Pic from a Late Nite

I have no idea what's going on here, but one thing's for sure: it's a bit.

Segway Tour of Amsterdam with Mao

Yes, we took a Segway Tour of Amsterdam. All thanks go to Andrew for setting this up. The tour was set up by Mao, an American ex-pat who was very nervous indeed to have us use the segways. Particularly Lauren and Laurel. He was real worried about them, so he had another guy follow behind all of us "just in case". Not the greatest pick for security since this bearded stoner guy, originally from San Diego and whose name escapes me, was about 5'5" and maybe 100 pounds soaking wet. Whatever trouble we might get in, I don't think San Diego hippie guy was going to do it.

Riding those things was the one of the most joyfully gay things you can do. Not one person could avoid looking at us and laughing at our helmets, the segways, and everything else involved.

Canal Ride

It's Laurel's B-day, so we were treated to a canal ride. Laurel looks hilariously tired in this photo. Our director Jon, had us sing Dutch songs as we rode around Amsterdam, trying to get others involved. Rachel made a strawberry cakey thing. The canals were beautiful.

I'm still pretty jet-lagged. Rather than spend another night in Jim's Casa de Filth, Matt invited the two of us to stay with him and his girlfriend CeCe. They live in a little studio on the top floor. The view looked like this:


I still couldn't sleep. Tonight, we're staying somewhere else and living off the kindness of the cast. Definitely a big college vibe here.

Day One in Amsterdam

Dunbar dropped me off at the airport with Erica and I said my goodbyes. I know that Erica will only be apart for 3 months, but it's hard top say goodbye to her. Dunbar's been so great in helping me move too, and I will miss him a lot. After they drive off, I am left with my mountain of bags to bring to Europe.

The flight is long, and I find that I am very anxious. It's been 10 years since I backpacked through Europe and I can barely remember what Amsterdam looks like. I watch shows on my laptop and read about Amsterdam and I can't sleep so I don't. Once I get off the plane I find Jon (or Pep as he is known to Boom folk), Lauren, and Amber waiting for me. I've overpacked and have so many bags that I am totally embarassed as we go to an aiport cafe and wait for Laurel's delayed flight.

I drink coffee and await to hear about the big news on my apartment. Everyone in Chicago kept asking me where I was going to be living, and I had no idea, so Jon explained to me that he was thinking that I would live in this certain apartment that had a cat. I mentioned my allergy to cats, so that changed that. Apparently, this also left Laurel without a place too, so once she arrived we dropped off all our bags at Boom in the actor's office, known as "the Shiny". They would end up living under the computer table for the next week.

After the bags were stowed, I was sent over to Dan and Lauren's place. Dan and Lauren are the other two new actors, from Los Angeles, but they arrived a few days ago and already are moved into an apartment together. Dan allows me to try to nap on his bed, but besides the awkwardness of sleeping on a stranger's new futon bed, the room is also very small, more like a large closet, and there is only room for the futon, a fan, and a shelf near the ceiling. I rest more than nap and the four of us meet Pep for dinner and we watch the first show and then get ready for our first big show.

The cast of my first Late Nite:


Greg tries to show me how to put on my microphone. I try to work the mic belt, but can't figure out its logic with my brain pounding from adrenalin and lack of sleep. His method is to palce the mic into the belt and tuck it under your belt, which I find odd, but try it anyway.

The show is a blur, but my first scene with Lauren gets a big laugh, and I feel like I might be okay here. Then we head to our "room" for the night-Jim's filthy bed.

Jim's bed is legend, and people are already telling me tales of Jim getting drunk one night and pissing on the mattress rather than getting up for the bathroom. "Don't worry, he turned the mattress over," someone tells me. Jim and Suzi are in Frankfurt with Tim and Tarik, so we are sent there with Justine, Suzi's girlfriend and her friends visiting from Australia.

This is tough to write about without sounding catty, but trust that I'm just trying to be honest when I say that Jim's room is filthy. There's a deep funk in the room, certainly from the dirty clothes and sheets, and who knows what else. A naked girl is drawn on the wall, her vagina drawn carefully in the foreground with her saying "Fuck me, I'm Dutch and unemotional." The grey stain on the wall by the end of the bed is what I imagine to be dirt coming off the grey pillow cases, but turns out to be a collection of what Jim grabbed from nose during his night's slumer. A giant, booger cloud. The bed reeks of, well, Jim. I ask Justine for some different pillows, move down the bed so my head is not near the booger cloud, and fall asleep. If it weren't 5am and I hadn't been up for over a day, I don't know if I could have slept on that bed. I've had my own filthy days, but no one ever had to sleep in it but me. I wake up around 1:00 the next day, my first day in Amsterdam behind me.



Getting ready to sleep in the filthiest bed ever.


The "new kids" post-show.

30 Days Left

So, after all my worrying, I am heading to Amsterdam. I really thought it was not going to happen. Now, everything has that feeling of "the last time."

I'm grateful. Very much so. Finally, I will get to spend a year working and making a living doing what I want to do, plus I get to do it in another country. I'm realistic enough to know that this isn't going to be perfect; it'll be a job with the up's and down's of any job, but I hope to keep a clear head about the fact that it's taken years for me to be a paid actor. Three years of Patrick's theatre company and four years at Charna's Chuckle House has brought me, finally, to being a paid actor. It feels good.

I'd better not forget it.

A Friend Has Passed...

Brian sent me word that the Coronet Theater in San Francisco is closing. They're putting up a housing center for seniors, and as much as I think that's awesome for the old folks, having lived in that city for seven long years, I know there are plenty of other real estate opportunities for such a facility. The problem was, the theater was the largest single screen in the States, seating 1,300 and not enough people showed. It was losing money, so they sold it. Good work, City of San Francisco. Your preservation efforts went out the window of a live/work loft. Thanks for the memories, Coronet. It was great to see Star Wars there, Exorcist, and many others. You will be missed.

Fuck you , Hallmark.

Last Christmas, I watched a CBS Hallmark movie about a pair of red shoes a little girl wanted to give her dying mother. I appreciate the sentiment, but this was the biggest waste of time. We could have spent that time talking or even sleeping. The most current Hallmark attraction, however, is worthy of your time and attention.



I have a special relationship with Hallmark films or Afterschool Specials of this type. My Mom would always make my brother and I watch a TV movie if it was about teen suicide or drug use or running away or safe sex. She's say, "Boys, there is a program that I feel is important for you to watch tonight." This was the way we were exposed the deeper issues, by enduring an hour long special presentation.

Once, we watched one that was about a teen couple that had a baby while they were still in high school. At the end, my Mom said, "You see, boys, it's very important to practice safe sex." It was one of the few times we had a "sex chat." Usually, we avoided the topic altogether. When we did finally talk about it, it was in public.

I had graduated high school and was preparing for my first semester in college, so my Mom took me to CostCo to buy some supplies. After loading up the cart with Goldfish crackers and Top Ramen, my Mom decided to enter into our first frank and adult conversation about sex. "Do you want to get some condoms?" she asked, "They sell them here."

I went immediately red. "N-no," I stammered, "I'll take care of that."

"I just want you to be safe. It's important. We might as well get them while we're here."

It was tempting. I'd be supplied for a good while, a wholesale tub of rubbers. But then, I realized my Mom was attempting the best safe sex of all. By buying me condoms, I'd think about her every time I went for one, completely ruining any sexual urge I'd previously had. I declined and got Kool-Aid instead.

I just saw the cover of the new TimeOut Chicago with Defiant Thomas Brothers. I'm so happy for those dudes, whom I don't really know except I did a shitty sketch show at Second City with Seth when I first moved to town, but I can't help feeling that if we had only kept our shit together, it would have been Good Time Hour doing just as well. That is a great regret for me.

Not too sure about this Amsterdam thing anymore. The longer it takes for me to get "the call", the less confident I am about it. I spent February and March living in a dreamworld, wherein I would be living in Europe, performing improv and sketch to Dutch people and tourists. I tried not to let too many people know about it, but word gets around and most people ask me, "When are you going to Boom?", and I have to be all, "Ah, I don't know yet." It'll suck to have to tell people I'm not going at all.

But I will be moving. That much I'm sure of. I think I am done here in Chicago. Time to go. I'm trying to think of what would keep me here, and besides continuing to do what I've done for the past couple years, I'm a little stumped. So, off I go. Europe or LA, here I come.

I took two "snow days" this week, and spent one of them playing XBOX until my eyes crossed. What a life. I have no patience for my job anymore. The dangling carrot that is Amsterdam has me already giving up on work (I need a new job anyway), and I basically come in to check email and hunt through the Internet.

We miss you, Shaq.

FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

Last weekend Erica and I headed up to Minneapolis, visiting my brother and taking in all that Minnesota has to offer. First stop was the Mall of America, or MOA, as it is called.


I'm totally MOA right now.

My brother tells me that the South section is the most dangerous, which blows my mind to think that there is a dangerous section. Not in the danger zone was an Orange Julius, which I used to love growing up. They had one at the UTC, but then it closed and I didn't have one again until college, when they had one at the Serramonte Mall. I had to have one. I decided on an original, and oh heavenly delight, it was as delicious as my childhood remembered. They are samplings of fucking nirvana. Yeah, I said it. I looked for a recipe on the Internet, and here's a recipe some dude has even copyrighted:

Recipe Created By: Robbie
Prep. Time: 0:15Serves: 2
6 oz. can frozen concentrated orange juice
1 cup milk - low-fat okay
1 cup water
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
8 ice cubes

-Pour all ingredients, except ice cubes, in a blender.
-Blend, adding ice cubes one at a time, until smooth.

Nice secret blending technique, Robbie. Glad you got the copyright on it. Now, no one steal this, or Robbie will sue. By the way, there's a ton of Orange Julius recipes on the Internet, so I'm not the only one with misguided priorities.

Slurp!

To follow, we went here:


and went tubing. There were fathers and their little kids, teenagers, and us, four twenty and thrity year-olds crashing their lines. First couple runs were a little tentative, but pretty soon I was racing from the tow line to the fir

The only thing that comes with age is responsibility. I think I may be avoiding that as much as possible in my life. I was thinking about this last night as I played Splinter Cell on my XBOX until 3am. I work a crappy day job I can't stand that barely affords me a living, I am more disorganized than I have ever been, I sleep less, and my evening hours are usally spent either rehearsing or performing improvisation. That doesn't sound like what I thought 30 would be like.

Most of my friends are either married or engaged, going to grad shcool, buying a home, or having children. I'm not worried about keeping up, rather a little amazed at the path my life has taken. When I was a teenager, I really never had set goals for myself by certain ages. That might have been a mistake, I don't know. I'm reflecting because I may be moving to Amsterdam to work in a theater there doing sketch and improv. I will be 31 in October, and this feels, this move to another country, like only keeping me from truly growing up. I have no idea why I feel this way. On the other hand, I'm totally thrilled.

Today on the El, a guy was reading Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. It made me smile. I own a record of the same book, but it's more of a long commercial for why someone should own the book. Looks like someone does.

When I say I own the record, I am lying. I "borrowed" it before my roommate Brian moved to Japan. I was using it a lot to mix into songs at the time, so I took it. I'm sorry, Brian. I have your record.

This got me thinking. I know people have some of my stuff, and I know I have some of other people's stuff. Here's a quick list off the top of my head:

-some Judge Dredd comic I borrowed from Torin (since 1989).

-the book SNL- First Ten Years I borrowed from Andy in my sophmore year (1990). Thanks Andy, I've read it quite a few times!

-I borrowed Conderacy of Dunces from Ali (1991), and she borrowed some Beautiful South cassettes. I hope she's still listening to them. I only got through half of John Kennedy O'Toole's little tome. Is it OK that I didn't get into it? Everyone I know loves that book.

-I feel really bad about this one, because Keith really wanted this book back. It's an anthology of One-Act Plays (2000). Sorry, Keith.

-Torin gave me a bunch of stuff to borrow; never learning that I suck at giving stuff back. His VHS copy of Armour of God (borrowed in 1993) is in a box in my parents attic.

-a Casio keyboard from Aimee. (probably around 1988 or so). It probably needs batteries.

I'm also pretty bad at remembering what I let people borrow. On Halloween, last year, my friend Chris gave me 3 Cd's I forgot I had lent him. Thanks, Chris.

p.s.
It gets so dark in Chicago, and so early. Yesterday my co-worker gasped at the sunlight, just peeking around the corner of the buildings off Michigan Ave. Most days, it is so dark I can barely see the world outside, only me and my desk staring right back at me. I can safely say I hate walking into the cold darkness after a day at my horrible office job.

falderol

falderol
Originally uploaded by talfulano

I am really proud of this show, and I have had the most fun working on than I have with anything. Every Rehearsal we start off do a ridiculous dance and laughing. The whole process has been fun, not any attitude of "we're going to invent the new form or be the group that everyone talks about." Also, I've learned a ton from working with our director Matt Craig and Laurel and Ed.

What is up motherfuckers!