thankfully getting a break

it’s been just over a year since i started to go to Chicago every week... it’s taking some kind of toll on me though i’m not sure what. well, financially for sure - anyone who’s going to try to leave ‘reality’ and start a career in acting has to support themselves with something. of course, that ‘something’ has to leave you the ability to go to auditions in the middle of the day, or sometimes in evenings, with a day or two of notice.... then if you get that part, you have to be able to take the time off (which could be a few days) to do that work.

yeah... so basically, i’m penniless. the woman in my life helps a lot, she more often than not covers meals and so on, and aside from giving me a great chance to prove that money is truly the basis of a relationship when she brings it up in a fight, it gives us a chance to spend some time together out & about when i’m not wasting her life away. i shouldn’t complain, i really am lucky to have her, and lucky she puts up with me. i’d have to say she’s probably tops on the list of things i’m thankful for this year.

a couple weeks ago i made the decision that i would try to do more with my time - which, includes this blog to some extent. part of that was to make sure i went to thanksgiving with the family, go early, gorge myself with food, not leave as soon as the meal was over, and spend some time with my nieces. mission accomplished. over the course of the day i stuffed myself with 3 of the plateloads you see above, it will probably be a week of starvation and cardio before i burn it down. but it was good to hang with the family, relax in the recliner next to the fire, and do nothing for a day without feeling like i’m a loser for having nothing to do.

moving right along

i told myself a while ago i was going to do more with my time. there’s a part of me that wishes my friends and i would still do things - any ‘things’. but life, work, kids.... Warcraft.... people just don’t do things anymore. so i made a list of random crap that i’m going to do solo, today was the first.

today i made a late afternoon run to the Museum of Transportation, and i have to say it was kinda cool. the place has a huge variety of trains from the past of a lot of varieties - above you see picture of a rotary snow plow engine, this badass machine is like 16’ tall and was made to plow through drifts almost as tall. crazy. since i’m on a train almost every week, i asked the conductors about it, and apparently they’re used to following these plows through mountain passes where drifts and avalanches will cover the tracks. one even told me a story about how the freight train in front of them was caught in an avalanche, which could have easily been them. they finished by telling me it was worth taking that train for the views. i may add it to the list.

also at the museum of transportation was a collection of cars, a tug boat, and a WW2 era plane - but the collection of trains was really the meat of it, and worth the trip in itself. that, and the section of the Coral Court Motel they saved. awesome.

speaking visually, tied rhetorically

this afternoon my coach, the lovely and talented Carrie Houk, sent me an IM asking how i had been lately and encouraging me to go up to Washington University for a showing of the 1993 film “King of the Hill”. and, i must say i enjoyed it a great deal.

it was showing as part of the St. Louis International Film Festival (SLIFF), and included a panel discussion after which i enjoyed a great deal as well.

the film was good, great in fact, and included a lot of fairly well known names of great talent who (at the time) were not known at all. most importantly, it was shot in st. louis and a handful of bit parts were cast to local actors. of course, as most productions go, they cast the key roles out of los angeles without giving anyone in st. louis a chance.

i am DYING for someone to blow some life into recognition of st. louis actors. here i am, planning my escape to LA while spending all my professional time in chicago, without any hope of seeing real work here.

and my lovely union, SAG, is zero help. they’re rules state that i cannot act in any format for a non-union production, but they allow producers to roll into st. louis and produce great films like “King of the Hill” without much restriction on any roles that aren’t lead. my union restricts me, but puts little restriction on producers if the production isn’t in LA or NYC...



sad

ms saigon, and Say(ing) Goodnight

when i got up this morning, i knew i had things it would be nice to accomplish - or wanted to accomplish today. in the end, i spend the majority of my day helping my friend look for work instead of working on websites or acting. i’m banking on a little karma here.

while helping him i was talking to kirsten, and wanted to do something new today like any ohter day, so the decision was made to go to an African restaurant tonight. we made the plans, and then i was reminded that a film i was in would be showing tonight at the St. Louis Film Festival, and Dan assumed i would be there. after she left work, i squeezed in a trip to the gym, got to her house around 7:30pm, and went to the Loop.

upon arriving at Nubia, we saw only one customer inside, but was told that there is some kind of paranoia about places that don’t have any customers. rather than assume we missed the dinner rush, or that it was just a slow night, i was instructed that i could eat there, but i’d be eating alone because kirsten believed that being the only customers of the night would lead the restaurant to poison us. she also made a comment about how she didn't want to be the lone white couple inside. she would be offended that i pointed this out in a public forum, but will probably never read this, and i was offended by her paranoia and her comment, so we’ll call it even.

after this the debate over where we could go attempted to start, but i just told her to decide, i’m don’t fighting the rapidly growing list of rules based on unverified thoughts and paranoias which guide people’s lives. sadly, some day, i’ll also be the ass who wanted to try new things and didnt consider other people’s needs. what? because there’s always a current reference and i love rules? whatever, we end up at ms. saigon.

i’d had vietnamese food before, so it wasn’t the new experience i was aiming for, but i didn’t have to listen to her martyr herself for my thoughtless and life-threatening impulses either. i went out of my way to try something different anyway, ordering seafood & chicken on a bed of flash fried noodles. it was pretty bland, but since i generally don’t like vietnamese food i would have rather have had a tolerable new trial than a repeat of past experiences.

after dinner, we went to the film, and while there ran into my old friend Meredith. ‘Muzzy’ was there with 2 friends, and i think they were taking advantage of time away from the kids, because they’d had a few. during the film they solidly annoyed those around us with regular loud comments and normal volume random conversation... classic.

it was pretty obvious kirsten did not like the film, but it is totally a guy film, full of crass comments, etc. after we joined my friends who had produced the film at blueberry hill for a while, then walked back to the car around 1am in 25’ wind. i know she did want to see the film since i was in it, i can appreciate that, but i’m surprised she was ok hanging out with all these guys she didn't really know. i wouldn’t have. i didn’t get a good read on if kirsten was enjoying the night out with the film guys either, probably not too much. we’ll call us even on the dinner thing i guess.

as the night came to an end, i got email from the guy who’s still angry after 10 years. he’s still carrying his torch... and fine, he gets everything he wants. let’s face it, its not going to make him happy.