A New World, Just Beyond the Mountain

Internet. It's me. Sup. [disclaimer: I don't use sup in real life.]

Why is the world so wonderful? I'm looking out the window right now at my parent's house in Anthem, and [despite the 109 degree weather] all I can think of is how beautiful it is. There are colors and shapes. Light, movement. It's all so beautiful. Take some time today and just look around you. The world we live in is just bursting with beauty. You just have to look for it.

Update time. My week long vacation slash summer camp extravaganza is coming to an end. I got to spend some time with the people I love, reach out to some young performers, and learn a thing or two myself. I go back to work tomorrow in Tempe and I'm just [sarcasm alert] thrilled. All good things must come to an end though, or they wouldn't be good in the first place. Things with the bf are wonderful. He doesn't cease to amaze me. I got to meet some of his friends the other day and they all seemed really great. I'm looking forward to meeting more of them! 

Game night took place at my house last night. I should take a moment to explain my love of board games. Simply put, I'm obsessed with them. I really can't put it into words, but I'll do my best. I love rules and order. The math side of my brain gets off on playing a game in our world where the rules of life don't mean very much. Luck, probability, exploration, everything. It literally brings me so much joy that it's hard to contain sometimes. When I play board games, I play for blood. Ask any of my friends. We played Betrayal at the House on the Hill and this new game called Bang! If you haven't played either I highly, highly recommend you go to your local board game store [they're usually located in malls or sometimes video game stores will have board games] and buy one of them. 

Betrayal is a wonderful game by the same people who brought the world Axis and Allies, Risk, Magic the Gathering Card Game, and [of course] D&D. Betrayal is like Dungeons and Dragons, but if D&D was fun... and not weird... and shorter... Basically you take control of one of six explorers and discover rooms in this haunted mansion. At a predetermined time, an event called "The Haunt" begins. One of the players turns "traitor" and pits themselves against the remaining explorers. One of fifty different scenarios begins and they've really pulled a lot of them from the horror universe. Dracula, The Mummy, Frankenstein's Monster, Zombies, and a whole lot more. Last night the house was transported to another dimension and we had to find our way back. Needless to say, we failed and the alien traitor killed us all. Just peachy. But it's a lot of fun and you should give me a call if you want to play. :)

Bang! was a new game that my bestie Jen's boyfriend: Will [adjectives!] brought. Firstly, the game is in Italian with poor English translations which always equals fun times. It reminded me of that classic party game Mafia where you secretly assign mobsters and they slowly kill everyone off. One person is the sheriff and the other players are outlaws, deputies, or renegades. You all have different tasks to complete and the person who completes them first wins. Obviously if you're the outlaw you want to kill the Sheriff, if you're the Sheriff you want to kill the outlaws, if you're the deputy you want to protect the sheriff, and if you're the renegade, you want to kill everyone and have a 1-on-1 with the sheriff. It's a good time.

So if you can't tell by the wall of text alone, I'm pretty obsessive about them. I've also started playing Yahtzee and Euchre on pogo.com which is soooooo amazing. No dealing, no picking up dice, fantastic. But that's another story. I'm always down for a good board, dice, or card game. :)

Oh! I've also started baking and cooking! This week, alone, I've made peanut butter cookies [with regular, mini, and pretzel m&ms], cake-batter blondies, fried rice, saute[weird squiggly e]d veggies, and cake-batter blondies... again. I'm going to post the recipe here, because they are that delicious.

Evan's Cake-Batter Blondies That He Stole But Still Wants Credit For Them:

You will need:

One box of yellow cake mix [cheaper the better!]
1 Egg [white please!]
1/4 Cup Canola Oil [no stick!]
2/5 Cup of Milk [weird measurements!]
1/4 Cup Rainbow Sprinkles [or one small shaker!]
1/2 Bag of White Chocolate Chips [if the brand starts with "G" you're okay!]

Easy-Peasy Recipe
Start pre-heating your oven to 350 degrees. Get a bowl. Use a mixer, a spoon, or your hands and combine the cake mix, the egg, and the oil until you get a mushy, crumbly mix. You'll need a mixer for this next part, so you might as well use it the whole time. Add in the 2/5 cup of milk [I say 2/5 because it's between 1/3 and 1/2 aka the perfect amount] very, very slowly so you get a thick, thick, thick, thick [do you get it?] mixture. You want it thick so the blondies are still gooey and batter... ey... Once the milk is added, combine the sprinkles and white chocolate chips by hand. Take out an 8x8 [that's the square one] brownie pan and spray the bejeezles out of it with canola spray, butter spray, or any other spray. [so the blondies don't stick!] Put your delicious mixture within and bake for 25 minutes. When they're done, you'll think to yourself, "These don't look done! They're still mushy in the middle! WTF 24/7[evan]!?!" Relax. Please. They're supposed to be that way. Let them cool for 20 minutes. You may be tempted to eat one, but don't!!! It'll all be so worth it, I promise.

And there you have it. Delicious, gooey, cake-battery, blondies! Yum! They're fairly inexpensive and oh-so-easy to boot! Try them out and leave me a comment!

Well, that's about enough blogging for the day. My family and I are going out to breakfast, so I must bid you adieu. As always, thank you for reading. Wish me luck as I head back to real life balancing a wonderful man, a tedious job, a stressful family, and monetary expenses!

Your's,
24/7[evan]

Scheduled Sleep is for Quitters

Back again with some new exciting updates on my life! 

First, I'm surprised by the amount of people that are finding and reading my blog! I'm touched and honored that there are people out there interested in what I have to say. Feel free to follow me if you have a google account, or post comments! Those will certainly make me smile!

And now an update on my life. If you read my last blog post, you know that my life was looking good and that, after the evening of my post, it was going to look even better. Well, I have good news! I have a boyfriend! He's an adorable, smart, sexy, attractive, talented, brilliant, hunk of a man and I can say that he's now mine ;) He met me at this free wine event hosted by Metro Valley Players and then we headed back to my house where I had flowers, a goofy-cutesy document titled: Declaration of Romantic Intent, and red velvet cupcakes. I'm fairly certain the cupcakes won him over. I like to think that I contributed as well... ;) Anyways, he's great and I'm thrilled to see where things go from here!

I'm also doing a summer camp off of Happy Valley and 107th St. called the Brockway Triple Threat Summer Camp. Brockway is a local band/group that performs rocked out versions of musical theatre songs. It's original, creative, funky, and unbelievable. The talent that goes in and out of the group is simply remarkable. At any rate, I'm staying up in Anthem with my parents to make the drive a little less painful, to see my wonderful family, and to catch up with old friends. So far it's been awesome and I'm a lot closer to my boyfriend who's also doing the camp. Perks.

In other news, I'm hoping to join the reunion cast of Les Miserbles: School Edition at Spotlight Youth Theatre. It should be really fun and I'm just waiting on a few more details for confirmation. If you aren't aware, Les Mis was the show that got Spotlight on the map. It won a ton of Zoni Awards (the Tony's of Arizona) including 2 leading actors (one of them being myself), 2 supporting actors, direction, and musical direction. Remounting the show should prove to be a lot of fun and it'll be nice to catch up with some of those old cast members. I'll be sure to post more deets when I find them out.

As for the title of this post, I'm having some trouble sleeping recently and I'm not sure why. Instead, I've been power napping daily and not getting the recommended night time sleep... My conclusion: I'm going to sleep when I want to sleep. As long as I'm working out, eating right, and balancing my stress levels, I think it's okay that my sleep suffers, especially because it's summer! :)

School starts up soon. Yowza. Not excited. Welp, thanks for reading, internet. I hope your life brings you happiness. And more sleep than I'm getting.

'Till next time.

24/7[evan]

Things are Looking Up

Hey internet. Me again. I'm impressed that I made it to post #2. Hopefully more to come.

At any rate, things are starting to look up for me. I'm learning what it means to be a performer, how to love openly and honestly, and how to be happy with who I am and what I look like. I have a firm grip on what I want to do with my life and the steps I need to take to get there. I'm also in a good place right now with working out, love, and sleep. Things are looking up. 

In other news, I'm volunteering in a review for a new community theatre called Metro Valley Players. They're a brand new theatre [literally this is their first show] and the love there is just incredible. The show is directed by Kyle C. Greene and stars a whole bunch of talented performers. Nine to be exact. Four guys, five girls. The official title of our show is Curtains Up: A Musical Revue. Catchy right? Basically we sing songs from just about every period in musical theatre and call it a show. We opened last night and it was received really, really well. A lot of people turned out to see it and they all seemed really happy with the performance. We also had the cast party last night and there was far too much food. I definitely ate waaaaay too much and took two pizzas home with me. Don't judge, just love.

So what's next for me you're wondering? Well, I'll tell you. Before the semester ended I had auditions for You're a Good Man Charlie Brown at ASU and was cast as Snoopy! Shortly after that I had my generals audition at Phoenix Theatre and was called back for 9 to 5 and Gypsy. After a whole lot of dancing, reading, and singing we received an email informing us that 9 to 5 was shelved. I guess they just didn't think it would be as successful as some other options, so they opted to not do it at all. Instead, they're adding another production to the end of their season [still unknown] and are collaborating with a local community theatre to bring an awesome show to the PT stage. This year, PT and Nearly Naked Theatre are going to be doing Spring Awakening! How exciting, right? Hopefully there's a role for me, but we'll see...

 Anyways, back to the generals, I received a call yesterday informing me that I was cast in Gypsy as one of the farmboys! I'm super stoked to join the cast, but it gets better. Normally we ASU students get cast in these professional PT shows as students. Instead of payment, we get $100.00 which goes towards paying our Equity Membership Candidate [EMC] fee and college credit. It's something I've grown used to. It's like doing a college show, but you get points toward your equity card. I've done this four times and was part of the first group they ever tried it on. I did it for Les Miserables, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Hairspray, and Avenue Q. This time, however, they offered me a real person's contract. I think this means I'm growing up!!!

So with all of that, it's safe to say that I'm on cloud nine. Things are looking pretty good and I'm thankful to have so many amazing people in my life. After tonight, it'll only get better. I won't tell you what's happening, but I'll update you in my next post. Think of it as a surprise for next time.

Thanks for reading, internet. You've been swell.

Your's,

24/7[evan]

The First

Oh hey internet. Didn't see you there. Don't mind me, I'm just going to do my own thing over here.

So the first blog post of 24/7[evan]... Where to begin... Firsts are always a little bit exciting, a little bit scary, and a little [to a lot] awkward. I'll do my best to embrace all three fully. Think about it: First job, first day of school, first kiss, first fight, first time you tell someone you love them... Firsts. So this is my first blog post. I guess it would be in good taste to tell you about myself.

Name: Evan Wilson [some people like to call me by my full name... stage name? idk. Evan Tyler Wilson]
Age: 21
DOB: 12/5/1989
Location: Tempe, Arizona [Orig from Anthem, AZ]
Education: Currently studying Musical Theatre and Secondary Education (Mathematics)

Those are the quick facts. I'll post about more stuff [ie my favorites, dreams, fantasies]... eventually. So, what do I want this to be? What purpose is this blog going to have? I suppose it will be therapeutic, mostly. A way for me to write my feelings down and practice my typing and language skills. I also will try to post about my theatrical and secondary educational [what?] experiences and hope that some young actor or teacher-to-be will find it helpful. We'll see :)

Basically this blog is about me. 24/7[evan]. A young actor with big dreams stuck in Arizona. It'll be a place I can come to vent, or talk about how excited I am about things... Or I guess how fed up with them I am. Or somewhere in between. That'll be an adventure for sure and Lord knows I love adventure.

Today I started my Insanity workout. I wouldn't say that I'm fat, but I also wouldn't say that I'm skinny. I'm somewhere in between... But aren't we all? I'd just like to tone and trim myself for me. It took me awhile to come to that conclusion, but I want to be healthy and active for myself. Anyways, day one of the sixty day workout was pretty brutal and it was just a fitness test. Basically Sean T [if you don't know who he is, click here -----> http://photos-ak.sparkpeople.com/7/9/798131725.jpg] comes up with these killer workouts that make you work work work, take a 30 second break, and then push through [or dig deeper as he likes to say] through an even harder version. Basically I hate him. But I know he's getting me in shape so I guess I love him... His abs definitely help.

Oh! That's an important fact I forgot. I'm gay. It is what it is, it doesn't define me, I'm here, I'm queer, get used to it. Relationships in the past haven't worked out well and I'm looking to fall in love. Blah blah blah Evan's a hopeless romantic we all laugh hahahaha.

So there you have it. First post done. It was definitely exciting, a little bit scary, and a whole lot awkward. But hey, that's me. 24/7[evan].