Hey kids rock'n'roll.

So I used to own a car, a pick-up truck actually, that I sold when I moved to New York City this past summer. It was a decent vehicle, nothing special, that got me where I needed to go and allowed me to move large things (Usually other people’s large things, since I was often asked to help friends relocate. It comes with the territory.). Some of my friends, I’m sure, thought I seemed a little out of place in it, but I liked it well enough. I drove it for six or seven years, put close to a hundred thousand miles on it, hit a deer, and rolled it into a tree. My relationship with that Chevy S-10 spanned at least seven girlfriends, nine or ten residences and the duration of grad school. Yet, the one thing I miss the most about it is it’s mediocre, Best Buy CD player.

For me, my favorite way to really listen to music is while I’m driving. I once heard a quote from K.D. Lang, which I’ll paraphrase thus; “you know a song is good if you can enjoy it while driving, while doing the dishes and while making love” (I really hope she didn’t mean at the same time). I agree with K.D.’s theory, but for me the car has always been the single best place to really take the music in and process it. I think I really found my appreciation for some of my all time favorites, like Wilco, The Jayhawks, and Liz Phair, behind the wheel of that S-10 or the shitty Geo Prism that preceded it. It was where I played Ryan Adams’s “Come Pick Me Up” over and over just to make sure he was actually telling his lover to “screw all my friends behind my back”. It’s also where I decided I didn’t like the Beta Band as much as I thought I should, but that I liked the Monkees more than I could. It’s where a mix CD (or tape depending on the decade) of the Beatles or REM could get me by for most of the trip between Cleveland and Chicago. It’s also where I drove more than a few friends crazy with my insistence on playing Matthew Sweets “Girlfriend” like it was the next coming of Neil Young’s “Harvest”.

I remember really listening to Wilco’s “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” for the first time with my good friend Kyle. I think we stayed in that car for a good three hours and never switched CD’s. I remember once while I driving on one of my Shakespeare tours, I was listening to the V-Roys “All About Town”, and my buddy Paul say, “man, there isn’t a bad song on this one”. He was right. I also remember being completely clueless in 1990, thinking that Bad English was a great rock band. In my defense, everyone who was listening to them in the car with me as we drove to the Rush concert in Detroit agreed with me.

I bring all this up because I just bought the new Wilco CD and tried to listen to it while I was at work the other day. It just wasn’t the same. And then there are things like volume issues and the competing noise of other office workers listening to Yanni, or the fact that I should actually be making phone calls to prospective advertisers so I can earn a commission this month. I’ve also had a tough time getting used to the I-Pod revolution. I love my MP3 player, it’s very convenient, but I will always feel more at ease singing “Scenes from an Italian Restaurant” while driving seventy miles per hour on route 75 North, then I would while running on the treadmill at the YMCA.

But tomorrow is going to be a good day. I’m driving to DC and will have the whole trip back to blast the stereo. I’m thinking the new Wilco will get another listen and probably the Fratellies, who I know I like, but I want to know why. I’ll let you know.

Sports of sorts.

So today I’m going to write about sports. For those of you who aren’t sports fans, those of you who can’t believe you are actually reading the second sentence of this entry after the first even mentioned the s-word, I’m sorry. For you I’ll give you this to tide you over; go listen to the Fratellies. They are really, really good. Check out their single "Flathead", it's great. I’ll write more about them later, but right now we’re turning to the sports page, probably section C.

Hello. My name is Chris and I’m a Cleveland sports fan. (In unison – “Hi, Chris”) Between the Browns, Indians and Cavaliers I have enjoyed a lifetime of almost greatness, interspersed with long unbearable stints of rock bottom with dashes of mediocrity and ineptitude. (Sounds like my love life. Booya!) But for the moment, and possibly for this moment alone, I am feeling good about my sports life.

First, there is the Cavaliers. The Cavs actually swept a playoff series for the first time in their history (never mind that it was against a team consisting of Antawn Jamison, Gary Coleman, Stephen Hawking, the corpse of Boris Yeltzin, and you), they are now up 1-0 on the New Jersey Nets in their second round series, and are a favorite to make their first Eastern Conference finals in fifteen years (or so). Yes, their style of offence is as boring as a conversation with an Olson twin; yes, if they actually beat the Nets they will probably get slaughtered by the Pistons; yes they might be as good as they ever will get with the current players and staff; and yes, they might lose Labron to free agency if they don’t win it all soon; but hey, they are winning now. Which is what matters now.

The Indians you say? They’ve only lost one series all year, which was unfortunately to the Yankees. (f-ing Yankees; I think that if the musical “Damn Yankees” were written today it would probably be called “Fucking Yankees”? Or “How to Succeed in Baseball with a $200 Million Dollar Payroll Without Even Trying”) The Indians have so much starting pitching that they might have to send their best guy to the minors to make room for the older dudes who make more money. They have a couple of potential MVP candidates in Grady Sizemore and Travis Hafner, though neither is hitting .300 at the moment. I have optimism. I think they will contend for the playoffs and might even have a legitimate shot at a championship. I say that knowing that there are about fourteen teams with a legitimate shot at a championship, but it’s good to be one of them.

And what about those lowly Brown? Well, they were the bell of the ball on draft weekend. They not only got the player they really needed, (the un-sexy pick that was offensive lineman Joe Thomas) but also the player that they really wanted (Ohio’s own golden boy, quarterback Brady Quinn). They rebuilt their offensive line, which has been responsible for the broken bones (and spirits) of at least seven quarterbacks over the last seven years, brought in a quality, though over the hill, running back in Jamal Lewis and have given us a reason to tune in for the first couple of games. If they get beat up a lot, (which is still a distinct possibility) they may fire their coach and (hopefully not) their GM, and we may be right back to where we started. But come on, that’s months down the line. Right now they are innocent until proven shitty.

Now that I’ve got that bit of optimism out of the way, may the last second game seven losses, the ACL tears and the steroid suspensions begin! Let Cleveland be rocked.

You want to buy an ad man?

So, I'm still in Staunton because...
I'm going on freakin tour again!
Those of you who know me, or better yet, those of you who have toured with me know that I about lost my mind the last time out. For those of you who didn't have the pleasure of working with me from 2003-2006, (meaning everyone in the world other than Greg Phelps and Alyssa Wilmoth) I was labled the "Krusty and unhappy" one of the tour, and that was before I got dumped by my girlfriend. (For the record, Greg was "the one who didn't talk to anyone" and Alyssa was "the one who talked too much") However, I was very happy to take the job when Jim and Jay at the American Shakespeare Center gave me everything that I could ever ask for. Big reason number two is the roles I'm going to be playing. Shylock in the Merchant of Venice is the big one, but I also get to play Fluellen in Henry V, which is a role I've always wanted to do and play the disgruntled elf in the one man holiday show The Santaland Diaries. What is big reason number one? They hired my girlfriend Alisa too. Yeah. That's right. A year of shacking up with a hot twenty-four year old. (Oh, and I love her too.) The only oddity of the situation is that she's going to be playing my daughter in Merchant. That's a little creepy.
So in the interum between the Ren season, which ended a couple of weeks ago and the upcoming Piercing Eloquence tour (coming to a city near you, maybe, if you live near Orrville, OH or Canton, NY), I am working in the ASC offices as there Advertising Coordinator. I'm selling ads. I'm Herb Tarlic from WKRP in Cincinnati. A-B-C, Always Be Closing. I will never watch Glengarry Glen Ross the same way again. I've been at it for three weeks and I've closed nothing. Sales is a hard racket Alec. So, I'm avoiding going broke in New York for not making a dollar in Staunton, but at lease here I'm not paying rent.
So now that we know where we stand, maybe I can actually put an entertaining blog entry up here every once and awhile. (You are supposed to answer: Why? Did you put one up before?)

Oh where oh where has our little Chris gone...

So, I've been getting a lot of emails and messages from people wondering where I am and what's going on in my life right now (Not to mention Joe Wack's threat to take away his link to my blog; Who am I, Jessica Dunton?). For those of you wondering why those people haven't gotten any answers from me, please see my previous entry addressing my worthlessness. For those of you already familiar with my worthlessness, I'll try to fill you in a little bit.

Just before the holidays I packed up my clothes, my guitars and my dignity, said goodbye to my great roommates PeeWee (a cat) and LeRoi (not a cat), and headed back to Ohio for the pleasurable experience of another Christmas where I couldn't afford to buy anybody anything (except for the cool $100.00 guitar I bought my girlfriend). It was actually a nice couple of weeks. I like short visits to Mom and Bob's house in Huron, and Alisa's (the aforementioned girlfriend with guitar) parents happen to live five minutes away from them, so I got to spend most of the holidays with her. My dad let me borrow my/his truck (I sold it to him in August so I could afford to move to New York City) so I could get around on something other then a Schwinn for two weeks. This was very cool of him, but the day before I left town I broke a tie rod on it, which sucked since something always seems to fall apart on vehicles that my dad lets me borrow while I'm driving them.

I then made my way down to Staunton, VA where I started work for the American Shakespeare Center's Renaissance season. For those of you who don't know much about ASC, I'll just say that we try to perform Shakespeare's plays in a way that is something like the way Shakespeare's original group of actors would have done them. For more details, check out our website. The Ren season takes this to another insane level and it was probably one of the hardest experiences in my theatre life. First off, we were doing five plays in rep that, for the most part, we weren't all that familiar with. Those plays were Ben Jonson's "The Devil is an Ass", John Webster's "The Duchess of Malfi", Shakespeare's "Pericles" an original play called "The Brats of Clarence", and the "bad quarto" of "Hamlet". Next, we were not given the entire script, just our own lines, so we usually didn't know who we were supposed to be talking to or who we were supposed to answer until we rehearsed the scene. Then, we were given roughly two weeks to put up each show. Sometimes those two weeks were actually twelve days (Hamlet), but sometimes they were more like five and a half (Devil). Lastly and certainly not least, we put these shows up without the use of a director. Twelve personalities crashing together on five shows over three months with nothing but our professionalism standing between us. It went very well. We got decent reviews, had great houses, and really felt good about all the plays. I got to play a lot of music with a lot of great musicians, play a few choice roles and spend a few months working with friends that I never had the chance to work with before. It was great.

I finished that contract a few weeks ago and am now still in Staunton. Why am I still in Staunton? Stay tuned and I'll let you know. (Wow man, this is just like those damned Matrix movies, every installment is just a set-up for a preplanned sequel.)

5-4-3-2-1

So, about a year or so ago my friend Ben Curns and I sent a string of emails back and forth in which we gave our top fives on certain subjects. I can’t remember all of them, but the list included top 5 movie montages (Rocky IV training sequence; Back to School studying for the big test), top 5 songs about drugs (too many to list), top 5 fictional hangouts, (Arnold’s from Happy Days or the Cantina from Star Wars) and top 5 rock n’ roll bass players (Ben Curns and Chris Seiler). A couple weeks ago Joe at Hairshirt wrote a post asking his readers to state their all time top 5 favorite songs. Yesterday my girlfriend Alisa posted about some of her top rock moments. Yeah, it’s about time I jumped on this bandwagon.

This is, of course, a cliché right out of the movie “High Fidelity” and the book the movie was based on. It is also fun and, not surprisingly, difficult. When Joe posed the question my list of top five songs were as follows.

1) Care of Cell 44 – The Zombies
2) She’s a Jar – Wilco
3) Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters – Elton John
4) Come Pick Me Up – Ryan Adams
5) Product of DK – The Blue Van

I was lying. I do, truly, love all of these songs, but upon further review I’ve decided that they are honestly just five songs that I really want other people to listen to. I was trying to educate. I was being a music nerd. I was saying, “isn’t it obvious that I have a superior knowledge of good music then you”. (I dare any of you hum a bar from each of The Zombies three big hits, let alone “Care of Cell 44”) So I’m going to try again and I invite all of you to join in.

Our first decision is this. Are we listing our favorite five or the best five? For me they are two completely different things. If I’m picking the best songs of all time then I should be considering the broader scope of what a good song is; taking into consideration a song’s structure and tone and whether or not it has universal appeal. However, if I’m picking my favorite songs then I can throw everybody else’s opinions out the window and name anything I want, even if its four songs by Asia and one by Tiffany. Personally, I’m going to stick to the pop/rock genre, though you can put anything you’d like, including show tunes, you damned theatre majors. You’re probably going to want to change these lists even as you are writing them, but that’s the fun of trying to keep your list short. So here we go.

Here is a list of what I think are a “Top 5” of the best songs ever.
In no particular order but numbered anyway.

1) Stairway to Heaven – Led Zepplin
This is probably the most clichéd answer to the most clichéd question, but it’s got everything you could want in a rock song. Fantastic build-up, great lyrics, perfect guitar solo, possible devil worship. What more do you want?

2) God Only Knows – The Beach Boys
My girlfriend mentioned this one on her blog, and because I agree with her, was probably what inspired me to create this post. One of the most earnest ballads ever.

3) American Pie – Don McLean
I remember when I was a kid my dad had this song playing. I said that guy sure took his Chevy to the levy a bunch of times. How can music make you nostalgic for a time that you weren’t even alive to be nostalgic about?

4) You Can’t Always Get What You Want – The Rolling Stones
Cool stands for a lot in rock n’ roll. The Stones were never The Beatles, but they were The Stones.

5) Iris – The Goo Goo Dolls
Finished laughing yet? I’ll never be caught dead with a Goo Goo Dolls CD, but I’ll listen to this song every time it’s on. Perfect Pop.

The other ones I really wanted to put on: Won’t Get Fooled Again – The Who; Born to Run – Bruce Springstein; Imagine – John Lennon; Suite Judy Blue Eyes – CSNY; All Apologies – Nirvana; With or Without You – U2. Notice, no Motown, no Johnny Cash, no Punk or Raggae. Just goes to show you what growing up to shitty FM radio will do to you.

Now here’s a “Top 5” of my favorites:

1) Hello It’s Me - Todd Rundgren
2) Happy Christmas (War is Over) – John Lennon
3) Nothing Left to Borrow – The Jayhawks
4) The Bends – Radiohead
5) Ghost – Indigo Girls
I’m cheating, but:
6)Ooh, Child – The Five Stairsteps

And finally…

My girlfriend kind of outed me as a Monkees fan on her blog, so I’m just going to say it. The Monkees were the outlet for some of the best pop from the sixties. They were manufactured? So what? So were the Beach Boys. So, the Top 5 Monkees songs that prove they were great.

1) Love is Only Sleeping
2) The Door into Summer
3) Pleasant Valley Sunday
4) The Girl I Knew Somewhere
5)For Pete’s Sake

All right, now let me know what you think of my lists and then come up with your own Top 5s. Start out with best or favorite songs and then see what else you can come up with. Hurry up. I'll be right here.

Sorkin, Shmorkin

So, I really like Aaron Sorkin. If you don’t know who he is then you probably weren’t a fan of “The West Wing”, “Sports Night”, “A Few Good Men” or his current project “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”. Sorkin’s material is known for it’s natural, off the cuff rhythms and the use of the “walk and talk” style of dialogue, in which busy characters, doing busy things in their busy lives, discuss various problems while walking through the hallways of office buildings, television studios or White Houses, depending on the show. Critics and fans also like to point out that Sorkin’s shows have more to do with the characters then the environment in which they exist. Therefore, “Sports Night”, which is set in an ESPNish, Sports Centerish, kind of Sports-News environment, is not about sports, but about the people who cover sports. “The West Wing” is not about politics and world affairs, but rather the people who deal in politics and world affairs. I will say this; the first four seasons of “The West Wing” (the ones in which Sorkin was at the helm) along with the first season of “Sports Night” (I’ve yet to have the chance to see the second, but I will) are some of the best television I’ve ever seen. There are times when “The West Wing” gets almost operatic or Shakespearian. The last episode of season two entitled “Two Cathedrals” features a scene in which President Bartlet, grieving the death a longtime friend, and seeking answers for his future, curses at God in Latin while standing in the National Cathedral. Oh, and there’s a tempest storming outside as he does it. “Sports Night” has a great arch in which Jeremy (played by Josh Malina) becomes obsessed with doing a story about a yachting disaster as a way to compensate for his parents divorce, just one of many moody moments that made it’s use of a laugh track absurd. Sorkin also seems to have a knack for using old standbys from classic television to class up his current shows. “Sports Night” had Robert Guillaume from “Benson”. West Wing brought in Alan Alda from “MASH”. “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” has both Ed Asner from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” and Judd Hirsch from “Taxi”. These are just some of the reasons that make me want to give “Studio 60” a little leeway. It’s not a bad show, in fact I really do like it, but it has some glaring weaknesses. The biggest for me being that this hasn’t become a show about the characters yet. Except for Amanda Peet's Jordan (who I originally saw as the show’s weak link, but now believe is the best thing going for it) the characters all seem to be more about the job then the people doing the job. The biggest complaint that I’ve heard from my friends in the writing community is that the comedy these creative geniuses are producing isn’t that good. A friend of mine who I’ve mentioned numerous times on this blog (let’s just call him “Flo Balk” at “Bearflirt”) even went so far as to call the sketches “insipid, vacuous, horse dung slapped on a piece of paper and called funny” (I’m pretty sure he never said that, but it sounds like him). Essentially he’s right, but it's not uncommon. If you’ve ever seen movies that try to show fictional artists being great at what they do, like Tom Hanks' “brilliant” stand up comic in “Punchline” or Billy Crudup’s revolutionary guitarist in the band Stillwater from “Almost Famous”, they are almost always underwelming. So does that mean that shows about showbiz should never be produced? I’m not sure, but I do know that if you have compelling characters and storylines nobody will really complain about the quality of the sketches, even those presenting “Gilbert and Sullivan” parodies as a hip, hilarious way of scathing the critics. “Studio 60” has a fantastic cast and a creator that should get into a groove sooner rather than later, so I hope it sticks around for a few seasons.

A few other things

If you like sixties Who or Kinks you might like a band called The Action. They only have one album which is called “Rolled Gold”, and it's more of a demo then an album but it's really good British Invasion pop/rock. Check out the song “Brain”. Good stuff.

I’ve decided that I will never run for the subway. I don’t see the point of rushing at top speed just to jam myself into a sardine can. There is usually going to be another train arriving within five or ten minutes. If you are in that much of a hurry, you probably should have left fifteen minutes earlier.

So I temped at the Polo Ralph Lauren store on Madison last week and will be at Saks Fifth Avenue for the following two. Let me just say this. If you are buying a pair of gloves for $250.00 that you can find at Target for $10.00, then you are an irresponsible person. My god, on Sunday I saw a dress at Polo that could have paid off my student loans. Must be nice.

So, Robert Altman died yesterday. I loved a lot of Altman’s movies and hated a few too. “MASH”, “Nashville”, “The Player”, “Short Cuts” and “Gosford Park” are among his greats. I really liked “The Gingerbread Man” which starred Kenneth Branagh, but I think Altman’s immediate family and I were the only people who actually saw that movie. “Popeye” and “Beyond Therapy” were two of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. I remember being completely disturbed by a scene in Altman’s “McCabe and Mrs. Miller” (a really dark, realistic western starring Warren Beatty) where a good natured cowboy played by Keith Caradine gets shot dead by a guy who cons him into drawing his guns by complementing the craftsmanship of them, and asking if he can have a look. His last movie was “A Prairie Home Companion”, which kind of sums up the odd nature of his material.

I’m flying out of Newark tomorrow morning for Thanksgiving. My flight is at 6:25 AM, it is now 11:30 PM. I’m not sure why I’m still awake since I will have to leave my apartment at around 4:00 AM to get there on time.

Have a great holiday.

Baldwins, Baldwins and more Baldwins

So, I figured for my next few entries I’d stick with what I know best, (no, not disappointing my mother) pop culture. Maybe this will turn out to be the direction this blog takes in the future, who knows? This entry consists of two parts that don’t necessarily have anything to do with each other, except the fact that they both contain the Baldwins.les

I saw a rather disappointing article the other day; Daniel Baldwin was arrested for stealing a friend’s car and possession of drugs. For those of you unfamiliar with Baldwin, he is the second oldest of the Baldwin brothers, (Alec, Daniel, William, and Stephen) and a pretty good actor. Over the years he has appeared in films, (“Trees Lounge” being a favorite of mine), major network series, (the great “Homicide: Life on the Streets”) and cable series (an upcoming run on “The Sopranos”). Unfortunately however, he has also had to put in stints on such C-list offerings as VH1’s “Celebrity Fit Club” and Bravo’s “Celebrity Poker Showdown”, proving that among the Baldwins, he is their “Ringo”. (No wait; Steven is more of a “Ringo”. Maybe “George”, but then that would make William “Paul” and I don’t think anyone would agree with that. Okay, let’s just say he’s number four on the hit parade. I think the reason for this is that his brothers have successfully taken up all the typecasting possibilities that Daniel could have prospered in. He’d probably fit best into Alec’s role; a tough guy leading man who is also quite capable of providing a stellar supporting turn when asked, but as soon as Alec stood toe to toe with Sean Connery in “The Hunt for Red October”, Daniel had to find another niche. William took the “cute one” status (hey, he is the “Paul”) when he started showing up in mainstream movies with Julia Roberts and Sharon Stone. For his part, Stephen took up the mantle of wacky-edgy-independent-supports Pauly Shore guy and has now eased into the role of wacky-edgy-born again-supports George W. Bush-obviously crazy as bat-shit guy. What was poor Daniel to do but get hopped up on Peyote and steal his buddy’s Rav-4? But, now that I think of it, he might have found his niche. Now he’s the “bad apple” Baldwin, the one who could end up pulling a John Belushi or a Kurt Cobain at any moment. He’s Robert Downey Jr. with pedigree. Honestly though, I hope he pulls through it and makes a career for himself I prefer to think of Stephen as the failure.

Now for some other Baldwin related news. Since I now have access to something known as "Television", I’ve gotten to see a couple of episodes of the new NBC show “30 Rock” and I think it’s going to be pretty good. “30 Rock” is one of two new NBC series based on the writers and staff of fictional “Saturday Night Live” style shows (The other, “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”, will be discussed in a near future entry on this blog, which I know my friend Joe at Hairshirt will want to comment on). The first thing that “30 Rock” has going for it is creator, writer, and star Tina Fey. Fey became every intelligent geek boy’s wet dream when she teamed with Jimmy Fallon and then Amy Poehler on SNL’s Weekend Update. She was head writer for the show for a number of years and then made a name for herself outside of the Sketch Comedy genre by writing and starring in “Mean Girls”. I have always had a soft spot for Fey who, besides being intelligent, talented and attractive, is only a few degrees away from me in the entertainment world. Her husband, Jeff Richmond, is a Kent State graduate who I missed crossing paths with by a couple years. Jeff worked with a lot of people who would later become my friends, teachers and colleagues, so I know that if I ever run into Tina on the streets of New York, I have something to talk to her about (Exactly what she’s looking forward to, I’m sure. “Here comes an out of work actor/fanboy with a story about my hubby. Impressive! I’ll hire him.”). In the two episodes I’ve seen, Fey’s Liz Lemon, head writer of a sketch comedy show which stars Tracy Jordan, (SNL’s Tracy Morgan, you see how those names are almost the same, but different?) fears choking to death while sitting at home single and alone, engages in a maybe it is/ maybe it isn’t romantic relationship with a lesbian blind date, and becomes obsessed with rehabilitating a scantily clad intern. Fey is always funny and her Liz is someone we can all relate to, an abnormally normal woman in the midst of a bunch of eccentrics who make her feel like the strangest person in the world. Besides Fey, other bright spots include Jack McBrayer as Kenny, the fresh off the farm NBC page, and best of all, Alec Baldwin as Jack, a network executive who excels at meddling in the creative process of the show and the personal lives of those that work for him. Baldwin seems to have recreated his career of late. For so long, he was seen only as a dramatic heavy, (Check out the first 10 minutes of “Glengarry Glen Ross”, or his supporting role in “The Cooler” for proof.) but with some strategic appearances on SNL and a penchant for being a great guest on late night talk shows, he has shown that he can sell almost any joke with a straight face. Baldwin’s Jack has a poker night face off with Kenny that just about killed me when I first saw it. As long as Fey keeps "30 Rock" on it’s creative toes and Baldwin sticks around to keep the comedy grounded, I think this show could stay around for a while. Check it out if you get a chance, I think NBC recently moved it to Thursday nights and they make the latest episodes available on their website, though that’s not always reliable.

A couple quick things:

Check out Hairshirt’s spin-off advice blog at http://askhairshirt.blogspot.com/, I think it will be pretty funny. (There Joe, I mentioned you twice in one post. I think I am now due one one hundred dollar bill, or a check for one hundred of said dollars).

Also, my girlfriend Alisa’s father was in the hospital recently with heart problems. If Alisa is a friend of yours, and I don’t know why she shouldn’t be, give her your best.

It's Alisa's birthday

So, this is a blog completely dedicated to my relationship with my girlfriend Alisa Ledyard. Let’s call it a birthday present of sorts since she was born on October 31^st (boo!) and since I really haven’t got the money to buy her anything really cool, this is about as good as it’s going to get for her.

This is Alisa Ledyard.

Alisa is a singer. Alisa is an actress

Alisa likes to perform in her underwear.

Alisa likes to perform dressed like a rockstar.

Alisa likes to perform in any capacity that allows her to show off her stomach.

Alisa likes to perform dada.

Alisa has even performed on TV

Alisa has always had a way with a funny face.

Alisa and I did a show together about four years ago at Kent State University. This picture is the only proof I have of the two of us being on stage at the same time. I have a cast on my hand, she's carrying a sign.

Alisa apparently likes older men.

Alisa’s name is pronounced the way it is spelled. Uh-Leesa.

Alisa doesn’t like it when you spell her name Alyssa.

Alisa went to Halloween dressed like this.

Alisa turns twenty-four on Tuesday.

I love Alisa.

Happy Birthday baby.

With friends like me, who needs friends?

So, I’ve moved around a lot the past decade. After undergrad I lived in Cincinnati for most of the nineties. In 2000 I decided I actually wanted to make a living doing the one thing I knew how to do well, (well, I actually knew how to do two things well, but sitting on my butt watching reruns of “The Rockford Files” wasn’t going to pay much) so I moved back to Kent, Ohio for grad school. Three years later Shenandoah Shakespeare hired me, and though officially I was a resident of Staunton, Virginia, my travels with the touring troupe meant that I slept in more hotel beds then the Harlem Globetrotters. (I really wanted to put a sexual reference here, but I know we’re all better then that)(Okay, Wilt Chamberlin; a Kiss groupie circa 1978; Paris Hilton (She’s a freakin hotel heiress!!); your mom) Three months ago I went back to Ohio to work for another theatre for the summer. Right now I’m in New York City. I’ll be back in Virginia for a few months at the beginning of next year, then probably back here for a while and then maybe back to Ohio next summer (maybe) and then… Yeah, you get the point.

As an actor, I figure this is going to be the norm for my life, at least for a while, if I’m lucky. If things go well for me I could end up working anywhere that theatre exits, places like Chicago, Denver, Seattle,…Jackson,…uh,…Juneau, and everywhere I go I’m going to meet a new group of people who I hope I’ll get along with. Here’s the problem. I don’t know if I have room in my life for any more friends.

A few years ago I had a conversation with a guy I went to grad school with named Matt Gorris, who also happens to be a subscriber to this blog. (Shout out to my Kent State homey Gorris!) Matt had just come off of a summer job where he worked with some pretty cool people among them a guy named “Frank”. (I actually have no idea what the guys name was but let’s just say it’s “Frank”) Matt and “Frank” agreed that they had a good time that summer and “Frank” said that it would be cool if they stayed in touch when the job was over. Matt said that it would be nice, but told “Frank” not to be insulted if they didn’t. Matt wasn’t being mean, he was just stating that because the two were unlikely to be working together again any time soon and because it might be a bit of a long shot that they would fly out to see each other on holidays and long weekends they might not stay as close as peanut butter and his pal jelly. This has happened to me a number of times. In fact, it kind of happened with me and Matt, who I had become pretty good friends with over our three years together at Kent.

If I were the most social person in the world, I mean like a party throwing, conference calling, massive posse leading freak of popularity with 5000 minutes a month on my cell phone plan and a trust fund that allowed me to sit around my apartment all day to wax social with all the citizens or the world, I would still manage to alienate most of my rolodex, for there is just not enough time for me to talk to everyone I know. I figure that a normal person (and by normal I mean someone with a 9 to 5 career, a wife and maybe 2-1/2 kids) probably has two or three groups of friends to worry about. These might include old friends, family friends, collage friends, work friends and maybe a few stray relationships formed over bowling balls or beer bottles. I believe I have no less then ten groups of people that I need to keep track of. I have my friends from high school, friends from undergrad (both dorm and theatre), friends from Cincinnati (work and theatre (both professional and community)), friends from grad school, friends from the Shakespeare tour (first, second and third, all very different groups of people), Porthouse friends (including my girlfriend), and now New York friends. I just don’t seem capable. I finally got around to calling Kelly (a high school friend) who has been trying to get a hold of me for the past week. I’ve failed to get together with Michael (undergrad friend and now New York friend) to see a movie that we’ve been talking about for four weeks. My buddy Jason (2^nd Shakespeare tour friend) has been calling me for a month, but I sure have managed to not see him. Lynda (a, until now, not mentioned Cedar Point friend) is someone I’m always talking about getting together with in the city. I’ve talked to her once since I moved here. Jillaine (grad school friend) just posted a comment on my myspace page stating that we need to see each other soon. Theresa (undergrad friend) always asks me if I hate her since that can be the only explanation for my failure to call her. Even those people who I consider nearest and dearest seem to have to wait sixty days or so between conversations with me, oh, unless I get dumped, then I call them every day for the support that I don’t seem capable of giving them.

To put it simply, I suck. But look at it this way. You could be related to me. It seems like I only call my Dad to ask for money, and I don’t think I even know my brother’s phone number. Now that’s friendship.

Money sucks. Long live money.

So, I’m a big fan of Liz Phair. I first heard of her in 1993 when I went to see Matthew Sweet play in the Flats in Cleveland. Sweet announced that though he usually would never consider covering another modern artist, he really felt like this girl Liz Phair was going to be something special and he wanted to play one of her songs. He then did a great version of “Never Said”, Liz’s first single off of Exile in Guyville. With Guyville’s no glitz, no glammer production quality and it’s straight to the point lyrical honesty, Phair became an alt-rock goddess with her critics, fans, contemporaries and especially me. (Yeah, she was hot.) Guyville and her next album, Whip Smart, both went gold as she rode the mid 90’s alt-chick wave that had her grouped in with the likes of Courtney Love, Sheryl Crow and later Sarah McLauglin and the whole Lilith Fair scene. (Anybody remember Paula Cole or Joan Osborne?) After that, she got married, had a kid and took a few years to put out her third album, Whitechocolatespaceegg. Egg was a good record. It didn’t break any new ground like Guyville, but it was really solid. The critics and fans, though still on her side, had cooled considerably (Except me, I was still in love). Egg includes a great song titled “Shitloads of Money”, in which she sings of the perceived evils of wanting to make a buck. Here is the chorus;

It's nice to be liked
But it's better by far to get paid
I know that most of the friends that I have don't really see it
That way
But if you could give 'em each one wish
How much do you wanna bet
They'd wish success for themselves and their friends and
That would include lots of money

Six years later, after another long hiatus, (which to my relief included a divorce) Liz put out her forth album, Liz Phair. It was on this album that she did the unthinkable; she actually tried to sell a few records. She hired a production team called “The Matrix”, the group that had created the ultra-slick sound of teeny punkster Avril Lavigne, co-wrote and produced four songs with them, released one of those as a single and waited for a reaction. Every Lollapoloozaing pseudo hipster who had ever worn a flannel shirt cried foul and threw this “new” Liz to the dogs, saying that this was the biggest sellout since Santa hired that flashy ninth reindeer with the shiny nose. She also, however, got the most radio play she’d seen in ten years, a gold single and an endorsement deal with Women’s collage basketball. Did Liz sell out? She sure as hell did, but should it really bother anybody?

I feel like I have some pretty high standards when it comes to what I do artistically. I try to seek out the best theatre groups and directors to work with and the best material to perform. As a songwriter, I am rarely happy with anything I create. The fact that I have eight or nine songs of my own that I can stand is a miracle in itself. I am incredibly critical of theatre and film and believe that most entertainment today is lucky to be mediocre, yet if I were given the chance to “sell out”, I’m pretty darn sure I’d jump at it.

You see, I just moved to New York City about a month and a half ago and have already put myself in a position where I am surviving on Raman noodles and any dollar menu I can find. In the past two weeks I overdrew on my Checking account, got charged a ridiculous amount of penalties, borrowed money from both my parents to pay for my next sublet, let friends pay for meals and beer, ceased all social activities for fear of spending forty dollars every time I walk out the door, considered selling plasma, considered selling sperm and almost put all my hopes of a future on the slim chance of winning the $5,000,000 grand prize in the McDonald’s Monopoly game. My brightest opportunity was being provided by a joint venture between Ronald McDonald and the Parker Brothers. I’ve got money coming in now, so things are leveling out, but damn man, this poverty thing just isn’t fun.

I read an interview that Liz gave before the release of the Liz Phair album, where she stated how if that record didn’t sell well then she would probably have to move back to Chicago and live with her mother. Well, a year or so ago she released another poppy album called Somebody’s Miracle (the first Liz Phair album I kind of don’t like), so it looks like she is doing okay with her new sound. I, like Liz, don’t want to move back in with my mother. So, if anyone knows how I can sell one of my songs to Nike for six figures, I’m all ears, otherwise I’m going to have to buy a lot of Big Macs to find that ever-elusive Boardwalk piece.

It’s better by far to get paid.