It’s one of those weeks that only other theatre people can truly understand.

Sunday evening we rehearsed for the fundraising concert, Monday evening was the first Charlie Brown rehearsal, and we worked harmonies for 3 hours. Tuesday evening was tech rehearsal for the concert, another late one, and I’ve just gotten home from tonight (Thursday’s) Charlie Brown rehearsal, another three hours of harmony (but goly gosh are they sounding good considering). Tomorrow night is, you guessed it, rehearsal for the concert again, we open Friday night, play two shows on Saturday, matinee on Sunday, and then next Monday is back into Charlie Brown again. It’s particularly rough because there are six of us doing both shows.

At Monday night’s rehearsal, a theatre friend came up to me with a wide beaming smile and said “So you’ll be joining us on the bridge walk!”. She pulled out the newspaper and there was my name listed (twice?) in the sea of names of those who had gotten tickets. Then this morning I got a phone call that woke me up at the shameful time of 9:30. It was one of those, grab the phone, sit up straight, clear your throat, practice a “Hello” and hit ‘Answer’ kind of things. About 10 minutes and $22 later, I had a 8×12 photograph of the bridge and a three month home delivery subscription to the newspaper.

I must admit that I am pulling out of Summer session. A mere 5 or 6 hours before my first class was to start, I was in bed without sleep, having returned from rehearsal, so it seemed a pretty good idea to call the whole thing off. I’m very glad because the weather has been awful, and moving house will likely mean I’ll be without the internet for a while. I’m also in the packing to move house mode, but a misguided early stint of packing has resulted in boxes being rumaged through to find the things I have required since packing, and it isn’t until next Friday when we move.

Finally, I’ve decided to turn my old PC over to my parents so they can pass their severly outdated machine onto whomever is unfortunate enough to receive it. It does, however, give me a good excuse to buy the sound and MIDI interface I need for my iBook. The politics of it all.

Now for a ritual of external body cleansing, then to finish setting up my parents new computer, and then to bed with my new book, “How Sondheim Found His Sound” by Steve Swayne.

After going to Amy’s singing recital for her students, Amy, Adam, fresh from his USA tour, Min and myself went out for a spot of bloat at Chili’s. The storm had really picked up while we were in there and we had a great view of the illuminating sky thanks to the wrap around windows. At one point a sporting team of some description (the hawks?) came in to eat, but we outstayed them. Trying to stall before re-entering the storm, we got a bit photo-trigger happy, and you can see some of the more ‘public’ ones on my flickr account.

Afterwards, aided by Adam’s jetlagged body-clock, we went to Adam’s place for some exercise machine workout (or not), and watching some of the many hours of video tape he took in America. I intend to get the time I watched those tapes deducted from the my quota for viewing the final, edited video presentation. It was almost worth it to see (and hear) Bagpipe Betty who had learnt one of the Beatles songs on bagpipes, and had dressed up in full Scottish attire just to serenade Paul McCartney as he drove into the complex he was performing in that evening. Next to her, about a dozen women were trying to scream, but since age had ravaged them, it just sound like 12 women gargling at Paul as he drove past. It was slightly scary though as it panned around and Greg was one of the aging women, holding a sign “We Came From Australia”. Holding it up to the camera, I suspect he was hiding a little moist patch from view after Paul had driven past.

I do think it was a wasted opportunity though. I would have been there with my on-location equipment recording interviews, but Adam was too scared to get close to them. You could tell he was using zoom.

Tyson’s Nuggets

The very next morning after Greg’s return from his USA tour, I get this in my email:

“Hi Tyson,

I wont say what product i found named after me,
suffice to say it wasnt some avian bird flu ridden
carcass off cuts from a slaugter house.”

Just charming. As you can see, Greg is still strugling with the ‘Shift’ key on his keyboard.

Packing Vinyl

One of the (many) awful things about packing is that you are expected to neatly assemble everything you have worked hard to own into boxes. This is a logistical nightmare with some things, and would you believe it, my vinyl collection included.

It seems you can only put a few in each box (unlike pictured) otherwise the boxes become far too heavy to move. Does anyone have a box big enough for my piano?

It’s Uni results time again, and I’ve got nothing to complain about. I even did well in the course I was convinced I would be lucky to pass. So what are the results?

3 Music Subjects: 85, 86, 87 - all high distinctions.
Economics Subject: 83 - a distinction.

Can’t fault that!