Five Seconds on Bedford Avenue.

3:49

The man in the red Subaru drives by one more time. Still singing.

Twenty Minutes on Bedford Avenue.

12:01 - 12:10
I buy an egg salad on a wheat bagel at Bagel Smith. As I wander around outside, trying (unsuccessfully) to eat it delicately, I start reading the breakfast menu of Bliss out of boredom. A short, bald, toothless man taps me on the shoulder and says I look familiar, but I'm not who he thought I was - his friend (who's a "fashion designer with her girlfriends and they make clothes and then model each others' clothes") - because her hair is longer. His name is Peter, and we converse until my sandwich is nothing but an egg-smeared piece of wax paper. He says I'm "adorable to talk to" asks "if I drink" and I tell him that "I hope to run into each other again sometime." He says, "If fate will have it, we will."

12:13 - 12:14:30
I walk into an eye doctor's office. The receptionist is unlike any other I have ever seen, even compared to the clientele of my Very Queeny eye boutique back in Chicago. Imagine if Eddy Munster grew his hair out to look like Priscilla Prestley. Draw in eyebrows with a thick, black, solid MS Paint brush. Dress him in tight black jeans, black boots, and a yellow . . . well, blouse. And give him a John Leguizamo circa To Wong Foo latino accent. Voila. The guy who told me the doctor will be back at 3 p.m.

12:15 - 12:21
I head towards home. In the span of these six minutes, a man in a red Subaru drives by three times, blasting a Dean Martin CD and singing along at the very, very top of his lungs. I laugh harder each time. I wonder why he keeps rounding the block.

Boom boom . . . wow.

My weather widget tells me that the next four days in Brooklyn will maintain a steady high of ninety degrees. That means it will be 108 degrees in my apartment. If I keep a cauldron of water at a steady boil, I could do Bikram in my living room. Hey, it's a recession! But apparently I can't use that excuse for much longer . . .

. . . which means I ACTUALLY have to find a job, lest risking a deflated return to Chicago upon the termination of my sublease on September 1st. So, besides the usual BroadWAY or Bust endeavors, I've been (sort of?) job seeking:

1) Last week I auditioned at Ellen's Stardust Diner. Ellen's Stardust Diner is a lot like Ed Debevick's, without the (intentional) rudeness. Wear poodle skirt, sing song, serve milkshakes. They told me to come in Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday between 2 and 4 for an audition. I show up, give the manager my resume, and he says:

"Okay. What do you want to sing?"

And I said, "Wait . . . you mean, like, NOW?"

And he said, "Yeah. You're up after this waiter."

So I proceeded to sing and bop around from table to table to "I Wanna Dance With Somebody." In front of the entire restaurant. That was a bit shocking; I had no idea I was going to play Waiter when I showed up. I guess that's how they weed out the awkward people. However, I felt slightly pimped out as they had me do another song ("There Are Worse Things I Could Do" from Grease) and, like . . . dude, I should have collected tips or something. I better get that job. I'm going back on Wednesday for a second interview. Fingers. Muthafuggin'. Crossed.

2) In a couple of hours I'm to audition for a company that rents out singers and dancers for corporate events and Bar Mitzvahs and shit. They told me to "Sing a pop song, and then maybe a jazzy ballad, and then do a dance you might see at a Bar Mitzvah."

"I've . . . never really been to a Bar Mitzvah."

"Well, you know. Just something to get the crowd going."

So I am doing the "All Over the World" choreography from Xanadu to "Boom Boom Pow" from the Black Eyed Peas.

Live that dream.

Awash.

What was supposed to be daily seems to be monthly. And for that, dear reader(s), I apologize.

Living in New York has instilled in me a great desire to live in the woods. I had the same feeling while living in Chicago, but because Chicago is My Baby and I dote on it , it wasn't quite as acute. But, as That One Guy's Law describes, if something gets, like, real big and extreme on one end, then it's going to get real big and extreme on the other, and, uh . . . well. Yeah. New York is crowded and dirty and now I want to live in a fucking hollowed-out tree.

I've also been fortunate enough to escape the city a couple of times this month, which always leaves me not wanting to go back. A few weeks ago I managed up to Hollis, New Hampshire with my friend Jared. My first real experience with the beauty that is The Northeast. I kayaked on a lake smothered in fog at midnight. Got to experience the wonder that is Andy's Summer Playhouse (that wonder is: children and teens making great theatre against a backdrop of great tradition and gobs of love). I looked at trees and - dare I say - stars. Not Broadway stars, sthilly! Burning gas stars. Real burning gas!

And yesterday I hopped a train to Poughkeepsie. Vassar College. It was a little strange being on a college campus again, sleeping on a rubber mattress in a dorm room, but the place is beautiful and the air was saturated with dew. I wanted to just stand there and breathe in and breathe in and breathe in and pass out, drunk with fresh air. It was hard to leave.

Back in Brooklyn today, where I sit with my shades closed so I can imagine that if I were to open them, I'd see a huge lake with trees and various woodland creatures flying/running/hopping about.