Emily Kaye Lazzaro

Guys, so you might know that I volunteer as a dog walker at the MSPCA.  It’s true!  I go on Tuesdays at 7am because I like how smug I can be when I wake up early to volunteer.  It’s called Being A Good Person.  So, a little background about the MSPCA volunteer training: it’s really intense.  The woman who is in charge of dog behavior stuff is like a Ph.D. in dog behavior (they have those) and she developed this system to train dog walking volunteers.  It’s called Safewalk and you can read about it yourself, I’m not here to educate you, I’m here to entertain you, make no mistake.  The point is that you have to go through a lot of training and a lot of hours of volunteering to move up the ranks until you can walk the crazy big dogs who drag you around and head butt you all the time.  I’m only two trainings in (ugh the process seriously takes SO LONG) which means I can only walk “green” dogs, i.e. chihuahuas and yorkies and other little baby things.  And up until this morning I hadn’t walked any dogs at all on my own because those little “green” dogs get snatched up really quick by people who live in apartments so they don’t stick around on the adoption floor for long.  BUT.  This morning they were understaffed and there were TWO “green” dogs (Can I stop putting quotes around green now?  I’m going to stop.  We get it.) and I walked both of them!!  By myself.  It was the best.  Oh, and I also shadowed a more advanced volunteer who took Georgie out.  Here’s a little bit more about some cute dogs, maybe if you live near Boston and you are looking for a dog you should go adopt one of these fools instead of getting one from a breeder.  Cheaper, too.

Georgie

Georgie is a medium-sized mutt who is black with white paws and floppy, soft beagle-y ears.  Stop it with your white paws, dogs!  It is too cute and it makes me love you too much!  You have little white shoes on like a grandpa.  Stop it!  Come let me squeeze them.  I shadowed the walker with Georgie so we didn’t bond that much.  Also it was hectic in there and the other dogs were all like TAKE ME OUT, I HAVE TO PEE SO BAD RIGHT NOW so we took Georgie on a little jaunt around the building and that was that.

Pee-Wee

So Pee-Wee is probably actually not named Pee-Wee, but is in fact in a kennel recently vacated by this dog who was adopted who was named Pee-Wee.  As a result, I don’t know what Pee-Wee’s real name is.  I called her Pee-Wee this morning and I’ll call her Pee-Wee now and you can’t stop me.  She is the cutest!  She’s this tiny black schnauzer mix and I’m in love with her.  When I put her leash on and let her out of her kennel she literally slipped out of her harness and TORE AROUND THE ADOPTION FLOOR like a maniac.  But she’s so small that it was just very cute and not at all threatening.  She freaked all the other dogs out pretty good.  I picked her up (she’s probably like eight pounds) and put her stuff back on, and as this was the first time I’d taken a dog out by myself I was like “oh holy shit, I’m not cut out for this, I’m going to lose this tiny dog and then I’ll be black listed from volunteering here or ever owning a dog ever.”  But the rest of the walk went smoothly.  We walked.  We ran.  She rolled over and let me pet her belly.  A good time was had by all!

Emu

Haha.  That’s a picture of an emu.  Emu the dog isn’t on Petfinder yet because she just got spayed and is ready for adoption next week.  She is a doll and a half.  She’s this chihuahua-sized puppy of another breed and nobody knows what she is, but I don’t care, we’re in love.  She’s black and silky soft and she was VERY NERVOUS to go for a walk.  She was jazzed to get out of her kennel but when we started walking she kept getting under my feet and seemed like she really just wanted to burrow underneath me.  She kind of panicked when we got to the outside and I had to pick her up and take her to the grass.  She wasn’t super into walking so we found a quiet spot and snuggled for about fifteen minutes which SWOON.  Dogs, you guys just don’t even understand the power you have over me.  Oh, you just want to snuggle?  Oh, okay, I’m not going to get emotionally attached to that at all, NOT.  Haha, good “not” joke.  Anyway, in conclusion, Emu can live in my pocket forever now, right?  Right.  The end.

Guys, check out the Upcoming page for some new stuff.  I have a production at a festival coming up in the spring in Seattle, in case you happen to be in Seattle?  In the spring?  I hear it’s lovely that time of year?  And, more urgently, THIS FRIDAY I have a reading of one of my short plays in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Here’s a link for that if you want more info as it’s happening very soon.

I’m back from vacation and there’s a lot I want to share with you, but first I want you guys to play this fun new game with me.  It’s a game where you make up advertising slogans for things that don’t need advertising slogans.  Inspired partially by Chandler Bing from a little show called Amigos.  Just kidding, even in Mexico it’s called Friends.  We watched this episode in the hotel room last week and were inspired.

My favorite one Chandler comes up with is “Pants.  Like shorts, but longer.”  Haha.  That show really stands the test of time.

Okay so, a few examples for you:

Limes.

Limes.  When life hands you lemons, throw them out and get some limes.
Limes.  Because who wants a key lemon pie?  Nobody.
Limes.  Sometimes it’s easy being green.

Tacos.

Tacos.  Because forks are too hard.
Tacos.  Because your gastro-intestinal tract needed a work-out.
Tacos.  Put ‘em in your panza!*

*Panza is Spanish for belly.  #TheMoreYouKnow

Sunscreen.

Sunscreen.  Having a tan is hot, but try to think long-term.
Sunscreen.  Does this mole look weird to you?  No, because I put on sunscreen.
Sunscreen.   True story: I heard a Canadian dairy farmer ask one of the Mexican waiters what he uses for sunburns.  Don’t be that guy.

Another fun thing about this game is you can do it from anywhere, just using the things you see around you, as evidenced by the material I was working with above.  Today my list would include things like green tea, yoga pants, and unseasonable weather.

Yoga Pants.  Because you work from home.

Green Tea.  I think it helps you lose weight!

Unseasonable Weather.  The best part of global warming.

I could go on forever, baby.*  Let’s play!  Leave comments with slogans and stuff, it’ll be so fun, you guys!

*If you get this reference I will divorce Billy and marry you.

Guys I´m in Mexico but I want to share a link with you.  It´s a blog I wrote for my friend who is raising money for Doctors Without Borders or something, I´m not entirely clear on what is going on there but read it and donate if you´re a good person.  Here it is!

1. Last night I discovered that my cat Oscar really likes creme fraiche.  Now that’s a sentence.

2. I think that sunscreen on my face makes my eyes feel all burny.  Does this happen to other people?  I’m trying not to get skin cancer so I spent too much money on this moisturizer that has SPF 35, just to wear for everyday, and now my eyes feel all burny.  Isn’t that some irony for you?  Reason number 856 why I would not make it through a zombie apocalypse: without SPF I get skin cancer (probably), and with it my eyes get all burny.

3. I recently had a realization: if I continue to work in theatre for the rest of my life, I will basically never have my nights free.  How do I feel about this?  Well, to put a positive spin on it, if I can’t get theatre work for awhile that just means more time to spend at home watching TV and cooking dinner and drinking wine.  It’s basically win-win?  This is uncharacteristically positive of me, but whatever!

4. My friend Patrick sent this to me the other day and I keep thinking about it and smiling.
He’s just a little husky!

Hey you guys.  So tonight is the last night of the first ever Boston One-Minute Play Festival!  It’s been an awesome experience so far.  There’s a really solid community of playwrights, directors, and actors in Boston and sometimes it can be easy to forget that, since we’re up here in the shadow of New York.  So, hooray for Boston theatre.  I hope the OMPF comes back to us again soon.  And if you’re around and reading this and want to try your luck with the waiting list, come out to the Boston Playwrights’ Theatre and see the show!  I’m acting in four minutes of it, and I wrote two other minutes of it so if you see it you’ll get a sum total of six minutes of solid Emily time, but honestly, it’s not about any one person at all.  Which is the best thing about this festival.  It’s a truly shared experience.  OH AND I ALMOST FORGOT.  If you don’t live in Boston or you don’t have a ticket or you’re busy or whatever, the show is streaming live tonight.  So you can watch it in real time.  That’s pretty cool, huh?  Check it out here tonight at 8pm.

I have made some improvements and updates to this website so please check them out if you’re so inclined!  I added some new stuff I’m doing to the Bio page, and some new stuff to the Plays page, and some new stuff to the Upcoming page.  And Billy is working very hard at making it easier for you guys to subscribe to the blog and stuff, if you want.  I’m not saying you have to subscribe, it’s fine either way, I’m just saying, if you want to, it’s easier.  Or it will be soon, hopefully.  Just… please like me?  I like you!

THIS IS THE WORST BLOG POST BUT I’M LATE FOR SOMETHING!

My new years resolutions:

1. Drink more tea.

2. Say yes to everything, enjoy being busy, and relish falling into bed exhausted every night.

3. Eat vegetables at every opportunity.

4. Savor things.  All the things.  Slow down.

5. Run a 10k.

6. Get paid money for writing plays, acting, and/or teaching.  Beat my current record of $10.86.

7. Banish discouragement.  And jealousy.  And stop talking about how unjust it is that nobody values theatre enough to let me make a living.  Be grateful.  And remember that the waiting is the hardest part.

8. Figure out how to embed video on my blog.

UPDATE: Check number 8 off the list…

9. Lose 13 pounds.  I am not above this.

Everybody with a blog is on vacation this week, which means that I am sitting at my computer, trying like the dickens not to work on this play I’m writing, and there’s nothing for me to read or watch.  Which means I am resorting to baking when I can’t look at my own asinine dialogue anymore.  But that is neither here nor there.  (I made cheddar thyme scones just now, they are ridiculous.)  The point of this post is to talk about New Year’s Eve you guys!  This year Billy and I are going to Maine to spend the weekend with my dad’s side of the family so it shouldn’t be too ridiculous.  But that got me thinking of all the ridiculous New Year’s Eves I’ve spent in the past.  And now, in chronological order, starting in the year 2000, is a list of how I spent the countdown to the new year:

1999-2000:

I was a freshman in high school and I went to this new store in the mall called Forever 21 with my friends to buy slutty outfits, which we proceeded to wear in my living room with my mom while my hamster rolled by in his hamster ball as the clock counted down to midnight.  When midnight came, we ran outside to see if the world had ended.  It hadn’t.

2000-2001:

I invited my friends to my dad’s house and we sneaked Miller Lights from his basement refrigerator and pretended they were sparkling apple cider and poured them into champagne flutes.  My dad definitely knew it was beer.  We each had about two champagne flutes worth of beer and then acted drunk, which we were not.

2001-2002:

We went to a Sleater-Kinney/Flaming Lips concert in Madison Square Garden but my friend threw up in a garbage can, so we had to take her home and we rang in the new year on MetroNorth on the way back to Connecticut.

2002-2003:

We went to some kind of big party at a church and drank a bunch of Smirnoff Ices.  One of my friends tried to make out with me while I was asleep on the living room carpet.  He turned out to be gay.  In retrospect, this might not have been New Year’s…

2003-2004:

We went to New York City and tried to stand in Times Square to watch the ball drop but my friend had to pee so she jumped one of the barricades to pee in an alley and I went with her and these cops wouldn’t let us back over the barricade after, so we had to leave.

2004-2005:

Can’t remember, for the life of me.

2005-2006:

We had a party in Connecticut that we lovingly dubbed “New Year’s Punk/Metal Eve”.  This was the time I rang in the new year with my head in the toilet.

2006-2007:

We were in Peru for my cousin’s wedding.  We ate twelve grapes in the last twelve seconds of the year and we gave each other yellow underwear.  It’s a South American tradition, apparently.

2007-2008:

Billy and I watched the ball drop on TV and went to bed.

2008-2009:

We took a family trip to Antigua.  It was my college graduation present.

2009-2010:

Billy and I were planning our wedding and were all stressed out about everything so I don’t think we did anything at all.

2010-2011:

Jared and Katie got married!  Word to the wise: it’s really fun to go to a wedding on New Year’s Eve.  Everybody have your wedding on New Year’s Eve!  You take away everyone’s pressure to make plans!  Everybody will thank you for it.

Jeez, those got pretty boring by the end, huh?  Growing up makes you have less horrible stories, I suppose.  What was your favorite New Year’s Eve?  I think my favorite was… God, they were all kind of disasters, weren’t they?  Probably New Year’s Punk/Metal Eve was the most fun, minus the vomiting.

YOU GUYS!  How was everyone’s holiday time?  Are you all still off work?  I feel like nobody is at work right now.  I, on the other hand, have to finish a draft of this crazy circus play I’m writing by Sunday, which, it should be noted, is the worst deadline ever.  Seems like a logical time to have a deadline, January 1st.  But don’t do it.  It’s a bad idea.

There are some other things going on as well!  I have to memorize my lines for the One Minute Play Festival and I have to finish reading my packets of ten-minute plays for the Boston Theatre Marathon.  Things are busy over here.  Which is to say, sorry for not posting as frequently lately.  I’ll get better next week!  Or definitely by February.

But listen.  The real reason I’m posting today is to share something amazing with you.  A picture of me when I was probably nine years old?  Maybe ten?  It’s horrible:

AHH!  Isn’t it horrible?  It’s so horrible.

But whatever.  We all have awkward periods.  Mine was from age eight to about… age sixteen.  It was a long awkward period.  But it did end!  And now I know enough  not to wear George Costanza glasses and sleeveless polo shirts.  NOBODY WEAR SLEEVELESS POLO SHIRTS, SERIOUSLY.  It’s not a good idea!

Do you guys have horrible photos of yourselves from your childhood?!  Do you know how to post them in the comments?  Because if you can figure that out, and I understand it will be tricky because I don’t even know how to post photos in the comments, but if you know how, you should post your worst childhood picture because, like I said, misery loves company.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR, SAD NINE-YEAR-OLD SELF!