Life Altering Events

Every now and again something will happen that takes your life to the next level.  Up until this point, my life has been heightened by what I like to consider "normal" things, such as travel, food, books, music, etc.  These normal things have helped to shape me and make me who I am today, and they are considered normal because I have access to them whenever I please.  

Well, this morning I was faced with an opportunity to heighten my life again.  I stood there staring at the shower in my cousin's room and knew that once I stepped in, there was no turning back.  Did I want to do this to myself?  Once you have experienced nice things, it's hard to go back to what you had before.  I can't go back to VHS now that I have DVDs.  I can't go back to Nintendo after having played a Playstation 3.  And now, now I have to go back to bad showers after having experienced the most amazing shower of my life.  

Every shower I've ever had, up until this point, was considered the best shower of my life as long as it met the criteria: the proper temperature and the proper amount of time.  Simple, right?  It doesn't take a lot to have an amazing shower.  So, what about this shower that I had today made it so special that I have to blog about it?  Picture this: 3 shower heads coming out of the wall, plus a detachable massaging shower head and a rain fall shower head from above.  Also, there was a water temperature control gage.  One by one, I began to turn knobs in the shower, and one by one something started to spray the perfect temperature of water.  I knew even before I got in there that I was making a huge mistake.  And as I stood there, not wondering if I had gotten all of the shampoo out of my hair or all of the soap off my body, because with water hitting you from every angel, you don't have to worry about those things, I started to think of every shower I had had in the past and how they just didn't compare.

Sadly, I turned off the water and then spent another 5 minutes just standing in there, wrapped in my towel.  Oh, I think that I failed to mention that this shower also doubles as a steam room.  It has the tile bench that you could sit on and steam, if you wanted to.  I did not.  I thought that it would be best for me to not become delusional and start to pretend that I could afford luxury items like this.  One day.  One day I will have an amazing shower like that, and then every shower will once again be the best shower ever.

Mixed Emotions

My last day of work was on August 20th.  Since then I have just been enjoying my free time.  I started off making great use of that time by working out everyday and doing some reading and writing, but lately I've found that I'm just laying around wasting away.  I told my dad yesterday that I feel like I'm just sitting around depending on other people for survival and I hate that!  I moved to Philly with nothing and I made it work, so why is this different?  I keep telling myself that I should stop complaining and be grateful that I have family who is able and willing to help me.  But I need more than that.  I guess I'm just worried that if things don't happen for me soon, I will start to be a burden and then people will regret helping me.  I am kind of annoying.

While reading an acting book this morning I started to realize something; my friend BB and I are working on a screen play and one of the characters was really hard for me to develop because I had no way of connecting with her and her situation.  These past few days have really given me a sense of the struggle that is similar to what this character is dealing with.  Well, mine is less severe than her situation, but it's a start.

I will admit that as I go through trying times, I do my best to live in the moment and commit my feelings to memory because I have no way of knowing if I will need to summon it for a future role or for a character I'm writing.  The only thing about living in the moment is that you are forced to experience the pain.  Perhaps this system is flawed.  LOL.  Sigh.  This too shall pass.

Who Is It?

I've been staying with my aunt for the past few weeks, and since being here, I've learned more about Michael Jackson than anyone. My aunt is a fanatic; my cousins even call her obsessed. Well, yesterday we were on youtube watching all of Mike's old videos, and when we came to "Who is it", my aunt told me something I did not know. This song was written for us. Now, I remember hearing the song when I was in middle school and loving the beat and singing to it like someone had wronged me, but when I heard my aunt describe the true meaning, I felt ashamed. It's not very often that I am forced to feel total remorse for something that I've done. The last time I remember feeling this way was when I poured salt on a slug as a child. I just stood there crying and my dad asked me how I felt and what I learned from that. This was that same type of feeling.

Obviously I didn't know Michael Jackson, and obviously I never personally did anything to the man, but in some obscure way, I did. In some obscure way, we all did. I fed into the hype that he was bleaching his skin because he wanted to be white. While I never believed that he molested those kids, I did believe that he had psychological issues and many other things wrong with him. The man was human. He was flawed just like the rest of us. I listen to the lyrics of "Who is it" and I feel as though I failed as a Christian. My only job is to live like Jesus lived, and I'll tell you, Jesus would not have passed judgement on that man.

Read the lyrics, listen to the song. We loved him and left him and offered up no explanation.

http://www.elyrics.net/read/m/michael-jackson-lyrics/who-is-it-lyrics.html

The fear of insects is called "entomophobia". There is no specific fear of cockroaches.

But I don't have a fear of insects; I have a fear of roaches. A bug is just a bug, but a roach, a roach is offensive and will cause me to shake and consider moving.

I was with my cousin and his friend at a Taco Bell by USC on Friday. They were talking at the counter and I went and sat down at a table to make some phone calls. While I was sitting there talking, a guy across from me started talking about a roach and how gross it was. He started walking towards me and I looked at his face and followed his gaze to the floor. What I saw was so disturbing and imprinted in my brain that I couldn't close my eyes for several hours after without seeing it's horrible figure. Talk about being shook up! This roach was easily, EASILY, 3 inches long. Yeah, that's the length of my cell phone. Not only was he abnormally large, but he seemed like he was raised up on hydros. He seemed semi elevated off the ground. The man walked right over and stepped on him. Crunch. I promise you that had I eaten anything that day, I would have vomited it up immediately. IMMEDIATELY. I felt so ill. All I could think about was getting out of there and thanking God that I wasn't getting anything to eat.

We got back in the car and my cousin started to talk about how that roach looked as though it had evolved. I was just sitting in the back seat shaking. We dropped my cousin's friend off and he asked me if I was ready to get something to eat. I could have cried. I was still so shaken up. It was too much. Too much. Believe me when I say that I don't deal with tini tiny roaches and I definitely don't deal with genetically mutated roaches. I spent the next hour just being unhappy.

Addicted to Dexter

I know, I know. I was gone for a long time. You'll have to forgive me, but I wasn't feeling very motivated. I don't know what's been going on with me, but it seems as though I've hit a stagnant patch. Not only have I not been writing to you, but I haven't been writing in my journal or working on any of my movies. I just feel kinda blah right now. Like I'm just laying around and waiting to see what is going to happen as opposed to me actually getting out and trying to make something happen. Well in the midst of all my blah-ness, I discovered that my aunt has Showtime. Yeah, I don't know how I managed to miss that. Needless to say, once I discovered the hidden treasure, I immediately went to On Demand, and fuled my addiction.

When I left Philly, I had only seen through Season 2 and I was craving Season 3, but it wasn't out on DVD yet. So imagine my surprise when I realized that not only was it available, but it was available in the comfort of my own home and I didn't have to wait for the discs to arrive. And really, this is when bad things happen. I watched nothing else between Sunday afternoon and Monday, stopping only to eat, sleep and use the restroom. And then, as if God knew that I could use a pick me up, Season 4 was made available to me. What! So, I watched the first 3 episodes of Season 4, and now I sit here, sad, because I must wait until Sunday to see the next episode. That kind of sucks. I'm thinking of taking on a new series. The Tudors is a Showtime show...any thoughts?

Animals With Eating Disorders

I was eating lunch with my aunt the other day and she tossed a fry to a bird. Several birds swarmed around the fry, and my aunt tossed out a few more fries. I turned to her and said, "Auntie. You know good and well that you shouldn't feed those birds fries. We're not even supposed to be eating fried food!" I then proceeded to tell her about the obese squirrels that my friends and I had encountered while camping at the Grand Canyon.

There were signs every where that asked us politely to refrain from feeding the animals. We found a nice spot on our hiking trail to set up our picnic. No sooner than we sat down did two morbidly obese squirrels come scurrying/waddling up to us. Needless to say, we promptly ignored the pleas from the sign and started to feed the squirrels Cheetos. In hind sight, that may not have been the nicest thing to do.

In keeping with the theme of animals who should not be eating fattening foods, I have decided to attach this email I got yesterday. Please enjoy!

A seagull in Point pleasant Beach, NJ has developed the habit of stealing Doritos from a neighborhood convenience store. The seagull waits until the manager isn't looking, and then walks into the store and grabs a snack-size bag of cheese Doritos. Once outside, the bag gets ripped open and shared by other birds. The seagull's shoplifting started early this month when he first swooped into the store in Point Pleasant Beach, NJ, and helped himself to a bag of Doritos. Since then, he's become a regular. He always takes the same type of chips. The manager thinks it's great because people are coming to watch the feathered thief make the daily grab and run, and that's good for business, and especially since customers have begun paying for the seagull's stolen bags of Doritos because they think it's so funny. However, the manager did say, 'This is New Jersey , and if that seagull starts to grab a 6-pack of 'Bud' to go along with the Doritos, I may have to put a stop to it.'

A Common Occurance

Hello All! I found myself kidnapped again yesterday. My friend pointed out that this is something that seems to happen to me on a regular basis.

I had a job interview yesterday, so my aunt took me. Afterwards we went over to my cousin's new house to help him move. Helping him move turned into us spending the night and me being stranded without a computer. It wasn't all bad though. I was able to see more of LA and reinforce my blossoming love for this city. I saw some of the mansions of Beverly Hills and the view of city from Mulholland Drive. This place is so beautiful.

It always takes me a while to get over the "I made a mistake and never should have moved" phase. After yesterday, I can say that that phase has passed.