Super Cereal!

So this is what our weather map looked like at 9-ish in the evening. Notice the giant red bar with 'blizzard warning' on it? Yup. As I head to bed they have already cancelled school tomorrow for all of us but we still haven't had a single flake. I am hoping we come out on the extreme conservative side of the snowfall predictions, but didn't take any chances. I had Jason run to the grocery store while I went to school (the air thick with anticipation and dread of the coming storm), then on my way home I hit up the HoLo for some crafty essentials. My hands are already dotted with paint, tee hee! When Jason left for work this evening I had him pack extra food and a blanket. I really don't want to take any chances. The midwest is famous for wicked ice storms, after all, and that's a lot harder to drive in than snow. I'm going to go ahead and guess the snow will arrive early this morning, stop Wednesday, and we will be back in school Thursday. Let's see how this pans out...

Almost Human

This poor kitty puts up with so much from us. I've been trying furiously to learn some lines for an audition (Shakespeare is hard. Every syllable MATTERS. You can't mess up the words because it sounds obvious!) and he's been my faithful companion for the better part of the evening. How do I repay him? By flashing a light in his face to get a picture. And that's why we keep him in catnip.

Who's Settling?

I didn't realize it when I took this picture, but you can clearly see Brianna's hand on the right, there, picking up a game piece from the table. Nice. Austin moved to a new house recently, so she decided to throw a small housewarming/game party. The game in question was Settlers of Catan. I had never played it before, but I'm pretty sure I'm hooked. That sucker's fun! It's kind of like Civilization but in board game form, and I'm a Civ geek. Heck, I'm a huge Sid Meyer fan, if I'm being completely honest. It was great catching up with Austin and seeing her new digs. Plus, her new roommate has an awesome and grotesquely fuzzy kitty and a hamster. I think she's in good hands.

Maturity Schmaturity

Sean Wooley's birthday happened to be the day that we put Godspell up in Iowa. Needless to say, he was a bit busy to celebrate, as were all his friends. He decided (and rightly so) to throw a belated bash tonight and only invited a select few. I gleefully accepted the invitation when I found out I had made the cut. He decided to celebrate his quiet maturity now gained from another year on this earth in the best way my generation knows how: by playing Super Smash Brothers with his best friends. Ah, adulthood.

I thawed so

I've been so tired today. I woke up feeling fine, feeling over my cold, then BAM. Four o clock hit and I was completely dragon! Rawr! Even coffee didn't help. (but then, dragons don't like coffee.) We decided to go out to eat as a result, taking the kids to Chick-Fil-A: the fast food place that thinks it's too good for all the other fast food places. Not that I don't appreciate the real flowers in the vases and the wait staff that asks if you need a refill or more napkins, in fact, that's really nice. But at the same time, everything in me says, "Dude....you're still a fast food restaurant." So I kill those voices by eating the yummy chicken sandwiches they make.

No, they're not cutting me a check for this. Dragons don't get paid. Rawr.

All Covered in Cheese.

The placid island of Tejuatanalakalulukauwee rests idly in the intense heat of another tropical day in the Tuyellow Sea. When suddenly, the peace-loving natives of the island are shocked to find that chaos has broken loose. What they thought was just a large hill (or 'Mt. Wapahunakalesh') is in fact an ACTIVE VOLCANO!!!! The villagers panic, but where do you run when you are on a small island surrounded by hundreds of miles of yellow ocean? Families gather together in thatched-roof huts to spend their remaining minutes together. Goodbyes are exchanged. But wait, what's this? Suddenly a bright green dawn of hope appears on the horizon. The people gasp then cheer as giant frosty boulders tumble down the side of their once beloved mountain. They are saved! To this day, Tejuatanalakalulukauwee and her people remain unharmed and going about their daily lives as they have for centuries. However, one important change is readily apparent: A large plastic bag altar that marks the site of the near disaster. And maybe, just maybe, if you're lucky you will run into old Madame Hakkalanai, who will whisper to you the tale of how a bag of Andes mints once cooled the wrath of Mt. Wapahunakalesh's fires, and how the combined forces of brownie mix sand, egg yolk and milk sea, and (of course) a bag of mints came together to create a delicious desert. Which was then quickly eaten.

Hey, they can't all be happy endings.

Sinusarus

I'm sick at the moment,therefore kind of miserable to be around, let's be honest. However, when I came home from school, the sight of Jason helping Bri, with what was apparently an impossible to solve word search that she made, warmed my heart considerably. Bri had girl scouts tonight so Jason and I spent some time with Leigha. Jason's parents love to get the girls t-shirts from vacation destinations, and when we are with them they allow them to pick their own shirt designs. Leigha happened to be wearing one she got in Arkansas that was dark blue in color and pictured a rearing white horse and some lightning. I remarked on the shirt, saying:

Me: Wow, kiddo. That shirt totally makes me think of Napoleon Dynamite, except you're not wearing it ironically.

Leigha: *quizzical look* What's ironically?

Jason and I together: Exactly.

Ah, the simple joys of having kids. Why doesn't anyone mention THAT stuff more than being proud of them at school concerts and plays and stuff? Oh, right. 'Cause we're horrible people.

Just in time

First day of Spring semester for me. I had a rough start this morning, first causing Bri to miss the bus (whoops...you really have to prod that one with an iron poker to get started. Leigha wakes up before me no matter how early my alarm is set!) then forgetting that my class started at 10:30, not 11:00 like I kept thinking. I discovered this when I was fixing my hair...at 10:12...and my school is a 20 minute drive. Somehow (and because it's a theater class) I made it within the first ten minutes of class and gave my teacher a sickly apologetic smile as I walked in late. He knows me (and because it's a theater class) so he just said, "See? Like I just said. You can communicate so much without words." and the whole class laughed. Perfect timing. I got a few syllabuses (syllabi?) and was putting them into my binder when I realized I still had my notes from a class I took last semester, which a friend of mine will be taking this semester and to whom I promised to pass the notes along to. I am a doodler, so I went back through them and found this picture of 'bacon birds.' Wow. I must have been really really SUPER bored to come up with that. Oh, and sleep tight, America! I have pell grants for part of my education, so your tax dollars directly produced these little monstrosities. *salute* U.S.A! U.S.A!

This battery is dead.

Today was spent recovering. Ugh. I really don't believe I've ever had my energy sources THIS depleted in my life. No exaggeration. When I finally got up I moved at about 2mph. While driving. However, life keeps rolling along and I have my first day of spring semester tomorrow, so I grabbed my suitcase and dumped it into the wash, complete with a full load of Chucks. I decided to line them up on the washer to drain before I stuck them in the dryer...I'm just tired enough for this to be HILARIOUS.

The indomitable two

The drive home was unremarkable. I-35 is pretty boring in the winter...at least in Summer you get trees. When I finally got home the girls were already in bed and this sign was on Leigha's door. The lovely depiction of fighting makes me want to see how she would interpret a few Rorschach Charts. Just sayin'. Home sweet home.

Community

Sean Wooley (Blue and gray baseball tee, ginger) was unhappy to learn that I didn't post a picture of him from a couple days ago in the blog, so I promised him I'd get him on today. So, while a bunch of us were hanging in the pool area I snapped this lovely bromance shot of Phil, Graham, and of course, Sean. Good times. Today was the response for Godspell, so we got to listen to what other professionals thought of our work. Most of it was pretty good, the rest was helpful. We also got to see the finals for the Irene Ryan scholarship, which is a huge huge deal and one of our students was in the running. He didn't get it, but he put up quite a fight. And tonight at the FOUR hour long award ceremony, the Godspell cast and crew was pleased to discover that we had been presented with the 'Golden Handtruck Award,' meaning we had the safest, fastest, most professional set load in and strike of all the other shows. Buh-chinga! I think we all came back to the hotel feeling like winners.

The long climb up mount IKEA

This is a picture of me. Behind me is a 2,600 seat theater. Behold it in all its glory!!! BEHOLD IT I SAY!!!!! Or not, whatever. Either way, that sucker was freaking HUGE. We spent a long day, full of shock and awe, building the set, rehearsing, and then performing. And oh what a performance it was! The cast rocked so hard that the audience whooped for anyone from our school at an awards ceremony immediately following the show (in the same theater. It was supremely funny to watch them try to give out plaques with a sense of decorum whilst surrounded by trash, leaves, and a rusted out truck under a set of train tracks.) Immediately following the ordeal was strike. Full of good energy from an amazing show, we took that whole sucker down in about two hours. Even the union workers standing by couldn't believe how fast we were. That's such a great feeling, though. We came up here for the festival with this show weighing heavy on our minds. The whole trip was leading up to this point, even with all the workshops, parties, and frooh frah, and we nailed it. We did exactly what we set out to do and it felt great. One more day of festival to go...its on.

I'm going to my room.

Long day. Lots of drama. Go figure, theater department. At the end of the day (and after seeing a three hour staged version of The Odyssey) we were all exhausted, so Hilary ordered a pizza. After sitting down to grab a slice, she said, "Oh, hey, look! It looks like I got rejected by my prom date!" So we decided that's exactly what had happened.

Pool! Sharks!

During one of the breaks we had today a bunch of us decided to go swimming/hot tubbing and pool playing. All conveniently located in one room (how is the humidity good for the table I wonder?) . As I was over with the group playing pool, Shelby decided she wanted to be a dolphin for everyone and she started jumping out of the water, splashing, going "E-E-E-E-E-E-EEEE!" Hilarious! Phil decided to get in on it to and fed her a goldfish cracker. Nice. We ended a long day of workshops and fun with a Rocky Horror themed party at the convention center near the college. Crazy fun.

Lame Street USA

Behold. A sculpture in downtown Ames, Iowa. I don't quite know what to think of these things, and they're everywhere. Seriously, not just downtown. Either way, day one of the festival. Woo! Somehow between food procurement and workshops I managed to get to the downtown area with Phil and Graham, and we checked out the sights, got some coffee, and figured out that, yeah, this isn't like every other college town. Their main street is dying. Incredibly sad. On the way back to the college campus for an award ceremony, we got really lost out in the country. We turned around to head back into town when the train crossing came to life and did its whole "WATCHOUTTHERE'SATRAINCOMING!!!!!" routine. We sat in the car laughing about how typical this is of the Midwest and how we shouldn't be surprised. We anxiously waited for the last car and just as it slid past our intersection, BOOM!!! Another train came on the other tracks, having been out of our viewpoint until exactly that moment. We erupted with laughter and ultimately waited at that train crossing for about 20 minutes.

Godspeed, Godspell.

Today begins the Kennedy Center American College Festival. All of us theater kids piled into the various vehicles assembled to take us to Iowa. On the way there I spotted a Volkswagon Scirocco, so I had to take a picture. That car is pretty scenic, considering the bleak winter Midwestern landscape. We made it safely to Ames, aired out, then went to a freakishly long orientation. This week is going to be just amazing. Yay!

At least I have a good story now.

Holy carp....okay, so I got up and went to the school at 6am today to begin the neverending Godspell rehearsal/performance. My day consisted of frantically working with the rest of the cast to load the set, costumes, makeup, and everything (EVERYTHING) that goes into making a show happen, and moving it from one theater to another. In one day, we rebuilt the set, refocused the lights, moved the actors to new dressing rooms, mended costumes, set up a makeup room, ran a music rehearsal, then performed the show. *Phew!* My family got to come see it, and Austin was gracious enough to take this picture. And then things got really crazy. We are practicing this heinous process for taking the show to the festival this week in Iowa, so immediately following the performance, we started breaking down the set with the purpose of putting it onto trucks so we can repeat the process Thursday, this time for an audience of 2600 strangers. I began my portion of strike by dumping a ton of costumes into the laundry. Considering how tired I was, it amazes me that I managed to get it there at all...but not too long after I got a rude awakening when I found out that one of the other girls had chosen tonight as the night she just had to dye her shirt green...guess I should have checked the washer first. Whoops. The good news is she was already through the rinsing process and it had been maybe two minutes with the costumes in the washer, so there was no harm done. Barely. I fixed it and restarted the laundry process, then went downstairs to get a drink of water. On the way I saw a friend and decided to tell them about my brilliance, when out of nowhere *WHAP* I got beaned across the temple with the corner of a 2x4. Again, the guy who plays Jesus is a paramedic, so he took me outside (along with a small crowd of concerned friends) to get some snow to put in a bag and hold against the side of my head for the swelling to go down. While we were outside the doors locked automatically (at 11pm when the campus closes) and we were trapped outside, most of us without our coats. After we were let back inside I was examined, given a prognosis of 'Well, you're gonna live." and scuttled back to our jobs, eager to complete the process. When the set was finally broken down and the costumes and makeup and lights all ready to load onto the trucks, we hit a snag. One of the trucks broke down. Are you kidding???? So we ended up sitting around until they finally said, "Okay, it's one am. You guys are cleared to go, we will finish load in tomorrow before we leave." *sigh* So we headed out to our cars, eager for some sleep after a grueling 19 hours at the theater. I got into my car and turned it on...just in time to see the truck (now running fine) pull up. Everyone was already gone, so I watched the driver back it onto the dock and jump into his car and leave, but oh man. What a finishing touch on a looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong day.

Elevensies

Leigha turned eleven today. On a Friday. How lucky is that? Her entrance to tweenagerhood was celebrated with much fanfare and hooplah, with two friends joining us for a pizza dinner, ice skating, and a slumber party. We were disappointed to find out that her owl from Hogwarts seems to be running late, but oh well. Hagrid can't be everywhere at once, I suppose.

Dy-no-MYTE!

Working diligently, I was able to finish another animal hoodie, this one for my friend Angie Gee. She decided to name the lion 'LeStat.' Nice. The kids finally went back to school today. They were relieved as well, I think, having figured out that school means seeing friends. It's great when you're on break and on occasional days off, but when you expect to go three days in a row and end up not...it makes it not as easy to deal with for whatever reason. It was Jason's day off, too, so we ran a ton of errands that had been stacking up the past few days. Felt good to get them crossed off the list. This evening was the final rehearsal for Godspell before the festival. We will be performing again this weekend before we go and then that's it. The performers were all feeling it too, and unfortunately got reamed in notes afterward. The good news is that a bad dress rehearsal means a good show, so let's hope the old adage holds this time.

I felt that...

We had a read through for the scene I'm doing in the play this spring. Lucky me, Austin is my director! We read the scene, talked about our characters, and coordinated schedules. While I was on campus I was lucky enough to find out that today was the first day we could pick up books, so I got that out of the way as well. Yay! I also met up with Angie and Nate. Angie wants one of my increasingly popular animal hoodies (catchphrase of the week from other people: "You need a store on Etsy!") so she gave me the hoodie that she wanted me to sew her lion onto. We also took the opportunity to get coffee together as a trio. I came home after that and began the grueling task of composing a to do list of things to be done before Iowa (we leave Sunday morning) and started the process of knocking them off one by one. Done already: Laundry, make hoodie (oh yes, it's finished. And so cute!), make road trip CD, and finish iPod case (I finally determined that no company had made one as cool as I would like it to be, so I made my own.) I also managed to make dinner, spend time with the kids, and watch a movie with Jason. *Sparkle Faerie Power!!!*

Evil Waffle Face Minions

Another snow day. My kids haven't even gone back to school from Christmas break yet, sheesh. But my life keeps rolling on, so today I stepped out for a bit to drop Tiffany off at the airport and go grocery shopping with Alanna because we're making dinner for church tomorrow. Her kids had a snow day as well so they all came with while my girls stayed behind with Jason (watching a movie while he slept) because, yeah, six kids and two adults in one car? Not unless we had a weird 15 passenger van or whatever, and neither of us have a need for one. We had a great time buying hordes of food while the kids played tic tac toe on a box and looked like a small band of blonde gypsies. I came home and made hot chocolate for the girls (who gave up on making me a snow man and settled on a giant smiley face in the front yard instead) then went to the school for a costume fitting session for the Godspell cast. We want to make sure nobody overindulged during the holidays and nothing went missing or fell apart. Hooray! Nobody did and nothing had!

Blatant Easter Egg

Tiffany says I make her feel normal. I have no clue why someone would find relief in such a horrid title. Guess that's what makes me me. This morning school was cancelled due to the awful snow piling up in the yard. The girls happily declared today 'Harry Potter Day.' I laughed and headed out the door with Tiff to drive across town where she totally nailed her job interview, and was presented with a job offer! She accepted and we enjoyed celebratory sandwiches. We came back to the house and played a few games with the girls and when Jason got up we talked for a bit before he had to head out to work on the crappy roads. We then enjoyed ourselves a girls' night in, complete with a movie and chocolate.

Don't Jump!

I felt like someone decided to viciously twist my innards and squeeze today. Ugh. Fortunately Tiffany went to visit her brother and soon-to-be sister-in-law. (that's a LOT of hyphens. Wow.) I got some good quality food in me and rested a bit this afternoon then went for an abbreviated improv rehearsal. After that concluded I went down to the theater department to check in with the Godspell crew, working furiously to brush it up for the festival next week. I'm glad I went because apparently there's a bunch of costuming stuff happening this week that was never communicated to me! Yeep! So I got a few things done in preparation and came home to watch a few episodes of Daria with Tiffany. We are both exhausted from the past couple days, so, wild things that we are, early bedtime! Hooraisin! She interviews tomorrow morning, so extra sleep will do us both good I think. Jason is also interviewing tomorrow, for a supervisor position at his work. Guess we'll see what comes of it.

Tastykake Queendom

This morning I got up early and picked up Tiffany from the airport! She is here for a job interview, so hopefully this will become a permanent thing. (Yay!) We spent a lovely day shopping and hanging out with my family. Tiffany was super excited to give me a whole slew of presents, including a Tastykake sword, tiara, and breastplate. Oh yes. This evening we messed around with the new Xbox Kinect. I honestly have no idea how long we played but Tiffany and I beat about half of the game together. We were sweaty, sore, and out of breath. Nothing a little sleep can't fix!

Suburban Decay

This is how we always see Vegas. From the air. In my mind, that's the preferable way TO see it, in fact. So obviously today was the day we came home. We left early early early, too. I hate that. But the girls had their huge annual Girl Scout sleepover at Great Wolf Lodge, so we wanted to get back in time for them to go. We made it and Jason deposited two very giddy little ones at the event. We went out for about an hour, just out of principal, but we are utterly spent at this point, so we came home early. I missed my bed. Zzzzzzz...........

The things that make you happy

Lynette took the day off work to spend with us, so we met up this morning and went in to Reno. We went down by the riverwalk and explored a few of the shops down there, then took a walk and chased some pigeons. We also went to Circus Circus and played a bunch of arcade games with the girls, who won several tickets that the spent on fuzzy dice and candy. Perfect souvenirs from Reno if you ask me. After a few more stops (including a trip to In-N-Out Burger...yeah!) we came back and met up with my parents so we could go visit Grandma and Grandpa Smith, who I haven't seen in forever and a day. We had a lovely evening in their new apartment sharing stories about people who had hit, or almost hit, various animals with their cars.

Ready, Freddy

The girls enjoyed playing with their gifts this morning while Jason and my dad stayed in and played with the Kinect as my mom and I headed into Reno. My mom's knee has been bugging her for a while so she decided to try accupuncture. It was fascinating to watch as they inserted eighteen tiny needles into strategic locations. My mom later informed me there were red dots in each spot, at which point I told her to connect the dots. I bet it makes a dinosaur. Rawr. Anyhow, after the doctor appointment we did a bit of shopping and met up with everyone else (boys, kids, and Lynette) and we went to see Tangled. Holy cow, hilarious, cute, and so very watchable. Go see it. We went to dinner after that then came back to the house and wished my grandpa a happy birthday via webcam after opening Leigha's birthday presents. It's his actual birthdate, hers is next week. But hey, when you're only together a few times a year, close enough is good enough.

Just one more

Long long long day. We got up early and went to the airport to fight our way through security and dodge full flights, eventually ending up flying through Phoenix to Reno where my dad picked us up. Yay! 'Bout time we got to get out here and see them. I love getting to see my family, but the way air travel has been (and the fact that Reno is insanely underserviced) getting out to see them has become an exercise in spontenaety and luck. Any type A personalitied person would be weeping in a corner if they heard what we have to do to make it out sometimes. We met up with my mom and Lynette at a pizza place for dinner before coming back to the house and doing the Christmas thing. We got lots of cool stuff, but the real cherry on the sundae was the Xbox Kinect that we got! Woot! Can't wait to make an idiot of myself on yet another gaming platform!

Nice Play, Shakespeare...

Austin is moving! She wants to be closer to the school among other things, so today I helped her pack up some stuff to take to storage. We found this in her tea cupboard so we decided to leave it. Pretty funny, I think. We had a blast loading boxes and pretending to fix up her storage space with a garden and welcome mat as we ran through the hallways with the trolleys, alternating between playing we were being hunted and the elevator was some kind of time machine that took us into a post-apocalyptic world where humankind had been reduced to living in bins like an animal shelter. Hooray! I came home and did a ton of laundry and packing stuff for our trip to visit my family before our break ends. I did lots and lots of packing is what I'm getting at.

Banksy

We had improv rehearsal at our house today. Our regular venue is closed for Christmas break and getting a hold of anyone else this time of year proved impossible (gahhhh...) so I rearranged some furniture and we went to town. Among things I moved, that lamp came downstairs. I think I'm gonna leave it, it looks better here. Hooray for change!

I can see the Sheraton from here.

Hooray for sleeping in! It allowed me to have enough energy to go with a bunch of theater kids to see our fellow thesbian (Graham, the drummer from Godspell) with his band, Adam Evolving, in concert! They were really quite fantastic. It was one of those deals where the venue had booked just a ton of acts slated to perform in a pretty tight window, so we only got to see about four or five songs from each band, but from most of them, that was more than enough. AE was absolutely superb, I am pleased to say. That's not even my own bias, a lot of the crowd came forward as they started playing and increased in energy and size as the show went on. Sweet. We had a little group of theater kids there to begin with, but as the show continued a few more trickled in. It was so great to see everyone! After it was over we all went out to IHOP and annoyed a waiter. Good times, good times.