Cleaning up around the house and invitation emails. That was my morning. Oh, and a nice haircut too!
I think I'm upto around 12 people for the Thursday evening (I only have four tix)! Need to scrounge from the other cast members.
I tell you, the drive along Sunset Blvd is a pain in the arse. It's a very long winding road and I think I know every nook and cranny from here to Malibu. Also doesn't help when you're running a little late and you know how much ground you have to cover.
Rehearsal was pretty good today. Worked from the start upto marvelous Party and ran that a couple of times. It's all there. Just a couple of things here and there to polish. New business all the time. Worked in another topical joke today. Very funny btw.
littl'un had his favourite jacket on today and refused to take it off all day! Have a fun shopping trip with his Mum and was given some more cars (I seriously think we are keeping Mattel in shirts). He's a pretty happy chappie and you can't knock that!

Thursday - went into the office today.
Seems the Hollywood OS party/book launch for the updated version of "Extra work for Brain Surgeons" was last night. I was invited but couldn't go. Basically, if you're coming to Hollywood to be a movie extra (I've met a ton of people who make a very good living at it, believe me) or a principle actor who needs to do extra work between jobs (i.e. most actors in LA), this is defintiely the book to get. Hollywood OS was started a nunber of years ago and has grown from a floppy disk (remember those) passed around the casting agents to the humungous web site with thousands of people that it is today. The bosslady is a no nonsense, shrewd business-minded sweetheart called Angela. Check out hollywoodoperatingsystem.com for the fast track into LA movie extra work! Good luck.
Anyway, back to the office. Seems that I have two auditions... One for Alison Horn for Surf (which is a UK detergent) which I can do but can't make the shoot date if I were to land it (Getty obligation) and one for Francene Selkirk which I can't make this afternoon but can make the shoot date. So, J my lovely agent had to phone both of them up. Well, they were both pissed off. Let's just say I probably won't be brought in for either for the foreseeable future. Great. Two huge commercial CDs down, several more to go! Had visitation in the office today which is always fun!
Rehearsal, rehearsal, rehearsal. Looking good. Working on new stuff all the time. Business here, a new line there! Very fluid!

Class went well today although it's taking me a while to get back into things since my break. Need to be more open and available. Worked with B.
Two messages though: one was a possible voiceover job for a little company on the web to do with web based training. If I get it, it's a ton an hour. Nice. They're going to send me an audition script. The other message was from J to say I had an audition for Surf (UK detergent). Ironic innit - I travel 7000 miles and end up auditioning for ads for back home. Hey ho. They want talent who can do a Northern English accent! Unfortunately, it shoots next Thursday when my show is on. =( Ah well.
Home and went out again to ferry M around for her sales calls. Saw R & C on the way home and picked 'em up. Went and had dins at SS. Yummy.
Littl'un to bed and into pants, no nappy! So I told him he couldn't pee in his pants and had to get up and go to the loo if he needed to go.
Recorded my audition script and emailed it. Working on the computer, we heard cries from his room so I went to investigate. He was upset about something so I picked him up and cuddled him for a few minutes. Well, before long I found out what was upsetting him when he pee'd all over me, while I was cuddling him. He was great after that. Changed him and he went back to sleep, happy as a sandboy. I'm covered in pee from my chest downwards. Got to love kids.
Checked online and foudn out I had another audition tomorrow, this time for Sprite. But this one's during rehearsal time so I guess I can;t go to that one either.
Nothing for ages and then two on the same day. Marvellous.

Hummm.. just searching the blog and realised that I didn't note the day I received my SAG card through the post (translation into yank: mail) so I'm going to note it here. I suppose it was about 2 months ago and it marked the next stage of the road to earning a living wage as a pro thesp in LALA land (Los Angeles to you non-locals).
How did I get it, well I ended up qualifying two ways at the same time... 4 SAG extra vouchers (only needed 3) and three principal SAG jobs (1 commercial and 2 industrials).

Some months are good, some not so but one thing I know for sure, there's no feeling on Earth to match walking into an acting job in LA, knowing you're going to step in front of a camera or onto a stage and someone is going to pay you for it. Nothing better. Seriously. Worth fighting for and working your arse off for too. If you're just here to "try it out", please piss off back home - you're taking up space and using up air.
'Nuff said.

Appeal for vintage UK TV commercials/adverts:
Please please please if you have audio or video of the ads for Safeway (#we work a little harder, we go a little further#) or Berger Paint (#who makes the paint that's sleak and ???? and gleaming on this Rover car, Berger#), please let me know. I need to reconnect with these pieces of ad history. Thanks!

Happy Tuesday. Fun and games to start the day. One thing I've been meaning to post is an idea for any parents potty training their kids. The way we did it was to fill a shoebox with a ton of fun things like sweeties (Brit for candy), matchbox cars, stickers and other things and tell the nipper that if he poops in the potty he gets a 'prize' from the 'red box'.
Obviously, up until that point, we'd endured endless 'accidents' where he would be playing and 'forget' to go to the bathroom, favouring instead a quick dump wherever he happened to be playing at that time. BUT, with the introduction of the prize box, he tried to go poop every time he went pee as well. Result!! (Brit for 'Good for us').
It was fairly easy thereafter to remind him every so often to go to the potty as the prospect of a piece of candy or a small toy was never far from his mind.
We did this for probably three or four weeks and now we only give him the box randomly throughout the day when he poops, not every time.
Oh, by the way, the trick is to hold the top over the box so they can't see inside and they have to feel inside. The point of the ziplocs is that every prize feels the same and they can't favour one prize over another (i.e. always going for the candy).
If you're out and about and don't have the box with you, just let them know that the first thing you'll do when you get home is get the prize box for the reward. They'll trust you!
Thought I'd share that with you!
Oh, and another thing. You know when the battery in your car alarm keyfob is starting to fade and the range of the button push decreases until you're practically standing on top of the car before the button unlocks or locks the door? Well, if you push the top of the keyfob into the dent of your chin and push the button, you'll find that the range has miraculously increased 10 fold. Why? Well, it would seem that your skeleton acts like a huge antenna for transmitting the radio waves from your keyfob. Oh and don't worry. The waves your keyfob produce are as safe as the radio waves traveling through the air that your radio picks up. My mate Richard told me that years ago and it really works. Next time you try it and someone asks you what you're doing, just tell 'em "Something a mad Brit told me".
Anyway.. back to today.
Rehearsal. Looking good. Sounding good and bloody funny. New inserts all the time. Managed to work in some VERY contemporary stuff (think the major awards ceremony from the weekend).

Monkey slept until 8.30 this morning - bliss. Doggie off to the groomers to get a wash and brush up! Back home and searched for some possible places to move to. Most of them are in the 'wrong' area!
Registered CI with WGA website. Safe to publish!
The pooch took 2 and a half hours! She looks great though!
Almost late to class. It's filling up. Lots of new faces coming in.
Universal dissing of 36Mafia and their award last night. NO-one could quite work it out.
Worked with Miche and we both got a 'don't take things for granted' note. Fairly nuff.
New guy I may do a scene with. Seems pretty keen.
Pissing with rain again.
Picked up littl'un and C at the library to save them a walk in the rain. Yes, I'm nice like that.
M had a 'conference call' so I did bath bed and clean up. Great.
Changed my photos on actors acc and researched some photographers. Emailed a couple who looked good. Basically I'm looking for good lighting and good eye capture.
Spoke to S about VI and he has yet another backer. I think we're up to a coupla hundred grand for the movie - yeehaaa. Starts shooting June 1st. Even more yeehaaa.

Up at 7am (Sunday morning - nice!). Spoke to J on the 'phone. All is well back home.
Off to rehearsal for 10. At least Sunset Blvd was clear all the way to Malibu.
Good rehearsal.
Bought Girl Scout cookies on the way home. For those of you unenlightened souls out there who don't know what GS cookies are (basically anyone NOT from the US), they are the most wonderful way to add pounds of fat and clogging agents to your arteries known to man. God, they're good.
Bath and bed for littl'un and then watched the Oscars. Was meant to go around to a friends to watch them but they had their friends freak out on them and tell them that they couldn't possibly share them with anyone else tonight. Yep, I thought it was strange too. But anyway...
Results are on the 'net so I won't dupe them here. Great hosting (if a little safe) by Jon Stewart. The oddest thing thought was the winner of best original song. It was a terrible rap song from Crash (the film I loved BTW). Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against rap music. Give me a heartfelt rap song about human struggle, tragedy or some similar emotion which is well sung, coherent and intelligent and I'm nodding my head with the best of them but this was just jumbled up crap, totally inaudible, repetitive and boring. Basically it was just noise. Maybe the Academy are trying to get hip and cred on the street but don't try and do it by handing an award to this standard of shite. Great acceptance speech, guys.
I seem to remember the song being better in the movie. Maybe I'm being hard on them. The stage was not the best for performing live, indeed Dolly Parton's singing came over as pretty small which, as we all know, is not what Ms. Parton is famous for. Why wasn't she given a band and some backing singers on stage with her?
Actually, not that anyone gives a flying toss what I think!! I've just searched all the blogs about the oscars and there are thousand of them. All with narcissistic, shitty, holier than thou comments and opinions.
Who do you think is reading your mindless crap, people? Who do you think cares what you think?

Walked the dog. Been meaning to write a note about the guy around the corner who leave a canvas bag by his back gate, in the shadows, but basically on plain view to the street. He does it almost every night and I've seen it there since I've been here (coming up for two years now). What's in it? No idea! Why hasn't anyone stolen it? No clue. Maybe it's a 'plant'. I'm not going to try and find out. Either very trusting or very stupid. Not sure which.