3:18 P.M.

Today marks the beginning of a new chapter in my life and I have spent large portion of it watching Apple trailers on my laptop.

In two weeks I set out on the journey that all my other journeys have led to. Finally, after years and years of wanting to do one thing, I have resolved to do it and it’s getting closer by the minute. I am moving to Los Angeles to attempt carving out an entertainment career for myself, something I have wanted to do since the sixth grade. Now I’m finally doing it. So, I should be stoked, estatic… prepared. And I’m not.

I have found the best way to deal with what is happening is to ignore it. I have moved across the world with very little possessions to essentially start over in a completely new place, only taking a mild detour to my childhood home to gear up. And what am I doing now? Pretending that I don’t have to pack, to buy health insurance, a car, bedsheets and just downloading the Harry Potter movies instead.

I’m terrified.

I’m terrified of failing, of succeeding, of being depressed, of being happy and I can’t tell you why. I’m terrified I’m going to be mugged in the grocery store, I’m terrified I’ll mismanage my money, I’m terrified no will hire me to do anything much less what I actually want to do, I’m terrified I won’t have any friends. So many good things can come from this terror, but right now, all that is coming from it is denial.

Life’s too hard, so I’m going to pretend like it’s not there.

I got a new Macbook Pro with my tax refund back in July.  Something I had been waiting to do for almost a year ¹ Apparently, eight months before the release of the new and improved one.

I broke down and got an iPad back in January because they finally went on sale.  A day later, I found out they were releasing an all new and improved version.

My feelings towards this can be found here.

___

So … yeah I wrote something, but the problem was that I wrote it, actually wrote it by hand, and it was far too difficult to transcribe…… so I thought I would draw you a cartoon about the dynamic of my household.

PLEASE CLICK ME!! I AM AWESOME

Today I am taking the lazy post out by reposting someone else’s post, but I assure you this is better than anything I could have put together myself.

Screenwriter John August writes why it’s important to have a general education before a specialized one and why Ron Weasley is more than likely illiterate.

Follow this link or check it out on my Articles page.  And don’t be lazy just because I didn’t post it in it’s entirety for you.  It’s one click, dude.

I just applied for a job that requires attention to detail. Just after I clicked the submit button I noticed that the job site had the wrong resume stored in my account. It was my old resume from the last time I was out on my ass looking for jobs. I swear to god I changed it yesterday, but alas, there was May’s resume, mocking me.

Alanis may call it ironic, but I call it most unfortunate.

The power.

Just think about it: there is a small yet earnest number of people who honestly believe that Satan himself personally sent me and my kind to earth to destroy the morally sound humans of this mortal coil.  And that number is ever expanding.

What if, just what if, they are right?

What if my very existence is single-handedly destroying people lives?  I don’t even have to do anything that directly affects the lives of others, just being harms them and their way of life.  I can go to the mailbox and fetch my bills and BAM three Evangelicals I take down with me. A trip to the gym?  By merely running on a treadmill I can crumble a Republican’s marriage. Grocery shopping?  WHAMMO! A basket of kittens destroyed beneath my feet.

What other demographic can wield such destruction? The answer?  None.

There was a time where these same people believed that black people were less than human, but they, subhumans, did not have the benefit of holding the power to send others to hell simply by looking at them.  No, thinking about them!

Just think.  What if these haters are right?  I can be the queen and the humans my playthings.

un·der·whelm  [uhn-der-hwelm, -welm]

–verb : to fail to interest or astonish

This is my first post in almost three months.  My record to date.  It would have been closer to two months if I hadn’t spent the last two weeks pondering my glorious return.  Everything I remotely came up with was so underwhelming and certainly not glorious, so I have decided to embrace it.

I figured I would dazzle you with some trivia on the word, or at least an etymology of sorts.  The googled results are surprisingly underwhelming.  Not really sure what I was expecting, now that I think about it.

In the past three months, I have:

• Gotten my first technical writing job.  I am writing procedures in the corporate office of Westpac, an Australian bank.
• Submitted a second round of immigration application which in theory will lead to permanent residency.
• Discovered The Oatmeal
• Sanded and oiled six deck chairs we found in the trash pile of a Mormon church.  Surprisingly, this project has taken the entire three months.  I put the final coat of oil on this morning.  I still smell like turpentine.

All I  can do is apologize promise to attempt to be more dazzling, or at least more consistent, in the coming months.

I leave you with this profound quote:

Chastity: I know you can be overwhelmed, and you can be underwhelmed, but can you ever just be whelmed?
Bianca: I think you can in Europe.

God speed.

I don’t know if you’ve been following this, but in the last couple weeks there has been a big uproar in the entertainment industry when Ramin Setoodeh wrote an article in Newsweek claiming that gay actors could not “play straight.” This was a response to watching the broadway play Promises, Promise where he was unconvinced by leading man Sean Hayes’s performance.  Since then, the after math includes venomous retaliation from fellow cast member Kristen Chenoweth and fellow gay Alan Cumming, among others, who were appalled by Setoodeh’s remarks.

Now, I understand the uproar.  I get why they would come running to the defense of Sean and other’s like him.  However, I couldn’t quite gel with their arguments.  And I have figured out why when I read an article posted by the genius himself, Aaron Sorkin.  Immediately I felt “this is my opinion.” Funny that, I knew I had an opinion, I just couldn’t articulate what it was.

Me trying to recount it would only butcher the grace in which he writes, so I have posted Sorkin’s response in it’s entirety below.

Now That You Mention It, Rock Hudson Did Seem Gay

This is a sentence I never thought I would type: I’m coming to the defense of a theatre critic.

Newsweek‘s Ramin Setoodeh wrote an article last week titled “Straight Jacket” in which he argues that gay actors can’t and shouldn’t play straight characters. His “Exhibit A” in the piece is Sean Hayes, the stunningly gifted actor who came to our attention playing Jack MacFarland on the much beloved NBC half-hour comedyWill and Grace. (This was back when NBC broadcast television shows.) Mr. Hayes just opened in the Broadway revival of Promises, Promises, a 1968 musical by Neil Simon, Burt Bacharach and Hal David that was based on The Apartment, the Academy Award-winning film by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. (Izzy) Diamond that starred Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. Are you following so far?

It doesn’t really matter, because all you need to know is that Sean Hayes plays C.C. Baxter in this great show, and that C.C. Baxter is a man who is attracted to women.

Ramin Setoodeh, unlike the overwhelming majority of the people in the audience at the two preview performances I attended, was unhappy with Sean Hayes’ performance. This reaction was not due to Mr. Hayes’ acting, singing, dancing, comedy, unique charm and exceptional rapport with the audience. Mr. Setoodeh’s problem with the star’s performance was that in real life, Mr. Hayes is gay. And as if the studio had given the screenwriter a note that the story had to be spicier, Mr. Setoodeh is gay as well.

Much is being made of the Newsweek piece. Much should be. I’m proud to say that my friend, Kristin Chenoweth, who stars opposite Mr. Hayes in the show (and about whose performance I can’t possibly be objective — she’s sensational and we’ll leave it at that) led the charge — posting an online rebuttal to Mr. Setoodeh in which she called him homophobic.

For an actress who makes her living and her reputation on Broadway, throwing down with a prominent theatre critic isn’t something you do as a career move. In her response to Setoodeh, Ms. Chenoweth made good point after good point after good point…

…and missed the point.

So did Setoodeh.

Read the rest of this entry »

New blogs have been added to my links.  —->

Hollywood University OR: How to get a job in Hollywood

and

A TV Calling

Also, my earnest apologies for the lack of updates.  The joys of an crazy life.

Mary Sue

a term used for a character in a piece of fiction who is really the author’s idealized self-image, often shallow and uninteresting to anyone but the author. Mary Sues dominate any story in which they are included and are most often seen in online fan fiction. The term originated with Paula Smith’s 1974 character from Star Trek fan fiction.

I added a link taking you to a “Mary Sue Litmus Test” to help you determine if you’ve fallen into lazily writing this over-cliched character.

Note: There are many many Mary Sue litmus tests available on the web, some pretty extensive ones at that.  I chose this one because it specifically pertained to the creation for characters in original fiction, whereas most include one or more sections of FanFic and/or RPG characters.  I figured this would be more helpful to people are writing something intended to be actually published.