Back In The Saddle

Today I did something I haven't done in almost five years: I went on an acting audition. As I have mentioned before, I used to be an actor. I trained; I did shows; I hung out with other actors. I still have many actor friends, but in mid-2000, I took a break from performing that turned into a semi-retirement. Since then, I have taken all of three acting classes, done one play and performed in a handful of staged readings and 24-hour play festivals. And I think I've only gone on two or three auditions, the last of which was, I believe, in 2002.

Then, on pretty much a whim last weekend, I decided to join Casting Connection. That lead me to this morning's audition, which was for a student film. Much in the same way the staged readings I occasionally do help playwrights, these little movies help students learn the craft of film making. Whether they use me or not, the audition was really fun. I also ran into my friend Wendy there, and she slipped the cutest little note into my purse when I wasn't looking. It basically said, "Yay, Sassy!" How sweet is that?

I'm not sure how committed I'm going to be on this pass, but it's nice to stick a toe back into the acting pool.

After my audition, I decided I needed to spend a lot of money, so I bought myself a digital camera. Another whim, really, but I take a lot of photos and needed to graduate from those disposable cameras you can buy at Walgreens.

Newly-purchased digital camera in hand, I hopped on BART and headed for my singing lesson with Best Friend. During the lesson we (and by "we," I mean Best Friend, as she is the real musician here) did lots of harmonizing, and it sounded great. I have invited Best Friend to join my soon-to-be band, Blo Pop, and she came up with the brilliant idea that we should have Blo Pop names... much like the Spice Girls had Spice names back in the 90's. I, of course, am going to be Sassy Pop. Best Friend is going to be Sexy Pop. I'll have to run this by Mindi, Blo Pop's other founding member, to make sure she approves of this idea. And then she can pick her Pop name.

And finally tonight, I had Fake Band rehearsal, and it went really well. It was actually one of the more productive rehearsals we've had in a while. Writer Ben Fong Torres (of Rolling Stone fame) is going to sing two songs with us at our upcoming show, so he joined us for rehearsal tonight.

Acting, singing, potential photography. All in all, today was this week's Day of the Arts here in Sassyland.