I just sent Viv the link to this blog. Hi Viv! Oh boy, I'm feeling just a little naked... hope I can stay honest!
Ah, home. Or rather, my parents' home... but funny I've always thought of wherever my parents are is home -- probably because I never really created a life (read: HOME) for myself... I think that's kinda sad. I've got a flight in the morning to help with the anniverary party plans... Jack will take care of Yvette, thank goodness.
Class this weekend was wonderful -- Ms. Jenny was great and I'm glad I was there for the info and to support her. Still weird that I haven't talked to BC yet... well, I guess I'll cross that bridge when I get there! I'm too pooped to pop right now... more later.
Just got this note back from Viv:
"But then again, i didn't have the nerve to ask you because you'd say I was trying to do too much again."
Oh GOD..... who the hell am I to talk..... I'm back to writing my lists again, so I can kept all my many tasks straight. this sounds like fun, and I'd love to help. What day? Let me know so I can plan my week..... talk soon... :-D
She's the best!
Too pooped except to pop this quickie email to my friend Vivian:
Hey you,
"you doing okay? did you resolve everything with BC. When is your trip to hawaii again? Do you want help on your movie this summer? :-D "
Thanks for checking up on me. I just got your message because I just came in from Jenny's house. She was teaching the Database Review class today (and tomorrow) because BC was out this month... and her teaching buddy, Deborah, was gonna do it with her but got strep instead. So I got called in as a ringer to help set up, calm her down, etc (not to teach! I swore I wouldn't do it)... I hadn't slept in 24 hours after the class ended at 6:00 and so I slept on her couch until 8:30 so I could be awake enough to drive home. Drive through Panda Express, eat a little, walk Yvette, feed that cat next door and I'm in the shower to and off to bed for another long day. Thank god tomorrow I don't have to haul chairs and TV trays up two flights of stairs! Boy, I'm pooped and haven't sweat like that in years.
It's not Jenny's fault because I like her a lot, but boy I'm really resenting all this bullshit. I told BC I had an email for her but if she didn't want to open it until July when she's off "recess" that was okay too -- so of course she hasn't opened it. And this morning at 5 am I had to call her because we had a semi-stupid emergency with a document... we talked to get that solved but then I handed her over to Jenny. I'm so........ tired.
Real quickly -- I've been putting off asking you... I'm going up north on Monday (day after tomorrow) until July 4 so I can finish all this crap (more crap!) for my parents anniversary -- getting favors, table coverings, etc. But most of all to finish off this slide show movie that I've written (in my head of course, I'm sure you're not shocked). It's really a lot of pictures, with music and a little narration... but I was thinking it would be neato if I could have a couple of talking heads (them and me -- I'm like a reporter trying to find out the secret of their long marriage) and I'm asking them a bunch of questions... in real life I'm asking them questions like "What's Mom favorite dish?" and Dad will probably say "Fish, we always have fish every single day" but I would cut it together where I'm asking the interview question: "What do you think has made your marriage last so long" and then cut to Dad saying, "Fish, we always have fish everyday." You know silly stuff like that. So I was gonna ask you if you wanted to come down for an afternoon and dinner so I could shoot that wrap-around stuff and shoot me and do the camera while I'm talking to Mom and Dad and then capture it on my Dad's computer (only he doesn't have a DVD burner -- is that a problem?). But then again, I didn't have the nerve to ask you because you'd say I was trying to do too much again.
Anyway, I'll ask since I already have... would you be able and willing and want to come over for a day and help with this? (with one of the Barbs' cameras of course) If not I'll understand, lemme know.
Whoosh, I need to go to bed!! Hopefully I'll get better at not sleeping like a vampire. BTW, send more details about your new loan adventure!
Madley
UGH. I hate when I say I'll do something because I think I should or it's the "right" thing to do, when all along I should've said NO from the very beginning.
And I just booted Jack out of the house. The nerve of him. "I've been calling you all day but you haven't picked up." (I was asleep.) "Let's take pictures of the dog. She won't be with us much longer." (But he didn't want to get the camera from his car.) "I just want to lie in bed with you." (I DON'T!)
He certainly wasn't going to be sympathetic to the predicament I put myself in. "You should never have said yes. I don't want to hear about you complaining about doing something you agreed to do."
So I said it wasn't a good time to visit and he should leave.
Fuck. At least I got to eat the tacos he left.
And you know, BC decided she wasn't going to have class this month because she needed time off, great. But she threw it all on the teaching staff, and they're falling apart. Jenny got left holding the ball because Deborah took on a full time day job with her waitressing this week and she burned out and is sick with a fever. So the one thing I wanted to do was just be a fucking student in this class... and I have be Jenny's #2. SHIT! Smile and be "on" because nobody can say no.
Holy shit, I don't think I'm learning anything at all.
The reading tonight of Athol Fugard from his notebook at the Fountain Theater in Hollywood was WONDERFUL... lots to tell there later. But the more pressing event?
I made myself meet Gordon Davidson, the Artistic Director/Producer of the Mark Taper Forum! After we'd done a little "dance of the non-valet-parked-cars" in the parking lot, I went to the restroom, pepped myself up to say a word before going upstairs to the reception (he was sitting out with a friend)... though confident in the parking lot and joking around anonymously was a breeze, I felt like a complete dorko:
I waited for him to acknowledge me. When he looked up:
"Hi, Mr. Davidson, I just wanted to introduce myself, (sticking out my clean but cold hand) I'm Madley..."
"Hello," he said and ROSE (Swoon! does anybody every RISE anymore?). "And what do you do?"
"I've always wanted to meet you and didn't know if I'd ever get another chance. (Babble, babble, sounded like I two-year-old) Actually, I'm a playwright and my play, Carabao Bookends, was produced for the Festival of Philippine Arts..." and I faded at that because I sounded so "Hollywood-y" to myself and like such a has-been -- yuk.
"That's good."
"And I've just been gun-shy about picking it up again, so I when I saw you I thought I better just make myself say hello."
"Well, don't you give up."
(More babbling) "Oh like with Mr. Fugard -- he was so inspiring."
"Yes, and cuts through all the lines. Universal."
"He does! It's just hard because Filipinos and Filipino-Americans don't have a strong theater-going tradition yet." (I guess I'll just kick the dog myself while I'm down!)
"Do you know Chay Yew?"
"I've not met him, but I know a lot about him." (I'm so lame.)
"He's written about the Filipinos. You don't give up, all right? Just don't give up."
"I won't." A quick thank you and my audience with The LA Theater God was over. Whew. Chay Yew too.
I sauntered over to the stairs for the reception, took a deep breath... and tripped on the top step.
It was a good night.
(About wonderful Athol tomorrow... "I didn't know if Pumla Lolwana was barefoot or she had shoes on her feet as she stepped out in front of the train." (Sorry, Athol, I paraphrased. Please forgive.) Man, is he the consumate storyteller... and wowee-zowee: I got to see him/hear/feel him! Talk about lucky.)
I'm having a love/hate relationship with this blogging thing already -- I'm a bit obsessed -- when should I write, should I write, this would be funny, who cares anyway, etc. Hence, terrible night (day, actually) of sleeplessness.
Rushing out now to see Athol Fugard LIVE at the Fountain to do some reading of his work -- Claire's a great gal to take me when I'm this broke. Ah well, thanks Claire... you're the top. Off to wrestle with this frizz on my head...
It's 2-1/2 hours later and I'm still at it, semi-believing in this "blog" thing. I forgot that last night I was at the official sites of Idina Menzel and Brian Stokes Mitchell and I really loved getting the personality of the performer by reading their own typed thoughts. So here I am, hoping I have a personality worth reading about...
And that reminds me: I can't get that song "Popular" out of my head! It's from Wicked: The New Broadway Musical which I wish I could get out to see before Idina (Elphaba) and Kristin Chenoweth (Glinda) leave this summer. (And there will be no spoilers here -- though there IS someone who graciously spilled the beans on the net.) Oh, to be in Hell's Kitchen again... I really love New York.
(BTW, I cannot STAND how people use the word "wicked" as an adverb (common to those in the New England, as in "He was wicked hilarious!" Makes me nuts.)
I guess the Wicked part of me is the one who relates to Glinda who does a "makeover" on her green roommate/friend to help her be "popular" like her -- good God, I used to do that at college all the time! Our weekly dorm newsletter would say: "If you have time this weekend: (1) Get your Before picture taken by SS (me) and JJ (my photographer friend); (2) get your hair cut and makeup and wardrobe done by SS; then (3) get your After picture taken by the team again!"
Geezo, that sounds pretty arrogant -- who am I to think I could make people over like that?
Hrmmfff... well, I was kinda good at it. Years later as a color consultant, I even got paid for it. And between that -- well, the most incredible wish came true for a lifetime Chubby Chick: I got on to be the first Lifestyle makeover on a health and fitness show in 1984 -- WAY before all this Extreme Makeover baloney... ah well, maybe not so wicked after all! Just making the world a prettier place, one hairy 70s college student at a time. And another topic of discussion I'm sure... that whole TV experience was... what I needed then. I will be sure to rail later.
Heya! I finally figured out what a frickin' BLOG was -- it was making me crazy and feel absolutely ANCIENT. Thank God for Margaret Cho and Wil Wheaton (no, I don't know them, just somehow ended up reading their pages) and now I'm here trying to figure it all out... well, at least until I can fall asleep.
I tried to grab madley.blogger.com, but for some reason all the other Madleys in the world -- probably last names -- keep grabbing it before I do. And I thought I picked a unique name. Oh well. MadKata it is.
And for some reason, I like the idea that I finally have one miserable place to all my thoughts and feelings (blah!), not on the zillion pieces of crap paper I can find on my house to write down dreams and (the same old) rants and such. I don't know if I'll even tell anybody about this secret hiding place of mine yet (if it can be "secret" while being on the net)... the point is when I'm rich and famous and teaching Jay Leno how to say my [last] name ... all my "before" stuff will already be recorded for all posterity and that'll save a big step, right? HA. It could be a very long time before that.
In any case, this is for me and my insomnia, for my Hal 9000 (a hand analysis gift marking that I'm sure I'll yak about sometime) to chew on, and well... I guess... not to feel so old and that I'm still creating something while I stall on the "official" creating (plays, composing, etc.). I wonder how many times I'll revise this first post before I actually meet up with some zzzzz's........
