the slack daily

Life/Death.

Things that make me die a little inside:

• Hearing from someone that they took a check that was mistakenly sent to their house and wrote on the envelope "no longer lives here."  To be fair, they did email me about it - just to an email address that I haven't used in two years (and I haven't used to correspond with them in just as long.) 
• having a woman refer to me as "girl."  Not as in "she's such a cute girl" (I'll live with that) or "Girl, get it together!"  (sassy!) but as in "Girl, there's no toilet paper in the bathroom."

Oddly enough, those are also the same things that make me feel stabby.

Things that make life worth living:

• WE HAVE A WII.  (And a Wii Fit!)  Don't tell Will that Wii Sports sneaks in some exercise with his game-playing.  He's a purist that way.
• We had a GREAT chat last night.  My thank-you speech, here.
• We've decided to make BeTheMarriage Live! (On Ice!) a regular fixture, so check out the details here. For those too lazy to click: this Saturday, June 28th at 9pm PST.  BYOB.

I hate blogging in lists, but I hate not blogging even more.

Also!  SlackMom celebrates her second 31st birthday today!  Happy Birthday SlackMom!

My favorite SlackMom story here.

No Free Lunch.

One of the benefits of being an unemployed writer is that people always offer you writing work.  It's rare that a week goes by that I don't field some sort of offer to ghostwrite a book, pen a screenplay, assemble a television pitch or rewrite dialogue.  They've always found me through LinkedIn or MediaMatch or Variety's the Biz.

This week's contestants:

1. Person #1: 

Respectful, returns emails, inquires about my rate, is eager to discuss the project.  

2. Person #2: 

Offers me work on an "exciting project" that happens to be their screenplay. Does not inquire about my rate, tells me "it's all there except the story."  When I discuss payment am simultaneously told that a "writer" should work for "art's sake."  Explain that landlady is not willing to be paid in half-finished screenplays and discuss my hourly and project rate.  Receive an email in return insisting that they can hire the guy who works at the gas station for $5 an hour.   Respond saying that I hope to see him and Union 76 on the Oscar stage next year.

I'll let you guess which offer I receive more frequently.

I've done some writing work for causes I believe in, but that's a case where I've intentionally donated my time in a volunteer effort.  But why do people expect writers (and artists, and web designers, and filmmakers, and bloggers, and etc. etc. etc.) to work as a hired gun for no money?

Do you work for free?

...

Me to Will, last night:

You know what I think one of the secrets is to a healthy relationship?  You hate the same people.

...

Elsewhere around the web:

• I am anti-education. (See the comment on the left, and my response.)
• Will has Things To Do on a Friday Night.
• I can only offer you things to do on a Saturday night: BetheMarriage LIVE! (On Ice!) will be headed your way Saturday night, 9PST.  Check it out at Stickam.
• Tomorrow night The Doctor is In with yours truly.
• When Good Things Happen to Good People:  My friend Tomas' movie The American Mall is almost upon us - and is already in Sears!
• When Good Things, Part Two: TC gets into Moorpark College's Exotic Animal Training Program!
• Piglet reviews our first LiveCast.
• I've got stuff going on over at Antisocial Networking.  No really, go see!

Sometimes I Hate People.

Today, at the Bill Foundation Adoption Fair:

A couple walks in with a 4-to-5 year old girl.  The little girl kept shoving her fingers in cage after cage, even though we asked her and her parents to stop poking at the doggies.  Finally, her dad approached the table and asked me about a dog [an adorable, poodley looking guy] that was listed as "not good with kids"

Can I still look at the dog? he asked.

Is that your daughter?  I asked back.

Yes.

Then no, you can't.  I'm sorry, but it says it's not good with kids.  We have many great family dogs here, I'd be happy to show you them.

But that one looks like it would be the best around kids.

And I'm telling you it's not.

Another volunteer joins us.  No, that dog can't be around children. According to the shelter it was in a home with children that terrorized it, so we want to find him a quiet, adults-only home.

Well, I want to look at that dog, he insists.

I'm sorry, I continue, I will be happy to have any of the volunteers show you another dog--

Clearly you don't care about these dogs, because you'd want them to go into good homes like mine, he says.  He snorts and grabs his daughters hand and they stride off.  Maybe he'll get her a pet lion instead.

There was also a couple who left their dog unattended in a shopping car for ten minutes and the family who boasted that of course they would keep the dog inside - that's what their garage was for!  But it doesn't have A/C, so they need a sturdy dog - could we hook them up?

/headdesk

TivOh?

Blogging about the contents of one's TiVo is the ultimate in LazyBlogging.

Which is why I bring you a picture instead:

Back tomorrow with your regularly scheduled slack!

You Be the Judge.

Places I Might Have Been Last Night:

1. A Junior League Tea.
2. An Italian Restaurant with a bunch of Junior League members, one who might know someone who knows people I know in LA.
3. A practically-empty Trader Vic's with a bunch of fabulous gay men drinking Malibu and lime Juice (?!) Lady-and-the-Tramp style out of a huge ceramic bowl while a 22-year old woman might have declared me "hot" and "wanted to take me home."
4. A bar in a seafood restaurant with a Pink Floyd Cover Band.
5. A bar that smelled like a Frat House Basement that had a $10 cover that might have been paid by someone else, thumping techno music, guys in cutoffs with backwards baseball caps and the smell of date-rape clinging to the air.
6. Whataburger.

Close Encounters of the NON-Celebrity Kind: Diablo Cody, Part Three.

Further to my run-in with Diablo Cody's #1 Fan, I present to you video of the event to show you that I do not make this shit up:

I didn't realize my friend Patty was taping us until about halfway through the video.  At the end when you hear Tomàs answer that phone call?  He totally faked that to get me outta there.

Could I sound more nasally?

Diablo à Deux, or I'd Like to Get Stabbed on My Own Merit.

Back in November, at the beginning of the WGA Strike, I was mistaken for Juno screenwriter Diablo Cody.

 

I even provided a handy Slackmistress-or-Diablo? guide which you can find here or here.

A couple of weeks ago, my friend Kate Coe at Mediabistro's Fishbowl-LA alerted me to a blog written by an aspiring screenwriter named Rodney.  Rodney, although not a member of the WGA, has been out on the picket lines supporting us.  Rodney also has nine things in common with Diablo Cody.

Rodney has been trying to get in touch with Diablo, presumably to share those nine things.  Rodney also has started to picket at NBC - the same place where I picket.

Today I showed up wearing something akin to the outfit I'm wearing in the picture above.  I arrived at the corner of Alameda and Olive when my friend Tomàs grabbed me.

That guy over there is obsessed with Diablo Cody, he told me.

Is that the guy with the blog? I asked.  Because that guy is cra--

Before I could finish, Tomàs exclaimed I can't believe it about your Oscar Nomination!  You're so young!  And to think you used to be a stripper.

Without missing a beat, I answered.  I know, but it's weird since they mention the stripper thing so much I always feel like everyone's trying to picture me naked.

The man made a beeline for me - so quickly, in fact, that I was convinced that I was about to be stabbed.   Those fleeting moments weren't about my husband or my dog, but the fact that I was about to be stabbed because this guy thought I was someone else. 

Dammit, I want to get stabbed on my own merits.

He stuck out his hand.  I'm Rodney, Diablo, I've been trying to get a hold of you, I sent you a message through MySpace.

He oozed insane but I felt terrible.  Plus I didn't want to get stabbed.  I'm sorry, I told him, it's a joke everyone plays on me when I show up.  People think I look like Diablo Cody, but I'm Nina. I stuck out my hand for him to shake.

Oh, he said, well, you look like her.  Are you a writer?

I am, I wrote for 17 episodes of Lizzie McGuire, as well as a bunch of animation, I told him.

Oh, I bet you're nice like her.

Um, thanks?  Well, good luck with your quest--

I have nine things in common with her, he continued.  D'you know we're both from Minnesota?

Actually I'm pretty sure she's from Illinois, she grew up not far from where I grew up, I told him.  So it's really more like eight things.

At this point Tomàs and our friends Patty and Arturo took a couple of photos* and dragged me to safety.

Diablo, I rode the crazy train as your amateur lookalike for you this time.  But next time, doll, you're on your own!

*Coming soon!

Scenes From Hollywood, Part 38423984.

Yesterday I worked the early shift at the gym.  Now the gym I work at is tiny: three studios (one for spinning, one for ellipticore, and one for yoga) plus Women's and Men's Locker rooms.  That's it.  You have to walk by the front desk to check in, and since nothing is computerized, you have to interact with the front desk staff to get to your class.  (Unless you're Brandon Davis, who just hands you a hundred dollar bill and assumes you know what to do with it.)

In addition to that, there's only five people who work the front desk, and three who cover the morning shifts: younger slackbrother j., me, and D., who has one arm, so there shouldn't be an issue in telling us apart.  Most people who take classes at the gym - most Hollywood-types, most perfectly nice - have gotten to know us over the years (or in my case, 6+ months) so we chit-chat when they arrive.  Yesterday, one of my favorite clients, one of the founders of the Bill Foundation, showed up with a copy of Sunday's New York Times.

Oh my god, Nina! she exclaimed.

A few seconds later, a well-known actress walked in the door.  Nina, I saw you-- she spots the copy of the newspaper on the counter --I saw this yesterday!  That's so cool!  We all chatted for a moment about the craziness of the industry when another client entered.  A woman who I am endlessly cheerful toward, but who acts like I don't even exist.  The two women I talked to turned to the new arrival - an art collector - and showed her the paper. 

Look, Nina's in the paper!

The art collector attempted to furrow her botox'd brow.  Who's Nina?

The first two clients looked at me, confused. Um, Nina? one of them said helpfully, motioning toward me.

I waved and smiled.  That would be me.

She looked at the paper, looked at me, shrugged and walked away, leaving the other two women standing there, horrified.

I shrugged. Hooray for Hollywood!

...

In other news, I've finally uploaded some of the photos from our wedding, which you can check out in all their glory here.  Hey, it's only taken me eight-and-a-half months.  Now if I could just finish the rest of the thank-you cards, I'll be set...

More Fun in Tinseltown.

Remember when my manager's assistant asked hey, do you have a blog?  (If not, go here.)

Well, a few short days after the New Year, I saw that he had sent me an email.  Odd, I thought, as he rarely sends email (or uses the Internet, as evidenced by his juno.com address.) 

Maybe this is a brand new year, I thought.  Maybe this is the year something's set up, maybe this is the year that it doesn't take eight months to set a meeting and when we do go into the meeting we'll be prepared and it won't be like that time that we were expected to pitch an entire series in the room for a line of toys we had never seen before, maybe this is the year where he follows up on meetings after we've followed up the most we can, maybe this is the year when we do the research on what's selling where and ask him for an introduction that he doesn't ignore the request and then tell us, eight weeks later that his 'phone call wasn't returned' or that he 'doesn't know anyone.' 

Maybe, just maybe, this is the year, I thought.

I clicked on the email:

One day, when I was a freshman in high school, I saw a kid from my class was walking home from school. His name was Kyle.It looked like he was carrying all of his books...

(The rest can be read here.)

The email continued:

It's National Friendship Week. Show your friends how much you care. Send this to everyone you consider a FRIEND.

If it comes back to you, then you'll know you have a circle of friends. WHEN YOU RECEIVE THIS LETTER, YOU'RE REQUESTED TO SEND IT TO AT LEAST 10 PEOPLE, INCLUDING THE PERSON WHO SENT IT TO YOU.

...

Curious, said Older SlackBrother J., that our career makes him think of suicide.

Needless to say, I didn't send it back.

Everything that is Wrong with Women...

...in one single article.

Long story short: ESPN sports writer is in multiple fantasy sports leagues.  His pregnant wife makes a bunch of picks this year, and ends up beating the pants off of him.  She then begs to write his column, so she can "humiliate him on a famous sports Web site."

She meets a bartender who wants to be a sports writer. He's in multiple fantasy sports leagues.

She dates the bartender who becomes the sports writer. He's in multiple fantasy leagues.

She marries the sports writer.  He's in multiple fantasy leagues.

She gets pregnant by the sports writer. He's in multiple fantasy leagues.

More:

Anyhoo, Bill claims that being in all these leagues "helps his column." I call B.S. because he was in all these leagues when we met and he was a bartender. He also claims that checking magazines and newspapers and Web sites for NFL info helps his picks column (we know this isn't true) and that his annoying phone calls with his annoying friends help his column (sounds like a stretch, right?).

The only reason her husband is defending why he participates in fantasy sports - something he's been doing since before they met - is because she's got a problem with it.  And because he can't say "I used to do it for fun, but now I do it to get away from you, you controlling little twat"

True, he checks his Blackberry during an "X-mas party" (she was too busy out curing cancer to spell out Christmas, I imagine.) Yes, that can be annoying.  However, it's also a art of his job, a job that pays the bills and might provide insurance and gives her this opportunity to "humiliate him on a famous sports Web site."

"According to Bill, my record is 127-104-9, putting me 23 games over .500. I have no idea what the "over .500" part means or why it matters but Bill seemed to think it was really impressive."  She continues to say that she doesn't understand why Statisticians refer to it as "over .500" and don't "just say that I picked 59 percent correctly or whatever the number is."  It's because that's the terminology they use.  Like when you refer to the cluster of DNA expelled from your uterus as a baby. Is it honestly that difficult to understand?

But it's not enough to beat him.  No, when he wins in another league, she complains that outside of the prize money:

This particular league has a huge trophy that will now be moving in with us. Awesome! Who needs a new piece of art or a vase when you can showcase an ugly 3-foot-high trophy? I can't wait to clean his office and accidentally "bump into it" and break it into 10 pieces -- this will be the highlight of my winter other than any time our son pees on Bill during a diaper change.

The only confusing part in this entire scenario is how he ever came to have sex with her in the first place. 

My holiday wish for him is an uncontested divorce. 

And my holiday wish for her? I hope she has six happy, healthy little boys. 

Who are all exactly like their father.

(A hat-tip to my fantasy sports playing husband, who emailed me the link this morning.)