Sleep-Driving: FAIL

Kids, don't try this at home.

On Monday, 2/22, on my way to work, I'm toodling down I-270 in DC's typical stop and go traffic.  Stop... Go... Stop... Go...  Somewhere in there I missed a Stop...

Did you see my license plate?  How does that happen?  I rear-ended an Accord.  Looking at the other person's car, you'd think I just scratched the bumper.  Did you see the HOLE in my license plate??

Ugh...  I was supposed to open a show next week.  I would have been at the theater Monday afternoon.  But no.  I fall asleep on 270 and that screws up the whole thing.  I feel so bad...  I've been working on this project for a while now, and was really looking forward to being a part of it.  Thankfully, the theater community pulled together and covered my pathetic ass.  People are doing what I typically do for other groups.  Pop in with a week to go and fix/redo it all.  I feel horrible about it.  My stage manager is ready to kick my ass for being so hard on myself.  I know I didn't do it on purpose.  But still...

I'm okay.  My ankle is not really happy.  Apparently my tendons don't appreciate me slamming the brake pedal to the floor.  Not that it did much good since everything was done by the time I hit the pedal.  I'm in a collar for the rest of the week.  I'm very sore, and headaches are constant.  Upside - my rental is a Toyota Avalon.  One of the models involved in the RECALL.  I can't imagine they'd still be loaning the vehicle if it had the acceleration issue.  I hope...  Nice car, but not for me.  Too wide.  I don't like the position of the side mirrors - hard to see well.  I thought the ride would be smoother than it is, too.  Ah well.  I don't know yet if my car is repairable.  The air bag did not go, so that's a plus.  Hopefully I'll know in the next day or so.  In the meantime, drugs and rest, heat and rest, drugs and rest, stretch and rest, drugs and rest, ice and rest, drugs and rest....

POLAR BEAR PLUNGE

Yup, we did it.  And here's proof.  What an awesome day.

Click here: Our Polar Bear Plunge for Special Olympics

Am I REALLY Doing This??

Yup.  I am participating in the 14th annual Maryland State Police Polar Bear Plunge to support the Maryland Special Olympics.  I've done it the last few years, and this year is no different.

I know, you think I'm crazy.  Well I am, but really Mr. Blondie is the crazy one.  He thinks jumping into the ocean in the freezing weather is fun.  He doesn't need a reason to do it.  But to get me to do it, he had to find a really good reason.  'It'll be fun!' just wasn't, and won't ever be, enough.  So he finds this.  Knowing that I have a soft spot in my heart for Special Olympics, he talked me into it.

We've done it a few years now, so we are getting better at being prepared for what to expect.  The first year we did it, they ended up with almost twice as many participants as they had planned for.  Each year it's gotten bigger and bigger.  This year is no exception.

However, the weather this year is a little different.  The past few years the temps have been in the upper 30's, low 40's and lots of sunshine.  Last year there was a bit of a breeze to deal with, but we all survived.  Tomorrow they're expecting the high to be 25 degrees, 10 mph winds, and a 50% chance of snow.  Yippee...

I know I don't sound very enthusiastic, but this is nothing compared to what those kids and their parents deal with every day.  When you come out of that water, and see a bunch of kids standing on the hill cheering and screaming and having a blast, you remember why you're doing this.

Ginormous thanks to all of you who donated on my behalf.  Every penny goes to support the Special Olympics, and when you see what the kids get out of it, you'll know it was worth it.  Go here to get an idea.

MIA? Yeah, maybe...

It's been way too long since I've been on here.  The show closed and I collapsed.  It's the new year now, and I want to get back to blogging a little more often.  Plus I have three shows back to back starting the middle of next month, so there will be plenty to blog about.

I've spent the last couple months mostly recovering.  The Monday before Thanksgiving was the car accident (I was/still am in PT for my headaches at the time), then in mid-December it was a Colitis/Chron's scare.  We still aren't sure what I have (I find out on Monday hopefully) but needless to say it hasn't been fun and I've had zero energy. 

Other than that, life is dull...

If all the world is a stage, then techies are the forces of nature.

West Side Story - Weekend 3

Yo Murphy!  Did you really have to resurface on Friday the 13th?  Thanks.  Thanks very much.

Friday morning I had physical therapy with a new PT.  She rocked.  If I can get all my remaining appts with her, I might be a little more optimistic.  I felt great after.  Work was easy, so Friday was a good day.

Then I arrived at the theater.  I walk in at 7p and head up to the light board.  I'm not there 2 seconds when Robert Jones comes upstairs.  The SM was looking for me - 'I wish she would call if she were going to be late'.  Um, I'm at the light board, dude.  Whatever...  I start going thru the light cues.  Something doesn't look right.  The city tech says no one was in the theater, and aside from powering up the board, no one touched anything.  :-/  Things don't look right.  After going thru the first 30 cues I realized the moving lights are misbehaving.  They are going haywire.  The colors are wrong, they're making all sorts of noise, they're not aimed in the correct place.  Crap.  I power down the board and restart it.  Now it's worse.  I can't get them to reset, I can't get the lamp to come on, I can't get anything to work. 

Now I'm starting to really cuss.  The city tech is showing me how to do a global reset of the movers - nothing is working.  It's 7:35 - we have to open the house.  I said if you guys don't mind me flashing lights all over the place, go ahead.  So they opened.  I tried calling Joe - no answer on his cell.  I call his home number.  His wife answered - I apologize for bothering them and ask if he's available.  I tell him what's happening, and what we tried.  He walks me thru a couple other things.  Nothing is working.  He gets on his cell and calls Shaffer - another city tech very familiar with the board - and has him come in to look at it.  (Joe lives on the other side of the planet, Shaffer around the block.)  About the time Shaffer shows up, Joe suggests that we reset the dimmer pack.  I've got the city tech on headset, my cell with Joe on his home phone, Shaffer standing behind me, Joe is also on his cell talking with ETC, and the city tech is on his cell with Kim (boss man).  People are suggesting - maybe this happened, maybe that happened - I finally say "I don't give a fuck what may have happened, just help me figure out how to fix it!"  Ok, maybe that was repeated more than once...  I just remember hearing my spot op say 'man, she's going off...'  :-)

We cut power to the dimmers that work the movers.  I power down the board for the third time.  Everything comes back up and I just let it sit for a second before I start going thru cues.  Cue 10.  Cue 17.  Cue 19.  They're working again.  I go thru the bulk of the cues in the first act, it's working.  Thank god.  Our convoluted circle of communication is terminated and all is well.  It's 7:50.  Plenty of time to spare before curtain. Just before we take the house to half, the SM says one of the instruments we use as a street light got bumped and was facing the complete wrong direction.  We have a scene where there are 5 groups in their own special, and this instrument is in the same area.  She is worried that this particular scene is going to be awkward.  I said no, we are using different instruments for that scene.  She kept pushing - are you sure?  I turned to her and said I'm positive.  She said you'd better be.

The first act runs well.  Every time we get to a cue that involves a moving light, I hold my breath.  During a quiet moment of the balcony scene, I execute a cue and one of the moving lights makes this horrendous clacking noise.  Don't start, please?  Have you not tortured me enough?  It's Friday the 13th.  I get it.  But can ya stop now please?  Nothing else unusual happened during the first act with regard to the moving lights.

Oh, BTW - the scene with the specials that the SM was all worried about - flawless.  We use a different instrument for that scene.  The light comes up, just as it should.  I said, "Oh look, they're lit..." with as much dripping sarcasm as I could muster.  No response.  Heh.  I look over at the city tech - he's got his headset mic off trying not to laugh out loud.

I love the spot op who took over for me when I started running the board.  She's great.  She's touched a spotlight once in her life.  Instead of closing the fader, she shrinks the circle.  When it doesn't go out, she swings the spot around til it's on the top of the wall back near us - but not before swooping it thru the audience.  A few seconds later, she finds the fader and turns it off.  Ugh. 

I haven't seen the second act for a while, so if there were little irritating lighting issues they were never resolved.  Now I get to watch the second act, cuz like I have to.  There was one scene that really bugged me, so I made a note.  But all in all the second act was fine.  The audience loved it.  Yippee!

Kim comes by the theater during the second act.  After the show he shows me what I need to do should this lovely event ever happen again.  The cast is heading to Gordon Biersch...  and while I live three blocks from there, I decide I'd better head home.

I return to the theater Saturday; making sure I get there extra early to make sure everything works.  Smooth as silk.  Excellent.  I fix the one cue in the second act that was bugging me from the night before.  I head down to the lobby to schmooze with audience members I knew (Kharfen Cookies!  YUMMY!  You rock Mr.  Kharfen.  I love your cookies - but I love you more!!!)  I attempt to bribe the producer for a ticket for my husband - we're sold out and she has a stash she keeps for emergencies - like WATCH judges who didn't make their reservations...  I try to pay her for it, she won't take my money.  :-/  I thank her profusely.

Earlier in the day I get a text from my buddy Brian.  He's doing Arsenic at the Arts Barn.  He's in the first 10 mins of the show, then you don't see him again until curtain call.  He said he was going to do his scene, then come to Rockville to see as much as he could of West Side.  Dude, you're crazy.  I told him we were sold out, but that he could come up to the bridge and watch.  I warned a couple people who would be up there that he might come by.  Do you know he did?  OMG...  I couldn't believe it.  LOL!  He watched about 2/3 of the first act, and hung around at intermission.  When they flashed the house lights, he went back to Gaithersburg.  He got back with 10 mins before curtain call.  One of the other cast members said 'dude, where were you?'  His response, 'Out.'  LOL!

The lighting is working fine.  It's so hot in the booth that if I wore make up it would be melting off.  There is one scene in the first act that the SM always calls late.  We got to that scene and I pushed the button at the correct time.  She was not happy.  We get to the end of Maria and she tries to call the spot out before the end of the song again.  I interrupted just before the spot op took the light out.  I really wanted to say 'are you ever going to learn when the song ends?'  but I didn't.  At intermission the Prod and Choreo came up to me thrilled that the cue was run on time.  Choreo said there was another in the second act that is always late.  Since I don't remember the scene well I executed the cue when she called it, but also figured out where it's supposed to be.  So it'll be correct for the matinee.

Speaking of matinee's...  It's 12:50p.  I'm supposed to be at the theater at 1p.  I'm not dressed yet.  Guess I should get working on that.  Enjoy the day.  It's the first sunny day here in over a week.  I almost forgot what a sunny day looked like...

West Side Story - Thursday Brush Up II

I dropped by the theater to make sure the cues were set - esp since we had a disaster with the light board on Sunday.  I loaded the cues from my jump drive, and went thru the first act.  Everything looked good and was working as it should.  I made a few little tweaks, resaved it, and I was done.

The city tech I've been working with this whole run said they figured out what happened on Sunday.  We blew a circuit.  The light board has it's own battery back up.  It's then plugged into a UPS.  We also have a stand-alone instrument that the LD rented to display the logo on the curtain before the show, at intermission, and after the show.  That instrument was plugged into the UPS.  I think there was also a music stand light, as well as a few other things plugged in there too.  Well Murphy says 'If it can go wrong, it will'.  It did.  When the circuit blew, none of the backups worked.  The whole theater is plunged into darkness while the audience is escaping.  It didn't have anything to do with what the operator was doing, or anything else.  It just happened.  Thankfully, it didn't happen say, mid show somewhere.  So the city guys re-ran the power and distributed the draw evenly so history will not repeat itself.

Reminds me of when we did Into The Woods the first time, I inadvertently hit the toggle switch on a power strip while fixing a spotlight.  Of course the light board was plugged into the power strip, and there was no UPS.  Hilarity ensued. 

So that little problem is resolved.  The next thing the city techs were working on is getting a monitoring system for the thrust running.  The biggest problem when using the thrust is it's a sound dead zone for anyone standing on it.  There are no audio monitors in the building that will help the cast hear the orchestra when the cast is on the thrust.  So the city is running monitors that will be in the alcoves pointing at the thrust.  In theory, this should work.  Unfortunately, we are also having feedback issues.  If you turn those monitors up loud enough so the cast can hear, the sound feeds back thru their microphones and then you have an ear-splitting screech.  We don't want this.  We already have a problem with the amps that the orchestra is using.  I can't imagine this will help the cast and keep the feedback from becoming a problem.  But that's what they wanted to try.

Well, big Robert points out the feedback issue.  Everyone is arguing with him about it.  What are we going to do if we don't have the monitors?  The actress can't hear her entrance.  Blah blah blah.  He says, we understand that, but feel this is not the right approach.  So he wires a video monitor instead.  The camera is pointing at the MD, the tv monitor is in the alcove.  The actress looks at the monitor, the MD cues her, all is well.  I don't know what happened - I left while they were running the video cable. Whatever they decided to do, I'll see it tonight.

Tonight will be the first time in a while that I'll have seen the second act.  That is unless I get thrown off the light board again.  I don't see that happening, but one never knows...  I've been tweaking the lights in the first act for the last two weeks, but the second act I've ignored since I haven't been there to see it.  I'm sure tonight I'll have a fix list.  None of it will be major - just little things that annoy me.  So I'm not stressed about it.

I am going into the theater tonight with a positive attitude.  If the SM wants to give me lip - fine.  Whatever.  It's really not worth it.  The show will be good, esp since I have to be able to talk on the headset.  If the SM doesn't call something correctly, I'm not going to be afraid to say anything.  Wow do I wish I was calling my own cues...

On a lighter note - I saw a new physical therapist today.  While I really wanted her to rip my head off, she was great.  I wasn't in too much pain when I left, and I didn't end up with a blaring headache.  Yipee! Hopefully my level of discomfort will not worsen as the weekend progresses.  I still can't turn my head abruptly.  Looking in my blind spot really sucks.  So as long as I don't make any quick moves, I feel pretty good.  If the timing gods are in my favor, I may even get to have dinner with Mr. Blondie tonight.  :-D

Anytime You Want To Turn Your Brain To Mush...

Isn't he beautiful?  Me want.

Heh...

West Side Story - Sunday Matinee 1

Sunday was an interesting day.  Matinee's are always 'fun'.  You wrap up the Sat eve show around 11p. Then you head to the cast party, even tho you know you have to be at the theater at 12:30 the next day.  Most Sundays the cast and crew are pretty wiped from the night before, but things typically don't go too badly.  One thing I did notice the moment I got there - the SM was barking quite a bit.  Maybe she didn't get enough sleep, maybe she had too much alcohol the night before...  I don't know what it was, but she was not happy.

There were a couple light cues I adjusted.  One that would definitely look different, but shouldn't throw the cast.  Noam was hesitant...  He knew my idea made sense and would have done it immediately if we had a different SM.  However our SM will notice the change, and will not like that we just went ahead and did it.  I tried to reassure him about it and said if she started to give him a hard time to blame me.  I made the change - you didn't know - whatever.  Blame me.  So we made the change.  (Which looked FABOO by the way...)

At the same time, the folks video recording the show are getting set up. There are two cameras, and a microphone, as well as a recording of the body mic feed being burned to CD.  I provide tape to put over the lights on the front of the cameras.  Most cast members hate knowing they're being recorded, and those that really hate it can see those tiny lights from a mile away.

We're all ready to start the show, but we haven't gotten word from the house to start.  2:10...  2:13...  We're supposed to start at 2p. I went downstairs to find out what was happening.  Four van loads of handicapped patrons arrived at 2:05.  It took them 15 mins to get everyone unloaded and to their seats.  In the meantime, another patron who got there on time was giving the box office and the Prod hell for not starting at 2p.  She didn't care what the reason was, and she didn't like anyone's tone.  Ugh - glad I don't do much box office work.

As we go thru the first few scenes, it's pretty clear our SM is struggling.  It doesn't help that when she calls Spot A out, Spot B went too.  We caught it, tho it still looked weird because the timing was thrown off.  We get to the song 'Maria' and for what is probably the fourth time she tries to take the lights out before the end of the song.  There are only two spotslights on Tony while he's singing.  She calls the spot out cue - the city tech takes his spot out, I ignore her.  For a moment you hear her take a deep breath and get ready to say something when Tony sings his last line.  Instead of getting upset, she's relieved that her ass was covered yet again.  Then she says something like, 'Well that wasn't that bad.  Maybe we'll keep it for next week.' Whatever... 

As the first act continues, things are looking better.  Then we get to the end of Act I.  Typically the order of operations is:  Spot A on - GO.  Sound - GO. Light cue whatever - GO. Spot B out - GO.  Pull the grand - GO.  As the grand closes, the set piece magically disappears by two people who walk with the curtain, and grab the set piece so the curtain doesn't hit it.

Well, it didn't exactly go as it should.  The city tech didn't hear whether she called the spot out.  Then she says 'why isn't the set moving?'  She never called the grand to close, and since it's Mr. SM who's working the curtain he waited for her cue like a good little boy.  So the end was a bit....  Let's just say 'clusterfuck' and leave it at that.

It didn't help that all thru the first act one of the mentally challenged patrons was gagging, and during a fight scene another covered his ears and went running up the isle screaming.  Hmmm... There's a good sign.

The Prod says: It's been 17hrs since we did this last.  The dialogue hasn't changed.  The music hasn't changed, and funny, the cues haven't changed either.  I tell her I don't trust the SM - how are we going to cover for her when the only other talent (aka smart enough to ignore her when necessary) isn't going to be there next week.  I can't run the spot and the board at the same time.  Ugh!  Next weekend I will not be afraid to interrupt her if something goes wrong.

I decide it's best that I go home after intermission.  I pass the Choreo on my way out.  I'm really trying hard not to let this bother me, but dag...  I tell him - I'm trying...  I fill him in on what the Prod & I discussed.  I tell him I don't trust her, but that I'm praying things aren't this jacked up next week.

I don't know what else to do.  I guess nothing...  It kills me to see the wheels fall off the way they did on Sunday.  There were some awesome moments, but some were just dreadful.  If the SM trusted her staff enough to do their jobs correctly, then we could have gotten thru her brain fart without too much trouble.  But no one breathes unless she says it's ok to.  So we sit there in the dark, the spot is still being used a 'search light', and she says 'why isn't the set moving?'  It's so frustrating cuz it doesn't have to be like this.

I have no idea how the second act went over all, and I don't think I want to know.  Tho I did get an email from Noam after the show:

"After the show, I saved everything and the board decided to spazz and it took out all of the lights (including the house lights) so no one could see anything.  I re-loaded the show and everything looked fine, but please check to make sure all the cues are set on Friday.  Thanks."

D'oh!  Dontcha hate it when you have a house full of blue hairs trying to get out of the theater to pee when the lights in the whole place go out?  LMAO!  If we still did the Oh Shit award, this would be on the top of the nomination list.  LOL!  Noam, we love you.  We'll miss you next week.

There is no tech brush up again this Thursday.  The SM won't even be there.  I'm going to go anyway so I can make sure everything is fine before Friday and have time to fix it if necessary.  I did receive an email from the SM asking if I would be by Thursday and if I could check out the cues after the mishap that happened with the board.  I told her I would be there, and that I had the most recent version of the show on my thumb drive, so I'll make sure all is well.  I took the opportunity to point out that Thursdays are very useful if there are problems so we don't have to run around like crazy just before the show starts on Friday.

I have to say again - I know I'm whining.  I don't want to be irritated by all this stuff.  I love theater.  But every day there's another reason to be annoyed.  If we'd had a brush up, Friday's show would have been fine.  If the SM wasn't still drunk (or whatever) the Sunday show would have been fine too.  There are mistakes we laugh at, and mistakes that are just not acceptable.  The light board spazzing - funny.  The clusterfuck of incompetence - unacceptable.

Maybe I am getting too judgmental the longer I do this.  Maybe I'm spoiled by those SM's & LD's I've worked with in the past.  Who knows.  I have three shows in the spring.  If I have the same attitude problems, then I'll know that it's me and theater may not be in my future.  We'll see...

West Side Story - Weekend 2

The days have again blended together.  Friday Noam ran thru the cues - he knew of the changes that happened earlier in the week - everything looked ok.  One of the ASM's was asking about the little christmas lights that they threw up for light off stage.  The city needed them taken down after our last show last week, and they hadn't been put back up.  Where are they?  Who put them up there initially?  Someone said Big Robert put them up.  Where is he?  I'm listening to this thinking - wouldn't we have figured this out yesterday if we'd done a brush up?  Gee, the brush up seems pretty helpful for keeping things cool for a Friday performance.  But what do I know...

I dropped my stuff at the spotlight and headed to the lobby.  I was chatting with a few people when I realized we hadn't opened the house at 730p.  Apparently the sound system wasn't working.  They traced it back to a bad cable, replaced it, but never had enough time to do a true sound check.  Hmmm... Would this have been this much of a problem if we'd had a brush up? 

Later the Choreo said something to me that really hit home.  I feel stupid that it hit me as hard as it did, as it's something I say quite frequently in other situations.  "It's not worth getting worked up about it."  He's so right.  It's not.  Yes, I am very passionate about what I do.  I find reasons every day to be irritated with something that's going on with the production.  It's not worth getting myself all stressed out.

We start running the show Friday, and things don't look right.  Where the cues looked ok as we went thru them with no cast, something just didn't look right.  The tell tale sign was one particular scene where we have a blue special down center.  The light was on, but no color.  :-/  A couple other things looked weird, but the rest of the show was fine.  We were trying to decide if maybe we loaded the incorrect copy of the show, or if something got changed.  It didn't seem like it, but with the new moving lights we have, things get weird with them on a regular basis.

On my way out of the booth at intermission, the SM calls my name and asks a couple questions about the issues with the cues.  I gave her the best answers we had, while trying not to sound too surprised that she acknowledged my existence.

I don't think I stayed for the second act, but I don't remember clearly.

Saturday I went into the theater with a new resolve.  I wasn't going to let the SM get to me.  If there were issues with other aspects of the show - as long as it's not me - I'm going to try not to get worked up.  I went thru the first few cues to see if we were going to have repeat issues.  It didn't apper we would.  I made a few adjustments to some scenes to make them a little more even, and we were good to go.

We had a full house Saturday.  It was crazy.  I spent most of the time before the show helping people find their seats.  I could see the staff on the bridge looking over the edge - I just kept seating people.  Once the lines were gone, I headed upstairs. 

Saturday's show was the best we've had so far.  The audience was awake and alive, and the cast was really feeding off their reactions.  We still had some cue calling issues, but all in all it was wonderful.  I stuck around for the second act, tho I sat out in the lobby and chatted with Robert and the house manager.

After the show I was chatting with some people I knew.  They really enjoyed themselves.  Yipee!  At one point I see Allison - SHINY!  She had a top on that had sequins everywhere.  I head over to her - unfortunately I felt like I was rudely interrupting but I had to tell her I admired her blouse.  She introduced me to those people I didn't already know.  While chatting she asked me if Mr. Allison has trouble finding his light.  I said no.  She got this look on her face... it was either a damn-him or couldn't-you-have-just-lied-to-me look.  We laughed and I said it's not a big deal.  That's why we spike your spot on the stage.  You never miss your light when it's spiked.

However that is not the thought that nearly came out of my mouth.  Thank god for working internal filters.  The first thought I had was, 'Maybe Mr. Allison can find his light, but who cares?  You have two things going for you - you're beautiful and you have boobs.  Who cares if you can't hit your light perfectly if you have boobs.'  I am glad I did not say this out loud in front of her family.  I didn't see here without mixed company for the rest of the weekend, so I never shared that silly thought with her.

I went home and crashed.  We have a matinee the next day and I wanted to get some good rest.  Mr. Blondie and I had been to Ikea earlier in the day.  We picked up a new wall unit and he put it together while I was at the show.  It looks great!  I thank Hubby as I pass out....