home honig family theatre spot journal links
August, 2003
August 31, 2003
Another night at the theatre
Last night, Bill and I attempted to see Little Shop of Horrors. I tried to buy tickets online but it was sold out. We decided to try to buy them at the box office, hoping that seats would be released closer to curtain. No luck, it was sold out. I had brought other discount codes with me so we saw Big River, first time for him, second for me.
The first time I saw this show, there was so much for me to pay attention to, it was a bit overwhelming. I concentrate on everything, sets, costumes, music, lyrics, and I was also trying to pay attention to the sign choices, which signs they chose to convey the concepts. Seeing it for the second time allowed me to concentrate more on the signs. I noticed last night that they use the older, compound sign for HOME, rather than the more abbreviated sign we use today. I suppose that was to indicate that this story takes place many years ago. I thought that was a nice touch. It's a beautifully done show, beautifully performed. I see from a playbill article (Big River article) that there is a possibility this production will be moved to another Broadway theatre after it closes at the American Airlines Theatre. I was hoping that this would happen, especially since it will give teachers of the deaf a chance to bring their students to see it. Maybe we can take a field trip this year.
Back to academics this week. With my workday ending at 6pm, everyone will have to pitch in and help with dinner so we're not eating too late! We're very good at adapting to different schedules.
til next time....
__________
August 29, 2003
But whatever they offer you, don't feed the plants
Performances begin tonight at the Virginia
Theatre.
Performance Schedule
PREVIEW PERFORMANCES--FRIDAY, AUGUST 29
THROUGH WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 1*
Tuesday through Saturday evenings at 8 p.m.
Sunday evenings at 7 p.m.
Saturday and Sunday matinees at 2 p.m.
BEGINNING SATURDAY, OCTOBER 4
Tuesday evenings at 7 p.m.
Wednesday through Saturday evenings at 8 p.m.
Wednesday and Saturday matinees at 2 p.m.
Sunday matinees at 3 p.m.
*There will be added performances on Wednesday, September 24 at 2 p.m. and Monday, September 29 at 8 p.m. There will be no performance on Friday, September 26 or Friday, October 3.
Break a leg, cast and crew!
__________
August 27, 2003
Happy Birthday Kelly!
This is the last of our summer occasions. Celebrating will take place tomorrow, when we go out to dinner for both her birthday and our anniversary.
Well, I'm back to work. It's been interesting, interpreting football practice for this week and then back to the academics, as well as sports, next week. As I walked onto the football field the first day, I heard, "Heads up!" and had to duck to avoid a football. One of the coaches said, "That was your initiation. Welcome to Northport football." I'm trying very hard to understand and remember the plays so I can help the student remember them. This is difficult since I don't follow football and don't really understand it. The coach assures me that I will learn. That remains to be seen. Last year, this student was a kicker, and was very good. I mentioned that to the coach but they're not working on that yet. So, at this point, they have him trying different positions to see what will work. I'm not sure what will happen during games. Do I run out and interpret the huddle? I guess I'll find out!
Incidentally, here's a Playbill.com article about The Thing About Men, which opens tonight at the Promenade Theatre. Playbill News: Love x 3: New Musical Comedy The Thing About Men Opens Off-Broadway, Aug. 27
__________
August 24, 2003
Thanks to Margaret Lo, I had the opportunity to see The Thing About Men (official site) today with Amy Gargan. I really enjoyed the play and it's such a treat to see Ron Bohmer and Marc Kudisch on stage together again, as well as spending time with Amy again. When Kelly and I are free, we'll be back to see this one together.
Before the play, I met Amy, Margaret, Kathy Sheehan and her friend, Doreen at Sam's Restaurant for brunch. I wasn't aware that Sam's has musical accompaniment during Sunday brunch. At first, we were the only people in there and Kathy is on a first name basis with the pianist/singer, Michael Walsh. Before we left, we (except Kathy) sang two songs with Mr. Walsh, Colors of the Wind and If I Loved You. I made sure Amy was holding the microphone and I was far enough back to barely be heard! Much better that way! When told of this adventure, Kelly's comment paraphrased Amy from the Pimpernel days, "You're still making a scene everywhere you go!" It was a lovely, spur-of-the-moment afternoon.
From left, Margaret, Doreen, Amy and Michael
Walsh. This picture was taken before I joined the
group.
__________
August 23, 2003
28 years
Today is our 28th wedding anniversary. Wow! Since Kelly has to work late today, we plan to celebrate our anniversary and her birthday (August 27) on Thursday evening by going out to dinner. Kelly will have many celebrations with friends this week. I call her birthdays "neverending" birthdays. She makes the fun last! Today, I've got a roast chicken in the oven and I made a great sour cream coffee cake. And the weather is beautiful! In fact, it's very much like the weather we had for our wedding.
August 23, 1975
Kel, Jan and I saw our friend, Stephen, in a play last night and then went out to eat and had a great time, lots of laughs. Eric and Lori met us at the restaurant afterwards. We made such great friendships from what I like to call the "Pimpernel experience". Now that Douglas will be back on Broadway, we'll undoubtedly see fans and friends we haven't seen for awhile. I'm so looking forward to it!
Have a great day, everybody!
__________
August 18, 2003
HAPPY BIRTHDAY KIM!
We had dinner at Red Lobster, lots of laughs (we're incorrigible in public) and stuffed ourselves. Whew! Also, I forgot to bring the camera to dinner. I know, hard to believe, isn't it? Bet my kids are glad!
Dad's vacation is over and he's back to work tonight. My vacation officially ends next Monday when football practice starts and I start working. Wow, that went by fast.
Off to read...
__________
August 17, 2003
Here's a picture of Colleen and Kelly from Colleen's graduation party today. Aren't they cute?
Off to sleep, having partied all day, goodnight, all.
__________
August 15, 2003
Where were you when the lights went out?
Yesterday, I asked what fall and winter had in store for us. I guess summer wasn't finished with us yet. Here we were, enjoying a quiet summer afternoon, Bill was watching TV, I was reading the newspaper when everything shut off at 4:10pm. He tried calling LIPA (power company) with no success. We tried with the cell phones and they weren't working. Then, I put batteries in the radio to get an idea what was happening. As soon as we realized how widespread this was, our first thought was batteries! We first tried CVS, which had just closed, a hardware store across the street and they had no batteries. Then, we went to Radio Shack. I opened the door, stuck my head in and asked, "batteries?" The guy said, "Sure, come on in!" So, we were able to stock up on batteries and Bill and Billy were able to get two bags of ice, after searching several stores. We put the milk in a cooler with one bag of ice and several bottles of water and put the other bag of ice in the refrigerator and then didn't open it again until power was restored about 4:30am, a little more than twelve hours after we lost power. The refrigerator only inched up five degrees from normal and the freezer was at 25 degrees. So, we were lucky, considering the fact that we'd gone food shopping yesterday morning and stocked the freezer with meat on sale!
It's been quite a year. Here we were in February:
and we thought THAT was bad! It was uncomfortable yesterday and we are so spoiled by central air conditioning. I didn't sleep well at all and spent a good part of the night reading. It brought back memories of Hurricane Gloria in 1986, when we didn't get power back for a week. When the workers restored power on our street, everyone came out of their houses and applauded and cheered! It was amazing.
So, I'm ready for an end to endless rain, piles of snow, heat, humidity and power outages. I'm ready for some nice weather and a peaceful fall! Please??
__________
August 14, 2003
I stayed up until 12:30am but I finished the quilt top. Now I have to baste it to the batting and backing and "tie" it. I'm not going to quilt it because there are so many flaws, it would be too difficult. I really never should have picked such a difficult pattern for the first bed quilt! It will still take awhile but not as long as quilting. Here's a picture:
I've done a lot of little things to the website today. I added another page to the theatre section (can you guess what it is?) and I've added hyperlinks along with the "hover buttons". The hover buttons are java-enabled and some people may have trouble with that and, therefore, not be able to access any pages on this site. My web-savvy son suggested I add the regular hyperlinks, just to make sure. I also added Todd's website to the links. How did I forget about him before?? Finally, I changed some colors and fonts to make it a little more uniform and to replace the "geocities" blue of the original pages.
It's hot today here in NY but I guess we shouldn't complain because the sun is out. Yes, it's a little hard to believe, after the gray, rainy days we've been seeing. It really hasn't been much of a summer, following an absolutely miserable winter. I wonder what fall and winter have in store for us.
__________
August 13, 2003
Let's see, what's up for today? First, if you love cute babies, check out Megan Morrone's jumpingmonkeys.com for pictures of her baby, Annabella. Megan was a regular on TechTV's daily program, The Screen Savers, until Annabella was born. It's a favorite show in the Honig household. I love to check out Megan's site every couple of days for new pictures. Ah, digital photography. I love it.
I got the results back from my heart monitor test yesterday. Everything is completely normal, no arrhythmia, no extra beats, even when I feel that fluttering feeling. The doctor isn't sure what I'm feeling but is thinking that whatever it is, it's probably hormonal, not dangerous and not even worth pursuing anymore. Now, I'm scheduled for a stress test and some advice on how to adjust my exercise schedule to lower my cholesterol.
I'm still working on my first bed quilt but I'm seeing progress. I plan to spend the afternoon doing that. Hopefully, it will look alright and I'll take some pictures.
Speaking of pictures, here are a couple from my nephew, Steven's, ninth birthday party this past Saturday:
Steven (front) and his cousins
Kim, Carl and Billy (Shari in background)
Billy and I left the party early so we could go to see Shakespeare in the Park interpreted for the deaf. I had such a good time. Billy wasn't enthusiastic but he hung in there so Mom didn't have to go alone. He did get a good dinner at a luncheonette on Amsterdam Avenue, however, so it wasn't a total loss! And he said he did enjoy the scene near the end when Henry V (Liev Schreiber) is "wooing" and proposing to the princess, Katherine. Coincidentally, most of the reviewers felt the same way about that scene. The interpreters were so good and the seats were amazing. Also amazing was the fact that it rained steadily through the performance and they just kept on going. It didn't bother me (I had a sweatshirt) but many people left.
My vacation is winding down. I can't believe the summer flew by this fast. Whoa.
Til next time...
__________
August 8, 2003
Well, I finished Mr. Darcy's Daughters. It was a good story and I couldn't help thinking that Jane Austen never would have written a story like that. I don't want to spoil anything for anyone who'd like to read it but there were some references to sexual situations that never would have been written in that day. Incredibly tame by today's standards but when I read them, I had to gasp! Hmm. I am now reading a book of three novels written by Jennifer Chiaverini. Together, they are called the Elm Creek Quilts series. The main characters in the stories are part of a quilting group in Pennsylvania. I read the fourth book in the series already because it also had to do with the use of quilts as a way of communicating to escaping slaves on the underground railroad prior to the Civil War. I really enjoyed the book, mixing interests for me, but didn't understand a lot about the characters and now that I'm reading the first novel, The Quilter's Apprentice, it's making sense. I often do things backwards like that. Not that it matters. It's a good story, a real quick read. The other two novels in the book will keep me busy for awhile.
P.S. Thanks, Bruce, for signing the guestbook (just read it now). I have a question, though. Why is it I can do this but messed up the bold type on your message board. Yikes. Totally weird.
__________
August 6, 2003
It's coming....
__________
August 4, 2003
I'm really having fun with this website stuff. I can't seem to stop making little changes and adding different things. I went back to the Pooh clipart sites where I found the graphics and found more to add to pages which were Pooh-less up until now. I like this little Pooh writing graphic on this page. It's really cute. I might as well take advantage of the time I have now and play with it because once I'm back to work, I may not have the time or energy to experiment. At least it's up and running and working properly (crossing fingers). Please, people, sign that guestbook! It's the only feedback I have.
I've added lots more links. Some are pretty interesting, like "My Cat Hates You". It is a bit strange but it's really funny at times. I can't believe how much time I can waste just looking at cat pictures. Did I just admit that? Also, Kelly originally sent me to Meg Wood's site. She chooses a "boyfriend of the week" from various celebrities and the entries are really funny.
Keep checking back, I guess until I run out of ideas!
__________
August 1, 2003
Summer Disappearing??
It's August already? How did that happen? It took so long for summer weather to actually make an appearance here in the NY area and once it finally felt like summer, a good part of the "summer" was already gone. Huh? Did that just make any sense? I don't know.
Anyway, it's cloudy and threatening to rain again. We didn't even open the pool this year and we still can't decide if it's worth it or not. The weather isn't all that warm and even if we bother, the water will be cold. Sigh. We'll probably regret not opening it if we have a real heat wave (probably once school opens!).
I interpreted a night class this past Wednesday evening and will interpret the same class this week, Tuesday and Thursday evenings. It looks like I'll start work early this year. I will be working with a student on the football team in the afternoons and practices start August 25. I'm not sure yet what my schedule will be this year. At this point, it looks like 1:15 to 3pm at the high school and then three hours in the afternoon for football practice (3-6pm), at least until November when football ends. It's not the best schedule. I'd prefer to finish early and have the rest of the day open. I was really spoiled for the last eight years, when I was usually done by 3 or 3:30pm. Let's face it. This schedule will severely cut into my theatre-going! I guess I'll have to take advantage of any discount that's available for Saturday and Sunday matinees. Discounts are rarely available for Saturday nights. I suppose I could conceivably make an 8pm curtain during the week but would have to forgo the usual dinner before and eat after. Another sigh. Hey, a job's a job, you know what I mean?
