I'm Baaack!

It's been an energy-sapping, drama-filled holiday season. We FINALLY closed our show amid multiple blown fuses. I think that was one of my more exhausting shows I've worked on in awhile. It gets tiring sitting on pins and needles 5 hours a night, 4 nights a week, waiting for something to break, fail or blow. On to my (pathetic) personal life...

I really dislike being dragged into other people's drama. I especially hate being involved in the middle of drama. I have been witness to people making stupid decisions and if it wasn't for the fact that these people ranking higher than "acquaintances", I would have written them off a long time ago. Unfortunately, because I know and care about these people, I can't just write them off and be done with it. Dealing with drama and craziness is very draining. One of my resolutions for next year: no more new crazies. I work in theatre, my PDA is full of crazies.

Oh, and it's the Christmas season. That's enough stress to last me till Lent.

Now for stupid stuff that makes us laugh.

A friend of mine drove from Houston to L.A. about a week ago. I get a phone call at about 9am the morning (breaking my crack o'noon rule) after he left Houston.

Me: Morning.

C: How much do you know about international law?

pause

Me: Not enough to bail you out of a Mexican jail, if that's what you're asking. WHERE are you?

C: I'm in Mexico.

another pause

Me: How did you get into Mexico??? I-10 doesn't run through Mexico!!! L.A.'s a straight shot down I-10!!!

He then proceeds to tell me that he and his buddy wanted to get breakfast in El Paso. He turns on what he thought was an exit ramp off I-10. What he actually turned onto was the border crossing in to Juárez, Mexico. He's never been out of the country before and he's armed with only his driver's license. I'm laughing my head off while he's panicking slightly and worrying that he won't be able to get back into the U.S. (Don't worry, he made it back into the U.S. and gave the U.S. border guard something to laugh at.)

How To Be Single And Still Have Complications

Me: All the good guys are taken and/or married. Or gay.

D: There are probably 2 left here [in San Francisco].

Me: I think there are 2 here. One is on his way to being taken. The other has issues.

D: Of course.

So a dear friend in SF and I were commenting on our current plights. Nemesis and I have been advising her to drop problem guy like a bad crack habit. She's trying, but it's tough. Nemesis and I decided we just need to take a road trip to SF to run an intervention program on her. (Hang on, D. We're making plans.)

Our current plight is this: we are both single, fabulous women (if I do say so myself) with complicated relationships. I thought complicated relationships were reserved for those actually IN a relationship! Ours don't even come close to being a relationship. Strictly platonic. Yet somehow they've evolved into complicated relationships.

Interesting...

Your Birthdate: June 10

Independent and dominant, you tend to be the alpha dog in most situations. You're very confident, and hardly anything ever shakes you. Mundane tasks tend to drain you - you prefer to be making great plans. You are quite original. When people don't "get" you, it bothers you a lot. Your strength: Your ability to gain respect Your weakness: Caring too much what others think Your power color: Orange-red Your power symbol: Letter X Your power month: October

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Will This Show Never Open???

I'm in the throes of yet another show and this show is also cursed. We've been plagued with problems from all sides: cast, staff, building, etc. There have been so many problems and headaches that one of my actors jokingly said I should upgrade from the beer to the crack. I think I should just upgrade straight to the gun with a handful of bullets to be used on others or myself.

Cast: I love my cast. I truly do. That said, some are still fishing for their lines and making it difficult for their fellow actors and making it difficult to establish the rhythm and pace so necessary for a comedy. We open in 4 days and have now had 2 public previews. Oy vey!

Staff: Problems on every design aspect. The set construction is behind and a major set piece has yet to make its appearance. Lighting is somehow overloading the system and blowing fuses for the ENTIRE building. The costume designer is in the midst of moving, so she's been AWOL for half of tech week. Since she's moving, her sewing machine is packed up and she's behind in some alterations. Sound designer is also AWOL because his wife just had a C-section (their first child) at the beginning of tech week. It's also a complex sound show and most of our sound cues need to be redone or adjusted. Props is the only area that's done.

Building: Besides loosing power, we can't run the a/c in the lobby with stage lights up because the a/c repair man bypassed a regulator and the a/c is now pulling too much power. I have spent the past week watching the show on pins and needles hoping the electricity holds out at least till the end of show.

It's a mess! One day, my life should return to some state of normalcy (whatever that is).

Life's Small Pleasures

Life's little pleasures (at least for today):

1) One of those rare days - mid 70's, not a cloud in the sky, nice breeze blowing and low humidity (REALLY rare).

2) Hammock

3) Wireless that reaches all the way to the hammock

4) A happy dog

So I took my dog and laptop outside. As my dog was running around, I hung out on the hammock and made some friends jealous as IMed from the great outdoors. They were stuck in windowless offices while I was outside in the fabulous weather. Of course, I went into great detail about how great it was outside. I don't think they appreciated it.

Maybe Next Time

Well, it's over. It was a clean sweep and like the NL Championship, I spent most of the World Series listening to the game in bits and pieces during breaks and calling various people for updates. What little I saw was pretty painful and was one long nail-bitting session. Yes, it was great to finally get to the World Series, but it would have been nice to win some of the games - especially since we SHOULD have won some of those games.

No more discussion. It's too painful.

Finally!!! I Win!!!!!

I finally got a hold of some juicy news before my mother!!!!!! I win!!!!!!

This Week's Lessons

Here's what I've learned from this week:

1) Sleep is a highly overrated, frivolous, unnecessary and time-consuming luxury.

2) Murphy's Law kicks in to overdrive when you're trying to take a much-needed power nap after getting little to no sleep the night before.

3) The best time to call someone is when they're attempting to take a nap.

4) I REALLY, REALLY, REALLY want to live Downtown! It feels like you're living in an actual city.

Go 'Stros!!!

My Life As A Staffer (Or How To Make An Emergency Mint Julep)

My friend (JV) who I've been helping with some of his Katrina/Rita efforts was asked to testify in front of a Senate committee. He'll be talking to one of the various committees that are reviewing government efforts and responses in the past two hurricanes. He's talking to the committee tomorrow and found out about the trip this last Saturday. That's not a whole lot of time to prep for a trip to The Hill.

Monday

I get a call Monday afternoon from JV pleading for my help and my laptop. Being the fabulous friend that I am, I agree to go help him out. As I pack up my stuff, I get another call from him.

JV - "I need you to something really, really important."
Me - "Sure."

I'm thinking Kinko's run, FedEx drop-off, something along those lines.

JV - "I need you to get mint juleps."

Mint juleps??? It's 2pm on a Monday, mint juleps don't come ready-made and who under the age of 50 drinks mint juleps on a non-Derby day? (Apparently him and his friend / newly-appointed handler .

I go pick up the ingredients for the very important mint juleps and hightail it downtown. My first job was to mix a couple rounds of mint juleps. My only request: red wine and a TV tuned to game 5 of the NL Championships. We spend the rest of Monday typing and researching while watching the game. We could hear the crowd literally across the street from us watching the game as it was projected on the wall of a neighboring building. At the 7th inning, we decided to take a break and join the screaming, cheering masses below. It was crazy, pumped and insane - in a good way. At least until the top of the 9th inning, 2 outs with 1 strike left to send us to the World Series. Thousands of screaming, joyous fans silenced by a home-run. OUCH! After that, we went back to office to drown our sorrows in more work. We were so busy that we lost track of time and realized that it was too late to get our cars out of the garage. So I worked till about 4:30am then crashed on the couch.

Tuesday

Wake up at 8am as JV's friend / handler comes bouncing into the office (he left at 9:30pm the night before, so he got plenty of sleep). More work on the report and its supporting evidence. The handler had us promise to get JV out of the office by 9:30pm since they were catching the 9am flight to Baltimore the following morning. Handler left the office at 6:30pm and we were pretty sure we could wrap things up by 9:30p - 10p at the latest. I (foolishly) make plans to go kareoking that night. 10pm turned to midnight.

Wednesday

Midnight turned to 4am as we finished the report and prepared for final assembly - or so we thought. At 4am, we get an email from the local Vietnamese community organization with some long-awaited numbers. Those numbers had to be plugged into the report and the appendices. At 5am, I announced the time and declared that we had to be out of the building in 45 minutes since JV still needed to change, pack and get to the airport. We finally left the office at 6am. I ran JV home to shower and start packing while I picked up his dry cleaning and ran back to help him pack. We finally headed to airport at 7am and made it to IAH in record time - 30 minutes during rush hour traffic. After I dropped him off, I spent an hour trying to make my way back home. I figured I could finally sleep after sending off some last-minute email. WRONG! Everytime I'd go to sleep, I would be awakened 1.5 - 2 hours later by a phone call. After waking up to field my 4th call, I decided sleep was highly overrated and not necessary. Besides, game 6 would be on in a few hours. I could sleep after the game. And meeting up with some friends to celebrated our 1st trip to the WORLD SERIES!!!!!!

Total hours of sleep in a 72 hour period = 7 hours (give or take 30 minutes)

Couples...bleh!

This couple thing is getting old. If you want to invite one, you have to invite the other or they're busy being together, blah, blah. It seems like everyone is in some state of coupling: married, engaged, domestic partners, exclusively dating, etc. And it's not just confined to the straight world. My socializing circle has just gotten much smaller - fewer playdates with fewer playmates. With everyone coupled up, there are fewer people to talk about, too. One can't talk about who's interested in who, who their Friday date is, as opposed to their Saturday date...in other words, no mess to debrief about because they are all DATING. Or engaged. Or married. Or might as well be married.

BLEH!!!

Or maybe I'm just bitter.

The Rita Debrief

I FINALLY made it home last night at about 9:30p. I took my time leaving Ft. Worth and stopped in Temple to visit with my friend who graciously housed my cats and I on our way up to Ft. Worth. The drive down was uneventful and completed in normal travel time.

A few of my friends stayed and hunkered down for Rita. The worst I heard was a loss of electricity for about 12 hours. A few that I know did leave. One person ran as far as Spring, TX - a 30 minute drive that he completed in...30 minutes. (Boo him!) Other drive times & locations: 22 hours to Huntsville, 12 hours to Belleville, over 50 hours from Galveston to Ft. Worth, and one spent the first night in a nudist colony. This person didn't realize it was a nudist colony until they arrived (the person who housed them left that little bit of info out). That person, hands down, had all of us beat.

Hopefully things will get back to normal soon. We go back to normal show schedule starting tomorrow. We have now extended the show yet another week, so we close on the 23rd, barring anymore fires, hurricanes or other disasters, natural or manmade. We figured the next will be the plague of locusts, or down here in Texas, a plague of roaches.

A Small Rita Diversion

This is one of the quizzes Nemesis took and has linked in his blog.

What a letdown for my brother & parents!!!

You are a Social Moderate (55% permissive) and an... Economic Liberal (26% permissive) You are best described as a: Democrat

Happy, Nemesis???

Happy now, Joel???


How evil are you?

My Hurricane Update - pt.2

Just a few observations & musings while I've been on the run:

1) The traffic jam/parking lot I encountered on 290 & Hwy 6 up to Bryan/College Station was at least 10 times worse than ANY traffic jam caused by an A&M-t.u. game! (And if I complain about the next game-induced traffic up to B/CS, remind me of this evacuation.)

2) This is the first time I saw heavy traffic on a 2-lane farm road that wasn't caused by the local football game (FM 485 from Hearne to Temple).

3) I don't think I could live in the DFW metroplex - too flat, too suburban, too small-town mentality, no beach/oceanside within reach (in spite of hurricane season's best efforts to scare us away)...too blah.

4) Thank God for friends who reside in small, podunk Texas towns! She not only opened her house at 1:30 am, but her town was the 2nd spot I saw that had gas! (The first one had at least 40 cars lined up to enter the gas station.)

5) Who would have thought that something as mundane as D-cell batteries could be more precious than gold?

6) Non-Filipinos / non-Hawaiians combing the shelves for Spam - who'd have thunk????

7) For that matter, a run on Spam????

8) The land of big-hair still lives on in Ft. Worth!

9) The longest travel time I personal heard of (to date): OVER 48 hours from Galveston to Ft. Worth!!! (After hearing that, I'm not about to complain about my 14 hour trip on 1 full tank of gas. That family had to pull off and wait at least 3 hours for gas after they ran dry.)

10) I never imagined seeing both sides of an evacuation in under 1 week! Last weekend, I was helping settling Katrina evacuees; this weekend, I'm a Rita evacuee.

11) Now that I'm on this side of an evacuation, I'm not sure I like the moniker of "refugee" or "evacuee".

With any luck, the next blog will be from home!

My Hurricane Update

I finally made it to my destination! I'm at my cousin's place in Ft. Worth. I left Thursday morning with plans to stop off at my friend's place in Temple to visit, eat dinner and feed and water my cats. I ended up staying overnight because it took me 14 hours and almost a full tank just to get to Temple. Normally, Temple is a 3 hour drive. At least I wa able to gas up in Temple, the 2nd station I saw that had gas. The first was in Hearne and the lines were over a block long - in either direction. I'll probably head back home Monday or Tuesday. I want to avoid the 100+ mile parking lot.

This is my 2nd evacuation and it's getting a little freaky.

WOO HOO! I Found Water!!!!

I just came back from an early morning shopping trip. When I say early, I mean EARLY! 2 am early. That's when the grocery store by my place restocks. Earlier in the afternoon, I hit 4 grocery stores and the shelves were empty. No water, batteries or tuna to be found. The gas station I went to had lines at all of their pumps and 2 of the pumps were dry. I think everyone down here is a little freaked by Rita. Well, let's face it, Houston is WAY overdue for it's hurricane.

I'm encountering 2 very different responses to Rita. On one hand, you've got the people who are concerned (at the very least) and are prepping 5 days before her expected landfall. These tend to be the people who are natives to the coast or at least were here during Alicia (I fall in this category). Then there are the ones who are rather blasé about Rita. They tend to be non-natives. I just talked to a non-native friend of mine and he's doing nothing to prep for the hurricane. It's a little disconcerting. I don't think Rita will be as bad as Katrina (I hope not), but a hurricane is nothing to sneeze at. Even this far inland, she can cause trouble for us. I remember Alicia - no electricity, lots of water, damage to the house, trees downed, etc. Granted, our house was under renovations when Alicia hit, so the water in the house was due to the hole in our roof (we were getting ready to put a skylight in, so there was a big ol' hole over the living room). Still, Alicia was no picnic.

I'm not in panic mode...yet. I'll wait till the forecast models are a little more accurate before deciding whether or not to move into the panic stage. In the meantime, we're stocked on water, canned beans, tuna and snacks. I'll stock up on wine tomorrow. So if any of y'all are floating by the house when Rita blows through, come on in for a little hurricane party!

Good luck, Houston!

Another Day, Another Storm

Well, Mother Nature's been busy this hurricane season! We're at our 18th named storm. Does anyone know the last time we made it this far in the alphabet? Houston is packed with Katrina evacuees and the city/state is discouraging future coastal evacuees from coming here. I hope we ARE ready for this one!

It's About Time!!!

Brown's out.

Not "yay". Not a sigh of relief.

It's about d*** time!

Oh, and here's a novel concept - replacing him with someone who HAS experience in emergengy response and management.

Doesn't FEMA stand for Federal Emergency Management Agency?

Domestic Problems

No Coffee Left!!!!! Waaaahhh!!!!!!

Let me restate that...no GOOD coffee left!!!!

The coffee I'm referring to is the stuff that is personally hand-carried from the Philippines. This stuff (at least in our family) is worth it's weight in gold. We don't trust ANYONE with this coffee - especially our own family members! My uncle is still bugging me about the coffee I was "suppose" to have delivered to him - 3 years ago! (Nevermind that his freezer has just been restocked with a few kilos of the golden beans.)

Roomie came in this morning and asked me if we have a grinder at the house (which we don't - but I plan on rectifying that problem this afternoon). She then told me that there was ONE teaspoon of (ground) coffee left, then took cover behind the BF as I screamed and wailed. I NEED MY COFFEE!!!

Brief recap on Saturday's events.

The original plan was to meet up in the morning with a friend who I've been assisting with the Katrina relief efforts. We were going to phone some organizations in town to gather info and post them on a central message board. Instead we met with one of the city councilmen at City Hall and then proceeded to check out apartments that the city has targeted as longer-term housing options for the evacuees. The mayor's plan is to empty out the big shelters by (we think) end of next week. We then scouted out possible neutral meeting spots for a last-minute meeting between one of the mayor's staffers, one of the councilmen and heads of organizations that provide services to the various Asian communities in town. The problem that we're seeing is a lack of communication between the groups. The groups tend to be very territorial and that's causing a breakdown in communication and expeditious dissemination of information to the evacuees that are being assisted by these various groups. The big question on everyone's lips is information about FEMA - what are the aids and services FEMA will provide to the evacuees, the voucher programs FEMA will provide to evacuees and vendors who are donating their resources, etc. FEMA STILL hasn't set up shop yet here in Houston! They should be acquiring a location tomorrow. That's ridiculous!!!!

On the artistic front, we opened our show last night and it went off without a hitch. No fireworks or anything! After the theater's opening night party, my director, her husband, 2 of my actors and I went out back to BW3 to eat. The talk quickly turned to events caused my Katrina. One of my actors is currently playing host to her baby sister and her family (that consists of her sister, husband, 2 kids, 2 dogs, 1 cat and a parakeet). It's a regular zoo at her house, but she doesn't mind. In fact she's thrilled her sister is there. And relieved. The conversation then turned to the government and THAT'S when the verbal fireworks started. The actor (who's a native of New Orleans) is a staunch Republican (a rarity in my field) and my director and her husband are staunch Democrats (the norm in my field). When I left, they were still arguing about the Bush administration, the federal government, the Louisiana state government and the New Orleans municipal government. I wouldn't be surprised if they were arguing until the restaurant kicked them out at closing time.

1 positive note: the general consensus is that everyone has been impressed with Mayor Bill White's actions, both reactive and proactive. I heartily agree. He and the non-governmental organizations are at the very least steps ahead of the federal government in this situation!

Long-winded

After reviewing my last blog, I realized that I never fully explained the 5 points I listed at the top of the blog. I might talk about them at a later date. I also realized that my past few blogs have been rather long, but my brain has had quite a bit to process over the past few days. It's been an unusual couple of weeks, to say the least.