Wednesday, December 30, 2009

2009 - best of the rest

I really did give up on that challenge, didn't I? Oh well. I do like writing with prompts and sometimes they have wonderful results (like that English paper!). Whatever. As they say: It's New Year's Eve (Eve) and hopes are high, dance one year in, kiss one goodbye.

Here, in no particular order, are things I loved in 2009:

-VEGAS, baby! Even though I had stomach problems during the trip, rendering the all you can eat buffet at the Mirage COMPLETELY USELESS to me, I was at large in Sin City - rhinestones, the Beatles + Cirque du Soleil = magnifique!, Sigfried and Roy's Secret Garden (sounds just wrong somehow), dancing fountains, and (finally!) my gondola ride!

-2009 also saw several performances of my Favorite Broadway Diva, Patti Lu - in St. Louis with Mandy Patinkin, in Vegas (where she stopped the show!), and at Ravinia (accompanied at the end by Mr. Kauffman at the piano)

- Speaking of St. Louis, I asked myself that time honored question: What Would Patti LuPone do in St. Louis with some time to kill - and figured that, obviously, she would climb fearlessly to the top of the arch, so by god, I decided to do that too. Are you afraid of heights or confined places, the ticket guy asked me "Haha - I guess we'll find out!" I gaily replied. Never again. No matter what Patti tells me to do.

- Speaking of Ravinia, it was another great season, if a chilly one. I was at the Park and dancing in the aisles, with my glitter lantern and jelly ring(s) for the Arrival from Sweden concert (music of ABBA, baby!) and then again for Patti in the 7 Deadly Sins, Kelli O'Hara, and the Bill T. Jones dance commission Fondly do we hope...

- Jane the Fraudulent Bell Ringer

- U2 at Soldier Field

- U2 at Soldier Field

- U2 at Soldier Field

- U2 at Soldier Field

- Earl Grey Vanilla Creme tea lattes at Argo

- Albee the Holiday Elephant

- Lord Peter Wimsey

- Broadway in Chicago: particularly Spring Awakening, Legally Blonde, the Addams Family, In the Heights (am seeing that this weekend!) and eager anticipation of Billy Elliot, the return of August: Osage County

- the Live Bait vending machine (what the WHAT?), the book barn, and trying to start a fire in Green Lake, Wisconsin

- the Cheese Castle in Kenosha and their temptingly delicious array of cheese curds

- the song "Bad Romance" by Lady Gaga

- Ballet! Particularly Carousel (A Dance) by Christopher Wheeldon, Lar Lubovitch's Othello, and Gerald Arpino's Waltz of the Flowers from The Nutcracker

- Glee!!!!!

- Lindt chocolates

- BOOTS!

- the color purple (no, literally, the color purple)

- the Viking Rumble (everybody...RUMBLE!)

- my new team, the Indianapolis Colts (even though they blew their perfect record last week. WTF?)

- Sugar Bliss spice cupcakes

- 30 Rock

- Flight of the Conchords

- Lill 1154 sample sales and my new Hadley bag

- Eric Northman, True Blood and all of the Sookieverse

- my free subscription to Time Out New York (I don't want you to end!!)

- the 6 foot nutcracker

- Karen, my Physical Therapist.

- my heating pad (I KNOW. OLD.)

Oh, there must be more. There must be. It was a pretty good year, all things considered. I still haven't learned to purl, but that's what resolutions are for, yes?

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