Design calendar filling up

Just in the past month or so, I've added a few shows to my designer's calendar.  The company for which I'm a board member has me doing their July production.  That one should be easy, as the director & costumer are going for a basic, contemporary look - no special effects of any sort.

A local company I've been trying to get in with has asked me to design their January show.  That one should be easy too - only 4 actors, who will be doing their own hair & makeup.  The only thing special I might need to do will be to show 2 of them how to do age makeup.  Like next month's show, once the actors know what to do, I can step back & enjoy the process.  (Not like Patience, which required special attention every night for a few of the cast members.)

In February I'll be doing The Gondoliers for the one company that actually pays me a design fee.  The only possible problem with that one is that I want to audition for it and I learned from The Merry Widow that designing for a show I'm also in can be something of a juggling act.  Ah well, first I'll audition and see whether I'm cast; then I'll worry about the juggling.

The show I'm most looking forward to working on, though, is for a community theater company with a reputation for high standards.  The play includes a couple of special effects that involve blood.  This will be the first time I've worked with stage blood since my stage makeup class 3 years ago.  More, I'll have to come up with a way for someone to bleed onstage that a) won't make a mess and b) won't stain costumes.  This is gonna be a fun challenge!

Census of this year's garden

We went a little crazy with the plants this year.  The Chief decided to turn our rusted-out grill into a planter, so we filled it with dirt and:
- 3 angelwing begonias
- 3 double impatiens in different colors
- 2 browallias (new to me but suggested by someone on the nursery's staff)
- a variegated ivy
- 2 colors of torenia

I put "medium dark red" geraniums (this color's a keeper!) and a fuchsia Rising Star superbell in the railing planter w/ the annuals.  It's only just getting hot enough for the geraniums so it's too soon to tell whether I'll want to use the same combination next year.

The Chief also repurposed one of the clothesline poles into a trellis.  I just planted a Westerplatte clematis (burgundy) on the east side of it and a Ramona clematis (dark lavender) on the west side.

 

He also spent way too much time assembling our new grill (Kingsford, you need to fire or at least retrain the person writing the assembly manual!) and we got the umbrella "planted" in our patio table, so we're all ready for our first cookout of the season.

Out of the 21 ice plants (delosperma) I put in the front yard, only about 14 or 15 are growing or at least hanging in there.  Fortunately, the nursery will let me return the dead ones!  I do have to dig 'em up and take them back w/ the receipt, but they'll refund the purchase price.  My first choice would be to buy more ice plants; here's hoping they still have some.

What is it with January?!?

The Chief's BIL died of his cancer in mid-January and his widow, the Chief's sister, was put on hospice for hers at about the same time. This is 3 years running that we've had loved ones die, nearly all of them from cancer, in January.  And the Chief's mother got her terminal diagnosis in January.  T.S. Eliot was wrong: April isn't the cruelest month; January is, at least for us.

This year's garden

Our neighbor to the south had to take down a big maple that was between our driveways.  We were hoping that would mean more sun on the tomato bed, but it doesn't look like that'll be the case.  Oh well, I put in 5 tomato plants anyway:  2 Sweet 100s, 1 golden (something), a Steakhouse, and another larger variety.  I also planted an onion that had sprouted; we'll see if it actually grows.

No purslane or sunflowers this year; instead, I've got lantana in the pot I used for lantana last year, and 2 other colors of lantana in the majolica planters that had sunflowers last year.  I'm looking forward to LOTS of butterflies and hummingbirds this year! 😊

I'm putting just 4 pots on the front steps this year.  One pair has angelonia, a tall white flower; melampodium, a short yellow one, and a "quartz mix" verbena that I hope will sort of split the difference between the angelonia and melampodium.  The other pair of flower pots has marigolds from last year's seeds.  I was delighted (and relieved) to see that the seeds started sprouting just a few days after planting.  I'm looking forward to seeing how they do.  One thing's for sure; as long as I keep harvesting seeds and am happy with the varieties I've got, I'll never have to buy marigolds again.

The biggest project so far was digging up a considerable section of the front corner of the yard next to the driveway and a smaller corner by the front door and putting in 21 ice plants (3 or 4 different varieties).  Eventually I want to have the whole patch planted with ice plant so it doesn't need mowing, but that's going to take a few years.  Buying enough plants for the whole patch -  as many as 100 bedding plants! - is more than I want to tackle (or spend) in a single year!

I have two pots of citronella, sold as "mosquito plant".  Maybe it'll keep 'em away, maybe not, but if they don't, at least I'll have 2 pretty plants that smell nice.  I also have some herbs.  My established oregano came back even after it got deadheaded last fall, and I also got a tiny seedling of a syrian variety of it from the local listserv.  I'm trying rosemary yet again, in the same spot as last year.  (I'm ever the optimist.)  In addition, I've got 2 curly parsley plants, 2 basil plants, some thyme, and I want to get some mint to replace the spearmint, which didn't come back this year.

The newest garden project was the Chief's idea.  The grill was so badly rusted out that we had to buy a new one.  We hadn't gotten as far as figuring out what to do with the old one when the Chief saw the flat of bedding plants I had set on the shelf of the old grill and decided to turn the old grill into a planter.  He got some sheet metal to reinforce the bottom and cover the rusted-out places that would be below the dirt line, chose purple for the paint, and is leaving it to me to decide what to plant.  Because he wants to leave the grill in a spot n the backyard that gets shade most of the day, I'll probably go with some combination of begonias, impatiens, coleus, maybe some torenia or asparagus fern.

When you're retired...

Oh, the joys of retirement.  The Chief had his one-year post-op checkup today, after which we stopped for a nice, leisurely lunch.  SO nice to be able to do that sort of thing without having to take time off work. 😊

Kid with a new toy :)

The Chief asked me what I wanted for a graduation/Christmas present and I decided on a food processor.  I found that clean-up wasn't as bad as I'd feared, and we managed to find space to store the thing, but what really converted me was when I made salmon spread for our Christmas party.  (The Chief let me open my present early so I could use it for party prep.)  It takes a long time and a lot of elbow grease to mix the salmon & cream cheese thoroughly by hand.  My new Cuisinart did a more thorough job, and did it in 30 seconds, if that!  It also did a nice job on cookie dough.

Earlier this week I used it to shred cabbage for unstuffed cabbage rolls (I like to make batches of this to have in the freezer for lunches), and today I used it to shred carrots and sweet potatoes for orange soup and sweet potato-black bean chili (more "freezer food" - I'm restocking the freezer this week now that the semester has begun).  I know I've barely scratched the surface of what I can use my food processor for, but I'm beginning to realize why so many people swear by theirs.

Orange soup is something I made up, named for its color, not because there's any citrus in it.  I don't us a recipe so much as instructions:  Sautee onion and garlic in some evoo, add butternut or any other winter squash (I like to use the frozen pureed stuff because it's both easier & cheaper than the cut-up stuff in the store, which goes for $5.99/lb!), a can of pumpkin, a carrot or few, and a sweet potato or two.  I throw in 1/2 tsp of garam masala, let it simmer for a coupla hours, puree it, and freeze in single-serving containers.  When I want some protein, I throw in some thawed salad shrimp for the last minute or two of heating.  Yum, yum, yum!

Wig laundry

I'm designing hair & makeup for The Merry Widow, set in 1895.  Almost none of the women in the cast have hair long enough to approximate 1895 styles, which means wigs for the rest of us.  Fortunately, the company has dozens.  After spending a few hours going through them all, I found 7 that might work.  However, you can tell they've been stored in a non-climate-controlled space (musty at best), which means I wanted to wash them before making anyone wear them.  Here's a kitchen sink full of wigs:

And here are 6 of them, set out to dry:

Final semester as an undergrad (this time)

I graduate with my 2 BA in just a few weeks!  Yesterday I got an email from my department asking me to speak at the department's graduation ceremony!  They'd nominated me for an award which I didn't get (but I was the Theater department's nominee, which was a nice surprise), so maybe this is their way of singling me out.  I've joked about being their oldest undergrad (heck, I'm probably their oldest student, undergrad or graduate, now that J received her MFA this spring), so I'm already a little different from their usual student speakers.  Now to come up with something to talk about that won't put my audience to sleep or make them roll their eyes... 😉

Been a busy semester

I realized earlier this week that the reason I'm more exhausted than usual this close to finals is that I've had very few free evenings.  First it was Antigone - rehearsals 5 nights a week from the first day of classes until tech, then the run - 9 performances in 8 days!  That closed the night before my birthday.  Then, on Halloween, I started crewing for the next show, with strike the Sunday before Thanksgiving.  The Sunday after Thanksgiving started "tech" for the Mozart Requiem concerts, which wrap up tomorrow.  Oh, and Merry Widow rehearsals started up the weekend before Thanksgiving.

All this contributed to my nearly entirely dropping the ball on one of my assignments, and has me behind on my 2 term papers and prepping for my voice jury.  Fortunately, the term papers only have to be about 6 pages.  One of those is a history paper, so the hardest thing about that one will be deciding what information makes the cut to be included.  The other is a lot more subjective, but I also have a few more days for that one, so I'm not too worried about it.

2017 continues to pile on

Let's see -

• neighbor & friend lost to cancer about 4 days apart in January
• Chief's brother, sister and her husband all dealing with various cancers
• Chief diagnosed w/ cancer at end of March, surgery at end of May
• two friends widowed very suddenly, about a month apart
• cousin diagnosed w/ cancer, died 3 weeks later!
• SIL and her husband both having to keep going after their cancers, which don't want to stay treated.

I think we could be forgiven for feeling like the universe is sorta piling on lately, and wondering "Who's next?"

Happy birthday, Chief!

Today the Chief marks another trip around the sun.  Here's to many more! 💖

Garden notes to remember for 2018

This year I planted lantana and purslane in the biggest pot, in the yellow plant stand.  I was delighted to learn that hummingbirds like lantana!  I'm indebted to the woman at the nursery who suggested I plant it.  The purslane is pretty, but the flowers don't stay open very long - they're usually closed tight again by noon or so.  I'll definitely plant lantana again, but maybe pair it with portulaca instead.

The Chief bought me a pair of fancy ceramic planters, which I used for sunflowers.  The sunflowers aren't doing very well.  I really oughta read up on them to see if it's too little water, too much water, or something else.

I put 6 pots of various flowers on the front steps.  The verbena isn't doing too well; hanging in there, but no flowers after the first ones dropped.  The snapdragons and marigolds are doing well.  I'm collecting marigold seeds for next year; let's see if I remember where I stash them in time to start them next spring.   Several of the seeds I dropped back into the pots have already sprouted; can't wait to see how they do.  The 6th pot was an attempt at red, white and blue.  The lobelia is doing well, and the geranium is hanging in there, though not flowering very happily.  (The one in back is doing better.)  The white flower, though, died pretty quickly, poor thing.  It looked like some kind of tiny daisy.  I didn't save the little label, of course, so I have no idea what it used to be.  That pot is also on the top step, so it doesn't get as much rain as the others.  Maybe next year I'll just put out 4 pots - 2 each on the 2nd & 3rd steps.

I tried rosemary in a new spot this year, next to the deck steps.  The oregano has been happy on that side of the deck, so maybe the rosemary will last more than a year or two.

Planted 5 tomato plants this year, no peppers.  Three sweet 100 plants at the far end and two beefier varieties at the near end.  Time to get out the wildlife mesh; no sooner did some of the beefy tomatoes start to ripen than some varmint started snacking on them. 😠  So far we've gotten 3 cherry tomatoes; I'm hoping for lots more.  Oddly, the plant closest to the bird feeders has all the leaves stripped off the topmost few "branches".  That's not a problem we've had before, so I have no idea what's eating it.

Wow - it's been longer than I realized.

It's been an eventful coupla months in Lake Wobegon.  Let's see; where to start?  Think I'll break this up into separate posts...

The Lighting homework that ate my day

BOY, is lighting design time-consuming!  First there are image searches, which take hours to yield a few useful images for "design inspiration."  Then you have to apply your ideas to actual lights.  One of our final projects is to create a lighting design for West Side Story and go into the light lab - essentially a tiny black-box "theater" with a slew of lights and accessories to experiment with - to apply that design to one of the songs from the show.  We're all paired off, chiefly for efficiency (e.g., one can stand in a focus point while the other focuses a light) and safety (that 20-foot ladder is definitely a 2-person lift).  My partner met me this morning for our 8-noon block in the light lab.  He left for class afterwards, but I stayed to keep working.  I finally left around 6 pm to go home for dinner, then went back for another hour and a half.  For those keeping score, I left for campus about 7:30 this morning, stayed till 6 pm (I did allow myself a lunch break) to have dinner with the Chief, then went back to finish up.  I got home to stay around 10 pm. 

Even subtracting a couple of hours for trouble-shooting, I spent nearly 10 hours writing cues for a song that's all of about 2:34 minutes long!

More bad news

Just learned of someone's inoperable, stage-4 cancer diagnosis.  What IS it with this year?!?

Happy anniversary?

We started our anniversary (Happy Sweet 16, Chief!) with a trip to the 2nd surgeon.  The Chief had fun cracking wise with the nurses who took his vitals and his health history, and we finally got a date for his surgery, at a hospital 20 miles closer than where the first surgeon works.  The wonder woman at the front desk got all the Chief's pre-op testing scheduled back to back on a single day.  She also corrected the referral record, which was written for Radiology, for some inexplicable reason.

I had a noon acupuncture appointment and snoozed a bit on the table.  My juggling coaching got cancelled because my classmate had to cancel, which was fine with me.  As early as we got up to get to that 8 am doctor's appointment, I probably would have been dropping balls right, left, and center.

Shortly before we were going to leave for dinner at our favorite Greek restaurant, it started pouring like crazy, with nickel-sized hail into the bargain!  The Chief glanced outside and noticed someone huddled under a tree out front, so he urged him inside to wait out the storm.  He'd been playing soccer at the park down the street and was heading home when the heavens opened.  We ended up giving him a ride home once the hail stopped and the rain backed off to a more reasonable rate.  (He only lives 2 blocks away.)

Dinner was delicious - eggplant dip with plenty of garlic, and the Chief got what he always gets - lamb.  We even indulged in a dessert each instead of splitting one.  Decadent, but I expect to work it off tomorrow in the garden.

And I'm in!

Got an email the other day telling me that I've been cast in this fall's Antigone - 2nd Attendant, Chorus, and Eurydice understudy.  The director said at auditions that she plans to incorporate a lot of movement - we have a choreographer - and maybe some music too.  I'm looking forward to it!  Too bad rehearsals don't start until the first week of classes, in August.

The director is the person who taught my Voice for the Actor class last semester, which I really enjoyed.  She often closed class with a 2- or 3-part song, different groups of us singing each part, all at the same time.  We all loved that; I hope she plans to build a little of that into Antigone.

I played Eurydice in a different translation of this play several years ago.  It'll be interesting to dig out my old script and compare it to this one once we get it, and to see how much this version will differ from that one.

This is why I would never make it as a designer

We're starting on our final Lighting Design project of the semester.  Tomorrow we're supposed to bring in our initial concept & research for West Side Story.  Sounds easy, yes?  Except that I have NO idea for a concept.  I researched 1950s NYC, fire escapes, spotlights (for the dance, when Tony & Maria see each other that first time).  All well & good, and all pretty predictable.  I suppose I'll come up with something eventually; I just hope that "eventually" happens in time for tomorrow morning's class.

Bad news can do that to you.

Sunday morning, just days after we got the Chief's diagnosis, a friend posted on Facebook that her husband had died suddenly during the night.  Needless to say, Sunday was a write-off.  Getting picked apart at that audition felt that much worse because of it, my continuing "juggle struggle" the same - it seems the tears are just plain closer to the surface while I digest all this bad news.  I haven't been sleeping as well, either, which makes me a bit crabby; poor Chief!

We'll get past it, of course - we've both survived worse - but oh, it's exhausting in the meantime.  Pray for our sanity as the Chief & I weather this latest storm.

Called back!

Well, that was a bit of a surprise.  After the way my auditions went for a couple of fall classes (alternate for 1, didn't get into the one I wrote about - no surprises), I had no hopes for Tuesday's audition for the fall season.  I wasn't too sanguine about how I did, partly because I tried to change a few things based on last week's feedback, partly because I was still a bit bummed to realize that I've been doing it all wrong all these years, and partly because I was exhausted after the recent spate of bad news.

Imagine my surprise this morning when I checked my email to find one telling me I was called back for Antigone!  They called back 45 people, which might be everyone who auditioned (shades of last semester's season auditions), but given that they've announced that they plan to cast 20, including the Greek chorus, I suppose that number makes sense.  I've already printed my "sides" (side = excerpt from the play), which I'll start looking at today or tomorrow.

Callbacks are Saturday morning, and finish up right around the time my partner & I have our slot the light lab to work on our latest lighting design project.  That means I'll be in the building from 10 till 5, unless we finish our project early (not likely!).  As I told the Chief as I was leaving for class this morning, guess I'll just pack for the day.