Heddoh, inderwebbs. (Hello, interwebs.)

I've had a nasty sinus thing for three days now -- to the point that I took off work yesterday (all 5 hours of it) so that I could continue to just sleep all the damn day in order to have enough energy for rehearsal last night.  Because, seriously?  Thursday night (Day 1 of sinus thing)?  TERRIBLE REHEARSAL.  My energy was about negative 35 when we started, so the first two scenes felt crappy/draggy, even with the excellent efforts of my leading/supporting men, and then when I finally did have some energy by Act 1.Scene 4, I couldn't remember my damn lines, because my entire brain felt as if it were wrapped in cotton gauze.  So I had to call for line twice, and feel like an idiot.  And have I mentioned I get water thrown on me FOUR TIMES DURING THIS SHOW??  So I was wet, on top of it all.....

Hence the ghetto sangria this evening.  I had a pretty easy day of it -- slept in late, have taken at least 2,000mg of Vitamin C today, plenty of fluids...lots of down time...went to the gym and did light cardio (only 300 calories) to get the blood pumping and hopefully helping things along...but now it's late and I can't really just go to bed -- the lovely Ms. Molly is here for her week with us, and Jack's at work, so I feel the need to at least be conscious--so I am trying to keep myself present...so obviously, Ghetto Sangria is the answer.  About equal parts orange juice and red wine...so you get double anti-oxidants and vitamin C!

"Beyond Therapy"

What an awesomely busy and tiring New Year!

We started rehearsals for Christopher Durang's Beyond Therapy as soon as the holidays were over.  It's been raining steadily for the past two weeks, but that first week of rehearsal, I was going to the gym in the mornings, racing home to shower, biking to work, racing back to the house & getting picked up for rehearsal, then rehearsing til 10pm.  With the rain, I haven't been doing the biking to/from work, but the days are still just as busy.  I haven't been in a full-length play since the spring of 2004, which is leading to a certain amount of self-consciousness and doubt, but I've been really invested in getting off book as quickly as possible and committing fully to all choices made onstage.  It's been an exhausting and wonderful process so far.

The show opens on Feb. 5th, plays three shows each weekend, and closes Feb. 28th.  The 6-person cast includes the lovely & talented Kathleen Ennis (who also happens to be Jack's ex-wife & Molly's mom), 2 young actors from the junior college who are really talented (Sean Trew & Tim Glidewell), a professor from the JC who I actually worked with in a Christmas revue years ago (Charles Mullins), and a Modesto actor who's done some work with Prospect Theater in the past (Josh Bower).  We all work really well together and it's a very supportive atmosphere.  The director, Ron Lane, is a friend of Jack and I, and he is just a doll to work with.  He had me cast in his head months before auditions and has given me incredible support and freedom.  It also helps that the character, Prudence, is a character I find myself identifying with.  It's really just such a wonderful play and I couldn't be more thrilled to be working on it.

I'm totally stressed about making sure I retain all the lines -- although I have been off-book for a week, this week's rehearsals found me getting stuck in places where Durang's lines for Prudence in one scene are similar (or in some cases, have the same exact lead-in phrasing) to other lines either in that same scene or in a different scene.  It's forced to me call for line more times than I'd like.  I shouldn't worry as I am, because making the mistake in rehearsal (for me, at least) is often a good indicator that I won't make the mistake in performance.  But because I haven't been onstage (MyMK47 shows notwithstanding) in years, I feel rusty and nervous.

...how do you get to Carnegie Hall?   Practice, practice, practice...

Menfolk.

Jack is terribly congested and miserable with a nasty sinus cold.  I have tried very hard not to take care of him, because I just end up getting frustrated, since his version of taking care of himself does not include: drinking copious amounts of liquids, eating low-sodium broth, vitamin C, vitamins of any kind, orange juice, zinc, or anything else proven to help the body's natural defenses.

Instead, when he wanted a "brothy soup" today, he ended up getting 5 packages of Top Ramen (after I had just pointed out that Progresso was all on sale, though not picking any particular kind) and has eaten three of them today.  Which, according to the nutrition information, means that he has ingested approximately 240% of the DRV of sodium, or about 2700mg.  And not drank very much water to counteract this intake.  He has taken some Nyquil and quietly gone to lay down, the poor miserable man.

This morning, he told me I should take mega-doses of Vitamin C so as not to get sick myself.  I gave him the longest look, and he asked "What?  Am I telling you something you've already done?"  And I refrained from saying "Hey, goober!  Just because you're already sick doesn't mean that Vitamin C is going to be of no use to you!  ...telling me to take Vitamin C..."

But you know, we all have our different ways of being sick and miserable.  Mine is inherited from my mother, and I have an inborn nurturing sense, to boot, so it makes sense that my methods of recovery involve copious amounts of all the things listed in the first paragraph.  And I know that I tend to be grumpy when sick, and very stubborn, so I'm not about to force remedies upon a patient who shows no sign of wishing to be treated.

But I really wish he had drank more water today!!