Let me tell you, tonight is the annual Austin Chronicle Best of Austin party and even though I’ve been looking soooooo forward to it ALL I WANT TO DO IS GO HOME AND SLEEP.

My insomnia is 85% better now that I’ve backed off both the sleeping pills and the caffeine and my dreams have experienced a 95% increase in WTF. But my sleep is restless and my back is achey and hello what is going on, is this the blog of the old and withered? Want some licorice? Get off my lawn?

It’s damn near Halloween and I don’t have a costume. A friend is getting married the Saturday of that weekend, so in my head I think it’s a good reason to sit out any spooktastic festivities. But with Halloween brings the onset of the holidays. (Yay holidays!) Our British contingent will be traveling to Texas next month for a two-week visit. That’s going to be stellar. I haven’t started in with the Thanksgiving dinner menu palpitations just yet, but you can bet that’s on its way.

And Christmas? We’re going to spend it in Cambridge with Daniel’s family this year. Two years in row? (Yep, more on that later.) The first time I was in London for Christmas I was floored, FLOORED by street corner vendors selling fresh roasted chestnuts. That’s right. Actual chestnuts roasting on an open fire. For real. I flipped out like a kid watching cotton candy being made for the first time and kept pointing and shouting, “CHESTNUTS!! ROASTING!! ON. AN. OPEN. FIRE.”

Essentially I was this:

CHESTNUTS! ROASTING! ON AN OPEN FIRE!

After what can only be the longest break I’ve had off from improv since I started, I’m finally in Level 5. After an entire session of The Harold, I’m having trouble turning off the “tie everything together” plot-focused mentality to get back in the mindset of character development. Maybe I should find a Level 3 to sit in on to brush up those skills. Being away from improv for as long as I was, and being a total asshole and not checking out shows in the interim, got my attention span dangerously close to spinning off the improv radar. I need to fix this quick because I know how I am with the follow through. EYES ON THE PRIZE, WOODROFFE.