I think I am finally somewhat recovered from the weekend in Philly or the trip referred to the great Sandwich Getaway. We ate our way through Philly and discovered some great new places.

So my favorites….

Bonte Wafflerie -
I had the sugary coated thick dough waffle with pecans and blueberries mixed in.  Wow – delicious and something I have never quite tasted before. I read further on these yeasty waffles from Belgium, and might even attempt to cook them myself sometime. So good.

ISHKABIBBLE’S
Cheestake. Fun Name. Cheeze Wiz Yum. That’s all.

Tattooed Mom
Love this bar. The bartender looked like a vampire in True Blood and he made us the regional specialty of a pickle back with a shot of liquor. Pickles make everything better. After taking a break from eating we promptly returned for more debauchery at this place.

Sarcone’s Deli at the Italian Market
I took a bite of the hoagie and fell in love but Scotty got seriously upset when he thought the second half of his sandwitch was ganked. It was that good.

The World’s Largest General Store
A random stop of the way home that was full of softserve and photo opportunities. Oh my.

IMG_3029 by keli shiny-penny

IMG_2986 by keli shiny-penny

IMG_2962 by keli shiny-penny

IMG_2951 by keli shiny-penny

DSCF3309 by keli shiny-penny

After a week of being cooped up in a house I finally took my mom on an afternoon outing to meet her best friend Aunt Linda for lunch yesterday. Linda is the type of person who will literally say anything to anyone at anytime. Whatever funny thing she is thinking just flies out of her mouth quicker than you have time to process what she has said. This usually leaves me blushing, or as I experienced today, laughing so hard I have to remove myself from the situation.

Cut to the scene when we are standing in Sears shopping for a new vacuum for my mom. (This is a much needed purchase considering her current model weighs what seems to be 100 pounds and you break a sweat just staring at it as it sits ominously in the closet.) The sales clerk that approaches has about as much personality as a soggy piece of bread. Aunt Linda immediately sniffs out his lack of enthusiasm and goes into high gear questioning the guy on the features of the entire vacuum line. It is obvious Linda is going to sell my mom the dream vac while milquetoast follows-up Linda’s questions like a retired hype-man.

Listening to someone talk about “sucking power” and “extension rods” is enough to make an immature person (myself) laugh, but there is some certain finesse to which Linda delivers these phrases that makes me feel especially giggly. Perhaps it is her slight Southern lilt that adds a hint of mischievousness.  Sales clerk then decides to elevate his presentation by demonstrating how quiet the machine is and plugs it into a wall. The three of us stand there staring at the very expensive (I will not say how expensive in case my father ever reads this) machine as he attempts to turn the machine on. Nothing. “Wow, that is really quiet!” Linda says.  I look at the flustered clerk and walk away so I will not make him even more deflated over the ridiculous laughter that is going to erupt from my chest at any second.

Eventually I return after a stroll down the homegoods section and see that Aunt Linda has indeed sold mom on the top of the line floorcare investment piece. At this point Linda starts asking the clerk if he knows if the machine will go on sale or if he is willing to throw in some kind of discount.  “Well, I’m part Jewish so I had to ask!” is what I hear coming from Linda’s mouth as soon as I get close enough to clearly hear what she saying. I shake my head and walk over to Linda and point out that she is not Jewish. ” I am too part Jewish, my great Grandfather was a Hasidic Jew!” she replied emphatically. I got nothin’.

After things are paid we walk over toward another part of the floorcare section and then hear the sound of a whirring vacuum as the three of us walk around the corner and peek. Sales Clerk is on the floor holding the canister and the extension rod as he says “I realized the lid wasn’t snapped on tightly enough. See it works!” Under her breath I hear Linda say “Well thank God he knows his products so well.”

What the hell? Those are the words I had been mumbling to myself over the past few months before Julie pointed out I should probably change my mantra to the classic Bruce Lee advice of “Be Like Water.”

Go with the flow, man.

These past three months have been anything short of insane and the only common denominator I can find is the element of surprise. Not a single thing that has occurred has been the result of some well devised plan, rather it has been a mix of happy accidents, strange occurrences or all out mind effs.

After finishing up directing my first show I vowed to take a break from theatre only to get a surprise email from a long lost friend who suggested I audition for a stellar available role in a show that one missing one key player. I took the bait and made what some people are referring to as “my stellar return.” I didn’t know I really had left,  but I guess the bitch is back. Well, at least for a limited engagement as my schedule allows.

Before I agreed to do the show I decided to move and rather unexpectedly found a great place owned by a friend located in the Gordon Square Arts district. So I started to mentally prepare to move, I gave notice to my current landlord,  put down a deposit,  and naturally, that’s when all hell breaks loose.  In the middle of performances my mom calls with the news she has to have open heart surgery for a rare heart condition.  Fuck, this is a rude awakening.

I work for the most understanding manager ever who shoos me away to be with my family before I barely have time to throw my MacBook, dog and laundry into my Saturn. The very SUV that had to have a sudden wheel baring replacement the day before I was able to leave. This was in between rushing to get my new license and registration because surprise,  my license would expire the day after I arrived in Virginia. I  take a decent license picture despite only getting about three hours of sleep the night before.  The lack of sleep is cause by a rather unexpected makeout session the night before. Yaaaaahhhh, that’s another story in itself and I will just say Bruce Lee him self appeared to me in a vision telling me to “go with the flow.”

Mom is peacefully recovering, I’ve been able to pound out some decent design work and I then take a  look at what I planned while life was swirling around me and I GASP to see in the next four week I have scheduled an INSANE amount of concerts, sporting events, festivals, appointments, packing, moving  unpacking and I even threw in a trip to Philly over the Forth of July for good measure. OH MY GOD.

I’m glad I have another week of relative calm before I am thrown into the next storm. I also realize that this is the pace of my life, but I just don’t usually have three weeks to pause and catch my breath. I wouldn’t have it any other way but I do need to really consider getting a midget to be my personal assistant. I mean Chelsea Handler has a Latin midget named Chuy. I want a small German midget named Klaus. My own midget assistant – that’s how I will know I have truly arrived.

“Don’t get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water. Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup; You put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle; You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”  – Bruce Lee

I am currently residing at my parents house in Virginia for three weeks and have survived my first week of Southern living…barely. My mom is currently in the hospital recovering from planned open heart surgery to repair damage (they suspect) that was from an unchecked bought of Rheumatic fever when she was younger. (Yes, let’s just add to the mounting list of things that make me resent my late drug addicted grandmother, and grandfather that abandoned them all when my mom was in grade-school. Really, I’m not bitter….)

Nonetheless, this trip has been made possible by the fact my summer will consist of mostly graphic design work and writing in preparation for the upcoming school year. Work projects that need to be done alone, and God knows, projects that are done better when you don’t have a soundtrack of baroque trumpet music wafting down a hallway in an empty 100 year old building.  Isn’t the Ohio Renaissance Faire hiring?

So, the last time I spent this length of time here was about five years ago when I was considering moving to D.C. before I realized I didn’t want to spend most of my waking hours stuck in my car in traffic. Anyone who does not understand the concept of road rage should just take a little jaunt around the D.C. innerbelt at 5pm on a Wednesday evening. You will be searching for the nearest bridge with scalable walls within 45 minutes.  Needless to say, I was back in Cleveland 4 months after that little experiment.

I decided to embrace this time as a relaxing spa-like experience free from late nights, temptation and unmentionable bad things that are no-doubt hacking away at my life expectancy rate. However, after an emotional day I broke down and bought a 6 pack of beer last night and scoured the freezer case at the Fredericksburg market for pierogies.  (Just in case you are wondering -  no, you cannot find pierogies in Fredericksburg, Virginia, not even the shitty freezer kind.)  I wasn’t really hungry, I just sought some kind of comfort in knowing that the pierogies were there. This is when I realized after years of transient living, Cleveland finally emerged as the true victor in the place that I call home. I may carry a slight vocal lilt of someone living south of the Mason Dixon, but my heart burns like a river for the land of Cleve.

My list of 33 Things to do and see before my 34th Birthday

1. Plant a small garden and watch it grow
2. Eat my first chilli-dog, choco taco and taste of caviar.
3. Add on to my tattoo
4. Complete 100 hours of volunteer work/community service
5. Meet someone on the street and become friends with them
6. Gamble for the first time
7. Write 52 love letters
8. Write (and finish) a book
9. Host 12 Parties (including a HELVETICA party)
10. Visit New York, Chicago, Washington DC, Philadelphia and Vegas
11. Learn how to bake the perfect croissant
12. Drink Absinthe
13. Read the Nag Hammadi Texts
14. Take a psychology class
15. Watch at least 20 classic/stellar movies I SHOULD have seen already
16. See Phoenix live
17. Go to a hookah bar
18. Host Christmas for my family and friends
19. Paint a scenic landscape
20. Ride in a gondola
21. Say “I love you” first to someone
22. Take one interesting photo everyday
23. Learn how to screenprint
24. Go on a spontaneous weekend trip at the VERY last minute
25. Compile all of our family photos into a digital archive
16. Make wine or beer
27. Spend at least one full night at home once a week
28. Wear my favorite dress again
29. Anonymously pay for a stranger’s groceries
30. See a metal show where fire is involved
31. Become an owner of a real designer bag
32. Send a message in a bottle
33. Visit one new place every week

This is the first Saturday in months I woke-up feeling like a human being and not wondering if I had been drugged the night before. Annie is over, and like any major time consuming project, there are mixed feelings about the conclusion. I feel like we accomplished something really special. However, it is nice to not have the “What the hell is going to happen tonight?” feeling I have had hanging over my head the last few months take it’s final bow. Seriously, this one was interesting….a beautiful show in the end, but WOW. I hate it when people use the world “journey” to describe the process of play-making, but this one was more like the Odyssey. Sirens, monsters and challenges at every turn. I guess all of those things make you appreciate the outcome more.

Nonetheless, I sit here looking at two completely goofy animals and wonder what is next. I have a few things up my sleeve, but I think for today, I just want to sit and catchup on being in the moment and not wondering about what’s next.

To an outside observer, the class would have been misconstrued as an intense group psychotherapy session. We walked in on a group of actors in basic tanks and shorts adorned with various pieces of clothing. Caps, pants, aprons and under-skirting. A skeptical instructor asked probing questions as she headed around the circle trying to draw out the details of people’s lives.

The group of observers sat in seats at the side of the class and we learned the basic secrets of what drives these fictional characters. The characters were contrived by MFA acting students. The students invented a character after observing portraits at The Cleveland Art Museum and picking out a portrait subject to study and make a story for a few class sessions earlier. This basic exercise of character development was an intense thing to watch. The creation of these characters was so focused that it made me think on all of the actors who are sometimes said to be too deeply drawn into the fictions they portray.

As I walked out of the class I thought about the exercise and how that probing of character takes the idea of “Stepping onto someone’s shoes” to a whole new level. This was a type of empathy I only began to experience the last few months as a director. During that time I was stepping into the shoes of 10 year old girls to figure out what motivates them. I was thinking about how to approach the 60 year old seasoned veteran and get something new out of their performance. I was learning about how to communicate on general and specific planes of engagement

I also realized that in order to communicate with people you truly have to understand where they are coming from. Communication really has nothing to do with you, it has to do with learning what will strike a chord with your audience.

I realized at that moment that I need to become a psychologist. I discovered my motivation by deciding I need to figure out what motivates others.

• These little girls are going to eat me alive this afternoon.

• With my luck some fat old lady will be the one to frisk me.

• It’s so sad…………Dead penguin.

• The fat one had brain damage from the plastic Pepsi rings lodged around his neck.

• It’s DILF weekend at the Q!!!

• Can we put spinners on your wheels? I am sure D—- can install something douchebaggy like that!

• I am hoping I won’t do a Britney at the salon and grab the clippers.

• We made it out on the other side…peeing cats, broken cars, dictators and all.

• Bowling, hj’s and bj’s…..bottom line.

• Yes, you are a cheetah, and Greg is now officially a cougar.

• Can we go to a donkey show for your wedding reception?
Um, no. Have you been watching Clerks 2?

• BTW Where are the hooker photos? I thought everyone sends back hooker photos when they travel.

• A goat tried to eat my purse today and I fed sharks and stingrays.

• Btw…Hitlers-Right-Hand-Man thought that M & J were a couple!

•  was in my lounge pants snuggling with my pets. Dipshits! All of them. I’m becoming a nun. God, here I come!

• Seriously, why is it always the douchebag that calls?

• Did Julia put Kevin’s hand down my shirt last night?

• Don’t forget that “I’m gonna get you pregnant” song for Greg’s Birthday Playlist.

• Only in Parma would you see a trailer-hitch with a nut sac hanging from it.

I had an epiphany last night that somewhere along the line I never fully developed my inner bitch. I’m not talking about the overly aggressive, nasty, biting-for-no-reason-bitch, but the assertive, strong, outspoken get-what-she-wants-bitch.
The one who stops the jerks in their tracks and calls them out on their shit and then moves on to being a nice, creative, happy human being again in one swift movement.

In many ways I let 2009 happen to me. I had a lot of great things happen, but I spent a large amount of time listening to people and not telling them what I really think despite them asking for my advice on the situation. I was afraid of being mean or insensitive. What I failed to realize is I was letting people be insensitive to my time or feelings in the process.

Every once in a while I will go into a crabby sort of rant in front of my friend Greg who always exclaims “GRRRRR!I LOVE this side of you!” I can see why he likes it – it’s sassy, intelligent and right to the point. It matches up better with my personality.

Trust me, I have no desire to be a mean and nasty person and my inner optimist will never let me become rude. However, I am on a mission to not let people be rude to me anymore. If I get called a bitch in the process, it is a sacrifice I am willing to make.

This picture was taken at the strangest wedding reception I have ever been to.  So what makes for an interesting reception?  Um, how about a fist fight, almost catching on fire, fake puke, a mentally disabled d.j. and GOATS!  Thanks Julie. This will no doubt be the most memorable reception I ever attend. This is a self-portrait with the lovely goat with a sideways face from being kicked as a foal. Yeah, tragic, I know. Poor goat.