Fat Trickery

The Shaking-Spear-a-thon (have to be cautious--that Google search engine is a fell beast) is OVER.

It's MORE than over. It's OVAR.

Thank the LORD. I'm sorry, but two nights walking up 8th Avenue at 4:45am was enough to make me call that theatre company's artistic director and tell her that keeping actors until that time in the morning isn't only cruel, it's DANGEROUS.

Didn't I tell you about the robbery two winters ago? I was coming from an audition after dark, walking up 8th Avenue, when BANG! BANG! Two gunshots. Screaming. People running. Then two cars peeling out and zooming past me and a frightened family of French tourists.

But I digress.

YES! Danger! On the streets! I kept thinking about the gloomy predictions of those professional trend-watchers who all agree that New York City is headed for pre-Giuliani-ville FAST. It gives one pause.

In other news, Parker Posey was recently diagnosed with Lyme disease. Just like what I had. Maybe I should call it "our" Lyme disease.

Huge Mistake

This fund raiser is the dumbest thing I've ever done.

No offense.

But when it's 1:30am and there's no audience, howzabout we all go home and *pretend* like we just read the play?

But no. We can't do that. Instead, everyone plays like we're all part of some grand thespian tradition of pushing onward despite the fact reason screams, "Don't! Everyone's gone home! You actors are all that's left!"

So when she starts saying, "Oh for a muse of fire!" everyone cheers, like, "Yeah! Our drama club is the BEST!"

They're already $1000 past their goal. I mean. Come on.

But no. Home at 5am.

On the bright side, everyone agreed that my scene reading as the French princess in Henry V was probably going to be the highlight of the entire 24 hours.

Off Broadway. Off Broadway. Eye on the prize... Must stay positive. The artistic director directs Off Broadway...

Okay. Time to roll out of bed and read these other two plays for the first time before the 10pm-4am portion of the day.

Oh, for a muse of coffee...



-- Post From My iPhork

What a Weekend...

It begins now.

Went to the gym this morning.

On the choo-choo to New Jersey right now. Beginning work on the Ezekiel sculpture. This is gonna hurt. A lot.

After that? It's off to see some old friends of mine from Everycity, TX in their Fringe show.

After that, it's back to the gym to get/do the new kettlebell routine.

After that, it's home for a little while to print script pages and get organized for...

The Shakespearathon. That email I sent out was a total bust as only two of the, like, 20 people I sent it to could manage to make any kind of pledge. I know times is tough, but come on. Two bucks, people. I'm not asking for your life savings. I don't know why this is annoying to me. I don't even really LIKE this theatre company all that much. I suppose I thought attaching my name to something like this would generate a smidge more interest.

Whatever. It's all good.

And by "good" I mean "dreadful". The hurricane is here and New York City is set to be soaked all weekend. Which is especially lame because I'm participating in two very late nigh portions of this blasted fund-raiser. The first is tonight from 1am-4am, the second is tomorrow from 10pm-4am.

And with subways running once every half hour at that time of morning, there's an excellent chance I won't be getting home until 6am from both of these readings.

Which is why I'm praying the rain scares our audience away, if only for the late-night portion. If nobody's there when we start reading at 1am, will they really ask us to stay?

Why did I agree to something like this? Well, the woman who is running this thing is also a director of Off-Broadway shows. I guess I figured if I scratched her back she might scratch mine sometime.

Yeah. Or maybe I'm just a chump.

Anyhow, it's gonna be a wild 48 hours. Here we go...



-- Post From My iPhork

End of August

August is almost over.

That's pretty good, if you ask me.

Things have slowed back down again, for the most part. The show is over, summer art classes are finished... tonight is my last night modeling for this Christian artists group out in Brooklyn.

Not much else to report. Well, actually, there IS, but right now I don't have time to write it all down. Stuff like the Shakespearathon, teaching the new kettlebell class, beginning a sculpture based on Ezekiel or Isaiah or something, intentionally gaining weight with a weight-loss app on my iPhork which I love, a trip to a beachside villa in September and Disney World in October...

Yeah. I'd write about all that stuff.

But I don't have time.

Gotta start moving toward the subway.

Nearly There

Why am I not getting paid just to be alive? I'm so busy! I feel like I'm working for the man!

But I'm not. I'm working for myself.

I feel like I'm my own executive administrative assistant.

If I have to put up with any more of my own shinannigans, I'm going to start posting about how much working for myself sucks.

Booking travel, setting naptime, pirating video games...it's not easy, people!

Tonight is the final performance of our little show. Come on and see it! It's swell!

Gray Hairs

I had to download one of those New Age 'Music with relaxing nature sounds' albums today.

I know. I always thought they were kind of cheesy.

But listening to the thirty second sample on iTunes, I was more than a little surprised at the way I very nearly passed out in my computer chair listening to a snippet of "Woodland Rainstorm".

Holy cats. Am I really THAT wound-up?

It's been confirmed by numerous people this summer: "Fork, you're the most high-strung person I know," they all say. This is usually followed by a comment or two about the increasingly visible and numerous gray hairs that are sprouting up.

"If you'd just learn to RELAX...to let things GOOOO..."

I texted my trustworthy massage guy. He's out of town till the 31st. I found myself typing, "Stressful summer. Can't seem to relax." That got me to thinking.

Good GRIEF.

This summer HAS been stressful!

*bites nails, worries over what to do about it*

Summer is Here

And not a day too late. *Lots* of people even complained that we've had such a relatively cool summer. As if something was dreadfully wrong with that. In fact, it looked like we might get through August without hitting 90 degree weather here in the Big App.

Well, we finally got it. And waiting on the piping-hot 100 degree subway platforms only to have our sweat-drenched bodies frozen by the air conditioners in the subway cars is fun again. And did I mention the summertime smells of New York City?

Anyone for a hot tuna melt?

Babies on Parade

In case you don't know, long time 42nd Floorer Bibb Leo File and his wife just received a little bundle of joy. Owen Arthur Leo File was born on August 14th, 8lbs, 6oz, 20 1/4 inches. The mother is doing well and I can only assume the father is too. Since he won't send pictures of the little squirt, we just have to imagine what the little angel looks like.

When out of money, a Fork is fine too

Naw, I'm not really out of cash. But I'd have a lot more if Nutty would freakin' pay me the past month's rent like he's supposed to.

There's a word for this. When you take something without paying for it.

Anybody care to venture a guess as to what that word is?

Futon Get!

Futon's here. I can finally stop sleeping on the floor like an alley cat.

In other news, we open our little show this Friday. I'm currently en route to one more rehearsal before the final dress tomorrow.

I'm really sorry for not having posted more about this one. I guess it just sort if feels like if you've done one you've done em all.

But this one was a little different, thanks to Our Leading Lady.

We have a huge make-out scene in the play. I'm not talking about a peck on the cheek. No, this is the kind where the director shouts out, "Grab 'er boob!"

OLL has been frustratingly icy. It's not anything personal and I get that. Hey, she really wanted her talentless boyfriend to have my role. I get it. I'd be mad too if I had to make out with me. Rippling muscles? Taught sinews? Who needs em?!

Her new thing now is directing the kissing. The make-out scene goes something like this:

Part 1: Surprise! I'm smitten with you! I hope you don't mind that I'm kissing you. I'll take it nice and slow and be very tender because I'm still not sure you're okay with this, but I want to make you comfortable so you'll want more.

Part 2: I take it you're okay with this. Now I want to eat your face.

Part 3: Goodbye. Hope you don't mind if I take a little taste for the road.

It's part 2 where the problems arise. I'm playing this like someone with a lot of pent-up sexual energy. As a result, I'm totally pouncing on her.

And she doesn't like it. Because it's not her boyfriend.

So she's decided that if I start kissing too fast, she's gonna pinch my back really hard. If I go too long with it, she's gonna push me off.

Way to be in the moment, Baby Doll.

We'll see what happens tonight. We're running that scene because the director thinks OLL is really stiff and doesnt appear to be enjoying it.

Me? I'm ready to throw down.

As for Nutty, I'm at a loss. I doubt I'll ever see that July rent.

I've still got a few tricks up my sleeve though...

-- Post From My iPhork

Back in Business

The Internet man came. Oh wow. The iPhone just capitalized "Internet" for me. Whoa! It did it again! I didn't realize the Internet was a proper noun.

Yep. I decided the new TV was a little more of an extravagant Christmas-style gift so instead I went with...




An iPhone.

Now, some of you may remember a couple of years ago when I bought an iPhone 3G. I hated it.

But time heals everything and after becoming a big fan of the app store through iNez, my iTouch, I started warming up to the blasted thing especially now they've put it on steroids (what do you think the S stands for?) and made they keyboard bigger. But it wasn't until I figured out you could watch movies--yes, talking pictures--on this thing and that doing so makes a subway trip WAY more tolerable--that I decided I was ready to leave buttons behind.

And so far I'm fairly pleased. In true Apple fashion, the first time I tried to browse photos and use the camera the stupid thing crashed. But my first iPhone crashed every time a dead cat sneezed so this wasn't a huge surprise.

But now that the initial bugs are out of the way--man. This thing. I got lost looking for the restaurant I was supposed to meet Sethro and Syrup at for din din.

I was annoyed at first. Then, quite suddenly, I remembered I didn't HAVE to be lost.

I pulled out the iPhork and hit the maps button. In no time flat, Big iBrother had fixed his eye on me from outer space. And in old-fashioned Russian submarine style, it followed me as I walked to blocks east and found the restaurant.

I'm now convinced that every new New Yorker needs to be issued one of these things when they move to the City. It's like...the future, man.

In other news, the drama with Nutty has passed, but if he doesn't pay his share of the rent today he's in for a surprise. Because I know where his violin is.

-- Post From My iPhork

All Out of Internet

I have a whole lot of money right now.

I've finally been paid--or am in the process of being paid (ahem. Nutty)--for all the gigs I've had this past summer and whooo doggies, do I have a lot of dosh.

So the question arose.

What do I do with all this extra green?

Obviously I lock some of it away.

But what about the rest of it? What about the fun money?

You see...I've fallen in love with someone.

She's from Best Buy. She's 40 inches. She goes up to 1080p. She's crystal clear, like looking through a pane of glass. She's LCD. She's paper-thin. She's the hottest thing on the market.

And there are children starving in Africa.

Oh who cares! You wanna judge me?? WELL I could also be a better steward of my dollars by living in Orange, TX where rent is cheap so I could have more to send to the African orphans!

In related techno-news, the internet has run dry on my expensive computer (which I paid off!!). Yep. Apparently, even though it was working before, NOW they need me to pay $40 to have some schmucks come and "install the internet" onto my machine.

And the earliest they can do that is next Thursday.

I'm sorry, but the next episode in the downloadable Monkey Island pirate adventure game series comes out on MONDAY. NOT THURSDAY.

So I called back three times asking--no--DEMADING an earlier time!

I wasn't saying something. It was absurd. Kept getting the same "Sorry but Thursday is the ONLY day" crap. It's New York. It's a five-minute job. I must not have been saying one of their key buzz words. But what was it?

Oh! Yeah!

"I need this for work."

Suddenly, they were SURE there were more times available.

So hopefully the internet man will come with his marvelous box and refill the internet on my computer. Because I'm all out.

And finally...

Time Out New York, the hip n cool weekly magazine at all the checkout counters wants to do an exposé on--guess who?--moi! Yes, I've hit the big time!

Apparently the whole nude modeling thing has become a source of tremendous interest to the public at large.

I was encouraged by the writer to go online and view the series to get an idea of what it's all about.

Umm.

"Art School Model of the Week"?

"Meet Candice"? "Meet Malcom"? "Click for photos"??

6-8 nude photos, all looking at the camera with a sassy smirk?

And an interview segment that reveals just how stupid and depraved Candice and Malcom really are.

This isn't artistic! This is them trying to use some loophole to get nudity in their mag!

It's like...Fancy porn! Ugh!

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Moved

Nearly there.

I would post pictures, but I forgot to bring my memory card reader. I'm pretty sure it's at the other apartment.

And by Other Apartment, I don't mean the one behind the little door that seems really great but is actually a trap. I mean the one that I used to live in.

And every time I make a trip back there I wonder why I put up with it for so long. I guess because moving kinda sucks.

Seriously. It's not been the most fun thing I've ever done in my life.

But what AM I thinking? I've completely forgotten to mention the play I'm in rehearsals for.

It's an adaptation if this cheerful story. I'm playing Robert.

Yes. More feminist drama. And you know what THAT means. Yep. And we've got 'em. In spades.

It's actually kind of irritating. I don't think I've ever been in or read a piece of feminist theatre that didn't have some sort of lezbionic overtones. It's so weird. I know men are pigs and y'all girls want to be free and all, but seriously. SRSLY.

Okay. Time for bed.

Moving Day 2

The moving guy overslept so I have an extra hour to do some last-minute packing.

It's incredible. I just can't seem to get moving until I have a specific time limit. Is it from playing too much Super Mario Bros. as a kid? If I don't hear the "da doo dee doo, doo dee doo, DOO DOOO!" signaling that time is running out, I barely move.

Well, that sound effect just played and I'm doing a killer job!

More later.

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Moving Day

The mover is coming this morning.

Time to get to work.

But I'm so sleepy.

Sleepy because of what happened last night. Was up all night long. Man, y'all. Just...man.

I'll tell you later. Threats of legal action be damned.

As Rizzo says in the dreadful 'Grease,'

Some people are so touchy.

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