Hilarity and genius!

I'm watching Big Fat Loser. And I'm not ashamed!

I hope Julie wins. And I hope Jillian shows up at my door tomorrow and moves in with me and changes my life with her hot biceps and terrifying military antics.

Briefest of briefs

Doesn't this post sound like it should be about underwear? Alas.

• Birthday drinks were amazing. I got a boyfriend for my birthday! Actually, I got a creepy redneck stalker, so when Peter (beautiful perfect brilliant precious and GAY Peter) arrived, my friends at the far end of the table filled him in, so he marched right up to me, said, "Hey, babe," and started kissing me. A lot. So he was my boyfriend for the night to protect me from Cletus the Slack-Jawed Yokel!
• Drank all day long on Friday in honor of Kendra getting a degree in biology (as well as Carol getting her degree in acting, Lisa getting her degreeS in vocal performance and musical theatre, and Katie Bahr getting her degree in English. spotlight stealers). I'm never doing that again. Damn Kendra's peer pressure.
• Played with Mom & Hungover Kendra on Saturday!
• Had a fondue party with wine, cheese, and chocolate (and cheesey eggs!) with Lisa and Carol Saturday night. It was amazing. We stayed up until 2.
• Then Lisa and I got up at 4:30 to get her to the airport. GAH.
• Went back to bed. Woke up. Cleaned the whole apartment. Packed. Kendra took me to the airport. (For a later flight, since my original one had been cancelled...but upon arrival, the people at the airport said it WASN'T actually cancelled and they looked at me like I was nuts. WTF?)
• Got to Grandma's, tired and bitchy and tired again. Had a spillage-in-the-luggage incident that I don't want to talk about, but all is pretty much well now.

Now, about to head out for brief errands with Grandma before going outside and forcing the 69 dgree weather to feel like 80 degree weather and doing work. And possibly yoga with my shiney new PINK yoga mat.

Hope everyone else is well!

Birthday girl!

I'm 23! YAY!

I have decided that 23 is an awesome age.

Also, I have the most wonderful friends. The APO Christmas party was on Tuesday, and it was completely insane. I took a million pictures, but maybe I'll put some up just for funsies.

Last night, I went to see my baby girls/ex "roommates." They are the SWEETEST little things in the world. They bought me a fondue set! SHAPED LIKE A HERSHEY KISS! They are amazing. Lauren made cheese for it while Mich and Jamie filled me in on the latest gossip. Then - they brought out a CAKE! With lit candles and everything! I was convinced they were going to set off their smoke alarm and get in trouble. Then they violated exam week quiet hours by singing me a stunning, soprano-operatic rendition of Happy Birthday. It was quite special.
Jamie & Mich lead off the singing.

It looks like I'm blowing on my hand instead of the candles. I'm not sure what that's about. Oh! I'm trying to make sure my hair doesn't fall in the flames.

That is the smokiest picture ever.


As for tonight...there's a new cycling class at the gym that I've been wanting to try, but they haven't introduced it on the schedule yet. Well, they're doing a special master class of it TONIGHT! It's my inadvertent birthday present from the gym, hooray!

Afterwards...getting wasted at Schooners, of course. Don't think too many people will be there, as I did have the misfortune of being born during finals week at CNU. However, Kendra has informed me that starting tomorrow, she wants to get wasted first thing in the morning and remain in that condition until Christmas in order to kill all of the brain cells she's grown at school these past four and a half years. So it'll be a very busy day!

Best friend!

I am so overwhelmed with love and joy right now!

Katie Parker came over tonight to make me a birthday cake. How sweet is that?

I love that girl. I am so blessed to have her in my life!

Also, the universe loves me...I left the apartment for the gym today very reluctantly because Pulp Fiction was on and I didn't want to leave it because I haven't seen it in forever - but I left, because I couldn't be late. Well, Katie just left, and I turn on the TV...and I shit you not, Pulp Fiction is on in almost the exact spot that it was when I left.

Thanks, Encore Action! And universe!

Anyway. A tribute to Katie, since I'm more obsessed than usual with pictures these days...

Baby Katie turns 21! She's going to be 22 in less than a month. Good god!


Actus Fidei Cast Party, suckas!

GALA!

Me, the wife, and our BABY KATIE!!! Best friends!

I need to get some hot pictures of Katie and her hot new haircut.

It's the most wonderful time of the year

I had the most fantastic, full, glorious weekend! Alas, I don't have time to write about it all in detail, so I shall give an abbreviated rundown for my own OCD recording purposes.

Friday:

• Went to Pilates! Yay for my crazy tiny instructor
• Had lunch with Denise at Anderson's! She gave me some fantastic feedback on my portfolio, so between her feedback and Peter's, I'm going to be COMPLETELY overhauling it. Good times. We also gossiped, and she's going to quote me in her upcoming article for Southern Theatre Magazine!
• Had a massage, courtesy of Miss Carol Wilson...she gave me the most wonderful birthday present ever - a free facial, massage, and hair appointment. Yay!
• Drove to Richmond - had dinner with Mom & Jim at a fabulous new Mexican resturant
• Watched Megan's wedding video that Carol made for us!

Saturday:

• Got a pedicure with Mom!
• Had lunch with my dad - he gave me a GPS for my car (!!!) and money so I can go to New York to see Garth & his show!
• Did some shopping with Mom (happy birthday to me)
• Got pretty for the symphony
• Went with Mom, Jim, and Jim's mother to a beautiful Italian place, then off to the Richmond Symphony! It was so amazing and beautiful

Sunday

• Had a wonderful mommy-made breakfast & showed her my soon-to-be-deceased portfolio
• Went to the beautiful Westhampton Theatre in Richmond to see I'm Not There (!!!) with Jess and Brenda! (!!!!) Jess and Bren being my ex boyfriends parents who I love more than Christmas. They're phenomenal people and I haven't seen them in nearly 4 years. And the movie was absolutely spectacular, I loved every single second of it. Cate Blanchett is a goddess.
• Had Chinese with Jess & Bren at the old place we went to way back in the day
• Drove to Norfolk to Steven Breese's gorgeous house and spent the night with Carol (who was house and dog sitting) to keep her company and help her drink her vodka. His dogs are the sweetest things alive. And so was her vodka.
• We got drunk and fell asleep at 10:30. Then we woke up at 4am and talked for an hour and a half before falling asleep again.

And now I'm sitting here in my messy apartment contemplating laundry, watching Home Alone, and working on my mommy's amazing Christmas present.

Three more days till I'm a 23-year-old.

Gulp.

YAY! (and my sister is insane)

1. YAY!

So, yay doesn't adequately describe this, but it's a start.

I had lunch with Steven today, and after taking 8 thousand years to get to the point, god love him, he confirmed that he does have a LITTLE bit of money set aside for me on the budget, and that he wants me very much to come on board as his assistant (Assistant to the Artistic Director...which would be BIG), but he wants me to "look at my life" and make sure I'll be able to eat.

And, HELL YES is my answer. But he's making me take a couple more days to think about it. HOWEVER...there's nothing to think about. I'll be free during the days from January till mid-May, which means I can still temp, which means I'll be making money, which means I can eat and pay rent.

Basically, money's going to work out BETTER for me taking this job. If he had no money for me in the budget, I'd be applying to work (and possibly intern, depending on the awesomeness of the theatres) everywhere ever...and I'd be making the same measly amount of money, but over a longer period of time, AND I'd have to be worrying about what I'd do with my little ol' apartment in Newport News - basically either paying rent when I'm not even living there, or finding someone to take my place (which is nearly impossible in this town), and then there's the question of which jobs would provide housing and which wouldn't, and would I be living with friends' parents...on and on and on.

So, my answer is YES. Yes yes yes. It's going to be a ton of work and responsibility, a ton of authority and power (bwaha), working really closely with Steven, and a massive massive MASSIVE learning experience. All of those things make me super happy inside, and isn't that the whole point anyway? I say it is. So, I'm SO HAPPY AND EXCITED!

2. My sister is insane

I am too, but it's more fun to blame it on her.

So, awhile ago, when I was in the midst of planning my Baltimore trip, my sister made some kind of comment that we should plan a "sisters" trip sometime soon - we talked about how sweet the Baltimore Aquarium is supposed to be and how that might be fun to do. Well, we brought it up again when I went to her place for Thanksgiving, and we were also talking about running. And she said, wouldn't it be crazy if for our sister vacation, we ran a race? We were thinking of a 5K or something in Charleston, her favorite city in the whole world, which I also absolutely love.

Well, today, I get a voicemail from her, and she said that her ex-trainer (he owns his own fancy expensive gym now, hence the 'ex') laughed in her face at the suggestion of a 5K, and challenged her to do a 10K...in Charleston, April 5th...and he said that he will fly down there and run it with us and then buy us lunch afterward. (Which is a dangerous proposition on his part, because Megan has expensive taste in Charleston resturants!)

So...eep!

The only really scary thing about this is...I fucked up my shins earlier this fall. I took about a month and a half off, and now I'm starting up again verrrry slowly and gently, and my shins have started to hurt again. If it's just splints, I'm not worried, but this evil voice in the back of my head keeps shrilling, "stress fracture!"

So we'll see if my legs fall off.

Finally, in other news, I'm going to Richmond this weekend! Hooray! Visiting Jane and hopefully some of my old boys on Friday, lunch with the dad on Saturday (and hopefully getting my birthday present - aka money to go to NYC for New Year's and see Garth freaking OFF BROADWAY!), symphony with Mom & Jim on Saturday night, and...drumroll...lunch with freaking Jess and Brenda on Sunday afternoon. The parents of my ex-boyfriend. These two are the most amazing people EVER...I probably haven't seen them in about 4 years, which is nuts. They were such a big, supportive, influential part of my life for two years and I think of them fondly every day. (Brenda gave me a necklace for my 18th birthday...I've worn it every day since and I'm about to turn 23)

So, that's exciting.

In conclusion, I'm turning 23 next week.

[whistles]

It's December!

Aside from meaning that my BIRTHDAY IS COMING SOON (and I want this shirt...so so bad), this also means that it's the season for jolliness and friends! Hooray!

This weekend has been so much fun...Aaron and Gemma came over to stay with me, as they were coming into town to see Adding Machine (which is AMAZING...I am so proud of my friends!), and of course we all went to Cheeseburger afterward.

Here are some select highlights...of course I don't have any actual pictures with *me* and Aaron or Gemma. I'm silly.

Me and the Partners! I think this is the first picture I have with Katie's hot new haircut. And...Anna's just really happy ;)

Hannah says...Yes, I was amazing in The Adding Machine. And so was my hot gray hair.

I love my silly babies.

Lauren and Jamie are starting to come up on Michelle and Katie in the Ugly Face Game

Paaron Age and Fatalie Nehlner! Aaron + Natalie = True BFF Love

This is a completely natural and not-at-all-staged picture of Peter and I laughing gloriously.


So that was all fun and games.

Saturday, we were lazy...Gemma had to leave to get back to work, and Aaron and I had a bacon-and-egg breakfast, watched some Office and Extras, played with Hannah and Natalie at Panera, napped, watched more Office, and then we had the best time ever! Tiny Lisa came over, and I haven't seen her in what feels like an absolute eternity. I got my family's Fudgy Fudgy BonBons recipe from my grandma, and Aaron and I had gotten all the ingredients earlier. So Lisa came over, we ordered pizza, and we made bonbons and drank wine (and beer and liquor) together! It was absolutely fabulous, and while Aaron was napping I bought some Christmas music on iTunes, because I had absolutely nothing, so we listened to mostly the Elf soundtrack and songs that make me think of Christmas.

After the bonbons were finished and we had all talked on the phone to Jordan (who is visiting Nick and ACT in San Fransisco! and who saw some freaking Matisses at San Fransisco's MoMA, the jerk), we all laid down on the air mattress in the living room together and watched A Muppet Christmas Carol together. And I may or may not have cried like a little baby. We ended the night with the genius Daniel Radcliffe episode of Extras, which was the most entertaining thing ever due entirely to Lisa's reactions. Oh, little Lisa.

So I'd say that was a pretty badass way to bring December in. I'm getting the feeling that I'm going to be feeling more holiday spirit-y this year than I have since I was a kid. I guess I have to occupy my grown-up time somehow!

Today I'll either do a bit of Christmas shopping, watch Home Alone 2 in my pajamas (shut up), watch Love Actually in my pajamas, work on my portfolio some more, or all three! And I'm definitely going to the gym. Damn pizza and bonbons.

Also, I'm developing an obsession with Christmas music, and I feel like it's possible I'll spend more money at iTunes than I will shopping for presents this month. Here's what's on my Christmas playlist so far:

1. Joni Mitchell, River (of course!)
2. Joni Mitchell, Both Sides Now (blame Love Actually...whose soundtrack is not in iTunes! wtf?)
3. Elvis Presley, It's Now or Never (I don't know why it makes me think of Christmas, but I just love this song)
4. Louis Prima, Pennies from Heaven (Elf Soundtrack)
5. Ella Fitzgerald, Sleigh Ride
6. Lena Horne, Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!
7. Ferrante & Teicher & Les Baxter, Sleigh Ride / Santa Claus Party
8. Leon Redbone & Zooey Deschanel, Baby, It's Cold Outside
9. Jim Reeves, Jingle Bells
10. The Brian Setzer Orchestra, The Nutcracker Suite
11. Elf Soundtrack, Christmas Island (for whatever reason, this song aparently has no artist. but it's cute)
12. Eartha Kitt, Santa Baby
13. Leon Redbone, Winter Wonderland
14. Eddy Arnold, Santa Claus is Coming to Town
15. Billy Preston, Nothing from Nothing
16. Elvis Presley, Blue Christmas
17. Frank Sinatra, You Make Me Feel So Young (not on the soundtrack, but it should be! it's such a great song)
18. Frank Sinatra, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
19. Ella Fitzgerald, Santa Claus is Coming to Town (because she's awesome)
20. Bing Crosby, It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas
21. The Drifters, White Christmas

That's it so far! Anyone else have any favorites?


I hope everyone's having a great weekend! And I guess the only thing left to say is...