What I learned from "Limitless"

(aka everyone's favorite Wedding Crashing Hungover douchebag Bradley Cooper's star-turn opposite the legendary DeNiro) is that given enough preparation, intelligence, time management proficiency and pill popping here in New York City, anything is possible, rising to the top is inevitable and you too can section off some of the world to own and rule.

Sweet right?

Pretty sure that makes me on track for total domination as I approach my "prime" this November, so as I sit here at my corner desk, cup of coffee in hand planning for the week ahead (which happens to be week 9 or the 18 week transformation for anyone who's wondering/following my progress as guinea pig/spokesperson for whatever mystery product it is I'll be formally endorsing come this Summer) and manifesting shit as I type if you will simply by picturing positively and with purpose the potential awesomeness in store for this Summer and beyond, I'm delighted to have opted to go downtown and braved the risk of bed bugs being brought home from the 42nd Street AMC in order to catch the 9:25 of the film when it was sold out at the Loews on the Upper East Side where I met my moviegoing buddy.

Because I didn't expect to learn anything much from my weekend, and I got that lesson from good ol' freakishly blue eyed bf of Renee Zellweiger and another one from my awesome Improv teacher.

What I learned at the post-performance dinner my class had at McMannus' Irish Pub was that if you wanna be on a sitcom, you gotta go to LA.

Something's coming

Next Thursday, March 24th, I start my two week Gotham Writers course on preparing non-ficition book proposals.

And I really cannot wait. I edited the first quarter of the book down to 98 pages last night, and I've shopped the latest revision of the first 44 pages around to my sorelline and the Rox to stellar reviews.

If we're talking about non-fiction writing though, and you're interested in reading some phenomenal reporting, please take a minute to first say a prayer for all those affected by the Earthquake in Japan and then take a few minutes to read this incredible article from the New Yorker by the talented fiance of one of my favorite friends in the world.

I gchatted her to say "that boy of yours sure can write," and she humbly replied, "not bad huh?"

Seriously, I'm excited for their wedding - these two are movers & shakers. Based in Beijing for a little while longer, I'm looking forward to them coming back stateside to start the next leg of their lives together here selfishly because I want to spend more time with them both.

This week I've checked the mailbox every day on my way in from running (had back logged some of my training runs for the half marathon the week after next, so I feel like I was doing daily 5 or 6 milers), and I can't really explain why, but I checked eagerly each time.

Something's coming.
In the meantime, I bought these new sneaks tonight that are bound to make me run faster and jump higher:not bad huh?

here come the brides

I got a text from my best friend from kindergarten informing me this evening that the third of the four original members of our Girl Band from Middle School, G2W, or Girls 2 Women (formed in 5th grade, and loosely modeled/blatantly name after Boys II Men and TLC) has recently gotten engaged. And I'll give you a hint - I'm not one of the 3 with "a ring on it."





That's us (to the right of our idols) at my Sweet 16 Birthday party at the Knights of Columbus. We'd long since given up our aspirations to be the next 3Lw or female Dreamstreet, and I have no idea why this is the only pic of the "band" that's made its way to Manhattan with me.

All of this is insignificant, and really there's no need for me to be making the latest proposal to have reared its head public here in the blogosphere. I just thought it was of note. And I'm just wrapping my mind around it all and keeping people posted.

I suppose it sort of ties in to the quotes from "Up in the Air" that I wanted to muse on, Actress Writer Agent Nomad New Yorker that I am having seen the movie last night...

First George Clooney's character saying "we're not swans, we're sharks" to his audience of business professionals who are soaking in the suggestion he's making that they lighten their loads of personal connections and upkeep demanding relationships.

Second, that firecracker from the Twilight movies (who, did you know is from way Northern Maine, and told Ellen Degeneres she and her brother have been taking the train to Manhattan for auditions by themselves since they were kids? Seriously, from Maine? What were their parents thinking? And when are we going to go ahead and annex the top two thirds of that state? I really think they're more Canadian up there than American)...Anna Kedrick is her name, I can't think of her character's but she plays a convincingly trite Cornell business grad, and she's speaking for all of us career driven lasses when she thanks Vera Farmiga on behalf of her generation for paving the way for we Gen-whatever-we-ares to shatter glass ceilings but admits that at the end of the day "sometimes it feels like no matter how much success [we] have it's not gonna matter until [we] find the right guy."

Tough one to swallow - the movie was great though.

And don't get me wrong - I am thrilled beyond belief with the course I've charted and the progress I'm making from up in my tower here on the Upper Upper West Side...

I think the whammy might just be that we really are going from being girls 2 women and I'm left grappling with my choice to swim in this big sea like a shark while the three of them are gliding through this stage of our lives as swans.

Crazy Love

I guess I didn't realize there was any other kind until I got to high school and had friends falling in things like puppy love.

But the way the only people for Jack Kerouac are "the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes 'Awww,'" the only kind of love for me is the eats you from the inside out it's such a monster love.

It's the how desperately seeking to demonstrate just how fully you appreciate someone, you go to the ends of the Earth to try and surprise them with the simplest gesture that says "I've been listening" to you with your birthday gift love, and the how even though you really want that last bite you'll always say sure you can have my pizza crust so you can dunk it in vinegar even though I think that's disgusting love, the kind that makes you spontaneously combust into a big ball of tears in the balcony of church on Christmas Eve when you realize you're never ever ever going to be truly lonely because you've got best friends built into your bloodline and standing beside you holding your hands during the Our Father and making you laugh throughout the, overcrowded mind you, drawn-out 5:30 mass, and that makes you still sort of partial to doing laundry at home under the guise of it being cheaper but truthfully in the hopes that you'll score a home cooked meal and some company, it's the "have a little faith in me" and "you can't live my life for me, even if you're right you probably would do a darn good job doing so, sis" love, and the kind that fills your heart so full of so many people worth's emotions you're not sure it can contain it or that the little house you love to hate and hate to love and curse buying but couldn't have been more proud of to move in to with its dishwasher and sprinkler system and stainless steel appliances and 96inch long kitchen table can contain it. It's the kind my sorellina's talking about when her facebook status says she loves her crazy ass Italian family and the kind my Irish grandfather exhibits when he's offended by the lack of acknowledgement with this being the week of St Paddy's and all.

It's "a mistake or did He do it to us on purpose" kind of, insufferable, intolerable, irresistable, gravitationally pulled and driven simultaneously, and extreme, dramatic, and serene and simplistic beyond any sense of rationality sort of love.

Crazy love is an investment. It's a responsibility. It's a blessing, a curse, a charge, and an unconditional, surely unmeasurable, irreplaceable element - I might even go so far as to say life force, but then I know I'd be sounding trippier than I do already.

To me though, it's seriously the only kind worth holding onto, believing in or fighting for.

So there you have it. That's what I learned when I visited Boston this past weekend. It's a regular old wonderful life.

As of March 20th my mother will be 48 and feeling great. It's a new dawn, it's a new day... Spring's en route, and love is in the air.

THE PINK DELL IS BACK FROM THE DEAD

Please excuse any and all typos/grammatical errors... I am writing this as quickly as the brown fox jumps over the lazy brown dog ...

Yup. There it went.

Turned off.

Cause that's what this computer does.

Have I mentioned this is the worst purchase I've ever made?

Ever?

And that I'm secreting for a new macbook? Know I've mentioned that.

Okay back to hanging with the bff - MILEY CYRUS (sp?) is hosting SNL this weekend...which means, party in the USA.

I just had to jot down a few quick thoughts because it's not every day the pink dell laptop comes back from the dead.

Do you ever have those days

when you wake up about ten minutes later than it may have behooved you to get out of bed feeling like "well, that's alright, it might still be a pretty okay day" until you're crying at your desk by noon because you can't believe how cranky everyone else you're dealing with is and the attitude in the most recent email you've gotten's enough to dampen even the most bouyant of optimist's mood, so you find yourself perusing Monster.com during your 20 minute lunch break, but not quite sure of what sort of work you're looking for just that you're totally feeling all "what the fuck am I doing" with your life and not at all like doing any of the umpteen things on your afternoon to-do list, least of all paying your bills, checking your bank of america account as it descends towards deficits, or running 5 miles before heading to the rehearsal you have scheduled at 9 for the project you're still not entirely sure you want to sign on board for, and then have the night take the most pleasant of turns as you smoke a cigarette walking through Times Square towards Bryant Park realizing that you live in the most amazing city in the world and things are actually bound to pretty much work themselves out if you keep putting your nose to the grind, your mind to it and your money where your mouth is?

I call those days Tuesdays, and I'm being ware of the Ides of March as I put myself and this first Tuesday of the month to bed in a few minutes, but I'm basically happy as a clam to have weathered the storm that was being an actress-writer-agent on this otherwise breathtakingly bright sunshiney day.

And I hope you'll all come see us bring Lacey and Danielle: From Beantown to the Big Apple back to the stage at O'Casey's Irish Pub later this month.

Of course I should also mention making this my fb profile pic for a full 24 hours may have had something to do with putting the pep back in my step this afternoon as well. The bff taking a punch out of life and really making it count. Can't you just hear him exclaming "YEAH!"

Marching out of February

No offense, but it's a little bugger of a month and I'll be happy to say goodbye to it in an hour and a half or so. I'm only hitting 8 posts this month in light of how packed the past four weeks have been and I fear March is going to bode similarly, but c'est la vie.

Have been meaning to write about a couple things: 1 being the classical music they play in the waiting terminal at Penn Station for the New Jersey Transit Line and the way I think that misleads people who are from NJ. They hear that music and totally forget that they are in fact going home to the armpit of America.

2 being the tendency I have to tense up whenever I am entering or exiting a subway terminal in the vicinity of a woman pushing a baby stroller.

Because I get so worried there won't be any one else around to offer to help her carry the child and carriage up or down the stairs, and I OBVIOUSLY want to help but I'm paranoid of falling up & down those stairwells when I'm walking on my own two feet and carrying my purse or Trader Joe's grocery bags, can you imagine the anxiety I would feel over lifting a CHILD at the same time.

It's dire.

The 3rd and final piece I'll share is that everytime I hear from my college roomie, Dr. Fife, I think she's getting in touch to tell me she's engaged, because the proposal is definitely impending. I hope impending has positive enough connotations to use in that sentence.

There's literally nothing I am more excited about currently - and that is really saying something because I've got the transformation going on, a new sisterband demo completed and ready to promote, a potential offer to go back to full time Agent-ing being put on the table, a half marathon to run in a month, the next draft of the book nearing completion, but seriously, nothing's got my hear more aflutter than knowing two people who are totally wonderfully perfect for each other and in SO much love are about to start a year and a half or so long walk to the aisle.

Yep - palpable excitement :)

Fortunately, Fife just assured me she'll call with the news when it's fit to print, so I don't have to worry about 60% of our conversations (gchat, texting, emails) coming through with the announcement, I just have to nearly have a heart attack any time the phone rings and it's her in the next month.

Fairwell February!