And the moral is....

Of all the headlines I read today, one really stood out:
"Tortoise beats rabbit in China Pet Ski-Off"
Guess that Aesop guy was right. And I will take this as a reminder of the lesson that slow and steady wins the race. No need to worry that I'm not moving towards goals as quickly as I wanted. I'll get there. If a turtle can out ski a rabbit, (and the duck, cats, and dogs that were also in the mix) everything is possible.

Also, with the upcoming Olympics, this story makes me think that we should have animals involved in more sporting competitions. Cats on ice. Elephant hockey. Bobcat bobsleds. Monkey gymnastics......think how popular that Puppy Bowl is? Just saying.

Anger Management

It appears those hours spent playing Angry Birds was less of a happy distraction but more of an instigator for our rage issues.

I am a pretty angry person. There really is no reason for me to be so filled with rage, but I am. I blame humans. And I'm not the only one who is walking around like an old curmudgeon complaining about everything. But when it comes down to it, I express my anger and move on. You can't worry about that which you cannot change. For example, I hate when people walk slowly in front of me. But I can't stop that. It's their right to stroll at a glacial pace in the middle of the sidewalk. The best I can do is take a deep breath, be happy that I have healthy legs to walk on, and then bitch about it a ton later to whoever will listen. See I have a some pretty good zen balancing my rage issues.
My concern with the world, is the people who don't. Remember that kid in kindergarden who would just bite you if you didn't hand over the blocks you were playing with? Well apparently he's still doing that.
Do we all need mandatory yoga? Counseling? Time outs? We definitely don't need angry people wielding weapons.....this week I have seen some headlines that are upsetting examples of rage fits beyond what you can imagine.

Today in Florida a man shot another man in a movie theatre because he was mad that the man was texting during the movie.
It also was in the news that a man stabbed his girlfriend for bringing home pizza instead of the chicken sandwich he wanted for lunch. A totally reasonable reaction.
And last week, a pregnant woman blamed her hormones for her assault of her roommate regarding what was I'm sure, a very sensible dispute over butter.
Now, I realize I've blogged about headlines like these before, but it seems to be escalating and frankly I'm getting afraid to leave the house or be involved in any sort of confrontation. I feel like if I so much as get a parking spot in the Whole Foods parking lot that someone else perceived to be theirs, my life could be in danger.
As if I needed anymore encouragement to be a shut in?

*And while I'm committing to life as a shut in I may as well build this nearly life-size Lego R2-D2. Not only would that be awesome, but I learned that Legos are great for anger management.

Champagne Wishes and Coffee Dreams

The dream of the 90's is alive in Washington, D.C.
In the 90's, I sat in my living room every Thursday night to watch the characters on "Friends" sit in the coffee shop Central Perk. The idealistic high schooler who was I couldn't wait to be a useless 20 something wasting my days away on an indy coffee shop couch. But fate had something else in mind and instead of a quaint coffee shop where everybody knows your name, I, and many others promised this dream, came of age in the era of the Starbucks take over. Yes, they may ask your name to write it on your crack that they are cranking out of a coffee grinder in their behind the counter factory while you stand in their retail section questioning if you might need that Aaron Neville holiday CD. But of all the Starbucks on every corner, none have fulfilled the promise of lazy afternoons spent sipping coffee out of over-sized mugs while musing about relationships with your quirky friends.
So I guess I should go to D.C. where all the local coffee shops have risen up and banned together to take down Starbucks with this wonderful "Disloyalty Card" which offers patrons a chance to collect stamps at participating locally owned coffee shops. Six stamps gets you a free coffee. That's pretty much one free coffee a week! This is so much better than the trap of that Starbucks club thing that my roommate fell victim to and obsessively bought $4 coffees for weeks to earn gold which means that once every couple months they toss you a free small coffee or muffin. Plus you get to support local and maybe find a couch to sit on and even make friends. And I love that by joining together, these coffee shops really do become competition for the omnipresent Starbucks. Even if you aren't near your favorite one, there is most likely another one that you can go to and earn your stamp. Brilliant. I hope this trend catches on.

Never a Bride: Bizarre Adventures of a Great Pretender

I am in a weird business as a performer. I have been paid as a dancer to wear a fairy costume and twirl while glitter flies through the air. It's like every six year old girls dream, and sometimes I forget to think how special that is, that you can actually grow up to play pretend for a living.
And while playing pretend, as an actor, I have filmed a sex scene-on the Oprah Network for their housewife-pleasing steamy show "Unfaithful." Seriously. So, not unlike a porn star, I've been paid to spend a day in bed making out with a hot actor in a hot room filled with lighting equipment and a half dozen crew men. That was an odd day. It is jobs like that where the magic and innocence of playing pretend are upstaged by the stark crossover to reality. Seeing what you look like close up in bedroom action in high def, having a director tell you how to move and what to do in that sort of context, having cameras, it's.....not normal. And there is a good amount of reality that even a talented actor can't separate from. (Read: the dude does still get it up and this obviously leads to awkward pauses in the film day while he takes a moment to...re-prepare.) Overall, that day was one of my most exhausting days on set ever, and ironically I spent most of it in bed. And most of it thinking how I was not feeling like I wanted to engage in these bedroom activities at home for quite a while either. Or at least for a little while, until the director's voice got out of my head and I wasn't worried about rolling over and hitting a bad angle for my thighs. I also now watch any sex scene in film and television with a certain detachment. I know how unsexy it all is.

Not as sexy as it looks.

But it is the detachment from reality that I have found to be the most adverse side effect of engaging in the world of pretend as a performer. In my world, it is totally normal to play dress up, to twirl through glitter, to sit around practicing accents by calling for your take out using it, to go from small talk to being madly in love with someone and kiss them with unbridled passion and then rush off on your equity ten to use Listerine to get the taste of them out of your mouth. But then, when it comes to reality, sometimes I just can't cope. A day spent on set kissing a stranger makes you come home and be aloof to the guy you are actually dating. A day not spent twirling in glitter is a day that feels wasted. How can any normal day of cleaning cat litter and running errands be compared to a day filled with applause, roses, and glitter sparkling in the spot light?
This week I came back from the whirlwind of the run of shows of Nutcracker, the holidays, and a vacation to the beach in Mexico to hit the road running and attend a bunch of auditions. Auditions are a whole other alternative reality where people can be total asses to you with no consequences. Polite pleasantries that are expected in society don't apply here. You walk in and say hi, and they just stare at you and sip their coffee. Actually when you talk, they may not even look at you. And when they do talk to you, it's usually to criticize you.

Any other situation, you would yell at these people for being rude and storm out, wanting nothing to do with them. But instead, here you are, hoping they like you and that you get to spend more time with these bitches. What is wrong with that picture?
But anyway, this week one of my auditions really caused me to think about the weird reality I live in as a performer. I had a casting call for a Bridal photo shoot. I am not married, I've never been engaged, I'm not even currently dating a good prospect for that, so obviously this was the first time I ever tried on wedding dresses. And what a bizarre way to do it. There I stood, seeing myself in the most amazing white cupcake dress, complete with a bodice encrusted with crystals, and before I had that moment that I have seen so many of my friends have when trying on wedding dresses-that moment of seeing yourself in the mirror and thinking how you look like the Princess you always wanted to be-before I could have that moment, I was accosted by casting directors and designers just picking on me. "Oh, she's way to short waisted for that." "No that makes her look short and boxy." "Can you walk more gracefully in that?" "I don't know if she looks like a bride." What does that even mean? The first moment in a wedding dress felt ruined. I stood there feeling not at all like a princess, but more like Cinderella having her dress torn off of her by the stepsisters. And just like that, wedding dresses became as fake to me as a sex scene or a British accent. I'm not saying I'm scarred for life or will never want to get married, though I did see a wonderful article this week about bridal pantsuits that I now like the idea of as they may make me look less short waisted......but I did find myself becoming bitterly disillusioned by yet another sect of reality that to most "normal" girls is their twirling with glitter in the air moment of life. Maybe I should be glad that this didn't go the other way which would have ended up with me pathetically buying a wedding dress like Liz Lemon and sitting around eating night cheese in it.

So I am thinking maybe it will be different when I am actually getting married. Maybe that sense of magic will return and I will have forgotten the time I auditioned to be a bride and I'll be able to live in the moment and actually be a bride. I got over hearing that director's voice in the bedroom, and the crocodile tears I've cried in dramatic moments on stage have not taken away the depth which with I've felt real tears in true moments of sorrow. So maybe there is hope.
But meanwhile, I continue to pursue this life in altered reality while traveling on the parallel road of reality. Like I said, it's weird. But the glitter makes it worth it.

Cheesepocolypse

While we are all being distracted by the polar vortex and Chris Christie's Bridgegate, we are being blindsided by an unthinkable and tragic crisis at the start of the year. There is a Velveeta Cheese shortage. Oh the humanity! We greedy, fatty-food loving Americans have really done it now.

That's right, we are in a Cheesepocolypse because, according to BusinessWeek.com, people are buying more of the orange, gooey Kraft product as it is football season--and everyone knows nothing goes better with touchdowns than Velveeta cheese spread over your chips and chili.
A Kraft spokesperson explained vaguely that additional to the product's rise in popularity, there have been some minor "manufacturing challenges" for this liquid gold that should only last a couple of weeks. But during that time, it may be hard to find Velveeta stacked on your supermarket shelves.
This is madness. Will there be a black market for cheese? Does this affect Kraft's Mac and Cheese too? What will I eat for lunch? What if other cheeses start getting bought up and there is an all around cheese shortage? What will I do at night without my night cheese?
These are truly unsettling times.

2014

I'm back! After months of hiatus, I have decided that the start of the New Year is a perfect time to return to examining the cheeziness of pop culture and whining about it.
And to kick off, I would like to start off with a list of things in pop culture I think we can look to 2014 for.

 

1. The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Already these have gained a lot of press because of Russia's anti-gay laws. So we have all that drama to look forward to in addition to the feats of athletic prowess. Considering figure skating is one of the competitions, there is no way this won't get good. Oh and remember the nightmare inducing opening ceremony in London in 2012? I'm excited.

2. Bunnies. Hear me out on this......I predict bunnies will be the new cats. They will be the pet everyone is posting about. Mark my words, 2014 will be the year of the rabbit. (Even though the Chinese say it is the year of the horse.) I know several adults who have recently acquired these little fluffernutters as pets and keep enthusiastically telling me I have to "come over and see the bunny." Bunnies will be everywhere that cats once were and be the new cute standard. We will have Batty Bunny Betties instead of Crazy Cat Ladies. Bunnies will flood youtube. Watch out.

3. Constant references to what we are doing towards creating the 2015 future that was promised to us in Back to the Future II. Hover boards, 3D animated billboards, flying cars. We have only a matter of months people. Let's get on it. 

4. 2012 was all about food porn. 2013 was the year of the selfie. What will we be snapping overshare pictures of this year? I'm scared.

5. Relationships with technology ala the movie "Her." Have you seen the previews for this? I was convinced I was watching a pardoy video. The premise of this Spike Jonze movie is that a man develops a relationship with a female voice produced by an intelligent computer operating system. So basically it is a dude who is dating Siri. This daring film which is hailing some acclaim opens the door to the closet lives of many people who feel more connected digitally than personally whether it be to other people over the internet or maybe even the internet and technology itself. And this is the 2014 future we are in. So....great. Digital boyfriends, a whole new way to end up in a dead end relationship.

6. Crazy hair and fashion. It's a free for all of anything goes. Right now you can literally shave half your head, die the other crazy long side six different colors, wear way over the top eye make up inspired by pinterest, wear huge glasses, put on Doc Martens, printed tights, a frilly 60's inspired dress, and top it off with a poncho on and you will look totally vogue. Everyone can look like they were dressed by their inner toddler. Super hero capes and shirts worn inside out....Go for it. And don't forget to instagram it.

So bring it on 2014. And keep reading this blog to hear all about it.

Shutting Down.

Think the Government's Ctrl+Alt+Delete doesn't affect you? Think again. It has caused a black out of the Panda Cam at The National Zoo. 

Try not to panic!!

As for me, I am also shutting down as well for the day. If the Government can't provide me with the Panda Cam, then I just can't go on.

*And in keeping with the shut down theme and in case the absence of the Panda Cam has left you looking for a way to waste your time today, here's an interesting article on the history of Ctrl+Alt+Delete shut down-which apparently was a mistake! I'm sure we'll look back at this Government shut down and call it a mistake too.