Blessings and Tonys and Zombies

My sister is here for a visit this weekend, with Tiny Nephew and Slightly-Larger Nephew. It’s excellent to have them here. CC and all the kids are thrilled because they haven’t met Tiny Nephew before, and we don’t get to see most of my family more than once a year, tops. I’m happy to report that Tiny Nephew still has itty bitty feet.

The Puggle and the Fuggle are fascinated by the sounds Tiny Nephew makes. They like that he’s small, and smells like milk and poop. They’ve found a kindred spirit.

CC and I both had to work two shows yesterday right after they got here, but my sister kept me updated with pictures. This is the one that broke my heart:

The clown, the baby of our family, bacon-crazed, never-serious #5, with Tiny Nephew, sitting up straight, being responsible, resting his hand on the baby’s belly. I showed it to someone at work and she asked, “When did he grow up?” and I said, “Apparently, right then, when he had someone to be older than.”

Yes, they keep asking for a baby. No, we’re not going to have one.

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CC and I have a party to go tonight for his work.

We both have pretty cool jobs. Speaking for myself only, the fact that I have this job is proof of some benevolent force working in the universe because if I had the job I deserve, it would likely involve cleaning up after an exploding whale.

Last night a man came up to me at the end of the show and insisted that my main speakers hadn’t been on all night. He had an English accent so he already sounded smarter than me. I told him I’d check it out, but I think he was looking for a different answer, because he wouldn’t leave.

English dude: You must believe me. I’ve seen it three times. Your speakers weren’t on.

Me:

Because really, I’ve got nothing for that. Nothing at all.

The Tony awards, the reason for tonight’s party, don’t mean much to anyone except to the people that work in theater. Okay, let’s be honest: Theater doesn’t mean much to anyone, unless they work in theater. There is a small and mighty cross section of die-hard fans across the globe, small being the key word.

When CC was touring with Phantom in the 80’s, the crew once exchanged house seats for tickets to a Space Shuttle Launch. That’s badass. By the time I got on the road, it didn’t matter how big or high-profile the show was, nobody had heard of it.

I toured with Aida (the musical written by Elton John and Tim Rice) and largely, if people recognized the name, they thought it was the opera (by Verdi). If they saw the commercial, they thought it was about interracial love.

*sigh*

Loading out the Hairspray tour in Providence, sun coming up near the end of a twenty-two hour work day, a minivan pulls into the alley and flags me down.

Me: Yes?

Woman in Van: Are you with the Wiggles?

*sigh*

It ain’t rock’n’roll, that’s for sure. But once a year we get a shot on prime time TV. Broadway has some ridiculously talented people and you should tune in tonight, CBS at 8pm EST, and check some of them out. You won’t get to see the stagehands though, unless something goes horribly, horribly wrong.

CC’s show is up for practically every award tonight. I’m stupidly excited for them.

The first Tony for Sound Design was given in 2008. My two very favorite sound designers are up for the award tonight, my designer (Steve Kennedy) and CC’s (Brian Ronan). I have a million people to be grateful for, but I am deeply, deeply indebted to these two men. Without them, all this would have been a very different story.

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Last night I dreamt of zombies. It was one of those dreams where you look around and you gradually see that the situation is worse than you first thought, and you realize that you’re the only one who knows it, and you keep looking around and all of these very normal seeming people are actually all zombies and they get more and more zombie looking and therefore more dangerous every second, and one, who had been holding my hand was suddenly grabbing my wrist and he twitched and I recognized him for what he was and started punching the crap out of him.

CC, springing straight up in bed: Jesus Christ!! WHY ARE YOU PUNCHING ME?

Me: ZOMBIE! ZOMBIE!!!!

CC: STOP PUNCHING ME!

Me: I HAVE TO, YOU’RE A ZOMBIE!!!

CC: STOP! I’M NOT A ZOMBIE! WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU?

Me:

Because I had nothing for that, either.

And now, I have to go see if I fit into any of my party dresses.

Tell me about your blessings, theater opinions, or zombie experiences.

It All Started Out With Bad Directions

#1 had a doctor’s appointment today and I looked up the directions for her. In my defense, I didn’t do anything to her that I wouldn’t have done to myself. Had it been me driving, the same thing would have happened. Well, up to a point anyway. She got lost, missed her appointment, and it’s my fault. So here are some pictures, a little visual salad of my past week, while I wait for her to find her way home again.

#2’s Choir concert. She’s in the front row on the far right. She was good, and she looked like she was having fun up there (neither one of those really comes through in the picture). I harassed the tech guys (adults) at the booth during intermission and gave them our info in case they need any help. They looked kinda relieved. I’m not quite sure what I’ve gotten myself into.

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Casey, listing to starboard on a basket of clean laundry. She gets more sausage-like every day.

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Gratuitous Tiny Nephew baby foot picture.

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These are shots of the room that #3 & #4 share, before we spent a few hours on it. Believe it or not, this wasn’t that bad. We gathered four baskets of laundry, two bags of trash, and two bags of donations.

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Action shots of the puggles unmaking my bed. Casey wraps up like a burrito and Jack jumps on her head and then they bite each other’s faces through the bedspread. Neat.

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Picture my sister sent me on my phone. Look familiar? Slightly-Larger Nephew strikes again.

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Herbs that CC planted before work. This makes me very happy. We have a bajillion deer and planting in boxes on the deck is the only way to keep plant things from being eaten prematurely by animal things that aren’t us.

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And finally, the silver Mystery Utensil my mom gave me for Mother’s Day (I had to have my sister mail it to me because I was flying with only a carry on bag and I was sure it looked weapon-like, considering how bothered they were by my tea canister on the way out). I know what it is only because my mom told me when she gave it to me. This thing was the highlight of my Memorial Day. Anyone here know what it is?

That’s all I got. Happy Wednesday!

Happy Birthday, Goofballs.

When CC and I were on the road together years ago, back when he was just my boss, I used to ask him if we could get a sound department puppy. Preferably one that the props crew would take care of. Nobody went for it.

The kids started asking us when we were going to get a dog pretty much the minute they started living with us. We had lots of conversations about care and taking responsibility, but really it all boiled down to one thing: dog poop. We weren’t willing to talk seriously about a dog until all the kids unanimously agreed that they would handle the dog poop. It took longer than you might think.

I didn’t know this before, but puppies are contagious. All it takes is for one kid in the neighborhood to get a puppy and bam! everybody’s got one. There is apparently no vaccine.

Two years ago, a kid across the street got a puggle puppy and would bring it over to our house to play. It was summer, and CC was letting me sleep in until the puppy came over for its morning visit and then he would let it into our bedroom, where it would jump on my head and be all like “Oh my gooood! I’m a DOOOOG! Isn’t it GREAAAAT? I can’t BELIEEEEEEEVE it! YAAAAAAAY!”

It’s something, being around so much enthusiasm.

Before long I was online, looking for puppies. We did a little research and a lot of soul-searching and decided that more than anything we wanted a puppy that was happy. Enthusiastic, if you will. That led me to a puggle breeder about two hours away that had two puppies. They were the entire litter. I wrote a little about them here.

I packed four kids into the minivan one Sunday and trucked out on a road trip to look at some puppies.

We couldn’t decide. I’d thought that there would be some magical bond, some way that I would know The Right One For Us, but it wasn’t like that. Especially when there were only two to start with. It was more like eeny-meeny-miny-moe.

CC had to work and I sent him pictures, but he wouldn’t say which one he liked best. The kids were evenly split (#1 had opted out of the road trip). I wanted both of them, but that’s insane. Who gets two puppies? I picked the goofy looking one because he seemed to fit into our family the best:

He howled the entire way home, and he doesn’t look it, but he’s loud. That’s the Beagle in him. Then he pooped on my shirt. The kids thought that was hilarious.

As soon as we got him home, I realized the error I had made. Our puppy-to-kid ratio was way off. There was so not enough puppy to go around. Poor Jack was all tiny and blinking, cowering there with five kids hovering over him. CC admitted that he wouldn’t say which one he liked best because he wanted them both. I traded some texts with the breeder. They were willing to cut us a deal.

Three days later we went back for the pretty one:

When we brought her in the front door, Jack smelled her before he saw her and started dancing in circles around us. They were so happy to be back together. Then they immediately started fighting:

And it’s been like that ever since.

I will probably always refer to them as “the puppies” but today, Jack and Casey are two years old. They are ridiculous dogs. They are way more expensive than they should be. They are the one thing that we all agree on: we love them bunches.

Back when CC and I were just touring together, before any of this crazy stuff happened, I wasn’t ever planning on getting married to anyone or settling down on the east coast or buying a house or definitely not being a parent, but I did want a puppy.

I finally have a crew of five to take care of them.