"Is a Puzzlement"

I don't know if this happens to everyone, but lately I have realized that "multi-task blogging" is hard for me.  You may never have heard of multi-task blogging....that wouldn't surprise me since I just made up the phrase!  So, what do I mean?

In the time that I have been a blogger, I have come to recognize that blogging has several distinct parts: 

***  Reading blogs
***  Commenting on blogs
***  Writing  my own blog
***  Reading comments I get
***  Responding to comments occasionally
***  Discovering new and interesting blogs

If there is a day when I actually accomplish all of the above parts, I consider that a multi-tasking blogging day!  See?

Unfortunately, what I am discovering is that if I spend much time reading, commenting, and discovering blogs, I don't usually write my own!  Sometimes its because I find myself in awe of really winning blogs.  Writers that have a real gift for painting lovely self-portraits in words.  Sometimes it's that I just end up sitting for a very long time and my not-so-little bum gets sore!  Sometimes it seems that I do blog-stuff all day long and that can't be good!. 

Sometimes, it's that I keep finding new blog sites that I love and I add myself as a follower and then I realize I don't have a new posting to invite my new bloggy friends to visit.  Not only that, but the new blog is just one more blog to add to the already long list I read each day. 

Whatever it is, once I read and comment on a bunch of other blogs, I seem to lose my motivation for writing. 

Thus, I find that I incapable of multi-task blogging!

When I analyse the problems, it becomes increasingly clear that I cannot manage my blogging time appropriately.  I just need a better system, right?  One that doesn't end up overwhelming me.  Trouble is, I haven't figured out what that system might be!! 

I have enough difficulty in identifying topics I want to write about in the first place!  By spending so much time on other people's blog, I am basically shooting myself in the foot!   Read first? Write first? Comment first?  I really have to figure this out soon!

Let me tell you, "Is a Puzzlement!!"

"All the World's a Stage" Story #5

Yesterday I told you about one of my encounters with theater gremlins.  And I left you with a teaser....today I would tell you about me and Nelson Eddy (and the gremlins).  So here's story #5.   This one is a kind of triumph for me because I beat the little devils, hands down!

I was in a production of  "Jerry's Girls", an ensemble cabaret show with a cast of 16 women.  The show is a showcase for some of the most well-known of Jerry Hermann's songs and a few of the not-so-well-known songs.  All of his big successes ("Mame", "Hello Dolly", "La Cage Aux Folles") are represented as well as his lesser known shows ("Mack and Mabel", "A Day in Hollywood, A Night in the Ukraine.)  Each cast member was in several musical numbers, but several had their own moments too, where they were the featured soloist.  Okay, you following me??  It was essentially all of Jerry Hermann's favorite songs, with lots of singing and dancing by a bunch of talented women in pretty costumes!
 
My song was an obscure little ditty that Hermann wrote for  "A Day in Hollywood and A Night in the Ukraine", an even more obscure show.  The song is called "Nelson". 

In it Jeannete MacDonald (that would be me), wearing a bonnet over her blonde curls, sings of the difficulty of appearing opposite the completely untalented Mr. Eddy (“Nelson”).  As we didn't have any men on hand, we substituted a free-standing, life-sized, black and white, cardboard cutout of Nelson Eddy, sporting his Mountie uniform complete with hat.   It's a funny song, that practically no one had ever heard of!  Here are some of the lyrics to give you the idea:

NELSON - by Jerry Hermann

My heart, my love, my life is his alone
But if, but if, but if the truth be known....

My hero must stand on a box in our love scenes
God, does he act like a lox in our love scenes
Nelson, what you're putting me through

And all of his notes above B flat, verbotten!
And all of his notes below B flat are rotten
Oh, Nelson, Don't call me, I'll call you

His love making casts such a pall
It's not hard to sleep through at all
His vocal chords carry insurance by Lloyd's
and so I might add, should his adenoids

The lights wilt his hairdo,
on camera he'll primp, and quite frankly,
his hair isn't all that goes limp.

*******
A symbol of virtue and class
America's sweethearts, My ass!
 "A pair made in heaven," the fans love to say
but each time we kiss I swear that he's gay.

In film after film after film I betrothed him,
we snuggled and smooched,
and oh God, how I loathed him.

My Nelson,
oh so calming you'll never need embalming
Oh Nelson, what you're putting me through!


Not exactly a song about the love affair of the century is it?  But it was great fun to sing and the audiences loved it! 

Jeannette....um... .I sang to the cardboard Nelson and danced around him while I sang.  Toward the end of the song there is a brief musical interlude during which I would pick up ole' Nelson, heft him up to my shoulder and carry him to the other side of the stage, arriving just in time to set him down, and pick up the song and sing to the end. 

So you get the picture?

We eventually came, as you always do, to the last performance of the run....and (because no one ever seems to learn NOT to do this!), the show was being filmed.  Naturally, the gremlins appeared....during MY song.

Went through the first part of the song just fine, the audience was laughing and loving it!  The interlude arrived, so I chucked him over my shoulder and marched him to the other side of the stage.  I set him down, took a breath, ready to sing after the end of the interlude. 

Suddenly, before we got any further, Nelson fell face first, about halfway off the front of the stage, falling on top of one of the floor mikes with a loud boom.  There was a collective gasp from the audience, the band stopped completely, and I just stood there looking down in disbelief!   "Oh crap!  What do I do now???" 

It's amazing how many possibilities run through your head at a time like this.  I quickly considered and rejected several choices, when the perfect solution occurred to me. 

I bent down, grabbed Nelson his "ankles" and pulled him back on stage.  As I lifted him into a standing position, I leaned forward a bit toward the audience and said, "I told you he was a wuss!!"  The audience exploded with laughter, giving me time to be sure he was actually settled where he belonged.  The conductor looked at me, raised her eyebrow inquiringly, I nodded, the band and I came in together, at exactly the right spot and on we went. 

The audience clapped for a looong time at the end of the song!!

The tricky little gremlins hung their evil little heads in defeat and exited, stage left!

It actually looks pretty good on the tape!

"All the World's a Stage" Story #4

I don't believe in ghosts, spirits, vampires, witches, warlocks, and all such ethereal beings; but I do believe in gremlins....theater gremlins!

A gremlin (at least, in my definition) exists only within the confines of any "stage" upon which actors "play".  They are puckish little imps, who pop out of some hidden cave deep in the caverns of "backstage" at some point during the run of every show!   They delight in creating minor havoc at one or more times during  the most inconvenient times....during a performance when said actors are on stage and right in the middle of the highpoint of their performance!  Always!

Oh, and there are two other conditions that usually exist when the little guys  create their "Gotcha" moment.  One or both of these conditions are almost always true.  The gremlins come out in force when:

1)  It is the very last and final performance of the show before it all disappears forever, never to be seen again;  and/or

2)  A video recording (for Archive and teaching  purposes only--ahem) is being made at that performance and will not be done again.   So that the only record of the show will forever more include whatever mischief these imps come up with!

I do want to make it clear, I'm not talking about the disasters that sometimes occur on stage.  No blood, no collapsing walls, furniture, or actors!  No, what I mean is the little something that never, ever happened before, and rattles the actors a bit, throwing off everyone's timing, or just plain embarrassing the cast.

These kinds of things happen for no explainable reason, except the Gremlins are loose again!  To wit:

I was in Noel Coward's "Blithe Spirit", a wonderful show about ghosts.  I was playing the medium, Madame Arcati (one of my favorite roles ever!)  All thru the run, every performance ran like clockwork with all the "ghostie" things happening without a hitch.  Until....(duhn, duhn, duhn) the final performance when the video was being made!  The camera was rolling and the little things began to happen:

* someone was late for an entrance, so we had to ad lib a bit to fill some time.
* a table that usually levitated smoothly, made a rather bumpy ascent and descent.
* one of the "ghost" actors, briefly got her costume caught on the edge of a set piece

(So you see what I mean?  Just enough to unsettle everyone.)

During the middle of her "seance", Madame Arcati screams,  falls to the floor in a dead faint, and the lights go "out" (lights "out" on stage is a relative term)   She remains there, in clear view of the audience, but unseen by the actors while there is a lot of other stuff going on.  I had choreographed my fall so that it looked very natural and believable, but I was actually moving sideways to a sofa, that I fell on and then slid gracefully to the floor.  A very controlled movement that kept me from breaking my neck! 

Went perfectly EVERY performance!  Always in control, looking good! 

Well, not that night, because the gremlins were there.

When the moment arrived, I screamed and started my fall.  For whatever reason, I hit the sofa at the wrong angle and down I went, faster than a speeding bullet, flat on my back, with my head hitting the floor with an audible clunk.  It was not a stage fall, but a real fall.  I was "unconscious" so there was nothing I could do to break the fall, except hope for the best.  I didn't break my neck, or start bleeding, and I wasn't at all injured, so the audience didn't realize anything had happened.  Not too bad, huh?  Nothing to be upset about, right?  So why was I upset??

When I started the fall, the different angle did something that caused my skirt to slide up, and up, and up....till it was practically around my waist.  I could feel it, the audience could see it, the other actors could see it, but there wasn't a thing anyone could do but let me lie there flashing my "dainties" at the world for what seemed like an eternity, until I was "found" by the sweet man playing the doctor. During his examination he pulled the errant skirt back down a bit, so that I was no longer X-rated!  Nevertheless, it is saved forever on videotape!   Oh crap!!

If you look closely I think you can actually see the little gremlins laughing and pointing at me from the back of the sofa!   I'm pretty sure those creepy little thugs pushed me!!!

That wasn't the only time I was their target either!  Come back tomorrow, and I'll tell you about me and Nelson Eddy!!

"Do You Remember?"

People remember precisely where they were and what they were doing when major tragedy strikes.  My mother would always remember the attack on Pearl Harbor.  I will always remember the Kennedy assassinations, the assassination of Martin Luther King, the space shuttle disasters, and September 11, 2001. 

When these horrible events occur, they become indelibly etched into our memory and some of the images can be called to mind forever after.  Some times the things we remember are good news, but mostly they are not.  Mostly they are horrifying, unbelievable, and frightening.  Things no one ever expected or wanted.  Very few are natural events like earthquakes or huge fires.  They are more likely the work of insane, fanatical, zealous, misguided, or downright evil people who believe it is vital that they undertake an action that will result in many deaths, injuries, pain, loss, destroyed families, and broken hearts.   Their actions defy understanding, are hard to forgive, and impossible to forget.

Today, it is 9 years since two commercial airliners full of typical passengers, were hijacked by terrorists and flown directly and purposely into the twin towers of the World Trade Center.  Everyone watched as those buildings came down like some sort of insane chain reaction, first one and then, unbelievably, the other.  Nearly 3,000 people died.....ordinary people who had gone to work on an ordinary morning....firefighters and police who were desperately trying to get people out of the buildings before they, too, were buried in the rubble of the collapsed buildings.....all the passengers and crew of the airliners....and the terrorists who had commandeered the planes. 

We watched it all happen, live, from the safety of our own homes, but afterward, our safety became even more fragile than ever before.  Fear became part of our day to day lives for quite awhile and we are still feeling the effects of that awful morning.

So "Do You Remember?"   Of course you do!  None of us who saw it will ever forget.

"Bits and Pieces" (ad infinitum)

Just a little of this, and a little of that:

*** Today would have been my mother's 89th birthday (I think).  Back in the Depression my mom lied about her age in order to get a job; she actually made herself older!  It took years for it all to get sorted out with the SSA, the IRS, insurance policies and even us....well, me!  The result was that even now I'm not sure without looking it up if she was born in 1921, 1922, 1923, or 1924!  To make matters worse, she and my dad were married on September 15.  So when September 9 rolls around, I've  always had to stop and think whether it was her birthday or their anniversary, and I was never sure exactly how old she was.  Sometimes even she forgot!  

So like I said, today would have been her 89th birthday, I think.  She has been gone for nearly seven years now.  Her age doesn't really matter anymore.  I miss her still and will forever!  I sure wish I could hear her laugh again!  Love you, Momma!

*** Each year there comes a day, when the season changes from summer to fall.  No matter what the calendar says, today felt like that day.  There's just something about the angle of the sun and when and how darkness falls, and a certain crispness in the air, even if it is still warm, that moves my perception into fall.  As  I wrote a while back, I will miss this summer.  It was a really good one, the only bad part was that it was over too soon!  Even though fall brings back to school, changing leaves, Halloween, and Thanksgiving, it can also bring cold-ish temperatures that make me think of winter; and I reeeaaally don't like winter, even in Austin!  Nevertheless, that won't happen for a little while yet, I hope, and fall is my 2nd favorite season.  Happy fall!

*** As a former Floridian I would unequivocally like to say that Preacher Jones is not representative of Preachers or the people of Florida.  He is in a class by himself.  Talk about dumb ideas!!  Burning Islam's most Holy Book?....in public?....with media coverage?  Ohh yeah, that's really brilliant!  Whatever in the world did he and his "congregation" expect to achieve?  The whole thing sounds like a publicity stunt to me.  Sort of like the kid-in-the-balloon parents and the White House party crashers.  If you hear the words "reality show" coupled with his name, you'll know!  If that doesn't happen, then this guy is a World Class Idiot!  Actually, even if it does happen, this guy is a World Class Idiot!

***The media isn't coming off too well in this "incident" either!  They should have just left the story in the oblivion it deserved!  Whatever happened to journalistic and broadcasting standards??  The new standards must be, "If it's stupid, dangerous, outrageous, or deceitful, it's NEWS!"   Bah!

*** September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.  Every day in the U.S.  46 children are diagnosed with some type of Cancer.  Every Day!   One of every 5 of those diagnosed children will die of the disease.   That's 9.2 children who will die! 

The only thing that will change those statistics is research to find a cure!  Please contribute as much as you can to CureSearch:  http://www.curesearch.org/about_us/index.aspx?id=7840, or any other research group working on Childhood Cancer.  How many kids can we bear to lose?  

***Hermine, the most recent hurricane to make landfall in the U.S. came by Austin Tuesday. It pretty quickly was downgraded to a tropical storm and then to just a tropical depression.   Whatever it was, didn't actually go over Austin, but we got the rain anyway!  Lots and lots of rain.  Parts of the Austin area got 11-12 inches of rain!  Whoa!  That's a lot of water! All of the normally little, nearly non-existent creeks turned into raging rivers from the run-off.  We had flooded roadways, traffic accidents, even a fatality of someone who ignored the warnings and unsuccessfully tried to drive through the moving water. 

The development in which we live is located at the second highest elevation in Austin, so there was no flooding near our house.  Ratchlet lives in a part of Austin that is not close to any of those raging rivers.  Thus neither of us suffered any damage or losses.   And we are grateful!

And there you have it, "All the news that's fit to print."  See??  "News" doesn't have to be "stupid, dangerous, outrageous, or deceitful" to be interesting!