So, I guess I’ll pick up where I left off?
Apologies for typos… my personal home PC keyboard has long been a pain in the ass and will delete letters or add letters seemingly at will.
So, the rehearsal on Sunday went much better than expected. I only got two line notes and that was because of what I’d mentioned earlier. If I don’t get the cue line at all or if the next line bulldozes my line entry… I’m not going to fight with another actor on stage. Ignore it, pretend like it never happened, and keep going. Unless it is a pivotal plot point, don’t derail the damned thing!
The two big examples were:
Diedre cries
Marj: Oh dear!
Clarke: Are you unwell?
Beau: Are you alright, poppet?
And what happened was… Diedre cried, Mari remained silent, and Beau rushed “Are you alright?”
then the other one was
Beau: Sylvie, you had something to say?
Sylvie: Ah, yes. The telephone call.
Clarke: I thought I heard it ring.
Sylvia: Marji, come on out, dear, you should hear this too!
And what happened was… Sylvia combined lines “Ah yes. The telephone call. Marki, come on out dear, you should hear this too!” and so I felt I thought I heard it ring not only didn’t significantly add to the scene but at that point would seem odd considering now we were mostly “waiting” for Marji to come out.
But truth told… we’re much closer to being audience ready. We’re not quite there yet. If Makeup and Costumes account for 8% and having the actual props (including food and drink) account for 7%… Sunday’s rehearsal showed that we are 80% there to being audience ready. Which is a perfect place to be with more than a week to previews. It means, hopefully, we can spend the next week of rehearsal finishing that last 5% in scene work before we add the costumes and full props during Tech! FINGERS CROSSED!
After rehearsal, as ever, I came home and the dog and I went to the dog park. VERY cold. VERY windy. But there was another dog there (there haven’t been MOST of the times we’ve gone this winter) so Nala really wanted to stay and play. Which meant an hour or more at the frozen dog park. From there it was straight home to begin on this slow cooker recipe.
THIS SLOW COOKER RECIPE IS A PERFECT EXAMPLE OF WHAT I MEAN WHEN I SAY THE RECIPES ARE NOT Witch’s Brew enough for me! I need a “dump and cook” not.... this. First: the beginning instruction is “dice the following into bite size pieces” and then lists
3 pounds of chicken, 3 large carrots, 5 Yukon Potatoes, and 3 sweet onions. Dicing alone took me 2 hours! Then you throw all of those various small chunks into the slow cooker; add 3 more ingredients and let cook. A WITCH’S BREW SLOW COOKER RECIPE WOULD THEN BE COMPLETE AFTER COOKING… but not this one. AFTER it cooks, add 10 Curry cubes one at a time, making sure to stir until each cube has dissolved into the liquid before adding another. Add two more ingredients after and let simmer for another 15 minutes. WHEN THAT IS OVER or WHILE THAT IS GOING ON cook 3 cups of rice. Upon completion: combine and enjoy!
Now… for people who do this kind of thing a lot… maybe that is simple, straight forward, slow cooker cooking. But I cannot begin to explain how my schedule cannot permit that kind of experience every week. That isn’t “Oh, the slow cooker does all of the work.” That is an hour or more at the grocery store plus two hours of knife time plus 30 minutes of post-cooking additions plus making A COMPLETELY SEPARATE ITEM on top of all of that. This is what my siblings thought I could “easily fit into my week.” You know what I do need, honestly? Something like “throw meat sauce onto noodles, add spices, let cook for 5 to 8 hours, serve with bay leaf for presentation. The non-slow cooker doing its thing parts of this recipe took 3 hours. And I’m sorry to be the asshole here; but this month, I’m not exactly made of free time. And I haven’t even started with explaining the CLEAN UP required for this whole process! MAYBE maybe when I’m not in the last weeks of production on top of one of the most unforgiving trial seasons of my career… maybe something like this could be a fun weekend project. As it is? It put me significantly behind on my schedule! Significantly! To the point where I had to push some of Sunday’s things onto Monday, meaning the tightly packed schedule had to unravel completely in an attempt to fit in what needed fitting in.... and frustratingly enough.... that still included Slow Cooker shit when I had to do the “Add Curry Cubes; let simmer, Make Rice” at some time on Monday! It seems… almost impossible… to be two hours behind schedule by 8 a.m. on a government holiday… but here we are!
Today was one of the coldest days we have had this winter. It slowed things down amd I didn’t get everything done that I wanted to, but I got a lot done! Rehearsal was… rough. Which is good! Yesterday- we did the best that we have ever done it. So, today, we see areas we know we can’t slack on! Other than that? Well… between work and theater? I am about to start an absolutely KILLER 13 days!!!
Tragically, my plan to read entries and respond to PB notes today fell through due to too much else going on. Apologies.
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