Ah, the Heady (or Not) Days of the Brain Fast...

A night or two ago, I found myself waxing wistful for the Lenten Brain Fast I did a little over a year ago. It was such a hopeful time, where I wasn't worried because I didn't allow myself to dwell on worrisome things. I wasn't discouraged, because I didn't allow myself to dwell on discouraging things. I wasn't consumed with endless negative what-ifs, because that would have involved thinking, and I was fasting from that.

[Disclaimer: Most folks who know me will agree that a brain fast was a good idea, and that if anyone ever needed to think less, 'tis I. But for anyone who reflexively gets concerned, let me assure you that making rash, life-destroying decisions was not even a remote danger for me. Even without all the thinking, I still had sense.]

I'm not sure how to describe the time since that fast ended. Do I think less than I did before the fast? I'm not sure. I think I learned a valuable skill, but one of the reasons I was able to do it wholeheartedly was that I knew there was a time limit. What if I were to live the rest of my life that way? It might turn out to be a good thing, but it's a far bigger risk than 40 days.

Here I am, though, thinking about it again. I wonder if it would suit me now, as I live with my Nov. 4 prayer and it's fraternal twin, the summer 40 Days of Faith prayer. If one of my big goals is to learn to enjoy myself, and in order to enjoy myself I need to live in the moment, and if I wouldn't be able to enjoy other answered prayers without these abilities, then thinking less might once again be just what the doctor ordered.

I'll have to think about that ;-).

Chill, Baby, Chill

I had my first comedy sketch-writing class on Monday, and I could feel all the old things coming up from improv -- wanting to get laughs, wanting to be good at this, feeling like there's only so much success to go around and I have to be better than everyone else.

You can guess how much fun that was.

So I think my goal for this class will be, as much as possible, to take a step back, relax, and try to just enjoy it. Try to enjoy the assignments, instead of trying to anticipate every possible criticism and account for it. Try to listen to other people's ideas and what the teacher has to say, instead of being all inside my head, thinking about what I'll say when it's my turn.

Trying to let this class just be whatever it is, and let myself be myself, instead of hoping, hoping, hoping it will all lead somewhere bigger.

Much easier said than done.

Stop This Brain, I Want to Get Off

Anyone who's known me for seven minutes or more will know that I have a tendency to over-think, and often to over-over-over-over-think. And it happens almost before I can stop it. Example: I get out the Cray-Pas to do my daily scribbling, and I pick a few colors I like. Before one of them even touches the paper, my mind will go through the following gymnastics: Have I already set a rule by choosing these colors? Should I try to avoid making lines to color within? Am I unnecessarily restricting myself in the opposite direction by trying NOT to draw lines? Would I be able to counteract all this planning and control by using my left hand instead of my right? Now that I've started drawing one set of lines, do I stick with it?

All this takes place within a second or two, much less time than it took to type it out just now.

I've learned to ignore my own thoughts in these instances, but I have to be careful that they don't lurk beneath the surface, making me unhappy for reasons I can't pinpoint. That happens a lot.

I also notice that I make assumptions about everything being my fault (which would mean that somehow everything ought to be under my control). I've had a lazy day so far today, and I took a nap just because I felt like it. I woke up with a headache, and immediately felt guilty, because somewhere in my head I assumed that I wouldn't have a headache unless I'd made a bad choice -- oversleeping, undersleeping, eating poorly, eating too little, whatever. You may remember that I've had headaches pretty regularly throughout my life, so you can imagine how many opportunities I've had to feel guilty without even realizing that it may be groundless.

It's been a long process of noticing these goings-on within myself, and realizing that it doesn't have to be this way. (The brain fast I did last year was great for this.) It makes sense that recognizing unhelpful assumptions and over-thinking for what they are would be a big part of learning to live in the moment and enjoy life a lot more.

At the same time, I'm practicing not apologizing for who I am, even if it's hard to understand or annoying. The little hamster in my head, who spends so much time running on his wheel, is what makes me a writer, and I'm hoping that as I write about all this stuff, it'll be helpful to somebody. For all the folks who read it and think, I don't relate to that at all, but I'm glad I'm not you, perhaps there'll be someone else who says, Have you been transcribing my diary?

So, fellow over-thinker, at least you know you're not alone. Spend a few pleasant minutes thinking about that, if you like :-)

Permission to Speak Freely, Sir?

One of my big fears, for years, has been that I won't speak up when it's necessary. That I'll be one of those good people who remains silent, thus allowing evil to prevail. I've always been shy, and don't like conflict, and up until a terrible event forced me to rethink the issue, I assumed other people knew what they were talking about more than I did. Speaking up for myself was hardest of all.

I've been having to get over that, largely for my own sanity. When other people make terrible assumptions about me that become terrible accusations, I need to know for myself that they aren't true. I'm getting better at that.

I was also intimidated by verses like the following, from Psalm 40:
⁹ I have told all your people about your justice.
I have not been afraid to speak out,
as you, O Lord, well know.
¹⁰ I have not kept the good news of your justice hidden in my heart;
I have talked about your faithfulness and saving power.
I have told everyone in the great assembly
of your unfailing love and faithfulness.

With all this blogging about my recent prayers, and the way I'm telling people about it in conversation, I feel like I am speaking up. And I'm excited, because I'm doing it during the process and the waiting and the uncertainty, so everybody can see it for what it really is, and not some polished version at the end.

I don't know how things will play out. But I keep coming back to the feeling that I've done a good thing just by asking.

Doubling Down

Most years, during the season that more traditional churches call Lent, my church does something called "40 Days of Faith." There are several components to it, including the opportunity to pray for others more, and to fast. Because of my history with legalism, I choose to focus more on the part where we're supposed to ask God for something really, really big for ourselves -- scary in both its boldness and apparent selfishness. We're encouraged to ask not just for something surface-y -- e. g., "I want a spouse" -- but for the need behind the need -- e.g., "I want to love and be loved in the context of meaningful and intimate relationships."

This year, I prayed for the ability/capacity/grace to enjoy myself. This does not come naturally to me. I think a lot about the past and the future, and find it hard to live in the moment. When I do think about the moment at hand, I'm often analyzing it rather than enjoying it. And what is there to enjoy, really, when you're not enjoying the present? What good will it do me to get everything else I've ever imagined wanting -- husband, career, ancient castle with modern plumbing -- if I'm not able to enjoy it when I have it? So that's what I asked for. Not concrete, but rather practical, I think.

Since then, as you know if you've been reading, I prayed a more concrete prayer: That God would bring the big changes I've been waiting for in both the career and romance departments by Nov. 4 of this year. Still not uber-specific, as those changes could take any number of forms, though I'm also praying that I'll be able to recognize and enjoy them when they get here. The date is darn specific, though.

I now have another dimension to add to the mix. Last week, I discovered that a writer whose blog I read, Trish Ryan (http://trishryanonline.blogspot.com/), has been leading her own online 40 Days of Faith for the past couple of summers (http://fortydaysoffaith.blogspot.com/2010/05/40-days-of-faith-2010.html). I decided to be obnoxiously bold and join in. I prayed a big 40 Days prayer earlier this year, I prayed the Nov. 4 prayer, and now I'm doing another 40 Days -- who the heck do I think I am? I'm somebody who's had enough experience being meek and unassuming and is trying shamelessness instead. I'm betting that God can handle it. It's not like He doesn't know what I want anyway.

My new 40 Days prayer is similar to my Nov. 4 prayer, but the specifics shift to the other foot. What I'm asking for is more defined -- a husband, and a job that I love so much that I practically run/skip to work every day -- but without the Nov. 4 deadline. (Good heavens, I'm not even dating anybody -- I do NOT want to be married by Nov. 4!) And I'm doing the fasting part this time... sort of. Instead of abstaining from something (food, TV, alcohol, swearing), I'm adding something on: Scribbling! I bought some oil pastels and a blank pad, and the plan is to draw/scribble every day, to get myself out of my heady, verbal world, and be messy and free and color outside the lines, literally and figuratively. It's an interesting discipline for someone like me, who, when presented with a blank piece of paper, will usually draw lines of my own before coloring them in with precision. That's gotta be a massive window into my psyche, right there.

These latest prayers are risky, because I'm investing a lot in them. I'm investing time, effort, and money, as I head into the classes I've recently joined. I'm investing my heart and my hope, as I allow myself to ask and keep asking. I'm investing my reputation and my pride, as I tell everybody and their uncle about what I'm doing. Eek. EEK!

But I'm not apologizing.

Summer Un-Vacation

I've just signed up for a couple classes that ought to keep me out late on school nights: An acting class, and a comedy sketch-writing class at the theater where I learned improv. Should keep me busy, especially since the writing class will involve -- of all things -- writing assignments. Like, school or something!

Holly will coherent sentences make have to.

Headaches in Hiding

I've had so few headaches over the last month or two! Wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles. Hurrah!

The Exploration Stage

I've got acting on the brain. It's been several months since I did improv, and that comedy troupe I got into appears to have fallen through, so I'm now looking into other options. It's even occurred to me that I could go to grad school to study this stuff, which is funny because I've steadfastly avoided school since I got my postgrad diploma in '99. I wanted to be out there, living life, instead of just preparing for it. But the idea of diving into the deep end and being completely immersed in All Things Drama-Related for a year or two certainly holds its appeal.

It's also occurred to me that I could go back to the UK to do it. What's better than being immersed in acting? Being immersed in acting and Scotsmen.

Of course, there are all kinds of issues with the practicality of adding an acting degree to music degrees (unemployable in two artforms!), the matter of finances, and the reality that if I did head back overseas, I'd once again be foreign and unable to work, both of which rather stink. And this time I'd be old enough to be everyone's mom. (Did you know you can go to university at 16 over there? Good grief, I'd be older than half the professors.)

In the meantime, I've signed up for an acting class at the local center for adult ed. Maybe I'll sign up for another class or two, as well. I occasionally toss my hat in in response to requests for local actors, like I did with that comedy troupe. Lots of exploration. Not quite sure where it will lead or how. But I'm dipping my toes in again. I still think I can do this. I still want to do it. And along with all those annoying practicalities, I have this God fellow who seems to think that I could use some fun.

I've come to agree.

But Probably Not Bunjee Jumping

I'm heading into The Risk-Taking Zone. Where if God doesn't come through or things don't work out, I'll fall on my face in spectacular fashion.

Spectacular.

11/4/2010: Save the Date

How do, folks!

I'm in transition -- or at least, I hope I am -- and thought it might be good to let you in on the process.

As you can see in the blurb at the right of this blog, I've been in a time of Serious Waiting for going on a decade now. In 2000, I returned from a second year in England, moved to D.C., and planned to head into my grown-up life: a music career with, hopefully, a comfortable income (it is possible!); an apartment of my own; a church; some long-term friendships; and meeting and marrying the right guy.

Well, I got the apartment, anyway.

The rest of it either crashed and burned or never quite got off the ground at all. There have been some changes, most of them slow. I believe God has been at work, both in me and behind the scenes in my life, but I'm still waiting for some of the big things that I've wanted my whole life.

So, 4 weeks ago, while praying, I found myself asking God to cap this season of waiting at ten years. If I remember correctly, I moved to D.C. on Nov. 4, 2000. As of today, that leaves just over five months. Yikes! I don't know if that sounds like a long time to you, but after ten slow years, it sounds incredibly short to me. I prayed that God would bring the big changes I've been waiting for in both the career and romance departments, and that I'll recognize and enjoy these changes when they come. I'm not letting God or myself off the hook with this one! The prayer is prayed, and it stands.

I know that in letting the world in on what I've done, I open myself to all kinds of opinions, advice, and concern: What am I doing to make this happen? What if it doesn't happen? If it does happen, how can I say it's God and not me? I'd ask you to trust me, since I've had years and years to wrestle with these issues, but you don't have to trust me. I'd ask you to trust God with it, but maybe that's not your thing. Whatever happens, I think this is an important risk in my relationship with Him, and I'm just trying to walk it out. And I'm sharing it here to give Him a chance to show Himself to be big, and to show myself to be... well, whatever I am in relationship with Him.

I'm both afraid that it all won't happen, and afraid that it will. After all, I'm used to things being slow and quiet, and I've asked for things that are new and scary.

But I'm also hopeful.

Skype Lessons

Don't pick your nose.

Do wear clothes.

Don't take it into the bathroom. For the love of Pete, this ain't a phone call.

Moving from Depressing to Creepy

After that last post, I got an ad for a Hoveround in my email inbox. Not only is Big Brother a creepy freak, he thinks I'm a frigging grandma.

GILF

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

My height: 5'6"

Other things I'm up to:

--Still experimenting with eye makeup. Getting OK at the eye shadow. Eyeliner still scary. If my life depended on my ability to accurately apply eyeliner, I'd be shot on sight. Also, I start to look a little like I have a black eye. Or two black eyes. And Emo.

--Sung along with a worship music CD tonight. Haven't done that in yonks (to use one of my favorite British slang terms, though I'm told most Brits find it dorky).

--I prayed a big-scary-crazy prayer.

--I mentioned the honesty and trombone already. These are biggies.

Taken all together, I'd say strange things are afoot at the Circle K.

I Am a Horrible Person. Also, I Played My Trombone

Today, I was finally honest enough to get somebody good and mad at me.

In other news, I've taken out my horn a couple times now. I expect it will be a long, slow process, getting back in shape. My breath is shaky. My left hand and wrist (which bear all the weight) are weaker. My tongue is slow. But the great thing is that I don't have to do any of this. I can spend the next year doing nothing but warm-ups, without the pressure of making a piece of music sound good. Or, I can focus only on the music I find fun, and not be accomplished in all styles for the sake of being a well-developed musician. Or I can just learn one song and play it everywhere and be absolutely dreadful at everything else. At this point, I don't think any of my local friends has heard me play, so anything they hear will be revelatory, even if it's just some simple honks.

And truth be told, my honks ain't sounding too bad.

I'm finding my voice in more ways than one :-).

HVAC Blogging

The latest in blog posts designed to help me vent a little.

First, I've finally begun hiding the Facebook friends whose posts consist of little but "It's Friday!" as if it's not true for the rest of the world. As oblivious as I can be, I do not need other people to tell me what day it is. It's insultingly boring.

Also, I'm not sure whether someone was grateful that I turned off the fire under their food while they left the house for an hour, or whether they were upset that I touched it. It just never entered my head that anyone would do that on PURPOSE.

When the day comes that all my media outlets come under the heading of my full name, I'm going to have to delete some of these posts, along with some tweets.

But not today.

It's Too Darn Hot

The temperature's risin'
It isn't surprisin'
She certainly can Can-Can.

It was in the 80s today. This is inconvenient. I get most of my exercise from walking, and if it's hot the instant I step out the door, it ain't gonna be pretty after I've been moving for half an hour. In work clothes. With my hair getting frizzy. The alternative is to take the (sometimes) air-conditioned bus, and get no exercise. Holly no likey. I'd much, much, much rather trudge through the snow. I spend all Fall and Winter listening to people whine about the fact that we have weather. Well, now it's my turn.

All the Winter Whiners can kiss my sweaty ass.

Easter Weekend

Friday: The menfolk fly the model airplane around.

Saturday: The family spends a couple hours dislodging the model airplane from a very tall tree.

Easter Sunday: They fly the model airplane again, and also shoot off some bottle rockets. Because it's Easter, duh.

Noteworthy: My nephew is becoming way fun. He learned to say my name (sounds the same as when he says "Hi"). He's also a budding mash-up artist. When you add the sounds he knows to the words we grown-ups were singing, you get, "Jesus Christ is ris'n today, E-I-E-I-O." He's also arranged the Beach Boys. "Giddy-up, giddy-up, giddy-up, 4-0-9" has been simplified to, "Clip clop, clip clop, NINE!"

The original was a bit wordy, if you think about it. And surely two-year-olds are nothing if not economical.

Things I Like

God. He's nice.
walking
watching TV
eating
reading
9 hours of sleep. in a row.
stretching, even though I'm not very flexible
applause
the way I look in my long leather jacket. you should see me in it. really.
not having to go anywhere
funny YouTube videos
furry, friendly dogs

The Vatican's Chief Butt-Kicker

I'm not Catholic, but in a comment on another blog I read, someone referenced articles about Gabriele Amorth, for years the Vatican's head exorcist. Some fun facts:

The Exorcist is his favorite movie.
He shares some theology with Verbal from The Usual Suspects ("The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist").

Some links to interviews:

http://www.vaticans.org/index.php?/archives/61-An-interview-with-the-Vaticans-chief-excorcist,-Father-Gabriele.html

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/1260364/posts

Mostly, I just love that this guy sticks it to the Devil on a daily basis.

More Acting, Less Drama

Shit been goin' down.

As one might expect when sharing a planet with other sentient creatures, there is occassionally tension. And sometimes outright conflict. And sometimes high drama that makes living as a hermit in a cave for the rest of my earthly existence look like an extremely attractive idea.

I'm trying to navigate it all as best I can, because lessons unlearned are repeated, and no more fun the second/third/fifty-seventh go 'round. But as frustrated and angry as I get with other people, I'm more frustrated and angry at myself for not being better at dealing with the confusing mess. And it's not encouraging to think that even if I weren't messed up and were perfect in every way (which, alas, I'm not -- I know, shocker!), everyone else would still be messed up and it would still be hard.

Hard is hard. Why can't all difficult situations be condensed into a movie montage with a rockin' soundtrack, so I could feel awesome?

And why can't I have more upper-body strength so that throwing and punching things would be worthwhile?

You Have Been Warned

I have decided that I am not pale; I am white hot.

You'll want to wear sunglasses if you come to Boston this summer, though. Wouldn't want to go snow-blind should you catch me in shorts.

Things I Would Do if I Had the Money to Be as Eccentric as I Want to Be

Wear costumes
Get a giant trampoline and/or moon bounce

That's all I've got at the moment. I'm a simple woman.

It's My Brain's Fault

I may have figured out why I cannot, for the life of me, stay awake in meetings and training sessions: There are no Attention Triggers.

I've made this up, but it makes perfect sense to me, so you can't disagree even if you disagree.

Here's my theory: Our minds, as we grow up, become conditioned to pay attention to certain triggers -- someone calling our name, a raised voice, the mention of subjects we're interested in. As a musician, my ears perked up at the mention of "trombones" or "brass," and tuned out when other sections were being spoken to. Parents learn to pick out their children's cries. Without being fully conscious of it, we probably know when the commericials are done and we need to get from the kitchen to the living room to watch more of our favorite show, or we can tell when a family member has pulled into the driveway.

The meetings at work have a complete lack of Attention Triggers for me. They don't discuss things that I'm interested in, or even fully understand, and they're usually explained in a drone by people who are perfectly nice and perfectly knowledgeable but not exactly on their way to winning Entertainer of the Year. I try to pay attention, but every ounce of gray matter floating inside my skull is convinced that there are at least a dozen other things worth thinking about, so it does that instead. OK, there is one small part that cares about being good, but the rest of my brain seems to believe that, to quote Dark Helmet, "Good is dumb."

Mutual Anger. Nice!

I was annoyed at my roommate for not being like me. I just found out he was annoyed with me for the same reason. Somehow, that made me feel a whole lot better. I think that, more than anything, I'd been struggling with my own anger, and how it made me feel like a bad, judgmental person. Now I feel like we're even, and have a mutual understanding about our mutual misunderstanding.

Being a messy human is awkward and gross, but getting it out in the open can be relieving and fun*. The rest of this day will be much better now.


*That's what she said.

Four Out of Five Ain't Bad

Change, baby!

The tiniest things make the difference between happening and not happening. Over the last few weeks, the right tiny things fell into place and look to be bringing about the kind of change I've been waiting for for the last ten years. I'm not making any predictions yet, but am instead determined to enjoy the present and enjoy the process. But I can't pretend it hasn't occurred to me that this could change everything, and hoo boy, is that exciting.

It would allow me to be an Actress, Musician, Writer, and Comedian. No Princess promises yet, but the thought that I could even get to have all four of those creative outlets at once is amazing enough. I'll take it!

And I'll keep you all posted. Sorry for being a bit vague about it at the moment. I may be approaching the point where I have to ditch the anonymity, and let my blog, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and personal selves meet. I'll be Out There, last name and all, for the world to see and judge, and I may have to delete some of the posts and tweets that could hurt people's feelings. I'm up for letting myself look ugly as long as it's real, but there's a lot to be said for consideration and discretion. That should be an interesting balance to strike.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. For now, just know that fun is a-stirrin' in Hollyland, and the world at large could benefit (or be appalled) in the near future!

I Don't Like Phone Calls

I've figured it out.

I've always been a little afraid of the phone, especially when it comes to making calls. Receiving can be OK, but I've found I'm not always a huge fan of that, either. Yet texts are fine. I've also learned that I hugely prefer e-mail to instant messaging. And I think I've finally figured out why.

I feel interrupted when contacted via a medium that demands instant reponse; whereas things that can sit for a while, for which I can take my time to process and think about my responses, are fine. And I get really, really scared at the thought of interrupting somebody else, not knowing whether they'll be free or in the mood to interact with me, and I'll have to navigate a potentially awkward situation without the benefit of facial expressions or hand gestures and all the reciprocal communication contained therein. Yikes!

Some of you are probably worried now, but don't be. I don't always hate calls or messaging. It is interesting, though, what accounts for our preferred methods of communication.

Messy, Messy, Messy!

I think I'm reaching the point where the rubber hits the road in terms of being able to be myself in all my flawed splendor. Like in the way I'm leaving comments on my pastor's blog, even when I don't come off as sunshiny, or even rational. Just putting stuff out there, because even if it's not all brilliant or it's not all understood or appreciated, at least I tried.

This applies to lots of areas, not just having points of view. It applies to creativity, and turning ideas into works, even when they don't always come out as you'd hoped. And it applies to relationships, showing genuine enthusiasm to be around someone instead of playing it cool.

It means allowing myself to be unabashedly geeky, unapologetically unironic, fully engaged, exposed, anal and not "cool" with everything when I'm NOT cool with everything, and left wide open to criticism. It means letting people see my flaws, and not always trying to paint them prettily first. It means being OK when I don't know where I stand with everybody, when not all confusion is cleared up, and when some of my ideas get shot down as soon as they're spoken.

Ze Frank talks about the difficulty of "moving from 0 to 1," of how beginning something is harder than keeping it going, and how our ideas will always look better when they live only in our heads and never make the transition from Idea to Creation.

I'm leaving zero.

I Am a Commenter!

A few months ago, I began reading my pastor's blog, and I took a leap of courage and left some comments on it. There are some posts that don't interest me at all, and others that I feel so strongly about that I get quite caught up in it, and I find myself checking the blog every fifteen minutes to see if other people have read my comment and what responses they have.

I get scared, too. I care what people think, and I've had some pretty harrowing experiences with being misjudged (outside that particular blog), so I've always got my eye out for that. But I'm learning, over and over again, that putting my feelings and opinions out there is a brave and vulnerable thing, and I don't have to apologize for having genuine reactions. I'd grown so used to valuing my intellectual detachment, wanting to be unassailable in my arguments, but lately my heart has begun leaping ahead of my brain and I say things that are entirely assailable, but that I also feel deeply.

Well, good. I'm not objective, and that is progress.

Wakefulness Fail

It's not like I set the bar all that high.

Today's goal at work: Remain awake while other people are watching.

Nope. Couldn't even do that. Kept nodding during a 2 1/2 hour training meeting, which was pure theory to me -- I'd never worked on the kinds of projects they were talking about, so while I understood the words, their combined meaning bounced off my head like bullets off Superman's chest. I was impervious.

Ugh. Whatever they pump through the vents in those conference rooms, I sure could use some of it near my bed around 11pm on weeknights. I'm almost never sleepy then.

Down with Haters

That's it.

People have been so insistent about complaining about the snow -- often in comments after my own Facebook wall posts, wherein I specifically asked that they let me have my fun and not hate all over the snow-- that I've now lost my own joy in it. Instead of being entranced when the flakes fall, I see what they see: A wet, inconvenient mess.

I'm pissed. It was quite disrespectful, really.

They managed to spread their whininess until it seeped into me, and now I have less joy than I used to. And frankly, I didn't have a heck of a lot to spare.

I really wish people would keep their stupid yaps shut when they have nothing but negative things to say.

Except for me, of course, when I'm complaining about the negative people, because that's totally legit.

Sports for Comedians

I've got the Super Bowl on, and it has me feeling wistful for the best Super Bowl party I've ever attended. It was last year, and it was hosted by this guy who created an online group for stand-up comedians in Boston. I'm not a stand-up, but I joined, and the party was perfect for me -- full of people who weren't all that into the game itself, but appreciated the cultural experience and focused during the commercials, making lots and lots and lots of hilarious comments throughout the whole thing. And the pomtini, perhaps the single strongest drink I've ever had, which didn't hurt the fun none. If I remember correctly, the only piece of sport knowledge I came away with was, "The Cardinals are basically douchebags."

Sigh. Missing you, Comedians' Party.

The World Is a Better Place with These Things in It

Croutons
Deodorant
Dogs
Acne medication
Books you read because you want to, not because you have to
Cashews
Percussion
Metaphors
Dr. Seuss
Slap bass (the instrument, not the fish)
Lip balm
Blankets
Mid-Winter celebrations
Beer hats
Walking shoes
Finger paint
Ice cubes
3-legged races (the competitions, not races of 3-legged people)
Headphones
Irony

I'm Quite Full. Here's Why.

I ate most of a chicken pot pie.

But that's not the reason.

I left room for dessert. I had some frosting left over from my birthday cake that had extra frosting and I didn't want it to go to waste so I saved it, and rather than eating it by itself with a spoon, as one should do with Nutella, I thought I could make my way through it by putting it on other desserts, and I made it through a brownie, a cookie, and a bar.

And now I'm full.

Career Paths That Are Closed to Me Because I'm Too Sober

Sailor
Jazz Musician
Suicidal Novelist
Groupie
Reality Star
Pirate (admittedly similar to sailor)
Merry Friar, esp. in 13th Century Sherwood Forest
Genius (admittedly similar to suicidal novelist)
Jaded Detective Who Breaks the Rules but Gets the Job Done
Drunkard

Dude, What Is the Nature of Reality?

One of my Facebook friends is really into working out, and he posted a link to an article praising the beauty of women who are into weight training. At first I thought it was cool -- hooray for finding beauty in women who don't fit the magazine mold! -- but the writer lost me pretty quickly. He criticized women who tone instead of bulking up; he mocked women who wore makeup to the gym. I can understand not being a fan of what may appear to be shallowness, but ultimately he simply replaced one standard of beauty with another.

It's pretty hard to affirm one thing without comparing to it another and making that other look bad. I think this is why we end up tossing the term "real" around. We're flooded with the output of a small percentage of the population that creates the media. Women who don't look like Hollywood actresses, and who don't know anyone who does, say, "Those actresses don't live in the real world, where we have sedentary jobs and kids and houses to clean. I'm real, and my friends are real." And thus bigger women become "real" women. Folks who live in the Midwest see movies and TV made by people who live in New York and LA, who either never lived in the Midwest or chose to leave. Their home is lumped into the category of "flyover states," and their values are mocked. They say, "Those people in La La Land have no clue about my life. They're rich and have their heads up their asses. But my experience is real, too." And they call their home "real" America. And then everyone else gets miffed at the suggestion that they're not real.

We can chicken-and-egg it, trying to figure out what imbalance first lit the Hate Fest, but I don't see that being more productive than two siblings fighting over who started it.* Everything is a reaction to something else.

I get it. I understand how we all get offended and we all get our feelings hurt and we feel left out by this set of values or that standard of coolness or this ideal of attractiveness or that way of life. And it's almost impossible not to express that in a way that doesn't alienate the people who alienated you. It goes back and forth and everyone feels justified. But I wish people could take a step back once in a while.

Not that it hasn't been hugely productive so far. Everyone feels like they have to defend their position, which makes them look like the persecutor in the eyes of the opposition.

I'm certainly having fun, aren't you?

*It was my brother.

Language Changing Before Our Eyes (Ears?)

When I was a kid, we walked to school through three feet of snow, uphill both ways; all we had to play with was a stick and a pile of dirt, and we were grateful; and there was this crazy part of speech known as the adverb.

One nice thing about working at a publisher is that I get to be around other people who care about the difference between there, their, and they're. One of my colleagues was lamenting the disappearance of the adverb this week. And I've already done my own lamenting about shifting trends in subject-verb agreement when it comes to singular nouns that denote groups. And as much as I believe in following conventions for the sake of clear and effective communication, and as much as it pains me to say it, I think this is just how language evolves. It's interesting to think that language can change significantly within one generation. By the time my peers and I are in our eighties, will usage that's considered incorrect now be acceptable and even taught in schools? Perhaps I shouldn't protest so much and just accept the inevitable.

Like being trapped in the tundra and finding a place by a rock where I can sit and let cold, numbing death slowly overwhelm me.

The Grinch vs. "The Christmas Shoes"

There have been discussions bouncing around my pastor's blog and in the recent sermons about whether Christmas is too consumeristic or whether it's nifty and people just need to chill with the Scrooginess. Rather than coming down on one side of the other, I'll give you my little theory about why there are sides at all: We all need something different. I kinda meant to save that for the last paragraph or two, but here it is right at the beginning! But if you listen to people talk about why they love/hate this season and all its trappings, it usually comes down to personal experience, and what they want to embrace or feel the need to reject. There's no right or wrong stance, because on one side is people saying, "People have bad experiences and do bad things," and on the other side is people saying, "But some people have good experiences and do good things," and both are true and neither negates the other.

So, some folks have bad memories from childhood, or don't have anyone to celebrate with, or can't afford to buy things for people, or feel pressured to participate in the extravagant materialism, and they'd like the world to ease up on the Christmas already. And others love the lights and the opportunity to give or the opportunity to receive and the baking and the trees, and don't want anyone raining on their parade. Of course, there are variances and nuances, and I'm not trying to oversimplify anyone's feelings. What I'm saying is that maybe it's OK to fall anywhere in that spectrum of approaches, and perhaps we don't need to make it so antagonistic. One person feels accused or left out and vents a little, and other people react, and suddenly we have a volley of hard-line stances and recriminations: "You're a mindless consumer who doesn't care about the third world!" "Well, you're a Grinch who doesn't know how to have fun!" And on it goes.

How about a little less accusation and a little more invitation to find some joy, each in their own way?

Snow: A Positive Post

It snowed last night, which was awesome. It started out as rain, which is wet and cold, and I went out, and it turned to snow for me, which you can brush off, and I was all, "Yes!" Ha ha, yes!

And then after I got home, I went out again. I changed into the Greatest Parka Known to Man, Even When Taking Its Frumpiness into Consideration, and went to the grocery store. Cuz I really needed to, y'all. I let the supplies run down before Thanksgiving weekend and then I got a little sick and I was living off of cereal and pasta for a week. I made up a little ditty about my little foray to the market, which involved saying grocery like "grocer-ay," but I don't remember it off the top of my head. Anyway, best night to go to the store. A ghost town, man. Luxury. And then we hoofed it home again, my parka and me. In the snow, which was neato torpedo.

I spent some quality time this morning with some angry thoughts about Snow Haters. I was going to post some hate in response. But now I'm thinking, let's end the hate. I'll just explain where I'm coming from, invite you to join me, and let you make your own choice, because how you respond to snow is a deeply personal decision.

I rather startled my roommate last night with my impassioned defense of snow. Here's where I think all my impassionedosity comes from: I grew up with snow, and liked it the way any kid would: Yay, it's something pretty to play in, and maybe you get a day off school. How can you beat that? When I grew up and heard fellow grown-ups declaring they hated snow, I was shocked. Do you also hate weekends and compliments? How could you hate something so pretty and fun and get-out-of-schooly? The response: "It's hard to drive in." That seemed like the kind of grown-up-ness they warned me about in Saturday morning TV. Not for me!

But it was also more personal than that. I loved snow without question, and when people declare they hate it, I hear, "I hate this thing you love." It's like telling somebody they're "wasting time" on a hobby they love, or that the food they're eating is disgusting and you would never touch it. Even weather people are guilty, saying that 75-degree weather in mid-December is "gorgeous" and a lovely snowstorm that means you get to make snow angels and drink hot chocolate without sweating through your sweater is somehow "awful." Says who?

So I'll try not to be grouchy when people don't want to feel the cold and don't want their heating bills to go up and don't want to drive slower and don't know how they'll watch their kids when school is canceled. If you'll try not to hate when even the ugliest parts of town look unsoiled and peaceful for a few precious hours after the snow has fallen; if numb fingers and toes make me feel like I've earned an evening warming them up again with a yummy hot drink; if all the songs about Christmas being snowy are like prayers and celebrations for me; if I feel like when it snows, it's a gift and I don't have to just be happy because other people get things they like -- I get to have things I like, too.

Pink and Snow and Christmas and Happy

It got up to 69 degrees in Boston today. Plenty of people were delighted. I don't mind being comfortable outside, honest I don't, but weather like this weirds me the heck out. It's December! In Boston! I moved up here because I wanted snow for Christmas without all the worrying -- and believe you me, I do worry when I don't think the temperature leading up to the big day is falling fast enough. I'm like a little kid. Or great big baby. Want snow! Want snow now!

I know I talk about this every year. But I feel the need to vent because Facebook is full of people who are rejoicing over the warm weather. I don't want to hate all over their updates, but I gotta let this out somewhere. So the blog it is.

My blog is pink and pink is the color of candy and candy comes from the North Pole and so does Santa and Santa is Christmassy and the North Pole is snowy and I like Christmas snowy and I like my blog because it's pink and Christmassy and snowy even though it's pink and snow isn't pink.

Unless the Cat in the Hat gets pink cat-ring all over it.

But that is neither here nor there.

It isn't even anywhere.
It's not in a house,
It's not with a mouse,
It's not on the stair,
It's not in a chair.
It's not in the sky, where snowflakes should fly.
It's not on the ground, where snow drifts should mound.

I do not like green deciduous trees in December.
I do not like them.
Holly I am.

Nor Sure Whether I Should Share This or Not

So I'm gonna, because I don't have a whole lot else to say. For your entertainment, here's a little exchange I inflicted upon my roommate a few minutes ago:

Her: You want $25 for free?

Me: What do I have to lick?

[Pause.]

Her: I may never recover from the images that came to mind when you said that.

Me: It could be a lollipop.

One More Thing about That Movie

It made me want to be an actress.

I wanted that already, but this made me re-want it. The way the animators made visual magic, the actors made magic with their voices. I want to do that with my voice, with my face, with my body. I want to create something both real and super-real.

A modest dream, no?

Holly Reviews a Movie

We went to see Disney's "A Christmas Carol" yesterday. I loved it! It made me feel all Christmassy, which is no small feat. Rather than give away some of the pleasant surprises by describing it all, I'll tell you why I liked it.

First, the animation was amazing. OK, I don't know diddly about animation or computers or special effects, and usually they wash over me and I don't pay much attention, but I'm pretty sure the animation was amazing. It was amazing to the point where I'll go back on my word slightly and give away one thing: When they close up on Scrooge's face, you can see the pores and hair on his nose. There were other highly effective moments, but I want you to experience them for yourself so I'll keep my mouth shut.

Second, it managed to affect me. A story I've seen and read countless times, and it had me laughing and crying at all the right moments. Part of that may be because the movie and I met at the right time and place; I find that's the way with books and movies. But I found myself taking a step forward in my attitude toward the poor. As with everything else, my feelings are always shifting on that subject, and I'm coming out of a season where I've felt a need to steel myself against guilt and legalism and the feeling that I'm obligated to carry the pains of the world around on my shoulders. This meant that stories like this felt like kind of a guilt trip. But as I get used to not feeling guilty, I have more room to care about people without it overwhelming me. It was nice to watch a moralistic story and not come away feeling like a jerk, or at least like someone else was trying to get me to feel like one. I also have more understanding of Scrooge with each passing year; time, loneliness, disappointment, and fear really wear on a soul.

What I liked best, though, was the combined feeling of longing and hope with which I left the theater. I think that's what felt Christmassy about it. I wanted what I saw on the screen: beauty, snow, love, joy, contentment, snow, meaning, and snow. It's not the same excitement I had as a kid; it's grown up now, and there's always a sense that Christmas will never live up to what I hope it will be, if only because I still have so far to go in my own ability to enjoy moments for what they are. But that hope-longing combo -- that feels like prayer. I've been learning a bunch about how broad the definition of prayer can be. I used to think it had to be verbal; now I don't think that at all. I once read a great line in a book about how a dying woman's suffering was worship "because she willed it to be so." I think that's all it takes, a turning in your heart with whatever else you're doing, choosing to direct it towards God; it doesn't have to be a constant striving to make everything "sacred." Fasting and dancing can be praying with your body. Singing, even secular songs. Cleaning my room. If prayer is communicating with God, then surely the choices are at least as wide as our options for communicating with people.

I came away from the movie with the usual awareness of all the things I want and still don't have, but was excited to daydream about them and bring them to God and enjoy the process of asking and expecting.

Yep. Got all that from a cartoon.

Places I Want to Live

A castle
Underwater
The North Pole (not the real one -- the one with reindeer and candy-cane lamp posts)
A log cabin
A gingerbread house
One year each in --
Norway
Sweden
Netherlands
Italy
Russia
Japan
France
Hong Kong
Spain or Portugal
South America
Montreal
India
Africa (sub-Saharan)
North Africa
New York
Chicago
St. Louis
Australia
Salzburg
Heidelburg
Antarctica
Mongolia
Hong Kong
...and I'd like to get a decent handle on the languages of each while I live there.
Alaska
Scotland
A modernized cave
In my own little red house where I can rake leaves and chop wood and have a fireplace and have people over.

Oh, THAT'S why the vegetables tasted raw.

Because they WERE.

Why is My Butt Still Attached?

I love Fall. I love Winter. I love it when the weather gets cool, then cold. I love Thanksgiving and Christmas and a birthday in December. I love decorations and music and presents and time off work and special food and visiting family and catching up on sleep and then stockpiling more sleep for later. I love the threat of freezing my butt off so that I need slippers and blankets and yummy hot drinks every evening when I come home.

So why is it so warm outside that I barely need a light jacket, and am sweating after 15 minutes of walking? I certainly don't wish any suffering on people who have no choice about being on the street, or even upon those wusses who complain when it gets below 70 degrees (and you know who you are, you wusses!), but I'd really like it to get cold. This kind of warmth is nice in September or even October, but this late in the game it just feels wrong. At some point when I was a kid, we must have gotten our first snowfall on Nov. 11, because from that point on I've had that date in my head as the perfect date for the snow to start. But apart from one wondrous day in mid-October, we ain't had nothin'.

Let it snow (please!), let is snow (please!), let it snow (pleeeeeeeeeeeeease)!

Priorities

On Friday, I did something I almost never do: lost track of time. At the end of the workday, too! I looked at the clock on my computer and it was only 4 minutes till the shuttle left from work to the T station that gets me closest to home. I scrambled to pack up my things, dress for outdoors, and began running down the hall. Then screeeeeeeeech! I realized that, in my now-locked desk drawer, was a giant cookie. I had to go back.

I didn't think I could go back, find the key in my purse, lock everything again, and make the shuttle. So I went back and took my time, took a different shuttle to a different station, and probably added 20 minutes to my commute. 20 minutes out of my evening wasn't such a high price to pay for a giant cookie, when you consider that my big plan for the evening was to eat the cookie.

It was a GIANT cookie.

Genetics is Funny

It's kind of amazing how a kid can look like both parents at the same time. I suppose I'm that kid, really; I look like whichever parent I'm standing next to. But right now I'm thinking about my nephew, who's 20 months old and looks different every time I see pictures. I don't know how he looks like both my brother and his wife at once. Different expressions accentuate different similarities, though.

When smiling, he's pretty much his mom.

He looks most like his dad when he's confused.

Hulk Mad!

Everything is annoying me! Flaky friends ("friends"). Malfunctioning technology paired with an overwhelming workload at a job I mostly appreciate for its light workload. A video where it looked like people had important things to say but I'm not sure because the "background" music was as loud as the people talking and I was so distracted I missed most of what they said.

Hulk practice being thankful now:
--That 2-week headache seems to have finally gone away. Also, I don't know if they were part of the solution, but Ben-Gay and Head-On feel really cool and I would use them just for fun.
--My roommate brought home Trader Joe's chewy chocolate chip cookies last night and I combined them with peanut butter, extra chocolate chips, and little milk to keep it from sealing my tongue to the roof of my mouth. Very, very yummy. Must repeat if possible.
--I get to watch improv tonight without the pressure of having to perform.
--I'm allowed to be angry, and the people who love me best are the ones who'll encourage it and won't be all shocked and offended that I'm human and don't appreciate being crapped on.
--There's still candy in my desk from when coworkers had leftovers after Halloween and brought them to the office. I was not shy about relieving them of their burden.
-- Getting kinda excited about upcoming holidays. Hulk like holidays.

Hulk blog done now.

It's Not a Toomuh

Although, heck, for all I know it could be.

I get headaches all the time. Have ever since I was a kid. In elementary school, they thought maybe I had a milk allergy, though I don't remember going without dairy, so that, to my knowledge, remains an untested theory. When I was about 12 or 13, I remember going to a hospital and getting some kind of scan (CAT? HORSE?), and I'm pretty sure they didn't find anything but the usual innards. I had a week-long headache when I was about 15, and a doctor prescribed me some mega-strengh ibuprofen that didn't work. And then, a few years ago, my primary care physician recommended Excedrin Migraine, which usually works but leaves me very jittery (and usually pretty happy).

Folks have suggested that I might be under- or over-hydrated. And that I get my eyes checked. These aren't bad ideas, and I might look into that eye thing. It might not kill me to see a specialist, either; there have got to be a hundred reasons why I should get my head examined. If there's something genuinely wrong, by all means, let's figure it out.

But heck if I can find a pattern. Apart from this and the inconvenient-but-not-life-threatening issue I sometimes get surgery for, I'm obnoxiously healthy. Headaches just appear to be my body's response to anything that's even slighty off, physically or emotionally. Tension, cold, hunger, tiredness, stress, oversleep, wrong food, wrong drink, tight turtleneck, heavy backpack, bad-shaped pillow -- here comes a headache.

My dad had headaches as a kid, too. I don't know if he still gets them. I should ask. Dad, do you still get them? Did anyone ever figure out what was wrong with you ;-)? Is this part of that melancholy-perfectionist thing you and I share? Can we send it back? Do your model trains help?

Maybe I need toy trains. Or a Spirograph. Remember Spirograph? That was neat.

Plaid Poncho Vindication!

I've been wearing my plaid poncho again. Some of you may remember this from a post a couple years back, wherein I was told that it was the most hideous article of clothing anyone ever dared to place on a human body. OK, slight exaggeration. But the response was negative, and folks hadn't even seen it!

Well, obviously I can take neither hints nor direct commands, because it still dwells in my closet and I still put it on. And I get compliments on it, I tell you!

What's more: I saw Jackie wearing one (albeit with a different tartan pattern) on a rerun of "That '70s Show." And she's meant to be stylish, isn't she? Well, then.

If you catch me outside over the next couple weeks, you may see it for yourself. And perhaps you'll raise your assessment from "Unthinkable!" to "Meh."

Don't be a hater.

Quittin' Time

Ben's comment on my last post made me realize that many people probably only have a partial picture of my recent improv experience, and it might be helpful if I explain this whole quitting deal a bit further. (Ben, I hope you didn't think I was ignoring your comment -- I just thought the questions deserved some attention and it took a few days before I found the time to sit down and type this all out.) For reference, here's Ben's comment, which I imagine sums up the questions most people would have:

As a fan, I'm concerned. ;)

Seriously, I didn't realize improv wasn't fun any more. Why is that? Is it possible that there's a way to make it fun again?

You're so good at it, and it seemed to give you more joy than anything I've ever seen you do; I guess I don't understand why you're considering quitting.

Of course, I don't want this message to sound like I'm pressuring you not to quit. Just wondering what you're thinking about...

I know this must be what people are thinking, because it involves thinking I'm awesome. That just rings true, doesn't it?

Basically, I was thinking and feeling several things. One of the biggies is something I've been aware of from the beginning, which is my tendency to take things so seriously that the fun gets sucked out of them. This happened with music. It even happened with this blog, which is why 2007 contained a whopping 14 posts; I had only been blogging for a few months when I felt the pressure of having to post almost every day, and I took a year off before returning to a moderate output. At various points throughout my improv experience, I wondered if I should take a break, but I never did. And for the most part, I was glad to have kept going. But eventually the nerves I felt before performances felt more like dread. I was losing the expectation that a show could go well. Rehearsals became something to get through. I was beginning to feel disconnected from the activity, rather than fully engaged; in the past, I had been truly engaged, even when that engagement involved frustration.

Now, this hadn't been going on all that long, and in the midst of it I had the hugely positive experience of the grad show, which I'd thought could have been the home run that knocked me out of my slump. But I'd begun to have negative associations with the activity of improv, and one show wasn't enough to undo that feeling. I'd already determined to take a break after this round of House Teams, but after last weekend's rehearsal, I was wondering if that break should start even sooner. I went home and prayerfully made a list of reasons to stay and reasons to go. My reasons to stay were the same as those that had kept me in situations in the past -- I'd made a commitment, I didn't want to disappoint anyone, there was always the chance that things could get better and I didn't want to miss out. I only had one reason to go: It wasn't fun, and I didn't really expect to get any more joy out of it in the near future. In light of that one reason to go, all the reasons to stay became reasons to go, because they were coming from a motivation that didn't involve authentic joy. For someone like me, who's always tried so hard to do the "right thing" that I hardly even know what I want in a situation, actually paying attention to what I want takes practice. This seemed like the perfect opportunity for practicing just that.

I was thrown when my improv coach gave me encouragement, telling me that she was pushing me harder because she saw me on the verge of a breakthrough. I have talent? Potential? Dang it, those are positive reasons to stay! I wasn't expecting those! Right up until Tuesday's show, I didn't know what I was going to do. But I've been used to letting other people heavily influence my decisions, and I figured it was time for me to make my own, even if that meant trusting my assessment of the situation above everyone else's. So that's what it came down to; I needed to make my own choice, even if it ended up being a bad one. I do feel like I made the right choice regarding improv, but I think that it would be OK even if I hadn't, because at least the choice would have been mine.

I've been learning how intertwined trusting in God and trusting yourself can be. For example, if you're going to trust what God says to you, you have to place some trust in what you think you've heard from God, which means trusting your own ability to hear God! Scary. It can lead to some interesting mistakes, but the motivation is right, and God-ward. I'm also learning that our instincts and desires aren't necessarily the suspicious entities I'd once thought. Perhaps they're like hunger and thirst -- while they can get out of hand, they're essentially good things that we need to pay attention to, and God can steer us by these as well as He can by anything else. So then, if I'm going to let God lead me by my desires, I'm going to have to pay attention to those desires. If I'm going to find joy in God and find God in joy, then I need to pay attention to what is and isn't giving me joy! Perhaps I've said this here before, but it's worth repeating: It's a kind of discipline, not letting myself fall into my old habits of discipline!

And quitting something halfway through?? I never do that! Even if the quitting itself isn't the best idea (though in this case I think it was -- bonus!), it could be good for me just to buck convention that way. It can be easy to assume that it's human nature to always do what's easiest and most self-indulgent, but that's not my problem. My problem is taking the "no pain, no gain" philosophy to the unhelpful extreme of "more pain, more gain." But sometimes more pain is just more pain, and it's a sign that you should stop what you're doing and go make yourself some chocolate milk.

I don't have a plan, which means that I'm not determined to quit improv forever. I feel more like it's a seed, and because I value it (it was SO good for me, I got so much out of it, and I'm so glad I did it), I choose to plant it and step away, trusting that if and when I come back, it'll not only be there waiting for me, but it will have grown bigger and stronger in my absence. In the meantime, I have other things to explore that will only help. Remember that week of physical theater I did in July? When I came back from that, I felt somehow bigger, expanded. Right on the heels of that, I had the most amazing improv class! Somehow, taking creative and emotional risks, even though they were more physical and less comedic, left me much more able to do improv comedy. I expect my various creative explorations to reinforce and support each other this way, like lots of poles resting against each other to make a teepee. I also think it's important for me to keep exploring, and not commit solely to one activity yet. It would be premature.

I have a few ideas about what I can try out next. Perhaps after the new year, I'll try acting classes, or another physical activity like improvisational movement or some kind of dance. Those ideas both excite me.

But like I said, no plan.

I Understand about Indecision

So, I got a response from my improv director and, long story short, she's encouraging me to stick it out through the term. She sees me as on the verge of a breakthrough.

I don't think I made it clear to her that I was only planning on taking a break, not quitting forever. Still, I wasn't expecting encouragement, and it's thrown me into confusion again.

I'm still leaning toward letting this be my last night for a while. Because I like the idea of not having to worry about it. Six more weeks of rehearsals and shows sounds long.

I don't need anyone else's blessing to quit. But as Mr. Bingley said in Pride and Prejudice, "I should like it all the same."

I'm inclined to trust that my breakthrough will still be there, waiting for me, whenever I decide to come back.

Lord, help me to make a good decision.

Get While the Gettin's Good

I quit!

This is a good thing.

I almost never quit things. I see my commitments through to the end. The bitter end. This often means sticking with things much longer than I should, just to make sure they're extra dead, and there's absolutely no joy left to be found in them.

I'd like to avoid doing that with improv. So rather than ride out this term of performing teams for another two months like I'd originally planned, I emailed my coach today to tell her that I'd like Tuesday to be my last show. Now I just need to hear back from her.

I don't know if I'll stay away from improv forever. But it's not fun anymore, and I want to have positive associations with it, so I think it's best to leave before I run it completely into the ground. My prayer now is that Tuesday will go well, like the grad show did, and I can go out with a bang.

Art Is Everywhere

There was cat hair stuck to the toilet this morning. No idea how it got there. Don't care to know. Then I looked out the window at the changing leaves. Suddenly I was inspired. Wrote a little song about it like to hear it? here it go:

The tree are getting pretty
Trees trees trees
I'm allergic to a kitty
Sneeze sneeze sneeze

That last part, about being allergic? It's not even true! Fiction! How's that for creativity? In your face, Art!

I bet Art likes it when you throw things in its face.

Famous People Who Are Nice, According to a FedEx Driver I Met in My Early-Level Improv Classes, Who Has Delivered to Said Famous People

Steve Carrell

Four of the five members of Aerosmith

My parents

... normally call me on Sundays. But tonight they were late, so I called and my mom answered. She sounded funny. Did I wake her up? Had she been crying?

"Oh, hi honey!" she said, "not that we forgot you..."

"Except we did." That was my dad's voice in the background.

"Did you really?" I asked.

"Rick and Christa came over."

Ah, OK. Old friends visiting from out of town. That funny sound in Mom's voice wasn't sleep or tears. It was alcohol. They had friends over and had a lot to drink and forgot they had a kid. So I said it was OK and they didn't have to talk and they could go back to the friends and the drinking and she said, "OK."

"I'm not missing any limbs and haven't gone to the emergency room."

"OK."

I know they love me and all, but it's hard to compete with a refrigerated box of wine.

Guess I'm Not the Only One, Then

Back in August, at one of my improv classes, I admitted to having seen the Hannah Montana Movie. My coach looks at me and says, "Did you cry?"

How did he know? He doesn't know about my blog. I didn't mention it on Facebook. This is so weird! I was almost scared. How did he know? How did he know???

I stared at him blankly, wondering by what kind of witchery he'd come by this knowledge.

"I know other people who've seen it, and they said they cried."

Oh.

I was at the grocery store

...and was having trouble finding the salami. And I thought, Where did they hide it?

Cuteness

... is Nature's defense mechanism for the incontinent and whiny.

Perhaps I'll live to be 100, in which case I'm right on track.

I've spent the better part of my life being impatient for things I don't have yet. This may be typical for people in their teens and twenties -- we think we should get the career and the money and the relationship, and then our adulthood will be established and we can spend the next sixty years living it out.

But I'm pushing 35 now, and these things are still in my future, if they're in the cards for me at all. Sometimes, I get antsy as hell. But being antsy doesn't really help. And at least in the career department, I've already been there, done that as far as picking one goal and focusing all my energies on it (music, in case you weren't paying attention for the preceding 334 posts). I'm now trying to learn how to function without a detailed plan, without prematurely committing to any one endeavor. My plan for the present is to not have a plan.

And it's hard to stick to! It takes a kind of discipline not to fall into my previously established forms of discipline. This is part of what I'm running into with improv. At this point, having graduated from this theater's training center and being on student performing teams, I find myself around plenty of other people who take the pursuit seriously. They're trained actors or stand-up comedians and on track to do improv professionally. I can see who the most gifted performers are, and look up to them and want to be a part of them like they're the cool kids at school.

In each activity you pursue, you're likely to encounter people who have made that their world. Not that they have no other interests; but we each have some "core worlds" we're a part of. Now that you're involved in this activity, do you want it to become one of your handful of core worlds, or do you want to hang on the periphery? You can only be a part of so many things, and you can be seriously dedicated to even fewer.

My family, my roommates, and my church are three core worlds for me. Music used to be one. Work, tellingly, is not -- though I spend a lot of time and mental energy there, it does not hold my heart. I could choose to become ever more a part of the improv world, and let that be my primary creative outlet. And it could be fine. But I haven't done all the exploring I need to do, so in spite of my creative serial monogamy, I think I need to tear myself away and dabble in a few other worlds. Yeah, there's the desire to have my evenings and weekends free and curl up with a candle and a book at home. But there's also the desire to do Shakespeare and dance and sing in musicals.

And darn it, all this exploring takes time! Yargh! I thought I'd have my ducks in a row ten years ago, but ducks are stubborn. And lines are probably overrated anyway. So here I am, almost old enough to be president (we all know the age requirement was the only thing standing in my way, right?), and I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do without prematurely putting down creative roots. (Oh my gosh, do you know what this means? I'm sowing my wild oats, artistically! Who knew I had wild oats?) I'm almost as old as Mozart was when he died, and I've barely begun to show the world what I have to offer. Heck, I hardly know what I have to offer. Yet this is a process that can't be rushed, like pregnancy or reaching your adult height. So as tempted as I am to settle into something so that I can say, "This is what I do, and this is my plan to become successful at it," I know that I did that once before. I'm having to unlearn it!

I'm trying to remember that taking my time is how this process will work best for me.

It's just that it feels so much like waiting.

"Just a Joke"

It sounds like an excuse, doesn't it? "Hey, it's just a joke! Lighten up!" Like the sort of thing you'd hear from a group of bullies, or from somebody who'd just insulted you and doesn't want to deal with the consequences of being called out as a jerk.

But I've found myself thinking it a lot. And I wonder if often it's true: Some things really are just jokes, and we don't need to get so ruffled about them.

This is an issue for me, both in public and private. In public, as you all know, I do improv comedy. Full of jokes. And nothing is sacred. I've dived right into subjects that some might find offensive, and others have dived into subjects that make me uneasy. But I'm finding more and more freedom in being unafraid as a performer, and also in being harder to offend as an audience member.

On a personal level, my sense of humor has gotten me pretty misunderstood. A few people have assumed that because I state something in a humorous way, I must not be taking a situation seriously. (On the contrary, I find that humor is often an acknowledgement of the seriousness of a situation, because that's when levity is most needed.) Or they have experienced jokes as taunts and mocking, and assume that must be how I'm using them, too. When I first encountered this, I was shocked. My experience was that humor was a form of inclusion; you joke around with people you like. Any teasing is done with affection, and requires a kind of intimacy. And it's indicative of trust -- you trust that the other person meant well, and they trust you to take it all in good fun.

I learned the hard way that not everyone functions on this level. I've been accused of having terrible motives behind the things I say. It was incredibly hurtful to have people I thought of as friends take one of the traits I felt I wielded most skillfully -- humor -- and tell me that they saw it as a destructive weapon. I spent a long, agonizing time looking inward to see if what they said about me was true, and eventually came to the conclusion that it was not. In my need to understand how they could have misjudged me so drastically and so aggressively, I came up with analogies.

One is that of a high school varsity baseball team. Imagine them throwing the ball fast and hitting it hard. Then imagine a 9-year-old on the field. If the teenagers include him in the game, it's a compliment, an indication that they see him as an equal. But if he's not used to that kind of game, freaks out a bit, and gets hit with the ball a few times, he's not going to have any fun. His pain is real. But it would be wrong for him and his mom to declare that the other ball players are terrible people, that they meant to hurt her son, and baseballs are weapons that should be banned from our schools. I felt like one of those ball players. I tossed jokes to my friends, they had no idea how to handle what was coming their way, and in return for a baseball I got accusations thrown at me. Where this metaphor breaks down: I never expected them to play at my level. I was always careful. But it wasn't enough, which made it even more surprising and difficult when even my slow pitches were mistaken for grenades.

From what I've observed, "taking a joke" is largely a matter of giving people the benefit of the doubt. Are we going to assume we know another person's motives, and further assume that those motives are bad? Or are we going to acknowledge that we all bring our own shit to the table, and perhaps our reactions have more to do with our shit than they do with the joke-teller? I'll even give an example by fessing up to shit of my own: I have a big nose. I know I have a big nose. So if, in an improv sketch, somebody in character decided to make fun of my character's appearance and called me a fat, scuzzy-haired, big-nosed stink-bag, I wouldn't react to the "fat," "scuzzy-haired," "stinky" bits, but I might feel a twinge at the "big-nosed" bit. But I'd be wrong to assume that the other actor meant anything by it, or that they even think I have a big nose. It's my issue. I could even approach it optimistically and hope that they consider that insult to be as fictional as the other three.

That last point is important, because the way I and many people I know use humor is to tell others that things are OK. You don't make fun of something if you think it's a real problem. Which means that, if somebody makes a joke about something that feels scary or sensitive to you, you can take it as a sign that it might not be as bad as you think. But to do this, you again need to give that person the benefit of the doubt.

This applies to public situations, too. There are some performers we come to trust, and we can take jokes from them that we might not take from an unknown. But we can choose to give the benefit of the doubt, even when unknown performers are involved. It'll stop us from making unfair accusations about people we don't know, and it will keep us from getting our feelings hurt so often. Less pain all around.

I think, in our culture, we have a tendency to take offense and express outrage because it shows that we care, and that we have standards. But from my vantage point, it seems like that's just a large-scale way of making ourselves look good by making others look -- and feel -- bad.

It's a lot more fun to be free to laugh.

No Long Processions or Boring Speeches Here!

My improv graduation show went well! I had been in a slump for about a month, and even now have some negative feelings about performing improv in general. But the show itself was fun, felt pretty good, and the positive feedback seemed enthusiastic and genuine, both from friends and family, and from the experienced performers and teachers who were there. I had begun to feel like I wasn't good at it, but now I think it's just that I had some weak performances, and there's an important difference.

I may still take a break after this term of student teams, but now I don't have to feel like I failed, or have a sad feeling whenever I think of my time in improv. The grad show was redemptive. I'd prayed a lot about it, and when there were opportunities to get prayer from other people, I asked them to pray about the show. I really wanted it to be a good memory. And now it will be.

It was also an interesting experiment in pushing my own boundaries. I hadn't realized how much of our show was about sex until we did it all together, and the fact that a lot of our improv went in that direction added even more. I may have been the guiltiest party in that regard. Yet, in spite of the presence of my parents, little brother, several church friends, and God in the audience, I wasn't embarrassed. I ended up being more concerned that I'd taken a comedic cop-out. Even then, when I asked a couple of my teachers whether they thought that was bad, their response was, "Nah. It just tends to go there."

Cool. I feel like one of the things God is working on in me is this sort of internal stiffness -- stick-up-my-ass-ness, if you will. I don't want to be afraid or unable; if I'm not going to do something onstage, I want that to be a choice that comes out of confidence in my relationship with God, not merely a fear of risk. My natural tendency is to stay on the conservative and careful side of things (and this tendency is not necessarily godly in itself). I don't think I'm in danger of becoming a libertine just because I pretended to eat a mushroom burger while bowm-chicka-bowm-bowm music played in the background. And besides, it was funny.

I was also pleased that the other actors didn't seem afraid of me. Most of the time it's like I have this invisible force field around me that convinces people that I'm made of glass and will shatter in tears if they touch me or say anything untoward; I guess I come across as emotionally and physically fragile. But in our last improv bit, I ended up on the floor, and one of the guys came over and sat on me. (It's funny how something that would feel weird in real life can barely even regisiter in your consciousness when you're in the middle of a scene.) He didn't put his full weight on me, but I was still happy that he didn't hold back out of fear of breaking me or freaking me out.

So, here's to freedom!

And as we learned that night, sometimes you just have to sit on each other.

Sick, Again

I don't know what kind of game my immune system thinks it's playing.

I had some cold-cough weirdness less than two months ago, during which I lost my voice for a few days. (OK, I find laryngitis fun, I'll admit that.) I almost never get sick, but now here I am, with throat-nose weirdness. Very similar. And a little embarrassing.

Here's a good thing: They gave me a laptop at work a few weeks ago, which means I'm able to work from home, which means I don't have to get behind or use up sick days when I'm functional but germy.

I've cancelled my evening appointment, and will try to rest and recover. Here are some things I won't be doing:

Cleaning my room
Cleaning the apartment
Shopping for groceries
Filing my loose documents
Unpacking from an overnight trip and putting my duffle bag back in the basement
Putting on makeup and doing my hair
Tae-Bo (ha! like I was about to do that anyway)

I've Come So Far

On Friday, I was telling my family the body-parts-that-begin-with-P story, and my brother informed me that being female was no excuse for drawing a blank, because we also have a body part that begins with P if you use slang. Not the nicest word, but in a comic setting, not to be ruled out. But I didn't even think of it, much less rule it out.

So I guess I have a way to go yet. But if you agree that swearing, drinking, and using naughty words constitutes genuine progress for me, then you'll be proud of what I'm about to do in the graduation show for my improv class.

I also have not outgrown

laughing at farts.

It's the Kneecap

In an improv warmup on Saturday, I was trying to come up with a body part that started with P. It took me several awkward seconds to think of patella. Last night, during another warm-up, someone tossed out the word penis. Oh, duh! How was that not obvious to me on Saturday? The only excuse I can think of is that I don't have one.

Although I think patella is probably funnier, I find it odd that the obvious P-word completely passed me by. This may be my first notable experience with comedic penis envy.

Things I Have Not Outgrown

Cream of Wheat
Looney Tunes
pajamas with feet
naps (actually, hated those as a kid. love 'em now.)
mooching off my parents
writing my Christmas list in October
the Muppets
letting dogs lick my face
throwing my arms in the air and saying, "Ta-da!" when people clap
wanting my mom to feel sorry for me when I'm sick
fairy tales
Disney cartoons
having crushes on movie stars
the suspicion that I really can breathe underwater
Sesame Street
wanting to be famous
the desire to please authority figures
junk food
TV
daydreaming
imagining performances when I'm not onstage
the tendency to agree with people, in an effort to be pleasant, before I realize how compromising it could be
chocolate milk
wanting to see the world
wanting to live in a castle
liking plaid
hoping for a snow day anytime between Oct. 1 and May 1
acne
wanting to be popular
being shy around cute guys
finding food in weird places hours after I've eaten (true example: eyelid)

Mangia, Mangia!

Last Christmas, one of my (male) roommates got me a calendar entitled "Porn for Women." It has pictures of mostly-clothed men saying things like, "I don't have any advice, but I'm a good listener, " and "I don't have to have a reason to bring you flowers!" It's up in our kitchen.

Mr. September is urging us to have another piece of cake, because he doesn't like to see us looking so thin.

Ladies, take heart, because men like this exist! Not just in calendars, but in real life.

In Connecticut, in fact.

I hear my dad say this to my mom just about every time I visit: "Eat up, Bon! You're too skinny!" She has to keep turning away big pieces of cake and pie. He does it with me, too, though I don't need as much urging. Dad remembers with pride the night when I was fifteen and the family went to a buffet that had a whole separate table full of desserts, and I got one of everything.

Part of this is my dad's personal aesthetic -- he grew up in the era of Marilyn Monroe, where a little wiggle in a girl's walk was considered a good thing. Part of it may be his disbelief that we women get full on less food than he does. But in recent years, I've come to believe there's a third contributing truth:

My dad is an Italian mom.

Food equals love. You doubt me? Mamaluke, what do you know? Hit yourself upside the head for me.

Ray Romano does a standup bit about Italian and Jewish "food mothers": If you want a lot more, tell her you want a little more. If you want a little more, say you don't want any. If you don't want any, you have to shoot her.

I haven't had to shoot Dad yet.

But that's because I usually do want another piece of cake.

Break Me off a Piece of That Kit Kat Bar

I'm thinking of giving myself a break from some activities. Improv in particular. This occurred to me on Monday. I thought two hours would be enough time to walk from my office to the library, putz around for a while, and then walk to improv class.

Nope.

I'm glad to have been involved in all these creative pursuits. But it would be nice to have time to putz around the library once in a while. Or buy hats for winter. Or groceries. Or do laundry. Or read those books I got at the library. Or lie on my bed and daydream. For hours. And hours.

Sometimes I forget how much freedom I have. I can take a break from improv at any point. I can come back at any point. I can explore other things. I can just watch TV for a few months. I can do anything.

The other night I went to Trader Joe's to see if anything caught my eye. The granola did. I was standing before the shelf for a while, trying to decide between two different kinds. And then I thought, "I could get both!" That sort of thing usually doesn't even occur to me. It felt so extravagant!

And then later, it occurred to me that maybe it was a little sad that that was my idea of extravagance, and that it took me so many years to do such a seemingly small thing as buy two granolas in a grocery store.

You know what else rarely occurs to me? Quitting things once I've started. But I can. If I want to.

I just need to figure out whether I want to. And I may have to figure out by doing -- or not doing, as the case may be.

Who Goes Home with the "Honor Student" Bumper Sticker?

Would you like to come to the Student Awards Night at my daughter's elementary school?

It'll be great. The kids and parents get so excited, and it's obvious the teachers take pride in their work. The band will play, there will be a little skit, and the PTA sells sodas for a quarter each.

Or how about this:

We had a big meeting at work today. They showed a whole slide show about the national sales convention. It looked like a ton of fun. I didn't go to the convention, so I don't know how it applied to me, but the sales people in the room seemed to enjoy reliving it. They announced some figures and statistics and I clapped when they said a number. And they gave us bagels. My coworker and I giggled when we saw people in the slideshow with bad haircuts.

What? You're not jealous? You're not eager to attend these events? You're not excited for the fifth grader and the salespeople? What could possibly be the reason?

Yet the entertainment industry is baffled by the fact that no one watches the Emmys.

I'll catch an awards show every few years, and as happens with my dad and Big Macs, that's often enough to remind me why I don't partake more often. I caught the Emmys on Sunday, landing there because I needed something on while I painted my toenails. What lured me in was this year's host, Neil Patrick Harris, whom I find endlessly charming. But I missed his opening number, and once that's done there's too much other stuff going on on an awards show for the host to be sufficient reason for watching. Well, I say "stuff going on," but what you really get is a night of lists. Here are six mini-series you haven't heard of till now. Here are dramas other people rave about. Here are comedies, two of which you may be able to catch on a regular basis. Here are actors on the cable channels you don't get, or the PBS station watched by people more sophisticated than you.

I can see why entertainment folks feel like they should be able to pull this off. They are, after all, professionals in all the areas required to produce a great show, something which could not be said of most other industries (tractor sales? PVC piping? come on). And perhaps, in the early days when Hollywood seemed inaccessible, there was something of the fairy tale when we watched stars on the red carpet (as opposed to the "Her dress is hideous!" snark we tend to indulge in now, myself included). I certainly don't begrudge creative folks the opportunity to be recognized by their peers; heck, I daydream about working as a creative type myself one day.

But I think that amidst all the analyzing about declining viewership and target demographics and changing technology, they may be missing one simple, key point:

Awards ceremonies are boring to everyone who isn't up for an award.

Awesome or Obscene, Depending on Your Point of View

Went to a housewarming today. There was a chocolate fountain! Chocolatefountainchocolatefountainchocolatefountain. There was fruit to stick in there. Bah! I took the last chocolate chunk cookie and smothered it. There was one fingerprint spot, left uncovered like Achilles' heels. That's OK. Still yummy. Obnoxiously yummy.

One Nice Thing about Having Roommates

...is that I can be social without having to be upright. I can go home, crash in front of the TV, be semi-conscious, and still be hanging out with someone. I like that. I like lying down. Sometimes the hardest part about meeting up with people outside the home is that I can't rest my head anywhere.

My Memory

On a Tuesday morning eight years ago, my car was in the shop. The engine had blown, and I was taking the bus to work. During my commute, we passed a minor but traffic-impeding accident between two cars in an intersection, and I remember being grateful that I wasn't one of those drivers. Their day was starting off badly.

I had no idea.

Of course, it was only 8:15, and none of us had any idea.

I first got the news from a customer who walked into the store. I was otherwise alone in the bakery. After the second plane hit, I turned on the radio and kept it on. But my human contact was with customers.

I remember feeling, and seeing and hearing in some other people, an excitement. Not happiness. Of course not happiness. But an energy, a heightening of our experience, as we were all thrown into a world where the glass window through which we viewed the chaos was shattered and the wind came rushing in. For those of us not touched by personal tragedy, was this an opportunity to engage, to take part in a spiritual battle or a physical one, to find a dangerous hole and try to fill it with our own courage? It was like feeling stunned and numb, yet raw at the same time. What would this reveal about us? Would things eventually settle down and go back to normal? Would we hear a call and heed it? Would we rise to a challenge, or shrink back? Would we get lost again in the details of our lives -- and was that necessarily an evil thing?

I learned that my uncle had made it out of the World Trade Center without injury. I hadn't even realized he worked there.

The phone chains went into gear in my church North of D.C., and in the evening we gathered in our auditorium to pray. That I was glad to do. In a situation too big for me to understand, I was only too happy to turn to the One who was even bigger than the situation, and who cared for the hurting -- and the perpetrators -- more than I ever could.

I wasn't angry, and I wasn't scared, and I wasn't sure if that was an indicator of something missing in me.

In the days and weeks that followed, and New York began burying its fallen firefighters and policemen, there weren't enough men and women in uniform to attend the funerals of their commrades, so my dad and other firefighters and cops from outside the city went down to attend the funerals.

I wondered if my brother, then a Navy pilot, would be sent to fight. I'm still thankful that he wasn't.

I don't think there was any one "right" response to what happened on 9/11/01, either in emotion or in action. Eight years on, I don't know what the proper balance is between somber remembrance and finding joy in the present.

Perhaps the imporant thing is to acknowledge the validity of both.

New Links!

I've been finding some fun blogs out there, and I've added the links to the column on the right side of this blog. Hope folks enjoy them!

Dismissed from drama school, with a note attached

The note said: "Wasting your time. She's too shy to put her best foot forward."

The dismissed student was Lucille Ball.

From one shy funny girl to another: Thanks for being brave, Lucy.

Filing Recipes Will Have to Wait

Every couple of weeks, I feel the need to have a long day at home where I can intersperse relaxing with getting some items crossed off my to-do list -- one of the luxuries of spinsterhood. If I have a second day like this, I can delve into those long-standing items, the ones I wrote down a year or two ago and still haven't gotten to. The problem with not being a hermit is that such days can be hard to come by, and the cupboards grow emptier while the laundry pile grows bigger (for the record, laundry and groceries are on the immediate to-do list, not the year-long one).

Well, it ain't gonna get done this weekend. Because my Jeter-stalking friend, Chris, and I will be heading to NYC for a weekend of being fabulous. Sex and the City without the sex. This will be aided by the fact that I found out this week that I'm getting a sizeable bonus at work! (Really, I never expected anything so huge. Ha --that's what she said!) My salary ain't huge, but this should at least give me an excuse to replenish my barely-hanging-on summer wardrobe, and have a few drinks and sleep indoors while I'm at it.

Hmmm. This might be at odds with my sleeping goal.

You're Getting Sleepy, Very Sleepy

Or maybe it's just me.

I was never more well rested than when I was a struggling musician. By the end of that four years, I was down to two days a week at my retail day job. Apart from that and church on Sunday, I didn't have scheduled activities till I started teaching in the afternoons. So I could come hom from rehearsals and gigs at night, unwind by snacking (or having a super-late dinner!) with a book or in front of the TV, then wander off to bed and sleep till 10 or 10:30. I woke up when my body wanted to wake up. Then I could lie there awake for a while, and maybe work out before showering. It was great. So great. Most of the rest of my life sucked, but that part was great.

No more. It's all about the day jobs now. And while to some folks I come across as quite conventional and square, I have a determined nocturnal streak that my will has not been able to tame. It likes junk food and late-night TV. It's not a partyer, but it has plenty of energy for evening performances and hanging out with friends. It likes to go to bed around 1. And while it often manages to hit the hay by 11 or 11:30, it still feels very sorry for itself on weekdays at 7am.

The struggle has increased since I got myself into so many improv activities, which are geared toward night people. I want to sleep. Honest I do. I'm good at it. But it's happening less.

I've recently read about the importance of sleep. This was hugely validating, because while my practice may not be great, my desire is usually for 9 hours per night. Conventional wisdom is that we need 8, and most folks consider that a luxury, so I felt like a slob for sleeping longer when I had the chance. But at least according to one article, folks regularly slept 9 hours 100 years ago. So maybe I'm not a bum. I'm just old-fashioned.

In our culture, busyness is like a competition. Songwriter Sara Groves wrote ironically, If you sit at home, you're a loser/ Couldn't you find anything better to do?. If you're going without sleep, it must be because you're busy, right? I kind of get tired thinking about it.

Last night I saw a Nova episode about sleep. They're still trying to figure out exactly why creatures need it, but based on studies done, it looks like one of the huge benefits is that the brain uses the time to work through, practice, and solve problems. One scientist theorized that by sacrificing sleep, we sacrifice wisdom! Not to mention the fact that we're mentally and physically impaired by tiredness, and the cost to health, well-being and lifespan can be considerable.

I don't want sleep to be something I save up for on one or two precious nights a week! I want to be rested, happy, and wise. Sleeping Brainy.