DAILY
-Drink WATER 1.5 liters a day (set aside little cups for on the go or markers and drinking them at a specific time)
-Think of 3 Things to be grateful for

——————–
January
——————–
-have my temporary reel done (add the taxi scene, 25 and summer clips)
-Continue Jacqui’s Exercise Regime (once a week)
-research an “Acting for Commercials” class
-1 Segment & 1 episode (tape ep3 Sun Jan 22)
-Audition for 5 projects

——————–
February
——————–
-New headshot (2/11/12)
-Find Small group (2/5/12)
-take an “Acting for Commercials” class
-Continue Jacqui’s Exercise Regime (twice a week)
-Audition for 5 projects
-tape 2 things (segments or sketches)
-tape episode 4 (Sun?)
-Clear out ALL of my childhood toys via gifting, giving away or geocache (2/28/12)

——————–
March
——————–
-Audition for 5 projects
-obtain MONEY for goals
-Continue Jacqui’s Exercise Regime (thrice a week)
-tape 2 things (segments or sketches)
-tape episode 5 (Sun?)
-move vhs tapes to a smaller storage unit
-buy a vhs to dvd recorder and start converting

——————–
April
——————–
-Have an agent (4/30/12)
-Audition for 5 commercial spots
-tape 2 things (segments or sketches)
-tape episode 6 (Sun?)
-see Jacqui in Australia again (or in May)
-finish writing ep 7

——————–
May
——————–
-Tape one spot (5/5/12)
-Audition for 5 commercial spots
-tape 2 things (segments or sketches)
-tape episode 7 (Sun?)
-finish writing ep 8

——————–
June
——————–
-Audition for 30 spots (5 a month – 6/15/12)
*Launch TRKS something
-tape 2 things (segments or sketches)
-tape episode 8 (Sun?)

-Have a costar role in a tv series (due 8/1/12)
-star in a short or feature film (8/15/12)

I’ve made several observations on the Australian lifestyle and here are a few of my thoughts:

Koalas and Kangaroos aren’t everywhere like I pictured. I do see yellow warning signs with kangaroos on them like I would deer signs in the northwest. I’m still optimistic. The only wild animals I’ve seen have been at the wildlife preserve.

Every power outlet (powerpoint in Oz speak) has its own power switch which indicates a painted orange dot when it is on. My guess is that this is to prevent an electric shock from the higher than US voltage coming from the walls. Another benefit is that this would solve the ‘phantom power’ issue of charging cables. Quite handy I think.

There are LOTS of spiders. There are several poisonous spiders in Australia. So far I’ve encountered a Huntsman that Jac has smashed with her shoe. A White-tail (who’s bite apparently often results in amputating an arm or leg as it turns purple) and a Red-back. It’s more the constant presense of webs everywhere that bothers me, however. I see them everywhere. I run into them often. Not so fun.

Jac made a joke in the US about many of the laws and restrictions we have. I replied by saying something about how Australia is just more lawless. I experienced something similar in Spain in 2010, and here it manifests differently. There are cars parked all over the place. A dangerous traffic maneuver called a hook-turn exists for those willing to try (my girlfriend being one of those). Among other things. Not that I’m complaining though. The US is too cautious due to excessive litigation and fear of liability.

Food and clothing here is quite expensive. This is justified I suppose by the higher minimum wage ($18 according to Jacqui). A typical dinner is $30-40 and that is WITH a buy-one-get-one-free coupon or ‘voucher’.

The language varies unexpectedly. Jacqui and I often keep ourselves amused at each other’s accents. As she predicted I am often needing to be corrected in my Aussie-lingo. It isn’t a restroom, but a toilet. It isn’t called candy but ‘lollies’. She doesn’t carry a purse, but a ‘handbag’. I am constantly forgetting these words and I probably won’t get it until I’m about to leave back to the US. .. And then all my friends will comment on my interesting vocab. Then there is the constant ‘reckon’ usage. This and other such words are often used. I’ve heard them before, but usually in a historic or rural setting. Then there is the difference in pronouncing words and companies. They pronounce Nissan as niss-anne where us says niece-on.

Again I’m not complaining about these differences, merely commenting on observations. I find it all such a delight and I’m glad I still have about two weeks left to enjoy everything some more.

I’m very optimistic about my relationship with Jacqui. So I know I will visit again and again.

Oh, and the area of Melbourne (or Sydney) isn’t like the cartoon versions I have constructed in my head. I pictured everything tan and dusty and everyone talking like Crocodile Dundee. Jac has assured me such places exist in a different state than hers (she lives in Victoria). People who speak that way are called ‘auckers’ (sp?). Perhaps I’ll venture to those areas the next time I visit.

I’m going to start a habit though, where I make time to get to someplace early so I can read these books. I have a BUNCH of plays, acting theory books and reflection I could do, but as I’m learning in BCII, you can only go so far ‘learning’ acting. The rest is doing. That is what I am preparing to do.

I don’t want to sit too long now and type up a post.. I have LOTS to memorize. Part of my new process is to type or scan the script and have the ‘robot voice’ read it to me. When I try recording the script myself, I end up accidentally doing intonations and then run the risk of always repeating them that way.

I have a scene from Angels in America (need to re-read this play), When Harry Met Sally, and then I have to memorize a dramatic monologue for my Tuesday Hollywood Playground class and a comedic monologue for Monday.

It is times like this that I really wish I had instant memorization.. someday… = )

So yeah, digital books are great, unless you have ‘non’ digitalized books that you have to carry around too.

My plans for ‘Catching Up’
——————–
-gathering a smoothie recipe collection & healthy out and about snacks (I’m sick of eating terrible-for-me foods when hunger strikes)
-setting dates for important things (like my hike-plan day!)
-recruiting others to help me with my community building (I have a list of great ways to build different communities impact l will appear soon, probably more in depth after BC2 is over. My ideas include: cold reading practices, ramshackle films, goal club, TRKS planning meeting, commercial improv, bible study group, LA adventure group, and of course a hiking club)
-getting rid of the ‘junk’ that is taking up space in my room
-mini-calendars and pencils near sites of habits to form (or checklists)
——————–

Calendars and Checklists

Keeping track and marking progress is the best way to accomplish a goal. I made a bunch of little June calendars and my goal is to do put these near ‘stations’ where I want to forge new habits.

- Dental Hygiene: last week I got a cleaning and checkup. (thanks to a $29 Groupon). They mentioned that I have ‘pockets’ forming on parts of my gums. This is probably due to my hit-or-miss habit of flossing and rinsing. NO MORE! I made a little calendar that I’ll check off twice a day for brushing-for-2min/flossing/rinsing.

- Workout. I haven’t been to the gym in a LOONG time and I keep thinking about how that is such a wasted opportunity. Apple paid for my membership to 24 hr fitness until March 2012. I put a little calendar check off list near my pull-up bar in the hall for: pullups/pushups/situps/touching-toes. I’ll need to buy some 8lb weights for some shoulder exercises too.

- Feeding Seamonkeys. You are supposed to do this every two days, but I often lose count. Sorry little dudes.

Same thing with checklists
- Car. I once supposed that I spent $150 on gas a month. I’m about to find out how accurate this is. My plan is to fill up today and then keep track of all gas I pay for until the end of the month, then fill it up again. This should work right?

- Acting exercises. There is a collection of different exercises that I ‘could do’ and I’ll have to come up with a way to rotate these things.

-Free time list. I’ve gotten in such a bad habit of wasting those ‘free moments’ one has throughout the day. I now have my little list of free time activities that are prioritized: Submit to LAcasting/Actors access, ‘things-to-ponder’, life goals meditation etc.

As other ideas pop up, I’ll add little calendars and golf pencils near the area. I’ve tried using my phone all for such matters, but it gets lost in the sea of apps on there, and a lot of things are location specific. What good is a timed reminder that appears when I’m elsewhere?

Let the month of change begin!

For a while now, I’ve been collecting all the ways other people memorize lines, and trying to figure out what works best for me.

One such way has been to write out my lines, so then I can go back afterwards and see what words I messed up on.

The tried and true method is to ask to have someone read lines for you, but I always felt bad because I would constantly need my lines fed to me. I needed a middle ground.

Then a while back I saw an iPhone app called Rehearse, which had this awesome feature that allowed you to highlight your lines on a pdf and then press a button and the highlight would turn black, leaving just your cue lines. Great! This works a little more elegantly than using a card to cover your lines.

The drawback was that the app was ‘free’ and they had a subscription model which meant that you would have to always pay for the scripts to be put in the app. Boo I say! This subscription price was WAY overpriced.

I turned to the clunky hollywood helper app, but there was always some sort of formatting issue with that little guy.

Then today I was preparing all the scripts I have to have memorized for my BC2 class, and I wondered if anything had changed with Rehearsal.

Yes! They’ve done away with the subscription fee and now I can pay a one time price of $20! FINALLY!

Now to get memorizing! I hope this app helps me overcome my memorizing mental blocks!

A few years ago I was dating this girl and after we broke up I decided to write a play. In it I said a lot of things I had wished I had said and things we may have each been thinking. It was very cathartic actually. I wish I knew how to write songs, it seems like people have better attention spans for such things. Isn’t there something about how all songs (or most of them) have to do with love. So true. Although, this came to me as I was listening to “love songs on the coast”.

Anyway, I kind of miss that high emotionally charged moment you have when you are with someone who really gets you, someone you have really opened up to- or someone you are getting to know. Relationships are so fascinating.

A friend of mine told me that I have been guarded, and this was a while ago. Then recently someone asked what I was thinking. Have I put on such a guard that no one knows what I’m thinking! Yikes!

Anyway, this post was supposed to be all about benchmarks in life- Another book I read recently (seriously- I’ve had my kindle read me so many books so far, utterly amazing) this one was titled “Moonwalking with Einstein” and it was all about memory and how we should all strive to make memories because they create benchmarks so we know where we’ve been.

I had this resolve to start collecting such benchmarks aka making memories, and I was all set, but I don’t think I’ve really done all that much. Well, my excuse for the past month has been that I have been taking an acting class, but I start up again for a two-month stretch starting this Sunday! Make memories happen!

Anyway, I know I have been living life too safe lately. I’d like to start have things happening again–

Oh, and then my Tuesday acting teacher said that I, and another girl, were quiet, and we didn’t have a bunch of disruptive drama surrounding us like certain classmates. Then later we were told by a director (and the teacher) that it is best to keep to one’s self and do your job instead of fueling the antics of those certain actors that make everything about them.. sound advice, but I know there’s got to be a line to explore there. How does one do the work, but be memorable and have fun? Are they opposite spectrums? Hmm..

Right, benchmarks.

Make them.

Do them.

Explore them.

And appreciate all things happening while in them.

At least one’s heartbreak, contemplation, or high emotion makes good art! = )

Well, when I received my tax refund it was time. I purchased it on April 3 and to my surprise, it arrived two days later.

Since then my commute hasn’t been as terrible. It takes me an hour to get to work each morning, but now I simply turn on the read-to-me feature and my books are read aloud! I had been downloading audiobooks, but I missed taking down notes and highlighting.

Occasionally I try to keep up on kindle news and I recently discovered that Amazon will soon allow kindle to check out digital e-books. Nifty!

So in a nutshell, here is what I like about my kindle:

- able to read outside in the sunlight (unlike my iPhone)
- battery life lasts a LONG time
- can make notes on the book and highlight (also release my notes to others and see other’ people’s highlights.
- it READS ME THE BOOK (so incredibly awesome)
- I can read the same books on my iPhone anytime (yay whispersync!)
- it makes sampling and buying books so easy

Little annoyances to an otherwise incredible device-
- can’t bookmark while being read to (would be useful when driving to come back to later make notes)
- ‘page numbers’ are only visible when pressing the Menu key (same reason as above)
- there isn’t a way to get a book on the whispersync (would be useful for books I get from other places)
- when you download a sample and then buy the book it doesn’t automatically get rid of the sample (a small annoyance to be sure, but it makes the process one-step less elegant)
- the symbol selection screen doesn’t allow me to wrap around to the beginning
- plays aren’t as available on the kindle (at least that I haven’t found yet)
- sharing a passage on twitter only gives you a link
- notes are date-stamped automatically
- the ‘-’ symbol is far away on the symbol list– if only it had a keyboard equivalent
- there is no way to easily organize my books. You can organize, but it isn’t as easy as simply creating a folder system on my mac

It would be great to join a book club I think. Unfortunately, my taste in books isn’t shared by most people around me (that I know of anyway). Perhaps someday a bookclub feature will be added someday

Useful keyboard shortcuts-

SHIFT+SYM – begin/stop reading aloud
Spacebar- pauses reading
ALT+SHIFT+H – screenshot (although I can’t view it until it is connected to a computer)

More shortcuts are available on 3gooddogs.com/pub/Kindle3KeyboardShortcutsV1-8%20.pdf

Yay kindle!

Now it has been almost six years since college. Ah, I miss those days of classes. Everyone was so serious about acting, it was a priority for those people. There’s something magical when everyone is trying hard and pretending together.

I recently joined something called “The Hollywood Playground” in Santa Monica on Tuesdays. However, I’m already seeing people skip days and not prepare and it is frustrating.

The same thing happened long ago in a free acting class I took from Mosaic church, by the end there was only me and another student!

I woke up this morning and saw a Groupon for a month of classes, 5 days a week! Hooray! I know it will be tough and I might hate it. At UW we had a mix of acting theologies, and The Actor’s Bootcamp does only Meisner.

Whatever happens I am excited to throw myself back into my passion. I miss acting. I’ve been doing improv for quite sometime, but it isn’t the same.

I am eager to do some work with people who are committed to the craft!

This was 7:00pm.

I didn’t know which to get, but they have that handy calculator thing that tells you. So I bought it and walked over to my car.

I plopped down and turned the ignition. The lights came on, but it wouldn’t start!

Last time this happened the battery connection was loose. I told Chris at the service department and he came over with the battery checking unit and tested it for me.

After a series of trying different things, he thought that it might be the starter. Unfortunately, he could work on it until the next morning.

I called my old Pasadena roommate and asked if I could crash on his couch for the night. Incidentally, something happened like this a year ago. One of the radiator hoses fell apart and my car was overheating. Luckily he agreed again.

I called the family I nanny for and she was totally okay with me arriving later the next day.

I still needed to get a ride to workshop and I didn’t have anyone’s number. However, I remembered that a student always had his iPhone with him so I emailed him to call me.

At 7:30 Mike was there to pick me up, and we arrived late to class. Everyone was already doing a warm up exercise and then we had an awesome time.

The other Matt was able to give me a lift to Lindygroove.

I should also mention that I’ve been hauling around an Ikea bag with all of my stuff, including my backpack with camera and laptop from earlier that day.

After the dance Char gave me a lift to Eric’s place and after a quick visit I went to sleep.

This was around 1 am.

—

The next day I figured it would be a good time to check levels on the antifreeze. The day continued normally, but the radiator started steaming, and I figured I put too much in and it was about to boil out to proper levels.

After DSB anniversary dance, I began the trip home when everyone was stopped on the 210. Marianne and Jason were nearby so I chatted with them and let my car cool down because it had started to overheat.

After the traffic started up again I noticed that the temp gauge went straight back up! Yikes!

I drove off the freeway to this secluded area and tried adding more fluid– and to my surprise, the radiator cap was off.

Which answered what the clunking sound was on the freeway.

2 am.

I didn’t want to drive any further because it kept heating up and I didn’t want to damage my engine. So I drove a few miles near an AutoZone. Then, slept in my car until it opened at 8.

After I put it on, it still overheated. So I put some more fluid directly in the radiator and that was it. Good thing I remembered to put the extra antifreeze in my car.

I then remembered that I once kept extra food and a blanket in the car… I’ll have to put that back.

Now, after two nights, I will finally be sleeping in my own bed.

And today I found out that if you are wearing headphones and the loose mini-jack brushes against your static cling jacket, your ears will spark! *ouch*