Day and night: Theatre Thursday

2 weeks ago I was in the midst of, and enjoying, an intensive 10 day run of a children's musical. I was getting on stage and singing and dancing and hamming it up in a bubblegum pink world in front of cheering young fans. Backstage we talked Disney and Broadway.

One night I went to the first rehearsal of my next project.

We met in a high ceilinged dance studio in an arts center. The large windows overlooked city buildings in the central business district. We sat in a circle on the floor. Makeup was scarce, serious theatre training cred was high. We read the play. Heard some of the original music. We moved around the room doing exercises that I had learned in a physical theatre intensive years ago in Los Angeles and have had very little opportunity to play with since.

My latest project is new. Raw. Political. Fringe.

It's worlds away from bubblegum pink.

And yet I felt right at home.

to y'all - Monday Mission

Even before I moved to the south, I said ya'll. I just say it more often now. A lot more often. It's inclusive. It's gender neutral. It's charmingly southern. It's casual. It rolls off the tongue. Best of all, every time The May Queen says it I smile. So ya'll... raise your hurricane glass, or your mug of cafe au lait, or your Abita Amber (or your diet Coke or cup of coffee or whatever non-southern drink you might have with you at the moment)... here's to y'all.

This post has been a Monday Mission. Today's Mission, should you choose to accept it, is to write a post in the form a toast (to anything! be creative!). If you write a Monday Mission please put a link to your post in the widget below (and if you want to steal the little Monday Mission button and use that in your post it will link back here for people to check out the other Monday Mission posts). This mission was suggested by the wonderful de at An Indigo Virgo.



Join us next week when your mission is to write a post in the form of a Tanga or a Nonnet (each is a specific type of poem, click on the word for a link to a description of the poetry). Mission suggested, again, by the fabulous de at An Indigo Virgo.

Video-licious: Theatre Thursday

Restraining an overwhelming desire to scratch has so taken over my day that I nearly forgot it was Thursday. Theatre Thursday!

But it just so happens that I received a video of one of last week's performances. It's not a very good video, and keep in mind that theatre never looks or sounds very good on video, and particularly video from a stationary camera set up in the back of the theatre without any direct audio feed. Plus, we're itty bitty and apparently you can't open the video into a larger version.(Qualify much?) But here's a little snippet (oh wow... turns out it's a long snippet! I thought I had trimmed it to just over 2 minutes, but it seems to go through to the end of the show. Don't feel obligated to watch all 20 minutes! Yikes! but if you're really bored...)


The truly best part of the video, which isn't in this snippet, is that I can hear The May Queen laughing hysterically at one point. It was her fourth viewing of a performance and she had attended several rehearsals as well. That's one satisfied customer.

Actually, it was really neat for her to see the process, and although she had never expressed any interest in the stage before (witness her unenthusiastic participation in Sunday School Christmas Pageants) she began talking about "what if [she] was P*nkalicious..." and is now signed up for a drama class at school. I don't expect it to become her thing (two actresses in the family? imagine the drama!) but I am glad that she is at least taking an interest in what I do. It's fun to share with her.

not on my roof

Well.

I appear to be elderly.

I thought I had at least a few more years before this happened. I am, after all, only 35.

But today I was diagnosed with shingles. Fun. I thought the irritation in my armpit was from the elastic around the sleeves of the cute top I wore last Thursday. Then when it appeared on my arm I assumed it was from the same thing.

I thought the aches and pains were completely unrelated. I told my husband that I kept expecting to come down with a fever because of the aching. But the fever never came.

But then the rash on my arm seemed to spread a bit. And today it was on my chest. So I called the doctor. By some miracle I was sitting face to face with him within the hour.

The doctor took one look at it and said it looked like shingles. But that I was a little young to get shingles. But after more discussion of my symptoms he declared that yes, indeed, it must be shingles.

Nice.

Shingles occur when a person who has had the chicken pox before becomes stressed or immune depressed, and the virus, which has been lying dormant in the nerves ever since the pox, gets activated. Usually shingles occur in people over 50.

And although I can't give someone else shingles, I can give someone who hasn't had the chicken pox or the vaccine the pox.

Someone like my daughter. Or my husband.

Or the 80 or so kids I work with at the preschool.

Actually, the doctor said that it's unlikely to spread because I don't have the cough and such that's associated with chicken pox, plus the rash is (at least so far) easily covered with clothes.

Between the shingles and my hurt foot? Let's just get me a walker and get it over with, shall we?

Nighttime Mambo No 5: Monday Mission

A little bit of sleepytime in my life
A little purring kitten by my side
A little shy of eight hours is all I need
A little bit of darkness is what I seek
I don't want to wake up with the sun
I want to sleep soundly all night long
My big soft pillow, here I am
Time to go to sleep beside my man

_______________________________________________

This post was a Monday Mission. Your Mission, should you choose to accept it is to write a post in the style of Mambo No. 5

Mission suggested by the fabulous de at An Indigo Virgo

If you play along (please play along! Mambo No 5 is so infectious you know you'll be humming it all day anyway, so go ahead and make up your own lyrics for it!) put a link to your post in the widget below.



Need more info on Mambo No. 5?

wiki info here

lyrics to the Lou Bega remake here

watch and listen to the remake here

Original lyrics

(very little is changed, but check this out:)

A little bit of Mardi Gras in my life
A little bit of carnival, it's alright
A little bit of cellulite, if you please
A little bit of mambo is all I need

...

Oh, we party down in the city
We gonna do New Orleans

(you know I love any reference to my beloved NOLA, but here comes my favorite part...)

[Incomprehensible]

(he he. this was the only site I could find with the original lyrics, and one line is
[Incomprehensible] . Love it)


And join us next week, when your Mission (also suggested by De!) is to write a post in the style of a toast (for an occasion of your choice, such as Anniversary, Wedding, New Baby, Birthday, New Home, Death, Curse, Holiday, Health, Love, Men / Husbands, Women / Wives, To Drink Itself... ed. note: if that's not enough to inspire you I don't know what is!)

I don't know what's up with the fonts in this post. It won't let me change them for some reason, even though it appears to change several times in the middle of the post. I give up. I'm going to bed.

Pinkatired

23 performances in 11 days.

Thousands of little girls in pink dresses.
At least one boy in a pink wig and pink necktie.

The opportunity to meet one fabulous local blogger and her family who came out to enjoy the show. (that's my costume from the end of the show. I called it 70s bridesmaid fabulous. One little girl kept calling me "pink Cinderella." Could you just die? adorable!)

After our second show tomorrow it will be over.


What WILL I do?


Oh, maybe I'll sleep.

(except that I jump into rehearsals for not one, but TWO Fr*nge Fest*val shows, so then again, maybe sleep isn't REALLY on the agenda...)

(and can you see my mic pack hanging out of the back of my shirt in that last picture? nice. I think I solved that problem after seeing that picture!)

___________________________
Monday Mission is fast approaching. Your Mission, should you choose to accept it (and please do) is to write a post in the style of Mambo No. 5

wiki info here

lyrics to the Lou Bega remake here

Mission suggested by the fabulous de at An Indigo Virgo

Seven

7 years ago tonight I was in the hospital. I had been in labor for 41 hours at this point, and had just finally given in and decided to get the epidural. My birth plan had been to go completely drug free, but at 2 weeks overdue and labor not progressing I was worried I wouldn't be strong enough to deliver you if I didn't get some rest, which the epidural did allow me to do. I don't regret that decision, although I wish I hadn't had to make it. I remember that The West Wing was on when they came in to give me a shot, and I was trying to watch it at the same time that they were sticking a needle in my spine.

I would be in labor for another 7 and a half hours beyond that, with nearly 2 hours of that spent pushing.

I think you must have been pretty comfortable in there.

But on October 3, 2002 at 4:35 am, PST, you finally entered the world.

And my world will never been the same.

You have brought me immeasurable joy. Pride. But most of all, love. Some days you exasperate me to no end, but the love is still there. Will always be there. There is nothing you can do that will change that. Nothing. I will always love you.

48 hours of labor. It's a story I always tell expectant mothers to ask for AFTER they've given birth. I don't want to scare them.

But I always end the story the same way.

I would do it all over again, in a heartbeat. Without a second thought. It was more than worth it.

Happy 7th birthday, baby.