Bubble, Bubble, Toil and awwww screw it

I started P90X weeks ago promising myself I would have the perfect shirtless costume for my Halloween party.

Thanks to Hurricane Sandy, I'm left with a Halloween that consists of me blogging shirtless and staring at myself in the mirror in order to validate the weeks of starvation and muscle cramps that have led me here. I thought about putting on my Sexy Indian (and by that I mean Native American, not Bollywood) costume and Instargramming countless photos of myself laughing and drinking so the rest of the world would think that I still managed to have a memorable (and by that I mean blackout) Halloween.

Alas, you're left to imagine how amazing I look just halfway through the 90 days of my Adonis glory as I will not be walking the 1.5 hours to Hells Kitchen for any Facebook photos.

This Halloween actually isn't too far off from last year's Halloween when I was stranded on tour playing Rock Star Thomas Jefferson, sitting in my hotel room in Erie, Ohio drinking a bottle of whiskey alone because the other founding fathers (and let's not forget Dawn Shapiro) cared about their livers (and dignity) far more than Tommy J. I tried to find a blog from that night, but apparently I had more self-respect back then than I do now (it's been a slippery slope).

Speaking of, I sure did reconnect with a lot of people from high school via Facebook photo comments that night...

Have you noticed my paragraph structure is getting better? I'm really committing to 3+ sentences now that I decided run-ons count as 2.

Regardless of my cynicism: Happy Halloween. I hope you make it to your parties, I hope you puke from drinking too much booze and blame it on the candy, I hope you show up to work tomorrow with traces of fake blood and glitter on you (neither of which are from your costume).

I'll just be here. Me and Jack (which refers to the whiskey, but is oddly enough also the name of my Teddy Bear (which is an actual stuffed animal and not a gay thing)).

Here's hoping Christmas isn't F-ed up by a blizzard with a white-trash name,

TJB: Making It

Hurricane Sandy is a Basic BITCH

I know my national/international readers have been very concerned about my well-being during this storm.

I'm no stranger to devastating weather. A tornado ripped through my hometown back in 1996. My parents were at a concert, I was 7, and my 14 year old cousin was babysitting. I couldn't have pointed where my house was on the weather map, but my cousin was pretty sure we were well out of the danger zone. So, I went to sleep and thought nothing of it.

The next day, my parents took us into town to see the damage. Trees were everywhere, buildings had been flattened, and houses ripped off their frames. I think that was when I learned the world still exists while you're sleeping.

But New York City is not a place where catastrophic storms exist. Hurricane Irene felt more irritating than devastating last year (I wouldn't really know. I was on tour. I was a working actor then...) So when Hurricane Sandy came looming in the distance, I had a hard time taking the warnings seriously. Not here. Not New York. Not when they were still sending news reporters out into the winds.

So I pointed to my house on the weather map and decided I was safe. I went to sleep and thought nothing of it.

You can imagine the look on my face as I sat and watched cars floating down the East Side of Manhattan.The facades of buildings crumbled. The subways flooded. And even on my own street, the trees have been ripped from the ground and tossed onto cars.

Though I went through the motions, though I begrudgingly bought 4 gallons of water and 3 cans of Chef Boyardee, I did not prepare for the hurricane. I feel lucky to have been safe inside my trendy apartment in Queens playing video games and being called off work with a smerk of happiness that I had a reason to be lazy.

But now I feel stupid that I treated Sandy with the same aloofness I treat the brunette girls at auditions.

You have proven yourself a blonde, Sandy, here to be seen and heard and feared by all.

To those affected by the flooding and destruction, my thoughts and prayers are with you. I now have 8 candles with pictures of saints that I light in your honor.

To those of you stranded in Astoria like me, I'M OUT OF DIET COKE! HELP ME PLEASE!

I'll stay away from serious topics I promise,

TJB: Making It

Ginger Slapz

There have been quite a few notable characters in my blog over the past year and a half, but no character will ever be as infamous as the original:

The Ginger.

To be honest, THE Ginger may actually be several gingers, but when they all seem to be 5'9" bundles of muscle with a pension for talking and a Super Cuts original hairstyle, there's no use in distinguishing. I had even placed a name with The Ginger. After his second blog post appearance, a friend of mine was convinced he knew just which ginger it was. "Randy".

Randy was a rather infamous character in the MT community. He was young, cute, talented, and dating a famous director. He had even recently signed with my agency, and I've been following his career ever since.

So when I got an e-mail from my agent last week offering me a film job I didn't audition for, I accepted it without hesitation until he told me

you'll be playing the boyfriend of [The Ginger].

I freaked. I laughed. I panicked. But I accepted twice as eagerly knowing this was my chance to finally meet the boy I had written about for so long.

SIDE NOTE: I ran into a ginger at a final callback the night before filming with Randy. I assumed it was Randy and approached him as such, and only accepted that he was not actually Randy when the Casting Director called him Andrew...sorry Andrew.

When I showed up at the filming location, it wasn't long before I saw the flames of fury crossing Madison Square Park. I could hardly contain myself through the introduction. Suddenly, I was Andy Warhol meeting my new muse. The word vomit was flowing and I had practically exposed myself as a full-on stalker by the time the producer told us

this was not our filming location. We would have to move up to Central Park as soon as he could figure out where in Central Park the film team was. I had another hour and a half to make smalltalk with The Ginger before we even saw a camera.

THAT will teach you to keep your mouth shut. I had already shown that I knew everything about him, and now I had to sit and stare at him wondering if playing my boyfriend is a healthy decision for his career and personal safety.

Turns out, it wasn't...because the film was called "No Excuse for Abuse" and I was chosen as the abusive boyfriend in the relationship. So, once we ACTUALLY started filming halfway into our MAX call time (this is why you join unions kids), I spent another 2 hours slapping Randy and shouting profanities in his face while chasing him through Central Park.

The Asian tourists were terrified of our amazing acting abilities.

Luckily, throughout the extra 3 hours of filming between the screaming matches, I got to know Randy.

Here's a snippet:

Me: "I wrote about you in a blog."
Randy: "You read about me in a blog?"
Me: "No...I wrote about you in a blog."
Randy: "Oh...that's...why?"
Me: "Well, I used to run into you at auditions all the time and when I described you to my friend who knows you from NYU, he told me it was definitely you, and then I kept seeing you, but never introduced myself...until today."
Randy: "Where have you seen me?"

I described every situation in which I had come across Randy and it turns out...

I've never come across Randy in my life.

You know how they say you should never meet your heroes? Apparently, you should never meet your gingers either.

Here's hoping I get that job and not Andrew,

TJB: Making It

i was much prettier when i was 16

I was 16 years old and working in a bakery in the middle of Michigan. I could tell you almost everything about the moment (how I was leaning on the register, that I had just sold a German Chocolate cake, how I was wearing my glasses because I had dropped a contact) and about the woman (hair pulled back, glasses as well, black jacket over a sweatshirt), but what she said is most important.

Woman: "You look just like Randy Harrison".

I gave her a blank stare.

Me: "Who?"

I had never been told I looked like anyone except my parents, and the only thing I could think was that perhaps she meant Harrison Ford, but he was old, and I was 16.

Woman: "Randy Harrison? He plays Justin on Queer as Folk. You don't know him?"

My face turned bright red as soon as she said "Queer". She could tell I was nervous about her insinuation that I must be gay and know every gay person in the world, but since I was 16 in the middle of Michigan and clearly no idea what she was talking about, she retreated.

Woman: "It's a TV show. He's beautiful. It's a compliment. Trust me."

Of course, as soon as I got home from work, I went straight to the desktop, waited for the dial-up to connect, and did an AOL search for this elusive Randy Harrison.

He was beautiful. A beacon of blonde, but to my self-conscious (and still closeted) 16 year old self, looked nothing like me. He represented what I could never be at 16 in the middle of Michigan.

But for years, he was the only celebrity anybody had every told me I looked like. So, naturally, I stalked his career, watched Queer as Folk in secret, and used him as my Facebook celebrity doppelganger.

You know, the usual.

And then I walked into the first day of rehearsal. There were only two seats left. The closest was next to the director and in no way was I confident enough in my acting to sit in the face of judgement. That's like sitting next to your TA in discussion when you haven't done the reading. I decided it would have to be the farther option which was next to

Randy Harrison.

As I slowly walked across the room giving a weak wave while introducing myself aloud, my heart began to beat faster and faster and faster until suddenly I was sitting to his left. Luckily, Randy was busy eating a salad (he never made it to his yogurt...must be on a diet), so I didn't bother trying to make conversation (as if I would have said anything short of disaster).

When rehearsal began, I spent the entire time wondering what the hell I was doing sitting next to Randy Harrison. And when Christian Coulson (you remember him. Tom Riddle? HP2? Possessed that poor Weasley girl?) popped in with his British accent, I knew I had to get the HELL across the table to the seat next to the director.

So, I picked up my bag and moved. Just like that.

Remind yourself this is not a lecture hall full of people across which I quietly shuffled, but rather a circle of several gays, all more famous than I, all much more welcome to take the vacant seat next to Randy Harrison should they wish since I had just risen to walk to the exact opposite side of the table.

Thank GOD Day 2 came with assigned seats or I would have been a MESS.

But as I sat and read my lines, safely at the other end of the circle from Randy, and watched these actors I had seen on TV and in movies and on stage, I found myself choking back tears. Partly because the script is beautiful and partly because

...this is becoming some weird new emotional thing I'm capable of...

Tears, because I felt like I was back in my living room and back at Cinema Hollywood in 8th grade and back in the audience where I had first admired these actors

now in the same room as them, reading the same script, a part of the same work.

I'd say it's such a beautiful feeling, I'd do it for free but...I am doing it for free.

And I wonder if there will ever come a day when some young boy in the middle of the Midwest gets told he looks like me, and he'll grow up watching my work and post my picture on his Facebook (or the revamped MySpace) and we'll do a reading together and never speak but he'll sit across the circle and think I'm the most amazing actor he's ever met (other than Cole Escola, because that bitch kills it) and write about me in his blog. 

...I just remembered I write a blog...

Waiting for his manager to sue me,

TJB: Making It

History Repeating

You've spent the entire day knowing that he's back in the city. In fact, you could almost feel 8AM hit when you knew his plane was landing even though you didn't hear from him until 1PM when he was already well into his whirlwind visit and you were already well into a day you knew would be torture.

But it's almost midnight and your soul has been slowly dying for hours waiting tables while you're waiting to see him.

You haven't seen him in almost a year, and before that it had been another year, and before that another, but you can remember every year and every hour of every visit from the first time you met him when you were freshman, and you were jealous because he had replaced you that time all of your best friends went to the same college and you went away trying to prove you were bigger and better. And as soon as you met him, you understood what all the fuss was about. He was amazing, he was smart, he was funny, he was everything your friends had said he was.

You fell for The Boy With the Glasses.

But it's almost midnight and you realize you're still polishing glasses thinking about The Boy With the Glasses when your phone buzzes in your pocket and you jump because you know it's from him, because you just KNOW.

And it is.

He tells you he's out in the East Village. You tell him you're almost off work and ask if you should come. He replies

Jarrod says YES!

Your heart sinks because, though you know Jarrod, you wanted HIM to say yes. You debate with yourself if maybe this is just the start of something terrible, and even when you decide it probably is, you respond

be there by midnight

You take the train and walk the numbered streets, and even though you've been to this bar before, and even though the streets are strategically numbered in such a guiding way, you get lost because you're about to start what you know hasn't ended well year after year. So you call him thinking that hearing his voice might help convince you to turn and run or take a chance

but he doesn't answer.

So you take a chance and hand over your ID to enter the masses of boys that would have drowned out his voice anyway, and even though they're all pretty, and even though they're all buff, your eye goes straight to him and it happens

You fall for The Boy With the Glasses.

And suddenly you're a freshman again ordering a vodka/soda and talking to him like you've never met and commenting on the fact that you're both wearing the same gingham shirt, trying to pretend you're not thinking it has some deeper meaning.

To break your awkwardness, you begin to push through the crowd so he can find Jarrod who is still checking out The Boy With the Mustache they're both really into. You cringe when you hear this, and you cringe again when you see that The Boy With the Mustache is actually The Casting Director You Know All Too Well and you're relieved when Jarrod is nowhere to be found so you can quickly turn and head the other direction because you know where you find The Casting Director You Know All Too Well you will find

The Boy With the Leather Jacket.

And even though he wasn't wearing his leather jacket, he still smelled like leather and acted smooth as suede and was right there when you turned around like you knew he would be making you look like the loser you are right in front of The Boy With the Glasses.

So you make your awkward stalker joke and return an awkward hug, but all you want is a real moment with The Boy With the Glasses before Jarrod appears, but once the hug ends, Jarrod appears with some journalist girl, so you play it cool

until your roommate appears.

You know this is trouble because everybody has fallen for your roommate since he was someone else's roommate freshman year at Northwestern when you fell for The Boy With the Glasses at Michigan. When they begin to bond over movies, you begin to yawn and feign exhaustion to forgo jealousy, exclaiming that you had better get home if you're going to make it to the brunch Jarrod had planned.

You do not invite your roommate. 

You're sad to leave because you want to stay, so you hug him goodbye at the corner and ask "Can I sit next to you at brunch?" Jokingly, but in all seriousness.

"Of course."

You go home a mess, staying up and eating chicken wings with that Kelly Clarkson song on repeat you had once (surely drunkenly) told him he reminds you of.

But it finally puts you to sleep and you wake up feeling like you haven't seen him in another year and are all too eager to show up early for brunch even when he texts you not to hurry because they'll be late.

You calm yourself on the bench outside talking to that journalist girl you met last night that seems to write everything in her head like a column before she speaks it aloud. You realize this is funny because you write that in your head like a blog you'll write later. You keep writing your blog in your head while she speaks her column until you jump when he calls your name.

The Boy With the Glasses is half an hour late, but that doesn't matter because your table is ready and as the six of you move towards the seats

he doesn't sit next to you.

You don't even flinch because you were just joking when you asked him that last night, so you sit next to Jarrod and try to engage him in conversation as much as possible hoping that The Boy With the Glasses will feel like you did when he bonded over movies with your roommate. You know this is silly as soon as Jarrod mentions he's into your roommate which you had just assumed anyway. You move your conversation back to that journalist girl when The Boy With the Glasses brings up your blog

"Too bad this brunch isn't cool enough for you to blog about."

You explain that that's not how the blog really works, but having already decided you were going to blog about this brunch. He responds

"I just want to be in your blog with a cool name like 'The Boy With the Leather Jacket'."

You laugh and decide in your head that you've already named him The Boy With the Glasses.

You try to eat slowly, but you're so hungry, so you're glad that everyone else eats slowly because you don't want this brunch to end even if he is sitting so far away.

When brunch does end, you play it cool and proclaim that you'd love to hang out, but you have so many things to do and places to be.

But as everyone leaves and he asks you to hang out, you decide there's only one thing you want to do and one place you want to be and it's all right here.

He has to stop by to see his ex boyfriend who hasn't liked you since they became ex boyfriends and when you ask if you should wait elsewhere, he assures you no and you're happy to stay by his side.

The ex boyfriend is dismissive and doesn't speak to you.

The Boy With Glasses brushes it off and asks if you want to go for a walk on The Highline.

You talk about San Francisco and the dream job that turned out to be a nightmare and how all he wants to do is come back to this city where all of his friends are while you talk about how all you want to do is leave this city where all of your friends aren't. You leave The Highline to walk East because he has to meet another friend in an hour, and even though you have another hour alone, each Avenue ticks closer to the end.

You stop and sit to talk on the 5th with half an hour left, and as much as you try to avoid it, you talk about dating. Not you and him, but people in general

and you exclaim how terrible it feels to be so alone in a city so full of people.

He says that it's much easier outside of The City which doesn't make you feel any better about what you're trying to accomplish. He talks about his dates, 9 of them, ending with

The Actor.

And as if you didn't already hate actors enough, he entertains you with the story of the first one he ever dated. Sadly, he explains, The Actor was only in town for 6 weeks.

You think how lucky The Actor was to have him for 6 weeks when you'll never get 6 hours.

And at the end of your last hour, his worried parents begin to call him, and as you see him getting worried, you know it's your time to go. You sacrifice your last five minutes alone so he can call his mother. You don't even hug him goodbye, but instead, awkwardly skip away like it's no big deal you might not see him for another year.

When you enter the train, you're sorry you didn't hug him goodbye. You text your best friend who reminds you of the trouble you've started again that never ends well that she was there to witness freshman year when your tears mixed with your puke on that New Year's Eve he gave you the turtle that started the terrible end the first time.

You realize you're on the 3rd floor of Macy's, unsure of what motivated you to get off the train except for the fact that you had mentioned wanting a new pair of shoes. As you come to your senses and realize you can't afford a new pair of shoes, you step onto the down escalator and realize you're crying. You think, "Not THIS again" and rub your right eye so everyone will think there's something in your contact. You pull it together before you exit Macy's and head back to the train

on the way to which you pass ALDO and decide that maybe you need those new shoes after all. The idea of something new in your life gives you hope that you can move past all of this old shit you're still blogging in your head.

You decide while waiting in line to buy your new shoes that if you write about this in the second person, maybe you can ignore the reality of it all.

You'll be wearing your new shoes when you write this later.

You stop at Wendy's on your walk home because even if you're doing P90X, this has been an emotional day and you are a very good emotional eater. Still, you're happy you skip the fries.

You go home to put on your new shoes and a new outfit to head to rehearsal for the reading of a new play you're doing. You begin to feel refreshed by everything that is new, yet still can't help but jump every time your phone buzzes in your pocket.

This time, they're not from him.

So you go to your rehearsal with all the famous people who don't talk to each other and especially not to you, and you sit and read your lines and are relieved that some of them laugh and are more relieved that you decided to shut your phone off so it won't buzz anymore.

But even when rehearsal is over and you turn it back on, there is no buzz. At least, not from him, which is almost worse.

You know in your head that he is busy attending a movie premiere with other famous people and feel stupid typing and deleting texts asking him how it is as if he'll pick up his phone and answer sitting behind Don Cheadle and Marisa Tomei.

You leave rehearsal with the only other non-famous boy who is the only boy that will talk to you. The more he talks to you, the more his newness assures you that you can move past the old and you decide that maybe you could be into him instead of The Boy With the Glasses.

Then he mentions his boyfriend of 8 and a half years.

It's like a slap that makes you realize you're standing on the wrong train and you're going to have to transfer and your new shoes are killing your feet.

They're one size too small, but you saved money while wasting time so it was worth it.

When you finally figure out how to transfer trains, you can't resist anymore

Hope the movie was great!!!

He responds.

You put your headphones on and play that Kelly Clarkson song he reminds you of as the train approaches. You decide to blog about this day as soon as you get home.

But it's almost midnight, 24 hours later, and you realize that though you think this is somehow poetic it's probably pathetic and while you know that he'll read this you hope that he won't because he's probably able to say what he feels while you can only blog it.

And you know it's nothing you'll want to hear because as long as there are actors who are in town for 6 weeks, you'll still be across the country for 6 years.

But it's now well past midnight and you scroll towards the PUBLISH button wondering if you're simply ending what never started well.

Famous people are much shorter in real life,

TJB: Making It

The Rise of Fall

I thought my television career was over.

Hell, I thought my entire  career was over. But just as I had begun to wonder where the Fall audition season was amidst the frigid air and Pumpkin Spice Lattes,

my agency pulled through.

And not even just my agent who actually knows my name (and race for that matter), but the AGENT-agent of the agency. The old man in charge whose e-mails are in 24 pt. font who sends nothing more personal than "Let me know if this works for you".

So when I received an appointment for my favorite show a show called SMASH

Oh yeah, that worked for me.

I'll be honest (to you, not to the casting director) that I watched the first episode of this show, HATED it (because it made me feel like I was at work in the sense that it reminded me I wasn't working), and never watched it again.

But to the casting director, I LOVE THIS SHOW!

I showed up half an hour early still riding off the bad karma of my first television audition. Thankfully, this audition was not at 30 Rock, so I didn't have to sprint up 50 floors in case of emergency.

Instead, I had to sit in Broadway's biggest casting office and listen to child actors more successful than I am belt out their inner anguish through the lyrics of Adele and Bruno Mars.

Oh, to be 10 again...

And as I sat listening to prepubescent heartache, I began to realize that I recognized quite a few too many adult faces from Playbill.com

This game again.

I guess I should start to feel flattered and expect that I'm continuously called in amongst those actors who are not waiting tables, but when everyone knows each other from last night's Jonathan Robert Brown-Gealt cabaret and you're still getting the half-hearted smile and "oh, you again" stare

you just wanna book a Mormon a black eye.

But instead of throwing punches, I just sat and prepared and remained calm, because the worse that could happen was that I heard "No" again, and my emotional Novocaine had already numbed that sensation.

I mean, NBC already reads my blog so who needs a show.

OH WAIT, I  DO.

At the call of my name, I went in and gave the classic 30 second result of 30 hours of stress and walked out feeling

good.

GREAT in fact, because I know I'm pretty and can read and that's all TV really is.

So I went to get a Pumpkin Spice Latte to celebrate the start of my fall audition season. And as I stepped out of Starbucks and turned the corner into the frigid air of 8th Ave., I raised the sweet smell of Autumn to my lips and

the large woman in front of me thrust her left arm into the air to adjust her purse and elbowed my coffee straight into my face.

And as I felt the hot liquid fall from my face to the fabric of my favorite white shirt, I closed my eyes to take it all in.

When I reopened my eyes to lean forward and wipe the coffee from my nose and chin, the woman turned around and gave a very sincere "I'm sorry".

I put the lid back onto my latte, gave her a shrug, smiled and said,

"It's New York. It happens."

and continued down 8th Avenue, covered in coffee, loving life.

Fame burns,

TJB: Making It

self-deprecation is the new confidence

Here I am sitting amongst a pile of brightly colored hoodies I attempted to wear in vain for an autumn that refuses to stay. My iPhone 4S has become significantly outdated just days ago and I had to restart my 5 year old laptop 4 times just to get the screen to turn on.

I would have gone to blog at the Starbucks around the corner, or better yet, the trendy coffee shop a few blocks farther that I can't remember the name of and can't afford anyway. However, since my laptop lasts no more than 15 minutes without being plugged in and I refuse to be that awkward-Asian-girl who stands and stares waiting for the generosity of a stranger who gestures to the available outlet under his stool

here I am

amongst my hoodies

on a bed that belongs to a girl I met once...

writing a book.

Well, I suppose I've already WRITTEN the book since I have pages and pages of a word document full of my last year which somehow seems so empty when typed in Times New Roman 12pt. font...so I put a few more words in bold to convince myself that something exciting really did happen and the world really would want to read about it on paper.

Or on their iPad...or iPhone 5...or whatever that off-brand thing Barnes&Noble sells is called.

In a typical fit of procrastination, I scrolled through my Facebook newsfeed, refreshing several times, hoping to be inspired or distracted when I found a quite comical status update in which a person with a normal job wrote about an interaction with a client.

"You should write a book" was the first comment on the status...no doubt from some suburban mother or misguided, urban lesbian (I couldn't tell from the thumbnail photo).

And when I scoffed and thought "Yeah, right"...I remembered exactly what I was doing.

writing a book.

So, of course, I began to imagine hundreds of young sassy (probably very attractive) gay boys reading the comments on my posts and scoffing just like me.

And having just removed my cardigan (which I thought would be the weather appropriate answer) to throw on top of my hoodies

I'm wondering, yet again, if I'm the one who has it wrong.

Maybe when people say "You should write a book", it's like when people say, "You can always do porn."

No, you can't.

I mean, sure, you always could, but that doesn't mean anyone is every going to watch it and SURELY nobody pays for that anymore.

So, is me sitting on a bed putting together a manuscript just some self-made masturbatory porno I'm going to throw out into the world? (There isn't one of those, don't Google it. Please.)

Do I have any business being in porn?

I mean, writing?

Well, America, since I have just re-read the first 20 pages of Sex and the City, which the Wall Street Journal called "A breath of fresh air" 15 years ago...

Yeah, I got this.

In fact, I'm more certain than ever I'm going to make somebody a lot of money someday.

So refill my coffee and turn on the AC because my cardigan is going back on and I'm getting down to business! I don't care what anybody says, it's autumn and I'm writing a book DAMMIT.

Oh GOD I should have bought a Mac,

TJB: Making It