Turning 12? NAILED IT.

Crazy, Sexy Diet--Day 2

I was too hungry and angry to write a blog post yesterday. The first three days of this diet are ROUGH, but this time I'm actually totally fine right now, on the evening of the second day!

A little bit about Crazy, Sexy Diet (CSD from now on, peeps): created by Kris Carr, an amazing woman who has been fighting an incurable cancer for over 10 years, it is a vegan, gluten-free, plant-based diet. (CSD is also a no booze detox!) What I (and my bestie Chelsey) are doing is the 21-day detox adventure. Yes, "adventure" is what it's called in the book but it takes a few days for it to feel that way!

Before anyone (especially you, Ma) tells me I don't need to lose weight, please note that I am not doing this to lose weight. Not that it's any of your bid-nass! (I'm so sassy.) I'm doing the detox because I have felt tired, unmotivated, depressed, and just generally icky lately and doing this detox in the past has made me feel super happy, healthy, postive, and at peace. If you have never heard of Kris Carr or CSD, I suggest you take a look at crazysexylife.com. It's not just about food. It's meditation, maintenance, fitness, and overall peace.

I'm writing about this in my blog for a few reasons:

1. It makes me feel amazing to do this detox and I want you to feel amazing too.
2. It holds my lazy ass accountable.
3. I like sharing new recipes, products, etc that make me feel healthy and inspired.

The biggest draw of this diet for me is the disease/cancer prevention aspect. As someone who has a family history riddled with cancer (this day and age, who doesn't?) and has had a few scares herself, I want to do all I can to prevent disease by paying attention to what I put in my body.

I tried a new green protein powder today. It's fantastic. Raw, gluten free, vegan, sugar free and chock full of vitamins, protein, probiotics, EVERYTHING. Here is the link:

Amazing Grass - Amazing Meal (Vanilla Chai Infusion)

This is a recipe of Chelsey's from another powder: protein powder, 1 cup of unsweetened almond milk, 1/2 cup of coconut water, teaspoon of macca powder, teaspoon of flaxseed oil, 1 banana, and blend that baby up with about 6 ice cubes and you have yourself a delicious treat! It completely quenched my hunger AND my sweets cravings. Plus, I feel energized and focused.

Cheers! (Excuse my "first thing in the morning look.")

Haters Gonna Hate

Actors can be real assholes. It's usually rooted in deep insecurity, which causes them to feel like they have to screw someone else over to make it in this business.

Here's the thing: if you have the luck to make an amazing career for yourself, it doesn't have to be at someone else's expense. In fact, the only way I want to make it is surrounded by people I love an respect.

I'll never be like Kirsten. (Pronounced Keer-stin.) I'm sure there are other lovely Kirsten's out there, but this one was, as the Duchess call, a hater.  

The ladies of Duchess Riot have been having great luck lately due to the success of our show at the Comedy Central stage. I'm so grateful for that, and I know the best is yet to come. However, it seems the more success that comes your way, the more haters you acquire. Yesterday, a few of us were called in for an audition at Paramount. Five Duchesses, one non-duchess, one role. We were all called at the same time, and we were chatting while waiting in the lobby area.

"Do you all, like, know each other or something?" Kirsten asks.

"Yes! I'm Suzanne," Suzanne extends her hand to Kirsten and she tentatively shakes Suzanne's hand while looking at her like she has leprosy.

"We're all in the same comedy group." Katie says.

"Oh, where does your little comedy group perform?" (This sentence was said so patronizingly, it was palpable.)

"Comedy Central asked us to perform at their stage a couple of weeks ago. That's actually how we all ended up here. LOTS of casting directors and industry attended." I said, with a smile because pretty much the only time I'll brag is when I'm faced with a condescending twat who is trying to tear me down.

"Oh. So, what are you going to do when one of you gets this part and the others don't?"

Did I mention this chick was a HATER?

"Be really excited for that girl and go celebrate with drinks!" Dione said.

"Right. Well you better make the girl who gets it PAY for the drinks. Can you even drink? You all look like you are sixteen." woofed Kirsten.



First of all, Kirsten, telling a group of actresses they all look super young is NOT an insult. Second, you suck. And the one thing we have learned as a group, is that we are going to have sucky haters, and we will kill them with kindness. (But I WILL blog about you later, as an example of the kind of actor I will never be.)

Go ahead and believe that we were naive and didn't notice you were being condescending. Laugh at us for all waiting for every Duchess to get in and out of the room, so we could walk out together. Tell yourself that if one of us books something and the other doesn't that we would be anything less than THRILLED for each other. It's not going to change the fact that we love each other and celebrate each other's successes. And trust me, Kirsten, we got a LOT of success coming our way.

Wet n' Wild

In an attempt to be fit and active, I hopped on board at my local gym when they offered a discounted rate for a yearly membership. I was spending WAY too much going to Cardio Barre and I wanted some variety. My friend Dione (a fellow Duchess) joined as well so we could take classes together. After a couple of weeks of Zumba classes, it was time to shake it up! This morning, I got a text from Dione saying, "Let's try the water aerobics class at 9:30!" Awesome! Here's what I was picturing:

Maybe a little of this:

I mean, who doesn't need a hand with pool noodles? Those things are so hard to manage! Water aerobics is the premise for the Magic Mike sequel right?

Instead, Dione and I donned our cute bikini's, grabbed our towels and noodles, and walked in to this:

Those ladies are having too much fun though. It was more like this:

Bad disco music was pumped through the chintzy pool speakers. The young, super fit and enthusiastic instructor was so thrilled to see us. , we were determined to have fun and make the best of it! Everything was great, until I put my foot in the water and it was freezing. That's where I draw the line.

I will accept that my dream of a fun, Vegas pool-party style water aerobics class at my local gym is dead. But I will not accept being cold and wet before 10am. Those bouncing, buoyant grannies are tougher than me, I'll be the first to admit it.

Next class? Spinning! If anyone has gone, can you tell me if it's more like this:

Or like this:

I'd love to have a head's up this time.

What's up?

Well, hi! It's been so long since my last blog that I have to figure out the new set up and format of Blogspot. As if life weren't tough enough, amirite?!

After about six months of dead air, I'm back. Mostly because my mother gets joy from reading my blogs and sharing them with her friends. The other reason is that, as always, I love writing. Any excuse is fine by me.

So, what's up?

For me, a lot! Career, life, EVERYTHING has gotten steadily better and better this year. I can't complain. I do complain, often, but I shouldn't. If we just automatically reached our goals, they wouldn't be as sweet, right? Sure! Let's go with that.

I won a fellowship from Writer's Bootcamp to develop my pilot and have a shot at a development deal at the end of all of it. I am really proud of this. After having a successful reading for my 2 Broke Girls spec at iO West, it's been the first tangible confirmation that I'm headed in the right direction by pursuing the writing side of my career with more tenacity. I'm halfway through my first draft of AmericaLand (my pilot, based on my year in Singapore) and I'm having a BLAST recreating that world.

The other source of ridiculous pride for me lately is my all female comedy group Duchess Riot. We were invited to perform at the Comedy Central Stage, a prestigious step for a comedy group in LA, and sold it out, got a standing ovation, and accolades from many casting directors and industry folks. Missed the show? Not to worry! We were invited BACK to the CCS and also have a few shows a month that you can catch whenever you fancy. www.duchessriot.com

The reason I get such joy from this group is that these ladies have become my closest friends. Yes. Every single one of them. You may say, "A group of 8 women and you ALL get along?! Yeah, right!" and to that I laugh! I say, "Pffft!" Come see a show. You will see 8 chicks who love each other to pieces and come alive when they get to share a stage together. It's the most fun I've had performing in years!

I'll catch you up on more and have stories of me being a total weirdo soon! Subscribe, follow me on twitter (not you Mom,) or FB.

Thanks for reading!
Love!

My F*cking Apartment

Let me preface this blog by saying I am wearing neon orange air traffic control strength earplugs as I type away.

I woke up this morning to 90's electronic rock blaring through the wall my headboard lies against, at 8am, on a Saturday. It's important to note that it is 90's electronic rock because it is the same creepy beat over and over again. No lyrics. No break between songs. Just a continuous string of cacophonous crap pounding through my bedroom for about an hour. I want to bang on the wall and go, "HEY! How 'bout some Tone Loc?! I'd be down for some LLCoolJ, TLC, or Salt n' Peppa if you insist on the 90's but PLEASE put down your glow sitcks!!" When that stopped, my downstairs neighbor, who has the patio in the courtyard of our apartment, started playing with her dog. When I say, "courtyard," I want you to understand that means the area where every sound is has a deafening echo that seeps into each unit whether your windows are open or not. Each of the ground floor apartments has a 10 foot by 10 foot AstroTurf fenced in patio and whatever they choose to do on that patio reverberates through the courtyard for all 4 stories of our apartment building to share. My downstairs neighbor has two gears: playing with her dog, defined as her continuously saying, "GO GIT IT! GO GIT IT!" in a high pitched baby voice while the dog barks, OR her and her boyfriend screaming at the top of their lungs about how much they hate each other while pacing in and out of the apartment, slamming the sliding glass door. At this point, there is unity amongst my neighbors. We all creep over to our windows facing the courtyard and look down at the train wreck that is the 1st floor relationship, with a shared look of, "Here they go again!"

For the past 3 months, my elevator has decided it does not stop on the 2nd or 3rd floor. I happen to live on the 2nd floor so this is an unfortunate turn of events. I got used to using the elevator to go to the 4th floor and then walking down two flights of stairs. There isn't any staircase from the lobby to the apartments so you can't just conveniently take the stairs at your leisure. You have to take the elevator to another floor, then take the stairs. In these 3 months, they have renovated the elevator with new paneling and faux hardwood flooring. It looks absolutely GORGEOUS as it continues to sail past the floors where have of it's tenants live. One day, I accidentally found a loop hole. If you hit the first floor button just as the elevator passes the first floor, it will stop at the second floor!!! The "trick" spread like wildfire! I even had a guy SHOW ME MY OWN TRICK the other day. I proudly said, "Yeah, I invented that." I instantly earned his respect. It was a good day.

The upside is that I have a flippin' amazing room mate who has become a close friend, I own the bedroom furniture I've always wanted and, ya know, I have my own bathroom, so it could be worse.

And in a few years, when I'm sitting, wrapped in a silk robe at my house in the hills, in a chaise on the patio by my infinity pool, I'll miss the high-pitched shrieks of, "GO GIT IT! GO GIT IT!" and the incessant booming of a 90's rave pumping through the wall. I'll feel sad and pout my Chanel glossed lips when my glass elevator stops at the correct floor.

Nope. No, I won't. But I might have less to write about so, today, let's count it as a "win."

The Beauty of the Present Moment

I was reading my tattered old handwritten book of inspirational affirmations and quotes this morning because I was feeling a bit disheartened and hallow. I woke up thinking, "Yep, another day waiting tables and not getting to act. Poor me." I knew I needed to snap out of that mind set. No matter what mood I'm in, I always seem to come across one of the quotes in this book and it will hit me as if it were the first time I've read it. Mind you, I've read these probably hundreds of times. I read them, and added to them, every single day in the last half of my time in Singapore to get me through.

"Don't spoil the beauty of the present moment by wishing for something else."

I'm so blessed. I have so much and I spend a lot of time wishing for more. It's great to want and strive for more, of course! But, if you aren't appreciating what is right in front of you, what's it all for? Last night I decorated a tree and had hot cider with my wonderful room mate and then got to snuggle with the man that I love watching TV while getting a foot rub. If I were a working actress, it wouldn't have made a difference. Yeah, the tree would have been real and my apartment would have been bigger but who cares? The only thing that mattered last night were the people I shared my time with and it was beautiful.

So that's what I'm thinking of today. There's no big detailed story, no funny anecdote. I'm just going to concentrate today on the beauty of the present moment. I'm going to go to my job (I HAVE a job, how lucky am I?!) where I work with fantastic people, owners who I adore and be finished within a few hours with the amount of money lots of people have to work an entire day or two for. Then, I have the rest of the beautiful day to do whatever I want!

Today is beautiful and I'm grateful.

Opening a Gift

I'm not proud of it, but I have come clean to my family. It was a real problem, that I couldn't control through much of my childhood. I hid it, and I completely got away with it, too. My parents never suspected that I would do such a horrible thing.

I opened my presents before Christmas.

After the illusion of Santa was crushed, (and I remember EXACTLY where I was when that happened . . . a story for another day), my mom would put the immaculately wrapped presents under the tree as she bought them, sometimes weeks before the big day. Did she have no idea what this would do to me? Was she under the illusion that I had self-control?!

My parents were asleep . . . I went to the living room to watch TV and there was the beautiful and majestic Christmas tree, with it's twinkling lights and years and years of homemade ornaments. The paper and cotton ball Santa, crumpled and held together with tape, that my dad made when he was in elementary school, Miss Piggy with angel wings and halo (my FAVORITE ornament), and dozens of multi-colored tinsel umbrellas that my mother had from her mother, just to name a few. There's nothing like my family Christmas tree. It's always crooked, the limbs are weighed down with far too many ornaments, and it'll never be the kind of tree you see on TV in a Christmas special, but it's the most beautiful tree in the world to me. And underneath that tree, dozens of mysteries wait to be unraveled . . .

It started pretty innocently. I casually strolled over to the tree, taking a peek at the "to" and "from" cards. (I liked to compare the size and quantity of my presents compared to my brothers . . . solely for research purposes. I'm not competitive or jealous, you see.) And, oh, one of the presents "To Erin, From Mom" is in a gift BAG. "Well, maybe I'll just lift the present, to see how heavy it is. Hmm, I don't suppose it would hurt if I just PEEKED inside . . . if the metallic green tissue paper shifted to the side, that's not MY fault . . . " And just like that, a red-headed, flannel pajama wearing, present snooping maniac was born.

It was SO EASY that year to pretend that I didn't know that the gift bag contained my yearly decorative socks! My performance was pitch perfect! "Oh! Socks with kittens wearing sweaters?! Thank you, Mom! I love them!" And she BOUGHT IT!

After that, there was no stopping me. I'd wait until my parents went out, and I'd get to work. As the years went by, I become such a pro. I could unwrap the Fort Knox of presents and rewrap it with the greatest of ease and no one ever suspected. I was untying and retying decorative bows like a ninja (if ninjas were into untying and retying bows). And I was getting more and more convincing with the shock and awe I would portray opening the gifts that I had previously unwrapped . . . which, let's face it, over the years became all of them. I'd even start to unwrap a couple of my brother's presents (for research, remember?) There was no stopping me.

At around age 14, after opening all of our family presents, I had a hallow feeling inside. My parents had bought all of these amazing and beautiful gifts, as they always did, and I felt like a jerk because I wasn't EXCITED. It didn't feel magical, as Christmas should, because I had known for days, sometimes weeks what everything was. I took that joy you get from giving someone a special gift away from my parents, and the crummiest part was, that they didn't even know (CURSES for being such a good actress!) I had this huge moment of recognition of how spoiled I was. (I still AM, but at least now I know it and I don't open my gifts.)

Years later, I casually mentioned, "Oh, yeah, I used to open all of my Christmas gifts," much to my mother's shock and accusations of, "Oh, you're bad! You're BAD!" And I really do feel bad about it. Why couldn't I stop myself? What a shithead! I'll never get those moments of surprise back.

So, to my wonderful Mom and Dad (and let's face it Dad, it was MOM doing all the shopping), I'm sorry I ruined the magic of holiday gift-giving for years. I guess the only way we could get it back would be . . . hmmmm . . . I mean, I promise I won't look . . . more presents?

Something that belongs to someone else

I am, once again, trying to get back to writing daily, so I cracked open my A Writer's Book of Days for some inspiration. Today, I write about "something that belongs to someone else."

The first thing that comes to my mind is my heart. Throughout my life, I feel like it's almost uncomfortable for me to have ownership of my heart. I give it away too freely sometimes and I've certainly had it returned in a million pieces. Right now, I feel pretty safe with the person who has it. He wouldn't frivolously toss it aside or do anything careless. It was definitely handed to him cautiously, and covered in band-aids. Every once in a while one of those band-aids loosen and I get scared. I worry about it breaking again because I feel like it's pretty close to having it's last punch so I try to build a wall around it or take it back, but he soothes my heart and mends those tricky wounds.

My friend Jamey put together a show a couple of years ago with artists in all different mediums. There was one scene that has really stayed with me. There were no words, just music and a man and a woman. They both wore a beautiful heart made of metal wires with long pieces of yarn hanging from it on their chest. As they portrayed "falling in love" they would attach one of their yarn strings to the other persons heart. Then, as so often happens, they started to grow apart. The actors moved farther apart in distance, stretching the heart strings to their limit. Finally, one of the actors took scissor and cut right through the strings, eliminating any attachment they had to one another. It was heartbreaking and elegant.

We build connections to each others hearts and sometimes it's really hard to detach. For some, it's easy to just cut right through those connections . . . for others (like me) it takes a long time to detach the strings, one by one, and let it go.

My heart belongs to someone else. He knows who he is. I hope he is as careful with it as I am with his because his is pretty tattered and beaten up too. Maybe that's how we ended up feeling safe enough to let someone else in again, who knows. I'm just glad that I'll never give up trusting there will be someone to take care of it forever.

I got nothin'

I got nothin'. I have been staring at this computer screen . . . hoping for inspiration . . . for a good 45 minutes. All I've got is this.

I'm grateful right now for:

My amazing family
Friends: from Orlando, New York, Singapore, Australia, Europe, EVERYWHERE
Someone to snuggle
An awesome room mate
Laughing (I did a lot of that tonight)
Group Therapy Improv Group
ACME Improv
A job
A super comfy bed
Ramen noodles
Yummy smelling soap and lotion
The relaxing melodies app on my iphone
.... speaking of which . . . I'm sleepy.

Goodnight.

Words

I can't help but write about this because I woke up early, unable to get back to sleep thinking about it.

Words are my downfall. They weigh so heavy on me and it's so hard for me to separate them from my emotions. If you've never read The 5 Love Languages, I highly recommend it because it really opened my eyes years ago. The basic premise is that we all show and receive love in different ways. After reading the book it's usually very clear what your "language" is (and what your parents languages are, which in turn really effects you) and that makes it easier to communicate love to others whether it be in a friendship or romantic relationship. When I read it I was immediately like, "HOLY CRAP!" I completely, 100% give AND receive love in the form of words.

I'm the girl who will always be forthcoming about my feelings (whether they are undying feelings of love or complete and utter disgust). I've always been that way. Sometimes it leaves me feeling incredibly vulnerable. I take what someone says in one moment and hold on to it for dear life. "But you SAID this!" We all know we say things in the moment that we very much mean . . . but then feelings change. That has been a huge lesson for me: to accept that those words were real at the moment, but now the moment has passed and I can't hold that person to those words.

Words are also why I have always loved reading, writing, and acting. They are so moving! I mean, gees, who can resist a Shakespearean sonnet?! (Okay, LOTS of people can resist them, but not me!)

So as I was lying in bed I was just thinking about a situation in my life right now where I feel stuck and it's completely attached to the fact that I am putting a TON of weight on words and how I often let the fact that the words aren't backed up by actions slip by.

"Words are but symbols for the relations of things to one another and to us; nowhere do they touch upon absolute truth."
Friedrich Nietzsche 

Reality TV: my frienemy

After a long crappy day yesterday I was shutting things down behind the bar at work thinking, "Great. I made this goal of being grateful for something each day and then I have a day like this. What am I going to write about."

I get home, check my facebook and have messages and comments from my friends all over the country saying they saw me in the audience of Bachelor Pad. I started cracking up. The stupid reality show (that I'm hooked on) turned around and made my day. All of a sudden I was reliving that day a week ago when Kat flew from Vegas just to go to the taping with me because we are HUGE fans and remembering how much fun we had. I'm so grateful for her friendship. The tickets were also given to me by a friend I adore and respect so much who wasn't able to make it to the taping because she's a good mommy and it was her son's school orientation. I have good friends. I'm a lucky girl.

And Kirk blew me a kiss!

WTF am I doing?

Hi.

I have spent every day the last month saying, "I'm gonna . . . ya know, get some writing done today," and yet every friggin' day, something took me away from that: reruns of Tosh.0, Facebook, staring at a wall, ANYTHING I could do to not have to put my hands on the ever-loving keys of my macbook and actually get creative, I would do. And then I'd convince myself, MAN, I just ran out of time today. CRAZY!

So, this pile of shit blog is where I put my foot down. Even if it's this blog entry that has no significance, I had to write because if I don't write something I feel like I'm just going to find more worthless, time-sucking, reality TV shows to zap all of my creative mojo.

Shits been hard. Yep. I've had a lot of tough shit lately but that's life. When is there NOT shit? Speaking of shit, the thing that got me writing tonight was my friend Julie's blog entry about shit today. She is hilarious and she is doing this whole "living joyously" thing where she basically does whatever she wants (including quitting her job) and knows it's all going to be fantastic. I love her. Julie's blog. (note: "shit" used five times in this paragraph . . . well, now six times I guess.)

Today I had a moment of intense and insane clarity writing down a take out order at the same time as playing tic tac toe with my fellow counter server where I thought, "Woah! Wait a minute. I'm sorry. This isn't my life. I must have accidentally beamed into someone else's body and life because this isn't mine." I think it's a combination of being really hard on myself (as always), being impatient (again, per usual) and being EXHAUSTED (by quite a few things). All I know for sure is that I needed to slap myself across the face tonight, force myself to say something, and hold myself accountable for my total laziness.

I need to focus on the amazing things in my life, even if it's the tiniest thing one day, I'm so freaking lucky. I have a tendency to get in a rut of only focusing on the things I want to change, the things that suck. The problem there is that there is always stuff in your life that sucks, no matter who you are. The difference between a happy person and a miserable one is that the happy person is looking at all the fan-flippin'-tastic blessings they have and the miserable one is focused on the shit they are wading through. Until I have a story to tell, I'm just going to let you know what I'm grateful for and focus on that.

Today I had my graduation show for my 301 UCB class. I love improv. I was hung up for a while, about a year ago, feeling like I just couldn't do it and that I was awful, and well, because I THOUGHT that, I was. Now, I don't even really care that much if I'm amazing at it, I just love that I LOVE doing it. I love making people laugh and I got to do that today. I am so thankful for that. My class rocks, UCB rocks and hanging out at Birds afterwards rocks.

And I'm grateful that I finally wrote something today. It'll make writing something tomorrow so much easier, and now, I have no excuse. I'm sure the THRONGS of people who read this will hold me accountable and urge me to keep writing. (And by "throngs of people" I mean, my mother.)

Goodnight.

The Worst (and Best) Wing-woman

My bestie Kat came into town from Vegas this past week and in accompanying her to the Roosevelt Hotel's Beacher's Madhouse show I realize that I am the worst (and best) wingwoman. Here's why:

1. I am not smooth. I lost the straw to my drink three times. Once it was in my hair, once I smacked it out of the drink and across the bar in an awkward dance move and I have no idea where the third straw went. We were still asked to join a VIP table area by a group of dudes (because Kat is incredibly smooth and has crazy flirtation skills.)

2. I, on the other hand, got rejected when I wasn't even flirting. I was trying to be funny and sarcastic with the waiter because he had a small flashlight in his mouth while he pouring drinks from the bottle at the table. I said, "Wow, you're really good with a flashlight." He didn't even turn back to look at me while he said, "Yeah, so's that guy over there. Maybe you should talk to HIM." Yeesh.

3. You want a picture of you, a dude dressed like a giant penis, Spiderman and Paris Hilton? You got it:

4. Or a picture with an Oompa Loompa?

5. OR the world's tallest stripper?!

I'm your wing-woman.

6. But the drawback is that you have to deal with me wanting to get up on a platform to dance with a human chicken:

The man to the right looks absolutely terrified/disgusted.

7. I can dance the night away with the best of them but don't ask me to have a seductive conversation at the same time because it will go like it did that night:
Cute Guy: "Hey, nice moves."
Me: "Thanks! It's my 'I got a big penis' dance!"
Cute Guy: <blank stare>
Me: "I mean, my 'I'm nine months pregnant' dance?"
Cue cute guy's swift departure. Whatever, I thought it was funny.

8. I will only have one drink so that I can drive, and pass the glasses of champagne that the random guys at the table pass me to you. GREAT wing-woman!!

That is the end of my list. It was definitely one of the most fun night's out in Hollywood I've ever had (I very rarely do it.) I'm so glad I got to spend an impromptu evening with Kat though! One more picture of Paris and Nikki Hilton:

Loving the expression on the Oompa Loompa.

This happened too:

But most importantly, we had fun:

Daddy's Girl

This is a repost from my Road to Singapore blog. I haven't recycled any blogs yet but I wanted to in honor of Father's Day. I hope you are having a great day with your Daddy! I won't be with my Dad until August but I'll be serving many dads free burgers today at work! I hope you enjoy!

My dad is celebrating a milestone birthday this year (he's turning 65,) along with my mother who is turning 60 and myself (I'm turning 30). In a recent conversation with my mother, she told me that my dad doesn't want to celebrate his birthday (which is in June) until November when I get back to the United States and we can all celebrate our birthdays together. I got teary-eyed, of course. My dad is certainly not much of a sap, but in the past few years, there have been times when he does or says something that is surprisingly mushy. My dad never really likes to celebrate birthdays anyway, but that fact that he wants to wait until I'm home was sweet. It's probably because my dad and I share a special bond that no other father and daughter share. You see, my dad had me.

Yes, I mean that my dad gave birth to me.

My brother and I each have a photo album that my mom put together from our first year on the planet. The first page in both of our albums is a picture of each of us in the hospital, bright pink, only moments old. The only difference in my album is that the first picture you see is of my father, in a hospital gown sitting in a hospital chair holding me with pink and white balloons floating behind him with a big smile on his face. He looks exhausted but elated, I mean, he's just given birth for crying out loud; give the man a break! My mother, who hates to have her picture taken, was no where to be found in any of the hospital pictures. She must have been working that day and left my father to have me, all by himself.

I somehow got it into my head one day, very early on, when I looked through the photo album, that I had found out a huge secret that my parents were trying to keep from me. I confronted my mother.

"Dad had me, didn't he?" I asked her, through tears. "Why on earth would you think Dad had you?" my mother replied. Oh, okay, she was going to try and play hardball (with a 6 year old). I had THE EVIDENCE! I opened the front page of the photo album and presented it to her. "You aren't in any of these pictures and Dad is in a hospital gown holding me! Why didn't you ever tell me that dad had me?!"

"Oh, you're a silly goose," my mother replied and didn't elaborate, because, well, proving my theory wrong would be quite a conversation for a 6-year-old. I'm assuming that's why my belief went on for so long. I eventually got over the sting of betrayal that I had never been told this secret, and defended it with great honor. This was a constant source of amusement to my family, along with the fact that I am the ONLY person in my generation (and the generations before me) in my family to be born outside of New York. (The icing on the cake being that I was born in New Jersey, but more on that another day.)

I remember several family gatherings vividly where someone would say offhand, "Well, that's because Rich gave birth to Erin." I could sense sarcasm from a very young age and I would fly into a tantrum! "He DID have me! I have PROOF!" I would shout as I would stomp off to get the photo album. My father, of course, didn't help me accept the truth. He would laugh through a big smile and say, "That's right honey, show them!" I liked feeling that my dad and I were a team that no one could quite understand because WE had a special bond. None of my other friend's dads had had THEM! Obviously, those dads were too lazy!

Years went by, and I remember realizing that it might not be true, even before I knew the scientific reasons behind it, but I still insisted that my dad had me. Part of me didn't want to lose that special link to my dad. My mom and I got closer and closer as I became a woman, but the father-daughter bond is harder to keep strong.

One day I will have to re-post this with the picture (THE PROOF!) of my father and I, because it is in storage somewhere in North Hollywood until next year. I've just been thinking about this story and wanting to share it so I couldn't wait that long! I hope you enjoyed it! (UPDATE: I STILL can't find the picture! I spent an hour this morning looking! rrrggghhh!) This is a beautiful moment caught at my brother's wedding in December. My dad and I are both workin' double chins but I love it. 

Say Cheese!

A friend of mine showed me a picture of her adorable two-year old daughter tonight. In the photo, her cutie-pie was sitting at this horrible angle and doing the smushed face, double-chin action that no adult would ever do (or we would force whoever took the picture to delete it, immediately). It made me giggle and feel wistful for the days that I didn't have that awareness of the camera.

I absolutely hated seeing pictures of myself, probably until I started getting headshots done and realized how to angle myself in a way that looked attractive. Oh, and not let the complete and total spazz within my soul shimmy it's way out of my face. For example:

I like how my childhood friend Brianna couldn't be less interested in my present-opening. BRIANNA: it's a California Beach Taxi! Wake up! She seems pretty fascinated with that party horn, so all is forgiven.

Or what I believe was next years birthday:

I'm the one on the end in the glasses with the arm that resembles a stork or seagull leg. Not my best angle. (And no matter what I did, apparently my birthday parties were not enthralling enough to squeeze a smile out of Brianna.)

But the picture that really captures the full awkwardness of my childhood, the one that used to send me whining and crying to my mother to PLEASE take it out of the frame and destroy it as a teenager was this gem:

I'm definitely not worrying about my double chin here! Not to mention my WAY before the times Kate Gosslyn haircut with confetti style headband. Boy, oh boy was I a looker. This was around the time that I asked my mother if she thought I would grow up to be beautiful. She responded with, "You will always be unique-looking and that's even better!" 

I ran to my room crying.

The funny thing is that of all the "glamorous" or "sexy" pictures I have now taken, THAT horrifying 4th grade school picture is my absolute favorite picture of myself of all time. I have no awareness of what I look like and frankly, I think I look fairly pleased with myself. 

The Inspiration

The inspiration for this blog comes from studying improv at UCB. In many of our exercises we have to tell a story that comes to mind based off of a one word suggestion. My stories always end up revolving around some horribly embarrassing situation I got myself into. The story I'm going to tell you now is what inspired me to start a blog retelling the cringe-worthy episodes of my past. I hope my unfailing dorkiness brings a smile to your face.

Fashionista Middle School Erin

It was a sunny humid August day in Altamonte Springs, Florida. This day was a big day. It was the Erin and Erin 14th birthday party celebration. My good friend Erin O'Brien and I both had birthdays within a few days of each other and both had the name Erin. If that doesn't scream LET'S HAVE A JOINT BIRTHDAY PARTY, I don't know what does. This was also going to be one of my first co-ed birthday celebrations and I don't want to brag but the guest list was pretty impressive; the creme de la creme of Teague Middle School and Lake Brantely High School were going to be in attendance. (This had much more to do with Erin O'Brien's popularity than mine, I assure you.)

I was looking fly in my fantastic birthday outfit. I showed up to Erin's house in my sunflower print, rolled up Bongo shorts, matching sunflower sneakers and bright yellow shirt feeling HOT. (I scoured my pictures looking for a shot in those shorts. I came up empty handed, a true tragedy.) Our friends started to arrive and I breathed a secret sigh of relief that the gossip at school the next day would not be how no one showed up to the Erinx2 party.

Now I don't know if it was a puberty thing, a nervous thing, or what but for a short window of time in the transition from child to teenager, I had a secret shame. When someone would make me really laugh, I'd nearly pee my pants. I assure you, it's not an issue today, or else I would most likely not tell this story. I still possess an uncomfortable laugh when I don't know what to say but the uncontrollable bladder is a thing of the past. (Don't be jealous.)

The party was just getting good when I was having a conversation with Brad Gomez (remember, I had BOYS at this party: boys, I tell you!) Brad Gomez is a funny guy. Who knows what he said, but it must have been funnier than a Judd Apatow movie marathon (or it could have been just mildly amusing . . . my bladder was weak, people) but it started happening, I was going to pee my pants. At my own birthday party. In front of boys.

I couldn't think of anything that made more sense then to rip open the sliding glass door that separated the large living room where the party was taking place from the swimming pool and jump in, fully clothed. So, that's what I did. I also threw in a, "Woooooooo! Pool party! Come on everyone! Jump in!" as I sloshed around the empty pool in the dark by myself waving my arms in the air to the faint sound of the music from the real party taking place inside, my poor brand new sunflower shorts already suffering the chlorine damage.

Needless to say everyone just stared from the living room, dumbstruck, until I gave up on trying to make the pool seem like the most obvious fun place to be. Erin O'Brien (bless her heart) walked me into the bathroom with a towel around my humiliated shoulders and let me borrow dry clothes. She asked me, "Why on earth did you just jump into the pool?!" I can't remember whether I told her the truth or not.

When you are faced with two choices: peeing your pants or looking like a totally cool party animal . . . . well, I think you know the answer to this one, guys. WOOOOOOO! Come on in! The water's fine!!!

Me, waiter at Planet Hollywood that's a little to creepy, Erin O'Brien and Lisa Heckerman