8:20 pm - Weds 5/18/11
The Next 50 Years

My birthday was this past Sunday.

The lead-up to "the big day" (#50 in an ongoing series) was, frankly, pretty awful - I felt downright assaulted by negative thoughts - but the actual day, on the other hand?

Surprisingly enough, comparatively angst-free. Go figure.

I worked in the morning, then went to Target, "to buy myself something pretty" (I looked around for awhile, but left after buying only a seven-pack of underwear, underwear actually more "utilitarian" than "pretty").

Then I went back home and just hung out, debating whether I wanted to have a "Birthday Lunch" or a "Birthday Dinner" (Lethargy more than anything caused "Birthday Dinner" to win out).

So I walked down to the House of Pies in Los Feliz (Even though it was my birthday, I was feeling slightly guilty about the food I was going to eat - so the walk was my penance).

Once at HOP, there were a few panicky moments when I couldn't find "Turkey Reuben" on the menu (I knew that's what I wanted going in - that and pie, of course).

I considered trashing the joint and storming out - my usual M.O. in that sort of situation - but opted instead for inquiring politely if it would be possible to get a Turkey Reuben with fries (And as it turned out, it was possible).

I finished off the meal with cherry pie a la mode, which was the big reason for my being at the House of Pies in the first place; I enjoy a nice cake, but in my heart-of-hearts, I'm a "pie man" ("House of Cakes" wouldn't have nearly the same allure for me).

While I was at House of Pies, ran into someone I knew from ArcLight, leading to a semi-awkward few minutes of conversation. Not terribly awkward, but just awkward enough that when I was leaving, and saw another person I knew - from my unsuccessful stint at IO West - I decided to pass on any additional strained conversations, and just kept moving.

For this most special of days, I'd originally planned on seeing Bridesmaids at the Los Feliz 3, in part because I thought Howard - my frequent moviegoing companion - wouldn't care if I saw it without him.

But then the mostly positive reviews piqued his curiosity, so I decided to hold off till we could see it together, and since the other two movies were not of much interest, I went back home (At the time, I thought I'd rather go home and do this anyway...though somehow, that's not what ended up happening).

But anyway...

I'm guessing this isn't my most fascinating entry ever, but be that as it may, the day you just finished reading about felt like a big deal to me; I was pretty miserable about this birthday for days beforehand, so it would have been easy to just hole up in my apartment and feel sorry for myself.

But I didn't do that, and for me, that's a "step in the right direction".

I don't want to make it sound like no one noticed it was my birthday - There were, of course, the requisite "Happy Birthdays!" on Facebook, Cary and Kay both messaged me, and Kevin and Jane both called (Missed Jane's call, unfortunately, but had a nice talk with Kevin) - and like I already said, the day really was "comparatively angst-free".

But that said? I hope next year to have at least one special person to share my birthday with.

That would be a real "step in the right direction".

10 Gifts I'd Like To Give Myself:

1. Invisalign braces
2. An Ipad 2.(With a bluetooth keyboard, like my friend Kevin)
3. Full cable, with all the trimmings.
4. A Honda Fit.
5. A weekend in a Nevada brothel.
6. Rosetta Stone - Spanish.
7. Laser treatment on my nail fungus.
8. Full-sized electric keyboard/nice electric guitar, and anything I needed to help/motivate me to learn more.
9. A homestead (Something bought and paid for).
10. A sizable "nest egg", and help in managing it.

Unfortunately, the "Shake 'N Take" blender that was in the parcel, which I was very enthused about, didn't work when I plugged it in (Which made me feel more bad for Jane than anything; she already went to all the trouble of putting this gift box together for me and getting it out - now she's gotta screw around with calling the company and getting them to send me a blender that actually works? What a pain-in-the-ass!).

The first one, in the morning, had me back at WOB Casting for It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia, in the role of "Mortician" (In two quick scenes with the Danny DeVito character).

As I've said before, they clearly like me there, cause I've lost track of how many times I've been to their office (I was just there less than three weeks ago).

Wendy herself was running the session, and was very complimentary of my audition (And work in general) - commenting on how "subtle" I am - and I thanked them (Her and the cameraman), for clearly trying hard to get me on the show.

(That's a good feeling, when a casting place keeps bringing you in, over and over, and I don't mean just because you'll probably get hired at some point - It's just nice to feel like people are "taking notice".)

I got home from that audition, then got an email that I had a commercial audition later that afternoon in Santa Monica.

Would have been nice to have two auditions I felt positive about yesterday, but alas, it was not to be - the commercial audition (for something called Hot TV, for Israeli television), felt as disheartening as the earlier audition had felt encouraging.

I have no expectation of booking the commercial thing - when it feels like just "the luck of the draw" at an audition, I never think the wheel's gonna stop on my number - but I was disappointed to not hear about "It's Always Sunny" today (Though I think that one could definitely still be "in play").

Pretty disappointed with this entry, but I'm posting it anyway, because I'm tired and I want to either, 1) Watch tv, or 2) Go to bed.

Anyway, tomorrow is another day...

previous - next