Off the road

Rich was away on a job last week and is gone off and on most of this week. That's right, the tables have been turned on me, and now I'm holding down the fort while he's traveling to exciting places like Fall River, Massachusetts and Ogden, Utah. I'm actually pretty jealous of the Utah gig, since that's one of about 5 states I've never been to. Curses!

What other states have I not been to, you ask? North Dakota, South Dakota, Oregon, and possibly Kentucky. I really can't figure out if I've been there. In fact, I just got out my atlas to see if I must have driven through it during my trips from Dallas to Boston, but I think I might have gone from Tennessee right into Virginia. So to be safe, I'll add it to the list. So that's 5 states. If anyone can offer me a trip to any of those places, that would really help me fulfill my dream of national domination. There was talk on our last shoot of doing a Sonic shoot in Utah. Keep your fingers crossed.

By the way, if you buy an atlas at Wal Mart, it lists cities in each state and whether they have a Wal Mart or Sam's Club.

This past weekend I attended the "on the road reunion" of Greenhill, the school I went to in Dallas from 4th-12th grade. A handful of administrators and teachers from Greenhill will travel to cities with large alum populations (New York, LA, Chicago, Austin) and have a reception of some sort. There have been two others since I've been in Chicago, but this was the first one I went to. Fortunately I didn't have to go it solo, since my childhood buddy and fellow alum Allie still lives in Chicago. Also fortunately, we had an easy escape because I had to be at Second City at 7:30 and the event started at 6:30. It was actually pretty painless. I got to see the alumni director, who I knew during my Greenhill days, as well as Mr. Perryman, who was my 6th grade English teacher and advisor (Greenhill's more mature word for homeroom teacher), and probably my favorite teacher ever. He had attended Greenhill too, and was fresh out of college when he came to teach us. This makes him about 10 years older than me, which is a lot when you're 11 and in 6th grade, but not a lot when you're 31 and have plenty of other friends in their 40's. I also met the current headmaster, which is a lot fancier and more expensive than a principal.

A group of five, including the three mentioned above, all came to the Second City show Sunday night. There's a scene early on in the show where Brian is asking people to sign his petition to end the war, and a series of people come by with different reactions. Matt is the first one out and signs a bunch of different names, ending with him saying a name that is his "porn name." Whenever someone we know is in the audience, he'll use their name. I asked him to use the name Sam Mulroy, because he's the kid who in 6th grade detention linked up a bunch of paper clips and stuck them in an electrical socket. He was also in my advisory (not homeroom, you simpleton) with Mr. Perryman, and I really hoped he remembered him. I watched Mr. Perryman's face during that part and I swear I saw no recognition at all, but then when we talked after the show he mentioned it right away and said it was hilarious. So there you have it. The legend of Sam Mulroy lives on.

Costume party

There's a scene at the end of the first act of our show called Parent-Teacher. It's an improvised parent-teacher conference, based on an audience interview that Brian does a couple of scenes earlier. He picks an audience member who either Matt or I will later play as the student (depending on the gender). Claudia is the teacher, Maribeth and Antoine are the parents, Matt or I (whoever isn't the student) is the first crush, and Brian is the idol. The best part of this scene is that we get to play a little dress-up, and I've started keeping a camera backstage to capture some of the better get-ups. Above is a picture of Matt as a childhood crush who had "a lot of hair" and Brian as Wonder Woman. I think the party hats as wrist bands is a particularly brilliant touch. There's also a picture of me playing someone we simply know as "Francesca."

The Second City holiday party was this past Monday. I won my very first raffle prize: 2 tickets to the Shedd Aquarium. I'd say the Shedd is my favorite museum (if that's in fact the category it falls into) in Chicago. The architectural boat cruise is probably my favorite touristy thing to do, but the Shedd is a close second.

I've never been to the top of the Sears Tower. In September, I will have lived in Chicago for 10 years. So I figure I could celebrate that anniversary by going then, or I could try to wear the fact that I haven't been as a badge of honor. Let's see if I can make it another 10 years, huh?

Days of My Life

My normal schedule is gradually creeping back into existence, and by "normal" I mean going to work at 7pm and trying to figure out what to do during the days. The difference now from when I first started on mainstage eight months ago is that now, having gone through a rehearsal process and writing a show, I feel like I've earned my free days. At least so far, there's much less guilt, and much more sleeping in and watching movies. That could change of course.

Last weekend my friends Heidi and David and their two-year-old son Oliver came to visit from Albany. They (minus Oliver) got to see the show, and we did some fun Chicago activities. On Sunday, Heidi, Oliver, and I went to the Children's Museum on Navy Pier, which at first I was sure I'd never been to. As we started to climb the stairs to go up, I had a vivid flashback to a time when I was in fact in the Children's Museum, doing a live industrial for Pledge Grab-Its. Erin McEvoy and I were dressed in white jumpsuits, spouting facts about dust to kids who I'm sure ran out and bought themselves some Pledge Grab-Its right away. Actually, they probably bought Swiffers. Wouldn't you?

Anyway, I have to say that the Children's Museum is pretty brilliant, since a lot of it is based on letting kids do stuff that adults can do but they can't. First we went to My First Strip Club, and then to the Li'l Smokers Korner. I think Li'l Smokers is actually a Hickory Farms product. Anyway, they had a little grocery store, car wash, construction site, things like that. I'd like to thank the Chicago Bears for having a playoff game that day and making the crowds bearable (pun intended! Ha ha!).

Last night Frank Caeti and Joe Canale cam by to play the set, and then we went to Corcoran's across the street. A guy came up to me because he recognized me from Sonic commercials (he's from Alabama), and about 10 minutes later one of them came on in the bar. My "friends" started yelling and pointing at me, and when the commercial was over the people at the table next to us applauded. I think they felt sorry for me. It was definitely pity applause.

So it's Friday and my big task for the day is to get to the post office to buy some 2-cent stamps and mail a couple of packages. Thank goodness the weekend is coming soon - this pace is killing me.

Photos

Here's a cast photo from our current mainstage show.


And this is our most recent Sonic shoot.

Just deserts

Greetings from Phoenix! I'm enjoying some sunshine and 70 degree weather for a couple of days while shooting another Sonic spot. Today we did peach and raspberry iced tea, although I was actually drinking Diet Dr. Pepper the whole time. I occasionally like iced tea, but much like I am with coffee, I'm very particular about how I take it. So it worked well for me that I could opt for another drink. Tomorrow morning we do radio here in Phoenix and then fly home. Pete & TJ, our Sonic cousins, often shoot just before or after us, and this time we were fortunate enough to have them overlap with us a bit. So we went for sushi with them and the ad agency folks, and then Pete, TJ, & I went to Casino Arizona. They go there every time they're in town, but Brian and I have never gone. Part of that is because I have a terrible time sleeping here and am usually too tired for any post-dinner activities. But last night I came home from dinner, took two Benedryl and was out by 9:30. So - after a half hour nap following today's shoot - I was ready for action this evening.

I really think I'm allergic to the desert. I mean, literally. I somehow manage to be completely dried out while simultaneously suffering from a runny nose. So that's part of the reason I can't sleep here. The other is that at our hotel, the James in Scottsdale, the beds have way too much going on. The beds themselves are ok, but with a super-thick down comforter and half a dozen down pillows, I feel like I'm sleeping in a giant marshmallow. Plus it's incredibly dry; I wake up and go for a sip of water and end up drinking almost a whole bottle.

So it's just before midnight and I've taken two Benadryl once again, hoping to replicate last night's successful sleep. We have a relatively late call tomorrow: 9:15 instead of today's 7:30. I'm currently downloading episodes of The Office (the NBC version) to put on my ipod for the flight home tomorrow. I had a few episodes of The Joe Schmo Show that I watched on the way here - I highly recommend both seasons of it if you haven't seen it. Anyway, it was great to be able to watch tv shows on my ipod. The future is here, everybody.

Happy Birthday...

I would like to use this post for the sole purpose of wishing loyal Erdmania reader Abby McEnany a very happy birthday. Abby, your gift is this picture...I hope you figure out what the caption would be.

So long, year.

Happy New Year! It's been a fairly eventful final week of 2005. We had 2 shows every night at Second City due to the holiday crowds. At the beginning of the week it still seemed easier compare to the previous 9 weeks of rehearsals, but by Friday it was taking a toll on all of us, I think. Last night for New Year's Eve we did a countdown after our 10pm show and did a 10-minute improv set. It was fun to do total goof-around improv. Ruby, our musical director, has a tradition of buying us a couple of really good bottles of champagne and doing a toast backstage before the countdown. So we got to have a nice little cast moment to celebrate New Year's, our show opening, and the fact that we were 5/6 of the way through our week at that point.

My New Year's countdown was a bit sad for me since my Grandma Alice passed away that morning. I had been fortunate enough to have seen her the previous weekend when I went to Dallas. So rather than go on about my other trivial matters from the past week, I'll mention two of my favorite memories about my grandmother. One, for some reason, she couldn't stand seeing someone put a napkin in their mouth. So of course at the dinner table the grandkids would do that constantly, evoking the funny face she would make that was a cross between disgust and someone tickling her neck. Two, I always knew when she was coming to visit because we'd have those Keebler Fudge Sticks in our refrigerator. And when we would visit her in El Paso, she'd often serve an afternoon snack of a cold Snickers bar cut up into small slices.

Happy New Year, everyone. I hope everyone has something from 2005 to be thankful for, and something in 2006 to look forward to.