The past 48 hours have been the longest, well, 48 hours I have ever lived. In fact, I’m recounting on my fingers right now to make sure I’m numbering them right–it feels like it’s been at least a week since I wrote my last journal entry. Which, coincidentally, is where the whole thing starts. To help me keep things straight, all times are in military.
Shortly after I finished fiddling with the idiotcam©, Ken asked if I wanted to go out somewhere for dinner. Certainly! I said, but as I was flat broke it seemed the possibilities were limited. But wait! I had the free pizza I’d won from Little Caesar’s, didn’t I? Problem solved!
Unfortunately, the bastards at said pizza joint were apparently resentful of having to give away anything at all, and so laced my double slice with a hearty dose of poison. The rest of that night was entertaining, to say the least (which I will), and the fact that I was slinging together an entire toon from script to finish didn’t exactly make things easier. I finally trudged to bed around hour 0100 hours, to begin a series of short naps interrupted by–well, fill in the blanks yourself.
After one such nap, I awoke not long before my alarm was due, and decided to turn it off so it wouldn’t wake up my poor roommates. I then forgot about said precaution and crawled back under the covers. In the words of The Spleen, “Big mistake!” Jon finally woke me up himself when he noticed that it was a good half hour after my planned wakeup call, and while I engaged in The World’s Fastest Shower© David was calling my room to see where, exactly, the hell I was.
We got into Henry’s car only running about the aforementioned half hour behind (but let us not forget that my body was just beginning to make me pay for the pizza). We got to the airport around 0815. I was writing Henry a check of appreciation for the ride when it became clear that yes, in fact, my pen had exploded all over my hand and made me look like some kind of squid molester.
I think it’s to my credit that only then did I start making signs against the Evil Eye.
I set off the beeper at the security checkpoint, of course (foolish, foolish zipper!), but even with all the delays it turned out not to matter–our flight was late and we were routed onto a different jet, an hour behind schedule. Having removed most of the ink evidence from my hand, I covered myself in my coat, shivered and began the practice I’d cite to Matthew repeatedly (and weakly) whenever he checked up on me over the next six hours: hanging tough.
David got the window seat on the way to Atlanta, the bastard.
We’d missed our connection, of course, but things actually began to look up at this point. They put us on the next jet to Mobile–only an hour and a half behind–and meanwhile I bravely consumed a Sprite and four peanut butter crackers. I didn’t actually think I was going to get on the flight, as they waited until roughly every single passenger was on before assigning me a seat. As it turned out, though, that meant I got the window seat in the very first row of the plane.
Allow me to state, for the record, that flying up front–even on a one-hour flight, and especially when you’re slightly feverish–is a very weird thing. I think the stewardess spotted me as a first-time first-class passenger, though I can’t imagine how my ratty khakis and bewildered expression would have given me away. She was even courteous enough to help me stow my carry-ons, and to smile, and to get me a lemonade from the back when first-class passengers were supposed to get soft drinks. I believe I will love her until the day I die.
The fact that our luggage was actually in Mobile can only have been a huge mistake on the part of our airline. I fully expect to have the repercussions hit on our return trip, and it only remains to be seen whether we’ll accidentally be flown to Norway or just get sucked out through the toilet at 29,000 feet.
The three-hour nap David and I got at the hotel was up there with turkey sandwiches as the best thing. Ever.
We registered (David had problems), we ate (I had problems), we went back to the room to unpack our snazzy borrowed laptops, and we arrived at the ballroom just in time for auditions to start.
Yes, This Is Still Going, I Warned You
Auditions were the most heinous display of “AC-ting!” I’d seen since I volunteered to time qualifier auditions, but there was promise here and there. I took notes like “sycophant elephant” and “you can’t kill a roach with a rolled-up newspaper” in hopes of inspiration, which were almost as helpful as they look. Finally, around 2330 hours (central!), they cleared the place out and told the chosen six of us to get to work.
It should be noted that we were all guys, and fate is cruel.
There has been plenty of “well it has been interesting!” content already, I think. The next seven and a half hours, though, take the proverbial cake as the longest stretch of time ever measured by human experience. Let’s recap: I had slept no longer than three hours at a stretch out of the last twenty-four; my digestive system had yet to even apologize for the things it had put me through; the only idea I had was for a zany cross-dressing comedy that involved a baseball cap and a wedding veil; and as I am me I was of course unable to get anything useful accomplished until way behind deadline.
After about five false starts, I finally started on something promising around 0100 hours; the first draft was due for a group read-through at 0300, but when that rolled around I had three pages out of a required ten, and no idea where I was going next with it. The waning half of the night followed a fairly standard cycle: I would write one line, stare at the screen, and get up to walk around for a while to wake up. I couldn’t recite much of the dialogue from my script if I tried, but let me tell you, I could find my way around the second floor blindfolded.
The scripts were due at 0700, and at 0600 I had six pages. By well-established Brendan habit, of course, I finally got down to work when it was clear I wasn’t going to make it, and at 0659 I was done and casting about desperately for a title. David (who had finished at like 0400, the bastard) gave me the nudge I needed, and at 0705 I was hand-numbering the pages of the finished product.
They gave us a break just long enough to lug our bags back to the hotel room, and at the final read-through with the directors I finally came up with a much better title, which I naturally made everybody write in on their own copies. It got a good response, and I got assigned a very funny director, and David and I finally got to go back and get four hours of sleep, and now I’m sitting here finishing the longest journal entry I have ever written before we go to dinner. The performances start at 2200, and even though my script has to go first I am looking forward to this more than I expected. My hands are off–it’s their baby now. And no matter what happens, it’s going to be fun.
That’s all.
Oh, unless you saw my other play and recognize that I recycled like an eco-bandit. In which case: shush.
