I had 4 HOURS between my last set today and a company meeting this evening.

So, instead of driving home and back (and therefore dealing with LA traffic 2 extra times), I got me a large coffee at Voodoo Doughnuts, found me a nice quiet spot to write some blog posts and then proceeded to be interrupted every single time I got on a roll.

I don’t know what it is about my wearing giant BOSE QuietComfort Noise-Cancelling Headphones and typing intently on a laptop in a corner away from the world that says, “Hey! Come interrupt me!” but, as hard as I tried, I simply could not finish the post I was working on. People kept sitting down to chat with me.

Now I’m home and more-than-slightly drunk (giant company meetings full of fellow actors always stress the introverted hell out of me) and have decided to finish my post tomorrow. Until then…

That didn’t last long.

Remember how I said that, after years and years of having to work on Christmas Day, I was finally going to get to just spend the holiday at home? Well, at work today, two of my managers caught me coming back from my set to ask if I could possibly be available on Christmas.

I told them I’d get back to them and, honestly, I’ll probably just end up doing it. Considering those managers played a huge big part in the scoring that moved me up the roster recently, it’s the least I could do. Plus, it’s nice to feel wanted at work (especially since I’m not Grinching it up this year) and, of course, holiday pay.

Besides, like I said before, I don’t mind celebrating the day before or the day after a major holiday. Still, I was kinda looking forward to this, especially since it felt like a badge of honor to not have to work. Also, I’m in the middle of trying to convince my Halloweencentric finance that Christmas isn’t awful (she hasn’t had the best of luck with it in the past) and this doesn’t make it any easier.

Perhaps that’ll be the way I’ll know I’ve finally “made it” in the world, celebrating holidays on the actual holidays.

Tonight’s win felt great.

And it looks like a huge part of it happening was thanks to black voters, particularly women, getting out to vote. (White people, we gotta get our shit together!) And a lot of the organizing that helped get out those crucial votes was done over the internet.

An open internet.

A… (chokes back distaste at this awful, awful term) “neutral net”.

So, naturally, once again, people are trying to kill net neutrality. I don’t know why this battle keeps happening but, my guess? Rich people wanna get richer as well as prevent others from succeeding. (Sound familiar?)

Well, the vote’s in 2 days so let’s use the momentum from this win and get the word out.

Go to Battle for the Net or Save the Internet for more information.

Don’t let the FCC kill net neutrality.

 

I’m trying something new today as well.

I’m currently sitting on my couch, cat in my lap, attempting to do a entire blog post by dictating it into the Drafts app on my iPhone, editing it with the onscreen keyboard and then sending it to the WordPress app.

Since I started blogging back in the early aughts, I always did it from a computer or laptop so composing this way feels completely unnatural, like writing with my non-dominant hand, but mastering it could really help increase my ability to post more often.

You see, aside from trying to get myself into the habit of writing every day again, I’m hoping that this “30 Days of Blogging” experiment will really get me comfortable with the WordPress platform (I’d always used Blogger in the past) as well as with how far technology has come in the past decade.

My ultimate goal with this is to use what I learn, and any momentum I get, to help me turn an unwieldy first draft of a book I wrote several years ago into a running series of blog posts, a serialized story of my first year (and perhaps beyond?) in Japan.

When my original goal was to write a capital-B Book and have it capital-P Published and have it end up on bookshelves at the bookstore, it was such a monumental, overwhelming undertaking that, no matter how much work I did, I never felt like I was making any progress. It was an old-fashioned approach to an old-fashion goal.

But, as time has passed, I came to realize that my goal was less about HOW my stories were told, and more THAT my stories were told at all.

So, much like my goals are evolving, so are my methods.

I’m trying something. I’ve got just under a half hour before I have to go back on set so I’m going to try to write a blog post before I have to go back out there. It’s one of those rare occurrences when the break room is not too crowded thanks to most people being on set. Besides, I’m planning on finally putting up Christmas decorations with my fiancé tonight so I don’t want to have to worry about any blogging once I’m done with my shift.

I’m still feeling slightly under the weather but better. I ended up getting cumulative 9 hours and change of sleep last night. Needed it. I’ve got to build my defenses back up. For my first set, I kneeled down to introduced myself to a child (named Damien, no less) and he promptly coughed into my open mouth so, yeah.

I’m excited to decorate tonight. I like Christmas. Well, not the “starts before Thanksgiving, requires exorbinate spending and somehow, in any way, involves Pentatonix” Christmas but the “just sitting around the house and relaxing with family” kind of Christmas. Being a long-time service industry and/or theme park performer – which, loathe as I am to admit it, is still pretty much a “service industry” job – I’m used to having to work on Christmas. I don’t mind and am quite used to celebrating the day before or the day after holidays but the fact that I’ve earned the right this year to NOT work Christmas (and STILL get Holiday Pay) is something I’m very proud of. The highways may be empty and the hiking trails may be deserted that day but I don’t plan on going anywhere.

So, I’ll be home for Christmas. You can count on me.

Showtime!