Goodnight Sweetheart, We'll It's Time To Go

I'm awake. It's too early to be awake on a Saturday. This is of course after I already laid in bed for a long time trying to go back to sleep. I'm just all wound up and nervous/thinking about too many things. And I don't have 3 men to sing me a lullaby when I can't sleep so....here I am. I'm sure I have yet another cold sore coming, which will be ever so exciting for my family in Indiana to hear!!!! They love that kind of stuff.

Speaking of Indiana, can I just say that I loved going home for Thanksgiving. A part of me was skeptical. I was the only intern, I think, that went home for the holiday and it was just feeling like it was going to be spending a lot of money for no reason. Well, that is crap. I have a ton of reasons why I needed to do it: I got presents (like christmas gels for our windows and stolen hotel coffee bags), I got to see two movies and they didn't cost a zillion dollars (Four Christmases had nothing redeeming about it except for the Taboo scene and Vince Vaughn's description of his life as Shawkshank Redemption, and Quantom of Solace was pretty darn awesome although not quite as good as Casino Royale), I ate epic amounts of food which you know doesn't happen often on my salary, and I got to just be with my family. They really are a crazy bunch of people. Example: one morning all five of us were bustling around our hotel room trying to get ready and Jackie notices all of my mom's jewelry on the table. She then proceeds to put all of it on and became the female version of Mr T. It was hilarious...but I guess you had to be there. And did I mention Irish Car Bombs with some of my cousins? I won't mention their names in case they run for office one day but it was quite bizarre and hilarious.

All of my extended family is reading this blog so I'm sure I'll here about everything I'm posting when I go home for Christmas but I think it's fun to be more connected to them than usual. How can they adore me when they don't even know what I had for dinner yesterday. Am I right or am I right? I'm also just glad that I am over and done with flying by myself for the first time. It wasn't too bad. I guess. The way home was stressful, delayed and consisted of an unavoidable $47 taxi ride, but hey! I did it all by myself. Where's my cookie?

Coming back to work after such a packed holiday was really just not that much fun. We were all stressed out and had too much to do. Opening night for YCTIWY was hectic. We had to do another audience response video and we were being legit professional about it. We made quarter sheets to pass out to people that had a blurb about it, our Talk It Out Booth logo, and a snazzy map of the lobby to show you where to go. Yeah, professional. We even had the stool, lights and backdrop set up the whole time so that people could walk by it and get interested. Well the second intermission was over and we’re doing our final prep and in walks a five piece band that set up about 2 feet away from us. I could have shot them all. The sound quality is pretty bad on the tape. And overall people just didn’t want to do it. It seems like it always ends up being a ton of work for practically no pay off. Once the video is up I’ll post a link to it and you can see what I mean. It’s not bad it just, well it’s not what we wanted it to be.

Then last Friday we had a double whammy. The Crew 10th Anniversary party was the same night as Happy Hour. We had to set up for both of the events simultaneously which mainly meant hauling around huge tables from one end of the building to another and trucking mass quantities of alcohol. And maybe it would have been okay if it didn’t happen on a day when two people got laid off and we had a company meeting about how screwed we are for next season. It was just a really sad day to be at work. The parties themselves went really well though. Drew and I made $27 bucks each in tips working behind the bar and we were finished cleaning a bit after midnight. Oh 9am-midnight days, you are only possible because of my youth and lack of ability to find another job.

I lobby managed all weekend and then bippity boppity boop I’m back at work again on Monday. No complaints because money is great, but, I think I need to scale back next year. I’m just doing too much and I fear my head will explode.

This week wasn’t as bad, but was still a long one. We had Taste of the Rep last night. There was talk of snow happening so traffic was ridiculously bad. Half of our participants didn’t show up and the food was an hour late. It’s fine. What was really awesome was when we were setting up a song came on and Fran said, “This is the song that helped me get over a break up.” So we turned off the lights and Jessica, Fran and I laid on the floor and just listened to it. Sometimes we just don’t have time to do bonding stuff like that because we’re too focused on getting more napkins and moving chairs. It was fun and will most likely be one of the truly peaceful moments I’ll have until I’m back in Iowa (coming Dec 20th to a Dubuque near you).

This was Haley, the paints intern’s, last week at the Rep which was really sad. She’s down to Earth and really funny so she’ll be missed a lot. We also did our Intern Skit for the SRO holiday party. The basic plot line was that we acted out snippets from three shows that we’ve done this season and had an actor ask the stage manager what their next line was. In a bit of hilarious I’ve-never-seen-this-before type circumstance, the stage management intern was day dreaming and then WHAM the actors transform into the dream sequence. Highlights of my acting included a Delilah reference, channeling Samuel L. Jackson for our Cakes on a Plane scene, and mocking Waiting for Godot. People were saying it was the best skit they’ve seen in years. Obvi. Our intern class is pretty much phenomenal.

OH AND DID I MENTION? This week I also went to the Deck the Hall Ball at WaMu theater in down down downtown Seattle! The bands were The Aqueducts, Shiny Toy Guns, Cold War Kids, Death Cab for Cutie and The Killers. Um. I need an iTunes gift card NOW. It is killing me to not be able to buy music. This was my first time going to a concert that wasn’t headlining five men singing and dancing for 13 year olds and I loved it. The Killers were absolutely, positively the best band I’ve seen live, which granted isn’t a long list, but get over it. I was pretty miffed off that they wouldn’t even let me into the bar area because I had a vertical id still. I just said, “Really? Really? Even though it clearly states that I’m 22 and a half?” “Um, yeah. It’s Quest policy.” And the hit list just keeps getting longer and longer.

I have another long weekend of lobby managering ahead of me, but it shouldn’t be too bad. I do get to go to my very first office holiday party tonight at Scott’s house which I’m probably way too excited for. We’re talking egg nog and singing carols around a piano type fare and I’m pumped. I’ll also be watching a lot of Mad Men Season One, which is slowly starting to push me to working more in marketing and maybe even an advertising agency someday. Okay, we won’t even talk about that. Also—I rewatched Dial M for Murder last night and it is still amazing. Netflix it, it’s good.

Alright, well I’ll try to calm down and hopefully my last week before Christmas won’t be hell on Earth. I will be going to two high schools all day Monday to take pictures and shoot videos for the Playwriting Project so at least that’ll be fun. If anyone has strong sleeping pills, send ‘em my way. I think eventually I should try to get some sleep.

Love and Frasier.