Snacktivity

The GM at my restaurant, Buanao, gave me this list that she found, which she called

"Twelve or Thirteen Things That Will Keep Your Brain Active."

-Dancing
-Exercise
-Eat one Egg a Day!
-Multitask
-3 or more 4 ounce glasses of JUICE a week
-Laughter!
-7 hours of sleep a NIGHT
-Reading!
-NO MORE THAN two hours of TV a day
-Spice up your life! With rosemary, basil, cinnamon, turmeric, oregano, thyme and SAGE
-Study another language!
-FLOSS
-5 or more cups of green tea a day (INTENSE)

Good thing I already do all of these things without thinking about it! Onto the next list, Steps to Ensure Your Nobel Peace Prize

Outlying Snack

Everyone is possessed with an innate and natural talent for something. For some it's very specifically one thing, for others it may be quite a few. I finished The Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell earlier this summer, and in it he expounds upon the magic 10,000 Hours-- the number of hours it takes of practice, experience, pure and sheer work on the thing at which you will excel. The Beatles logged about 10,000 Hours in Hamburg playing cover songs 6 nights a week in skeazy nightclubs, testing and setting new limits in their ability to experiment with several musical genres, all before "Love Me Do" in 1962. Bill Gates worked as a programmer for some computer test center while he was still in high school, and he logged 10,000 Hours doing that before Microsoft was even a twinkle in his nerdy bespectacled eye. Da Geniuses of Da World, it seems, do what they love and love what they do so much and so passionately, that it is no problem for them to reach that number, and subsequently reach greatness.

For all of the kids my age, the ones who went to my school and majored in Theatre: I calculated that, assuming that you did drama club or theater company or whatnot for all four years of high school, and assuming that you did studio all four years of college and maintained a heavy evening presence throughout rehearsing on the 2nd floor of Tisch, and assuming that you have worked rather steadily (not insanely either, like, a bundle of hours of rehearsal/theatrical endeavour a week) since you've graduated, that we have all surpassed the 10,000 Hour Mark sometime this summer, or we will be doing so this fall.

So, Congratulations. You are on the fast track to becoming a Bona Fide Creative Genius, and according to the aforementioned existing models, we have all the right to change the world . Keep doing what you love and Loving what you do. As my brother said when he visited this summer, "Watching you guys find time to do what you love just because you love it, it's like watching the future of stuff."

The only thing I've logged as much time or more on as this is probably investing myself in fictional love stories, which may or may not hold as promising or lucrative a future.

Payback Snack

All of this Fixing It With Money has left me broke as a joke. I am literally counting the quarters I can put toward my rent in case this one dumb check doesn't go through tomorrow. These past few months have been a constant re-learning of the same lesson: Save Yer Frickin Money.

I did get a new MacBook, but I didn't splurge on it; it was an overdue gift from my parents for graduating from college last year. A lot of the things I did with my brother Boopsie while he was in town I was able to do because my parents paid for it (half as his high school graduation present, half as my birthday present).

I am in the throes of getting two new jobs and ditching my unemployment, and that transition left me with a lot of paycheck delays that are now nipping at my heels. There are bills I actually have not paid yet that I have to get on top of, there are loans that I need to undefer to put my credit score back on track, there are plans I have for saved money (gym membership, headshot printings, plane tickets home and to Europe) that I have had to put on hold time and again because there is no money saved.

All that, and the fact that when I'm feeling down, I go out to dinner with my friends, which is deeply therapeutic and always hilarious and fun but at the same time it's completely depleting my resources. And for what? My mental and social well-being? I could host a jamboree in the park or meditate transcendentally. We could watch Netflix, we could go to free concerts, we could play baseball. I could start doing yoga or jogging around that big pond or making collages for people's birthdays. I don't need to eat fifteen dollar pasta every other day.

I don't know why I can't get it through my head that I have to be more resourceful. It's stressing me out and it's entirely my fault, so I'm just going to grit my teeth and get it done.

This is the most grown-up topic I've ever blogged on; meanwhile, I am a selfish child! Boo hoo hoo.