Thursday, September 25, 2008

Trip to NY

The day I drove to San Francisco and hung out with my good friends Courtney and Allison made me realize how much I miss them all the time and how much I wish we lived even closer to each other. The wedding was such a blur that I didn't have time to feel it then. But thrift shopping on the Haight, eating Thai food, hanging out at Courtney's cute apartment and discussing our sense of self and style made it all come flooding back to me. Guys! I miss you again already!

So I moped a bit and worked some in the few days following, and then it was time to jet-set it to New York to see yet another dear high school friend, Olivia, and meet the mysterious boy she has been spending time with.

I worked until 5 pm on Sunday and then came home and packed for an hour, ate dinner, and was picked up and driven to the airport. I was going through security and who should I see ahead of me in line but Silar, from Heroes. I didn't freak out or anything, just kind of went "Huh" and continued on my way. Sent my sister Emily a text message about it as I was boarding, to which she replied, "Is he on your PLANE?!" I was about to text back that no, he wasn't on my plane, when I accidentally ran over the toes of a man in first class with shiny shiny shoes. I looked up to apologize and OH my god it's Silar from Heroes and he is going to kill me and steal my brain. But no, he was very nice about it and I went on my merry way once again.

I have since found out that it was NOT Silar from Heroes (which explains the non-brain eating), but someone else. But I KNOW I have seen him before in something on television or in movies, and it is eating away at me.

Anyway, we took off at 10 pm but I was plagued with smelly hippie girl in the seat next to me, who put her feet all over my leg and at one point was half leaning over onto my shoulder, asleep. So I watched the movie, which happened to be Son of Rambow (very cute), and didn't sleep at all. We landed at JFK at 6:00 am New York time.

I got picked up by Super Shuttle an hour (HOUR!) later, and then only because I chased the guy out of the building when he said my name too quietly for me to hear, but I noticed a large group of people leaving the transportation area and figured I should check it out. We then took TWO AND A HALF HOURS to get into Manhattan, so I missed Olivia on her way to work but finally made it to their apartment in the Theater District.

I got let in by a dude with a french bulldog and met Tristan, Olivia's main squeeze, on the stairs. He offered me a leftover omelette on bagel (which was DELICIOUS) and the bed, and I conked out for a few hours.

When I woke up, Tristan and I walked to meet Olivia for lunch in Central Park and we all caught up on things for a while. Then she had to go back to work. So, Tristan and I went to MOMA and saw all the special exhibits (except the Salvador Dali one, which I just missed, natch) for a few hours until I had to head back and get ready for the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers Observership Party.

Which was good. I met 3 people that I really connected with after schmoozing a room of about 30, learned more about the program (it's basically like a job bank for people that want to observe theater run by the Director and Choreographer's union), and felt very much at home. Afterwards I met Tristan and Olivia who had been sitting in this big area in Times Square that had been set up to watch the Metropolitan Opera's Opening Gala on the big screen. I was sad that I missed it, but the party had been at the same time and that was more important. We three got pizza and headed back to the apartment to wait for Travis, a friend's brother, to come hang out. But by the time he checked in by phone it was late and we were all pretty fried, so we watched Bill Clinton on Letterman and then went to sleep.

Woke up to say goodbye to Olivia, then hung out in the apartment with Tristan for a bit and packed until we decided to go get breakfast at a nearby coffee shop. Came back to the apartment afterwards to wait for the SuperShuttle Driver to call. A while passed. I called dispatch to ask about the van, and she said they were a half mile from my destination. So Tristan came down with me to the curb to wait. I watched the van that was supposed to pick me up turn down another street and disappear. I called the dispatch, who said, "Oh, no, he was there a half hour ago and your phone number was disconnected." Which is BS because they called me the night before to confirm. And since Bush was speaking at the UN at the time they couldn't get another van out to pick me up. Even though I watched three shuttles pass during the time I was speaking to dispatch. Bastards.

So Tristan walked me down a few streets and I hopped in a cab to JFK. Pain. Luckily there wasn't too much traffic going out of the city, just going in, so I made it to the airport just before my plane was boarding, enough time to go to the bathroom and get a ten minute manicure. I know, it was the coolest thing. Then I boarded the plane, watched Be Kind Rewind, worked on concepts for my show, and touched down at SFO. I hitched a ride home with my dad, who had been up in the city for work that day. Whew!

So, what's happening now?

Besides trying to reorganize my life and finish writing wedding thank you cards, I'm rushing to fill pretty much all the positions for my show, as well as to find rehearsal space which is the real challenge. Until I find decent rehearsal space, I can't hold auditions. And the later I push auditions, the less time we have to rehearse the actual show. Yikes.

But I came back from New York with a renewed sense of purpose and the feeling that I can do it. In fact, I remembered that I used to do this kind of thing all the time - every 8 weeks, in fact - and even though it was really hard it did happen. So I'm just going to press on and try not to let myself panic.

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