pictures = 1,000 words

I wanted to write a post about how much fun I had at the Shakespeare this weekend, and at the gorgeous B&B in Fredericksburg, how much I enjoyed antiquing wif mah honey and the new project involving repurposed WWII linen mail sacks, and I wanted to illustrate all this with photos from our indoor picnic...



...except Nicki forgot her stays, and all she can look at is her midsection.

Jesus H. Gay, how did I get this fat again?

A Funny Story

I was going to be really mean and petty and selfish and post a picture of a newborn up here and then say that I had to put a random picture up because I don't have any of Lily yet, but then I decided that would be mean. So I didn't. I know people are busy, I'm not complaining. Newborn baby and all. But I still don't have any photos to share with my rabid readership, and I'm starting to feel like a total narcissist (more than usual, I mean) because the wallpaper on my computer is a picture of me in the ranks. Soon though. Soon.

In the meantime. My roommate and I get along quite well. She's a flighty theatre type, I've been known to have fits of drama myself. Like today when I threw down the frock coat I was altering and declared in a fit of hysteria, "I've ruined it! It was perfect until I touched it with these hands of ineptitude!"

Which is not entirely true: Granted, the sleeves still aren't sitting right, but at least I didn't put the pleats in backwards.

But back to the story. So my roommate and I understand one another. When I told Am about my ambition to Start Recycling, she said, "okay" and then (two weeks later) when I mentioned that the recycling center for Williamsburg was right down the road, she only hesitated a minute before volunteering to take us there, along with two week's worth of recyclables. The problem was though, the drop-off center closed at four, and it was now eight pm. What to do. Picture it: two young women, sitting on a darkened county road, in a black car with the vanity plate "HAM1ET", staring forlornly at their goal which is securely locked behind a ten-foot tall chain link fence.

"What should we do?"

"We could leave it here and they could pick it up tomorrow."

"No, we can't."

"No, I suppose not."

"It's okay. I'll get it on Saturday."

"Or I could come tomorrow. I have tomorrow off."

"I feel bad making you do it. It was my idea."

"It's okay."

"You know what? Let's just leave it. It's not like we're littering."

"Yeah. It's not a crime to recycle."

"Or is it? 'Sorry officer, we just wanted to recycle!'"

"Tee-hee!"

"Maybe we should throw it over the fence so the critters don't get it."

"Okay. I feel so naughty!"

"They've probably got cameras posted. They're going to come knocking on our door tomorrow."

"They probably can track your car."

"Ohmygosh, you're right!"

"Oh well, too late now!"

"This is totally the naughtiest thing I've done all week."

"hee, hee, hee..."

"You totally have to blog about this."

"Oh, absolutely."

Your Love Will Live In Me

Do you hear that? That is the silence that has descended now that the gears in my head have finally wound down--I've finished my application for Madison. It is printed, bound, shiny and ready to be posted. I just want to sleep with it under my pillow for a few days. For Luck. Madison sent me a link to a website so I can track the progress of my application...yeah. Maybe wait a few weeks before I start compulsively checking.

But more on that anon. I decided to reward myself by going to see Chicago Shakespeare's production of "Passion," another Sondheim/Lapine musical. "Passion" is a hard play to put on--it's not particularly happy, and the music is very...weird. The singers in the show were solidly good, but not spectacular, except for Ana Gasteyer, who positively inhabited her character. Everyone else leaned a little to the "musical theatre" end of the spectrum--she totally ruled as Fosca. Overall, a solid interpretation of a weird little play that is also not without it's faults.

I like "Passion" because I can relate to the story. Basically Giorgio, a solider, is totally enraptured with Clara until he is shipped out to a dreary outpost in 1860s Italy, and becomes the object of Fosca's burning affection. Fosca is ugly, ill and slightly anti-social, the opposite of the angelic Clara. He resists for most of the play, but her love for him is so passionate, so all-consuming that in the end his resistance is burned away. One of my favourite lines from the play last night was "I don't know how to love. No one's ever shown me how to love. All I have are these emotions, and I don't know what to do with them." I thought that "Passion" would teach me a lesson about temperance in love, but instead it teaches the opposite: revel in your feelings, because that is the most honest thing of all. The ending reminded me vaguely of "Pride & Predjudice," where the lovers' one kiss conveys more passion than anything Lydia might have done--so too Giorgio's cautious handholding with Fosca is somehow more satisfying than the beginning of the play which is lights up on him and Clara en flagrante.

I'm not a huge fan of "Shakespeare" companies, I worry that you limit yourself too much, so I'm always glad to see them branching out. If I had to pair this show with another one, I would actually do "Sweet Charity" since both deal with women who are not afraid to love or constrained by the role that society has for them.

I wanted to put up a picture from the show I saw last night, even though I didn't think the Giorgio was anything spectacular. But then I found this one of Audra MacDonald and Michael Cerveris, with no pants on. Enjoy!

Isn't it good? (norwegian wood)

Last night, I added a new rule to the list of rules of theatre people: Never try to outdrink a man who's played Hamlet. Man. I went out after the show last night to meet with yet more theatre people--shake hands, hand out business cards, etc--and I ended up closing two bars. Mostly because I got into an argument with this guy about the interpretation of Hamlet. He was insisting that to understand it, you had to see it, I was resisting, saying that no interpretation could possibly live up to the poetry that is inherent in the words. I recalled Oliver's "To be or not to be" speech, he cited the Royal Shakespeare production in the early nineties. We became swift friends after agreeing that Horatio was our favourite character. After the actor's bar down the street closed, we went to the Green Mill, which is where Al Capone used to hang out--and promptly got into a fight because the jazz band playing featured a horn player on something that neither of us recognised, so he kept insisting this instrument did not exist. Finally I tapped the horn player on the arm during one of his breaks and asked him, "Excuse me, sir! What instrument is that?" and found out it was a bass trumpet. honestly. actors. The Green Mill is SO COOL--they have live jazz most nights, and the ambiance is definitely old-school bar, with heavy wood panelling, painted walls and a concrete statue of a Greek goddess in the corner. I'm definitely going back. Although next time I'm not going to stay until quarter to four.

I also started my new job yesterday. I am a proposal writer for a small engineering and architecture company, and so yesterday was learning how these proposals were put together, all the ducks that needed to be put in rows. My boss is an older gentleman named Mr. S, and he told me that he wanted to hire someone who was creative--but right now he really needs someone who is organised. I shall do my best. The office is very old-school, and the people that I work with are ok. I think that once I learn the role, and don't have to ask people for help every five minutes, it will be challenging but not difficult. I'll be working under my own direction a lot. I'm definitely looking forward to working steadily for a change. Putting a little money away. Making a dent in my student loans. Getting a desk--I realised after I published my wish list last week that DESK should have been item number numero uno, so I can write in my room. Then the Wii.


In other news, London has unveiled the logo for the 2012 games, the theme for which is apparently "80s Dance Party." Sigh. I've been feeling so good about living in Chicago lately that I haven't had time to be homesick, which is a good thing, but a strange feeling. Especially as I have discovered the stories about Horatio Hornblower, a fictional sailor in the late eighteenth century. They are full of brave men, daring the seas to stop the French invaders--but what makes Horatio such an interesting character is that his actions don't spring from an inherent well of bravery and courage, but rather a "If I don't do this everyone will think I'm afraid, and they won't follow my orders, so I better do this even though I'm fainting from fear." Also the stories feature lots of nautical lingo like "then Horatio slipped from the ratline and fell into the shrouds just as the mizzen topmast gave way and came to rest on the mainsail's royal yards." The hell you say. I love it. I may never learn how to sail a boat, but at least now I know what "fothering" means.

Gregory Peck stars as Hornblower in "Horatio Hornblower and the Hussy Wore a Dress Without Sleeves, the Hussy."

"Like a different way of living now."

I completely forgot to thank my incomparable parents yesterday for hauling me and my stuff down to Chicago. They rock! I know they were grumbling about the three flights of stairs and the fact that I insisted on bringing a ton of books, but they were, once again, amazing. I'm so glad to have my babies around me again. How could I quote from "Twelfth Night" in last night's journal if I hadn't had "The Complete Works" by my side? I really believe all theatre people have Shakespeare's Complete Works with them, even if they aren't into Shakespeare, or they're modern dramatists or they flat out hate Shakespeare: every theatre person will have his brick of a book somewhere, maybe just propping up a table. The quote I was looking for was Sebastian's aside to the audience after he's mistaken for his sister (not as weird as it sounds, Viola was dressed as a man at this point...okay, it is as weird as it sounds.). He has a speech which concludes "If this be a dream, still let me sleep." London seems like a dream now. I have these memories and knowledge of the city, but it's as if I was dreaming an incredibly detailed dream and I've woken up now. Parts of it are still memorable, but parts of it are starting to break up and drift away. Am I being over dramatic? Of course. I like Chicago, but I don't feel connected to it like I did with London. Give it a few days, I hear you say? Pfft. I loved London before I ever set foot in it. But now I'm living here, and stage managing and meeting theatre people, and I seem to have slotted in to this life so easily it's as if nothing happened before it. As if I've looped myself and there's a part squeezed off. Everyone keeps reassuring me I'll go back: I don't WANT to go back unless I can do theatre, unless I can pick up where I've left off. Or maybe it was just a dream. Maybe the city doesn't really exist, except as some kind of Otherworld, like Tir na n'Og. Maybe it's the speed with which I've been assimilated into Chicago that's causing disorientation. Or maybe it was a dream. Who knows?