http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0122-climate.html

97%!!  There was even a renowned skeptic scientist hired by the infamous Koch Brothers to DISPROVE Global Warming and he found he was WRONG - that it is real -

http://www.yellowbullet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=433579

We have now had the warmest Winter on record -

http://freethoughtblogs.com/singham/2012/03/21/record-warmest-winter-in-cleveland/

We've had days of record-breaking temps all over the country -

http://www.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/record-warmth-this-week_2012-03-11

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-03-22/chicago-cools-a-bit-after-incredible-warm-streak

And yet somehow, SOMEHOW, there are people with no meteorology or climate science background who know better than all these people with years of experience.  Somehow they just KNOW better.

I don't get that.

Was home yesterday with a double migraine - it was gone by around 11am and came back around 1pm.  I napped on and off yesterday, which Fazio didn't get.  He felt the need to wake me up twice, yet finally got it and lay down near my knees on the bed when I went back to sleep yet again. 

Without my phone, I had to notify work, so I had to guess the e-mail address for two people in my dept and finally remembered I could send a text message via the Verizon website.  So I was able to notify them.  It sucks not having a phone and this does make me want to think about a land line, but to me it's just an extra expense that I might only use if there were an emergency and my cell phone was dead or lost.  I got my phone back last night, finally, after seven days without it.  I did find that I don't care that much about going to Facebook at all.  And my friend who expected ME to apologize to HIM after he belittled me on my own post about global warming has now "un-friended" me. 

And I now shrug my shoulders and think, "You belittled me and expect me to apologize?  Meh."

"The Gin Game" is fully blocked.  Act I took all of about 2 hours on Tuesday and Act II took 90 minutes on Wednesday.  To me, THAT'S HOW IT'S DONE.  Get the most basic of blocking in there and now work Act I, then Act II and keep alternating, changing things that don't seem to be working, but giving the actors the opportunity to memorize both the lines and the blocking by just going over it again and again.  It's the most beneficial for the actors because it also gives them the continuity they need.  And I've given a task to my stage manager Kourtney - pay attention to the 11 rounds of gin played within the entire play and follow anytime there is any specific blocking written in the play when someone discards and when someone specifically either picks up the discard or draws from the deck.  Sometimes the blocking just says "they begin to play" and other times it is very specific, and that to me is the hardest thing in the play for the actors.  I don't think directing is my forte.  It's just not as enjoyable to me as actually being on that stage.  But I hope I do well enough for the actors to enjoy doing this production and for them to get good reviews! 

I don't remember if I mentioned before, but I also convinced the Board to turn what normally becomes "free preview" night, where actors who are in other shows come to watch the final rehearsal, into a fund raiser instead.  We are charging $25 a seat and all proceeds will go to the National Breast Cancer Foundation.  However, they for some reason are not able to take reservations in advance - all the tickets will have to be purchased at the door.  This not having a headcount will make me worry right up until that night whether anyone's going to show up - or too many people are going to show up.  If we sell out, that will be $1,500 for the Foundation.  I hope it goes well -

http://cvlt.org/82ndSeason/gingame.php

And they'd rather belittle me for it AND THEN expect ME to apologize??? 

I stopped going to Facebook once about a year ago when someone whom I thought of as a close friend (not anymore) wrote a comment on a political article I'd posted: "Dude, I thought this was Facebook, not Political Book."  Yes, I am passionate about politics.  When one of this country's two major parties has spent decades telling everyone how evil gay and lesbian people are and used us as scapegoats to raise money, after a while you don't sit back quietly.  You start fighting back and show how fake that party is as often as you can.  When it's your own livelihood, your own freedoms, hell even you're own safety that is constantly being jeopardized by a political party, you're going to fucking fight back and expose their lies as much as possible and wherever/whenever possible.

I saw that many other people were posting political articles and comments on Facebook, so I started doing the same.  But then I get called on it by a friend???

Here's a suggestion.  Don't read the article.  Ignore what I posted.  How many freakin' Farmville and Mafia War postings did I ignore?  TONS!  I didn't complain about all of them, I just ignored them.  But no, I had several friends who felt the need to say something by commenting either on my Wall or on something I'd posted.  To me, that's the same as coming here to my blog and telling me why I'm wrong.  You can bet I'm not only going to be insulted, but I'm going to remove your remarks.  Make them on your own Facebook page, on your own blog.

Yet another friend did the same thing when I posted about how ridiculously weird this Winter has been and how I can't believe there are people who don't think Global Warming is real.  He belittled my status update with the comment "It's just weather, dude."  And then went on about how "he'd let my posts go on too long without saying something."  And it escalated and I thought, "If you don't believe what I'm posting DON'T FUCKING READ IT.  It's like when you don't like the show on your TV.  Change the channel or turn the TV off.  But DON'T call the station and complain that you don't like their show and you want it pulled off the air because it's too damned inconvenient for you to lift the freakin' remote and change the channel."

This is why I again stopped going to Facebook.  And now that I've been without a phone for 6 days, I care less and less about Facebook.  But I posted something akin to what I've written above on Facebook about why I'd been gone since people were asking and within a couple hours, not only did that friend privately message me about what I'd posted, but demanded that I apologize to him for how I'd insulted HIM on my Facebook page during that whole Global Warming post.  WHAT!?!?!?  I wrote him back and said, "Are you kidding me???  You belittle what I have to say by commenting on my own status update, I fight back and I'M the one that has to apologize to you????  You've already made me regret coming back here."  So, within two hours of my saying I'll come back to Facebook, I was belittled once again via private message, and now I have no desire to come back at all.

Change of subject - I managed to get all of Act I of "The Gin Game" blocked last night in 90 minutes.  None of this spending two hours drilling the same half page over and over and over again.  ALL of Act I blocked and done, thank you.  I hope to do the same with Act II tonight, especially since we're now losing Thursday night's rehearsal.

Today is supposed to be in the low 80s.  First day of Spring and it's going to be Summer temps.  I'm going to run the air conditioner today with all the windows closed in the hopes it'll make my bedroom cool enough to actually get some sleep tonight. 

I am a little worried about what I'm going to do this Summer - do I run the air conditioner during the day for Fazio while I'm gone at work?  My electric bill will be staggering if I do.  Or is it going to remain cool enough during the day that just having the fans on will be enough until I get home?

Change of subject, I am a little ticked.  I only just found out yesterday that we are supposed to have a brush-up rehearsal Thursday night.  I've already got a blocking rehearsal scheduled for "The Gin Game" Thursday night.  And the reason I do is because I had NO idea there was a brush-up rehearsal scheduled.  I have NEVER had a brush-up rehearsal for a musical EVER!  You just don't do it because you don't have the band there.  I've only had brush-up rehearsals for plays and let's face it, most brush-up rehearsals are a waste of time because everyone goofs off.  The only sensible thing to do is have a line speed-through because then you actually get something done - you have everyone sitting in the house, concentrating on their lines instead of goofing around onstage.

But no.  This director wants a brush-up rehearsal.  I only found out about it because my stage manager for "The Gin Game" e-mailed me back saying, "Are you having rehearsal on Thursday?  Because I'd heard you're having a brush-up rehearsal."  I had to e-mail the director.  He is insisting on it.  I am a bit livid about this.  First of all, it will be a waste of time.  Secondly, who has a brush-up for a musical?  Thirdly, without the band there, what's the point?  Fourth - it may have "been on the schedule from the beginning", but no one - not the director, the producer or the stage manager bothered to mention it to ANYONE at any point.  Fifth - and something I did NOT mention in my e-mail to him - our director was not even AT our rehearsals for "The Drowsy Chaperone" the first three weeks and I had to run the rehearsals myself for 6 rehearsals, teaching everyone the music.  I may have gotten an e-mail thank you from him, but I didn't get so much as a mention in the program for it, or a thank you from him in front of the cast.  He spent the first three weeks of our rehearsals directing another musical at another theatre.  And I don't want to neglect the cast of "The Gin Game" in that way.  However, I had to send them an e-mail yesterday, letting them know Thursday may have to be canceled.

The director sent out an e-mail which someone in the cast forwarded to me.  He did not include me in this e-mail.  I can only assume it's because he replied to me at my work e-mail (I did work 11 - 7:30 yesterday and was using that e-mail up until I left) and I won't see it until I get in later this morning.  In the e-mail he says that he "always" has a brush-up rehearsal between the opening weekend and second weekend when he does a musical.  He uses it to "clean up things" that he "didn't get a chance to touch upon."  In other words, he expects to change things and give notes.  I'm sorry, but in community theatre, the unwritten rule has always been "Once a show opens, it belongs to the cast."  You do NOT change a thing or give notes, unless something goes so dreadfully wrong that you HAVE to change it, such as a broken set piece or something of that nature.  The band is going to be there "so they can have a chance to rehearse properly since they never got the chance."  You don't know how badly I want to say, "As if WE, the cast members, ever got the chance to rehearse properly."

Which brings me to another thing - directing style.  I have no idea if any of you (other than *Mumsie*) reading this do any theatre, but there is a particular directing style that I can't STAND.  And it's happened in two of the shows I've done in the past year.  It's a director who only does one scene - in some cases only half a page - over and over and over at one rehearsal.  Each rehearsal is only one scene and only the two or more actors in that scene are needed for the rehearsal and you are going to be blocked in that scene, then nit-picked to death and made to do the scene over and over and over and over until at least 2 hours have gone by.  These directors claim "it's a great way to direct because you get down to the details right away and it helps the actors memorize right away."  What a load of crap.  Yes, it gets down to the details right away in a way that shouldn't be done because more than likely you aren't going to touch upon that scene again for about two weeks.  There is no way in hell as an actor you're going to remember that level of detail in two weeks' time.  And I love the directors who say, "Well you should be working on it on your own time."  When?  When I'm sleeping?  Traveling to or from work?  Or when I'm at work?  Here in the real world, any remaining spare time I have is spent just memorizing the lines, not worrying about details that minute.  Ri-donk-ulous. 

The other thing that kind of directing style does is it keeps the actors from getting any kind of continuity.  You may have a scene memorized because you ran it 38 times one night, but when you haven't run the show through once until Tech Week, you have a lot of bewildered actors with no clue what scene comes next because they've had no continuity.

BLOCK THE DAMN SHOW.  Block it in the simplest of terms as quickly as possible.  Then start running the show.  Run it as far as you can, stopping and starting and changing/correcting as you go along.  Then continue where you left off at the previous rehearsal until you get all the way through.  Get to where you're doing a "stumble-through" of Act I as soon as possible.  This gives the actors a chance to view the show as a whole and will help them to memorize both acting and blocking together. 

Don't waste my freaking time with that drill-down crap.  We'll get maybe get 4 run-throughs total and that will be tech week only when you direct it that way.

I am directing a production of D.L. Coburn's classic two person play "The Gin Game."  It will be opening at Chagrin Valley Little Theatre's River Street Theatre the weekend after "The Drowsy Chaperone" closes.  It's technically my directing debut, but I've directed before. 

My first time directing was in high school.  I wrote a short play called "A Day In Elizabeth's Court."  It was about Queen Elizabeth I 1/2 (she wasn't quite a whole) and a day of her presiding in judgment over denizens of her kingdom.  It was a bit of a political spoof - her first court case was ruling over the peasant Howard Jarvis (look him up - California property tax history) and it went on to be a murder mystery where everyone had a reason to kill the queen and they'd thought they'd poisoned her.  But she was actually alive and able to solve the case.  It was a lot of fun.  We even got a cardboard Burger King crown and crossed out the word "King" with a Sharpie and wrote "Queen" instead.

But the 2nd time I directed was only a year ago, when I was co-director of "Scream Queens".  So this will be my first time full-on directing.  And already I don't think I like it.  I didn't realize how much needed to be done before you even have your first rehearsal.

I asked my friends Linda and Steve a year ago if they wanted to do the play and when they said "yes", I submitted my proposal to do it.  You don't get paid to direct at River Street, but it's your chance to try your hand at directing before possibly directing at the main theatre where you do get paid.  Although I'm sure I will enjoy doing this, my focus is about acting on stage - even though in community theatre the actor does not get paid.

I also managed to convince the board at the theatre to turn what is normally Free Preview Night into a fund-raiser for the National Breast Cancer Foundation.  We are going to charge $25 a seat to see the "sneak preview" and all proceeds will go to the NBCF.  I've already spoken with the NBCF to get their approval as an official fund-raiser for them.  Not only am I helping a great cause, but I'm helping to create a lot more publicity for the show!

I am still without a phone.  They get in the new digitizer either tomorrow or Wednesday, which means it may be as late as Thursday before I get my phone back.  And since I don't have a land line, it's been very weird to be "off the grid" as it were.  Not really completely off the grid because I still have my computer, obviously.  But I have found that with each passing day, I miss Facebook and Twitter less and less.  Facebook even more so since I haven't posted anything on it for two weeks now.  Only a couple people have noticed enough to post anything.  Just goes to show that I wouldn't be missed all that much if I were to truly go COMPLETELY "off the grid."

Working a later shift today.  There is some new software that went down and techs across the country going out to our locations to install it and the dept for whom the techs work is asking that someone stay later in our dept just in case West Coast techs run into any problems.  So we are trading off working the 11am - 7:30pm shift.  We each have to do so once every two weeks so that everyone gets a turn.  And this will go on through April.  Steve and Linda can't rehearse Monday nights for now, so this is the only night I can work that later shift.  It was VERY nice to sleep in the extra 2 & 1/2 hours this morning.  Although Fazio was freakin' out by the time the alarm went off.  I thought it was because he needed to go potty - until I heard the other dog collar rattle outside and I knew it was just that he wanted to see who was out there.

It's also nice to be able to leisurely type this instead of rushing through to get out the door, PLUS I'm having a cup of coffee at home while I'm typing, too!  Usually the coffee has to wait until I get to work.

VERY dense fog outside this morning.  It was so warm last night I slept with just a sheet.  Finally had to pull the comforter back on this morning about the time the fog came in.  It's going to be ridiculously warm for this time of year the next few days - considering it should still be very snowy, we are hitting 75 - 80 degrees (24 - 27 C) the next three days.  Mind you, I'm not complaining that we've had maybe a total of 5 snow days this Winter, it's just so weird to have the extremely warm temps with it, too.  But it is officially the first day of Spring tomorrow, so it's only appropriate it be so nice!

The very first scene with the cape, I walk on, the breeze as I'm walking lifts the cape and it falls right off my shoulders.  I have to pick it up and try putting it back on my shoulders and it distracts me the rest of the scene.

Then, my next scene, as I'm supposed to be "seducing" someone, it falls right off my shoulders again.  I picked it up and threw it on the bed because I was done with it.  What I really wanted to do was throw it on the ground and dance on it, but I couldn't because "it's a rental."  I at least got a laugh for throwing it on the bed.  Otherwise, opening night went well.  And suffice it to say, I now have a snap on my cape as I originally requested.

Last night, the curse was back - one of our two actors playing the Gangsters in the show was too sick to perform.  We had to change some lines and Gangster #2 had to do ALL of the Gangster lines.  That went okay, but it sounded like one of our orchestra members was missing.  They were just somehow really off last night.  LOTS of clunker notes and weird tempos.  To top that off, when I'd finished my number, the woman who plays opposite me tells me that the CEO of the company I work for is in the audience.  She and her husband are friends with him and family.  She said she didn't want to tell me until after my big song so I wouldn't worry.  Eeeek!  Turned out he loved the show and loved talking to us afterward.

Oh - and to top things off yesterday, since it was St. Patrick's Day and since we Americans love bastardizing holidays that have nothing to do with America and turning them into excuses for drunken binges (St Patrick's Day, Cinco de Mayo), a couple actors decided they needed to start drinking at 7 in the morning yesterday.  One luckily quit around 9am.  The other didn't until about 4pm and no matter how much he protested to us that he wasn't drunk, he was still a bit sloppy last night.  And it showed in parts of the performance.

I have only once performed buzzed - my father's best friend, who was my Confirmation sponsor and my father's older sister both passed away within a day of each other and I found out about them both at the same time, a few hours before a performance.  I had ONE whiskey with dinner.  It was a single and I've had more than that and not gotten much from it, but for some reason this one whiskey hit me.  And two hours later at curtain time, I was still buzzed.  And I had to open that particular show with a sword fight!!  Believe me, that was enough for me to NEVER again have ANY alcohol before a performance.  But it also made me wonder - there are several actors in Northeast Ohio who are known for the fact that they WON'T perform unless tipsy and I just don't get it.  How in the HELL could anyone act while drunk or even slightly buzzed??  You need your full faculties to concentrate on what you're doing and to be on your toes for anything that could go wrong, which is why I just don't get anyone who performs that way.

I have also been without a phone since Friday morning.  I had the screen replaced when it was shattered a few weeks back.  And Friday morning my screen stopped responding to my touch, so I can't unlock it to use it.  From what I was told, just below the touch screen is another layer called the digitizer which is what actually responds to your touch.  That is what has stopped working.  The company that replaced my screen is going to replace the digitizer, but the part is not available until Tuesday or Wednesday.  And since I haven't had a land line for years I have no phone.  You don't realize how reliant you are on the phone until you don't have it.  Strangely, however, I have found that the more I am away from Facebook and Twitter, the less I miss them.  Facebook especially.  I haven't been to Facebook except to see if anyone's sent me messages.  Used to be I checked it several times a day.  Now I check it maybe once or twice.  Usually only once since I pretty much only turn my computer on in the mornings, not at night.  And it's now been two weeks that I haven't paid attention to Facebook and two days that I've only seen Twitter on the computer and I'm missing them less each day.  Once I get the phone back, Twitter will be more common since I have many people's tweets sent directly to my phone as texts, but I'm wondering if I'll ever go back to Facebook?

But not before some more drama went down.  We were all gathered into one dressing room around 8:30pm while still waiting on the last bus and told that our Music Director had up and quit on us just before 8pm.  Word has it that she wanted her contract re-written and when the theatre would not comply, she up and walked.  Not only that, but the video camera and monitor which was hooked up so that the orchestra could see the stage from where they were down in the pit belonged to here, so she took those with her as well.

Classy, eh?  After belittling us, after making excuse after excuse for what was going on with them and never ever just saying, "You're right, I need to correct that.  It won't happen tomorrow," she just up and walks out. 

Does she really think she's going to find work again as a Music Director after that?  Does she not know how connected a lot of these theatres are and that they will hear about this?

The remaining 4 people in the band decided to stick by us and stay.  Luckily, it turned out that the director of the Chagrin Valley Light Orchestra was also there and he volunteered to be in the pit to help conduct. 

Thank you Jeebus!!!

It went GREAT!!  It was as if a big weight were lifted off everyone's shoulders.  As another person in the cast put it "I have never seen a show where the announcement that the music director quit just before the first curtain would make everyone so happy!"

The tempos were (for the most part) were they needed to be - FINALLY!!

It went very well.

And now I finally care about the show.  About time.

I don't want to have to deal with this all over again and I most certainly don't want to have to buy another computer when this one is not even two years old yet.

I'm hearing the thunder starting to rumble right now and I'm watching him lift his head up.  Let's see if the Thunder Shirt really makes any difference in his behavior.

Last night was ALMOST a decent rehearsal.  We finally got the monitors up to a decent level so we could HEAR the music.  And somehow the LOO was playing most of the songs at the right tempo!  However, "Show Off" was still the Death March Of The Volga Boatmen.  Luckily, I'm not in that number.  We're all supposed to sing in that number, but there's enough people onstage singing - and I need to save my voice for my number - so I don't sing.  If I did, I would be too furious.  It's as if no one playing the music in that number has ever listened the song on the Broadway soundtrack to hear how the tempo should be.  If it were my song, you'd better believe I'd be speaking up.

Okay, Fazio is now trembling badly, leaning up against my leg, because the thunder is getting louder.  So the Thunder Shirt doesn't seem to be doing that much.  I'm going to have to learn to ignore him and go about my business this morning.  And considering how many thunderstorms we get here, he'd better start getting used to me ignoring this behavior because I'm certainly not going to put up with it and I don't want to coddle him to encourage the behavior.

Preview Night tonight.  Let's see what happens!