Looking Back: Poetical Parentheticals

“This post is a part of 20SB’s Looking Back Blog Carnival, and Ben & Jerry’s is awarding free ice cream to lucky bloggers and readers!”

So here you are, readers. A very old post from a very silly me, writing about the kind of writing that I set out to write... Whether or not I accomplished this feat I suppose is something that you are equipped to determine for yourselves.

If I remember correctly, I wrote this because my then-boyfriend had shared with me the now-defunct blog of a girl he said he had a crush on "because of her writing"... And I found it somewhat pretentious and off-putting (albeit witty and funny... so really, I was jealous). And I think I wrote this post at him (I'd say "to him", but he never lowered himself to reading my blog -- which I started because of his influence -- despite his insistence that I should read his).

Originally published 09/29/07. Enjoy!



My mother often will comment to me that she enjoys reading e-mails I’ve sent her because “you write just like you talk!” I don't understand... Doesn’t everyone? Why would you write any other way?

I agree with her. I like to think that I write in a fashion that is similar to the way I speak. Run-on sentences and fragments. Beginning sentences with conjunctions. An appalling amount of long, winding parentheticals (I don’t think that’s even a noun, but someone I know uses it all the time, so I’m stealing it… and I just realized that I put in a parenthetical right after mentioning my use of parentheticals. That was unintentional, and I’m slightly embarrassed that I’ve accidentally proven my own point. But since it so beautifully illustrates what I’ve said, I’m leaving it in. Wow, I didn’t mean to start that sentence with a conjunction. Smooth move, Angela. At least there is now evidence that I know myself). Other than omitting my disturbing usages of “like”, “um”, and “uh”, this is pretty much the standard way I communicate.


I probably shouldn’t admit this, but to make certain that everything I’ve written is something I would say, I recite each of my blog entries out loud once through before posting them. I remove anything that’s too fluffy or unnatural, because I don’t want to be that sort of writer. I want to be, for lack of a better word, real. (If you’ve met me, and you try hard enough, I bet you can hear my voice right now…. Helloooooooooo!)

I’m not one for long passages of purple prose. I’m not going to grab a thesaurus while typing (or rely too heavily upon the thesaurus I have internally). I’m not going to carefully compose something that is linguistically artful. I’m just going to write. And I’ll write whatever thoughts come into my head, whether they follow or not. Just like I’m doing now. Which is why I’m writing about writing instead of actually writing something of interest to others. Because that’s what I’m thinking. (Luckily, I’m a decent typist. Otherwise, this would be a far more complicated and arduous task. My fingers can’t quite keep up with my thoughts, but they do alright.) I still choose my words, because if I said everything that popped into my head, I’d surely be committed against my will. I have no desire to be institutionalized. I imagine that it would be far less interesting than the movie Girl, Interrupted made it out to be. So I only let the debatably crazy thoughts leak out (until I’m being arraigned for something, in which case I will find a way to use insanity as a defense. I wonder if that would work with parking tickets...).

I like to think that, despite my breaking the occasional rule of language, I'm relatively articulate. I think I get most things across exactly as I intend to. Although I do, from time to time, have to translate my thoughts into a language that can better be understood by people who aren't me. It’s not that I’m dumbing down my writing to make it more accessible (which I certainly did on occasion in my previous online journal… I had a couple of regular readers who became confused and alienated when I chose words in excess of seven letters… and I loved having fans so much that I catered to them a little in order to bait them into returning). I will only translate myself if the things I wish to say don't seem to be understood the way I wish them to be.

I'm not going to try to impress you. Why should I? It's not like you're going to read this if you have to google half the things I type. I hate reading ostentatious or patronizing writing (if you don't know what those words mean, then you really should invest in a good dictionary... trust me, you need it), which is why I refuse to compose it. I will not read text if it seems that the writer is out to prove something about their abilities or how “deep” they are. Tell me a story (or four). Take me on a journey full of ideas. Make me think. But don’t choke me with words; I won’t put up with it.

For the record, I am quite capable of writing at a more scholarly level than I do. I am, after all, rather cerebral (or, as I generally prefer to paraphrase that, “I think too much.” It makes me sound like less of an egomaniacal jackhole). Maybe someday I will. Just to prove a point. I’m not even sure whom I’d be proving it to (myself, I suppose). I’ll write something so condescendingly profound and pretentiously b****y that you’ll deign it to be good writing, if only because that’s the kind of writing you have been taught is good. I’ll throw in tons of unnaturally large words so that you’ll be confused as to what it’s even about, and you will be forced to say it’s great rather than admit that you had no clue what on Earth I was talking about. We’ll see. Someday. Hopefully I’m stimulating and eloquent enough that it won’t be a problem in the meantime. And if it is a problem, I have a couple of other blogs I can recommend that might better suit your liking (the very sorts of things that I, personally, will never enjoy).

I learned something while writing that last paragraph… I am apparently hesitant to swear in my blog. I took out two instances of using language that my mother would not approve of, and I used asterisks on a third (I actually considered going back and paraphrasing that last one… replacing b****y with “haughty” or “pompous” perhaps, but I decided to keep my self-imposed suppression to a minimum. Besides, that one seemed necessary). I don’t know what I’m afraid of. I guess that people will read it, realize I know how to use curse words, and condemn me to some netherworld in which people are made to suffer until they can respect language. I try not to swear very much. I only began swearing about a year and a half ago. I always felt the power behind those words when I used them sparingly. Throwing one out in conversation made people shut up and pay attention. Now, I spit them out a little too freely. I usually ask for forgiveness about that. It just seems like the right thing to do. I apologize at work a great deal, as I use the phrase “what the hell?!” quite a bit while talking to my computer about why it is choosing to so rudely disobey me.

(I wish I knew how to type an interrobang on the keyboard. An interrobang is a piece of punctuation that looks like a question mark and an exclamation point rolled into one. It takes the place of “?!?!?!” rather nicely. The alternative seems confused and rather juvenile.)

You know what, I’m done. I would normally allow this to evolve into a blog entry about something (anything) else, but I just don’t feel like I should. I think I’ve said what I needed to say (although, trust me, I have about three directions I could take this entry from here… and it’s a little hard for me to not dive into any of them). And for those of you who are psychoanalyzing me right now (I know there’s at least one of you who is), yes, there’s a reason that this is on my mind. And yes, like always, I’m judging myself, over-thinking things, and wondering if I should just delete this whole blog altogether. But that might just be because I’m listening to “Feathers and Doom” by The Cardigans right now and it makes me want to curl up into a ball and be reborn as something more beautiful than myself.

And yes, if you’re curious, I did just read this aloud and cut a whole slew of things that didn’t quite sound like me; they sounded like me trying to be a writer.

May you never try to be someone you’re not, in writing or in life.

Much love,

~A~

P.S. I hope you paid attention to rule #7 (and if you don't understand why I pointed that out, go back and read my first entry, "An Introduction to My Mind")
P.P.S. I chose the title because of a scene in Twelfth Night. A disguised Viola has written a speech for Olivia on behalf of the Duke Orsino. She begs to be allowed to read it, saying, "I would be loath to cast away my speech, for besides that it is excellently well penned, I have taken great pains to con it." Later, she states, "Alas, I took great pains to study it, and 'tis poetical." I felt that those statements somehow applied to this entry and wanted to find a way to stick them in. And besides that, I find "poetical" to be a very fun word.
P.P.P.S. If I had not already named this blog ~angelaboration~, I think that "Poetical Parentheticals" would suit it rather nicely.

Chicago-less

Can I just take a second to say how sad I am that I can't be at the 20sb meet-up this weekend? Because I am. Particularly because it's in my old stomping ground of Chicago, Illinois. *sigh*

Instead, this weekend I will be playing a role in a movie.

It's a graduate student film being directed by the other film student I bonded with in February (mentioned briefly here), who happens to be very good friends with my boyfriend.

I auditioned for the role in March, and the director/writer has been sort of tailoring it to my skill-set since then.

So I'm excited. I know this is going to be good for my résumé, and I can start a reel (which is like a video résumé for performing artists)...

But I'm still a little sad.

Think of me once or twice during the festivities, okay?

Thanks.


May you have good reasons to pass on great things.

~A~

Pain from the Brain?

I had my blood drawn a couple of weeks ago because of all the weird pain I was having coupled with my freakish cycle.
My doctor told me that "no news is good news", and that I'd only be getting a phone call if something was weird.
So it freaked me out when a phone call came.
My mother got a phone call when I was at work, and the doctor said to call back... but by the time I had the chance to call, the office was closed for the day.

My logical side, of course, said that if it was urgent, they would've tried my cell phone... So nothing insane.

A nurse called me the next day on my cell while I was at work.

My cholesterol was fine. I'm not gluten intolerant. Things looked pretty good.

But one level was high, so the nurse said that I had to get my blood drawn again, but I had to be fasting before getting it drawn.
I said, "Um, I fasted last time before it was drawn. For ten hours."
The nurse seemed surprised.
She said I might need an MRI, but that my doctor would be out of town for a couple of days, so she wasn't sure.

Yeah, that's so not what I wanted to hear. If something is wrong with you that requires an MRI, the last thing you want to be told is that you have to wait.

I talked to my father (who, conveniently, is a gynecologist). As it turns out, having this one level high might be a sign that I have some sort of growth in my pituitary gland in my brain.

My doctor is now back in town. She's having me repeat the blood test this week, fasting again. If that level is still high, then we'll go the MRI route.

Weird brain growths and cysts seem to run in my family, so I won't be shocked if that's the case. But don't freak out on my behalf. According to my dad, it's not as bad of a problem as it sounds like.

I'm going to have an ultrasound tomorrow morning, and I'll probably get blood drawn again on Tuesday.

All that said, I haven't had any stomach pain for about a week now... So maybe it was just a weird fluke of a month? Or, as someone suggested in my comments section, maybe it had to do with anxiety after all?

I just hope it gets figured out soon.


May you know what's ailing you.

~A~

F*** My... Nevermind

(A little bit of art that I made a long time ago)

I created my very first ever F*** My Life on 06/09/2009.

#2744716
Today, my temp agency sent me out for an interview for a great job. The interviewer and I hit it off. She asked if I could start later today. She said she'd call after making up a contract. She didn't call. My temp agency called to tell me the interviewer was fired right after my interview. FML

As of right now, 34,513 people agreed that my life is f***ed. 793 dissenters inexplicably voted "You Deserved That One" (which, based on the comments, may because they inferred from the phrase "hit it off" that I was "hitting on" my interviewer... a 60y.o. woman. Of course, they don't know that she was, because there's a character limit for FML submissions... But whatever...). Not a bad ratio, and clearly a successful submission, I'd say.

As it turns out, my life is not actually f***ed at all, but I'll tell you the whole story.

I was in a lot of pain and in bed for like a week (as you might remember from my last post, if you were brave enough to read it). On Monday, I was in bed all day, but I knew that I needed to trot over to my temp agency with my birth certificate so that they could legally send me out for some money-making. So I threw on some professional-ish clothes, popped an additional 800mgs of Ibuprofen, and put on my best "health and not in pain" face, and pranced in about 15 minutes before they closed for the day. And as I was leaving, the guy I report to said...

GUY: Wait! Did you say you wanted Full Time?
ME: I'd prefer full-time, but I'll take anything. Right now I just want a job. Any job.
GUY: Did I tell you about the jewelry store?
ME: I don't think so.
(i.e. no, he definitely did not)
GUY: Do you have any experience with jewelry? Do you like jewelry?
ME: I have experience with retail.
(i.e. I worked at a store run by crazy Asian people whom I affectionately referred to as "The Crasians" who paid me under the table and kept "forgetting" to put me on the schedule after I was trained, but gave me the employee discount for like a year even though I think I worked there about 3 days total.)
GUY: That's good.
ME: And I wear a lot of jewelry.
(i.e. I spend like $30 a month that I shouldn't be spending on kitschy stuff from Etsy)
GUY: They're just starting and I know they need one or two people. We've already sent a couple, but let me give them a call. Maybe I can set you up an interview.

I got home about 15 minutes later, and the phone was literally ringing as I walked through the door. I had an interview the next morning at 9:00am. Hot dog! This temp agency of mine? Pretty stellar, I have to say. A long term temp interview that fast is insane.

So prayed that I wouldn't be in pain the next day, took my ibuprofen ("Vitamin I"), and I went in for my interview.

I met my interviewer (let's call her "Sharon") at the local Bagel King (yes, it's called a Bagel King). She was about 10 minutes late, and I had been 10 minutes early, so I spent 20 minutes sitting there, not ordering anything, and feeling like a jerk (right before I went, my mother had said never, NEVER eat or drink anything during an interview, even if they offer to buy you something).

I was nervous, but it went well. Sharon was nice, loud, and seemed pretty nutty (just the kind of person who loves me). She took me to meet her boss. She took me to the main office. She took me to the business office to meet the other employees (let's call them Dina and Alana). She sat me down with Dina, who then started explaining to me the entire database system. It was very straightforward (and far simpler than the database that I worked on at my "real job" in Chicago). I said that it was no problem at all for me.

The job, Sharon said, would start with the database work before the store opened, and then they'd transition me into sales. She said she was ready to hire me right then and there, but she wanted to check it over with her boss and my temp agency, and figure out some contractual things. She asked if I could start working later that day. I said absolutely. She was thrilled. She said she'd call as soon as everything was taken care of, and it shouldn't take more than a couple of hours.

So I went back home and called Guy from my temp agency.

ME: I think I'm a great fit for them. Sharon even asked if I could start today.
GUY: That's great. She just called me and said the same thing. I'll call you back as soon as I hear from her.

So I crawled back into bed, feeling like everything was going my way.

But my phone didn't ring. I waited. I waited. I began to worry, but I knew that the interview had gone well, so I told myself it was probably just because they were busy.

Then, Guy from my temp agency called around 4:00pm.

GUY: Hey Angela. I wanted to let you know, Sharon has just been terminated.
ME: Terminated?
GUY: Yeah. I kind of thought it was coming, but I didn't know it would be this soon.
ME: This happened today?
GUY: Yep. Sharon and Alaina were both terminated today.
ME: So what happens to me?
GUY: Not sure. They just called me and asked what the situation was with getting someone in there. I said, "What about Angela?" They said to have you send a résumé. You might have to interview again. And they might just not take you because they didn't trust Sharon.
ME: Um, okay.
GUY: So e-mail me your résumé. I'll see what I can do.

Clearly, luck was not on my side. (Nor was it on Sharon's side, apparently.)

Wednesday, my dad took me into NYC to see a matinée of this year's Tony Award winning Best Play, God of Carnage, which had just won the Sunday before. (I had been watching the awards from my basement in a formal dress, as I do every year. Tradition!) And while in NYC, I got a call from Guy. The jewelry store wanted me. I would be starting on Monday.

(As a side note, my standards for theatre are getting very, very high. I've gotten to the place where I'm criticizing more than I'm enjoying. It kind of blows. But I guess that comes with the territory.)

Over that weekend, I took a gig as a stagehand for another children's dance recital/show, which is my second time teching that sort of production since being in CT. I can sum up my thoughts from said shows pretty quickly:
1. Glitter is comparable to a venereal disease.
2. Children. Spandex. Sequins. Sexy dancing. Children's Dance Shows = pedophile heaven. (A choreographer requested low lighting when the underaged teens in skimpy clothes dancing were like strippers to "Out Tonight" from Rent, saying "I don't want to get arrested.")
3. I will never, ever get the song "Jai Ho" from Slumdog Millionaire out of my head.
4. Being a stage manager can make a person get a delicious power high. Loved it.


On Monday the 15th, I showed up to my new workplace. The store is still under construction, so we're in an unmarked office on the next block. I'm pretty sure that we're the only office in the three story building that is not connected to medicine. (Convenient thing: Quest Diagnostics is on the first floor, so I can get my blood drawn before work if I need to. Fantastic.) The only people in the office are me and Dina.

It turns out that Dina was brought in to "save" things when it turned out that Sharon wasn't doing what she was supposed to be doing. She'd been there for a couple of weeks, figuring out what was going wrong, and then they kicked out Sharon. Dina is now in charge. (Still no idea why Alaina was fired.)

My job isn't just putting things in the database. My job is doing whatever Dina needs me to do on a given day. So far, that has been:
- setting up jewelry in a pretty way on the table so that when the Big Boss' wife came by, she could tell us what she hated (she only actually liked about 4 things from the hundreds I displayed)
- spy on smoothie shops (seriously. They give me money, I buy a smoothie. I sit there for an hour and take notes on what kind of people are coming in and what they're buying.)
- checking shipments to make sure we got everything we were supposed to
- make a list of all the things that Sharon bought on eBay (she thought she could sell them in the store as vintage, not realizing that she couldn't actually prove that they were vintage... Hello $6000 liability)
- taking notes at focus groups
- gathering people for focus groups (i.e. getting my brothers and neighbors to come talk about smoothie shops, since the people starting our store are already looking to begin on more projects)
- take inventory of all the athletic shoes that were left behind by the last occupants of our office (which appears to have been a sports store that went under and left five styles of K-Swiss shoes and several kinds of MBT "anti-shoes" behind)
- putting on the jewelry and going to a farmer's market to get people to enter a drawing for a gift certificate to the store
- quality check jewelry and scarves
- pick up/order food for focus groups
- calm Dina down (okay, this one is unofficial)
- keep lists of all the random tasks that need to be done that haven't been done that Dina thinks of throughout the day
- type up notes from meetings

You know what I did today? Put on $450 worth of jewelry at a farmer's market and got people to enter a drawing to win a gift certificate to the store.

Starting Monday, I'm actually going to have an assistant. That's right. I'm a $10/hr temp, and I'm going to be delegating to someone else (a 16y.o. who somehow knows the Big Boss and needs a summer job). Considering that minimum wage in this state is something like $8.25, I think that makes me the cheapest supervisor ever (I'm tempted to track down numbers on how much supervisors get at McDonald's to compare).

It's a fun job. I like it. I really like Dina. And I'm good at it. And I'm going to get an employee discount on jewelry once we open. So all in all, I'd say I'm doing pretty well.

And as for how weird my body is... well, that'll be another post.


May your life be less than f***ed.

~A~

TMI: My Body Hates Me

I was trained in undergrad to have a concept of "body-mind" to better myself as an actor. Most people address their thought patterns as being a state of "me" and the body being something separate. This is especially evident when it comes to body image. How often do we hear someone say "I hate my thighs/nose/elbows/etc."? The nature of this statement is that the elbows in question are somehow not a part of the entity of "I"... or at least, that's what my professor said. For actors, it's incredibly important to not be splintered in that way. Mind and body need to be connected in order to better portray anything through acting.

But I can't do that when I'm sick or in pain. I feel like somehow my body is attacking itself, or trying to disrupt my plans. My body is not me; my body is the enemy.

So here's a little trip into my body.

WARNING: If you don't want to read about my pains, potential medical problems, stomach acid, or reproductive cycle, stop reading now. I'm about to bust into some sketchy TMI Territory.


Okay, truth be told, a lot of my pains start out from a really strong body-mind connection. I break out in hives when I'm nervous. I get back pain (connected to my lordosis) when my self-esteem is low. I get headaches when I feel sad. And I get stomachaches when I have high levels of stress.

I've been getting the stomachaches since I was about 10. I finally had an endoscopy when I was 21. The doctor told me that I have gastritis, but no sign of anything else wrong. I have an over-production of acid in my stomach, but instead of having heartburn, it just eats at my stomach lining and duodenum. (See, this is why I threw on the WARNING up above.)

I was put on medication for awhile, but I didn't like the side effects. Since I wasn't getting them all that frequently, I decided to take my chances with Zantac 150s. I've been off prescriptions since around April 2006.

Around April of this year, my "stress stomachaches" as I call them (although they're not always related to stress) started coming more regularly. And one of them was excruciating -- easily in the top 2 most painful of my life (the other high-ranking one was around 1998 and was bad enough that I literally could not stand up).

I was in so much pain that I took my Zantacs, climbed into bed naked (because when my stomach hurts, the last thing I want to be wearing is underwear), and crying so hard that I induced a migraine. I felt so weak that I could barely talk or focus. It was awful, to say the least.

I chalked up the stomachaches to it being the end of the school year (stress). When they continued, I blamed them on the whole situation with Daniel being released from grad school.

In May, the days with pain far outnumbered the days without.

I have a low threshold for pain, but a decent tolerance for it. I think people often confuse the two, so I'll explain. I have a very strong sense of physical sensation, and I can feel things physically that are more slight than other people (if you don't believe me, ask my movement professor). I'm the kind of person who can feel an ant crawling on my foot. This is probably why I crave physical comfort and cuddling so much. It's also probably the reason that I have a low threshold for pain, which means that the point at which I feel pain comes much sooner than most other people.

That said, my pain tolerance is pretty good (far better than most, considering how easily I feel pain). For example, a friend of mine would take a day off from work if she had a headache or a cold, whereas I got hit by a car and showed up for work 32 hours later. I may be in pain, but I'll deal with it. If there's ever a time that people around me (aside from people I'm living with) can tell that I'm in pain, the pain is probably pretty significant.

When Daniel and I were in Disney World, I was having stomach pain all day, but I kept going. It somehow turned into chest pain, which I told Daniel, but we kept going. When it got so bad that I said I needed to sit down, he knew I wasn't messing around. After a call to my mother (a registered nurse), a visit to a health station, and an EMT hooking wires up to my chest, they determined that I was fine. The chest pain and breathing trouble probably occurred because I have asthmatic tendencies, and the fact that my heart was beating so hard and strangely was probably just because of the panic I went through because of the breathing issues. I spent some time in a wheelchair (with Daniel pushing me around and me feeling miserable) and was advised not to go on Expedition: Everest (I think Dan was disappointed, but he acted like it wasn't a big deal). But by the end of the day, I was an extra on stage in the Indiana Jones show and had taken my first ever drop in the Tower of Terror (what can I say, I'm a daring woman).

By the end of my time in Florida, I was having a lot of abdominal pain, but it wasn't in my stomach (by the way, your stomach is up near your diaphragm, under your ribs). It didn't really feel like cramps, either, although it had been a long time since my last period, so I assumed it must be something like that.

I won't go into specifics, but my menstrual cycle is freaking weird. Thank goodness I'm not sexually active, because if I were my life would be filled with pregnancy scares.

Anyway. So I came to Connecticut, and had my mother (i.e. my personal assistant -- my mom is awesome) schedule me all sorts of appointments. Gynecologist. Internist. Dentist. Ophthalmologist. Dermatologist. The works.

My cycle has continued to be really freaking weird since I've gotten home. Meaning that I got it the day after I got home (May 25th) and, guess what, I have it now (June 9th).

I've had stomach pains every day since I've gotten home. Bad ones that won't go away. I've talked to my gynecologist, internist, and father (he's an ob/gyn) about them. The pains move around. Sometimes it seems like an ovary, sometimes my pancreas, sometimes my bladder. My internist suggested that I might have a "spastic colon" (which, up until this point, I thought that Tennessee Williams had made up for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof).

My gynecologist said that I seemed fine, but that due to just how irregular my cycle was, she wanted me to have blood-work done to see if I have a thyroid problem or Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (as soon as I told my dad that, he said, "Yeah, I've thought that you might have PCOS for awhile."). My internist added a blood test to check for gluten intolerance.

I woke up around 6am this morning with stomach pain and my period. I was supposed to have an ultrasound today, but they won't do it now because I'm on my period, so I have to wait for another week. Fantastic.

In the meantime, I've been told to take 800 mgs of ibuprofen with food every 6 hours (which, so far, are doing nothing). And I've spent most of the day laying in bed.

I wish I knew what was wrong with me. I wish I could make it go away.

If I do have PCOS or a thyroid issue, I'll probably have to go on some sort of hormones or birth control or something (which is not something I want to do, but it sounds like it's my only real option).

Anyway. I'll keep you posted.


May your body not mysteriously rebel against you.

~A~


P.S. Despite being in bed all day, I booked another stage managing gig for Thursday-Saturday (let's hope I'm up and about by then!), and I got an interview tomorrow for a jewelry store that's just about to open (wish me luck!). Maybe my bed is a lucky place to be when it comes to employment? I'm going to chalk that up as a Feng Shui win!

Honest Scrap Award

A big thank you to Amy for giving me the Honest Scrap Award!



"The HonestScrap award comes with a caveat or two. Firstly, you have to tell your readers ten things about you they may not know, but that are true. Secondly, you have to tag 10 people with the award. Thirdly, let all the people you've given the award to know that they've gotten it (comment on their blogs or something). And finally, make sure you link back to the person who awarded you." (Okay, so I personally added in #3 and #4, but really, that's just common courtesy when receiving/bestowing anything.)



The Ten Things are:

1. I don't handle spicy food well. At all. I like to think that my taste buds are just incredibly powerful and can therefore taste the spice when other people can't. Many things labeled "mild" are, in reality, not mild enough for me.

2. I've some things that are called "great literature", but I don't find them nearly as captivating or entertaining as the sorts of books I prefer to read. I'd rather pick up Harry Potter. Or chick lit. Or young adult novels. Or science fiction. The last two books I read were Bitter Is the New Black and Ender's Game. I just found my old copy of Tomorrow, When the War Began in my parents house, so I think I'm going to reread that.

3. When I was in kindergarten, some boys on the bus teased me by calling me Michelangelo, referencing the then-popular cartoon, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. There was another girl in my class named Angela, but they never targeted her for some reason. My mother's brilliant solution? She bought me a Michelangelo action figure and got me to love the show. Suddenly, the flustered reaction to teasing turned into, "Yes! I LOVE Michelangelo!" (My mom = superhero)

4. Polka dots make me cheerful. I never actually seek out polka dots, but whenever I see them, they just kinda make me happy. Perhaps I should buy more polka-dotted things...

5. The last post I wrote was post #200... and I didn't realize it until I started writing this one. My grad school blog is at #179 (that's what happens when you blog multiple times a week, kids). My random crap on the internet blog is at #215 if you include everything in the Scheduled folder. And my novel blog that I've pretty much ignored for the last year is at #29.

6. Despite the facts that A. I'm usually far busier than I am now, B. I already have blogs that I can barely keep up with, and C. I use Blogger... I'm actually thinking of starting a new blog (in the style of CakeWrecks) dedicated to bad prom photos... I was thinking of calling it something like "What the Prom?" or "Prom-tack-ular". Why? Because I've saved up about 10 forwarded emails with bad prom photos... And I think it would be fun to put up one a day until I run out (or until people send me more, like the Cake Wrecks chick did). Thoughts?

7. When I was in 2nd grade, I was convinced that I would someday have twin daughters and name them Jessica and Tiffany (it was amusing to me when, many years later, I ended up going to school with a set of identical twins who bore those names). Around 1997, I thought if I had a son I'd name him Tarquin and I'd name a daughter Hedwig. Around 1999, I liked the "name" Anavieve Viana (I can't tell you how much that embarrasses the name-freak in me now). In college I went through a phase where I liked names like Friedrich and Zelda. At one point I had a love affair with Dahlia and Clark. Same with Hazel and Jared. In Roma (when I did as the Romans did), I liked Ginevra and Giacomo. When I moved to Chicago, I really liked the names Jeremy, Bernadette (I would've nicknamed her "Betty", but I think that Ugly Betty has kind of tainted that name), Julie and Malcolm. My favorite male name has been for a while now Henry (and there's a weird part of me that would want to nickname him Helo like on Battlestar Galactica, although I think the sensible part of me would beat the sci-fi fan up for that). My tastes in female names seems to change more rapidly (which is somewhat fitting with the current culture). Today, I'd probably pick something something more elaborate (to fit the times... remember that Olivia, Sophia, and Isabella are popular names right now) but still unusual, like Sabrina, Isadora, Clarissa, or Susannah.

8. Here are the characters I've played (most recent at top) that I can remember off the top of my head:
- Tillie "Tea" (upcoming)
- Laramie "Lara" (upcoming)
- Girl
- Sally
- Pastor Gray
- María "Masha" Sergeyevna Kulygina
- Hildy Matthews
- Mary
- Farina
- Hot Cocoa
- Carmella
- Suzanne
- Carol/Carolyn/Caroline
- Imogen
- Luciana
- Erotium
- Adriana
- Rosalind
- Julia
- The Priest
- Lady Macbeth
- Pfeni Rosensweig
- Diana Barry
- Stepsister Portia
- Violet "Vi"
- Ruthven
- Mrs. Louella Soames
- Digna Ochoa
- Rigoberta Menchu Tum
- Jose Zalaquett
- Marlene
- Abigail "Abby"
- Zot the Robot (yes, I played a robot)
- Fairtone
- Mrs. Myrtle Webb
- Emily
- Ernestina Money
- Miss Susan Barrymore
- Chamka
- Singing Ghost
- Carmel McGregor
- Follies Girl
- Tavern Adult
- Lost Boy
- Peanut Dancer
- Martha's New Clam Chowder Spokesperson
- Anansi the Spider
- The Ugly Duckling
- Peter Rabbit
- The Blue Engine
- The Farmer

I know I'm forgetting some, but I think that's pretty good for an impromptu list.

(Note: I decided a while ago that I would try not to give any child of mine the name of a character that I had played, because it would be too weird. As you can see, this has eliminated several good options.)

9. I have a mouth full of fillings. The dentist I went to for most of my life told me that it's not really my fault. Apparently, I have genetically bad teeth that have deep grooves in the middle, making it easy for cavities to form. I went to the dentist this week (where they told me I'm doing an EXCELLENT job, thank you very much), and the dental hygienist said that the fillings are all small and the cavities really weren't that bad. But then I went to a family practice doctor for a check-up who said he was shocked (SHOCKED) by how many fillings I had, because most people my age grew up with fluoride-fortified drinking water that helped with dental issues. Well, whatever. I blame genetics.

10. I'll admit it: I judge people who heavily align themselves with political parties. It doesn't even matter WHICH party. If someone is too far left, too far right, or too far out into the colorful world of independents, I have a problem with them. I vote based on candidates and issues, which means I end up voting in different directions. People who vote straight down a ticket? It feels like they're looking at politics the same way people look at college football; they've chosen a team, and they want that team to win*. I find myself often trying to play devil's advocate to those people and educate them on grey matter, even if I agree with them on some issues.

*(This seems especially true in presidential elections where people bring up things that have NOTHING TO DO WITH POLITICS in mud-slinging. Like when a family member of mine pointed out that Barack Obama's parents weren't married. What, exactly, does that have to do with an election?)



So okay... I guess it's time to award people (and also tag them with the meme that comes with it).

1. Valerie from Mixed Salad of Thoughts
2. Heidi from Heidi Renée
3. Jenn from Free and Flawed
4. bFlat from Lens Impressions
5. Roisin from The Beat of My Noisy Heart
6. Angela from My Quiet Testimony
7. P from *Insert My Blog Name Here*
8. Gooseberried
9. Katelin from Gorgeous Footsteps in the Sand
10. Pink Sun Drops

Have fun ladies!



May you be so open and honest in your life that lists like this are seriously hard to come up with. And may you be interesting enough that you can come up with them anyway.

~A~

Out of the Networks

(Me and Wifey at a pizza place. 05/22/09)

So since about, oh, August, I've been difficult to reach. I thought it would be a good idea to start calling all of the people who I scroll past in my contacts list and think, "Oh man, the next time I have time for a good long talk, I NEED TO CALL YOU" about. As it turns out, that list has gotten very, very long.

Occasionally one of those people will do the calling (like my friend John, whom I spoke with a couple of weeks ago for the first time in about 9 months). And usually, I say, "It's so great to hear from you! Can I call you back?" But the best laid plans of mice and Angela go oft awry.

I've neglected so much while being at school -- which is, of course, exactly what I needed to do. The days are gone when I can come home at 5pm and work on my less-than-Pulitzer-worthy chick-lit novel. I can't hold myself to a blogging schedule of twice a week (I've been barely clinging to once a month). And I certainly can't keep up with all the people I care about.

I thought about making myself some kind of schedule. Call one person a day or something. But that seemed formulaic and somehow disingenuous. Like "I'm calling you today because you're the next person on my list" as opposed to "I thought about you today and I genuinely care about what's going on in your life."

I used to be better at this. Keeping up with people and information. Brian, my ex-metaphysical-boyfriend, has said that whenever he wants to know what someone from our high school is up to, he knows his best bet is to call me. I know about the girl who's engaged to a girl, the girl who has three kids and just got divorced, the girl who is now a guy, and the girl who is now an exotic dancer. Some of it I get from facebook, some from my mother, and some from all the conversations I used to have with people I went to high school with. But now that I'm living away from all the people I knew back when, that flow of information has been cut off. Or maybe, for the most part, I just don't care anymore.

I still care about some of them, of course. The people who were (and are) important to me in one way or another. But I've gotten to the point where I'm beginning to forget names and faces. My friend had a crush on a guy for a couple of years, and I can see his eyes and his hair, but I can't remember his name for the life of me. I can, however, remember the name of the girl he was dating (though not her face... I think she was a redhead?).

My mother used to say, "The world is so much bigger than [Town] High School." That statement was, of course, obvious, but I don't think you really come to grips with it until you're away from everyone you knew there. Every community I've been a part of in my life, with the exception of my immediate family, I am currently separated from. The last time I saw someone I went to college with was October. I don't remember the last time I saw Phil, who was my best friend through some of my hardest times in high school. I haven't seen my dear friend Greg since the week before we graduated college back in May of 2006.

I've passed through so many networks and stations in my life. Not just your standard "High School" (Heidi, Ian, Kate, Katie, Lauren, Monica, Sara) and "College" (Renee, Deet, Rachel, Christina, Lauren). I had "Chicago" (John, Cleric). I had "Rome". I had "Chicago Workplace". I had "Summer Shakespeare", "Tony 'n' Tina's Wedding", and countless other casts and crews for the plays and musicals I've been a part of. I've had "NaNoWriMo"(Ricky, Jim, Michael, Valerie, Amanda). I've had "Shakespeare Classes" (Aileen). I've even had "Karaoke" cliques, in a couple of different places. I've had the "Broadway Message Board" (Chris, Christine, Papa) and the "Baby Name Message Board". And then I have the one group that I'm never fully away from because I was rarely with them: the bloggers (Barry, Nico, Chele, Andari, Tipp, Carrie Lea, and so many others it would be insane to list them all).

(And believe me when I say I miss being in Chicago that had 20sb meet-ups on a regular basis. It is SAD to not have people like Jenn, Rachel, Jessi, Joy, Pete, Jessi, K, Cheryl, Kayleigh, Jamie, Angie etc. in your life once you've gotten to know them.)

The network that has mattered most to me has been "Grad School". And I don't even really mean that in a social way.

But now I'm in Connecticut, and even that network is gone. Let me tell you who I know here: my mother, my father, my two younger brothers, my brother's girlfriend, and a large percentage of my parents' neighbors (because apparently in Connecticut everyone is friends with their neighbors). Through the wonders of facebook, I've discovered that two people I know from high school are in this state, as is a gal I knew years ago from that Broadway Message Board (I've known her online since 2004, but we've never met in real life).

But instead of building a new network here, like I've so comfortably done wherever else I've been in my life, all I want to do is reach out to the ones I've had before. So maybe I will go through my contacts list. Maybe I will finally get a chance to talk to all the people that I wonder about. Maybe soon.



Make new friends, but keep the old.
One is silver and the other gold.

~A~

School Love

(D-Train, me, and Newbie after a play-reading. 05/22/09)

I'm officially in Connecticut for the summer. It's the home of my parents, but I've never lived here before, so it doesn't yet feel like home to me.

Before I left Florida, life got crazy, as life often does. Daniel basically moved in with my for a month. We spent few days in Tallahassee. We spent a couple of days in Disney World. We tried to make the most of the time we had together.

(As a side note, this involved the most awkward event I've ever dealt with from a relationship standpoint. Remember Brian, the Air Force guy I used to call my Metaphysical-Boyfriend? He came to visit me WHILE Daniel was staying with me. I spent two days with my boyfriend and the ex that he's heard all about... Both of them handled it surprisingly well.)

But since Daniel is pretty much the only aspect of my life that has gotten any blog attention since, oh, I met him, I'll move on.

I love my school. And my school loves me. I don't mean that in a "my school cares about its students" kind of way, either. I mean, specifically, that my school loves ME. That is, of course, not to say that my program doesn't care about the others. Just that I don't think my school sees me as only a student; they see me as a resource.


EXHIBIT A: Assessments

Okay, so I won't annoyingly type out all of my assessments like I didlast semester (you're welcome). But I will say this: my assessments this semester were EVEN BETTER that the glowing ones from last semester. They think I'm intelligent, skilled, and fabulous (I'm paraphrasing to be brief, but I'm not exaggerating).

At the end of the assessment, they summarize the entire thing for you. There's a section on the official form for "areas in which you excelled", which was cluttered with notes, one of which was written at a funny angle to fit in properly. Then there's a section of "areas in which you can improve". The only thing written in that section was "Confidence". Analysis Professor said, "Angela, you're doing wonderfully with everything here. We just want you to believe in yourself."

So, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, if at times I seem a little full of myself on my blog, keep in mind that normally I'm far better at keeping it under wraps in my professional environment. In fact, I've been so careful to ride that line of Diva-dom that I think I've actually erred too far on the side of humility.



EXHIBIT B: The Workshop

Back in April, the head of my program (aka the man in charge of the next year of my life) said that the artistic director (aka the Grand Poo-Bah of the theatre who will determine my third-year casting and holds much of my creative destiny in his hands) had asked if I was available to do a new play reading at my theatre at the end of the month. I said yes (even though it meant I'd have to back out of the film that Daniel had wanted me to be in, causing the biggest conflict we've had in our relationship thus far -- I then said I'd be in the film instead of the reading, but him leaving film school made the decision for me).

D-Train and Newbie were asked to be in the reading as well, as were several Equity actors who were in the Rep theatre season. The published playwright was so lovely to work with, and she told us that we were the best cast that she'd had thus far for this piece. This play is the third play in a trilogy that she started writing in 1982, and the character I played was the main character in her first play. She told me that I exemplified the character she had in her head in a way that no one else had and thanked me. She said I can send her my headshot and résumé and she'll see if she can spread it around for me. (AWESOME!!!)


EXHIBIT C: The Caretaker

While I was at Disney World with Daniel (we went right before the workshop had started), I got a phone call from the theatre. I started hyperventilating right there on the Monorail. Had I forgotten a rehearsal? Was I supposed to be there? OH DEAR GOD HAD I DONE SOMETHING WRONG?

Daniel made me calm down before calling them back. It turned out that one of the high-up people in the theatre (the Vice Grand Pooh-Bah, if you will) had a family emergency and needed someone to stay with an elderly relative for a couple of days. The stage manager for the theatre called me first.


EXHIBIT D: The Assistant

As a 2nd-year student of the program, you are assigned to assist a professor or a department. This is their way of justifying paying us to be in school. There are 11 people in my class at present, so they came up with 11 stations that need assistants:
- Head of Program (the artist formerly known as "Analysis Professor")
- Head of Program's Assistant (aka the woman who makes the world go 'round)
- Movement Professor
- Voice Professor
- Acting I Professor
- Acting II Professor (who has been with this theatre for decades)
- Costumes (if anyone needs things for scenes, they go through the assistant)
- Props (ditto, but it requires driving across town. the most daunting of these tasks)
- Tech (manual labor)
- Crew (I think it's the same thing as Tech)
- Library (which is apparently a huge job involving keeping the program's library organized)

At the beginning of our first semester, my classmates were ALREADY discussing which positions they planned to request. The job post that looked like it was going to cause the most conflict was with our Acting I Professor, as so many of us idolize him. Several people told me they thought I should assist our Voice Professor, as I'm always doing extra homework in that class just for fun (yes, I'm one of those students). I had a suspicion that my Movement Professor might request me, as we get along incredibly well. But past 1st semester, I didn't really think about it.

I was having a conversation with Acting I Professor in April, when he suddenly picked up on the fact that I'm pretty on top of things (I'd go into specifics on this, but I don't want to brag or bore). So he asked me to be his assistant. I said sure.

I went to talk with his current assistant, and she said that both Acting I Professor and Movement Professor are up for promotion next year, which means that being assistant to either of them will be a far more complicated and work-intensive task than it might normally be. Instead of shying away from the additional workload as a more intelligent person in my position might have done, I decided that it was all the more reason to agree to that assignment. Clearly, Acting I Professor needed me. I WANT him to get a promotion, and I'm going to be of greater help to him than most of my compatriots. So Acting I Professor and I agreed: he'd request me, I'd request him, and everything should be golden.

On the last day of classes, Voice Professor pulled me into the hallway before class and asked if I would be her assistant. I said that I would've loved to, but I'd already agreed to assist Acting I Professor. She said that she yielded to him (knowing, no doubt, about his promotion -- she went through the same grueling process this year). I told her that I'd be happy to make up example sentences for vowels and consonants for her despite not being her assistant, just because I like doing that sort of thing.

When I filled out my request form, I ranked Acting I Professor 1st, Voice Professor 2nd, and Movement Professor 3rd. (I considered putting down "Library" because I really like sorting things -- everyone else will probably hate it -- but I thought my skills were better used assisting people). As I turned in my form to Head of Program's Assistant, she looked me straight in the eye and made a point of saying to me, "You know that just because you request something, doesn't mean you'll get it, right?" I coyly smiled and nodded. I knew she had probably already gotten a couple of request forms with Acting I Professor's name ranked 1st. But I knew something that she didn't: that he would be putting my name down as his first choice. I wasn't worried about what assignment I'd get.

The next week, a 2nd-year came up to me. "Angela, out of curiosity, what did you write on your Assistantship request form?"
"Oh, I'm going to be [Acting I Professor]'s assistant."
"No, what did you write on the form."
"I wrote [Acting I Professor], [Voice Professor], and then [Movement Professor]. But I already talked to [Acting I Professor] and I know he's requesting me."
"I thought I should warn you, you're not going to be his assistant."
"WHAT? WHY?"

This 2nd-year has had the job of assisting Head of Program's Assistant, who is, of course, the person creating the assignments. Head of Program's Assistant needs a really great, organized, friendly person as an assistant, so she wanted me. She had planned to steal me away from Acting I Professor. Clearly, this is why she had given me the "just because you request it" speech.

"So I'm going to be HER assistant," I reasoned.
"Nope," she answered.

Apparently, Head of Program's Assistant had been complaining to this 2nd-year that she COULDN'T have me, because Acting II Professor requested me, and she has the most seniority in the program.

That's right. Even though I have 10 other perfectly capable classmates, 4 of the 6 people who get assistants wanted me.

I felt like the prettiest girl at the dance.

That said, the whole thing felt unfair. I warned Acting I Professor that he probably won't have me as an assistant, despite our solid "request-each-other" plan. He seemed a little disappointed, but I assured him that my classmates are reliable and that I was sure his promotion materials would be assembled easily.

We don't officially get our assignments until we get back to school in the fall. But I'd say this story is a pretty good example of my school loving me.


EXHIBIT E: Facebook

Today (yes, TODAY... 5 weeks after classes have ended, and I'm not currently getting any sort of paycheck from this school), I got a facebook message from a woman who works for the program in some sort of marketing capacity:

Angela: I spoke with [Head of Program] yesterday about having a FB page for the Conservatory and he thinks you'd be the one to know how to set it up just right. What do you think?

Yes. Of course I'm the person they think of. I am, of course, the one with the blog. They associate me with the internet and with being a person who will help the program in any way they ask. And they're not wrong to make either assumption (just a few days ago I created Wikipedia pages for both my program and the Rep theatre because I realized they didn't exist yet... I did that for fun. On summer break. Because I'm a loser.)

So I did it. I created a fan page for the theatre today, complete with events for all the Conservatory's up-coming shows for next season.


VERDICT: They totally love me

Seriously, is it any wonder that they love me? I'm sharp, I'm trustworthy, I'm talented, I'm professional, and, most importantly, I'm the best free labor ever.




So now what...

I've been in Connecticut for a little over a week. I've already been the Stage Manager for two dance recitals at a local theatre. I may have just been offered a role in a play reading (that I didn't audition for). I've been offered a babysitting gig (that I had to turn down because of the Stage Manager gig). I applied for a job as a waitress at a yacht club.

Movement Professor says you she thinks actors should watch a movie every day. Analysis Professor says we should read 3-4 plays a week. Acting I Professor says you should always be reading a book.

I think those suggestions are all too difficult for me to keep up with, but I do see the value in them. So since school got out 5 weeks ago, I've watched 18 movies (most of them with Daniel), I've read 3 plays, and I've finished 2 books. Not bad, I think.

I don't know how things are going to go for me here. I feel out of place still, and I probably will until I get a steady job. But I'm hoping for the best.



May the evidence always show that you are appreciated, beyond any reasonable doubt.

~A~