"The snow's coming down, I'm watching it fall, watching the people around..." ~u2

Y'all are so lucky that I'm a clumsy loser who is so desperate not to write lesson plans that she will do anything to put it off. Actually, I'm not sure who 'y'all' is, because it doesn't seem like I have any readers, so I suppose this is mostly for my own amusement, which is fine. I have a few things to write about today.

Nic and I have made it through 4 of our 6 shows, and we're holding up well. Here are my reactions:
1. The Lion King (on Thursday evening) was entertaining. I've already seen it and it's not one of my favorite shows, but the costumes are very impressive and it's fun just because of the visual spectacle. And the music isn't bad.
2. Rock 'N' Roll (on Friday evening) was amazing. I almost cried a couple of times. It's so dense and confusing and requires such a great deal of concentration and thought that I'm still processing it, but I loved it. I will echo the command of one reviewer and tell you to "Beg, borrow, or steal tickets," because it really is fantastic. It further proves how brilliant Tom Stoppard is. Or, if you can't make it to the Broadway production, at least go read the play. It spans decades and continents and generations, and everything is tied together with rock 'n' roll. There was an insert in the Playbill about Czechoslovakia in the 1960's and Marx and Communism, and I was glad I read it before the play started because otherwise I think I would have been pretty confused.
3. Trumpery (on Saturday afternoon) wasn't bad. It focuses on Darwin around the time he wrote The Origin of Species. It was a little slow at times, and I'm not too interested in the subject matter, but the performances were good. Whenever Manuel Felciano spoke (he played Wallace), I couldn't help but picture him as Toby in Sweeney Todd (he was amazing in that role). His appearance has changed, though.
4. Is He Dead? (on Saturday evening) was great. It's a play written by Mark Twain in 1898, but it was never produced until now (it was just recently discovered). It's about a group of struggling artists who stage the death of one of them to raise the demand for his paintings. Norbert Leo Butz plays the main character and he is absolutely hi-larious. He is such a talented comedian.
Norbert and I (obviously not taken yesterday; this is from after a performance of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels):


5. This afternoon we're going to August: Osage County, so I'll report back on that later.

It is snowing right now. I woke up to see the ground covered with snow. Of course I had to do laundry today. I really was out of clothes, and I couldn't put it off any longer. So at 10:00am I ventured outside to walk 8.5 blocks to go do laundry. It was still snowing hard, and the sidewalks were not shoveled for the most part. I had my granny cart filled to the brim with laundry, and I slowly pushed it along through the snow. I nearly made it to the laundromat with no problems. About a half a block away, I hit a bump. My cart fell forward, and so did I. I ended up spread eagle on top of my cart, with some of my laundry spread all over the snowy sidewalk. Of course this happened directly in front of a store where a group of men were hanging around outside and a bunch of kids had just stepped outside. I had quite an audience. I just lied there for a few seconds in shock. Then I started to laugh. It was just too funny. So funny, in fact, that I decided to reenact it when I got home to show you what I looked like (I was wearing my pea coat, a hat, and my Uggs as well). Picture this in the middle of a snowy sidewalk, with clothes falling out of the cart and a huge group of people standing to the side watching and trying to hide their laughter:

I mean, you have to laugh, right? One of the men asked me if I was okay and if I could get up, and I answered in the affirmative to both questions. I clumsily got up, pulled my cart up and loaded it again, and slowly continued to plow through the snow with as much class as I could muster. Oh, how I dislike snow.

"Broadway is dark tonight. A little bit weaker than you used to be. Broadway is dark tonight..." ~the goo goo dolls

Broadway is definitely NOT dark now, and I'm thrilled about it.

Nic and I are going so show-crazy it's ridiculous. We're making up for lost time during the strike. Check out this schedule:

Thursday: The Lion King
Friday: Rock 'N' Roll
Saturday matinee: Trumpery
Saturday evening: Is He Dead?
Sunday: August: Osage County

That's FIVE shows in FOUR days. And I'm only paying for one of those (my $25 Rock 'N' Roll ticket). We'll also see The Seafarer on Tuesday or Wednesday, so it'll be 6 shows within a week (for a grand total of $25). Pretty crazy. I'm very lucky.

"Hope dangles on a string like slow spinning redemption, winding in and winding out, the shine of which has caught my eye. And roped me in, so mesmerizing, so hypnotizing, I am captivated. I am vindicated, I am selfish, I am wrong. I am right, I swear I'm right, I swear I knew it all along. And I am flawed, but I am cleaning up so well. I am seeing in me now the things you swore you saw yourself." ~dashboard confessional

I loooove that song. They played it at the concert I went to a couple of weeks ago and as I keep listening to my recording of the concert (which turned out really, really well), I'll play that song over and over. The lyrics are great.

My life has been insane lately, I haven't had any time or energy to write. There have been both good and bad insane things. I now feel like unloading, so get ready for a long post. I'm going to start with the bad and end with the good, because I like to end on a happy note.

The bad things:
1. On Friday night (I was at home with my family), actually I guess it was early Saturday morning (around 2:00am), my dog had a seizure. I can't tell you how much Josie means to me. We've had her for 14 years and she's a part of our family. I love her to death. Luckily most of us were still up and hadn't gone to bed yet. I was upstairs but heard her barking/squealing/making strange noises and ran downstairs. She lost control of her bowels, was drooling, and shaking uncontrollably. It was one of the scariest things I've ever seen. I'm crying right now as I'm typing just thinking about it. My dad told me to stay away from her, thinking she could have rabies and might bite me or something, but I ended up just holding her, not caring about getting her poop and drool on me. It finally stopped and she seemed scared. She was hyper and couldn't stop running around the house, stopping occasionally to jump on someone. We called the emergency vet number and my mom and I drove her to the animal hospital. So around 2:30am on Saturday morning I found myself sitting in the backseat of my car, crying as I held Josie as close to me as possible (of course she struggled the whole time). She stayed at the animal hospital that night, and she had another seizure while she was there on Saturday so she had to stay the next night as well. She came home on Sunday night, after I had already left to go back to NYC. They don't know exactly what's wrong with her. Worst case scenario, it could be brain cancer or a brain tumor. There's not really anything they can do to find out. She's on some kind of medication right now (I'm not sure what it does; I think it's like codeine). My parents say she's doing okay, but I'm still terrified. I can't lose her. I would be devastated. She means so much to me. I know she's old (14), but she still seems like she has a lot of life left in her. So that really shook me up.

2. I was observed this week at school. That's a serious thing. The principal can either give you an S (satisfactory) or U (unsatisfactory), and if you get a U you're in serious trouble. You have to meet with the principal ahead of time to discuss your lesson plan, which we did on Tuesday, and mine needed some changes. On Tuesday night I spent 6 hours working on it. 6 Hours for a 90-minute lesson. How crazy is that? And that was just 6 hours of revising what I already had done. Total it was like 10 hours. So I was very stressed this week because of that. I didn't sleep at all last night. I was observed today and luckily I got an S.

The good things:
1. I can now relax a little bit (nerves-wise, not work-wise; I still have tons of planning to do) because I have my S.

2. I got to spend lots of time with my family last week. Thanksgiving was fantastic, as usual. My aunt and uncle's new apartment is beautiful, and we all managed to fit into it rather nicely. We had lots of family staying with us over the weekend and I loved seeing them.

3. There was a free run-through of the Broadway play The Homecoming on Sunday night. Because of the strike (which just ended!), they couldn't begin previews when they were supposed to and they wanted to perform in front of an audience. It was their first time doing it in front of people, and they performed it at a small off-broadway theater because they couldn't use their own. Raul Esparza joked that apparently the setting of The Homecoming is now Cuba (because the set for Celia was up). Despite those obstacles, they did a good job. It's a bizarre play, though. I think it's one of Harold Pinter's most controversial. The actors, although they still need some time to become accustomed to their roles, gave strong performances for the most part. Ian McShane was particularly hilarious. I adore Raul Esparza, I think he's one of the strongest (if not the strongest) musical theater actors working today, but he seemed nervous and he needs to work on his accent. Eve Best was wonderful. Anyway, it was a great evening of theater and I was very glad to be able to go. They collected money for BC/EFA, a wonderful organization that's been suffering because of the strike, which was very smart and kind of them.

4. On Monday night I went to a free advance screening of The Savages. Go see it. Now. Seriously. It's wonderful. Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman give Oscar-worthy performances (I'd really love to see Laura Linney win an Oscar; she deserved to win for You Can Count on Me). The Savages is brilliantly written, directed, and acted. It's funny and sad and hopeful and touching. I really expect and hope to see it do well when awards season rolls around. My great-aunt has dementia, and my mom keeps joking that she should take her to see it. I don't think she would understand the connection to her at all, because she doesn't realize she has a problem.

5. The Broadway strike is over!!! Nic and I are going to see Rock 'N' Roll on Friday and I can't wait. I was supposed to see it last week but of course it was canceled because of the strike. We're also seeing one or two other plays this weekend (she has comps).

That's all for now. I think. I need to start planning lessons for tomorrow.

I'll leave you with my baby:


ETA: Just got a call from Nic, now I'm going to see The Lion King on Broadway for free tonight! The comps are rolling in for Nic right now. Never mind that I have no lesson plans completed for tomorrow. I'm not crazy about The Lion King, but I'm not one to pass up a free show. And I think I know the kid who's playing Simba. Ah, the perks of living in New York. And having a best friend who works in theatre.

"As we lie in the shade of poison trees, are we as safe as we let ourselves believe?" ~dashboard confessional

After school yesterday I got to stick around for five hours of parent-teacher conferences. Five hours. That was fun (can you sense my sarcasm?). When I finally got home after 9:00pm I just collapsed on my bed. It was an exhausting day. I did have a nice dinner with some other teachers, though. We went to a Dominican restaurant near the school. Victoria and I had cheeseburgers and fries (for $4!); we were surprised and relieved to find that on the menu at a Dominican restaurant. We've both tried Dominican food a few times, and although some of it's good, we haven't entirely warmed to it yet. Today was a crazy day. My students assumed that they were on vacation already and were even wilder than usual.

I am soooo glad that tomorrow is Thanksgiving. It's definitely towards the top of my list of favorite holidays. Every year a bunch of my family members (sometimes up to 50 of us) cram into my aunt and uncle's Manhattan apartment. I can't wait to see everyone. It's crowded and busy and noisy and chaotic and absolutely wonderful. They just moved less than a month ago from the UES to Chelsea, and I know they've been working insanely hard to get settled in time to host Thanksgiving. They've hosted it for as long as I've been alive, so they're not going to stop now. Their new apartment is really nice, too, and bigger than their old one. This year I'm excited because I'll have a really easy commute; I just have to take the 1 train downtown. My parents are driving in and I'll ride home with them. My great-aunt, my grandparents, and my uncle and his family (who live in Maine) are all staying at my family's house this weekend, and my brother and I will both be home, so our house will be full (there will be 12 of us). It's like an extra-long Thanksgiving. I love my family, so I'm thrilled that I'll get to spend time with them. I do have work to do, but I'm trying not to think about that. I'm afraid I'll be going crazy Sunday night trying to get everything ready for school next week.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

"You have stolen my heart." ~dashboard confessional

I'm very lucky; I've been to some really, really amazing concerts. Wednesday night was another one to add to my list of indescribably amazing nights. Nicole and I went to the Dashboard Confessional concert. It was absolutely fantastic. It was the last show of the tour, and Chris was really on fire. It was at the Blender Theatre, where I got to see Counting Crows a few weeks ago. It's a great, intimate venue. I was in the second row and had a perfect spot. Augustana was one of the opening bands and they were good. I have their album and I like it. It seemed like most of the crowd only knew the words to "Boston," though. Heh.
Dashboard was superb. Chris played all of my favorite songs, and it was a good crowd. There were lots of sing-alongs; it's always fun when the performer lets the crowd get involved. Adam Duritz was at the show, in the crowd during the main set. During the encore he came onstage and sang "So Long, So Long" with Chris (they sing it on the album version together). It killed me. I loooove that song, and their voices are just so beautiful together. They also did "Angels of the Silences" and "Rain King" together (some members of Augustana came back onstage and joined them for "Rain King"). It was so incredibly cool. I hoped Adam would show up because I know he's good friends with Chris, but I never would have expected him to sing two Counting Crows songs along with the Dashboard song. And Adam's spot onstage was directly in front of me, which made it especially exciting. I took some videos, and I'll post them next week (I can't upload them on my Mac). I also recorded audio of the entire show; let me know if you want a copy. It's definitely my best recording so far; I'm really happy with it.