Two weeks from tonight will be  OPENING NIGHT of the Sherlock Holmes classic (still can’t believe how many odd looks I get whenever I mention the title) The Hound of the Baskervilles at the splendiferous (yes… that is a word) Huber Opera House!  For my part, I am happy to state that my lines are learned which is quite common at this point in a show (more common than the line learning from my last play… still a great experience but challenging which was even more rewarding personally).  The next couple of weeks will be a whirlwind of activity from work to vocal lessons to rehearsal and whatever else may come my way but as always… I AM SUPER EXCITED!

Sunday, my talents will once again be used in set construction.  As many of you know if you ever need anything painted… I am your guy!  I remember the praise I received for my last set paining… I think it was a few years ago for The Odd Couple.  Funny how no one has ever asked me to once again use my paint brush.  Their loss, I guess.  But my talent has not gone unnoticed.  More than once justj has commented to Mare about my remarkable painting prowess.  We’ll see on Sunday if it used.

Hopefully, by Tuesday everyone will be better on their lines to avoid the dreaded Saturday before review rehearsal day.  I just learned that another tangenteer will be coming to review the show.  Hopefully, it will not take as long for her review to be published as the one I wrote for OKLAHOMA! did.

Click the link to the Village Players website for tickets and time information.

Not good enough in my eyes either.  A good lesson today.  Worked on two songs… one a light, fun, fluffy piece that includes a patter line (a long, section spoken in time to the beat) at the end. K suggested I do it as a rap instead of the traditional.  For this piece, I think not.  I envision a small group of  friends accompanying me as I recite the section full of alliteration.  Definitely will work on that!  Could be much worse, I could have to learn “I am the very model of a modern Major-General.”  (Not yet, please!)

My coach also decided to test me on another song.  Although the piece is written in the key of C (no sharps nor flats… shouldn’t be difficult to play), she kept hitting the wrong keys in order to find out how confident I am in the correct notes.  At the end, she told me that, technically, it is good but it is time to go beyond the technical.  A very dramatic piece which I believe is meant to show the lead character’s vulnerable side.  I was challenged to find that vulnerability and let it come out.  SELL THE SONG! OK! Homework! Character songs are easy… digging into the vulnerable side of a heroic character will be a fun challenge.  One I am confident that I will be able to rise to.

I think it would be rather difficult to be the only male cheerleader in a relatively small school system.  However, even after being bullied to the extend that he received a broken arm for his pains, Findlay, Ohio sixth-grader Tyler Wilson has no plans to give up on it.  His trials have met with national press as he and his mother were featured on Good Morning America this morning.  He has also received phone calls and visits from male college cheerleaders. And although Tyler has stated that he has been threatened with another broken arm, he has no intention of sitting on the side lines.  GOOD FOR HIM! YOU GO DUDE!

As I learned long ago:  Find something you are good at and do it the best that you can. Wise words… wonder who came up with that.

Not the GMA clip, but you get the gist of it.  One thing the clip does not mention.  After Tyler got home with the broken arm, he told his mother that he tripped over a curb and landed on his arm.  Just like a sixth-grade boy.

Question:  What’s the best way to dislodge me from a “case of the Mondays”?

Answer:  A surprise trip to the zoo on a work day, of course!  Hubby knows me so well 🙂

Tangent:  If you have your own “case of the Mondays”, rent the movie Office Space – it’s hilarious!

So we took off Monday for the zoo, and we were torn between which side of the zoo to visit – Toledo Zoo straddles a major highway, the Anthony Wayne Trail, and we never visit both sides in the same day because it adds a TON of walking, much of it up long ramps pushing a heavy double stroller.  We usually park in the back and opt for the larger side of the zoo, but we have been visiting  a lot lately, and since it was a work day and Hubby had to get home at a somewhat decent hour to get back to work, we opted for the smaller side of the zoo.  This side might not have many exhibits, but there is this almost-year-old baby polar bear that I’ve been wanting to see, so it seemed like the right choice – until we saw the sign at the gate that read, “Our baby polar bear, Siku, will not be on exhibit today.”  WHAT?!?  Well, we had already parked, unloaded kids, and walked into the zoo, so visiting the other side was no longer an option.  We trudged on, determined to make the best of it.

And lucky us, it all worked out wonderfully!  We may not have gotten to see a super-cute baby polar bear, but we got to see a full-grown male polar bear up close, nose to nose – I’m talking within inches.  Sure, there was a pane of glass separating us from the polar bear, but that’s a given – look at this:

In case you’re wondering, Marty the polar bear (Siku the cub’s dad) has a bucket containing frozen fish in an ice block.  We watched him conquer the first bucket and devour the fish, and then he bullied the 2nd bucket away from the other polar bear and worked on it for a good 30-40 minutes – we had to leave before he got to the fish from the 2nd bucket.  I could not decide which video was best, so I’m just going to post all 4 – they’re all under a minute long anyway so they don’t take forever to unload off my camera.  All of the videos were taken while Marty was working on the 2nd ice bucket.  You can see how he dips the bucket in the water and even  dives into the water with the bucket in his mouth in order to let the water loosen up the fish ice block for him.

In case you’re wondering, being up close and personal with a thousand pounds of polar bear (give or take a few hundred pounds) is really as amazing as it looks!!!

And my two little ones had a great time also – at first my son was afraid of the polar bear, but he got over that once he realized that Marty was much more interested in his bucket than some zoo visitors.  Here are the kids posing in an “arctic cave”:

And the kids’ favorite part of the day?  Climbing on and posing on this mock dung heap near the giraffe exhibit.  Kids – gotta love ’em!

It’s been really difficult to blog with a 2-year-old in the house, especially because mine is a boy.  He just seems to get into anything and everything, and this phase of his is lasting longer (and is much much messier and harder on my house) than was any of his 3 sisters’ terrible twos.  Complicating my schedule is the fact that he seems to be growing out of his naps, so now Mom’s daily time-out has been reduced to mere hopefulness for a time-out.

So anyway, this explains my blogging absence, and now you know why it’s taken me so long to blog that…

My 6-year-old daughter Samantha lost her first tooth last week!

She was SO excited, and of course the tooth fairy made her nighttime visit.  You might have read that I’ve been teaching 1st grade Sunday school (which just happens to be Sammie’s class), and that’s been going very well – I really enjoy it.  Sammie’s lost tooth prompted me to ask last Sunday how many of my students have lost teeth, and they were all full of stories.  One little girl (who is missing her two front teeth) told about how she lost this one and that one in the same day – and she was pointing to her missing bottom teeth, not even  the top two that were visibly missing!  So it seems that Sammie is just beginning – she has lots of teeth to lose, and because teeth seem to drop out of 1st graders’ mouths constantly (dropping like flies?  That doesn’t sound quite right now that I think about it), it makes me think that I had better bring a little container or two with me every Sunday just in case I need to send a fallen tooth home with its owner.

What an exciting time in a kid’s life, and it was neat to hear how enthusiastically all my first graders talked about losing their teeth and getting visits from the tooth fairy.  By the way, the going rate for a baby tooth seems to be around $5 these days – WOW!  Do you remember how much the tooth fairy gave you for your teeth?

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Congratulations Sammie!

Well, the Bears are 3-0 and it is very hard to believe…  Every win this season has been BEARly.  This week was no exception and we began to see flashes of “Bad Jay” — the interception machine (Jay Cutler) from last year.

But, in the end, all that matters is the score: BEARS 20, PACKERS 17.

I will take a sloppy, undeserved win over a well played undeserved loss any day.

On thing did happen in the win over the Packers that should really make Bears fans giddy though…  THIS:

https://youtube.com/embed/XsBYWRt9qGU

With Devin Hester once again returning punts for TDs (one was returned for a TD and another was close) this becomes a HUGE advantage for the Bears.  You see, it is not just about the touchdowns.  Football is a game of field position…  The closed your offense is to the endzone when they get the ball, the better their chance of scoring…  PERIOD.  And, if you have a return-man (Hester) who opposing teams are afraid to kick the ball to, you start to get consistent good field position.  In my opinion, the FEAR of Hester was the #1 contributing factor to the Bears’ 2006 Super Bowl run.  Teams were willing to give the ball to the Bears with great field position just so they wouldn’t have to deal with a Hester return.

Now the Bears head to the Meadowlands to play the Giants who are hungry for a win.  This will be a dangerous game for the Bears – but, IF they win and go 4-0 it seems impossible to believe they will not be in the playoffs this winter.  🙂

GO BEARS!

I could never, ever put the last 10 years down!  I have been in 17 (soon to be 18) stage productions and met the most amazing group of people anyone could hope to meet.  They really are my best, dearest friends!  Today, I went to my first professional call back.  I had absolutely no idea what to expect so I made sure to get a decent night’s rest (after watching the best season premiere of Smallville in its ten years… what a way to start off the final season) and eat something this morning.  I was a little nervous but a LOT MORE excited.

As I entered the call back space, the receptionist acted like I was from outer space. Not far off but after learning that I was the first to arrive (big surprise) she invited me to sit in the sitting room and wait so I had more time to read through my sides.  Only three other perspective actors arrive… two of whom I have had the pleasure of working with before… and one already professional from Indianapolis who has appeared in a commercial with a certain Colt.

After waiting the arrival of the producer (who ran a bit late as his car was attacked by a horde of rampaging wildebeast), we were subjected to horrors too gruesome  to describe on this little, family-friendly blog.  I must tell you that I have never seen such horrors.

Following the torture, we were given “the acting is not all peaches and cream speech”.  Even after the fearful events we were put through, I thought that it could not get any worse.  And I have heard the same speech more than once.

And the outcome of all the horrors!  EXCELLENT!  I am forbidden to say anything more.  But I am just a bit more excited than I was when I left this morning 😀

I wonder if I get to rid myself of the “scruff” after October 17.

Tonight is the season premiere of  CSI: New York. There is about half an hour left before it starts and I am dreading and anticipating it at the same time. Last season they ended it with a shot ringing out during a black screen! Who was shot and was baby Lucy all right are the top questions I need answered and I know that with this episode, my questions will be answered, but with this episode, I will see how my favorite character, Stella, is being written out of the show. She decided she didn’t want to do another season, to be able to spend more time with her family. I get all of that, but she was my favorite character and I don’t want her to leave the show! The person they have coming in to be her replacement I don’t really know. I have only seen her in the Fugitive and that was for about five minutes, because she was the wife who was killed.

Of course, she isn’t going to be Stella. They have come up with a new character, but being second in command to Mac? No one will do the job as well as Stella. She was Mac’s best friend, his trusted co-worker, his confident. And now she is going to be gone! Who is Mac going to be able to turn to now? I think it will be either Flack or Danny, most likely Flack. I will watch the show, but not until Tony gets home. I am going to record it and then once Tony gets home, we’ll watch it together. I hope it’s still good without Stella!

Especially when you are this cute – my two youngest helped carry in the recycling bin on garbage day, chanting “Teamwork, teamwork” all the way!  Awww!!

After Saturday’s OSU/OU football game, I saw on a friends fb account that the OSUMB’s halftime performance was less than outstanding… full of Looney Tunes, Flintstones, and other cartoon themes. However, I wonder if the Bobcat alumnus thought the following was so extraordinary:

Apparently, the heinous display by Rufus Bobcat upon the unsuspecting Brutus was premeditated.  The no-goodnick tried out for the role of mascot a year ago with the ultimate goal of tackling the Buckeye.  He has since been summarily banned from all Ohio University affiliated athletic functions.  The funny thing is, the miscreant no longer attends the Athens, Ohio college. He now attends nearby Hocking College.  OU has issued an apology to the Buckeyes.

In every way but personally, the shenanigans were for naught as the Bucks handed the Bobcats a 43-7 thrashing.  They should have tackled the player with the ball instead of the mascot.  Kind of funny especially after the games outcome.  A streaker running across the field was even more shocking and hilarious.