Haines His Way

The TOD is easy for me to answer. The most annoying and disruptive thing that has ever happened to my home environment was when those pesky Russian soldiers tried to burn it down. That was very annoying. And most definitely disruptive.

Then there was the time when my mother decided that she would buy a big house in Toronto and we would live on the ground floor and she would rent out rooms on the other two floors. One of the roomers - a Mr. McIntosh - robbed the store where he worked (okay, he wasn't a Mensa member). The police came and had a stakeout at the house, waiting for him to show up. That was very annoying and disruptive. Believe it or not, he DID show up. Late at night. Guess he figured the police all go home after 10. Did I mention he wasn't a Mensa member?

Good Evening!  Good Morning!

I'm back from the post-show supper that BK mentioned in the notes.  What a nice time.  And it truly was a very nice and unexpected - and very generous - surprise when DR Michael Shayne's friend, Gabriel, picked up the check.  Thank You, DFofDR (Dear Friend of Dear Reader)!

Despite some page-turn trauma tonight - which, thankfully, was not too noticeable (to most people at least) - I had a pretty good show tonight - as did the rest of the cast.  It was a great audience.  And in yet another "small world" coincidence, a friend of mine from college happened to be in the audience tonight.  He was just coming to see the show to see the show, and noticed my name in the program when he got there.  I actually ran into him before the show when I went out in the hall on my way to the bathroom.  I saw this attractive guy - - and suddenly he said, "Jose?"... "Hey, it's Charles from VCU!" -And our mini-reunion started there.  He then introduced me to his wife - ah, well - and then it was time to get ready to start the show.  Charles moved out here a couple of years ago.  Wonderful singer - tenor - and he just finished a run a new musical that was running at a theatre just up the street.  And, as I mentioned, he's very nice looking too.

Also in attendance tonight was my friend, Chris, and some friends of his.  Chris is the one who produced the audio for the "Coming Attractions" sequence, and this was his first time seeing the show.  Hopefully, we'll be able to get together on Sunday or Monday and grab a bite to eat or something.  We haven't seen each other since I "moved out" of his place a couple of weeks ago.

Well, that's about it... Oh, as I unpacked my laptop tonight, I realized that I had left my mouse at Kinko's - I had gone there to print out some stuff before the show.  Well... It was starting to die anyway, so, I guess that's me "permission" to by a new one.  -Although I'll probably go back tomorrow and check to see if it's still there.  In the meantime, my touchpad doesn't seem to acting up too much.

Oh, and there were those few times in college, when my electricity was turned off... Well... You know... Umm...

Some years ago, not long before we had moved into this house, I turned on the shower one morning to have it fill with sand and not water!

The plumber thought he had been called out to a candid camera stunt.  Water pipes under the concrete slab on which the house was built, had ruptured and were drawing up the bedding sand.  New pipes had to be installed to bypass the old ones which could not be reached without destroying the concrete foundation of the house.  Fortunately for us, all the piping was down one side of the house only.
Also fortunate was the fact that we have kind and understanding neighbours with a spare bathroom at the end of the house nearest us - and an exterior door to that part of the house so mimimal disruption was caused.

Our greatest fear in this semi rural area is bushfires. The last fires through here wiped out much of the village and many of the neighbouring homes.

My disruptive horror story happened during my first year of retirement. I was playing Bob Cratchit in SCROOGE and the director had booked me, my "show wife," and my "show children" in various venues around town to do PR for the show (which worked - we didn't play a single performance to an empty seat). Anyway, it was during this very busy time that my central heat decided to die - the coldest December on record in Charlotte. My house is well insulated so the first night, the house kept its heat fairly well, and I could sleep under an electric blanket and not freeze to death, but after the heating company came in and said it couldn't be replaced until Monday (this was Friday), that meant a weekend of either sleeping in my own bed or availing myself of kindly friends who offered their homes to me. I tried one more day and night - the worst I think I have ever spent. The house was 40 degrees, and during the day I would sit in front of a space heater wrapped up to keep warm. My bathroom has a heater built in the wall so I could take a shower and not freeze when I got out. So, I lived that day and night in the bathroom, the den where the space heater was, and my bedroom where the electric blanket was (and I still slept in a sweat shirt and sweat pants that night).

Kicker is that the workmen didn't finish the job on Monday, and it wasn't completed and heat back on until Tuesday. And living on a pension, I was VERY unhappy to have to fork out this huge sum of money for a new system. And, wouldn't you know, my central air conditioning system ALSO had to be replaced that summer. So both major systems had to be replaced within a year of my retiring. My bank account was as inconvenienced as I was.

I have a friend who's ridiculously wealthy. Here's one example of how she deals with disruptions.

Minor renovations were underway in her home. So the only sensible thing to do was to move the family into a suite at the posh Prince Hotel. She told her daughter they'd be "camping out" for a month.

In referring yesterday to DARBY O'GILL, someone yesterday asked if this was the movie with Sean Connery and Walter Brennan. Well, Sean Connery is certainly the star, but Walter Brennan is not in this film. You're probably confusing it with Disney's later fantasy with Walter THE GNOME-MOBILE.

That's it - blame the Republicans

I am furious....I am furious blue....I am beside myself.

My Second Season I Love Lucy DVD's all begin to play....I see the CBS Video Logo...and then....INCOMPATIBLE disk message shows up....all other DVD's still play fine.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

...a microwave oven and a coffeemaker (and nothing else) in a bathroom.

Made taking care of the usual bathroom necessities quite a challenge, I suspect.

I have on NPR which is broadcasting an Opera in English program. I now know why opera shouldn't be sung in English (unless it was written in English to begin with - Britten, for example). The reason it shouldn't be sung in English is that you can't understand what they're saying anyway, so it just becomes an exercise in frustration. If it's in Italian, you don't expect to understand it, so you can relax. Plus Italian or French or German sounds better. Carmen in English? Naw. Give me unintelligible pretty sounds with surtitles and I'm happy.

LOL

Slooooooooow.  Well, I'm here.  At some point, I shall go to the gym for my daily (at least until I have hot water) shower and exercise bike ride and sauna.  I'll probably do that in the afternoon at some point.  I'm hoping it won't be too crowded on a Saturday on a holiday weekend, unless THAT is where all the dear readers have got to.  I also hope to watch a DVD or two.