Another Day, Another Cold Beer

So I worked this morning, until 12:30 pm - that would be from 7:30 am. I don't mind these seminar things in the summer, but getting up at 5 am and leaving the house in darkness leaves a lot to be desired, particularly when it's cold and wet out. This one was about Dealing with Difficult People. I tuned out...if the difficult person is your superior, just say yes. If the difficult person is below you on the totem pole, just say do it and shut up. This doesn't need seven hours of explanation. (For those of you anal retentive types out there counting, I was able to leave before the seminar ended, okay? I know 7:30 to 12:30 doesn't add up to 7 hours. Now shut up and go alphabetize your spices.)

Meanwhile, I have been plunged into a positive whirlwind of activity. Tomorrow and Saturday, I will be doing a "meet and greet" at Niketown at 57th and Madison. This has something to do with the Marathon on Sunday, although God knows what. All I know is that I will be meeting and greeting from 10 am to 7 pm both of those days. No, I have no idea whatsoever of what this might involve at a sneaker store. "Hi. Greetings. Those are shoes. Buy some." Damned if I know.

Friday, of course, I'll be mailing off packages to the four corners of the earth over by the UN, as usual. I wish to hell that damn job was over - not that I don't enjoy it, in a way, because I do. Compared with meeting people in a shoe store (I still don't understand this) or signing them up for idiot seminars on things they should already know, it's absolutely stress-free. I mean, hell, once you remember how to spell Addis Ababa and Burkina Faso, you're good to go. But the problem is that it ties me up every Friday when I might get a full week's work, you see. Ah, well.

Then tomorrow night I will run (wrong choice of words here) from Niketown to Christopher Street to see my pal Margot in her new band, which should be interesting - the gig is at the Stonewall, into which I have never set foot. My first husband and I were at the original Stonewall on our honeymoon, the year before the riots. (Yes, well, it wasn't actually your best marriage.)

Friday night, of course, I will be holding up the sidewalk at the Halloween Parade. I was at the very first Halloween Parade when it started over here in the West Village as a walk for small children and their parents, and I've missed very few since. Sarah went to it from the first year she was alive, for heaven's sake. It's gotten totally out of hand, of course, but it's still fun. And this year Sarah is going to be in it as a refrigerator, and my pal Jiggers and his nutty marching band too (they're stalwarts of the Coney Island Mermaid Parade), so it should be fun.

Saturday night I'll be running (yeah, right) from Niketown to the East Village to drop in at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe and pick up my long awaited video of the show I did there last year, just about this time.

And Sunday I am going to relax happily with Tiger Lily and the Boss for their marathon watching/welcome home from the honeymoon bash! So a busy weekend.

And on Monday I am taking the day off, no matter what my temp agencies think, and getting new pictures done - in color! Yahoo! My pal Tom, who is my go to guy for all things cinematic (in professional terms, that is) told me that I was quite probably right in thinking that the reason I was getting nowhere fast with getting background work is that my picture is in black and white. Yeah, it's petty as hell, but evidently casting people just toss b/w pix right out without even bothering to look at them. This is terribly difficult for any old time stage actress to understand, because we were all taught that color pictures were the absolute HEIGHT of vulgarity - suitable only for "those movie people." (You can actually check this out by looking at old photos of stage actors as opposed to movie actors - all the stage actors are in black and white.) Then, of course, we discovered what those "movie people" were making. Hoo, hah. Did we ever get the hell off of our high horses in one fast hurry. Anyway, my current headshot has me with a short auburn pixie cut, and my hair is now dark brown and well past my shoulders - so it's time anyway. I had the great good sense to schedule this shoot for 2 in the afternoon - after a solid three days of work and party followed by a day of party, I'm really, REALLY going to need those hours Monday morning to completely reorganize my face and change it from the grayish frayed puddle I confidently expect it to be to the bright shining visage that is its normal state. (Aw, shut up - a girl can dream, can't she?)

I picked up a copy of the new Food Network magazine today, because I am a food magazine freak. It's not bad, although nothing I'd usually spend money on - my stalwarts are Gourmet, Bon Appetit and Food and Wine - but there was something in there which, for me, absolutely underscored this country's peculiar relationship with food. Now, we've got obesity, yadda, yadda, yadda, eating disorders, yadda, yadda, yadda, organic food....well, you know. Nobody seems to know what the hell to eat or why or when. And here is the Food Network magazine, and they are doing a page on how macaroni and cheese is suddenly back (I hadn't actually been aware that it had gone anywhere much). Which is fine. But one of the things they touted as a wonderful idea was a place some damn where that sells - please, all of you with cholesterol problems, back quietly away from the blog because I don't want to be responsible - macaroni and cheese fritters.

Yes, that's right. They take a large spoonful of something that is made with salt, and full fat cheese, and quite probably evaporated milk, and pasta - AND THEN THEY COAT IT WITH BATTER AND DEEP FRY IT.

Now, let's be fair here. I am nobody to talk about my ascetic eating habits. I was absolutely thrilled to the very core of my being when I noticed that I can get a large container of duck fat at Citarella, because I want to make French fries with it. And anybody who serves me chopped chicken liver without schmaltz (chicken fat, all you gentiles out there) will get the back of my hand.

But I'm sorry. Even though I love fried food, that one is overkill. Rich, creamy mac and cheese, then batter, and then oil...I'm sorry. My teeth feel greasy just thinking about it, and I'm not even wearing them at the moment.

Oh, well, there are more important things to think about right now anyway. I am (of COURSE) going to a party on Tuesday night for the returns. I am so excited about the whole thing I can't see straight. You will find me at the polls the damn instant they open...hell, if I had the chutzpah, I'd fill in my parents' votes too, and they've been dead for years.

I'll tell you one thing I'm worried about, though. When Obama wins...I'm not even entertaining the idea that there might be an if here, even though I know good and damn well there's always an if (see Gore, Al)...I am worried about a backlash among the idiot population. Not here in my nice West Village, necessarily (but hell, if I can almost be mugged in my own front yard, who knows), but in the other boroughs. I do know that the NYPD is already planning a large police presence around and about. Let's just hope that cooler and more intelligent heads prevail.

Meanwhile, I'm gonna party my ass off for the next four days. WHEE!

Love, Wendy