five thousand seven hundred sixty minutes*

sacked out, got up, hung out, slept in. turkey roasted upright and a small helping of all the trimmings. wine and brahms' first, pumpkin pie with extra whip. lost and found friends, good phone chats. lazy cups of coffee. golden girls' three, cheers' seven (aka 80s teevee dvd heaven!). straight bartender drunk thanksgiving at the gay bar: "heeyyyy, bitches! i love vagina!" darts, pool, salt n' pepa's "push it." pushed it good! netflix friends. holiday wish lists. girl-powered omakase sushi with my favorite sushi buddy. saturday seafood double-header. headaches, stomach aches--broke every diet rule. paying rent at the cinerama dome, "and no singing allowed!" twice with the road raging hazard lighting hand motioning strategists. quick changes, reversible belt, contacts to "hello, prada!" celeb look-alike glasses. ballerina slippers. brown corduroy jackets. perfecting the art of the "excuse me honey" push-through in crowded weho bars. whipping winds, chapstick. barefoot and scarf wrapped, breathtaking views. melon margaritas. dirty martinis. falling in love with a couple of poodles. never wanting the night to end, never wanting any of us to have to go home. denying monday, and all the obligations of the days and weeks to come. and me and my camera, so full of stories from a long, long weekend full of fun.

*obviously a cheap play on rent's theme lyrics, which i can never remember and thus refer to as "the math song." i actually did the math for this title in order to calculate the number of minutes in the four-day thanksgiving weekend.

holiday still life

Thanksgiving 2004
Originally uploaded by sassylittlepunkin.

i couldn't help but go to bed early last night, out of sheer exhaustion. in turn, i woke up just a tiny bit later than usual--somewhere between 6:30 and 7:00 this morning--and have proceeded to do nothing of little more exertion than make some coffee and chain-watch episodes of the golden girls. normally on thursdays i have nothing more to do than prepare for my theories of composition and rhetoric class that meets in the evening, so it's slightly ironic that i have to be somewhere earlier today than usual, at, say, midafternoon. of course, what i'm off to do is close to what most folks in the u s of a do today: lay low and eat a lot. in any event, i took this photo last year, and it's a sort of visual representation of what thanksgiving is to me and mine here in l.a. there's the mellow easygoing laid back vibe of a cup of coffee, some old recipes, and sun streaming in from every corner.

happy thanksgiving, everyone!

turned in my teasing comb and went back to high school

i'm sure it comes as little shock or surprise that i was one of the "drama kids" in high school. in fact, not only was i bit of a drama queen, but i also was deeply entrenched in the day-to-day life of the drama department; i was in one way or another involved in every single school play during my four year tenure as high school student. in my senior year i nabbed two leads and went out with a bang and a bow. and while i'm not one of the sadly naive folks who look back with nostalgia to my teen years as the "best years of my life," i do look back with an awful lot of fondness, and think of the freedom i had to let myself get wrapped up and carried away in all that drama. believe you me, there was scandal, intrigue, and hijinks a-plenty. man, those were good times. crazy, intense, exciting, ridiculous times.

so here i am, pushing thirty (oh, okay, fine, i'm techinically pushing twenty-nine, but it's racing towards me on the speedy wings of mere weeks, mere days--37 days to be exact), sitting at home on a saturday morning, doing a little writing, having a little coffee, surfing a little on the web. i manage to steer myself from the la times local section to the even more local small-town news site of my former hamlet, where i did the first spurt of actually "growing up" (though, as it is quite obvious to those who know me well, i did most of my "maturing" later, and elsewhere). a news item about vandals breaking in and destroying the sets and costumes of the fall play at my alma mater concluded with the uplifting note that the show must go on, and did, and that the final performance of the musical grease! was to be held that night. well, i was on the phone in a flash to my once and always partner in crime: bunny.

we simply had to go. it had been over ten years since last i saw a school play, when i graciously went to support some younger friends in the year following my own graduation. i was absolutely dying with curiosity. not about the students, or the play, really. i mean, grease!? that turkey? who are we kidding here? i was curious to see the object of my first thoroughly inappropriate crush.

in my senior year a new drama teacher had to come to town to take over the job from the previous drama teacher, who had, let's just say, crossed a few boundaries. i've hashed out those details here before, so, with a two-year delay, i will now pick up the story where i left off. the new drama teacher was a young married man with a couple of young kids. he came in on the first day of school wearing a silk shirt and sporting his best new guy on the job attitude. i, in turn, was sporting my very best bad girl-hates the new guy attitude. it got ugly. i actually told him he could "kiss my ass" when he mentioned homework. this was advanced drama, after all, and i was a senior. homework my ass. so things were shaky at first.

at some point, however, things began to turn around. i actually liked this guy. he was funny, oddly charming, clever, and a good sport. i could trust him with things, like top secret info, my defection to the other side in the courtroom drama of his predecessor, and loads of everyday stuff, too. we had these journals we had to keep, and he would let us fold over pages and mark them "do not read" and he wouldn't read them; he trusted us, too. so i started to have more and more "do not read" segments in my journal. they were "do not read" because they were rather confessional.

i was confessing that i had feelings for him.

they say history repeats itself, right?

he and i spent a lot of time together, like after play rehearsals, at drama events, and after school. he'd give me rides home, he hired me to proofread and edit plays he was writing, and we'd wind up deep in conversation; he'd tell me how unhappy he was at home, and right afterwards he'd shake his head in astonishment, saying: "i can't believe i told you all that." we were close. we knew stuff about each other. we had each other's back. oh, and yeah, i had that crush on him. it was getting out of hand on my end.

one day, a group of freshman raided the stacks of journals, and all my "do not read" entries were torn open and passed around. what rumors i hadn't already started or heard escalated to a fever pitch. my teacher pulled bunny aside, panic in his eyes. "what do i do?" he asked her. "lindsay says she's in love with me!" i got called to the principal's office, where i lied to save face and to protect the truly innocent parties involved. no, i told the principal. i didn't write that. they made it up. i don't feel that way. honest. i was let off with a stern warning, and a reminder that we didn't want to go through what the school had just endured, and was enduring, with the drama teacher's infamous predecessor.

the thing was, nothing had happened. sure, we were too close for a seventeen-year old student and her drama teacher. sure, there was too much going on under the surface of our drama department. it was all we knew, and so we kept it going.

right after graduation some of the drama kids took a trip to new york. i fell madly in love with the city, and farther in love with him. my diary from that time is an embarrassing melange of overwrought teenage emotions. what the hell did i know? i was a never-been-kissed high school graduate. i remember standing next to him in the whipping wind at twilight at the top of the empire state building. i was so good at inventing romance. and of course, nothing ever happened. nothing ever did. but tell that too my heart. i would have dared you to. he knew. everyone knew. but nothing. my first inappropriate crush...

a few weeks after we got home i moved to new york. maybe in part to see if whatever magic i'd tapped in to on that trip could be sustained. it was, indeed, magical. new york remains firmly magical to me. he remained in his job at the high school, and turned the drama department into this amazing machine. a new principal, my former and favorite english teacher, took over. the school won awards, big ones at that. the curmudgeonly music director left and the new regime was in favor of musicals. the shows got bigger--i heard through the rumor mill--but i never went back, save for that one time to see just one play. i wrote him a letter around that time. i don't remember what it said, but he never wrote back.

i suppose i got over it. i got over it as much as anyone can get over their first major crush. i would often wonder how he was. i would, and still, often miss the carefree (and yet so serious) times of high school. i knew he'd divorced his wife, and remarried his student-teacher, a young woman only four years my senior. don't think it didn't occur to me that it could have been me. i wanted it to have been me.

during intermission, we spotted a little visual time capsule in the lobby display case; it was a series of photo collages, each of which were dedicated to one of the plays he'd directed in the past dozen years. right smack in the center was his first play with me in it, and pictures of people i haven't seen in years. it was so surreal to realize that in my own small way, i was a part of a history, a legacy. i found myself in a photo, standing immediately to his right. "i knew if i found him in a picture i'd find you," bunny laughed. "you were always right next to him." and she was right. that's exactly what i did. i remember so well what it felt like to be next to him.

after the show ended we lingered in the crowds near the stage to do a little meet and greet. after all, i'd come to see him, not the show. we stood at the lip of the stage and banged on it, shouting his last name. we may as well have been seventeen again. he didn't hear us. we finally motioned him over.

we kicked in to conversation like ten years had only been ten minutes. sure, there was major news to share--like his new wife, my and bunny's various accomplishments, and the intriguing fact that i work with his predecessor--but ultimately it was the same teasing and talking. he sat on the proscenium steps and i found myself smacking his arm or leg for emphasis. he needled, and i balked. none of us looked the same. none of us were the same.

except, deep down, we are. fundamentally, there are things you can never change about yourself. naturally, and despite the fact that i know i'd be unhappy in the role of his wife, i still wished it had been me. i think i always will.

but it's ten years later, and i've sincerely moved on. i can linger in the past, and delight in the present. saturday night i gave him my card, and he scrawled his number on a copy of the play program. over a decade ago he'd assured me we'd get together. we'd "do kawfee, and tawlk." we never did. and we parted saturday night with the same promise. i hope we keep it, i really do. there's so much i miss about then, and so much i love about now that i want to somehow bring together. he remembered things, details and incidents and names. i'd like to think he thought a little about that crazy, fateful, intense year that was his first and my last. i'd like to think he thought a little about me.

i guess in that respect, it was me. it was exactly the way it was supposed to be. and i know my stories are mine, just like my memories, but sometimes they involve other people, and i can't help but bring them in. they're a part of me, and always will be. so i hope i didn't say too much. but if there's one thing i've learned in the past ten or so years it's that there's nothing to saying how you feel if you're hiding behind folded pages labelled "do not read."

laundry quandry

we have one laundry room with six washers and dryers in it that the whole building shares. sometimes it's dog-eat-dog in there in terms of timing your cycles and clearing out for the next person, particularly on the weekends. i try not to leave anything in there, because on the off chance that someone decides to take the low road and steal, i don't want them to steal my stuff--not my detergent, my bags and baskets, my clothes, nor my quarters.

but just now, when i was loading up one of my thousands of loads into the only free washer, i opened up two of the finished washers to see if there was stuff inside. i didn't want to pull it out and just take over; i've resorted to that before and it gives me a yucky feeling, and i've had it done to me and i sure don't like it.

but...one of the items in the washer happens to be a bright pink and green striped laundry bag. a laundry bag i once owned, and probably last saw when i'd left it in my white plastic basket in the communal laundry room. this puts me in a laundry quandry.

do i:

1. ignore it all. maybe it's not mine. i should give people the benefit of the doubt.

2. remove the wet clothes but ignore the bag.

3. take the bag. after all, it's most likely mine, right?

4. remove the clothes but write a note saying i think the bag is mine.

5. wait in the laundry room to confront the person. i know where i got the bag. do they?

what to do, what to do?

insane in the membrane

i was just sitting at home, enjoying my (relatively) quiet friday off at home, doing a little music downloading, watching some teevee, emailing my students, and so on, when i realized that the men who have been working on the roof of my apartment building for the past couple of weeks have finally made it over to my side of the building. rather, they've made it over to right above my head. we're in a three story building, and our apartment is on the second and third floors. it sounds like a family of elephants wearing lead shoes have taken up tap dancing, and it's making me mentally insane. while i was making lunch just now i started singing an old playground song i remembered from like a hundred years ago:

i am slowly going crazy
1-2-3-4-5-6-switch
crazy going slowly am i
6-5-4-3-2-1-switch

yeah. right after lunch i am quickly going to the movies or something.

laughing it up

we were making all sorts of jokes and remarks about middle school aged kids, and the distinct feeling we shared of feeling like we'd found ourselves in one of those godawful dreams about being trapped forever inside junior high. after all, we had to be led through locked gates to get to what seemed like the center of the campus--painted an eerily uncomfortable shade of institutional blue-gray--to the cafetorium, where about sixty sixth to eighth graders lay in wait.

i was pretty damn nervous, and i'd be the first to admit it. here i was, over three years since i'd done a single acting warm-up exercise, or played "freeze-tag" or "what are you doing?" and i'm entering a room full of pre-teens that i'm about to perform mini-scenes in front of, then turn around and teach them the very same skills i'd just had to take a refresher crash-course in. and kids are tough critics; i know from having worked with them until i couldn't take it anymore last year, and from having been one myself. i was itchy with every kind or form of anxiety one could expect in such a situation. stage fright meets fear of adolescents. and i was doing this with a group of near strangers (less strange since i'd met them in, oh, the last hour or so) and one person i know well. she was the one who'd gotten me in to this. could it really have been so many years since we two had played together in countless improv classes and shows? did i mention i'd have to speak into a microphone?

the kids were amped and ready for us. we got on stage, and i gave it my all. i even grabbed that microphone when my turn came, and without a second thought i let my words fly right in to it. it was just time to get over my fears. i hammed it up, i did everything extra big, the way i remember doing it, and more importantly, the way i remember being sucked into such shenanigans as a kid. i'd loved these kinds of events. i'd be the kid who was mesmerized, utterly enchanted, and wholly envious of the lucky adults on stage. and there i was, umpteen years later, one of the lucky adults on the stage.

we split the kids into groups, and in minutes they were my best little pals. we cheered for each other, we played until time was up. they clamored for me to pick one of them to be sent up to represent us onstage, and it broke my heart to have to break five other little hearts by only picking one. they'd asked me to play with them. they threw their arms around me unabashed. they blew me away with their innate senses of humor and timing. they were better at the games than us grownups were.

"are you going to do more of the show?" one asked me.

"a little bit, i think. we're all going to do stuff together. how come?"

"well, we really like it," she said.

i'll tell you, that was the best review i've ever gotten.

when we left there were more hugs, and shouts requesting we come back again next week. by dinnertime i'd wager most of them forgot us, though i'm sure a few of them remained just a little mesmerized, thinking about how they might someday be one of the lucky adults on stage. and here it is, a full day later, and i'm still mesmerized. i've forgotten how good it feels to do something i love so much. i've forgotten how playing with friends old and new, and in turn passing on the know-how, is so incredibly rewarding.

now that's what i call lucky.

the highly efficient slob

this weekend i carried around a few notecards in my bag filled with lists of things to do and items to investigate. one card, dedicated solely to the must-do things of november 12-13 has such scintillating tasks mapped out like: grade essay #3 and update roster, get quarters and do laundry, mail netflix dvd, and so on. the other was a list of super ultra mega girly-girl things, such as a long list of names of mac lipstick shades that were appealing online, but needed in-person investigation. after all, i was down to the nub of my everyday netural pink-beige (girl alert! girl alert!) called "spirit" and after years of loyalty to the multipurpose tone, i was willing to be brought around to an alternate neutral shade. i had also done some more dangerous internet digging, unearthing more things i wanted to check out in person. but i was armed with a list, and the firm intention not to stray. well, at least not to stray far.

one of the items on my to-do list was to cash in a coupon at lenscrafters, where my superfantabuloustic new red rectangular eyeglasses came from a couple of weeks ago. hello, prada! they're positively stunning, and were much needed, since the optometrist confirmed my sneaking suspicion that my old prescription of days gone by just wasn't cutting it. lo and behold the very next day after my purchase came a flyer in the mail with a generous coupon. an investigative phone call revealed that i could retro-apply the coupon if i just brought it in within thirty days. so sunday was that day.

that task done and crossed off the list (so many items crossed off equals a lovely feeling of accomplishment, yes?) and off to mac. i whipped out my trusty list, and the sales associate was utterly delighted. "wow, you have a list!" she exclaimed, and then retrieved her own store list that was a guide to the display. we began to pull shades off the rack, and i elimated and considered them one by one. "too orange!" "too brown!" "too frosty!" "too much like something i already have!" and the gal was getting in to it. "gimme your pen," she said. "i'll help you with the list." she crossed things off, she made notes, she made suggestions. and i, of course, started to spend out some of what i'd just saved with that lenscrafters coupon. thrilled with my choices i headed out into the dangerous wilderness of the mall.

i succumbed to temptation at the steps of nordstrom; what girl can resist the banners declaring "half yearly sale"? and what girl can resist shoes, i ask? particularly a girl who, until rather recently, wore little more than flip-flops and then found herself having to dress like a college professor, since that's what she is. this girl needed nice shoes. so i worked my way through the racks, falling in love at first sight with the ones that remained in the $300 range despite deep discounting, but only trying on the ones within my more limited and reasonable budget. a friendly sales associate offered to unburden me, and led me to a seat amidst the chaotic seas of abandoned footwear. she returned with the mates to the shoes, and i systematically moved through the pile, much like how i'd shuffled sample tubes of lipstick over at mac, and made my choices. "you are really efficient," commented the sales associate.

i sent myself home at this point. i could have easily, and apparently, efficiently, negotiated several more purchases for myself, but such luxury was not listed on my notecards. so i went home to my mess.

wait, mess? but-but-whaaaaat? someone this organized, this list-oriented, this task-dedicated, this efficient is messy?

you betcha.

we have a standing joke around the house that revolves around expressing sadness that "we had to let the maid go." we then add lines about her being thieving, or, horror of horrors, wanting to get paid. naturally we've never had a maid, just high-brow longings to solve our collective laziness. and when someone comes to visit, or when we can't see the sink for the dishes, we buckle down and clean. the shared spaces are well-managed, albeit not aggressively so. our individual spaces are constantly in various stages of disarray. of course, i'm still a little ocd about things: my pens, highlighters, pencils, and colored sharpies dwell in separate holders on my desk; the few cds i haven't sold off since the advent of itunes remain staunchly alphabetized; my books are arranged in categories and sub-categories on their shelves; the dvds are in order; my closet has an order. but it's chaos. i rarely make my bed. things rarely get put back where they belong, at least with any immediacy. for me the chore of laundry rarely includes the phase known as "putting away my clothes." it's amazing for someone so anal, so orderly, so seemingly put-together, has secret fantasies not about shirtless hunks, but about someone willingly picking up all my messes that i leave easily in my wake.

sigh...

i've crossed over to the dark side of cleanliness only a few times in my life. suitors nod, impressed with my clean sheets and the wafting odor of the "napa valley harvest" scented candle i'll light. one boyfriend--a self-proclaimed neatnick--was even working his clean magic on me. by god, my space was clean for the bulk of our courtship! but now, well... no such motivation in sight. i've tried. i do try.

in fact, that was the one thing that didn't get crossed off my list this weekend: CLEAN!

by whatever means necessary

it's really great to be eating healthily and working out regularly. i mean, i feel pretty good most of the time, my pants are too big, and my excess belt tail--you know, what sticks out past the buckle once the buckling's done--is getting longer (and unwieldly) by the day. and i'm actually enjoying heading to the little remodeled gym in our building. i know: enjoying the gym? what?

well, okay. i don't get all jazzed about jazzercising my butt on the treadmill. i hate being sweaty (except when caused by dancing and, well, you know what). i don't like to interact with strangers. however, i love me some cable teevee.

yes. our little remodeled gym comes with a cable-equipped television.

and when i'm the only one in there (which is the only way to do it) that means i can watch whatever junk i want. what not to wear. the golden girls. dawson's creek. seventy-eight channels at my disposal. beats the hell out of cross your fingers and pray it won't be too fuzzy to make out channels that come in unassissted by cable on my own tv set. but, see--i'm no couch potato! i've turned watching television into an actual activity. complete with action!

this morning, after a good, sweaty, thirty-minute treadmill session with betty, bea, and rue, a promo spot reminded me that i certain show i love, worship, and watch whenever i can, comes on later tonight. the little sweaty lightbulb went off in my head. oh.my.gosh. i can work out TWICE a day!

it's a little sick and twisted, but it's getting the job done. and at this point, i'll take it, by whatever means necessary. god, i love cable tv. even if all i watch are crappy reruns.

postcard from my at-long-last mellow weekend

Glammy Pajammy
Originally uploaded by sassylittlepunkin.

finally i had one of those weekends where i found myself verging on the brink of boredom just long enough to feel uncomfortable and guilty for not being more productive. luckily there wasn't much to produce, since this was not a paper grading weekend, and things are somewhat in order for the next few days. i actually slept in on both saturday and sunday. i went for a girls' night out to dinner (cha cha cha-delish!) and a movie (elizabethtown-disappointment) friday night. i took a little walk in some hills and stayed out of trouble up there, thankfully. but when saturday night rolled around and l.q.t. and i couldn't decide if we wanted to go out for a martini or stay home to watch will & grace on dvd we had to weigh out the pros and cons. well, the pros, at least. pros for going out: martinis, getting prettied up. the pros for staying in: wearing jammies, will & grace. the compromise: jammies, makeup, homemade martinis, dvds. and "glammy pajammy" night was born. naturally, because i'd clearly overdosed on fun i had to spend my sunday seeking balance, which is why i did little more than play with songs in itunes, slowly drinking coffee, and contemplating my future life and home high up in the hollywood hills.

"if it makes you happy..."

my apologies, internet, for such infrequent updates on the thrilling chroncicles of my little life. i'm fairly certain i'm actually out there living it, but those nights when my eyes refuse to remain open past when the little hand is on the nine and the big hand is on the twelve lead me to believe otherwise. things have been just the tiniest bit bi-polar here lately, what with my own moods rising and lowering like a well-oiled elevator. hello, top floor: jubilant laughter and smiles of delight! whoops, descending to the bargain basement: uncontrollable outbursts and anger spells.

in recent days i've gotten boderline teary-eyed over helping tutees and my students with their papers, and also have really been lovey-dovey with my campus gal-pals. halloween was actually bearable this year, and i even "dressed up" in a get-up i called "kitty-kat karen walker" which basically meant i put my hair up, wore fake diamonds, a low cut top, drank water from a martini glass, had kitty-cat ears and a tail, and spouted insults in a high voice all day. my favorite part was my pill bottle that said "socialite party mix take as many as wanted whenever you want." i didn't even care if no one got the joke. the martini glass got a lot of looks, and so did the cat ears--mainly because three of my co-working gal-pals also were sporting ears. oh, lest you wonder: no, i still hate halloween.

i did, however, break a personal record. i have not, did not, and will not consume a SINGLE PIECE OF HALLOWEEN CANDY this halloween season. nary a mini snickers, kit-kat, twix, etcetera has passed or will pass these lips. not a single sucker, jolly rancher, twizzler, nor tootsie roll either. not a bite. and, actually, it wasn't all that hard. i (gasp) just.didn't.do.it.

so here i am, busting into all these new and unprecedented moves, but also drifting back to the territory of the old familiar: improv. this past weekend i caught a show starring a dear friend, as well as two other pals i hadn't seen in, frankly, years. it was beginning to feel that i had left that part of my life behind me, and that was starting to make me sad. moving on, in all its glory, is not always all its cracked up to be. especially when what you were moving away from brought you so much joy. anyhow, after the show my friend asked me if i'd volunteer to help her teach some improv theatre games to some kids in a couple of weeks. at first i was terrified--"it's been so long!"--but then i said yes. what the hell. it's what i love. it's what i miss. it's what i'm giving up academia for.

oh, yes. academia. the source of my frustration and anger and temper tantrums. who me, throw a tantrum? oh...yes. there was this straw, see...and it broke the camel's back. and i had a fit. i felt pushed. p-u-s-h-e-d just a bit too far. needled. so, i snapped. excused myself from a meeting. well, not so much excused myself as burst out with "I HAVE TO LEAVE NOW" and then ran out of the room. and i was found (for crying out loud of all days it was the day they needed me in a picture!) and dragged back, my cute red be-jeweled flip flops smashing against the cold, unforgiving tile of the hallway. "i'm just very angry right now!" i told my escort, incidentally the bearer of the back-breaking straw. she knew it. she went with it. she's used to it. man, i'm such a petulant child at times. so i posed for the picture. "act like your working!" we were instructed. "i'm acting," i said sarcastically to a friend. "i see," he replied. "you're good at it." "yes," i told him. "it's what i'm giving up all this for."

tantrum passed. duties resumed. papers graded. reading done. moving on.

when i left the theatre the other night the violent femmes' "kiss off" popped up on the ipod via shuffle. it's funny how after all these years it just takes a split second, and i can recited the big counting section of the song: "take one, one, one 'cause you left me, and two, two, two for my family, and..." it's like talking to ashley after weeks have passed, and yet it feels like we're still riding in her dilapidated jeep, on our way to the big boy, brimming with the dish from the office. it's like when laurie and i would call each other up on the other side of the country, only to find we could still finish each other's sentences, even if it was only in a story about socks. she and i used to drive around, making each other laugh for god knows what reason, and that song would come on KROQ, and there we'd be, yelling along "ten, ten, ten, ten--everything, everything, EVERYTHING!" in a heartbeat i'm back in that very moment, even though laurie, and i, and our world has grown up around us. everything, everything, everything. but you can just step in sometimes, back to things you've moved away from. and i'm not unhappy right now, just not as happy as i could be. i like what i do, but i don't love it.

i'm looking forward to stepping back into what i love.