I take it back, God.

I am in a strange position tonight gentle readers. I am in the position of having to apologize and admit that I was wrong. As you may remember, I went off a few weeks ago about how crappy it is to perform in front of children in religious schools, and how much better the audiences full of heathens were. Well, my face is seriously scarlet. We performed yesterday for a public school, and you know how that went. Today we went to Our Lady of Mercy, a space which was so small we couldn't get any of our set pieces in, a space where we had to park on the street and wheel the cases we could use into a passenger elevator and take them downstairs, a space where we were changing in a storage closet. And yet, the load-in was smooth and swift, with us being able to keep all the big pieces on the truck and maneuver the other pieces off the truck around them, set up was lightning fast since we didn't have any huge heavy pieces to lift, and the people at teh school were polite, helpful and friendly. (Even if the maintenance guy did sound like an extra from...well name any gangster film...) But the best part of the day were the kids. Ah, the kids. 6-8th grade, and these kids were the exact opposite of the oil painting we dealt with yesterday. I swear I heard kids crying while I was chopping up the old man. And they were laughing like crazy at the funny parts. We even ended up having one kid yelling, "YEAH!" at the end of the show as we took our bows.  It was amazing. It was the type of audience that reaffirms in my heart why I spend my mornings eating hard boiled eggs and hotel coffee at hours most sane people are hitting snooze for the third time. These kids were so into what they were seeing that they made each one of us happier to be there. And the whole no set thing didn't bother anyone either. In fact, Bob suggested, and I concur, that having so many things to deal with allowed us to be creative. In fact, it FORCED us to be creative and do things differently. And that allowed us to do something that you never get to do in Chamber's productions--play. There was a chance for us to bring things to the performances that would never have been there had we done a regular show. We were kept on our toes, and we were allowed to bring what we wanted to the characters. An example--at the beginning of Sleepy Hollow, I am usually huddled behind the stage with a black cloth over me. At a certain point, I stand up under the cloth and make my way onto the deck, trying to be scary as I do so. I then lay down under the cloth, and on my intro cue, I throw the cloth off me like I'm having a nightmare, then sit up and am revealed as Ichabod. I then stand up to toss the cloth offstage and do a pratfall to set up for a physical description schtick. Well, they decided that since we didn't have the deck, there was no reason to do the cloth thing, which I wholeheartedly agreed with. So I was to enter during the nightmare cue with my cane and reveal myself that way.  Well, I come on out, and get the laugh I usually get when they see me in the silly wig and nose, but then I realize I have to end upon my ass so I can do the schtick for the physical description. So I lean on my cane which I let slip out from under me and fall that way. Personally, I think that's a better, far more characteristic entrance for Ichabod, and I never thought the whole cloth thing worked all that well as a scary opening. But it's one of those things that would never have happened with the regular show, and it was one of the things that infused the show with a truly playful feeling. Now, I'm not suggesting that we just trash the show and do whatever we want. I'm just saying it was fun, and like I've said a number of times, I think that Chamber loses out on not allowing their actors to bring their own instincts to some of these roles. But hey, what do I know?

I know this--the way we did the show today is the way private performances should always be done. I have yet to be in a school yet where the show actually fits. Even if the set will fit up and down, the show itself never fits side to side, and that's the important part. So whenever you go into a school, follow our plan and go setless. You end up having a much easier day, and I feel the show looks better, even if you don't have all the bells and whistles. It looks like a show meant to be in a school,a nd that looks more professional than trying to make that huge monstrosity fit into a timy space. The effects, like the Headless Horseman, actually look better with less technology around them when in a small space. Otherwise, you;ve only got half the stuff needed for the effect to work, yet you try to do the effect, and that looks lamer than not trying to do THAT effect and instead doing something much simpler, like, I don't know, having the Horseman come out from the wings and creep toward me from behind. It scared the kids today. I just think if you deal with the actual space you have and adapt to that instead of trying to make the space adapt to you, you'll have a more successful show. I plan on suggesting this to Chamber after this tour is over. It won't happen, of course, but I do plan on making the suggestion. Otherwise, i have no right to complain.

Anywho, after the show, we drove to Harrisburg, PA, a drive which was incredibly uneventful. Tomorrow we have a show at an actual theatre--the only one we have this week. Hopefully it will go half as well as today's did. And yes, I do accept that fact that the religious kids kicked the public school kids ass when it came to enthusiasm. I will also say that the teachers at today's school did NOT do the thing the other Catholic school's teachers did, which was intimidate the children into submission. Today's teachers actually told the kids to ENJOY themselves! So I do put a large amount of the credit to that. I applaud the teachers for that. And yes, this will prove to all you doubters who think that I never admit being wrong that you are, in fact, wrong as well. I admit when I'm wrong. I'm just very rarely wrong. So there you have it--Pond in 2012--He'll Admit When He's Wrong, But Won't Have To!

Folding with Queens

That's it. I'm done, finished. I have no desire to go on. Today was quite possibly the worst single day in my Chamber life, with the possible exception of the day the truck got decapitated. The difference is that day started out well and turned horrid. Today started out shitty and just somehow managed to get worse. It began this morning at load-in, in beautiful Chester, PA. The school we went to was purported to be an easy load in, and I assume that back when they did a show there before, it was. However, that was in May, not March after a particularly rainy weekend. What difference does that make, Andrew? You ask. Well, I'll tell ya (which really, is what the whole blog concept is about.) We had to back up to some doors which required us to back up on their lawn. Normally this isn't a problem, but today the ground was particularly muddy, so not only did we tear the shit out of their grass with the truck, but when one of the school administrators or teachers or whoever the hell he was came out and was telling us we had actually backed toward the wrong door and the one we were supposed to have backed up to was closer and therefore would have required us to cross less of their lawn, we discovered that (can you guess? I'll give you three....give up?) we COULDN'T MOVE the truck. Yes, that's right! Our back wheels were mired in the mud. All we did was spin and spin. So we unloaded where we were, hoping that being lighter would help. (I know, it doesn't make any sense, but we were grasping at straws here) Surprisingly, it didn't work. (I know, you're all shocked) So I got to see the entertaining sight of Levit snapping at both the school administration for having the temerity to suggest that perhaps she shouldn't have had us back up where we did, and at Schneider for not being able to make the truck move. She claimed it was because her kept turning the front wheel. So he got out of the cab and told her to do it. Guess what? That's right! She couldn't move the truck either (and she also kept the wheel turned, so I'm not quite sure what the hell the whole wheel deal was...) I tried putting the dock plate under the tire, which succeeded.....in getting mud all over the dock plate.....and me. So then the school guy, we'll call him Ant'ny, cuz that's what he looked like, suggested putting old scraps of rug and stuff underneath it. Levitt said that was worth a try, then as soon as he was gone tried to move the truck again, failed again, then said she was going to call Ryder to set up a tow. I suggested we wait to see if the other idea worked first, at which point she grunted and walked into the school. So I waited. The blankets didn't work. But Ant'ny getting eight maintenance guys and a maintenance truck to pull us did. So that was crisis #1 dealt with...

Crisis #2 struck as we set up the set and realized that the venue was missing something very important for actors putting on a show--dressing rooms. Now, it was a high school, so I'm kind of used to the idea that we don't have real dressing rooms and instead have to use a music room or a bathroom set aside for us, or something like that. What I was NOT prepared for was the revelation that we had no rooms of any kind--that the school refused to set aside even one bathroom for us to use. So where did we change? A hallway offstage right. A hallway which had glass walls facing outside where people crossed from one side of the school to the other. A hallway which had another glass wall facing into a music room, and which connected down another hallway with the main part of the school and was not blocked off in an way. Yep, that's right. We were basically getting butt-ass naked in the middle of the school. I have freaking had it. I'm sorry, but I've been working way too long to still have to sit in a hallway at a school and do my makeup. I have no problem dealing with the shortcomings of performing in schools when I am performing a show designed to be performed in schools, but this is NOT that kind of show, and I am sick of being the actors being held to these über-professional standards when we are stuck in situations which are in direct opposition to those standards. And I am also sick of hearing the excuse, "That's just the way tour is." Bullshit. You are in control of what the tour is, and if the company is not willing to sell their actors and, I'm sorry, audiences, short by trying to cram a huge show into a tiny space, then that's not the way tour will be. And I'm not saying this just because I'm 37 (dear god that still hurts to say) and have been doing this for 14 years. Nobody should have to put up with this. ESPECIALLY if you work for a theatre run by someone so high-faluting as our producer, who really should know better. Again, if you're a show that's designed to go into a school, then of course the lack of amenities won't be that big a deal, because you won't require them in the first place. But I'm sick of people acting like it's okay to just throw us into any kind of shit situation and we'll just throw something together, which will be judged based on what it should have been in a big space. It's pathetic. And don't give me the "that's what you get for still being non-union" spiel, because I refuse to accept that we somehow deserve this treatment because we refuse to pay someone for the privilege of being treated like human beings. 

So that started things off well. And it only got better once we realized that the kids....hated us. Not since the Catholic school earlier this tour have I been in a theatre with such painfully anemic response. Nothing reached these kids. Not a thing. And then at lunch their teacher tried to convince us that they loved it. Please. It was a hateful show from beginning to end, and all I could look forward to was sleeping in the van on the way to Queens and not having to deal with anyone or anything until we hit the hotel. But that's where crisis #3 comes in. As we were eating our free lunch (which, by the way, was lovely) we noticed that Bob was looking a bit under the weather. Turns out he had the beginnings of a migraine. Spots in front of his eyes and all that. So, Levitt proclaimed that there was no way he could navigate the truck for her that afternoon, and she needed someone else to do it as she drove. Silence greeted her question. And the silence stretched on uncomfortably. And stretched. And then Flo came to her rescue and offered to ride with her. The problem? Flo lives in Queens and was planning on heading out to see her friends and roommate once they got into the city. Carol and Alice were also planning on heading out, so there were a number of people with vested interest in getting to the city swiftly. I, on the other hand, had no need to get to Queens with alacrity, so being the sweet guy I am (quiet all you people who have known me for more than a year or, dear lord, dated me) I offered to take her place. Not surprisingly, she accepted. So yep, instead of napping, I was going to spending 2.5 hours in a truck with Levitt. You listening to this, universe? I better get some beaucoup karma points for this shit. 

So we load out (which goes far better than load-in, and hit the road. About an hour into the drive, in Bristol, PA, at a gas stop, crisis #4 struck us with the force of Hurricane Andrew. We stopped to get gas. The place had diesel, but only allowed you to pump on one side of the truck at a time (we have tanks on both sides) so if you want to fill both sides, you have to turn the truck around. Levitt told me she was only filling one side. I go in to the station to get a drink, come back out and find out she IS going to turn the truck around. She's filled up the passenger side and it going to swing around to the same pump and continue pumping. So I stand aside and watch as she starts to pull out. Now, the pumps are in this huge vacant lot with plenty of room for our truck to turn, so all she has to do is pull straight forward then make like a three point turn. She starts pulling out heading to the right as she does. This brings the rear of the truck perilously close to one of those little guard railings they have near gas pumps to keep you from driving perilously close to them. I realize what is about to happen a second too late as she zips forward, and grazes the rear tire against that guard railing, leaving rubber on it, bending the rim and popping the tire. Yep, you heard right, gentle readers, she blew out the tire. She stops, runs back and then asks if I had bothered waving at her to stop because she was looking to me for direction. What i wanted to say was, "No, I didn't wave. I wasn't aware you needed me to talk you down. I foolishly assumed that pulling out from a gas pump was within your skill set. Apparently I have once again overestimated your competence." What I SAID was, "No, I didn't have a chance, it was too late once I realized what was going to happen." But yes, somehow, this was my fault, at least partially. So then followed the phone call to Ryder, the hour-long wait for the guy to come out, then the changing of the tire, all of which put us smack in the middle of rush hour to get into Queens.

But wait, there's more. We made decent time into the city, thankfully, until of course, we got too close. Once you reach a certain point anywhere in New York and you happen to be driving a commercial vehicle, you are banned from any direct or easy route into the city. One of the largest, busiest cities on the planet wants nothing to do with commerce or the vehicles which practice it. So off the parkway and onto the surface streets, which means it takes us 45 minutes to go 8 miles. And once we get near the hotel, we are informed of crisis #5 by Flo, who has arrived there. There is no parking for the truck. Of course there isn't. It's New York, and nothing good ever happens to us in New York. There is a possibility that we can park in the back of the parking lot if we can squeeze the truck in there. I don't like the term "squeeze". There's also a hospital that will charge us a very reasonable fee to park in their lot overnight. I don't like the term "reasonable" when said by anyone who works in NY. So we finally crwl into Queens at 7 p.m. and realize there's no way on god's green apples that the truck is fitting anywhere in the 10-space parking lot. Flo, Carol and Alice are on their way into the city, and Schneider and Ted are doing venue run, so that leaves Ted to run interference with the hotel for us. He lets us know that the hotel has an alley with a gate that we can park in, if we can get into it. I look at it, leaving the truck to sit on the street a few blocks away. The one-way street which leads to it is so parked in that the truck will never make the turn into the alley, and the alley is roughly as wide as my shoulders. I tell this to Levitt. She wants to look at it. I repeat the information and my opinion that we'll never fit. She insists on seeing it. She sees it. She says there's no way we're going to fit. I keep my mouth shut. I notice that there is space on the one-way street that we might fit in. We try to back in. Levitt sucks at parallel parking, and there's only so much help I can offer when the driver has no feel for the vehicle. As we are in the midst of that debacle, ted runs out and tells us the hotel has suggested we talk to the service station across the street to see if they'll let us park in their lot. I tell him to talk to them as I relay the info to Levitt. He comes back and says the owner of the station cannot envision a 26 foot truck, and needs to see the truck before he makes a decision. So we pull out of the space and drive around the block, where I see a huge empty space on the street. We resolve to come back if the station doesn't work out. The station doesn't work out. Apparently this guy thought 26 feet meant a Kia. We return to the spot, which is now parked in. Schneider calls us (he and Ted are back) that a space has opened up o that one way street right in front of the station and he is standing in it. We arrive and sure enough a lovely space! We pull in. We are joyful. We prepare to leave. We are accosted by a very unpleasant man fromt he hotel yelling that we are a foot into the path of the driveway for the station and we will get a ticket. I wan to tell him to stuff it because he hasn't been trying to park this truck in a city which seems determined to make sure no-one parks anything larger than a Vespa. But his admonishments scare Levitt enough that she moves the truck! ANd tries to back into another space on the same street which she succeeds in getting completely messed up in, even with Schneider and I helping her, until a man comes out of one of the houses and moves his mini van from in front of the truck. We applaud his consideration. I secretly think it's because he was terrified she was going to ram his car, but I'll take anything at this point. She manages to get settled, and the ordeal is over--at 8 p.m. Yep, gentle readers--an hour to park the truck. Shoot me. Just shoot me.

Crisis #6: the venue is so small that we may have a show tomorrow with no set at all. That sounds easy, doesn't it? Except we still have to unload the whole truck to get to the lights and costumes and props and then put back all the set pieces. But hey! We get fed! So that makes everything okay. I have GOT to work for less stupid people.  Pond in 2012--He Won't Negotiate with Stupid!

Pennsylvania weather's-Lousy!

Please make sure to read the title of today's post in the rhythm of Pennsylvania 6-5000. Thank you. Yes, we're here in Chester Pennsylvania, which is apparently PA's First city. Thank goodness they improved after this one. Truthfully, it's not a bad place, just small, with very little to do, and the streets (on a Saturday, no less) roll up around 10. Oy. But we attempted (or at least I did) to go out last night and get my birthday celebration on. Well, gentle readers, I should've known that wasn't a good idea. We rolled in here around 7:30 after an absolutely wonderful van trip. Why was it so wonderful? you ask. I mean, it was about 10 hours, which is always difficult. So why was it so nice? Because Levitt was in the truck. Ahhhhhhh,,,,,, Everybody breathe a sigh of relief. And that allowed us to do things like stop for coffee in a Barnes and Noble, which of course meant we took 30 minutes to stop for coffee because everyone in the cast is addicted to books. We had fun discussions and everyone was mellow during the ride. The only downside was the fact that poor Schneider had to be in the truck with Levitt, but fortunately for him, she doesn't like to talk when he's driving, and he pretended to be asleep when she drove. So that went as well as one could possibly hope. So we got to PA feeling pretty good, if a little tired. And I went straight to finding some place where I could imbibe some alcohol. ANd I found it. We are staying in a very nice Best Western near Widener University, so I knew there had to be bars nearby. And yes, Virginia, there is a college pub within walking distance. So I called everyone up and floated the idea and....got no response. Turned out the only people willing to go were Flo and Levitt. And Levitt only agreed because she thought more people were going. The body language when she found out who was going was priceless. She deflated like a sick balloon, which while a little insulting was, I must admit, amusing. So we took off, looking for cheap collegiate alcohol. We arrived at the location, to discover that, you guessed it, gentle readers, the place was closed. And not "Oh, we're not open this evening," closed, I mean like "By order of the Department of Public Health" closed. Can I pick 'em? So we returned to the hotel, where Levitt quickly departed to the nearby 7-11 to get dinner and find refuge from socializing with me, and Flo and I went to find somewhere else to eat and drink, because I was determined, I was committed, I had nothing else to do! We discovered a brewpub nearby, and was able to take the hotel shuttle (basically a "will you drive me to thus and such a place" taxi thing) up to the area where it seems this place hides all its eateries. We wandered the street to find a place, and discovered a nice sports bar-type of place which was packed due to the Villanova NCAA game having ust ended and the Philadelphia Flyers game still going on. We entered the mob-infested bar, and after 15 minutes of trying to get a bartender's attention to ask if the kitchen was still open, I was informed by Flo that it wasn't. She had wisely asked a woman leaving the ladies' room. Where else would you get your info in a bar? 

I want to know how it is humanly possible that I blend in to the background? I'm standing right in front of the bartenders (yes, both of them) and they don't even acknowledge me. ANd let's face it, I'm kinda hard to miss, I think. WHo the hell knows. But this isn't the first time this has happened. It happens all the time in restaurants and bars, and I'm constantly amazed by it. I mean, I understand that I was not one of the drunken throng chanting "Let's go Flyers!" Pound, pound, pound-pound-pound! But that doesn't mean I'm not sympathetic to the cause. Come on, give me a break! Take a chance! I might just be the best customer you ever had. But, sadly, they missed out on the chance, for we left the sports bar and ended up back at the brewpub we had originally found. It was far more pretentious than the sports bar, and far more expensive, but far less closed. Sometimes, the simple things are the most important. We were joined by Schneider, Bob and Alice, who helped to turn what had started off as another completely disappointing evening into something quite enjoyable. We had a lovely time, especially complaining that we had somehow gotten the one waiter in the place who had neither a neck nor any people skills and would bring our drinks and set them on the edge of the table as he walked by, barely slowing. His name was Cal, and appeared as if his bench press number was higher than his IQ. And let me warn all of you, according to Alice, Iron Hill Brewery in Media, PA has some seriously shallow pours of 12 year old Jameson. Not shallow enough to keep her from spilling it all over herself, but shallow. Just so you know. Consider this a PSA for rejects from AA. 

Other than that, not much else has happened. We have today off, which means it's laundry day. (Oooooh the glamour!) and tomorrow we start a week of private performances again. (Sigh) At least it means we get free lunch again. The downside? Next week (after the one coming up--it always confuses me to describe that on a SUnday because unlike what some people believe, to me Sunday ENDS a week, not starts it) we only have three days of shows and no drive days, which means we don't get a full week of pay. Never mind the fact we're still doing a full week's worth of living. Or that the last two weeks we have worked at least 6-7 days, which I believe should roll over and fill in the empty spaces, thus giving us a full week of pay. After all, they got extra work out of us with no extra pay. Oh well. But trust me, I'm sure there will be so much to talk about this next week, so don't go anywhere! (Yes, I know that technically this isn't a real physical place and therefore you already are somewhere else, but don't get didactic, it's not attractive.) Pond in 2012--he's no didactator!!

All I need's a Little Rock...

I come to you, gentle readers, from the land of Clinton. That's right--Little Rock, Arkansas. Let me say this about Arkansas. It has to be the mot uncreative state ever to grace the Republic. Not only is their state nickname--The natural state--just plain boring (I mean what, everyone was sitting around and said, "What really says Arkansas?" "Well....we're natural." The NAtural State is just a fancy way of saying there's jack shit IN your state.) but their city names are also really pathetic. They break down into a couple of different categories, none of which are particularly inspiring. They are either combinations of the state name and other states or cities (Texarkana, Arkedelphia) or they are vague amorphous concepts turned into cit names (Hope, Friendship) And then there's where I am right now, which seems to be based on whatever they happened to see first when trying to name the city (Well, hell, there's a little rock. How 'bout that?) In short, you can keep it. Thankfully, we are only hanging around here for one night before driving off early tomorrow to Virginia, the next stop on our quest to return to Pennsylvania and points north. And as far as I'm concerned, I am very happy to be leaving the South. Way too humid, way too warm, and way too many billboards proclaiming Jesus' place in my life. Jesus and I have a very nice arrangement. He knows his place in my life--it's the same as nature. Something seen from afar, but not interacted with unless absolutely necessary, and then for as short a time as possible. I stay away from him and he stays away from me. So I guess he's less like nature and more like a neighbor's dog. That makes much more sense, especially considering what dog is spelled backwards...

So the show today in Dallas went amazingly well. The venue--the Dallas Convention Center was a complex which I believe took up about ten city blocks. So all in all, slightly smaller than your average Wal-Mart. But the load-in was swift and easy, and the crew was jolly and even-tempered. The interior was more than large enough for our purposes, and we did very well in getting everything up. Flo was a particular favorite of the guy who was helping her set up sound. As she said to me later on "Schneider gets professional contact numbers. I get numbers for 'if I ever need anyone to show me around the Dallas/Ft. Worth area for a few days'." Yes, that's right--she got the digits....of a long-haired, snaggle-toothed guy who, by his own admission, "Has tattoos older than you." The glamour and romance of the road, people. Who can resist it? But the show actually went quite well, in part, I think, because for reasons that are only easily understood by a Dallasite, the crew played old O-Jays, Kool and The Gang, etc before the show. The kids were rocking out, and that energy level and amount of interest and engagement in what was going on onstage stayed throughout the show, even when Carol's opening curtain speech attempted to tamp it down and reign the children in like petulant puppies. Have I mentioned I hate our curtain speech? It's specifically designed to suck the enjoyment out of the show for ay kid not lobotomized into complete and utter compliance with everything an adult says. I honestly feel like whoever wrote it wanted to just yell, "Children should be seen and not heard!" Oy. But this crowd, of over 700 kids, was engaged and into it. That, let me tell you, was a welcome relief after the week of silent corpses we've had. What's even more amazing is that they were able to have that kind of engagement watching a show where virtually none of the lights worked. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but for some reason, we had zip front of house from the venue. We were able to use some overhead stage lights they had, and we sent one of their guys up in the catwalk to work a spot. It was ad-hoc and slapdash, and the kids didn't give a shit. That's what I like to see. Even when the Headless Horseman was in no way, shape, or form scary because all the lights were basically on and the black light and strobes were useless in that situation, they were still going right along with us, even as I rolled backwards and slid like (as Flo's mother pointed out later) Paul Blart, Mall Cop along the stage to disappear as the Horseman swung his pumpkin head at me. From what Schneider was able to tell me afterward, it seems when he uploaded his lighting disc onto their system, he wiped out every bit of information in their system. To me, that sounds catastrophic, but he insists they'll be able to remedy it. But that was what caused the huge problem with the lights. But I didn't care. I mean, hell, it's live theatre. Shit like that's going to happen. Does it suck? Yeah. But that's one of those things that you can't control. It just happens, it's nobody's fault, and you have to punt. If I have to deal with screwed-up things, I prefer to deal with things that have been screwed up through simple crap luck rather than things that have been screwed up because someone was an idiot and didn't do their job. But today I can say with complete honesty that I didn't lay any blame at anyone's feet about this. And I did what I could to take stress off of our illustrious leader, since I knew she was dealing with what had to be a stage manager's nightmare. There really is nothing worse than when the technology goes awry, because chances are it's gong to be something you cant fix in five minutes. But everybody pulled together and put out what i think was a damn good show, so I am very happy.

So tomorrow we have a 10 hour drive to Virginia, and I shall be piloting the truck, which is fine. I actually like long drives when I'm dealing with the truck, mostly because I'm basically in charge of making decisions on when to stop and things like that, AND most of the time we stop at truck stops, which, now that I've been doing this a while, makes me feel very competent indeed. I can now walk into a truck stop and actually know what the hell's going on, and speak to the people behind the counter and understand what the hell they're talking about. Good to know that if the acting thing doesn't work out, I can always get a second career as a trucker. (Thats not true at all. I look horrible in hats...) But it'd be great for the campaign--I'd come off as normal folk. Probably help me do well down here in the south. Pond in 2012--He's One Bad Mother Trucker!

Curses, Foiled Again!

Gentle readers, I have sad news. This is the kind of news that really should be accompanied by weeping strings...or in this case, crying steel guitars. I am here in Dallas, TX, and had high hopes that the one true goal I had for this tour would finally come to fruition. I mean, here, of all places, it should be possible--nay, damn near inevitable--to get my ass up on a mechanical bull. I mean, hell, if Texas didn't invent the damn things, they certainly were the ones to raise them to legendary status. And we are staying near Gilley's in Dallas, an establishment so thoroughly ensconced in the urban cowboy ethos that for them not to have a mechanical bull is as unthinkable as the GOP working in a bipartian way with the new administration. More unthinkable, actually. And we discovered that yes, indeed, Gilley's has a mechanical bull. And according to their website, they are open on Wednesday nights, so it seems the universe has come together to allow me to experience this particular...experience. (Leave me alone, it's almost 1 a.m.)

So we head on over to Gilley's, which is in what appears to be a compound of entertainment venues. In attempting to find the door that actually leads to Gilley's (instead of one of the other five clubs) we are approached by a doorman and told that Gilley's is closed. We inform him of the fact their website refutes his claim. He nods understandingly and then informs us that while that may be the case, on this particular Wednesday, they are closed for a private function. And there you have it, gentle readers. I had no idea that renting out places with mechanical bulls was such a party trend in this, the 21st century. It appears the only way I'm getting my ass on a mechanical bull is to throw a private party. It is now apparent that the universe, far from coming together to aid me in my quest, has taken on the role of antagonist and is determined to thwart me at every turn. This would cause some people to reconsider their commitment to the idea of riding the mechanical bull. Those people are what I call cowards. I refuse to be held back by something as minor as the universe. I have sworn to ride a mechanical bull before this tour is over, and ride one I shall. We are heading to Little Rock, AK tomorrow after our show, and I have every confidence that there are enough crazy rednecks in Arkansas to support a mechanical bull industry. So stay tuned, gentle readers,there may be news yet of me flying through the smoke-filled, sawdust-besotted air of a southern bar. Fingers crossed!

Today's show as very rough. We performed at Louisiana State University--Shreveport, and their facility was very attractive on the inside, but tiny. So tiny that most of the cases and carts had to sit outside during the show, and even then there really wasn't enough room in what passed for wings for our stuff to coexist peacefully with us. We were constantly walking all over each other, tripping over cables and props and costumes--many of which were hung on ladders so they were up and out of the way since flat surfaces were at a premium. I am damn sick and tired of shit like this, to tell you the truth. I am tired of trying to cram a five-piece bedroom set into a studio apartment. Just because your set fits into a certain space (and by fits, I mean BARELY) doesn't mean that your show does. But that's tour, at least according to Levitt, who of course was all pissy and angry about how the whole thing was working out. But if any of us said anything, we'd get the "That's just what you have to deal with and just do it. It is what it is" attitude. It didn't help that half our temp crew didn't show up until 9:30 when load-in started at 7:30, or that the guy in charge of the venue wasn't there when we showed up. But somehow we got everything up and ready to go a little early, so we were able to sit in our tiny, very hot dressing rooms and relax, or at least attempt to.

The show itself went well. We didn't have many kids, but they at least had a pulse. They seemed to be into it. It's very hard for me to tell. But they applauded through the whole curtain call, so that's a plus. Tomorrow we have over 700 kids coming, so I trust that'll be pretty cool. Once we get back to PA this weekend, we actually go back to doing private performances for the next week or so. Not every day, but here and there throughout. I can't wait. I'm tellin' ya. I don't care about the money, but if I were ever to think about doing this again, I would never do the spring tour. I find it weird that they don't offer any other shows besides Encore and Classics, and they barely offer Classics. I don't understand how schools can keep bringing them back every single year when they always do the same thing. I mean, how many times can kids see the same stories? There's so many great works of literature, you're telling me they can't come up with a few of them and put together a show that seems a bit more apt for the spring? But what the hell do I know? They're too busy attempting to write their math show, I'm sure. Yeah, that won't turn out to be a huge nasty mistake. But at least I still enjoy the show itself. I just wish we were performing it in better places. I have no confidence in the space tomorrow, since I have been told on more than one occasion by Josh last year that most, if not all, of the venues in Texas suck. I can't wait. I seriously do not want to do another tour until it's the type where I sit my ass on a bus and am taken to the venue, where I walk in to find that other people have been there to set everything up and I walk into my dressing room and start getting ready instead of putting together a set in hot humid weather in a theatre where the concept of air conditioning is apparently one they can't wrap their minds around. Ah, the concept of actually getting to be an actor. Nice work if you can get it, I hear.

Okay, enough bitching. After the show tomorrow we start driving, and we spend Friday and Saturday all day driving our collective rumps back to PA. Which is fine since for those days (save tomorrow) Levitt and I will be in separate vehicles. Some people have suggested that I dislike Levitt even more than I disliked the Parkway Twins from the last tour. I  don't think that's entirely accurate, but if it IS, I have to say the only reason is because she holds a position of power and authority and I find stupid in authority more annoying than blue collar stupid. But I still my antipathy for the Parkway Twins was greater because it was very hard to stay away from them even offstage, whereas it's easy to keep away from Levitt once we get to the hotels. And while I do have to deal with her at the theaters themselves, once the show starts, I don't have to be there onstage with her. And regardless of whatever else she has done, she has NOT broken the truck. 

So there you have it, gentle readers, a day of cramped spaces and thwarted desires. Thank goodness my campaign is still going strong. Pond in 2012--No Bull!

I've been to Jackson....

Sit right back and you'll hear a tale,  A tale of a birthday trip

That started from a cheap hotel In Jackson, Mississip'.

The birthday boy was 37 and just wanted some booze

Eight passengers crammed in a van for an alcoholic cruise....

An alcoholic cruise

But the bar they wanted was closed that day, much to their chagrin

And everywhere they wandered, no-one would let them in...

No-one would let them in!

The van arrived at the doors of a Sonny's Barbecue....

With Birthday boy, the sound gal too

All the cast, and the tech

The SM bitch...

Saw the salad and the meat, 

But no serious BOOZE

So this is the tale of the celebrants, 
Trapped down in Dixie. 
Stuck in an empty rest'rant

Off of I-20

The sound gal, cast and tech, it's said, 
Tried to party through the hell, 
But the SM bitch just moaned and whined, 
Cuz she couldn't be on her cell 

No scotch, no vodka no bourbon, 
And no whiskey too, 
Nothing but Bud and Heinekin, 
And some mysterious microbrew. 

So the birthday boy has one message, 
To relate to thee, 
There's no greater shithole, 
Than Jackson, Mississippi!

Yes, gentle readers, that's the story of my birthday celebration in Jackson, MS last night. Flo had found a place which was described as having the best food in Mississippi, and they had a fully stocked bar, so we decided to go there. Unfortunately, what none of the info said was that it was closed on Mondays. So there we are, in Jackson MS, trying to drive around blind and find somewhere to eat and have at least a halfway decent drink to celebrate my birthday.  What we discovered was that in much the same spirit as Portsmouth, NH, Jackson closes everything at 8 p.m. that isn't a fast food restaurant. So yes, we ended up at a Sonny's Barbecue, because it was open, and we were there. And I believe if we didn't stop, Levitt would have eaten us all. Levitt is always hungry. I mean like two hours after lunch she wants to stop the van to get more food, hungry. I'm convinced she has a tapeworm. (Actually, I'm far more convinced that she IS a tapeworm who is presently between hosts...) And since she had been STARVING at 6:30, waiting until we left at 8 to get to the restaurant had her RAVENOUS. And because we waited so long to go to dinner, she didn't get a chance to talk to her husband beforehand I guess, so he called while she was at the table and instead of getting up and taking the call like any norma person would, she said she couldn't talk because she was out and at dinner and if he wasn't free later, she'd have to talk to him tomorrow, which upset him, which upset her, so she hung up on him, then stormed off out of the restaurant five seconds later to respond to a text from him and, I suppose talk to to him, as she could have if she had just gotten up before. And so, when she returned, she was a glowing little ball of sunshine. And by glowing little ball of sunshine, I mean huge sucking black hole of despair and pain. And of course, the place didn't have any drinks, save for the ones mentioned in the song, so I got myself a Heinekin (I have no idea of that's spelled right) consoled myself with the fact that at least the place had an all you can eat salad bar, and did my best to have a good time even though my soul was being sucked out of me by little Miss sulky in the corner, who, I might add, did NOT offer to make sure I didn't pay for anything like she did when we celebrated Carol's birthday. Just saying.

That having been said, I am happy to say that despite all of the insanity that ensued from this attempt to celebrate me getting one step closer to a birthday containing a theme having something to do with being on the other side of a rise in the topography, I DID have a good time, because the people I tour with are a lot of fun. And after a certain amount of things go wrong, you just have to laugh the whole thing off and regroup. Plans are now that I will at least get bought one drink this weekend when we get into PA from Dallas. If not, I'm buying myself a drink and screw you people... I also discovered that Jackson, Mississippi is another southern city which does not believe in people being able to drink coffee within the city limits. I hate the South.... trying to find a place to get a late night cup of coffee down here is like the Bataan Death March. You just keep going forward, convinced that sooner or later, you HAVE to find something, even if it is just an all-night diner, and yet, you DON'T! I ended up drinking coffee in the lobby bar of a Marriott hotel. I can tell you this, gentle readers, birthdays suck as you get older.

Today was possibly the worst show we had. The load in at the Mississippi State University was nowhere near as bad as we had been led to believe, since the dock had an elevator on it which lifted everything up to stage level, so even with the temp crew, we loaded in pretty fast. The problem was the space was small, cramped (All of stage left was taken up with fly rails, so in order to make room for the scenery to hide behind the masking, I had to place the prop and costume table

BEHIND the free-standing pulley systems, which, since there were no outlets back there to plug a clip light into, made running back for costume changes quite interesting.) and hot as a welldigger's witch. Add to that the fact that the audience was made up of Stepford children that had apparently been bred not to say shit if they had a mouthful, ANd the fact that a third of the audience showed up after Tell Tale and that ANOTHER third of the audience showed up right before the LAST story, and you can imagine the incredibly low-energy, disappointing experience we all had. These kids were so averse to making noise of any kind they opted out halfway through the curtain call. One of them tried a half-hearted "whoo" when Ted bowed as the frog, and that seemingly tired the whole audience out, because the applause stopped as Carol took her bow. I then tried to skip my bow and go to the company bow, but no-one read my mind (slackers!) and then we kind of all wandered offstage in a daze, feeling like we'd been beaten, kicked in the groin and socked in the gut simultaneously. All in all, NOT a good way to go.

Now we are in Shreveport, LA, where it is raining. But the hotel is already better than the pit we stayed at in Jackson. That hotel was so bad... (How bad was it?) It was so bad that the lady at the front desk had to walk around the desk to the lobby area to make her wireless internet work. WHat did that mean for me? It meant I had to come down to the lobby from my perch out in the western back 40 of the hotel (for some reason my room is always as far away from everyone else's as humanly possible. And Levitt makes the assignments...go figure.) and go into the lobby. Because otherwise the network kept disappearing on me. And the free coffee was great--if you liked motor oil. But the Shreveport hotel is completely different, in that it isn't a run-down, crumbling, mouldering rat-trap in a sinkhole of a city that as far as I can see has never in any way deserved to be sung about with the fervor used by Johnny and June Carter Cash. The Man in Black lied to me, and when I meet him in Heaven (on a visitor's pass, obviously) I will take him back to Jackson, and shoot him there, just to watch him die. Why? Because that's all there is to DO in Jackson!

Pond in 2012--Willing to kick Johnny Cash's dead ass for Freedom

Alabama Getaway

Being a nice guy, gentle readers, can sometimes be very tiring. Yesterday, after driving for eight hours in order to get to Baton Rouge, I was relaxing in my hotel room when Ted, my roommate, who had driven the van most of the way to LA, discovered that somewhere in his travels that day he had lost his wallet. He searched his (copious) pockets and tore apart the van in search of it, all in vain. We discovered, through deductive reasoning, deep hypnosis, and asking Carol for an old receipt (don't question my methods--mere mortals cannot hope to understand the depth of my power) that he had more than likely left the wallet in a Wal-Mart....in Alabama. A phone call confirmed our fears (and hopes) His wallet was indeed in an Alabamian Wal-Mart. (I want to point out something that only I can register right now. The term Alabamian, which I thought I had made up, does not trigger my spell-check alert. I had no idea that word existed, nor did I suspect that I knew how to spell it. I am truly awesome.)

So here was a dilemma--All of Ted's money, cards, driver's license and DOT permit resided in his wallet, which was being eternally greeted by Wal-Mart employees. Without it, he was for all intents and purposes cut off from the rest of the world, as he could not drive or access his funds. And having anything new (say a license or bank card) sent to him was difficult since he was never in one place more than a day or so. He tried to get the Wal-Mart to mail the wallet to Chamber so that Chamber could mail it to him, but to no avail. The most they would do would be to mail it in a self-addressed stamped box that Ted had to send to them. Suffice it to say, that was out of the question. The only alternative was to drive back to Alabama the next day and pick up the wallet. That was doable since we had today off, but the question was--who was going to go with him? He couldn't go by himself because he had no license. The Wal-Mart was 3 hours away, so it meant that someone had to give up their day off to drive him back and forth from Alabama so he could recover his wallet. Guess who? Well, who else am I going to ask to do it? I doubt anyone would jump at the prospect, and I would hope someone would do that for me were it to happen t me, so I volunteered to take him. And I did. We hit the road at 8 this morning, our one day off this week, and drove three hours to Saraland, AL where Ted picked up his wallet and I picked up some more toothpaste. (See, it wasn't a wasted trip for me after all.) We then turned around and hit the road, trying to get back to Louisiana early enough for Levitt to take he van to pick Flo up at the airport. Flo was in NY this weekend doing a big cattle call audition and was flying back from her stopover in Atlanta. On the way back, I got a call from Levitt asking if we could go pick Flo up ourselves. This required us to stop and kill some time before proceeding rather than coming back and giving Levitt the van. That was fine with me, because it meant we were able to stop for lunch. We ate at a place called WOW--grill and wingery. (WOW stands for World of Wings) I decided against getting more gumbo--I didn't want to over-gumbo myself. (The cast had gone out to a place called Copeland's last night where I got authentic New Orleans gumbo for the first time in my life and it was incredible. I do love me some gumbo.) I instead decided on enchilada soup and a bowl of melted cheese and chili. Or as I like to call it, the cardiac special. We were able to kill enough time to make it to the airport just as Flo was coming out of the terminal. So we all got back to the hotel safely, happily, and walletfully.

Other than that, I did not do much at all today. I went and soaked in the hotel's hot tub, and I got some coffee at Starbuck's. Other than that, I was as unproductive as possible. Before I hit the hay tonight, I shall be working on one of my many writing projects, which are going well, although I have to tell you, it's an odd experience trying to write four or five things at the same time. Trying to keep plot lines straight in my head when I don't get back a particular plot for about four or five days is challenging. But it's cheaper than drinking. This next week is going to be interesting, since we have the drive to Dallas in the middle of the week, and then driving from Dallas to Pennsylvania. I am sure I will be captaining the truck during one, two or all of those days, which of course leads me to this evening's campaign slogan--Pond in 2012--Driving US Into the Future.....

Way down on the Suwanee Ribber....

Here I sit, in a hotel in Suwanee, GA (another hotel I have been in before, I might add. It's kind of terrifying that I'm recognizing these places....) after a nice long drive from Winston-Salem this afternoon, which itself followed a show. A show, I might add (well, not MIGHT, since I just did add, but it's a writing convention. Although that's not true either because there are no other writers here, so it can't really be a convention. But that's another kettle of fish. Now fish! But that's another story...) which was at a theatre we had performed at last tour. I remembered it once we pulled in, and one of the crew guys actually remembered me. "I remember you," he said, which proves I'm telling the truth. "You're the only one I remember from last time." "I'm the only one who was here last time," I said, which seemed to explain it rather well. "Y'all seem a lot happier this time," he said. Now there's a man with a talent for understatement. We ARE a lot happier this time around. Some of the cast heard our exchange, and the rest of the cast was informed of it at lunch, because that's the kind of stuff we talk about. I tried to explain to the cast just what the situation was last fall when we were in Winston-Salem, but to be honest, they really couldn't grasp it. And despite my copious talent with words, I find it difficult to express to people who weren't there the depth and breadth of the antipathy some of us held for others of us and vice-versa. When you're in a group of people where everyone is perfectly happy to speak to each other, it's hard to get them to believe it's possible to want to do nothing but never hear the voice of the person next to you in the van. I mean, they kind of get it because Levitt drives us all crazy, but they have trouble grasping how systemic the disgust was. And you know what? I'm glad. I am very glad that we haven't split up into our tiny little mini-cliques in this group. And I know the main reason that happened in he last cast was because of a couple of certain people who wanted to split themselves off and the way that whole feeling kind of poisoned the whole experience. But I am glad that somehow that hasn't happened here yet. This job is hard enough without all that other shit. I do wish that the other two from the Triumvirate were here on the tour, not so much because I don't like the people here, but because I wish the two of them could experience being on this tour without that cancer running through everything. 

The show was ok. It wasn't quite as great as the rest of them have been this week, but the kids (all 800) seemed to be into it, and I was relatively happy with how the show went. I think it was a little slow, but that might have just been because it was Friday and we had a 300 mile drive staring us in the face. And I wasn't happy with my Tell-Tale performance. But to be honest, I'll probably not be happy with my Tell-Tale performance more than I am happy with it this whole run. I found some new stuff the last few shows that I'm trying to set, and it just didn't gel as well as I wanted today, but whatever I think, the audience seems into it, so I can't be ALL bad. I will admit I am having a really good time doing the show. Thank goodness for that, since it is way too damn long to hate it. I look back and realize just how long I've been on the road, and it's amazing, because it simultaneously feels like I've been on the road for years and yet feels like it was just yesterday I was with the last cast. I am definitely looking forward to living somewhere other than a suitcase. But even that is a strange dichotomy, because there's a lot about touring that I either a) enjoy or b) don't mind all that much. And I have a hard time having a HUGE problem with anything that gives me a lot of guaranteed work. Maybe that's the problem--and by problem, I mean the reason behind why my career isn't further along. I'm too practical. I go where the work and the money is, ignoring for the most part doing things for the pure artistry of it which, at least in Chicago, it seems, is the only way to get anyone to pay attention to you. I mean, I moved to Chicago and decided right off the bat not to work for anyone who wouldn't pay me, even though I knew no-one and had no connections in the second-largest theatre market in the US. Now, there was a good reason for that--I had no job and no money and a wife that would've kicked my ass (most deservedly) if I had come back and said, "Hey, it's no money, but it's so artistically fulfilling!" But I didn't think about finding a regular job and doing free theatre with artistic merit in order to build any kind of reputation. I said screw that, I've been working for 7 years and I deserve to be paid. So I took a kid's theatre tour and headed off to New England. (Whoa--deja vu!) I like the idea of making a living doing this work. I like the idea of not having to have a regular job all the time to make ends meet. I prefer being able to point to paid bills that were paid by theatre work than being an "artist" and having to wait tables. So maybe that's going to consign me to never really being successful, and I'll have cut my nose off to spite my face. I don't know. I mean, I've done cheap theatre--made money, but not enough to cover any expenses because I figured I'd get seen and that might help me move forward, but I look at calls for stuff done at theatres that get great reputations and see that they don't pay anything and I know that if I tried to work for them, I might get some recognition, but I feel like that's a lot of pretentiousness in some way. Especially small theatres that have been around for a long time. I mean, I understand when you first tart out you can't necessarily pay people, but if you've been around for 20-odd years, then you know what, you should've figured it out. I mean hell, I worked for a startup theatre company that insists on paying its actors. It's not a hell of a lot, but it's something, and they haven't been around for FIVE years, much less 20. I mean, hell, what's your priority? I know none of us get into this business to make money, but I don't see why it's impossible to be "artistic" and have an eye on paying the people who help you create that art. I don't know. I'm rambling. And I obviously need my own theatre. Not that anyone's going to give me one anytime soon. And that's probably for the best, because I really won't have much time to commit to it after I get elected President in 2012. Vote for Pond--He doesn't know Art, but he Knows what YOU like!

So here's a little offshoot. Those of you who know me (which as we all know, is all of you. If not, WELCOME stranger, are you registered to vote?) know that I have a great affinity for the music of Meat Loaf. Well, recently, I finally bought up the remaining Meat Loaf Cds I didn't have, including his latest, Bat Out of Hell III--The Monster is Loose. Well, I've listened to it, and I have to say something amazing. I really like the CD (that's not the amazing part) but there's a very obvious disconnect between the songs written by longtime collaborator Jim Steinman (who wrote all the music on the original Bat out of Hell album) and the songs written by others. Now, I also own Bat Out of Hell II--Back Into Hell, and I love it. And most of those songs (if not all of them--I don't have with me, so I don't know for sure) were written by Steinman. But on Bat III, the Steinman songs sound jarringly...well...archaic. I mean, I appreciate the fact I get to hear "It's All Coming Back To Me Now" sung by Meat Loaf instead of Celene Dion (Yak) and the song In the Land of the Pigs, The Butcher Is King is fun, but the rest of his songs sound out of date, and really only like rehashed stuff from his earlier albums, which is a shame, because on Bat II they sound fresh and still full of the wit and screw you attitude I liked on the original Bat. The other people writing seem to have a better handle on what Meat Loaf is able to do and they challenge him more than the Steinman stuff does. I don't know--maybe collaborating with Andrew Lloyd Webber on Whistle Down the Wind sucked all the creativity out of Steinman. (If you haven't heard the cast album to that show, do yourself a favor and don't) And Meat's voice is still amazing, especially when you consider how old he is and how long he's been tearing his voice up, but I've seen video of him live doing the new stuff and even live he's still ripping off the rafters, so I strongly recommend Bat III, as well as Welcome to the Neighborhood and Couldn't Have Said it Better. I'm telling ya. They're damn fine CDs. End of music criticism.

So tomorrow  drive the truck from Suwanee, GA to BAton Rouge, LA. Schneider will be in the truck with me, since apparently you can, for a fee, go to the DMV website and print out a paper license. So at least he can drive now. It's going to be a long drive, but it does mean that we get a whole day off in Baton Rouge, which is a city I haven't been to. I'm looking forward to it. I do love Louisiana, but I am pissed that thanks to Dallas, our show in New Orleans got cancelled. If there's any group that needs to hit New Orleans, it's us! Grr.... Just another reason for me to hate Dallas. Like I NEED a reason. Like anyone does.

Her name was Lola...L-O-L-A Lola!

Hello! Allow me to send you all salutations from Winston-Salem, NC, the only place left in the country where restaurants still have a smoking section larger than the non-smoking section. This place offers supplication to the tobacco industry the way Florida pays obeisance to seniors, but I find it kind of refreshing. At least here the hypocrisy of the rest of the country is blown away--or hidden behind a haze of cigarette smoke. While the rest of the country vilifies the product yet refuses to call for its destruction based on the fact it's too much of a cash crop to give up, here they just look at you and say, "Yeah, we smoke. And we know it's bad for us. But it makes a lot of money and that's a good thing for everybody, so get out of our face, safety Nazi." I applaud that kind of honesty. Besides, I find the whole anti-smoking campaign just as unbelievable and biased as the fake facts the tobacco companies put out back in the day. Tobacco companies are not after your soul, and they do not rub their hands together gleefully when faced with cancer statistics. Let's move on, shall we?

Anywho, this morning we performed at a venue in the beautiful city of Charlotte, NC (You remember--the city I walked all over like the last administration walked over the Bill of Rights and international Law) The venue itself was lovely, and the kids were quiet, but interested. And the crew--boy, I have to tell you we have lucked out when it comes to crews this week! I'm telling you, I'm actually worried about the future, because I see a horrible let down coming, where we end up with crews that are incompetent, slow, and surly. This one though was on par with the rest of the crews this week--in fact, I may say they came out on top. We started loading the truck after the show at around 12:45, and I was filling out paperwork in the truck, ready to hit the road by 1:15. Not to toot my own horn (because if I could, I wouldn't have to tour with a kid's theatre) but that did happen in part because Schneider and I kick some serious ass at packing the truck. All it takes is the right system and the willingness to implement it. Which, I must say, sometimes requires yelling at the stage manager, who for some reason refuses to bring things out in the order they are needed. And I'm not talking about the stuff whose position in the load we have adjusted since the beginning of tour, I'm talking about stuff that is right there in black and white on the list. But every day I have to call out for something else that she has forgotten to have come out at the right time. But enough patting myself on the back (which honestly, tends to strain my shoulder) and back to the crew. Well, one particular crew member. Gather around, gentle readers, and listen to the tale I am about to spin....

The venue required me to back down an alley to the dock. The only problem with that was I had to back into the alley out of a narrow two-lane street at the height of morning rush hour. Traffic doesn't like that. At all. And for some reason, cars seem to think that they are more badass than a 26 foot truck. And since I have a tendency to not want to dent, crumple or otherwise mangle either my vehicle or that of other people (even assholes) it was slow going. Once I did get the truck moving, I looked into my mirror to see a rather butch lady waving me backwards, giving me directions. I thought little enough of it. Tour to enough theatres, and butch lady techs become rather commonplace. She was doing a bangup job of it though. No hesitation, and she was gesturing as if she was bringing a 747 in for a landing. This was obviously something she had done more than once or twice. It was funny because her look (at least from the mirror) screamed 80's hair band roadie. I figured at least there would be someone on the crew with an interesting personality. When I get out of the truck and come around to the dock, I hear the crew member talking to Tim, and I realize that I was mistaken and it was a slender guy. And as I come around the truck, I realize I was right, and that the look wasn't 80's hair band roadie, but 80's hair band lead singer, complete with feathered blond locks and tattoos. He comes over and shakes my hand, introducing himself to me as Kelly. It's then that I notice a couple of things that make me rethink my rethinking. Then I look again and I see one thing that makes me rethink my rethinking of my rethought and leads me, Escher-like back to the beginning of my thought process. Yes, the couple of things were breasts. And the one thing was an Adam's Apple (get your minds out of the gutter, you dirty, dirty people) Yes, gentle readers, our crew member was a transvestite. Or transsexual. I'm not sure which since I can't see into her psyche to figure out her motivations. It was also obvious that Kelly decided on this change late in life. I was more than a little surprised--not so much because the concept of a transvestite shocks me, but more because a) I wasn't expecting to find one working as a crew member at a theatre, and b) I certainly wasn't expecting to find one doing so in North Carolina. So kudos to NC for turning some of my preconceptions on their head. The other funny thing was that the rest of the crew consisted of two genetic (I assume) females and the head tech, who was a guy named Bobby. And yes, I'm sure he was a guy. The Wilford Brimley mustache gave that away...though I guess he could have been female...and Bulgarian. So I don't know, maybe Kelly decided on the change because it was the only way to get hired. I have no idea. What I do know is that she was a machine. I can safely say that one of the main reasons we were set to go at 9:20 this morning and that our load-out was as quick as previously mentioned was because of Kelly. But then, it's so typical--women always try to outdo themselves because they have to prove themselves to the men around them.

But seriously, everyone at the venue was extremely helpful. That's one thing I'll say about the South. The whole friendly hospitality thing isn't just a marketing ploy. The people down here really are that nice. To your face, that is. We all know that simmering beneath the surface is a festering pool of rebel vitriol just waiting for the right moment to boil over into a second war of secession which will succeed in nothing but tearing this country asunder, perhaps to the point where, like Humpty Dumpty, it is impossible to reassemble into anything recognizable. Or something like that. After the show, I drove the truck to Winston-Salem, to a hotel I had stayed in last tour, which is a very nice hotel, and is right next door to a fried chicken restaurant called Mountain Fried Chicken. It turns out it is a local chain--and by chain, I mean there are three locations in this city and that's it. THEIR marketing ploy is a painting of a hillbilly on their sign uttering what I'm sure is a slogan that could only have been written by a slick Madison Avenue type--"It's not greasy!" Sometimes simple is all you need. Turns out that, like southern hospitality, that slogan is NOT just a collection of marketing buzzwords wrapped in a cleverly calculated image. It is some fine fried chicken, and let me tell you, people, it ain't greasy. At all. Yet it's still juicy. And seasoned beautifully. And most of all, cheap. I got a three piece dinner with two sides and a dinner roll for a little over 5 bucks. Excellent coleslaw. Overcooked green beans, but that's the way they roll here in the south, and they make up for it by cooking them in pork and onions. So do yourself a favor, get your asses down to WInston-Salem, NC and have some Mountain Fried Chicken. And tell them that Candidate Andrew Pond sent you, because I plan on stealing their slogan. Pond in 2012--He isn't greasy! 

I Got them Greensboro Blues

A very unusual pattern is starting to emerge here, ladies and gentlemen. Great shows, crappy mornings, usually at the hands of our stage manager. It's disturbing, considering this has happened now every day for three days. Yep, you read that right. Even today started off stupid and ended up being a great show. Every single night, the first thing that happens once we check into the hotel, is that Levitt and Schneider go in the van to check out the next day's venue, so they know a) how to get there, and b) How long it'll take so we know when to make van call for the next morning. Reason a is the salient one here, so keep it in the back of your mind as you read further. We get up this morning, and after what has to rank as the most pathetic free breakfast known to man (You SUCK, Ramada! I mean, nothing that was low in carbs, not even fruit. Just waffles, pancakes bagels and the like. They did have oatmeal, so I figured what the hell. I dumped it into the bowl, then went over to the hot water dispenser and dispensed what I thought was hot water into the bowl. After stirring, I tasted, only to discover that the water was, in fact, cold. I then moved the bowl to the microwave, which, unbeknownst to me, was placed on power level Chernobyl, and within 30 seconds has cooked the oatmeal to the consistency of a rubber hockey puck. Undeterred, I threw that bowl away and tried again, able to make this serving only resemble wet concrete. I decided to cut my losses and thin it out with coffee, since I knew that was hot. Thus ends the longest parenthetical statement in the history of blogging...) I got into the truck and headed off to the venue with Schneider next to me and Levitt driving the van in front of me. I decided to follow the van. After all, they knew where they were going, right? After all, Levitt had done venue run. So we follow them. Because of this, Schneider doesn't tell me what the route actually is, like he usually does when we're not following the van, until the van drives straight through the intersection that they are supposed to turn at. We are a little concerned, but figure that Levitt is using the GPS (why we're not sure since a) she already knows how to get to the venue and b) she's always bitching about everyone relying too much on technology to get them places, yet does it all the time herself) and it must be taking her a faster route, so we decide to follow. (Plus, we are operating under her stricture--follow my call even if I'm wrong) As we continue down the road further and further, I actually start to worry that we somehow lost sight of the van getting out of the hotel and are mistakenly following a completely different white van which is leading us astray. But no, it's them. Finally, they make a right....right into a blocked off driveway off the main road in order to make a U-Turn. Yep, they had messed up. So we drive all the way back to the first turn they missed and head off to the venue, which is twenty minutes away. And it's not like we can make up any of the time because Levitt drives like old people fuck--slow and sloppy.

So we arrive at the venue--Guilford College, an absolutely gorgeous campus--only five minutes after load-in was to start, and all I have to do is pull the truck back to the dock. Yes, we had a DOCK! It was glorious! The only problem was that the dock was right next to a wooden porch that I had to back around. So there I was, slowly pulling back and forth, making cuts trying to avoid scraping alongside this porch while maneuvering against the dock. Remember the scene in Austin Powers, where he was trying to back that cart out of the hallway? That's how I felt. ANd I've got Schneider making motions in one direction, the crew guy from the venue making motions in another direction, and Levitt gesticulating wildly and yelling about how far behind we are, as if I was the reason we were behind. But I held it together, calmly got the truck where it needed to be, briefly entertained the image of giving Levitt a hydrochloric acid facial, and moved on to unloading the truck. That went with the speed of Superman on crack. The crew at this place was quite possibly the most together, well-oiled yet non-intrusive crews I have ever worked with. Even with the late start, we had everything ready to go by 9:20. It was amazing. And the nicest guys you could ever hope to work with on top of it. Even Levitt couldn't make them angry, and she makes EVERYBODY angry. And the crowd was great as well. The venue was about half-full--the orchestra level was full, but the balcony was empty. But again, the kids were awesome. Not AS responsive as yesterday, but they definitely came alive during Sleepy Hollow. It was another one of those audiences that I think we intimidated into silence with our curtain speech and it wasn't until the silliness of Ichabod that they realized they were allowed to react vocally.

Load-out went just as swiftly, if not more so, and before you knew it, we had eaten lunch (at a very nice little diner in Greensboro that is open 24 hours a day, has awesome food and a name which I cannot for the life of me remember.) and hit the road for Charlotte. We arrived with plenty of time to relax and unwind. But fate had other plans for me. ABout an hour or so after we arrived, Flo wanted to see if there was anywhere nearby to get coffee, so I, a long-time caffeine aficionado (some might say addict) I agreed to accompany her in her quest for joe. There wasn't much around the hotel, at least in the coffee shop strata, so we headed off down the road. Down a side road looked to be what might have been a strip mall, the natural habitat of Starbucks. We soon found out, however, that the side road was in fact a frontage road and took us parallel to the freeway our hotel was near, then curved away from it. We, feeling like one direction was as good as any other, continued to follow it, confident that at the other end, we would be rewarded with some place where the art of straining hot water through beans was practiced. We arrived at the other end one exit further down the road from the hotel and no closer to anything resembling a coffee shop. At this point, we decided to cut our losses caffeine wise and got to the Mobil On the Run mart we were near and get coffee from them. Once this was accomplished, another question loomed before us like a monolithic.....uh...monolith. How to get back to the hotel. True, we could go back the way we came. That option was safe, known, guaranteed to end in success. OR we could try to figure it out by walking in the general direction we felt the hotel to be and hoping to get lucky. This option was risky, completely unknown and had about as much chance of being successful as blindfolded brain surgery. Anyone want to guess which option we chose? Class? Anyone, anyone? Bueller...Bueller... That's right--we chose option B! So, pointed in what we were reasonably sure was something akin to being nearly almost certainly kind of the right direction, we headed back. 

Charlotte is a lovely city. At least I assume it is. The skyline looks lovely. The sections of Charlotte that Flo and I traversed were not quite up there on the loveliness scale. But let me say thins and be very clear about it--it beat the hell out of Auburn, GA. Beat it the way lifers beat a new inmate. But it was still not pretty--mostly because we somehow managed to never make a decision to go down any road that wasn't primarily industrial in nature. I don't know how we managed it, but we did. We're just that good. We passed many fenced in lots and were barked at by many dogs, though I'm not sure how intimidated I'm supposed to be by a dog barking like he wants to rip my face off and wagging his tail like he wants to play fetch. I did manage to be worried enough by telling myself what he wanted to play fetch with were my balls. Though I did feel bad for the last dog who barked us away from his very valuable junkyard. He was barking like a good bloodthirsty killing machine, then when we were out of sight of him, I heard whimpering. I felt so bad for him. Obviously he didn't feel we had been suitably frightened and was feeling very down. I did my best to pick up his flagging spirits by assuring him that I had been terrified of him and had, in fact, wet myself. I don't know if he understood me, but the whimpering did stop. Hopefully that kept him in good with his union.

We had left the hotel at 7 p.m. By the time 9:30 rolled around, we were starting to despair of ever finding our way back. I shit you not , gentle readers, we had been walking non-stop for three hours. It was so crazy that I actually pulled out my brand-new cell phone because I knew I had navigation capabilities on it. Of course, as I was getting ready to do that, we discovered the main road we had originally walked down, so I put the phone away, since not only had we found the road, but we were both confident that we knew which way we had to turn to get to the hotel. Remember that, gentle readers--I PUT THE PHONE AWAY. So off we go pointed in what we are absolutely, 100% sure is the right direction.  When 10:00 rolled around, we started to wonder if perhaps we were NOT, in fact, going in the right direction. I then pulled out the phone and went through the lengthy setup process to get the navigation to work, all the time continuing on in the direction we were going. Finally I was able to punch in our destination to find out that yes, we were, in fact, going in absolutely the WRONG direction, and had been for the last two miles, putting us a full three miles away from the hotel. So around we turn, our aching bodies groaning in protest, and trudge back the way we came. Three miles, people. On top of the god knows how many we had already walked. And if I had just not put the phone away, we would've discovered we were a mere 1 mile away from the hotel back at 9:30. It is the little choices one makes that your life hinges upon. Major choices mean nothing, because you have given great thought to them and are therefore protected to a certain degree from their outcome. But the little choices, the minor decisions, like do we go left (yes, yes, go left for the love of all that's holy) or right (no! That way lies madness and fallen arches!) those are the ones that can affect the rest of our lives, because we pay them no mind and are therefore unprepared for their consequences. As we were. Finally, we shuffle our way up a hill and around a curve and we see things that are familiar! Yes, we've made it! I can only imagine that we felt something like what Lewis and Clark felt when they first beheld the Pacific ocean and realized that their long, painful journey was at an end and they were going to have to find some way to keep Sacagawea quiet about what had gone on in that tent. I have never been happier to see a Wendy's in my life. In fact, we were both so happy that we extended our trip by crossing the street (OUCH! why the running?) and going there to get something resembling fuel for our poor drained, beaten bodies. It also let us get off our feet for the first time in 3.5 hours.

And there was our final mistake. For when, filled with Wendylicious goodness, we started back on our trek, the pain which lanced through our recently relaxed feet made us gasp, we realized that sometimes it's better not to rest. But we persevered, and finally, at 11:00, we returned to the hotel and to our rooms, where we could do the one thing we had been dreaming of since we made the first fateful mistake--LAY DOWN. But it is good to know that with absolutely no planning and no safety net, we were able to turn what could of been a horrible disaster into a slightly less horrible disaster. Oh, and may I say--we walked what had to be about 15 miles or so in many different directions (sometimes all at once) and we did not see one single coffee shop. If cities were coffee, Charlotte is decaf.

But all in all, gentle readers, I am impressed by what we did. I have been laughingly called "retro" by a friend of my wife's since I am actually willing to walk further than out the door to my car, but I haven't walked like this in a very long time. But I did it. And I think that says something. I think it says that I am the type of person who will push through the hard times, no matter what is thrown in his way. I think it says that I am dedicated and single minded. I think it says that I hate to ask for directions. And I think it says that in 2012, vote for Pond--He'll walk that 3 extra miles for you.

North Carolina State Of Mind

Today was so completely different from yesterday, I had to pinch myself, gentle readers, which resulted in two things. A) I realized that I wasn't dreaming and today really WAS going as smoothly as it seemed to be, and B) I added a brand-new bruise to my collection. Oy. But it really was like night and day, and I don't mean a song by Cole Porter. As much of a bulging hemorrhoid that yesterday's space had been, today's was a Tuck's medicated pad. Easy-to-get-to dock, professional crew, and a swift, non-lethal load-in. It was everything you could ask for. God bless Raleigh. AND the show was sold out, crammed full of kids who were so into the show that when I smacked the old man in Tell-Tale Heart with the lantern, a girl screamed. They were engrossed in every single story, and gave us so much energy that every single one of us had a ball doing the show today, which I think was imperative considering what a tough day we had yesterday. Today was the type of experience that reminds me exactly why I do shit like this for a living. It was filled with the unbridled joy you really only get from a theatre full of kids. Adults bridle their joy, except on rare occasions, which I think is a sad thing. Because to be honest, we (adults, that is, among which I must count myself, at least legally speaking) don't bridle any of the negative emotions we have. We are quick to unbridle our anger or our derision or our hate. We are also quick to unbridle our jealousy or our depression (which of course brings our therapists joy which, being good therapists, they bridle at the first symptom) or our greed (AIG, anyone?) I have a feeling that if we were to work as hard at bridling those emotions and go ahead and rip the bridles off our joy, then a lot of the problems we have might just work themselves out. So remember--Pond in 2012--Burn The Bridles! (I think that's a winner)

I have to take a moment and say something about the crew we had today at the venue. They were great. They've been doing the show for awhile, from what I understand, so that always helps. But the reason I thought they were great was because they had North Carolina accents so thick you could pour them over pancakes. The head tech guy sounded exactly like Olympia Dukakis in Steel Magnolias, which made me giggle like nobody's business. (Though I did manage to wait until I was out of earshot. I think giggling in his face would've been a faux pas) And the ride after the show was short (Raleigh to Greensboro is a hop, skip and a jump) and Levitt was in the truck while I was in the van, so all was well. In fact, the only black mark on the day happened right away, first thing in the morning and, while ti didn't manage to cast a pall over the whole day (it was way too good a day for that) it did reinforce my dislike for Levitt as a human being and not just as a stage manager. 

Levitt and Flo are roommates. Levitt is neurotic about everyone being IN the van, ready to drive away at van call. Not putting your luggage in the van, not putting your self in the van, but in the van, doors closed, ready to pull away. Levitt always leaves the room and gets down to breakfast before Flo does. I know this because I am usually down at breakfast before Levitt gets there. So it's not unusual to see Levitt eating breakfast but no Flo. However, Flo always gets down there by at least fifteen minutes before van call. This morning, I'm down there eating, and Levitt comes in, and then slowly, one by one, everyone trickles in. Except Flo. Soon, it's five minutes before van call and Flo hasn't shown up. I'm heading out to the truck, and I'm thinking, "I wonder where she is." I was worried that maybe she had overslept and wasn't awake yet, but then I told myself, "no, that's not possible. Levitt is her roommate and surely Levitt made sure Flo was awake when she left the room. I'm sure she was just running behind and she'll get down before van call." That's what I get for assuming. Turns out Flo did oversleep. She woke up four minutes before van call. Two minutes later, Levitt decided to call to see where she was. That in and of itself was stupid, but what pisses me (and everyone else) off is the fact that Levitt knew Flo was asleep when she left the room at 6:50. Van call was at 7:30. According to Flo, Levitt never even turned on a light, just got ready and left. Levitt said that the reason she didn't say something as she was leaving, like, oh I don't know, "Hey, Flo, it's almost 7:00. You awake?" was because she "Didn't want to be her mother." I honestly have a hard time not thinking she's doing shit like this on purpose. Being her mother would be something like shaking her awake and making sure she got out of bed and was ready to go at the same time you were. Reminding her of the time and then going on your way is just being a considerate human being, especially since you have this hard-line stance on what van call means. I do that. I remind Ted what time it is. I make sure he's awake before I leave the room. Not up, necessarily, just conscious. It's a courtesy, since you would want someone to do that for you. Hell, I did that for Michael on the last tour. I'd be leaving the room and I'd say to him, "See you down there--it's _______(fill in time here) To not do that makes you look like you want that person to be late. It's a shitty thing to do to someone. Period. And there's no reason for NOT saying something. NOW of course she's all over being Flo's backup. It's crap. And it just reinforces for me the fact that Levitt has zero people skills, zero interest in anyone besides herself, and zero consideration for other people's feelings. The only reason she apologizes for anything (usually a day or two later) is because of the fact she wants people to think good things about her, not because she thinks she did anything wrong. And how do I know this? Because she's never wrong. And I don't mean like I'M never wrong--in a joking way, I mean like she will tell you flat out that the facts don't exist and you have obviously mistaken them and her way is the only right way. It's insane. She's the type of person who will be moving something heavy by herself and constantly rebuff offers of help, then when she is unable to move it by herself correctly, will say the reason it fell, broke, got messed up, what have you, is because no-one was helping her.

So that was today. Thankfully the positive outweighed the negative in a big way, and everyone settled into Greensboro happy and content on this St. Patrick's Day where not a single one of us went out to drink ourselves into oblivion. Except Levitt. I'm hoping that makes her more pleasant. It also makes me want to call her room tomorrow REALLY early to make sure everyone's awake....but I'd NEVER do that....would I?

Step Lively

Today was HARD. I'm just going to get that out of the way right now. I want you all to know that right off the bat so that you are not taken by surprise when the vitriol starts flowing. I know how hard it is to get vitriol off your shoes once you've inadvertently stepped in it, so consider this a courtesy. But today was NOT easy breezy cover girl. I don't even know why i typed that--that's how hard a day it was today.

We had a load in that started half an hour earlier than usual, even though the show was at the usual start time of 10:30. That right there just screams pain in the ass load-in situation. And it did not disappoint. This venue was brand-new. No-one had ever performed here before us, so we had no idea what the setup was. So when we arrived this morning, I discovered that the loading dock (and I use that term in a way far more loose than say, a 60 year-old hooker) is little more than a porch on the side of the building. A porch you got to by going up about five stairs. A porch with a big column right in the middle of it, right between two sets of double doors. And thanks to the pillar, and all the trees surrounding the (HA!) dock, and the fact that the stairs had decorative walls on either side of them which were higher than the level of the dock, it was impossible to just pull the truck up to the dock and drop the ramp. Instead I had to do something with the truck that resembled a cross between ballet and open-heart surgery. That resulted in the ramp being at an extreme angle onto the dock, all the way into the corner furthest away from the doors we actually were able to go in, and THAT resulted in us having to take everything down the ramp, then maneuver it past the pillar to get it to the doors. Which wouldn't have been that big a deal if it hadn't been for the fact that once you got TO the doors, you realized that in order to get to the stage, you had to go back DOWN a flight of stairs. A steep flight of stairs. And yes, just in case you're wondering, there was no other way to get to the stage. It was the stairs or nothing. This, of course, meant that in order to keep from killing ourselves (or anyone else) we had to keep all the large boxes either on the truck or outside on the dock and unload them there, taking the individual pieces inside. It also meant that all the (unnecessarily heavy) doors and the (EXTREMELY heavy and unwieldy) doorframe had to be taken off their cart and carried into the theatre one at a time. As well as the platforms. Oh yeah, it was going to be a huge pain in the...well, everything. 

What did save us was the fact that we had a crew--a temp crew. Usually this equals more trouble than its worth since temp crews consist of people who don't work in theatre for a living. This means that they're usually more underfoot than not and more of a hindrance than a help. But we lucked out like you wouldn't believe because all the temps were laborers, and a couple of them used to be movers. Hallelujah! So we were able to get everything off the truck without a) taking too much time, b) anyone getting hurt, and c) Schneider or I having to be the ones hauling the huge heavy shit down the stairs. That of course is the most important. The hilarious thing is that usually you have trouble getting temp crews moving, but this one we could hardly keep them from taking things right out of our hands as we were carrying them. That sounds like a wonderful problem to have, except they LITERALLY would take things out of our hands while we were carrying them. On the ramp. Mostly from the girls, who, for the most part, have tenuous grasp of most of the equipment, so they could use the help but since the grasp is that tenuous, having it suddenly ripped from you could end up being more dangerous than grasping tenuously. But they were enthusiastic, so what the heck. And like I said--nobody got hurt. 

The space itself wasn't a problem--plenty of room and a beautiful house, so the show itself actually ran pretty well. EXCEPT for the fact that 120 kids ended up coming in late--like the middle of Sleepy Hollow late, which split Flo's attention between her duties as house manager to get everyone in and her duties as sound board operator to get the sound cues into the (ridiculously sound cue-heavy) Sleepy Hollow. And EXCEPT for the fact that the doors for Frog got put into the frame backwards AND the tie line that keep them closed for travel was not untied, so I had to quickly do that as the story was starting, and then one of the doors (which had been broken before and "fixed" by cold welding) came right off its hinges as I came through it. Yep. But the kids really liked it and really got into it, so the show itself felt fine. And load out, while terrifying in its potential for death, ended up going as smoothly as could be expected. Thankfully, even though the whole thing was one stress-filled experience after another, we all got through it with good humor. Well, kind of good humor. Apparently during the load-out Flo was moving a box and bumped into a door. I mentioned to her (since she is kind of on the clumsy side) "that's a door. You can't walk through them." She just looked at me and (I found out later) wanted to punch me. She had a hard day. But she didn't, so I still stand by my statement that it was done with good humor. Bad humor would've gotten me hit. (as it has done so often in my life)

ANd then came the drive. I drove the truck from Richmond, VA to Raleigh, NC with Levitt in the truck with me. Oh yeah, you know that was fun. Actually, it wasn't that bad, because it was silent. Apparently Levitt doesn't want to talk to me, save to give me directions. And that's fine with me. The three hours flew by. Tomorrow's venue is supposed to be the diametric opposite of today's, so I'm looking forward to that. I've also taken on quite a daunting writing task on this tour. I have several ideas for shows and/or stories, and so I have picked five and am simultaneously writing them all. One of them is kind of a cheat, since it's technically a rewrite of a play I have already written, but it is going to be a pretty extensive rewrite, so I feel justified in including it in this notice. And one of the things is a story, which I have not written in quite a while, choosing instead to write scripts. The projects are as follows:

Points On The Curve: The rewrite of a previously written play. Misogynist goes on blind date with uber-shy girl with issues with men. Hilarity ensues.

Midnight at the Lost and Found: Denizens of a local dive bar attempt to better their lives and the lives of those around them sometime during happy hour. Hilarity ensues.

Dead Flowers: (This is the story) Aging has-been rock star mulls his existence while drinking and shooting up in his hotel room. Hilarity ensues.

Facets--A Crisis in Three Acts: Woman is abducted, tortured, protected and perhaps saved by a man with Dissociative Identity Disorder. 3 times the hilarity ensues.

Tour De Farce: A one man show about touring with kid's theatre. Stories from my work in Chicago AND this tour will be used. NO HILARITY ENSUES.....but a truck does give up its life....

So wish me luck, gentle readers. I have decided to try to get at least one, if not more of these things finished by the time the tour is over. I may abandon it all in a week and return to watching episode after episode of House, but for now, I am determined! Onward and upward! Tally-ho! (Which is, of course, what a pimp does once every ten years....) And remember--Pond in 2012--All Hos Tallied!