Two Weeks Old and First Audition

Hey guys. Hope your Monday was as swell as mine. I'm now two weeks old!

The pangs of homesickness are starting to subside. Who has time to think about home when one is hacking on secondhand smoke?

Seriously, these "enlightened" New Yorkers act all superior to everybody else, hate the president and Corporate America, yet as soon as they cross any threshold and take a step outdoors...

BAM! They've lit up again. Maybe someone should tell these morons that Big Tobacco counts as the Corporate America they loathe so well.

Seriously, at this rate, I'll never need to take up smoking. I already get a lethal dose of nicotine and carbon monoxide just walking down the street next to these monkeys!

But a rant about the vices of Supercityzians isn't why you came here is it?

This morning I had my first New York audition! It's for a Shakespeare company. Seeing as how I could do Shakespeare in my sleep, rolling off a log, with a fox, in a box, on a train, in the rain, I decided, "What the heck?! I'll knock 'em dead!"

The alarm on Blackwell the Blackberry gently knudged me off of my air mattress and into a smart audition outfit. I walked the ten minute walk to the equity office and marched proudly inside.

"Wow! It's a good thing I didn't come any earlier!" I thought. "There's nobody here and the doors don't open until 8am! I guess I'll just sit here and twiddle my thumbs."

A man in a rainbow-streaked shirt walked in.

"You know there'th a line out-thide."

"Yeah, I know," I replied casually. "Janet Jackson is signing at the record shop this morning."

"Nooo-uh," he said. "For auditions. You have tuh get in line. Outside."

"Oh! Whoops! Sorry. First time!"

My attempts at tried-and-true Texas charm were wasted. The poof rolled his eyes and slammed the door behind me.

I walked outside and found the line. And what a line! Chock full of people dressed a variety of clothes, from rags to their Sunday best. Most of them had books of Shakespeare and were animatedly talking to the air in front of them.

Say what you will, Janet Jackson can still draw a crowd.

Wrong line.

I looked around and found the other line. The one that also had people talking animatedly to thin air, but with dead eyes, pasty complexions and sunken-in cheeks from eating nothing but cat food to pay the rent.

Actors. Bingo.

They corralled us in at 8:00 sharp and divided us into two lines. One to the left, one to the right. Those in the left were immediately sent to the gas chambers. Those to the right were non-union and signed their Li'l Jackie Hancock on a long list.

I was in the line to the right. I survived.

I'm supposed to check back at 9:20 to see if they'll have time to see non-union folks. Since I live so close and not in some borough like Yonkers or Bonkers, I decided to swing by the ol' Internet Café for a "cup on joe" (that's what New Yorkers call coffee!) and to give yawl the most up-to-the minute breaking news!

Check back for an update later today! If I get in, you can bet I'll knock 'em dead with my Billy Bard!