Cricket!

Note: This incident was stressful when it happened, but by the end of the night it was HI-larious!

I hate my job, but I do like most of my co-workers. One of them happens to be Arnie. He's this short, little, reserved, Italian guy who's about my age. He's a character and he cracks me up. One day he came to work with this thick mustache. It looked like a mustache that porn stars would wear in the 70's or that of Freddy Mercury from Queen. Granted, I hadn't seen him for a few days prior, but it was all his own hair. He got a lot of flack for that mustache, but man, he wore it with pride - until he decided to shave it off.

As a server, you will every so once a while, deal with a freak incident. Arnie was the lucky bastard tonight! One of his tables had ordered a salad and it is BJ's rule that we have to check on our table a minute after the food is dropped off. Arnie stopped by his table, occupied by a couple, and asked if everything was alright. The girl said, "Something tastes weird." She then proceeded to spit the contents of her mouth back onto her plate. Arnie took a look and realized that she had spit out a partially eaten carcass of a giant cricket! Yeah, PANIC!!!! As procedure, Arnie grabbed a manager to help deal with the situation. In an effort to be helpful, he grabbed oranges, limes, and lemons to help the poor woman rid herself of the taste of cricket. When those didn't work, our manager told Arnie to get her some soda water with bitters.

Nothing could get any worse, right? Riiiiiight...

The woman then breaks out into hives! She apparently had an allergic reaction to the bitters in the soda water! Poor Arnie was freaking out!!! Of course, their entire meal was complimentary and they left pretty quickly. Luckily, they were really calm and nice about the situation because they were regulars and understood that this was a freak incident. I felt bad for Arnie in the moment, but after a couple of hours, I could not help but laugh about how a bad situation just got INSANELY worse.

Poor Arnie got so knocked off his groove that throughout the night he kept introducing himself as a new server to tables that weren't his, and refilling their drinks. I was giggling at him all night. Arnie's fine. He's such a trooper!

I've now started calling him Cricket. :0)

Psycho Girl

There was a period of time where I was really curious to know what a "psycho girl" was. You know when a man says, "I took her out and realized halfway through the date that she was crazy! I couldn't wait to take her home and never see her again!" I never really knew what that meant because, well, I'd like to think I'm sane. That being said, I'd like to think that all of my girl friends are also sane. So aside from being women (a.k.a. more emotional than men and irrational/hormonal when we're on, say our periods), what exactly is the definition of a "crazy/psycho girl"?

What's the saying? Oh right, be careful what you wish for!!!

=If you want the short version, stop reading here and skip to end.=

Back in July 2010 I discovered this girl on Facebook. At the time she was an acquaintance of Randy's. Over the months she started to bug me. She always knew what Grey Goose event he'd be working at or when he'd be going out of town. I also knew this information, but I was the girlfriend. I think it's kind of expected for a guy to tell his girl where he'll be and generally what he'll be doing. So who the hell was this girl??? In November, out of an irritated curiosity I clicked on this girl's profile and discovered that her privacy settings were set to public - so I could see everything she put up. This lady (I use the term loosely) was born in 1975, is a single mom, and at the time, lived in Florida. I clicked on to her wall to find out more about her and to my horror, found that she was leaving love notes to/about Randy in her status updates. What was even worse was that she was planning on moving to Los Angeles in July 2011! Holy panic and pandemonium, Batman!!!

I happened to be visiting friends in New York when I discovered all of this and of course, my dramatic side surfaced. (I believe that all actors and actresses have a dramatic side. There's a good percentage that are able to keep that side of them in check, I'd like to think that I am one of them, but it will come out at the worst of times.) I was up the whole night, I cried, I panicked, I ranted, I raved, I made Randy call me at 6 o'clock in the morning ... it was definitely an unpleasant mess! I look back and I think I did a decent job of not falling apart too much on the outside, but I definitely feel a little bad that Derrick and his family had to deal with me. (I hope I wasn't that much of a handful Joanne! I know this happened almost a year ago, but I'm still sorry!!!) Inwardly, the best way to describe my feelings was to compare it to the activity of an electron. (Nerd reference!) I was bouncing all over the place!

Needless to say, Randy and I had a huge fight about it. Randy denied anything was happening. He was good friends with this girl's brother and as a favor to his friend, took this girl and her daughter out to lunch while she visited LA back in July 2010. That was the first and only time he had met her. He would occasionally have a texting conversation with her, initiated by her each time, and that is how she knew about things he would be doing. For example, he would be at the airport to fly to to Maryland to visit his mother. She would text, "What's up?" and because he is a nice guy, he would respond with "Can't really talk, boarding plane to Maryland." This chick would then post on his Facebook wall, "Hope you had a safe flight!" and I would see it. Add on domino effect reaction.

He had no idea this girl was leaving love notes for him and was mostly upset about the way I reacted and handled the situation. I was angry because I thought there was an affair going on, and how could he not know that this girl was leaving notes for him???, and how could he not understand the way I was reacting??? So starting in December we started to fix things. I will say that we didn't get 100% past this until April 2011. Randy and I have always had issues with time. We're both busy and we don't get to spend as much time together like the average couple would. I can't say that I felt like I could 100% trust him at that point, even though Randy sent her a message saying that he was in a relationship, deleted her information, and then defriended her on Facebook. There was a lot of hurt on both sides but by April I will say that a lot of our issues, this one included got ironed out.

So everything was hunky dory until this past Monday. (Is your head spinning? Because mine is! Kudos to you if you're still following along!) Randy had an evening business meeting this past Monday with Grey Goose. Crazy Pants had an early birthday dinner party going on at Flemings Steakhouse to which Randy (and all her other crazy friends) had an invitation to. My man, who despite this drama was still friends with Nutcase's brother, stopped by the restaurant because a) he wanted to catch up with his friend, b) the restaurant was on the way to his meeting, and c) he thought enough time had passed and that things would be "normal". He brought along a bottle of Grey Goose (which is free for him, as he is a Goose employee) as a gift because he didn't want to show up empty handed. He stayed for 10 minutes, spoke solely to Crazy's brother, and promptly left. Why Randy thought this would be a good idea, God knows. So then I start seeing status updates like these:

"Just got home from work and received everyone's birthday wishes!! THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH!! You are all soo special to me!! XOXO!!..Getting ready to go eat with Randy and then out with the girls later tonight!! ;) Loving my birthday so far!! ;)"

And then:

"Just had the most amazing birthday dinner with Randy at Flemings..And my birthday presents were amazing as well..Flowers, a day at the spa, Express and Nordstroms gift cards, a bottle of Cabernet and 2 bottles of Grey Goose ;)..Thank you Randy for an amazing birthday!! xoxo"

*sigh* My head hurts.

Then tonight, she decides to show up at Houston's where he also works as a bartender. Already annoyed and slightly stressed out by this situation, he tells another bartender to take care of her. And yes, she posted a note about how she visited him and blah blah blah.

=For the short version, resume here=

So I guess, speaking from personal experience, a psycho girl is a female who pursues a man who is not attracted to her and/or already has a girlfriend. Despite the fact that she is made aware of this, she decides to pursue him anyway, making her presence known, and constantly contacting him to a point of harassment.

Why on earth would a woman want to pursue a man who does not want her??? Oh right, only a crazy woman would do that.

Here is what's going on in my head:
1. I refuse to ask of Randy anything that I would not want him to ask of me. He is a big boy and he has proven to me that our relationship is very important to him. I believe that I am overstepping my boundaries if I ask him to stop being friends with psycho's brother. However, I do believe that Randy will step back from that relationship if Koo Koo keeps pursuit.
2. I trust Randy. Absolutely 100%. I trust his judgment (although he clearly made a lapse in judgment this time).

Randy said to me that he told Crazy's brother that he thought she was bananas. The brother's response was, "Oh, she's harmless!".

I beg to differ! She's not harmless to me or my relationship. She's poisonous! Words can hurt and do great harm. She's like herpes! We got rid of her in December, she disappeared for a while, then months later she suddenly flared up and now she's back!

As far as her mother and friends are concerned, Randy is something wonderful and couldn't be a better boyfriend to her. Thankfully, I am aware of what's going on and I definitely take ANYTHING this girl says with a grain of salt. As of now, she hasn't made any physical threats and I'm letting Randy handle this. But I am ready to spring into action if Randy gives me the green light. What am I planning to do? I have no idea yet. She is 6ft tall so it might prove to be a bit of a challenge for my 5ft frame. I am feeling so territorial, though! I don't know if I should laugh at this girl because it's so ridiculous or to grab a cudgel and prepare for battle!

Gah!!!!

A Man's Doctor Notes

My friend shared something about her Dad on Facebook and I thought it was so funny that I'd share it:

"my dad keeps an address book with detailed notes on his ipad under the notes section. I am laughing crying under his list of doctors "DR Birin: does not care about my kidney stones" "Dr Suozzi: He does not look like a doctor" "Dr Jacob: Doesn't want to be doctor. wants to be karate teacher". " Dr B: I like him, he is fat and tells me i can eat whatever i want"."

Murphy's Law

So these past couple of weeks have been one of the busiest weeks in the artistic department for me. Last Tues evening I headed down to San Diego to film my second day on the commercial I booked for Sycuan Casino and Resort. (Call time was 4am. I managed to get about 4 hours of sleep this time, as opposed to my first day where I had a 3:30am call time and only 1 hour of sleep.) I spent the whole day in a micro-mini skirt and 5 inch heels. I was in them for 11 hours! My feet HURT!!! I then drove the 2 hour journey back home as soon as shooting was done.

Then the following Saturday I had a workshop with Scott David, casting director with April Webster - huge casting office! Current big show that he casts is Criminal Minds. Then on the following Monday, I had an audition for an acting internship at A Noise Within, theater company located in Glendale that focuses on classical plays. Yes, I was pretty busy with prepping monologues and scenes. On top of that I was working my restaurant job.

So guess what happened??? I got sick! Got the flu! And it wasn't a 24 -48 hour bug. No! It's been a week and a half I'm still not 100% out of the woods yet! I had laryngitis, headaches, body aches, running nose, cough ... you name it! Everything but the fever. It got so bad that I actually went to my doctor and she put my on antibiotics. Not only am I still currently on the antibiotics, I'm also on antibiotic eye drops because I'm a genius and managed to get my eyes infected too! Hopefully I should be done with antibiotics this weekend.

I did all my auditions with half a voice. I had this raspy, whispery thing going, which was either really sexy or chain smoker. I gave the choice to whomever I was speaking to. I think it was just peer determination to do well because I wowed Scott David (whom I was secretly petrified to meet because I had heard that he could be a bit of a bitchy gay man) and I nailed my audition for A Noise Within! Personally I think it was the voice. It gave me some mystery. Unfortunately, I'm getting better and my voice is getting back to normal. Haha!

But yes, I am now an acting intern (albeit an unpaid one, but I need some artistic outlet at this point) at A Noise Within and they've decided to put me in their first production of the fall season, which is Twelfth Night. I'll probably be part of the ensemble and be doing a lot of dancing/pracing around. Either way, it's something TO DO while I wait for my agent to get me those tv/movie auditions. It'll also be nice to get involved in the LA theater community and meet new people. I have a feeling I am going to disappear for the next few months. This internship lasts until December.

Next on the agenda: How to get rid of this damn dry cough?!?!

Underwear

Another chinchilla story:

Sometimes I'll let the chinchilla run around the bathroom while I take a shower. I guess I consider this multi-tasking because Emo needs time every night to run around outside his cage. This one night, I was getting undressed and accidentally dropped my underwear. It landed right on top of Emo's head, who unsuccessfully tried to pull it off. Unfortunately, the chinchilla managed to get himself tangled in it and promptly began to run around the bathroom in a panic. It seemed like his inner dialogue was:

"It won't go away! Maybe if I run away from it while wearing it, it'll go away!!!"

Luckily I was quickly able to untangle him from my underwear before my already traumatized chinchilla could pass out from fear. He instantly jumped into my arms and burrowed his head in the crook of my elbow. Chinchillas will hide their heads when they're nervous or scared. He was so cute!

Couldn't help but feel sorry for the little guy, though! Poor Emo! Got scared by a pair of panties tangled on his head.