cast party and first lindy lesson

last night was closing night for much ado. the show was sold out (at 152 people), the actors were great, and the audience loved it. i've never been a gung-ho theatre person (me: NOT A DRAMA DORK in high school. 'course, i was, instead, an orchestra geek, which was perhaps worse because we had to haul heavy instruments around (at least, *i* did, since i'm an idjit and picked the cello of all things to play (hello? where was my brain when they were passing out flutes? or offering voice lessons for crying out loud. no, just kidding. i love my cello (especially now that it has been to see the cello doctor and has a nice new straight (straight, in this case, is *very very good*) bridge, new bow hair, and has had a seam reglued))) and didn't get as much lovin'). what was my point? oh yeah: i've never been a gung-ho theatre person, but i do enjoy that rush of putting on a show that everyone's worked so hard on for weeks. only one thing went wrong: we use twinkle lights at one point (the costume party scene) and they are supposed to be set on "steady on", but last night they got all screwy and were cycling through all 16 different flashy settings. all well and good until they started manicly flashing during benedick's emotional speech. oy. the director SO gave us (stage crew types) the Look Of Death about it. enh, i don't think the audience noticed.

so anyway, the show went well, we mambo'd like we'd never mambo'd before (we mambo'd the bows to rosemary clooney's verson of mambo italiano), we laughed, we cried, we struck set in an hour.

then came the cast party, to which i dragged karl and his friend david, who had just flown in from england that afternoon. it was a costume party, since we were all in dress rehearsal on halloween. i went as a traffic cone. other costumes: harry potter, rain (i'm going to have to steal that idea, i tell you what), the stage (our, m.a.a.n. stage, that is), lucifer and lilith, cowboys, gangsters, the queen of england (ah, nigel), and a 70s porn star. i drank one cider and a heavy-on-the-vodka vodka and cranberry juice. yum! i must not be drinking very much lately (well, of course, i *know* how much i've been drinking lately, and it is, indeed, not much) because i was pretty drunk on that much alcohol. i don't know how many beers karl had, but it was more than that, and he was sooooo not drunk hardly at all. i danced, i talked with folks, i got to know david a little. i like him, though i'm still jealous that *he* gets to sleep with (well, not *with*, but you know what i mean) karl this month. anyway, david wouldn't let karl drive after the party, so we 3 walked back to my house and slept there. david, the poor thing, slept on couch cushions and my featherbed on the hardwood floor in my living room.

so we went to bed about 5:30 this morning, and arose again about 2:30 this afternoon. i only dragged my headachy self out of bed then because i had my first lindy lesson (with eric, who played benedick) at 3:30. i don't usually get headaches after drinking, and i don't think i really drank enough to warrant the one i have now. hm. maybe i am/was dehydrated.

lindy will be fun. today was the first class, so we spent the hour painstakingly going over the basic swing-out, which is complex so requires an hour of slow work. next week is sure to be better. and $30! hello? that's awesome! not $30/class, but $30 for the whole shebang. whoooo!