City of Angels

I went down to Axis last night and saw City of Angels, a musical several of my friends were in. It was great. I highly recommend everyone goes and sees it next Friday night. You can get tickets at centerstageplayers.com To be honest, I think my friends were among the most, if not the most, talented in the cast. Jonathan had a small part, but he cracked me up, especially when rubbing lotion on a hot woman's leg and acting like he liked it. :) Mary and Lisa were members of the quartet, which was a sort of chorus but much more interesting, and they were hilarious! They did lots of cool stuff that kind of held the shoe together. Mary's facial expressions were to die for, and when Lisa grabbed Jonathan and held his face in her boobs, I almost peed my pants. I saved Michael for last because all I can say about him is... WOW! He played a Latina cop out to get the detective in the murder mystery, and every time he came on stage, he totally stole the show. He was a larger than life character, and his musical number was the best. I can't wait to see them all star in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum in April. Esther and I are prepetual audience members now. :)

Also, the Grey's Anatomy spinoff, Taye Diggs is going to costar! And it will be an ensemble cast. Cool. Oh, and I moved the speakers and laptop away from my TiVo, and it seems to be working fine again. Who ever knew that that would mess things up?

Qop!
"You bitch!" ~ Jonathan's improved line when the hot women exposes his homosexuality

Change, Change, Change

First, I would like to tell you all about a little YouTube video called Chad: Vader. The first few episodes were called Chad Vader: Dayshift Manager, and featured a guy in a Darth Vader costume working at a grocery store. After he lost the job, they are now just called Chad Vader. Six episodes have been posted, including the new one a week ago. Each episode is only 5 minutes. They are all well worth a watch.
Also, my favorite Grey's Anatomy stay is leaving the show in May! She is supposed to be leaving with her own spinoff, which I support. Two hours of Grey's a week would be bliss. If she leaves, though, it had better get off the ground.
Right now, I am in a transitional stage of my life. I know that. Change can be good, right? I mean, I will be a full fledged teacher by December, provided I can finish the program and stay sane. Right now I am halfway through an unpaid field experience, so I'm busy, poor, and stressed. Also, I really feel like my car could die at any second, or at least the brakes may give out permanently. To cope, I have allowed other changes to infiltrate my life. For instance, I have officially retired Netscape from my computers. I resisted forever. I was still running like a three year old version of it because I hate the new versions. Finally I faced reality that it was dead, and I am now a Firefox user. So yay. I also rearranged my bedroom. I think it looks good. My recliner is in a cubby corner instead of the middle of the room. The only weird part is my TiVo cord blocks the door, so when I'm not watching TiVo on the tv, I disconnect it. It still records and everthing.
Well, actually, it may not still be recording. Speaking of TiVo, the past 24 hours have been rough for my little box. I left the standard DVR and switched to the big TiVo five months ago with quite a lot of hesitation. My box has been acting up for a day now, only recording partial programs (thankfully nothing important airs on Friday), playing back choppy, and just plain crashing. I called the service line, and they wanted to charge me $60 (for labor and shipping) for a replacement. I only paid $30 for the box in the first place, and my one year contract is not even half over! Turns out they only replace free for 90 days, so I'm stuck with a malfunctioning unit and a contract that I would be penalized for cancelling. So I was going to suck it up and pay the $60, until I found out that I also have to put a $266 deposit down. It will be paid back to me when I ship them the old box. Well I don't know about you, but I don't have $266 in my bank account, and with my current employment status, it will be some time again before I do. I guess if the box dies I might as well just ship it and then I don't have to pay the $266, but that leaves me with no box for a week, which sucks. After 45 minutes with the tech guy, I am still at a loss about what to do. I am transferring programs to my computer so if the box crashes, I will still have last week's show to watch on the new one. Hopefully it will at least stay alive to let me do that. But faced with a week of no TiVo would be a scary thing, because my obsessive compulsiveness doesn't allow me to miss episodes of shows. If it can just hold out until March, when everything is on rerun... We'll see.

Qops! (from Grey's Anatomy)
Dr. Alex Karev: Why are you helping me?
Dr. Isobel "Izzie" Stevens: [yells] 'Cause it's what Jesus would freaking do!

Dr. Cristina Yang: I need you to help me find the leg!... Aren't boyfriends supposed to help in situations like this?
Dr. Preston Burke: When we're on duty, I can't be your boyfriend.
Dr. Cristina Yang: So, when we're on duty, I can have sex with someone else?

Dr. Derek Shepherd: [to a patient and rapist whose victim bit off his penis] I have good news and bad news. The good news is that we managed to stop the bleeding. The bad news is that we gave your penis to the cops.

Dr. Miranda Bailey: Every intern wants to perform their first surgery. That's not your job. Do you know what your job is? To make your resident happy. Do I look happy? No! Why? Because my interns are whiney. You know what will make me look happy? Having the code team staffed, having the trauma pages answered, having the weekend labs delivered and having someone down in the pit doing the sutures. No-one holds a scalpel until I'm so happy I'm Mary Freaking Poppins.

Dr. George O'Malley: He *likes me*, likes me.
Dr. Alex Karev: Go for it, man. Get yours, I'm down with the rainbow.
[George gives him a strange look]
Dr. Alex Karev: Oh, are you not gay?
Dr. George O'Malley: No.
Dr. Alex Karev: Really? Dude, sorry.
[he walks away]
Dr. George O'Malley: [Cristina walks up] Cristina! Do you... does Meredith think I'm gay?
Dr. Cristina Yang: Are you?
Dr. George O'Malley: No!
Dr. Cristina Yang: Really?

Back to Writing

So the snow days continued, and I watched more than enough telvision, even for me. I wish I could get paid to do that, instead of sitting at home and making no money. Some of you may ask, well why didn't you pick up extra shifts at Champps? Do you really think with all of that bad weather that it would have a.) been smart to drive all the way across town and b.) enough customers would have been there to make it worth my time? I answered no to those. I did however get somewhat productive on An Actor's Nightmare Book Four. If you follow the series you know that Book Three is in the editing stages and due out this coming fall. Book Four is still a year and a half away from release, but I wanted to get an early start, so I tackled it head on. I have written a prologue that I am very happy with featuring the funeral of one of my main characters. Why would I be so heartless as to kill off one of the most important people in my books after they survived through the action packed trilogy? Because it happens! There's a twenty year time jump. Do you really think that everyone is still alive? Absolutely not. Most of them are, but somebody important will not be. Sorry. Not that you guys can even hazard a guess as to who it is, because you have not read Book Three, and thus do not know who survived the final assault. Hint: Many people did not! :) Well rather than torment anyone further, I'm off to grad school, but hopefully you will all check out the book and enjoy it as much as I enjoy writing it.

Qop! (from Grey's Anatomy)
Dr. Derek Shepherd: [to a patient and rapist whose victim bit off his penis] I have good news and bad news. The good news is that we managed to stop the bleeding. The bad news is that we gave your penis to the cops.

Inevitable

Those of you who know me had to expect this type of post. It's 3am on Valentine's Day. Since I was told that school was cancelled like 8 hours ago, I'm not worried about sleep. But I am depressed. I'm drunk. Yes, I drank alone. I don't do it too often, especially not to excess, but I did it, because I'm lonely, and I'm sick of this shit. I think I'm a pretty good catch. I almost have my teaching lisence, I sub, I have two published books available for sale. I like to think that I'm funny and creative. And yet I've been single for three and a half years. Why is that? I don't know. I really don't. But I am definitely sick of it. Somebody please set me up on a blind date or something. Seriously. I'm ready to cast off the single life. Hell, I was ready to do that two decades ago, no exaggeration. I'm ready for marriage. My biological clock is ticking. At least help me score a date or something. I'm not desperate. It would have to be the right girl for me to start a relationship. But I am anxious to meet that right girl, and the more women I meet, the more likely that is to happen. So please set me up with a cutie immediately! :)

Qop!
There is no Qop today. Give me a break.

Smokin' Aces

My brother David and I saw Smokin' Aces last night. I really wanted to see the movie because of my friend Jonathan's race review, and it had a host of great actors such as Jason Bateman, Ben Affleck, Ryan Reynolds, Jeremy Piven, Ray Liotta, and others. It was also a bunch of people trying to kill a mobster getting ready to squeal. Sounds awesome, no? Unfortunately, it was not. I have to say, the actors did a superb job, but the film just didn't cut it. I blame faulty editing. There were great moments and funny jokes, but the pacing was totally off. It was a major disappointment.

I also finished reading The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Presents America: The Book: A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction: Teacher's Edition this week. Basically it's the same book as the first edition, but the new Supreme Court justices faces have been planted on naked bodies, and they let a history professor go crazy with a red marker. The mistakes he chose to mark were often very factual, but he was very selective in what he marked, and every once inawhile, it was just plain funny. I'm glad I own both editions.

And Barack Obama has officially entered the race for President. Hilary Clinton and John Edwards are also considered front runners. I honestly expect two of the three to be on the ticket in just over a year when the primaries end. I just am not sure which one. And I read an article or two lately where Al Gore said he wouldn't rule out running, although he couldn't imagine seeking office at this time. One article called him a possible dark horse, swooping in at the last moment. I wonder how that would upset the balance. I am eager to find out.

Qop! (selected reviews from the back of America: The Book: Teacher's Edition - many of them are probably not accurate)
"Even better on the second banning!" ~ Wal-Mart

"I wouldn't have posed nude for any other book." ~ Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

"Four and a half stars." ~ Four-and-a-Half Star Review Magazine

"AMERICA (The Book) is an upstanding collection of bound pages, each containing several paragraphs of multiple words, made up of individual letters, that when processed by your brain elicits both humorous feelings - sometimes manifested as laughter - and previously undiscovered insight into..." (cont. on page 3). ~ Senator John Kerry

"This book is gay. You know, like me." ~ Abraham Lincoln

Snow, Snow, Go Away

Ok, I secretly loved having three days off this week. I had my TiVo completely empty for the first time since I got it, as of Wednesday. Then Wednesday night Lost, Knights of Prosperity, and American Idol recorded, so now it's not empty. But briefly, it was nice. However, as this is the last week I am going to get paid for awhile, I needed the money, and now I'm screwed. I did get to work today for a whopping hour and a half, but I got paid for a full day, so I'm not really complaining. I am scheduled tomorrow, too, so we'll see. Next Monday begins my three week multicultural experience at Praire Lincoln Elementary School in the Southwestern district. I have mixed feelings on this. I mean, I'll bet it's a good school, and it'll be fun and all, but it'll be a ton of work coming at a time when I'm very busy (I know, I know. I should have used my snow days more wisely), and plus, I won't be paid for it. I have to pay Ashland for it, actually, more than I would have made in those three weeks. Actually, about the same. But that is ridiculous. They should just let me sub out there for a few weeks or something. Anyway, I is a poor man.

Also, I hope you have been enjoying my new comic strip, Excerpts from The Morning Show. I haven't been real regular in my posting. That means sometimes the day's strip gets posted the night before, sometimes it's late in the day, or once even the next day (tomorrow's is already up)., but I've gotten it drawn out and scanned in for the next month so it's just a matter of remembering to log in and put it up.

And I wrote half my prologue for An Actor's Nightmare Book Four today, which was a totally bad idea, as now I want to keep writing, and the next three weeks will be insanely busy. But I love the series, and it's been killing me to take a break, and I am very happy with what I've written so far, so screw it. It's fun. :)

Qop!
"Rape is just surprise sex." ~ My brother David. He named his Facebook Group that. Don't worry, he got banned from Facebook.

Man Market

So WNCI's Man Market last night was interesting. Definitely a lot more fun than a couple of years ago when I went. It was at Flannagan's, and it was packed, shoulder to shoulder. I drank semi-heavily (I wasn't driving), and actually got the courage to make it up on stage where Dave Kaelin told them all I looked like John Lennon. I have to say, I was flattered. I've never really looked like any celebrity, but I guess with the longer hair and scruffiness I finally do. And I like John Lennon. Who doesn't? Then the really scary part came. I had to dance. On stage. In front of a mass of screaming women. I did it, looking (I think) semi confident, although as we exited through the parking lot a short time later one girl did comment that she could tell I 'flew' off the stage. Oh, well. I still was a lot braver than I would have been a couple fo years ago. Now if it had only helped me meet girls... :)

Qop! (from Ruminations)
No matter which way you slice it, you've sliced it. And it won't grow back. Way to not pay attention, idiot.

July 21st Will Be a Magical Day

It's official. Book Seven, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be released on July 21st. Barnes and Noble is already taking preorders for $20.99 ($18.89 at amazon). The last couple of times they released a book, I preordered from amazon.com or Barnes and Noble's website and had to wait all day for my book. I think I'll just go somewhere at midnight this year. There won't be a major, shortage. They plan for this stuff now, unlike the surprise smash of Book Four. I am disappointed that no page count has been announced, but I'm excited, as I was beginning to think the release date would be much further off. The fifth movie will also be out that month. Yay!

On a different note, I am going to WNCI's ManMarket tonight. Any single girls should come. There will be about 400 single guys there. Hopefully that many girls will show up, too, or my chances might not be so good. I tried it a couple of years ago and it was lame, but this time it is at Flannigan's, not the practically deserted Continent, and I have a bit more confidence than a few years ago. Wish me luck! I try to ignore my biological clock, but it's ticking, and I would love to find that special woman sometime soon.

Qop! (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire)
Harry: Why do they have to travel in packs? And how are you supposed to get one on their own to ask them?
[Stops in front of a group of girls, hesitates, then continues walking]
Ron: Blimey, Harry. You've slayed dragons. If you can't get a date, who can?
Harry: I think I'd take the dragon now.