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Yeah yeah, I’m back on Facebook.

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Why is Sir David Attenborough’s voice so damn comforting? Is that strange to ask?

Growing up I saw at least forty or fifty PBS / BBC programmes (note the U.K. spelling) that he voiced. Every single one of them was an introduction to something wild and wonderful in the natural world that I’d never seen or heard about. I feel like I learned more from him than any of my teachers.

Yes, that means I learned a lot from television.

We watched documentaries in school constantly. Filmstrips with cassettes and those ratty old clickety-clack reel-to-reel movies eventually gave way to Beta and VHS tapes. We even had a laser disc machine during 8th grade. I remember very clearly coming in way early some mornings, just as the school was open, to watch the laser disc documentaries on every animal from aardvarks to zebras. It was so early that I had to leave school to get to Steinmetz for my Early Involvement class (I took math at a high school during the morning in 7th and 8th grade), and then head back to Sayre for my regular day.

Mornings with PBS. That’s prolly one of the only great memories I have of grammar school.

Anyway, Sir Attenborough took me into the rainforest, the desert, the Arctic circle, and everywhere in between. Something in the way he spoke affirmed his deepest reverence for the natural world. Awestruck as I was by what he was showing me, I was even more impressed that someone had to immerse themselves in these environments and actually capture the footage I was seeing.

Yes, I was a total brainiac as a kid and pondered things like camera angles, filming in a dripping wet jungle, and how anyone in their right mind would consider pointing a camera at a crocodile over three times a large as them. In a jungle crawling with insects and various other living things.

And who goes hunting for trap door spiders? *shudder*

Last night I seriously had a sit down with Disc 1 of Planet Earth and Sir Attenborough once again became a part of my lifelong learning experience. The series, only two episodes into it, has raised the bar for natural documentary film making.

Believe the hype. It’s that good.

I’ll admit that my early PBS obsession paved the way for me to study every Nature and Nova, but Planet Earth has seriously exceeded my expectations. Again, I’ve only watched two episodes and there are tons more.

The biggest kick for me, a throwback to my brainiac childhood, is the Planet Earth: Diary section at the end of every episode that chronicles some of the challenges that the film makers faced capturing the footage. That sort of insider look is somehow magnifies the original documentary ten-fold.

My hat is off to the creators, the crews, and Sir Attenborough for once again bringing the world into my living room and teaching me thinks I’d never knew before.

And I know things now,
Many valuable things,
That I hadn’t known before:
Do not put your faith
In a cape and a hood,
They will not protect you
The way that they should.
And take extra care with strangers,
Even flowers have their dangers.
And though scary is exciting,
Nice is different than good.

A lunchtime trip to Merz. I’m gonna smell good tonight!

Is twitter.com/AndersonCooper the real Anderson Cooper?

Hrm. I hope so.

A much deserved nod to the costumes. And a set mention *giggle*.

The Sun Times loves the performers, but not the script…

Time Out dishes on Die Mommie Die.

It ain’t great, but it ain’t bad either.

I’m in the habit of trolling WTTW Digital for HDTV content for my new-ish television. I’m amazed as ever that TV can look so beautiful. Not that I necessarily need to learn about the mating habits of ostriches, but hey, the glow of HDTV still hasn’t worn off on me.

While sifting through the online guide, I came across a series on PBS called Carrier, which is a jaw-dropping intimate look inside the lives of the men and women aboard the USS Nimitz, an Naval aircraft carrier. The ten hour film follows the crew of over 5,000 on a six month tour. The honesty and candor of the people who interact with the camera is amazing, including one young man who does nearly everything short of coming right out of the closet during a segment on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”.

Admittedly, I’ve considered joining the Navy about a half-dozen times in my life. Even today I think about it. I might be a bit long in the tooth, but I have a heavy information technology background and I know technologists are welcome in nearly every sector of the military. Plus I’m a polyglot which has to count for something.

Are you surprised? Don’t be. I honestly think serving in the military is one of the most honorably American things a person can do. Maybe someday I’ll work for the government, and maybe someday I’ll even be a part of the American military. The only problem I see is getting it started. How would it all come together?

I’ve often thought that when I dropped out of college I could have enlisted and made a career out of it. Of course, hindsight is always 20-20, but the thought is there in the back of my mind. Where exactly would I be today if I’d joined?

I’m looking forward to the rest of Carrier, mostly because the voices of the people aboard that ship, the voices of people who chose to enlist, should be heard more often. Everyone is all wrapped up in what The White House is doing without really listening to the actual people involved.

We all have stories to tell, but we all need to make time to listen.

Our first full-swing week of performances went exceedingly well from my vantage point. The cast is settling into their performances, the run time is getting tighter, and the pacing is evening out. 99% of that is getting accustomed to an audience and their reactions. The other 1% is relaxing enough to enjoy the work.

My personal routine is falling into place as well. The pre-show work is methodical and steady, and there is sort of a zen thing when I’m in the theater before everyone arrives. I still love the set every time I look at it, and sort of foolishly beam with pride. It wasn’t my invention, but as part of a team we made that happen. Damn good feeling.

While the performances were great, outside of the theater my life isn’t used to doing four shows a week yet. It’ll take another week or so to fit everything together to where I don’t even notice the time flying by. The only problem is the to-do list in my house is exceedingly long and approaching the danger zone.

My unpainted bedroom is laughing at me every time I lie down to sleep. There is still a mess in the living room that I have to deal with, and my kitchen has seen better days. Not to mention the gigantic television box still on my balcony and I have yet to plan the garden for my back deck.

So tonight, if I don’t collapse, I’ll be playing catch-up.

It’s Easter time. Get out your red eggs. Oh wait, you ξένοι have already celebrated the rising of the Lord with marshmallow peeps, chocolate, and pastel colored eggs. Well I got news, mah peeps sez teh Lord rizes dis Sunday! Srsly. Why? Well let me tell you.

Greek Easter, a primer for the ξένοι.

In the Orthodox faith, the holiest of the holies is the Resurrection of Christ. Bigger than the Birth of Jesus, the Resurrection represents the largest and most involved holiday of the Orthodox calendar. I’ll quote Wikipedia here because they do a brilliant job of distilling the significance of the day.

Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was crucified and died, descended into Hell (Hades in Greek), rescued all the souls held there through sin; and then, because Hell could not restrain the infinite God, rose from the dead, thus saving all mankind. Through these events, he released mankind from the bonds of Hell and then came back to the living as man and God. That each individual human may partake of this immortality, which would have been impossible without the Resurrection, is the main promise held out by God in his New Testament with mankind, according to Orthodox Christian tradition.

That’s a pretty big deal if you ask me.

Whether or not you believe in God, the moral of my tale today is to understand WHY we Greeks make a big deal out of Easter, and not to explain the belief system of the Orthodoxy. I don’t think I could ever do that.

There are three basic criteria for determining the date Orthodox Easter. First, it must be based on the Julian Calendar, not the Gregorian. I’m not going to explain the difference between the two, but that’s how it is. Julian, not Gregorian.

Second, Orthodox Easter must follow Passover. There is a complex explanation behind this fact that has to do with the vernal equinox, the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., the dispersal of the Jews, and a lot of other complex history which I haven’t studied in years. Needless to say, Orthodox Easter follows Passover.

Third and final rule is that Orthodox Easter must fall on the Sunday of the first full moon after the spring equinox. A little contentious that rule is, given Gregorian vs. Julian, but it’s a rule nonetheless, despite how you determine the equinox. It’s *usually* dated around March 20something.

Got all that?

Given how the calendars converge and diverge (Julian = Orthodox, Gregorian = Christianity) at times we share the same Easter Sunday. And some years, like this one, we are over a month away from each other. Bad news for all the little Greek kids in the US because there is no Easter candy left by this time, unless their Moms decided to horde candy during the 50% off sale the day after Easter.

Anyway.

Today is Holy Friday, when mourning happens all over the Orthodoxy. We are mourning the death of Jesus on the cross. Nearly every Greek community will parade around their parish, raising an effigy of Christ that represents his dead body. That’s a traffic tip for all of you who live near an Orthodox church. I’m not sure if the other flavors of the Orthodoxy do the parade, but the Greeks definitely do.

By tomorrow, Holy Saturday, the mood has lifted and people are preparing for the biggest church service of them all. Tomorrow night, me included, Greeks will flock to church for the service that begins at 11:00pm. The ritual chanting, the incense, the ceremony of it all is beyond beautiful, and at midnight we celebrate the rising of the Lord with a candle ceremony where all the lights are extinguished in the church. Then, as the flame of resurrection blazes to life, it is passed from parishioner to parishioner (who all hold candles) until everyone has shared the flame. We sing together, and celebrate the rising of the Lord.

Holy Sunday is party time. More church, more celebration, more feasting. Good times.

There are a couple key words you can share with your Greek friends. Right now, before the midnight mass on Saturday, we say “Kali Anastaci” which means “Good Resurrection”. But after He is risen, we greet each other with “Christos Anesti!” and respond with “Alithos Anesti!” “Christ is risen!” and “Indeed, He is Risen!” That sort of talk goes on for a week or so, maybe longer depending on who you see.

I have many more tales to tell about Orthodox Easter, but for now, I’ll wish you Kali Anastaci.

I am, dear readers, a foodie. Without the snobbish connotations associated with that word, of course. Food is what brings us together and what makes us human. No other animals on the planet cultivate food the way we do. If they did, you can be sure I’d be clamoring to sit at their dinner table and taste what they have to offer.

Somehow growing up in Chicago gave me an adventurous palette. Could have been the fact that I took my first steps in my Dad’s restaurant. Could have been the eating adventures Mom and I would go on when I was the only child left at home. Or it could just be my Aqueerian nature. Whatever the case, Chicago provided the backdrop for the adventures.

I learned to eat with chopsticks at a very young age. I was never afraid of fish being served head-on. Entrails, liver, offal, and generally any animal or vegetable were passed before me and I partook. The only taboo to this day that has held up is shrimp. I used to have a mortal fear of mushrooms until I tasted something other that the canned dark-taupe limp variety. I wouldn’t eat raw onion. And I disliked raw tomato. But today I eat everything, and I mean everything, except shrimp.

Exotica was the shiznit for a while in my book. Snake (delish!), alligator (watery but good, amphibian tasting like frog), snails (eh, the sauce is the highlight), guinea pig (it’s divine!), raccoon (not bad, not good, meaty), ostrich (Raw Bar has the best), buffalo (Heartland’s buffalo chili is beyond), and the list goes on and on. Blood cake stew with intestines (smoky and deliciously chewy), steamed pork-fat (my new obsession), virtually anything Japanese, raw and cooked, and basically anything spicy on the Korean table is ok by me. Just not live baby octopi because when I ate one, it stuck to the inside of my cheek and squirmed too much.

Vegetables of every kind amaze me. Burdock, the newest thing I’ve been playing with, is flawless when done right as a flavoring agent. You can even eat it, but the prep is a bit much for me. Squashes and tubers, greens and beans, fruits and nuts, I’m all about it. Everything is an adventure in the kitchen these days.

I likes to eat. I does.

Food is also history, culture, religion, language, relationships, and ultimately in my world food = love. There is nothing more comforting or more satisfying than sharing a meal with my family or the people I care for. Dinner with friends is what I enjoy most in life, and cooking fills me up like nothing else.

I also find that men who enjoy eating are incredible in bed.

I’ve said this to many people, but the way you eat is the way you act between the sheets. This theory has consistently held true for the men in my life, past and present. If you want to know about how a potential lover will act, share a meal. Watch how he eats. It’s a 1:1 sign of how he behaves in bed.

But back to my point.

I’m right on the edge of releasing something massive onto the internets, and I’m close folks. Real close to making it happen. But, the foodie on the inside of my brain learned about Community Supported Agriculture last year, and I planned to make it happen this Summer.

A CSA is basically a farm, or group of farms, that allow you to purchase a ’share’ in their crops. Depending on the way the CSA works, you usually get regular deliveries of fresh produce. As you can imagine, there are quite a few out there, but after doing my internets research and checking around, I settled on Home Grown Wisconsin.

They offer a pick-up just a block from my house, and the price is right. Every other week for 20 weeks, I’ll get a box of veggies, a dozen farm fresh eggs, a pound of cheddar and a half pound of specialty cheese. All made by a cooperative of farms in Wisconsin, all for $515.

There is a full-share option, but I’m single and don’t think I can manage a box of veggies every week on my own, so I went with the half-share option, plus the eggs (I’m totally a baker) and the cheese because really, who doesn’t like cheese?

Thus far, I think this will be one of the more challenging food tasks I’ve set myself on. Random veggies showing up every other week, deciding what to do with them, learning to cook new things, dealing with a cheese overload, and baking up a storm with farm fresh eggs are all the tasks at hand.

June 11th, it begins.

Yes, yes, I watch the pithy madness known as America’s Next Top Model. Seriously, it’s because I like the fashion shoots. Something magical in the whole process that I’ve adored since I was a little kid. Hair, makeup, set, lighting, the theatrics.

Playing dress up was always fun for me.

So last night I pop on the television after a fabulous dinner at Ethiopian Diamond with my friend Jen, and settled in to a new episode of ANTM. Six girls down to five, the rocker-chick (Lauren), the ditz (Anya), the Slavic goddess (Katarzyna), the drag queen (Dominique), pseudo-Iman (Fatima), and the plus sized pageant queen (Whitney) were all still standing a the top of the show.

I honestly love Katarzyna. She has such a femme fatale look, I can instantly picture her in BeBe ads and the haute couture catwalks all at the same time. Very Thierry Mugler she is. A corset and a beret would put her over the top I think.

Anyway, as the show is opening the girls are off to Italy for their final few challenges. Whitney, who has actually been one of my favorites since the beginning because a) she’s beautiful and reminds me of Emme, and b) she seems to know enough about the world to make it, is on camera first. Then she drops this high-larious pearl of wisdom:

Because I am a plus sized model, it’s a huge deal I’m here. No pun intended.

Thank heavens for DVR’s because I had to pause the show I was laughing so hard. Oh Whitney, able to make fun of yourself and be comical at the same time? I loves you. I loves Katarzyna more, but you’re my new #2.

The episode was, in a word, meh. But Lauren got her ass booted off because when she speaks (or walks) she isn’t what the Tyrant wants in a top model. Hella good pictures, just not the ANTM mold. Which, if you ask me, needs reworking…

Over the weekend I managed to squeeze in a midnight show at The Music Box with my friend Jane. I’d been to her shop Barberella for a haircut and she told me about this movie called Teeth.

vagina dentata is the latin term for toothed vagina.

It’s a myth that has persisted across many global cultures and years of human history. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s origins are either men afraid of castration or powerful women.

Either way, Teeth is a movie about one such girl.

The film, a B-movie horror flick directed by Mitchell Lichtenstein, is rather genius. The plot devices are as obvious as can be, and the gory effects are there mostly to shock you, but what worked so well in the film was the style of the whole thing from start to finish.

I don’t want to give up too much of the movie because I can’t recommend seeing it enough. Cinematographer Wolfgang Held paired nicely with the director, and the look and feel of the film was so tight that even when you were looking at a sight gag (and there are many) it fit. Despite it’s B-movieness, this one is so on my wishlist when it drops on DVD I can’t wait.

I look forward to more work by Mitchell Lichtenstein.

* that’s the film’s tagline

After what can only be described as a week of personal hell with tons of house drama (broken windows, drywall repairs that took forever, construction crews in my living space freaking out my cats) and a week of incredible joy working on the previews for Die! Mommie, Die!, we opened last night.

And we opened pretty flawlessly I must say. The show ran eerily smooth from start to finish. Even the acid trip sequence, the heaviest tech scene we have, went well. And a good thing at that because there were tons of press in the audience along with the Jeff committee.

Sadly I couldn’t make it to the opening night soirée at Joey’s because I had a very early start at work this morning, but I’m sure everyone was thinking what I was thinking:

We frickin’ rocked the house.

So this morning when my iPhone began to ring with the sounds of e-mails filling my inbox, it was no surprise when David sent the cast & crew and note saying we’d been Jeff Recommended. We’re not on their website yet, but the recommendation is in.

I’m proud to be a part of the production. But above all, I’m happy that my friends are being recognized for their true talents. It’s a major win for Handbag and honestly, accolades aren’t everything, but when the community says “Hey, good job!” it really does feel good.

Congrats everyone!

Have I really been off for three days? Nope, not really. Despite taking some vacation days at work I’ve been at the bailiwick more than anywhere else. Cheryl (our director for Die Mommie), Brian (our stage manager) and I have been working closely to make the stage and the production look just-so. Of course the actors and the other ensemble kids have certainly had their hand in it (duh, they’re the ones on stage) but the six eyes between the three of us have been looking, seeing, feeling, and changing everything. This photo is just about the last incarnation of the set. It’s slightly different, and I’ll get a better pic of the new one soon.

It’s been fun to work on the show but I’m drained at the moment. Our previews went really well and the odds and ends that inevitably appear during previews came out in the wash, but I have a great feeling about getting this run polished during this next week.

Seriously tho, I need a vacation from my vacation. And there is no such thing in my future, so it’s back to the grind for me tomorrow.

I found out last night that another one of my friends is positive. It wasn’t a sit-down conversation about it, but it came to light while we were talking. He thought I knew, and I hadn’t a clue.

It’s still sinking in today, and I don’t know how I feel, if I should feel, or what I should feel. The thing that boggles my mind is that he thought I knew. Given another situation where I found out about a former close friend’s status (who’s friendship ended poorly for a million reasons) this marks the second time I’m the last to know.

I’m not hurt, just puzzled. I wanted to ask why and how and when, but neither the time nor the place was apropos of the subject. It was, for me, a stark reminder of how secrets become truths with just a few words.

I’ve fallen in and out of love with social networks for some time now. Their usefulness is only slightly better than a cardboard coaster in my opinion, but there are a lot of folks who use cardboard coasters.

What I’m really talking about is those people who click every link on a web page. There are tons of them out there and I really need to get a grip on my potential audience for many reasons, the largest of them being the upcoming video project I’m planning.

So, I reopened my myspace page. Thankfully today the spam measures on myspace are far more sophisticated than they once were. So far no boobie girls have been trying to friend me.

In two weeks I’ll see what happens. Until then I have to sort out myspace css. It’s a beyatch.

…hide my worry about the Die Mommie tech stuff that hasn’t been rehearsed yet.

…find a few hours to edit my New Mexico videos.

…not fear the sore throat I’m nursing will turn into something else.

…buy ten pounds of lemons without having to carry them home and up three flights of stairs.

…be able to head outside without a jacket.

…have had that double date that never happened.

…prevent the mess that the drywall repair crew in my house may make.

…take a 50 mile bike ride.

In the post-work rain yesterday I trekked over to one of my old high school haunts, Athenian Candle Company. It’s right in Greektown, a walk away from my alma mater Whitney Young.

Athenian Candle is part occult bookstore, part religious supply shop, part botánica, and part candle factory. They have the most unique collection of stuff (for lack of a better term) in Chicago. Lots of candles made on site, in every color known to man, fun spell-casting books, herbs, powders, tinctures, oils, incense, charm bags, talismans, religious statuary, and more. If you can find it in a church, a Wiccan coven, or hanging around the neck of a Voo Doo practitioner, they have it.

The shop is a big part of my own personal history.

In high school I used to visit once a week to buy stuff; a blue candle because I had a cold (blue heals), some lumps of dragons blood (to protect), and oils of all sorts to make lotions and potions and everything in between. I was heavy into Wicca, herbology, astrology, numerology, and had a burning desire to find myself somewhere in clouds of smoke, by the light of a candle.

The Power, as I’ve come to call it, is pretty strong stuff. It’s everywhere, and using It takes skill, caution, determination and above all, practice. I’m not going to dig deeper into the topic of magick here. I suppose that’s a topic for a podcast. But, I’ll recite a very useful axiom for life:

An it harm none, do what thou wilt.

Athenian Candle became THE go-to place for me. With lots of help from folks at the store, I began to find my spiritual way in the world. I bought books, learned how to blend oils, taught myself how to make incense (cones, sticks, powder), how to work with parchment, how to use candles the right way, the differences among the occult arts, and tons more. I basically gave myself a crash-course in the occult, learning along the way what worked for me and what didn’t.

That’s kinda the genius of magick.

I managed to build up quite a repository. Sort of like a full pantry or a well stocked refrigerator. Unfortunately, during a particularly rough point during my teenage years, my parents found everything, mildly freaked out, and threw everything away.

Hundreds of dollars (my collection was amassed over almost three years) and so many hours of work put into building that collection vanished in an instant. I thought my world would end. The next chance I had, I intended to hit Athenian Candle to buy some black candles, which I planned to use in a less than desirable way.

On my way to the shop the next day (during lunch period) I was angry with my family for not understanding me. In what I considered a perfect mirror of my emotions, there was a violent thunderstorm that afternoon. I was walking in the rain to the store, clutching my umbrella, rejoicing that nature was as angry as I was. They should know better than to mess with me, I thought. I’ll show them!

The moment I stepped up onto the doorstep of the shop, the rain stopped. Bizarre as that sounds, it was pouring one moment and quiet the next. I left my umbrella at the door as I entered. The usual sweet smell of the shop wrapped itself around me. It’s hard to describe, sort of like beeswax, flowers, and good smelling soap all at the same time.

Anyway, I marched right over to the candles (steps away from the door really) and stared pointedly at the box of shiny black tapers. I knew what I wanted to do. I knew what I though I could do. I knew better than to go messing with stuff that was way stronger than me, but I was angry. A couple black candles… some nightshade from the neighbors fence… write their names on paper in red ink…

Without looking, I felt the door of the shop open and a woman walked in. I didn’t hear her, or see her come through the door, I sort of felt her come into the shop. Kind of like the way you can feel someone staring at you. You just know there is another person there.

Oddly, she felt big. My mind had decided she was a large woman, adorned with charms, rings, and lots of necklaces, wearing galoshes, clutching a large dripping pink umbrella. But when I turned to look at her she was very small, plainly dressed, and holding a shopping bag with the Hindu Aum symbol on it. She had no umbrella and was oddly dry as a bone.

We locked eyes for a moment and she smiled. A warm, generous, broad smile, teeth and all. In a split-second I went from being upset with my family (and the world) for not understanding me, to realizing that life is about people and experiences, not bottles of oil and herbs. Before I knew it, I was laughing. We didn’t speak, but I watched her mill around the store, gathering up a few things. A moment later she paid and left.

I grabbed a blue candle, ran to the counter, handed 54 cents to the clerk (I knew most of the prices by heart) and ran out the door to thank her. I couldn’t see her on Halsted, so I looked down Jackson. Nothing. I ran up to Van Buren, but couldn’t find her. I even ran over to Adams, sure she’d be there. Nope.

It started raining again, just as hard as before, but I’d left my umbrella in the store so I was beginning to get soaked. There I was, blue candle in hand, in the rain, trying to find the woman with the big smile and the Aum bag.

Yesterday while walking to the shop in the rain all I could think about was that woman. Was she even real? Did I make her up in my head?

Maybe someday I’ll run into her again and have the chance to thank her for the smile she gave me.

The cast is doing a spectacular job in the space at the Bailiwick. They’re adjusting and relaxing into the space nicely I think. However, the biggest problems are yet to be solved. The set doesn’t have the oomph I expected, but that is on its way to being solved. The lights aren’t set (full tech is in what, two days?), and there is a potentially huge issue with some projection work that we’ll sort out tonight with a lot of luck.

But these, dear readers, are the things that draw me into projects like this.

I’ve often thought of myself as a hurdler. Run, run, run, and oh look, there is something coming up, so let’s jump over it and move on to the next one. That could sound like a load of horse shit, but it truthfully is the way I deal with things.

Keep moving. See what is ahead of you. Get to it. Deal with it. Move on forward.

Like the caving experience taught me (for about the millionth time in life), if you keep your world to three feet in front of you, and three feet behind you, you can deal with anything. Sure there are goals miles ahead, but none of us can deal with miles ahead.

Three feet at a time.

I have a smattering of errands to run today, the biggest of which is to have my new teeth installed up in mah grill. Somehow (god knows, I slept about three hours) I managed to remember to photograph my smile this morning. After said teeth land, I shall photograph again and share.

My dental history may bore you, but the reason I share is to prove that sometimes little things like that can make all the difference in how you feel. Cutie Justin at JustinFeed.com recently, and bravely I might add, shared that his dental adventures are only just beginning. Kudos to him for having not only the guts to share that with us, but for having the guts to start a long project like that.

The three feet at a time advice hold up in every case.

—

I got a text last night from my good judy* Joe. I met his newest flame this past weekend, a cute-as-a-button Greek guy named Niko. (A gay Greek!) Niko’s friend Adam was there as well, and as it turns out, there may be a double date in my future with said Adam, Greek, and judy.

Yay!

* the expression ‘my good judy’ refers to any of my close gay friends in Peter-speak. Why judy? Judy Garland of course. However, judy without caps is a close friend. Judy in caps is the grand dame herself.

Managing to escape from Greek class a little early last night, I was able to get to Die! Mommie, Die! rehearsal at the Bailiwick. The space truly looks great, but it’s quirky and needs some 60’s-ing up. The decor is pretty flat at the moment (although the set is fairly angular) and a few tidbits here and there should really liven things up.

It felt good to be back in that space again. Not sure why, but it did.

After I returned home I fell into watching an episode of Nova about Mayan epigraphers and their quest to decipher the glyphs found in South America. The polyglot in me DEMANDED I watch the entire show, thus I stayed up far later than intended.

But what a fascinating story! To look at the inscriptions coating the walls of temples and eventually get to an “Ah hah!” moment where you can understand them must have been the greatest intellectual orgasm ever.

Not to mention that Mayan writing is inherently beautiful. They have many ornate constructs for both concepts and sounds, as opposed to a pure alphabet (like we do in english), a pure syllabary for sounds (similar to the phonetic writings in Japanese), or even pictograms (like Chinese).

Each of the characters across constitutes the concept or word, and depending on where and when it is used, it can be as ornate or simple as needed. They literally have the ability to paint with words, and when you think that they were adorning sacred spaces in stone carvings that would last for eons, the thought that went into the writing is both staggering and revealing about the genius of their society.

Remember, they were doing this while the ancient civilizations of what would become Europe and Asia were still brewing up their concepts of culture and writing systems. That’s sort of why the ‘intellectual orgasm’ I mentioned above would have been so great. Here was not only a fully developed and artistic writing system, but it could actually be deciphered, acting as history books.

History, due to the fact that they invented one of the oldest (generally accepted) calender systems in the known world, based on a vigesimal (base-20) system. In the glyphs that were deciphered, much of the information relates to itself based on the calendering system, so perfect copies of historical records are right there, in stone, for eternity.

Fascinating stuff. Now you see why it kept me up!

Image via famsi.org

会ったか？触れないで其処で。
atta ka? furenaide soko de.
Do I know you? Don’t touch me there.

(been a while since I did one of these)

Flipping through the news this morning and Project Runway is moving to Lifetime!

But not without some flack from NBC Universal, which will cause a pretty interesting battle in the near future…

I think I’m live on the new host…

Testing 1,2,3 ?

What started out as a quiet Sunday at home turned into a day of theatre. I hadn’t planned anything in advance, but it all sort of fell into place courtesy of Smith & Grimm. Trista Smith & Jason Grimm that is.

Saturday night while I was out, Trista invited me to see Dead Man’s Cell Phone at Steppenwolf. Duh, natch I wanted to go see it with her, so we made our way to the theater and enjoyed what I like to call “a slice of twisted Americana”. That’s Peter-speak for what Steppenwolf does best; twisted stories, very American, utterly fascinating theatre.

The premise of the play is that a woman in a cafe answers a dead man’s cell phone. Upon reading that initially, I thought it would be a dark solemn play. Couldn’t have been more wrong because the play was truly a dark comedy and wonderfully funny. Mary Beth Fisher, who I’d just recently seen in Little Dog Laughed, was hysterical as usual. Molly Regan tho, seemed to steal the show in my book. Her portrayal of Gordon’s (the deceased) mother was perhaps the most interesting performance I’ve seen thus far this year. She was simply mesmerizing.

Shortly before we hit Steppenwolf, Jason Grimm phoned and invited me to see The Drowsy Chaperone that evening. Natch I said yes to that too! I met up with him later on in downtown and we caught up with Steven and John, two members of the Jersey Boys cast, and both cute as buttons.

Drowsy was the kind of musical that you see because you love musicals and you love big splashy colorful scenes on stage. I was gagging every time another gown appeared encrusted with rhinestones and trimmed in fur. Nancy Opel as The Chaperone had the best lines, the best costumes, and the best stage presence. But hearing Andrea Chamberlain as Janet Van De Graaff belting out those notes pushed me over the edge. She’s a super belter and was perfect in the role.

Post show I headed to Rock Bottom with the thespian set. People from Drowsy, Jersey Boys, Seussical, and more were in attendance. It was a table of gay actors and between the beer, the razor sharp wits, and the stories of sexual adventures (that came after much beer) it was a great night in Chicago.

And to think. All I was planning on doing was staying home.

My site will be changing hosts over the next day or so. You may or may not see it come up and down, so in advance I’m letting you know that things might get a little wonky.

Be back soon!

I got my hair did when I was in Roswell. Just sharing a pic of it.

Grrrrr!

Chicago smelled funny when they opened the airplane door. Not that any other city would smell like roses at their local airport, but I could smell the city on the wind, over the jet fuel and exhaust. The culture shock of masses of swarming people was a bit much the first day, and despite the fact that I was looking forward to Greek class that evening, I almost wanted to hide under the covers with my cats (whom I was happy to see) and drown the world out.

However, I did make it to Greek class and had a great session. We reviewed a few things during our time together and spent the rest of the class asking each other questions and answering back. Simple stuff like:

Τι έκανες χτες το βράδυ;
tee eh-kaa-nes htes tow vra-thee
What did you do last night?

Οταν σήμερα είναι Παρασκευή, τι είναι αύριο;
oh-tan see-meh-rah ee-nay pa-ra-ske-vee, tea ee-nay av-ree-oh
If/When today is Friday, what (day) is tomorrow?

Super fun with a great group of people. My vocabulary isn’t as rich as I’d like it to be, but I’m slowly building things in my mind. Whenever I hear a new word, I try to repeat the English, Spanish, Japanese, and then the Greek for it. It’s a jumble of meanings and sounds, but associating words with their counterpart in another language seems to be helping.

—

Last night I finally joined the cast of Die! Mommie, Die! in my role as production assistant / assistant stage manager. Nothing glamorous on my part, but it’s great to be working with those Handbag kids again, plus a bunch of new faces. The production in rehearsal is really fun and I love the scope of characters that everyone seems to be bringing out. I’d read the script, and even auditioned (unwisely I might add), and am fascinated to see the pages come to life.

With everyone in good spirits, I think this will be a great cast to work with backstage. Selfishly, I love being backstage as part of a production. I’m insanely detail oriented and I love the process behind the scenes to create the life on stage. I was a techie well before ever stepping on stage back in the day, and as a result, it’s my first love.

This song is the shiznit. Look fer me around 2:12.

I’m back in Albuquerque right now, nestled in my hotel room safe and sound. I made it ’round a good portion of the Southern half of the state, and I have to tell you, I’m bruised, sore, and walking like an elderly man.

But damn it, I did some caving this weekend and it was awesome.

I was too exhausted to post yesterday. Two ’strenuous’ tours back to back was a bit much, but I wouldn’t have done it any other way. They are both still rolling around in my head, and I suspect it will be a very long time before I can really tell you how they were. I got into it a little bit in my last post, but as you can tell, it was mostly a physical description.

It’s rough trying to nail down exactly what I learned in the ground on this trip. I suppose I’m jumping the gun a bit by trying to rush through what I’m feeling. But I never want this feeling to end. Ever. And I seriously doubt it ever will.

I woke up pretty early Sunday morning to have a hearty breakfast at the Best Western Stevens Inn in Carlsbad. It’s around a 30 mile drive to Carlsbad Caverns, but with a complimentary buffet in the morning and complimentary high speed internets, I couldn’t be mad about the drive. Mentally, it was also nice to leave the town and drive into the countryside each morning.

I decided to take the Kings Palace guided tour in the morning. It was a walking-only trek, not very far, but you got to see some areas of the caverns that you can’t see on your own. That started at 10am, but I took the elevator down at 8:30am.

Much to my delight, I was the only one in the elevator. Other than one ranger at the bottom, I saw NO ONE for around an hour and a half. I did the big room self-guided tour again, but this time in eerie silence. Literally I felt like I was alone in the cave. No one but me, no sounds but my own and the dripping water. Nothing.

Pure. Clean. Drip-drop.

Several times along the path, I managed to scare myself with my own noises. The thing about a flat rock-face is that it’s a great sound reflector. Near the furthest part of the trail there is a pool called Mirror Lake. The water sounds were coming from every direction, so I reached for my iRiver and recorded a minute or two of them. While trying to put my iRiver back in my bag, my rustling nylon backpack made some noises that bounced off a rock about five feet away and hurled themselves at me.

Imagine it. You’re in a darkened room. It’s humid. The ceiling is nearly a hundred feet or so up. Eerie gothic-like formations surround you. Droplets of water smack your head every now and again. For the last hour the only thing you’ve heard are drops of water, your boots on the path, and your breath. All of the sudden you hear a loud rustling noise coming towards you.

Trust me, you’d be scared too.

After the initial adrenalin-laden jolt of terror, I realized I was the one making those noises. For fun I did it a few times. The lag was barely seconds, but the effect was profound. Thankfully I hadn’t soiled my pants. I was going to be in another cave for another few hours in close company.

After milling around on my own, I took the Kings Palace tour and one of the rangers who tailed our Hall of the White Giant tour, Laura, was tailing this one. It was great to see her again, plus I had the chance to chat with her quite a bit more. She works at Jewel Cave in South Dakota, and I suspect that’s where I’m headed for my next caving experience.

Oh, yeah, speaking of caving, the subject of this post. While it’s in my head, I’ll recount what Keith, the Spider Cave tour guide said (I haven’t talked about Spider yet, but I will shortly. Just don’t wanna forget this.) Someone asked him what the difference was between a spelunker and a caver. As the axiom goes: Cavers are the ones who save spelunkers.

I’m not 100% sure of the truth in this, but ‘cavers’ tend to use that term as a more serious definition. Folks who have gone ‘caving’ are ‘cavers’. Spelunking is the outsiders term. If you’ve never done it, you are more apt to use the terms ’spelunking’ or ’spelunker’. Semantics yes, but each culture has it’s own language. And you know I’m a stickler for languages.

No, I’m nowhere even near an amateur caver yet. Do I intend to become one? Hell yes! I’ve been bitten by the bug in a big way. I don’t know much about the sport, but you can bet that I’m going to learn more and do more.

Speaking of bugs, so my second caving experience was at Spider Cave. Once again, the entrance is a secret so folks don’t go getting in trouble, but we had to drive from the Visitors Center out into the desert some. Then a serious hike down into a valley ensued. I say serious because hiking in a forest (or at least the forests I’ve been to) are generally pretty soft on the foot due to the terrain. Lots of dirt and floor litter as cushion.

Not so much out here. Rocks, rocks, more rocks, spiny cacti, lechuguilla, yucca, and many other oddities you have to deal with. You have to pay attention to every step, much like you do when you are in the cave. None of us were leading the hike, but the ranger also had to keep his eyes and ears open for snakes.

Even when we arrived at the entrance, he had to head in first to check the entrance for snakes. Yes, you read that right. There may, although the chance isn’t very high given how they’ve designed the entrance, be snakes in the cave entrance. If you were an reptile, you’d prolly want to find a cool place to hang out during a hot day too…

Anyway, as we headed in (down a ladder) the crush was on right away. If the squeezes on Saturday were tough, these were downright nasty. I’ll give you an example. You may wish to read this bit then drop to the floor and try it out. Lay yourself down flat. All the way, no arching of the back, hands at your sides, knees on the floor, crotch touching the ground too. Now try to move without raising any of that (because you cannot. There is no room to raise ANYTHING up!) Oh, and keep one ear to the ground as well because your big head won’t fit upright. Has to be sideways.

Are you down there?

Your only choices for locomotion are your feet/toes (heels together now, no room to raise them!), your wrists/hands (elbows down, no room to move them up), and believe it or not your hips. Now picture having to wriggle about six or seven times your body length in that position, over fist sized rubble. No, you can’t really look up (head to the side, remember). No, you can’t really see where you are going (follow the curve of the tiny tunnel you are in). And oh look, there’s a big juicy cricket crossing your path. No room to be scared, it’ll get out of your way.

That’s how you enter Spider Cave. According to the original cavers, the entire tunnel was COATED in daddy long legs when they first entered. Looking up they could see the roof of the slim tunnel pulsating. Naturally, being in such close quarters with them, they fell on your neck, in your shirt, between your glasses and your face, crawling around on your mouth, over your nose, and just about everywhere else they could possibly get to as you entered.

Praise the Lord they aren’t around any more. If they were I seriously do not think I could have made it in. But I did. And I made it out again to tell you about it.

Radically different from the Hall of the White Giant, Spider Cave is known as a maze cave. Named for both the original coating of bugs at the entrance and for the way it branches out into different places, Spider is more crawling, slithering, straddling things, where I think Hall was more climbing, maneuvering, holding on for dear life.

Not that Spider didn’t have it’s share of dark pits and slippery slopes. On more than one occasion in Spider I had to depend on another person to help me over the gaping holes in the ground. And one by one, in turn, we each got to the other side of said chasms, grabbed three stable points of contact, and offered a steady hand to help the next person over.

Climbers know this, but I didn’t until Saturday. When climbing/caving, you must at all times maintain three points of contact for stability (duh, a tripod). Hands or knees or elbows or butt or feet or in extremes, head. Doesn’t matter. Three strong points of contact and you can use whatever is free for to find the forth and free up one of the previous three to move on. Crossing those gaps, for us newbies, someone else had to become part of that tripod.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but that kind of dependency on other people has never been an easy thing for me. I always want to do things on my own. I’m very much type-A big-ego like that. But truly, you cannot be that way in a cave. A big ego has no place down in the earth like that.

We moved through so many chambers, with each one having what looked like four or five different exits. Along the way, Keith (mentioned him earlier) pointed out how cavers tend to name things using the alphabet as a way to remember the path. We passed different formations, each named with a progressive letter of the alphabet. There are many more ways to track your progress inside a cave, but I liked that sort of mnemonic one because it stuck in my head.

With a cave like Spider, there seem to be n number of paths you can choose along every point. So not only naming things in order, but using them as guides to ‘point’ to the right path also helps. For example, there was a cluster of stalactites (hanging ones… they ‘hold tight’) that pointed down to a hole. As the early cavers moved through the cave, they realized the formation pointed to an exit, so they noted it down. We learned tons of things like that as we moved through the cave, most of which I’ve promptly forgotten.

As we backtracked out of Spider and eventually hiked back to our cars, I was kind of sad thinking that the experience was over. The entire trip was really based around these two tours I had planned, and being on the other side of them left me melancholy. I’m still a little depressed I have to head back to Chicago.

The silver lining, and you know I always look for one, is that I do, indeed, feel different. How different? What changed? Well, honestly that part is still foggy. Time will tell.

One thing is for sure. As soon as possible I’m going to schedule my next caving trip. To be completely cheesy, and to quote my favorite Disney movie (laugh if you must, it fits):

I don’t know when
I don’t know how
But I know something’s starting right now

Watch and you’ll see
Someday I’ll be
Part of your world!

I’m going to skip over my description of Roswell NM and save that for a later time. Truly, it isn’t worth much.

I’ve just gotten out of an incredibly hot shower in my hotel room. Absolutely necessary because I’ve just returned from spending my first of two days at Carlsbad Caverns.

O.
M.
G.

I arrived at the park around 9am this morning. The visitors center is under construction at the moment, so there is a fairly large trailer farm marked with TICKETS, GIFT SHOP, etc. Inside I collected my entrance tickets for both tours, The Hall of the White Giant and Spider Cave, along with a general admission pass.

First things first, I hiked a short path to the Natural Cave entrance, which I recommend as the ‘full version’ of the self-guided tour. The cheater way is to take an elevator 750 feet down, but seriously, you WANT to hit the Natural Entrance. Unless you are in poor health, it’s no sweat and a clear, marked trail with tons of handrails and lots of information.

I was spectacular. Only a brief glimpse into what I was going to end up doing later on in the day. You leave from full daylight and descend into the darkness. And darkness indeed because for a good portion of the cave, it’s only lit with gentle yellow footlights. Special formations are highlighted with spotlights, but this is a dark tour and at times you can’t see very much except the foot path. Spectacular I assure you. The massiveness of the rooms doesn’t quite hit you for some time, but when you’re perched on a switch-back walkway looking down hundreds of feet at the specks of moving shadows, only to realize they are people, the grandeur of this place sets in.

If White Sands was magical, this place is downright spiritual. There is a quietness and a stillness to the caverns that is simply astounding. But as the day pressed on, it got so much better.

At 755 feet you hit the rest area and lunchroom. I purchased a sandwich, struck up a conversation with some friendly South Carolinians that turned into a creationist theory discussion which I feigned neutrality about. They handed me some sort of a pamphlet as they departed for their walking tour. You meet all kinds I suppose. I haven’t read it yet because I had more important things to do.

From the rest area, after my snack, I headed into The Big Room. An unbelievable cavern that seems to go on forever and ever, winding here and there in a large loop with formation after formation. Still dark, dimly lit, with spots on the better features. By this time I’d worked up a bit of a sweat, so the cool dampness of the cave felt wonderful. I stopped in one point and felt a small breeze, which I later learned was part of the convection process of this cave. As hot air rises, the cooler air sinks, dampening with the nearly 90% humidity in the cave.

After I got back to the rest area, I decided to ride the elevator up, dump my bag and most of my stuff, and grab my caving gear, which consisted of:

soft kneepads (Mizuno)
soft elbow pads (Truefit)
flexible gloves (Novara multi-purpose)
a head rag for under the helmet
hiking boots (I have Stanley steel toed)
shirt and pants (both REI Brand)
spandex undies (to wick sweat away from the boys!)
a spandex biking shirt I love
a SIGG liter of water
4 AA batteries

I also brought a granola bar, but it turned out I didn’t need it. The