While I’m an upstanding member of the Writer’s Guild, I can’t say for sure whether or not I actually know the definition of irony, but LET’S TRY and also WHO DOES?  For the past few months, especially weeks, there’s been a tonnage of anxiety about whether or not there would be a WGA strike come May 1st. In the weeks leading up to the potential strike, I found that I actually had no brain or emotional space to worry, as I was too busy re-writing a movie based on The Secret. I gave pretty much NONE mental energy to the strike, and in fact, I convinced myself it wouldn’t happen. CUT TO 1 AM LAST NIGHT, when the WGA negotiators reached a tentative agreement with the Producers. No Strike. DID I JUST IN FACT USE THE SECRET TO AVOID A POTENTIAL WRITER’S STRIKE WHILE WRITING THE SECRET?

I would just like to formally apologize to every actor who came to callbacks for The Cake last night for how much I was frantically writing during every read. If I were you, I would of course assume that I was making a long list of everything that was annoying about my body and voice and just me as a human, in general. But actually,  when a playwright sits in on auditions for their play, suddenly all of the emotional holes in the scenes become clear, and the playwright must frantically write these holes downs along with any ideas re: how to fix them before they escape. Unfortunately sometimes this must happen while an actor is beautifully emoting. Basically La La Land is a documentary, and sometimes, I AM THE VILLAIN IN THE ROOM I’M SORRY.

My American Gods bosses sent me this screenshot of my lil piece of the pie in the show’s opening credits. Maybe some day years from now my name on a screen will make me feel nothing but currently, it still gives me a hot zing of yay which is what I call all good feelings, just in general. COMING TO STARZ 4.30!

Since I’m a writer, I want my brain to full of questions and wonder, problems and solutions, but if I’m being real, especially when I’m busy, it’s usually equal parts where my next food is coming from and what that food is, what clothes I will put on myself for the next thing, and that scene from Newsies when Christian Bale sings Santa Fe. Occasionally there is a large philosophical question and that scene from Sound of Music when Captain Von Trapp tilts Maria’s chin up to him in the gazebo, but that’s basically the extent of my imagination.

Looking at my schedule for next week, I realize I’m meeting with four different people so that they might ‘pick my brain.’ As a classic Gemini, I’m of two minds about this. Mind Pt. 1:  I am happy to do it, especially in honor of those who did it for me when I was just starting out. If I can offer any insight that might help a person get to where they want to be, then good on me, good on them, and good on kindness.  Mind. Pt. 2: my brain is currently in a million places. It’s held together by frayed bits of old friendship bracelet and sour punch straws and the subpar bobby pins that really don’t hold any hair in place at all. If anyone were to, at this point, ‘pick my brain,’ it actually might lose its structure entirely.

The Kilroys went on a retreat this weekend to a giant golf resort / conference center in the City of Industry, which is an actual name of a place about 20 miles outside of LA. We picked it at random, but little did we know that it was the perfect place for gathering and scheming up plans for the coming years (hot tub / chocolate fountain / two weddings / one child’s math competition). What do thirteen lady theater nerds need nightly? A safe place to sing, by which I mean, a DEEPLY SERIOUS KARAOKE NIGHT HELD IN A CONFERENCE ROOM FEATURING PEOPLE IN THEIR 60S WITH STUNNING VOICES THAT CLEARLY COME TO THIS CONFERENCE ROOM EVERY WEEKEND TO BELT OUT UNCHAINED MELODY AND ALSO THE THEME TO LOVE BOAT. We sang not one, not two, but approximately thirty songs, a decent split between musical theater, Alanis, and completely unrecognizable but very personal numbers. We were at first met with trepidation, but eventually welcomed into the fold of regulars, until that time Sheila accidentally scratched one of them with her shoe while line dancing, at which point we could have been kicked out,  but then someone revealed we were TV writers, and suddenly, we were heroes, not activists, per se, just girls who used to sing in closets, and then cars, and now, in conference rooms. Also we made plans for the future. That, too. We need movements for gender parity now more than ever. STAY TUNED…..

Yesterday, in one of the stranger Hollywood but not Hollywood afternoons of my life, I had the privilege of attending a Golden Globes ‘gift suite.’ Basically a bunch of jewelry designers, skincare makers, and charities gather in a penthouse and wait for celebrities to visit their booth, so that they can tell them all about their product or cause, in hopes that the famous person will then champion the face lotion / cause. The celebrity or out of place TV writer gets sort of marched around the room and handed free things, and a  sort of stressed out ‘host’ has to introduce them to each vendor, and genuinely try but mostly mispronounce their name every time perhaps as Backah Brunsettler, and then hold the free things the famous person gets handed, because famous people and lower level TV writers cannot hold things with their hands. It was a strange glimpse into the life of a person who just gets given things for no reason. Highlights were the Vagina cleaner, the woman who gave me a sample of her perfume then pitched me her pilot idea, and last but not least, Viola Davis, who floated behind me with an entourage of what appeared to be granddaughters, generously thanking everyone, giving each person time and attention, showing the rest of us how it is done.

Dreamt I was writing in a beautiful green meadow, with a pencil in a clean white college ruled notebook. I was JOURNALING, even, writing towards figuring out exactly what it is that’s blocking me from becoming the best person and writer I possibly can be. After a page of writing, I arrived at it. The very thing that I needed to confront. The one thing that needed fixing. I stared at it there on the page, circled and underlined it, felt sort of free, and ready to fix. So what is it? What is the thing? NOPE. NO CAN DO. DON’T REMEMBER EVEN AT ALL.

There’s a thing going around instagram, Best 9, in which people post a grid of their best nine pictures from 2016, summing up a year in their lives. Whenever everyone is doing something it kind of makes me not want to do it, as I am no sheep,  by which I mean BAAAAAAAA I’LL JUST DO IT HERE INSTEAD but with 24 pictures because I LIVE MY OWN LIFE (IN GRIDS.) And so with no further ado, it has been a magnificent year! I:

Ate that chicken pot pie in a blizzard, wrote for American Gods, had a beautiful production of my Heaven play at South Coast Rep, found the perfect overalls and wore them approximately 170 times, washed them about 3 times, took a surfing lesson with Elizabeth, had a Dewey’s pink lemonade cake to call my own at my Easter pot luck thanks to my Mom, ran a 5K with a little girl Monet who ate gummy savers the whole way thanks to Blaine, celebrated 2 years with Mo at Red Lobster,  patroned Ru Paul’s drag con, got after that no speaking above a whisper resort life in Joshua Tree, spent some time writing at Space on Ryder farm in upstate New York, went to Carrie’s Beyonce themed beybe shower (then later welcomed and met her dear little Sebastian who I am now calling Bash / 2017 let’s see if we can get that going), and then also:

Had the most perfect of bridal showers complete with hats and tiny sandwiches, spun for 3 hours in YAS-a-thon for cancer research, made Ina Garten’s flag cake, welcomed little nephew Mojo, worked on The Cake at the Alliance, Echo and Ojai, did Vegas so hard bachelorette style, tried on a bunch of white dresses / picked one had a bunch dress fittings / obsessed over its details and its accessories namely did I ever mentioned that Ferris Bueller cropped leather coat? / GOT MARRIED / cast my vote for a woman president for the first time, attended Blaine and Jason’s non baby shower baby shower, read Vivian Howard’s incredible cookbook, and started writing for This is Us. And so, a great many things.

Last week I started to have dreams that I was left out of something creative, being mocked for output or performance. Personal favorite:  I dreamt I had to  play a drunk dog onstage and the reviews were terrible (this dream brought to you by the first night in Hong Kong, surrounded by every stimulus possible.)  I think the dreams  stem from a feeling that I haven’t accomplished enough creatively this year, like I haven’t dug enough into my own heart / brain. I’ve been working, yes, but I feel, in general, sort of uninspired, like the questioning part of my brain has been numbed. It’s most likely because the majority of all extra time and emotional brainspace I had went to wedding planning. And so, I will forgive myself, hope that 2017 brings characters / moments / stories / questions, big new ideas, but ALSO, more cakes / adult onesies / trips / love, FOR BALANCE.

In a surprising and miraculous conclusion to the trip, we were randomly upgraded to business class for our flight from Hong Kong back to LA, which neither of us had ever experienced on an international flight. It means you get your own little pod world to stretch your legs out to infinity,  and they bring you meals and meals and meals with always a hot towel in between. We basically spent the entire flight grinning at each other stupidly and shouting things like HEY LOOK! TINY THING OF OLIVE OIL! and rubbing our faces in the towels and just being amateurs and very un-business like, and conducting absolutely no business whatsoever. A perfect conclusion to a perfecter trip WHAT ARE WORDS WHAT IS TIME OKAY BACK TO BUSINESS