The sizzling sound you hear in Paris right now is the rain hitting the pavement.

No, I’m not dressing up like Catwoman while I’m away… but I figured I might as well share what’s going on. I’m doing weekly updates from Paris. So here is the first one in two parts. It’s been pretty cloudy, and raining a lot this first week. I hope the sun comes out soon, I wasn’t prepared for colder weather. But it’s still a lot of fun and the rain hasn’t stopped me from doing anything yet!

I meant to edit and post this short little video a couple weeks ago, but things got hectic, what with preparing for our trans-Atlantic flight…

I attended Sharon’s Ride.Run.Walk on April 19th, and one of the first things I see once we laid out our beach towel in the park (yeah, I wasn’t actually riding, running, or walking this year) was….

Well, you’ll have to watch the video to find out.

Hello! Miss us much? Well, I hope you’re all fans of Audrey Hepburn, because that’s our new gig. After making a depressing amount of money on the boulevard as superheroes, we thought “It couldn’t be any worse” as Holly Golightly, and much more comfortable… so we donned our dark sunglasses and hit the street. Alas, we made about $2 in tips, once more, BUT we had our back-up plan. We sat down and negotiated with Café Audrey and got a little part-time gig going around to local hotels with pocket-sized menus, in costume, and earning a little extra money. It’s not enough to retire on, but at least we’ll be making friends with the concierges, and be able to wear sunglasses in the summertime. Better than nothing.

How do I look?

How do I look?

When I get the mean reds...

When I get the mean reds...

And a little bit of video…

Well, the boulevard, and the pier, have been quite depressing lately. Unless we go out there and have a really good day soon, this might not last much longer. We barely break even on lunch and gas (and we’re not eating much, I swear! $2.25 pizza!). I don’t know how the other girls out there do it.

I’m almost willing to bet people snipe and decline to tip because they still think someone hires us to be out there. Which really makes no sense. I’ve never thought that. I mean, how would that be possible… have you SEEN some of those costumes? They’re about ready to fall apart. If I was going to hire characters, I’d make sure they weren’t embarrassing me or my business by going out like that. Plus, why would I hire 4 Marilyn Monroes? 3 Jack Sparrows? Doesn’t make any sense.

I love to dress up, and meet other people who love to dress up, and be able to walk around in public in costume… but not when I have bills to pay, credit cards to pay off… traveling to fund… I’ve got to be getting paid for my time. Batgirl too. We aren’t going out there just for the heck of it.

Honestly, I’m just not sure what the next step is. We’ve offered ourselves as models to photographers now, and perhaps that will bring in a little something. We’ve got some amazing costumes in our possession. I’d love to make use of them, and get my money back (seems like my costumes always cost way more than I think they will). I’m supposed to be signing with a new agent soon, but that seems to be taking some time, as well. I’ve had some good auditions, so we’ll see if they lead anywhere.

I AM happy though, because right now I have some free time to sew, and I’ve been wanting to do that for a while. Get creative, sew some new dresses… I want to totally revamp my wardrobe. I’ve been working on that for a while! I sat out by the pool today, and that was relaxing. I need to do that more often, because I worry too much, and work too much on the computer to keep the money coming in.

I’m debating whether or not I want to order a new catsuit. Mine has some issues, and the new one wouldn’t cost that much, but still… I’m wondering how much use it’ll get and if it’ll pay itself back. If money wasn’t an issue, yes, I’d get it. I love costumes and I strive for perfection. We shall see… Back to work now.

Though they mainly come through YouTube and rude people born without brain filters who just walk up to strangers and say any random, stupid thing that comes into their head, this is for all the complainers. The people who want professional, HD filming from two hobbyists, who want archive quality costumes on our shoestring budget, who want professional pictures and scratching of their fetish itches without offering anything in return, this is for you:

oh god

oh god

You could have it so much worse, so be grateful we’re sharing our high quality, sexy selves with you. For free.

(The picture above was taken from Holy Taco’s “The Worst Homemade Star Wars Costumes” list, which is definitely worth looking at. Go. Look. We’ll still be here.) And thank you to the few who have offered your help, expertise, constructive advice and have actually helped us along the way. It’s greatly appreciated, and maybe some of your class will rub off on the ruder people.

Hey, remember that one weekend where Catwoman and I were taken on a wild ride, ditched and shafted by a bunch of drunken morons who claimed to be in a band? A band signed with “a major label” who claimed to live in a $10 million house in Hollywood Hills and money to burn who said that $300 was a drop in the bucket to them? They still haven’t paid us. In fact, they’ve been playing the “let’s ignore them and see if they disappear” trick with us, so I guess a few hundred dollars really is a big deal to them. They must be afraid to break open their little piggy banks, aww. Anyway, after Catwoman kept emailing them (after sending an invoice and setting a deadline, after which there would be late fees), the dipwad in charge finally wrote back. It made me so angry, this self-righteous douchebaggery that trust fund hipsters own in spades because they’ve never wanted anything, that I’m going to pull out a very old trick of mine. You get to read Mr. Douchebag’s letter, but with a running commentary. Think of it as a literary Mystery Science Theater 3000. And if you’ve never seen that show, I weep for you. I really truly do. Anyway:
(more…)

I’m up way too early. I shot a student film last weekend and had to get up super early for that, 2 days in a row. But that was OK, filming didn’t take very long. Then on Tuesday I had a couple lines in a low-budget film called iCrime and was on set til midnight. “On set” though, was a backyard poolside party. Luckily they had heat lamps! I don’t know what we would have done without them! But I already had the sniffles at that point and allergy medicine wasn’t working, so…. on my way to feeling miserable. The next day I could barely get out of bed. I spent most of the day sleeping, and didn’t even get online. 24 hours without the internet!! Crazy. But I survived. But now after all that sleep, my internal timer is a bit off! Blah… so here I am.

Monday at the pier was interesting. I was very nervous, since as far as I know, no other costumed characters have been at the pier. Everyone seemed nice, and it was very relaxed there. We didn’t really speak to any of the vendors, except briefly to one on the way out. It was a little windy that day, which scared me, because I thought my little umbrellas and the empty water bottle (where is there a water fountain on the pier?!) were going to roll right over the edge and into the ocean. I think we need some kind of chain for our tip bucket as well. My bike chain is too springy and wants to keep the bucket right up against the railing. That bucket… pretty funny all the effort that went into making that thing. Do you think there’s much of a market for tip buckets? Because I think we could design a killer tip bucket. lol.

I’m sorry it’s been a bit quiet around here lately. We haven’t really been out doing superhero stuff for a while, which is why the world is such a mess. All day Saturday was spent retouching photos for me, Sunday was family time, and yesterday Catwoman and I finally reunited for something we hope will be really worthwhile. If you follow us on Zannel (or read the tiny print on my widget to the right, or follow me on Twitter), then you know that we applied for street performer permits last week. This is what happened yesterday:

We really didn’t stay long at all, slightly less than an hour on the Pier. It wasn’t too bad, though because it was a weekday afternoon and ridiculously windy there weren’t a whole lot of people out. Still, better than the boulevard! There have been some days where we’ve stayed out for 4 hours and only made about $7 each, so we consider this an improvement. Also, no competition from other characters, the police are on our side in Santa Monica, and most importantly, no drama! Everyone just keeps to themselves. It was a little bit lonely and we did miss the few good characters we like (you know who you are), but seriously, there’s just been so much crap we somehow got dragged into the middle of that it was time to get out.

Today another piece of the Mystery Costume came as I was heading out to do some errands. Yay! Here’s the two major pieces that I have so far, I’m just waiting on one more, which is en route:

I wear a lot of yellow and black

I wear a lot of yellow and black

After piece #3 comes, it’s a lot of cutting and sewing, and then it should be all set. Then you can finally see what I’ve been blabbing about all this time and hopefully be as excited as me! 🙂

Well, I’m not sure when Catwoman and I will work again. We’ve been pretty busy doing separate things lately and we haven’t been too good at synching up. If it’s any consolation I’ll be working with a really great local photographer soon who really wants to do a Batgirl shoot, so if worst comes to worst you’ll just have to look at some pictures of Batgirl hanging around LA.

For a second, I thought Luke Skywalker had mailed me my boots:

c/o Hoth

c/o Hoth

P.S. I know the creature’s name is spelled “tauntaun.” Humor me.

I know I just said I’d probably never work the boulevard again, but here I am, asking if anyone I know is working tomorrow and Saturday. (Sunday it’s supposed to rain.) Catwoman’s always doing other things now and I need a work buddy to hang around because I hate being out alone (and for safety’s sake). Plus, I just need some cash. 😉 So if any of you that read this are going to be out, drop me a note! You can either leave a comment or email me through the site, either way I’ll get it.

P.S. Catwoman’s been in contact with that god-awful band that stiffed us last weekend, so I’ll let her write about all that’s been happening in that area. I’m also expecting to get a picture CD by the weekend, so I could maybe slip a few shots up here so you know what we’ve been up to.

Yesterday . . . *sigh* As far as I’m concerned, yesterday was my last day on Hollywood Boulevard. The day started out good enough: it was a cool Sunday afternoon with good crowds. There were a lot of people out, but everyone seemed in a good mood. Loads of characters, a lot of them new, but Catwoman and I were doing good business. $15 for the first hour, and that’s including a couple of stiffs. It looked to be a good day. If you read my last entry, then you’ll remember Storm Trooper’s Kiss feud with the old Kiss guy, and you’ll be as pleased as I was to see this:

rock n roll all night

rock n' roll all night

(more…)

« Previous PageNext Page »