Do you want to know why I haven’t blogged in awhile?

It’s because I just sat down to write an entry and I wrote out not one, not two but THREE paragraphs about Downy Fabric Softener. Simple Pleasures to be exact. In Lavender & Vanilla scent. And how I love it but I can’t find the Rose & Violet scent. Did they discontinue it?

WHAT?! Did I think anyone would be INTERESTED in three paragraphs about my thoughts on laundry!? Wow. I must be drawing some blanks here, people. HELP ME! I shall now ramble and make lists because that’s what I do when I don’t know what else to say. Errr…when I don’t know what else to BLOG. When I don’t know what to say, I blush bright red and use words that don’t exist. Anyway. Here are some things I’ve been thinking about. I can’t say they are interesting.

I love Thai food but I CANNOT STAND Pad Thai. This seems to be the Thai food staple and what most people think of when you mention “Thai Food” and yet, ew. I prefer the chili/basil sauce with tofu and vegetables and those wide flat noodley things. You know. The kind of Thai food that doesn’t make me want to throw up.

You can show me 10,000 times but I still haven’t learned how to neatly fold the fitted sheet. My mom does it perfectly. In fact, the fitted sheets are folded so squarely that in her linen closet, I can never tell just by looking which are the regular sheets and which ones are fitted. The woman is THAT Good. Me? I just give up and roll it into a huge ball because well, why not?

Sheets remind me of fabric softener. I can smell my hanging laundry right now and it smells like lavender, which is lovely. I wish it smelled like roses and violets though.

I’m in an intense casting workshop class type deal thingamajig. It’s seven weeks long and every week we sing for a new casting director and gain feedback from them and also our classmates. It’s hands down the BEST thing I’ve ever done for my career. Suddenly, I don’t have to walk out of the room and think WHYYYY DON’T YOU LOVE ME?! Now I just ask. And they actually say it.

Surprisingly enough, most of them tweak little bits of my songs here and there and then nod and say “Great!” There are no huge revelations like, “Wow, you kind of suck at singing!” or “I don’t like your hair. It’s ugly.” or “You really need to step up and actually show me you have a DEGREE in musical theatre in order for me to want to cast you. Mediocrity is your middle name.” There really isn’t any major issue that anyone sees with my work. I’m an obvious type (young ingenue) and an obvious vocal type and therefore, a clear-cut, obvious casting choice. I dress appropriately, I sing appropriate songs, I make strong acting choices and am generally found to be somewhat quirky and endearing. If all this is true, and it must be true because why would they lie to me? then seriously, why aren’t I getting callbacks? I’ve decided to ask this next class. So far, my own answers are:

a) There are a gazillion quirky young ingenues with blonde hair and I haven’t been around that long. Need to keep at it until I stand out.
b) My resume is somewhat lacking. I think this could be the reason or at least, a minor one.
c) I joined Equity too soon. Should’ve gotten more credits in the non-Eq world.
d) Since I’m currently without representation, I attend a lot of required calls, meaning auditions that are mandated by the union. A lot of times, for those auditions, they have already cast the show and aren’t really looking.
d2) They are lying to me and in real life, they find me ugly, untalented and fat.

This class, while amazing, has made me extremely meticulous and analytical about my career. I think some of the obsessiveness will die down when the class is over and anyway, it’s not a particularly BAD thing. But sometimes, I hear myself talking about auditions and auditions and casting directors and who and who and who and I want to SMACK MYSELF because I’m reminded of my 14 year-old self who could rattle off every ensemble member of the current cast of Miss Saigon. Note to both selves: NO ONE CARES.

I bought organic argula today. Why? I’m not sure. I hope I think of something fun to do with it. Like braid it and pin it in my roommates’ hair. SLEEPOVER!

Speaking of food, I ate chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast this morning with strawberries and coconut. They were totally vegan and quite possibly the best things I’ve ever eaten.

I ate a few spoonfuls of the twins’ macaroni and cheese the other day. It was decidedly not vegan. And surprisingly, did not make my stomach explode. MMMM. FAKE PROCESSED CHEESE.

I had a hard-boiled egg white in my salad last week. It was on purpose. I craved it, wanted it, ordered it, ate it. I thought perhaps I may reintroduce eggs into my diet, or at least egg whites. But as soon as I thought that, I didn’t really crave them anymore.

Am I blogging about egg whites? Is that almost as bad as fabric softener?

I’ve needed a new cellphone battery for at least 3 weeks. I charge my cell, take it with me for the day and by the time I get on the subway, the energy level is down to one bar. If I chat on the phone for about twenty minutes, it dies. A new battery can’t cost me more than $40. I can afford the $40. But I just don’t WANT TO. I think about how I have to spend $40 on a damn cellphone battery and I think what an ANNOYING THING to waste $40 on. So I ignore it. And just let my cellphone die every day around 2 in the afternoon. And a few days ago, I nonchalantly dropped $123 on three pairs of shoes. Because those? THOSE WERE NECESSARY.

For the above class that I mentioned, as a homework assignment, we had to write out full pages in our journal describing where we wanted to be in 1 week, 1 month, 6 months, 1 year, 5 years, 10 years, 20 years. That’s seven pages of future talk. DESCRIPTIVE, DIFFICULT FUTURE TALK. I dare you to do it. My teacher wanted big broad goals and also little tiny details, as miniscule or encompassing as I wanted. You know what? I kind of liked doing it. Of course I did! Because I’m Type A and love writing out things! I must confess that I’m not done with it yet. I’ve only just started but after scribbling some stuff down last night, I went back and read over what I’d written today.

UHHHHH. If you read over what I’d written, you’d have the same exact thought that I did: That I must’ve drank a bottle of rum before writing out my list. The truth? I was 100% completely sober. Observe:

In my “6 Months From Now” entry, (November 20, 2007) I wrote out how many shows I want to be called back for by then, how much I would prefer to weigh, how I would like to continue my veganism and then I guess I got a little carried away because the next sentence after those lofty goals is, “I will do my Christmas shopping early!”

Just. Wow. Laura? Did you actually write that out? On paper? Did you actually EXPEND ENERGY talking about your CHRISTMAS SHOPPING?! Get thee a life, pronto.

I couldn’t stop there though, no, because along with holiday shopping, I also wrote that I wanted a “pretty new winter coat” and that also in six months, my periods will be pain-free!! (With two exclamation points, seriously.) And this is why I should not be given these kinds of assignments. I will flesh out WHERE I WANT TO BE IN 6 MONTHS until it is an amalgamation of the scariest details ever imaginable. Pretty winter coats and periods that don’t induce nausea and painful cramping. LAURA. I THINK YOU ARE MISSING THE POINT.

By the way, I’m only up to writing 1 year from now. Where I’ll be in 5 years? In 10? I’m supposed to write out what I’d LIKE to happen, what I WANT, just to visualize it, just to put it down on paper but I get crazed by that kind of thinking. I mean, look how I handled six months!! In 10 years!? How many kids will I have? Will I still live in this apartment or a house with wooden floors and a fire place and a bathroom painted dark red? It’s too much for me! So I stopped for now, at just a year. I think that’s best for me at this point in time. Maybe I’ll get to the other timelines tomorrow. I think that tonight, I was too overwhelmed trying to think about how many pretty new winter coats I’ll need by the time I’m 30.

Sometimes, just sometimes, I think that I would like a little “Shut Down” button on the part of my brain labeled “Crazy”. That way, I can stop thinking simultaneously about my hatred of Pad Thai and love of rose-smelling laundry and sopranos that play ingenues. I could just complete homework assignments correctly and without much unnecessary anxiety. I could write out the career I want to have, the kind of man I want to marry, the kind of children I want to raise and how many ab muscles I would like visible when wearing a bikini. But because I can’t click SHUT DOWN, I’m left to stare at a blank page and get completely overwhelmed by the thoughts that are swimming around my cranium, crippling my thought process and rendering me helpless and unable to complete the task at hand because I just can’t stop wondering about how painful my periods will be in 20 years.