11:25 AM - FRI 5.13.22
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0nly just taking note that today is "Friday the 13th" - Not really superstitious, by and large... but a small part of me wonders how the day's gonna go.

(Guess we'll see.)

But anyway...

There's not much "news" to report, but feel like I haven't "communicated" to the world at large enough lately, so I'll give you what I've got.

Was hoping at this point that the film would be starting its film-festival journey, but we're still waiting to hear where we'll be making our big premiere.

I feel like I've talked and talked, then talked some more, about not knowing what's going to happen with the film, what it is or isn't going to do, what might or might not happen, etc.

And it's been kind of crazy-making (For a reference point: This is Year Four of this project).

So I think what I really need to do now, as much as possible, is just act "as if" nothing is going to happen, then be surprised and delighted by any little sign of life the film demonstrates. Because I feel as if I've been "hanging some hopes on it", as something that will deliver me from my struggle for meaning and purpose, and that's starting to seem like a recipe for perpetual anxiety and dissatisfaction with...whatever-the-fuck-is-going-on now.

Anyway...

One thing that's "going on now" - actually, two days from now, but you get what I mean - is my birthday.

On Sunday, I will be "61 years young" (Which, FTR, is one of the most annoying things anyone can say about a pending birthday).

For the past number of years, on "my special day", there have been small lunches or dinners in my honor, attended by a couple of my close personal friends who live in the vicinity.

I'm a little disappointed that's mostly not happening this year (After initially thinking she was going to be here for the blessed event, Jane R. won't be in attendance. And Cary is also unable to make it on the day - but we'll be lunching in Santa Clarita tomorrow instead - and Mike M. is residing in Vegas now).

But my buddy Josh (With his relatively new girlfriend Dana, who seems very cool) is taking me to the breakfast buffet at Sizzler, so "attention will be paid" on the day in question, which is really all I need...especially since I'm being "gifted" by everyone who can't make it in person, there's the aforementioned lunch with Cary tomorrow (Complete with a trip to the action-figure store and the action figure of my choice), and there will, of course, be well-wishes from an assortment of friends, fans, and well-wishers on Facebook.

So, as is always the case, I'm getting way more than I really deserve on this celebratory "Day of Days".

Another "celebratory event", that I didn't actually expect was going to happen at this point, is happening a week from tomorrow - The Shameless series-ending wrap party!

The show wrapped a year ago in March, and a wrap-party was scheduled, not once, but twice, only to be canceled/open-endingly postponed due to COVID.

Frankly, it's been so long that, when I'd talk about it with Mike M., we both assumed it just wasn't going to happen.

So I was quite surprised when Mike texted me recently to ask if I'd gotten the invite (I hadn't - which is the second time I didn't make it onto a Shameless wrap party invite list - so I was little put-out by that. But as the kids say, "It is what it is").

Piggy-backing off Mike's invite, I responded to the RSVP for me and a "plus-one" (Jane R. was able to free up her schedule to make it into town), so that's a thing that, barring unforeseen - and I'd imagine catastrophic - circumstances, is going to happen.

The party has a title or a "theme" or whatever-you-want-to-call-it ("The Grand Re-Opening Of The Alibi" or something along those lines), which would seem to suggest the dress code will be a little more "casual" than in previous years (Jane actually wondered if they would "replicate" the Alibi in some form or fashion - To me, that seems like a lot...but on the other hand, it's the final wrap party, so who knows?).

Anyway, with "casual dress" seemingly "the order of the day", I'm startled that, in my effort to dress myself for this thing, I have spent hundreds of dollars.

At my current level of "fattitude", I not only have no dress clothes to wear, I hardly have any real clothes that fit.

(For the past number of years my "uniform" has been gym shorts or sweats, a black t-shirt, and an open short-sleeved shirt on top. And however "casual" the dress code is for the party, I don't think it's gonna be that casual.)

And I don't quite know what Jane means when she means "casual" (But again, I'm guessing she's not planning to show up in gym shorts and a pair of flip-flops).

So somehow from all that, I'm now ending up with two suitcoats, four pairs of pants (because I ordered two pairs online before I realized, after the fact, that they weren't going to arrive in time for the thing), a vest, a black shirt, and a blue-and-white short-sleeved shirt which was my first purchase ever at a "Big Fat Guy Store" (Where the guy measured me and said I was "almost" too small for the "Big Fat Guy Store"...which is the nicest thing anyone's said about my body in decades).

(I could do a whole "thing" on my ambivalence about spending money on clothes - dress clothes in particular - but I've now been at this for a long time, I'm almost done, and I think I've probably taxed your interest as is. So I'm gonna dispense with it and just "wind things up" now.)

There's a part of me that has enjoyed these wrap parties over the years - they're as close as I get to fancy, industry-related 'dos, since I'm not exactly winning any honors for my work or being invited to any other high-class functions - but I always find the prospect of attending quite stressful as well.

Even though I was actually on the show, the parties are attended mostly by people I don't know, which I find stressful (the only thing that might be worse is trying to make conversation with the series regulars who might be in brief attendance, since we really have nothing in common beyond the fact that we're ostensibly in the same business).

There's a lot of food, most of it not super-helpful for my purposes (And there's nothing like a four-hour-long cocktail party to make me want to retreat to the comfort of eating good-tasting shit that will make me feel bad about myself immediately after).

And I'm even stressed about the thing that is typically my "sanctuary" (And something of a "claim to fame") at previous wrap parties, which is dancing.

I've had something of a reputation at these things for "tearing it up on the dance floor".

But there won't be any "tearing up" anything this year - Zumba was years ago now, it hurts every time I get up from sitting down for any length of time, and I've lost so many "steps" since the last wrap party I wonder if I'll have any "steps" left at all.

BUT...

I understand there will be presents.

And Jim enjoys presents.

(There actually already were wrap-party presents, literally on the last night we worked. But - and if I come across as ungrateful here, so be it - they were a little...underwhelming, considering it was a wrap for the series and not just another season. So maybe there'll be some better/cooler stuff on hand this time around.)

And I'll be hanging out with Jane, which is always nice, and will also be a nice "buffer" for the anxiety of making conversation about nothing with people I don't know (And in addition to Jane, Mike M will be there as well - after he worried he might not be able to make it - armed with the action figure he will have bought me for my birthday).

And regarding the dancing - First off, I'm the only one who seriously gives a shit about whether I can still "tear it up" or not.

And hopefully, like an aging Michael Jordan, I will figure out how to get around my age-related limitations and come through in the clinch (Or not, and it'll be a wake-up call to get myself back together, at least enough for people to say, "You know, for a crusty old white man, that guy can dance...!").

And on that note, I think I'm gonna wrap this bad-boy up, clean myself a little bit, and head to Target with my new gift certificate (Which I got yesterday as part of a gift parcel from Mark and Jane Z.) - With all the spending on clothes I've done in the past week, I still need a couple of dress shirts.

(Part of why all that clothes spending happened was that, as I considered how I didn't have any dress clothes that fit - because I've let myself become "a fat tub of goo", as David Letterman would say - that got me thinking how, in addition to the party, I need some dress clothes for auditions, for those rare occasions where I'm auditioning to play someone "fancy", and not the usual drunks, homeless people, and general weirdos I usually get called in for.)

Till next time...

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