July 7, 2004
10:03am Wednesday

A LOT GOES ON BUT NOTHING HAPPENS

As you may have gathered from my entries, I'm a horrible hypochondriac. Not so much so that I have to take OCD medicine for it or anything, but enough that you could ask me if I think I've got a brain tumor at any point during the day and I'd say yes. I'll say it: my body scares me. It's my mother's fault for being a nurse and for giving me Gray's Anatomy when I was eight. So needless to say getting blood drawn isn't my favorite thing and I become the World's Best Procrastinator when faced with it, and then the World's Most Anxious Anticipator until it's over. And really, what is it? It's a couple vials of blood coming out of my arm. People say to me, "You get a period every month. What's the difference?" The difference is that while the lifeblood is being sucked from me through a needle I can feel my heart strain to beat harder to keep up with the loss. Gray says this is ridiculous, but I felt it this morning. Frankly, after giving those three vials, I'm lucky I'm alive.

On the off chance that any of you are fearful blood-givers like me, here's a cool trick: you can lay down if you want. The man before me in line was apparently scared just like me, and he got to lay down. So when it was my turn I said, "I'd like that too, please," and the nice blood-taker said sure. Another good trick is to bring your iPod and play Hardknox's "Attitude" super loud so you can't hear the replacement vials clacking into place.

I had to fast for 12 hours before going. Never did I want popcorn after dinner so badly in my LIFE last night.

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I'm still working on Huckabees. Whereas a normal 3/4" double reel will result in nineteen pages of dialogue, each Huckabees tape has been averaging forty. They talk, talk, talk all the time. Thankfully it's not all drudgery -- I've been laughing out loud in parts, which is rare for me. I did it during A Mighty Wind and I think once on Starsky & Hutch (and then there's SINGING out loud, which I did for Justin To Kelly, but that's another story) but there have been a couple of pretty great comedy moments in this. Like when Lily Tomlin's running across a lawn and a sprinkler hits her and she goes "Shit! Fuck!" Perhaps you have to see it to really feel it, but I promise it's genius.

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I just remembered I have to go to the dentist at 2:30. That's two medical buildings in one day. Can I handle it? Maybe I can get them to file down the front tooth I chipped on the coffee cup ten months ago. Oh, dear. I hope they keep the smelling salts handy.