Writing witty missives about my Holiday excursions just seems trite and self-absorbed in light of the horrific tragedies people are going through half way around the world, so instead I'm posting this link to organizations that are accepting donations to help with the relief effort:
Pick one. Send them what you can. It won't come anywhere near to easing the burden of the living, nor bring back the dead, but every dime will help, and you'll feel better knowing you did something good for somebody you don't know, and will never meet.
Like The Summer Sunshine Pour Your Sweetness Over Me
I am SO high right now.
Before you-all start tsk, tsking away, however, let me qualify this statement by avouching that it's a perfectly legal intoxication.
Remember that scene in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home where Spock eats some chocolate, and then suddenly starts cussing like an Alameda sailor, "The Hell you say," and "The Hell I am", and whatnot while he and Kirk are riding the bus? He was totally stoned on simple sucrose, and all I can say is, I know how he feels.
This is what happens when you spend the afternoon making holiday cookies. So far, I've completed a batch of Nanaimo Bars, am in the middle of baking a batch of Egg Nog Cookies, and am waiting for the Rum Truffle base to cool, so's I can add the rum. That's an awful lot of chocolate, coconut, powdered and granulated sugar, and there's just no way to avoid licking spoons, spatulas, beaters, fingers, because it all gets covered with batter and dough, and it seems such a dawgone shame to just wash it all off and send that sweet, sweet goodness down the sink for the fishes to enjoy.
Of course, the real challenge will be trying to get rid of all this stuff, because I really don't want it lying around staring me in the face, whispering sweet enticements into my ears. So, tell me if you're in desperate need of cookies, if you're local, I'll deliver.
But, tell me quick, before the rush wears off and I experience the inevitable blood sugar crash...
After my morning check through the online job listings yesterday, I decided to take a walk. It was a nice afternoon, one of the nicest we've had here in the Upper Lefthand for several weeks, and it seemed like such a shame to waste it on mundane activities like job searches or addressing holiday cards. So, I slipped on some comfy shoes and set out from Ravenshead, but after a few blocks I realized I was treading an already familiar path, and decided to alter my course, setting off in a direction that was hitherto unexplored.
My trek took me east, in the general direction of Lake Washington, through the Madrona business district (in reality a three square block area consisting of a couple of restaurants, a small grocer -- which delivers, or so their sign says -- an art gallary, and some small mom-and-pop operations, including what appeared to be a rarity in these modern times: an actual haberdasher). Over the hill, and down some twisty, windy boulevards to an area most people probably never venture into, one of those seemingly nondescript neighborhoods that, if you have the patience and the eye will yield surprising details.
This one held, among other things, a "lake" (barely larger than a kiddie wading pool), a nice hilltop lookout, a multitude of expensive homes, and a street pattern evidentally designed by a sidewinder.
After about an hour and a half of trudging through this hilly labyrinth, I ended up in Madison Park, a toney lakefront neighborhood known locally for a few decent, if somewhat overpriced restaurants, as well as one of the few public beaches in the city. Being as it was far too cold for a lakeside dip, I settled for a brief trek through the shopping district, finally deciding on a quick luncheon at a local pub, figuring I could catch a bus up the hill to salve my now weary feet.
Unfortunately, I became distracted by a small, but smartly apportioned kitchen store, one of those tiny places that sells French enameled cookware and Swedish cheese knife sets to upscale urbanites who normally don't have time in their busy schedules to actually cook food, but who nevertheless like to have all the trappings just in case some catastrophe occurs, such as the local deli being out of take-out Osso Bucco, and they're forced to improvise.
I'm a sucker for these kinds of places. Like the carnie barker promising a glimpse of heaven in the form of a twenty-five cent hootchie dancer, I get sucked in by the colorful window displays, and the completely unrealistic notion that, well, I really COULD use a good set of mixing bowls.
So, in I wander, and wander I do for the space of forty minutes, ogling the sixty different types of heat resistant silicon spatulas, the butter wells, the wall of cookbooks, the three-beer-can chicken roaster, I even briefly contemplate the dog biscuit recipe books, because well, I know people with dogs, and wouldn't it be a surprise to give them dog bones as Christmas presents?
When I came to, I found myself staggering toward the bus stop laden with an oversized plastic shopping bag containing a nine piece set of Duralex (tm) mixing bowls, a stainless steel Danish cheese knife and slicer set, a glass butter dish (do you know how hard these are to find nowadays?), and -- thankfully -- only ONE of the sixty heat resistant silicon spatulas.
I won't tell you how much this all cost. It doesn't matter. Obviously, I needed it, the way you ladies NEED that pair of Vera Wangs, and guys, like you just gotta have that PS2 version of "GTA: San Andreas" or you're just gonna DIE! With me, it's cookware. Doesn't have to be pricey or some designer brand (although truth be told, I can spot a bargain Chasseur stock pot at 100 paces), but I just have these uncontrollable urges to buy things that can be used in the process of preparing food -- generally for large groups of people.
And don't even start on some pseudo-intellectual analysis of what sort of neurotic tendencies this indicates: I'll cop to that. Heck, if you look in my utensils drawer, the implements are laid out with the deliberate orderliness of surgical instruments on an operating table. Practically everything I use: pots, pans, knives, utensils, you name it is pure, stainless steel. My cutlery is honed to scalpel sharpness (what do you think sliced my finger open to the point of needing stitches?). It just means I treat cooking as a serious business -- getting the recipe right is a matter of life-and-death. Each deflated souffle or crumbly frittata is like a flatlined ER case in my book.
Yeah, you could say I have issues; it probably has something to do with low self-esteem or an unconscious desire to please others, but whatever the psycological explanations, what it boils down to is that I am slowly amassing a veritable armory of cooking utensils. Which in-and-of-itself is probably pretty low on the scale of obsessive-compulsive collection impulses, but it also leads to the inevitable conclusion that, at some point I'm gonna start cookin' -- for like an entire battalion, and that is just going to put an insurmountable strain on both my stove, as well as my refrigeration capacity.
My only hope at this point, is that I can get through the holiday season with a huge weekend baking jag (Sjet, I can totally relate), that will satiate my desire long enough to get me through until January, when I have two weekends of scullery opportunities at 14/48 to satisfy my unnatural cravings for feeding large numbers of hungry people.
In the meantime, if I can't make it until then, don't be surprised if I show up on your doorstep with enough baked goods to scare a Costco shelf stocker, because now I have nine graduated sized mixing bowls -- and they WILL be used.
It's not often I get involved in altercations involving the local constabulary. In fact, to call it a rarity would be a gross understatement. But, when you live in a reasonably large city, eventually the odds are that you will find yourself talking to a police officer, and this evening evidentally was my turn.
I'd just left local sketch comedy geniuses Bald Faced Lie's (PLEASE update that website kids!) "Brown Derby Series" production of "Showgirls" (yes the Paul Verhoeven trash-o-rama extravaganza), a sort of anarchic, Marx Brothers inspired rendition of the film script performed at a local bar, and drove up "the hill" to Dick's Drive-In, a local hamburger joint of no small repute.
I drive into the parking lot, and the first thing that should have warned me things were not to proceed according to the normal sequence was that a late model Mercedes Benz was cross-parked in the lot, having obviously entered via the exit, and was now taking up three parking slots in front of the place. And next to which naturally I parked, it being the closest stall to the order windows.
I get out, get in line, and am standing there for all of about ten seconds when one of the occupants of said Benzo, presumably the driver, since there were only two and the co-pilot was clearly snoozing in the passenger seat, staggers over to the line of people waiting to order, and loudly requests the use of a cellphone. Now, normally this wouldn't be all that unusual, except for the fact that this person was packing two cellphones in one of his rather largish hands to begin with.
Okay, thinks I, either he's joking, he's really drunk or he's just lifted two phones that don't work -- any of which could be a likely scenario.
"C'mon! Anybody got a cellphone?"
A wag in line points out the obvious: "You've got two phones dude."
To which Mr. Cellphone Guy responds, "Yeah, but both the batteries are dead!"
A brief scene ensues, in which Cellphone Guy becomes the object of various and sundry smartassed retorts from line-standers asking why he needs a phone so bad, and doesn't he have a charger in that late-model Benzo (which has a number of major dings in the front end, so it's not exactly this guy's cherished baby -- another clue), and what, he's never heard of a payphone, etc., etc.
Cellphone Guy tries to maintain a jocular banter with the trash-talking customers, but he's obviously in no condition to rise to their level of late night badinage, and so mid-stream switches tactics from requesting assistance to somewhat belligerently insisting that he's gonna "kick someone's ass if they don't provide him with a cellphone right now", which just sets the crowd off even more, seeing as pretty much everyone can tell that this guy is in no shape to initiate an attack, and that even the 15-something junior high school girls in line can probably take him out without mussing their laboriously applied make up. But, in his alcohol-infused single-mindedness, nothing will deter him from securing the object of his desire.
Cellphone Guy focusses on a single figure, a rather slight-looking gentleman who up to now has pretty much been ignoring the entire episode. CG proceeds to accost Slight Looking Gentleman, demanding a cellphone, telling him he's going to kick his ass if he doesn't produce one forthwith and generally making an ineffectual nuisance of himself. After two decidedly hostile, yet altogether pathetic attempts to physicially intimidate SLG by attempting to grab his throat (which SLG easily fends off), CG wanders back to his car, mumbles something to his Shotgun (who is either completely passed out or blatantly ignoring his driver), then wades back into the crowd to repeat the process, having completely forgotten that he just pulled this same stunt no more than 20 seconds ago. AND he goes back for SLG's throat, having also evidentally blocked out the fact that he just for all intents-and-purposes battaried this guy already.
Needless to say, after the second attempted throttling, SLG leans into the counter, whispers to the burger attendant, and bruskly slaps off the insistent CG, who aparently perplexed at his inability to force someone to do his bidding weaves his way back to the side of his trusty Benzo.
Within thirty seconds, four Seattle Police Department squad cars descend on the parking lot, the first containing two female officers, one of whom jumps out before the car has come to a complete stop, grabs CG (who is in the process of making yet another attempt on the crowd), swings him around, neatly taking him down to the pavement. Handcuffs are produced, words are exchanged and before you can say, "Deluxe, fries and a chocolate shake", CG is whisked into the back of the patrol car.
At which point co-pilot, having missed the last six or seven minutes of his partner's schenanigans wakes from his passenger seat slumber just in time to get out of the car and get grabbed by another SPD following close on the heels of the first.
It's all over in about thirty seconds, apart from the statement-taking, which goes on for roughly thirty minutes. I give my $0.02, along with pertinent personal information, but am prevented from leaving the scene due to the fact that one of the police cars has parked directly behing me, blocking my exit. During the ensuing wait, I casually make an inspection of the Benzo, and notice that it has Oregon plates which expired in April.
These boys are not going to have a fun evening, I surmise, since at one point one of the officers speaks to an employee about their tow away policy, indicating that CG and his sidekick are probably not going to be released anytime soon enough to retrieve their vehicle from the lot before somebody decides to call the towing company.
Still, despite everything, I'm really curious who Cellphone Guy was planning to call, and what -- if anything -- he hoped they would do to extricate him out of whatever precarious situation required calling them in the first place. I mean, things would have gone MUCH easier if he'd just done what all the other panhandlers do in front of Dick's Drive-In and simply asked for some change to buy a burger -- that we can deal with graciously.
But, these out-of-towners, they just don't know not to come in and try to muscle our turf.
So, let this be a lesson to those of you who live under the mistaken impression that people in Seattle are just a passel of passive-aggressives who won't lift a finger to deal with an unpleasant situation.
Ran into one of my former co-workers at the Ballard Freddie's today, first person from there I've seen since my orientation session with the Outplacement Service about a month ago (but they'd all just been laid off too, so perhaps they don't really count). We chit-chatted for a couple of minutes, and then naturally the conversation turned toward "how things were doing at work":
"Lot's of changes," she replied, "so-and-so (one of the VP's) is retiring at the end of this year, and they're going to break up his division and fold it into Finance, Operations and keep only one small part of it in the same "silo" (this being one of those businesseze terms for a division). Also, such-and-such (another VP) is leaving, and blah-blah-blah will be taking over for him."
"Wow, that's a lot of reorganization!" I observed.
"And that's just at the executive level," she continued, "every department is downsizing, or will be very shortly after the new year."
"Sounds like I was ahead of the wave."
"Yeah, it hasn't been very pretty."
"Well, at least it'll improve your chances of winning those door prizes at the Company Christmas Party!" I joked.
I'm well into Week #5 of the Perpetual Vacation, and still going strong. Granted, I have actually begun sending out resumes to prospective employers, but on a decidedly selective basis. I figure if I have to look for a job, I'm going after ones that: a of all) are ones that fit my experience profile (admin combined with arts/non-profit); b of all) are ones that I feel have room for advancement; c of all) have a reasonable chance of paying me a wage approximating what I was used to earning; and d of all) are ones where I feel I might actually make some small contribution to making The World A Better Place To Live. That's not too much to ask from a job, is it?
IS it?
In the meantime, I'm getting lots of reading done, and seeing a fair amount of theatre, taking walks through my new neighborhood (when the weather isn't -- as it has been the past couple of days -- so miserably cold, wet, dark and windy that only tugboat captains, firemen, and ambulance drivers would be compelled venture into it), although these are activities in which I would have engaged regardless of my employment status. On the negative side, I'm burning through my cash reserves somewhat faster than anticipated, due no doubt to dubious purchases like bathroom remodels and arts auctions, but I just look at it as my contribution toward keeping the economic engine that is Capitalism the well-oiled machine that is the envy of Third World countries throughout the globe.
And, I'm giving my Frankenstein's Monster of a left index finger a bit of a workout on the side; feels good to get it back in action, although I can tell it's going to take a while to get full functionality back, even after the stitches are removed (tomorrow -- yay!). According to the documentation I was given on the night of the "accident", it can take up to a full year for lacerations to heal completely (although I doubt it'll take that long in this instance), so there's always a slight risk of me "popping open" through some series of unfortunate actions, which I will nevertheless heartily endeavor to avoid. Right now, however, the the annoyance factor is somewhat akin to having a particularly bristley nose or mustache hair that scratches you by pointing in or up instead of down or out, except that you can't just pluck it to avoid the discomfort of having it constantly poke you in the nostril or lip.
And before I forget, a hearty "Happy Birthday!" to KC, and to BK!
I'm really looking forward to getting these stitches out of my finger sometime in the next couple of days, so I can start living a normal life again.
It's really quite amazing how even the slightest loss of function in a single digit can have such a profound effect on ones day-to-day existence. It took me about three days just to adjust my handwriting to the point that I could recreate a reasonable facsimile of my signature. I've been reduced to holding eating utensils like a starving logger in a boarding house in order to avoid accidentally diping the gauze bandage into whatever was on my plate; chopsticks are completely beyond my capacity to manipulate. Wallets and keys have been relegated to right side pockets, where they are occasionally forgotten until patted back into existence. I have to don plastic bags over my hand when showering or washing dishes. My typing technique has become half touch, half hunt-and-peck. And I've developed this semi-permanent extended finger which, depending on its orientation either looks like I'm making some accusatory gesture or else that I'm imitating one of those stained glass depictions of saints you see in churches, who are always pointing up to you-know-where.
The only upside has been that several people have treated my dressing like a cast and have either signed it, or in one instance turned it into a Santa Claus finger puppet; cute, but I'll settle for just having a plain, old-fashioned, naked, sutureless finger, thank you very much.
Not much blogging lately, as I've been busy with the job search, or more specifically working with the outplacement service to get ready for the job search. I go into their office two or three times a week to take seminars on such things as how to create an effective resume, changing career paths, networking -- all the things you'd expect. In addition,I spend several hours every day on their website and checking out the classified ads online.
Observations so far:
- If you're looking for an admin position in Seattle, the health care industry seems to be your best bet.
- The really fun, cool jobs rarely show up in print; like choice apartments, word-of-mouth is usually sufficient to bring in a good pool of candidates.
- It's definiely an employers' market; nobody's interested in what you've done so much as what you can do for them.
Fortunately, my financial situation in the short-term is pretty sunny, so I'm not feeling pressured to jump on the first thing that comes along. Unemployment is paying all the bills, and my savings should hold out until well into next year at the current burn-rate. Besides, this is the longest break I've had from the work-a-day world probably since my grad school days, and frankly I'm rather enjoying it.
Well, except for that recent trip to the emergency room on Saturday to sew up a minor laceration to my left index finger, requiring four stitches. It'll cost me (I'm still covered by my work health insurance, but my deductible is so high it'll all be out-of-pocket), and it's made writing and typing something of a challenge, but I'm getting by, and the stitches will come out in about a week, so I think I can cope until then.
I started rummaging in my little fridge, looking for a spot to put the tupperwares of seafood chowder I'd cooked up this morning, and excavated a second foil-covered tin of cupcakes, left over from last weekend's Annex Theatre Retreat.
So, now I have yet another dozen cake confections to deal with, when I had thought (although somewhere int the back of my mind, I knew this to be untrue) I had finally consumed the last of these little hellions a couple of days ago.
(A bit of backstory may be in order: A few months ago I purchased an auction item at a fundraiser which entitled me to a birthday cake, personally created to my own specifications by Ida and Molly, who have developed something of a reputation for concocting marvelously weird cake dioramas. Previous examples have included bloody, "Saving Private Ryan"-meets-"The Lost World" battle between little green army guys and dinosaurs, the deliciously creepy, "Hug me!" cupcakes, and the infamous "flaming banjo" cake, what was in fact, a flaming banjo, complete with some sort of alcohol powered combustible material. My only request was that my cake had to involve astronauts, and Molly later suggested that since my birthday this year would fall just before Retreat, perhaps I would consent to delaying gratification for the sake of group participation? Of course I did, seeing as if nothing else it would provide an opportunity to stretch the birthday fesitivities far beyond any reasonable timeframe.
Whereupon last weekend, I was presented with a garish, purple-and-violet moonscape, sort of a cross between The Giants Causeway and that set from the end of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", but of course made completely out of cupcakes. In their inimitably sick style, the diorama consisted of some sort of outer space cataclysm wherein a drunk shuttle pilot -- who had aparently imbibed a few too many of those tubes of Russian vodka secreted aboard the International Space Station -- crashed into an assemblage of his fellow space explorers, scattering them and untold billions of dollars worth of valuable equipment across the lunar landscape. Like I said, they have a creepy sense of humor.
And needless to say, there were plenty of extra cupcakes for me to take home. Hence, my present dilemma, to which we shall now return.)
They confront me in all their faded purple frosted succubus splendor, a dozen two-bite sized concoctions of flour, sugar, butter and egg, mocking my paltry efforts to bring them to submission. It's like a bad horror movie: just when you think the evil has been successfully vanquished, and it's time to take a refreshing hot shower, suddenly the throbbing bass swells in ominous expectation, "duh-dun, duh-dun, DUH-DUN, duh-dun", increasing in tempo until it reaches the desired 100 beats per minute, making your own heart follow like a lemming over the cliff, the camera tilts at a crazy angle, racks back suddenly to reveal the horror of -- MORE CUPCAKES!
Perhaps they're breeding in the fridge; maybe a 42 degrees Farenheit environment is actually the ideal incubation medium for their little devils food spawn, and I am unwittingly unleashing an infestation of apocalyptic proportions on an unsuspecting world. Will future generations, sitting in the rubbled remains of their once gleaming cities invoke my name with spite and venom? Will it pass into the ages like that of Cain and Judas, as one of the Great Betrayers Of Humankind? And all because I was too reticent, too health-conscious, too timid to do my duty and dispatch these evil cakelets to the fate they so richly deserve?
Sometimes I'm just overwhelmed by our consumer culture. I've been known to stand in supermarket aisles dumbfounded by the infinity of choices one can have for the most mundane things, like say breakfast cereal or chocolate chip cookies. But, every once in a while our mad dash off the cliff of compulsive consumption gets slowed down just a tiny bit by some wondrous, albeit probably completely unnecessary object that either makes you smile at the whimsical sensibilities of whomever thought that said object was worthy of manufacture, promotion and wholesale export (probably from some Communist third-world country, meaning most of the people making it are either political prisoners or earning the equivalent of about two weeks of our average wages per annum), or laughing out loud at the idea of actually purchasing said object, thus justifying Some Marketing Genius' estimation of our unconscious desire/need for all manner of ludicrous things.
Case in point: This little gem can currently be found at your neighborhood Urban Outfitters
Yes, my friends. Something you've all secretly been waiting for, but just didn't know it until somebody else figured it out for you -- your very own, fully articulated, 12 inch tall, talking Darren McGavin action figure from the move "A Christmas Story", complete with mannequin leg lamp! I hesitate to consider what "tapestry of obscenities" may issue from his little tinny speaker, but what I really wish is that someone will create an accessory kit, complete with rumpled sports jacket, spiral notebook and porkpie hat, so that you could convert this into a "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" action figure.
And of course, for those of you who aren't content with a little-bitty 8 inch tall leg lamp, you can always spend your hard-earned disposable income on one of these beauties.
The one thing I'm really enjoying about being "between engagements" (as we call unemployment in the entertainment biz), is that for most of the past two weeks I have felt a refreshing freedom from the concept of time. Certainly, there have been instances of having to be at a particular place at a particular time, but these have been rare compared to existence in the eight-to-five world, where practically every activity from the moment of awakening is dictated by the clock. Now, I can get up when I want (or when I get tired of the cats trying to rouse me), go to sleep when I'm tired and not at any specific hour, I can spend as much time on mundane activities like laundry, dishes -- or even more pleasurable pursuits such as reading, watching DVD's (just ran through the entire 17 episode "The Prisoner" series) or writing -- and still have plenty of time left over for actual appointments (Ironically, since being laid off two weeks ago, I've had two commercial and two theatrical auditions, a veritable cornucopea of performing opportunities compared to what I've experienced in the past several months), or other work-search related activities.
But, things have definitely slowed down. For the first time in years, I feel like I'm actually physically attuned to the natural world. I feel relaxed, rested, refreshed; the way one is supposed to feel after taking vacation time from work, but with the added bonus of not having to go back to the job that stressed you out to the point of needing to take a vacation in the first place. I feel calmer, more centered, I'm even losing a bit of weight, no due to a combination of slightly elevated activity levels, reduced stress, and improved eating regimen.
And it's not like I'm being entirely lazy, either. I'm still getting up between 7:30 and 8:30 a.m., getting to bed usually before Midnight, and still doing things: aside from the aforementioned auditions, and domestic chores, I'm spending about 2 - 3 hours each day combing job posting websites, updating resumes, taking online career assessment seminars, making phone calls, in short actively pursuing getting back into the job stream, just not succumbing to the dreaded "must take the first offer that comes along just because I need a job" syndrome; I'm really looking for something more in alignment with my interests and pursuits, and I don't feel at all guilty about indulging in the one luxury -- namely a modicum of financial freedom -- that's going to allow me, at least for the next couple of months to actually have a shot at finding something I: a of all) can get really excited about doing on a more-or-less daily basis; b of all) might pay me something approximating my previous salary/benefit package; and c of all) might actually make a positive contribution to society.
I mean, isn't that the whole point of re-evaluating your career options?
Did Someone Call Me "Snorer"? Hurray, Hurray, Hurray!
Slept for 14 hours last night after returning from Annex Theatre's annual retreat. Although we get a lot of work done during the two days, we also tend to play hard, and in addition, I seem to have been suffering from some sort of temporary sinus condition that rendered me a literal pariah -- I was snoring, something I don't think I'm prone to do, at least not to the degree that not only does it bother other people -- immensely, as it turned out -- but, it had the added drawback of making it impossible for me to get any sleep either. Hence, my thought that this is not normal for me; people who snore regularly learn to sleep through it, my inability to do so would seem to point toward the idea that this is a somewhat rare occurance for me.
In any case, I'm well-rested today, and ready to tackle Week 2 of Living Without Gainful Employment.
I've been without email access for the past two days, which in internet terms seems like a veritable lifetime. After trying every possible workaround, fix, hack and whatnot I could think of, I finally resorted to downloading the latest version of Netscape -- and "voila!" I've got mail!
Evidentally, Bill Gates (or more likely, one of his horde of faceless minions) has decided that I don't need to access my non-Microsoft proprietary email account through their equally proprietary internet browser. But, this is (still, for the moment) a free country, and no lackey of the Richest Man In The World (tm) is going to dictate to me how I can or can't get my spam.
Otherwise, life amongst the unemployed is (so far) just peachy...
Calling All Citizens From All Over The World. This Is Captain America Calling
Over the past several days I've been giving this whole political situation a lot of thought -- prompted in large part because of the uncertainty of my own circumstances.
I had my exit interview today with my "new" boss of one month. And during the course of our conversation, he said something very telling, "This is always the hardest part of being a manager, having to let a good employee go. Because you're always afraid of how they're going to respond to this kind of news."
It didn't strike me until about an hour later, but I think he hit on something very crucial to this discussion. Most of the people who voted for George Bush aren't idiots, and they're not our enemies. What they ARE is very, very fearful. They're afraid of losing their jobs and homes, losing loved ones to terrorism, war and natural disaster, losing their long-cherished beliefs and values. Fear makes people irrational, it causes otherwise sane human beings to revert to the most primitive level of instinct; when confronted with some situation that elicits fear and anxiety, there are two basic responses -- fight or flee. Right now, many people on both sides of the vote count have chosen to fight, and a significant number are seriously considering fleeing.
Both of these responses, while understandable, are born out of fear. If the sense of fear is removed, people will calm down and begin to think through the situation. But, in order for that to happen, you have to first identify what it is you're afraid of. In this instance, it's pretty clear -- we're all afraid of each other. The entire political debate in this country pretty much since Vietnam has been couched in the language of conflict: Red vs. Blue, Democrat vs. Republican, Conservative vs. Liberal, "Class War", "Culture War", "Drug War", "War On Terror", you name it, most of the rhetoric on one side, and an unfortunate amount of it from the other all use these heavily laden buzz words that continuously press the emotional buttons in our brains that link directly to our adrenal glands. A certain group of politicians and idealogues (not all by any stretch, and not exclusively coming from the Right) have spent the better of the past 40 years cultivating this environment of fear: fear of blacks, of women, of Gays, of Muslims, of Fundamentalists, of Soccer Moms, of NASCAR Dads --basically anybody who doesn't look, think and act the way we do.
And it's got to stop.
The only way to conquer fear is through knowledge. Once it becomes impossible to objectify and dehumanize the "other", it becomes increasingly difficult to fear them. When you see that deep, down, you have more in common with someone from Kansas or South Carolina than you have differences (as significant as those differences may be), you can't help but think of them as fellow human beings. You may not agree on a lot of things, but you're not going to fear them. And if you don't fear something, it just follows that you're not going to hate it either.
You know what I'd really like to see happen in the next four years? If I had a few million dollars burning a hole in my pocket, I'd take a big chunk of that money, rent about 50 school buses, load each one of them up with as many of "my people" as I could find: artists, environmentalists, punk rockers, leather dykes, drag queens, academics, Goths, lawyers -- in short, a whole bunch of out-and-out "freaks" -- the very people that have been held up by the GOP as the boogey(wo)men who are out to wreck good, old-fashioned White Christian American values, send them out all over those so-called "Red States", and whenever they got to some little burg in the middle of Nebraska or Alabama, these people would all pile out, and walk en-masse to the nearest county courthouse, church or school. One of them would step forward, and in a big, booming voice proclaim, "We're here to help. What can we do?" And then just sit there and wait for a response. No matter how long it took.
Maybe somebody's house has been destroyed by a natural disaster, maybe the school is in disrepair, maybe the levee needs rebuilding, maybe some little old lady needs her lawn mowed -- whatever it was, big or small. If somebody from that community stepped forward with a request for assistance, you go help them. And with no thought of "converting" them to your way of thinking. No Quid Pro Quo, no "pay it forward". There'd be no speeches, no teach-ins, no community meetings, just a bunch of people who come in, and do a job They don't ask for thanks, they just help, where ever it's needed and to whatever degree it's requested. And when they're done, they just leave and move on.
I think after an experience like that, it would be pretty hard to hate someone just because they're different somehow.
As several online observers predicted, it hasn't taken long for Team Bush to start bandying around the term "mandate" to characterize their hairsbreath victory. Of course, it's no such thing, given that 48.6% of voters have said they don't agree with the administration's policies.
On a lighter note: What's the first thing our newly (first time) elected preznit decides to do after claiming victory?
I'll Take An American, Medium Rare With The Bechamel Sauce
It may be down by the time you read this, but the current headline at www.msnbc.com ledes with our newly elected (for the first time) preznit stating, "“I’m humbled by the trust and the confidence of my fellow citizens. With that trust comes a duty to serve all Americans."
I guess it's just the latent paranoid in me, but doesn't that sound suspiciously like the title to an old "Twilight Zone" episode?
Oh the irony. On what surely must be one of the most memorably depressing days of my life, a day that will live in infamy, a day of crushed hopes, of somber reflection and genuine apprehension regarding the future of this Great Land, in short, a day that I thought just could not get any worse, did actually.
At 3:30 p.m. today I was officially notified by New Boss and HR Director that effective immediately, my services for the company for which I've worked for the past six and a-half years would no longer be needed.
Actually, it wasn't nearly as heartlessly soul-crushing as that, but the effect is essentially the same.
I've been laid off. Sacked. Given the boot, the pink slip, my walking papers, shown the door, etc., etc.
Sly devil that I am, I talked them into keeping me on through the end of the week, so that I can hand off the few duties I have that nobody else knows how to do onto some other poor schlub who's own head will probably be next in the guillotin basket, but it a of all) makes me look tres professional in the eyes of management (right, like I should care now), and b of all) gets me two more days of salary.
At least there's some sort of severence package -- two months pay along with my unused vacation days, continuation of my health benefits through the end of the year, "outplacment counceling", instant Unemployment, plus I get to keep my 401(k) in the same mutual fund (which is actually a BIG deal -- no 25% tax penalty for this boy-o), and evidentally an extended vacation too boot.
"Spin it, Comte, spin it - it's a GOOD thing!"
So. To all of you who sent "a little something extra" in those recent birthday cards -- thanks very, very much. It looks like it'll come in handy.
And, the next sound you hear will be that of the door slamming me in the ass on my way through it.
So, if you're in the neighborhood of ACT Theatre this Sunday evening, you should really check out Ghosty! Annex Theatre's spooky Hallowe'en extravaganza (I'll be the ghost in the aviator's helmet).
Plus, it's a fundraiser for Union Playhouse (Nee Union Garage, current home of Theatre Babylon and future home of Annex), so you just KNOW you want to help save one of Seattle's most versatile, valuable and vulnerable performance spaces.
Otherwise, the ghosts will haunt you long after the toll of Midnight on Sunday.
In Xanadu Did Kublai Khan A Stately Pleasure Dome Decree
NASA's Cassini/Huygens spacecraft made a close flyby of Saturn's largest moon, Titan yesterday, snapping off a phenomenal series of images of the only moon in our solar system with a measurable atmosphere. When the full series of images is downloaded later today, scientists will hopefully begin to answer some fundamental questions about Titan's structure, which may in turn lead to some further insight into Earth's early atmospheric formation.
The bright area on the right hand side has been designated "Xanadu" by Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists. The darker region to the left is of (currently) unknown composition, but it theorized to possibly be a lake of frozen methane or ethane. The white patches at the bottom are thought to be clouds made up of similar gaseous elements.
In January, Cassini will eject the European Space Agency built Huygens probe, which will make a controlled descent into Titan's atmosphere, hopefully answering further questions about its composition.
Another birthday approaching, number 44 if you're counting (and next Monday if you're the card sending or libation buying sort). It's certainly not one of those "milestone" celebrations, like 18 or 21 or 30 or even 50, but still, with each click over of the natal odometer I keep coming round to the inevitable conclusion that -- statistically-speaking -- I've got more miles of blacktop behind me than ahead.
It's not something I'm prone to be maudlin about; I come from a rather long-lived family (three of four grandparents still alive-and-kicking in their early 80's to mid 90's), and despite the history of congenital heart problems that run in my family, I'm probably in a lot better shape at this age than was my dad or grandfather, both of whom are thankfully still with us. So, it's not completely out of the quesiton that all things considered, I've realistically got another 45 - 50 years of mileage in me before some major organ craps out beyond repair.
Some days though it's hard to rid myself of the nagging suspicion that somewhere I took a turn that sent me off in a direction I never thought I'd go, and that suddenly I'm sitting here by the side of the road staring at some Rand-McNalley Atlas that clearly indicates I'm nowhere near where I thought I'd be by now.
I guess it's just that I always imagined my life would be somewhat more conventional than it's turned out, one accompanied by all the trappings of what passes for "normalicy": marriage, kids, mortgages, etc., etc. So, when I look around and realize how many aspects of my life are decidedly not of the norm, I have to admit I feel a bit ambivalent. On the one hand, I'm still plugging away at a vocation that, despite a recent (hopefully temporary) malaise, nevertheless seems to maintain some forward momentum. I've got a passle of good friends, although not perhaps as many truly close ones as I'd like, but an otherwise great group of people. I seem to have dug out some small niche for myself in my chosen community. I have a decent job that pays well, even if it's frequently not as intellectually challenging as I'd prefer, and I've lived a rather unconventional lifestyle over the years, that while perhaps not as on-the-edge as some, certainly falls outside of what most people experience. But, my romantic attachments over the years haven't been terribly successful (with one notable exception), and there are times when I think I really should have been able to make something more of myself; that I haven't always lived up to my full potential.
Still, it seems like there's an awful lot yet ahead of me, that my life isn't anywhere near the point of beginning some slide into that long dark goodnight. Maybe it's having played people older than myself for so long in my acting career, but getting older doesn't really scare me; the only real disturbance about the process is that there aren't all that many people I know close enough to my own age with whom to share the experience. How do you get 20 or 30-somethings to relate to the onset of late middle-age and impending geriatry? Not that I'm complaining about hanging out with 20 and 30 year-olds mind you, if nothing else it causes me to forget at times that I'm not 35 anymore myself.
What's the old saw, "You're only as young as you feel"? Well, for one day I think I'll be like those kids in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off", when they stick the Ferrari up on blocks and run it in reverse trying to get the odometer to wind itself back to where they started. I may pay for it on Tuesday, but that's somewhere up ahead in the road, isn't it?
Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboaratory in Pasadena, CA have made the first extensive map of fluxuations in
Earth's gravity field, providing proof of "space warping", one of the keystones to Einstein's General Theory of Relativity.
Two earth-orbiting satellites, part of the Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment (GRACE) Project have mapped the gravimetric fluxuations as part of a five year study to determine whether the Earth affects local space-time via an effect known as "frame dragging" (the article provides a good layman's explanation). One of the things noted in the article is that physical features (i.e. mountains, oceans, etc.) seem to have some bearing on the amount of localized drag, which makes sense, given that there is going to be significant differences in mass, which of course is a function of gravimetric strength.
Now, what's interesting about this image is that it clearly shows above normal gravitation in very specific locations on the globe, including around the Pacific Rim, which upon closer inspection corresponds exactly to what geologists refer to as "The Ring Of Fire", a region of significant volcanic activity:
I'm no physicist nor geologist or vulcanologist, but even I can figure out that hat this seems to indicate is that there may be a connection between volcanic activity and gravimetric displacement; that is, gravity tends to be slightly higher where volcanic activity is present, and I guess the question this begs is, "why?" Magma isn't necessarily denser than solid matter, but it is generally under tremendous pressure; the grinding together of continental shelves for example, where one mantle is subsumed beneath another (as occurs just off our own coast), creates a tremendous amount of pressure, which in effect turns solid rock molten. So, would that possibly mean there may be some correlation between gravity fluxuations and an increase in dynamic pressure, all other things being more-or-less equal?
I really don't know, but it's an interesting speculation...
Remember how in college, if the prof was more than 15 minutes late to class, you could leave? (I don't know if it was a real rule, and I think I may have actually only done this once or twice in six years of under and postgraduate studies.) I wish they had a similar rule for the office: if your extension doesn't ring for, say more than an hour, you get to go home early.
Besides, if I continue to sit here with nothing to do, the plate of chocolate chip cookies over in accounting is going to draw me away from my desk -- again.
Now that I've pretty well settled in to my new digs, I've managed to eke out a teensy bit of time from my normally busy schedule to at least make some brief sojourns around my new 'hood, which is officially known as "Squire Park".
A Brief, Incomplete List Of Things Close-By (Within A 3 Block Radius):
1 Coffee house
1 Coffee stand
1 Post Office
1 Ethiopian Restaurant
1 Tailor's Shop
1 Ethiopian Community Center
1 Cajun Restaurant
1 Chinese Herbalist
1 Cafe
2 Gas Stations
1 Penske Truck Rental Location
1 Bank (not mine, unfortunately)
1 Convenience Store
1 Liquor Store
2 Hair Salons
1 Barber Shop
3 Churches
1 Precious Metals Dealer
1 Cinema 1 Pilates Studio
1 Boxing Gym 1 Cheesesteak Restaurant
1 99-Cent Store
If I go out to about a 6 block radius, I can include:
1 Full-Service Grocery Store
1 Hamburger Stand 1 Deli/Cafe
1 Chicken Shack (The World Famous Ezell's)
1 Elementary School
1 High School
1 Community Swimming Pool
3 More Churches
1 More Hair Salon
1 Music Store
1 2nd Hand Store
And beyond that I'm on the southern Fringes of Capitol Hill with it's plethora of bars, music clubs, fringe theatres, galleries, restaurants, arts venues, car dealerships, Trader Joe's -- you name it.
Plus, the #2 bus will take me to within about eight block of my office, or with one transfer to the #24/#33 to right across the street.
Maybe it's the "anxiety" of being in a new environment, or maybe it's because I've been so busy, but whatever the reason my sleeps cycle this past week has been all over the map. Went to bed at 10:00 last night and woke up at 2:30 this morning with a case of insomnia (something that has been occuring periodically for about the last year or so -- usually happens about once a month for no reason whatsoever), and when by 4:00 a.m. I was still tossin'-an'-turnin' decided there was just no point and got up.
In a way, insomnia can be very productive. I made a cup of coffee, turned on NPR, organized some old bills, receipts, bank statements, unpacked and shelved the last box of books, put some carpet pads down under the kitchen rugs, fixed lunch, took a shower, put away last nights washed dishes, all before heading out the door at about 6:15. Caught the #2, which dropped me off on lower Queen Anne right behind the #15, which I hopped on for a short 10 block jaunt up Mercer, and was in the office before 7:00 a.m. (My boss was already here.)
I'm hoping the restlessness is just a sign of my brain and body trying to wrap itself around the new living situation, and that it'll calm down in the next few days, because I really don't want to go through this for an extended period of time.
Otherwise, I think I've gotten the place whipped fairly well into shape, although there are still finishing touches I'd like to accomplish at some point -- art work or some suitable wall things would be nice. But, at least the place is liveable. Spent a small fortune (at least by my extremely modest standards) on new kitchen items, including a new microwave, so I'm actually able to cook, store and reheat meals. Because I wasn't anticipating having to spend the extra $$, some of the items I purchased weren't even close to top-of-the-line, but I did the best I could given my limitations: the cookware is all stainless steel (Farberware, not exactly my preferred choice, but at least I didn't demean myself by purchasing the aluminum, even if it was non-stick), and I could only afford a Henckel starter set (3 knives, but I just can't drop $300 on a decent set like what I had before), and I passed on the 1960's all chrome SpeedQueen mixer, opting instead for a 1950's chrome industrial bar blender (Hopefully, the mixer will still be available at the consignment store next month). Chrome and stainless steel -- my kitchen will be very bright and shiny!
The various-and-sundry electrical gadgets and gizmos: TV, VCR, stereo, computer, and wireless headphones have been plugged in and are all in working order -- pretty impressive considering this stuff has sat unused in storage for 3 1/2 years. There's no TV reception in the basement, but I've got enough videos that I haven't watched recently to keep me occupied for at least several months.
I'm still hoping to get rid of a few items -- hopefully one more large bookcase and the smaller of my two filing cabinets -- but the actual organization of books, scripts, files and whatnot is something that can be done on grey, raining winter evenings, which we will have in spades for the next three or four months at least, so it's not high up on the priority list at the moment.
I have to say, the place is beginning to feel like "home", and it's reached a point where I can have friends over without having to resort to the inevitable, "sorry about the mess -- just moved in" excuse.
Now, I'm not a UFO conspiracy nutcase, and I'm not sayin' there's anything going on down south, but at the very least you have to admit Ms. Ducey has a subtle sense of humor.
The cats went over to Ravenshead last night, although being cats they were not at all happy about making the move. Aurora has left some marks that will take a few days to heal, and Jenny kept up the most pathetic sounding whine for the entire 15 minute drive (having only one cat carrier, I made two trips). Still, there was food, water and litter box awaiting their arrival, and by the time I went to bed last night, both had settled down considerably.
Unfortunately, being cats, they kept up a veritable marathon of jumping up and down on-and-off the bed for most of the night, so once again I'm short on sleep.
Tempers were flaring this morning when both tried to claim the bathroom, and Aurora at least seems to be a bit off her feed (Jenny, pirate that she is, was more than happy to abscond with the extra kibble). Still, they seem to be transitioning much better than anticipated, and assuming they haven't clawed the furniture to shreds by the time I get home tonight with their "scratching hamper" (their favored - and from my perspective prefered clawing device on the boat), things should settle into some semblence of normalcy by the weekend.
If you're a space-geek like me, 4 October is going to carry a great deal of meaning from now on.
It's ironic to a degree that defies rational understanding: on the same day Brian Binnie wins the X Prize by piloting Spaceship One on it's record setting flight into space (on the 47th anniversary of the launch of Sputnik no less), one of the pioneering "star voyagers" of Project Mercury should leave us. Gordon Cooper was the sixth and last of the Original Seven Mercury astronauts to complete a mission (the seventh, Deke Slayton had been grounded due to irregular heart rhythms), completing 22 orbits in "Faith 7" in May of 1963.
Chances are my dad sat me down in front of an old black-and-white television somewhere in the outskirts of Cheyenne to watch the liftoff, as he claims to have done with the earlier Mercury shots. I still remember these moments with a sort of clarity, and there's a good likelihood these indelible moments etched itself on my synapses as some of my earliest cognizant memories. I can quite easily conjur up the image of a slender, needle shaped object rising on a plume of cotton candy smoke, but it's one I've seen repeated so many times during the course of my life that I have to honestly wonder whether these are actual memories, or merely an approximation of what I think I remember.
Two years later Cooper and rookie astronaut Charles "Pete" Conrad spent a grueling eight days inside their Gemini 5 capsule, on a 122-orbit mission that covered more than three million miles, proving that it was physically possible for men to travel the relatively short distance of 500,000 miles to the moon and back. It was the last time he flew in space, although he remained on active duty until 1970, by which time the public had lost interest in the Apollo program, and Congress had axed the last three planned missions, effectively ending his shot at ever setting foot on the moon.
So, now of the Original Seven only three remain: John Glenn, Scott Carpenter (the only one I ever met personally), and Wally Schirra. Gus Grissom of course died during the tragic Apollo 1 fire in 1967. Slayton, who finally got his ride as commander of the 1972 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project died in 1993, and Al Shepard, the first American into space went in 1998.
Given the coincidence of today's events it's not hard to imagine that while Brian Binnie was making his historic flight this morning, the line from an old movie might have come to mind.
"Who's the best pilot you ever saw?"
Seeing the curve of the blue earth highlighted against the velvet black of outer space, Binnie might have looked at his own sun burnished face reflected in one of Spaceship One's port windows, smiled to himself and thought,
Exhausted. That's the only word for it. Between finishing out Hothouse, and moving this weekend I'm just wiped out.
Basically, everything went fine, got some help from a few of the Annex Regulars (Yay! Tom, BenLau, Molly, Scotto & Dante!) between shows on Saturday to move the U-Haul truckload of furniture, clothing & odds & ends into the new space (and special Yay! to Meaghan for giving me the matinee off to load the truck!), then spent yesterday afternoon shoving things around until they fit, opening boxes, organizing books, doing laundry, cleaning, and getting rid of a few things that I really don't need any more. Most everything fits into my tiny quarters, although with the built-in bookcase, I'm planning to get rid of some home-built shelving. And once I get around to compressing and consolidating 12 years worth of files, theatre programs, scripts, and whatnot I'll probably be able to live without one of my two filing cabinets. That should make the bedroom space a bit "full", but liveable. Maybe I'll even be able to squeeze in that reading chair I'm still planning to track down.
Despite the loss of some crucial items, I managed to stay fairly close to my budget on the move, even with the additional purchase $200 worth of kitchenware and bedding. But, now I have new glasses, cookware, utensils, flatware, pillows, etc. And dear Dawn presented me with an early birthday present (after pulling a slight practical joke on my tired, unprepared self) in the form of a down comforter. There are still a few items I could use (first and foremost a small vacuum), but nothing that can't wait. Still have a bus load of stuff that needs to go in, plus some items from the boat to move over (including the cats), and on Saturday, I'll be getting some additional items, courtesy of SGNP (Yay! Bread makers!). Hopefully by next week I'll have more-or-less put the finishing touches on my new digs.
Spent my first night there last night, although I must say it wasn't nearly as restful as I had hoped, given that I was sleeping on a new mattress, in a new space, with lots of new noises (thermostats clicking, heaters cooling, refrigerators fridging, and the like), as well as the general stress of dealing with new circumstances, with the result being that I probably only got about 3 - 4 hours of actual sleep. And this week is a full-tilt boogie of meetings (tonight) and theatre-going (Tuesday through Saturday), so I won't be spending much time there this week.
Add the name of Brian Binnie to the slowly growing list of "commercial astronauts", with his X Prize winning flight this morning. And hats off to Burt Rutan, Paul Allen and everyone at Scaled Composites for opening the door for the rest of us.
Now, if I can just scrape up enough for that deposit check to Virgin Galactic.
Well, St. Helens finally gave off her mini "burp" at just after 12:00 Noon PDT today (nice video footage here courtesy of KING TV & MSNBC.com). Geologists have been predicting an iminent eruption since earthquake activity began increasing several weeks ago. Compared to the 1980 cataclysm this is pretty much a non-event, probably due to some pressure from a reservoir of magma that has been slowly building up for the past six years or so.
Seismometers seem to be indicating a decrease in activity, so this may be as much as the mountain can give off for the foreseeable future, which is good news for anyone living in the vicinity, but for those of us who lived through "The Big One", it certainly brings back memories.
Just moved the last of my boxes from storage to Ravenshead during my lunch break today, and in a revoltin' development discovered that I seem to be short 2 - 3 crucial containers. Guess what they had in them? Yep. 90% of my kitchen stuff. The good stuff. The stuff I was really, REALLY looking forward to unpacking and using again after eight-odd years being packed away. Unless there's a secret hidey-hole in my locker somewhere, it's all gone.
Pots, skillets, mixing bowls, serving trays, cookware, barware, flatware, glassware, rolling pins, pie tins, blenders, mixers, yogurt and espresso makers, springform, muffin and baguette pans, woks, spatulas, spoons, ladles, knives, mallets, chopsticks, whisks, strainers, can openers, sausage stuffers, -- vanished into thin air, like a rabbit in a hat. Even my cookbooks. It's gone. All gone.
It's not that any of this can't be replaced, it can (although the Italian espresso machine will be particularly missed), it's just that here I've been under the impression that I've been lugging this stuff from one living situation to another for years -- and SO anticipating its impending re-emergence into the light of day -- that now that it's aparently disappeared, I'm feeling very unhappy.
Remember Ronald Reagan's old story about the kid who woke up on Christmas morning, ran out to the stable and saw the big pile of manure, and said, "With all this, there must be a pony around here somewhere!" That's the sort of disappointment I'm feeling; all this manure, and not a pony in sight. But for me it's even worse, because at one time the pony actually existed! Evidentally it snuck out of the barn in the middle of the night, and I'm going to have to spend a fair amount of money to replace it.
Plus, it begs the question: WHERE did all those things go? Are they sitting in cupboards and drawers at the house on Durland? Did they get left in a closet during the brief stay on 17th N? Were they accidentally schlepped to the dump when the house on N 125th was sold? I've no idea. And the mystery of its disappearance is, frankly a bit disturbing.
Well, I guess I should look at it as an opportunity -- or more to the point, perhaps you-all can. I've got a birthday coming up in exactly 32 days, don't you know, and now you've got a list.
The boxes. So many, many boxes. Still more boxes. Boxes within boxes holding long forgotten surprises nestled like Russian matryoshka dolls inside of envelopes, inside of folders, inside of shoe boxes, inside of larger boxes, hidden away in the depths of a storage locker like the Ark Of The Covenant in some U.S. Government warehouse. Things that sneak up when you're not looking and rabbit punch you in the kidneys, that melt your face off when you stare into their depths.
Everybody has at least one of these boxes within which resides the reliquery of a past life. The tiny bits of surviving detritous that somehow manages to cling to us like sweater lint through a lifetime of packing, sorting, downsizing, moving. The old photographs, the letters, the journal entries, the reminders of lost loves, of forgotten friendships, of barely recalled events, all of the contact points between your life and other people's, cold-case evidence of someone going left when you went right, when two joined threads diverged to create new spokes in an infinitely huge spiderweb of collective experience. Thin bone fragments of your life that have been carefully preserved, though yellowed and faded with time, and smoothed like river stones to a dull finish in your mind.
The thing about all these little pieces of history is that at one time pulling them out of their paper cocoons and holding their butterfly thin pages up to the light would have been a risky proposition. There used to be a lot of pain, sadness and regret attached to them, psychic echoes of missed opportunities, hasty decisions, spurned offers. But memory is a funny and wonderful thing; I can now look at quite a few of these things and remember the sensation of physical discomfort they once might have caused me, but the pain itself is absent. Somehow over time, they've lost their power; now the blows are weak and have no effect.
And there's a part of me that sort of feels bad about that. Because when the memory of the pain has dulled, it means the memory itself has been corrupted, dilluted, and become inert. It's not that I want to wallow in the past, especially with memories that obviously are personally traumatic, and surely this means their influence has equally waned, which means the emotional knap sack has been lightened somewhat along the trail, but the main reason we hold onto this ephemera is that they are a reminder that sometimes even pain is precious.
Still, there's something hopeful about being able to look at things that once caused pain, but now don't.
Maybe it means there's some room inside again for happiness to take its place.
Made the first move of boxes out of storage and into the new place last night (which I'm tentatively dubbing "Ravenshead Manor" -- a bit verbose, but if you come by sometime you'll see why -- Oh Ladies Who Name Abodes, if you are inspired by something better, please let me know), and am quickly coming to the inescapable conclusion that, despite not having all that much in the way of material possessions, I'm still going to end up departing with some things by the time I complete the move in another week or so.
I've had boxes and boxes of all sorts of odds-and-ends that I've been holding onto for, in some cases, 10 years or more, some of which haven't seen the light of day since I moved off the farm where I lived in Eastern King County back in the early '90's. Although I'll no doubt keep most of the books, there will surely be plenty of other items that realistically should go to some worthwhile thrift store, but part of the "fun" will be opening each of these cardboard treasure chests to rediscover what amazing contents it may hold. I can vaguely picture some items: the pub glasses, theatre logo'ed coffee mugs, the various and sundry kitchen accoutrements, but I expect there are going to be other things that I just pull out and go, "Huh. Didn't realize I still had THIS!" Some of these surprises may turn out to be useful, necessary, and "keepers", but others will end up in the "what in the world was I thinking when I decided I needed to keep this?" pile.
Also purchased my first actual furnishing item last night: a teensy little yellow drop leaf dinette table with two matching vinyl chairs, circa 1963 or so, in very good condition. The copper trim is a bit worn and in need of some spit-and-polish, but otherwise it has been very well taken care of over the years. I've decided that the kitchen decor will be 1960's "space age" style (think Peter Ghyczy or Eero Aarnio -- "The Jetsons", but on a much smaller budget). The main living/sleeping area will probably be something more traditional, maybe English Country Manor, but cleaner, since it's a pretty small space itself. (I can't believe I'm actually thinking of these spaces in terms of actual interior design!)
So, if you've got a spare lava lamp or wingback chair you're just itching to get rid of, give me a call -- maybe we can make a trade.
The Associated Press
Updated: 1:42 p.m. ET Sept. 23, 2004
WASHINGTON - Standing beside Iraq's interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, President Bush on Thursday denied that he has sugar-coated the situation in Iraq and said that elections are possible as scheduled in January despite ongoing violence “because the prime minister told me they are.”
On top of the other good news, just a few moments ago my agent posted an email saying she's getting out of the business effective the end of this year.
Not that I've gotten much in the way of auditions through her since I joined Actors' Equity, but given the dismal state of the film/commercial market here in Seattle, chances are no other agency in town is going to be eager to pick up any of her actors.
Well, "when it rains it pours", as they say. I got an email this a.m. from the people managing the little apartment I looked at on Saturday offering me the unit. So, looks like as of the 1st of October I'll have a new home!
Okay, the place is teeny by apartment standards (but still big compared to what I'm used to), and it's a bit on the dark side being a basement unit, but it's surrounded by lots and lots of green (certainly a change of pace), which will be pleasant in the spring and summer, and the upstairs neighbors seem very nice -- and evidentally, they thought enough of me to overlook my carnivorous tendencies.
I'll probably begin moving things in as early as next week (the unit is currently vacant), and make a major move of big items the weekend of the 1st/2nd. Fortunately, most of what I own is already boxed up, so if I can get a few people to give me a hand with a couple of larger/heavier items, it should go relatively smoothly.
The one thing I'm going to need to do is track down a couple of furniture items, specifically a new mattress for my bed frame, a small love seat, a small dining table & chairs, a computer chair or nice comfy reading chair, and probably a torchiere or similar type of stand up lamp. Yikes! That sounds like a lot of stuff!
On the plus side, I'll be giving up my storage unit, and no longer living on the boat, so that saves me $200 a month right there. In another month or so, I'll probably move the boat to a cheaper marina, which should save me another $100 - $150 a month, so between all these, I'll have most of my rent covered without too much additional expense. It means putting a little less into savings each month, which concerns me a bit, particularly as there may still be ramifications due to Friday's office shake up, but given the rotten weather we've had the past six weeks, the advantages of being able to eat, sleep, shower and dress in the same space actually outweighs other concerns.
Well, Old Boss didn't come in to work this morning, lending credence to the speculation that whatever went down on Friday, it wasn't planned on his part. But, it does of course beg the question of whether he'll show up again during office hours. I'm not holding my breath.
Yesterday afternoon's revelation sent me into a bit of a funk, which I proceeded to dispell with several Guinnesses at my local watering hole, which just happened to be celebrating their 2nd Annual "Half Way To St. Paddy's Day" event. Since I won the limmerick contest last year, I naturally felt compelled to defend my crown, although sad to say, politics triumphed over talent, as I was dethroned by a decend, but decidedly inferior effort. The host later informed me that, "Your's was the best of the lot, but I didn't make the decision." This made me feel a little better, but I also understand this is strictly a marketing gimmick and so naturally the proprieters might want to "spread the love" as it were. Either that or they found out I'm a family member of rival Pacific Northwest Irish Restauranteers.
Today is the kickoff for Annex Theatre's Hothouse playwright's festival. We've hooked up with four writers (one each from Seattle, Vancouver, B.C., Minneapolis & NYC), brought them all to town, put them up in a B&B "Big Brother" style (but without spycams and manufactured dramatics), and over the next two weeks they'll basically have a free hand to create, embellish, hone or otherwise work in a creative, fun, pressure-cooker atmosphere that we hope will generate some good ideas and perhaps even some finished product on their part. It's a way for our company to get to know young, up-and-coming playwrights, establish a rapport, and hopefully build a creative relationship that will prove mutually beneficial in the future. Lots of work to be done by all, but also lots of fun.
In my burgeoning quest to seek land-based housing, I took my first walkthrough of a little studio apartment this morning. The place itself is small (although the kitchen is rather spacious compared to most studios), but it has a lovely yard filled with fruit trees, medicinal herbs, and even some space for a garden plot. The people who live upstairs are very nice, artsy-activist types, and I felt like we had a good connection during the 45 minutes we spent talking and looking a the unit. There are a couple of issues that might preclude things working out (namely the cat situation -- the landlady already has two on-site, and the issue of vegetarian versus carnivorous consumption), but I did my best to assure them of my flexibility in these areas. Still, even if it doesn't happen - it is after all only my first foray into apartment hunting - it was a good start.
Finally, just a reminder, in case I don't get online, that tomorrow is International Talk Like A Pirate Day. So get out your eyepatch, your tri-corner, your cutlass or your blunderbuss, and start practicing your "Arrrs!" and "Ye scurvey dogs!" in the mirror, then get out there Sunday and TALK LIKE A PIRATE!
Holy Bleeding Heart of Jeebuz on a Ritz Cracker, Batman! My boss left early today, exiting with a completely out-of-character handshake and a "goodbye", which naturally prompted a quizical look from me. "Just leaving early for the weekend", he replied nonchalantly.
Two hours later, our HR Dept. posts an email informing us that my boss is "taking an early retirement" effective September 30!
I'll Trade You This Pair Of Sunglasses For Your Wool Mittens
The TV weather forecasters are loathe to report it, but I have it on good authority that, for all intents-and-purposes -- summer is officially over here in the Upper Left-Hand Corner. The sun still occasionally makes a few paltry attempts at showing up, like that distant relative whom you haven't seen at family renunions in 20 years, who always writes promising to put in an appearance next time around, but generally the result has been pathetically ineffectual.
In the past two weeks our daytime temps have plummeted from the low-to-mid 80's down to the lower 60's, mornings are increasingly dark, grey, damp and blustery, and the nights are starting to chill down to near refrigeration levels. There are still a few cockeyed optimists strolling through the early a.m. gloom and drizzle wearing shorts and T-shirts, but the rest of us aren't fooled by their forced cheerfulness. "We'll get a nice Indian Summer!" their pitiful attempts shout, but we all know it's a doomed proposition, like expecting the White Sox to ever win another World Series.
No, the rest of us aren't fooled in the least. We're pulling the sweaters out of storage, turning up the thermostats, spraying the heavy jackets with water repellent, searching through drawers for gloves, scarves and knit hats, wondering if we should invest in that full-spectrum sun lamp. We know Winter is coming. We can smell it in the air like a bloodhound scents its quary.
At some point in the next few weeks we'll get a bit of a break, a sultry, burlesque tease courtesy of Summer Past, just enough to feel the heat of the sun warm cheeks already windburned the color of ripe cherries. If we're lucky this will be followed by a week or two of what in other locales might be recognized as Fall: the evening air will get as crisp and brittle as a saltine cracker; the leaves will begin to turn from lush green to mottled orange. Then, right around the end of October we'll be plunged into another six months of perpetual, drizzly twilight.
The sweet summer smells of mint, strawberry and honey are already being replaced by the savory aromas of curry, tumeric, and nutmeg. Soups and stews are beginning to bubble away in crock pots like pre-Cambrian lava pools. Bodies honed to razor sveltness by months of outdoor activities will soon soften and swell like Thanksgiving parade balloons under gradually increasing layers of wool, polar-fleece and gore-tex. Mounds of buttery popcorn paperback techno-thrillers will be pushed aside in favor of dense, meaty hardbound volumes written by dour Russians and verbose Brits. Bar-B-Que utensils will be shoved to the backs of drawers, while pumpkin carving implements will be placed at the ready.
If you go by the calendar of course, Winter isn't officially expected in these parts for more than three months, but up here we know the futility of relying on arbitrary, man-made systems of seasonal reckoning. Winter makes her own vacation plans, she books her own flight itinerary, and tends to arrive before you've had a chance to put fresh sheets on the guest bed. So, we're preparing now, in expectation of the moment when she presses the buzzer with her icecicle-thin finger, when we'll welcome her in with bright Jack-O-Lantern light, a warm fire, and a hot cup of cocoa.
$475 1 BR Chp Apt. In The 'Hood (Central District)
Because of all the housesitting gigs I've done in the past couple of months, I've actually spent more time off the boat than on, and all those days not having to walk outside to take a shower, being able to cook meals on real stoves and store the leftovers in real refrigerators, not to mention actually getting a complete night's sleep in a real bed has prompted me to give a lot of serious thought to moving into an apartment situation. Now that the boat's paid for there's not so much financial pressure to economize, and a quick cost-benefit analysis shows that a modest rent expenditure of $600 a month would allow me to stay within my income budget and still put a couple hundred in the savings account each month.
So, I've been looking through the classifieds, checking out apartment listings on Craigs List, and scoping out "For Rent" signs in some of the neighborhoods close in to downtown. The good news is that right now the rental market in Seattle seems to be pretty stable, with a fair number of studio & small 1 BR units available in my price range, so I seem to have the advantage of being able to take my time, find something that fits my needs and lifestyle, and plop down a bunch of cash.
The only possible downside I can see is that the whole process of renting has changed drastically since the last time I was actively seeking housing. Now, it's all about background checks, evidentally to give the landlord some assurance that: a.) I'm going to be able to pay rent on a timely basis, and b.) that I'm not some crank-cooking, machete-wielding psychopath. From their standpoint, these are probably quite reasonable considerations, but in terms of my rental history, I've been somewhat "off the grid" for a number of years (unless the definition of "renter" can be strethed to include three plus years of liveaboard boat moorage), which conceivably could cause me some difficulty.
I suppose I could always do the roommate route again, but I've been-there-done-that, and with two geriatric felines in-tow, I'm not sure that would necessarily be any easier of an arrangment to negotiate than just living by myself. Besides, at a certain age (namely -- mine) the issues of trading social interaction in exchange for things like being able to use the bathroom whenever you need to start to rear their ugly little heads, in addition to the fact that I've frankly come to enjoy the luxury of privacy.
"Work, work, work. Work, work, work. Hello boys, did you miss me? I missed you!"
Back on the chain gang again after a relatively blissful 10 days away. Actually, transition today was much less stressful than I expected, but that could in part be due to slight punchiness from yesterday's blood donation.
With the last couple days of my vacation winding down, here are a few things I've learned in the interim:
1. It's amazing how much of your stuff can migrate from the place you live and/or store your things, to someone else's place when you've been housesitting for two and a half weeks.
2. As much as I miss having a real oven, what I really miss is a four burner stove.
3. While cable television offers scores of channels, the only ones really worth watching are those that broadcast programs about: history, custom hot rod and motorcycle fabrication, cartoons intended for adults, satire disguised as news, and news that just happens in front of the camera without commentators, pundits or anchors filtering it through their own narrow world-views.
4. Bellevue really is as dull as most people who live in Seattle believe it is.
5. On the plus side, they're not picky about issuing library cards.
6. Van Gogh was as good at drawing as he was at painting.
7. Mondrian is highly overrated.
8. Sarah Rudinoff is not.
9. Two cats can shed enough fur in two weeks to inundate a small state such as Delaware.
10. Vacations are never as long as they need to be.
Wet. Really wet. Abnormally wet. That was the prognosis this weekend after we received a one-day record rainfall for the month of August (.57 inches recorded at Sea-Tac Airport) in a twelve hour period ending at 5:00 p.m. on Saturday. Now, for those of you out there who already have this picture of Seattle as being perpetually damp, let me point out that this amount equals our average total monthly precipitation for the month -- and we'd already received about an inch prior to this weekend, with even more rainfall expected through the middle of this week.
So, in case anyone asks, just tell them everything they've heard about The Pacific Northwest being wetter than the bottom of the ocean is absolutely true; if nothing else, it'll keep at least some the lookey-loo's away until next summer.
"We Were Highballing, So The Hogger Beat 'Er On The Back"
Travel by train is just so civilized, especially if you're lucky enough (as I was on my return trip from Portland) to ride on one of the cross-country routes, in this case the "Coast Starlight". Unlike buses, you're not packed in with dishevelled, sweaty, unsavory looking characters, who've been on the road for several days -- and smell like your laundry basket after you've been camping for a week. And unlike airplanes, you actually have the advantage of being able to see and enjoy the scenery you're passing through.
There's a sense of spaciousness to rail-riding that is absent in just about any other form of long-distance transportation; you can actually get up, walk around, go to the lounge -- or better yet, the dining car for an actual sit down meal, with white linen tablecloths, real silverware, a waiter taking your order. And if you're on a really long trip, you can even spend the night in a private sleeping cubicle. You sure don't get that kind of service on airlines, which except for their convenience of speed have evolved into little more than "buses with wings".
Another thing I like about trains is how they exude an atmosphere of congeniality. Almost everyone you meet on a train -- from the conductor on down to the youngest passenger -- seems genuinely pleased to be there. Maybe it's the novelty of the experience, but they're relaxed, physically loose (perhaps from all that swaying back-and-forth), cheerful and unhurried. Train travel facilitates an opening up of personal space in a way that being packed together like sardines in a plane or on a bus can never come close to matching. You're not forced to interact with the person sitting next to you, but at the same time conversation just seems to come out as a natural consequence of the environment.
Since I usually travel solo, I almost always end up seated in the dining car with other people -- to maximize space -- so I'm invariably put in the position of eating my meal with complete strangers. Yet rather than feeling like an imposition or invasion of privacy, in my limited experience it's quite the opposite; the conversation is always generally pleasant, the food surprisingly good (albeit somewhat on the pricey side), and the service nearly impeccable.
For many people rail travel is something of a treat, a throwback to an earlier era when getting from one place to another could be measured in tens of miles per hour instead of hundreds. Trains move at a speed that can easily be assimilated; there's a sense of human scale to be had in rolling through towns and villages, following the courses of rivers and creeks, skirting the edges of farms, pastures and wilderness, paralleling roads and highways in one continuous ribbon of experience, like a movie that scrolls by on an infinitely long spool.
But, what I find most fascinating about train travel is the brief glimpse it allows into the hidden sides of peoples' lives. There's a good reason why we refer to "the other side of the tracks" as the downscale, the less-than-ideal, the lower class side of things, because in small towns and villages the tracks parallel the main streets, and are literally the dividing line between the carefully maintained storefronts and houses on the front side and the detritus that accumulates behind them: the brackish inflatable swimming pools, encrusted plastic lawn furniture, and broken toys strewn through a thousand back yards; the post-apocalyptic landscapes of abandoned buildings, the rain dissolved carcasses of rusted vehicles, the geriatric leaning of old chicken coops and garden sheds, all the things that we keep hidden from the neighbor's view, but which are unceremoniously on display for the benefit of complete strangers thundering past at 70 mph, on their way to somewhere else.
The only real disadvantage I can see with Amtrak is the general laxity in their scheduling (the railroad conductors' watch, that symbol of late 19th/early 20th century chronological accuracy having been chucked at about the same time that Amtrak was created in the early 1970's). On some trains nowadays they even make a point of displaying computer generated maps showing your position on the route, with a digital clock to let you know how far behind schedule you actually are. It's not unusual for the Starlight, which normally makes a 35 hour one-way trip between Seattle and Los Angeles, to arrive hours late at its end destination
So, I fully expected to depart late from Vancouver, but was pleasantly surprised when the engine rolled up right on-time. I learned later that there had been a tunnel fire between Sacramento and Eugene, and that this train had actually been sent down from Seattle earlier in the day to pick up the unlucky passengers who had to be rerouted around the blockage -- sometimes even with trains you get stuck riding the bus.
Of Waves And Seagulls, Football Crowds And Church Bells
Back from PDX last night after a very relaxing train ride from Vancouver (more on that later).
I always feel a little disconnected at family gatherings. Most of my relatives live in fairly close proximity to each other, and so they benefit from an almost daily interaction with each other that's lacking in my relationship to them.
But, I also recognize it's not their fault. Regardless of the circumstances that brought me to where I am today, I'm the one who chooses to live 200 miles away, and so much of the responsibility for keeping myself "in the loop" rests squarely on my shoulders. But, it's still somewhat disconcerting to listen to aunts and uncles, cousins, grandparents talk about things they did together yesterday or last week or last month and know that it's completely outside of the frame of reference that defines my life, and that for the most part, that's the way things will always be.
Still, it does make me appreciate the limited time I do spend with them, and I hope I've done a good job of letting them know that.
The wedding was quite lovely, small-scale, intimate even, and the new bride (my cousin Jessica) and groom (her new hubby Luke) seem like a great couple; I wish them all the best.
Because the event was at my aunt & uncle's in North Portland, I only managed the briefest excursion into downtown. But, for future reference, Tri-Met has extended the MAX Light Rail "Yellow Line" north to the Expo Center, which is at most a 10 minute walk from their condo, and it takes only about 20 minutes to get from there to City Center -- at a cost of $2.60 round-trip, it's a real bargain (not to mention another glaring example of what Seattle's missing in terms of mass transit options). Got off right underneath the Burnside Bridge, smack in the heart of the Saturday Market,
From there it was an easy 10 block trek along the edge of Chinatown
to Powell's (bought an old Thomas Pynchon, and new Jonathan Raban & Mark Chabon).
Afterwards finished off with a pint of Hammerhead at Ringler's Pub.
(Just hope my coleagues at Annex Theatre don't get mad that Mike & Brian have co-opted their name!)
And finally a snap of the inspiration for (what every theatre geek knows is) Teddy "Roosevelt" Brewster's favorite bathtub toy...
All-in-all a pretty quintessential "Portland Experience" crammed into less than two hours time.
