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Books, BBQs and ACTRA Con
After finishing a new first draft of Prophecy as the first book in a trilogy, I spent last Monday reading it with a notebook to keep track of things. I find it really useful to write down any important information I reveal about characters (eye color, likes and dislikes, dates, etc.) or the story, so that I don’t contradict myself. It is especially useful when you are writing more than one book in the same universe. In addition to facts, I make myself a list of things that need to be changed or added. This can be for mistakes (if I wrote that she was 12 a decade ago, then…
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An Exciting Month
We’re secure! By that, I mean that there is a little lock icon beside the website url because I fixed the security issue and people should be able to find the blog again. Amanda 1, Technology 0, right? This past month has been pretty consistent as far as working for the gym and doing Jiu-Jitsu classes, doing background as a high school student and living a multitude of lives as a standardized patient. There’s also some new/exciting things happening. For starters, I turned 29 and celebrated and had a wonderful time. Then I realized I only have one year left to accomplish my 30 by 30, and slightly panicked. But…
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Nano, BJJ and Being Social
I had a pretty standard week, work-wise, to start off April. I worked at the gym, did some Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu classes, hopefully made some progress…mostly the usual, with the addition of camp nano, where I am trying to write a book within a month. I have it all plotted out, so I thought it would go super smoothly, but I decided to try my hand at time travel, which means there’s a lot more research and figuring out to do. Socially, I was more productive 😉 My parents came to town on Tuesday, so we went out for supper, then for lunch on Wednesday. On Thursday I met up with…
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Family, Sets and Cold Reads
This week was pretty awesome on all fronts. On Monday I worked from home and got to see the rough cuts for a few scenes from Get-Together, which looks amazing from a completely unbiased perspective. Then I spent the afternoon/evening on set doing background. On Tuesday I spent the whole day on set and got so much side work done. I am playing a student so I get to walk around with pens and notebooks and spend scenes (or in between takes) writing, which is the absolute best for me. I plan my months, I come up with story ideas, I plot my Nano camps…let’s just say it leads to…
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Podcasts, BAs and BJJ
The day after the competition we decided to take it easy. We had a delicious brunch with mountains of crepes and meat pies and all the toppings you could need, then spent the afternoon hanging out and watching movies. The rest of the day was equally as productive, comprising of video games with friends and a few episodes of Breaking Bad (I know, I’m way behind, but I’m getting there) On Monday it was back to the grind. I spent the afternoon getting ultrasounds for work, then in the evening went to the Women on Screen: Out Loud podcast wrap party. To be completely honest, other than the first Serial…
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Next Gen Niagara Falls
My second tournament was a lot less stressful than the first. For instance, I woke up and had a bunch of eggs and mushrooms and spinach and turkey bacon because my weight was good. I did weigh myself continuously to make sure this was still the case, but I did not have to jog around for hours in multiple layers to try and lose a few pounds to not be disqualified. We packed a bunch of snacks, got ready and headed out to Niagara with a few members of Team 4Points. We talked about movies and restaurants and classes on the drive rather than me furiously texting with my coach…
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A Hustling Actor
Monday was the official start of my no-carbs to get down to competition weight, so every time I had a craving, I put it down in a list of foods I would have once the competition was done. Our subway stop happens to have a Cinnabon inside, so even though I have never gotten one from there before, on Monday it killed me as I headed to my Standardized patient work. We did 3 scenarios and although it was definitely weird to have my partner play my husband in the first 2 scenarios and my father in the 3rd, I think it all worked out in the end. That night…
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Drills and TAWC
I’m hoping you haven’t, but you may have noticed some weird things with the blog this past week. If you use the www.amandalynnpetrin.com link, it disappeared for a while and now either looks funny and is not secure, or you can’t reach it. Does anyone who reads this have a knack for websites? I will slowly but surely figure it out, but for now the blog lives at wordpress.com and my website is a work in progress. I’ll keep you posted on how that goes. On Monday I finally got to catch up on all the things I have been putting off, like figuring out the blog, answering emails and…
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Books, BJJ and a Bday
My first week of February has been pretty busy on getting out there and doing things, but I have been very lazy when it comes to administrative tasks. Lazy probably isn’t the best explanation as to why I’m not getting things done, but nearly coughing out a lung wouldn’t really prevent me from being more productive, it just makes it a lot more tempting to cuddle up with a tea and read a book. Or sleep. I blame dry air, cold temperatures and being the guinea pig for people to learn their BJJ chokes. I skipped out on a few BJJ classes so I wouldn’t contaminate my training pool, but…
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January 2019
This year started off with me joining in on a lot of new traditions. After having celebrated Christmas with my family, we came back to Toronto to celebrate New Year’s with my boyfriend’s. New Year’s is a big deal in his family, so we went to a dinner/party on the 31st, then spent most of the 1st at his parents’, where friends came over to ring in the New Year. It was a short stay in Toronto before we went back to Montreal for Rikki and Jonathan’s wedding. We decorated the hall and had a little party on Friday before a sleepover, then Saturday was all about hair and makeup…