the Detox

I've just come back from another trip to Florida - yep, this marked the second time in as few months that I went down there - but this trip was different.
First of all, I flew. Secondly, all I carried were my backpack and mandolin. Thirdly, there was absolutely no stress involved. As for that third statement there? Well, there are a couple reasons. And I have the tour to thank for all of them.

Touring made me a better traveler. I never over-pack, know exactly where everything is, know exactly how much I'm going to be spending and, most importantly, can easily improvise when things don't go as planned. The train is running an hour behind? There's a tomato-recall? Screaming child in the row behind me on the airplane? I don't need to stress out.
Compared to performing our show in a thrust-space for the first time after 6 hours of sleep after a 14 hour drive... that's nothing. Compared to swiping a Mack truck on the freeway at 70 miles per hour? ... It's like taking a nap. So, touring definitely imparted upon me the ability to relax, assess and respond rather than panic, panic and, subsequently, panic some more. Thank you, Theatreworks, for that. I had to share a hotel room with both my parents and my little sister, which made for some pretty cramped quarters, but I was never the reason we were late. I planned my showers around when they wouldn't be showering. I made the most of the half of the bed I'd chosen (and I made sure to choose first, another thing I learned while on the road). I brought my ear-plugs (essential for getting a good night's rest).

Part of the reason I've waited so long to write this last post is the fact that I needed to get a little perspective. Now that it's been nearly a month since Max&Ruby and I parted ways, I've had time to decompress and work through the negative aspects of this in a more helpful way. I've learned a lot about myself as a performer and colleague; I know that I can now deal with any curve-ball you throw my way and, more importantly, that I can help someone else hit that same curve-ball without assigning blame if everything goes wrong or crowing too loudly if everything goes right.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I thought I could roll with the punches before this tour, but now I know i can roll with the punches.

In order to come to that realization, however, I had to work through what was difficult and what, potentially, could have blinded me to what an overwhelmingly positive experience this whole thing actually was. By the end, we were all so weary - both of the show and one another - that we could barely muster heart-felt goodbyes and see-you-soons. We took a group photo (tellingly, only with the one camera) and then split off in different directions. In my case, I literally skipped town to clear my head a little bit from the fog of the preceding four and a half months.
In the ensuing weeks, I've had a lot of time to rage, rant, dissect and - slowly but surely - recover the good parts and start bringing those up in conversation. Sure, that story about the meth-pipe is terrible, but it's also hilarious. It's also a thing Ben and I will never forget and I know that, ultimately, it makes us better friends. Ditto that stupid incident with the towels that Michelle and I went through - yeah, ok, we had to blow off some steam and yell a little but if we hadn't, we might not be where we are as friends now. As for the rest of the team - we all rubbed each other the wrong way by the end, and I'm looking forward now to getting together, knocking back some beers and hearing you recount for the 10th time that story about the hookers in the Home Depot parking lot. Or that weird guy named Crash at the biker's bar karaoke night. I can't wait to see Ethan and laugh at the awkward rip in his pants that point-blank refused to be fixed. I'm anxious to get Leah in a room, watch her smell a beer and get drunk and wait for her to start shrieking out some Janis. Leigh's the whole reason we even have the "Cha Ching" phrase that will forever, indelibly be associated with this in my mind. I love that we run into each other at auditions and have a moment where we know we've both been to hell and back and get each other.
I guess that's the largest thing. We all get each other. Not just our senses of humour or fashion or predictable expressions, but all of it. I know Emileena's night-time routine before she goes to bed. I know what Ethan sounds like when he snores (and it's not that bad, kiddo, you should know). We all know what we all smell like, at every stage of the day be it pre-show, pre-shower or post-bar. We've come to know and loathe the smell of the van after our lunch-break after two shows, while Ben's ears dried out in the back and (inevitably) lent it a unique smell that can only possibly be described as musk.
And those are all great things.

I also know that I need even more time to recover before I take on a project this size again. If I'm going to be touring consistently (and part of me would be fine with that), I need to regenerate a little soul before I sell it to another production. I'm grateful for the shape I'm in as a result of touring - as I've said to many of my friends repeatedly, I can do real push-ups for the first time in my life - but I'm also grateful for my ceiling every day that I wake up underneath it. I am extraordinarily grateful for the little hovel I'm hanging my clothes in these days, for the fact that if someone visits NY, I'm actually here now and - most importantly - for the fact that I can call people like Arjun and Travis up and actually see them (schedules permitting).

So yes, touring was an extended anger-management course. It was boot-camp, it was close quarters, it was hell and it was riding in a dangerous vehicle and missing the Delaware Memorial Bridge and it was exit # 89 (which really, truly is the least convenient exit for coffee and pee-breaks, but should you ever want to visit the Decoy Museum...). It was a diet of coffee, cigarettes, the occasional joint and a constant barrage of fast-food, Panera and Ruby Tuesday's. But it was also mid-afternoon jaunts in the pool, exploring Myrtle Beach, cranking up Indigo girls while driving through some of the most beautiful (and/or terrifying) landscapes you can conjure up, Cracker Barrel experiences, and the ultimate spawner of inside jokes.
We have so many inside jokes, I couldn't begin to list them. I'm not even sure they're really funny, but when I remember the context, the lack of sleep, the endless list of injuries and other stupid happenings, I do remember how hard we laughed. I still laugh about the time we performed the show in a space that was too small for the entire set but we built the house anyway. I think we all accumulated new bruises, between kicking set-pieces that were too close and running into each other in an effort to avoid stepping on the kids. I also still laugh about Leah's weird face that she made every time I took a picture of her, before she made me retake it so she could smile. I think about "I have a crown like that at my dad's house!" and "Save yourselves!" and "Max, you've destroyed everything!" and thousands of kids chanting "Superbunny!" and the occasional kid peeing himself and I can't help but feel like we really accomplished something.
We brought a story to kids that don't always have access to theatre. We brought theatre, in two vans, from the northern most tip of the East coast to the southern most end of Florida.

We put over 7,500 miles on those vans.

I got to know six complete strangers better than I ever thought I could get to know someone outside of my family. I pushed myself (and my co-workers) to the limit in the interest of fostering the arts in an environment where they can't always grow. It's so huge, I have to repeat it: we brought a story to those kids! We gave them what we could, but they gave us the knowledge that what we do matters (even when it doesn't feel like it does) and that if we really, truly want to be performers, we have partially payed the debt that such a selfish career reflexively generates. Because we DO owe the community a story if we want to be story-tellers.

It wasn't always pretty, but it was always real. And honestly, I think that's the best I can ask for.

Shows # 83 & 84

Last Thursday and Friday, we performed Max & Ruby for the last two times.
In all actuality, Thursday's show is the one that felt like a real last performance, where as Friday's show was booked in the common area of a Lower East Side school where we (for the billionth time) did the show without its key set-piece.
Still, it was fitting to end the tour where we began it - at an elementary school.
Thursday's show, however, was at the Veteran's Memorial Auditorium in Rhode Island, somewhere (I want to say Providence? I think?)... It was a perfect high note. We had two thousand kids singing along, shouting out "super bunny!" and being a generally wonderful audience. To the best of my knowledge, nobody peed themselves during Blue Tarantula, but the screams were awesome. A good way to finish out our run.
Friday's show was also good - the kids were very well behaved and very enthusiastic. My personal favourite was the little guy in the front row who, when Grandma entered to see the play, yelled out "Max, you destroyed everything!"
Yes, Kid Quote of the Tour, I think. It may have deposed the "Save yourselves!" line we heard a couple weeks ago.
Anyway, I took this last weekend to decompress and am going to continue doing that for a few days before I write a sort of "In conclusion..." entry.
It's weird to think that this whole episode has come to an end, but all things do.

Shows # 79 - 82

It should only have been 79 through 81, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
Let's start with yesterday (shows # 79 & 80).
They were just fine - we had some small slip-ups (when don't we?), Ethan came on without his braids (which basically just meant he looked like a boy, instead of like a girl. He's supposed to in that one instance. It was pretty hilarious, in the moment), Michelle twisted her ankle, I dislocated my hip (don't ask), some cues were late... you know, the usual.
Then we drove to Cape Cod, where we thought we had one performance, today.
Only it turns out we were scheduled for two.
The thing is that, under Equity rules, we're supposed to be given 8 days of advance notice per performance. Which technically means we were not obligated to perform for the second time, today.
However, after a pros & cons conversation, some negotiation with Theatreworks and a secret-ballot vote, we opted to perform our show for the second time.
It's just been a little bit stressful, these last 48 hours.
Whatever.
We're on our lunch-break, driving to Providence and doing this show (presumably) only two more times.
Yes, I'm counting.

Show # 78

We performed for the 78th time today in West Springfield, MA, which is a very nice little town with quite impressive architecture... they had some very imposing clock towers for a town I'd never heard of.

It went by pretty fast, for which I was grateful. Having not performed this show for two days gave me a feel for what my life will be like again after this ends (and the end is nigh, good friends); I'm ready for the next phase.

Anyway, performed, loaded-out, lunched, drove to Dartmouth (which is where we are right now) and Michelle and I went out for a small dinner.
Also, I got my hair cut. Nothing drastic, just something to make it manageable again.
Tomorrow is our very last two-show day.
And tonight is the House MD season finale, which is all I really care about.

CHESTER PA

This one speaks for itself.




5 more days...

Shows # 76 & 77

...were shows pretty much like all the rest.
They both went very well: Leigh's voice was back, nobody coughed on stage and the load-in (albeit in the rain) still went fairly well.
The second show was RIDICULOUSLY hard for some reason... I can only assume that we weren't rested enough in the wake of this last week.
Enjoyed a day off today (hurray!) and hit the road again tomorrow.
Also, posting the Chester PA video.
Next.

Shows # 72 - 75. Oh my God, we hit 75.

Yep, today we officially hit performance number 75 in ... somewhere in Jersey. I don't actually remember where.
Yesterday, for performances 72 & 73, we were in Morristown, NJ, which was quite nice - very cute little town, with pleasant non-chain cafes and shops. Had some ridiculously good coffee and a parfait at the coffee shop around the corner from the theatre and enjoyed one of the most helpful crews we've had yet.
The crowds were pretty good, too.

Today's shows were fine, except for the fact that Grandma (Leigh) is sick as a dog and Ruby (Miss Michelle) was injured when she got thrown suddenly from her seat in the car during a very abrupt slamming-of-the-brakes. Luckily, both shows went off without any hitches.
We're hoping like hell that Leigh's voice comes back before tomorrow's shows.

Tomorrow is our last day of the "local" leg (where local can mean anything from a half hour drive to an hour and forty five minutes) and also officially marks the day that we have one week left! It is ridiculous to think about how near the end we are... and to realise how far we have come.

Anyway, I'm sleeping in Inwood tonight (courtesy of Michelle) so as to minimize my AM commutes to the van and it is hot and stuffy. And I can't sleep. It's ok, I'll meditate or stare at my eyelids until sleep comes. Until it does, I will think about how awesome the dinner I made was (you wish you had some!) and how I should be grateful that it's warm and no longer winter.

Sleep tight, everyone.

Shows # 70 & 71

After we spent our (free! whoopee!) night in a shitty little Econolodge and performed two shows today in Hartford, CT on what was easily the smallest stage we've ever encountered, I realised we were into the 70s. Yep, today we broke 70 performances.
It feels like it, too.

The size of today's space was enough of a challenge that we had to re-block certain aspects of the show even without the house. The stage was a total of 16 feet deep.
Let me repeat that.
The stage was a TOTAL of 16 feet deep.
That's practically a closet.

The other thing I realized today, fully, is that I've got some serious burn out.
It's been creeping up on me, as I'm sure anyone who reads this has been noticing, but today was sort officially the day that I realised just how ready I am for this to end. Not because the kids weren't wonderful - they were. Not because the stage was small - the cast pulled together and, as always, worked through the complications (albeit in the face of less helpful people...).
I think I'm just having trouble remembering what makes this experience joyful.
Our nerves are always relatively fraught, but lately it feels like that is more the case than ever.
I think that what it boils down to is the fact that I wanted this to be a more professional experience than it has been lately. I want to make clear that I don't feel this way because of my fellow cast-mates. We may stress each other out, but we tend to stay civil towards one another.
Unfortunately, I have to work with people besides the cast who don't always stay civil. Nor am I convinced that they are even partially civilized.

Still, when the going gets tough, I just remind myself that I have less than two weeks left. And after that, I'll be able to say I completed one of these tours!

Show # 69

Was yesterday.
We went to New Haven and performed on the Southern Connecticut State University campus, in a very pleasant little theatre.
We also did the show (for the umpteenth time) without the house (which made load-in and -out correspondingly easier...sometimes I thank God for venues that are too small).
There was the little issue of being able to hear our stage manager calling the cues via the god mic (and yes, the whole house could hear her), but that was resolved once I texted her to tell her to turn the mic off.
See next entry for today's shows...

Shows # 67 & 68

I guess I thought the Lebanon Opera House would be bigger.
Instead it was... entirely average. Perhaps a little narrower than most of the venues we've been playing in.
We had a 9 am and an 11 am performance to two very enthusiastic crowds - the first crowd clapped along with every song. Literally. Every. Song.
Whether or not the song called for it.
Really, their doggedness to keep clapping was sort of admirable.

Anyway, we lunched in a little Irish pub, packed ourselves into the vans and then drove back into NY, where we will be enjoying two whole days off.
Two days without the show.
Two days without the vehicles.
Two days of time with people by choice, as opposed to obligation.
Two days with sleep, food and more sleep.
It's gonna be wonderful.

LOST IN THE THEATRE!!!

At last, the video I've been promising:







I'll post the one about our ghetto-tastic weekend in Chester soon. Really. I swear.

Shows # 65 & 66

Interview with Michelle about how today's shows went:

L: Were today's shows sold out?
M: Um, the first one was. The second only the first level was filled.

L: Were today's shows good?
M: Very good. Um, our stage manager might argue with us, that our second show was a little over the top, but we felt great about it.

L: Even though I nearly knocked the gong off the stage?
M: Eh, details.

Kid Quotes OF THE TOUR:
During Blue Tarantula, "Save yourself!!!"
And during "Happily Ever, Then What", after Ruby sings "And she'd live Happily Ever, Then What? What's next? Can't say!", a child yelled out:
"Ruby! 'AFTER!' "

Shows # 63 & 64

Call time: 7.45 am
Loaded in.

1st performance - sold out? I think? At any rate, very large, very enthusiastic crowd. Good show, except for one set malfunction which caused me to be unable to complete a set-change which, ultimately, meant that a somewhat important prop didn't make it on stage. My goal? For that to never happen again.

2nd performance - crowd of, like, 20 kids. Very quiet and well-behaved. Possibly bored? Whatever.

Came back to the hotel.
Showered.
Slept for an hour.
Now I'm going into downtown Concord, NH to gallivant. Or maybe just to eat, we'll see.
Call time tomorrow is 9 am.
(No load in! Yippee!)

Shows # 60 - 62

Fairfield, oh Fairfield. Fairest of the fields. Field of fairs and all things fair and equal. I could wax eloquent about what a pleasant experience you were for hours and still not fully make my point.
Sunday, we drove to Fairfield, loaded in the set and performed two shows, back to back, for the general public. I love family audiences - the parents get to laugh at the adult humour, the children get to laugh at whatever it is Max is doing and we get to feel like we're reaching out to families as units, rather than just individual people. I LOVE when I peek out through the cracks in the set during Tarantula, and I can see a young child holding on to dad's hand. Or mom's. The show is more meaningful to me when it serves to bring people together; theatre, on the whole, should serve to bring communities together (among other purposes, but that's another debate) so when we achieve that, I feel like there is grace in what we do. Even if we are also getting beacoup de splinters and bruises and throwing out our backs, etc.
The other reason Fairfield straight up ROCKED is because of the food. When we first rolled into our tastefully decorated green room, there was a giant spread of bagels, cookies, fresh fruit, tea, coffee (even decaf!), juice and jellies. It was awesome. We were better fed between those two shows than I think we have been in a while.
No, I take that back. Totally ate lobster in Maine, and while bagels undoubtedly rule, not much can compete with lobster.
Anyway, after the show, I parted ways with the cast and drove out to family friends who lived in the area (for those of you who've been reading this, they are the people whose house we all stayed at in South Carolina, Myrtle Beach/Pawleys Island/what have you). I had a lovely dinner and spent the night with them (so rejuvenating to be around people you love and who love you) and then drove back to Fairfield this morning to do our show for the classes that were bussed in to see it, load-out and drive to NH.

During load-out, I was given cause to remind myself that the end is near and that, at this juncture, losing my temper achieves nothing. Bad habits that haven't been fixed by now never will be. Conversely, the good stuff has only gotten better. And, as I was saying on the phone with my dad today, I'm getting paid to do something that I love. Sure, the manual-labour-circus-style-life has its drawbacks, but I've always been a nomad at heart. I may as well be one professionally. And in profession, you can't always choose the circumstances, so you make the best of them. Obscure, I know, and probably irritating to read. I'll finish this section by quoting my old roommate, Brandon:
"If you can fix it, do. If you can't, get over it."

Regardless - we finished our sojourn in Fairfield, picked up the trail North and drove through to Concord, NH, a state I've never been to before. We'll be here (at the distinguished Hampton Inn) for the next couple days and then heading out to ... somewhere. I think more New Hampshire gigs are in the future, but I don't have my schedule in front of me and I'm too lazy to go check.

Anyway - call time tomorrow is 7.45 am. Sleep tight, everyone.

Show # 58 & 59

Shows # 58 and 59 were in Patchogue, NY and Wallingford, CT respectively.
There isn't too much to tell.

Patchogue (pronounced Patch-Ogg) was an evening show in upstate NY. The crew was useless - half an hour late - and the audience was... I don't know. The adults didn't care, the children ran around the theatre and barely watched the show and we barely got back to Manhattan in time to get 8 hours of sleep before we had to pack up and drive to Wallingford again the following morning.

That being said, Wallingford's show was entirely civilised and lovely. We performed to a sold out audience in the Paul Mellon Arts centre, which was attached to a high-school with a very in-depth performing arts program. Literally, high school students (udner the supervision of the technical director) helped us with load-in, build and load-out. The TD was a woman named Leslie who not only was super-organised and helpful, but could also lift the flats of our house over her head. Single-handedly. Yeesh.

At any rate, these shows were both considered "local" shows, but were also the last two of that sort before our jaunt out to points North. I'll discuss those in another post. Probably in about 10 minutes, because I've been falling awfully behind on the blogging front and feel like I need to catch up a little. Ok, a lot.

Show # 57

Today's show followed on the heels of breakfast in bed and what amounted to a very rushed load-in. Also the crew at this theatre was insufferably rude and did their best to make us aware of how low on the totem-pole they think Theatreworks is. It was... not pleasant.

Still, the show was wonderful - as was the space. We played in the same hall that some of my favourite artists have performed in: Joan Baez, George Carlin, Dame Edna (to name a few...).
After our show, we went our separate ways for lunch and I ended up at an Indian restaurant. It was a good lunch before the drive back to NY (which is where I am currently.. yep, back in Bushwick).

Tomorrow is a day off and on Friday we aren't called until 2.45 pm. So it's almost one and a half days off. HURRAY!

Shows # 55 & 56

Oh man, we have been back on the road for three days now with two new performances under our belt and the range of emotion I have felt in the last 72 hours just about spans all of the things one can feel.

I have felt exhausted, enraged, elated and exhausted (yes, exhausted twice). Things have been tense, peaceful and indifferent. The music has both rocked and sucked while in the van.
Basically, no two days are ever fully alike.

Take, for example, our first show after our days off. We loaded into a giant gymnasium, easily large enough to host two basketball games simultaneously while driving a tractor around them, and with the little amount of energy we had gave a completely mediocre performance to a suitably unimpressed crowd. Literally, the only honest moment I had on stage that day was when I yawned in the middle of a song. Everything else about the show was purely painful. We had a painfully early call after nowhere near enough sleep; the crew was present but not at all helpful and the stage was about 6 feet up off the ground. Oh, did I mention we had to do it in a thrust-space again? Yeesh.

Still, while that may have been par for the course, we then trucked from ME down to MA for a show in Auburn at one of the most beautiful spaces we've ever performed in (video images and photos to follow...) The Mechanics Hall (so named for reasons I never discovered) turns 150 years old this year (like Thalian!) and has truly stunning decor inside. It also has an extensive set of maze-like hallways and back stair-cases, which Michelle and I got thoroughly lost in while trying to find our way down to the loading dock.

As for how the morning went - we loaded about half the set into the freight elevator, lugged it on up to the third floor and realised the stage was WAY too small for the house. I LOVE WHEN THAT HAPPENS! It makes load-in (and -out) significantly easier and the entire day that much more bearable. Especially given that after lunch, we had to drive back to ME. Yes, we went from Maine, to Mass and back to Maine in three days. Not anywhere near the length of drive from North Carolina to PA, but still not the best planning, I feel.

After a stormy drive across MA (complete with the loss of my temper and my subsequent apologies to those who had to witness the outburst) we got into our hotel in ME, went out for a lobster dinner that couldn't be beat and came back to enjoy a drink and a smoke with the Portland ME law-students at their law-student prom. They were asking us what we were, and Michelle and I answered "We're travelling actors. It's... beyond words." Anyway, we had a few jokes on the front steps of the hotel and then I came up here. Our call tomorrow is at 7.50, the latest it's been in a while, and the hotel we're in serves breakfast in bed. I am THRILLED about breakfast in bed.

And the upcoming day off in the city.

Sometimes I ask myself when this will end. Sometimes I go out for lobster dinner. It is what it is.
Ah, touring.

Shows # 51 - 54

Our Saratoga Springs shows were among the best we have had yet. Shows # 51 & 52 both ran off without any real hitches. At one point, Ruby's mic was muted, but I compensated for Ethan's absence in a scene change and he turned her mic back on for the remainder of the show. All in all, these shows were both quite lovely. Except there was the one minor hiccup of the fire alarm going off in the beginning moments of the 2nd show and the show having to be put on hold until the building was deemed safe to re-enter. We also had to cut the show down to about 25 minutes (and for the record, it's about 50 minutes long, normally). These things were all challenging, but entirely do-able. And almost expected, I think, at this point in the run.
Anyway - Saratoga springs was very good to us, ultimately (they brought us deli sandwiches between shows! it rocked!) and it was with high hearts that we drove to Woodstock, CT to perform for the 53rd and 54th time.

We drove into this private boarding school in the middle of the country (and the fields had all just been freshly fertilized... yes, the smell was... not enchanting) and loaded in the show for our last two performances before we headed back to the city. The shows were fine, even though we had a bunch of sound issues and we loaded our entire set out in a RECORD 40 minutes. The itch to get back was pretty strong with all of us.

Anyway, we got in last night, I had some time with my Trav at brunch today and now I'm getting set for the next jaunt out on the road. Given that we will not be out for six weeks straight this time, it feels much more do-able.
I'll let you know how this next leg goes.

Show # 50

Today marks the 50th time we have performed the beast known as Max & Ruby.
It was... not a good show.

First off, yesterday was a 16 hour road-trip day, complete with bickering, high-strung-ness and the usual pettiness that occurs when 7 people are couped up in a vehicle or two for entirely two long. We are getting to a point where this upcoming couple of nights in the city may be the only thing that is powering us through.

Regardless, Michelle and I (who shared a room last night) awoke this morning after a scant six hours of sleep to climb into the vans and drive to the High School in Turin, NY (somewhere upstate near Booneville) where we had a show at 9.30 am.

The good news is we didn't have to build the house, which lightened the load of our usual load-in tremendously. The bad news is none of us had slept enough, there was no breakfast readily available (short of the granola bars some of us had packed in our bags), no coffee and we are all too physically exhausted to give a good product at 9.30 in the morning. I, apparently, had left my voice somewhere in VA and could barely sing through this morning's show.
Others were also hard-pressed to vocally mark and try to compensate for it through the sheer physicality of this show. Long story short, we were all very low-energy and the quality suffered accordingly.

On the plus side, after load-out and lunch, we drove to Saratoga Springs which is the CUTEST little town I've been to in a long while. Feeling as miserable as I did about today's performance, I opted to treat myself to something spa-like and wandered through the little downtown area of Saratoga until I found a place where I could get a pedicure. Michelle joined me for that particular activity, and then the two of us wandered around until we found the Circus Bar, where we enjoyed a couple of exquisite mojitos and finally called it a night around 7.30 to come back to our hotel room.

I've decided that I'm definitely coming back to this town for a weekend to fully enjoy it.
Anyway, 50 down. I don't know how many we have to go, but we're definitely going for another month or so. I'm back in NYC this Saturday for the day and I'm so anxious to get there and touch base with my friends that it nearly boggles the mind. I'm more anxious about getting back to NY than I ever was about my own birthday presents as a young child. I just need to be around my people again, I guess.
Anyway - I'm enjoying the mojito buzz. I'm going to finish the pizza I ordered for lunch, watch some mind-numbing tv and occasionally glance down at my delightful pedicure (it's an orangy-coral, for the record). Goodnight, all.

Shows # 48 & 49 and ROAD TRIP FOR DAYS

Oh Wilmington!
We finished up our two-day stint at Thalian Hall in Wilmington with two absolutely delightful crowds, packed up and drove to to Richmond, VA. It was a good way to end out the 40s (by which I mean the count of how many times we have performed).
Once in Richmond, we slept soundly for a night and geared up for the following morning, when we would not only be driving to Booneville, NY (I'm not making this shit up), but have to stop in Philly to pick up the Death Mobile and drop off the rental vehicle.
It was a long long day; we began at 7 am and didn't get into the old-style boarding house where we slept last night until 11 pm. Then, this morning, we were called at 7.30 am.
Today's show will have to be a separate entry, just to mark the uniqueness of it.
Anyway - to sum it up, Wilmington rocked, the road-trip was long and arduous and we're back in NYC in two days. It's SO CLOSE I can almost chew it up. Almost.

Shows # 46 & 47

Today's performances were LOVELY.

We are currently performing in a delightful old theatre in Wilmington (it celebrates it's 150th birthday in October!) and had two performances today at the entirely civilised hours of 2 and 4 pm.

The crowd was made up entirely of families - as opposed to school groups - and the combination of parents and children was what this show was originally intended for, I feel. The parents laugh more than the kids do! We got responses we have never gotten before - during the first performance, one child bellowed along with us during one of the songs. Parents were able to encourage their children not to be afraid of the tarantula, but rather to laugh at it. It rocked.

Look how pretty this space is:
Tomorrow, we have morning shows, but we were able to leave the set there this evening, so we don't have to build tomorrow - just load-out.

Call-time - 8 am.

TRAVEL DAY

So about 15 hours ago, I got into the Death Mobile (aka the passenger van), drove with Emileena into Philly, dropped it off at a Dodge dealership (where they will hopefully repair the van), picked up our rental car and then headed back to Chester to pick up the rest of the cast and drive back down to North Carolina.

We drove.
And drove.
And drove.

this is what the moon looked like, as we drove

It is now midnight, we just checked into our hotel a few brief minutes ago and we are called at 11.15 tomorrow morning for two shows.

One of these days, I swear I will sleep.
One of these days, I swear I will even sleep in my own bed (dare to dream).

Shows # 43, 44 & 45

Today was our first (and hopefully only) three-show day.
Yikes! Three shows!
We were called this morning at 6.30, drove to Drexel Hill High (well, took taxis, as our passenger van is out of commission), loaded in our set without any additional crew and ran the show twice, pretty much back to back.
Then we were "on break" from 1.30 til 6.00, but unfortunately, the taxis we called to pick us up after lunch (so around 2.45) didn't show up until 4.00. Yes, we loitered in the front area of the Perkins at which we had lunched. Yes, the manager thought we were vagrants or something and asked us to leave. No, we did not leave.
Eventually, the cabs showed, we crawled in, rode back to the hotel. Some of us showered, all of us napped and at 6.00 pm, we were fired up (or attempting to get there) and ready to do our third show and load out the set.
We did, and we did.
Now, we're here at the hotel and gearing up for tomorrow's road day.
There are almost too many details to add to today's entry, but know that there should be another video in the near-ish future, fully illustrating JUST how ghetto these three days have been.

Goodnight.

So, about Myrtle Beach...

This photo is indicative of what the entire stay at Myrtle Beach was like. These are the wind-chimes outside the back window of my aunt's beach house in Pawleys Island.

We went to the beach (just to say we'd been).

We ran from this giant shark by the side of the road (luckily, everyone survived).



the photo that wasn't.
all of those are self-explanatory.

the COOLEST MEMORABILIA EVER!


... it was
SO AWESOME.

Shows # 39 & 40, 41 & 42 and the Saga of the Van Door

This will be cryptic, because I'm too excited about what just happened, but I want to catch up as much as possible before I spill.
Shows # 39 & 40 took place in Wilkesboro, NC - the floor was so slippery that most of us slid on stage for our entrances, slid off for our exits and I even face-planted mid-scene, as I was running around various set pieces and actors. Also, there was almost no air and we were very overheated. Also, it was discovered that Leah misplaced her mesh-bag containing socks and tarantula gloves and so she and I are currently sharing tarantula gloves.
I hope we find her her own pair soon.

So that was Wilkesboro.
Then we drove to Wilmington, where we performed in the most beautiful theatre - it's part of the North Carolina School for the Arts. The ceiling must be 80 ft up; there's enough fly-space to fit a few rockets up there. Also, the seats were a brilliant, vibrant green, giving me the impression that I had stepped into the Emerald City when I first walked in to the theatre. The crew was very helpful and the shows ran fairly well, given the unavoidable hiccups that always happen - mic issues, scene change minutiae getting missed, what have you - and after our two performances (#'s 41 and 42, respectively) we loaded out and lunched at the Mellow Mushroom. A good day.

Then, today, we drove to Chester, PA. Yes, you read correctly. From North Carolina to Pennsylvania. Eight hours, 4 states, 3 ten minute breaks and 1 lunch-hour after we stepped into the vans this morning, we pulled into the parking lot at the illustrious Days Inn of Chester, PA, where I was gloriously reunited with my laptop!!! It's in PRISTINE condition, completely re-outfitted with a new outside structure, new charge port and complete with all the memory it got sent to the Apple Centre with. It's a beautiful thing.

After a couple hours of blissfully tooling around on the internet, Ben and I opted to drive to a nearby Walmart to buy some breakfast and snack food for the marathon day that tomorrow promises to be. On the drive back, we discovered that the side door on the passenger van is no longer functional. At all. Even with bungee cords holding it shut ( and yes, I bungee-ed the door shut, after vaulting over the seats while we were briefly stopped at a red light. I felt very MacGyver-like). So, having just returned to the hotel for the last time this evening, Ben and I informed Emileena, the stage manager, who in turn informed the rest of the cast. We have removed the most important personal belongings and ordered taxis for tomorrow morning. I only hope we can get it fixed before we have to drive back to North Carolina (which we do on Saturday).
To follow: Photos from Myrtle Beach!

Shows # 37 & 38

Oooooh Talladega. All I knew of Talladega, before the fateful day we set foot there, was Ricky Bobby. That was, quite literally, the full extent of my knowledge about the place. And I want to start off by saying that the place itself is just fine - as a town, Talladega is about average. Certainly no worse than your average American small town.

But our experience at the Ritz was... beyond words? It can't be, though, because words are all I have to convey what it was like. I guess I'll just give you a blow-by-blow account.

We began with load-in the night before. Why the night before?
Well! Turns out our first performance the following morning was at 8.45. Yes. 8.45. Gag me.
So, the previous evening, we trucked on in to the loading-dock and took a look at the stage. It was (significantly) too small for us to build the entire set, so we cut the biggest piece (yep, the house) and sallied forth courageously anyway. After all, we've done the show sans maison before, so this really shouldn't have been the obstacle it turned out to be.
Once we had loaded in the set (which didn't take long, given that 50% of it was left in the van), we did some touch-up painting on select props and set-pieces, while our stage manager tried to set up the sound equipment together with the (un-)help of the technical director.
Basically, we're painting, running the fans, hanging out, chatting, what-have-you, when we hear an incredible crashing noise. That noise, it transpires, is the sound of our mini-disc player, falling. Off of the edge of the balcony. Down to the ground floor.
However, it played the first bit of the overture, so we weren't too panicked when we said good-bye with the promise of an early morning return.
We headed back to our Super 8, slept like the dead and awoke in time for our first show call. Warmed up, dressed up and made up, hit places and waited. And waited. And waited.
The guy who ran the theatre decided he wanted to "warm the crowd up" for us. The thing is that five year olds don't need to be warmed up for this show. They're already thrilled to be there. If anything, he warmed them down.
Regardless! He made his spiel, then Emileena said her bit about photography, then I gave the curtain-speech and FINALLY! the overture began. Max and Ruby ran out on stage to start and all seemed to be going fine, until the sound started skipping ahead and then just plain stopped. Michelle (the lady playing Ruby) did her best with the silence - though she was supposed to start a show, she stalled, ad-libbed and did what she could to fill the void and, just as she was running out of ideas, our stage manager walked down the aisle to make the following announcement:
"Ladies and gentlemen, we ask our pardon. We're experiencing technical difficulties, but hope to have them resolved in ten minutes. Actors, you may leave the stage, when we begin, we'll be starting from the top."
Yep. We started over from the top.
Turns out dropping the mini-disc player a whole story isn't good for it - who knew!? So, we waited, Emileena did what she could with the malfunctioning machine and we did our first performance. It was sloppy, sweaty and scary as hell, not knowning whether or not the sound would work and being a little overcome by the size (or lack thereof) of the stage.
Ultimately, the shows were ok. Brutally hard, but the kids loved it (thank goodness) and, because the two shows were back-to-back, the whole thing was over before early afternoon.
As soon as the second show ended, we packed up, drove the hell out of Talladega and headed for Georgia.

From Georgia, we headed on to Myrtle Beach, but I reeeaally don't want to write about it until I have my laptop back and can show you guys the pictures of where we were.

Ugh, I get tired just remembering Talladega. Not that the people weren't lovely - they were more polite than.. somebody really polite. BUT THOSE BUMPKINS BROKE OUR MINI-DISC PLAYER!
I think, from this point on, I will never speak of it again.

Driving Through the South...

...is a nearly surreal experience. It's big, it's beautiful, it's boundless. We cross rivers with names like Withlacoochee, Chattahoochee
(Way down yonder on the Chattahoochee
It gets hotter than a hoochie coochie )
Echeconnee, Tobesofkee, and Tallapoosa.

We drove up the I-75 and jumped on the I-20, headed West. We passed through Atlanta, clear out and over the Georgia/Alabama state line. I regret to say that, while in Georgia, we did not drive by a single peach orchard. I won't say I was disappointed, but...

Once in Alabama, we had to stop for the mandatory union break, which we decided to take at a Cracker Barrel. Now, I know they exist outside of the South, but I'd never been to one before, so for me, it will always be inextricably linked with this particular sojourn.
We drove in to Talladega, got royally lost in the back-roads of Alabama and opted to head back to the Interstate. Eventually we received alternate directions and followed those to our hotel (the glamorous Super 8). Once here, we went to the theatre here to load in our set and do some basic touch-up painting. (Un)Fortunately, the stage is too small to build the house. So, once again, we will be performing our shows tomorrow sans maison.

Our call time tomorrow morning is 7.50. We have an 8.45 am show and a 10.30 am show.

And to think, most people think theatre is a night-time event. The night will barely be over before we begin our performances tomorrow!
As for pictures - I've been taking them with my phone, but I can't quite figure out how to load them up onto this blog, so.. until I do... these entries will be photo-less.

Use your imaginations.

Show # 36

Today was show # 6x6, 12x3, 9x4 and many other ways of multiplying smaller factors to come up with a total of 36. It was... a good show? I don't know. I think it was predominantly good, but we need to pick up our cues.

Load-in was a very smooth, almost regal affair. At this point, we are so entrenched in the sheer muscle-memory of building the set that we barely need to communicate, verbally, and we go through the motions on auto-pilot. It's nice - putting the set together (for me, at least) is almost a ritual before the show. We build it before we get to live on it. I'm not saying I want to do that for the rest of my life, but... it's a nice thing for now.

Anyway, we built the set, had a very leisurely sound-check, sedately spiked and corrected prop and set-piece placement, lacksidasically went back to places, unhurriedly finished make-up and getting into costume and received our places call in due time, when (GASP!) we all had a collective jolt of adrenaline as Ben realized that he had forgotten his bunny ears in the van!
With seconds to spare, he bolted out into the parking lot (in full costume, I might add) and dashed back into the venue as the pre-show announcement was cued. It was... kind of a wake-up. No matter how much we think we have this down pat, we still need to be alert. Oy.
Anyway, I want to describe our drive through the South - but I also want to save it for tomorrow. I'm trying to take pictures with my phone and send it to the blog (we'll see how that goes).

In other news - I won't have my laptop for nearly two weeks. Thank you, Ethan, for letting me use yours.

Show # 35/i am electronically challenged

More about the electronics later.
For starters, we had our first show in five days and it felt GREAT to be back in the swing of things. It was a rough show; the stage was slippery and we had to fudge our way through a few scene changes that went awry, and really only made some of the costume changes by the skin of our collective teeth, but on the whole, the show rocked. ROCKED. And the kids went absolutely wild. So, that was nice.

In other news, not only did my lap-top come down with a minor cold yesterday (necessitating a trip to the mac store, dropping off my lap-top and waiting for a week while they give it the old poke-and-prod to make sure it's healthy again before they ship it out to me... wherever we may be) but my PHONE also died. By which I mean, the screen died. I could receive calls and make calls, but only if I knew what number I was dialing. And I had no way of knowing what I was dialing unless I physically entered the number myself. Scrolling through the phonebook? It's pretty much impossible when you can't read the screen on your phone.

Anyway, the happy news is that I got a new phone today - FOR FREE! Luckily for me, I was just inside my warranty by about a week. And I should get my laptop back in a week or so.
So, I can still communicate with the outside world. I cannot, however, post pictures or movies or anything on this lovely little blog until I have my computer back.

Anyway - good show, a good trip to the Verizon store and the promise of a good night's sleep.
Call time tomorrow, 7.15.

Nowhere Fast

Today was one of those days (following on the heels of many days like this one) where I sat.
And thought.
And sat some more.
Ate some fruit.
Devoured a novel written by a friend.
I have spent the last couple days holed up inside of myself, so to speak.
I'm thinking and trying not to worry about the end of this tour; specifically, what I'm going to be doing with myself at the end of this tour.
And where I am right now.
I cut myself off a little bit from the group, to clear my head, to sleep and think things out and to get a grasp on myself.
I know I'm going to be alright.
My friend Brett floated a pretty huge idea past me a couple days ago that I am still marinating on. I know that's kind of cryptic, but that's also about as specific as I'm going to get about it.
We went out to dinner, having made plans to go The German Restaurant, but were thwarted in our efforts when it developed that we should have made reservations. Instead, we stopped in a Boston Market, where there was much hemming and hawing about do we eat here, do we get it to go, do we pay separately or together. The inanity of the decisions that we were unable to reach irritated me to a point where I withdrew again, mentally, and waited for my cohorts to come to some sort of communal agreement. They did, we got our food to go and now Leah and I are sitting on our beds, having eaten, watched an episode of the Simpsons and discussing the merits of "Step Up & Dance", a Bravo reality show.
I have a feeling I'm going to finish that novel I started today.

Show # 34

Oh, Ocala!
Our venue was a former-high-school-turned-community-college with all the charm and ambiance of a prison. Everything was gray, shades of gray, granite, tombstone, depressing gray. The bathrooms? Gray. The lobby? Gray. The exterior of the building? Gray, with a darker gray stripe running around the entire building, as if it highlight the additional gray slate roofing and gray parking lot structure. Even the plants were drab. In contrast, however, the interior of the auditorium we performed in was a (not much better) mustard yellow. The wood looked more like plastic or linoleum than wood, but the stage was big enough for the entire set. Which was, incidentally, the only splash of colour in the entire surrounding area. It was quite the contrast to our Tampa experience...

Anyway, the show went off without too many hitches. We were all a little affected by the heat and humidity and, not for the first time, I think more than one of us phoned it in a little. I feel sort of guilty saying that, but it's difficult to throw in 100% when you wake up after 6 hours of sleep in high humidity, load in our (let's face it) gigantic set and then run through the 47 minute marathon that is our show. In extremely warm costumes. Particularly with the knowledge of the impending load-out before we can break for lunch. It's times like that that make it difficult to commit all of your energy to the 47 minutes of show time. You want to conserve some for the break-down and drive. Whine, whine, whine, I know, I know, I know. At the end of the day, I am very lucky to be doing this. Still...

From the prison, we drove to lunch at a Panera and then hit the road back to Port Richey, where we are now. The hotel itself is decent, the area has enough businesses and restaurants that we won't get bored during out stay here and the beach is just a short drive away. On the agenda while we're here? Definitely some jet-skiing. Perhaps some para-sailing, if it can be fit in to the schedule.

But now, as promised, some pictures from our glorious day at the beach when we built sand-castles, flew a kite and had a general grand ole time!

Show # 33

Yesterday's show was in the old Tampa Theatre... it was built in 1926 and, honestly, the whole thing is so beautifully decorated that it almost felt like a Disney ride. The whole front of the proscenium is carved statuettes and busts with intricate detailing and the ceiling is blue-black and covered in stars. Yes, some of the stars even twinkled. It also has the original Wurlitzer organ that it had when it opened. Gorgeous space.

What made the show unique (apart from all the gilt work and carving) was that the stage was too small for our entire house and so, for the second time, we did the show without the key set-piece. Namely, the house. It was fine; we've done it before, so we weren't overwhelmed by this hurdle.

Anyway, I'll write about today's show later. I just wanted to get caught up for now.

Gone swimming.

Cancellation!

We thought we were supposed to have two shows today, but it turned out they were canceled two weeks ago. Only Theatreworks (the company we work for) failed to inform us of the cancellations. So... we showed up at our venue, only to be turned away.

Anyway, long story short, Ben, Ethan, Michelle and I went to the beach (the rest of the girls went and did... something else), swam in the ocean, flew a kite, built a sandcastle and finished off the day in a seafood restaurant with live music.
It's good to be near the ocean. It makes the fact that I have to be someone else, a lot of the time, slightly more bearable. At the end of the day, the ocean is so much larger than the stupid problems that arise out of being surrounded by the same people day in and day out. Pictures when there's a better internet connection, but for now:
Good Night.

Homeless

some insight into what it's really like.

Today, I did...

... pretty much nothing.

Originally, I had planned on going to DisneyWorld with the castees today, but when the alarm clock went off, it occurred to me that six hours was not enough sleep for me to run around a theme-park on. And also, I'm coming back here in June with my baby sister to spend four days running around said theme-park.
Plus, I went to Downtown Disney with the kids last night for dinner (and ate at Wolfgang Puck's, which was t-t-t-tasty tasty) and got a mini-Disney-fix.
So, guilt-free, I rolled over and went back to sleep.

Then I lounged by the pool.
Read my book.
Went to Happy Hour across the street for snacks and a beer.
Got in the hot-tub.

I may get a drink at the little bar that's right next to the pool. I may not

Tomorrow? Searching for 'gators on an air-boat!

Celebration! / Show # 32

"Celebration, Florida ... You've got to see this place!"

With a tag-line like that, how could we pass it up? Especially once we did a little research and figured out exactly what it is that makes Celebration, FL such a special place...

"Celebration, FL is census-designated place and an unincorporated master-planned community in Osceola County in the U.S. state of Florida, near Walt Disney World Resort. It was developed by The Walt Disney Company.
Celebration is connected directly to the Walt Disney World parks and resorts by World Drive [ ... ]"

So, we went. And wouldn't you know, it really does look like someone just transplanted the Mainstreet USA section of Disneyland into the real world! It's got mood-lighting under the trees, a fountain that shoots up over coloured lights and music piping from little hubs in the flowerbeds. All the awnings are striped, all the lawns are perfectly mowed and all of the sidewalks are pristine, neat and polished-looking. It is so perfect and normal that it's actually kind of weird.

Regardless, once we got past the strangeness of it all, we decided to have dinner there at a lovely Sushi restaurant, located in the heart of the downtown area of Celebration and ate some of the best Japanese food I've had in YEARS. So that was lovely.

Then, today, we rose before the sun did to drive off to the Kissimee School District headquarters and get our finger-prints taken before we drove to our venue (a school, in case you hadn't guessed) to perform. The show itself was fine, I suppose. We're all a little tired right now, which is somewhat counter-intuitive, given that we've had a lot of time to relax during these past few days. Perhaps it's just that we're letting ourselves feel how tired we've been and are still recovering. Whatever it is, I'm either going to have to start drinking more coffee in the morning (a feat that will surely result in my bladder EXPLODING, given how much I'm already downing) or I'm going to have to take up coke. I hear it's good for energy.
I'm totally kidding. I'm not doing coke.
I don't have the money for it.

Anyhow - tomorrow, we're going to DisneyWorld! HURRAY! I love these days off down here, where there's so much touristy stuff to do. The other things we have planned during our days off? Going for an air-boat ride, spending more quality time with that pool and hot-tub and possibly writing a few more postcards.
Maybe I'll send you one.

Shows # 30 & 31, Miami and Fort Lauderdale!

I type this from my hotel room in Orlando - our internet connection hasn't been the best and so it's been a while since I updated.

In Miami, we had our first show with the lovely Ms. Jacobs. For her, it was the first time through the show in its entirety - Hurray for Leah! We were performing in a day school that was attached to a synagogue, had to get security clearance to get into the parking lot (tho nothing like what we have coming tomorrow, but more about that later...) and set up under some of the most beautiful chandeliers I have ever seen. Let me repeat: chandeliers. In a school. These kids are privileged.

They were also a wonderful audience! They absolutely loved the show, although one little boy was so overwhelmed by the Blue Tarantula that he hopped into his teacher's arms and practically wept. He's ok now, though. I think.

Anyway, we had a good show, a quick load-out and then went back to the hotel room for a bit before we all went out to dinner at a place called.. something Opa. Taverna Opa, I think. I could double-check, but I'm too lazy to do that right now. Anyway, it was a fun Greek place, where the music was pumped up, we ground our own humus and the patrons (and waiters) were dancing on the tables.

After dinner, we realized we were just across the street from the beach. So we went for a stroll on the beach, which ended up turning into a night-time dive into the ocean in our underwear - incredible.

• the things that we didn't wear into the ocean

After our swimming adventures ended, however, we went back to the hotel and slept as soundly as possible before the hour-long drive to Fort Lauderdale, where our next performance was.

This brings me to yesterday. We drove to Fort Lauderdale and performed in the War Memorial Auditorium, loaded out quickly and went to lunch. During the lunch break, I swept a HEAP of sand out of the vans (which had gotten there after the hijinks of the night before) and stripped the front of all of its garbage. Now it's actually a place we can ride in comfortably, as opposed to being a complete sty.

Anyway, we finished lunch and hit the road to Orlando, where we checked into our La Quinta, ran across the road to get pizza for dinner and then came back. Once at the hotel, the castees and I hopped into the hot-tub, made friends with the bartender and had drinks bought by a new friend at the bar (which is poolside, incidentally). So, now we are caught up to today!

This morning, the girls and I got up for breakfast, where we met the boys, ate enough to tide us through lunch and then I headed out to the pool, where I have just spent the last two hours or so swimming, laying out and reading my book.

It's a hard life, but someone's got to do it.

As for dinner tonight, Ethan and I have been talking about driving out to Celebration (which is the town Disney built) and maybe getting some grub while we're there. Just to say we've been.

My Rampant Stupidity...

... struck again, this morning, in a flash of fury and fire. Well, so to speak.

What happened is this: in my idiocy, while entering the elevator at the last hotel we were staying in, I tried to take my cell phone out of my bag, fumbled, dropped it and watched it slide towards the elevator door and, to my horror, fall into the crack between the elevator and the wall and heard it bounce and clunk its way down the elevator shaft. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this morning, my phone was at the bottom of an elevator shaft.
S!Q("091N&*%o34~~!!!!!!!!!!

At any rate, after it had been established that the phone could not be retrieved without the help of the company that installed the elevator (and, this being Easter Sunday, they could not be called until tomorrow at the earliest), we hit the road with our sights set on Miami. The drive was mostly beautiful. We noticed palm trees, rivers that snake alongside and underneath the I-95, the fields, the towns we passed through and what at first appeared to be pretty clouds.
However, they soon became threatening clouds and, before we knew it, we were pelted with rain and mist. After what seemed like hours of rain and fog, the weather lightened up and we rolled into our Quality Inn down in Miami. I promptly stripped and changed into a swimsuit, dove in and played Marco Polo with a couple of kids in the cast as well as some kids from Wales and Germany, whose families are staying at the hotel. Our rooms look out onto the pool:
I will definitely be back there tomorrow as well =) As long as there is water, I'm happy.

Anyway, Leah and Ethan and I went out for dinner at a little French bistro place, where we all ate enough salad to feed the 3rd World (and where I nearly left my cardigan, which would have topped the day off very nicely) and now we are back, with a call time of 7.15 am tomorrow morning. Why 7.15? Because the free continental breakfast starts at 7.00. So this way, we can chow down really fast before we drive out to whatever school it is we're performing in tomorrow. Goodnight!

South of the (North Carolina) Border!

Today's trip from Fayetteville, NC to Jacksonville, FL was delayed by three hours, due to the fact that the red vehicle was indisposed:
Once the tires were rotated and replaced, Ethan and I went to go pick up the glorious passenger van and set forth, this fine day, to the next destination on our quest to Miami.
We also picked up the rest of the cast so they could set forth with us, too.

Anyway - it was a primarily uneventful drive. It's Easter weekend, so the cops are out in full force, pulling over speeders and writing plentiful tickets. We stopped for lunch somewhere off the I-95, just into the Georgia border and ate at a Perkin's. It was a first for me, and I was happily satisfied with my meal of green beans and carrots. Wow, you know the drive was uneventful when I actually detail what I ate for lunch.
"How's touring?" Oh, you know, I eat green beans.
Um Gottes' Willen, how boring.

Anyway, we pulled into our luxurious LaQuinta in Jacksonville, FL about an hour ago, and I'm shacked up with the boys, while the remaining ladies all share a room next door - we've split into two groups on these nights where we literally pull in to the hotel just to go to bed and then get up and go again. So, because we are a total of seven people, - and two divide someone into 0.5s would be painful, not to mention necessitate another replacement cast member - the rooms divvy up into one room of three and one of four. It sort of ends up being randomly assigned, with all of us rotating who we stay with. Tonight we split such that the two girls who are going to church tomorrow morning to observe Easter Sunday are sharing a room, and the rest of us are split off haphazardly. It works.

Our call time tomorrow is 9 am. So, like the little old lady I already am, I'm going to go read some of my pulps and then drift off.
Tomorrow: Miami.

Shows # 28 & 29/ New Friends / Fayetteville

• Leah & Ester - Louise's Present & Past
  

Yesterday, we performed in Camden, NJ (Home of the Campbell's Soup National Headquarters... rock.) with our lovely Ester for the very last two times. She has voted in favour of her own bed and home-cooked meals and yesterday was her last day with us. Though she will be sorely missed, her replacement (the lovely Leah Jacobs) has joined us and is ready to rock'n'roll. After our shows, we had lunch at the Victor Pub (just across the river from Philly, apparently) and then hit the road to drive south to FLORIDA!!!!!

As of this moment, we are approximately a third of the way there and are spending the night in Fayetteville, N.C. There's all kinds of nifty info about Fayetteville. Apparently, it was named in honour of General LaFayette. Also, the Constitution was ratified here. However, the information most readily available (at least the only landmark that was touted on the billboards we passed on the highway) was about the infamous Cafe Risque - an adult entertainment centre just 20 miles north of our lovely Comfort Inn. Somehow, I don't think we're going to backtrack just to go to a topless bar, but should you ever want to go, there are a bajillion signs all along the I-95 that will point you there.

For now, we are squeezed into two rooms (one of four people and one of three, in there interest of saving our per diem) and looking into
1. dinner options and
2. a place to get new tires for the passenger van, where the tread has worn down all the way to the metal interior part of the tire. The thread? I don't know what it's actually called, but it's exposed and threatening looking, so we're going to get the tires replaced.

Anyway, for now:
I'll let you know what it's like when we get there.

Show # 27 / Italian Eating / Hydro-plane Adventures

Oh. My. Goodness.

For starters, I have about half of a carafe of pinot grigio in my system right now (not a ton, but not a negligible amount either), have just eaten fairly well, nearly laughed myself into oblivion and, most importantly, survived the drive here (Trenton, NJ) from our venue (George Washington University, DC) through the rain and sleet. The show today was wonderful. We all were alive, awake, aware of our surroundings and finding new things that make the show interesting. At a certain point, I think we all start struggling for ways to keep it fresh. Today was a turning point for a lot of us, I feel - a threshold, Leigh says - in how to keep the show alive for ourselves as well as making it engaging for the audiences. It felt like discovery, instead of doing the show by rote. It felt like it's supposed to feel.

Anyway, after a painless load-out, we took lunch in the student centre and then hit the road to drive up to Jersey for our last points north show before we head south. The drive was difficult, in and of itself - the weather is foul these days. It's been raining buckets and the fog crossing the Susquehanna River was so dense that we couldn't see the car in front of us. Yes, I have footage. No, I'm not posting it right now. Suffice it to say that we hydro-planed the whole way down the Delaware Memorial Bridge before the brakes finally kicked in, during which time I really thought I was about to drive the car and all its passengers into sheer oblivion. Obviously, we survived and arrived at our Howard Johnson hotel (or HoJo, as we are calling it) where I'm currently making use of the free wireless.

Another exciting adventure, once we had already arrived here, was that the fire alarm was set off by some unknown factor - someone smoking in their room? - and consequently we met a barrage of firemen running up the stairs to locate the origin of the smoke.

No, we were not in any danger - as far as I can tell, there was no actual fire. For now, I'm back from dinner at some Italian restaurant where the food was passable, the wine was fine and the laughter never really ended. Ethan actually completely lost his composure at one point, although I'm not entirely certain that I even heard the joke that set him off.

At any rate, our call time tomorrow is 7.45.
I could get used to sleeping in that late.
Cheers.

Show # 26 / Back in the Saddle

Today was our first performance in a school 'cafetorium' in a long time; lately, all of our performances have been in old Vaudeville houses or performing arts centres, so it was quite the challenge getting back into the old routine. It was also our first day with a load-in and load-out in nearly a week. After all, last week we loaded into Fredonia's venue and then stayed there for three days - it was almost like doing a normal show. I say almost, because we still had to load out the set at the end of our time there. Still, we got spoiled and today was a serious reminder of how good we had it last week.

Anyway, after our performance, lunch and subsequent load-out, we headed back to the hotel only to discover that our rooms were in shambles! The hotel cleaning service had started but not finished our rooms, and so the nap we all felt like taking was put on hold. Never fret, however. I went to Target, which is something akin to therapy for me, and bought another bikini (or... two?) for the beach. BEACH. Oh, it's so close I can taste it.

I also bought Tylenol PM, which I am already making a prominent part of the bed-time routine. And yes, it's way past bed-time for me. But before I forget:

Proof that spring is near.
I think it's officially here in Thursday.
Yay.