In office day. I got a bunch of requests for platinum rush Important Documents--SIGH. Two actually paid up but one of them has a different name in our records (more like Firstname-Middlename Lastname and they wrote Middlename Firstname Lastname on all their papers--I am grateful I waited for them to come up with an ID number instead of trying to find them by name because that would not have worked) AND wants it for legal stuff, so I said I'm not ordering it until they clear that up. Then more emails. Then more lists. I'm annoyed that 2 out of 4 requests are for HUGE documents so that's even more trouble/money, bleah. And of course the magic word "international!" comes up. Gee, wouldn't it be nice if we could order these things every week and get them in the mail after 3 weeks instead of six? Except we'd have to get everything reprogrammed and that'll never happen.

I did, however, "officially" hit my 20 years here. My boss and I have been confused as to what my work anniversary is--February 5 when I started as a temp or mid-August when I finally got hired permanently. "Well, I guess they split the difference, because here it is," she said, giving me a pin, a printed letter, and a $200 Visa card, which I plan to use this weekend at Whole Earth, muahahah.

After work, I went to the first murder mystery company training. (Happily, I hit NO traffic. Like it was a bleeding miracle and I was even ten minutes early.) There were only seven people in this, as I gather a few couldn't make this day but will be there later, or trained elsewhere, but also there were a lot of audition flakes and there will be more auditions in a few months. Two of them were "old timers" who were in this company pre-pandemic, which I gather pivoted to Zoom in pandemic but are now doing private parties IRL again. They were pretty excited about going back to it. I didn't see the guy I auditioned with, he may be there Wednesday, perhaps?

I really like the director, Emeri. (Who is NB, uses all the pronouns, I will probably switch around which I use since if there's more than one option, I tend to do that.) She was a total hoot telling stories about all of the shows, very pragmatic. I printed the documents for training and watched the videos they sent while at work (hey, I can listen to a video while typing stuff) and there's a "table speech" you are supposed to memorize and the guy in the video reiterates over and over again that you should touch people. Emeri was all "We don't do that in California, the people who write the scripts are in Michigan, I guess that's more okay there?" Nor do we pull out fake guns and shoot them in California shows either :P Me: "WHEW."

It sounds like the company is pretty great to work for--sensible mask policy, sensible sexual harassment policies, you can tell people off or leave if you need to. It sounds like Tony n' Tina Murder Mystery sort of experience and that they are having a LOT of fun. They have an online hub where you can sign up for shows (mostly weekends) all over NorCal, do as much or little as you want, can do other shows (obviously) if you want to take some time for that, as she did.

On the side of Hot Goss, she asked what went on with the musical director and I told her all the Evita goss. She was also like "Steve says he's too old to be in shows any more, and then every few shows he's in," and I said, "I think they're short on dudes" and they said "Love Jan and Steve, but they need to start cross casting," and I said sometimes they do, like Sarah playing Hot Blades Harry in Urinetown (and I know some roles in Mary Poppins that are usually guys were played by ladies and/or made gender-ambiguous, like the park ranger). Maybe this show just has too many Macho Men to do that, I dunno. The women in this are pretty girly and my fake kid is NB but plays ladies in shows (at either rate, would not cast a 13-year-old around my height as a macho soldier).

I'm kinda nervous about handling the whole thing, but also intrigued? Next training is role playing in a few days. Would give me something fun to do in between shows, anyway, and they had CRAZY AWESOME stories about doing shows on the wine train, and fancy vineyards, and one guy there kept having a bartender make him fake alcoholic drinks while he got fake drunk, and the bartender was having an extremely good time doing that. And then there was the time where they were pretty much performing for a wine cult...seriously!

I note that while I was in training, I got a text from Scott. I have been worried the last couple of days that he was going to audition for Music Man and I definitely wasn't. He marked himself as "interested" on FB and told Jan on Saturday he was considering it but had to watch it first. Knowing him, that was pretty 5050/who the hell knows, but I admit it makes me sad to think he will someday do a show there without me (never liked it when that happened in Winters, but that wasn't my decision to not get cast). Like I was debating volunteering to be crew for Music Man (even though I plan to be probably-not-able-to on 1-3 of the shows, someone else would have had to cover my butt) if he did it. Well, he texted me tonight saying he watched it last night and "I really don't care for that show" and he nearly fell asleep and he hates Shipoopi (ME TOO) and while he might consider a lead, he doesn't like it enough to be ensemble. I am pretty eh on it myself. Like it's okay (except for Shipoopi, and I think getting worked up over a boy band is silly...and watching Schmigadoon made me think, "I cannot live in Music-Man-verse...") and I was trying to talk myself into it months ago, but I'm relieved he doesn't wanna. Huzzah.

Anyway, halfway through this thing during break, I told him I went to this thing--I assumed Robert told him about it and he blew it off,-- and he said it said you should be local to Sac and he isn't. I did ask about that and she said "well, we wouldn't make him drive out to the warehouse for costumes and then drive in the other direction for the show, would just have him meet everyone for the carpool," and that they will do more auditions in a few months since this one got a lot of people flaking out on going. So, I'll let him know how it goes, we'll see if I feel like poking him about it again in a few months. Not sure if he could do it or not, but he'd freaking love it if he did.

I note that Emeri said she loved it so much that her grades started going down in college once she started, and she met her SO there and we can meet him Wednesday. THAT'S ADORABLE. "I note that that was before I was a director."

On a less fun note, Roe vs. Wade. I'm not even surprised or shocked. Jackie sent me this during the training and I didn't read the link at the time (probably a good thing) along with a bunch of other stuff that didn't exactly match that mood so I didn't pick up on it, which was probably all for the best. I can count my blessings that (a) I'm nearly unable to reproduce, (b) my gynecologist will keep me on Depo until menopause, (c) I live in CA and (d) blessing in disguise, I guess, that no man will ever fuck me again. So at least I'm okay, even if, well, you know.

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