I am going stir-crazy. Climbing the walls. Bored to tears. I’ve read my back log of New Yorkers, Tin House, Granta, and Money Magazine. I spent hours in bed yesterday, thinking the big questions: What am I doing with my life? Why am I here? What is going to become of me? I’ve recently accepted that I do not know what is going to happen.
I do know that I need to get a job. Not strictly for financial reasons, but because I need something to do. This feeling usually takes a month to set in, but it’s taken less than two weeks since I left the playhouse.
So I’m pounding the virtual pavement again, making the usual round of phone calls. I’ve looked at jobs that I wouldn’t normally touch with a barge pole. Companies I’ve never heard of, in fly-over states, which offer weekly rates that probably don’t even equal minimum wage. Argh.
I took off my St. Christopher medal for the first time in a month. It feels odd. I think that he’s becoming one of my favorite saints. More optimistic than Jude, less arty than Genesius, and less verbose than Augustine… I do travel often. I asked the nun at the religious bookstore where I bought the medal about the de-listing of St. Christopher. She told me that we just have to take him on faith. Luckily, I didn’t laugh until after I got out of the store.
I took on an ambitious project this week: a fairisle hat knit in the round. It started as an adaptation of a Rowan Big Wool pattern, worked at a much smaller gauge, but that was quickly abandoned. I’ve never done fairisle before. The ease is surprising, though it isn’t as mindless as my usual projects. The hat is goose shit green and slate blue, with ear flaps.
I got a phone call from my friend Bob at last. We’re playing permanent phone tag. He left a charming, rambling message and I responded in kind. He’s at the playhouse for the rest of the season. It’s a living, I guess.
I celebrated my friend Harlie’s birthday, with very short notice, on Monday. We met at the diner, neither of us feeling any pain. I was clad in a neon pink wig, bubble gum pink Burberry knock-off raincoat, and $6 worth of vintage jewelry. A couple of gentlemen mistook me for a lady-of-the-evening as I waited for Harlie, which was très amusant. I was standing on the corner at the time.
Harlie recently had a party at her apartment, which is one of many recent parties to which I’ve not been invited. I think the last party that I attended was the one that I threw last July. Maybe I’m predestined to a life of Saturday nights at home with the Sunday Times.

My trip back to Chicago was a little less enchanted. It rained and rained and rained. There was fog and sleet and a general funk. There were unexplained lane closures, bumper to bumper traffic in the middle of nowhere, and many, many trucks. I dislike driving near trucks even in good weather, but especially in the rain. It took me about eight hours to get across Pennsylvania when it should have only taken six. Then I hydroplaned in Ohio and was almost blown of the turnpike by a semi. I decided to pull over and take a nap at one of their amazing rest stops. I ended up sleeping several hours in the cramped backseat of my Ford while trying to wait out the rain.
I was prepared. I had blankets, pillows, old New Yorkers, a Maglite, and my walkman. What else could a girl want? Well, I wished that I were shorter or the car wider. I had to curl up into the tightest fetal position. One of my friends who is from Ohio gave me a call. It was very pleasant. Then I woke up around five am and drove to the next rest stop, where I took another nap and visited Starbucks. I was so relieved that the rain had passed. The second day was much easier. It also had a high hick factor. I stopped a couple of places in Indiana and was amazed by how different it is from its adjacent states. I saw a woman at McDonald’s wearing an openwork crocket tank top on a sixty degree day without anything under or over it. That’s a bold choice.
When I got home, I had three New Yorkers, a Tin House, and a copy of Bitch awaiting me. Huzzah! I’ve been home a couple of days, and I’ve read everything but the Tin House. I am so enamored of the printed word, especially sparkling, witty, liberal printed word.
I dragged my mother out to purchase a wifi card for my laptop with my federal tax refund. It is the bee’s knees! I wish I’d done it sooner, but if I had, I would have gotten one of the older ones. I purchased a Belkin 54g card, which fits smartly into the slot in my laptop. Now I can take the Viao out to Starbucks, Borders, and McDonalds (supposedly, they’re going wifi in the next six months at 18,000 locations. I’m not sure that I want to use my laptop someplace full of screaming children, grease, and creeps), and network at Frisky’s, since he has a wireless router. Yee haw! The rates for the hot spots are kind of high, though I can get a good deal if I commit to a monthly renewable plan through my wireless provider. I’m not sure if that’s best for me, given the unpredictability of my income. I’d also like to avoid being nickel-and-dimed to death. So, I’m going to try this out for a month and evaluate how often I use it. It may be worthwhile to go unlimited for $19.99 (plus tax). I don’t know. It certainly is nifty to take the laptop out for a spin.

It has been nearly a month since my last blog because I have been away from my home base. I have been away from my computer as well, which is an odd occurrence given that I use a laptop. I left the laptop at home and brought along my tablet pc. It’s pretty neat, but I didn’t have access to a phone line where I was housed. Yeah, no phone line, no access to computers at work; I was completely dependent on the ancient pc at the public library and the eMacs at the local internet café. In either location, there was no way to print and an eye on the clock. It was very, very frustrating.

My job was a three week gig in Eastern Pennsylvania. I won’t name names, though it may be fairly evident to anyone who’s talked to me lately. The housing was in the middle of nowhere. The theatre was falling apart. It was a “character building experience”. Except it wasn’t.

The wireless mics kept dying on me, even though they were always fine during sound check. There must be some nice technical term for that, but I don’t know it. It certainly led to many “oh shit” moments. One of the actors sweated like a pig and killed two mic heads before I realized the cause of the malfunctions. Medical tape is always cheaper than microphones.
One day, I got a bad batch of nine volt batteries. Half of them died before we’d even finished the first act of the show. The stage manager, who is not really a stage manager but an electrician, was on my ass about it for the rest of the run. She badgered me about changing the batteries for every performance—which I always, always do---even insisting on changing them herself for the last matinee. I hate being treated as though I am incompetent or don’t care. I do care. I want to have a good show. I hate having train wrecks. I hate feeling as though I am not in control of the show (at least the sound elements), which happened several times during the run. I was lucky that the actors were very flexible about mic reassignments and really saved my ass on more than one occasion. Actors should be kind to their sound engineer. We can make them sound like a million dollars or the worst hack.

The highlight of this sojourn east was a long weekend in NYC. I spent the three days off between our Sunday matinee and Thursday evening show in Gotham with friends. It was wonderful. I pounded the pavement everyday. My legs ached. My feet were blistered. I was in my element.
In New York, I did the following:
•Continued my tradition of buying a Manhattan Portage bag from their tiny shop front on West Broadway in Chinatown. I purchased the flight bag, in black, which is a very good size, sleek, and very practical. I wore it out of the shop.
•I made my usual pilgrimage to School Products for giant cones of yarn. The proprietor, an Eastern European woman who’s been knitting for about a million years was unusually attentive. I ended up purchasing three cones of mercerized cotton, very similar to Karabella’s Zodiac yarn, in ice blue, camel, and red. Very, very classy color combinations. When the owner fussed over my eye for color, I was surprised. It wasn’t until later that I realized she was surprised that someone wearing a neon pink wig would have such discriminating taste.
•I went to a movie. I realize that we have movies out in the sticks, too. I like to see something different when I’m in the city. This has included the following in the past: Camp, Huit Femmes, and Drunken Angel. This time, I went to see Triplets of Belleville at the Chelsea Clearview in the late afternoon, on the recommendation of a good friend. There were only five people there. The other four sat directly behind me and talked throughout the film. When I realized that it was a mother and her young children, I couldn’t work up the nerve for a good “shut the %%## up”. I was still irritated. I recommend the film, nonetheless.
•I went to The Beauty Bar, a highly anticipated visit. They’re known for their ten dollar manicures and cocktails in a tiny, dimly lit former beauty parlor. They weren’t doing nails the night that I was there, but they did have a nice happy hour. It was the cheapest cocktail I’ve ever purchased in Manhattan!
•I paid a visit to KnitNY, about which I’d read many things on the stitchnbitch listserv. It’s a nice, glossy store, but they were a bit understaffed when I was there. I ended up helping a beginning knitter put together a project while the sales clerk was tied up with other customers. I’m such a girl scout. They had the perfect elements for a gift for Lisa, who is learning to knit, and let me use their swift, so I really can’t complain. Also, I enjoyed calling information for their info and asking for “New York, New York”. I’m such a nerd.
•I had lunch with friends. I say had instead of did because there were no cocktails or reservations involved.

It was a good trip, and just the right length. Of course, I didn’t want to go back to PA at the end of it, but my things were there. And there was the small matter of my contract. So I went back, all of my purchases in tow. I had to make half dozen transfers on the subway to get from Greenpoint to Astoria, since the G only runs out there nights and weekends. Argh. Luckily, there was a very helpful man sitting in front of the map in the car on the Q who helped me find the local N station. Sadly, this involved walking several blocks while toting all my luggage, but I got there. I chalk it up to my St. Christopher medal. I think that the gentleman in question wanted to strike up a conversation anyway….but he gave good directions.

I had one good show of Superstar. I was pretty frazzled by shit that happened before the show, what with arguments over batteries, mics going haywire, etcetera. I managed to squeeze in a trip to the local Starbucks. Considering my allegiance to wonderful indie coffee shops, you’d think that I’d hate Starbucks. I don’t. You always know what you’ll get at Starbucks. It’s the overpriced McDonald’s of coffee.

Anyway, the intern decided that she’d “fix” one of the mic packs by spreading the battery contacts with her car keys. She demonstrated that it worked by turning the pack on and showing me the tiny LED light on top, rather than checking for signal to the board. I told her I wouldn’t put it in the show because I wasn’t confident that it would work during the show. She must have said, “I don’t know why you won’t use it in the show. It should work now” about five or six times before I just walked away. I wanted to scream at her, “because you’re the f$^#ing intern!” She’s still in her teens. Maybe she’ll outgrow it. The show was our best, sound wise, and it was our last. The producer never came to see it. Oh well.

Hey Hijinksters, it's been a while since my last post. I've been a busy, busy girl lately. You see, I met my quarter century mark this past Sunday. Naturally, there was no way to get everyone I love together for one celebration, so it stretched out like an ancient roman festival to one week. This involved three cakes, some cocktails, a floral arrangement, nouvelle cuisine, and a small roman candle. Fireworks and the indoors don't mix. The smell was atrocious!
I've also been packing up my gear for a gig in the great state of Pennsylvania. Or is PA a commonwealth? I've done a lot of laundry. I finally got around to doing all of my handwashing, which was back-breaking work. Using the bathtub for this process seemed like a good idea at the start, but forced me to practically stand on my head to agitate the garments. I washed all of my handmade socks, a felted purse and wallet, two shells, and a cardigan. As I worked the sweater in lazy circles in the dye-seeped bath, I had an irrational urge to make another sweater like it. That sweater did not meet my expectations when I first made it, but now that it's properly blocked, I think that I will love it.
The past week has also featured feverish creation of minidiscs. They're far less desirable to thieves and much more compact. And my minidisc player is more power-(therefore cost-) efficient than my discman. This decision required me to attempt to predict my musical yearnings for the next month or so. I think that I've made about a dozen new discs, ranging from Glenn Gould to Sahara Hotnights. I also had a fairly respectable collection squirreled away, which I sorted into piles like Scrooge counting his coins. Fortunately, my cousin Chris gave me a MD organizer for xmas a couple years ago. His brother is giving me his ipod when he trades up, so this last gasp at embracing the minidisc is funny and a little sad. I think that I'll keep my MD around, for when I don't want the "steal-me" allure of the ipod or when I want to make field recordings, messages for Willie B., make show discs, etc., but our relationship will be forever altered by the ipod. I used my MD player today as I did some shopping in the Loop. I finally found a pair of short-line cans to replace mine, so that I can use the remote again. It's really handy. And who doesn't want to listen to Swedish garage rock while shopping for a St. Christopher medal?
In other news, I finally managed to sync my tablet pc to a desktop. It required me to haul it up to the north side to connect to Lewis's eMachine, but it finally works as I'd hoped! I installed a pared-down version of AOL to it, so that I can still get my email while I'm on the road. Huzzah! I am so excited/relieved by this development that I can barely put the feelings into words.
Now, all I have to do is clean out my car...

I watched the Oscars tonight. It was a terribly predictable evening. As always, the technical categories, such as sound editing, makeup, editing, et al, were poorly judged. Those "minor" awards almost always go to the big popular favorite because people cannot differentiate between a great movie they enjoyed and one with good editing, sound design, scoring, etc. It's really too bad, because many truly talented artists go unrecognized due to the academy's penchant for movies with loud explosions, hideously expensive special effects, and a big gross. I was happy that Digidesign got a Technical Achievement award for the development of its ProTools sound editing system. The importance of that program cannot be overstated. I love it, and naturally, I can't afford it.
The whole evening was pretty dull. The only interesting speech given was by Blake Edwards. Of course, since it was a lifetime achievement award, he had time to prepare. I added a few things to my list of films that I'd like to see, kept a scorecard, and knitted furiously. My picks were not as astute as they've been in the past, largely because I made sentimental choices instead of politic ones. I wanted Bill Murray to win best actor, and Keisha Castle-Hughes to win best actress, though I can think of many reasons that they didn't. I was surprised that Canada won the Foreign Language category, even though American audiences find French language films more accessible than, say, Japanese. There were several films nominated that were featured at the film festival I worked in the fall. Made me wish that I'd gone to more films then.
I've resolved not to buy any sock yarn until my stash is greatly diminished. I have enough sock yarn for a month of Sundays at present. Socks are an easier project to which to commit, I guess, and a smaller financial outlay than, say, a sweater. Still, do I want to work in small gauge forever? I don't even wear socks most of the time!
I finished the beautiful pastel socks in Schaefer yarn, a very luxurious blend of fibers but very fine. Eleven stitches to the inch fine. So when I started working on a pair of socks for my grandfather's upcoming birthday at seven stitches to the inch, it felt luxuriously large gauged. It's all relative. The birthday socks came as a bit of a revelation. I'm making them from Cherry Tree Hill Supersock, with which I have never worked. What a pleasant surprise! I knew that their yarns were beautiful, but they also have a magnificent hand. Supersock feels a lot like Koigu sock yarn, which is an expensive, rare beast in this area. I even have another skein of Supersock in my stash!
I'm working on my raglan colorblock sweater in fits and starts. I don't want to make it with a v neck after all, so I have to chart out a crewneck instead. Knitting is just one big story problem, minus trains in different cities leaving stations.... It isn't terribly difficult to make the necessary alterations, just tedious. Since I cannot start on the sleeves until I've finished the body, I'm stalled on this project.

What if the internet were a physical place that you went to?
That was the main theme of a sketch that I saw on an episode of Chapelle Show. He posited that it would be a horrible, intolerable place. The sketch featured a mall-like environment. I imagine the physical manifestation of the internet to be Times Square circa 1975. It's full of smut, cheap shit to buy that you don't really need, people trying to rip you off, pickup artists, and thieves. The internet doesn't have neon signs though....