A Hooker’s work is never done

Last night, I went over to Steve’s house to help him decorate for Christmas. I don’t know if you’ve ever had the experience of decorating for the holidays with a gay scenic designer with the money to do it right, but lemme tell ya, it looks GRAND!!! I’m actually quite pleased/proud of the job we did on his living room….

First, the tree… We wrapped the trunk tightly with white lights that flicker, then topped that with 1000 purple lights that are stationary. Next came the sparkly, glittery garland that looks like tiny ornaments…we made swags of it, so the garland loops down in these semicircles, the balls on the garland getting bigger as we got closer to the bottom. Then, with one last larger string of garland, we made a large ‘S’ on the front of the tree…monogramming it just like his towels and bathroom doors!!! The color scheme was all gold and purple, so the ornaments are just two colors…making it look like a Royal Xmas tree…Royal is Steve’s last name…I mean, it looks fantastic. It looks like something you’d see in a store window. It looks like the gayest thing ever, and it’s gorgeous.

Then we created the North Pole and Santa’s Village on his entertainment center with the houses and figures his grandmother has been collecting since the dawn of time, from the Heritage Collection… All the houses light up, and with the addition of the bunting and the fake snow we drizzled over top everything, it really looks like a mini-North Pole…SO CUTE!!!

And now it really feels like the holiday season for me. I had so much fun!!

This rest and relaxation has done me woonnnnnnnders, I tell ya. I’m in such a good mood now, thankfully! I was no exactly Debbie Downer, but I sure wasn’t Suzy Sunshine for the last several weeks. I’m glad to be back where I belong…singing songs all the time and dancing around everywhere I go, this is normal behavior for me, because I love where I am and what I’m doing; I just needed a week of sleep to remember that.

As a side note, the combo of dry heat and my yearly sinus infection has turned my soft palette into a cripsy slab of tender. Gross.

Another side note, my knitting is going along like I’ve been doing it my whole life, and I think I understand why all those Hollywood types took up knitting…it’s a good way to be productive while sitting still, it keeps your hands busy so you smoke less, and damn it makes pretty gifts! I’m so happy that I’ve finally learned, after seven years of frustrating false starts… When I’m accomplished enough to make hats, I might be the happiest girl in the world. Hats to match any outfit…hats for every occasion…sounds like a dream to me!

Goddamn, I feel good!!! I slept in until 2:30 today, and while most of the world might find this gross and excessive, it made me feel excellent…I have been fighting off some kind of sickness, teetering right on the edge of Being Sick instead of just Feeling Bad, and it finally appears to be gone. Also, I know you can’t technically catch up on sleep, but after getting 0 to 4 hours of sleep a night for two weeks, it felt like the best present ever to stay in bed for 12 hours.

This Thanksgiving break is shaping up to be the most relaxing ever…but I think my family may hate me for it. Somehow, it was more acceptable to them that I travel to Asheville to not spend Thanksgiving with them…spending Thanksgiving at my home in W-S, they are taking as a personal affront. I mean, not really…they get it, but they sure are giving me loads of shit for it. My stepmother in particular just can’t imagine why I’d prefer staying in my big, empty house (devoid of roommate) than traveling the hour and a half to be with them for one day. Truth be told, holidays aren’t that important to me. What IS important to me is my mental health and my happiness, both of which necessitated this housebound holiday. What I mean is that I’d much rather take five days for myself, five days that I won’t see again until summer, in all likelihood, to just be by myself and relax in the true manner of the word. Cuz most of us know, going home isn’t always the most relaxing thing that ever happens. If I’d gone to Asheville, I would have spent the whole time packing in as much time with as many friends as possible, and while that would have been awesome, I am just too tired for that. If I’d gone to Raleigh, I would have spent the whole time feeling guilty about not calling my friend Hannah (who I haven’t seen in a year) or feeling guilty about not having the conversation my dad is dying to have about his affair and how it makes me feel. If I’d gone to Whiteville, I would have spent the whole time smoking, sleeping and watching TV, which I can do right here at home.

And SO, I’ve opted for the economical choice, the sanity-saving choice, the choice I wanted the most, and why is it that people are having a hard time understanding that? I think my family doesn’t believe me when I tell them I have 20 hour days at school, or something…I think maybe my stepmother is jealous that I get to spend time alone at all, b/c she sure hasn’t in the last eight years…I think my dad feels like he can’t say anything about it at all because he’s been selfish in most regards for my entire life, and now it’s my turn.

Maybe I am just being selfish, but I don’t feel like my family should need a manufactured, commercial holiday to know that I love them. I tell them, I show them, they know it…why do I need to be there to get so full I can’t have conversation? Maybe one day they will get it…that I am being selfish now so that I can be successful later and take care of them like they deserve, when the time comes.

I don’t think it’s coldhearted of me to take time for myself. I mean, right?

So I can’t seem to stop knitting. It’s the best new trick I’ve learned in ages…Hello, Christmas presents!! It’s so much fun to choose colors and textures based on the personality of the people I’m knitting for…my mom, for instance, is a very beautiful woman who dressed in a very understated manner with lots of neutrals and pastels. So for her, I went opposite…she needs more color in her wardrobe (maybe her life) and so I’ve chosen a gorgeous redpurple fuzzy yarn, which I’m accenting with a more subtle yarn, much thinner, grading from white to cream to tan to black…with metallic fibers throughout. It’s soft and fuzzy and absolutely beautiful so far. I’m proud of my new skill!!

Also, in case anyone was wondering how a large, airy, gorgeous 3 bedroom house in an uberconvenient location to everything can be on the market for $650 a month, I’ll tell ya: it’s the fucking crackheads all over the place. I swear I have never lived in a city with so many stinking crackheads. I’m tired of them and their diminshed lives and their addictions and their forwardness about it all. I mean, I have a heart, I have empathy for those that can’t do for themselves, but lawd have mercy on the next crackhead that thinks it’s appropriate to approach me, in my car, at a stoplight at 3 am. In what world is that every a good, fruitful idea? I’m pretty tired of it, myself.

This tyrade reminds me of something an old friend use to say about gamers: “Magic The Gathering, more expensive than crack”. I never truly understood what he meant by that, but it always made me laugh…

Happy Thanksgimme, everyone. I’ll be thinking of you all from my station on the couch, where I spend my day tomorrow in blessed solitude, knitting away.

I really might have to give up the rhyming titles…I’m stretching it a bit here.

And, I’m relaxed, finally! Turned in my last project yesterday two full hours before deadline, I got my portfolio review taken care of, I’ve stocked on up movies, I got groceries and fire wood, Kaylan and DaniRose both left me lots of wine to drink, and I don’t have shit to do for at least two days. Glory be!! I can’t begin to explain how luscious it is going to be to lay down on my futon and not move for as long as possible…the only thing that sucks is that I can’t watch movies or TV while it’s light outside because the projector bulb is getting kind of dim…other than that, it’s paradise on my couch.

I’ve taken up knitting and set the goal of completing one scarf (aka Xmas present) by the time break is done. Also, I have to complete all of my renderings, but that shouldn’t take more than two days of steady painting, and being at home, high as hell with a glass of wine and a paint brush is almost NOT work…it’s fun craft day surprise.

I’m eating Thanksgiving dinner with several of the Wig and Makeup girls…they are always a hoot. Then, Steve and I are meeting in downtown Greensboro to go find our rendering teacher and get holiday hammered with him. I do love that Franco Colavecchio…he has made me a better painter already…I like that with each piece I do, I see a definite progression. It could have everything to do with getting used to a new medium, but I like to think that instruction from a man that taught at Harvard and Julliard before stopping here has something to do with the progress as well.

Also, I’m going to see Rent tomorrow, and Harry Potter on Friday, and I can’t think of much that would please me more…aside from having a cute girl by the fire with me…

Speaking of cute girls, I absolutely believed that me and DaniRose were being so discreet about our little affair…turns out, in reality, the entire school knows. Apparently, the looks we give each other are enough to tip off the bystanders. And here I thought we had a hot secret….but no! They’re all onto us, everyone’s talking about it, and, as life works at NCSA, now I’ve got another uber-hot girl flirting with me since I’m psuedo-unavailable. I mean, I don’t HATE feeling like I’m in demand (but it’s not hard, what with all FIVE of the lesbians at my school….)

I just never really intended to jump into the NCSA pool…because now, by six degrees, I’ve slept with most everyone. And that’s how it goes around here…everyone sleeps with everyone else. I guess maybe that’s how it works at most colleges…I’ve just never been to have a frame of reference.

Okay, I’m getting real groggy from the Tylenol PM Cold I took a bit ago…must head for the couch with my knitting…to take an eight hour nap. mmmmmmmm….nap.

I am so relieved at the fact I’ve turned in my last drafting project for the term that I literally feel high…like a sandbag had been living on my chest for a couple of months, and someone finally hoisted it up a bit to give me some more breathing room.

Thankgiving break is gonna be awesome, that’s for sure. I very much look forward to knitting and watching movies and sleeping like it’s my job and eating good food and having fires in the fireplace all day long…mmmm…good times. The joy of having a futon is that I can hole up in the living room and not move very much. I mean, no need to go upstairs to bed when I could just pull the futon out and totally submerge myself in the Lazy Experience.

Can’t. Think. Straight. Must go take a nap. There’s an end of term party tonight that I just can’t miss.

Well, it’s Friday again. I don’t know how this happens…really I don’t. Time mystifies me sometimes with the speed it moves…I’m not entirely convinced that there aren’t wrinkles that speed up or slow down it’s passage. This Friday was my last day of class until it’s 2006, and with that, there is a great deal of relief, and a touch of terror. How can I already be done with the first term of my sophmore year? I know it sounds silly, but I just got here.

I think I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed with all of the information I’ve absorbed, all the information I’ve had to process, apply and regurgitate, and all the work that has gone into the previous two reasons. I simply can’t believe Loot is up and running (and about to close already!), the semester has ended, I’ve learned how to draft groundplans, elevations and sections, I’ve painted five renderings included a damn-near perfect replica of an Alphonse Mucha portrait, and completed two 4 foot by 8 foot paintings using sticks with brushes attached to them. Oh, and all that stagecraft stuff like how to figure out which width wire rope to use to hang that 400 lb. curtain we just painted. Lotsa handy stuff, but handy stuff in large quantities is still large quantities.

And my brain is full now. And my body is tired, wanting a long sleep with no interruptions, and lots of showers afterwards. Oh, and fresh vegetables! I want to cook, and sleep, and knit. And sleep. And eat and sleep and watch movies and sleep and read comic books and eat and sleep some more.

As such, I’ve opted to stay in Winston Salem for Thanksgiving, which is kind of odd, because it’s the first holiday I’ll spend away from my family or my old friends in Asheville…but it feels right to me. It’s economical, and it’ll actually be a real live break. I haven’t actually completey unpacked from moving in, and I think it’s high time I do it.

And really, it’s that I have school work that has to be done over break. Suck as it might, it’s the truth. I’ve had a lot of fun this term, and I don’t regret a second of it, but I have not exactly been pushing myself like I did all of last year to achieve more. And I see myself sliding in rank here, not much but it’s enough that I notice it and don’t like it…because in order to really excel here, there’s so much sacrifice. Somtimes it’s time to work really hard, really consistently (and I DO work hard, every day, but there’s always someone working a little bit harder), and sometimes it’s time to enjoy life and not take things so seriously. But I feel the time for seriousness is creeping up on me, and I welcome the challenge. I think. Maybe, at least, I will after a week of me-time, down-time, sleepy-time.

That’s assuming, of course, I don’t get so paranoid about being alone in a house that’s under surveillance by a crazy Moravian that I have to go to Raleigh just so I won’t be alone. It could happen…it could definetly happen.

I can’t seem to stop listening to the Avenue Q soundtrack…especially the songs “It Sucks to be Me” and “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist”…too f’in funny. And I particularly like the fact that my friend Becky that graduated last year is working on the show…it makes me like it more. Is that ridiculous? I guess it’s one of those success stories that gives us all back at NCSA great hope that we’ll get to Broadway, too. Whatever. Really I just like the fact that there is a Gary Coleman character… I imagine a Gary Coleman puppet is quite a sight to see. Additionally, I love that there is a puppet show on Broadway. Good stuff.

Thank goodness for stage managers and their phone trees…I would NOT have woken up for drafting this morning, had myself, Kaylan and DaniRose not instituted the Monday/Friday morning phone tree…meaning whoever wakes up first immediately calls the other two. DaniRose was the first up, 30 minutes after my drafting class started. For some reason, I won’t wake up for the alarm, but my phone rings and my eyes snap open…so I wake up to DaniRose saying, “Suzy, you didn’t wake up. Go to drafting right now.” And then I cried on the phone for a minute and hit the ground running. I hate that feeling…it must be one of the worst in the world; your eyes open, the sun is all wrong in the room, you look at a clock and realize that not only did you oversleep but you’re already due somewhere. I mean, it’s one thing to wake up fifteen minutes before class starts…but waking up thirty minutes AFTER class has started, well…that just blows. And to ice that crap cake, it means I lost five points off of 20% of my grade, when I can use all the easy points in drafting that I can get. The silver lining to this morning is that Dennis gave us a full week to complete our final draft, which is nearly unheard of, and also totally fuckin’ awesome…gives me time to deal with the rest of my finals this week without having to draft til this weekend, when everything else is already finished.

My parents are coming to see my show this weekend…I’m super-excited. I think this production is the one I’m most proud of, thus far. I just GOTTA get some pictures and post them…I don’t think I can quite do 1500 roses justice without photographic evidence.

I have a distinctly heart-shaped bruise on my left shoulder. It’s cute. I wish I always bruised in identifiable shapes. It’s almost like a temporary tattoo.

Also, I got purple paint in a blister, and then it healed up and now I have a purple polka dot on my index finger. Kinda cute, might kill me with blood poisoning.

Uh oh, I’m being a fatalist again. I don’t like to think that I use this space as a Complaining Ground, but I guess sometimes I do. Sorry, folks.

“The Jews have all the money and the Whites have all the power, and I always in taxi cab with driver who no shower.” That’s a line from “Everyone’s a little bit racist”, sung by the Asian American puppet. I love it! I feel like she’s a mail-order bride, but I guess that’s racist of me…

Mannnn…my house is trashed and it’s really freaking me out because I don’t have time to clean (I say as I waste MORE time on Friendster), and I really feel like Daniel ought to anyway since the mess is his, but I’m the one who’s most bothered by the mess and I have to just suck it up until tomorrow night when I can take an hour and clean the kitchen so I’m not assaulted with the stinky smell of gross old chicken the second I walk in the door. I like a kitchen that smells like fresh baked goods or sauteed garlic…not cigarettes and trash. Mmmmm… makes a person want to eat a big, fresh meal. Blick.

Since I’m on the Diet Coke/cigarettes/Lance cracker diet right now, I guess it matters not.

My eyes are crossing from drafting for so long, so I thought I’d take a break, and write on this computer??? because that’s gonna rest my eyes so good. Truthfully, I’m way too jacked on caffeine to sit and do nothing. As that would be unproductive in any fashion, it’s an unacceptable luxury to my silly brain right this second.

So that crackhead with the Bible I had to chase off the front porch about a month and a half ago…well, he’s officially a stalker. My neighbors from two houses up came and chilled with Daniel and I for a while, and apparently, this guy has a car, and is just sitting in it, on the corner of Sunset and First. He’s confused, thankfully, and has been knocking on everyone else’s door, asking if Daniel is there. Even so, I’m totally freaked. There is a CRAZY MAN waiting in his car to see if he can spot Daniel. That makes me reeeeeal uncomfortable, seeing as I’m in and out of the house at all hours of the day. This is a close little neighborhood, and all of the neighbors knew enough not to tell this guy which house Daniel lives in, but STILL, I already had to chase him off the porch in the middle of the night, and lucky for me, I had a large man escorting me home that night. But what happens next time? I mean, I could be alone with my hands completely full of drafting or rendering or groceries and he could pop out of the bushes at me. Ewwww…I’m getting so scared right this second!!! The word is out to call the cops ASAP if anyone spots him again, which I’m sure they will. Part of me feels very thankful I’m not his target, but I mean, close enough… He gives everyone some spiel about the Moravian Church, which scares me The Most…religious crazies, I think, are the very worst…they’re willing to do most anything for their “faith”. Oh god, I feel like crying a little bit. I guess the only thing to be done is call the cops immediately and constantly every time I see that greasy, creepy old fucker.

Well, now that I’ve scared the everliving shit out of myself, back to drafting…..sigh….

Somebody tell me please what I’ve done in life to deserve unlawful crazies lurking about everywhere, all the goddammed, f’in time?????

I’m up way past my bedtime…I thought for sure that the knitting-with-a-glass-of-wine-in-front-of-the-fire would put me to sleep, but I was wrong. Instead, I drowsed by the fire, dropped a bunch of stitches, and thought (instead of worked!) about all the work I have to do in the next five days. I really should have bored myself to sleep, but I worried myself awake, something I’ve just GOT to stop doing.

I worked on my spray project tonight for a good long time. I totally fucked it up in the fourth hour…yay for me! I spent what felt like forever masking this building and then doing a perfect gradient blend from a very light blue-purple to a very deep blue-purple, only to forget to mask it when I sprayed the sky right next to it. And voila! I wasted four hours of work.

Then I got electrocuted. No, really. My hands were wet from mixing paint and then washing it off of me, and I went to unplug the fan that I had on my flat, and zzzzzzttt! It got me. It actually freaked me out pretty good, it was quite a jolt…it made my whole arm tingle and there’s a blister on my finger where I accidentally made contact…kinda rattled my teeth in my head and made my knees feel weak…. After fucking up the building and THEN getting a decent amount of voltage via my finger, I called it a night.

I should have immediately gone home to draft, but instead I wandered around Performance Place, visiting all of my friends in tech or production. Me and Kaylan and another Wig and Makeup girl got yelled at because we were smoking right behind the stage that a show was happening on, and apparently people could hear us squealing and dancing through the dock door. Oops. I don’t think Chekov ever included ‘three squealing women’ in his monumentally boring play, Three Sisters. Wait…maybe it was the perfect sound effect, after all. Funny, I didn’t even put that all together until right now. So I don’t feel so bad about that, after all…

Then, I went and checked out the progress on the set of Loot. The crown moulding is officially A Pain In My Ass. You know it’s never a good sign when the TD is up on a ladder, staring down at me with a shit eating grin and a handful of joint compound, telling me that she loves me. In theaterspeak, that means she screwed my crew, as we have to paint every inch of that joint compound she’s applying to the crown moulding, and lemme tell ya, it’s not as easy to ‘touch-up’ wood grain as one might think. Especially since it has to be done on a fifteen foot ladder. Monday’s gonna be fun, I can see that much clearly. Granted, it looks pretty phenomenal already, and it’s gonna look absolutely amazing once it’s all complete (on Monday, knock on wood) but it feels awfully inconvenient right now, during finals.

Speaking of finals, this is what my week has been:
Oh, you have 800 hours of work to do in one week.
Oops, you accidentally found yourself hooking up with your friend during the busy season, instead of working like the little busy bee you SHOULD be right now.
Uh-oh, she’s also your neighbor so it’s too easy to make excuses about being ‘just across the street’ from all the work you should be doing.
Dang, you actually really enjoy her company, too.
Woopsie-daisy, you’re distracted by her charms when you should be focusing on work.
FUCK! There went three days.

Thank goodness we’re both working the same show…at least the insanity ends at the same time for the both of us.

I’m running on the faith and knowledge that everything WILL actually get done, it’s just the getting there that’s really gonna blow. And then there’s the wrap party, two days after finals are over. THAT’S my light at the end of the tunnel, right there. Term’s done, show’s done, no more staying up all night or getting up real early. At least for a week, I mean. And that’s something to look forward to, for reals. Sleeping in late with a cute neighbor will make everything okay again, I just know it.

Five more days, five more days, five more days. Then I’m done for a hot second. Except for all the rendering I have to do over Thanksgimmie. But that’s next week…

I’ve decided to take a page from Max Cannon, the writer/illustrator of Red Meat cartoons, and make all my titles rhyme.

So, OH SHIT, finals are here. I missed my f’in Stagecraft class for the SECOND time this week…bad bad bad. Luckily, my instructor is an understanding, kind man, and didn’t give me shit and helped update me and prepare me for the next class. Nice, nice man. I like to think that they all know how we don’t sleep and bust our asses, and really just want to see us succeed. I mean, I think that’s how they think. At least, I assume based on their attitudes if we actually go talk to them about problems we might be having in the class, attendance included. I’m a lucky girl, I know that much. Missing an arts class twice at end of term is frowned upon, for sure.

I’m supposed to be drafting right this second, but what’s new?

I’m going to go check out the set when I finish my draft…I hear there is joint compound on every joint that exists on the set, and that means that touch-ups are going to take FOREVER. I mean, wood-graining fifty 3″ sections… Not that I mind, I like painting as I’ve said over and over, but it seems like a lot of work that could have, perhaps, been avoided.

I’ll be in Asheville in ten days and this makes me immeasurably happy. Granted, I will have to spend most of my time painting on a bunch of renderings that I have to have done by the end of Thanksgimmie break, but at least I’ll be spending time painting in Asheville, and that equals happy times for me.

Hollis’ bday party planning will officially be in the works as of the 20th of Nov….stay tuned for further updates (any Ashevillians reading this…) That girl needs a good party this year…she deserves it.