To My Barista At Starbucks

Dear Starbucks Barista,

It's not fun to lose your voice.  So when you asked from across the store what I wanted to drink and I didn't respond, you shouldn't be offended.  Then I waved you over and you looked so put out.  I had already prepared a note on my iPhone for you so that you would know what I wanted to drink.  Here I am, holding the phone up in the air, and you aren't looking at it.  You're just looking at me.  So now here I am, shaking my phone up and down.  Finally you look at it.  You read my note.  You know I've lost my voice.  Why is it that suddenly now you've lost your voice too?  You're waving packets of honey in my face as if to ask, "Would you like some honey?" Well guess what, Barista?  I'm not deaf, I've just lost my voice.  I can still hear you.

And you didn't even give me a receipt.

From the Divine Hours

Breathe on me, breath of God,

Fill me with life anew,

That I may love what Thou dost love,

And do what Thou wouldst do.

Breathe on me, breath of God,

Until my heart is pure,

Until with Thee I will one will,

To do and to endure.

Breathe on me, breath of God,

Blend all my soul with Thine,

Until this earthly part of me

Glows with Thy fire divine.

Breathe on me, breath of God,

So shall I never die,

But live with Thee the perfect life

Of Thine eternity.

At the church office where I work, we go through this book every day together.  I particularly loved this hymn that was in the "Vesper's Office" yesterday afternoon. May it be my prayer every day.

Homesick

As I was perusing Design*Sponge today, one of my most favorite design blogs, I was pleasantly surprised that they chose Birmingham, Alabama as their City Guide city today!  It made me miss home and the South so much.  Good thing we'll be down there TWICE this summer: June 5th-12th and June 30th-July 4th.

To see the guide, you can go here.

A Perspective on Pilot Season

 

Yesterday I found a great PDF that a talent agent here in LA put together that gave me a lot of perspective on this past pilot season.  He looked at every pilot that was picked up by a network and analyzed every role and actor cast.  It sheds so much light on the demographics of who is getting cast.  Here is a link to the whole PDF which I would suggest reading, but here's my quick breakdown of some important points.

The majority of male roles in pilots this year were in the 30-39 age range.
21% of series regular roles went to big star names.
50% of series regular roles went to former series regulars of major shows.
27% of series regular roles went to heavy working actors with numerous recurring roles in previous shows.
2% of series regular roles went to actors whose careers are "in development," and most of those were children.

While this may sound a little discouraging (by the numbers, this past season I had less than a 1% chance of booking a series regular role in a pilot), it confirms something I've always known to be true.  You MUST be in this for the long haul.  You MUST be ready to build your career from the ground up, one audition and one role at a time.  You will start small.  You should celebrate every audition, really celebrate every callback, and really really celebrate every booking.  You'll start with a tiny part in a show, and if you're business savvy and a hard worker you'll turn that into a bigger part next time around.  Then, 5 years down the road maybe you've booked a guest star on a TV show.  Then if things go well you can turn that into a series regular role.  Now you're in the top 50% of actors that were cast in this year's pilot season.  Bottom line: building a career in the entertainment industry takes hard work and patience.

Does this discourage me?  No, it doesn't.  I really enjoy auditioning, and when I'm on set working there's almost nothing better.  I can already see my career being built, even though it's being built one little step at a time. I get impatient because I want to be able to provide for my family right now by doing something I love, but I'm SO blessed to be married to someone who supports me while we're on this long road of building a career.

This Is How You Buy A Computer

Despite the billions of dollars my acting career is making us, I also work a side job at an Apple store.  It's a great side job and I've actually met lots of career contacts here, but there's one other thing about working at an Apple store that's great: I know how to freaking buy a computer.  Really well.  And here's how you can, too.

So this past week new iMacs came out.  They're shiny and fast.  Don't get too excited though, because we're not buying that.  We're buying the previous generation iMacs that just DROPPED WAY DOWN IN PRICE.  Oh yeah, and Apple gives employees a pretty good discount on one computer purchase per year.  Since both mine and Ellen's computers are from 2006, it goes without saying that I hadn't used my computer discount this year.

Now you've bought your new(ish) iMac.  Congratulations.  Now we need to sell your old computer.  There are a million websites where you can do just that, even if your old computer doesn't even work.  Google that.  I did, and I sold our two laptops.  Now I'm going to amaze you with some math.

Original price of iMac: $1200
Price I paid after discount and previous generation pricing: $824
Price I sold our laptops for: $875

I'm not great at math, but even I can tell that those numbers are pretty good.  Now let's add in the tax.  How much did we pay for our brand new iMac?  Drum roll please....

$37

So here's what you can learn from this: A) I'm really cheap. B) Even seemingly expensive computers could be really cheap if you time the purchase right, take advantage of every discount, and sell your old stuff.

*takes a bow*

We're Going to Alabama

...and bringing a team with us.

As you all know, on April 27th the worst outbreak of tornadoes in US history devastated the state of Alabama leaving people without homes and wiping out neighborhoods.

In response, our church here in LA is sending a team to Alabama from June 5th-12th to help with the disaster relief.  Matt and I have been tapped to lead the trip as we obviously know the area well. We are going to be housed by our old church Mountain Brook Community and going out every day to pretty much do whatever is asked of us.  I am seeing a lot of manual labor in our future :)

Comment on this post with your email addy...
              If you live in California and are interested in going on the trip
              If you live in Alabama and would like to join us one of the days as a volunteer
              If you would like to financially contribute to our trip
And I will send you some more deets.

Prayers are needed for the planning stages as we are trying to recruit people to join us and prayers are certainly needed for the Alabama folk who have lost everything.

Hope to hear from you soon :)

*photo from CNN.com