Filed by Lance at 10:50 pm under Shameless Plugs, The Arts
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For those that don’t know me, I’m Lance. Trevor and Bil have been kind enough to bring me on board as a fellow fighter in the performative trenches, and I owe them a blog post. First ever. No pressure. Okay. Here goes.

This past weekend, I took a group of former theater students of mine to see my high school. They’re now eighth graders, and are all thinking about which college prep or high schools to apply to. The exact nature of my old high school could fill a whole blog itself, but all you need to know is that I come from an extreme and hard core nerd background. The Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, my high school alma mater, only has classes four days a week, and on Wednesdays, students complete some kind of inquiry-based project. Students basically do a miniature thesis or dissertation, forming the questions, testing hypotheses about the outcomes, and in general, following the scientific method to arrive at some kind of conclusion, which are all presented as formal research.

In addition to the math and science faculty, IMSA was the first place I ever met people who have Doctorates in crazy things like History or English, and had a lot to do with me doing a 180 from particle physics to theater direction.
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Filed by Bil at 9:46 pm under Shameless Plugs, The Arts
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My day job is soooo boring…

“How boring is it?”

It is so boring that I have time to ponder abstract questions like the following:

Is it better to stand on the shoulders of giants, or to be a giant?

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Filed by Trevor at 1:59 am under Activism, Fightin' Words, Gay Agenda, Homophobia, Love, Politics
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“What is the “gay agenda” anyway? Is it assless wedding gowns?” — Margaret Cho

“Marriage is one of the basic civil rights of man, fundamental to our very existence and survival. To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State’s citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discrimination. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.” — Earl Warren, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States; Loving vs. Virginia, 1967

For want of the ability to officially voice my opposition to Proposition 8 in my home state on Election Day, this past Saturday I joined 2,000 others in a massive protest against the measure — itself just one cog in a wheel that spanned the entire country in one coordinated effort. I feel the events of the day were covered more eloquently by Bil’s earlier post, so I will say simply that twice in as many weeks I have joyfully marched the streets of Downtown Chicago, and at no other point in my adult life have I ever felt so connected as I do now. Regardless of what lies ahead for us as a community and for us as a nation, there is relief and hope in the knowledge that this is a city of kindred spirits.
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Filed by Bil at 10:54 pm under Fightin' Words, Gay Agenda, Homophobia, Social Issues
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Ever the supportive straight guy, I went with Trevor downtown Chicago this weekend to the protest against California’s Prop 8. It was a rally that turned into a march throughout the Loop and up the Magnificent Mile. It was, as they say, really something. It’s hard to describe right now beyond the basic facts, so I guess I can start with those. The rally had several speakers, highlights of which included Pastor Sherrie Lowly of the Berry United Methodist Church in Lincoln Square, which, coincidentally, was the location of a play I saw the night before; also speaking was Illinois State Representative (13th District) Greg Harris. The 13th District apparently includes my neighborhood…also coincidentally.

The events of the day are still swirling in my head, so I apologize if this post seems loosely structured. I’m sorry. I’M SORRY, PEOPLE! I AM BUT ONE MAN!
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Filed by Bil at 10:27 pm under Depression, Love, Social Issues
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I wrote “LOVE” on my arm today to show support for those battling depression, self-mutliation, destructive addictions, or contemplating suicide. There is an organization called To Write Love on Her Arms and today was their official annual day where you do this.
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Filed by Bil at 11:20 pm under Activism, General
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All righty then.

It’s been a while. Apologies. I have a handful of excuses for disappearing from this blog, one of them being the absence of my own personal laptop at home. There have been three posts in the last two and a half months, and they were so far in between that tipyourwaiter.org can be considered “dormant” for that time period.

But that time period is over now. I have my laptop again. And I didn’t even have to bribe anyone.
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