I need some time in the sunshine

I wore a t-shirt this weekend. A different one both days, but a lone t-shirt nonetheless. No sweater, no long sleeve shirt, no multiple jackets. Just a t-shirt with a light jacket brought along (just in case). First time this has happened all year and I am glad. Walking to 301 class on Sunday was some sort of crazy joy, listening to my iPod while walking in the sun. I was even smiling at tourists, feeling really happy for their obvious vacation as they wrangled their anxious children. I remember what it was like to be in NYC in the summer on vacation and I'm glad other people are experiencing it.

This is now, the first real weekend of spring. I'll have another tune to yodel in a month, I'm sure.

I spent Friday night watching the entire first season of The Real World, set in New York in 1992. Much like last Friday's viewing of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I got to see NYC in all it's turn-of-the-decade grime as well as be shocked at how well the show stands up today. So many early 90s stereotypes are in the show and they all voice their beliefs so well! So many important issues are touched on (gayness, abortion, drug dealing, racism racism racism, homelessness, ticks on dogs) that I really regret loving the current Real World as much as I do. The show, when it started, was really important and it's turned into a nasty-fest. Not even the later-early seasons (Miami-Seattle) were as aware as the first three seasons.

I watched United 93 on Saturday and had my day thoroughly brought down. Really good movie but, geez, not a movie to watch in the middle of the day. Thankfully Louie came over and we watched an episode of Buffy and Hairspray. Two things that brought my mood up greatly and another two films in my 100 Film Initiative (I'm at 27, I think). I went to the final rooftop party with my friends from Late Show, but we cut out after a little while to go on an adventure.

A karaoke adventure.

Here. At SpotLightLive on Broadway.

The restaurant is at least three stories with a stage complete with lights and real instruments for the back up singers to incompetently strum during songs that "rock." The song selection for such a fancy establishment was appalling, but they made up for it in wild interactive features. Each table had a touch screen (because those are always efficient) computer that let you search for songs (all 38 of them), send messages to other tables, rate people performing, and watch past performances.

I was ready to sign up, the large stage, lights, and MTV reject backup singers did not frighten me. I came up with a list of songs to do on the way there. Knowing this was a fancy place, I thought they'd have a wider array of songs than the dinky sushi bar we normally go to (which has four Strokes songs and a couple Arctic Monkeys songs too, to show how random that place is). I planned on doing REM's "It's The End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)", anything by The Decemberists (a risk, but about as random as Arctic Monkeys), any B-52's song (preferably "Private Idaho" or one I haven't done), and "Ho" by Ludacris. But this place had none, not even "Love Shack." Somehow, they had "All Day and All Of The Night" by the Kinks, a staple of mine. I requested it, got on the list, all that. My turn got skipped, so I asked what the deal was. Apparently they didn't have it in their computer so it didn't show up on their thing, and there wasn't anything they could do about it. They had never heard of the song and wanted to know how it went, which I refused to enlighten them by singing. Whatever.

The rest of my party went and demanded it be found, and it was. I went on stage and rocked out with those gosh darn back up singers. These singers, let me tell you, sing the entire song on top of you in order to make every performance bearable, I guess. I don't need this. So I made sure to pump up the energy, pick up my mic stand, and do my best rock and roll screams. I showed them what's what.

The rest of my group had equally awesome experiences. Todd jumped on stage and broke it down whiteboy style to "Pump Up The Jam" (the most random song for karaoke ever, I'd say) and later did a paralyzing rendition of No Mercy's "Where Do You Go" after a mishap similar to mine. Ryan did "Sweet Caroline" which really brought the place to its knees, the backup singers looking confused at his crooning, and Reagan poured all of his sass into "Faith" and truly touched the audience.

We owned that karaoke bar, the only person coming close to us being the lady who looked like Kevin Sorbo who sang "Black Horse & The Cherry Tree." She was awesome.

Sunday was a lot quieter, but I had a nice 301 class. I have discovered that my gift is bringing opening games back around, full circle, to the suggestion. We did monologue hotspot, suggestion being tennis, and it got way far away from tennis for about 5 minutes. Most people had forgotten the suggestion, but I managed to link photographs to my time at yearbook and the awkward pictures of tennis players we had to go through. Yes, I was thinking of Nicole. I did this a couple more times during the organic openings we started learning. I only wish I could apply this confidence to my scenes, which seem to be okay. I don't think anyone is afraid to be in scenes with me, I just have noticed that I freeze up a lot and play the same character over and over again, mostly out of that same freezed-up-fear. Oy.

I saw Louie's form, Hotboard, done at the Magnet after class. It was really enjoyable and Louie did a great job of putting the cast together. The form itself was really cool, very quick and lots of song references (which I'm a fan of). I hope it's successful, since it deserves to be, and he gets to do it more often.

I start my 202 class with Joe Wengert on Wednesday. This is going to be a busy week.