2010: A Year In Review

(525,600 minutes. That's how you measure it. Also, in love.)

And so 2010 comes to a close. What a year it's been. Here's a quick look back.

Remember the 2010 Vancouver Olympics? Sure you do! That was THIS YEAR! I know, it doesn't seem like it, but it was. There were a lot of great stories that came out of the Olympics. Shawn White, Apollo Anton Ohno, Lindsey Vonn and Evan Lysacek I'm looking at you, but not only at you. So many great champions, and it was also really great to hear the Canadian National Anthem sung so many times in victory by the proud host country. OOOO CAAAANADAAAAA!!!!!

This year I saw a lot of movies. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World was my favorite movie of the year, but almost nobody saw it but me. Netflix it, y'all. You're missing out. Toy Story 3 made grown ups cry on its way to becoming the top grossing movie of the year. Everyone became very focused on spinning tops in Inception. 3-D movies were all the rage. Dragons were trained. Island's were shuttered. Titans clashed. Disney called Rapunzel "Tangled" so people would go see it, and it paid off. Sex and The City 2 was universally hated. And in the end, we learned the kids were indeed all right.

"The Bed Intruder Song" Youtube video took a news story about an almost rape, and made lemonade out of some really nasty lemons. Cee Lo Green gave the world one of the most amazing songs ever written which I spent many a day dancing in and out work listening to on my ipod. The Glee Cast dominated the charts by singing songs that were already dominating the charts. They also did a fun live concert tour. Lady Gaga wore meat dresses and made long-form music videos and went from someone I really wanted to punch in the face to someone who was kinda totally awesome. Bieber Fever exploded. Miley Cyrus imploded. LiLo went about as crazy as you can go without actually dying.

Roughly 37 million Hollywood icons actually died. Betty White lived it up like no one else. Simon Cowell left Am.Idol. Mia Michaels returned to an All-Star Season of SYTYCD. I broke up with Project Runway for good. Lil Russell lost back-to-back seasons of Survivor. The first All-Female team won at The Amazing Race. Lots of people (but not me) watched Jersey Shore and Teen Mom. Lost came to a mythologically frustrating, but emotionally satisfying conclusion. After months of drama Jennifer Grey finally vanquished Bristol Palin to the mirroball trophy on DWTS in an emotionally satisfying conclusion. True Blood focused on Vampires. Twilight: Eclipse focused on werewolves. The Walking Dead focused on zombies. Tiger Woods focused on apologizing for having 18,000 mistresses. The original Law & Order was inexplicably canceled right before it became the longest-running prime time drama in history. Jay Leno stole back The Tonight Show from Conan O'Brien when Jay's horrible new show tanked. Team Coco was born, Conan went on live tour and then got a new show on TBS. I'm with Coco.

It Gets Better became a national movement to help Gay Teens survive bullying and discrimination. Don't Ask Don't Tell was repealed. The 9/11 First Responders Bill finally passed Congress. Health Care reform finally passed on Congress. Prop 8 was overturned in California but is still extended indefinitely awaiting appeal. There are still roughly 83 wars going on across the world and none of them are going well. We continue to pray for our troops in harm's way and hope they can come home soon. Mid-term elections gave the House of Representatives to the Republicans but less than half the country is aware of it. Witchypoo Christine O'Donnell lost her Senate bid. So did Crazypants Sharron Angle. Michele Bachmann remained at large and was actually named to the House Intelligence Committee (!!!). Wikileaks had a field day declassifying all sorts of documents. There was a lot Tea Party anger, right wing fear-mongering, left wing hand wringing, a huge trumped up fight over building a cultural center a few blocks away from Ground Zero and a very nice rally to Restore Sanity And/Or Fear organized by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert held in our Nation's Capital.

The world faced horrible natural disasters with the earthquakes in Haiti, the volcano eruptions in Iceland and the Gulf Oil spill that raged on and on. This is just to name a few. The Chilean miners were trapped ungerground and eventually, amazingly rescued. To close the year out, some big ol' storms dropped non-stop rain in California and dumped multiple feet of snow across the Eastern Coastline right at the end of the year creating quite a mess for everybody who was traveling for the holidays.

This year we also learned about vuvuzelas, met Paul the Octopus and cheered for Spain's World Cup win. At least I did. Also good for Sports in Spain? RAFAEL NADAL. Our Hero fought his way back to the No. 1 ranking, winning the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open along the way to complete his career Grand Slam. I still can't believe I was at Roland Garros for the French Open Final. I went to Paris! Yay! Also the Saints won the Super Bowl, The SF Giants won the World Series, The Lakers won the NBA Finals, the Chicago Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup, and did I mention how well Rafa did this year??? I love him so much. But credit where credit is due, Roger Federer won the Aussie Open to begin the year and the Tour Finals to end it. Roger and Rafa also made this amazing video which still makes me smile whenever I watch it.

So that was the year at large. When I personally look back at 2010, I will remember it as being one of the most artistically satisfying years of my life so far. I started things out with a Die Vampire, Die! Workshop run by Susan Blackwell. It put me in a great creative mindset going forward. I sent my play into the Fringe Festival through Mind The Art Entertainment, got to do some singing on stage, took some improv classes where I met a great girl, had The Timing of A Day get accepted into Fringe and then we were off and running from like April to September. Putting up my first show in New York was a grueling, exciting, informative, scary and wonderful experience. I feel so lucky for the friendships that were made during the production and the existing ones that were strengthened through the process. The outpouring of support from people was so so soooo appreciated. To create something and have it put up on stage was a dream I always had for myself, but one I'd increasingly felt would not happen. But now has! And the show did really well for itself. And the experience brought into focus for me for what I want to continue to pursue in 2011. Since the end of Fringe, the production team has been working really hard to bring the show back and we look forward to making that a reality in 2011. I've also taken the last couple months to write three 10-minute plays and another full length one, on top of my blogging and, you know, work. So I'm keeping the creative inspiration going and continuing to write. Also I found time to see 30 performances by friends this year, plus 16 Broadway Shows and NYC Ballets. Looking back over the playbills and tickets stubs, everybody did a lot of great work this year. Super Inspiring!

There were plenty other personal highlights: another NYC marathon run, my delightful trip to Paris, my cameo in LMM's viral wedding video and lots more. For all the good things, there were a lot of painful times too, and the thought that keeps popping up in my head is that challenging times and painful experiences should not be allowed to prevent us from seeing the many blessings around us or experiencing the joy that can still be had. I take from 2010 a sense of accomplishment and an awareness that there is so much more work to be done.

Bring it, 2011!

DADT Repealed! An Updated Look at the Oppress-O-Meter

So yesterday was a little weird. Don't Ask Don't Tell, the much derided military policy banning gays from serving openly in the U.S. Armed Forces, was repealed by the Senate. Hooray! Soon it will be off the books forever. This is an amazing development, as it seemed like a dead issue only a few days ago. To briefly recap, the legislation ending the ban on gays had previously been included in a larger Pentagon policy bill, and Republicans refused to let the whole bill go forward, like they've refused every bill to go forward, because they'd rather point to how the country is falling apart under Obama than work to improve things. Or if you want to be charitable, because they thought dealing with taxes and spending was so important they couldn't deal with anything first, even if it was ready to be brought forward. Repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell had its Republican backers, but they refused to join in cutting off a filibuster against the larger Pentagon bill. So all looked lost.

Then, in an odd twist, occasional throwers-of-the-monkey-wrench Senators Joe Lieberman (Independent "Democrat") and Senator Susan Collins of Maine ("Moderate" Republican), had Dem leaders in the House of Reps pass a measure earlier in this week that was a stand alone repeal of the ban. So outgoing House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and Rep. Patrick Murphy (aka Congressman Awesome) did and it passed the House. Then Lieberman and Collins introduced the same bill in the Senate, and when it came up for cloture they had the 60 votes to end the filibuster and then it passed the Senate. It's a huge huge step in the right direction for equal rights and it's really exciting. It's a fulfilled promise by President Obama to have the ban repealed through legislation, and it's a career accomplishment for Patrick "Congressman Awesome" Murphy, a veteran of the Iraq War who worked tirelessly to see this bill get through the House (he actually got it through twice. Bravo.) Murphy lost his re-election bid this November, but it must be hugely satisfying to him that he got the job done on his watch. It's hugely satisfying to me.

You may ask, "If this is so satisfying, O, why are you not super happy?" Well, it goes like this: Even though the Senate did the right thing on this issue they are still acting like total douche bags on several other issues. And in one instance where the Senate actually got things right, The House then decided to go nutso.

We'll begin with the Senate, a body where the minority party has decided we no longer need to do any business by a simple majority. Any motion that does not have a super majority of 60 will get filibustered. This means even though the majority would vote to pass things. it's not allowed to get that far.

This is the case for the DREAM Act, that would create a pathway to citizenship for some illegal immigrants who entered the United States as children and who then went on and completed additional requirements including attending college or serving in the military for at least two years, and passing criminal background checks. Only 55 Senators voted for it, so it doesn't go any further.

This is ALSO the case with the James Zadroga 9/11 Health & Compensation Act, which failed to advance past a procedural vote in the Senate on Dec. 9th, on the grounds that Republicans didn't like how it was paid for and again because they refused to allow votes on anything until taxes were addressed. Not allowing this vote before the end of the year is just disgusting. Republican Senators invoke 9/11 all the time, but they don't want to help the ailing first responders? They dump billions and billions into foreign wars but get nitpicky about money when it comes to aiding sick heroes? It infuriates me. Hopefully, renewed pressure from Jon Stewart and other members of the media, the Senate Republicans will be embarrassed into allowing an up or down vote.

Beyond that, there is also START, the Nuclear Arms Treaty with Russia, which Republicans in the Senate may also try to scuttle for bizarre logic. They claim the treaty would limit development of U.S. offensive and defensive missile systems, despite everyone telling them that's not the case. They also aren't keen on cutting atomic weapons and don't like Obama's goal of eliminating all nukes. The START treaty would commit Russia and the United States to cut deployed strategic nuclear weapons to 1,550 for each side within seven years. 1,550 nuclear weapons aren't enough to blow up the entire planet? We have 1,551 strategic targets to aim at?

President Obama, along with our military leaders and a horde of Republicans who were former administration officials, have been arguing that it's crucial to have the new treaty so inspections of Russia's nuclear facilities can resume. The old START treaty expired a year ago. And even though nine Republicans voted with Democrats to at least allow debate on the treaty, it's hardly a lock that all of them will vote to support its passage, which needs 67 votes to pass the Senate since it's a treaty. So that may or may not happen. Scary.

And if all THAT wasn't enough, the House decided to lose its collective mind and killed the International Protecting Girls by Preventing Child Marriage Act of 2010. The bill would have recognized child marriage as a human rights violation, and developed comprehensive strategies to prevent those marriages around the world. The legislation had strong bipartisan support in the Senate, but was voted down in the House by Republicans who said the bill is too costly and could lead to increased abortions??? The bill had nothing to do with abortions. It's an argument with no basis in reality. But when has that stopped them from using that kind or argument before?

So just to recap where we currently stand on the oppress-o-meter:

Gays are (increasingly) okay. But still not quite equal citizens

Below them:

First Responders, who may or may not ever get a dignified response

Below them:

Immigrants, again with a DREAM deferred.

Below them:

Child Brides. So so sad.

We applaud progress when it comes. But one good vote in the face of four potential terrible ones over the course of the week does not work out to a good percentage. Our elected officials need to wake up and and allow votes on bills that protect us and improve our standard of living. These should be no-brainers. We must demand our officials stop with the partisan bullshit and get this stuff done NOW. I'm not asking you to do it, Senate. I'm telling.

O's Christmas Tree: 2010 Edition

Seasons Greetings all. It has been difficult to write this month, since I've been trying to finish up two short plays for submission, and post-writing actually takes time (it only LOOKS like it was thrown together in under five minutes.) so all writing time has gone to that. But now those are mostly under control, so I can post again. Woohoo!

It's Christmastime! Accordingly I have set up this year's tree. Here's a picture:

Nice, eh? There was very little fuss this year. The biggest drama was figuring out where my tree lot had gone. There's a good one that always sets up shop on my corner. but they had to move a few blocks down this year because the new owner of the property where they used to be decided to be a dick and not let them set up shop there again. Boo-urns to that Scrooge, I say.

Anyway, I walked right up to the lot and saw the tree I wanted. Usually I have to go back and forth between a couple, but this one I knew right away. Helping me decorate is an old friend I found over Thanksgiving weekend.

YES. It's Professor Coldheart!! Old nemesis of the Care Bears. In case you're not up on his situation, there is this:



He is the best. We had a great time decorating the tree together. The newest edition to the tree is my Moulin Rouge windmill that I got in Paris. You can see it has a place of great honor near the Shirt Tales ornament which is the oldest ornament I have on my tree.

I have to go buy some more ornaments. I love getting new editions each year. There's always room on the tree for more!

Tomorrow morning is xmas and birthday shopping for the nieces and nephew in the City. Wish me luck! Happy Holidays!

(Don't mess with the Professor!)