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Bee_Gee42
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read my profile
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Name: Bil
Country: United States
State: Illinois
Metro: Chicago
Birthday: 5/5/1981
Gender: Male
Interests: Theatre, film, Devon "MacG." (for anonymity's sake), wine and beer! music, mustard -- mustard? Better than cheese...Existentialism, Transcendentalism, literature, photography, art in general. M.C. Escher is my favorite. Who is yours?
Expertise: I am an expert in your mom. OOOOOOOH!
Occupation: Artist
Industry: Art
Message: message me
Member Since:
11/5/2004
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| This is like euthanasia for this blog, a mercy killing. It has been requested of me that I write one last blog up here to provide closure. I'm on MySpace; furthermore, I am a contributing editor for tipyourwaiter.org, a highly acclaimed and influential website...or at least it will be.
It's been a good ride. I started up on Xanga back in '04, around the time of the Great Election, where the nation somehow re-elected a president who was never elected to begin with. I'm not gonna wax bitter about that, I feel the time for resentment, if there is an end to it, surely must already have passed. But I wrote about that election quite a bit, as I recall, and as the lights slowly shone again on the rest of the world I began to contemplate other matters as well.
This was my first real weblog. I've kept a personal, private journal for much longer than I have kept a blog, and the blog is a nice contrast. It forces me to sharpen my wit, polish my prose, and prepare myself for any intellectual battles I find myself in. I write with full awareness that other people will be reading this, unlike the private journal. Hence, my blogs must make more sense, be more coherent. For the most part, I feel successful in this aspect -- coherency -- as well as in other areas.
Mainly, the reason I'm leaving Xanga has little to do with Xanga itself; I am not necessarily a comments-monger, though they are nice, but I understand that other people don't appreciate being forced to create an account just to participate in one discussion, and that admittedly has been a factor in my decision to move away from Xanga.
There was also MySpace. I started a MySpace account because I knew that there were more people to be reached, and MySpace comes with the "Bulletin" feature, which almost forces people to read your announcements. I had signed up to run an AIDS Marathon, and used MySpace to fund raise (fed the need to reach as many people as possible, see). But MySpace grew on me, it was fun, and I slowly, ever so slowly began to blog there more than on Xanga, especially after the Marathon was run.
And now that I'm writing for tipyourwaiter.org, I simply have no time or energy for this Xanga blog. And so I lay it to rest with this, my final Xanga post, a self-eulogizing blurb, a brief and incomplete history. This site will remain on the net for as long as the world turns, in case anyone wants to read the archives. It's all here. I simply won't be posting anymore articles, that's all.
But I, Bil, am not going to stop writing. No. As I said, I am active on MySpace and tipyourwaiter.org. Follow me there. Let us leave this dreary world.
Farewell, Xanga, you have been good to me. I will remember you fondly.
Goodnight.
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| I know. I'm a horrible Xangaloid. I never, never, update, ever, it's true. I don't. I suck.
Honestly, I am actually more into MySpace these days. I kind of hated it at first, but now I know my way around it and it's really pretty fun. The thing about it that threw me at first is that it's not really heavily geared towards the blog aspect at all. It's kind of about, well, everything else. But there's a lot to love.
Look, I don't want to sit here and rationalize my behavior. Two blogs is a bit much to maintain, and I seem to have made my choice. Not that I've been all that active there, either, but when I do write anything it's usually over there. I will make a final decision when things are calmer and I have more space to breathe.
Life has been quite hectic lately, as I am not only working full-time downtown, but also I am acting in a play -- not just any play, but "Proof" by David Auburn, a show in which I play a talkative geek with a lot of lines -- and of course there's still Starbucks on the weekends. I say I'm busy, but in a good way. I love this play, and I'm super excited to be playing the role of Hal, which is incidentally my first-ever romantic leading role.
As for my downtown job, I am now working in a non-profit organization that helps schools improve performance by helping teachers, principals, and parents. This one is not a temp gig, but a real permanent position. This is good for both money and health benefits, which I was sorely lacking up till now.
And Starbucks...well, as of March 10 I will no longer be working for the giant. While I do feel a teensy little hint of sorrow, for I do enjoy working with the people that I work with there, and I do enjoy not paying for coffee, it will be a magical feeling to have only one job and not just make enough money to get by but actually save money. That was the dream all along when we moved to Chicago -- one day job and theatre nights and weekends. Oh, the glory days are just ahead...
I recently received my first professional writing credit. It was part of a night of one-acts which were all written and staged in 24 hours, and performed that very night. Mine was well-received, which makes me very, very happy. Sitting in the audience before the show that I wrote was as nerve-racking as sitting in the audience before a show that I directed. It's thrilling and terrifying, and ultimately very rewarding.
And that's why I'm so scattered. That's all. There will be more later, and I'm sure it will make sense. In the meantime...it's Joe time.
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| Hey, National Restaurant Association – I hate to burst your bubble, but working in fast food is demeaning and unpleasant. | | |
| I have been tagged by Devon -- challeged, dared even -- to come up with five things you might not know about me. This will be hard, since the paparazzi follows me constantly and now everyone knows everything. But here goes:
1.) My middle name is Pendleton. William Pendleton, after whom I was named, was second in command to General Thomas Jonathon "Stonewall" Jackson during the Civil War.
I couldn't find a picture of William Pendleton, so here is one of "Stonewall."
Addendum: My brother's name is Thomas (although his middle name is not Stonewall).
2.) I play the tenor saxophone, but before that I played the clarinet. In second grade, I became the youngest-ever student in my school district not just to join the District Honor Band, but to play first chair. To date, I think I still hold that record.
Sexy.
3.) Speaking of lasting but useless glory from my childhood...When I was in eighth grade, some friends and I participated in our school lip sync contest. We dressed like idiot geeks and "performed" a rendition of "Earth Angel" so nerdy that "Weird Al" Yankovic would have been proud. It was critically acclaimed and the audience loved us. Somehow we didn't win the grand prize - but to this date they still show the video of our performance to students when announcing the annual contest.
I'm the cute one.
4.) In college for about two weeks I was the lead singer of a band. We were called Actors Out On Loan. We never performed live, but we did cut a Christmas EP. Eventually, though, like any good rock band, it turned out that the other guy and I hated each other so much that we had to break up. Seriously, he turned into a real dick.
(No pirated audio available...not sure why.)
5.) I possess impressively decent drawing skills. When I was young, I wanted to be a cartoonist. When I had free time, I made animated short films, drawing all the frames out by hand. I could have been someone...I could have been a contender...
I know it's dated. Don't judge.
And now I get to tag someone...I would tag Trevor, but evidently his blog has ascended to Blog Heaven, so I instead tag my sister Jennifer. You're it!
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| Okay, year, so far we're off to a bad start. I've screwed up an audition that I really cared about, I've been sick, I've been offered an extension of the same low-wage temp job and I took it when I really should be searching for higher-paying work, I lost an amazingly cool hat, I was rejected for an editorial PA gig on a big-ass Warner Brothers film, Devon has a creepy stalker, my boss at Starbuck's screwed up my paycheck, I'm tired, I'm poor, and I watched the Mel Gibson version of "Hamlet" (which sucks). For your eight-day performance review, 2007, I'm going to mark you down as "needs improvement."
Let's take another look on the 16th of January and see how we're doing.
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