Some Wicked views on musicals

Liam is ready for St. Paddy's Day-green eyes also

I do not like musicals. That would be plays as well as musical movies, musical TV shows. I avoid all like the plague unless they are about the plague as was Spamalot. How can one not love a play with lines like:
dead Collector-Bring out your dead
not dead body -I'm not dead
dead collector -Well, he will be very soon, he's very ill
not dead -I'm getting better
dead collector -you're not, you'll be stone dead in a moment.
not dead -I don't want to go on the cart. I feel fine
dead collector whacks the body with a club.
Silence.

MY type of musical. Wicked.

So I guess you can see I will not be running to see "South Pacific." I think it all started with the musical, "The Music Man." A group of folks marching down the street singing "76 Trombones." Why? Why would they all do that? Why would they think it is fun?

Then "Oklahoma." Any time some one says Oh, I feel they will continue and extend the sound into
OOOOOOOk lahoma.

4th of July is my least favorite holiday. An all day musical. Street fairs -same thing. Ugh-always someone on a rickety stage performing.

So when a newbie asked me to see the play I was afraid.
First, what is a newbie?
A newbie in my world is a person hired in Social Security in my unit or surrounding units within this century. I love the newbies. I rarely can say "No" to a newbie. So I said "yes."

I must confess though, the story of the Wizard of Oz is a favorite of mine. There is some really wicked stuff in that story. And this play Wicked took part of that and twisted it up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_%28musical%29

I bought the CD and while listening studied the story online-. It's complicated. But there are several positives- the Wicked witch is green. woo hoo. My favorite color.
I love witches, I am always a witch on Halloween-my Celtic background.
I am nuts for the Emerald City, all that green, so festive, so shimmering.
So I am going.

March 7, the day of Wicked, is an unexpectedly warm March day. I will be joining several newbies and a newbie Mom.

I take the LIRR to Penn and start my walk. This time the trickster street Broadway is my friend, leading me to my 3 destinations.
A- Starbux ( I am early)
B- the play at the Gershwin theater
C-Ellen's Stardust Diner. You will see my route in green (in honor of Wicked) and A, B and C representing my stops. with my head popping up on Broadway.

In Starbux, the line is huge. Everyone using S/B as a staging area pre-play. When we place our order, the server asks our name. For some reason I stutter and he repeats "name please"
I know the answer, I yell "Carol." I join the large group waiting at the drink dispatch area. Drinks are called, tall skinny vanilla, venti iced coffee, grande soy latte and so on. The group becomes smaller and I remain. Finally, no one else. "Kara" the barrister calls out. I look around, no one moves in. Again "Kara, grande non-fat latte" That's me, I proclaim. In a moment, I become Kara. Did I steal the real Kara's drink? No one comes forward to fight me for it. I feel wicked.
Then the lines from the CD play in my head

Are people born Wicked?
Or do they have Wickedness thrust upon them?
After all, she had a father.
She had a mother, as many do......

Yes, It is thrust upon a person! As simple as a stolen latte. As simple becoming Kara. Wickedness is thrust upon us! Poor Wicked Witch. I understand. I feel drawn to the theater. Must be with other wickeds. I am costumed in Wicked witch green and black, and now by the theft of a latte I am wicked on the inside- my wickedness is complete. I am ready for the play.
I walk up the street to meet the newbies while humming the refrain from Wicked:

"Dancing Through Life
Swaying and Sweeping
And always keeping cool
Life is Fraught less
When you are thoughtless............"

Kara (formerly Carol) loves Wicked, loves our dinner at the Stardust Diner loves Broadway. Kara is so "deeply shallow" (one of my favorite phrases from Wicked)

FlashForward.
It is 4 days later, I still love the musical Wicked. In Wicked, The Green witch, Elphaba, faked her death. Death by melting,followed by a green poof of smoke.

Only melting here at home is the snow. No need to fake melting, I am now proudly wicked.

Speaking of melting, Liam explores the new partially grassy yard Unlike me, he has not seen any green in over a month. But the wearing of the green is coming up and we wish you
good health, good times, good friends

be green and on St, Paddy's Day!
woof, woof

Snowblogging

Liam out in the February 25/26 storm, a record breaker, read on

I have been snowblogging. You know what blogging is-
A blog , shortened from web log is usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
Snowblogging is a form of blogging done before, during, and after a snow storm. My way of imitating the Olympic sport of snowboarding while remaining physically grounded and soaring on a virtual snowblog.

Another snowstorm last week. Yes! I admit it, I get chills as we brace for any impending storm. The threat of snow to others is a promise of snow to me. I still have the thrill of seeing those school closings scroll across the bottom of my TV which is naturally set on the weather channel. Last week we got the warning again. Those of us on a special weather mailing list received this message from a seasoned storm synthesist/summarist mid -week last.

"SPECTACULAR WINTER STORM ON THE WAY FOR THURSDAY AFTERNOON INTO FRIDAY AFTERNOON

There’s no other way to put it. This storm will stall and back in from the west, and this is the reason we are looking at a huge turnaround in the forecasts (and the overview), and quite possibly, the worst storm of this winter season.

12-20 inches, with locally higher amounts are anticipated for north and west of the city and coast. Areas north of the City could see drifting of up to 2 feet in places, making roads impassable.

The city and coast will see some wetter snow, or even a rain/snow mix, but even they won’t escape, with most areas seeing 6-10 inches. Areas from NYC east could still see amounts near a foot, even with all the mixing….

Eastern Suffolk county will wind up with the lowest totals, with mostly rain there.

Winds will be much stronger than the last big storm on 2/10/10, especially on Long Island. The storm’s fury will last for days because the winds will be slow to die down, possibly lasting through the weekend. Remember, the storm will move west and be basically trapped for a day or two!! Snow showers could persist through Sunday, but the heart of the accumulating snows should be gone by Friday afternoon.

stay tuned...this is another dangerous storm, and probably not the last winter storm of the season"

However, the above description was not a common one last week. The meteorologists, I noticed ( no weather girls or boys any more) seemed a tad cautious this time. I love that they try to hide their storm excitement by feigning anxiety, delivering their storm predictions with apologies and furrowed brows. I am sure that Jim Cantore, Janice Huff, Lee Goldberg all want the storm just as much as King Kullen wants its customers to storm the bread and milk aisles before the storm. The entire CNN situation room was on alert about the oncoming snow as were the teams on all the major networks.

With the popularity of the Internet, I am now aware of the huge amount of interest out there about weather. There are other regular folks like me, those who are fascinated by weather, and we are not paid meteorologists. One has to be careful in revealing this weather/storm quirk. Most folks ostensibly loathe the inconvenience, delays, cancellations and disruptions of routine that a storm might bring. However, there are those of us who find it a welcome shakeup in the world and a natural break from human violence. We must be covert in showing our interest. We watch the expressions of others as storm stories are exchanged. From these encounters we know how to act; sympathy and empathy for those terrorized by the first flake, a wink and a conspiratorial smile for those who share the expectant joy of an impending storm and its effects.

I believe my fascination began with Hurricane Carol. This was a memory from my very young days,. Water pouring through the windows, unstopped by towels, my mother turning to me and saying. "This hurricane is named after you. Look at all the damage you are causing."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Carol
"The name Carol was planned for use again during the 1969 hurricane season, before it was replaced with the name Camille. Due to serious destruction during 1954, however, the name will never again be used for an Atlantic hurricane. Carol was the first Atlantic hurricane name in history to be retired."

Hurricane Carol looking in at me, trying to lash me, only saw this much of my faceas I barely reached the windowsill. I had just turned 4.
I never forgot my first storm. And there was born my wonder of weather.

And we weather people love breaking the records. If there is going to be a storm, hey, let's go for it. Check this out for records:
http://www.wunderground.com/US/NY/New_York.html
.. Record monthly maximum snowfall set at Central Park... which is
also the record maximum snowfall for February at Central Park
NY... record daily maximum snowfall set at Central Park NY for Friday
February 26 2010.
An all time monthly record snowfall of 36.9 inches was set at
Central Park NY. This breaks the all time snowiest month record for
Central Park. The old record was 30.5 inches set back in March 1896.
This 36.9 inches of snow at Central Park in February also breaks the
old record snowfall in February of 27.9 inches set in 1934.
Lastly... a record daily snowfall of 11.5 inches was also set at
Central Park NY Friday. This breaks the old record of 8.4 set in 1991.

The February 25/26 storm one was not sneaky, just played down a bit by all, except for our writer above. Hoey tree pictured next

The author of the "Spectacular" storm story explains himself this way:

"I'm a "clearing house" of forecasts. I've learned to use and apply good judgment when reading over seemingly hours of information -- sometimes contradictory -- about the week's weather, especially the more complex and challenging. Moreover, I've learned to read technical forecast discussions by meteorologists and bloggers alike. In doing so, I've acquired the tendencies and biases of both individual forecasters and computer forecast models alike. This has taken some years to develop, as with all "hobbyists" that are not professionals. The one thing I've realized is that getting a forecast REQUIRES time and patience. I understand that it's not always possible to do this if you don't have the interest that i do, but the endless confusion experienced by people largely comes from the "rush" to know what the forecast is going to be."

Liam is okay with this featured "clearinghouse" person. They share the same birthday 8/01 as well as the love of a good storm.

For me, I have come out of hiding. I do have the Weather Channel on quite often. I do know all the names of the reporters on the Weather Channel. I use it as background decoration, like one would a fish tank or a glowing fire.
Liam out after last Friday's storm
Liam racing a squirrel in his sights

Tonight we have a 30% chance of a wintry mix which continues into Friday
Woof, woof

Olympic Observations and Liam 'Lympics

Liam watches Thursday's weather and wishes it on Vancouver, they need it

The word Olympic most often comes up in connection with the word Olympian and is plural as in Vancouver 2010 Olympics. An Olympian is an athlete taking part of these events. This week's title is both. Observations about the Vancouver Olympics as well as Olympic Observations. A play on words? Sure.

Olympic
adjective
15th century

1- Olympic, of or relating to the Olympic Games
2- lofty--superior, elevated in character and spirit, impressively high. Observations of a superior blogger and Olympics lover.

so here are some lofty, Olympic observations of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics:

1- The Sports
Fast Track, Snowboarding, aerial skiing, ski jumping, mogul (see upside down person in next pic) and the downhill. Folks that compete in these sports are rogues, unconventional spirits, possessed, inspired. Their mettle is different from most people. They compete because they love it and the medal is just a sweet by product. In some of these sports just being the last one standing gets you to the podium and lands you a medal.

2-Skating costumes
What are the ice dancers thinking? The costumes in the ice dancing short program are some of the most hokey, tasteless, and offensive outfits ever created. Vera Wang, where are you?
Did you see the pair with the leaves pasted on their shoes and body glitter glue? They professed to be honoring the aboriginal culture. The Australian aboriginal community had expressed outrage at even more offensive costumes worn at a prior competition, but were assured that the costumes were inspired by all aboriginal cultures around the world, not just Australian. That was better. Offend everyone-here is the link http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/sports/olympics/22rings.html

They ditched the costumes for red loincloths, more fake leaves, and brown bodysuits -new improved costumes in next pic From NYTimes Ivan These are supposedly better!
I can hear Tim Gunn pleading "make it work!"
Followed by Heidi Klum "You're out"

3-Skin Toned Bodysuits. You know, the part of the costume made to look as if it is the real skin but really a body stocking-see fake skin on top- Come on designers-we need help here. So tacky. We can all see that is not bare skin. Worse are the coverings on the skates so the skates look like the leg-see next Really, do they believe we think the boot is an extension of the leg, that ice skaters do not have toes?
Michelle Kwan always looked elegant, her outfits looking couture, not like Project Runway failures.

4-The Bronze Medal
Seems to bring more joy than the silver. Bode Miller was thrilled to get his bronze in the downhill. Of course, he then added a silver and gold. But he was so puffed "to first podium" with the bronze(we'll talk about podiuming next). Let's finish this bronze medal thing.
While on the second (silver) level of the podium, Russian skater, Evgeni Plushenko, stared at his silver as if he were holding dog poop. He wanted the gold. Would he have felt better getting the bronze? In an article in USA Today, Tuesday, February 23, 2010 it seems that those receiving bronze are usually more joyful than those who have earned a silver. Happy bronzers next
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/olympics/vancouver/2010-02-22-bronze-beats-silver_N.htm
"When you come in second," said Thomas Gilovich, chairman of Cornell's psychology department and one of the study's co-authors, "it's the most natural thing in the world to look upward. 'I got the silver and that's what it is, but what is it not? It's not the gold.'

"With the bronze, the natural place to look is downward. 'I got the bronze. That's what it is, but what it isn't is off the medal stand.' "

One of the US snowboarders loved his bronze medal so much that he wore it out celebrating and in photos showed up with the medal hanging below his waist being kissed and then bitten and well........

The bronze also is cool when another team is disqualified. USA fast track women won a bronze by being last, far behind, out of the race, until the South Korean team was disqualified. They were so "down from the podium" they were no longer looking at the board.

5-To podium

Using nouns as a verb is fun. I try to do it. But nothing has approached the new verb of these games- podium. The noun podium has become an active word. Lindsey Vonn has podiumed twice. Apolo Ohno has cumulatively podiumed 7 times in 3 Olympics. Will the US podium in hockey?

Podiuming is good, though podiuming for gold and bronze brings more joy than podiuming for silver.

Worse though is being "down from the podium." The unmedaled masses.

Liam 'Lympics

Liam had an idea for a doggie Olympic sport. Liam noticed that simple implements are used in some Olympic sports. He loves curling. In curling the participants use big granite stones-like this So Liam picked his favorite toy-red boney. He set out at the start line, looking for a team and some competitors.

His game has some cross country skiing see next pic a triple leg loop some snow curling, pushing the boney with his snout (brushless) and some running, encouraged by his coach -see shadow then getting to the finish first Sort of a cross country ski, triple leg loop, curling, and the Nordic combined slalom. However it is the Winter Olympics and weather is a factor. Snow begins falling

halting the competition Liam does not have the opportunity to podium in his outdoor sport. However, he does try some curling, an indoor sport unaffected by weather. His short program finds him not in perfect curl-see next pic But the long program provides another chance.

After the long program, Liam podiums. He is is an Olympic curler. Perfect execution, impeccable form, sharp edges, tight neat tuck

Woof, woof

East side, west side. all around the town

a determined walking Liam

What a day! A planned Saturday February 13 outing with a dear friend, all set, with meeting places and times. A play at 2:15 PM at 59E59 http://www.59e59.org/
I am a member and am all puffed up with the perks I would be receiving all day-discounted parking, free drinks, discounts tickets, restaurant discounts.

Followed by dinner at Blossom http://www.blossomnyc.com/site/ In between, meet at Starbucks, the train for me, a car and parking for her.

I have often written of my LIRR adventures, and this day began at the New Hyde Park train station. I arrive at 11:25 for my 11:35 train. Our play is at 2:15PM on the East side, so I allow for trouble and a 40 minute walk up and across town, west side to the east side. Something is immediately amiss. The board says the 11:35 train is delayed, but the 12:35 is on time. My suspicions rise. Why? If the first one is delayed, then a domino effect must ensue, derailing all the "on-time" trains coming after mine. This turns out to be true. The DELAY is changed to CANCEL and the waiting room erupts. The group is a raucous, irreverent diverse mix. It is Saturday and all seem to be headed for social events, so the disappointment turns into humor. The LIRR is reviled with glee. We hear an announcement that they are ordering another train to stop for us at 12:07PM, adding only a half hour to my trip. It comes around 12:10 and those on the train grumble when we pack in. I get to Penn by 12:50 PM. As we pull in, the conductor announces "the first four cars will not platform, go east everyone" more grumbling and an undercurrent of anger towards the New Hyde Park train orphans ( as if we caused this to happen)!
I try to look as if I am from Huntington knowing the New Hyde Park group is irrationally being blamed for the non-platforming train. My coat says "North Face," but I am sure the Huntington travelers took it for "New Hyde Park Face."

I trot off for my walk uptown , dreading Broadway which pulls me west like a magnet. I resist Broadway's pull and trek along, freezing cold and in awe of those pedestrians wearing short jackets, gloveless, scarfless and hatless.
see my suggested route up 5th Avenue in blue-(I actually walked up Madison)-you will see the logo for the Starbucks -where we have planned to meet.

I have sent the Starbucks address to my cell. I get there, go in, get my latte, sit and wait. This is a great Starbucks, two big lounge chairs, coffee bar in the middle, banquettes in the back, nooks. What a fine meeting place! I glance at my messages and see the address I have is not this one. I am in the wrong Starbucks!!!!

Text message exchange

me- I am in the wrong one
friend-I am in the parking garage
me-going to the right one
where?-57th/Lex
me-now in the right one

But I wasn't-this one was merely a kiosk, a shell of a real Starbucks, like an indoor hot dog stand.

Turns out, I was in the right one originally. Here I sit in 2nd Starbucks on a rickety stool, drinking the latte from the luxurious Starbucks. My friend arrives, having just left the correct Starbucks, buys her drink. We then advise the standing patrons to go to the nice one across the street. See I can be a tour guide!

Play-stunning, passionate all that http://www.themaninroom306.com/
Friend never found the discount lot recommended by 59E59. So we are snagged for typical NYC garage prices, not the promised $15 rate.
Must be hidden from the street, a secret entrance, I vow to find it another day.
Next stop, dinner
Back to the west side-Blossom. Not easy to get in. Only windows, no door it seems. We walk into "Bamboo." The Host immediately looks at us and says "you want 'Blossom'." (Double quotations marks, I looked it up)
Yes, we do. She explained that we must follow the signs. The Blossom's door is unmarked looking like the door to an upstairs apartment. We gingerly open it and are in!
Our meal has many luscious, fresh creative dishes-(parsnip soup-yummy) ravioli with cashew cream, pine nuts and white mushrooms vegan classic lasagna, tapioca cheese, ground seitan, roasted eggplant over marinara chocolate ganache with a snowball
and Heller cabernet and more not shown.
We plan for me to be on the 7:51 PM train at Penn. This all falls apart when we get stuck on 34th and realize even if I run making the train is impossible. Then I notice I am without tote. The tote holds the NYTimes, USA Today, a library book, Time magazine, my 59E59 membership card, directions and a tiny notebook. We ride back downtown to Blossom. Tote has been turned in. We ride back to Penn, on 8th Avenue this time. I am dropped off and soon see all the 8th Avenue entrances are closed due to a concert. I must walk all the way to 7th Avenue.
On the way I see the Empire State with Valentine's Day colors I snap it. Why not? I now have 45 minutes to hang around Penn to catch the 8:51PM.
I arrive home at 9:30 PM.
An amazing journey!

I notice on Sunday that my sunglasses are missing-they come back to me Tuesday. Thanks, friend.

What can I say about my performance? Certainly not as stellar as the actor in our play. I choose to see it as just a jaunt around town. Things lost, things found. Too much multitasking, too many items with me. One change- I am no longer bringing a tote bag. I am getting a huge bag, maybe suitcase size, like the homeless, I must carry a lot with me to deal with possibilities. What if the train gets stuck? I need reading material. A song pops into my head.

East side, west side
All around the town
The tots sang "Ring-a-Rosie,"
"London Bridge is Falling Down."
Boys and girls together,
Me and Mamie O'Rourke,
Tripped the light fantastic,
On the sidewalks of New York. from wikipedia

Liam waits at home trekking about the yard in the snow (he is back by the fence) walking the perimeter thinking, which way next, east side, west side? Woof, woof