Reached a new milestone

My talent services have been requested without an audition. Yes, I was offered a role. It's a small commercial for a local museum, but I didn't have to audition. My agent was contacted specifically for me. That's awesome. I film next week and then have an audition following that. I usually do well in auditions following a high like this. Good things to come I believe.

On another note, I was cast as the lead in an independent feature and I'm freaking out about the scene that will probably require me to wear swimsuit. Shit. So far, I've been able to get away with hiding all my dietary sins. I mean I'm real world ok, but film ok? Not so much.

Working out isn't even the problem, it's food. Oh, how I love food. I wish I could love healthy food as much as I love junk. Really. Or I just wish I could get away from CRAVING dessert after a satisfying meal. Damn you, sweet tooth. Damn you!

So, I'm trying my best at a "diet." Now I'm not going super crazy and going on some fad diet that I won't be able to maintain. I'm actually trying to be sensible.... less of this, more of that. And it seems to be going well except for the sugar. Oh sugar. And chocolate. Damn you... but I love you. So much.

I've actually managed to lose 5 lbs., so I'm halfway to my goal of dropping 10 lbs., I have feeling however that it's more attributed to my workout ramp ups than diet. The workouts I may not be able to maintain, not if my shin splints have any say. Neighborhood pool, when will you open, damn you?! As I type I'm dreading having to go from sitting to standing position. That "Hunger Games workout" in this month's Shape magazine is no little gym bunny workout. My legs are so pissed at me right now. I'm alternating between walking like a baby taking it's first steps and what my very elderly grandmother might look like trying to walk if she wasn't confined to wheelchair. P-I-S-S-E-D, I say. Seriously.

So, hopefully, by the time filming rolls around, my insecurities won't throw me into a pit of self-loathing and despair and maybe I'll actually have fun during the scene. Or maybe I'll just buy a one-piece with those tummy-tightening panels built in. And have cake.

How much can I juggle when I put my mind to it?

It's been a busy few months. Really busy. Really good busy. Crazy busy. After all my uncertainty and wondering how I'll make shit happen. I made shit happen. I managed to successfully create work for myself and along the way impress some awesome people who threw me an employment bone. So, no I'm not really all that unemployed anymore. I might be too employed. Not to jinx myself.

You're reading the blog of a working actor, acting coach, audition taper, agent helper, freelance casting assistant, registrar for an improv school and one of two Texas reps for the most highly respected casting website in the U.S.! It's nuts and I'm FREAKING lucky. I work my butt off and still manage to do most of it from home. How amazing is that?

It's been crazy and I'm only now just able to catch my breath for a moment (only because I felt compelled to write, not because I actually have the time. I'm making the time) and take it all in.

I got a chance to go to L.A. and train for my casting website contractor job over my birthday week. I really do love sunrises on the west coast. Makes it worth getting up early for the view and for the near empty beaches. I met some awesome people involved in the industry and got behind the scenes knowledge. I learned way more than I was expecting to. Priceless.

I'm using some of my more organizational talents to help maintain the day-to-day and session-to-session workings of a really great improv school I'm about to graduate from. Check me out in The Amazing Improvised Race at Salvage Vanguard Theater! To boot, I'll be in another play - my first Spanish language play - just before my improv graduation show. Literally. I have La Pastorela at 8 pm and then every Saturday that the play runs, I'll be rushing out to make the 10 pm opening of my improv show. It's exactly what I've wanted, to be busy with acting work. But I'll hardly get a break from performances before I begin rehearsals for my first children's theater play. And it's another Spanish-language role. Seriously, if you're a Latino actor and you don't speak Spanish, you're doing yourself a great disservice and seriously shutting doors for yourself. But hey, you'll get no complaints from me. I'm happy to take the work.

All this and that's still not including my weeklies at Fort Hood, which has been a tremendous experience. Being able to do what I love with some great actors, provide a much needed service to our soldiers, get paid and still be supported by my employers when I book other work is a dream. Just a dream.

I put my Fort Hood understudy to work (We have understudies! If only this were more common in local theater) last week when I booked a commercial job. That audition experience was definitely in a category all it's own.

I had been at home working up until 4:30 or so and then I decided it was a good time to shut down, get a work-out in and then get ready to hunker in for the night with some dinner and maybe a movie or whatever I had DVR'd. So, I worked out, got cleaned up, then went back into our office to get my phone. By this time it was a little after 6:30. Of course I would get phone calls and texts the minute I left my phone. I had a couple of texts from a casting assistant friend and voice mails from the casting director she works with, who's cast me the most this year and has also hired me out to assist.

The messages were literally "can you come by (right now) and audition for this project?" When I called back and explained that I was in my pajamas, he told me to get dressed and come by as soon as I could. They'd be there for awhile yet. I got ready in 30 minutes and was out the door. My husband had the biggest grin on his face as I walked out, saying, "I bet you book this one." I didn't even know what I was auditioning for. I called my agent and let her know what was going on.

I get to the casting office, sit down, get the script, which was one line is Spanish and then told to improv the rest in Spanish. So I did. One take, no redirection and the casting director says, "Great. You're on hold. We'll call your agent." I was told I would find out by 2 pm the next day whether I booked or not. I found out at 4:30 pm the next day. I was the only actor to book the same role in English and Spanish. I wish all my auditions turned out like this.

It was a great shoot. Short, sweet and I made the clients laugh. Their laughter actually messed up one of my takes - from the other room. I'm looking forward to seeing it when it airs.

It's nuts, but I'm enjoying the juggling. I just have to really focus and not let my usual distractions be my usual distractions. I also have to make time to film a Bigfoot movie I've been cast in. How I'll make it happen? Who knows. It just will.

New Year. New Kick in the Ass.

I probably should've done this last year. Leave it to me to have a delayed idea. Lord, help me -- story of my life. So here I am -- a 34-year-old, "self-employed" actor/housewife/flailing (failing?) entrepeneur, college graduate, possibly having a quarter-to-midlife crisis.

Where to begin? I moved to Austin in 1997 after falling in love with the city (OK, the UT campus. Hook 'Em 'Horns!) during a state high school competition in 1994 and 1995. I was an orchestra geek. Emphasis on the geek. I've only realized in the last few years that all college campuses must seem cool to high schoolers. So much academia, independence and sex in the air. It was the only school I applied to and I got in. Not bad for a timid El Paso girl.

Fast forward a decade after a promising career in online journalism (Not really. Turns out I don't have the stomach for it and I value my soul and not becoming numb to the horrors of humanity and whatnot), a move to and from Las Vegas and Los Angeles (Not acting related. Regarding here-to-fore-mentioned journalism career), jumping into the film and theater scene in Austin (which is plentiful and fun, but often lacking quality), and a-mostly-on-again-but-sometimes-off-again-relationship-turned-solid-marriage and I'm in my home office contemplating my next move.

I happily left the journalism industry in 2008 to more fully pursue acting, since I was booking quite a bit of commercial work and was excited at the prospect of what more devoted time would bring. I got a part-time receptionist gig through a friend who was totally cool with me taking time off, if and when needed, to audition  and work any booked jobs. Pretty sweet, I know.  It's all anyone in my position could ask for.

But, of course, it couldn't last. The company wasn't able to make payroll and I finally resigned when the county constables came by to seize equipment (including my office computer) to settle an unpaid debt. I wasn't being paid and I couldn't do the simplest of my assigned tasks. Thanks for your support! I gotta go!

That was back in April 2010. My husband said I should take my time finding new steady work and I should concentrate on my acting. So, I've taken my time, but the concentration has been sporadic at best. Something I'm trying to change as a deadline I wasn't previously aware of looms. I've been selfishly thinking that my time not steadily contributing financially to my partner in marriage and our shared bank account was limitless. Stupid, I know. I'm easily lulled into a false sense of security. Good news for our politicians! Anyway, the unfairness of making my husband the sole breadwinner is taking it's toll and I have until April this year "to make something happen with acting."

After which, we'll decide what "needs to be done". It doesn't give me much hope. I've never really been the most self-motivated person. The fact that I quit a steady career for something as fleeting as acting is more a testament to my insanity rather than my tenacity I've concluded. I must be a glutton for punishment if I've chosen a life where I'll be rejected more times than the smelly kid in the Kindergarten class. Though the punishment I received working in news should've told me that. Again, slow on the uptake.

So, I've taken up the day-job search in earnest and feeling further discouraged by lack of enthusiasm and possible un-hirability for the most menial of tasks. Truly a big ol' slice of humble pie for me. I'm still in there chasing the dream, however. I've set myself up as a private coach (one client so far!), and teamed up with a fellow actor from my agency to tape auditions (so far mostly folks from my agency, who get a discount, but I'm at the mixers drumming up business), and trying the Every Girl Friday for actors thing (again, one client so far!).

I'm going to work at picking up the momentum I lost after experiencing my first co-star role on a major network show. It was a high and the low following has been really low. I've booked a couple of commercial jobs since, but being able to turn that into more work has eluded me. The idea probably won't come to me until six months from now...... Lord, help me.

BTW, if anyone knows where to locate shows that have been re-dubbed/re-looped since their original airings, please let me know. I'd like to have the footage for my marketing purposes and not get sued by Neil Diamond in the process. Thanks.