Life keeps

me on my toes these past few days. On Monday, a friend, Franklin from MD stopped by my work to visit. It seems the place where she and Trebek were crashing at had a bitchy roommate who flipped when she saw Trebek sleeping on her beloved couch. It was later explained that the roommates weren't getting along and Franklin/Trebek got caught in the crossfire. So I offered up my living room for them to crash at.

I met up with Szymanski and Blondie for a wonderful Indian meal, when is it never wonderful?? We ended up gabbing for a few hours before I went home to meet up with Franklin and Trebek. They arrived, drop off their stuff and we hit the bar down below, called Toast, which is well-known for their hamburgers to grab a bite (me, I had a margarita and some ff cuz I was still pretty full from the chicken marsala.) It was great yakking it up with them. I realize I enjoy haning with lots of different people, it makes life so much more interesting and gratifying. Franklin also got the opportunity to meet my famous bitchy kitty, Tom and my roommate's Hamster name "Lazy Bastard." The funny thing is, Tom shows no interest in Lazy Bastard, no licking his lips, or crouching to sneak up on the little guy, more like, hmm.. "maybe if you chopped it up in smaller pieces, Ill feast, otherwise I am not gonna get my paws dirty." My roommate and I hung out with Franklin and Trebek for an hour or so, discussing airlines and what its like to be a flight attendant. I dont think people realize its hard work. My roommate comes home after being gone from 3 to 5 days at a time and goes into a coma for the next 15 hours due to pure exhaustion!

Yesterday I met up with my Sweetie down by 42nd st for lunch before I had to be at work later that afternoon. I decided to go into "touristy" mode and begged to hit Hard Rock Cafe. I have only been to the one in DC and wanted to see if it was a lot different? it sure is, the entrance is a small gift shop with Hard Rock Logo items. Then there's a staircase going down where we then were greeted by a host who ushered us to this area (I had no clue as to what was being said) but it quickly became apparent that our photo was gonna be taken. Snap, flash and a few seconds of seeing stars we then continue to another area where a different host sat us. Now granted I thought the food was lousy, its always lousy, same as DC. But the company was great! We talked and bs for an hour or so. The woman came by with our photo in 2 picture frames and 2 keychains with our photo selling them for $25 as a package. Neither me nor the Tin Man felt the picture did any justice, only verified our confusion to having our photo taken. We both have a puzzled or unsure look on our faces. We vetoed the package. No way would I ever shell out $25 for that crap. I know what we look like, we live here in NYC so its not the same as it might be for Bob and Marge from Iowa. They may actually be stupid enough to pay that ridicolous amount. Thinking "oh well, thats NYC for you, very expensive."

I went to work and met with my tutoring student for math. A native of NYC, and a deafie we hit it off right from the git go. After we did some stuff and agreed on a game plan, we had 45 mins left for the tutoring so she asked me to help her with her reading. Basically she would read a paragraph and then sign the concept to me. I would then let her know if she was right, partially right or off the mark and explain what the author really means. For example "we'll hang in there" doesnt mean people sitting around, hanging out but rather its a hearing slang for "we'll be fine," "we can put up with it" or "its not too bad, its manageable, tolerable..." The student was a little frusturated and I explained that these are cultural norms that hearing people pick up on everyday by listening to various conversations. Its the same for international folks who first language isnt English, its hard from them to graps our American sayings. During some of the clarifactions I would act out the emotion or the behavior being read by my student. Funny she remarked my facial expression was like that of a Black person and it was surprising for her (herself Black) to see a White Jewish woman like me, looking like that. I guess living in DC area all these years has altered my whitey DNA to at least an olive tone?? I didn't bother to explain I was involved with theater all my life and directed movies so its easy for me to mimic others. I could never be a FT actress simply because while I can act a certain way, its more for an example to my performers rather than a skill I could maintain for long periods of time. I just don't have the dedication to lose myself into a character, for a few seconds sure but all day long, day after day, week after week... I dont know it just doesn't appeal to me like it did when I was younger. I do enjoy being a background/ensemble extra more than a lead actress any day.

After work ended I swung by Cain's place because even tho I got some of my things the night before, I left behind important stuff like kitty cat liter scooper and trust me, every Cat Owner needs their scooper to keep their sense of smell intact. I arrived home and immediately cleaned my room up as it was driving me bonkers. Then I hooked up the I-Mac but no wireless service was accessible. I will have to call the cable company to see about having a wireless account open or try finding a plug in thinging like my bfs laptop that has a much broader range to pick up singles for wireless. I may be close enough to the several colleges nearby to pick up on theirs for free?

Later I joined my roommate to watch some cartoons and then we popped in MurderBall,
the documentary. I didnt get to finish it, but wow one of the characters Joe Soares brings major drama to the piece and the testosterone levels in this piece is extremely high. If they ever make a movie on this guy's life, they should get Woody Harrelson to play Joe Soares. They do look like they could be brothers!

What I liked a lot about this piece is they follow 3 to 5 different Quadriplegics life stories. And clarified many myths such as one rugby players gave an example of how he was out and about when one of his neighbors came over and remarked "why (name) its so good to see you out and about." as if he was hiding in a basement somewhere! Another guy remarked how he went to the food store to do some shopping and in the parking lot as he was getting ready to leave, someone approached him and asked him if he needed help getting into the vehicle? He's like "hello, how do you think I got here, did my food shopping, put the food in the vehicle and not be able to get in on my own!" Its the same crap deafies face about being "inspirational." Hell, go find something to do yourself thats inspiring but dont go up to every person who is different from yourself and make that dumbass remark! The movie also taught me that a Quadriplegic physical ability varies depending on where their neck was broken. The higher up the neck, the less mobility. But most do retain some functions in their upper body, such as arms and hands but maybe they cant grasp things. One guy likened his hands to spatulas. So the Quadriplegics rugby players have this tendency to identify themselves as a 2, 3, 4 whatever nbr they are to discribe where their necks were broken. I thought that was very interesting none unlike deafies who may identitify themselves as Deaf, deaf, oral, hoh, hearing impaired *shudders*... They also broached the topic of whether sex is doable or a dead issues. The goods news is, while everything waist below is paralyzed, their penises are NOT. What it didnt address was how much they actually feel while having a hard on? Most of them said, that was their biggest concern as to whether or not they will be able to wank off or be sexually desirable to others. I do wonder about female Quadriplegics, do they have any feelings in their clitoris? When having sex and being penetrated, can they feel this? I will watch the rest of it tonight but I gotta say, its one of the best documentaries I ever saw. If the American Rugby Quadriplegics Teams come to NYC for an event, I am sooo their. I would get Mark Zupans autograph in a heartbeat.

Here's a picture of Zupran in action, he is the USA team!

Last but not least, the USA Quad Rugby team has won the paralympics from 1990 to present every year except in May 2002 where they lost the championship by 1 point to Canada thanks to Joe Soares! You can read more about the US Quad Rugby Team here.

I ended up going to bed very late not because of Tv or the computer but simply couldnt fall asleep, finally at 3am, I popped in a melatonin to help me sleep and then dragged my sorry butt to work this a.m.. Tonight I have to burn some of my movies in quicktime format for my webdesigner. Currently the website is under construction but at least theres a site to go to. I will post it when its ready :)