Next time I'm laying off the Bellinis

Why do I do it to myself.

I know the way it's going to pan out. Last night, I stared in the bathroom mirror at the bar and realized that I was noticeably swaying. Did I stop? No. Instead I just switched to beer. Five beers later I woke up to my 7am alarm pulsating inside my eyeballs. I have no idea how in the hell I got to work, only that I got here early and I started the day with three vomit false alarms. It's now 3:30 pm and there's still toxic sludge slapping the inside walls of my face, only this time it comes in gentler waves. I'm disgusting.

The good news is that it was a company happy hour so most of my co-workers are in a similar condition (or so I tell myself). The difference between me and my coworkers is that they can drink and I can't. Two beers makes for a short night when everyone else is tasting eachother's coconut martinis. So every now and then I try to fit in with the big kids and drink like a 26 year old woman instead of a small hamster, like I'm used to. I'm never successful. I had 3 Bellinis and 5 beers last night. Usually by beer number 3 I've got my cab money ready, but I held on. Oh, I held on until around 11:30 (that's right - one one three zero). After a short skirmish with a cabbie, I stumbled into my apartment to call back my boyfriend who had been trying to reach me. I was clueless to the fact that he had experienced one of those policeman "bad feelings" about me and after calling, texting, and finding my apartment empty at an hour when I'd usually be sleeping, reasoned that I was dead or maimed. He interrogated me about when I saw his text and informed me that "something didn't sound right". Well nothing sounded right to me, I was shitfaced. Explaining this only got him more upset, so we hung up and I went to bed. He is still pissed off.

Needless to say, I've been in digestive hell all day, and am stil being visited by small waves of nausea.

I've said this before and I'll say it again, if you see me with a Bellini please ask me politely to put it down. I realize that you don't know me and don't know what I look like, but if you see a girl that looks like how I sound, please go out on that limb and ask her. If it's not me, you might get a bitchy retort (just ignore it), BUT if it is me, I'll give you my Bellini or I'll buy you one of your own. I promise. We'll shake hands. We'll be friends. It will be beautiful.

I'm behind on reading all of the urbfam posts. I'm finally coming back to earth. Even though I have not yet commented, urbfam, I have read. And I shall comment soon. I get excited and want to read them all at once. My friends are so fucking brilliant.

So I've officially moved into my own apartment for the first time. A one bedroom with high ceilings, hard wood floors, and so much natural light that I'm tempted to wear sunblock while I watch tv. There are eight windows in my three room apartment. I've burned two of my plants on accident by sitting them on my window sill. My aloe vera plant may need to be euthanized. Whatever, she's been a moody bitch for like two years. I keep doing all of these things to make that plant happy and all I get is a miserable looking plant. She looks like a pissed off octopus, twisted and now a little seared. I still feel bad that I burnt the two plants. Maybe I should have done my homework about that. I took it for granted that all of my plants liked high levels of light. Way to be a bad mom - if that had been a kid I'd be behind bars right now.

Also, due to magnificent abundance of natural light combined with the recent heat wave, my living room feels like the inside of an oven. Seriously. I open my front door and a waft of hot air bursts forth. I think that maybe the bathroom may be the hottest room. I was just thinking as I was peeing that I bet if I accidently got splashed with the toilet water it would give me a first degree burn.

But I love it. Oh, I love it.

I thought I would be one of those squeamish girls that was a little afraid to live alone but it turns out that I'm not. I don't know if it's because my boyfriend is a cop that works at the precinct on my street or because I have a knife on my nightstand, but I feel pretty safe here. I wish the lighting was a little better in the front of my building, though.

So my first week of being in my new apartment, I ate cherries and strawberries in my underwear and watched a marathon of Flavor of Love Girls: Charm School followed by a marathon of Carnivale. I have two things to say: I think Mo'Nique is fucking fierce and I am truly annoyed by how dirty everyone in Carnivale is. They just walk around all day covered from head to toe in black dirt. They have sex and kill eachother and basically do everything covered in dirt. I mean I really hate to be nitpicky, but we get it. They're in the heartland and there's lots of dust. There's a shit ton of dust, we get it. But all of the main characters look like they smell terrible and it keeps me from wanting them to succeed. There I said it, okay? I just want to believe that my heros smell good, or at least that they don't have tapeworms from rolling around in filth. A little dirt = hot. A lot of dirt = distracting.

Anyway, here's to new apartments. Here's to beautiful, beautiful natural light. And to big black women and red fruit and cops and to just a little dirt. I love it all.

A thank you to the Universe

So. In case anyone was wondering what the gravy train smells like, it smells like raw sewage. If I was still aboard the gravy train and doing a live broadcast, you would see the little girl from the Exorcist with a knife chained to Paris Hilton chained to George W. Bush chained to me. There would be no doors, just windows covered in shit behind a wall of flames. Oh, and fuck the Christmas shoes. What I'm saying is don't get on the gravy train unless you really really want to. Especially if it entails working for a shady wing of Finance that in my opinion uses money to brainwash their own people and crucifies those not willing to be brainwashed. I hope I'm being vague enough not to be sought out by this particular company and assasinated for not using shiny happy words to describe the shiny happy way they do business. If you're on to me, said shady wing of finance, bring it. I'll meet you in Grand Central by the clock at 2:45 pm on Monday. I'll be the one with the luggage and the ipod.

Ah hem. Excuse me.

The important thing is that I have returned to my company of origin and I am very happy there. My reasons for leaving, which will remain unmentioned, are calmed. More importantly, this experience has taught me lessons that I could not and would not have learned any other way. To the universe: thank you.

Need a new word for "Break up"

“Break-up” isn’t the word

Where my stomach ached to swell
there is a single concave
so quiet
waiting for a child that I do not know
No more impish smile and black braids

The male face at the breakfast table
Could be any face
Hidden behind any newspaper
Sports or Business or Weather
White or wheat toast

My hands are what I know
Clasped together tightly
Small soft ball on the linen
A mass of folded bone
one thing, two pieces

"The Vine"

This is an excerpt from my screenplay The Vine for your reading pleasure. The formatting got a little lost in translation. Please don't be offended at the mention of bloody children, it's all part of the stew.

INT. MOUNT SINAI HOSPITAL

As Lelaina slowly comes to, she hears a far off telephone ring and the sound of wheels on the polished floor. BETH ANNE, a perky southern belle, and CHET, clean cut and slightly prissy, speak to each other in low voices. They haven’t noticed that she’s awake yet.

BETH ANNE
I would appreciate it if you would participate in our prayer circle.

CHET
I’m Jewish, Beth Anne.

BETH ANNE
Why do you have to be so difficult?
(to her daughter)
Melissa, baby, leave that curtain alone.

CHET
What the hell’s wrong with your kids?

BETH ANNE
Don’t speak in that tone of voice to me, Chet.

LELAINA
Beth Anne?

BETH ANNE
(Suddenly cheerful)
Well would you look who’s up! Hey sis!
Lelaina stares into Beth Anne’s cheery face.

The curtain to the bed next door flies open behind Beth Anne.

CHET
Are you thirsty or anything? Beth Anne, she’s opening the curtain again.

BETH ANNE
What? Oh, Melissa!
Beth Anne runs after her child, who giggles and runs away. Her laughter jogs Lelaina’s memory. The sound of the bloody child by the pool resonates in her head.

LELAINA
(To Chet)
Am I dead?

CHET
No, honey, of course not.
Beth Anne picks up Melissa, a mischievous looking 3-year old who grabs at everything within her reach. The child starts to play with one of the machine cords.

CHET (CONT’D)
Don’t touch that, kid!

BETH ANNE
Melissa, you stop that. You’re gonna send Aunty Lili back into oblivion...

CHET
Can you please control your twenty five children--

BETH ANNE
Excuse me but I have four children. And don’t you dare spread your poison to me just because Jesus doesn’t bless homosexuals with babies.

CHET
(Mocking)
And this little piggy went wee wee wee all the way back to the trailer park.

LELAINA
How long have I been here?

CHET
Three days.

BETH ANNE
The doctor pumped your stomach, sugar. You’re as right as rain.

LELAINA
(Suddenly hostile)
Which one of you bastards called?
Chet and Beth Anne exchange worried glances.

BETH ANNE
Pardon?

LELAINA
You heard me! Who fucking called the cops!

CHET
(Taken aback)
Jesus.

LELAINA
JESUS?

BETH ANNE
(Accusingly to Chet)
You stop that! Lili, it was an anonymous phone call that saved your life. We don’t know who found you.
They all stare awkwardly at each other. Silence. Melissa yanks on something. Lelaina yells out in pain.

CHET
For fuck’s sake!

BETH ANNE
Language!

LELAINA
Was that my IV?

CHET
(To Beth Anne)
How about you grab a nurse, okay Rosemary? And you, little girl, you go wait outside before I lock you in the syringe closet.
Melissa starts to wail.

BETH ANNE
Nurse! Oh, Melissa honey, it’s okay. There is no syringe closet.

Welcoming the Gravy Train

Gravy train
n. Slang.

An occupation or other source of income that requires little effort while yielding considerable profit.

I guess that I'm a little curious about the gravy train. Does it look like the polar express, or does it more resemble the LIRR? Is it like the new N train that everyone in Queens calls the "unicorn" due to the fact that you only see it on magical occasions? Does it smell good?

I've had little exposure to this phenomenon growing up, but caught glimpses of it during "What I did this summer" stories in English class in the 6th grade. "Me and my parents went to Ireland" "Me and my parents went to our house in California". Mine was more like, "Me and my three siblings sat in the house all day. We went to Wal Mart sometimes." Okay, poor me, wah wah. The truth is, it didn't bother me so much. I kind of enjoyed getting on my oldest sister's nerves and threatening my younger brother with knives. When I got bored I dressed up like the chicks on MTV and me and my friends sang along to "This is How We Do It". We prank called the guys in my class. Life was simple.

But alas, people grow up and they move to New York, the capital capital of the world. And they decide they don't want to be an actor anymore so they get a grown up job so that they can afford a laptop and printer to write plays at night. And being able to answer the work telephone well turns into doing other things well that weren't in the original blueprint of your life. Other opportunities rear their heads and before you know it, crap. You start thinking like the yups. "How much money can I make doing this job? Hmmm..."

So you put on your Christmas shoes and board the gravy train.

This is not entirely accurate, actually. Gravy Train insinuates that you're somehow getting money the easy way, and my my work has not been easy. At all.
Again, wah, poor me.

The point is, I've located the gravy train. (It's not as easy as everyone says it is, but it's there). And I'm scared of it. I feel like I've worked for it but that I don't deserve it. I'm scared to talk about it. I'm scared to smell the air. I'm scared to look around. I'm even scared of these Christmas shoes.

Why does comfort make me so uncomfortable?