I really should use an outline.....or maybe simply stay on point....

It's like a cry in the night, really.
The thing you don't want to hear.
And after you hear it the first time, you dread it's second coming.

The sound of a computer giving up the ghost.

And now, with every little sound that comes out of the shiny metal box, I fear that it's going to happen again.

WELL THE JOKES ON IT, 'CAUSE THERE'S NOTHING ON THE DAMNED THING THAT IT CAN EAT THIS TIME!

Time for a little subject change.....


I don't know what's happening in the rest of the world, but from my window, it has once again blown in some kind of Alberta Clipper or Chinook wind or something, and it's cold again. And dreary. I don't mind cold and dreary, mind you. I come from the land of Michigan, so I'm familiar with cold and dreary. I went to college with cold and dreary. I was a little put off by cold, but wound up having a tumultuous affair with dreary, and although it wasn't what you would call exhilarating, it was....

Nah, it really wasn't.

Anyway.

The tradition of family at Easter was upheld again this year, in fine style, here at Casa Historiclemo, otherwise known as the HaHa Hacienda. Lots of food (and yes, I do raise a finger in the kitchen now and again), and plenty of eggs for the children to hunt....which they did. Everybody seemed to have a good time. All thirty three of them. Even the nieces, nephews and smallish cousins didn't grate me like lemon rind.

And, you don't really have to entertain when you can put the HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 2 dvd on upstairs, and the NCAA tournament on downstairs.

It makes me wonder what my life would have been like if I grew up in a huge family like the one my darling wife comes from. Perhaps I would have been a little more gregarious.

There is one strange tradition, though. For some reason, after a few drinks, everybody gets really interested in how many "famous" people I know. I try to tell them that all the people I know are famous.....but they want to know what Zac Efron's like (and I only knew him briefly, back when he was like 16 or so), or how many people I've worked with that are in films, television, or on Broadway (seven, all told, none of which any of my family have heard of).

And then they wonder why I'm not famous.

And then, I tell them this story:

Years ago, when I was an actor, I would look forward each year to those regional cattlecall auditions. You go, you peddle your flesh for eight or so hours, and then you schmooze with old friends in to the wee hours. And sometimes, you're good; and sometimes, you're not so good. Sometimes, the job people want to talk; and sometimes they don't.

One year, they didn't want to talk. At all.

So, I'm sitting in a hallway outside a room where the person I was dating at the time was interviewing for something, and along come these two young ladies. They don't notice me sitting on my briefcase, reading a book. The conversation is about some poor schmuck who didn't get many callbacks.

"God, he usually does so well at these things"
"He must be devastated."

I'm paying little attention, really. You hear that kind of crap all the time.
But then...

"I hope Clemo's okay about it."

WHHAAAAAT?

My first brush with fame; I get anonymous people talking about me. About my FAILURE, which is typical for theatre people...we're kinda bitchy like that.

My response to this conversation? I lowered my book and said kindly,

"Actually, I'm okay with it."

Now, keep in mind that they could have stopped, and we could have had a laugh about the odds of talking about somebody you don't know at just the moment when you're passing that person you don't know.....but no. They just kept walking, and had the nerve to look insulted that I had overheard them.

I have a lot of stories like that. They start strong, get jumbled in the middle, and sort of.....just......peter out.

I could have just said to my family: Fame sucks.

But that seemed to understate it.