Lisa Tries New Things: Being Interviewed by Huffington Post

Yesterday I tried the most terrifying and exciting new thing yet: participating in a skype interview on HuffPost Live. No big deal.

My story about my very embarrassing first attempt at hot yoga went story-viral (not to be confused with puppies-trying-to-climb-stairs video-viral) and, much to my surprise, I was contacted yesterday by a HuffPost producer who wanted to interview me about my yoga experience. I can’t say I ever thought yoga would be the thing that put me on the map (and by map I guess I mean Huffington Post). But I guess if I visited a psychic years ago and she told me I would become fairly popular for sucking at yoga in the future I wouldn’t be too surprised. “Sounds about right,” I would say, and then go back to using my yoga mat  as a colourful rug for my bedroom.

So I quickly agreed to do this skype interview for Huffington Post, making sure to warn the producer that I am far more charming in writing than in person, and then I walked around the house for an hour trying not to barf. I was incredibly excited and incredibly nervous all at once. I called Boyfriend and I think I just yelled into the phone a bunch. I’m not sure I made any sense. It was probably just me yelling omgomgomgWHATAMIGOINGTOWEARomgomg. I kept obsessing over what to wear and how to do my makeup and hair. I am horrible at makeup and hair, and I was determined to look half decent for the camera.

I barely slept a wink that night. I kept waking up in panic that I would throw up on HuffPost Live and go viral for all the wrong reasons. At one point during the night I even got out of bed and went into my living room to face some books on my book shelf that I wanted everyone to know I read (they were Mindy Kaling, Jenny Lawson and Marlo Love, by the way). How ridiculous is that?

I woke up at 6 am, got ready for work, and then just wandered around my house for an hour wondering why I had agreed to do the interview. “Obviously you agreed to do it for the exposure, Lisa,” my brain would tell me. “But that means you have to talk to another human being on HuffPost and that lots of other human beings will see it…that’s the opposite of everything you want to do,” my brain also told me. “But just think of how cool it will be when you can add a HuffPost Live image under your Featured On column on your blog!” my brain also told me. My brain doesn’t shut up. But picturing that HuffPost Live banner there on the side of my blog was the deciding factor. “I can do this! And I will! And I won’t even throw up a little bit!”

I went to work and told my co-workers the great news. They are awesome people so they were extremely happy and excited for me which in turn got me excited and happy for me. I worked for a few hours to take my mind off of how anxious I was, and then I went home to do hair and makeup. My friend Cat came over to make me look pretty, and while sitting there on a kitchen chair in my bathroom I felt a little bit like a celebrity. I wonder if Jennifer Lawrence often gets her hair and makeup done on a kitchen chair in her bathroom?

Halfway through the makeup process, while I had lipstick on my lower lip but none on my upper lip, I got a call from the HuffPost producer. She wanted to check out my Skype connection. She warned me that she didn’t have a chance to put on any makeup yet, and I told her I could one-up her makeup problems because I had makeup on only half of my face. We laughed about it, and my nerves started to disappear. But as soon as I was finished my conversation with her the nerves came flooding back. After my awesome hair and makeup were finished I quickly ran upstairs, cracked open a beer that my sister left in the fridge about 3 months ago, and attempted to take a sip to try to get rid of some of the nervousness. You know it’s bad when I feel like I need 3 or 4 sips of beer to get through something (because I barely drink…for those who don’t know me)! As soon as the bottle reached my lips I received another call from New York. Someone from HuffPost was calling to skype me in to do sound and video check before my segment would begin. “Damn it, not enough time to drink my beer,” I thought. So I brought it downstairs with me and hid it behind my coffee table before my skype connected to HuffPost headquarters. As I was patched through and my phone was connected to the audio in studio, the anxiety grew. I was being interviewed directly after this amazingly resilient ex-prisoner who found a purpose for life by rescuing dogs. How was I supposed to follow that? There were adorable puppies in studio! The solution to my anxiety lay right there in front of me, hidden behind that coffee table. Beer. So I quickly darted out of frame and took several sips before the producer noticed and asked me to return to position.

After the puppies were finished being adorable and the ex-prisoner was finished being endearing, I was up. And the rest is mostly a blur. The one thing that really stands out to me from the interview is the amazing feeling that washed over me when I saw them cut to a screen capture of my blog and then pull up excerpts from my hot yoga post while the host read my writing back to me. Nothing quite beats that. I’m not sure I have ever felt so accomplished, except maybe that time I built those book shelves all by myself. I kind of just wanted to sit there with my mouth gaping open in awe of the moment, but I thought to myself “Pull it together, Gellar!” (I’ve been watching way too much Friends) and I kept smiling and answering questions in hopes of appearing like a normal human.

I only remember snippets of our conversation and I am far too hard on myself to watch the interview. One thing I do remember is blurting out that I have challenged myself to do hot yoga every day for 30 days. Huh? When did I even make that promise to myself? Sure, I thought about maybe possibly trying to do it before, but thinking about something and doing it are very different. What a ridiculous thing to expect from myself. My track record proves that I find it difficult to commit to doing yoga once in 30 days. “Oh well,” I thought, “it’s not like they will ever have to know if I don’t do it.” And then she asked me to come back after the 30 day challenge to give them an update, and she told me to keep blogging about it. Great. Now I actually have to do it. At least I will lose 40 pounds and be a zen-master this time next month.

Then it was over. I said “take care,” which I think was very polite of me, and the video on my skype switched from me to Jason Lee, who was being interviewed after me. So I was an opening act for Jason Lee. I’m certainly putting that on my resume.

As far as trying new things goes, this one may take the cake. Top the cake? I don’t know how that saying goes. It was a definite learning experience, and now I think I’ve got this show biz thing under control. Next stop: Hollywood!

Below are some screen caps that my sister so graciously took of my interview, and if you feel so inclined you can check out the interview here.

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