TGIF: Cindy Screams and Fertile Turtles

Hello and happy Friday, Patrons! I just got back from doing some Cindy Bear voiceover (read: a lot of ridiculous screaming) and I'm feeling good and loopy! That show is so sweet and ridiculous, I'm so grateful I get a chance to be a small part of it. For those that don't know, I get to voice Cindy Bear on the animated series Jellystone! on HBOmax. It's basically a reimagining of the Hannah Barbara universe, so there's all sorts of nostalgic characters from a ton of their old shows now coexisting in the absurd town of Jellystone. And shit gets whacky. I love it. They send me the scripts my character is in a day or two before the recording sessions so I get a chance to go over the material, and it's always a damn delight to read. Today's episodes touched on therapy and juice, and you wouldn't believe it, but things in the town go really wrong before they go right. There's two seasons already out on HBOmax if you're curious. Plus, episodes are only 15/20 minutes each so they're a breeze to go through. The show is so silly I hope it NEVER GETS CANCELLED AND CINDY AND I CAN CONTINUE THIS BEAUTIFUL RELATIONSHIP 4EVA!!!

And that's how you manifest, people.

The funniest part about this gig is that the more I record Cindy the more I see so many parallels of myself in her stressed-but-sugar-to-the-core, awkward-yet-over-achieving, people-pleasing-but-sometimes-aloofly-selfish character. Cindy is the town's resident doctor/scientist who has an intense passion for her profession. More often than not she finds herself in a situation where she's trying to be the best, but her fixation on perfection ultimately fucks something up. I mean....c'mon....that's so relatable Maury Povich doesn't need to run the DNA samples. So, not only are the recording sessions plain ol fun, they're sneaky lil reflective reminders to myself to stay loose goosey and be wary of the perfection stick getting lodged in your ass. Cute!

How are you doing this week? Got any kewl plans for the weekend? At the moment my weekend is WIDE OPEN. Which is a joy...and a slight burden when you have one of those excitedly indecisive brains that thinks of everything you could do until it drowns itself in possibility. I know for sure I'll be making my way through Bad Vibes Only, which I finally started this week and was practically skipping around my house with giddy glee because of how GOOD it is. I knew Nora was a great writer, I just didn't realize that she writes exactly the way I think. Errrr, rather, the hilariously edited, effortlessly profound way I wish my thoughts laid themselves out. I cannot wait for our livestream, I think it's going to be a blast to go through together! Btw I posted it earlier but the livestream will be Sunday, April 2nd at 1pm PST! Buckle up, bad vibers.

Speaking of fertile turtles....I wasn't, but I am now....here's an eggciting story. lololololololUHHHHH. Did you hear a 90 year old tortoise named Mr. Pickles just became the father of three new turtle babies? Well, now you've heard it. That's right, Mr. Pickles, who has been with his partner, MRS. PICKLES (I know!), since she arrived at the Houston zoo in 1996 just became the proud parents of...get this...Jalapeno, Dill, and Gherkin. *smacks forehead in pure joy* I KNOW! Side note, I think we should start naming human children Gherkin. According to the article, "it was an astounding feat, zoo officials said, not only because Mr. Pickles is 90 years old, but also because the critically endangered species rarely produces offspring." GET IT, PICKLES! Cue Michelle Yeoh yelling "don’t let anybody tell you you are ever past your prime. Never give up." The other amazing thing is that had a zoo employee not noticed Mrs. Pickles laying her eggs the babies may not have survived since the soil in Houston isn't ideal for keeping the eggs at the right temperature. The radiated tortoise is on the endangered species list, but continues to be in demand on the black market, so the surprise of these lil pickles is extra special. (That's how I feel when I order a tuna salad sandwich a diner and they throw in an extra pickle on the side.)

Hmmm let's see what else is going on? Oh! The other week I got a wild hair and ordered myself an easel and some canvases in the hopes of flirting with some painting for funzies. No expectations of making anything extraordinary, mostly because I genuinely don't know how to paint, but rather giving myself permission to engage in artful fuckery. I'm gonna do a little of my own research, but anyone know of any online painting courses/programs they'd recommend for a true beginner? I'm not looking to go the route of ASMR zaddy Bob Ross, instead I wanna mess around with some abstract expressions and see what happens. Give myself my own little art therapy corner to dip in and out of. I love taking art supplies with me when we take trips (😉) and let myself free paint. It's like improv with paints and when I'm finished I throw it in the airbnb's garbage for the raccoons to dissect and discuss. I think it'll be nice to have a zero expectation space to move through some moods. And I think it'll be a little more fun than the knitting I tried to get into a few years ago. No offense to knitting! It's just knot for me. LOLOLOLAHHHHH. Anyone getting into new hobbies? Let me know! 

Speaking of hobbies, Elliott put on the documentary Running with Speed  the other night. It's about the subculture of speedrunning in the gamer community, which I had never heard about until we watched this. Speedrunners are gamers who try to complete video games as fast as possible. Makes sense. The doc takes a look at the huge (and growing) community around them and highlights different key players. It also shows the incredible charity work/fundraising they do which is truly mind blowing. Fair warning, it's a looooong doc (we broke it up over two nights) but I found it fascinating and really parallel/reminiscent of the early days of Youtube. It was unexpectedly nostalgic and took me right back to the early 2010s Vidcon days. Except the speedrunning world seems wildly more wholesome, and yet to have a obnoxious duo of Paul brothers smash through their community and disrupt the peace. Te he he/sigh. Still, what a trippy time warp. It made me sweetly grateful and kinda emotional about the early era of content creation. What a purely passionate, supportive, and exciting time that was. *stares longingly out of a non rainy window* Anyway, just throwing that out there if you need a TV rec this weekend!

Alright, I'm gonna wrap this up for now and get back to reading some BVO! Have great weekends everyone! Thanks, as always, for being here! 💚G