Au Naturel
I’m a “vegan.” I have to put vegan in quotes because I’m not really very diligent about this matter, mostly because I think being a vegan sucks. I’m telling you right now this is not one of those essays where I rhapsodize about how my skin is clearer and how I’ve lost weight and how [...]
Best Hair Day Ever
Amores, I’m sure I have many good qualities. I know a lot of knock-knock jokes, for example. And I laugh all of the time at the stupidest things (Adam Sandler movies or the aforementioned knock-knock jokes). And I am, despite routine crabbiness about how-come-people-don’t-care-more-about-injustice, a genuinely hopeful person. But I’m also rolling in the bad [...]
Chicago is Most Segregated City in America. Or, How to Make Jokes About Unfunny Things
I’m a semi-regular contributor to Paper Machete, a live news magazine that happens (for FREE!) every Saturday at the Horseshoe Lounge here in Chicago. Basically, what it is is a bunch of mostly funny people getting together to perform short pieces about the news of the week, plus some cultural commentary and musical acts. The [...]
Take Your “Feelings” and….
Well, Amores, lately I’ve been a little bit on the down low. Oh sure, you can catch me live and in person in any one of about a zillion-trillion meetings, classes, panels, workshops, or rehearsals, but alas… the internets have been quiet for me lately. Someone even complained that I haven’t been posting on FB! [...]
Funny lady… sometimes, anyway!
Amores, remember that anthology that includes one of my essays? You know the one… pretty blue cover… pink train… lots of gay stuff…. Well… here’s a review of Windy City Queer that just happens to call my piece “hilarious.” Yay! Coming soon… I’m a vegan, but I hate all-natural makeup! I’ll tell you why when [...]
Work With Me!
For the past few years, I’ve had the honour of working as the Lead Artist for the Poetry Performance Incubator at the Guild Complex. The Incubator brings poets together to create ensemble performance, merging my two great loves: poetry and theatre. Our last show, Tour Guides, was an off-center love letter to Chicago. It enjoyed [...]
Extra! Extra! Read All About It! In an actual book…
Amores! Do you know what came for me in the mail the other day? This book: It is a collection of ”LGBTQ Dispatches From the Third Coast” and one of the dispatches was written by ME! I’ll admit… I’m notoriously shy about publication, but it is a really good feeling to scan a table [...]
Go On. Take a Risk.
I love trying new lip glosses. But I don’t love trying new lip gloss colours. As I’ve detailed before, I stick to a steady palette of orange, gold, and raspberry, with the occasional orangey-red thrown in. But right now, my go-to lip glosses are a pale coral and a kind of light fushia/pinky lavender, both [...]
Quick n’ Dirty Tour Guides Info
Amores, in case you don’t want to read my long post about Tour Guides (below, and totally brilliant, just saying), here’s the short version. Tour Guides. Opens Friday. Worth Seeing. Tickets and Information at guildcomplex.org.
Tour Guides: The Chicago No One Ever Puts on a Postcard
Chicago is… the lake I love/still can’t believe it ain’t an ocean. Chicago is… bipolar as projects next to million dollar condos. Chicago is… masochists and character builders knee deep in snow… Amores, The Americans closed on Saturday night and today I’m jumping in to tech for TOUR GUIDES v.3, which opens on Friday. Wait a second, [...]
The Americans Are Coming!
For the past year, I’ve been asking random strangers the same handful of questions: 1.) Are you an American? 2.) What does it mean to be an American? 3.) If you could tell 100 people one thing about being an American, what would it be? 4.) Fill in the blank: The Americans are __________. For [...]
Random.
The best part, for me, of going to anyone’s house isn’t sneaking a peek into their medicine cabinet (does anyone actually do that? Alls they’d find in mine would be a boatload of rarely-used facial cleansers and some children’s tylenol. So don’t look in there. DON’T look!!!!) It’s sneaking a peek at their library. I [...]
For The Death Penalty? Oppose THIS Execution.
On September 21, the State of Georgia plans to execute Troy Davis. Now, I know it is no surprise to anyone reading this blog that I am deeply and 100% opposed to the death penalty. This is a position (like being a pacifist and a vegetarian) that I came to via my Christian values, and it [...]
Yum, Yum, Yum… Cabbage and Beer.
I have been trying to break out of my steady diet of microwaved veggie burgers and sugar snap peas in a bag by trying to cook a new, never before tried (by me) recipe. Tonight I wanted to try the Braised Cabbage and Seitan from Appetite for Reduction, but ended up going way off course [...]
The Americans
The Americans is in full swing, and yes – totally behind schedule. SOMEDAY I’ll work on a play that’s finished being written before we open! In the meantime, we’re in residence at the DCA Incubator and blogging about the process. Check it out here: http://www.dcatheater.org/blog/entry/flash_interviews/
I Love You! I M’eh You… I Love You! I M’eh You…
I am in an “It’s Complicated” relationship with L’Oreal LeGloss. About a month ago, my friend Dyan sent me a Twitter telling me that the new L’Oreal LeGloss was a “lip gloss revelation.” (I think there may even have been an “OMG” in there as well.) My friend is a master of looking cute on [...]
It’s a Gloss… It’s a Liner… It’s LIP FLASH!
Recently, a friend (and one of my favourite bloggers) sent me a question via Twitter: @coyapaz: have you tried L’Oreal Le Gloss? It is a lip gloss REVELATION! I am pretty brand loyal when it comes to drugstore products–Hello, Revlon–but I had to try a lip gloss REVELATION! I ran to the Store That Shall [...]
My Child is a Bleeping Vegetarian
My child is a [bleeping] vegetarian. That’s cool. I’m a [bleeping] vegetarian too. Not in a militant way. I won’t, for example, run up to people enjoying a hamburger and smack it out of their hands and tell them: YOU’RE EATING AN ANIMAL THAT WAS TORTURED TO DEATH YOU MEAN POOPHEAD. I used to do [...]
Stay in the Moment, Paz!
Auditions for one of my fall shows start tonight. That’s right… ONE of my fall shows. I think I have set myself up for a month of panic attacks by agreeing to direct/develop two pieces that open within two weeks of each other in October. Luckily one is a remount and one is a workshop, [...]
Dreams Come True…!
No lie. Just the other day (while I was off here) I wrote a poem called “List of Wishes.” I wrote it before I had any coffee, so mostly it is an incoherent ramble about all the things I wish for. Coffee tops the list and ends the list, but right in the middle I [...]
Whoa! Fa$hion Has a Plot!
A couple of months ago, the Artistic Director of Halcyon Theatre invited me to write a play for their Alcyone ’11 Festival: Remixed. The conversation went something like this: Tony: We’re doing this festival where we ask contemporary female playwrights to remix/adapt plays written by women before 1850. Playwrights can do anything they want as [...]
Podcast! Talking About Chicago, Theatre, History, and My Job
I haven’t been posting much because I’ve been busy with things like writing a new play, chasing my two year old, and actually working. At my actual J-O-B. We’re hosting a Symposium on Chicago Theatre History: Past, Present, and Future that starts this week. I’ll be honest. The whole thing has been kind of a… [...]
Cutest Lip Gloss EVER!!!
Today, I was walking from the Harold Washington Library (always awe-inspiring) back to my office (about 8 blocks) when it started to rain. And rain. And RAIN! Normally, I would not be grateful for a sudden downpour, especially because when my hair is left to its own devices it turns into a curly-on-one-side mess, but [...]
