‘Tis the season when everyone is busy and overburdened with the demands of Capital, tradition, family, and the gatherings that have been on hold for almost two years. Everyone is stretched pretty thin right now. Everyone I know is dealing with some mental distress, from mild cases of the winter blues to fighting severe bouts with mental illness.
Depression is afoot in House Peepas-Nichols, and Jennifer and I are finding it hard to keep up with our activities of daily living, though my cooking mojo has returned. This in part due to our newly acquired Instant Pot/Air Fryer combo and inspiration from cooking TikTok—especially the Barilla America chef’s TikTok and Instagram posts of beautiful pasta meals that look really easy to cook and mostly are. The recipes I have tried so far have been delicious. I have mostly been able to feed the Jennyfur and the Germy, but the rest of my ADLs are in shambles. Except for laundry. For some reason laundering my clothes is no big deal. Putting them away afterward—now that’s a different story. This week, I tried to fold my clothes like Marie Kondo suggests in her KonMari method. This was met with limited success. My sock drawer looks cool, but I still need to purge dozens of socks that are either too tattered or don’t fit due to my feet being swollen from lymphedema. I absolutely hate getting rid of things, but I also detest living in the clutter of my own making. Other people’s clutter does not bother me for some reason. Not my circus, not my monkeys, I suppose.
This weekend I have a plan to unfuck my office, the room that I am currently writing this blog post from. It is so distracting to work in this heap and to be plagued by the shame and guilt that it is in this state. Guilt-ridden that I have not fully unpacked and put away all of my things from our move in April. Even though I made a special trip home to Chicago while visiting my mom in Texas to do just that. And that it is still a mess almost six months after I came back home just makes me sick to my stomach. Not to mention all of the things I just cannot find in this disaster den. I am too ashamed to show y’all what it looks like. This is no way to live, yet here I am with almost five decades of living this way. I am going to try to disregard my shame and to follow this woman KC Davis’s imminently practical tidying advice—wish me luck.
Also check out KC’s TikTok: @domesticblisters
My last two posts were long. So long that Substack warned me that I was about to go over the length limit for emails on Google Mail. This week I will not have this problem. Besides, I am pressed for time today. My friend Nancy started doing a audio advent calendar last year wherein she recorder herself reading aloud The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie and uploading an excerpt on SoundCloud every day of Advent. This year she is reading Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery. This year she opened it up to other voice talent and I volunteered. My chapters are due tomorrow and I must finish recording them today so that I may begin my grand unfucking project tomorrow. I’m a notorious perfectionist, so I better begin soon or I will be up all damned night. My chapters are not for a few days, but I’m linking to the calendar if you all would like to listen. Nancy and the other readers are delightful and the story is a classic for a reason. Enjoy.
Earlier this year I filmed two episodes of Chicago Fire. I was an extra. A featured extra. What is a featured extra, you ask? A featured extra is a background actor who gets a little more screen time or face time. What it means practically is that you get paid slightly more. You also get treated better on set as a featured extra. More like a real actor and less like a prop or set piece. Years ago I was an extra on Chicago PD and I learned a lot about shooting television and had a pretty good time, but when the episode aired I watched my scene and I could only recognize the back of my own head because I knew where I was sitting in the scene. I did not even bother telling my mom what episode it was thinking that even she would not be able to recognize me. Eight years later I cannot remember the episode that I was in. This picture of the back of my head today will have to stand in for my footage. Trust me when I say that this is no more obviously me than when I was on Chicago PD.
It turns out that I should have trusted that Maa would know her own son anywhere. My sister sent me a picture in a text a few weeks ago, “Is this you?” Here is the picture in question:
Maa recognized me by my moles. Moms sure are noticers. That is all you can see of me in the whole episode, so I was less than excited when the background department of Chicago Fire sent me a text and email inviting me to film another episode as my original character. In my first communications with the production, I was to play “Heavyset Man” which became the husband in “Overweight Couple”, and then the thankfully weight-neutral “Chicago Couple”. I was also working at the food pantry and wasn’t sure if I could take time off to do the shoot. The producers of the episode moved a couple of things and let me skip one of my three Covid tests so I only had to miss one day of my day job. I really enjoyed working with my TV wife, Rachel, so I decided to do it. Well, my mom sent me this today and you can clearly see my face. My friend Kyle is a talented musician that used to do standup and he would always do a joke about being an actor in Chicago. It went something like this:
“My actor friends in Chicago are always getting cast on Chicago Fire and PD and they always say, “I know it’s not a great show. . .but my episode’s pretty good.””
Well, I know it’s not a great show. . .but my episode’s pretty good.
Thank you, as always, for reading.
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