I wanna be karaoke

Work is hectic and will continue to be hectic for a while, so I'll be posting lighter. Anyway, last night was fun even though I didn't see the woman I was hoping to see.

A few things I noticed about gay-bar karaoke as distinguished from straight-bar karaoke(although admittedly my sample size is really small):

Generally better singing at the gay bar.

More gospel songs at the gay bar (People who think gay=depraved take note).

More general friendliness and less strict cliquishness at the gay bar.

Singing about how I am an antichrist, I am an anarchist doesn't go over any better at a gay bar than a straight one (people who think gay=depraved take note).

SPECIAL TO MY READERS

Yesterday was awful, so today I'm planning to compensate. There's a cute lady I met recently who allegedly hangs out at the Lakeview Yacht Club on Thursdays, so that's where I aim to be. Come by and I'll buy you a drink. If all my readers show up, we might be able to get our own table.

Third Post of the Day: did I mention that Birmingham Mayor Larry Langford Sucks?

From this Alabama News article Re: Langford's regressive sales tax increase:

Olivia Thompson, a former city bus driver forced to leave her job because of a disability, said she lives on just $607 a month.

"They're saying one penny's just one penny," the West End resident said. "It's not just one penny if they double and triple taxes for business owners. That's going to spill over to us, and we won't even be able to afford food stamps."

Langford, who dropped in for about 10 minutes of the evening meeting and took the microphone, dismissed such fears.

"If a penny's going to break you, you're already broke anyway, so don't worry about it," he told the cheering crowd.


What a callous little man. A domed stadium might be a good idea, but don't put the burden on those least able to bear it.

It's the cheering crowd that gets me, though. Birmingham is dumb. Dumb like a frog.

Second Post of the Day

Realtor-wise I now have two offices to contend with; one has come onto the scene but the other hasn't left. As I've labored these past few days to correct my realtor issue (which seems to hinge on confusions between the two offices, confusions which are outside my sphere of influence) I've been uncertain which of the two offices is the boss and which is the subordinate. People at each office seem to think they're the top, and that the other office is topping from the bottom. I now think the relationship isn't a linear hierarchy; more like a bad marriage. Mommy-office and Daddy-office are fighting, and they were taking it out on me. Now I've reestablished the equilibrium by getting them to fight with each other. I feel semi-safe but precariously perched. I'm glad my real Mommy and Daddy are happily married. I feel like I've gotten a demo of what it's like to be the child of squabbling parents, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

P. S. to whom it may concern: Mr. Goldstein did a one-man show at Virginia Samford theatre a few months back, and it was dope. I will not be doing a one-man show at Virginia Samford, but I might do a one-man scene at an open-mike if I can find one that seems hospitable.

I won't bore you with the details

Various things involving my money seem to have gone awry. I've tried to be reasonable about it whenever the person on the other end was hoping for me to be gracious. Perhaps I'll get a positive karmic payback when I'm depending on the other person to be gracious. As it is, I'm playing phone tag with the woman who's in charge of attacking deadbeat tenants; despite paying my rent on time I've been mistaken for a deadbeat. I hope getting a refund on a lost money order is a painless transaction.

Meanwhile I'm working on a solo-performance text. Where does one do solo performance texts in B'ham? If you're Goldstein the answer is Virginia-Samford, but I'm thinking a bit smaller than that.

Move along, "Navel S--b" fans. There's no navel s--bbing to be enjoyed here.

I'm making a s--b at writing a monologue (do you suppose my use of the phrase "making a s--b" in conjunction with the tag "navel gazing" is why so many people come tripping across my blog in their search for "navel s--b?" Every day these people come to my blog. It's kind of disturbing) for some kind of performance, but it's nowhere near being ready to reveal. That's all.

I lost weight over Thanksgiving weekend

Heaven knows I needed to. My family eats light and lean compared to me, so I kept the eating thing under control. Also the actual Thanksgiving dinner was an extended family potluck, and my extended family is a mixed bag on the cooking front. Half the desserts were from Sam's Club. C'mon, people.

The time with my nuclear family was time well spent, indeed.

Anything else? I'm reading the anthology Extreme Exposure, Ed. Jo Bonney, full of text excerpts of various performance artists. There's some tasty stuff in here. Future audition monologues, for sure, but also a source of inspiration. I may try my hand at writing and open-miking, just to see if B'ham wants performance monologues, and if I can help meet that need.

Look, I had all these lovely little observations over the weekend, but I came home to a Landlord Letter which banished all such thoughts from my head. Home Office thinks I haven't paid my rent. I have. They've promised to clear it all up, but even the suggestion that a Kafkaesque eviction nightmare might open up through no fault of my own changed all my pastel sunlit ruminations into dark inky stormclouds. All's well (probably) but never underestimate McFate's power to make a sow's ear of a silk purse.