Busy, Busy Bees

My husband and I are greatly looking forward to life with baby; however, we realize that there are a number of things we like to do together that will become logistically more difficult when we have a child. As a result, we're sort of on a bit of a bender for activities (particularly concerts and plays) that will be difficult (or significantly more expensive because of babysitters) once the baby is born.

In the past few months we have seen a bunch of concerts including Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Beck, and TV on the Radio. We've been going to plays including Eurydice at Victory Garden and The Brothers Karamazov at Looking Glass Theatre. We also saw the Yard Dogs Road Show and a Henry Rollins spoken word show.

In addition to this, social events have kicked up since the end of October and likely won't die down until New Year's. Also, John and I both have been really busy at work. On top of all that I still try to do Bikram Yoga at least twice a week.

I was also spending some of my pre-mama time to draft a new full-length play. It's having a developmental reading at Chicago Dramatists tonight. On the one hand, I'm excited to hear the play and get some feedback. On the other hand, I'd love to be able to go home after work and just snuggle and watch TV with my husband. Of late, those nights are rare treats.

They say the best time to "do things" is during your second trimester, so I guess I'm following that advice to a T. Still, it's a bit harrowing and the time is flying by. I can't believe Thanksgiving is next week! I haven't even started thinking about Christmas shopping, which is very unlike me.

I look forward to January and some time to do nothing. We have a couple more plays to see in January and February, and a concert or two may pop up. Still, it will not be like now. I'm enjoying all we are doing, but it is starting to wear me out! All I want for Christmas is a weekend to myself!

Shameless Self Promotion: Future Ten 5, Pittsburgh, Pa.

This year Future Tenant requested 10 minute plays with a Pittsburgh theme for their annual Future Ten Festival. Running November 14-15, my play "Baby XL" imagines the frustrations of a pregnant Steelers fan when she goes into active labor during Super Bowl XL.

Surprise! It turns out that as I was working on "Baby XL" I was, in fact, a pregnant Steelers fan, although I didn't know it yet. I knew I was a Steelers fan, but as for the other part... I found out I was pregnant a few days after submitting the script. Now, much like the character in my play, I wear my Bettis jersey (one of the few articles of my "old" clothes that continues to fit me) and cheer on the guys in black and gold. The key difference between my life and my play is that I'm not due until March, so I should be able to watch the entirety of the post-season without having to rush to the hospital. Go Steelers!

Here are the details:

Ten new short works by playwrights from Pittsburgh and beyond will be featured November 7-8 & 14-15, 2008, in this fifth installment of a local theater tradition. As a fun new twist, all of this year's plays revolve around a Pittsburgh-inspired theme.

Future Tenant, an alternative art space located to 819 Penn Avenue in the heart of Pittsburgh 's Cultural District, will present Future Ten 5: Yinzer Edition . Split into two weekends (Fridays and Saturdays), the festival will feature a varied collection of plots and characters. This year's festival will also feature a "Yinzer Challenge," during which audience members will challenge each other for the illustrious designation of "Captain Yinzer."

Future Ten 5: Program A – Nov. 7-8 at 8 PM
I Can Tell Your Handbag is Fake by Dean Lundquist
Onus On Us by Cheryl Games
On the Inherent Dangers of Having Colleges Located Next to Each Other by Joseph Lyons
Singlish by Sloan MacRae
Eat Your Art Out by Joshua Elias Harmon

Future Ten 5: Program B – Nov. 14-15 at 8 PM
Baby XL by Kim Z. Dale
What The Puck by F.J. Hartland
Cupcake's on the Couch by Courtney Seiberling
Happy Birthday, Leonard by Walter Thinnes
Begin the Peregrine by Gayle Pazerski

Future Ten 5 will also feature the work of five directors, each of whom will helm two of the plays. Overseeing the shows are Fred Betzner, Sloan MacRae, Jaime Slavinsky, Kellee Van Aken and Stacey Vespaziani.

There will be a $10 admission collected at the door.

PLEASE NOTE: Seating is limited, and there will be no advance ticket sales.

For more information go to www.futuretenant.org

Showing my twisted side

Sure, I'm a mommy-to-be, but I'm still me. And this bun in the oven has not changed the fact that I have a dark and twisted sense of humor. As if the play I started outlining yesterday didn't prove that (it involves a Santa with no pants and the mother of the second coming), my Halloween costume will clearly show it.

I wanted to involve the pregnancy in the costume because it's not something that I'm likely to have many opportunities to do. The belly painting options seemed interesting (pumpkin, fish bowl, etc.), but at 20 weeks I'm not quite round enough to get the full impact. Other options seemed obvious and overdone: pregnant nun, pregnant cheerleader, pregnant (white trash) Britney. The bun in the oven costumes were cute but would be difficult to navigate a party in. (One year I was Botticelli's Venus with a long, wired wig, a body suit, and a giant foam shell. Everyone said I looked great, but shell kept me standing in the corner for most of the night.)

I wanted my Halloween costume to be a bit more creative, allow me show off my belly, be reasonably comfortable, and ideally be a little demented.

I'm going to be dead Sharon Tate.

Per the crime scene photos, she actually died in her underwear. Even though it is "unseasonably mild" today, I wasn't comfortable going that far. A picture taken the day before she was killed shows her in a cropped tank top (showing her belly) and little shorts. I've translated that as shorty pajamas with a cropped top. I've also added a robe for modesty and some warmth.

I have a long blonde wig and fake eyelashes. Again, not realistic to the crime photos but in order to better convey the character, I'm going to do bold 60s eye make-up.

I have some fake skin to make slash marks on my belly and chest. I've already stabbed the robe a bunch of times with a knife covered in fake blood. I have a lot more spray blood to spray over me.

One more little detail. They tied a white rope around her neck, threw it over a rafter, and tied it to another victim. I'll have a white piece of rope around my neck to indicate this.

So that's all.

I told you I was dark and twisted! Is it wrong that a future mother would find this amusing. I don't think so. My child may share my sense of humor or think it's weird/embarrassing, but I don't believe that will impact the child's overall development. After all, I got my sense of humor from my Dad. Other than wanting to be dead Sharon Tate for Halloween I think I turned out just fine.

One more week

One more week of the presidential campaign. And the hope is that late next Tuesday night we will know the winner. For better or worse. Hopefully the better.

This year's election has consumed me like no other before it. I crave updates and speech snippets and endorsements. I have been excited and worried and hopeful and scared. Sometimes, it seemed I felt those things all at the same time.

This election has brought up some ugly traits within American. These will not go away after the election, but the hope is that the certainty of who will lead the next 4 years will cull the ugliness if only under sense of defeat.

When the election is over I hope to regain my focus for other things. Preparing for the birth of my baby. Finishing the first draft of my new play so it can be workshopped next month. Relaxing. Not having to spend my time bouncing through the punditry trying to grasp at hopefulness without taking anything for granted.

I already did my civic duty. I voted early. Now I just have to wait for the rest of the nation to decide.

A Point of Agreement

Atheists and Fundamentalist Christians disagree about a lot of things, but there is one point on which they perfectly agree. "We will be with Jesus when we die." The Christians see this as meaning that they will go to heaven, where Jesus is waiting for them. And the atheists...well, they don't believe that Jesus exists. And they don't believe in life after death; therefore, after they die they won't exist. Just like Jesus. We will all be with Jesus when we die. At least the atheists and the Christians. I'm still not sure where the other religions fit in to all of this.

Work in Progress

My husband patiently allowed me to hole up in our office for most of yesterday. I must admit that my attention was often split between writing and checking out NFL stats particularly as they impacted my fantasy football match-up this week. Still, I got quite a bit done on full-length play I've been working on. And by working on I mean that I started strong but haven't touched the script in over a month.

I forced it out. There are details of the story that I'm still uncertain of, but I made myself put something on paper. It's hard to rewrite what you haven't written in the first place. The script is still rather short for a full length, but I notoriously underwrite my first drafts. I tend to fly through the events as they unfurl in my head, which means I have to go back and add pesky things like character development later.

It felt good to get this out. This was a project that really excited me in the beginning. It is my first time blending my playwriting with my professional life as it is a story that deals with information privacy issues. Forcing myself to work reminded me that the idea still excites me. It's just that little things like being pregnant have been a distraction (as well as, at times, making me exhaustion to the point of uselessness).

This project also scares me. The subject is something that interests me greatly, but I am a bit of an informaiton privacy wonk. Can I keep the story interesting and avoid sounding like I'm proselytizing? Can I keep enough techie details to be authentic without losing the audience in jargon? Plus, as the play is currently structured it combines realistic scenes with very non-realistic scenes. Will it work?

The only way to know if the play will work is to continue writing it.

Although I don't intend to give up writing for motherhood I know that in the beginning there will not be much time for creating new work. As a result, I want to get a lot of writing done this winter to have things that I can edit and submit as time permits when the baby is born. This play will be the centerpiece of that effort. I look forward to getting home tonight and continuing my effort.