I Am a Weak, Weak Man

All in all, I had a bit of a stellar weekend. Frankly, almost all of last week was pretty good. I don't want to jinx myself, or anything, but life is feeling pretty darn good these days. Granted, there's a lot I'm not happy about - my weight, the size of my savings account - but frankly, that doesn't make me very different from a vast number of Americans, and by comparison, my problems pale next to those of most of the world.

So, it's all good, friends.

Really, the only thing I have to bitch about is the fact that I'm getting next to no sleep, lately. And I can't even blame that on anything that's particularly worrying me in my life... I've finally got the culprit figured out: It's my mattress.

When Jesse Bernstein left to go do Brighton Beach Memoirs in Philadelphia, he knew that he wouldn't be coming back to the apartment, so I bought his mattress, thinking at the time that I would end up moving into his old room, and sleeping on the platform that John & Gary had left in that room.

As it turned out, I ended up moving into Maya's room and using her furniture for a long time. Only recently, when Maya spent a few days in town before going off to Utica to work on a film, did we sort out all the furniture and move everything into everyone's appropriate rooms - which means that for most of the last 1½ months, I've been sleeping on the mattress I bought from Jesse.

And it's hard!

So I'm looking for suggestions. Anyone have any ideas on how to make a mattress that's too hard a little less painful to sleep on? I was thinking perhaps a mattress cover filled with down, or something.

Thing is, I have a perfectly good set of bedroom furniture still sitting in Gavan's guest room which I'm going to get at some point, but I'm not sure when, and my mental health (and the physical safety of those who have to deal with me on a daily basis) won't wait - but I'm reluctant to blow even more money on a new mattress when I know I've got a perfectly comfortable mattress (and headboard and baseboard and chest of drawers and armoire) waiting for me. In fact, it may just be nostalgia, but I remember that bed being the most comfortable I've ever slept on.

So congratulations are in order to Doug Rees, who got the word last Thursday that after four (do I have that right?) auditions, he's gotten a part in the Wilma Theater's production of the new Arthur Miller play! It's not exactly a world premiere, since it was done once at The Guthrie Theatre, but it's being billed as an East Coast Premiere, which is pretty darn cool.

We went out to celebrate on Wednesday night, and I had a bit more to drink than I usually do. All in all, I think I had something like seven glasses of wine. We were snockered, there's no getting around it.

I'm a bit of a happy drunk, by the way. It happens so rarely that I'm never quite sure what kinda drunk I am, but if we're going by Thursday night, I'm a happy one. Go figure.

Thankfully, on Friday I only had to work from 9 to noon, because of the Council's summer hours program, so I met my gay.com friend Tony for lunch, and in my first-ever hair-of-the-dog episode (how on earth I got to be 39 years old without requiring a hangover-relieving glass of alcohol, I'll never know) I had a beer with lunch. Which is, in itself, not much in the way of news, except that it sure as hell made me sleep well Friday night.

Saturday I woke up refreshed and went off to meet the lovely Lagemae for a viewing of Northfork. Interesting movie... not sure if it's going to go down in my book as my favorite of the Polish brothers' films, but it sure was visually stunning. I'll give them this much: The Polish brothers are gonna take their time unspooling their story for you, and if you don't like it you can damn well shut up about it. Their films like to go at a...um, leisurely pace.

After the film, Kevin, Kirsten and I made for the West Village, where the delightful Shannon Brown had arranged a dinner out for a number of her friends. Eleven of them, to be exact! Doug joined us on his second outing with the faction of my friends, and I have to say it's really very neat to be able to bring two different parts of my life together and have them mesh so well. Now if I could only convince "The Gays" that "The Straights" are fun to hang out with too, maybe I wouldn't feel so fractured, socially.

We met up at the Caliente Cab Company for dinner and drinks, and a good time was had by all - I think. I know I did. Afterward, Shannon and the gang had planned on going to Marie's Crisis for a little piano bar action, but the Lagemae weren't feeling up to it, so Doug and I joined them for a cocktail at a bar/restaurant they had discovered in the Village called Vivaldi. It was really nice, and I had a really good glass of wine, too. I broke my promise not to drink for the rest of the weekend, after having withstood the temptation to suck down margaritas at the Cab Co. Alas, I'm a weak, weak man.