Leary of You

Is it just me, or does the Walgreen’s logo remind you of the infamous “coke moon” at Studio 54?

(Please go to my blog at www.joeleary.net for pictures)

They don’t show you, but those sparking drugs are being lifted out of the mortar and pestle by a big disco nose.

I was waiting for my ADHD prescription to be refilled at Target this morning…and eavesdropping on the woman in the next “drop off your drugs” divider. She was asking the pharmacist about her prescription for Ambien. She wanted to know if she could, on “good days”, supplement Simply Sleep instead of always taking her Ambien. Or would Tylenol PM be better?

The pharmacist said sure. “You need your rest.” Lady Macbeth was worried that she’d get addicted, but seemed relieved that the pharmacist said she was only risking a psychological addition…not a physical addiction. She might even just take a Benadryl, because it was pretty much the same thing as Simply Sleep. Although she cautioned taking her Ambien with her pain medication.

Yeah right, you can’t sleep. This chick is dancing with Dr. Smack. She probably likes to pop a few and listen to Rush Limbaugh backwards.

At Target, I like looking at the the contraband items that you have to ask for from behind the pharmacy counter. The needles, bag balm, the Fluoride rinses. Why is Bag Balm an “ask for” item? Is it used for making crystal meth? Why are they hidden with the pseudoephedrine products? They have a vaginal wash behind the counter, but not the douches. Is this one particularly dangerous? There are even a couple of bars of soap back there! Why? Why? Why?

To see the letter and a picture of Sugar go to: http://www.joeleary.net/site/Blog/Blog.html

I was scanning some pictures for a friend today and I came across this letter. It totally made me smile:

“Thank you SO much for making sure I got onstage, and didn’t have a breakdown.”

This little love note was written by Miss Megahan Markert. We were in “The Rink” together at Theater Latte Da…and during a performance one night…she was backstage being a chatty Cathy and suddenly I heard some familiar music. “Meaghan, aren’t you supposed be onstage in a second?” Miss M was not wearing her roller skates. (The girlie kind that lace halfway up the leg.) The color drained out of her face and she immediately started to cry. “What am I going to do? I can’t go out there like this!” I dragged her up to the stage all the while shoving her little feet into the skates. “Yes you can!” I said not tying the skates…just frantically stuffing the laces into her socks. “Now stop crying and get out there!” And away she went.
I’d like to think that I was in drag during this backstage drama. But, I wasn’t. The picture above is of Meaghan and I backstage. I played the role of “Sugar” in one of the flash back scenes. I must say that “Sugar” is one of my favorite costumes to date.

Where, oh where, were the Ivey Awards back then?

www.joeleary.net

I just finished my third weekend of “Farm Boys”. If you are reading this, and haven’t seen it yet…and you live in the Twin Cities area…you have 2 more weeks to come up with a decent enough lie.

So “The History Theatre” announced their season next year: Wellstone! (a musical), 100 Man’s Wife, some Minnesota Christmas patchwork of stories and polka songs, The Baron (a wrestling story) and Orphan Train (a musical). It just so-happened that “Orphan Train” was auditioning this past weekend. I felt kind of obligated to throw my hat into the ring because I was already performing at the theatre…and I’m in actor’s equity now…and I made a vow to audition more… So I do it. And I go. And it goes pretty well. We had to sing 16 bars, though. I have only done 16 bars TWICE in my career thus far. In college when we were learning how to do a 16 bars audition…and for the appalling auditions that John Command had for “How to Succeed…” for Actors Theatre, but I digress. So I sang “No Moon” from Titanic. It has an early American folksy lilt to it, that seemed appropriate. Everyone seemed receptive. I figured there was no good reason I wouldn’t at least get a callback.

Nothing. “We decided we aren’t calling you back.” Well, fine! If I said I didn’t want to get on the damn Orphan Train to begin with…it wouldn’t be far from the truth. (Singing in the early spring…with 10am performances about children, FOR children, WITH children in the cast is a hard sell to begin with) But the fact that the “Orphan Train” didn’t want me aboard suddenly made me depressed and pondering a career change. The Orphan Train had no intention of stopping at my station.

After our matinee yesterday, I had rehearsal for a workshop of the musical “How To Mow the Lawn” in the same room where we auditioned for “Murder on the Orphan Express”. And all of the headshots were still there. In a nice little pile. With notes on them saying who was going to be called back.

I was good. For about 30 minutes. Then I started thumbing through them. First, with the good intention of “possibly reformatting my resume…to get inspired…” and then blatantly looking to see who was called back in lieu of wonderful me. I got to one person, who I consider to be challenged in the performance department…and sure enough: CALLBACK! Why are they calling THAT person back? Am I that bad at auditioning? Has this person been taking classes and suddenly on the fast track to B’WAY? WHY, GOD WHY? And then it hit me….like a runaway train full of singing orphans…the TALL people. They called back all of the TALL people.

Who knows if that’s the plan or not. But it sure makes me feel better.

My mother’s long time friend Liz came into town this week on business. Liz is a riot. My mother and her were roommates in San Francisco in the late 60’s.

Liz came to see “Farm Boys” on Sunday night with another roommate from San Fran in the 60’s…they lived in a huge Victorian in the Haight - Ashbury area. They lived with 8 other people…and had a ridiculous amount of fun. Liz told me there was a dessert place called “Magnolia Thunderpussy” that would deliver naughty-themed sweets at all hours of the night to you. That was the name of the woman who ran the place: Magnolia Thunderpussy. There was a “Montana Banana” (a whole banana flanked by two scoops of ice cream and chocolate shavings) and “Pineapple Pussy” (a hollowed out half of pineapple with whipped cream and such…).

One night they called in for a delivery and a very sad man answered. He said he was sorry but they couldn’t deliver anymore. “Magnolia Thunderpussy took all the money and left.”

I went online to verify this hippie memory. And its all true. Magnolia Thunderpussy went on to start a restaurant in wine country. And she died in 1996, I believe.

How totally fabulous.

www.joeleary.net