Riddle Me Frickin Ridiculous

[Dana S]

I know what you're thinking: 'wow, what an unbeleivable lame title for a journal.' and you're probably right but did you ever think about the deeper meaning underneath the lame title? It says fuck it, I know I'm an awesome journal, I don't need a good title to prove it-that would just be overkill. And besides if you shouldn't judge a book by its cover then why in hell should you judge a journal by its title? No seriously, if you can think of a good deeper meaning that justifies the lame title let me know-right now I'm too sleep deprived to care. Insomnia is fun.

Anyway I'm starting this journal because I think my old one needs to be put to rest. I figure I'll start a new journal with a new outlook, or something like that.

I got back from the Del Close Marathon a couple days ago and I'm still living in a daze-more than normal. I can only dream of coming close to what great improvisers these people were. I mean Baby Wants Candy and WeirDass were just amazing. The timing in WeirDass almost seemed scripted it was so perfect. I spent a good portion of today completely trashing my room in search of my copy of Truth in Comedy. I want to reread it while the shows are still pretty fresh in my mind so I can remember specific examples of all the principles. I've also dragged out my Stanislavski book-partially because I keep meaning to read it and still haven't and partially because I'd like to see how the two books match up. I think it'll be interesting to see how the Stanislavski Method blends into the Truth in Comedy 'method.' Hopefully I'll be able to apply them to each other.

I think I'm getting tired. I'm gonna go test that out.

 

[Dana S]

Riddle Me Confused

Alright improv gods, please let my journal finally work. I've tried to create a new journal but so far my attempts have yielded nothing but me threatening my computer. I already have a journal in this same forum: we're all f***ed up together, but I think it's time for a new one-new outlook I guess. I haven't posted all summer, and sadly I haven't done a lot of improv this summer either. Hopefully I'll be signing up for some more DSI classes soon though.

I just got back from the DCM in New York last Monday-further cementing that New York is THE place I want to be. I seriously had so much fun. Although I will admit to hallucinating towards the end of the marathon. I only really remember a couple of them though. But I'll go ahead and share some of those before I forget:

-Well if you're looking at the mainstage from the side, with the pillars and all it looks like a trainstation (go with me on this) so I started freaking out and being like 'how the hell did I get in a trainstation!' and after my vision focused a little more and I realized where I was, the only thing that came to mind was 'thank god! the people onstage would've been killed by the train!'

-I also kept trying to put my hand on the traytable which I apparently thought was attached to the seat in front of me like in an airplane, which resulted with me being very perplexed as to how my hand was going through the traytable (the thought that there was no traytable never occurred to me).

-and at another point I had my eyes squinted and head down and the person next to me goes 'she's asleep!' and I said 'the hell I am, it's just too bright outside' because I thought the stagelights were the sun and we were at some sort of picnic or fair or something

-I also had this weird idea that everything depended on my giving Pablo a new nickname in case he ever became a muppet (or something like that) so his new nickname became Pabble Rock because it rhymes with Fraggle Rock (well sort of rhymes, and are Fraggles even muppets? They're both Jim Hensen productions anyway I think)and because Pablo does, indeed, rock.

-This one isn't really a hallucination but something that sort of was me thinking oddly. I remember mumbling something to Corey or who I thought was Corey about his brother Dana. Because Corey's brother is named Dana and actually has the same birthday too. I just remember saying (or maybe I just thought it) that Corey's brother had 'stolen my identity-but had done a really shitty job because he got the gender wrong'

It was a little insane, but it was also an awesome awesome time. I'm still a little dazed by the people I met and the improvisers I got to see perform though. I was watching comedy central today and I kept being like 'they were there and they were there and they were there and they were there' and so on. I feel so important by extension. Silly little starstruck girl. The improv was just mindblowing though, I mean WeirDass and Baby Wants Candy and Sheer MacBrayer just left me with so much passion to keep on improvising, so that someday I can be half as brilliant. I can't wait until I can move to New York and experience as much of their brilliance as possible. Meanwhile North Carolina has a suprisingly good improv scene. I don't know what I would do without DSI. The teams are super-talented (especially Mister Diplomat-another DCM fave), the classes are top notch (I've learned so much and the teachers have all been spectacular), and I adore the people. I love all of DSI-they are among my favorite people of all those I have ever met in my entire life. I love them all dearly-but frankly, who doesn't? And before I start sounding like an infomercial for DSI (although if you're in the area you really should check them out!) I'm going to crawl into bed and dream sweet improv dreams. Night all-or morning, rather

 

[Dana S]

The suicide bombers of the insect world

Hornets are the single most evil bug ever to walk, or er, fly over the earth. They suck! I've never been stung by anything but a jellyfish before, and that was blinding pain so I wasn't expecting some little tiny insect to be able to inflict much pain. But I was wrong. Oh, I was very wrong. So I was just sitting in my kitchen, enjoying the cryptograms when all of a sudden, for absolutely no reason at all-a hornet stings me on the elbow. WTF! It's not like he could sit there and enjoy how much I whined and complained because they sting you...and then they die. I mean they're practically the goddamn suicide bombers of the insect world. I take it back, they are the goddamn suicide bombers of the inside world, I think that's a pretty reasonable comparison. Check it: they hurt you for no reason, they die in order to inflict pain, they are usually a part of a group/swarm, they suck hardcore, nobody likes them, and they cause needless violence. Stupid suicide bomber hornets-I mean I STILL have a mark. If any hornet is flying by some computer screen somewhere: YOU SUCK!

What didn't suck today was that I went to go see DSI have it's first ever show at the skylight exchange tonight and it was hot. And by hot I mean both the awesome factor (because Mister Diplomat rules my world) and the temperature (because it was pretty steamy in there-and not from the adoration being thrown at the stage). So I would like to once again proclaim my love for Mister Diplomat. Oh Mister Diplomat, how I adore you!

And by the way, the reason my first two posts are so similar in parts are because I thought the first one was lost and I was trying to redo it with the second entry-but they both ended up working.

The suicide bombers of the insect world would make a great name of something. Band, book, movie, song-I dunno something cool and important, maybe I'll just find a way to make that an essay title in one of my classes. The suicide bombers of the insect world: how corporate America treats the masses like insects and how this constant patronization leads the individual to destroy himself and others. Too bad I'm not taking a science this year or it would be a lot easier to work that in.

Alright, I think I should probably go to bed, and at least make an effort to fall asleep. Hopefully my efforts will be rewarded with somenice hornet-free dreams.

Love to all.

 

[Dana S]

Quotes from the Big Sky State

I went to Montana a couple weeks ago to visit my aunt and uncle. I flew out with my grandmother, and then my cousin Cam flew up from Georgia as well. At the end of the trip we wrote out a list of quotes that made us laugh, here are a few of them (I'll do my best to explain).

-My grandmother: "Is that a mountain or a cloud?"
-me: "that...that's a cloud."
-her: "and it made such a pretty mountain too!"

-Dana: "Ow!!! I found the cactus." (after falling onto a cactus while we were talking about what Montana cacti might look like)

-Cam: You're retarded
-Dana: you are too I just don't point it out.

-Cam: "My conscience appears to me as a fox who wears a monocle and sits on my shoulder, it kinda freaks me out sometimes...but he's cool."

-Cam: "I'm sitting here on top of a mountain, and all I can think about is some Kashi cereal."

-Cam: (after seeing a license plate that said 'mastery') "mastery, mastery of what?"
-D: "life...in general."

-Cam: so what are you master of?
-D: The question is, what am I not master of?"

-D: The deer are coming!

-D: Someday when I'm rich I'm gonna buy a deer and put it in your room just to mess with you
-Cam: No, not cool

-Cam: (thinking he'd boxed in a deer after having chased it--not to hunt! He just felt like chasing it) "Ha ha! You've got nowhere to go deer!!!...(deer runs through a gate) ...'cept that way."

-Cam: "Damn you and you're magic cards! I hate your...life." (after three days straight of losing every single game to me in cards..I began letting him win after that)

-Cam: "Eights are wild!??!?!? I had like three of those." (After losing a game of crazy eights...you can see now why he didn't win a single game for three days.)

And then there is the tagline of our trip.
-Cam: "It's Montana....."
-Dana: "....it doesn't have to make sense."

 

[Dana S]

Well I'll be a sainted aunt

Holy Shit!! I will, I frickin will. I mean take away the sainted part and you've got something. I am going to be an aunt. My sister Selene, who is going to be 25 next month, is pregnant. Say what?! I mean as long as she's happy, so am I, but I'm still in shock a little bit. It's been a jampacked day. My mom turned 45, and my sister told me the news. I think she was nervous about telling me though. My mom, and sister and I went out to breakfast and she started by "I don't wanna tell her!" Our neighbors found out before I did. C'mon, I'm the sister I think I should find out before them-but oh well. Anyway, as far as I can tell my sister seems like she's getting her stuff together and she and her boyfriend Josh are happy-so that's all that matters. But still, holy shit!!!

 

[Dana S]

haircuts and one hit wonders

Okay, so I officially hate the title of my journal. It annoys me so much.

I've had one of those days where you aren't happy with the world and the world seems more than happy to keep reminding you how much things can blow.

Friday was an okay day. I decided I needed a change so I dyed my hair dark, cut it a little shorter and added some bangs. I think it's cool. I think it's kinda punk rock in a Joan Jett kind of way (before the buzzcut, and less mulletty). Which is good because I was a little worried that it would turn out more 60's boyband. Anyway, I like it, and it'll be something different for my senior picture.

I also hung out with my buddy Jorge, which I've decided we do not do not do often enough-we just lazed about talking and listening to music. Then Friday and Saturday latenight I, of course, went to the scoop for my weekly dose of improv. Lyda was trying to figure out which famous person I looked like (she never did decide) and I got Storm from the x-men and Linda Carter (that's the actress who played wonderwoman's isn't it...whatever). Change can be fun. I also met the largest cat ever at Scott and Austin's. Hootie is practically twice the size of my dog-it's crazy. I had fun.

Today for some reason just kind of got me down though. I'm a little stressed about collge stuff I guess. I'm sooo worried about it. I have so much to do and so very little time to do it in. I wish our lives had remotes. There are some things that I would rewind and play over and over and then there are periods of time, like now, where I would just fast forward it up a little. I want to fast foward to when I'm an established actress-a household name (Or at least until after I've got my college stuff figured out). Right now time is not moving nearly fast enough. I want out of Chapel Hill. Out of it forever! I mean of course I'll come to visit-I'm going to miss everyone at DSI terribly, I don't know what I'm going to do without them when I move away. But I want to be gone so badly it hurts. On to bigger, better, and happier things.

My mind has had a few songs in constant rotation recently. I watched the tail-end of the one hit wonder countdown on VH1 and number 3 and 2 keep playing. It's been 80's-fest in the cd player of my mind. It's been 'C'mon Eileen,' 'Tainted Love,' (which were number 3 and 2, respectively), 'right round,' and 'All I want is you.' I think Tainted Love is my current favorite song. Not the original by that girl, but the Soft Cell cover that had the electronic stuff in it-the one that was a hit. I have always loved that song. That's a good song. This phrase may be copywrited by VH1, but I love the 80's!

Oh and do you know what the number one one hit wonder was...the macarena. I lost a lot of respect for VH1 right there-I don't give a flying monkey's necktie if it does hold the current record for number of weeks at number one-there are so many better one hit wonders out there!

 

[Dana S]

Dear Music Fairy

I finally bought the Franz Ferdinand cd today. And Franz, oh, Franz, are you ever awesome. I want to go see them at the Cradle so badly! I mean they will actually be in Chapel Hill! If I miss this-I don't know what I'll do. I can just see them getting really big and rather than being like yeah, I saw them when they were at this small club downtown I'm going to have to be like, yeah, I missed them...a little part of me died that night. Plus since this is just a small show between big shows I bet whoever is opening is also pretty awesome. I mean when I saw the Strokes at the Ritz we didn't know anything about the openers and we got the Mooney Suzuki and Jimmy Fallon's band. It was superchouette. If there ever was a time for the music fairy to help me out-now would be a good time!

Dear music fairy,
Please let me get tickets to this show. I'll be a good girl and clean all my cds, not to mention make sure I spend more time listening to them than I have lately. Oh music angel, I beg thee: let there be scalpers, and if you should bless me enough to find scalpers, let these scalpers asking price be within my budget. Or you could let me win a contest or a friend could have an extra ticket, or there could end up being extras at the call window. O music angel, hear my plea. Let me get Franz Ferdinand tickets I beg of thee!
I'll even promise to start up guitar lesssons again with my dad. PLEASE!

I'm seriously going to be so disappointed if this doesn't work out-they're my new band obsession. It'll be like the time the Spice Girls came and I didn't get to go....no, you didn't misread that, I said the Spice Girls. I used to looove them. Oh well, looks like I'm going to be hanging around the Cradle wishing for a miracle that night.

 

[Dana S]

Alicia and the last 2 weeks

A lot has happened since I last posted.
Tues-senior pictures
Weds-first day of school
Thurs-start teching for the rock opera Toby (written by my friends Jorge Izquierdo and Will Guzzardi)
weekend-Inside Improv-of course!
Mon-found out a girl I knew at camp died in a car crash over the weekend, my friend Keri's best friend
Tues-Weds-dunno
Thurs-so exhausted I slept entirely through school till 20 min before dress rehearsal for Toby
Fri-Toby world premier, Inside Improv
Sat-Toby, Toby cast party, last night of Inside Improv, played murder at the training center
Sun-today, homework, errands, homework, babysat, homework and now (homework)

Toby was wonderful, it was an awesome musical and a really cool collaborative effort between the two highschools. I enjoyed it.

The Toby cast party was fun we-all went to Polly's and swum in her pool and hottub, then I drove my friend Julia home, ran to the Inside Scoop-walked in late and enjoyed the last two shows, and then we headed to the training center to play murder-it was a fun night.

With that maddash recap I'll just end with a farewell for Alicia. I wasn't close with her, but I have a lot of friends who are really suffering from this loss. I remember being at camp K with her and all I can remember is nice things. She really was an awesome girl-I'm so sorry for everyone's loss.

"may angels lead you in
hear me now my friends
on sleepless roads the sleepless go
may angels lead you in"
-Jimmy Eat World

Goodbye Alicia.

 

[Dana S]

shaking hands and class postponement

If anyone was wondering what expression my face is making-I'm pouting. That's right, I'm tired and whiney.

Yesterday I had fun. I got to skip my fourth period (with unofficial permission from our principal) to go see John Kerry's two daughters, stepson Andre Heinz (I really like him!) and John Edwards' daughter all speak at UNC. It was a fun little rally and I got to see a few of my UNC friends: Carla, Amy and my friend Kate who I thought was going to college out of state! I enjoyed it and I got to go and shake each of their hands (the future first family) and talk to them for a little bit-it was pretty cool-I had cameras on me from all angles as I was chatting with them. Super cool.

Today has been a sad day. I'm tired and exhausted. Plus my 3L class that I was really looking forward to has been cancelled which makes me really sad. I haven't been able to take a class in a while and just as I can-the session is postponed 3 weeks. This time last year I was taking 2 classes, both of which I got to perform with at 24Live. I really wanted to be able to perform again this year-but I don't know how. Plus I think I upset Zach a little with a cranky e-mail about my class being cancelled. All I want is to do improv! I can't go see it anymore bc its now only on weeknights and I can't do classes and I can't do 24Live because I don't have a team. It all just bites. I'm about ready to give up improv all together-it's not like I've been doing any anyway.

Life currently sucks. Plus counselors came around to talk to English classes today about college, and frankly I'm sensing a feeling of forboding about my upcoming applications.

Then I had my SAT prep class for 3 hours (so fun...I bet you wish you could join) and I got a decent score on my practice SAT-which made me feel a little better about all the college stuff.

I have homework to start and finish and sleep to wish about. Night all-sorry I'm in such a whiney mood.