Tues. Aug. 29, 2023: A Swirl of Retrogrades, Theatre, and Words
image courtesy of Rachel Burkum via pixabay.comTuesday, August 29, 2023
Waxing Moon
Pluto, Saturn, Neptune, Venus, Chiron, Mercury, Uranus Retrograde
Cloudy and humid
Yes, we are now up to SEVEN retrogrades. Uranus went retrograde yesterday. Ick.
Did you have a good weekend? Are you ready for our regular Tuesday morning catch-up?
Today’s serial episode is from Legerdemain:
Episode 115: Is It Worth Saving Him?
Shelley faces the dilemma of putting her life at risk to save the assassin’s, or letting him die.
I’ve been looking at hotels and air b&b information for the reading in Easthampton. The prices are about the same. Frankly, I think I’d be more comfortable being anonymous in a hotel than staying in someone’s spare room. But I also want to see how the weather is, how the twilight holds up, etc., closer to the date, to see if maybe I can just make it home that night and not spend the money.
It’s the day before Mercury goes direct, so there are bound to be challenges.
I’ll take another look at hotel prices after Labor Day. Maybe they’ll go down a bit.
I drafted an episode of Legerdemain before I headed out to the Clark. The staff is getting to know me there, which is fun, because I can hear all about the stuff that’s important to them when they’re not working at the museum.
Of course, I was down at the Munch exhibit again. Checked in with my WOMEN ON THE BRIDGE. But spent time with several of the other pieces, too. The woman in SUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (THE VOICE) started telling me her story. Not sure if it’s going to be a monologue or a prose poem or a flash fiction yet.
And spent time with the SEPARATION oil and lithos, getting the beginning of that play started, based on that sad snippet of conversation I heard in front of it a few weeks back. Got about a half a page of that play (it’s a short play) and some notes.
Read some of the catalogue, and I will have to buy my own copy, because the text is every bit as amazing as the photos of the art.
It was sunny when I emerged from the lower level gallery, so I sat by the reflecting pool watching them set up for this weekend’s concerts.
On the way home, I did a grocery shop. Of course, it was back to threatening to rain again. After lunch, I did the rounds to promote ANGEL HUNT, and then got the next four episodes of AH revised, polished, uploaded, and scheduled. Did the log lines. Did the graphics for next week’s Legerdemain episodes. Did the episode videos for Legerdemain, Angel Hunt, and Deadly Dramatics, and uploaded/scheduled them onto TikTok.
Doing some research for something else, I discovered that the house we live in was originally built in 1890.
It was past 4 then, so I called it a day, at least as far as the computer was concerned.
Started reading THE VERY SECRET SOCIETY OF IRREGULAR WITCHES by Sangu Mandanna. Absolutely adored it.
Up early on Saturday. I worked on the next two Process Muse posts. I think I may rip one of them apart completely and restructure it.
My mom was so excited to get dressed up to go to the opera. It was very cute.
We made good time driving to Pittsfield, but, of course, parking is always an issue at The Colonial. I dropped my mom off at the theatre, and drove around a few blocks to park on the street, hoping I wouldn’t get a ticket. I managed to cut through some private parking lots and the back of the theatre property, so I didn’t have to walk all the way around some very long blocks.
We were up in the nosebleed seats, up in the gallery. We took an elevator all the way up, but then had to descend some steep, scary stairs to get to our bench (bench seats, not theatre seats). Once we were in them, it was fine, but getting to them was a bit fraught, due to the steep incline.
The theatre dates back to 1903, and its opening production was the opera ROBIN HOOD. It’s been lovingly restored; basically, anything that didn’t move was gilded.
We were among the few who masked; there were way too many of the unmasked who were obviously sick and shouldn’t have been there. Plus, they were fucking rude, acting like they were in their living rooms.
I continue to hate the general public.
The opera itself was lovely. Very good voices, and it was nice to see a cast that wasn’t all white. Musetta and Marcello were exceptionally good. Rodolfo was more subtle and good. Mimi was a beautiful singer, but not that great an actress. Colline had a gorgeous voice, but mugged his way through it.
The set was fine, the directing a bit heavy-handed at times, but, hey, opera. The tech was abysmal. They needed more rehearsal. I expect they got a one-and-done, and didn’t get a chance to work anything out. The scene changes were far too long. But then, there was no stage crew listed, so perhaps it fell to the chorus to shift the sets. The top of Act III had to stop and start again, because someone hit the wrong button/pulled the wrong fly rope, and as the curtain went up, the supertitle frame crashed down and got stuck. They brought up the house lights and fixed it, kudos to just getting it done, and the audience rooted for them and cheered when it finally got fixed. The supertitles were basically useless, because charcoal gray lettering on a black screen isn’t particularly visible.
The opera was Puccini’s La Bohème, which is sung in Italian and set in Paris. And, I decided, watching the second act, should be subtitled “Men Acting Stupidly Yet Again.” Because Rodolfo and even Marcello created reasons to fight with Mimi and Musetta that had nothing to do with who those women were and their behavior. I wanted to bitch slap the two of those characters, even though the performers did an excellent job.
But it was overall well done, and my mother was so happy. I’m glad I got to take her to something that made her happy.
Then, of course, we had to get out of there.
Instead of crawling back to the top of the gallery (which was the only way we could have gotten up), we sidled to the side aisle and went out the door to the stairwell. Which meant we (and all our fellow, mostly older patrons) had to walk DOWN two flights of concrete stairs, rather than getting to an elevator. But the stairs spit us out into the parking lot.
My mom felt well enough to walk the shortcut through the private parking lots to the car. Which I’d parked under a tree, so it wasn’t too hot, and I didn’t have a ticket.
So that all worked.
I stopped at Adams Fresh Market to pick up some baked goods, and we made it home before the rain started again.
Old friends called; they are going to stop by in early October to visit. I will be in studio at the time, but I’ll leave baked goods, and they can visit with my mom. They’re coming up for the weekend to see the Munch exhibit.
Cooked dinner and read IRREGULAR WITCHES until bedtime.
Woke up around 2:30, fretting and worrying. Charlotte did her best to purr me back to sleep, but it didn’t work. By about 4, I gave up and moved to the sofa, where I dozed off and dreamed about studio work.
Woke up around 6 to incessant feline demands for breakfast, and then was on the couch, finished IRREGULAR WITCHES, which is a book I love so much I may have to buy my own copy (I read a library copy).
Polished, uploaded, and scheduled four more episodes of ANGEL HUNT. I’d hoped I could get eight up, but I ran out of time.
Got dressed and headed out for Lenox again. Traffic was okay; not too bad, but there are still a lot of tourists, and it tends to bottle up around Pittsfield. But I made it to the Mount, arriving just a single minute before the house opened.
The play was good, a one-woman show built around Julia Ward Howe called REPRESENTATION AND HOW TO GET IT. It is not a traditional play in the way it invites the audience in and takes a turn near the end, which then led into the post-show discussion with the director and two women who are local political activists/representatives. One I had met before, at the small business expo. The director is someone of whom I have fond memories, when we were both at the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation in NYC decades ago. I said a quick hello after it all, and will follow up with a note.
There was some information in the play that I did not know, and which was chilling. When the Declaration of Independence was first written, women had the right to vote. One by one, the states removed it, with the final state being New Jersey, where unmarried women could vote until 1803.
The current Republican party wishes to go back to those days.
I had put a chicken in the crockpot late morning, so I didn’t have to worry about dinner when I got back. Made stock after.
Jeremy Rock Smith sent us a video about what’s going on with him; I owe him an email anyway, so it was good to have this additional information.
Tried to read in the evening, but had trouble concentrating. Had a bad night, where I woke up around 1:30, worrying. Didn’t get back to sleep until nearly 4, and then overslept, upsetting the cats.
Was completely unsettled, not knowing where to start first, with a giant list of what has to get done this week.
Also worn out by the whiny “I want to be a full-time writer” posts on social media. No, boo, you do not. Or you wouldn’t make so many excuses not to write. You want the fantasy of having written and getting acclaim. You don’t want to do what it takes to actually be a full-time writer, which means putting the work first, and, if you have a non-writing day job, treating the writing as your second job until it is your only job. You want to HAVE WRITTEN, and be praised for it. You’re not about the actual writing.
Scroll past. Not worth getting into the argument.
I dithered for a bit, wondering where to start first. Then, I figured, just start SOMEWHERE and work from there.
I drafted an episode of Legerdemain. I wrote 3 of the short Llewellyn pieces. I submitted a proposal to a theatre company in Philadelphia for a two-year community project. I revised, edited, and polished “The Forest Library” short story and sent it off to two potential markets. I looked at a bunch of other submission guidelines, and noodled ideas for three teaching project proposals I need to get out the door.
After lunch, I started tackling ANGEL HUNT. The four episodes needed a good bit of revision, and wound up broken into six episodes. Polished, uploaded, scheduled, series bible updated, along with all the other paperwork, log lines written.
I’d thrown an email at a radio producer in Chicago for future submission calls, and he invited me to submit now for 2024. He wants BBC format, so I needed to convert a couple of pieces, and then off they went. I hope they fit what his company is looking for. He did a stint at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. I’m telling you, we are all six degrees of Kevin Bacon.
The Cultural Council has more funding opportunities opening next month, so I will see if there’s anything that makes sense.
By late afternoon, it started raining again.
And I still hadn’t gotten my admin work done.
Cooked dinner, tried to read at night. Started reading the latest book by an author whose work I’ve read for years, and who is trying something different. Good for her. I was too tired to get very far, and went to bed early.
Woke up around 3:30, managed to Yoga Nidra myself back to sleep, and dreamed I was on a theatre retreat and some of the actors started playing hockey. Makes no sense.
Up a little late this morning, and having a slow start. I need to do some writing this morning, then do the paperwork I didn’t finish yesterday, because it has to go out certified mail today, so it arrives where it needs to before the holiday.
I will tackle each task as I can, until I have to leave for yoga.
A white supremacist shot three black people at a Dollar store in Jacksonville. It’s the guns, you assholes. Stop letting these murderers buy guns and then use them. And then a faculty member was killed at UNC yesterday. I hope it’s not the professor I studied with a few years back. It’s the guns.
I would rather go back to bed, but too bad for me. Have a good one!
