Mumbling Madly

Remember when you were a kid and you made a HUGE stink over something? Typically it was when you hit about 9 or 10 and you were developing opinions tied in with an attitude (how else were you suppose to be heard?) And you were really vocal and loud and crazy adimant about whatever it was, (for me it was usually about how short was too short, why I should wear make-up before the set age of 15, and winning). This resulted in full on wars with my siblings or parents, because no one likes to be told what to think. And than after the big stink (and I may or may not have gotten my way) I secretly questioned myself: Was it really worth the hassle? Did I put people through “all that” for nothing? That’s how I feel right now about moving: Is it really that big of a deal? Is it really worth stuffing my belongings into boxes? Sure…but what if the new place is worse? This, my friends, is the result of being an eternal pessimist. It’s seriously a fault of mine. I need to knock it off. I need to stop worrying.

Josh and I had a real treat over the weekend. An overdue birthday present from his parents landed us in the illustrious, historic, four star, Brown Palace Hotel. This is probably the nicest hotel I’ve ever stayed in. Over 100 years old, I’m impressed the hotel still contains a decent sense of charm and history. Usually people remodel hotels the after something seems remotely outdated (have you noticed we’re seeing less and less of the red, green, and yellow squared patterned carpet in hotels these days?), but the Brown Palace managed to keep themselves relatively untouched by current trends. We had a damn good time.
We’re not the only ones. In the span of a few hours we saw three brides checking in. Later on that night we saw one walking up to her room with her groom and heard this classic line: “I sure hope these walls are sound proof!”

So, I’m not huge on change. I actually prefer a comfortable rut. I have no idea if this is based on growing up in a fairly stable family that never moved out of the house we moved into when I was five. Or perhaps I like familiarity and being an internal pessimist, change equals bad.
Pros and Cons of New Place:
Pro: It’s huge. Twice the size of what we’re living in currently. Two stories, dining room, sunporch, etc.
Con: It’s, well, it’s ugly on the outside. Cinderblock, 70’s, fantastico. The attached garage is connected to an art co-op and a laundry mat. So it’s behind a store front which is facing a busy one-way street.
Pro: There are no neighbors. Not really. It’s downtown, non-residential, behind the fenced-in backyard is a parking lot.
Con: You have to walk a few blocks before you hit paved sidewalks, front lawns, sprinklers, etc. It’s next to a gas station (that closes at 10pm thankfully) and train tracks run merrily in front of the store front. The train runs mostly during the day, but it is a full on choo choo with whistle.
Pro: Fenced in backyard, perfect for a lone cat to stroll about.
Con: No view but a fence on the ground level. View of busy road and F.C. high rise behind us.
I’ve never lived urbanly in Fort Collins. But I’m thinking the days of living in a college suburb are over. Am I prepared to trade in drunken next door parties, bass, and sunny sidewalks for the sounds of cars passing by and the occasional train? Am I just being really picky? Has my 3 years in F.C. softened me?

Mara with co-workers: “White Kitty” (Katie)” and “Cassandra” (Angela).

Okay, I’m losing my mind.
As some of you may know, last summer we were plauged by who we fondly refer to as The Choads: A pair of rich white kids who trashed the place behind ours, leaving dog feces, beer bottles, and a legal paper trail ranging from trespassing to 3 charges of noise violations and 2 charges of assault. It was a wild, upsetting, ride. One that we regale people with at parties but secretly have never recovered from.
So now we have new neighbors, one year later, and even though they’re not as bad as The Choads they’re nothing to write home about. Josh and I are perplexed: They Never Leave The House. We know The Girl is a student and has to commute to Denver…but we haven’t seen any commuting or any signs of studying. The Guy occasionally delievers pizza and is suppose to fix up the yard in order to earn his rent break. The yard was ripped up last week and remains that way: Grassless, dusty, two large piles of dirt remain that will allegedly be constructed into raised flower beds, and now we have a gravel driveway in the middle of the yard. Whee. Because they never leave, their music is always pounding during the day. Josh and I have varied schedules, so we’re in and out throughout the day. We can’t even venture into the west part of the house–the side that shares a common wall. They used to be quieter at night…until recently.
Two nights ago I was jarred out of quasi-sleep by a strange sound: an engine starting over and over again. But it wasn’t a normal sounding engine, this noise had a deep bass to it. Every minute or so it would start, and than a bass beat would begin for a moment before stopping entirely for 30 seconds. Than the cycle would repeat. Holy Shit. Anyone who has known or lived with me knows that I can’t stand that kind of noise. Give me a loud party before bass, at least voices can be blocked out with earplugs. I went on a rampage, trying to locate the source of the noise. I prowled around the house, around the block, trying to find out who was plauging me so I could rip their head off. I didn’t find the source, but I did hear our next door neighbors having sex. It was 1 in the morning, and I had to get up at 8. The noise disappeared and I lay back down again. As soon as it started up I decided to wake up Josh and have him join me in the crusade. (Not fair, admittedly, but I’m a brat). He too, donned flipflops and padded around outside. Right around the time the noise stopped, our neighbors went to bed. Our bedrooms share a wall (I know, that in itself is wierd), and we were entertained by giggles and bed jiggling for about 10 minutes before all was quiet.
The following night, we heard the same noises. It was earlier this time, about 11 and Josh went on a quiet mission around the house. That’s when he found them: Our neighbors playing an old race car game on the TV with the sound hooked up to their ghetto blaster. We were hearing reverb from their video game.
OK, so that’s not so bad. But I was exhaused from the previous night and I went into a rage: “I’m too old for this shit! I can’t be expected to go to sleep at 2 in the morning every night just so they can get their rocks of Speed Racer or whatever the hell their playing. I hate this place, I hate Ft. Collins! What the hell is wrong with these people? Why don’t they have jobs?” So we called the landlord and we’re probably moving. He has another property that’s actually downtown. It’s not ideal, but considering how pissed and disturbed we’ve been it’s better than sticking around here and sharing a wall. The option is to have a frank, upfront, talk with them. Although they’re not really doing anything wrong…just because most people start to shut down at 10pm doesn’t mean they have to (I mean, when you don’t work why would you have to get up early?). Perhaps they don’t know how noisy they really are, or maybe they don’t care. Maybe I’m overreacting, but even Josh is burned out and he’s the level-headed one in our duo. I’m the one that lashes out at strangers and will probably get Josh beat up one day because I don’t know when to shut my trap.
And that’s the thing too, I lived in Seattle for 5 years and I never had these kinds of problems. People just sort of understand that when you live in close quarters you observe certain levels of privacy and quiet. Here, in F.C, nobody has every lived outside of this town. Maybe it’s true: Ft Collins is one gigantic, rich, white, suburb. And with that comes ignorance, Republicans, SUV’s that vibrate with souped up bass at all hours of the night, and a general dim-wittedness that is slowly driving me insane. With so many days of damn sunshine in a row here, and the longest spring and summer that I’ve ever endured, the daylight hours are plauged with non stop noise. See, in the NW we didn’t really have a summer–it only last two months before the rain came back. People went back into their caves and drank their lattes in dark coffee shops and quietly puttered around. HERE? Oh, HERE people have croquet games until midnight, and everyone has a barking dog in a small yard, and no one understands that voices travel.
Whew…I’m sorry. I’m just really tired.

Having been without cable for a good three years, I didn’t realize how Reality Oriented everything has become. I shouldn’t have been surprised. What was surprising was that in the matter of one hour I saw two people I know on TV.
Firstly, Joel McHale, fellow Seattle Improvisor, back when I did a lot of late night comedy. You may have seen him in Spiderman 2 as Mr. Jacks, the mean bank guy who refuses a loan to Spiderman’s Aunt May. He’s also in Burger King and State Farm commercials AND he has a show on E! called “What the ?Awards.” Now, I don’t really KNOW Joel, but I did run lights a few times when he was performing at Unexpected Productions. I’d like to say we shared the stage a few times, but I wasn’t that good. We brushed shoulders at the U of WA because he was a graduate student in Drama for one year before he packed up and moved to LA to make it big.
Secondly, I flipped over to Spike TV and BAM, there was Ingrid, this chick I took Intensive Italian with six summers ago. Check out her bio, I totally forgot she was a Budweiser girl. Anyway, she was one of those loud girls who made fun of the few smart kids in the class. The refreshing thing is she looks exactly the same.
I suppose having majored in Drama, I’m bound to run into familiar faces on TV. Many of us were bound for either The Stage or The Tube and either way one had to move to NY or LA to “make it.” I punked out and didn’t do either.

I spent six hours rehearsing the L Project yesterday. It was a long time
on a very hot July day. But it went very well, and the show is looking
to be a huge success. Because the entire show is coming out of my
mind, I have to spend extraordinary time focusing on it.
Hence, it’s all I’m thinking about.

Teri and Josh rehearsing LOSS