First Week Back

I've been trying to be active everywhere, starting last week when I rediscovered this blog. It's been incredibly difficult. My executive dysfunction is as powerful as ever, but my depression is all but gone, so... I still can't do anything, but now I don't feel bad about it. Not the ideal state to be in. My laundry remains ever undone, my space unclean, my projects unfulfilled. But I'm working on it, trying to get things done...

I've been thinking back, largely due to Facebook bringing up the memories, to five years ago, when I was in Quincy Community Theatre's production of Spamalot. One could say that was the moment TAPAS was born, as shortly afterward I began writing a musical and imagining people I was in Spamalot with as its cast members. After a few years of work and study that didn't really go anywhere, I went back to Quincy, acted in two other shows, and managed to sort of start a single TAPAS project in the form of the Icewind Dale LP... drifted off again after that, hoping the third time is the charm, this time to return to Quincy and start TAPAS for realsies.

Spamalot photo shoot. Standing: Bill Stalder as King Arthur, Sage Mann (me!!!) as Sir Robin, Michael Gash as Sir Lancelot, David Samuels as Sir Galahad. Sitting: Drew Quintero as Patsy, Dick Rees as Sir Bedevere.

Promotional image from Is He Dead?, my third and most recent theatrical appearance. Sidney Shackleton as O'Shaughnessy, Aaron Joseph Schmitt as Dutchy, myself as Chicago, Luke Lawson as Jean-Francois Millet.

I still talk to most of my co-stars; Drew, Michael, Sidney, and Aaron provided voice work for the one TAPAS project I successfully began, recorded in Aaron's homemade sound booth, along with a few other contacts from the three shows I've done down there. Didn't get as many people involved as I would have liked! But I'm proud of the Irregular Webcomic soundsets and the voiced conversations I edited together into the first four episodes.

In the past week, I've made the decision that I simply can't catch up on the podcast. Last year, my depression eventually rendered me completely unable to make my weekly updates - there were absolutely no podcast updates from early July to early October. So ever since then I've been operating under the assumption that if I do multiple episodes a week, eventually I'll be able to catch up, get back to the point where the number of episodes equals the number of weeks I've been doing the podcast, but... as of this week, I've accepted that I just can't do it. So, I'm back to shooting for one a week. ...Even that isn't going well. But I'm shooting.

First project I'm going to tackle when I head back to Quincy is Better Yet?, a play co-written by my friend Mason Ellison, I believe he's going to direct it as well. We're in talks with QCT for using their rehearsal space to mount our production. I'm going to star. I was surprised when Mason told me he wanted me to play the lead, as I'd pictured him in the role when I read the script. Eager to sink my teeth into the character. It's the story of a guy who's bouncing back from a suicide attempt and using that as an excuse to treat everybody like crap, and he has to learn that, you know, you can't do that.

Also this week, got a nice gift from YouTube personalities Rob Thomas and Raven Fox. Last year, I donated a whole buncha money to their crowdfunded vacation, winning me the chance to have lunch with them over Skype. We've touched base a time or two since then, and, when Rob revamped his Patreon a bit, I upped my pledge, earning me a Twitter shout-out from the pair of them. When that happened, I decided to revamp the TAPAS website so that it included teases of nearly all the projects I talked about in last week's blog post. Ultimately, their shout-out added up to six hits to the website and one new Twitter follower, Raven herself. But hey, Raven paying attention to what I have to say on Twitter is certainly a nice reward.

So, gosh, I guess this has been a pretty big week for TAPAS, now that I lay it all out. I was feeling down about not getting much done.

Doggo! Dear old boy Sebastian. This weekend my mom asked me if I'd like to have him once I move down to Quincy. I sure hope I can. It would be an honor, taking in the old family dog in his twilight years, being the guy to keep him healthy and happy to the end, make some memories with him in the first home that's all my own.

Got some tips from my friend Grace about moving to Quincy, seems it'll be a mite more complicated than I imagined it to be... I'll make it work. I'm gonna go down there and start TAPAS for real. Five years I've been working toward this goal... bit pathetic that a goal as simple as moving to a new city so I can do theatre junk has taken me five years. But hey, today I unpacked the suitcase that I brought home two months ago. Not on my own. My aunt had to barge in and tell me to clean up the piles of mess in my space... can't do a thing for myself. I can only do things for other people. That's why I hope someday people expect me to create content and entertainment.

So, that's this week... an unusually active week for TAPAS, but I hope that changes soon. As of last night, I'm working with Naty on writing Luno Canyon and with Kenzie on storyboarding The Choices... or rather, they're working on those things and I'm waiting for them to finish so I can provide my directorial input. That's just the way they wanted it. Gives me more time for all my other junk, lots of that, time to get to that on this fine Monday morning.