Picking up the pieces wherever they fall

First things first, remember that audition where I said that it seemed like maybe I was starting to get it? I got that show! I am very proud to announce that I will be joining Multicultural Sonic Evolution in Welcome to New Yawk! A Five-Borough Musical Tour. I play Shana in the Manhattan piece "Stay Away from the Cave Man," and Woman in "Staten Island Fairy" (which is about Queens, obviously...).

Our flyer!

It feels REALLY good to be in rehearsal again, and the pieces are super fun and silly. It's gonna be a good time.

To celebrate (not really, but the news coincided!) I went to DC last weekend to drink heavily to visit one of my dearest friends from highschool/recipient of frequent asinine texts about the absurdity that is my life.

Casually chilling with the president. Sup Obama! Happy 2nd term to you sir.

Julia and I are best and most accurately represented by St. Patrick's Day... or one of the really awkward photos of us from high school show choir. Not sharing those.

 I went to DC in April this year to do all the sightseeing and touristing, so it seemed appropriate that this time I would focus on what's really important... visiting all of our nation's capitals bars. Okay, maybe not all of them, but quite a few. And unlimited mimosas, natch.

In other news... I've been slacking. Last Monday I had an audition for Double Falsehood at The Secret Theatre, which I was bummed to learn I did not book as 1) I loooove me some only recently canon-ized Shakespeare and 2) I just felt really good about the audition and it's been a long ass time since I've done Shakespeare. Tuesday I dragged myself out of bed for open calls for ArtsPower and with the intention of going to Theatre Under the Stars' Man of La Mancha call... 

My roommate and I divided and conquered to put up a pretty respectable numbers 15 and 16 on the list at ArtsPower... and 93 and 94 at TUtS. Eh. Could be worse. Being so much lower on the list made us trek from Ripley back up to Nola to do ArtsPower first, and both of us put up pretty lackluster performances. After a quick conference, we realized that it probably just wasn't worth it to go back to Man of La Mancha, and we called it a day to go home and take naps. 

Audition calendar is looking a little thin this week, though I do have an appointment for a new play and a workshop with a Shakespeare company on Tuesday that should be fun.

In the meantime, I have realized that my race is only a month away and I'm starting to realize I'm woefully unprepared. By which I mean I have still only run like 2.5 miles at a time... and I'm doing it sloooooow. And I only went running once this week. And didn't go to the gym at all. Basically it was a fat week, is the point of all of this. Might need to make myself a workout schedule for this week... which has Thanksgiving sandwiched in the middle. Totally gonna happen. Yep. Let's just keep telling myself that.

That's my "I really love exercise and I can totally handle making a workout schedule for myself" face. It's gonna be awesome. 3.1 miles let's do this.

In all honesty, however, I think my lack of physical activity goes a long way towards accounting towards the sort of... off color attitude I've had all week. Nothing is "wrong" in my life, per say, but I've noticed myself getting snippy and short with people who don't deserve it and generally starting to backslide into a negative headspace I've been consciously working really hard to get out of.

I had a small but very real slap in the face of "oh right, your life is kind of charmed" this morning afternoon when, after complaining via text message about wanting brunch, friends who had already eaten agreed to sit with me so I could indulge my brunch craving. Silly? Absolutely. But it was the kind of thing that reminded me that I'm very lucky to have the people I have in my life and I would be wise to focus on that, rather than sweating the small stuff.

This was particularly fortunate as my roommate - one of the aforementioned friends - did this for me anyway after witnessing a very real (if drunken) deluge of my insanity last night and chose to (pretend to) not judge me after I made a somewhat foolish/dignity forfeiting decision somewhere in the wee small hours of this morning.

The truth of it is that while nothing is "wrong," I'm spending a wee bit too much time dwelling in Last November right now - today is the one year anniversary of moving to this apartment and while I'm happy to have HIT a year in one place with no immediate moving plans, as I've discussed a few times, this time last year was not a walk in the park for me. A friend and I discussed it at lunch, and apparently we're deciding that October/November is annually when I do shows about New York and work myself into complicated situations with boys (more on that most likely never some other time). Yikes.

Okay and yes. I actually know how to fix my current complicated boy situation, I'm just... well... not doing it. Learn from your mistakes much, Stevenson? No? Okay great. Carry on. Proceed blindly off the cliff.

Realizing that I'm heading down this road is about as much as I can hope for right now - if I can recognize that I'm about to go off the psycho bitch deep end, I can reasonably hope to put in a little more swimming effort to stay in the shallow end of the crazy pool. That was a really poorly constructed metaphor, but it's what I've got.

So I'm going to take it one day at a time, I'm going to get my ass on the treadmill/pounding the pavement because shockingly, the whole physical activity thing really does help, and keep picking up the pieces wherever they fall.

Starting to finally, maybe, a little bit get it right

Before we begin, WAY TO GET IT RIGHT, AMERICA! So very proud to be an American in the wake of four more years with Obama in the White House. Are we a flawless America at present? Of course not. But I believe in my president and I believe in my country and I am giddy with relief and excitement that Obama gets another term.

Classiest post election photo? Perhaps not. Most hilarious? Yes.

Moving right along, today was a three audition day! This is big, considering I haven't been to an audition at all in over a week. I (mostly) blame Sandy. There is of course, the tiny snag that I was supposed to go to Disney on Monday but my disgusting cold has not entirely left the building and I was phlegmy and coughing and it just wasn't happening in the singing department, folks.

Because apparently the weather gods hate the northeast right now, after last week's run-in with Hurricane Sandy, last night we got treated to winter storm somethingorother. It had a name but I've already forgotten it.

This was my block last night on my way home from ballet. It's NOVEMBER.

I wasn't positive auditions were even going to happen today - curse you, weather! - but a quick search around Playbill/Backstage/Actors Access/Audition Update proved that we were still on track in open call land, which means No Skip November would win out. I tried grudgingly to remind myself that crappy weather is usually a benefit, because it means that less people will show up for auditions. It didn't make my impending wakeup call seem any less crappy.

Nevertheless, I dragged myself out of bed at 7:15 with a RAGING headache, which I thought was extremely rude since it's not like I did the drinking to deserve it. Made it to Pearl by about 8:30 for The Family Theatre Company's In the Heights and found that I was only number 10 on the list. Success! I had an appointment across the street for a new play called Confessions of Poverty at 10 am, though, so I was like ahhh this is confusing because I will be in (wait for it) group 1 at ITH and then how will I multitask ahhhh morning ahhh brainexplodes ahhhh auditions. So you can imagine my surprise and delight when I ran into the monitor, my lovely friend Vincent, on the street! He had my back. It was great.

Confessions of Poverty was meh. I should have read the whole play - which they sent me on Tuesday - instead of only making it to page 30, so that's on me. My reading was solid, I think, but also not exactly right for the way the character was written. There's something to be said for making it your own, but there's something to be said for it not clicking because it's not the best interpretation of the material. Nonetheless, when the author questioned me on my thoughts on the piece I was able to offer some reasonably not bullshit-sounding interpretation and I think overall he liked me. We'll see if anything comes of that.

Went back to ITH and was called literally immediately upon arrival. Win! Decided on the line what I was singing though, which is a habit I desperately have to get out of. It was at this time that I decided to try a new thing - singing from the show!

I was always told this was frowned upon, but I'm beginning to see that in the professional world that's not really true. I've sung "Breathe" on countless occasions in class, concerts, etc. - you can read about my relationship to In the Heights and the song in this post from last January - but I've never once thought to sing it in an audition. Which is silly, right? So decide I did, sing I did, and it felt GREAT. I have sung it so many times I really didn't have to worry about it, and because of that it was also one of the most solid acting performances I've had in an audition in a long time.

They didn't ask me to dance, which means I didn't get called back. And while that sucks, it's been a while since I've walked out of the audition and been like "I feel good about what I left up there."

This evening, much later, I had an audition for a collection of new short musicals about New York. I got home from ITH at 11:30... and this audition wasn't until 9:05. This is not exactly great for garnering momentum, so it was slow going dragging myself back out of the house into the 40 degree feels like 35 degree weather. 

I sang "You Can Always Count on Me" from City of Angels (AND didn't forget the words!) followed by Sara Bareilles' "Between the Lines" and a monologue from Nicky Silver's Food Chain. And everything went over really well! They were verbally responsive to both songs and I got huge laughs on my monologue which is reasonably rare. Afterwards, as I was wrapping up and getting ready to go, one of the panel said that he was really impressed to see somebody who made such smart choices of material and who clearly knew who they were as an actor come in the room.

Uh, WHAT?

ME?

KNOWING WHO I AM AS AN ACTOR?

I was dumbstruck with shock. And (here it comes again) gratitude. And maybe even awe. Because most days I'm not sure who I am as a person, let alone as an actor.

And yet... I think maybe I'm starting to get it. I know how to make the choices that make me feel comfortable and show me off, know how to find and present the material I really connect with that do show me off as a person and an actress. It was a GREAT feeling and I pretty much walked home on air. Who knows if I'll book it - I hope that I do - but that was a hell of a compliment to get today.

Son of a bitch I guess I'm doing something right - I finally got something right.

Hurricane Sandy, gratitude, weekend morning running... And a side of everything else.

Hey there, blogosphere.

As some of you living in America (and Kitty Kat) may or may not know, we here in New York just weathered a hurricane. My neighborhood was UNBELIEVABLY fortunate - Hell's Kitchen suffered now power outages, no flooding, no downed trees, no damage of any kind.

I have to be honest - in the wake of what I remain referring to as Fauxrricane Irene, I didn't prepare for Sandy AT ALL. I battoned down the hatches, taped the windows, filled the tupperware, stocked the dry goods, watched the news and waited through Irene, which in New York city turned out to be a glorified heavy rainstorm that passed by 10 am the following day.

Sandy, on the other hand, turned out to be decidedly NOT that kind of hurricane.

What in the wee hours of the morning would become the most iconic Manhattan image of Hurricane Sandy.

This photo was taken at Avenue C and 8th Street, in lower Manhattan, on Monday night. Shown this photo before last week, I would have assumed it was taken circa several years ago somewhere in Louisiana or Florida. I could share countless more, but you, like me, have the internet and can find the images just as easily as I can. I'd show you a picture of my neighborhood but if you look at this last post
you'll find a picture of Hell's Kitchen and it looks EXACTLY like that post-Sandy.

My hurricane consisted of a very ordinary Monday at work - actually, a very BUSY Monday at work for people looking for an open spot to drink, concocting a DIY Hurricane Cocktail, and partying through the storm with friends. Looking back, this was irresponsible at best and downright dangerous and disrespectful at worst.

I still find this image HILARIOUS, but in the wake of what turned out to not be bullshit the way Irene was, it's also a little embarrassing how much and how closely I identified with this as I did literally all of those things except the cigarettes.

Throughout the week I've heard more and more stories of the devastation of this hurricane of a scale I frankly couldn't have ever expected here in the Northeast. Many of my friends were without power for the last 6 days, most could not work nor get into Manhattan, and I talked to DOZENS of people at the bar whose lives were COMPLETELY changed by Sandy, including an older couple who lives in the building I pictured above. Even friends lucky enough to live in neighborhoods untouched were stuck without being able to go to work and earn paychecks this week because their offices or restaurants were at best powerless, at worst flooded and beyond repair. I watched the news this week with a blank horror I rarely feel, and a powerlessness I have never really known in the face of nature.

Previously, the term "hurricane" hit closer to home for me than many other natural disasters as I had relatives live through Hurricane Andrew in Florida and Katrina in Louisiana. Those relatives checked in early and often, both last year for Irene and this year for Sandy, and their concern made me feel guilty for my own lack of preparation. And made me realize how naive I was to be so cavalier about something like this. It's NOTHING but lucky that I live in midtown instead of the East Village or Battery Park City and that I work in a neighborhood that also never lost power. I didn't deserve to get this lucky and my earlier cavalier attitude is coming back to bite me in the ass with a sense of proverbial Catholic guilt I never knew I possessed.

I grew up in reasonably idyllic California in the 2000s and didn't live in New York for 9/11 or any of its ensuing crises. At the risk of sounding cliché, this was my first real wake-up that things like this REALLY DO happen where I live, to people I know, to people I care about, and maybe probably someday, to me. There are dozens of ways to help and I will be finding them - this is too big a lesson to not act on.

The reason I say this is because yesterday morning and today, I went for runs that took me down the Hudson River to the west village, and it was AMAZING the difference between yesterday morning and Wednesday (my last outdoor run, when the power was still out). And the spirit of New Yorkers hell bent and determined to return to their routine was awe inspiring. This is a RESILIENT fucking city. That's something I hadn't exactly hoped to experience first hand, but it's been pretty amazing to see.

This morning in particular, I ran with what must have been dozens of folks here for the marathon, which was cancelled in the wake of widespread controversy about going on with it in spite of the hurricane. Though the marathon's cancellation is something with which I agreed wholeheartedly, the amount of people out and about to make the best of it was pretty great. I've heard many ran the distance today in Central Park anyway, a lot of whom did so to fundraise for relief efforts. OBVIOUSLY I'm not a marathoner (hi the two miles I did Wednesday, yesterday, and today were killer enough for me so 26.2 is not in the cards for this girl anytime soon) but it's still something I can respect.

I have spent the week telling people that my hurricane was "uneventful" and reiterating how lucky I have been, but it's only recently been sinking in how much worse it could have - and by rights maybe should have - been. I live two blocks from a river and ON AN ISLAND, for fuck's sake. It doesn't get much luckier than having no damage in that situation. To be frank, I've never felt more blessed.

In other news, life goes on, both in New York on the whole and in my life. Pre-Sandy, my beloved San Francisco Giants WON THE WORLD SERIES!

Just after striking out the alleged best player in baseball for the final out for the win. Storming the field. Picture me in a bar screaming and jumping up and down and maaaaaybe crying a little.

Me and one of my best friends JUST after the win and we both called to gush with our moms. This shit-eating grin stayed plastered to my face alllllll night and I'm pretty positive I woke up with it in the morning.

The hurricane hit the following day, and if you want my recap there scroll up or read the goddamn news.

In audition-land, everything was (unsurprisingly) cancelled owing to the hurricane and rescheduled for this week. Tomorrow I have Hong Kong Disney on tap before work, with In the Heights and an appointment for a new musical appropriately about New York Thursday. Back to Backstage, back to Actors Access, back to Playbill... back to life, back to reality.

I also have a real idea for a creative project... it involves Shakespeare, the High Line, site-specific theatre, and me actually really doing some work for the good of my own career. I'm excited and kind of terrified and we'll see what happens. More details to come when I have them. If I can pull this off it's going to be awesome... and if I can't, I will at the very least know I tried.

In fitness land, as I said, I went on three outdoor runs today. I have no idea if my gym was even open, because I was determined to be outdoors... and also because it's time to stop fucking around and getting my body used to how much harder that is than the treadmill (and because it's gotten really cold, and I signed up for a December race like an idiot). In my C25K training, I ran my first 20 minutes without stopping this week! It's not that much, I know... but my cardiovascular fitness has always been more dance oriented. And for someone who still remembers being made fun of for not being able to run one mile without stopping in middle school, it feels pretty damn good to look back at the fact that this week alone I have run six. I WILL get a series card at BDC this week and I WILL be dancing.

I also have to be honest - this post almost didn't happen because I woke up feeling shitty and cranky and angry today after going to bed feeling shitty and cranky and angry last night. Not all of it is resolved, but a lot was a much simpler fix than I thought... and it feels good, at the very least, to know that. Some of it probably stems from bigger issues, but I'm working on it. It also feels really good to know that whatever my (many) flaws, I've come a long way from where I was even this July where I would have bottled this up and lashed out inappropriately rather than accept how I felt and motivate myself to feel better and deal with it. Baby steps towards maturity, baby steps towards gratitude, baby steps towards a better me.

Where I've been running. New York's pretty fucking gorgeous sometimes, right? Here's to rebuilding, and here's to inspiration.

On staying put for once

Greetings readers! I know you've missed me... I spoiled you with my three updates in an almost timely fashion. I had to go back to the old Siobhan you know and love.

Very little to report on the audition front, I'm afraid. The intention this week was to hit up Broward Stage Door Theatre on Monday and Literally Alive Theatre Company's A Christmas Carol this Monday and Tuesday, but unfortunately I have been sidelined by a really cute completely disgusting cold. I rarely get sick and therefore I handle it super well, by which I basically mean acting like a huge baby. Regardless, singing is REALLY out of the question at present.

I did audition last night for Monsterpiece Theatre Collective's all-female Richard III - it was just okay. I used a monologue I haven't done in a while and though I felt fine about it, I felt... fine. Nothing special. It was, if I'm being honest, a little one note. Though they kept me in the room for a while to talk about my resume and my training, they didn't ask me to read anything else. I think their callbacks are next week, so I suppose we'll wait and see but frankly I'm not holding my breath. Got five on the schedule for next week though - all open calls but one (boo) - so keep your fingers crossed for me that the all orange juice diet I'm about to embark on makes me actually healthy again.

In healthy living news, I'm getting back serious about the whole gym thing AND I decided to give myself a deadline! Aka, I registered for a race. Roosevelt Island Hot Chocolate 5K here I come. It's in December. I'm probably insane. You should all probably be there to watch me cross the finish line and pass out.

Eeee! Here goes nothing.

Now needless to say, because of the aforementioned really gross cold, today's gym adventure took the backseat but never fear. Still on track for tomorrow. And still clocking in at 7.5 miles so far this week... so I think I can give myself a liiiiittle credit.

In the meantime, it's October. Which for the past three years has meant moving time in this household. And yet for the first time in a long time, this nomad finally gets to stay put. It's an odd notion. Perhaps my constant schedule of New Apartment October is what makes me inclined, as I mentioned in the past, to feel as though fall - rather than January - is the real start of a new year.

The trajectory of having to move in October is also a somewhat unsettling one. See, once upon a time in first grown up apartment land, four little girls from NYU decided that living in a depressing prison cell of a two bedroom apartment with bunk beds was NOT worth $1600/month (give or take) per person, and they ventured off into the exciting world of Manhattan real estate. After looking at what felt like a thousand  twenty or so apartments, they settled on living here:

Ah, the glamorous life. Sure, they still had two bedrooms for four people, but they had a doorman and a patio and a schmancy Murray Hill address! What could go wrong?

Wellll... it doesn't work out quite so nicely in person as it does on paper when you run afoul of your next door dwelling super who has a vendetta against you and you aren't EXACTLY within the technically legal limits of your lease. One thing led to another and the super found out that management didn't know four of us lived there and well... bye bye Murray Hill, hello Harlem. And so began the first October moving month.

Meet my next home, the Miles in East Harlem.

Aww, look how much it looks like the luxury high rise it pretends to be from the outside. I've got your number, Miles, and so does every other tenant who's EVER lived there.

Pros: the biggest apartment I will likely EVER live in. The Cons: well... just about everything else. Where do I begin. From the 1 working elevator (of 4) for a building with around 1000 tenants (not an exaggeration) to the frequent police raids to the teenaged potheads in my hallway to the roaches to the mice to the neighborhood, suffice it to say that living here was an... experience. If you don't believe me you can google this monstrosity. Or read any number of scathing reviews on Yelp. (Ugh but the apartment itself... how I miss it). New October, new appointments. Life goes on.

Third apartment complex inside of two and a half years. We have a knack for picking the idyllic LOOKING ones that quickly turn to shit.

After a string of unsuccessful viewings up near City College, determined as we were to leave East Harlem we eventually settled in the no-man's-land known as upper Yorkville. Technically the border of Harlem and the UES, this was a paradise for us. Things delivered, there were (gasp) actual bars (borderline) walking distance away, and best of all, ALL OF THE ELEVATORS WORKED. Soon enough, however, we'd realize we were in another property managed by the same company. And sooner than that, some of us - namely me - would realize what a huge pain in the ass it is to live 45 minutes from everywhere you ever need to go. I need hardly tell you that October rolled around and boom... It was moving season again.

Home sweet Hell's Kitchen, where a little nomad girl can stay put for a while at last.

Which brings me to today. Moving round 4 in 3.5 years was nearly the straw that broke the camels back. Collectively, in that time, I have seen somewhere in the neighborhood of 70 apartments from the West 155th Street all the way to Crown Heights, Brooklyn. I have seen the good, the bad, the horrific, the way over-priced, the gorgeous but inconvenient, the walk through, the "but it's such a good renovation," and the dream apartments I could never have. I am, in short, basically qualified to be a real-estate broker but I'm pretty sure that to do so, you have to sell your soul to the devil. Clearly I'm not going to show you a photo of where I live now because this is the internet and I'd like not to get stalked. But give or take about a block, the above photo is where I live (not in that high rise, sadly).

My first year here did not get off to an auspicious start. After an extremely hectic but ultimately successful move in day turned pizza party turned drunken shenanigans, this went down, my roommates went home for Thanksgiving leaving me alone in a still-boxed apartment, my job took a turn for the worse, and I was left feeling... generally adrift. Though I had a new apartment in my dream neighborhood, things were not exactly going according to plan. I felt impotent, and out of control which I really hate... but I did not go shopping, a la Cher Horowitz.

This is not in New York. And so I did not go there to find sanctuary in a place where I could gather my thoughts. And no, I didn't need to look up that quote. I'm just THAT cool. It's fine, I know you're jealous.

Instead, just like any moving year... you adapt. You make a new home. And I'm proud to say that for the first time since 2009, I will be STAYING here for another year. Yep. You heard right. No boxes, no appointments, no brokers, no UHaul, no packing, no security deposits, no Ikea (actually that one's kind of a bummer). Just me, my roommates, and my first ever lease renewal. Yes, this apartment's kind of (really) small, and yes there are issues, but this time we're not cutting and running at the first sign of trouble. And besides, this neighborhood fucking rocks.

...Perhaps my relationship to my apartments could be construed as an extended metaphor with my relationship to commitment. Things to ponder for another time. Is this what adulthood feels like?

So in spite of my couchbed potato sickness day today and the generally crappy weather we've been having, I'm feeling pretty damn good about this October.

Here's to new-old beginnings.

No giving up when you're young and you want some

This post will decidedly focus more on the "madness ensues" part of this blog. It happens.

See, it all started two Wednesdays ago. What was supposed to be "go watch baseball" and have an early night turned into go watch baseball, then go to one's workplace (alllllllways a bad idea after a few drinks since it's not like you're going to end up paying for anything), decide to go home, get sidetracked by a mission for pizza, and end up in one's former local haunt. I blame the half day at work I knew I was having on Thursday.

So I'm not rock solid sure what my excuse for dance party Thursday before my Friday double shift was, but alas, c'est la vie. And then it was a baseball playoff weekend and then... well... the ball was rolling.

I blame the Giants entirely for the decline in my productivity and increase in time spent in bars.

Very little to report by way of auditions except for the Cabaret recap. I sang "You Can Always Count on Me" from City of Angels and in spite of the fact that I've literally been singing it since I was a freshman in college, I have this very bad habit of forgetting the words in audition settings. Or cabaret settings. (I'll refrain from the self aggrandizing inclusion of that video). It's embarrassing, particularly given that 3 years ago this ranked on like EVERY list of overdone songs. I think know I sang the crap out of it at Cabaret auditions, but this little kink doesn't seem to bode well for me and so it was a callback-less audition once again. Once again I was sort of pissed.

It is what it is. Had a full line-up for last Tuesday, but a last minute shift switch Monday night kept me at work until 3 am which rendered getting up at 7 DECIDEDLY out of the question. Weirdly there just hasn't been a whole lot going on, and not just because I've been less than responsible as of late. Have some appointments lined up though and throwing more things on my calendar. Focusing on trying to get Shakespeare Festival auditions as it appears to be that time of year again, and as we all know I love Shakespeare.

Idk, my bff Bill?

Friday night kicked off an eventful weekend, as I reunited with the some of my fellow NYU Cleftomaniacs alumnae (alumna? alumni? I always get confused on the pluralization of this word) and saw Pitch Perfect.

Cleftolove forever. This was taken at my senior concert - literally MOMENTS before it's taking I had been sobbing hysterically. Some of you people have sororities, all of us had acapella. The affectionate joke caption of this photo has since become Phi Beta Clefto.

Alarmingly accurate to my college experience. We all agreed.

Both the reunion and the movie were FANTASTIC. I know I sing all the time at auditions/in my apartment/under my breath at work when I get bored/with Bizarre Noir, but I miss singing in a group a lot of the time, and I really miss being a part of an acapella group sometimes. Anyway, the whole thing was decidedly dorky and fabulous, and much though I love my other friends I was glad to experience this movie with other acapella nerds. Following this was my dear friends' 25th birthday party, which degenerated into an appropriate level of shenanigans and post-mortem brunch the following day. Work, relaxation, and baseball rounded out the weekend - the Giants playing game one of the NLCS on Sunday evening.

On a whim Monday night a friend and I - while watching Giants NLCS game 2 - heard that Mika was playing a show at Webster Hall Tuesday and immediately knew we HAD to get tickets. In fitting with the acapella theme, I was introduced to Mika when we sang "Happy Ending" my freshman year - I purchased his first album that day and it became one of my most played for the next year.

Hey yo Mika - what's the big idea?

The show was AMAZING. I don't really go to a lot of concerts but of my limited experience this was BY FAR the most fun. A perfect mixture of songs from Life in Cartoon Motion, The Boy Who Knew Too Much, and the new album, The Origin of Love. Which I literally purchased on my phone as we left the concert venue. I've been on a Mika binge all day and my love of this artist is totally renewed. And I pretty much lost it when he played "Happy Ending." I tried to stop singing so I wouldn't hear myself on the video, but I kind of couldn't be contained.

Ignore me singing and the less than awesome camera work. "This is the way you left me, I'm not pretending..."

In the last two weeks I've managed to hit the gym approximately three times... epic fail. But I managed to make it today and kick my own butt a little, and I'm re-doing a week of my training plan. It's kind of nice to know that I am making strides (hah. pun not intended) even with my intermittent schedule; I'm still not the future marathoner of my dreams (hahaha. joke) but my endurance is definitely growing and I can feel myself getting stronger.

My tentative goal is to find a race to run in late November, before it gets SERIOUSLY cold in New York. I also MUST get to BDC to get a new club card so I can start dancing again.

Next week I have two A Christmas Carol auditions on the calendar (ah, October), an all-female Julius Caesar (uh. fun!), and hopefully a bunch more things besides when people start responding to my emails. In the mean time, I'll continue to try to have a balanced approach to the fun and living like an adult. We'll see how that goes.

A little attitude check

Now I KNOW we've hit some kind of record. Don't keel over in shock, readers Kitty Kat. I'm updating my blog twice in a week.

Out here in audition-land, yesterday I went to the open call for Prather Entertainment Group, who do the casting for several large dinner theatres and regional theatres across the country as well as national tour producing, and an appointment for a new musical based on the music of Lady Gaga entitled Lives on the Edge.

Prather Logo looking all official and shit. Not at all intimidating.

Gaga frankly also looking a little intimdating. Am I the only person who thinks that meeting her in person might be terrifying? Like pretty cool, I guess, but also most likely terrifying.

The Prather open call proved to me that last week's good luck was short lived; I arrived at 8 am to find myself number 113 on the list. Not horrible, but also not great. Womp womp. Sat around, drank my coffee, ate my egg&cheese on an English muffin (whoops), read my book (finished The Hunger Games triology for the second time... I really need to re-read less and first time read more), and when they announced they expected to get through 40 people an hour, I decided around 10:15 that I might as well leave for my 11 am appointment.

I mosey over from Chelsea Studios to DANY Studios for my Lives on the Edge appointment, at which they'd like us to dance first.

For those of you in the know, I reeeeeally dislike that. It's not that I can't dance. It's not even that I'm not a good dancer. But I'm not a fast learner of choreography and that tends to be my downfall in an audition setting. Plus I get all in my own head about not being a "dancer" and no matter what I try to think my face just reads "oh god please tell me I'm getting all of this right and look semi-competant." Plus like dancers in their real dance clothes (okay yes, I own those) and LaDucas just intimidate me.

LaDuca character shoes, aka the musical theatre world's answer to the red soul on a Christian Louboutin. Ah, one day.

Anyway. The choreography wasn't so difficult (as the choreographer/director pointed out, if he could do it in skinny jeans we ought to have no problem) and it was to a song of Gaga's I legitimately enjoy (I have a complicated relationship to her music... in that some songs I like and am ashamed to like, some songs I unabashedly love, and some I just don't get and think are horrible and the general population seems to adore). I learned quickly by lurking through my group of 10 that we represent a myriad of skill levels, which also mellows out my dance jitteriness.

We get through it, it goes as well as can be expected, and then out of those 10, they kept 7 people. Note that I don't say "of us." Yes, dear readers, I was among the only 30% not kept. And as I watched who they did keep, there were DEFINITELY people I was better than. Womp womp.

I walked out feeling cranky and unsettled and just generally put out when I realized something... I was pissed off to have not gotten a callback. Duh, right? But hear me out. The last two weeks have been so much more about getting back on the audition wagon that the outcomes have been less important to me than the act of actually doing the auditions. My disappointment, in it's way, was refreshing - and frankly sort of a relief - because I'm starting to get over the hump and actually, you know, start really caring again.

Went back to Prather and learned that though they were collecting headshots for my group, they weren't going to see us after lunch. Genius that I am, I had left my keys at home so I returned home for a snack and a bitching session with my roommate. Went back to Prather and remembered why I shouldn't on a whim decide to sing songs in my book that I don't usually do, and was unsurprisingly not called back there either. Again. I was pissed on my way home... I was pissed all the way from 27th and 7th to 47th and 9th until it dawned on me that this should be a productive emotion. Yeah. I'm pissed off. But it means all I want to do is do better. And in a way, that's a comforting thing to know.

I didn't exactly succeed at that today, though. When my alarm went off at 7 am for the Disney Cruise Line call it just wasn't happening. I didn't sleep well and I turned my alarm off like a zombie before I even really knew what I was doing. It happens. I think they call that listening to your body. But I was in the gym by 10 am (and knocked out 5 miles between the treadmill and the elliptical) and had cleaned my whole apartment by 2:30, so we can't call today a total loss.

Tomorrow is a new day: Cabaret time at Westchester Sandbox Theatre. That disappointment thing sucks, so let's go rock it out.

I'm channeling my inner Sally Bowles as we speak. Watch out, y'all.

In which the transformation to responsible adult takes an alarming shift forward...

Okay, maybe not alarming.

But to begin with, I'm updating my blog twice within the same month! Given the recent trends, this has to be some kind of record.

Audition update:

Since we last spoke, the total is 9, of a potential 12. This my friends is pretty damn good! Not as good as I was doing when I was actually productive, but pretty good. 

Last Monday night I auditioned for 2 a.m., a new play with Manhattan Rep. Read sides and felt pretty good about it. The sides were loooong! I actually read a more or less full-length scene in an audition, which was odd. Funny scene about a girl who broke up with her boyfriend. His tactic to win her back is to pretend her breaking up with him spared him the trouble... only to have it totally backfire when it completely pisses her off and she unloads all the things she's mad at him for... toooootally not something I would do. Nope. Not at all.

Decided to pass on open calls on Tuesday as they were for Cirque du Soleil (for singers; obviously I have not gained a new and unhuman level of flexibility) and The Addams Family and let's face it, I'm just not dark and twisty looking enough. There may or may not also have been laaaaate night pancakes involved on Monday after maaaaaybe some cocktails that rendered getting up at 7 am out of the question. It happens. Baby steps. I worked heavily on revamping my website, however, and did some bonding with Backstage/Actors Access/Playbill. Not an altogether unproductive day.

Wednesday shlepped it to Brooklyn and Queens in the same day to audition for Pride not Prejudice, an educational touring company, and a new play at the Secret Theatre. And then to work. Did I mention I was in three boroughs in one day, if we count Manhattan? 

Thursday I finally conquered my fear of the AEA center! Okay, okay, I didn't conquer my fear of EPAs or ECCs (yes, this is embarrassing. I'm working on it. Kind of. Well I will, now that I'm not afraid of the building). But I did have an appointment for something there and I went in and it wasn't totally intimidating. Until I saw someone who graduated the year after me there who had an appointment for something Equity. Aka he was actually union. And a year younger than me. Ugh. Men have it so easy. Attempted to go to an open call for Hamlet that afternoon but I made a crucial error in forgetting that Shakespeare people are even more eager than musical theatre people... how unlucky for those around me that I am both. Anyway, this of course meant that showing up for this open call around 5:30 (it began at 4), getting a  time slot for "6:05" and overhearing that people who'd arrived at 3:45 still hadn't been seen. I overheard this at 6:30 and realized that, since the call ended at 7, the odds of me being seen were slim to none. Meaning none.

Couldn't get my shift covered for Monday of this week, which meant, sadly, missing the Rock of Ages Vegas call. Talk about something I'm actually right for. 80s? SIGN ME THE FUCK UP, PLEASE. 

One day I will make it to a Rock of Ages call and it will be great. A girl can dream, right?

Tuesday I got back into open call land for Stiletto Entertainment Cruises. I would love to book a cruise ship gig and it's one of my biggest goals in the upcoming year. 

It was at this call that I was struck again by how incredibly ODD the whole open call protocol is. You get up at the crack of dawn to sign an unofficial list and hope they'll honor it, and then sit corralled with 100 of your closest musical theatre friends as you listen to them warm up and watch them curl their hair and put on a full face of makeup. Before 9 am. My friends, this is not the kind of musical theatre girl I am in the slightest and yet this is part of my ordinary life. Last year, Columbia Guy somebody that I used to know pointed out to me that the whole audition culture is a very, very strange one. [Frankly, it was one of the things that endeared me to him but that time in my life has come and gone, and besides I have hashed that out EXTENSIVELY on this blog already (barf).] I had never thought about it that way until someone wholly uninitiated to my lifestyle pointed it out, but it's an astute observation. Auditioning in general is a weird notion, but I'll save my thoughts there for another post. Anyway, my return to open calling was shockingly painless as somehow, my 7:55 arrival time made me just number 13 on the list? CRAZYTOWN. Sadly, Stiletto likes to teach you music, meaning I was stuck in holding listen to all of my 100 closest musical theatre friends sing "A Moment Like This" over and over again. The. Horror. 

Left from there to go down to 440 Lafayette, or as I will forever know it Playwrights' Horizons, for another educational theatre appointment. I have never felt older than I did sitting at Playwrights on a freshman class day, listening to them talk about Writing the Essay and Intro to Theatre Studies and dorms. And hating on Strasberg! Got briefly indignant before I realized I was quietly resenting an 18 year old from afar, and this made me feel even older. Also, being at Playwrights also always has the uncanny ability to make me feel uncomfortable even this much time later, so it's never my favorite audition venue. Eh. It is what it is. My hacking cough of the morning was getting worse, so I decided to pass on the afternoon open call for Jean Ann Ryan entertainment. According to auditionupdate.com, it was a zoo, so I did not feel at ALL bad about this.

Wednesday I got up and did it again for Theatreworks and an appointment for Midtown Arts Center. Theatreworks was SHOCKINGLY efficient for their usual audition style (guys I love you, but seeing 20 people in an hour is so not okay) and it was with great surprise that I discovered being number 63 put me at the top of the 2nd hour. Finagled the two auditions in the same time frame with relative ease, and ducked out out Chelsea to get to Nola. Midtown Arts Center was casting Legally Blonde, primarily, and I was the ONLY non-blonde at the call. Awkward. Note to self: at least wear pink to those. Got back to Theatreworks and was pleased that the auditioner who brought me in from last years' open call for another show was behind the table and remembered me! Feel pretty confident about how I sang there so fingers crossed for results from that this year.

Nothing through the weekend - missed Amateur Night at the Apollo which would have been fun I think, but sadly my job beckoned. Tomorrow's agenda is Prather Entertainment Group open call and an appointment for a Lady Gaga musical. Oh boy. Disney on Tuesday, that's always a joy.

Meanwhile, in exercise land:

So, I've been training with the help of the Couch Potato to 5K approach and I'm liking it so far! It works by training you incrementally with longer and longer runs. Pretty good, for a devoted elliptical (aka non) runner.

It's not exactly turning me into the runner of my dreams, nor is it really taking away my hatred of running, but it's mitigating it at least and it's keeping me on task. AND, I ran outside for the first time. This for me is HUGE, because I generally maintain that I'm devoted to the treadmill because it eliminates the human laziness aspect of me... well, wanting to stop. Turns out, I can motivate myself to keep going, and it gives you a lot more to look at!

I haven't signed up for a race yet because I'd rather feel confident that I can do it and then have the luxury of choosing a race rather than stressing about picking a race and meeting a deadline. Odd, that's usually the opposite of how I work... but once I get into the longer training runs I'll get down to the race-choosing.

I also bought new running shoes FINALLY! They're hot pink. I've been lusting after these:

Nike Air Pegasus 29

But by the time I finally got my act together and wanted to purchase them, I couldn't find them freaking ANYWHERE. Well, at least in the right size and color. Listen, the pink is really important to me okay. If I have to be shell out and spend real money on running shoes, I damn well better enjoy being seen in them. So instead I took to the internet, and bought these instead. For $10 less and brighter pink, I'll take it... even if I have to wait on shipping.

Asics Gel Nimbus 33

I've been making it to the gym pretty regularly and I think I'm finally starting to find my groove. Next step is getting back into dance class and then conquering my fear of group exercise classes at my gym. That's the stupidest thing ever, of course, because I've been going to drop in dance classes for years and it's exactly the same thing... but somehow the idea of doing it at the gym for something that's not dance just seems really weird. I've also decided I want to give yoga another shot. God, definitely stay tuned for that hot mess, as years ago I decided I wasn't zen enough for yoga. Then again, I also NEVER thought I'd train for a 5K either. Baby steps towards becoming a fitness guru!

Life, in other news, goes on as usual. I'm trying to eat better and mostly doing a good job of it, although I haven't been to the grocery store in ages so I'm getting bored of the same 6 things I can make myself with the food that remains to me at home. Working a lot and more or less LIVING out of the Manch. I've only wanted to tear my hair out and run screaming from the building once in the last two weeks, so there's something.

Say hello to my workplace!

Got my first checks from acting gigs, which makes me feel more like a real actor and less like the building above owns my soul and sanity. It's the little things. I also have been doing so much waking up and going to sleep early that for once, my sleeping habits actually resemble those of a functional adult! It's really, really bizarre. Worry not, I have an out of town friend meandering about New York this week so I'm sure the next time I make an appearance back at this blog I'll have some debauchery to speak about.

Lastly, my beloved San Francisco Giants (who I'm watching right now, thanks MLB.tv!) clinched the NL West. #ORANGEOCTOBER. Get ready. 

This was the Giants' playoff anthem in 2010. I think the sentiment holds.

This productivity thing is weird. We'll see what else happens.