The scene is Choir on Tuesday night. That's my "over-the-hill" chorale. No, they're not all old. Although, I suppose that's arguable. It's certainly not a "youth" chorus, although there are young punks there. (Then again, anyone younger than my 47 years feels like a young punk to me and that is starting to include more and more people.)
Anyway. . . we're at choir, working hard on some double chorus music, when I notice that the president of the symphony board is sitting in the back of the room listening to us. He has a smile on his face - that's always good.
There are some gyrations but it's determined that he will speak to us after the break. So, I gather up my courage and go over to talk with him.
"So, I was wondering if you could, for those of us who auditioned for Music Man, put us out of our misery."
"What? You don't know what's happening? We know what's happening, why don't you?" He joked.
Then he leans in and says, conspiratorially, "We're using the Think System!"
Very clever. I like this guy. He's very quick witted.
So he tells me that he'll announce something to the whole choir.
I can wait. I'm patient that way, NOT!
But I wait.
Break ends. He's up in front talking to us about our Membership Campaign and then teasing us about how much work we still need to do.
He likes to tease, and he's clear about his teasing. It's friendly and real. Entertaining.
Then he mentions that one of the choral members mentioned to him at break that nobody knows what's happened with Music Man and then he quips that he'll get back to us on that one and turns, as if to leave.
"Hey!" I blurt from the back row, much louder than I had intended, and with more force.
He turns a little red, then comes back and, continuing to play, starts talking about the Think System to the whole choir. He gets good laughs, as he should because the man is funny!
Then gets around to telling us that everyone who auditioned is in the chorus. He doesn't want to tell people about specific role assignments because he doesn't want to make a mistake and that we'll hear before the end of the week.
I'm very happy to know that I'm in the chorus. And I'm much less anxious to hear about whether I have a role or not, now that I've been waiting for almost three weeks.
I'm actually glad, in an odd sort of way, that I haven't known. The waiting has taken the sting out of not knowing.
I'll be excited when I find out, but for the meantime I'm content to wait. Mostly because I know now how long I have to wait.
It was the uncertainty about when we would know that was killing me.
I'm so glad that this man is president of the symphony board. He's quick, smart, funny and compassionate. Yes, he was yanking our chains, but he also seemed genuinely concerned when he realized that we'd been waiting and that many people thought that they had just not be cast because no one had told them otherwise. (I was too vain to think that I hadn't been cast. I figured I just needed to wait longer to find out, but it never even occurred to me to think that I hadn't gotten in at least in the chorus.)
It's a new program, this Musical in Concert series that the symphony has started, and they're still working out the wrinkles.
In the meantime: I'm going with the story that I'm using the Think System with my readers. Surely you all know what's happening to me when you don't hear from me, right?
Just Think my blog and you'll hear it in your heads. Dah de dah de dah de dah, dah de da, da de dah . . .
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Thursday, November 12, 2009
When rituals go awry. . .
I like to have homes for things so that I always know where to find them. My car keys, when not in use, are on the console table, just as you walk in the front door. My facial routine is supported by my having all of the supplies for taking care of my face (cleanser, toner, moisturizer) conveniently tucked away in a small basket that I keep under my side of the vanity. All of the cloth bags that I use to carry groceries, along with the mesh bags for veggies, etc, all are neatly rolled and placed in a basket that lives in my van, so that when I stop at the grocery store I can gather up the basket and have everything I need (if I've got clean glass bottles that the milk came in, they're placed in the basket so that I don't forget them), etc.
Well, my mailbox key has a home. It lives in the change slot of my van. I always put the keys back where they belong. But about a week ago, I didn't. Put them back, that is. Where they belong, because the next day, when I went to retrieve the mail, the mailbox key wasn't there, in its little home.
Where could it have gone? I searched the house. I cleared off and dealt with all of the mail that had been accruing, in case it had gotten mixed up in the mail. I cleaned out the van, including vacuuming (something I've been meaning to do for weeks now, but had just not been getting to it), and clearing out the two boxes where I store things like kleenex, pens and pencils, a pair of scissors, dental floss, sunscreen, lotion, an emery file, my pair of sunglasses that don't fit in the sunglasses spot because they're too big, the CD cases for the CDs in the machine in the car, etc.
Still no mailbox key. I've recruited my family in helping me look. I even went so far as to send out an email to our local road association to see if maybe I had left the key in my box and someone had taken it for safe-keeping but then forgot to get them to me. Nope. No response. No one can find the mailbox keys.
So, I call the post office to see if there is some easy way to get a new mailbox key. There is! I wasn't quite sure if they were going to rekey the lock or have someone come out and figure out how to make a new key to fit the existing lock, but someone from the post office was, for $35, going to get me a new key. But, Wednesday was Veteran's day, so I would have to wait until Thursday or Friday.
Okay. I can wait. It's interesting driving past the mailbox, knowing that I've got mail that I can't get to. Knowing that I know I've got a check in the mailbox from my Star Wars singing gig.
I finally, this morning, started thinking about what it would be like to just get the mail once a week, when, as I was waiting for some women to show up at the local coffee place and was killing time, cleaning out my purse, I pulled my red sunglasses (the ones that do fit in my special sunglasses spot in the van) out of the purse and started to put them where they belong. Only that spot is jingling. With my MAILBOX KEYS!
I must have, in a hurry, handed the mail to Megan (who would ordinarily have gotten the mail, but wasn't because of her sprained shoulder), and then put the keys up where the sunglasses go.
Totally out of my routine, and obviously not in the moment. If I'd been fully present, I would have noticed that I wasn't putting the keys where they belong.
Interesting.
I did manage to find them, and then call the post office. I called the guy just in time, so he didn't come up to do whatever magic he was going to do. I didn't have to pay $35 to get a copy of a key that I had found. (By the way, the reason I keep calling them the mailbox keys, as if there were more than one on that ring has to do with the fact that there is more than one key on that ring. There is the mailbox key and then there is a gold-colored skeleton key. The Skeleton key is the charm on the keychain, except that because it's a key, it doesn't seem like the charm, though it has charm.)
I'm happy about that.
This also gave me an opportunity to see just how much junk mail I get in a week. I'm going to be calling and canceling a number of catalogs this afternoon. I had done a purge awhile ago, but seem to have gotten on a few more lists again.
So, what did I learn? To slow down and smell the roses (and put away the mailbox key). And to notice that nothing happened when I didn't get to pick up the mail every day. It was much easier to process all the mail that I picked up today, all at once.
Hmmm, maybe I'll just pick up the mail once a week. Nah. But I will process it each day. That way I won't have piles and piles of mail on every surface.
Whaddya think? Will it work?
Well, my mailbox key has a home. It lives in the change slot of my van. I always put the keys back where they belong. But about a week ago, I didn't. Put them back, that is. Where they belong, because the next day, when I went to retrieve the mail, the mailbox key wasn't there, in its little home.
Where could it have gone? I searched the house. I cleared off and dealt with all of the mail that had been accruing, in case it had gotten mixed up in the mail. I cleaned out the van, including vacuuming (something I've been meaning to do for weeks now, but had just not been getting to it), and clearing out the two boxes where I store things like kleenex, pens and pencils, a pair of scissors, dental floss, sunscreen, lotion, an emery file, my pair of sunglasses that don't fit in the sunglasses spot because they're too big, the CD cases for the CDs in the machine in the car, etc.
Still no mailbox key. I've recruited my family in helping me look. I even went so far as to send out an email to our local road association to see if maybe I had left the key in my box and someone had taken it for safe-keeping but then forgot to get them to me. Nope. No response. No one can find the mailbox keys.
So, I call the post office to see if there is some easy way to get a new mailbox key. There is! I wasn't quite sure if they were going to rekey the lock or have someone come out and figure out how to make a new key to fit the existing lock, but someone from the post office was, for $35, going to get me a new key. But, Wednesday was Veteran's day, so I would have to wait until Thursday or Friday.
Okay. I can wait. It's interesting driving past the mailbox, knowing that I've got mail that I can't get to. Knowing that I know I've got a check in the mailbox from my Star Wars singing gig.
I finally, this morning, started thinking about what it would be like to just get the mail once a week, when, as I was waiting for some women to show up at the local coffee place and was killing time, cleaning out my purse, I pulled my red sunglasses (the ones that do fit in my special sunglasses spot in the van) out of the purse and started to put them where they belong. Only that spot is jingling. With my MAILBOX KEYS!
I must have, in a hurry, handed the mail to Megan (who would ordinarily have gotten the mail, but wasn't because of her sprained shoulder), and then put the keys up where the sunglasses go.
Totally out of my routine, and obviously not in the moment. If I'd been fully present, I would have noticed that I wasn't putting the keys where they belong.
Interesting.
I did manage to find them, and then call the post office. I called the guy just in time, so he didn't come up to do whatever magic he was going to do. I didn't have to pay $35 to get a copy of a key that I had found. (By the way, the reason I keep calling them the mailbox keys, as if there were more than one on that ring has to do with the fact that there is more than one key on that ring. There is the mailbox key and then there is a gold-colored skeleton key. The Skeleton key is the charm on the keychain, except that because it's a key, it doesn't seem like the charm, though it has charm.)
I'm happy about that.
This also gave me an opportunity to see just how much junk mail I get in a week. I'm going to be calling and canceling a number of catalogs this afternoon. I had done a purge awhile ago, but seem to have gotten on a few more lists again.
So, what did I learn? To slow down and smell the roses (and put away the mailbox key). And to notice that nothing happened when I didn't get to pick up the mail every day. It was much easier to process all the mail that I picked up today, all at once.
Hmmm, maybe I'll just pick up the mail once a week. Nah. But I will process it each day. That way I won't have piles and piles of mail on every surface.
Whaddya think? Will it work?
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Rituals
I realized that I put this blog on hold while I waited to hear back about the Music Man auditions. To be truthful, I put just about everything on hold.
I still haven't heard, but I realized that I don't like living in the future like this (way out in front of myself trying to see what my life will be like if I get a role in Music Man). It's uncomfortable, and ultimately, unsatisfying.
So here I am. Bread rising, ingredients collected for the Chicken Paprika Strogonoff thingy I'll be making for dinner and thinking about being in the present moment.
It's funny how sometimes it feels like work to stay in the present moment. My monkey mind wants me to try to figure out the future. What will it look like, how can I plan for it?
It's all very silly, because at any given moment the entire picture can change. Big, unplanned for events happen. In a novel it would be called a plot twist. In "real" life, it's things like earthquakes or hearing from someone from your past out of the blue, or car accidents, or a windfall of money from an aunt you didn't even know you had, or the flu. Plot twists come in many forms, both "good" and "bad." And often, what looks like good turns out to be bad, and what looks like bad turns out to be good, so it's all arguable.
What's true for me in this moment is that I'm enjoying thinking about these things and noticing, as well, that I can hear the bread machine chunking away at the dough for the second time, because I didn't check on it when it was kneading the first time. Turns out I didn't have enough liquid in the batter, so it didn't really stick together and it obviously didn't rise, so my "perfectly timed" bread event is now not so perfectly timed. Or is it? Who knows? Who's to decide what's "perfect" timing.
I'm also enjoying the play of my fingers across the keyboard as I watch the words emerge on the screen. I love that I learned to touch type. Now I can pretend that I'm creating that scene in the movies where you can see the typewriter keys flying up, with that special sound that an actual typewriter makes.
Of course, I have to replace the keyboarding sound with the typewriter sound in my head, but that's alright. I'm imaginative. I can do this.
I can also jump up and down making funny noises to express how frustrated I am that we haven't heard anything about Music Man!
Oops. Scared the dog. She wasn't expecting me to leap off the chair, flail my arms around and growl.
I do that often enough that you'd think she'd be used to it, but she still jumps everything I do.
I make a lot of strange noises. I'm in the house, all by myself, a lot. So I talk to myself. I sing. I growl. I cry. I yell. I laugh. Mostly I laugh. Out loud.
It's a good thing - laughing.
Ooh, now the bread machine is beeping. This is my notice to run downstairs and make sure that the dough is actually a dough this time instead of a lumpy mess.
Back. The dough is fine. I took out the compost while I was down there. I opened the door and the dog came racing down the stairs to go out with me. She loves to out in to the backyard when I take out the compost.
I don't stay nearly as long as she would like.
Present moment. Breathe. Breathe again. Feel. Breathe. Express. Breathe some more.
It's a practice. A ritual.
I still haven't heard, but I realized that I don't like living in the future like this (way out in front of myself trying to see what my life will be like if I get a role in Music Man). It's uncomfortable, and ultimately, unsatisfying.
So here I am. Bread rising, ingredients collected for the Chicken Paprika Strogonoff thingy I'll be making for dinner and thinking about being in the present moment.
It's funny how sometimes it feels like work to stay in the present moment. My monkey mind wants me to try to figure out the future. What will it look like, how can I plan for it?
It's all very silly, because at any given moment the entire picture can change. Big, unplanned for events happen. In a novel it would be called a plot twist. In "real" life, it's things like earthquakes or hearing from someone from your past out of the blue, or car accidents, or a windfall of money from an aunt you didn't even know you had, or the flu. Plot twists come in many forms, both "good" and "bad." And often, what looks like good turns out to be bad, and what looks like bad turns out to be good, so it's all arguable.
What's true for me in this moment is that I'm enjoying thinking about these things and noticing, as well, that I can hear the bread machine chunking away at the dough for the second time, because I didn't check on it when it was kneading the first time. Turns out I didn't have enough liquid in the batter, so it didn't really stick together and it obviously didn't rise, so my "perfectly timed" bread event is now not so perfectly timed. Or is it? Who knows? Who's to decide what's "perfect" timing.
I'm also enjoying the play of my fingers across the keyboard as I watch the words emerge on the screen. I love that I learned to touch type. Now I can pretend that I'm creating that scene in the movies where you can see the typewriter keys flying up, with that special sound that an actual typewriter makes.
Of course, I have to replace the keyboarding sound with the typewriter sound in my head, but that's alright. I'm imaginative. I can do this.
I can also jump up and down making funny noises to express how frustrated I am that we haven't heard anything about Music Man!
Oops. Scared the dog. She wasn't expecting me to leap off the chair, flail my arms around and growl.
I do that often enough that you'd think she'd be used to it, but she still jumps everything I do.
I make a lot of strange noises. I'm in the house, all by myself, a lot. So I talk to myself. I sing. I growl. I cry. I yell. I laugh. Mostly I laugh. Out loud.
It's a good thing - laughing.
Ooh, now the bread machine is beeping. This is my notice to run downstairs and make sure that the dough is actually a dough this time instead of a lumpy mess.
Back. The dough is fine. I took out the compost while I was down there. I opened the door and the dog came racing down the stairs to go out with me. She loves to out in to the backyard when I take out the compost.
I don't stay nearly as long as she would like.
Present moment. Breathe. Breathe again. Feel. Breathe. Express. Breathe some more.
It's a practice. A ritual.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
1.5 degree Sprain?
So, no news on the Music Man front. Just to get that out of the way. I'm still waiting, a little less impatiently, because frankly I was starting to annoy myself.
Anyway, the other, probably more interesting, news about yesterday had to deal with having spent the better part of the morning at Urgent Care with my daughter.
Megan was doing wheel rolls in her Martial Arts class on Tuesday and it appears she sprained her shoulder. Her dad picked her up from Martial Arts, because I was headed off to the auditions.
He suggested Urgent Care that night, but Meg decided that she would wait to see how it felt in the morning. Well, in the morning it felt like sh*t! She was not a happy camper. So, we dropped Kyle off at school and headed over to see what was what.
Urgent Care this time of year seems like a big ol' petrie dish. There were adults and children hacking and hewing everywhere. In fact, I was happy that we got shifted into one of the rooms, just because I didn't want us to get any more exposed than we already were.
We got Meg's favorite on-call doctor (we tried to see if we could get on her regular patient's list, but she's been booked and not taking new patients for years). Anyway, she moved Megan's arm through a whole series of things, determining what she could and couldn't do and then sent her off for x-rays.
Turns out there are degrees for sprains, the way there are degrees for burns. I had no idea. And that's interesting because I've sprained my ankle numerous times. Although I've only gone into to the doc just the once after the sprain caused me to faint (in the middle of the street, draped over Mark - people thought I was drunk). And at that point I was more concerned about figuring out what caused the fainting (it was a vaso-vagal faint, for those who are interested), completely missed any (if there were any) references to the degree of the sprain.
Anyway. . . Meg's sprain was in between a first and second degree sprain, so in between mild (first) and second (moderate to severe). She was sent home to ice it and rest for the rest of the day, which we did.
Megan curled up in front of the fire, and I came and put the ice pack on and took the ice pack off, multiple times yesterday. With the help of the kitchen timer, which will not shut up until you get physical with it, I managed to keep her on track for about 5-6 hours (straight through her 2 1/2 hour nap).
We were joking, on the way to the Urgent Care, that we really need to just schedule time to go do things together, rather than waiting for her to injure herself!
Today is much quieter. I ought to go light a fire, but will probably just put on a sweater, since I don't really care and it's just me and the dog here right now.
Anyway, the other, probably more interesting, news about yesterday had to deal with having spent the better part of the morning at Urgent Care with my daughter.
Megan was doing wheel rolls in her Martial Arts class on Tuesday and it appears she sprained her shoulder. Her dad picked her up from Martial Arts, because I was headed off to the auditions.
He suggested Urgent Care that night, but Meg decided that she would wait to see how it felt in the morning. Well, in the morning it felt like sh*t! She was not a happy camper. So, we dropped Kyle off at school and headed over to see what was what.
Urgent Care this time of year seems like a big ol' petrie dish. There were adults and children hacking and hewing everywhere. In fact, I was happy that we got shifted into one of the rooms, just because I didn't want us to get any more exposed than we already were.
We got Meg's favorite on-call doctor (we tried to see if we could get on her regular patient's list, but she's been booked and not taking new patients for years). Anyway, she moved Megan's arm through a whole series of things, determining what she could and couldn't do and then sent her off for x-rays.
Turns out there are degrees for sprains, the way there are degrees for burns. I had no idea. And that's interesting because I've sprained my ankle numerous times. Although I've only gone into to the doc just the once after the sprain caused me to faint (in the middle of the street, draped over Mark - people thought I was drunk). And at that point I was more concerned about figuring out what caused the fainting (it was a vaso-vagal faint, for those who are interested), completely missed any (if there were any) references to the degree of the sprain.
Anyway. . . Meg's sprain was in between a first and second degree sprain, so in between mild (first) and second (moderate to severe). She was sent home to ice it and rest for the rest of the day, which we did.
Megan curled up in front of the fire, and I came and put the ice pack on and took the ice pack off, multiple times yesterday. With the help of the kitchen timer, which will not shut up until you get physical with it, I managed to keep her on track for about 5-6 hours (straight through her 2 1/2 hour nap).
We were joking, on the way to the Urgent Care, that we really need to just schedule time to go do things together, rather than waiting for her to injure herself!
Today is much quieter. I ought to go light a fire, but will probably just put on a sweater, since I don't really care and it's just me and the dog here right now.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Not One More Poop Out of You, Madame!
I auditioned for Music Man last night. I thought I was simply going to audition for the chorus, but they had anybody who wanted to, read lines. And I, by the purest chance, got to read for Eulalie MacKecknie Shinn. I say the purest chance because the coordinator of the auditions told us to line up in four equal rows. I started a row, partly because I like to go first in auditions to get it out of the way (and to not let my nerves start to get more and more anxious as the auditions go on) and partly because I abhor a vacuum and people were fussing around in the back not wanting to be at the front of the line. Anyway, I started the fourth row. Stewart handed out the scripts, identifying which row was to read which part, and when they got to my row he said "And you'll read Alma." Okay, whatever.
Then the musical director of the show says to the first row "Make sure that everyone in this row is a mezzo; Eulalie's a mezzo." Well, everyone in that row was a soprano. And I'm not quite sure how it happened, but people from behind me started saying something about our row and so the roles got swapped and my row was asked to read Eulalie and the soprano row was asked to read Alma. (What's funny to me about this is that all three other lines of women were mostly mezzos. . . so why it got moved to my row is anybody's guess.)
Eulalie, on the other hand, has many lines. We read the scene about her having a bunion on her foot (after Harold asks her to lift her foot again). Anyway, as I was reading, I noticed that people were laughing, so I was pausing for the laughs and then moving on. The artistic director was reading the lines for Harold Hill, and doing a find job of it. So it was fun playing off of his reading.
Those of us who had been brave enough to line up first got two chances at reading through, so I got to actually say Eulalie MacKecknie Shinn's name correctly the second time!
It was an interesting audition for me in that I normally rock the vocal part, but in the past haven't done as well in the acting division. Then again, I haven't auditioned for a part in a play since college.
This time, my vocals didn't do as well. I actually sang out of key on the last thing she had me sing by myself, and that is so totally unlike me that I can't quite fathom that it happened. Now, I do know that my sense of pitch is much more refined than many and not everyone agreed that I sang out of tune, so who knows. What I do know is that I rocked that reading. I had a blast doing it and was funny. I'm still a little shocked about that, frankly, and here's part of the reason why.
In my sophomore yearbook, I have a signature from a senior (who I had a pretty big crush on at the time) that says a bunch of typical yearbook drivel and then this: P.S. Don't do any more plays, you are a lousy actress!!!! (Yes, there were four exclamation points. I just went back and found it and counted.) Anyway, it would appear that I took that to heart. Not enough to not do any more plays (I did three more school plays and some community theater as well), but enough to hold that in my psyche.
Funny that I should hold that in my head, and yet also have enough sense to not take it completely to heart, because I love theater. I held on to that thought just enough to hold myself back from shining.
Interesting.
So, now I wait, impatiently, to hear what the next step is. We all left the auditions not knowing when or how we would be told what would happen next. I'm assuming that we'll all get an email at some point. The question is when. And will there be callbacks or did they get enough information about what they wanted to know from that. I know know that they didn't necessarily want people to be reading for specific roles (or they would have told us who was to be reading what and therefore what line to stand in). I got to read Eulalie twice because I was brave and stood first in line. And then I was asked to read Alma later on as they asked to hear people read again. (And I was the first name to be called in that final reading.) I know that I was asked to sing a solo line three times. And that I rocked the first two bits and fumbled on the third.
And I know that I'm nervous and excited now. I know that I want a role with spoken lines. All of the women who have speaking roles also sing, and I'd be happy with any of them, although I'd like to play Mrs. Paroo or Eulalie MacKecknie Shinn. I'm not sure I could consistently carry off the Irish accent of Mrs. Parook, but of all the accents that I might have to do, that one is probably the one that I could do the best.
Wish me luck! I'll let you know what happens. I promise!
Then the musical director of the show says to the first row "Make sure that everyone in this row is a mezzo; Eulalie's a mezzo." Well, everyone in that row was a soprano. And I'm not quite sure how it happened, but people from behind me started saying something about our row and so the roles got swapped and my row was asked to read Eulalie and the soprano row was asked to read Alma. (What's funny to me about this is that all three other lines of women were mostly mezzos. . . so why it got moved to my row is anybody's guess.)
Eulalie, on the other hand, has many lines. We read the scene about her having a bunion on her foot (after Harold asks her to lift her foot again). Anyway, as I was reading, I noticed that people were laughing, so I was pausing for the laughs and then moving on. The artistic director was reading the lines for Harold Hill, and doing a find job of it. So it was fun playing off of his reading.
Those of us who had been brave enough to line up first got two chances at reading through, so I got to actually say Eulalie MacKecknie Shinn's name correctly the second time!
It was an interesting audition for me in that I normally rock the vocal part, but in the past haven't done as well in the acting division. Then again, I haven't auditioned for a part in a play since college.
This time, my vocals didn't do as well. I actually sang out of key on the last thing she had me sing by myself, and that is so totally unlike me that I can't quite fathom that it happened. Now, I do know that my sense of pitch is much more refined than many and not everyone agreed that I sang out of tune, so who knows. What I do know is that I rocked that reading. I had a blast doing it and was funny. I'm still a little shocked about that, frankly, and here's part of the reason why.
In my sophomore yearbook, I have a signature from a senior (who I had a pretty big crush on at the time) that says a bunch of typical yearbook drivel and then this: P.S. Don't do any more plays, you are a lousy actress!!!! (Yes, there were four exclamation points. I just went back and found it and counted.) Anyway, it would appear that I took that to heart. Not enough to not do any more plays (I did three more school plays and some community theater as well), but enough to hold that in my psyche.
Funny that I should hold that in my head, and yet also have enough sense to not take it completely to heart, because I love theater. I held on to that thought just enough to hold myself back from shining.
Interesting.
So, now I wait, impatiently, to hear what the next step is. We all left the auditions not knowing when or how we would be told what would happen next. I'm assuming that we'll all get an email at some point. The question is when. And will there be callbacks or did they get enough information about what they wanted to know from that. I know know that they didn't necessarily want people to be reading for specific roles (or they would have told us who was to be reading what and therefore what line to stand in). I got to read Eulalie twice because I was brave and stood first in line. And then I was asked to read Alma later on as they asked to hear people read again. (And I was the first name to be called in that final reading.) I know that I was asked to sing a solo line three times. And that I rocked the first two bits and fumbled on the third.
And I know that I'm nervous and excited now. I know that I want a role with spoken lines. All of the women who have speaking roles also sing, and I'd be happy with any of them, although I'd like to play Mrs. Paroo or Eulalie MacKecknie Shinn. I'm not sure I could consistently carry off the Irish accent of Mrs. Parook, but of all the accents that I might have to do, that one is probably the one that I could do the best.
Wish me luck! I'll let you know what happens. I promise!
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
The "but first" disease
This morning has been a series of "but first. . ." events. It started off with my hearing our alarm in my dream. This is actually a good thing. We've got this goofy alarm that sets itself off of some satellite that's racing around the earth. This ought to be a good thing, and in general it is, but Daylight Savings Time and Daylight Standard Time confuse it.
There is an "auto day light" button on it. And I keep that toggled on so that, theoretically, I shouldn't have to deal with it. However, it seems to have gotten a few leap days through into its cycle and so it is two days off. And there is enough time elapsed between DST alarm setting events that I don't quite remember the drill.
So, here's the drill, in case I think to look back at this post when Daylight Savings Time comes around again next April: The clock is two days behind.
I reset the time zone so that the clock would tell me the right time. Sometime in the middle of the night (I'm assuming at 2:00 AM, because that's when DST is supposed to happen) of the second night after DST is supposed to take place, my clock with "fix" itself. Now, if I've already jury-rigged it so that it will tell me the "correct" time (whatever the heck that is), then on this night, if I don't remember (or my little personal dream alarm doesn't go off), then we'll be getting up either an hour or late or an hour early, depending on whether it's April or October.
But I digress.
But first. See, that's exactly what's been happening today. I started to write about the "but first. . ." events, but first I had to tell you about the alarm clock debacle.
This was not intentional. It was just yet another example of how this day is going.
I started out wanting to get my Santa Cruz Chorale music folder in order. I've got around here somewhere, the Christmas Carols book that all good chorale singers have. It's orange and white, says something about 100 carols on it's cover and it has, wait for it, 100 carols in it.
We're singing a number of these songs for the upcoming Christmas concert. I've got the music, but it was copied from the German version of this book, so the german lyrics are first, and then the Latin lyrics and then the English ones. We're singing in English this time around (at least for these carols), so I'd rather have the lyrics right up underneath the notes so my brain doesn't have to work too hard. So, I was going to find my copy of this, copy out the music and replace my German-heavy ones.
But first, I have to find the bloody book. It's nowhere to be found. I have searched high and low to find this thing. If I've given it away, I'll kick myself or eat my hat or something silly. But, it would appear that that is exactly what I have done. It's gone on walkabout.
So, I give up on that choir folder and move on to the two folders that I'll need for tonight. I attempt to put those in order, but first I need to punch holes in a bunch of the music and then I'll put tabs on the music and put it in alphabetical order so I'll be able to find things during rehearsal tonight. But the tabs are downstairs and I don't feel like going downstairs, so I'll go ahead and work on paying this last bill and entering the checks into Quicken, but first, I have to dig through the stack of statements that are waiting to be reconciled so I can find the checking statement so that I can reconcile that one so that Quicken will be up-to-date so I can see how many of these checks I can write and then actually send out. (Now this is a "but first" that I should have done, but did not. Much to my chagrin.)
Anyway, it's been like that since 5:15 (oh wait, that was actually 6:15) this morning.
So, here's my post, which I probably should have waited on, so that I could write something more interesting, but but first I wanted to . . .
Oh wait! I've got to go get some pork out of the freezer so that I can make Pozole. But first, I need to check to see if we've got hominy. . .
Damn.
There is an "auto day light" button on it. And I keep that toggled on so that, theoretically, I shouldn't have to deal with it. However, it seems to have gotten a few leap days through into its cycle and so it is two days off. And there is enough time elapsed between DST alarm setting events that I don't quite remember the drill.
So, here's the drill, in case I think to look back at this post when Daylight Savings Time comes around again next April: The clock is two days behind.
I reset the time zone so that the clock would tell me the right time. Sometime in the middle of the night (I'm assuming at 2:00 AM, because that's when DST is supposed to happen) of the second night after DST is supposed to take place, my clock with "fix" itself. Now, if I've already jury-rigged it so that it will tell me the "correct" time (whatever the heck that is), then on this night, if I don't remember (or my little personal dream alarm doesn't go off), then we'll be getting up either an hour or late or an hour early, depending on whether it's April or October.
But I digress.
But first. See, that's exactly what's been happening today. I started to write about the "but first. . ." events, but first I had to tell you about the alarm clock debacle.
This was not intentional. It was just yet another example of how this day is going.
I started out wanting to get my Santa Cruz Chorale music folder in order. I've got around here somewhere, the Christmas Carols book that all good chorale singers have. It's orange and white, says something about 100 carols on it's cover and it has, wait for it, 100 carols in it.
We're singing a number of these songs for the upcoming Christmas concert. I've got the music, but it was copied from the German version of this book, so the german lyrics are first, and then the Latin lyrics and then the English ones. We're singing in English this time around (at least for these carols), so I'd rather have the lyrics right up underneath the notes so my brain doesn't have to work too hard. So, I was going to find my copy of this, copy out the music and replace my German-heavy ones.
But first, I have to find the bloody book. It's nowhere to be found. I have searched high and low to find this thing. If I've given it away, I'll kick myself or eat my hat or something silly. But, it would appear that that is exactly what I have done. It's gone on walkabout.
So, I give up on that choir folder and move on to the two folders that I'll need for tonight. I attempt to put those in order, but first I need to punch holes in a bunch of the music and then I'll put tabs on the music and put it in alphabetical order so I'll be able to find things during rehearsal tonight. But the tabs are downstairs and I don't feel like going downstairs, so I'll go ahead and work on paying this last bill and entering the checks into Quicken, but first, I have to dig through the stack of statements that are waiting to be reconciled so I can find the checking statement so that I can reconcile that one so that Quicken will be up-to-date so I can see how many of these checks I can write and then actually send out. (Now this is a "but first" that I should have done, but did not. Much to my chagrin.)
Anyway, it's been like that since 5:15 (oh wait, that was actually 6:15) this morning.
So, here's my post, which I probably should have waited on, so that I could write something more interesting, but but first I wanted to . . .
Oh wait! I've got to go get some pork out of the freezer so that I can make Pozole. But first, I need to check to see if we've got hominy. . .
Damn.
Monday, November 2, 2009
So now I've scared myself
Making the pronouncement that I was going to try to post every day for a month is problematic at best and terrifying at worst.
So many different voices in my head, all screaming for attention. But who to let in control of the keyboard. Good question.
No real good answer though. Do any of those voices have anything of interest to say? Depends on who's listening.
Who is listening? And why?
Who am I writing for? Am I writing because I want to be writing and this is as good a way as any?
Am I posting because I'm not willing to simply journal? Is it easier to type than to write something out long hand where I can't or won't go back and edit things?
Do I really want answers to all or any of these questions?
Again, good question. And yet again, no real clear answer.
Are you out there? It looks, from the sitemeter, like I've got three dedicated folks who check every day to see if I've written anything. So for the three of you, whoever you are, I do apologize for the long wait through September and October.
Who are you anyway? Are you people who are in my life tangentially and this is as good a way as any to keep track of what I'm up to?
Did you find me through someone else's blog and thought, at least for a time, that what I had to say was interesting?
I do know that I'm a good story teller. And I've got lots of stories to tell. But then everyone has good stories, some better than others.
Hmmm. It would appear that I have all questions and no answers today.
Maybe I'll have some answers tomorrow. Maybe not.
So many different voices in my head, all screaming for attention. But who to let in control of the keyboard. Good question.
No real good answer though. Do any of those voices have anything of interest to say? Depends on who's listening.
Who is listening? And why?
Who am I writing for? Am I writing because I want to be writing and this is as good a way as any?
Am I posting because I'm not willing to simply journal? Is it easier to type than to write something out long hand where I can't or won't go back and edit things?
Do I really want answers to all or any of these questions?
Again, good question. And yet again, no real clear answer.
Are you out there? It looks, from the sitemeter, like I've got three dedicated folks who check every day to see if I've written anything. So for the three of you, whoever you are, I do apologize for the long wait through September and October.
Who are you anyway? Are you people who are in my life tangentially and this is as good a way as any to keep track of what I'm up to?
Did you find me through someone else's blog and thought, at least for a time, that what I had to say was interesting?
I do know that I'm a good story teller. And I've got lots of stories to tell. But then everyone has good stories, some better than others.
Hmmm. It would appear that I have all questions and no answers today.
Maybe I'll have some answers tomorrow. Maybe not.
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