| Post-vacation depression
Be ready for a really long entry!
Ugh. Having to wake up at 5am again really sucks.
Thursday – was up fairly early because I needed to be over at Kevin’s by 10am. We fill up the car – in several ways. 4 people, luggage and camp chairs and bowling equipment stuffed to the top in back, and a full gas tank. We even managed to find $3.88 a gallon. So sad that that’s considered to be “cheap.” Nice drive down, little-to-no construction, ate bad-for-me food several times, slept for about 90 minutes while Brian drove at one point. Got to see parts of Kentucky I hadn’t seen before – interesting coniferous trees everywhere, plus the freeways cut through a lot of hills rather than going up and down them, plus instead of their hills being dirt, there are many layers of strata. Made for interesting rock formations in several places.
Checked into our hotel and met a few “Achievers.” That is what Lebowski-fest visitors call each other. This is based on the “Little Lebowski Urban Achievers” (yes, and proud we are of all of them) referred to several times in the movie. If you are there and you know a few lines in the movie, you are an “Achiever.” If you say a line wrong, or do something stupid, you are called a “f**king amateur” – also said several times during the movie. A lot of people were wearing shirts that say “Achiever” on them.
We then saluted the evening with several White Russians (The Dude’s drink of choice). I’d never had one before, so I decided to take it easy with the first one before getting to the second one. Someone in our group (not naming names) may have had three – or this person just did not handle it well to then mix in beers a little later with dinner – because this person became “belligerent drunk” and we’d never seen that on this person before. It was not worn very well! I myself have the problem where I just want to go to sleep after several alcoholic drinks. So after the long day of driving, carb-loaded foods and beverages, I was ready to hit the hay. Kevin and Coletta wanted to get out a-drinkin’ some more and to see if they could find Liam.
Liam is not really his name. His name is Jim Hoosier and he’s the guy who played Liam in the movie. He didn’t have any lines, but he is in a couple scenes with John Tuturro’s character, Jesus,. and he also is in the opening credits doing this slow-motion Twist type dance when he hits a strike while bowling. Coletta had gotten in touch with him via the Fest’s website and had promised to buy him a drink that night. Found out the next morning that they did indeed find him at one of the two hotels (two almost identical hotels across the street from one another with events happening at both places). I also found out that KEVIN SNORES. And I found this out at 1:07am – and again around 2 and 3 and finally at 4am, my alarm went off.
Why, you ask?
Because Coletta was determined that we were going to be at the bowling alley that morning as the local Louisville Fox Station did several live shots from Lebowski-fest throughout their morning newscast from 5 – 9am. I thought, sure, could be fun, as long as we get to sleep again during the afternoon.
Well, I’m up, showered, dressed, pretty – and no one’s moving. No noise next door – we had adjoining rooms with Coletta and Brian – and Kevin isn’t moving. I finally got response from Kevin… more like a grunt. Tried texting Coletta, no response. Finally gave up – a little aggravated – and went down to the lobby. I was just going to get breakfast somewhere and then come back and go to sleep again. Hotel restaurant wasn’t open at 5am and they said the only thing open would be McDonald’s. Was NOT in the mood for deep-fried McDonald’s breakfast, so I drove until I found a food mart and bought a couple of snacky things, then drove back to the hotel and just listened to morning news while eating and sitting in the car in the parking lot, a lot miffed that I was up so freakin’ early for nothing. I did NOT want to go across the street to the bowling alley by myself, feeling like I wasn’t quite sure what was going nor would I know anyone. But finally Kevin came walking by and I honked my horn. We walked over there around 6am and were greeted with shouts of “ACHIEVERS!!” I was surprised. I thought this would be a big thing, but there were maybe 8 people there. We were wearing our “Sobchak Security” shirts – Sobchak being the last name of John Goodman’s character in the film. Coletta and Brian had also given each of us Walter Sobchak style Aviator glasses. Very cool. Coletta and Brian finally showed about an hour later – they had forgotten to set their alarm.
We were on the air about every 15 minutes with either a “tease”, a “bumper” or a segment on the morning show. The reporter hosting was MEGA-cute and taller than me. They had us mostly bowling, but they were also doing a “marmot fling”, had a cornhole game going with pictures of Lebowski characters on the cornhole boards, and they were interviewing Liam. We finished with the “ringer toss”, which was done out on the lawn outside across the parking lot. They had an old Gran Torino like the one The Dude drives in the movie and they had a mannequin across from it dressed up like a Nihilist (again, you’d need to see the movie to understand the references). You had to throw the “ringer” – a case filled with dirty undies (see the movie) from the driver’s side over the top of the car to try and hit the Nihilist.
After the fun there, headed back to the car and followed Scott, one of the fest’s organizers, to a very fun restaurant called Lynn’s Paradise Café. Crazy place, with crazy decorations – even a table with a full model train and village under plexi-glass, and mega carb-heavy foods. I had the Vanilla Bourbon Ball French Toast. The meals were not cheap, either, although Scott had said they would be. They were each about $15. There was a gift shop and Coletta found a pair of glasses that had bowling pins lining the top of each lens with bowling balls as darker circles on the lenses themselves. Very apropos at the event and everyone wanted a pair.
Went back to the hotel to try for our afternoon nap, but the Fates were not having it. Almost at that point of no return – you know, where you’re about to drop off into deep sleep? – and this loud horrible noise awakens us. Fire alarm. 1:30 in the afternoon. Pull on clothes and grab a few things and trek out into the 96 degree (36 C), humid, very bright sunshine. I was not happy. Very pissy and wanted to get right back to sleep, but we had to wait for the fire trucks to give us the all clear. They were adding an entire wing to our hotel and the construction workers had just accidentally triggered the alarm. Wasn’t that nice of them? FINALLY got back to sleep again, awake in time for dinner and to go see this new movie that had been made called “Little Lebowski Urban Achievers.” I was under the impression that it was going to be a fake documentary about the under-privileged kids referred to in the movie, but it was instead a documentary about Lebowksi-fest and its fans. Was just over an hour. Could have stood to be only about 40 minutes, though. Was only at times interesting. We then grabbed our camp chairs and headed back over to the Executive Lawn to watch a “band” (really a bad comedy music act from Comedy Central) and a foul-mouthed comedian before they showed the movie at 11:15pm. Was fun for a while, with everyone knowing all the lines, but about 2/3 through the movie, I’d had too many beers, had to pee so bad I couldn’t stand it, also felt a little queasy and was sleepy – I mean, they started the movie at 11:15pm and I am finding that the older I get, the more I want to get to sleep by midnight. And the lawn was SO damn crowded that by the time I finally made it to the porta-potties, I knew there was no way I was going to make it back through that crowd. So I walked back to the hotel, texting Coletta and Brian to ask if they could bring my camp chair for me. I do recall hearing that Coletta and Brian were again going out for MORE drinking when they got back. Don’t know how they did it. I just do not have that kind of energy anymore. If Kevin snored that night, I don’t know. I think I was so exhausted that I slept right through it.
We met some fun people during all of this – two couples from Toronto who drove down for the event (they are on the video from the morning news show on my last entry); a couple from Columbus; a very cute kid from L.A. who drove all the way from L.A. to the event by himself and because he works for Common Cause, he was able to meet lots of new clients (most of the attendees at this event had very liberal leanings) and therefore he got PAID as work for two whole weeks of driving cross-country – he was headed to Washington, DC after the fest, and these guys from Philadelphia. One of them was so VERY fine as he has this big-time Matthew McConaughey thing going on – check out these two pics. Tim the Philadelphia guy’s in the picture on the left, Matthew’s on the right!
 
(most pictures in this entry courtesy of Tim's pages)
Saturday we got breakfast at Bob Evans to save some money, then headed back and slept the afternoon away again. At least I tried, but Kevin started snoring again. The main event was that afternoon. It started with the “garden party”, which was on the lawn again and was some of the same stuff as before, but more Lebowski oriented games added with prizes for winning. Plus some bands playing. VERY hot afternoon and most people were hiding under what little shade there was amongst the trees or under the one tent.
Then we headed back to the hotel for big part we’d been waiting for – the Bowling party! 900 tickets sold, but only about 360 people could actually bowl since there was 45 lanes. We got there an hour before they opened the doors, so we were the third group in line. We were in costume for this because we wanted to try and win a prize. Our costume? We were wearing bowling shirts with the “Treehorn Productions” logo on the back and “Talent Scout” on the left sleeves. If you know the movie, Jackie Treehorn makes smutty movies (or as he says when asked by The Dude “How’s the smut business?”: “I wouldn’t know, we’re involved with Publishing, Entertainment and Political Advocacy.”) We wore our sunglasses, except for Coletta, who just showed lots of cleavage and Brian had printed up very official looking badges for each of us, with our pictures, plus a bunch of different business cards for “audition times” that we could hand out to various people. So we worked the crowd both while we were in line and in the bowling alley. The guys in line in front of us for some reason went way down to the end of the alley so we took one of the center lanes, right where all the action would be.
There were these two girls there dressed as a pair of beavers, who carried around this picture frame they would hold up occasionally.
This is in reference to when Maude in the movie says, “You mean the ‘beaver picture’?” when referring to the sex film that’s part of the story. This was not an original costume. Someone had done that before and not only that, but these two girls were REALLY rude. When I tried to get their attention and give them one of our cards, they were very nasty. Not a way to win a contest ladies!! But they did win for Best Overall Costume. Bitches. Only because the crowd was made up mostly of drunk single guys. The 20 finalists for costume were picked by the guys who run the event, but their decision is based on audience response and all the drunk single guys were thinking “beaver.” Whatever.
But WE WON for Best Group Costume!!! Yeah, baby! We achieved!! And even better, the guys forgot to get a trophy made for that category, so we were each given copies of the book they co-wrote called “I’m a Lebowski, You’re a Lebowski”. They signed them for us, and so did “Liam.” So I made a point as we were leaving of saying VERY loudly as we passed the “beaver” girls – “WOW! Autographed copies of the book PLUS they’re mailing us trophies?? We got more than anyone else!” Hee hee.
It was about 1am by then. I was exhausted. My whole body hurt from standing all day, plus all the bowling. I was also the only one who didn’t get a nap due to the snoring, so I was out cold. The rest of them headed to the After Party in one of the party rooms of the hotel – went until about 3am. Luckily, I had been smart enough to get us a late checkout at 1pm. Nice drive back, got home around 7pm, but I could not fall asleep – and Slammy was being a pill. He had his stereo LOUD at 11pm. I just don’t understand that. How is it that some people have no concept of how to live in a shared space?? I wanted to make sure he was the one blasting the stereo because if it was, I was calling the cops again. I turned off my air conditioner, but still wasn’t sure. I went out my door and looked down from the railing up above, both hands on the railing – a look of contempt on my face – looking down at his door, and that’s the very moment he opened his door and immediately looked up at me glaring down at him. I didn’t flinch. He had a drink in hand and looked a bit startled, but kept moving out the front door to go have another smoke as usual – which is why his door constantly slams – he won’t smoke in the place since he’s trying to sell it. I wouldn’t have minded the stereo too much if it wasn’t for the heat. Too hot to sleep in the bedroom and I wanted to sleep on the living room floor, but his stereo is directly below that. I went back inside and miracle of miracles, his stereo was turned down the moment he slammed the door on his way back inside. I cannot wait until the man is gone, I tell you!
But I could NOT fall asleep. Got into bed around 11:30 after he’d turned off the stereo and by 2am, when I had not fallen asleep, I called into work and left a voice mail that I needed to take half a vacation day and would be in around noon. I hated having to take that time, but I really needed it.
Last night was first rehearsal back and it went really well for me line-wise, considering yesterday was the first time I’d gone over my lines since the last time I had been at rehearsal. But there was snottiness as usual from HD and MD. They can’t give a simple, constructive note. They have to be rude, arrogant and condescending. It REALLY got some people’s dander up last night. There was one point when HD yelled at someone, “I’m not yelling at you!” and if it had been ME out there on that stage, I would have said, “You may not be yelling, but your attitude is always smarmy and unnecessarily nasty.” They should be glad it WASN’T me! I can’t wait for this show to open so that we hardly have to put up with them. Never again!
Today is my first full day back and I’ve been fighting a migraine and queasiness all day. Of course, the fact that I decided to be bad last night and downed lots of beers with castmates after rehearsal, it’s my own damn fault!
PS - I will post links to various pages with pictures of the event at a later date!
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