the spastic starfish

Midnight in Paris

2012-02-12T09:01:00.001-08:00

Best PictureQuest - Film #6

Midnight in Paris is, again, a movie I'd been interested to see when it first came out. I was curious in a mild sort of way - it looked good, it seemed funny, there were lots of good people in it, etc., but in the way these things sometimes go, the chance to see it passed me by, until...Best PictureQuest 2012.

So Gil (Owen Wilson) and his fiancee Inez (Rachel McAdams) are in Paris. Gil is a screen writer, working on his first novel, and Inez just seems to be the daughter of snotty rich people. She doesn't appear to do much of anything except whine and wear pretty clothes. They meet up with some of Inez's friends, the pedantic Paul (a very disguised Michael Sheen) and his wife? Girlfriend? and what started out as a romantic getaway before their wedding turns out to be dominated by Paul, a droning intellectual. Poor Gil just doesn't seem to fit - he doesn't get along with his future in-laws (daddy is a Tea Party Republican on top of it), and he doesn't get a long with wind bag, know-it-all Paul, who argues with a docent on a Rodin tour. Yeah, he's one of those. All Gil really wants to do is let Paris inspire him. Oh, yeah, and he wants to walk around in the rain.

Is it any wonder that Gil longs for the nostalgia and simplicity of an earlier time? He longs for 1920s Paris, and one night, following a wine tasting, he gets lost on the streets of Paris and is picked up by a carful of noisy Parisians. He gets swept along - into the past. Glorious Paris of the 1920s, into the world of Cole Porter, Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, and Pablo Picasso. He goes to a party there, spends some time chilling with the Fitzgeralds, and Hemingway agrees to show his novel to Stein, and then Gil wakes up back in 2010.

Why he doesn't think that this is all a crazy kind of dream, I don't know, but he is determined to share this glittering world with Inez. He drags her back to the place where the car picked him up and.... nothing happens. She thinks he's nuts, with a possible brain tumor, and gets a cab back to their hotel. He hangs around, and at the stroke of midnight, the car comes back, taking him back to the 1920s. He meets Picasso's mistress, played gorgeously by Marion Cotillard (in beautiful, beautiful 1920s flapper style dresses) and kind of falls for her. It turns out that she is longing for the simpler, more glorious era of France in the Belle Epoch. He figures out, after a while, that everyone thinks their own time sucks and wants to be in what they perceive as a golden age. But is anyone happier about it? No. Stein and Hemingway have read his book, which he seems to be basing on his real life, because Hemingway wonders why the protagonist has not figured out why the fiancee is having an affair with her pedantic friends. The light goes on, Gil confronts Inez about it. They split up, Gil goes walking and meets up with a shop keeper he's been chatting with - a Cole Porter-phile named Gabrielle, who also likes to walk in the rain, and they walk off together, hand-in-hand through the rain soaked streets.

Aaaaannnd, that's it. This film was notable mainly for its gorgeous footage of Paris. It had snappy Woody Allen sounding dialogue, and was funny in the way Woody Allen movies are funny, you know? I didn't quite understand why Gil and Inez were together in the first place, because there was absolutely nothing likeable about her. Nothing. (But I still love you, Rachel).

I am also a bit lukewarm on Owen Wilson as a leading man. I think they were going for a sort of every man vibe with him, and he wandered through the film kind of baffled. It worked, I guess, but I didn't care very much about him as a character, so by the end I was kind of like, oh. Okay. Well good for you, but why didn't you dump that bitch sooner? And I know the trips to the past were the whole point of the thing, but it became a little too much, like, here's Dali (even though Adrien Brody was a hilarious high point), and here's Toulouse Loutrec, and let's cram as many references as we can into here even though it's getting kind of annoying now.

Still, it was enjoyable. Was it Oscar worthy? I don't know. What I can tell you, is that I am not a huge Francophile - and this movie made me want to go to Paris. I think there should totally also be an Oscar category for that.

I have three more films on the list to see - Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (still in theaters), Tree of Life (red box) and War Horse (I fear I've missed the boat on this one). I guess we'll see how close we get to the goal by the time the broadcast comes along.

Moneyball

2012-02-12T08:50:00.000-08:00

Best PictureQuest - Film #5

I'm going to be honest. I don't like baseball. I think it is probably the most boring sport on the face of the earth. I live in Chicago, and we have 2 teams here. If pressed, I'd probably pledge my allegiance to the Cubs, for no other reason than my family are Cubs fans, and I went to college on the North Side. Not very good reasons, but the truth is I just don't care that much. And I'm fine with that. I think it might be fun to go and sit at Wrigley and watch a game, and I have done that. I'm just not much of a fan.

Naturally, baseball movies aren't my favorites either. I stay away in droves. This was the case with Moneyball when it first came out. I had no interest. Zero. Nada. But I was told by several people that I like very much that Moneyball was really very good and not all about baseball, and then I saw an interview with Brad Pitt where he talked about the movie, and damn it, I decided I had to give it a try. Plus, it was part of the all-important Best PictureQuest, and so there was really no other alternative.

I got it out of a Red Box (thank you, Red Box!). It is the true story of Oakland A's GM Billy Beane, a former baseball player himself, who has to find a new way to scout players on the A's slender budget. He uses statistics, rather than other generally accepted scouting methods, to create his team, much to the dismay of the scouts who have made their livelihoods in finding quality players by, you know, watching them play and assessing their potential.

I had never really thought a lot about Brad Pitt as an actor - since his work has sort of been eclipsed by his personal life, but he is a fine actor, and does a great job with Billy Beane. I mean honestly, he made me CARE about a baseball story. The man should get an Oscar just for that.

Hugo

2012-02-12T08:40:00.000-08:00

Best PictureQuest - Film #4

This is yet another film that I'd wanted to see when it was first released, and another one where I have read the source material. Hugo Cabret is a young boy left orphaned and living in a Paris train station, ostensibly with his uncle. His father is a clockmaker, and his uncle is responsible for setting all of the clocks in the station, and he teaches Hugo to do the job. Once his uncle disappears, this job is all that stands between Hugo and a trip to the orphanage. He keeps the clocks running and stays out of the sight of the Station Inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen, delightfully diabolical). He is caught attempting to steal from a toy booth owned by a cranky old man (Ben Kingsley). He is forced to turn over his notebook, filled with drawings of mechanical looking devices. The old man demands to know if Hugo made the drawings, but Hugo will not give away his secret. The old man threatens to burn the notebook and report Hugo to the Station Inspector. The boy flees and we learn his secret - he is trying to rebuild a mechanical man, abandoned in the museum where his father worked, and rescued by Hugo when a fire that claims his father's life destroys the museum. He is convinced that the mechanical man, when fixed, will contain a message to him from his father. He meets the old man's ward, Isabelle (Chloe Grace Moretz), who promises that she will prevent cranky old Papa Georges from burning Hugo's necklace. Together, the two of them uncover the secret of the mechanical man - a secret that is connected to Papa Georges himself.

It's another very faithful adaptation of a book - The Invention of Hugo Cabret, told in both words and beautiful pictures. It was fun to watch this book come to life on the screen, in vivid detail from director Martin Scorcese. We saw it in 3D which didn't enhance it much for me (but maybe I was just cranky because I had to wear the 3D glasses over my regular glasses which was a little bit awkward).

The Help

2012-02-12T08:32:00.000-08:00

Best PictureQuest - Film #3

This is another film that I'd wanted to see when it was first released, but that I missed. Do you see how this quest could have been so much easier if I had just seen these things when I first heard about them?? But anyway, thank you, Village Crossing Blockbuster store.

I had read the book "The Help" right before the film was released. The film was a fairly faithful adaptation about a group of African American maids serving white families in Civil Rights Era Mississippi. A young writer, Skeeter Phelan (the awesome Emma Stone) wants to write a book from the point of view of the help, talking about what it is like for them to essentially raise white children and keep house for their families, while being kept completely separate. The real reason to see this movie is for Viola Davis's performance as Aibileen and Octavia Spencer's performance as Minny, the two maids at the center of the story. They breathe life into the movie, which is otherwise somewhat uninspiring.

I liked this movie, although I found the book to be more powerful.

The Descendants

2012-02-12T08:22:00.000-08:00

Best PictureQuest - Film #2

This is one of the movies that I'd been wanting to see since it was released.

It's just another day in paradise for Matt King (played by George Clooney) - but don't let the stunning Hawaiian setting fool you - even though he lives in a beautiful tropical setting, his life is far from trouble-free. His wife is in a coma, following a boating accident. Things haven't been going too well between the two of them, but the accident has made him realize that he is ready to refocus on this relationship. As we will see, it is a little late for that - not only is his wife in a coma, it's unlikely that she will ever wake up. Just as we're starting to think that the film will be about Matt as a kind of clueless dad to rambunctious Scotty and wild child Alexandra, dealing with the whole coma situation, we learn something else: Matt's wife has been having an affair. As a successful, workaholic lawyer, Matt has no clue about this either. Everything he thought he knew has changed in an instant.

It's a pretty film to watch, first of all for the exotic location, and secondly for the performances put in by George Clooney, Shailene Woodley and the rest of the cast.

The Artist

2012-02-12T08:12:00.001-08:00

Best PictureQuest 2012 - Film #1

I had heard so many good things about this movie, even though I knew next to nothing about it. I watched as it won piles of awards and decided to see what all the shouting was about. The Artist is a black and white, pretty much silent movie. A beloved silent screen star (played by the incredibly charming Jean DuJardin) finds himself losing his fame as silent films are being taken over by talking pictures. I had wondered how a silent film would look and feel in 2012, and it felt incredibly fresh. DuJardin is joined by a solid cast, including guardian angel Berenice Bejo as Peppy Miller, and the smartest, cutest little dog ever. It was an unexpected delight. This one is my personal favorite of the films that I have seen, and my frontrunner for Best Picture, AND Lead Actor.

It's still in theaters, so go see it while you can. It's amazing everything these talented actors can project without saying a word.

Best PictureQuest 2012

2012-02-12T08:05:00.000-08:00

Every year I say I will see all of the Oscar Best Picture nominees before the broadcast. Every.Single.Year. And it never ever happens. This is party due to laziness, and also partly due to the fact that the Best Picture nominees are usually films that are good in a snobby, movie critic kind of way, the kind of way that is completely over my head, OR they are films that I have no interest in seeing. And then, you know, they opened the field to allow up to 10 best picture nominees. If I couldn't do five, raising the number to ten is just another obstacle.

This year, I'm close. So close (incredibly close?). This year, the Best Picture nominees are ones I actually had interest in seeing. Woo hoo! I have, to date, seen six of the nine. I have decided to review them, for your reading pleasure. So stay tuned.

The Quest Continues...

gridiron confessions part 2

2012-02-06T06:28:00.001-08:00

So, now you know I am a football hooligan in a cunning disguise. Let's talk about teams now. I don't necessarily hold with the fact that you HAVE to like the team in the city where you live. That is just geography. I think you can cheer for whoever you want to cheer for, and it doesn't matter where you might live.

I live in the Chicago suburbs. Therefore, by rights, my team should be the Bears. And I've tried this. I have. I mentioned the '85 Bears in my last post. I watched the game. Since then, though, they have caused me nothing but heartache, so I've started scouting around for other teams (plus, you know, blue and orange? yuck.). I flirted with many teams, trying to find the right one. In my early days, I liked the Giants (I think that this is because my love of NYC began very early, and anything associated with it automatically became cool. This did not hold true of the Jets, though, for some reason. Giants = cool, Jets = thugs. That's the way it is.), the Raiders (cute logo! arrrghhh!), the Dolphins (pretty teal uniforms!) and a few others. My first major team crush though, was the Cowboys. I was in high school and I was bat shit crazy about the Dallas Cowboys. I don't know why. It was fun to watch Troy Aikman throw and Emmit Smith run. They were good. They were all-American. They were Cowboys.

Plus, it really annoyed this guy I went to school with, who was part of the group I hung with. So, after awhile, I just wore my Cowboys gear (oh yes, I had gear) on Mondays just to annoy him. He liked the 49ers who had a big rivalry with the Cowboys (at least, our rivalry was big). Whenever the 49ers would lose, I would say something to him about it like "24-17, huh? That sucks.". And if the 'Boys lost, he'd come and quote scores and records at me. And I'd say something awesome like "At least they aren't the 49ers." (I didn't have The Knowledge that I spoke of in the last post. That came later.)

But that phase ended. I broke up with the Cowboys and now I think they are obnoxious. I always got a lot of crap for liking them anyway (my dad called them "Cowpies" just to annoy me. Now I call them that too.). So it was back to the Bears for a while. But they are problematic. Like the ex-boyfriend you keep going back to. It's good for a while, and then they fall back into their same old asshole-ish habits. So I scouted for a new team. For a while it was the Colts (I mean, Peyton Manning, come on! Awesome!) but then they tanked. If I wanted to support a losing team, I'd just stick with the heartbreaking Bears, you know?

I know, I know, that's fairweather fan-ish. You have to take the good with the bad, and support them no matter what. But it's been too many times with the Bears, you know? What's a girl to do?

So I'm on the hunt for a new team. I like the Giants, obviously, and the Saints. I liked the Lions for a while, too, so I guess we'll see.

gridiron confessions

2012-02-06T06:12:00.001-08:00

I am a football hooligan. This may come as a surprise to the people who think of me as a sweet, quiet, foreign film watching, vampire series reading, broadway music listening culture princess who loves to shop. But it's true.

It began quite early, you see. I was 7 years old in 1985 when the Bears went to the Super Bowl. I knew all of the players in the starting lineup AND all the words to the Super Bowl Shuffle. I didn't know anything about the game then, but my parents were into it, and I was too. We also started spending Super Bowl Sunday with friends of my parents. I would eat chili and play with their cute toy poodle, but sometimes there was nothing else to do but pay attention to the game. And so I learned things. It was more fun to me to understand what was going on - it helped, too, during Thanksgiving when most of the day was spent with chips and dip in front of the tv. My dad took part in pools in the places where he worked, and one day, for fun, we decided to do it at home, too.

I picked teams for the stupidest of reasons, I liked the color of their uniforms, or they had a cute player, or I liked their city. The funny thing was, a lot of the times, I picked correctly, without even knowing anything about anything. We used to play for money, but now it's just for fun. (And no, I don't pick them like that anymore. I read the papers and look up stats and stuff like that). My parents are kind of amused, because I will sit in front of a game with them, sometimes I'll read, or sometimes I'll knit or whatever, just listening to what's going on, and watching, if it is super interesting, and then later, I can have actual knowledgeable football conversations. It's a little bit dazzling, because it is, I think, so unexpected. Here's an example, one day this past winter, my dad was wondering if a coach had ever been fired mid-season, and I answered, yes, that Vikings guy was fired last year before Thanksgiving. I didn't remember his name (looked it up later - Brad Childress) - it just soaks in. My parents were suitably dazzled. I don't know where it comes from. I'll just pick things up, like, subliminally, and they get stored in a little football brain folder, ready to be accessed again at a suitably appropriate time.

So last night, I was in front of the tv, watching the game, and transformed from sweet, quiet regular me into crazy, football hooligan me, yelling at the screen, clapping when the Giants made a good move and booing heartily when the Patriots did just about anything. It was crazy. It makes a difference, of course, when I actually like one of the teams playing. Last year, I was like, yawwwwnnn, whatever, Packers, who cares, bring on the commercials!

I have never actually been to a game, but really want to go to one. Like, a pre-season one. I am not so dedicated that I will sit around in freezing temps, to watch these guys run around. I know that makes it more authentic or something, but whatever.

So now you know my secret.

a new advocate for arts managers?

2012-01-11T06:30:00.000-08:00

This is possibly the best thing I've seen on the internet, like, ever. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Ryan Gosling, Arts Administrator

(I've got several committee meetings coming up this month and would love the notes help!)

the kissing cabbie

2012-01-02T08:21:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I don't feel like taking the bus to the train station from my job on Navy Pier. On those occasions, I will splurge on a cab ride. Cabbies are a special breed (although the ones in Chicago are not nearly as special as the ones I've encountered in New York, most notably the one who turned around and told me, as we were screeching along at 60 or so mph "De brakes - dey are not wohrking!") and I've had my fair share of crazy cabbies between the pier and union station. Some of them keep to themselves, some of them like to chat. There was one who saw my "Gypsy" tote bag and asked me, in a broody, eastern-european accent "Vot does it say on your bag? Vy does eet say dees?" He didn't think I'd like real Gypsies (even though I tried to explain it was from the broadway show - I thought it would confuse him if I told him it was really about the stripper Gypsy and not actual gypsies). He then thought I might like to see a few (Serbian) movies about Gypsies and proceeded to write them down (while he was driving).

There was the one who didn't know the address I wanted to go to. I was dropping something off, and I didn't know how to get there either, but, like, I'm not the cab driver. Aren't they supposed to know stuff like that? So he kicked me out because neither of us could figure out how to get there. Something wrong with that, I think.

Then there was the one that dropped me off at the train station last Wednesday. He noted that it wasn't a nice time to be out (rush hour) and I agreed. "Why you do it?" he asked me. Well, I told him I was on my way home from work. Then he asked me what routes were good to get to union station. So I told him the ways that I'd gotten there in the past. He asked me which one was best, and we took that. I think a lot of people were off last week, because the traffic was really light. Anyway. He asked me what I was doing for New Year's. This is before I was stricken with the plague (oh, fine, a really awful cold) so I said I was going to a rocking party at a friend's house. He then asked "You hev boyfriend?" and I said no and he wondered who I would kiss at midnight then. He told me I should just grab somebody, bend them back and give them a huge kiss. I said if there were any eligible guys around, I would consider it and he said "Who cares if they eligible? They not complaining!" He said there was a window between 12:00 and 12:30 where you just needed to kiss as many people as possible. I was surprised at the half hour window, but whatever. Since he was going to be driving that night, my driver went on, "I kiss my customers!" I asked him if he thought they would like that and he replied "I don't care!" and then he laughed like a lunatic. So there may have been a kissing cabbie on the streets of Chicago on NYE - maybe I should have warned y'all before? Anyway, I was amused and the ride ended on a cheerful note. I wished him a happy new year and lots of kisses (but not from me).

Never once have I gotten in the cash cab, and now that the Chicago show is over, so I guess that's not going to happen.

so many dreams to tease the heart...

2011-12-31T16:06:00.000-08:00

You didn't think I'd forget to post "The Perfect Year" did you? She was totally right about 2011. Happy New Year, everyone!

she's comiiinnnggg!

2011-12-27T07:30:00.000-08:00

According to her website, Patti will be at the Ravinia gala this coming July! With Patricia Racette, which is intriguing, because she's an opera singer. Whatever can this mean? I guess it's something for us to look forward to!

Below is a portion of the calendar with this info (sorry it's so eensy weensy)- I tried the Ravinia website, but don't see anything about the Gala listed yet...

you sunk my battleship!

2011-12-16T07:04:00.001-08:00

I remember playing Battleship in grade school when we had indoor recess. And since it's Chicago and it rains/snows a lot, we had indoor recess quite a lot. It really is kind of tedious, yes? If only there were aliens involved in the actual game, like there apparently are in the movie, that would make it much more fun. Still, as I'm sure I've mentioned, it has men (Alex!) in uniform, and that's all I really ask for in a movie based on a board game.
Happy Alex Friday!

happy alex friday!

2011-12-09T10:33:00.000-08:00

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a huge-ass planet colliding with earth! Whhaaaaat??? We don't know what's happening in this movie, really, but it was great to see you, Alex, especially all done up tuxedo style!

what a difference a year makes!

2011-11-23T06:43:00.000-08:00

A year ago today, everything came crashing down around me. It was probably the lowest I've ever, ever been. Ever been released (unfairly, but that's another story) from a job two days before your birthday? And right before Thanksgiving (by a deeply unhappy, vindictive bitch set out to sabotage you? Sorry, sorry, another time.) It sucks. It makes the holidays really suck.

But I'm thankful, this year, for my family, my friends, my new beautiful boss and delightful family of colleagues who have helped me rediscover my confidence. It's probably not healthy for me to carry around this resentment and anger for what happened last year, so I'm going to attempt to stop griping about it. Forget, possibly, but forgive, I don't think so. I know there's a distinction between things that are personal and things that are business, but this was personal. But what do you know? Good triumphs over evil, every time.

"so I said satan farewell - and now I'm all ready to fly!" Patti, who I am sure would agree with me about the benefits of holding a grudge (we're both Italian, after all) will say it better, so take it away, lady!

gq man of the month...

2011-11-18T13:02:00.000-08:00

And, to be honest, Man of the Blog, pretty much all the time. Yes, it's Alex Friday!

if you haven't missed me...

2011-11-13T15:05:00.000-08:00

Maybe you missed seeing Alex's hunky visage? Feast your eyes, friends, I'm sort of figuring out what to do with this blog. I started it out when I got a job in the arts, but I won't (can't) talk about work details. Confidentiality is the nature of the job. So I could talk about shows I see and stuff, but lots of people do that much better and more eloquently than I do. I was having fun writing the True Blood recaps, but the show's on hiatus now until June. I have started a little blogging side project (I'm just playing around with it, I promise I'll share when I've got something good) and I'm having a blast with it because it has a purpose (that little flame... that lights a fire under your ass... anybody?) and it's fun and I'm having so much fun doing it. This one feels old - even though I really really love posting pictures of Alex. How can that ever get old? But is it a fan blog? Not really.

I called it the spastic starfish after that immortal line in Billy Elliot and because, at the time, I was working for a dance company and trying my hand in dance classes. I no longer work there and I was awful at dancing (spastic starfish, indeed!) so the name is untrue (even though I am still rather a spazz in regular life). So we need a facelift and some new ideas and a new title. Maybe I'll just tell you stories about myself. We'll see. I'm still thinking.

guess what day it is!

2011-09-23T06:48:00.000-07:00

Alex Friday!!! I don't think I'll ever really tire of this...

i've had a long week, so...

2011-09-15T17:41:00.000-07:00

Double Alex Friday!

(I feel better now, don't you??)

let the season 5 countdown begin!

2011-09-13T17:53:00.001-07:00

Waiting really does suck, and now we fans of True Blood have a very, very long time to wait until we find out what happens to our favorite residents of Bon Temps, LA. But I was wondering about next season and what book elements, if any might appear next season.

I started re-reading the series. There's a lot that can't happen in the show because they've gone in a different direction (killed off characters, brought in other ones, etc). So. There's no more Sophie-Anne and so probably (most likely) no Andre, Siegebert, or Wybert. We've met Hadley and she's not a vampire (at least, she wasn't the last time we saw her. Who knows what might have happened in the interim?). Sookie won't have a reason (at least, she won't have the same reason) to go to New Orleans to clean out Hadley's apartment and probably won't meet Amelia.

A lot of the next book has to do with Jason shifting and becoming settled in the werepanther community. The nice guy Calvin in the books turned into dead uncle-daddy meth dealer, so his side plots are done. However, despite the fact that we haven't seen Crystal and the rest of the panthers on the show for a while, I think it might be optimistic of us to think we're done with them. It seemed to be too quickly and easily resolved. Although Jason does seem to have enough to keep him busy what with Hoyt hating his guts, his new friends with benefits thing with Jessica, and Steve Newlin on his doorstep (possibly a vampire now, and most definitely hating Jason's guts also).

Other things that show up in the next book - the packmaster contest, the supernatural sniper, and the pirate vampire. The packmaster contest on paper was between Alcide's father, and Patrick Furnan. It could be shifted to be between Alcide and whoever. Although there wouldn't be much point of a contest now, since he took Marcus down by force, somebody would have to challenge him. Besides, and more to the point, do we really want to see a packmaster contest?? Was that a chorus of "Hell no's!" that I just heard? Yeah, me too. The only thing we could get out of it, as far as I can see, is the introduction of Quinn. He can be a little bit of eye candy (like we need anymore) --- uh, I mean, another love interest for Sookie, now that she's ditched the vamps (let's see how long that lasts, shall we?). Besides, I like tigers.

As for the sniper - they could introduce a sniper, I guess, one who is picking off shifters and weres, but that seems a little tame for the Bon Temps of the True Blood universe.

The pirate vampire - again, they could introduce Charles Twining (but, as I said about Terry's war buddy - does this show really need some more random characters?). He would be fun character to have around. But his purpose in coming to town - exacting further payment for the death of Long Shadow) doesn't apply here. Bill already did that, in creating Jessica, unless Long Shadow's sire is really holding a grudge.

I wonder too about the Authority - something's gotta happen there, right? Like we actually find out who they are? Since Russell's coming back, I think that will bring more vampire politics back to the fore. Did he actually marry Sophie-Anne in the series? Will he make some claim on Bill's kingdom (how much longer will he actually have a kingdom, anyway?)?

I also just read that Tara may or may not really be dead. Will she come back as a ghost that possesses Lafayette? Will Sookie's shrieks for help summon a vampire who saves Tara by turning her?

Who knows? But the countdown to season 5?

Begins now.

post mortem: "And When I Die"

2011-09-12T17:45:00.000-07:00

True Blood Season Finale!!!!

(note - includes spoilers from both the series and the books. Can't say I didn't warn you.)

Was it me, or did this one seem to drag a bit in the beginning? I feel like Jesus was a little slow in discovering Lafayette's altered state - he didn't even seem to have thought about the possibility of Marnie the crazy witch seeking out Lafayette, the powerful medium. Really, senor brujo? He should have figured it out WAY before he got stabbed in the hand with a fork (as we'll see later, Tara, who's about as magical as a corn fritter, figures it out just from seeing Jesus's body). I feel like the moment that he agreed to give Marnie his brujo juju should have been BIGGER. Instead, it was like, slurp, slurp, done and done, ding dong the brujo's dead, Marnie's got the head of a cage fighter and the body of a fry cook. Awesome. It felt a bit like the part when Bill and Eric blithely agreed to kill themselves in exchange for Sookie's freedom. It was too easy, and it should have been a big moment, but it just felt lifeless. And then Jesus was lifeless, and it was like, oh, okay. Is it because there's so much going on that we don't have enough time to get really invested in these characters?

And, oh, it's Halloween, and Merlotte's is fully staffed (!) and decorated for the holiday. The employees, too, are all decked out in costume (although zombies wearing thumb necklaces? Not what I want my server to look like!). Sookie got unfired, once Sam figured out what the heck had happened. It's weird though that Sam didn't try to figure out why Sookie was missing so many shifts in the first place. If she hadn't come in, he'd still be hanging around wondering where the heck she was (although she's rarely at work, so maybe he hadn't noticed? He's been kind of busy lately, after all). Some other stuff happens - one of Terry's war buddies comes into the bar - because what this show needs is more characters who are all mysterious and kind of shifty. Holly comes to work dressed as a fairy (and she looks truly terrifying) and smoking a joint. Tara shows up and tells them both that Marnie's back. And that she's taken over Lafayette. See? She's really firing on all cylinders tonight!!

Sookie can't get Bill or Eric by phone - so the three of them go running off. They find the two vampires, divested of their shirts (thanks, Marnie!) and chained together, on top of a pyre. Someone's planning a vampire bonfire. (Are you ready for this witch crap to be over yet? Because I totally was, by this point in the episode.) Holly, Tara and Sookie start chanting. It's Halloween, and, as Holly told us, the barrier between our world and the spirit world is especially thin. Hmmm, huhhh, wonder what's going to happen now? Gran and Antonia emerge from beyond the veil, spouting fortune style platitudes like "change is hard" "follow your heart" and so on. They leave again and take Marnie with them (after Lafayette puked a bitch out). Again, this should have been a Big Moment, right? But it was kind of anti-climactic.

After that, Sookie's helping to heal the rather crispy vampires (clad in matching robes) with her magical fairy blood. Choosing between Bill and Eric is, like, super hard for poor lil' ol' Sookie, and so she decides to choose.... herself. I don't understand her sudden wishy-washiness. Why on earth did she go and forgive Bill? He didn't deserve it!!! He had his chance and he blew it. Arrghhh, whatever. She cries for a while and then goes home. Can I pause for a moment here and say a big Brava to Pam for saying what all of us are thinking? How can somebody named "Sookie" come between her and her maker? It is a totally ridiculous name. Is it a Southern thing or something? Are there tons of "Sookies" running around Louisiana? Is it short for something? A nickname? It's never been explained how her brother is "Jason" while she got saddled with "Sookie".

Speaking of Jason, he got the tar beaten out of him by an enraged Hoyt (cuz well, duh. But he really was trying to do the right thing. And telling him would have been better than sneaking around, right?) and he was comforted in a very special way, by Jessica, wearing an awesome cape. But she doesn't want to be his girlfriend. So they're basically the vampire version of the movie Friends With Benefits (and maybe sometimes a little blood too?). Anyway, Jess left, and Jason was visited by Steve Newlin, flashing a pair of fangs (did he die in the earlier season? Or were the fangs a Halloween gag?)

Bill & Eric get a visit from Nan, who has left the Authority, blah blah blah. The two of them save us from having to listen to her anymore by killing her and her guards. Thanks, guys!

Alcide is visiting a parking garage (I don't remember what he has to do with this), which has a big old hole in it, like someone was buried in there and has just busted out. Oh, wait, that's exactly what happened. Looks like we're going to see Mr. Edgington again real soon.

Finally - Sookie returns home, alone (instead of bringing along a big burly Viking Vampire. Stupid, stupid Sookie.). It's dark and quiet. She calls for Tara, but... it's Debbie who steps out of the shadows. With a gun. They fight. Tara appears, trying to help, but gets shot when the gun goes off during a struggle. Sookie then shoots Debbie.

Well. That part was expected, since it does happen in the book (not as if that matters, but they were using the source material for some of this season). I had expected other deaths, and was especially worried about Lafayette. Cuz, if we're going by the book(s), he would have been the body in Andy's car in season 2. I don't want him to die, since he's a great character. He's always the one keeping it real, you know? But still, in terms of usefulness, he could have gone with Jesus. Anyway, I was real.surprised. when Tara was shot and (presumably) killed. In the books. she owns a clothing store. She's had some brushes with vamps, and she stays away, but generally, despite her childhood, she's happy and successful. She marries JB du Rone and has twins. Why can't we have introduced JB into the series and given Tara a little bit of happiness?Can't anybody in this dang town be happy? Clearly, Tara had jinxed herself by daydreaming with Sookie about their (vampire free) twilight years (har har) on the porch, watching the sunset with their grandbabies. So, goodbye, Tara. Oooh, I just had a thought - maybe Tara's angry spirit will take over Lafayette next? Ick, ick, ick, no, no, no.

I wonder who will come to Sookie's rescue (or who she thinks is going to come to her rescue - her house is out in the middle of nowhere. Who's gonna hear you, Sook?) My first thought was Eric, since he's the one who helps her with Debbie in Dead to the World. But that's unlikely, since she just broke up with both him and Bill. My other thought was a fairy - they could introduce us to Niall, her fairy prince great grandfather. Or maybe Sookie has another fairy godmother kind of creature lurking around?

we remember...

2011-09-11T09:56:00.000-07:00

"In those days, we finally chose to walk like giants and hold the world in arms grown strong with love
And there may be many things we forget in the days to come,

But this will not be one of them."
— Brian Andreas (Traveling Light: Stories & Drawings for a Quiet Mind)

It's one of those things, you know, when people remember exactly where they were and what they were doing on September 11, 2001. I was at home, getting ready for work. I worked at a consulting firm in Skokie, my first job out of college - I had graduated in May, 2001 - ready to go out into the world, right?

But then the world changed. So I was getting ready for work. The tv was off - my dad, who worked nights at the time, was still asleep, and we didn't want the noise to wake him. We were waiting for the plumber. He's the one who told us to turn on the tv - a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.

We thought it was an accident, something that had gone horribly wrong. No one could even believe that it might have been done on purpose. Who could even conceive of such a thing? I had to get to work, so I got in the car and drove maybe 10 minutes. My office was right behind my high school, so this route was familiar to me. I couldn't help but think, though, that while everything looked the same, it somehow all felt completely different. Something had changed. Something was very wrong.

I remember I listened to Renee Fleming sing the Song to the Moon in the car on the way to work. It was soothing, and even though I didn't have all the details yet, I felt that soothing sounds were needed. I did not sit at my desk that day - someone was out and I was covering her phone - to add to the overall feeling of strangeness and confusion. I don't think any work got done by anyone that day - we were all online, or listening to the radio, trying to find out more news - what was happening out there. At the time we just didn't know, we didn't know if there were more planes, heading for Chicago, for the west coast, for the capitol. We had offices in Seattle and in Washington DC. Some of our consultants were traveling, so we worried.

I don't know why we all just didn't go home, but maybe there was a comfort in all being together. We had a staff meeting planned for that day, we ordered from a place called Pockets. we didn't have the meeting, but we still had the food. I remember eating it at my actual desk, scrolling through the news, emailing my mom (working at school) and my friends, trying to get more news, any news, about what was going on. I remember hearing stories of courageous rescuers and of incredible sadness and loss.

I remember the eerie silence of not hearing planes overhead, in the days that followed.

alex friday

2011-09-09T18:09:00.000-07:00

So there is apparently a contest going on, and the prize is lunch with Alex and Kristin Bauer (who plays Pam on True Blood) which is probably the best contest I've ever heard of, but I'm so shy, I probably wouldn't be able to say anything to either of them if I won, I just get so nervous. Or, I'd probably ask Alex silly things about mayo or something. What am I saying? I never even get to babbling or asking silly questions, I would just turn red and go mute.

It would be an awesome lunch though.

ding dong, the witch is???

2011-09-05T06:45:00.000-07:00

True Blood - episode 11 "Soul of Fire"

Oh, True Blood.... here we are, at the end of the season, and all I can think is basically "WTF is going on in Bon Temps?" Here are some thoughts about the last episode, just randomly and in no particular order.

The vampires arrived at Moon Goddess, badass soundtrack and flamethrowers poised and ready until Jason tells them to hold the phone - Sookie's in there, and they can't just level the place to the ground. The vampires grumble about it - hello Bill? Sookie has saved your ass many, many, times (from those drainers, like the first time you met her, remember? And from Lorena/Russell or whatever the hell was going on in Mississippi, and from the hotel when Eric was wandering around in a trance mumbling about killing the king.) And hello Eric? Sookie also saved you, from - uh - running down the street without a shirt on - and she took you in and sheltered you, and she almost certainly influenced Bill's decision on giving you the true death. So all I'm saying is that maybe you should think about that before getting all trigger happy with the torches. And also Jason is really firing on all his cylinders this season. He has been a multi-winner in the box of rocks (dumb as a) competition for many seasons, but this time, he's passed his crown on to other, worthier (dumber) characters.

Oh, and then Marnie shows up and says she's ready to negotiate - and her price for freeing Sookie is the lives of both Bill and Eric, and they agree. I know what I said up there just now, but it seems to me like they gave in to that a little too quickly. From calling her "f****ing Sookie" to being all like "yes, that's a great idea, kill me now!" Evidently, Pam felt the same way, because rather than shooting Bill or whatever she was supposed to do, she let loose a big old fireball that (duh) bounced off the protective wall thing outside the shop, frying poor Jason in the process. Jessica saves him and now there's a blood bond between the two of them, which seems to be spelling showdown between Jason and the increasingly unstable Hoyt.

Inside the witchy workshop, Jesus has finally figured out that the good witch in this scenario is definitely NOT Marnie and that she's crazy with power. The first indication of that was when she "puked a bitch up" in Lafayette's words and then bound Antonia to her. The second indication of that was when one of the witch-wannabes tried to escape and Marnie killed her. Kind of hard to believe that you're the good one when you kill people in cold blood there, Glinda. Jesus then convinces Marnie he feels a pulse in the girl and takes her away to do some brujo shit that ultimately unbonds Marnie and Antonia and sends Antonia off into the beyond of beyond. Finally. Sookie's fairy fingers also play a part in breaking some spells and the vampires come running back in. Bill shoots Marnie and just like that, she's gone. OR IS SHE??? Right at the end, she comes zooming in and gets swallowed by Lafayette. Oh. great.

What else? Andy is walking home from fort bellefleur, trying not to get "lost in the woods retarded" when he comes upon a fairy woman in the woods. She's gorgeous, he thinks he's hallucinating, one thing leads to another, yada yada yada, he promises to protect her. That does not seem like such a great idea.

Sam fights Marcus but, in a move that surprised NO ONE, it's Alcide who deals the final blow. (and that's when we fell for, the leader of the pack - vrrooom! vrooom!) Alcide was also none too thrilled to come back to his own house to find Marcus with Debbie in her underwear. Even though she swore nothing happened, he abjured her, which is a big hairy shifter deal.

I guess we'll have to see what happens on Sunday, although I think that Alcide will become packmaster or get set up for the packmaster contest that appears in the next book. Someone - either Jesus or some other witches, somewhere, will get rid of Marnie once and for all (at least, I hope they do, I'm ready for her to be gone). This will not be a bloodless coup, and I'm worried about Lafayette, and Jesus.

Sookie will choose neither Eric nor Bill, conflicted by her feelings for both of them and repelled by their vampire nature. I think she'll end the season alone (again), setting her up for the possible introduction of Quinn next season.

in our perfect park....

2011-09-02T08:47:00.000-07:00

I only saw three concerts at Ravinia this summer, and they all happened to be in August. It’s such a summer tradition for me and I was kind of bummed that I didn’t have a chance to go up there earlier in the season. It’s so nice to wander around the park before show time – you can marvel at the new pedestrian underpass (seriously, it’s pretty rockin’), stock up on glow rings at the gift shop, buy some overpriced food (although the giant carrot cake cupcakes and the garlic parmesan fries are totally worth it) and people watch. My mind is always blown by the amount of stuff people bring to the park. I’m all about minimizing the stuff I have to schlep around. I usually sit in the pavilion anyway, but on the rare occasions when I’ve brought food, it’s been a pretty modest spread. Sandwiches, bottles of water, fruit, a little dessert. Chips, maybe. Cole slaw and/or potato salad if I’m feeling ambitious. No chairs, no table, no candelabra, no keg, no coolers, no wine. No flowers. No knitting. No board games. Nothing crazy. But people go all out, and more power to them, I say, because it’s fun for me to look at.

Anyway. Wednesday night was our final visit to the park this season. We saw Mandy Patinkin** and Nathan Gunn. Together. At the same time. An exciting yet rather perplexing combination of performers. Mandy clarified for us how the evening came to be – they had apparently shared a dressing room (which they both referred to as “a closet”) for one of the Sondheim birthday concerts. They got to talking, like you can’t help doing when confined with someone in a really small space, and a bromance was born, brought to vibrant life for us in Highland Park.

The stage was mostly empty except for two pianos (grands? Baby grands? I really have no idea. They were quite large and black and shiny), two chairs (one on each side of the stage) and two small table to hold glasses of water etc) and two festive floral arrangements on either side of the stage. The crowd was mainly an older, north shore kind of bunch (not as extravagantly decked out as the group we saw who had come to see “Chicago” over the weekend. No glowy rings or light up sequined fedoras, more’s the pity). Our seats were decent (center section, row CC).

On with the show. The two gentlemen were both in great voice and horribly overdressed for the warm evening. Nathan had a suit on, for god’s sake, with a jacket and everything. Mandy was in his concert blacks (pants and long-sleeved v-neck shirt, possibly sweater), and was obviously hot and uncomfortable. He rolled up a bandana at one point and wrapped it around his head (possibly to keep the sweat out of his eyes) which, with his beard, made him look sort of pirate like.***

Although on paper it seems like a strange combo, in action, the two of them were really quite lovely. They were joined by Mandy’s son, Gideon, on a few songs (also wearing a long-sleeved shirt, although at least he could hang out in the air-conditioned back stage area when he was not on stage). They sang for almost two hours, without a break. They kicked off with a mash up that included a memorable rendition of Figaro’s song from the Barber of Seville – sung by both of them. There was some pop, some broadway (including Assassins and The Music Man, Camelot, no Evita, in case you wondered), some standards, some Yiddish renditions of broadway songs, including “White Christmas” (but why? It’s AUGUST!) and also “Maria” from West Side Story. When Nathan went up on some lyrics from Over The Rainbow, Mandy chimed in helpfully, “Do you want me to do it in Yiddish?” which he did – and it was back on track. They closed with "Sunday" from Sunday in the Park with George. Big sigh of contentment here.

They balanced each other out nicely – comedy and charm and great singing. I enjoyed it very much, and am even more of a Nathan Gunn fan than I was before. I will definitely see more of them in the future. And I am hoping that Mandy brings his little Sicilian friend back to Ravinia with him after their Broadway run in the fall (I heard they’re supposed to tour some more after that. So next summer? You bring the sass and I’ll bring the sequined fedoras?)

** Incidentally, my spell-check doesn’t know “Patinkin” and suggested instead: Potemkin, Patenting, Pataki and Paining.
***I have noticed this lately, at a few of the shows I have been to – and I’m here to let you know, performers of the world, that you can wear cooler clothes and we will understand. I know the leather jacket is part of your look, Bono, but you don’t need to wear it when it’s 90 degrees and humid. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt at that show and I was just sitting around watching you. You can take off the knit cap, Edge, really, we’ll understand. Although then it might be all like, “Where’s the Edge? Didn’t he come?” so we’d be confused, but you’d be so much cooler. In the same vein, Nathan, just take off the jacket already. For real. They were both making me hot just looking at them and I was, as I say, just sitting in the audience, not running around under hot stage lights. I know you want to look nice and professional and all that, but honestly. A t-shirt would be fine. I’m there to see you, not your spiffy suit/leather jacket/knit cap/leather pants (also Bono)/sweaty bandana.

alex friday

2011-09-02T07:04:00.000-07:00

Happy Long Weekend, everyone!

Laura Benanti at Ravinia

2011-09-02T06:49:00.001-07:00

How awesomely fantastic is Laura Benanti?? I was so excited when I got my Ravinia advance ticket order form and saw her name on the list - and for $10?? An absolute steal. (Plus we got free parking!)

Her concert was last weekend, in the Gordon Bennett Hall at Ravinia (the mainstage was occupied by the band "Chicago" and while I had a vague Peter Cetera-style idea of their songs in my head, at the time I couldn't think of a single one. And since I can never ever suffer in silence, I mentioned it to my friends, and we went trawling on itunes for Chicago songs. Now, we've been wandering around with songs like "What kind of man would I be" and "Glory of Love" in my head. Awesome. So maybe next year, I'll actually BE at the Chicago concert, but this year I was geeking out in the Gordon Bennett Hall.)

I knew Laura could sing, from seeing her in Gypsy (City Center and Broadway) and Women on the Verge. But I didn't know she was so hilarious. First off, she said "Nerd alert!" since we were all in there seeing her instead of being with the hip-er (or hip replacement-ier, judging by the hoardes of aging rock fans on the lawn) Chicago fans. She was surprised by how savvy we were as an audience, since we knew theater related stuff and could follow her anecdotes without lots of explanation. She, too, had been a theater geek since birth, practically, having a big time obsession with Stephen Sondheim (she even dressed up as Fosca for Halloween when she was a kid, eschewing the slutty nurse/slutty princess/slutty whatever costumes that would have gotten her more candy). Since all of us were also clearly geekishly inclined, we all ate it up with a spoon.

Anyway, she sang her face off - and it was a little bit of everything - broadway, rock, and an awesome medley that was started off, in all seriousness with "Single Ladies". Loved it. I kind of want to be her when I grow up. I hope Ravinia has her back soon, on a bigger stage and for more than $10 for tickets. It was a beautiful evening.

(Sidebar - being a total geek, I had bought a bottle of bright blue nail polish called "Model Behavior" and it tickled me, since it was the name of Laura's killer song in Women on the Verge AND it sort of went with one of her costumes from the show. So I had big plans to give it to her, but did not get the chance, alas, alas. So now I have a bottle of bright blue nail polish...)

post mortem: "burning down the house"

2011-08-30T06:53:00.001-07:00

The good:

1. Bill's new plan!!! We should have firebombed Moon Goddess a LONG TIME AGO, your highness. But he seems to have - ahem - seen the light, so to speak. And fortunately, he ordered a kickass attack soundtrack, too. Take up your flame throwers, vampires of Area 5.

2. Sookie and Jason recruiting Lafayette and Jesus - that's right guys! Now we're cooking with gas!

3. Holly and Tara - that's right ladies, get mad! Get even! Get outta that shop before it gets torched. You've got the juice. Now break that spell. Also? Way to get wise to the whole door-is-hot thing. You guys? Are definitely the brains behind the operation.

4. Jesus - way to get freaky with your inner demon-brujo self.

5. Antonia - girl, you were talking sense there, for one hot second. Should have left crazy Marnie when you had the chance.

6. Terry & Andy at "Fort Bellefleur" - I like that they fleshed out Terry's character a bit more, making him that pillar of support for his cousin Andy. But was it me, or did Andy not seem totally sincere in his vow to kick the habit? Maybe his long walk home to Bon Temps will change his mind?

7. Sookie, harnessing her glowy faery fingers to break up the big battle at the hotel (and keeping Bill alive, since a world without him would just be awful, or something) - leading to...

The Bad:

1. Eric regaining his memory. I'm sort of surprised that they did this now, rather than waiting for the very very end. And I know (I know!) that they aren't following the books exactly (at all!) and I see that they would need to shift the timing and circumstances of Eric's regaining his memory, since the witch was different and it was a whole other scenario. I get it. But in the book, his not remembering everything stretched out for several episodes. Now he remembers everything. Okay. Big problems there, for him and Sookie, obviously. Where does this go? And also, the next book deals with pack stuff and Jason becoming a panther, and I think they introduce Quinn - but what's next season going to do?

Sorry, I digress.

2. Tommy's death. I know that I should probably care more about this but, well, I just don't. I'm sad for Sam and all, but Tommy wasn't a great character. He had a tough life, with the dog fighting etc etc but he kept right on scheming. He took advantage of Sam, rather than trying to turn around his life. Sam gave him a job and a place to live and a chance to turn himself around, and he stole from Sam. Then he shifted into him and slept with his new girlfriend. He also scammed Maxine Fortenberry, who was teaching him to read and stuff, and he shifted into her too. This was a boy that was beyond saving. He seemed to be showing remorse at the end there, but he was dying. Everyone's sorry for stuff when they're dying. I didn't care enough about him to see him go. His death does seem to be the catalyst for several things though, and none of them good:

3. Sam wants revenge. He goes and beats the crap out of some henchwolf, and Alcide helps. Oh, and then....

4. Marcus and Debbie Hook Up. Yeah. As if Alcide needs another reason to hate you, Marcus. This seems to be leading to a wolf battle - and my money is on Alcide winning and becoming Leader of the Pack (vroom! vroom!)

5. Hoyt's descent into beer-soaked misery and continuous farting. What is happening to you, Hoyt? Get a frickin' grip, already.

6. Jason asking Jessica to glamour him to make him forget what happened between them. Loved her response - who will take away my guilt? (and then her wanting to go and eat someone, and then also her desire to blow shit up. Love Jess.)

7. Sookie being wishy-washy about Bill and Eric. Why are you so sentimental about Bill all of a sudden, Sook? Have you ever gone into any enchanted forests with Bill? I think not.

The Ugly

And "the ugly" prize of the week goes to.... Marnie! Here we were thinking you were the victim here, but hey, didn't you invite the spirit to come around in the first place? Yes I think you did. I think now that you've tasted real power, power beyond your limited means, you don't want to go back. People are listening now. They fear you. You're in control. Well, Marine, you're on a collision course with reality - in the form of a whole slew of angry vampires with blow torches.

I'm ready for this storyline to be over with so - burn, baby, burn (but Sookie, find a way out first, okeydokey? Or, hey, if not, the show could just be about the vamps, maybe?)

Happy Birthday, Alex!!

2011-08-25T06:29:00.000-07:00

Post Mortem "Let's Get Outta Here"

2011-08-22T17:19:00.000-07:00

The Good:

1. Dream Sookie: Let's face it, our girl has some of the best v-trip, blood-bond related dreams, like, ever (helloooo, snow sex with Eric!) Here, she has just gotten shot in a battle with a crazy witch (not like there was ever any question as to if she'd make it or not, but still), rescued by a werewolf with unresolved feelings towards her, brought back (again) by an ex-flame vampire who's now king, and off to find her current flame who's gone missing (presumed bewitched). And yet, she still has time to dream herself into a slinky red number and heels, complete with sexy noir-ish soundtrack for a little spicy menage-a-vampire. With both Bill and Eric. She has, at least in her dreams, neatly, sidestepped the whole Team Bill vs Team Eric debate. She's Team Both of Them (at the same time!), to which I must say, with envy, Brava. Go, dream Sookie, you telepathic siren, you.

(Best. Dream. Ever)

2. The Man with the Plan.... Jason Stackhouse (!?!): Remember last season when Jason was only playing at being a cop to impress a girl? Artfully dodging his written exam, doing drug-busting ridealongs to Hot Shot, making paper clip chains on desk duty? Now, he's the Voice of Reason on the Bon Temps PD. I say again: Jason "I'm too dumb to be depressed" Stackhouse is The Voice of Reason on the Bon Temps PD. Scary no? But he handled the Lafayette/Mavis baby Mikey kidnapping hostage situation very well (I bet HE would have remembered to bring Hoyt some pants!) And then, he brought Jessica's box of things to her (smartly scribbling over angry, angry Hoyt's writing of Monster Box - but more on him later). Speaking of Jessica, I am rather liking this Jason/Jessica pairing, although it feels like the Hot Shot plotline was way too easily dispatched. Which is fine by me, personally, I am all for pretending like Crystal and her freaky panther crew never existed, but I have a feeling that they'll be making a reappearance. Poor Uncle Daddy Jason...

3. Jessica's telling Nan: "This is the worst day of my life. I wish I was dead, except I am and it doesn’t even matter.” She is still a teenager, after all...

4. The Witchy Women (and man) of Bon Temps finally get their magic on: Tara and Holly F.I.N.A.L.L.Y start to understand that Marnie/Antonia is a few pages short of a spellbook AKA she's completely and totally nutso. These girls can do something about this, and now Tara sort of owes Bill for saving her from Pam. Let's hope she decides to call...

4. Jesus! Way to get down with your badass brujo self, mihijo! I was wondering what he was doing/where he was while his honey was getting possessed by the spirit of Mavis - I mean, presumably he was working, right, but since we were expected to believe he up and left work on a whim to go Mexico to see abuelito, so I kind of thought he'd stick around during all the supernatural weirdness going on. I guess not, but Jason (!) called him (!!) to figure things out, and he got Lafayette back to normal (relatively speaking). Now, the two of them need to free Holly and Tara (who should be doing some instructive reading while they are locked in the shop, right?) and work some magic on Marnie.

5. Hey, Mikey!! It seems as though the resolution of this Mavis thing also means the resolution of the whole Mikey the Demon Baby thing, yes? And while I love Terry the Doting Dad, there really isn't anything left to say here, is there?

6. Sam shifting into the bunny - along with Emma's comment about her turning into a bunny so she could pet herself... awwwww.... Growing up Shifter.... Points for that, Sam, but the whole camping idea was weird.

In the Sort of Good category:

7. Tommy, apparently feeling some remorse, seems to want to do Sam a solid, you know, after sleeping with his girlfriend while shifting into him. So he shifts into Sam to go and beat up Marcus. This is an odd sort of favor, if you think about it, because if it went well, Sam would never know what had happened, only that Marcus wasn't bothering him too much anymore. However...

The Bad:

1. Sam & Marcus: on the surface, this might have been a fair fight. They're both short guys, with slight builds, both shifters. Sam theoretically could probably shift into a wolf, to give them even footing (pawing?) but that's probably frowned upon, or something. But then you've got Tommy-as-Sam shooting off his mouth versus a whole room full of crazy weres, all of them (except Alcide) spoiling for a fight. Then Tommy shifts back into himself, cuz he's gotten the pulp beaten out of him. Oh, and because he's a dumbass.

Speaking of dumbasses...

2. Insecure Debbie's back on v and then she goes to see Sookie, offering her help. Now we all know she's not to be trusted, but what is this offer of help for? A case of keep your friends close but keep your enemies even closer? Was she supposed to give Sookie's presence away to Antonia in the magic shop? Was that (gasp, clutch pearls) a double cross? From Debbie? Surely not! But then, plan foiled, she serves as the getaway driver, even though she drives like a girl, despite her werewolfy badassness.

3. What's up with Alcide kissing the ring? You are too much of a lone wolf my friend - you're either going to leave this pack or end up running it.

4. The Convention of Tolerance - too obviously thrown in as a means for Antonia to strike. But also? Nan Flanigan, Jessica is totally right, you are nothing like you are on tv. Maybe someone can throw a wayward stake your way?

The Very, Very Bad:

1. Evil Antonia's use of 'The Blond One' for her evil bidding. Are Sookie and Eric never to be happy? I am so stressed out now about what's going to happen to Eric, I cannot even tell you. I'm thinking (hoping) either the local witches will get wise or the fairy blood will give him an extra boost to break free of the spell.

And Finally -

The Ugly:

Hoyt, you get The Ugly Corner all to yourself!!! Dang, but you've gotten mean and bitter. And, I mean, I get it. You're upset. You're heartbroken. You gave her your heart, she gave you a pen, and you used that pen to write "Monster's Box" on a cardboard box that held her possessions (was that a copy of Twilight I spotted in there, by the way?). But listen Hoyt, seriously: she warned you. You could be happy as a pig in poo with Summer, eating her biscuits and so on. Jessica tried to stay away from you. She told you what vampires are like. But did you listen? No. Is this her fault? Not completely. The monster here? Is you, buddy. I liked you better when you were sweet and standing up to your overbearing mama.

american girl in italy

2011-08-19T06:51:00.000-07:00

This iconic photograph turns 60 this month!! I remember, several years ago when I was studying abroad in Italy, it was actually pretty close to this, particularly in Southern Italy. We'd walk down the street, cute young college girls and we'd get the eye. I remember a guy almost fell off his scooter because he was looking over his shoulder at us instead of looking at the road. And one morning, in Sorrento, we were having some breakfast cappuccinos at a cafe on the street, and some guys across the street were hanging off the balcony to watch us. It wasn't weird or creepy or anything, and they never did anything else but give us the eye and go "Ciaooooo" (the equivalent, I guess to "How YOU doin'?"). This photo reminds me of that summer in Italy.

alex friday - man of style

2011-08-19T06:38:00.001-07:00

Look who's In Style's Man of Style for September!!

I got the magazine itself in the mail a few days ago, what a pleasant surprise in the midst of the brick-like September issue! Go and pick it up or read the article at askarsgard.com!!

Finish

2011-08-16T17:49:00.000-07:00

This is Finish, my sweet kitty girl, who we lost earlier this week. You can't see it here, but she had little extra toes on her front paws, so it looked like she was wearing mittens. She was 18 years old (over 80 human years) and she was a very good girl. She and her brother, Start, came to us about 10 years ago when we adopted them from a co-worker of mine who was about to have a baby. Her husband was phobic about having the kitties around the baby so he made her give them up (HATEFUL!). I don't get that, because I've had cats my whole life, including when I was a baby, and I turned out just fine. Whatever. They brought much joy into my life and I'll miss them both very much.

Post Mortem: "Spellbound"

2011-08-16T10:17:00.000-07:00

Things are really starting to heat up in Bon Temps (and I'm not talking about the temperature, ya know?) - it's episode 8 and we're in the thick of season 4. Let's get down to business. First off, though, are we liking the Good, Bad and the Ugly breakdown? I feel like it lets me hit the highlights and make comments while not having to summarize the whole episode. Right? Okay then. I'll do it this way until I think of something else... Cool?

The Good:

1. Uhhhhhhh, do you have to ask? Sookie has a magic shower that is able to transport her to a magical, Narnia-esque place filled with snow, a fur lined bed, and a clothes-less Viking vampire, with no memory and lots and lots of time on his hands.

2. Jess not being dead (yay, Jason!)

3. Sookie's being able to use her fairy fingers to fight off one of the witches (and her looking at them, kind of astonished and going, "THANK you!"

4. Marcus (Leader of the Pack! Vroom! Vroom!) keeping out of the vampire/witch war. Good, yes. Way to have strong leadership and do something not stupid.

5. Pam's got her face back (for now?)

6. Sam and Luna are back on track.

7. Sam gets cat barbie to like him (ah, no, just kidding, this is so far inconclusive).

8. Bill saving Tara ("Yew know whahhh" - No Bill, yew really need to spell this out for her, since she is pretty much as dumb as she looks)

9. Sookie and Eric (looking kind of American Gothic-y) telling Bill they wanted to fight with him. YEAH! Let's kick some witch butt, y'all!! And Sookie reminding Eric that he's a warrior (so maybe next time HE should do the battle planning?)

The Bad

1. Andy's V Addiction is SO BAD, he'd be willing to scarf down melty vampire entrails in the middle of the street. GROSS. Get him to v-rehab or something - stat!

2. Tara. Still following Marnie/Antonia (Marntonia? Antnie?). Do you really not remember what it's like to be possessed? Remember Eggs and Maryann? Yeah. Crazy. Not fun. Stop this madness!

3. Poor Jessica. Getting her invitation recalled from not one but two homes. What's a girl to do? And Hoyt, what a meanie. What happened to him? Why can't we have one happy, decent character without them getting irreparably scarred?

4. Marcus (vroom! vroom!) busting in on the cozy domestic scene involving Sam, Luna and Emma. Yeah. Way to not make rational decisions. Apparently his packmaster mentality doesn't spread to his personal life (no wonder people think werewolves are thugs!). And while I'm thinking about it, isn't it weird that he would have been married to a shifter in the first place? Aren't they all about preserving their were-ness?

5. Debbie telling Alcide to stay away from Sookie. Yeah, right, as if.

The Ugly

1. Bill Compton. I have a feeling that you and your "leadership" are part of the reason why the South lost the Civil War. What.Were.You.Thinking? Hey Antonia, let's totally meet. We can have peace! How does that sound? Good? Rockin. See you in the cemetary at midnight!

Did he really think that one phone call laying on the vampire smarm would be enough for her to suddenly turn rational? Instead of talking, they should have shown up in force, with maybe one or two other witches (duh! you guys are vampires! find some friendly witches and have them help you out!), and ambushed her. Shot her, exorcised her, whatever. Take her down. Without her, the other witches in the coven wouldn't be as powerful. They could have been glamoured to forget. The "Authority" wouldn't even have to know. Now as it is...

2. Sookie gets shot. Arrghhh! And then she's saved by Alcide, who is being watched by Debbie. Yeah. Someone hasn't kept his promises - to Debbie about staying away from Sookie, and to the new pack, to stay out of the vampire/witch thing. We knew he wouldn't be able to stay away, of course, but it's just going to lead to more trouble.

AND

3. Antarnie HAS ERIC! Someone's gotta rescue him fast (my guess - Pam or Tara will intervene)

So good job, Bill. That went well.

4. Lafayette getting, I don't know, visited by? Possessed by? That strange lady singing to baby Mikey in Merlotte's kitchen. Who is this chick? Do we even care? And LaLa's going to get into SO.MUCH.TROUBLE for kidnapping the baby. I thought maybe he'd be the one to go up against Martonia but now it seems like he's been sucked into a secondary storyline (that sucks!). And what happened to Jesus?

5. Tommy skinwalking as Maxine Fortenberry to get that money. Once again, Sam, you should not let this one out of your sight. Home skillet can TURN INTO YOU. No good can come of this. (What we were thinking is maybe Tommy will be posing as Sam when Marcus finds him. That would neatly and quickly get rid of him.)

So. I think that's it for now. Until next week - remember to take something warm into the shower (because you never know when you might end up in Narnia, with Eric. And living in Chicago, I can tell you. It's no fun to be outside in the snow.),

rufus!

2011-08-15T10:48:00.000-07:00

So, last night was my first trek to Ravinia this season (I can't believe it's already August!) and I saw Rufus Wainwright. I've enjoyed his music for some time, but in a sort of casual way. I love his voice, from songs like "Hallelujah" and "Complainte de la butte" from Moulin Rouge! and I even have one of his albums, Poses. I've seen his concerts at Ravinia advertised in the past and always wanted to go, but never really got around to it. But I decided this year was the year, and I got myself a ticket. I'm glad I did, too, because I can now say with 100% certainty that I am a big, huge fan. Much love for you, Rufus.

Anyone who knows my ticket buying tendencies knows I like to be close up, right in front of the action, but at Ravinia, it is kind of a crap shoot - I am a donor and I filled out my early ticket form and just waited to see what I'd get. Well, I had an awesome seat - row D, seat 13, center section. I was so close, it was ridiculous. I think it was because I had bought a single seat, so it was easier to fit me in. I don't know what the reason was, and I don't care because it was, as I say, an awesome seat. Behind me an older couple bickered about their seat locations and then the lady commented, "I don't know this Rufus Wainwright." and I was kind of puzzled, because unlike other arts venues, you can't really buy packages at Ravinia. So, like, say you buy a 5 play package - you may know some of the plays and the artists and not know others. But this is not, as I say, the case at Ravinia, so some thought must have gone into the purchase of these tickets. They left after intermission anyway, which I think is a DAMN WASTE OF ROW E TICKETS when I am sure some actual fans would have enjoyed those seats a whole lot. Anyway.

The first part of the concert was devoted to a Shakespearean song cycle that set the Bard's sonnets to music (played by the CSO) which were pretty. I'm not familiar enough with the selected sonnets to really go into a lot of detail, but I enjoyed them.

Then there was an intermission and I made it to the ladies' with plenty of time to watch the stage get flipped from a CSO configuration to a totally empty stage with a lone piano. When Rufus came back out, he commented how strange it was to be up there by himself when he'd just been on with a whole stage full of people. "It's like the wizard of oz," he said "when they draw back the curtain, except instead of the wizard, it's a gorgeous guy!" Hee hee. Funny boy. He told us how he'd been "Nice'd to death" in Michigan and broke out into "Falling in Michigan" to the tune of "Falling in love again." Adorable. He's just the cutest thing on this earth and I am now obsessed with his voice.

I was happy, happy, happy that he closed the show with his haunting "Hallelujah" - {swoon!}
and then I went back out to my car a happy girl.

(You'd think, wouldn't you, that since I was so close, I'd be able to take many many completely awesome pictures - but I forgot the camera, and the one on my little phone is awful. I didn't even think of it until I was halfway to the park, and I didn't think I'd need it because I always take pictures of the same exact things - carousel horse, banners, etc etc. Le sigh. Maybe next time.)

fix-ice machene - update!

2011-08-15T06:41:00.000-07:00

According to Culture Map Houston, the "Fix-Ice Machene" sculpture is by artists called "The Art Guys". And the world makes sense again! The article below explains the inspiration for the sculpture:

Headed to the Windy City this summer? You'll want to stop by the Chicago Navy Pier, where the Houston-based The Art Guys have installed, "fix - ice machine," a treated plywood and lumber text-based sculpture. The work is part of an outdoor exhibition curated by Joseph Tabet in collaboration with Dave Hickey.

The Art Guys are accompanied by other illustrious art world names like Terry Allen and Shepard Fairey, the artist behind the iconic Obama "HOPE" poster. The Art Guys' mammoth sculpture features the typo-ridden advertisement, "FIX- ICEMACHENE." What may initially appear a commentary on global warming is in fact a Dada take on a local repairman's oft-misspelled advertisement signs. "There's a person in our neighborhood of Acre Homes that puts up hand-painted signs to fix things like washers and dryers," says Michael Galbreth of The Art Guys. The artist argues, however, that the appropriated phrase has no particular meaning, describing the work as a "big sculpture spectacle."

Despite the sculpture's meaninglessness, The Art Guys say they drew inspiration from such diverse sources as Texas highways and 1960s conceptual art. "The idea dates back 20 years to a very large 'T' that sits out in front of a business on the side of the freeway on the way from here to Dallas," says Galbreth, explaining that he became fond of the letter's non-sequitur appeal and the idea of "hovering words with no relationship to themselves."

The other half of The Art Guys, Jack Massing, adds, "It doesn't have meaning, but anytime you make anything, people automatically find meaning to it, like seeing God in the clouds. Since this work is language-based, there's obvious meaning spectators will associate with words. For example, the ice machine in my freezer is broken — but that had nothing to do with this project."

Massing says that the aspect of text as art partially derives from the work of Los Angeles-based artist Ed Ruscha. "Ruscha came up with the notion that a word could have a portrait just like a dog or a person," says Massing, who also cites Wayne White's paintings of words on landscapes as inspiration. Over the past decades, Chicago has evolved into a model for quality civic art agendas under the auspices of former Mayor Richard M. Daley. A city once defined by its manufacturing and commercial base is now widely associated with icons such as Millennium Park's "Cloud Gate" (also known as, "The Bean"), a massive, reflective steel structure designed by sculptor Anish Kapoor.

"Chicago is committed to the idea of public art integrated into the fabric of the city," Galbreth says. "It's a very urban, pedestrian place. They get that, so they invest in it. This idea of civicness — it's attractive to me." That "civicness" is on full display at the reinvigorated Navy Pier recreational destination on the shore of Lake Michigan. This year's summer exhibition represents a new initiative to annually employ temporary public art onto the site. An estimated three million people visited the sculptures during the weekend of their unveiling. The Art Guys were handpicked for the show by art writer Dave Hickey, who assisted the Navy Pier's curator Joseph Tabot. "We were contacted out of the blue at the end of April — it was a very, very, very fast turnaround," Galbreth says. Budget constraints led the team to plywood. Explains Galbreth, "It was so modest, but our goal was to try to do something that would be of interest to the general public. When people go to the Navy Pier, they are expecting to be entertained. It had to be palatable, and language is one of those things."

tall ships at navy pier

2011-08-14T12:12:00.001-07:00

I took these Friday morning, on my walk to the Pier at the crack of 8:00 am. For some reason, the Pier's website lists this as the "Taste of Tall Ships" which is weird, I think, because I don't want to eat the boats, or even eat on them or near them. Still, they are quite nice to look at. Peaceful, and at that time of day, blessedly tourist-free.

They are only here for the weekend, and you have the chance to board them and sail on them (and possibly eat on them, too?) but I saw one of them had trouble late Friday afternoon, it was being pushed by a little dinghy back to the Pier. So maybe it's best just to admire them from a distance?

can someone please tell me...

2011-08-13T14:11:00.000-07:00

What does "FIX-ICEMACHENE" mean?? This (huge, kind of ugly) sculpture is at Navy Pier, right in the front, as you approach from Illinois and Streeter. I see it on a regular basis, and I find myself perplexed. WTF is this supposed to mean? Is it a request? Does someone out there really want ice? Or is it, like, a request for aliens who might happen to land (Welcome to our planet! Bring us some ice, dammit! Da Bears are on and da beer is warm!)? But why couldn't they spell "machine" correctly? Is it a joke that everyone but me is in on?

I'm puzzled.

"cold grey light of dawn"

2011-08-08T11:12:00.000-07:00

So, it's been awhile since I've done a recap. I had gotten a little behind on my viewing, and then it was the case of so much happening that I didn't know what to say about the past several episodes (except, of course, {Erriiiicccc!! Drool! I'm sorry, what was I talking about?} and things like that...) But I'm all caught up now, and not a moment too soon, since the shit is really starting to hit the fan now for our friends in Bon Temps.

So much to say, not just today, but always (anybody?)... let's do a quick run down, shall we?

The Good

Eric, Eric and more Eric. Frolicking in the sunshine, flirting with Miss Stackhouse, starting to learn about the vampire he was and the vampire he wants to be... recognizing that "King" Bill probably won't show him mercy, but being all shmoopy sweet, wanting happiness for Sookie.
Bill letting Eric go (geez, there would have been some kind of uprising if Eric had REALLY met the Final Death) even though he knows that Eric will just run back to Sookie and they will (finally!) get it together.
Eric and Sookie getting it together - pretty much all over Bon Temps (not that I blame her).

The Bad

The vampires' plan to silver themselves into their coffins to avoid Marnie/Antonia's spell to make them meet the sun. Nice one, Bill. THIS is your master plan?
Tara's willingness to go along with Marnie's plan. Girl. Seriously? You were possessed not too long ago by the maenad, remember? That was no fun, right? Why would you want to go along with this?
Lafayette and Jesus in Mexico with el abuelito batshit LOCO. Arrghhhhhh. Dumb idea. But maybe it will be Lafayette to get rid of Antonia.
Alcide and Debbie joining the new pack. Yeah, this is going to go well.

The Ugly

Pam's rotty rotten-ness. I hope Dr. Ludwig's shots help her. And she'd better get un-hexed soon. Don't the vampires have any witches they can glamour onto their side?
Tommy's skin-walking, life-ruining shift into Sam Merlotte and Sam's abjuring him. I know this is a big deal and all, but Sam should keep a close eye on Tommy. The guy can TURN INTO YOU, SAM. Even if he doesn't mean to.
Andy and Holly's date. AWKward!!
JESSICA OPENING THE DOOR AND WALKING TO HER DEATH??? Jason, I hope you get there soon!

"If You Love Me, Why Am I Dyin'?"

2011-07-11T17:42:00.000-07:00

True Blood Post Mortem, Episode 3.

Sooo, what did y'all think? Here it is, in a nutshell:

The Good:

1. Eric calling Ms. Stackhouse "Snookie" (hee hee)

2. Eric giggling when Sookie was cleaning his feet off because "it tickles"

3. This conversation:

Eric: You live... in my house? Are you - mine?

Sookie: No!

Eric (considering this): Would you like to be mine?

(Us: Yes, please!)

4. Also this conversation:

Sookie: You just killed my faery godmother!

Eric: Sorry! {sheepish grin}

5. Jessica calling Bill "My liege" (doesn't this make her like a princess now, or something?)

6. Sookie reading a Charlaine Harris novel.

7. Seeing Alcide again! Hooray, werewolves!

8. Sam seems to be in a better mood. That's always good....

9. Jason's voicemail message. "If this is an emergency, dial 911 and ask for me..."

10. Oh, just watch this...

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Ep. 39 - Recap

11. And finally: our meal: we've been having themed dinners at our little viewing parties - for the first two episodes (which we watched together - thanks again OnDemand!) we had fried chicken, hush puppies and french fries. This time, it was a Swedish feast, courtesy of IKEA and in honor of our favorite Viking Vampire: Swedish meatballs, pasta in the shape of elk (?), a sparkling peach beverage, salad and princess cake for dessert, that was approved by the King of Sweden himself, and that also came with helpful eating instructions on the box.

But back to the episode:

The Bad

1. All that godawful were-panther shit. Blah blah blah blah earth daddy blah. Not a fan of this plotline. Ugh. Ever since they turned Calvin all skanky meth dealer (and now, if I recall correctly, dead skanky meth dealer) I've found that I've rather turned against the panthers. Poor Jason. He did not deserve this. None of us deserved this.

2. Andy's v-fueled rant at Sam about his trees (although that was also kind of funny). But seriously here, can we get Andy off of the v now please?

3. What is happening with Tommy and Maxine? Is he scamming her or sleeping with her (ew. But with this show, you never know.) Is he just a substitute Hoyt or is she teaching him to read or what? His little forray as "Max Fortenberry" reminded me of a line from 30 Rock - "What's the past tense of scam? Is it scrumped? Because, Mz. Fortenberry, I think you about to get scrumped!")

4. Jessica glamouring Hoyt to forget her indiscretion. Why can't we have one sweet and happy couple??? Arrghhh......

5. The tray of "refreshments" Debbie offers Sookie. I can totally imagine it. Alcide hangs up the phone with Sookie and goes "Hey Debs! Great news, Sookie's not dead! And she's comin' over to ask me a favor!" "What? Sookie's not dead? Damn, I mean, what a shame, no, wait, I mean, that's real good. Uh... why don't I go fix up some food for when she comes? You think she likes sausages?" That's what you get when you put a former v-addicted junkie werewolf in charge of snacks.

6. Nobody listening to Lafayette when he outlines the best plan to deal with Eric. Let's just forget about it. Lay low. LaLa, you've got brains AND power! Use it wisely, my son!

7. Marnie and her coven getting all uppity about Eric entering (duh, it's a public shop, he doesn't need an invitation) and getting all up in their business. Well, excuse me, but it's not like you were sitting around peacefully mixing up potions. You wanted to raise the dead! That's not okay, missy! Not okay!

8. Marnie then channeling the Power (or whoever?) asking her to come and use her as her servant on this plane. Be careful what you wish for, Marnie. Because something wicked is definitely on its way up in here.

The Ugly

1. The Hotshot werepanther stud farm (oh, poor, poor Jason).

2. Bill and Portia. Dude. You're her great-great-great (etc) grandfather. NO. Wrong. Stop. (please?) Maybe Andy will find out and join in, to get his v-fix? Urggh, now I've grossed myself out. Sorry.

3. The creepy doll Jessica gives Arlene and Terry's baby (mercifully the only time we see those two crazies in the entire episode). Why do I have a feeling that we'll be seeing more of that thing?

4. Bill doling out justice. "Ah am sennucning yew to the truew deayuth" Arrrghhh. Why are you king? Why? Why?

5. The Marie Osmond belle halloween doll thing that Maxine orders. Why all the creepy dolls?

6. Those idiots that made the "vamps-kill.com" PSA. Why do I have the feeling we'll be seeing more of that thing?

So, yeah. The Good, The Bad, The Ugly. The Eric. Sigh. I'm out, Trubies. Until next week. Do bad things.

simple pleasures

2011-07-10T13:32:00.001-07:00

So, yesterday I went to the Morton Grove Farmers' market. I love me a good farmers' market. I try to pass through the one downtown in Daley Plaza every Thursday (I have discovered that I can catch a 29 bus to Navy Pier on State Street and get some exercise and fresh produce in the bargain!). Now, that is a farmers' market. There's a huge selection of stands selling produce of all kinds, fresh cheese, flowers, and baked goods. Lots and lots of baked goods (including Amish baked goods).

The farmers' market in the MG, which started last year, is, shall we say, on a bit of a smaller scale. There are a handful of produce vendors and a few stalls selling baked goods. Sometimes the Lifeway company, based here in the MG, comes and sets up a booth so people can try (and sometimes purchase) Kefir. There was a guy with a meat wagon, selling different cuts of meat. There's a lady who sells delicious pretzels dipped in chocolate, and some ladies who sell healthy granola kinds of things. Then, because that would be about 6 stalls in a very large parking lot, the creators of the market got, well, creative. At the farmers' market, you can visit the MG Chamber of Commerce (to which I exclaimed "We have a chamber of commerce?"), make charming hand crafted corn husk dolls at the table belonging to the Historical Society, visit the PTA of Park View school (warriors!) and do... something... at the table set up by the MG Public Library. Yesterday, there was also the chance to enter a drawing - the winner would receive a basket of produce from every vendor at the market. Why not? So I did it and then we left, heading about our business.

Well, several hours later, I get a call - I had won a special drawing and could I come collect my basket right now? So we made tracks back to the market to get my winnings.

Can I say? The basket was a thing of beauty. It included a bunch of gorgeously ripe tomatoes, some beets, a few carrots, a zucchini and a yellow squash, some packets of seeds, a head of broccoli and some lettuce, a gardening trowel, a pair of gardening gloves and a little decorated tile thing that bears a cheery phrase (I don't remember what it is now, and my dad has already put it out in the garden.). I was so excited because I never win anything, and suddenly, here I'd gotten a spectacularly beautiful collection of produce. And that stuff's expensive, you know?

The other highlight of my weekend was when I went to visit the art fair in Skokie. We'd gone to the library, and I saw a small collection of tents set up and I exclaimed "OOOoohh! Art fair!! Can we goooo?" in a kind of excited, high pitched voice that only dogs can hear. So we went. It was really hot. And most of the stuff was just kind of OK. I like looking at jewelry, but at these things it can really go either way. It's either really expensive or really kind of cheap looking. And as for the art, it's not like I'm really in the market for big paintings or large photographic prints, however lovely, so I don't spend a lot of time at those booths.

But then - I saw it. The most extraordinary bracelet, made of copper wire, beads and semi-precious stones. It was easily the most unique (in a good way) stand I'd seen. These pieces were unique, distinctive, and totally different from anything I'd seen before. The bracelet that caught my eye was copper wire and blue stones. It was gorgeous. But it was over 50 bucks. We walked around a little more, and I decided I wanted to get the bracelet. So I DID, and I do not regret it. It's one of the only pieces I own that has a name "Cooler by the lake" which is SO perfect, because I work on the lake (pretty much IN the lake) so it was like a sign. The designer is local and I cannot say enough about her work, so go and check it out here: www.shelionstore.com

So yeah. That's my weekend in a nutshell. I got a new bracelet and won some vegetables, and I was happy as a clam. It's the little things, you know? And just to keep up with the breakneck pace of my whirlwind life, tonight, we watch the True Blood and have a Swedish feast (in honor of Eric, brought to us by IKEA). So watch out for a recap/Post Mortem as well as a detailed description of our dinner.

When Soldier Field's A Rockin, Don't Come a Knockin'

2011-07-06T12:23:00.000-07:00

U2's set list from last night - about 2 and a half hours of amazing rock & roll. (Got this from the Chicago Tribune's website - there are pictures and stuff as well.)

1 Even Better Than the Real Thing
2 The Fly
3 Mysterious Ways
4 Until the End of the World
5 Out of Control
6 Get on Your Boots
7 I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For/The Promised Land (Bruce Springsteen snippet)
8 Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
9 Beautiful Day/Space Oddity (David Bowie snippet)
10 Elevation
11 Pride (In The Name of Love)
12 Miss Sarajevo
13 Zooropa
14 City of Blinding Lights
15 Vertigo/Miss You (Rolling Stones snippet)
16 I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight/Discothèque (snippet)/Psycho Killer (Talking Heads snippet)

17 Sunday Bloody Sunday
18 Scarlet
19 Walk On

Encore
20 One/Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow (Shirelles snippet)

21 Where the Streets Have No Name

Encore 2
22 Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me/My Kind of Town (Frank Sinatra snippet)
23 With or Without You
24 Moment of Surrender

25 One Tree Hill

the city of blinding lights....

2011-07-06T12:15:00.000-07:00

Our long awaited return to the U2 360 tour, last night at Soldier Field. More to come...

This concert had been a long time in coming - I had originally bought the tickets in November 2009 (I found the receipt in my ticket envelope). It had been scheduled for the summer of 2010, but then the tour was canceled due to Bono's back injury. So I'd been looking forward to this one for a very long time, basically because (and I cannot overstate this) U2 concerts are awesome. It is, seriously, like no other concert experience I have ever had.

I remember one concert that took place shortly following the events of September 11, 2001. There we all were, packed into the United Center, and Bono, like some kind of rock prophet, was up there, in his flag-lined jacket, singing Walk On, and telling us that everything was going to be okay. And we're all there, me and several thousand of my closest friends, in the dark, singing along, and being uplifted by this strangely profound shared experience. It was, and I am being totally serious here, like a religious experience. Every time a concert is announced, I am there, at the computer, finger on the button, poised to buy tickets as soon as Ticketmaster will let me. (I remember once I actually left work a little early so Heidi and I could go stand on line at a Ticketmaster outlet so we could get tickets right away. Those were the days!) So yeah, anyway, whenever they come to town, I go.

Solider Field is a massive, immense place. They packed 63,000 people into the stadium (and on the field) for the concert. How much would the Bears kill to get that kind of an audience into one of their Sunday suckfests? We were in section 332, if that means anything to anyone out there, not quite in the scary realm of section 407, that sort of hangs out into outer space. We were just sort of around the corner from the end zone. So good seats, with a good view of the stage.

We bought the requisite water bottles (because it was exactly 200 degrees and humid) without bottle caps (which I still don't really understand, but I was told that people had taken to lobbing full water bottles onto the field during Bears games - who could blame them? and that it hurts a little bit less if you throw a bottle without a cap. You probably drench your neighbors in the process, but whatever.) and went down a set of steep, cement steps to our seats, which were, of course, a row behind the requisite drunk, dancing morons. One of the guys was constantly draping himself on his wife/girlfriend/concubine. I don't know how she stood it. It was, as I mentioned, about a million degrees and sticky. If anyone draped themselves on me, I would have thrown them off so hard, they would have fallen over the side of our section, onto the field below. Hope you like to bodysurf, bub.

Anyway, whatever. Even the drunks and the hot weather could not dampen my spirits! We didn't have to wait too long before the guys hit the stage. This time, they pretty much ignored No Line on the Horizon, their most recent studio album (they only ended up playing three songs from it) and stuck to their better-known and beloved catalogue. We sang along to "I still haven't found what I'm looking for" and "One" and "Pride (in the Name of Love)" and all the rest. I don't know if this crowd was just better behaved, or if we were all old or hot or tired or what, but this is the first U2 show I've been to where the people in my section were mainly sitting down. The last show I was at, we were on our feet at the opening strains of "Ground Control to Major Tom" and we stayed there pretty much until it was over. This time, people stood up when the band was playing a really great song, and then they calmly sat back down. I have to say, that was okay with me.

I loved every last minute of it, but my particular favorites were "City of Blinding Lights" (where I sprang up out of my seat and cheered my face off. LOVE this song. LOVE it.) "Stay (faraway so close!)" and "Miss Sarajevo". I had originally heard that song because it was on the Diana, Princess of Wales tribute album. It blew my mind because the band were listed as "Passengers" and for years I was so confused because it sounded exactly like U2. Yes. This is because it was U2. Anyway, the song also includes a little, sort of strange, Italian interlude sung, naturally, by Luciano Pavarotti. They start the song, like you do, and it goes on for a bit and then this big, Italian tenor busts out with a verse, and then he stops and it picks back up again, like nothing strange has occurred. I have always loved that song. I had read that they were including it in the set list, and wondered vaguely how they were going to handle the Pavarotti bit. Well, Bono sang the Italian part himself. It sounded really good.

Other things - watching Bono made me melt into a big puddle of goo - and not just because I lurve him. It was mainly because he was running around the stage wearing a (possibly leather) jacket. Dude. I know it's kind of your thing, right, but I think we all would have been cool if you had decided to wear, like, a t-shirt or something. I was wearing a t-shirt and shorts and was pretty much just sitting still and drinking from my (capless) water bottle. I was roasting. I didn't even care when it started raining a little. Bono, on the other hand, was singing, strutting and working the stage. For about 2 and a half hours. He must have been ROASTING, but he never showed any sign of it. And he didn't pass out from the heat, or anything, so he must have been fine, but still. Sheesh. For the encores, he came out in what totally looked like leather pants. The Edge was also wearing his trademark knit cap. Which was still probably really hot, but I think if he'd gone without it, we'd all be like, hey! Where's the Edge?? He'd be unrecognizeable.

U2 shows are BIG, large scale productions. There's light, there's visuals, there's amazing, throbbing, pulsing music. They do this every time, and they do it well. I cannot wait for them to come back. Except next time, I'm buying TWO bottles of water (and smuggling in my own bottle caps! Yeah, I said it!)

"You Smell Like Dinner"

2011-06-30T17:39:00.000-07:00

Recap: True Blood season 4, Episode 2 (Thanks, OnDemand!)

SPOILER-SPOILER-SPOILER-SPOILER-SPOILER

(don't read this if you don't want to know. Okay, you've been warned.)

Where did we leave Sookie? Oh, right, in the arms of Eric Northman. But she's far more dumber than your average, not blind woman, and throws him out. Kind of. She asks him to leave, in very strong terms. He owns the house, right? She can't revoke his invitation, so she has to use her fairy powers of persuasion. Or whatever. Eric swaggers off, Sookie runs off to Bill. Sorry, that's King Bill to us peons. He even has guards around the house. She whines about how Eric bought her house and like, now he's always there and stuff. Um, that's a problem because why? Bill is all like "Ah will take cayur of that fer yew." Then he flashes back to the 80s when he was a punk vampire in London and made some kind of secret vampire deal with Nan Flanigan (oh, yay, she's a permanent cast member!). And we found out that Louis Pasteur was masterminding the creation of the synthetic blood. Sure, he can be a vampire, but where's Bubba??

Maybe he should be doing something to improve vampire/human relations in the post-Russell Edgington world. The crazies are protesting outside Fangtasia, and Hoyt gets into it with one of the protesters. Later on, Jess offers some of her blood, but Hoyt doesn't want it. Jess gets upset and takes off in the car. She says she's off for some advil for him, but she heads to Shreveport instead.... there's a hot fangbanger that she's got her eye on... Baby vampire gone wild...

In Hot Shot, Jason is feeding hungry were-panthers (he's sort of like their brother-cousin now, I guess, right?) and they lock him in a freezer. Crazy Felton and Crystal have a plan for him - they're gonna turn him into a panther, too, so that he and Crystal can have baby panthers. Dude, Jason, we told you that girl was trouble!

Meanwhile back at the ranch - wait, magic shoppe, Lafayette and the coven re-animate a bird and awaken all kinds of dark forces and shit. Oooohhhhhh, spooky witches. Bill has a spy on the inside, as it were, and orders Eric (!! Dammit, Bill, WTF!) to go to the magic shop and, in the words of Jack Donaghy, "Shut it down." But first, he asks Eric to sell Sookie's house back to her. Or, short of that, to Bill. That would be hell to the n-o. Your majesty. But Marnie's getting excited and wants the gang to try and reanimate a human - fun times for a Friday night! Eric busts in, on cue, asking if anybody's looking for a dead body. But no, he's just kidding. He's not there to play, he's there to shut.it.down. He grabs Marnie who starts chanting. Lafayette joins in when Eric grabs Tara. And then the dark forces really start a-brewing. Marnie has tapped into something really dark and dangerous...

Back to Sookie. She's driving down her street in her little yellow car, thinking Sookie-thoughts when she sees.... a running shirtless man. Oh no! What to do! But then she sees... it's Eric. Who somehow lost his shirt between the magic shop and Sookie's street. Whatever, don't overthink it!! He's looking (adorably) lost and confused and she calls out to him. "Eric," she says, "You know me." And he's all like "No, I don't" and she's all "It's Sookie."

"Who?"

{Swoon}

And end of episode two. What's happening in Bon Temps?

i need a hug...

2011-06-30T06:51:00.000-07:00

This is my kitty boy, Start. He passed away in his sleep last night. He was on the old side (15 or 16 at our best estimate), and he had a tumor in his belly.

We adopted him from a co-worker in 2002 or 2003 (as far as I can remember). She was going to have a baby and her husband was afraid for the baby around the cats (which I don't get AT ALL. I've had cats my whole life, including when I was a baby, and I'm totally fine. Plus, what kind of d-bag makes his wife choose between a baby and her pets? That she had as kittens? No way, no day. I'd never give up my sweet kitties. For anything. Potential boyfriends, take note.) When we went to visit her home, to meet the cats, Start and Finish, I remember sort of bonding right away with Start. He's the one who'd come cuddle on my lap, sit next to me on the chair while I was working at the computer, follow me around the house like a puppy (he even came when I called him!)

Both of the cats are good-natured and they have never, ever bitten me. Start was a sweet boy and I'll miss him.

post mortem...

2011-06-30T06:43:00.001-07:00

Recap of True Blood, Season 4, Episode 1: "She's Not There"

(Spoilers are contained in this post, by the way. So if you haven't watched don't read. Or if you read, don't blame me. Okey dokey?)

Look, I get that the series can't exactly follow the books. Where would the suspense be? All of us well versed in all things Sookie would know what's going to happen, blah blah blah. I get it, right? But there are just some things that I like in the books that I wish would have come to life in the series. For instance:

1. I liked it when Tara was in the background, running a clothing store, not cage fighting and kissing girls. Why can't we introduce JB duRone? Are there too many good looking residents of Bon Temps? Can't take one more hot guy wandering around??

2. I liked when Sam was a regular guy, without anger management issues and a sneaky half brother and messed up family.

3. I liked that Terry and Arlene were NOT together and that there was no damned demon baby.

4. I liked Calvin Norris when he wasn't a meth dealing uncle-daddy. Why did they do that to Calvin? Why? Why?

5. I liked Andy Bellefleur when he was just a bumbling deputy cop, married to a sweet schoolteacher and, this is important, without the additction to V.

6. I liked the fact that there was no Nan Flanigan and no mysterious "Authority." Who the hell are these guys, anyway?

7. I liked when Bill Compton was in Peru through most of Dead to the World. Out of sight, out of mind, buddy.

On the other hand, I do like the addition of baby vamp (princess?) Jessica, and the expansion of Hoyt's character, and I love the fact that Lafayette is not dead.

But there is not one single normal resident of Bon Temps. Not one. Do they all need to have bat shit crazy storylines all running at the same time? We can't have one moment of happiness for anybody?

Apparently not. We join Sookie in Faery, where she has gone into the light (but not in a dead way) to join her fae relatives. But it's not all light fruit and flowy dresses and dancing like children of the - uh - light. The Faery Queen wants to close the portal into their world, keeping all those with faery blood inside. Sookie refuses to eat the light fruit, thinking something fishy is going on. Too bad for Barry Bellboy, randomly re-introduced here (in the books, he ends up working for Stan in Dallas. Since I think Stan got killed off last season, that wouldn't have worked.) and also for Sookie's granddaddy, Earl, who'd been missing (presumed drunk?). Sookie is helped by Claude (weird shift of roles here, for Claude and Claudine. I think I liked him better when he was an ego-maniacal male stripper and romance cover model) to escape.

Except - surprise! She returns to Bon Temps only to find that it's a year later and Jason has up and sold her house. Everyone figured Bill had killed her (well, sure) and gave up on her ever coming back. Thanks a lot y'all! Sookie tells Jason where she's really been - "I was in fairy land! It was, well, kind of lame, but I met granddaddy! Here, he gave me his watch for you!'

Jason's a cop now, and in another weird shift of roles, is actually the brains behind the Bon Temps police force because Andy is addicted to V (maybe at the end of the season, Sookie will find out that the fairies dropped her into Bizarro Bon Temps so that she'll want to come back and eat the light-fruit?). He sold the house to some large corporation AIK International (huh, hmmm, I wonder who that could be?) and they redid the house (cleaning out all maenad-related messiness). Just outside, Sookie finds she has two vampire shaped lawn ornaments - Bill and Eric. Bill orders (?!) Eric to leave and he does. What is happening??

We see what else has been happening since Sookie's been gone. Hoyt and Jessica are playing house, and that's not going all that great. She's not much of a cook, and she's starting to want to have more of a variety, blood wise. Uh oh.

Lafayette and Jesus are still together, and dabbling in the occult. Well, Jesus is dabbling. Lafayette is, rather reluctantly, tagging along, despite his own true power. Jesus manages to convince him to come hang out with his coven, led by a housewife-ish witch named Marnie. Yeah, sure. This is going to end up great.

Tara, scarred for life because of Franklin, and presumably saddened by the loss of Sookie, took off on the road, and uh, became a lesbian and a cage fighter. They haven't really explained what's been happening with Tara. But something is definitely up with her girlfriend. Stay tuned.

Sam is taking shifter anger management classes for shooting Tommy in the butt. He meets a girl. They shift into horses and run around together. Woo hoo! Tommy is (strangely) dating or possibly (hopefully?) scamming Hoyt's mom.

Arlene had her baby, Mikey, spawn of Rene, who is possibly evil (why? huh? where is this going? they're either going to have to kill the baby, which nobody wants to see cause that's just mean, or, like, exorcise him, which nobody wants to see because nobody really even cares about Arlene.) Terry is the sane one in this relationship. Terry sane? Jason smart? See? Bizarro Bon Temps.

Oh, and Bill is the King of Louisiana.

!!!

I know, right? Despite the fact that he held no office, had no experience in leadership or anything like that, he kills Sophie-Anne and is crowned (ish) by Nan Flanigan. Blah blah, vampire politics, blah. That's why he gets to order Eric around. Boo.

Speaking of our tall, blond, viking vampire, you'd better sit down when I tell you this- he's the one who bought Sookie's house! I'm shocked (not really). He walked right in on Sookie (who is naked, of course) and declares "You're MINE."

End of the first episode.

Neil Gaiman's Vampire Sestina

2011-06-24T11:20:00.000-07:00

Who says it's all pictures of hot guys and vampires around here, huh? I can get all literary and shit too. Lookit, here's a poem. About vampires. Whatever. Enjoy.

Vampire Sestina (by Neil Gaiman)

I wait here at the boundaries of dream,
all shadow-wrapped. The dark air tastes of night,
so cold and crisp, and I wait for my love.
The moon has bleached the colour from her stone.
She’ll come, and then we’ll stalk this pretty world
alive to darkness and the tang of blood.

It is a lonely game, the quest for blood,
but still, a body’s got the right to dream
and I’d not give it up for all the world.
The moon has leeched the darkness from the night.
I stand in shadows, staring at her stone:
Undead, my lover . . . O, undead my love?

I dreamt you while I slept today and love
meant more to me than life — meant more than blood.
The sunlight sought me, deep beneath my stone,
more dead than any corpse but still a-dream
until I woke as vapour into night
and sunset forced me out into the world.

For many centuries I’ve walked the world
dispensing something that resembled love –
a stolen kiss, then back into the night
contented by the life and by the blood.
And come the morning I was just a dream,
cold body chilling underneath a stone.

I said I would not hurt you. Am I stone
to leave you prey to time and to the world?
I offered you a truth beyond your dreams
while all you had to offer was your love.
I told you not to worry and that blood
tastes sweeter on the wing and late at night.

Sometimes my lovers rise to walk the night . . .
Sometimes they lie, cold corpse beneath a stone,
and never know the joys of bed and blood,
of walking through the shadows of the world;
instead they rot to maggots. O my love
they whispered you had risen, in my dream.

I’ve waited by your stone for half the night
but you won’t leave your dream to hunt for blood.
Good night, my love. I offered you the world.

c'est Alex Friday!

2011-06-24T11:12:00.000-07:00

Ohhh la la la.... c'est magnifique!

countdown to the new season of True Blood...

2011-06-23T06:47:00.000-07:00

A Sunday Afternoon Patti Party

2011-06-19T13:21:00.000-07:00

I don't remember the first time I heard Stephen Sondheim's Company. I do remember that the first cast recording I listened to was not that of the original cast, but the 1990s revival starring Boyd Gaines. I did see the more recent revival with the John Doyle everybody plays instruments staging that starred Raul Esparza (both on stage and on PBS). But I was over the moon excited when I heard that the dreamy dream cast assembled by Lonny Price for the NY Philharmonic would be coming soon to a theater near me. A movie theater, to be more precise.

I was so excited, I went twice. The first time, I dragged my mom and we went to Rosemont. It was last Wednesday, it was raining and our mapquest sucked. The theater was not even half full, which was disappointing (apparently the theaters in Chicago had better showings) but the film itself was wonderful.

Today, I threw myself a Sunday Afternoon Patti Party and took myself to Evanston (didn't need any mapquest for that!). I am ashamed to tell you that I geeked out completely and even wore the shirt I got during the City Center run of Gypsy. You know. Red? With the eyes? (oh, I know. But if a girl can't wear a Patti shirt to a Patti related theatrical event, when can she wear it?) Look, you have your holidays and I have mine, okay? When I got to the theater, I started heading towards the Cine Arts side, and the usher was like "Theater Four is on the other side" and I started to ask him how he knew where I was going, but then I was like, yeah, duh.

The theater was PACKED. I happily settled in to an aisle seat with my smuggled in snacks from World Market (pretzels, weird gummy German fruit snacks that I thought were grapes, but I think are black currants - schwarze johannisbeere? Anybody? Hazelnut wafer cookies, a chunky Kit Kat and a Bounty Bar. No, I didn't eat all of it. I hadn't had any lunch and thought I might get hungry.) and a bottle of vitamin water that I'd bought from the theater for $4.50. (!)

This audience was more on top of things - they applauded (they even applauded when Paul G first came out, which was kind of funny, because you know, we weren't actually there and he could not actually hear us), they laughed, they were reasonably well behaved (no errant cell phones went off, maybe word of Patti's Wrath had already spread? Even though She could not actually see us?) For a group that hadn't rehearsed together until the final days of this project, I thought they all did quite well.

Highlights?

NPH, of course. For me, the perfect Bobby - fun loving, youthful bachelor, kind of stumbling through life in the big city, while his good and crazy friends all around him are getting married or are married. Or have been married three or four times. And also divorced. He watches these examples of married life, none of them really inspiring him to get married himself. What do you get out of it? He wonders. (Poor Baby.) But as the show goes on, he starts to see - and by the end, although he's sitting alone in his apartment, he's looking hopefully at the empty seat beside him, maybe his bachelor days are numbered.

The Patti - pitch perfect as Joanne. That's all. I would watch her do just about anything. No. You know what? Forget about the qualifier. I will watch her do anything. She blew them all out of the water with her "Ladies Who Lunch". Stunning.

It was a great way to spend an afternoon and I would go back again if I could. You all have one last chance to see it - there's one more showing sometime this week.

it's back!

2011-06-17T06:42:00.001-07:00

Happy Alex Friday! (Check him out in July's Vogue!)

tony winners & losers

2011-06-13T06:17:00.001-07:00

Highlights and lowlights from last night's Tony's (I know I should have totally blogged this live, what's wrong with me?)

Winners
1. The Patti. Just for showing up.

2. Neil Patrick Harris as host = love. Not so crazy about opening number, I think they should have started off with the dueling hosts thing with Hugh Jackman. That was adorbs.

3. Anything Goes & Sutton Foster. Yeah, Patti's Reno Sweeney will always be number 1 for me, but you gotta love Sutton Foster. I wish someone would give me a boatload of money so I could go off and see this show.

4. The Book of Mormon Yep. It sure did win a lot. I haven't seen it (or South Park, either, for that matter) but I am intrigued by it. And that damn "I beeeliiieeeeveeee" has been stuck in my head since last night.

5. The Motherchucker with the Hat - yay presenters for not yielding to temptation to say the full name of this show! (And also? How come in the little best play blurb for this one, nobody was even wearing a hat??)

6. The War Horse puppet horse. (I also really want to see this show...)

7. It's Raining Men. Completely awesome and woke the show up in the 11th hour. (Had no idea Paul Schaefer wrote it).

8. Company! Oooh, looking forward to seeing this in the theater on Wednesday!

9. Mark Rylance's speech. I have no idea what he was on about, but I liked it. UPDATE! It was a poem!! According to the Sun Times:Just as he did three years ago when he won for “Boeing-Boeing,” Rylance quoted a poem by Louis Jenkins, an obscure poet from Minnesota.

“Unlike flying or astral projection, walking through walls is a totally earth-related craft, but a lot more interesting than pot-making or driftwood lamps,” he said to the bemused crowd. When asked later why he had recited the poem, he said, “I don’t know. I was getting a little bored.”

10. Angela Lansbury for bringing the class.

Losers
1. Frances McDormand - glad to see you got all dressed up, Fran. WTF? Your Tony has been revoked.

2. How to Succeed in Business... based on the performance they showed, it looked kind of boring. And this is supposed to make people want to attend theater? I am also looking at you, Catch Me If You Can.

3. Spider Man: Turn this shit off: Many jokes, and also many shots of Bono looking po'd. Well, that's what you get for crashing the Tony's, dude (but love you! Still looking forward to seeing the U2 concert next month - don't quit your day job!!) and also completely boring scene from the show where Peter and MJ... just sit there. No flying or any action. Snore.

4. Tyne Daly in Master Class ??? No.

5. No surprises. Chris Rock, who apparently would have prefered to have been home watching some basketball game (they should have let him) said it best - why even bother reading the nominees for best musical? Massive waste of time. Everyone knew what was going to win. Even I knew what was going to win, and I only saw three shows this season (only 2 of which were nominated for anything). I just wish there had been a few more surprises.

6. The little 'my broadway moment' snippets or whatever they were called - there was only one, the one with John Leguizamo. I thought that was a cute idea, have the nominees (not just the big name slumming movie stars) talk about their first Broadway experience or whatever. But there was not follow through, so John's monologue was kind of pointless.

7. Big name slumming movie/tv stars. Look, CBS, I get it. You need to show some famous faces so that the people at home know what they're watching. Can't let it be just about theater, oh, no. I get it. But I wish that the actual nominees got more screen time, or chances to be presenters. It is, after all, their night. Or it should be. And some of them made sense - Whoopi introducing Sister Act, and Robin Williams etc. But Marg Helgenberg? Because why? Oh, right, because CSI is on CBS. Check. You could just about get away with Kelsey Grammer and Viola Davis and Catherine Zeta Jones, because both the ladies won last year, and he was nominated last year, but what are you gonna do next year?

8. Christie Brinkley - was she for real?

Glee! Live!

2011-06-08T17:27:00.000-07:00

Some of my thoughts about the show...

It was fun. I had a great time. I had bought my ticket the day of the show, and it was a pretty good seat, on the floor, kind of in the middle. I think it would have been more fun if I had been closer to my friends, since I was a single 30something in a sea of giddy teenagers and CRA-ZA-ZY fans. One of them in front of me had a 2 sided poster - one side was devoted to Finn and one side to Puck. Another fan had a homemade t-shirt with "Monteith" emblazoned on the back. Yeah. I was with those fans (but I was on the floor, what did I expect?).

The show opened with the Legion of Extraordinary Dancers and, yeah. They were all right. It went on kind of long. And since I worked at a dance company with some truly extraordinary dancers, it takes a lot to wow me when it comes to dance. These guys were all right.

The Glee part of the show didn't start until 9:00. When the opening strains of Don't Start Believin' started up, we were on our feet and we stayed there throughout the entire show. The Glee clubbers were all there - represented via video were Will Schuester (since he's off with NKOTBSB) and Coach Sylvester. A few of the Warblers were also there, we all know it's really Blaine and the Pips anyway. And he was there. And I love him. So I was happy (but why the teaser about the big 80s number without giving us Blaine and Rachel singing "Don't You Want Me"??

My favorites - Blaine (Darren Criss) and Kurt (Chris Colfer - his "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" just melts my heart, I just wanted to give him a hug and then dress him up in corduroy and put him on a shelf in my room), Santana (Naya Rivera) with her awesome vocals on "Valerie" and her duet with Mercedes (Amber Riley) which I maintain should have TOTALLY WON the duets contest. Brittany (Heather Morris) is a completely fierce dancer - now her number wowed me! What else? Oh, I love Quinn's (Diana Agron) new hair (I wonder if mine would look cute like that?) and Lea Michele absolutely brought it on "Firework". And yes, I loved the boys singing "Friday" and I was delighted that they let Artie get up out of his wheelchair for Safety Dance. That poor guy is not really in a wheelchair, you know? And he has to sit in one for the whole tour. But he gets to bust a move on one song...

Yeah. That's what I remember about the show. Some of the time, I was thinking 'I can't believe you're sitting here with all these crazies' and the rest of the time, I just joined in and became one of the crazies. If you can't beat em, join em, right?

Oh - and I know the set list is made up of, like, stuff they sing on the show, but I thought it might have been nice to add a little Chicago style variety into the mix. When they were all like, we love you, Chicago! And launched into "New York" it was weird. I love New York (the place AND the song), as you all know, so I was screaming my head off in a fit of fan girl frenzy (see "crazies, became one" note above), but I also think "My kind of town" or "Sweet home Chicago" would have been a nice (personal!) touch.

Still love you, Glee.

xoxoxo (have suddenly morphed into Gossip Girl?)

last night on the bus...

2011-06-08T06:24:00.001-07:00

Part of my new commuter experience is taking the bus from Union Station to Navy Pier. If it's a nice day, I'll sometimes walk part of this. If I'm feeling really ambitious, I'll walk the whole way. Not in this heat though.

Mostly, I take the 120 and 121 buses, which are "express" routes to and from Union and Ogilvie Stations/Navy Pier. My rides are usually pretty uneventful, since it's mainly business commuters going to and from work. Yesterday though, was kind of fun.

So I was on the 120 yesterday afternoon, on my way home. The buses sit at the depot by the Pier, and so I was just hanging out, waiting to go. The driver was on the phone, talking about some friend of hers named (I swear) Aquanetta (is it like that native American custom of naming your child after the things you see? So like Cloud Dancing or Sitting Bull? Did someone's mom use some hairspray one morning and decide it was a lovely name for a girl?). So that made me laugh.

Then, somewhere on the way to Ogilvie, this lady next to me starts talking on her phone to her friend Pam. And it's all like blah blah blah, which I kind of hate, but then it got interesting. She was saying that she had to reschedule a dinner with her "friend" Tracy, but Tracy had to cancel which was fine with lady-next-to-me because evidently, Tracy hates this lady's guts now and is saying all kinds of mean things about her. (I was sitting there thinking, oooh, like what? And then she gave details). This Tracy (apparently) sent an email to my seatmate wherein she called this lady a wino and accused her of child neglect. Who does that in an email? If you're worried about your friend having a drinking problem, wouldn't you be more gentle about it? Or, like, have an intervention?

And instead of telling her to naff off, my seatmate was talking about rescheduling this dinner with Tracy (who kind of sounded like a beeyotch to me). It was totally better than a soap opera. She would have kept talking but we entered the Loop which is kind of a dead zone.

I totally didn't want to hear any of these things, but I didn't have a book or anything, so I was kind of a captive audience to this lady and her drama. So message to all of you bus riders. If you don't want your entertaining conversations to become blog fodder for the likes of me, maybe you should keep your voice down?

glee live!!

2011-06-04T12:27:00.001-07:00

Allow me to share with you a tale of woe, followed by a tale of joy, all accompanied by the delightful strains of a Journey song, sung by a misfit show choir. Ready?

So last year, I heard about the Glee! Live show. And I thought, hahahha, yeah, right. I'm thirty-whatsit years old, I'd be sitting around with a bunch of kids. Not for me, as much as I love the show, and as much as my inner Gleek was dying to bust out.

But then I started thinking about it, and I really wanted to go. But I was too late. It was sold out. Sad, right? I stalked ticketmaster and eventually I ventured onto sites like Stubhub and asked myself how badly did I really want to go? I stalked some tickets on Stubhub, and on the day of the show, there were some affordable tickets.

I came really close to buying one, except I worked in the city you know, and by the time I made up my mind to do it, I would have had to go and pick up the ticket at a Stubhub location (somewhere on Randolph, I think), taken the train home, got in the car and hotfooted it to Rosemont. I don't think I would have made it. So I didn't go. In the end it was a good thing I didn't go, because the train got really delayed and I wouldn't have made it in time anyway.

So that's the tale of woe.

The tale of joy?

I'm going tonight!!! What what!??!?! Was talking to Heidi and she's taking Beth for her birthday (don't worry, it's not a secret), and I was like, are there more tickets? And there were and so I'm going to join them. With my special new hairdo. Wooo!

I don't think I have to tell you the moral of this story (all together now!):

DON'T STOP! BELIEEEEEEEEVIN'!!!!!

memorial day

2011-05-29T07:29:00.001-07:00

we remember...

2011-05-28T15:54:00.000-07:00

Every year, the City of Chicago holds one of the largest Memorial Day parades in the country. Before the parade kicks off, we attended a breakfast for Gold Star families - that is, those families who have lost a loved one serving active duty. It was held in the Walnut Room at Marshall Field's/Macy's and is always very nicely done. My parents and I attend the breakfast in remembrance of my cousin, a US Marine. Our new Mayor was in attendance, and four-star General, Ray Odierno served as Grand Marshal. There was also a wreath laying ceremony in Daley Plaza, with a 21 gun salute (and plenty of men in uniform!). It rained towards the end of the parade, but we just opened up umbrellas and put on ponchos and didn't let the weather dampen our spirits.

waiting sucks...

2011-05-27T07:42:00.000-07:00

A very happy Alex Friday to everyone!

Glee-cap - Nationals (don't stop believing??)

2011-05-24T19:28:00.000-07:00

SPOILER ALERT!! If you haven't seen tonight's Glee, read no further. I will dish and I will divulge. Go watch it and then come back and read, okay?

So, yes. I was looking forward to this episode for two reasons: 1 - Patti LuPone's cameo and 2 - those great big, colorful shots of the gang frolicking at Lincoln Center (although, can I say, when I tried to dance on the fountain at Lincoln Center, I got YELLED AT by a security guard). The episode, much like the rest of the season, seemed to be a little bit all over the map. It seemed like they were trying to cram everything into that one tiny little hour - Will's big Broadway decision. Finn and Rachel's big relationship decision. Nationals. New York City. The rivalry with Vocal Adrenaline. Maybe they should have had a two hour, or two part finale? Or maybe that's the trouble with such a big ensemble with lots of co-existing storylines?

We've got the gang in NYC for Nationals, but there's a little bit of a problem. You know those amazing original songs they're gonna sing? Yeah. Those haven't been written yet. Major essay crisis. The kids are sequestered in their hotel room, tasked with writing these huge show-stoppers (complete with arrangements and choreography) WITHOUT any assistance from Mr. Schu, who has gone off to perform with April Rhoades in a grrrreeat biiiig brrroooaaadwayyyy shoooowwww! And suddenly the show is a Matthew Morrison music video. Not that I'm complaining.

Cut to - New Directions says FTS to hanging out in the hotel room (Brittany's original song "My Cup" wasn't going to cut it, awesome as it was) and goes out to find inspiration on the streets of New York City. Montages ensue. Later, back in the hotel rooms, the boys try to get to work. Finn pines for Rachel. In their room, the girls have a pillow fight.

Finn asks Rachel out on a big, splashy New York City date. They meet The Patti at Sardis. Patti goes all Yoda on Rachel, telling her to never give up on her dreams. And then she leaves. What the what??? Why would you invite this Broadway legend to be on your big huge New York show and NOT HAVE HER SING????? This is my question. I will take whatever she wants to give me, but honestly, Glee. A little bit of a fail there, I think. And no so-called "diva off" either. Patti wins, Lea. Every time.

Anyway, blah blah blah. The romantic NYC date doesn't go exactly as planned. No songs are written. Tick tock tick tock. Kurt wakes Rachel the next day for Breakfast at Tiffany's. Then they break into the Gershwin Theater and sing a duet on the Wicked stage. A sidebar here - when I was on a choir tour back in high school, our chaperone PUT TAPE ON OUR HOTEL ROOM DOORS so that we wouldn't go sneaking around. So, we were in Minnesota, not like there was a lot of happening nightlife we could have gotten to, but still. We were under lock, key, and masking tape (no lie). Mr. Schu's kids are running around, breaking into theaters, and he is none the wiser. But wait!! He decides he loves them and doesn't want to go to Broadway after all. Yeah, I'd choose being a teacher in Ohio over being an actor in New York too (NOT).

There is a brief moment where Quinn is all wonk, wonk, wonk, I just want somebody to LOVE me, sniff, sniff!!! Well, hello, honey, you had Finn once before, but you cheated on him, remember this? Lied to him about being the baby daddy etc. Then you had Sam, who was willing to do that pottery thing with you, and was frontman of the Justin Bieber Experience (duh. Why didn't you guys do THAT for Nationals? Nobody would have beaten the Bieb!) but you ditched him for Finn. Brittany and Santana try and comfort her a little bit (no, not that way!) and then tell her that she will feel SO MUCH BETTER if she gets a haircut. Wait, huh? Then later we see her with new hair. It's cute. But will it make someone love her? I think they missed a moment there, to kind of get to the heart of Quinn's character and make the audience feel like she's not a total manipulative beeyotch. There could have been a cute, girls' day out montage in NYC. Shopping! Hair cutting! Bonding! Making us like Quinn! Still, not enough time, and we've still got songs to write!!!

Eventually, after a big old group hug, they get down to business and crank out those songs. And not a moment too soon, because here we are at Nationals!! The competition seems almost like an afterthought. We see some random girls' choir (insignificant, and a big time waster since we know nothing about them, why do they get airtime??), and then Vocal Adrenaline does their thing. Then it's New Directions' turn. They sing a great original song (written by Finn. Who knew he had it in him, indeed?) but Finn gets overwhelmed by the moment and plants a big old smooch on Rachel. After she has just told him that she loves him, but she loves her future dreams more. Whoops.

It turns out that kiss not only cost them the National championship, our team SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER doesn't even make the top 10. Well, damn. Does this mean we have to do this whole thing again next season?

Kurt retells the whole story to Blaine (what the hell happened to the Warblers, anyway? Didn't they tie at Regionals/Sectionals?) at the coffee shop where they run into (aawww!) Mercedes and Sam. Blaine's on his way to an audition at Six Flags (there's a Six Flags in Ohio?) and Kurt's busy working on a new musical "Pip, Pip Hooray" about Pippa Middleton. That line, a little throwaway, was possibly the best moment of the whole episode (don't tell Patti).

All in all, everyone seems pretty okay with coming in 12th. Because, as Brittany tells us at the end, the competition wasn't even really the point. And what was the point? Acceptance, which is a pretty fair evaluation of the season. Acceptance for Kurt, for Brittana, for Puck and Lauren. Acceptance of Sam's family circumstances. And that no matter what, the New Directions is one big, kind of dysfunctional family. They may steal each other's boyfriends/girlfriends and threaten to quit every week but they love and accept each other.

Until next season.

the rapture

2011-05-20T14:37:00.001-07:00

Huh? What did you think I meant?
No but seriously, if the world really DOES end tomorrow, isn't Alex the last thing you'd want to see?

be still, my heart...

2011-05-17T16:35:00.000-07:00

I think I have a little crush... Okay, a really big crush (could you tell)???? So, sorry about the dearth of Alex posts.

Well, actually, I'm not sorry at all...

You know you've been spending too much time in Bon Temps when...

2011-05-16T18:14:00.000-07:00

I spent a lot of time reading over this rainy weekend. After I finished reading Dead Reckoning, I went back through the series, starting at my favorite, Dead to the World and progressing from there. I actually skipped ahead again, reading Dead in the Family and All Together Dead simultaneously and am just finished From Dead to Worse (blah blah blah, weretiger, blah blah blah.... Crystal and Jason... blah blah blah stupid Arlene....)

But I think I've been spending too much time with Sookie and co. Witness:

1. A strange craving for iced tea. Usually I don't drink it, but Sookie always serves tea, and last week on a hot day, I stopped and got a Carolina Honey Breeze from Argo Tea. Yeah. Not great. Too much honey for my liking.

2. I started thinking to myself what kind of were-animal our new Mayor would be. (A fox maybe.)

3. And then, the kicker. So, I'm planning a meeting and waiting to get some responses. I alert my colleague as to whom I am still waiting on and send her an email with the following names: Tom, Alan, Bill and Eric. HA. Made me think, automatically, of Bill Compton and Eric Northman. AS IF they'd be at a meeting I'm planning... That just tickled me.

And made me think I should start reading some other stuff for a while...

guess what?

2011-05-13T17:11:00.000-07:00

It's Alex Friday!

1,000th post dance party!

2011-05-09T18:25:00.001-07:00

I've been gibbering absolute talkish on this blog for FIVE YEARS and 1,000 posts. Holla!

Let's all celebrate with a Jenna Maroney dance party!

second to none...

2011-05-09T18:05:00.000-07:00

I snapped these on the way to work one morning. When I am feeling particularly ambitious (and brave?) I will hop off the bus at St. Clair and walk the rest of the way to the Pier. These are the views that I am inspired by, every single day.

reading material... books & recommendations

2011-05-08T16:34:00.000-07:00

I have a long commute and like to pass my train and bus time with a good book. Fortunately, I've had lots of great reading material lately. Here's a peek at my reading list over the past few weeks, with some little reviews & recommendations (ranked in order of preference):

A Discovery of Witches (Deborah Harkness)

I cannot recommend this one enough - the story of a researcher witch, who has kind of renounced her powers, doing work at Oxford's Bodlean Library, a mysterious manuscript (shades of a supernatural Lord Peter??), a hunky vampire who does yoga, a quirky enchanted house, over 500 pages of intrigue. I turned off Glee because I was so close to finishing it - I thought I could read during the commercials or whatever, but I found myself so absorbed, I couldn't put it down, and I turned off the background noise so I could focus wholly on the book. It's the first in a trilogy which makes me DESPERATE because the next book won't be out until 2012. Read it, you won't be sorry. I could not put it down and even schlepped this massive hard cover tome on the train with me so I could read it on my daily commute.

Dead Reckoning (Charlaine Harris)

Just once, I'd like to read a nice book about Sookie Stackhouse where something nice happens, you know? Maybe she could go to work, hang with Sam, then go home and have a deep, uncomplicated talk with Eric, her vampire lovair (and then do what one does when one entertains a gentleman caller, in a most - ahem - spectacular manner), and then, I don't know, have some cookies? Dead Reckoning does not have many such happy moments for our favorite telepathic waitress. There's vamp politics a-brewing, an odd tension between Pam and Eric, and the new head honcho, Victor. Plus someone's been targeting Merlotte's and business isn't so great. It's up to Sookie (but of course) to figure out whodunit. Oh, and there are two fairies living with Sookie. Fun, huh? This book picks up where Dead in the Family left off - and as always, left me wanting more. This one, I inhaled in the space of a single evening.

Neverwhere (Neil Gaiman)

I've been a fan of Neil Gaiman's since Good Omens (probably one of my favorite books of all time). This one is --- oh so hard to describe ---- a trip to the place people go when they fall through the cracks, a romp through London's Underground. All because protagonist Richard Mayhew wouldn't look away when he saw someone bleeding on the street. He offered help, and got sucked into London Below. This is the pick for One Book, One Chicago, and it is SO MUCH BETTER than last year's (awful) pick, Brooklyn. It is fantasy at the most breathtakingly vivid - funny and scary and imaginative.

Alice I Have Been (Melanie Benjamin)

I'd read a few reviews of this book and thought it sounded good. I then forgot all about it until I ran across a copy of the book on one of my (many) trips to the library. It's a fictionalized account of the life and times of Alice Liddell, otherwise known as the inspiration behind Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. I found it incredibly moving and sad (it made me cry. On the train. That was a fun afternoon commute home) - the story of a little girl kept forever young through that famous story, and how the creation of the story haunted her throughout the rest of her life. A beautiful and well-crafted story. It even offers a little analysis about the Victorian attitude towards children and why it wasn't creepy at all, back in the day, for Carroll (aka Charles Dodgson) to take photographs of little girls, hang around with them and take them around (rowing on the Isis! Another book set in Oxford!). It offers a suggestion of the nature of the relationship between Dodgson and his young muse (Alice was only 7 when they met) and how that relationship shaped the rest of Alice's life. Read it. I now also have the urge to go and read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland again, too...

If You Were Here (Jen Lancaster)

I was so looking forward to getting this book - I went to the Borders on State Street on my way to work so I could get the book right when they opened. This one is Jen's first novel and details the adventures of Mac and Mia, a couple living in Chicago when they decide to take the plunge and buy a house in the suburbs (a fictionalized North Shore town Abington Cambs, a very thinly disguised Lake Forest). The house they buy is a fixer upper and the book goes through their adventures in home ownership - and there are many. It is told in Jen's signature engaging style and I busted out laughing several times (again, on the train. Sorry, fellow commuters, for disturbing you from your Wall Street Journals). I just love the way she writes, and it was a quick, light, fun read. I loved that her character wrote books about Amish teenage zombies in love (and I think I'd like to read "Buggies are the new Black"). I didn't get all of the John Hughes references. I think I'm from the right era, but I honestly don't remember all of those movies. Please don't think I'm a traitor to my generation or anything, but I just didn't watch a lot of movies as a kid. So I'm pretty sure I saw them....at some point.... but I don't remember them. I have no idea who Jake Ryan is or why anyone would want to move into his house. I get he's some kind of 80s Teenage Dream? But I have no mental image to call to mind. I'm curious though, and plan to rent some movies - anybody up for a John Hughes party?

All in all, I enjoyed it very much and hope Jen keeps writing novels - although I would read pretty much anything she felt like writing.

(But I feel duty bound to point out, as a lifetime suburbanite that everyone in the other suburbs totally makes fun of the North Shore snobs in Lake Forest. So when Mac and Mia were moving there I was all, ewwww, why??? Yes, I know, I get it, Jake Ryan's house. Still.)

as promised...

2011-05-06T06:41:00.000-07:00

Alex Friday, unleashed at last.

You're welcome, America.

watch this space....

2011-05-03T19:22:00.001-07:00

Starting on Fridays, we will pay weekly homage to our Favorite True Blood vampire hunk...

(That would be Team Eric - suck it, haters!)

Tony Talk

2011-05-03T19:07:00.000-07:00

I don't know what y'all were doing first thing this morning, but I was checking out the Tony nominations! Playbill talked to the nominees to find out what they were doing when they heard the news... (go there if you want to read the rest, I am just giving you the reaction of my favorite Sicilian Diva).

Patti LuPone, Best Featured Actress in a Musical, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
"I was watching the news because I am kind of obsessed with what's happening in the recent events in the world and I went, 'Who's calling me [laughs] in the morning?' I totally forgot. I was thrilled. First of all, I was thrilled when it was the Outer Critics, because that's the first one, and then thrilled when it was the Drama Desk, and then thrilled when it was the Tony. We're — Laura and I — I'm so thrilled for both of us, and for David…because it was a long time ago and I'm very proud to have been part of the production. Very proud to have been a member of that cast in that bold, original musical that didn't deserve to close. We were brokenhearted when it closed. I think that anything original needs to be supported — all of our composers and lyricists and playwrights that turn in original material need to be supported. They need to be allowed to grow. We need to be able to learn and be enriched by their new ideas and so I'm thrilled beyond belief that the nominating committee of these awards have not forgotten and acknowledged the production, the music, the performances — I'm really, really thrilled."

Congrats, Patti!

women on the verge revisited

2011-05-03T18:13:00.000-07:00

"Where do you go? How do you swim in a tidal wave? What do you do? When do you know that you can't be saved?" (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown)

I don't know where other people go, but when I found myself at the end of my rope this past November, I retreated to my island - that is to say, Manhattan. It was truly a retreat to a safe haven, a vacation to recharge my batteries from an increasingly tough situation at work. I won't bore you with details, but basically, I was getting burned out. I had the typical Bitch Boss from Hell - impossible to work with, incredibly disorganized, a crappy manager, moody as all get-out, who single-handedly brought down morale just by walking into the room. It wasn't just me, she was equal opportunity in her horribleness - everybody was on the receiving end of her dreadful personality and I think all of our department (and a few people from other departments) left meetings in her office crying. Yeah, that's a positive work environment!

Nothing I did was right. Nothing I could do would fix it. I was trying to swim in a tidal wave, getting pulled under and feeling awful every single day.

I left town with a cloud over my head, and spent my vacation feeling like something was going to happen, waiting for the other shoe to drop. I walked around the city, ate Crumbs cupcakes (so many cupcakes), saw the Statue of Liberty and of course, went to see shows. It always works wonders for me to immerse myself in another world, even if it's just for a few hours.

The shows this time around resonated strongly with my mood. I connected on a personal level with young Andrew Jackson when he sang "Life SUCKS! And my life sucks in particular!" in Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson. Right on, brother! It seemed like an emo rock musical about our 7th President was totally what I needed. And I mean, it more or less worked out okay for him. He came roaring back, kicked some ass and took some names.

Maybe it's obvious that also connected on a deeply personal level with Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown because I was so totally almost there myself. It was a great show, it starred Patti LuPone, one of my favorite performers, along with the talented Sherie Rene Scott, Laura Benanti, Brian Stokes Mitchell and Justin Guarini. This almost guaranteed that I'd love it, before any of them sang a single note - but as the show got going, I really, really found myself enjoying it. It was funny and fast-paced, the music was gorgeous, and hummable, and again, I could identify with the characters, because I was rather close to the edge myself.

"Welcome to the edge, the verge, the ledge," sings Patti/Lucia, "The bridge is out, you're looking in the mirror, baby. This is where it rips, a tear, a tear, a fear that what's been coming isn't coming cause it's here now..."

After the show, I had a fantastic evening out with an amazing group of people who brought me into their group like I'd always been there. They were so warm and kind and generous, I had almost forgotten that people could be normal and nice and kind and respectful to each other.

Still, I felt I was teetering on the edge (the verge, the ledge) and when I got back to town after my long weekend away, floating on cloud 9, I went in to work, feeling like something was about to happen.

I was right.

I was let go later that day. Two days before my birthday. The week of Thanksgiving. The reason I was given by captain Bitcherton? "It's not working out." Despite three years of excellent reviews, by the way. Nary a black mark on my record. Whose life sucks, in particular? I can kind of laugh about it now, but it was a really hard couple of months. You try being unemployed during Christmas and tell me how much fun it is.

Fast forward to today - to quote Andrew Jackson, "that's right, motherfuckers! Jackson's back!" And so am I. I have a new job that I love, thanks in part, to the people I was with in New York, my own personal "silver linings".

The Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown cast album was released on iTunes last week, and I promptly downloaded it. I haven't stopped listening to it since I bought it. It brought back all of this stuff, which is why I am telling you about it now. It holds kind of a special place in my heart, so if you haven't heard the music GO NOW to iTunes and download it. My faves are "Island" (one of them that stuck with me from when I saw it), "Model Behavior", "Time Stood Still", "Lovesick" and "Invisible". Go now. Download. Make some gazpacho. Listen. Enjoy. Repeat. And repeat, and repeat.

I was delighted that the show was recognized with Tony nominations today - one for Patti, one for Laura and one for David Yazbek. I wish more people had gotten to go and enjoy the show. The reviews were not great and I think that's kind of unfair. It was not a bad little show, I think it was really quite wonderful.

The power of live theater - it can be quite healing, you know?

Da Bard about town

2011-04-24T11:55:00.000-07:00

Billy da Bard, out and about in the MG to celebrate his birthday (prithee, thou art indeedeth a party animal!)

Billy's cup runneth over... with coffee

Visiting his vast collection of books at the Morton Grove Public Library.

And finally, imparting wisdom to the Youth of Today at Niles North.

War - What is it Good For?

2011-03-31T06:54:00.001-07:00

Let me preface this by saying that my family has a pretty extensive military background - My grandfather was in the US Navy during WWII (Pacific Theater). Some of my great uncles were in the Army. My dad and his brothers were all in the Navy. My cousin, David, was a US Marine, killed in action in 2004, in Iraq. He was younger than me. Incredible. I remember his funeral ceremony, and the memorial at Camp LeJune were incredibly moving experiences. Have you ever seen a group of Marines cry? It is so, so sad. I did a reading at his memorial service and it was the hardest thing I've ever had to do.

History geek that I am, I recently read Studs Terkel's book "The Good War" about WWII, and have been watching the HBO series "Generation Kill" (It was a Christmas present - thanks, Heidi and Jane!) - something about the soldiers' stories, the lost innocence, the sacrifice, the daily life, are all things that we civilians can just never fully comprehend. We watch, we pray, we send letters and care packages, we hope they will come home safely. I think I am about as patriotic as the next person, and I am always deeply moved by military rituals - the presentation of the colors, the playing of taps, all that stuff, speaks to me on such an emotional level.

That is a really long way of saying how much I was looking forward to Black Watch (and I am not just saying that because I work at CST now! Or because it featured a cast of lovely Scottish lads.) - the story of the famed Scottish regiment during the Iraq war. It was performed in the Broadway Armory, which was actually (duh) a military Armory and training facility and is now part of the park district. Gosh, if those walls could talk.

The show chronicles the story of the soldiers in the regiment, with a bit of history about the Black Watch thrown in for good measure. A proud battalion of fighters that participated in storied battles including Culloden, WWI in France and the Middle East, WWII (European and African Theaters), Korea, and were sent to Iraq to support the US Operaton Iraqi Freedom. The unit was deployed to what was known as the "Triangle of Death" between Fallujah and Karbala (the same area where my cousin died in battle). The show included music, a little humor, and a real life look into the Scottish soldiers' experiences in the war.

It wasn't their fight - but they fought. They wondered what the point of it all was -this was not a threat to their country, or even necessarily to that of their ally the US. They faced a new kind of warfare with suicide bombs, IEDs and danger lurking around every corner. They fought for each other, for their mates. Some of them made it home to tell the tale.

I was (can you tell?) deeply moved by the story, even though the sound was super loud (but come on, it was in a gym, for god's sake) and at times the dialogue was hard to understand. Oh and they swore a lot. I heard one guy comment if he had a dollar for every time they said "fuck" and derrivations thereof, he'd be a wealthy man. But I mean, come on. They're IN THE ARMY. In a place called THE TRIANGLE OF DEATH and I think a few "fucks" are warranted. Quite a few. But whatever, should they say "Oh, shucky darn, we're being mortared?" I thank Terry Pratchett's wee free men series for teaching me what "ken" means - because otherwise I would have been sitting there going who's ken? They keep talking about him...

I enjoyed the show. I am planning to see it again. It is raw, it is timely, it is thought-provoking theater.

papa penguin!

2011-03-28T07:35:00.001-07:00

I have no idea what all they are saying, but this video = adorbs!

Gimme a head with... confessions of a part-time (hair) model

2011-03-28T06:16:00.000-07:00

Ever wonder what happens at a hair show? Well, so did I, so when Heidi asked me, on Saturday night (while we were enjoying a performance by the saintly saints and scintillating sinners of Goat Song Theatre) if I wanted to join her in being a hair model for our friend Beth at a hair show on Sunday, I said yes. We've helped her out before, serving as models while she practiced up-dos etc, and so I thought it would be kind of fun, and all I would have to do was sit around while someone was playing with my hair. Awesome.

So. Off we went to the Sheraton Hotel downtown (so close to work, I could have wandered over to the office, if I had been so inclined) - we had a small adventure with parking (parking in Chicago is ALWAYS sort of an adventure, yes?) and then were waiting for La Stylista (Beth) to arrive. And we started to... notice things. Things that gave us a bit of... pause. For instance, the name of the show was the Proud Lady Beauty Show. Fun, right? Right? Well, yes. So anyway, short and short of it is, it was a show for African-American women. It included makeup and hair products and other assorted stuff, which is cool, right, but, for one small detail -we are not African-American. We sort of stood out a little bit in the crowd (one of the makeup ladies, bless her for trying, saw Heidi and I approach, gave us a big smile and said "Hello, girls! I've got some beautiful... lip gloss for you to try!")

It made me start to wonder what exactly was going to be done to my head to make it interesting for the target audience of this show. Because my hair? Is very fine, and straight as a republican minister from Kansas.

But then Beth turned up and we learned that we would be given the La Brasiliana treatment on our heads. This product is a deep conditioning sort of thing, with Keratin and Collagen and it provides smoothness, shine and manageability. Which brings me to another issue - this treatment is perfect if you want to achieve all those things - but did I mention my hair is fine? And stick straight? Pretty much all the time? All I have to do usually is brush it and it lays flat by itself. That's all it does. It doesn't curl, it doesn't frizz, it just kind of sits there. So a good candidate for a deep conditioning treatment I was definitely not. But we were what they had to work with, so on with the show - we were instructed to go and wash our hair - in the bathroom sink. We actually got all the way to the bathroom when we were called back - washing stations had been found, so we didn't have to try and wash our hair in the bathroom (thank goodness for small favors).

After the washing, we had to dry our hair "big" to make it look wild and unruly. As Beth started to work on me, she found a reason (and thus a marketing tool) for my treatment - my hair knots up, especially when it is wet, making it really hard to comb through. The treatment is supposed to help with this (we'll see). Anyway, I had to sit for a long time, while she dabbed some stuff onto my head with a little brush, worked it in, dried and then flat ironed with a really really hot tool (something like 450 degrees, I think it was. That sucker was smoking, it was so hot). She did only half of my head at first and then had me walk around like a before and after display, letting people touch the (incredibly soft) finished side of my head. And, amusingly enough, people actually did want to touch my hair - the original texture, versus the smooth treated side. And lots of people came over to watch while Beth was working, asking what she was doing. When I was in the chair, I didn't have my glasses on, so I was pretty much blind, so I did my best (blind) Vanna White impression, smiling and holding up the bottle of product so everyone could see what it was. When she was done, with my whole head, I reached up to touch it - and it was smoothy mcsmooth, like a big stick of buttah.

We were at the show pretty much all day, pausing for lunch breaks and to walk around a little, chat with people and hand out brochures and stuff. Everyone was super nice and friendly and it was a lot of fun. I am not allowed to wash my hair (or pull it back - eeek!) until tonight, and so we will see how long the treatment lasts and if it stays all smooth-like-buttah for very long. My particular treatment would have set me back $250 if I'd had it done in the salon and is supposed to last for 2 months. We shall see. I would recommend it for people with bigger hair problems than mine - frizz, or uncontrollable curls or any other kinds of issues.

It was a lot of fun being "the talent" - so if Beth asks again, I'll spend part of my time (hair) modeling, part of my time next to one of the Conchords, and the rest of the time doing my normal job...

the king's speech AKA give that man an oscar now!

2011-02-25T11:17:00.000-08:00

This past weekend, before the Devil Flu from Hell struck, I took myself to see The King's Speech. Let me start by saying that I love me some Colin Firth - ever since he and his white shirt dove into that tranquil pond in Pride & Prejudice, I have loved him. I loved him in Bridget Jones (Mr. Darcy playing Mr. Darcy? Genius!) and hell, I even loved him in Mamma Mia! and that is saying something. He was, as I recall, an early entry onto the legen (wait for it) dary Wall of Men that traveled with Cara and I into four dorm rooms in college.

The King's Speech is a wonderful film. It is not flashy, it is not filled with high speed chases or lots of explosions, it is a quiet film, exploring one man's struggle with a stammer. He was no ordinary man, of course, he was the Duke of York, the Spare Prince, #2, the invisible man, never to be King. Destiny changed all that for him when his playboy brother David (who was Edward VIII for a short short while) abdicated the throne for that "twice divorced, American woman" Wallis Simpson before they headed off to their "vee-la" in France (sorry, the above quotes were for my own amusement - I had a thing for Edward VIII in school and did an AP European history project on his non-existent reign).

Suddenly, the man in the background found himself center stage, at a time when the world was about to get sucked in to another global conflict. He had no actual politcal power, like to form a government, but everyone looked to him for guidance. The people need you, Bertie. So public speaking became important and he looked to the "common colonial" Lional Logue for assistance for getting rid of the stutter. The relationship with these two men lasted the rest of George VI's lifetime.

It's a wonderful story, a little slice of life. The cast is all kinds of star powered - aside from Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush, it includes Helena Bonham Carter as the Queen Mum, leading off a Harry Potter reunion of sorts with Michael Gambon as George V, and Timothy Spall as Winston Churchill. Also in the cast are Jennifer Ehle (from P&P - squee!) Sir Derek Jacobi, Guy Pierce and, something that will probably interest only me, but it is my blog, right, so I'm gonna mention it - Anthony Andrews as Prime Minister Baldwin. Mr. Andrews is a wonderful actor who once played Edward VIII in a little made for tv movie called "The Woman He Loved". He also played Sebastian in "Brideshead Revisited" - not the recent movie, an older version, a dashing Scarlet Pimpernel, and a bomb squad officer in a lovely little series called "Danger UXB"). He has about two scenes in this film, and it took me until the second one to recognize him, but sure enough, there he was.

Anyway. Do yourselves a favor, this Oscar weekend, and go see The King's Speech. There will always (always) be another Adam Sandler move (trust me). But this one is a sweet little gem and is not to be missed.

the best thing i've read all day...

2011-02-18T06:10:00.001-08:00

I read a review this morning of The Joffrey's production of The Merry Widow. The review opens thus:

"The Joffrey Ballet’s grand and glorious production of “The Merry Widow,” the full-length ballet by British choreographer Ronald Hynd now in a lavish company premiere at the Auditorium Theatre, might just inspire a little yearning for the rebirth of the Austro-Hungarian Empire."

Huh??

Really? Yearning? Really? I don't see how we're supposed to take critics seriously at all, when they say stuff like this. Full disclosure here: I haven't seen this and I most likely won't be. So, for all I know, the entire audience might have left the Auditorium having the following conversation:

Patron 1: You know what the world needs? A return to the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Patron 2: Yeah! I was totes thinking that too!
Patron 1: I love how they went from being primitive city-states to like, the first world superpower.
Patron 2: Yeah, Europe got all united and shit. Power to the Habsburgs!
Patron 1: It's really too bad that that Franz Ferdinand got shot in 1914, by those crazy-ass mo-fos in the Black Hand.
Patron 2: That would be a totally awesome name for a band.
Patron 1: Black Hand?
Patron 2: No, Franz Ferdinand.
Patron 1: I think that's taken. But whaevs. This ballet? Totally reminded me of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. I don't know how, since it was, like, a really long time ago, but I inexplicably find myself yearning for a return to those glory days of yore.
Patron 2: Did you just say yore?
Patron 1: Yeah, sorry, I guess I got caught up in all the yearning.
Patron 2: The costumes were pretty though, and ooh, the dancing was awesome, too.
Patron 1: Yeah. I love me a good waltz.
Patron 2: Is it me or is it really dark in that theter?

etc.

I don't remember what the rest of the review said, I have been sitting here chuckling about that opening line for a solid 20 minutes. So if anyone goes to see the Merry Widow PLEASE, PLEASE tell me if you are gripped with a sudden yearning for good old Archduke Franz whatshisname and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. And thank you, critic-who-shall-not-be-named-although-I-am-pretty-sure-any-Chicagoan-will-know-right-away-who-you-are, for helping me start out my Friday with a good laugh, and also allowing me to flex my creative muscles before work...

Let Me Entertain You...

2011-02-16T11:13:00.000-08:00

I've been spending a lot of time on public transportation lately, and so have had a lot of time to read. Aside from being crazy obsessed with the Pretty Little Liars series (so bad. And yet, so good.), I've also been reading Karen Abbott's American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare, the Life and Times of Gypsy Rose Lee.

I went into this book thinking I knew the story - I have, after all, seen Gypsy the musical fable severally, read Gypsy's autobiography and even her son's book, Gypsy & Me. The story is familiar - trouping the vaudeville circuit, at the end the era of that kind of entertainment. Baby June's crazy ability (very much exploited) to dance on pointe when she was only 2 years old, which probably led her to flee the act as a teenager. The creation of Gypsy Rose Lee, internationally renowned famous person and burlesque queen, from Rose Louise Hovick - the not very talented, self-taught girl, nicknamed "the Duchess".

This is a story about identity - Rose Louise, born June Ellen Hovick, had her name taken away from her when her cute as a button baby sister was born (thus becoming Baby/Dainty June AKA June Havoc in later years). But who is this girl? She is an early day Madonna of sorts, recreating herself to fit whatever image suits her at the time. Stripteaser extraordinaire? Check. TV talk show hostess? Check. Mother? Check. Pretty Princess of Fabulous Literary Salons and exclusive Parties? Check Check Check. A true ecdysiast (a word coined for her) - shedding her skin on stage and in life. Giving things away but keeping a lot to herself. The shy quiet Louise, desperate to be a star and seeking Mother's attention, that we grew to know and love from the musical? That story is the way Gypsy wanted it to be, maybe not necessarily the way things were. Hence the use of the word "fable" in the show's title.

This is also the story of America in the early 20th century. A time of notorious political corruption, post WWI isolationism, and the start of the Great Depression. This era saw the rise of burlesque as popular entertainment, chronicled in the book through the story of the brothers Minsky.

Several narrative threads come together masterfully in this book, the story of Gypsy, her relationship with her mother and with June, a tale of entertainment (and morality) in Depression-era America, before our rise to Superpowerhood, innocence lived and lost.

happy days, are, indeed, here again

2011-02-11T06:35:00.000-08:00

Happy, happy Friday and happy happy days!

when is spring gonna get here, anyway?

2011-02-03T05:46:00.001-08:00

Have I mentioned lately how much I hate snow? I hate it a lot. So I started the week with much trepidation over the weather forecast. On Sunday morning, when I was working out, I saw a weather report calling for 13-17 inches of snow. But, the weather guy said those estimates "might be conservative" - and I thought, eh. It's Sunday, they could still be wrong. But on Monday they were saying the same thing. And there was a timeline. But you know how it is. The newscasters whip us all into a weather watching frenzy, making us think that we will be stuck in the storm to end all storms, and then NADA. So forgive us all for being a little bit skeptical. I sort of thought that we'd get something, because they couldn't be that wrong, but maybe it wouldn't be as bad as they thought.

I went into work on Tuesday morning, and everyone was talking about the snow. Something about the possibility of a snow day made everyone kind of giddy - because really? As adults, when do we ever get snow days?? We already were starting to plan things around the snow - we scheduled meetings for Wednesday afternoon, assuming there would be some kind of delay in opening the office. Then we heard that businesses all around the city were closing early. My boss had a meeting with the head honchos of a big bank in the city - and we learned that they were closing early. This storm meant business, and everyone was suddenly taking it very seriously.

I had to drop off a grant that was due that day, at an office in the Loop, and my boss told me to just go home from there, since I was so close to Union Station. Thus, I was able to catch the 2:35 train, allowing me to get the hell out of dodge (on the way, I found a light shining in the darkness - AKA a new CRUMBS bake shop - a little slice of NYC, right in my backyard. Yes, I stopped. I was drawn into that shop like a demented moth to a flame. I might have squealed "OMG!" a lot. And of course, I bought cupcakes. I figured if I'm gonna be snowed in, I might as well have some delicious cupcakes, yes?).

The snow was already starting, right on schedule. I felt lucky to have gotten home safely, before it really got started, rather than being stuck on, I don't know, Lake Shore Drive, maybe? And then I got a call from work. We would be shut down on Wednesday - joining a long list of schools and businesses in the city and metro area closing for the day. I understand this was something of a first for us, but given the fact that the governor had announced a State of Emergency, I think it was the best possible move. And, of course it meant: SNOW DAY!!

We hunkered down in the house and listened to the wind howling outside. This was some storm - raging winds, blowing snow, and the best part, the rarest phenomenon - THUNDER SNOW. WTF? I know there was an alleged ginormus blizzard in 1999, but I don't remember it at all. I was in college then, but probably on break since it was early January. I say probably because I have no recollection of this at all. Maybe I wasn't as obsessed with weather events as I am now? Since I didn't have to worry about driving or going anywhere, it was but a blip on my radar?

At any rate. I went to sleep, listening to the wind outside and praying that we wouldn't lose power. It sucked when it happened in the summer, and I could not imagine what it would be like to lose power during the worst storm of the year.

I woke up to this:

Yikes.

That? Is my driveway. It is REALLY long and let me tell you, took forever to get clear. That's not an abandoned car on LSD, with its wipers up as a distress call, it's MY car, buried behind the house. See the HUGE drift right behind it? I dug the car out myself and I.AM.STILL.SORE.

Today, it's freezing-ass cold, and I got a text last night letting me know that the office is going to open at 12 today. So.... semi snow day!

BEST.BIRTHDAY.EVER

2011-01-09T10:48:00.001-08:00

One of my birthday gifts from my friends was tickets to a Chicago Wolves game, which was exciting to begin with. I love hockey but I've never been to a live game. All of my experience with the sport comes from watching tv - first the Olympics and then the Blackhawks. Oh, and we played floor hockey in gym class and it was always one of my favorites to play - that and soccer. This is possibly because I didn't completely such at playing them.

Whatever, anyway, our game was last night! The Wolves were playing a team called the Hamilton Bulldogs, and we were puzzled as to where the heck Hamilton was - they are apparently from Canada. On to the action! Our seats were awesome - front row, center ice, right next to the penalty box. SWEET!

It was fun and action packed and exciting, everything I expected my first game to be. There was even a fight, thus completing my experience.
Sadly, the Wolves did not win the game, but they did score a goal - and the crowd went wild (there were even fireworks). SO MUCH FUN. The final score was 1-4

I've been having some ups and downs lately, as I am looking for a new job, but this outing was just the boost I needed!

5-4-3-2-wha?

2011-01-01T10:50:00.000-08:00

Last night's extravaganza was filled with food and fun and friends. And booze-fueled board games, obviously (aren't those the very best kind?). We played Apples to Apples (LOVE) right up until the start of 2011.

We turned on the tv, looking for some local celebrations. I remember in years past, there would be a concert at the House of Blues and a few other Chicago-based activities. This year, we had a choice of "Daryl's House" with Daryl Hall and also a celebration from Navy Pier, hosted by Mark Giangreco and Janet Davies. We didn't see a lot of it, but there was a number by the cast of Million Dollar Quartet (they were pretty good), a performance by a DeBarge, and then... aimless anchor filler. Sort of strange. Very awkward.

And then the best part? The two clueless anchors began the countdown - WAY WAY before the actual countdown appeared on screen. They were on "10" and the numbers on the screen started at 15. And then there was happiness at Navy Pier and lots of footage of drunk people making out. Um, yeah. Happy New Year? There were allegedly fireworks, but we turned the channel. We ended up watching "Feliz 2011" on univision, because it was more exciting than the crap on ABC. We don't speak much Spanish (I took it in junior high and high school) but it was STILL better than the Chicago celebration. We rang in the new year again, with a more accurate count, with Mexico City.

So what gives, Chicago? We are not a lame city. But in terms of New Year's celebrations, we are a little bit sub-par. There is nothing that drops from the sky, nothing that lights up in a spectacular fashion, nothing. Did we all just give up and watch the ball drop in Times Square (an hour early)? Feliz 2011 showed pictures from around the world - really great fireworks displays in Sydney (over the Harbour Bridge), London (over the London Eye), Tokyo, and Berlin and a few other places. But Chicago? NOT INCLUDED. Because our televised "celebration" was, and I can't emphasize this enough, LAME.

Is it because of the weather? Nobody really wants to stand around outside in arctic temperatures to watch a lit up ball in the sky? Maybe, although people turn out in droves for Bears games, which are outside. Can't we get some A-list talent out here and televise it? Then we can be all like, hey people, this is the place to be for the new year! I think somebody needs to get on it and put together a really great NYE celebration in Chicago.

But that's next year. I was happy to be with my friends, chilling and laughing and having a great time.

Happy 2011, everyone!

another chance, another start, so many dreams to tease the heart...

2010-12-31T14:05:00.000-08:00

Patti tells me that this will be the perfect year. I really do believe her (although she said that last year, also)... Happy 2011 everyone!!

me too!

2010-12-29T07:17:00.001-08:00

Bring on 2011 - I am already done with 2010.

black swan

2010-12-26T14:15:00.001-08:00

Think ballet is all about frilly pink tutus and pretty satin toe shoes?

The thriller Black Swan shows us that not everything is beautiful at the ballet (which I could have told you for free, incidentally.). The movie is about an up and coming ballet star Nina (Natalie Portman, in full fierce bunhead mode) who has finally been given a starring role - the Swan Queen in a new production of Swan Lake. She is a natural for the White Swan, but can she play the darker, more sensual Black Swan?

Don't be fooled into thinking this is a happy little "a star is born" ballet story. It's a deeply creepy psychological exploration of Nina's increasingly paranoid emotions. As she strives to perfection in the dual Swan role, she feels the heat of competition, with other dancers trying to make it to the top. It's a cutthroat world, you know? Prima Ballerina, Beth, (great cameo by Winona Ryder) has just been pushed into retirement due to her old age. Ballet is a young person's art - although I watched a great profile on NYCB Ballerina Darci Kistle this morning - she just retired from professional dancing with the company - at the age of 46.

Nina grows more and more paranoid by the second, driven to the brink by the arrival of a new dancer Lily (Mila Kunis!! Doing awesomely in her post That 70s Show life! Goooo, Mila!!) who Nina thinks, of course, is out to get her. Incidentally, both of them did a lot of their own dancing, and it works very well. Rodarte designed the tutus, and they are truly fabulous.

Don't sit too close though or the camera action might make you spew. Other than that, totally go and see it.

see how we've decked our halls...

2010-12-25T10:47:00.001-08:00

...the angel on top of our tree...

Mainly, our tree includes angels, snowmen, and white cats. The big one at the bottom, aka "Goliath" is the first one we got, from sometime in the 1980s,

There is also the occasional sports themed ornament - we have da Bears, da Hawks and uh, one of Troy Aikman (for a brief time, in high school, I was a Cowboys fan. Although it was mainly to bug Angelo.)New Hawks ornament!!!!
"Why didju put dis bow onna head, ziztur?"

(shortly after I took this picture, she attacked the bow).

the greatest gifts...

2010-12-25T09:37:00.000-08:00

A beautiful Christmas tree, a hot cup of tea on a cold, snowy morning, eating cheese with beloved friends, spending time with family, and of course, a puppy in a box (what more could you want?)
I hope everyone has a great Christmas and that you all got wonderful presents and are spending time with family and friends, like I am.

merry christmas!!

2010-12-25T09:31:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas, Darlings, from me

(and Andrew Jackson...)

pillow talk (no, really)

2010-12-23T14:53:00.001-08:00

Can I share something with y'all? I.am.getting.old. And as an old person, I have become rather Set in My Ways. I'm basically a creature of habit, (despite by current bout of unemployment). I like things a certain way and if they aren't that way, then it Bugs me.

Case in point. Over the past several weeks, I have noticed some weird little puffy balls of fluff by the side of my bed. Upon close investigation, I discovered that they were coming from my pillows. From the gaping holes in the corners of my pillows, to be exact. I've had these pillows, oh, I would say at least since college (which was, yikes, 10 years ago!). They are Martha Stewart brand "Grandpa" bed pillows and I have two of them and I love them.

Now they are hemorrhaging cotton fluff, and I am faced with an immense dilemma: buying new pillows. Is it me, or did this used to be easier? You walk in, grab a bed pillow, pay for the pillow, go home, throw it on the bed, and you are cooking with gas, or more accurately, off to sleepy land with awesome new pillows. Right?

But now, you walk in, and there are all kinds of choices. There are pillows for side, back and stomach sleepers. They can be down filled or cotton fluff filled, or allergy safe, alternative whatever filled. They can be square or rectangular or full body sized. There are medium support, firm support or extra firm support.

I mean, really?? I have trouble making decisions on a regular basis anyway, but give me so many choices and it's like, impossible. Especially given the fact that this decision is so vitally important to my achieving a really good night's sleep. I love to sleep, and everything has to be just right - I have been known to get out of bed in the middle of the night and remake the bed because the covers have gone all bunchy and weird. I put my beloved pillows in the dryer every night so that they are perfect and puffy. I don't like squashy pillows. A little OCD? Perhaps. But like I said, I've become Set in My Ways.

I bought two new pillows. The first came from Target. It's an extra firm support and it is quilted (which gave me some worry, initially, because I thought I might wake up with quilt marks on my face?). Verdict? A bit bouncy but possibly workable.

The second is a Sealy, which I bought because they make mattresses, and should therefore know their shit vis-a-vis a comfortable sleeping experience. It's an extra firm with a gusset (wtf is with these pillow gussets anyway?) and this thing? Is like a rock. No way, no day.

So I am still on the quest for new pillows. The thing is, it's hard to know what they feel like until you're in your regular sleeping position, testing the thing out. Resting your head on it in the store is not the same thing. So I am afraid to get any others in case I don't like them. In the meantime, I've fixed the holes in my existing pillows (the Grandpa pillow, needless to say, has been discontinued) and will continue using them until they are nothing but cotton fluff balls.

Wish me luck!

did i tell you about the ferris wheel?

2010-12-09T13:11:00.000-08:00

People! The Toys R Us in Times Square has a ferris wheel. Like, inside.

My mind? Totally blown. (And no, I didn't ride on it. But I was tempted.And yes, I am very easily impressed.)

women on the verge of a nervous breakdown...

2010-11-30T08:10:00.000-08:00

What is a girl to do? Poor Pepa, she gets ditched by her man, Ivan, via answering machine and then stalked by his crazy ex-wife. And just when her day couldn't get any worse, she finds out she's pregnant AND her ditzy model best friend is frantic because she thinks the guy she's been seeing is actually a terrorist. The feminist lawyer Pepa tries to hire for her friend is actually having an affair - with Ivan! People (including Ivan's grown son and his uptight fiancee) come to see her gorgeous apartment and it's in such a state - the phone's ripped out and she accidentally set her bed on fire. Lucky for Pepa, she can find the Mambo cab at a moment's notice - anything you need, the friendly cabbie has it on hand (pictures of kittens! pictures of kittens!) and she's made up a killer batch of gazpacho.

And so goes Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, a spicy blend of interesting and exotic ingredients, as tangy and cool as Pepa's gazpacho.The digital backdrop brought Madrid to life in vivid color, moving as quickly as life in that vibrant city. There was a lot going on, yes, but I liked it. I'd been nervous, too, because of the reviews, but it was a fun show. This only goes to show - reviewers are usually full of crap. There have been many times when a film or theater critic has totally panned something that I've loved. Your "dreckitude" might be my treasure. You never know.

The cast was all outstanding - how could you put Sherie Rene Scott, Patti LuPone, Brian Stokes Mitchell and Laura Benanti into a show and not get magical performances?

So please don't listen to the critics - go see this one too, if you have the chance. It's light and frothy fun. Maybe it could have benefitted from an out of town try out, but whatever. The score is good and it's a funny and enjoyable evening at the theater.

I'm Andrew !@#&$^ Jackson!

2010-11-28T16:15:00.001-08:00

I don't know why I'd heard of Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson - I get email on a regular basis from the Public Theater, and it seemed to enjoy a good off-broadway run. When it made the move to Broadway, it started getting Buzz. But then I saw an ad in Time Out New York (which I am still getting! I love you, TONY!)

And I mean, really? I for one am totally in favor of history getting all sexypants.It was my major after all, and how could I say no to an emo-rock musical about our 7th President? I would totally have a beer with AJ (and I don't even drink beer!) and his tight, tight jeans.

The scene is set the second you step into the theater - it's bathed in red light, and moody rock music is blaring out of the speakers. And then our frontier hero emerges and commences to rock. I'm telling you, I was hooked the second the show started. It was fast, funny, and relevant. Told entirely in 2010 vernacular, we followed Andrew Jackson's progress with the assistance of a storyteller - until he shoots her in the neck, growling "I'll take it from here!" Ooooh, yeah, he's SO that guy!

Some of my favorite moments - "meanwhile back in Washington..." introducing the power players: John C. Calhoun, Henry Clay, John Quincy Adams ("If my father got to be the president, I should be president too!" and who later exclaimed, upon being "elected" president "I'm SO EXCITED! I never win ANYTHING!"), Van Buren ("damn it, VanBuren! Why do you have to be such a motherfucker??") and all of the others came dancing out to a Spice Girls song... One of them (maybe JQA or Van Buren?) exclaimed "How laissez un-fair!" Oh, my history geek heart was a-flutter. I remember learning about all of these guys in Mr. Daiberl's class! We had to identify pictures of John C. Calhoun and Henry Clay. I wonder how he'd react to the line in the show that James Monroe was a "douchebag"....

When the election of 1824 got stolen from Jackson (winner of the popular vote but not the electoral, I think?) he sat downstage, looking dejected, and the following came blasting out... "You're standing on the edge of nowhere.... there's only one way out, and your heart's gotta go there..." Yep, it was Cher's "Song for the Lonely" which played, disco ball and all as time passed and Andrew Jackson geared up for his 1828 campaign. You gotta love a show that invokes the Cher.

Jackson won the election with flying colors, becoming the first "People's President." He pledged to be the voice of the people, who rallied around him and voted for him because of his awesome tight jeans and because they'd totally have a beer with him, you know?

But it's hard, right, because the people don't actually know what they want (Just look at Dancing with the Stars. I mean, Bristol Palin? In the final? Really? I liked the girl, I did! She seemed like a really nice person. And major snaps to her for her growth as a dancer. That shit is hard! But still. The final? Really?) and Jackson realized that he couldn't just be Best Friend in Chief - he had to make the hard decisions himself - about the National Bank (a weird factoid just popped into my head about Jackson and the gold standard...) and the Indians and all the rest of it. He'd lost his wife (she died of grief, which as the show points out, is "the kind of shit that happened in the 19th century") and dedicated his life to serving the people (Populism, yeah, yeah!). Major bummer, dude. Is he still that guy?

The show ends reflecting on Jackson's legacy - with terror at home, unstable borders, the rich in charge and the working class suffering (sound familiar?), this Jackson thought of himself as a hero, doing what had to be done on behalf of the country. And on that score, you know, he did awesome - he doubled the size of the country, kicked out the English and French and the Spanish and solved the "Indian Problem." Yeah, Jackson really put the "Man" in "Manifest Destiny." But, the storyteller, back as an angel, points out that there are some who'd argue that Jackson was actually something of an American Hitler, taking drastic measures against the native population. I didn't really think about Jackson's legacy much one way or another. They certainly don't tell you all the good stuff in school (like the whole Jackson marrying someone who was already married thing. Wouldn't you have paid more attention in history class if you were learning stuff like that??)

But anyway, I loved it. I recommend it and would see it again and again. If you're in New York, go and see it. If you're not in New York, go there and see it. Stay at the Belleclaire - no bugs!

I left, happy, splashing through Times Square in the rain, singing the song "The Battle of New Orleans" - all together now! "In 1814 we took a little trip, along with Col. Jackson down the mighty Mississip..."

so nice they named it twice...

2010-11-28T14:58:00.001-08:00

So, there is a lot of stuff going on for me, personally, I don't really want to get into it right now. But I realize I didn't say ANYTHING about my trip to NYC a few weeks ago, and since thinking New York makes me ridiculously happy, and happy has been hard to come by this past week, I am going to talk about my trip.

I had been nervous to go, because of all of the news out of NYC having to do with the bedbug "epidemic". Because look - suddenly these things weren't just in hotels anymore. They were in stores, in movie theaters, in all kinds of public places. All I do in NYC is eat and sleep and shop and go to shows. Very much risk for picking up unwanted guests with these activities, yes?? I was scared to death of going to a hotel and getting bitten by creepy crawlies when I slept, and I was absolutely TERRIFIED of unknowingly bringing these critters home with me. DISASTER! Being me, my head went into Worst Case Scenario Mode and it made me crazy. No matter that I had been there in June and we'd been FINE (I didn't know. But still). I dithered for ages, trying to make up my mind. But what the hell? I finally decided that I couldn't just sit around and seal myself up over something that might or might not happen. You've gotta live your life, am I right?

So I found myself buying theater tickets. Booking a flight. Reserving a hotel. Canceling said hotel when I saw a Trip Advisor report of the Bugs. Booking another hotel. And then suddenly it was Tuesday, November 16 and I was at O'Hare! Honestly, at that point, I figured that a bout with bed bugs might actually be BETTER than all of the crap I was dealing with at work.

It was the easiest flight I've ever taken - checked my bag curbside, went through security in about 2 seconds (no full body scan) boarded, took off, yada yada yada, landed at LaGuardia, bag was waiting for me when I got to baggage claim, got on a cab, off I went.

I cannot say enough about the hotel I chose - the Hotel Belleclaire (77th and Broadway). I found it online, booked it because it was bedbug free (!) and had a great stay there. Everyone was so warm and friendly, it was ideally located (right across from the Manhattan Diner!) my room was clean and quiet and blessedly bug free (I checked). I hate elevators, so I never took it - I was on the 3rd floor and so it was easy for me to climb them up and down.

I went to the Shake Shack for lunch - I got the New York dog - without reading the menu. I had no idea New Yorkers put sauerkraut on their hot dogs! What's up with that NYC? Shoulda gotten the "Shack-cago" dog. Even though I don't eat them that way either (and I freaking live here!).

And then I walked. I bought an umbrella at Duane Reade, and then I just started walking. I thought that the city might have changed somehow, with all of this bug stuff. I don't know what all I thought I'd see - buildings with Scarlet B's on them? People furtively itching as they made their way down the streets and on the subway trains? But it was exactly the same as it always was - crowded and chaotic and inviting. I love the feel of New York City. Without a whole lot of effort, I can see myself living there.

So I walked to Lincoln Center and visited the Metropolitan Opera. Alas, no opera on this trip, but I paid my respects to the gift shop. It started raining and so I grabbed the train to Times Square. Oy, Times Square. It's one of those places that you totally have to see, but once you've seen it, it just becomes a massive pain in the ass to deal with. I actually try to avoid it as much as possible, which is difficult, since all of the theaters are right in that area. I had a show at 7:00 (Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, for those of you keeping score at home) but until then, the afternoon was mine and I wandered happily. I ended up in Bryant Park - there's a little holiday craft thing there, little kiosks selling ornaments, knit goods, other gifty type things. I didn't buy anything, but it was fun to just look. I continued wandering, and looking for a place to grab dinner. It was WAY early for dinner, but I stopped at a little Italian place (right near the Belasco Theater, which I found accidentally) and had some delicious lentil soup and a caesar salad. There was a tv playing over the bar, where I was sitting, first it was a soccer game. Then the owners (maybe?), gabbing in Italian, changed the channel - so they could watch the Barefoot Contessa. She was doing something holiday related and the owners were joined by the servers in watching the BC prepare a herb sauce for chicken or turkey or something. That? Was hilarious.

I was early (but what else is new?) so I picked up all of my show tickets, trawled Shubert Alley and spent a whole bunch of time hovering outside of BBAJ.

More on the show later....

Rock Star - BLOODY BLOODY ANDREW JACKSON

2010-11-22T10:30:00.000-08:00

This show is amazing. My inner history geek was jumping up and down going squee!

your bulldog smile for the day...

2010-11-12T05:51:00.000-08:00

start spreading the news...

2010-11-07T09:16:00.000-08:00

I'm going to New York in about a week in honor of my thirty-something-eth birthday. Huh, that sounds a bit clunky. Let's just call it 29th and be done, yes? Naturally, I have packed my three days full of shows:

- Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown: I have tickets for this and am excited for it, despite the rather disappointing reviews it's been getting.

- A Life in the Theatre: Patrick Stewart + TR Knight + David Mamet = theatrical awesomeness. A no-brainer

- Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson: I still need to get my ticket for this one, but how could I resist a show whose ads blare the slogan "History just got all sexypants"??

Am also debating wedging in a matinee of A Little Night Music but I guess we'll see...

earth to everyone....

2010-11-04T10:23:00.000-07:00

It's almost Friday... It's almost Friday... It's almost Friday...
But until then, let's watch Alexander Skarsgard's deleted scene from Zoolander.
Exsqueeze me?

cake boss

2010-11-01T06:10:00.000-07:00

I had the strangest dream last night and wanted to share. I was doing something ordinary, like brushing my hair or something, when my mom came in the room and told me "Patti is here."
And I asked "Patti who?" since I don't have friends with that name (only one, notable Diva Obsession). And yes, it was her. In a car. In my driveway. So I went out, wearing my grey velour track suit from old navy (yes, I remember what I was wearing). Apparently, I was in some sort of contest, dealing with her and she was a judge. She wanted to know if she could see "the cake". I have no idea why there was a cake, and I guess in the dream I didn't know there was supposed to be one, so I told her it wasn't ready yet. So she says to me something like "So I won't have final approval on it, then?" And I told her that I could take a picture of it for her so she could see it. Then I invited her in (naturally, can't leave the Diva hanging out in the driveway.) we chatted some more and then she left and I had to figure out what the hell to do regarding this cake.

I woke up before I saw the cake, and before I knew if it met with the Diva's preferences. I remember wondering about flavor. Red velvet? Chocolate? Vanilla? And also, what? Suddenly she's the Cake Boss now?

Finishing the Hat

2010-10-28T10:26:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, I started reading "Finishing the Hat" by Stephen Sondheim. This is the first of two volumes of his lyrics and backstory writing and creating each. I started just paging through it, reading through Gypsy, Company, A Little Night Music, West Side Story, Sweeney Todd...

The man is so intelligent, his use of language is amazing(God! The man is God!) and the stories he has in this book are just amazing little pieces of musical theater history. How he surprised Cole Porter with a lyric in "Together Wherever We Go" and how Jerome Robbins wondered "Everything's Coming Up Rose's WHAT?" how "Rose's Turn" grew out of a "dream ballet" concept by Robbins, which he didn't have time to create - absolutely incredible. He also wrote a sidebar, which I found fascinating, about the way that he writes - stretched out on his bed, with a ruled legal pad (with 32 lines, no more, no less) and a very particular kind of pencil.

This morning, I listened to some of these, just to hear the words and the music. I can't wait to dive into the rest of the book.

illinois state dress...

2010-10-21T10:25:00.000-07:00

Found this online: Robin Barcus Slonina is an installation and performance artist working on an ongoing project called "States of Dress." She has been touring the country constructing and modeling her unique dress sculpture in hopes to do one for all 50 states. Take a look at some of her recent creations, and see how they're made on her blog, StateofDress.blogspot.com.

This is the Illinois dress, which was apparently made from 28 dresses purchased from thrift stores in Chicago.