October 12 – Day 36: Oh, the Autumn, Part Deux


Two observations before I begin.

The first is that I’m just tickled to death that that bathtub photo shows up as a default image if I don’t add anything in the body of the post itself. Sometimes—like yesterday—there just isn’t anything to add, image-wise. I just love the randomness of the tub.

The second is that, after years of discovering we don’t necessarily travel well together, when we’re on vacation, Pidge and I now tend to spend our days doing separate things, then getting together in the evening for supper. While this has become the norm for us, whenever I mention it to people, they act like it’s highly unusual, so I mention it here in preparation for reports for days to come. That I had two matinees in the following three days, thus making spending afternoons together impossible, is coincidental.

With the above in mind, then, the idea that I stayed home most of Friday while Pidge went out exploring should not come as a complete surprise. She had her agenda, and I mine, but we had plans to meet up after my show. She was seeing Uncle Romeo Vanya Juliet on the west side, while I was doing my show on the east side, so we had to come up with a place that was mutually acceptable.

At the head of my own agenda was a trip to Actor’s Equity to find out just what the heck was going on with my membership or lack thereof. While I’d planned on walking uptown in time to arrive at Equity at 4:00, I was a little late and got there at 4:15 (it was fortunate I wasn’t much later, since the membership office closes at 4:30, not 5:00, as I’d assumed).

The plus side to the rain on Thursday was that it more or less kick-started autumn. Since the storm, the weather has been very cool—if not downright cold—and the humidity tolerable (as I write this, it’s Monday evening and, while it rained this morning and threatens to continue tonight—meaning the humidity is up—it’s not bad), so the walk uptown was a real pleasure; just a great sunny fall day.

I got to Equity and explained my situation to the nice lady at the membership desk. What it all turned out to be was that, even though I could join the union at this point, I’m not a member because I never submitted an application. The assumption on their part is that, if someone gets a job under an Equity contract, they’ll want to join, so they start the ball rolling on their end. While, in most cases, it makes perfect sense, I feel like “going pro” would mean I’d be cutting myself off from working at a number of places and not really gaining anything in return. Being non-union in the Bay Area gives me the ability to work at union and non-union houses, an advantage I’d rather keep. All I have to do for now is to submit a letter to Equity declining membership at this time, and I keep my accumulated membership points and ability to join some time in the future if I ever get offered another union contract. One good thing I discovered at the AEA office is that I can get a free flu shot there next week. (I’d called Kaiser back home to find out if there was some place I could do it here for free, and they were totally unhelpful.) I had the flu earlier this year and don’t want to repeat that experience.

After that, there was nothing to be done but to walk the fifteen blocks to the theatre for the show, which went very well indeed. Everyone’s energy was up, the audience was very responsive, and we all had a great time. All shows should be this good.

I left the theatre to meet Pidge at a small tapas place in Chelsea (it seemed to be the most likely option)—passing a couple of my castmates having a drink in the theatre bar—and headed out onto 59th. There’s a Duane Reade across the street from the theatre (there’s a Duane Reade across the street from everything) which is usually accessible, but tonight had a scaffolding in front of it, as though someone were about the clean the windows or something. As I passed, the guy who was manning the scaffolding said, in an almost comic-opera Italian accent, “What the hell happened to the weather? Yesterday, it was 80 and humid, now it’s winter! What happened to autumn? I didn’t even see the leaves fall off the trees!” I agreed with him and continued on my way to catch the E train to 23rd and 6th, and Bodega + Counter.

 Open less than a week and already 13 photos on Yelp.

That says something about something.

Pidge had mentioned Thursday night that she wanted tapas for dinner, so I set out to look for one that was open late (since we’d have to go after the show) and was highly rated, and Bodega + Counter fit both bills. It had opened only four days before, so there was still a learning curve, but it was clean, friendly, empty, and served really good food. We split orders of chicken sliders, beef ribs, Brussels sprouts, waffle fries, Mexican corn, and fried green tomatoes. Cocktails were a little light on the alcohol, but after two, the effect was pretty good.

Pidge had been to an ice cream place (Mikey Likes It) Thursday night and really liked her vanilla cone, so I wanted to take her to Van Leeuwen’s and have her try that ice cream. We took the R to Astor Place, then (after a stop to use the disgusting bathroom at Ray’s Pizza on St. Marks and 3rd; advice: stay away) to Van Leeuwen’s. She liked it, but wasn’t as impressed as she had been the night before.

 I scream. You scream ... You know the drill ...

We left and walked the few blocks home, and I turned in relatively early, although I slept terribly, which was unfortunate, since I had a two-show day on Saturday.

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