Here’s the fabulously talented Renée Summerfield, one of the actors who will be taking the school show that I’m directing out into the world next week.

Joining her will be Santino Paglia, a student plucked straight from my Second City Conservatory Class. He doesn’t have a website to call his own yet—not even a MySpace page!—but with fame and fortune beckoning he’ll be getting one soon enough…

One of the few regrets from my trip to Tokyo last winter was that I didn’t pick up a souvenir keitai strap of Docomodake, the freaky mushroom-like mascot of NTT DoCoMo. But thanks to an extremely kind gesture by fellow blogger Roy I now have one in my possession, pictured here dangling from my trusty hiptop2.

It’s perhaps a bit large for everyday use, but you know I’m going to have it with me on my next trip to the Far East—speaking of which…

(Drowsy circa 1999 at Theatre Passe Muraille…)

Kudos to all the folks involved at one point or another with what will forevermore be known as the Tony Award-Winning Broadway hit The Drowsy Chaperone.

I myself was a bit surprised that they didn’t win the hardware for Best Musical. I’m guessing that the powers-that-be switched the winning envelope after Don McKellar made that crack about thanking “The American musical comedy… Which has given us so much to make fun of.”

But I’m a conspiracist that way…

Though it’s really a sheer coincidence of timing, I’m gonna call the part The Williamson Playboys gave me in their radio pilot yesterday another birthday present.

What a joy it was to muck around in a studio with a bunch of really talented people, all trying to make each other laugh. If even half of the commercial auditions I’ve done over the years were like this I’d still be doing them.

Al Howell, Jack Mosshammer and I were talking just the other day about how we used to try to crack each other up on stage at Second City, more often than not at the expense of our fellow cast-mates.

But don’t be too quick to discount such behaviour—after all, Harvey Korman and Tim Conway weren’t exactly known for their smart writing on The Carol Burnett Show.

(Too much love for this old man to handle!)

So the tradition of posting my birthday Globe & Mail Horoscope is no more, as the Globe is now charging people to access that part of their site.

And you know what? Fuck ‘em!

After what happened to me in the dwindling hours of my thirties I’ve realized that I don’t need anyone to chart my future for me—I’m doing just fine, thanks.

Tuesday night I was invited to an intimate dinner with a small circle of friends, and through no small amount of subterfuge was led to the restaurant where my ladyfriend works, where a much larger circle of friends was waiting to surprise me. And surprise me they did! This Flickr Photo Set tells the story better than I ever could.

The next morning as the emails started flooding my inbox I was reminded that my circle of friends was larger still. And all I can give you in return is my heartfelt thanks—you’ve all made an old man very happy…

(a favourite indulgence from my favourite specialty bakery…)

Birthday season kicked off yesterday with a family lunch up at mom’s place. I say birthday “season” because in the span of about a week my presence has been requested at no less than five separate events!

What can I say? I’m flattered and soon to be fattened…

(It’s the humidity, dammit—a very sweaty yours truly with new friend Audrey Wong in Singapore, 2002…)

My blogging gig at iLaugh necessitates an open chat window to my boss via MSN Messenger. I have to admit that I’m still learning much the etiquette necessary to be an internet messaging master—like when it’s okay to let a conversion hang versus a proper sign-off. But it’s another person on my buddy list who’s taught me a neat trick.

Audrey Wong, who graciously chaperoned me on a tour of Singaporean nightlife in 2002, has been an on-again, off-again penpal via MSN ever since. We don’t chat as much as we used to, but in the past two weeks that I’ve been back on chat I’ve noticed that when online she frequently changes her screen name to reflect her mood, as in:

“Stressed Out”,

“Maximum Drey”, and most recently

“Drey is Down”.

It’s hard not to feel like a stalker when someone posts their state of mind for everyone on the internet to see. Thankfully, she pinged me for a quick hello this morning, and is only down because she’s stuck staging a corporate event on an island resort in China. Sounds rough…

With a little help from the Telus LG 6190 Fastap handset he got from yours truly for his birthday, Al Howell today brought his mobile technology into the late 20th-Century with his first text to me:

Andrew im using my new phone

Indeed you are, Mr. Howell… Indeed you are!

Don’t know what a “grup” is? Click here:

http://www.newyorkmetro.com/news/features/16529/

Cheers to Al Howell for assembling a fine circle of friends to celebrate his er, thirty-something-ish birthday. And jeers to Jack Mosshammer for putting work before pleasure.

“Hey Rob Smith, what’s new? Oh. Oh, dear… Oh, dear god!