I've been opening Todd and Pony's birthday present to me over and over since I got it. No, I'm not a masochist. It's a book, silly.
And I must recommend it to everyone who reads this. It's called Living out Loud: Activities to Fuel a Creative Life by Keri Smith. It has sections on different important things like remembering how to play, creating sacred spaces, and letting go. Each section has writing or otherwise creative activities to get you thinking and empower you to move your life in the direction that you want to go. Run to your library or bookstore. Now. Seriously, I feel inspired and slightly more alive despite my surroundings because of reading and working with this book.
I got to meet up with Todd and Pony at Slaughters in order for them to give me the donation check from the show listeners on Thursday. Good times. The rum and coke and darts flowed freely. They took pictures as well, which I will post as soon as I figure out where they ended up going first. I love those guys. They are so sweet and unselfish, even when they think they're not. We will hang out again soon.
Then I went to a drag show at my usual place the Egyptian Club. It was a benefit for equal rights. There were some pretty funny numbers. My favorite was this older drag queen singing political songs like "You Need Us in the USA," with lines like "you can't take the Homo out of Oklahoma or the ass out of Massachusetts..." but my favorite was her parody of kumbiyah, however you spell that, called "we wish we were all lesbians" with lines like "we don't tip too well, lesbians. We're all going to hell, lesbians." And "we drive pickup trucks, lesbians. We know how to suck, lesbians." I guess you would've had to be there, but it was hilarious.
After that I had a somewhat scary moment. This drunk girl who was trying to be affectionate and inclusive of me decided to jump on my lap out of nowhere and grab my controller to hang on to. So there we were going full speed ahead into the tables with her hanging on for dear life and me screaming for her to let go. Finally the tables stopped us, squishing her in between me and a table and the person behind that table squished in between two tables. And still she would not let go. I was pretty scared. Then someone who has worked with my chair before managed to get her off my lap and me back out of the tables. No one was seriously hurt, thankfully. I just really don't like that level of lack of control.
I'm getting ready to leave for my trip on Friday, and I'm so excited and nervous that I will forget to bring or do something really important. We will just have to see.
I'm also excited and nervous because the guys told me that since they have a songwriter friend who found one of my songs worthy of a tune, apparently. Nobody is sure which one yet. I will definitely keep you updated.
Due to an e-mail miscommunication, my mom left town before I was required to see her, which is overall probably a really good thing. According to my sister, my mom left me a card with a $50 inside, but she said I had to use it for camp things, and so my sister apparently found it appropriate to hang onto herself for the past two weeks. I still haven't actually seen either card or the money. Sigh.
On Tuesday, the winner of each table of the poker tournament gets to go to Las Vegas to play in a real tournament for free. There will be two winners. So I have been practicing like mad. But I'm proud of myself for at least earning a seat in this tournament.
I think that's all for now. I hope everyone is well.