Continuing Through New England

So it is 1 o'clock in the morning and I am sitting at my desk at the Comfort Inn in Flushing, NY. I could be doing something productive like packing or sleeping since we have a 1030AM show but I think I would rather blog since I am so wired and have yet again been neglecting to... so here goes!

So sometime after our lovely trip to Boston ( I am quickly getting to the point where I am losing track of where I have been and where I am going) we were in White River Junction, VT on the border of NH where we were actually performing (in Lebanon to be exact). We were looking for fun things to do and talked to the nice ladies at the counter about their suggestions, we looked into horse back riding but it was finally starting to get cold and for 40 bucks an hour we figured we could find cooler places on our trip to horseback ride. We also looked at hot air ballooning but we wont even DISCUSS how pricey that was. SO we settled on something free! Specifically, Sugarbush Maple and Cheese Farm! They had a maple walk, a sugar house, and free cheese and maple samplings. PERFECT! So off we went (we being Myself, Jonny, Margo, Jeffery, and Dave)

The first thing we saw upon entering the farm was this handsome fellow...

Margo deemed me the horse whisperer since he kept trotting straight up to me and nudging up against me... I think the color of my coat attracted him!

So then we made our way down to the sugarshack where we learned how maple syrup is made. When we walked out it had begun to snow/sleet fairly hard, hard enough that it stuck around on the ground and my hair! So we decided to venture inside to taste cheese and maple and buy fun things like cheese and maple... I knew it was my kinda place when they had this great shrine to maple syrup!


We all bought way too much cheese and syrup products and then proceeded to the Maple Walk, a brisk walk through the woods where you can see how they make maple syrup during the season. It was lovely!


It was overall a very successful trip :D

The past few days we have been around and about New York City and on two separate occasions I have ventured into the city to see shows.


Day 1 in NYC
Kevin, Jonny, Lindsay, and Myself ventured in from Newark Penn Station on the NJ Transit to NYC Penn Station. Lindsay split off for dinner with friends and Kevin, Jonny, and Myself headed to the newly refurbished time square TKTS booth. Kevin wanted to see August: Osage County but Jonny had already seen it and I wasn't all about paying more money than I needed to to see a show (tickets were only 25% off to August and Kevin ended up just buying a full price ticket anyway so he didn't have to sit in the crap seats) so me and Jonny confired and decided we wanted to see either The Seagull, All My Sons, or Equus so we went up the nice lady at the booth and asked what she currently had the best seats for, her answer was Equus so we each set down out 64 dollars and that was that.

August started at 7:30 since it is so damn long so Kevin headed off to the theatre whilst me and Jonny, having a bit more time, headed to my favorite little spot in Time Square...Bella Vita pizza on 43rd between 8 and Broadway. We got a cheese pizza and shared their FANTASTIC moose/cheesecake/strawberry heaven dessert and walked over to the theatre. We had pretty great seats in the third row of the mezzanine and the show was FANTASTIC. We ran into Eric in the bathroom line at intermission, who was sitting in the Orchestra, and this made meeting up to take the train back together all the much easier. We enjoyed the rest of the fantastic production (seriously, the lights, the direction, the acting, the lights, the script, the innovative horses, and did I mention the lighting?) were all just spot on, really delivered the powerful score and made it really ring even in a modern day. At the end of the show it was Broadway Cares/ Equity Fights Aids (it seems to be everytime I go to the theatre) and ontop of the usual donate this much money and get a signed playbill or this much money and get a signed poster they also did an auction... specifically for Daniel Radcliff's Pants! Someone paid 1 grand for the pants he wore in the show signed by him, if only I had a grand to spend on pants! It was great though and we all met up and took the train home.


Day 2 in NYC:
Last night (4 days after the initial NYC trip I think...) Margo, Kevin, and Myself again ventured into the city in search of cheap tickets and good time. We looked at the student rush and decided to go see All My Sons, and even though Kevin didn't have his student ID since they didnt really seem to care (the didn't even look at mine) we all got our happy 26.50 tickets to the show. Alas it was only 430 at this point and the show wasn't until 7 so me and Margo went to find a salon to get our nails done and Kevin went off to Colony and some other shopping trips. We found a place called Classic Salon on 48th between 5th and 6th that had a special 24$ manicure and pedicure between monday and wednesday so we went! The ladies there were very nice but also very pushy and I made the mistake of mentioning I had thought to get some waxing done before my trip to Key West next week and well needless to say 2 hours and around 100$ each later we walked out of there spiffed up and groomed up. We met Kevin and walked to the theatre. This production...well...wasn't quite as fantastic as the first. First off Diane Wiest wasn't on that night, her understudy was, which is always disappointing. Secondly, poor Katie Holmes was obviously given very little coaching as to how to project on stage so she was forcing and yelling quite a bit and you could hear in her voice it was leaving its mark of damage. Thirdly, and most importantly, all these great actors and this great script were simply swimming through soup trying to fight through what is obviously a very poor directing job. The director is some "innovative" director from Europe. The problem being most European theatre is Presentational whilst American Theatre, especially the plays themselves, are Representational so there was a lot of unfounded acting moments and meandering around the stage as if he was uncomfortable letting them just sit and be in the characters. It was awkward to watch at times but overall I am glad I saw it, and glad I only paid 27 dollars for it.

Sadly whilst in my purse over the past week my Camera got impailed by something and has suffered significant damage to its LCD screen. The screen itself is intact but the pixels behind it show where it got hit and the effects. Needless to say, I need a new Camera.

Two days till I am home for Winter Break!

Keeping Up To Date

So in an attempt to keep up to date and maybe encourage myself to write more often I am going to skip over the everything I have left up to this point and just jump straight to Burlington and Boston. SO HERE GOES

Earlier this week we were in BEAUTIFUL Burlington, VT. I drove there and everyone in the car was resting, I had my music playing as I drove up over the hills and mountains with the New England fall leaves and distant farm houses as my scenery. I was officially in love!

In the Car Margo discovered the "Let's Go USA" book that tells you about a bunch of US cities and what to do when you visit, she was elated. So that evening we went to an Italian Restaurant downtown and enjoyed a simply fabulous meal, one of the best we have had on the road so far. The building was designed to look like the inside of a rustic ski lodge and it was just a very calm, nice atmosphere for our supper. Lovely.

The next day, thanks to the unseasonably warm weather in Burlington, Margo, Jonny, Jeffery, Dave, Eric, Rudy and I enjoyed a lovely hike a few miles outside of the city. It was ranked as easy to moderate but I would say it was more along the lines of moderate to intermediate, nothing we all couldn't handle but defiently some make-your-butt-sore-the-next-day uphill climbs.


The trip was well worth the view from the top though. It was a touch hazy that day but you could still see the Adirondack Mountains in the distance as well as the beautiful view of rural VT.


Here is the whole group (minus Eric who took the picture) at the top!



On the drive home we passed by the Vermont Teddy Bear factory and with just a look we all knew it was necessary we stop! We didn't buy anything or take the factory tour we just looked around. There was a whole bin up front of defective teddy bears that were on sale for 20 dollars (VT Teddy's usually cost around 60 to 70) some just had holes in their backs that could easily be stitched but some were missing arms, legs, even heads! HA! sad. But they did have these lovely Biden/Obama bears on display!



Later that afternoon, Margo, Jonny, Jeffery, Kevin and I ventured to downtown burlington for some shopping and eating. I found possibly the most perfect engagement ring ever in a lovely jeweler called grannis, bought some maple sugar candy and other lovely vermont treats as well as turtle fur ear muffs at The Apple Mountain store, and bought myself a new claddagh ring to replace my broken one at a not-so-expensive jeweler. We then ate at Sweetwaters, not my favorite stop on tour thus far, but the company was great!

That night came the announcement of our new President Elect BARACK OBAMA and vice president elect JOE BIDEN! How do you think a bunch of young starving artist feel about that?

AMAZING that's how! ha!

Should have been a great day right? WRONG. Sadly, that day during the show my purple "harlequin verb slut" top untied on stage and I spent the rest of the number doing everything in my power to keep myself from flashing a bunch of elementary schoolers on stage. I DID IT THOUGH! ha
Then the second show I blindly ran with by big red fabric as I always do, however Dave's car wasn't being very friendly that day and had a hard time getting rolling so he was RIGHT behind me when I ran. My foot became the victim of this incident. He is still slightly swollen and blue to this day.

Anyway, Sadly we had to leave Burlington the next day. Onward to Concord, NH where nothing really happened that I recall with any distinction.

Next it was on to New Bedford, NH where Margo, Jonny, Lindsay, and I took a day trip to Boston (about an hour and some change away)
It was a BEAUTIFUL day! Here are Lindsay Margo and Jonny on our walk down Commonwealth Ave



We walked quite a bit that day... through Boston Commons and the public gardens which were both fantastic. Here is a lovely fall picture Jonny took of me!



We walked down and met up with his sister Andrea at work and she showed us the place she started. It is an amazing company called Nexus (http://www.nexusboston.com/) that educated other companies, architects, children, ect about how to build and maintain green buildings and homes. It's an amazing project and it was so cool to tour her place.
After that the group of us walked down Faneuil Hall and just walked around and shopped and observed a bit. Walked to Jonny's favorite waterfront stop and then over to Little Italy for dinner before back to the train. It was a great day, very peaceful and luckily the rain held off for our whole day of walking!

So now here I am in Lebanon, NH with a day off tomorrow when we are going to tour a Maple and Cheese Farm! Should be fun.

Only 11 days till I am home and 18 days till my birthday and trip to Key West. I am very excited!

Well I Suck

SO
I said I was going to be better about blogging on tour. GUESS THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN!

I am not going to go through and fill in everything I have missed since I last wrote SO I will just give the main points?

___FLORIDA___

Me, Kevin, Jonny, and Margo went to the Astronaut Hall of Fame in Cape Canaveral while we were staying in Melbourne. It was pretty cool. Jonny was most excited about the G-Force Simulator...

I could not participate due to my massive motion sickness.
Across the street there was the American Police History Museum and Hall of Fame. There was a shooting range and helicopter rides so we wanted to go... BUST. The shooting range was closed and they had "lost their contract" with the helicopter... but there was the fantastic gift shop..

amazing

We adventured down to Ft. Lauderdale on one of our last Florida days. I decided to take a break from the sun and go read my time magazine under a shady palm tree. within seconds of sitting down an elderly gentlemen made my aquantence and proceeded to talk to me for a good half hour. Everytime there was a lull in conversation he began a completely different one, everything from places he had lived, to airlines he liked, to the weather in Florida. Unfortunately about half way through the conversation the wind was blowing my magazine pages about and I looked down to straighten them and saw it... sitting there... staring me in the face... standing out against the sand and the dark blue bathing suit...big... old... BALL! so gross.

___McLean___

So after leaving Florida we drove to McLean by way of Lumberton North Carolina. McLean was great for me... I went to Tysons and bought a new jacket, Michael came down the first day and we went to my dads house for dinner. The next day we did a show and afterwards I hung out with Casey for a bit. Then Michael came back down and we went to Gordon Biersch for dinner then watched TV and fell asleep, it was great. The next day my dad came to the show and then we were off to Wilmington, DE

___Wilmington, DE and Staten Island___

Wilmington was cute. We went out one night for Dave's 27th birthday and had a very nice dinner. It was sad to see how damn cold it really was getting... significantly colder than even normal fall weather for the North East.

Staten Island was... interesting. I made last minute plans to meet Adam and Ann in the city for dinner. Well it took over 3.5 hours of crazy shuttle drivers, ferries, getting on the wrong train and ending up in harlem, to actually make it to Ann's place in the Heights. We had some good chinese and talked about people I used to know. good night, but stressful.

---BALTIMORE---

How could this not be great?! I was home for 5, count em 5, nights. ohhh man it was fantastic. It was kind of hard because it made me feel like I had been on vacation for the past 3 weeks and now I was home when it was really the opposite. But it was great all the same. I couldn't even really tell you what we did until the last day... a lot of sitting around our house, watching football and food network, and just enjoying each others company in our house. I did some halloween decorating. I really REALLY wanted to clean up the yard a bit and plant some more bulbs up front so I would have some fantastic flowers come spring but it was very cold and rainy the entire time I was home. The last day Alison, Michael, Mike's mom and grandma came and saw my show, they seemed to really enjoy it, then we went out to Lunch at applebees. Afterwards Michael and I spent the afternoon getting our house ready for people coming over for dinner. That night Eric, Brian, Margo, Lindsay, Jonny, and Dave came over for a spagghetti dinner. It was a really great time. I rarely....scratch that...never have friends over to the house since, lets face it, I dont really have any, so it was nice to have people over. Brian also brought over two PUMPKINS that we carved. I wish I had taken pictures but once Brian puts his up I will steal them.

So that leads me to being here in Virginia Beach. My mom came up and we had dinner and did some shopping and then she came and saw the show this morning and then had lunch with me margo and jonny before heading home. It was good times. The shows went mostly well, sadly there were some technical glitches this morning, but the venue is beautiful and the people that work there are nothing short of FANTASTIC. particuarly the wardrobe people, which are the techs I always have the most access too.

Tomorrow we are planning on going out for Halloween which I hope will be fun, though I won't lie and say I am very much looking forward to going home at the end of November.

TOUR!

Well Here I am out on the road, currently in Orange Park, FL (a suburb of Jacksonville). I have promised that I will be better about blogging on tour and hopefully I will live up to it.

I currently can not post any pictures on this blog to make it more interesting, sorry, but I left my camera cord in Baltimore so I will retrieve it from Michael in 11 days in McLean and then pictures shall be available.

SO! The beginning. We began by driving about 16 hours in two days to Sarasota with a stop in South Carolina on the way where I saw a bumper sticker that said "nuke Iraq" reminding me how much I love people. Sadly, the long hours of Air Conditioned Van Driving made Margo a sick little girl :(

So upon arrival in Sarasota Kevin and Lindsay joined us (both had auditions preventing them from enjoying the first 16 hours of driving and met us down there) and we had a full fun happy group. Tuesday morning Jonny and I ventured to Siesta Key (about 7 miles south of Sarasota) to Rent bicycles for our days in Sarasota. My logic to this was there were about 4 places of interest as well as downtown Sarasota within 2-5 miles from the Hotel and it seemed, by renting bikes, we could go to as many of these places as we pleased without worrying about Van usage and get some fun outdoor exercise while we were at it! I sent a text to everyone in the group, as is customary, but Jonny seemed to be the only one to agree with my logic. So to the bike store we traveled! The man at the bike store was very nice and helped us select two "beach cruiser bikes" on the logic that road bikes can only go on the road but beach cruisers can go on the road and the beach. We didn't intend on going to the beach but it sounded like a nice thought. That is until we decided to bike to the Aquarium 4.7 miles away over a very large bridge in a headwind... gears would have been nice. But damn it was good exercise. We saw all sorts of fun fish and petted sting rays and overall had a very nice time. Pictures to come later.

So that night Me, Jonny, Margo, Rudy, and Jeffery went to downtown Sarasota and had some Mexican food. It was quite tasty. Sarasota is a very very pretty place but I find it funny that the majority of dining downtown is Italian. Curious.

Anyway the next morning we had our first two performances of Tour at the very pleasant Van Wezel building. We mentioned constantly that we would be happy just planting ourselves for a couple weeks and doing the show there. The building was great, the staff was so smart, kind, and accommodating it was really a pleasure. The audiences were HUGE though I am not sure entirely as responsive as our DC children's audience, they still seemed to enjoy it very much. It was a pleasure.

Upon returning to the Hotel we dissapointingly realized that a trip to the Dali museum in St. Petersburg would not be happening because of Van usage and time and such so me and Jonny decided to get the most out of our bike rentals before their return and biked downtown to have lunch. We wanted to go to this homey looking Irish Pub called O'Malley's so we walked up the stairs to its second story home and stood there for at least 5 minutes wandering around calling out "HELLO" to no response. I even peaked in the Kitchen, and there was noone. Potentially the most awkward thing I have ever seen. So we went to a little, slightly more expensive, place called Patricks which was very nice. We then drove our bikes back over to Siesta Keys and returned them. That evening, after not being able to make any decisions, a group of us decided to venture back downtown and see if anyone was at O'Malley's this time. SURPRISE! they were. We enjoyed a late dinner, but they were in the process of changing the menu so most things we ordered were not available. And then the manger was trying to clean out a drain and upon opening it unleashed the smell of unholy hell. But he gave us a free round of Washington Apple shots as an apology and the food we did order was very enjoyable. Afterwards everyone wanted to go to this gay bar, but Jonny inquired to their underage attendance and they were strictly against it so I went back to the hotel. Luckily, it was a bust anyway and everyone was back by 11pm.

I spent the evening chatting with Michael on the phone and putting all my receipts in order for tax purposes before nodding off to sleep for our departure this morning.

We drove to Orange Park today (250 miles back in the direction we came from, one of the unfortunate aspects of touring is by no fault of anyones due to availability at venues we end up backtracking a little bit from time to time. for example on the 20th we are in McLean then we go to Deleware and Staten Island then back to Baltimore then Virginia Beach then back up to Mass.)
It seems like a pleasant place here. The people at Panera were possibly the nicest people I have ever encountered in my life and they commented on the pleasure of my pleasantness as well. One thing I do like about the south is the southern hospitality. They can be a bit blunt though... a woman got on the elevator with me in Sarasota and the first thing out of her mouth was "so who are you voting for". Awkward.

Everyone else has just departed for the Gym, and the Technicians are at the space doing Load In. I am staying here to work on a voice over for Michael and then who knows!

Ciao from Orange Park!

We have PUPPIES!


That's right, Michael and I are fostering two little Terrier-PitBull mixes for the next three weeks. And let me tell you, these little boys are a handful. We decided to foster because I am going on tour so we do not want to get a dog until I get back and we figured fostering was a good way to learn what we are going to need to do when the time actually comes and to see if we can even handle a little baby puppy or if we may have to go for one already trained.

First off, I can tell you this, we will not be getting a pitbull of any sorts when its time to adopt. Not that these guys aren't cute as pie but they are a touch on the aggressive side and I think for our first dog we would be better off starting with something already apt to be calm and well trained, like a the lab we keep talking about getting.

Secondly this training thing is mighty hard! Now the people at the shelter told us they are not going to be really able to be housebroken until they are older than 8 weeks since their little bladders aren't big enough yet to understand how to "hold it" but a website I was looking at about training said they can begin to be housebroken as young as 4 weeks so I think I am going to try to start. It's hard when you don't see them poop everytime!

They just got their first bath which went mostly well. They were a little stressed out after a while that they couldn't get out of the tub themselves and I had to dry them with a hairdryer since they are not old enough to keep their body temperature settled themselves.

Another problem? Walks. They don't understand the concept and have no desire. They have more fun rolling around the front yard and biting their leashes than actually making any forward progress. I am trying to enforce the concept on them so they start to learn but also so they start to accept that I am boss. I will update on this process as it continues to progress.

Crate training is going fairly well. They did soil their crate last night but they stayed in it all night with only a bit of fuss at the start. We have to physically put them in the crate at this point so we will see if they get better with going in themselves. Little entices them at this point. They aren't too fond of toys or treats, just my feet, so it's hard to find incentive for good behavior but I will continue to work on it.


I am slightly worried about tonight, since I have my show and Michael is coming so we will be leaving the house around 4:30 and not getting home until 11:30. 7 hours is a long time for the little guys and I am trying to figure out wether we should crate them or just keep them closed off in the kitchen. We will see what we decide.

David opens to mixed reviews...

David In Shadow and Light had it's official opening at Theatre J Sunday night, also press night, and the reviews have been...mixed.

I use the term mixed because whilst none of them were particuarly glowing reviews, each had different likes and gripes, as is typical in the world of critique. I generally turn the other cheek on reviews because in the end, they are not why we do theatre. The only real detriment of reviews is to the broader audience of non-typical theatre goers who rely on reviews to tell them what to see, as with movie reviews. I am the type that ignores movie reviews and go see what looks appealing to me, as I am with theatre.

The thing that got me really thinking as I read through the four reviews I found yesterday and today (the post, the times, all arts review 4 u, and DC Theatre Scene) was why, through all that was discussed, one important element was missing. I don't feel any of the reviewers talked about what was to be felt from the piece. What they got, what they thought about, what it meant to them. Isn't that what one of the great thing about live theatre is? The ability to go to the bar or coffee house after the show and discuss with friends not only which actors you liked, or what worked or didn't work technically, or what you thought about the music, ect ect but what affect it had on you, what it made you think about, what points were made.

I think a main part of this show is when you dig through everything else and look at the core, the bone structure, the heart, it is a story about the Human Condition, however flawed, and its affect on others and the world as a whole. David is a perfect example of this. Rising up from nothing, and through charisma, talent, beauty, poetry, and music he rises up to be King over all the land only to prove that he too, is flawed, and yet God and man still love and forgive him as he loves and forgives those around him for their sins. It seems the reviewers have all become so concentrated on all the technical elements they forget the main reason people come to theatre...people come to the theatre because of how it makes them feel. they want to connect with the characters and story unfolding on the stage in a way that is hard to do with a Tv or Movie screen. They want to follow them, feel for them, rise and fall with them and I think, through all its flaws, this is done in David.

I wonder how long a person can review theatre, day in and day out, weekend after weekend seeing show after show, before they become too jaded to see the beauty in anything. Not just the talent, not just the good story or strong direction, but the beauty. Art is beauty.

Is Advanced Placement always good?

So it's been a while but everyone has been talking about blogs and such around this place so writing I am. Plus I am not doing anything on stage at this moment.

A thought that crosses my mind on a regular day basis is how much advanced placement has affected the course of my life, in positive and negative ways. I have been in "aquilla" or "signet" or "GT (gifted and talented)" or "honors" or "AP" classes my entire life that they have been available. From about 3rd or 4th grade I believe. This provided a lot of very strong opportunities for me throughout my young life. I can remember back in Aquilla when we were allowed to make our own studies as long as we provided a clear goal and purpose. I develped a third level to the Shakespeare study. And it was all based in independent study. We were allowed to chose what we wanted to be working on at any given time and given the time and space to do it on our own accord undirected aside from the listed goals. But what about the negative affects. I was never in classes with any of the children who were not considered "GT" so I never developed a tolerance or understanding for people whos minds didnt work exactly like mine. Not that one is better they are simply different but it was instilled in me through the use of words like "gifted and talented" that we were "better" in some way. I learned to work on my own and as I got older and group work was used more and more in schooling I loathed it and took on all the work myself. To this day I still prefere to work on my own by my own accord.

Do children that are put through GT systems miss out on a certain level of socialization?

I think so. And while the benefits are many I can't decide if they outweigh the damage. I suppose had I gone into engineering or medicine these effects wouldnt mean so much but I chose theater. A profession where working with others, some who may not work on your intelligent level, is a matter of everyday life and you are constantly taking direction from others.

It's strange how much desicions made by others for you when you were under the age of 12 affect you for the rest of your life, most of which probably dont seem to matter at the time they were made. For example a lot of kids I know were held back from Kindergarden or 1st grade because they were socially ready to move on. That doesn't seem like a big deal then but when you are in 10th grade a year or more older than the other kids in your class it starts to become a bigger deal. Anyone who knows me know my theory that the Rhode Island school system screwed me with my spelling.

I wonder what I will do to my kids that will affect them for the rest of their lives.