Ugh, I am feeling so freaking old right now.  I just had to go pick up lunch for my boss at the Hard Rock Cafe (yes he was eating lunch at 5:30pm, but that’s because he was too busy, hence me getting it for him), and I had to wait at the bar for the food.  Well, the bartender was an over-active Hyper-hypo who decided he would chat me up.  Great.  So I gave him my credit card, which is a Texas Exes card and he was  like, “cool card, what year did you graduate?”  I don’t particularly like to answer this question, but what can you do?  so I was like, “98” and he was like, “woah” and his eyes got all big like I’d just said I was a man or something and he was like, “how old are you?” and I was like, “you never ask a lady that question”, which is my stupid-ass, I’m being a polite southern belle answer to questions from strangers about my age or my hair color.  And he was like, “I know, but you just look too young” and I was like,“I’m 27”.  And he was like, “woah, you look 23 and I just thought you were Doogie Howser or something.”  Please, 23?  I didn’t look 23 when I was 23.  I guess he’s buttering me up for a tip, which I don’t care about because it’s my boss’ money, right?  So I was like, “well I did graduate in 3 and a half years”.  And he asked all the standard questions, what my degree was and how I liked theatre, etc.  And he was like, “oh, I’m 25 and I’m in grad school for Structural Engineering and blah blah blah”.  And I guess I didn’t realize it, but I had my left hand splayed out on the bar in what I guess has become my “defense mechanism” and after 5 minutes of me being tortued by him chatting me up, he said, “oh, nice rock, so I guess you’re married he must keep you busy and blah blah”.  Okay, once again, no one has ever referred to my ring as a “rock”.  he was a total freak!  And before I got out of there I had to carry on a conversation with him about Green Day, about the toilet and sexual habits of Spider Monkeys, and about how all television was crap.  Oh, and he was from New York and everyone told him there was no theatre here in Austin.  Out of pity I wrote down LGT and Salvage Vanguard and Rude Mechanicals names for him and told him to check out the Chronicle.  But now I feel old and pitifully sad because this little stupid punk is in grad school and I’m picking up lunch for my boss.  And for the record, I don’t think 27 is particularly old, but he sure made me feel like it was ancient.  Dammit

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Comments

Bonequark@hotmail.com

2004-12-30T17:47:56.000Z

What Hath Gawd Wrought?

Fuklin

2005-02-01T17:24:33.000Z

I’m a guy in my thirties who looks like he’s 17. You don’t know how much that sucks.

be hungover.  But I’m admitting nothing.  I think my headache has more to do with the sudden weather change back to rainy compounded by the fact that I kicked the allergy medicine habit Tuesday.  Yep, cold turkey, nothing but nasal washes for me now.  And I’m in pain.  I also think I might have a headache because I didn’t get much sleep.  Had to come in early so I could be home early for my furniture to be delivered.  Bosses nearly had heart attacks when they saw me.  Not used to seeing me so early.  Heck, I ain’t use to seeing myself.  But I definitely ain’t hung over.  No sirree bob. 

I had a weird dream last night where I was in some foreign country buying cheap tchokskys  (i know that’s not spelled right but I can’t get close enough in word to get spell checker to give me the correct spelling) and there was this part of the store that was like an art gallery and it was packed, and lots of the people were naked.  And taking touristy photos, but naked.  And the girl I was shopping with was like, “oh, they’re just going up there because they can walk around naked.”  And I was wondering where the heck this came from, but then I remembered Anna’s story about the spa and all the naked people and I think that’s where it came from.

obviously I don’t want to work today.  Maybe the internet isn’t such a good thing, I can post my random thoughts for the world to see.

Hmm,  second cup of coffee improving headache.  So it probably is a hangover.  Oh, well.

So Americans re-elected W.  They rated morality as their #1 issue.  Why does the entire country need a daddy to decide how they are supposed to behave?  If you need someone to tell you when you’re bad, hire a mistress and go get spanked, but don’t take civil liberties away from the rest of us.  And the W. Administration is hardly moral anyway!  I don’t know why I’m surprised.  W. and Co. did a masterful job of scaring the pants off people.  I don’t understand this fear people have.  The worst thing that can happen is death.  That’s the worst thing!  That could happen any day at any moment without a terrorist attack!  In the meantime, you can lose your job, your health insurance, your rights, etc.  “Oh, but I’m so scared, Mr. Bush, go invade the rest of the world and root out terrorism, please!”  They’re such freaking weenies!  I want our nation to be secure as much as the next guy, but my worrying about it isn’t going to do one damn thing.  I think the problem is that these people never leave the town they were born and raised in.  They certainly don’t travel internationally, they don’t even travel the whole country!  Travel helps you to be aware of other people and stop being so damned selfish.  My father, (who is unfortunately a Republican but you gotta’ love them anyway), had the brilliant idea to have all kids, in their senior year of high school or thereabouts, spend a year in a third world country to gain empathy and an understanding that their is a world beyond their front doorstep.  I agree this is a fantastic idea and would go a long way towards improving opinions of Americans world-wide.  But it ain’t gonna’ happen under a Republican, especially this administration, whose solution seems to be to isolate American more and more while going out and attacking more and more as well.

I woke up this morning and started feeling so sick to my stomach thinking about what we’re in for.  The Chancellor of Germany expressed his wishes that the Bush administration would “mellow out” in their second term.  Hah!  With no re-election to seek, it’s no holds barred.  Mark my words, the next four years will see:

-An invasion of Iran and probably Syria to boot.
-A draft to cover said invasions.
-Bush appointing at least one, probably 3 judges to the Supreme Court, which will lead to:
        -The reversal of Roe v. Wade
        -Further erosions of civil rights and liberties, particularly Women’s Rights
-Complete break-down of Environmental Protections
-The turning of this country into a theocracy, which will include:
     -Prayer in Schools
     -Complete obliteration of separation of church and state (this may take more than 4 years)
     -complete obliteration of sex ed in schools.  Think it’s progressive to talk about abstinence?  I think we will soon see a day when it is not addressed at all.
     -Open and blatant discrimination against homosexuals. 

Thanks America for sticking your head in the sand and voting for Bush because you see him as a moral person.  I’m scared, really scared, especially because I think this trend will continue until all the baby boomers die off.  All hail Money, the almighty God!

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Comments

realistic

2004-11-06T14:28:38.000Z

So, let me get this straight… you think you’re smarter than the majority of Americans?

Anonymous

2004-11-08T19:04:10.000Z

When using the word smart in terms of Dr. Laura. Anyone who listens to Dr. Laura would concede that she is 100 times smarter than her call in audience. This call in audience may include people who did not make it out of grade school, and it may include people with multiple P.H.Ds. The fact of the matter is that they are simply not smart when it comes to making decisions about the relationships in their life.
Similarly there are numerous studies to show that on matters of current events and politics, Republicans are not as well informed as Democrats and often continue to believe erroneous facts once they have been proved to the contrary (see connections between Hussein and Al Qaeda, existence of WMDs in Iraq). In this sense, Republicans are simply not as “smart” on average as their Democrat counterparts.
And frankly anyone who voted for Bush is either:
    1) morally bankrupt
    2) stupid

so actually we are simply saying that the American people are dumb, because it beats saying that the American people are a bunch of greedy A**holes who really don’t mind if a couple of million brown people die so that they can keep driving their White Ford Excursion to church on sunday.

Tim

2004-11-08T19:06:25.000Z

“Realist” you think you’re dumber than the majority of Americans?

Tim

2004-11-09T02:50:47.000Z

interesting statistics on IQ and education and how they relate to the election.

tarv

2004-11-09T14:32:47.000Z

I wasn’t all that upset when I first read the comment posted by realistic.  We have the comment feature on our website so people can say what they think about our posts, that’s cool.  But the more I think about it, the more it bothers me, not simply the question that’s being asked but the attitude that would prompt such a question, and the other questions that it implies:  “how dare you question the majority?” or “who are you to dream of rising above the status quo” or even “how dare you call this mob a mob?”  This is just the same old attitude of following along with what the majority of the nation (ahem, 51%) seems to be thinking and trying to browbeat anyone who expresses a differing opinion.  History has plenty of good examples of what happens when this kind of attitude sweeps through a nation.  At the rate we’re going, Bushco won’t have to do much to push this country further into the arms of fascism because the citizens will just do it themselves.

Yep, it’s time for me to randomly ramble.  First of all, DO NOT try to watch Jersey Girl.  You may think, as Tim and I did, that it’s Kevin Smith, we have a coupon for a free movie, how bad can it be?  The answer is very, very bad.  So bad we had to turn it off after 15 minutes.  Even GEORGE CARLIN could not save this stinking pile of crap.  Don’t waste even fifteen minutes of your time on this movie.  I can’t believe that it was even made.  And Gigli is supposed to be even worse than this?  Is that humanly possible?  Does it kill you when you try to watch it?  Jersey Girl was so bad we had to cleanse our eyes by renting Laws of Attraction (hey, it’s digital cable movies, there isn’t a lot of selection), which was actually quite cute.  We enjoyed it, we laughed, it didn’t change the world, but it was very watchable.  I think Jersey girl is the reason that our digital cable box didn’t work for two days afterwards.  Jersey Girl crashed our cable box!

And I voted yesterday.  I always swell with pride after voting.  Let’s just hope that my vote is counted.  I was really pissed the democrats didn’t run a challenger to the Republican candidate in my House district.  So basically, I will be “represented” by a Republican, I don’t have a choice.  God, I’m going to miss Lloyd.

So I’ve been staring at the same diary entry for weeks now and it is driving me crazy!  I have declared that free time is good!  Wow, it’s so cool what you can do when you’re not in a show.  As mentioned in earlier posts, I have problems with “doing nothing”.  Or really, doing nothing productive.  I feel guilty.  I don’t know where this comes from, but it drives me crazy and it REALLY drives Tim crazy.  But, conversely, I usually won’t do the things I “need to do” when I have lots of free time either.  Like put a year’s worth of pictures in albums or 9 years worth of keepsakes in albums, or clean out closets or put together our wedding album.  (Hah, let’s face, it I’m never putting together that stupid album.  We’ve been married for over 5 years now, for Pete’s sake!  I’ll just leave it in the bag in the bottom of the closet with the stuff that’s supposed to go in it where it’s been for the last 5 years.  Although I did change the closet it was in.)  Or sew that skirt I bought the pattern and fabric for a year ago.  Actually I might do that.  Sewing.  I like sewing.  It’s an activity that, when finished, you have something to show for it.  And you save a buttload of money (I’m notoriously cheap when buying fabric:  I got the fabric for the top set of curtains in our dining room for $0.33 a yard and the bottom fabric for $1.00 a yard).  And Tim came up with the brilliant idea to turn the unused corner of our bedroom into a sewing area for me when we re-decorate over Thanksgiving.  Because the biggest reason I don’t sew is that it’s too much of a pain in the ass to set everything up in the dining room, then tear it down when I’m finished for the night, then set up again, etc. 

But anyway, wasn’t my point that free time was good?  Oh, yeah, I’ve done so much fun stuff and relaxing stuff lately.  I’ve been taking walks in the evening with Lucy (last night Tim and Roxie went too.  Lucy and Roxie are so cute running along), and I’ve been seing loads and loads of theatre.  And watching debates.  Debates rock!  I’m going to miss them after tonight.  I think we need to find something else to do so we can all get together in the middle of the week to discuss politics and yell at the tv screen.  Primal scream therapy or something.  I’ve almost lost track of how many plays I’ve seen since the show ended, let’s see:  You can’t take it with you, Death of a Cat, Maufraus and Freitag Take the Case, Sordid Lives, and Love’s Labor’s Lost.  Wow, is that it, it seems like it’s been more.  We’re seeing Dracula, a Woman Scorned this Thursday, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof Friday, and Nightswim Sunday.  So if you want to join us or something.

Wow, what a ramble.  i can’t remember what i began rambling about.  Sorry to subject you to this, but at least you don’t have to look at the same damn blog title.

So Copyright Denied is closed. It was a great show, but it was very unfortunate that few people made it out to see it. I think those who did see it were really impressed with it though, so that helps make up for the low turnout. I think it’s just bad timing, and it doesn’t help that we only had two weeks:( But I had a lot of great discussions with audience members about the show and what it meant, what was going on. Obviously got people thinking and laughing. I’m going to miss everyone in the cast, they were a really cool group and I wish I’d gotten a chance to get to know them better, hope to have the opportunity to do it again in the future. I also was sad to the see the play close because I felt like I’d finally, “gotten a wicked spinner and really been feeling my rhythm lately.” I’d gotten into the groove where the words just came off my tongue naturally and I could play and experiment more. But it was great to get an opportunity to play a character with such a driving role in the play, I don’t get those often. Thanks Le and Tim! Oh, and the female actresses of Austin for not auditioning in droves like usual;)

Speaking of playing often, I’m in that post-show blues stage. I didn’t get cast in either of the plays I auditioned for last week, so I’ve got a wealth of free time stretched out in front of me. I’m not good with free time, not very responsible with it. Hopefully I can be better during this hiatus. I’m pretty sure I won’t be in any more plays the rest of the year because Tim’s sister is getting married in December, so that month is out. In fact, I would have been able to reprise my role as Master Toymaker in 2nd Youth’s Toys Take Over Christmas, but unfortunately the last performance is the same day as Christine’s wedding. Oh well. I’ll try to make up for my absence from the stage by seeing lots of theatre: We’ll be at You can’t take it with you at St. Ed’s Thursday, Death of a Cat Friday, and Shirkworker’s Collective Saturday night at Beerland. Come out and join us!

Yeah, and I’ve been putting together my appeal to direct Travis’ play, which LGT will be doing in February, so hopefully that will work:)

Oh, and another sad thing: The Show with NO Name is No more. Sniff. We watched the last episode last night and were amused and surprised to hear Bowie call in. Go Bowie!

I just read in the Austin Business Journal that Ikea is coming to town.  Uh oh. I worry a bit about having an Ikea closer than 150 miles away.  That’s very dangerous.

I hate tech support, I just spent a half an hour on the phone and was nearly in tears before it was all over.  Just to invoice a measly 2k in travel.  And this my latest attempt to submit these invoices.  They’ve been rejected about 10 times before for various reasons.  I think this IM exchange sums my frustration up nicely. 

tim: I’m sorry.
tim: Is this people at your company?
julie: no, that would be simple
julie: this is people at (large faceless corporation), who run the billing for (large faceless government entity).
tim: oh sorry.
julie: And no one knows how to do anything.  And then I finally get tech support on the phone and I get two, not just one, but two guys who are very difficult to understand because of their accents.  They’re helpful, but it’s still really frustrating.
julie: and my stupid other contact just plays stupid all the time. 
tim: that sucks
julie: yeah, they won’t tell me why they’re rejecting my invoices, i just have to guess!
julie: and the tech support guys have to take 10 mins to figure out why they’re rejecting them too!
tim: I hate tech support.
julie: honestly, I don’t hate them as much as I hate the A/P monkeys.  they don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground.  at least tech support is actively trying to help me.  the A/P people just say, “it was rejected, I don’t know why, call tech support”.  And they have laughed at me before.
julie: how can you laugh at somebody trying to figure out your stupid system when you have absolutely NO INSTRUCTIONS and you don’t know how to use it yourself!
tim: damn outsourcing of government agencies.

God, I really should go eat now.

Clap your hands!  Ugh.  Mucho fun was had last night, but there is mucho regret this morning.  Although my regret is more over allowing my doggies to sleep in my room than over drinking too much.  Dude, I’d been asleep maybe 45 minutes when Lucy started barking like a maniac!  Of course, whenever I’m woken up in the middle of the night, especially if it’s within an hour after I went to sleep, I have a really, really hard time falling back to sleep.  Just one of those fun quirks of being an insomniac.  So I think I fell asleep around 4 this morning.  Ugh.  But never fear, I will drink the necessary gallons of coffee so that I can party more tonight.  I will sacrifice my stomach to the God’s of caffeine and I will party hardy!  Whoo-hoo!

On another note, I feel like swimming.  I really want to go swimming this weekend for some reason.  I should do that.  I should just find somewhere to go swimming and go.  Yeah!  I know you kids read these things, anybody else up for swimmin’?  Maybe Krause Springs or Hamilton Pool?

So I was killing time after I got killed in this Murder Mystery I was doing in San Antonio Friday night by reading this San Antonio Weddings magazine that was lying around in the office we were using as a green room.  There were lots of pictures of gorgeous wedding cakes in there.  I love wedding cakes.  They are the most delicious part of a wedding.  And for some reason, you just cannot find cake that tastes like wedding cake anywhere but a bona fide wedding.  The closest I’ve come is Italian Cream cake, but really that’s a poor substitute.  Like to serve wedding cake outside of a wedding is sacrilegious or something.  Then I was discussing this with Le and Lily Saturday, and we decided why couldn’t this be a dessert at restaurants?  You could order “the Wedding Night special”, which would be a slice of wedding cake, strawberries and champagne.  I think this is a fine idea. 

So after all this craving for wedding cake, I realized I get some Friday night.  Yay wedding cake!  I mean, I’m looking forward to the wedding because I really do want to celebrate my very close friends uniting their lives together and publicly declaring their love, too, but you know we’re all really there for the cake.  Just kidding!  But please save a slice for me;)