1) I love reading others’ blogs about 32 times more than I like writing one.

2) My list of friends’ blogs gets checked about three times a day, so I don’t miss anything.

3) I feel more connected to my friends who have blogs with regular entries.

4) David is my best friend, but Marcie’s is my favorite blog.

5) If anything I ever said scared Marcie away from writing, I think I would punish myself by hitting myself in the temporal lobes with a ball pein hammer - hard and several times.

6) I am a writer and yet sometimes, blog entries are a major pain in my ass and a cause of slight but persistent paranoia about revealing myself in a self-centered way.

7) Since I’ve started this online journal, I doubt more and more my power as a writer.

8) Every day, I keep hoping Kris Byrne will finally put in another entry (Maybe she is like me, and has grown mildly uncomfortable with all this.)

9) I respond to people to let them know I am reading, to try to encourage them to write more…

10) …But I am sure the tone of those responses sounds downright hostile. It’s like blogging and responding to blogs is making me a shitty interpersonal communicator, an asshole…or maybe I always was. (sorry, Joshie.)

11) Typing blog entries and expecting others will read them makes me feel incredibly selfish and ugly. Like if I could look at my “blog-self” in some internet mirror, it’d be some freakishly fat monster with mirror eyes and a leech mouth.

12) I half-thrill and half-dread responses to my blogs…or the more likely lack of responses, which also makes me feel a smidge more comfortable that no one is reading me being a selfish, paranoid, untalented writer.

13) I cannot currently think of anything constructive or worthwhile that writing and fretting in this format has given me…

14) …But I would shoot myself in the head if anything I said made my friends quit writing in theirs’.

15) I think writing this has taken away from my playwrighting.

16) I have this deep, dark longing to change my life, to have a metamorphosis, to live the rest of my life totally different than it is currently. Like the change from the first 15 years of my life to the next twenty, I long for transformation.

17) I cannot seem to make the small choices in my life that would add up to major reconstruction (he types as he takes another drink of caffeine-laden soda).

18) Whenever I try to act differently – more in the way of the person I want to be – the “asshole” me cannot seem but to interrupt.

19) I want to stop this…

20) But please don’t feel obligated to respond or to encourage me, and PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE, don’t quit writing too. Please don’t stop. Just let me.

21) And this is by far the most selfish, ugly egocentric, depressing blog I’ve posted.

22) So this is what the bottom of this particular Well of Stupidity looks like. Hmmm. Please forgive me, don’t beat me up for not trying, and please keep writing in your blogs.

23) I bet we can all think of about four hundred more constructive ways I could’ve said this.

24) And that’s why I’m stopping, in the hopes that I can start doing constructive stuff in the future.

25) Stare into the lighted tube on your desktop. Concentrate. You are getting sleepier, sleepier, sleepier. You are totally asleep, in a hyptnotic spell. Now. This message and any trace of my blog will be permanently wiped from your memory by the time you finish reading this sentence. You will awake at a totally differnt, more pleasant blog (pick Marcie's) with no recollection of my silly blog or this mind-erasing process.

There are no Indians in Indiana

I have been on vacation here in the great "whatever" state...

LISA, (that's my sister), what's Indiana known as??? - oh, yeah - the Hoosier state!

Hey, what are Hoosiers!?!?! Oh, nobody knows - but apparently they're good enough to mascot a Midwestern state - but then again Hitler was probably good enough to mascot some of these places...

Actually, I've had fun - on the first night she took me to a Duran Duran concert in Detriot - which means I've seen them three times on this tour... Weep for me, oh Wild Boys and Girls on Film...

Hehe

And we've had some good solid drama - which I will tell you about later. And my sis got sick on Easter Sunday, so after a very busy three days, I found that while her husband was next door preaching and she was sick in bed, I was fixing Easter Sunday dinner. Cornish game hens, rice, salad, (she made the peanut butter pie) and Texas toast. I kept pretending I was Whitney Houston in The Preacher's Wife. Although I didn't see the movie, that didn't stop me from trying to hit the high notes. Until it woke Lisa up and she threw a Mr. Goodwrench socket set at my head...

I hate having to say just kidding - it assumes that people are too stupid to tell the difference between lies and truths.

But Bush is President

So... Just Kidding.

O'Neill and Beg for Mercy!

Eugene O’Neill – an American playwright from the early 20th century. His plays – which include Desire Under the Elms, Long Day’s Journey Into Night, The Iceman Cometh, and A Moon for the Misbegotten – follow a standard pattern that NEVER varies.

His first acts are witty, character-driven plots teaming with interesting people. They are an actor’s wet dream. Good for him! Better for them!

His second acts are intermittently serviceable, but the “interesting” characters from the first act have to take the absolute most loquacious, circuitous route to revealing every little, soul-wrenching secret they’ve ever possessed. These second acts slowly but invariably become a symbolic combination of exorcism and molar-extraction performed without anesthesia in a pool of thick syrup.

His third act is a relatively short summation of how the characters will ever survive after the soul-peeling purgatorial confessions of his agonizing second act.

Even comfortable seats won’t fix this, people…

So, David and I saw A Moon for the Misbegotten at Orlando UCF-Shakespeare. The acting, the set, and the direction were superb. (There was one part, though, that I kept thinking would have been breathtakingly performed if only Russ Blackwell were playing the role. The current actor was fair, but Russ would’ve broken my heart.)

The biggest problem was that it was a typical O’Neill play. Like some people with Shakespeare, a lot of people believe that Eugene’s plays should not be edited. People, I am a playwright. Playwrights NEED editors. EVERY playwright needs an editor. Just because you are Edward Albee doesn’t mean that, occasionally, you accidentally pen some windy crap (see his Lady of Dubuque – or don’t, rather.)

Audiences change. What an Elizabethan audience wanted to hear six different ways over the course of a four-hour play, modern audiences watching Shakespeare will be permanently scared from the theatre by. O’Neill’s audience in 1952 is distinctly different from today’s audience. Nowadays, the ability to achieve a dynamic theatrical (or cinematic) experience in under two hours should have it’s own reward. (And the reason I mention this is because movies are also getting pretentious with their lengths. Damn you, Martin Scorcese and Anthony Minghella, right along with all those long-winded playwrights.)

People, it ain’t a penis; longer ain’t necessarily better.

And wow, could this entry use some editing!

Another Interview

Another interview with me. This one's a bit darker...this was in Davidroz Daily.

(1) What was the most surprisingly accurate observation somebody has made about you?
My psychologist from my college era said after just two sessions that he could tell I was truly a closet perfectionist. And it's true that I believe that if anything I’m working on cannot be perfect fairly quickly, I don’t want anything to do with it.

All the people I met during Assassins have helped me a long way in changing my opinion on this, 'cuz God knows that show wasn't perfect but so well worth it that it changed my life.

(2) What was the most surprisingly inaccurate observation somebody has made about you?
Quite a few people totally believe that I blithely plow on without any regard whatsoever to how it affects others’ opinions of me. I can see why people might say this. But I know you really cannot do much to control what others think of you - they will think what they think despite your every good intention (Even though you probably didn't mean to, I truly thank you for teaching me this, Geri).

I could - if I chose to - beat myself up about my perception of others' opinions of me every minute of the day if I wanted to. I'd be a bloody pulp, believe me. However, I had to battle with a suicidally low self-esteem in my young life so much that I conscientiously choose to make jokes, be insensitive, and have a thick skin now.

These are facts: Every single person on this earth has things they don’t like about themselves. Every single human being is sensitive to what others think about them. But for some people…me for instance…if they do not come up with some drastic and creative ways of circumventing the negative stuff that will inevitably get thrown at them, they’ll end up totally paralyzed and self-destructive.

Believe me, because I am a closet perfectionist, no one can beat me up as well as me.

And that's the most honest I have ever been in this blog.


(3) What do you worry about most often?
Being able to support myself both monetarily and health-wise.

(4) What traditions have you taken on as an adult that were not acquired from your childhood?
Happy Christmases. The New Year’s stuff David listed.

(5) What do you dream of the most that you don’t realistically expect to ever come true?
I was talking to Marcie about this just this weekend – I don’t dwell on the stuff that doesn’t have SOME chance of coming true. I’d never wish to be the 31st-century Mage/Keeper of the Mystic Golden Dragon Egg or some far-fetched fantasy crap like that.

The closest? I still want to get a Pulitzer. I would say the three silly, unrealistic dreams I have the most fun with are becoming an international rock star, winning an Oscar for screenwriting (so I can vote on all future Oscars), or having a drop-dead killer body.

(6) Name three things you are insecure about.
My body
My writing
My finances

(7) How do you feel about nursing homes - for you personally - should you ever become sick/incapacitated?
Nope – I’d rather just blow my brains out. No bitterness – it’s important to know the limits of what you’ll put up with in this life, ya know what I mean? I would never be capable of putting up with a nursing home – I ain’t that scared of death anyway. Given these two options, I would pull a Hunter S. Thompson.

(8) How do you feel about life support - for you personally - should you ever become deathly ill?
I’ll choose suicide again, thank you.

Pulled pork… … … (and cue the crickets chirping)

I know a lot of people dislike the supposed “baby killers,” but I think nothing is worse than the dreaded “conversation killer.”

This weekend, at one single dining experience, I effectively killed the conversation 3 times. I didn’t know I was so capable. Like a conversation assassin, I was. The Grim Reaper of Social Banter. People started making fun of me for it. Thank God I have a disgustingly impervious self-ego, or I would’ve been devastated.

Too late, I decided to just keep my mouth shut, because I was with some delightful people I enjoy spending time with. And I should listen more.

Just as a warning, apparently the subject of pulled pork is a conversation ender, for those of you who aren’t in the know on these things. And apparently I am decidedly not!

I haven’t quite tested to see if other pork products such as ham, bacon, and chops also decapitate and decimate good social interaction. But after the Arctic-chill reaction to pulled pork, I wouldn’t be surprised if all things porcine didn’t evoke The Demon Silence to interrupt even the most gregarious party.

It ain't just the other white meat, as I have recetnly found to my shock and horror!

Just an FYI, for those who didn’t know. God knows, I didn’t.

Damn pork...

TODAY IS A BIG DAY!

Ok, kids, the stuff I’ve been panicking about these last few weeks – the class redesign for Corporate – gets reviewed today…

And another class I’ve designed goes through its 1st CDR (customer design review), so today is a big day.

When I was working on the mentoring class with my employees and with the Communications department, I kept imagining that these training professionals today would slaughter my class, finding flaws and errors all over…

And then as the feedback I got started being very positive, I started worrying that no one else really cared. That I was doing all this work and everyone else was like, “…so?...”

These last few days I’ve had some other feedback, and that’s been sweet. I was told by two people on separate occasions that I am very trusted, people see me as dynamic and enthusiastic and smart, and they are even a bit intimidated to go up against me. I have such credibility and respect!?!?!?! Whu-wha-whuh-WHAT!?!?!

ME!?!?!?

I’ve heard the intimidating thing before, which I just don’t get…

So, maybe today will go really well and my whole future as a consultant and curriculum designer won’t be completely decimated. Because the worst is what I’ve been having nightmares about leading me to some wicked insomnia.

I have two funny stories about work:

Yesterday I was giving an introduction to an Effective Management class we are piloting and testing. And this jerk interrupts me to ask where my Lockheed Martin security badge may be. It was in my pocket because it had come unclipped when I got up and I didn’t want to take the time to rehook it.

I told the wiener this, and then I said, “How refreshing that you interrupted me in front of the entire class to give me that criticism. One of the important things we’ll be learning about today in class is the right time and place to give PRIVATELY give CONSTRCTIVE feedback, so as not to embarrass ourselves or others in front of our peers.”

Everyone laughed.

Number 2. Monday.

I commented quite smugly that I increase Lockheed’s Training Department diversity just by being here.

I meant as a gay man.

But a Lockheed trainer said, “Why? Are we short an asshole?”

Good zinger.

I replied, “No, apparently we have two…”

And that got a big laugh, too. I do love working with the person who was trying to insult me – she’s fun.

Wish me luck today. Wish me calmness...

I'm Being Interviewed!!!

I feel FAMOUS! Kateshrew interviewed me for Schmacko Daily. Shanks, kateshrew!

Okay, for anyone who's interested, this is how it works:

The Rules:

1) Leave me a comment here saying "interview me."

2) I will respond by asking you five questions here (in my comments section). They will be different questions than the ones below.

3) You will update your blog/site with the answers to the questions.

4) You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.

5) When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.And now,

here are my questions from kateshrew:

1. If your life story were turned into a musical, what would it be called?
“Midwestern Muses”

2. Give us some sample lyrics from said musical.
“A long time ago, a fellow names Lincoln
Started a blabbin’ with great pride –n- joy.
He wanted us to know, the image to sink in
He was born in a cabin in Illinois
Soon, every common person started thinkin’
His kid could grow up to be Lincoln
Yes, even a simple gent
Can one day be President
It doesn’t matter where you’re from.

How did Francis Gumm become Judy Garland?
How did Norma Jean become Marilyn,
And little James Dean from Indiana
Reinvent himself a rebel and a man among men?
It seems as their stars were being polished
Their pasts were all but abolished.
It’s doesn’t matter what you’ve done,
Only matters who you are.
Even a rural bum
Can turn out a movie star.
It doesn’t matter where you’re from.

Everyone needs a home,
Everyone needs a place to come from
A place that you start, you know it by heart
It’s that place you run from.

So thank you all for your questions and queries.
You won’t find me teary now that Tara is gone.
You can prod me some more with your posits and theories
But I’m wary and weary; it’s way overdone.
I feel like the past is always fading
I feel like tomorrow is waiting
And analysis and debating are downright dumb
(big finish)
It doesn’t matter where you’re from!”

…I’ve thought about this…

3. If you won an Oscar, Tony, etc., who's the first person you would thank?
Eeeks, the FIRST person? I don’t know, depends on what I won it for. But I would definitely thank the women who have been my mentors; My grandma Lorena, my college professor Susan Maroldo, and my adopted mom Janet.

4. If you could only read one book over and over for the rest of your life, which one would you pick?
To Kill a Mockingbird

5. Suppose someone gave you $1 million, with the stipulation that you could only use that money to throw a lavish party. What would that party be like? (besides being lavish, I mean).
Well, the first thing I would do is charter a jet to Venice, Italy and block out a floor of the San Trovasi Hotel during Carnaval. From there, I’d improvise. Oh, and everyone would get digital cameras to record their debauchery.

Quiz Kid

13 things you love (things = not people or pets)
1. Writing plays
2. Sondheim musicals
3. Good movies
4. Softening my hands (for Marcie Schwalm...this answer, I don't soften my hands for Marcie Schwa---nevermind)
5. Shopping at used CD stores
6. Napping
7. Peanut butter
8. Spacing out while listening to music through headphones
9. Duran Duran B-Sides
10. Making S’Mores with cool people (see Avis’ party, or Scott Hodge’s party, or David’s party)
11. Playing a part I’ve always wanted to
12. Introducing people to new music
13. Dark chocolate

12 good movies
1. The Color Purple
2. Harold & Maude
3. The Shawshank Redemption
4. The Princess Bride
5. Mulan
6. Memento
7. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
8. Chicago
9. Tootsie
10. Dead Man Walking
11. Far From Heaven
12. Monsoon Wedding

11 good bands/artists
1. Stephen Sondheim
2. Duran Duran
3. Anything Neil Finn is involved in (Split Enz, Crowded House, The Finn Bros., solo work)
4. Tori Amos
5. Henryk Gorecki
6. Simon & Garfunkel
7. Indigo Girls
8. Scissor Sisters
9. The Postal Service
10. Thomas Newman scores
11. The Smiths, New Order, The Cure

10 of Your Physical/Personality traits:
1. Scar on right thumb
2. White
3. Hairy forearms
4. Green eyes
5. Overweight
6. Balding
7. Three nipples
8. Biggish bottom lip
9. Ten fingers and toes
10. Glasses, mostly

9 good songs
1. Mouth’s Cradle – Bjork
2. Take Me Out – The Scissor Sisters version of the Franz Ferdinand song
3. Tryin’ to Keep the Customer Satisfied – Simon & Garfunkel
4. The Life – Wendy & Lisa
5. Anytime – Neil Finn
6. Laramie – Amy Ray
7. Nice – the live version by Duran Duran
8. The first movement from Gorecki’s Syumphony #3
9. True Faith – New Order

8 favorite foods/drinks
1. Salmon
2. Asparagus
3. Dark chocolate
4. Sour martinis
5. Strawberry-rhubarb crisp
6. Peanut Butter
7. Water
8. Murray’s sugar-free chocolate wafers

7 things you almost always wear
1. Glasses
2. underwear
3. Hair gel or cap
4. my LiveStrong band
5. My ring
6. Some sort of body product (mostly cologne)
7. A smile…

6 pet peeves
1. Metal scraping on anything
2. Chewing on tin foil
3. People with screechy voices
4. Heavy metal which is just screaming and one squeally repeated chord
5. Getting my teeth cleaned
6. Watching crews clean up car accidents

5 things you touch everyday(not people or pets)
1. Cof cof – see soft hands reference
2. The fridge
3. The shower faucet
4. My toothbrush
5. My MP3 player

4 shows you watch
1. None
2. Nada
3. Nope
4. Don’t watch TV

3 celebrities you have a crush on
1. Hugh Jackman
2. Jason Statham
3. Seann William Scott – please forgive me…

2 current wishes
1. I wish that Sons of the Revolution would win me a Pulitzer and make me an eternally famous playwright that the whole world worshiped like Shakespeare.
2. I wish I wasn’t so tired.

1 person you could spend the rest of your life with
1. Looks like it’s me, folks.

Just More Questions, Different Kind

IF YOU COULD BE SOMEONE ELSE FOR A DAY, WHO WOULD IT BE?
I’d be the Sultan of Brunai and then tell everyone that I wanted to empty my harem of women and fill it with men.

GOLD OR SILVER?
Two-tone

WHAT WAS THE LAST FILM YOU SAW AT THE CINEMA?
Hotel Rwanda and I still wanna kill myself

FAVORITE CARTOON CHARACTER?
Stimpy

WHAT DO YOU HAVE FOR BREAKFAST?
Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper and a health shake –b’fast of champions… if they’re overweight champions with desks jobs.

WHO WOULD YOU HATE TO BE LEFT IN A ROOM WITH?
The egotistical self-absorbed person who cornered me at the a party I attended last month - I also think this person’s a bit of a sociopath….what fun…

CAN YOU TOUCH YOUR NOSE WITH YOUR TONGUE?
Nope.

WHO INSPIRES YOU?
Right now, Charlie Kaufman

BEACH OR CITY?
City with the beach every so often

SUMMER OR WINTER?
Summer or Winter in Florida

HOW OLD WERE YOU WHEN YOU HAD YOUR FIRST KISS?
10, and wow, can my brothers kiss!

BUTTERED, PLAIN OR SALTED POPCORN?
Kettle corn, actually

WORST MEMORY?
And here’s where I’ll use my Skip card – why would anyone want to answer this? OK, the day my mom died! Are ya happy now ya know?!?! Huh!?!?!

BEST MEMORIES?
See above. Just kidding! The day I left home actually – I still don’t know where that courage came from.

FAVORITE SANDWICH FILLING?
Right now, tomatoes and spinach and Havarti cheese

HAVE YOU ANY PETS?
Oh, yep, my “Schweetie McPeters”, my loveable cat Cleo. And we’ve been watching over a couple feral cats, Ghosty and Jackson.

WHAT CHARACTERISTICS DO YOU DESPISE?
Sociopathy....and people who have no eyeborws, cuz that's just SPOOKY

FLOWER?
Whole Wheat Baking Flour

IF YOU HAD A BIG WIN ON THE LOTTERY HOW LONG WOULD YOU LEAVE IT BEFORE YOU TOLD PEOPLE?
I would only tell Cathy and David and then swear them to secrecy.

FIZZY OR STILL WATER?
Has anyone every tried out the idea of carbonating milk? Carbonated chocolate milk - Mmmm.

WHAT COLOR IS YOUR BATHROOM?
Ooo, it’s Fairy Dust Lavender with white tiles and a smidge of black trim.

Getting to Know Schmacko

Do You:

Keep a diary:
Yes, this blog. Also, a blog on our play Sons of the Revolution. And I scribble notes and ideas into journals – especially when I am working on a play, which of course, I am doing right now.

Like to cook:
Love it actually. Like y’all can’t tell! Have another Chocko-Crisco Ball with the Rainbow Sprinkles and Ranch Dressing Dippin’ Sauce!

Have a secret you have not shared with anyone:
Yes, that I’m actually Mother Teresa… oops, dammit!

Fold your underwear:
Only when I’m wearing it.

Talk in your sleep:
Yep, and snore and sleepwalk and have insomnia – Get me asleep and I’m a frickin’ vaudeville show!

Bite your fingernails:
God, yes, but it’s not because I am nervous – it’s so much worse that I am too ashamed to tell you!

You believe in love:
Not currently…


Last…

Movie you rented:
The French Canadian film The Barbarian Invasions, which was quiet and subtle and pretty wonderful. And I borrowed Eternal Sunshine from David – scrumtrellescent!

Movie you bought:
Can’t remember – it was probably a gift for Christmas – perhaps Saved! for Mikey and David

Movie you saw in the theater:
The very good but grossly depressing Hotel Rwanda – before that was the glorious Pedro Almodovar film (notice I didn't say "movie," because Lisa Loopner has taught me well) Bad Education

Song you listened to:
“I’ll Take the Woods” by Mocean Worker

Song you’ve downloaded:
The Scissor Sister’s cover of Franz Ferdinand’s "Take Me Out"

CD you listened to:
Tori Amos’ new one The Beekeeper

Person you`ve called:
Sarah!

Person that`s called you:
Sarah!

TV show you`ve watched:
He eeks. I don’t watch television mostly, the Oscars???

Person you were thinking of:
Someone I like who will currently remain nameless

I Wanna New Drug!

Another quiz I done found!

Your three best qualities:
I am intelligent
I am very quick-witted
I never mix my solids and whites when doing laundry


Three worst qualities:
Keeping my mouth shut
Babbling
Expressing unsolicited opinion
(Notice a trend?)

Three things you are often complimented for:
My quick-wittedness, my work ethic, my similarities to Mother Teresa (mostly the headscarf)

A compliment you got that made you blush:
Anything physical, actually.

You get embarrassed when:
People criticize anyone else in public for the show. I get embarrassed for me, for them, for anyone within earshot. I didn't pay for the show, and I don't wanna see it!

Makes you happy:
Sarah French laughing, my cat, tater tots (seriously, tater tots are SO COOL!)

Upsets you:
See above about embarrassing things. Also, people who settle with people when they aren’t right for each other but are too scared of being alone to leave, losing my friends to the various activities in their lives.

Also, in my nightmares there's this giant squirrell who upsets me by threatening to steal my family jewels...ya know, typical stuff like that.