A Hit, a Very Palpable Hit

Time for a recap of the opening weekend of Hamlet! I hope you will all be able to come and see the production that drove out an audience away. Luckily, none of our actual audiences left.


I can’t remember which performance certain things happened at, so they’ll have to all be grouped together. My pants broke before opening and were secured with solely a safety pin. My cape, thankfully, covers my butt, so no one can see it. My shoe came unbuckled twice during the final scene. One time it was my fault, but the other was Taylor stepping on it right before the scene started. Thus my shoe was unbuckled for the entire scene. Here I am getting ready to be the beautiful Player Queen.


If those are my only flubs, I think that I am doing okay so far. The show is getting more fun each time we do it. That may just be because my characters are ridiculous. I don’t know if I’d feel the same way were I playing one of the more serious roles. This mainly applies to the play within the play and the Osric/Hamlet/ Horatio scene. Each is becoming more playful and fun every time we perform.

Some funny onstage moments include: JJ spitting after sipping the wine, me covering a mistake in the fight by saying my line that was no longer applicable, Taylor hitting the wall as we ran out for a scene in Act 4, Jonathan’s sword breaking, our Sunday audience of six, and JJ naming Julie’s character Benefisense.

Back stage much funnier things happened. Billy Ray threw a piece of string on Susan, which she thought was a roach. Only moments later, he tripped her walking to places for the funeral scene. Taylor created the word “chilfs,” which does not need to be explained. Amanda’s monk mask scared Nick. Michael slept through Acts II and III. The mouse made an appearance. Billy Ray and Nick said multiple offensive things to each other, and Susan learned what a “queef” is.

We had our first cast part at Susan’s Friday night, and it was wonderful. Since rehearsals started, I have not really had a chance to just relax with friends, so it was nice to get a chance to do just that. Susan and Kenny’s house in Southside is a great venue for that. I hope when I own a home it can be as clean and well put together as their home is. I really like all of the older homes in that area of town. It was mostly just the cast, and it included conversations about many things like if you would taste your own breast milk, if you knew who Tony Bennet was, being a vegetarian, fruit allergies, sub genres of heterosexuality, and more. Somehow I ended up being there until three. I can only imagine what will happen at Bates’s this weekend.

Monday was my first day without anything show related to do, so I went to teach a client casework class in Aliceville, AL. The women who are getting trained to volunteer up there are a handful in a good way. I knew this class would be a struggle because it is the longest class we teach due to the enormous amount of paperwork involved. You have to learn how to fill out national forms and state forms, so it’s a lot of information. They all seemed to be interested, though. I just think it’s crazy that I can have an eight person class in Pickens County, and I can’t get more than three in Tuscaloosa.

Last night I went back to high school for the IB Open House. The event was for the parents of potential IB students and the students themselves to learn more information about the program and to ask questions in different breakout sessions. I was in the room called “IB Uncut.” One of the parents walking in asked if it was the uncut one. My laughter was stifled. This room was meant for parents to ask questions of current IB parents, students, and alumni. There were about seven current seniors, one college student, one alumnus (me), and two parents. I think it went fairly well, but there too many panel members. I hadn’t thought back on IB in a while, so last night made me realize even more how beneficial that program was for me and how much I love it. It was also a little sad seeing these high school seniors talk about how close they all are since I now know that only lasts for so long. I still have friends from my IB class, but I definitely don’t talk with all twenty-two of them. Some have even deleted me as a facebook friend. This has been a common theme in my social media existence.

In the beautiful world of the American Red Cross, we have started our West Alabama Meme group. If I’m not doing work, arguing with James, or eating, I tend to be great WARC memes. I’ll share one with you, but sadly it probably won’t be funny to you. This meme represents me in our office.

Red Cross Meme


James Quotes of the Week

“She wants to join Red Cross Club? She doesn’t know what she’s getting into.”- James on a girl wanting to volunteer

“You making things up?”- Me

“Like always.”- James

“Ladies. You need to get away from them sometime.”- James on his office girlfriend

“He put words in my mouth. See I’m tryin to be nice.”- James on his attitude

“Oh I talkin to da wall now.”- James on being ignored

“Now look-a-here. I’m gonna have to hang you two by your toes.”- James on people not signing in when the arrive.

This Show is Boonanas

With how busy things are getting, I am realizing that I need to be taking notes everyday to remember what needs to be written here. With rehearsals and work, my mind is just completely blank. This week marked the last of our rehearsals for Hamlet. We open tonight! This has been by far the quickest process for a show. I’m really excited for everyone to be able to come and see it. It runs this weekend and the next two Thursdays through Sundays. Sundays at 2:00 and 7:30 every other night.


On Thursday last week, I got the pleasure of attending a PR presentation done by students at the University of Alabama. I was really impressed by the amount of professionalism in the school of communication. Arts and Sciences did not do anything to prepare their students for actual careers. This campaigns class was able to plan and pitch a bar crawl, a volunteer recognition event, and a book fundraiser. While the presentations did have their flaws, it was a great start. I’m just glad those responsibilities got placed onto them and not me. Though, the girls in the class did volunteer me to grill at these events. I told them that would be a great idea if they didn’t want anyone to eat.

Tuesday, I led the Hispanic Service Providers meeting at the Tuscaloosa Police Department. This was after I spent so much time retyping my entire email list into Excel that morning. On my day off, I had accidentally deleted the distribution list. I officially hate Outlook. I had remained neutral up to this point, but now I’ve taken a side. The meeting went really well in the way that a large group of people actually showed up. I think the event is really going to come together, but I will be so happy when it’s done. I never thought I’d be the main person trying to organizing a 500 person health fair for the Latin American community, but it seems to be going okay.

Wednesday turned out not to be the day of dread I thought it would. I had a dream I had an emotional breakdown in the state office, and almost prophetically I received an email the next day requiring my attendance at a regional VISTA meeting for Red Cross. Luckily, I did not need to partake of the hidden stashes of alcohol in the building. They were either really fake or are actually okay with what we’re doing for the most part. It was also nice to meet some people just beginning their VISTAship. I wish I had been as lucky to have this kind of meeting. Instead the same person that led the meeting yesterday gave me a bag of keys and told me to find out what they went to.

I was so happy that Amanda Coppock came into town this weekend. We were able to go to Iguana Grill in Hoover and catch up. I also told her about Bama Memes and am highly considering making a Red Cross Meme group just for the people in the office. I think I’ll actually do that right now.


Rehearsals went really well over the weekend. The cast is really enjoying our time together. Sometimes we enjoy it too much as seen in the amount of backstage noise. We laugh a ghost pick up lines and people trying to get in and out of costumes among many other things. At least we don’t laugh during the funeral scene anymore. The cast went to JClyde after rehearsal Thursday to wind down. During this time, JJ looked at the television and asked if ESPN was currently running a story on Tim T’bow. This weekend we got a cast photo taken, which looks amazing, at least on my end. This makes up for how much of a doof I am in the promotional video.


During our final dress rehearsal, some women from Saint Anne’s Shelter came to see the show. Unfortunately, one of them got sick right as Sally was cleaning the bathrooms. Because they all rode together, they all had to leave after the first intermission. Some people speculated it was all a ploy to get out of seeing a Shakespeare show. Please don’t let this color your opinion of how the show may be. Last night, to avoid another cold shower and surprise drug party at my apartment, I went with Taylor and Michael to Formaggio’s for some mediocre, late night Italian. Since I went in with these expectations, they delivered. Whilst eating. JJ, Billy Ray, Jason, and Burt showed up after telling us they weren’t interested in coming. Taylor made the mistake of telling JJ to take his girlfriend’s place, who also came to visit. He’s doesn’t know what he got himself into with that offer, or rather what he’ll get into himself. J/k JJ just enjoys pretending to be creepy.

Here’s a link to the promotional video followed by the James Quotes of the week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IO--3KJBRkc&feature=youtu.be

James Quotes

“I like Riesling or just nay kind of wine.” –Holli

“You drink Mad Dog?” –James

“It’ll make you get drunk and run naked down the road.” –James on home brew

“Get me some of those chicken fingers.” –James demanding me to buy him food

“You went to bed that early? You weren’t in there alone.” –James on Wynease’s sleeping

"It's a bur-tiful day, whoo weee, make me wanna get doooooowwwwwnnnnnn. I may even lay outdoors all night til I wanna come in." –James

“Y’all Heard dat? She’s finally gonna take y’all home and put you in another pot. Finally y’all gone get some privacy.” –James talking to Holli’s birthday flowers

Did You Think I Meant Country Matters?

I'm enjoying how busy things are getting, and it's crazy that my 8 month VISTA anniversary is coming up next week. Only four months left before my time as an employee at the Red Cross ends. I cannot believe how quickly it has gone by and how much the office has changed since then.

Wednesday was my last night at trivia for a couple of weeks as rehearsals get more consistent. Our team name was The Country Bear Jamboree, and we were doing so well! Then the last round happened, and we missed every question... Maggie and I are looking forward to being I'll Have What She's Having the next time I get to come.

Thursday, Lexi came with me to teach the Disaster Services Overview in Aliceville, AL. We got to drive through Carrollton on the way there and back, so we drove past the face in the courthouse window, which is a staple Alabama ghost story made famous by the book 13 Alabama Ghosts and Jeffrey. Even though it was too dark to see it, I feel like it counts. They have a little arrow that points to the correct window so you don't go looking around the entire building. Lexi did a great job co-teaching, and it made the trip much better to have someone to talk to along the way.



Friday, my rehearsal got cancelled, so I had a free evening and no clue what to do with it. Everyone seemed to have plans already, and I was shuddering at the idea of staying alone at home on a Friday with no internet and cable. Luckily, Kaitlin O'Bradovitch came to the rescue. We made cookies and watched Galaxy Quest in my living room. I can't believe she was the first person I've had over since Natalie helped me move in. We discovered that my roommate has been smoking inside if I'm not in the room, which is great since my sense of smell can't detect it. I'm sure everyone else's can.

Saturday was the Great Tuscaloosa Chili Cookoff! I had to be there at 6 am... I had a great time, though. Joe, Mike, Cody, and I all dressed up like British lads in order to fit with our theme Chili Chili Bang Bang. We didn't win anything, but it was a great experience helping the exchange club out for their big fundraiser. We won a signed 2009 championship football in the raffle, so I see the day as a success.

After I slept for four hours post cook off, Martha and I met up so that I could see her new apartment in Birmingham. We watched When Harry Met Sally, which I had not really seen before. It was much better than I remember it being the last time I watched it. At least Billy Crystal got to be a believable romantic lead once in his life.
Sunday, after spending the morning with my family, Billy Ray and I showed up early for a special king and queen early rehearsal. We all knew that our play within the play scene just needed specific attention to make it good, and I think it's funny now. I haven't actually asked anyone if it was any better...

Monday, we ran as much of we could of the second half of the show without Hamlet being there. I am faced with a real challenge here because I have to create four distinct characters or else people might easily confuse them or just not notice them at all. I have been struggling with finding that distinctness with Osric, and Flannery finally gave me some good advice tonight that I think will be enjoyable for people to watch. Now I just have to do it successfully. The more important portion of rehearsal involved all of us laughing through Ophelia's funeral scene each time we ran the entrance sequence. I also saw a mouse during notes at the end. It is speculated that the mouse is attempting to eat my Tagalongs. I encourage him to reach that goal so that I don't eat another entire box.

You can almost see me in this picture. We're attempting not to laugh as Susan is carried in on a blanket. Here's our poster!

Tuesday was Valentine's Day. This has always been just a normal day for me, but I decided to make rehearsal interesting because it's JJ birthday. I baked cookies that I hand formed and cut into heart shapes and printed off Hamlet themed valentines for everyone. I got to rehearsal with all of them in a nice basket with a pink checked cloth under them only to discover that we have NEVER had rehearsal scheduled for that night. I had never looked at the schedule to confirm that unfortunately. Debbie showed up as well, which only made me realize that the two single cast members were the ones that came. wah wah

I hope that bringing my Valentine's themed things this evening will be okay. In other news, James and I have started playing travel size Connect Four. It's a pretty heated competition.

James Quotes of the Week:

"Go lay down at the funeral home. They got a bed."

"I was happy when you weren't here yesterday." *raises the roof*

"Martin Luther King and that lady (Clara Barton) 's ghosts are going to come to your wedding."

" My wife made dinner for me last night and cleaned up after."- Mike "You got lucky." -James about Valentine's Day

Garbage Can Louise

When I think back to the lack of things going on during my first month, I miss my lunch break naps that now I would not even dream of having time to take. While the office can still be pretty slow at times, we are still getting busier than I could have imagined. Trying to plan a health fair, teach and schedule classes, and be in Hamlet eliminates free time, but I wasn’t doing much with it besides staging my own Angel marathons and reading.


Wednesday night Maggie, William, Casey, and I had a pretty successful evening as Adventures in Babysitting at trivia. They asked a Novak Djokovic question, so my trivia life was made. Even if we haven’t been placing, we consistently have one of the best names. I think trivia is all about style points anyway.


Thursday, we had our chili cook off run off at the office. I, unfortunately, was too broke and too busy to participate in the making of chili, but I definitely participated in the consuming of chili. They were all so good and consisted of both my lunch and dinner. Red Cross is participating in a fundraising chili cook off this Saturday. Our team name is “Chili Chili Bang Bang.” It was the only name suggested that didn’t involve the negative effects of chili on the digestive system. I did say that if a detailed damage assessment was done after eating that chili my digestive system would be classified as destroyed. #redcrossjoke

Friday, Natalie and I went to the Alabama Gymnastics meet against Florida. The Crimson Tide pulled out an excellent victory over the Gators, who all do that dumb chomp thing during their floor routines. I love gymnastics meets because you can easily talk to the person next to you, and there is always something to watch. It may only be small children in handstand contests or two old women accidentally put on the kiss cam, but it’s something.

Saturday, I took a day long volunteer training course in the stat office in Hoover about disaster services technology. They took the five classes one would take separately and put them all together in a day long affair. While the information is useful, it was nothing mind blowing. I will definitely never put it as my primary group for a disaster relief operation. Our instructor did get in trouble for showing inappropriate yet semi funny videos during a break. A national employee should know that SNL is not apropos for a training course, especially when pointing out the ability to make Middle Eastern names sound perverse.

After that beautiful start to a Saturday, I went to my parents’ house in Hoover to work on my lines, which I should have done multiple times, and went to dinner at Barrio with Jeremy. This restaurant was excellent. They had great cheese dip, and their tortillas were definitely traditionally made. The meat was also seasoned really well, especially the Barbacoa on my taco mixed with Gorgonzola. Sadly, it was really busy, so to shorten the wait we sat in the lounge area. The table was below knee height, so it made eating a little difficult for anyone regardless of height. I would definitely recommend it. Just know that there is limited seating and avoid it during busy meal times.

Sunday was our Hamlet rehearsal at 8 in the morning. This sounds like it would be a terrible idea, but it was actually one of the funniest rehearsals I have had. It was the first off book rehearsal, meaning that everyone was shaky on lines. I thought I had mine down pretty well, but I had been working on a new voice to try for the player queen. Also JJ had me wearing my hat for the scene to get used to it. If you don’t come to the show, you’ll miss out on the great things I get to wear. Anyway, the hat combined with the voice made the majority of people start laughing immediately, which caused me in turn to lose focus and forget what my lines were. I think using all of that energy is what caused me to sleep from noon until 5 that night. I am so excited for this production. I just HAVE to work on my lines some more or my copious amount of smiling won’t be the only thing for which JJ kills me.

After rehearsal and before my lengthy nap, I met up with my old camp coworker Anna Beth at Chuy’s, a Mexican restaurant in the Summit. This continued my branching out in an epicurious nature over the weekend. Even though it was a gloomy day, the décor and atmosphere of this restaurant were contagious. It is filled with bright colors and interesting art work that make it differ from “traditional” American Mexican restaurants. They also give you a jalapeño ranch salsa with your free chips at the beginning. It was so good that I didn’t even attempt to order cheese dip. We both got “big as yo face” burritos. They come with a variety of protein fillings and your choice of sauce on top. I can’t wait to go back and try out more combinations and their cheese dip (as long as I’m not paying).

After my beautiful afternoon nap, I met up with my friends Abby and Alyce to have dinner at Nothing But Noodles. I had only been once before, so I was looking forward to going back. The basic concept is that there are several base pasta dishes in the categories of Asian, American, and Italian. They’re around $7 each, but that is without any meat or extra vegetables, so once you add those things It can be around $10 or $12. I got the Southwest Pasta with chicken and mushrooms. It was wonderful. If you like pasta, I would definitely recommend going, but only if you’re good at making choices because the three of us definitely took 20ish minutes just to decide what to get.

Because I took the selfless act of attending that Saturday class, I was able to take the day off Monday to attempt to memorize my lines for Act V. It must be nerves or something, but I just suck it up in rehearsal. I at least got to wear another fun hat and cape. I’ve got some stuff to work on before rehearsals next week, but I think JJ has some great ideas to make my characters more interesting and memorable. Otherwise, you might not notice I was even in the play. My outfit is even better than this guy's.

Tuesday was pretty slow, thankfully, because I had a class to teach in Belk, Alabama, that night. Belk is about an hour away in far west Fayette County. You spend time in four of our counties just to get there. The class I was leading was a Shelter Simulation, which is by far the most fun class to be a part of. It’s a game in which the participants are broken into teams, and they have to work as a shelter team to solve problems after being given different scenarios during a multifamily apartment fire. The people in Belk had a great time. They were so funny, and I can tell they’ll be great volunteers. If you live in Tuscaloosa, you should take the class from me next month!

That’s all for now. I’m full of Spaghettios and Tagalongs. It looks like I’ll be able to fill out my Player Queen dress in ways I never even dreamed of before now. As is now custom, we’ll end with some James Quotes of the Week. If you don’t know, James is a daily volunteer from a group home that makes office time more bearable by being hilarious. I may have shared this picture before, but here we are playing that game where you try to slap the other person's hands.

James Quotes

“Did you get a new head?”

“Bend over and let me kick you out the door.”

“You’re garbage can Louise.”

“Gonna have to put a cowbell on her.”

“What I gonna do? Get a whoopin?”

Make It Work!

It feels like these weeks are getting shorter with even more packed in them. Work and Hamlet are keeping me quite busy. I finished my volunteer efforts on the DR last Wednesday, so I’ve been in the office since then trying to get back on track for this month. This post will also cover the Australian Open, trivia, and Skanks in a One Horse Town.


I’m so happy that I got to watch some really good matches from the Australian Open, but my sleep schedule may not be as happy. It should have gotten used to it by now, though, since I’ve been staying up to see these matches that last until 3 or 4 in the morning for years now. I guess this is just the first year that I had to be up by 8 the next morning… I’m glad my man, Novak Djokovic, continued his domination of most major finals. His match against both Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal were very entertaining. Serena did not pull through for me sadly. I painfully watched her lose to Makarova or Macarena, whichever it was. I guess it’s cool that Victoria Azerenka won her first major. At least the women’s field is slightly more open than the men’s.

Trivia was an epic event this week. We had to stand for fifteen minutes just to get a table because it was so crowded. We were nervous that it would start without us sitting down, but it didn’t. It just never started. Then, finally, we hear that they postponed the start time until after the Alabama South Carolina basketball game. This lasted until 9 PM and resulted in an upsetting Alabama loss. Then there were technical difficulties with the sound system, so we didn’t actually start. Oddly enough, we had chosen the team name “Make It Work!” as an homage to Project Runway. The Trivia Jockey took it as a jab at the problems delaying the game. We also had our first top five finish at this venue! If only we had any idea about sports teams winning championships, then we could have won.

Thursday I taught a Disaster Action Team Orientation at the University Mall for work. It was the briefest of overviews explaining all of the things a DAT can do and how they function to respond to single family fires and other disasters. I unfortunately got my dinner to go from Picadilly right before class because people tend to show up late. EVERYONE was on time, so I didn’t get to eat until afterward. Speaking of which, I went to eat my wonderful dinner at my friend Sydney’s house, which was my house last semester. We LOLed and ROFLed as we talked about the love of Klaine we share and watched the Olsen twins in It Takes Two. That movie is just the right amount of cheesy, and I love it.

Friday, I went with Amanda Maddox, Jeremy, and a few others to see Skanks in a One Horse Town. It was… interesting to say the least. As with any of Billy Ray’s original shows, it was raunchy and peppered with obscure popular culture references. We sat on the front row, which made it all the more enjoyably uncomfortable. Once the play was done, a large group of people went to the drag show at a bar downtown. The one hosting the show had played one of the parts in the play while an actor was sick. The show was fun to watch, and I managed to make it through with only one person creeping on me. Then Jeremy and I went to catch up at the 24 Hour McDonalds dining room until way too earlier in the morning. I guess that can happen when you have three years to fill someone in on.

Sunday was my third rehearsal for Hamlet. I think it’s going really well. I’m excited for the show to come together once everyone gets off book. We’ve gotten a glimpse into our costumes, and I am sure mine will be a hit even if I am extremely jealous of all of Hannah’s Gertrude outfits. I’ve been working on memorizing this week because as of this coming Sunday we will have all off book rehearsals.

Monday was fairly uneventful except for a Community Day Mike set up in Reform, Alabama. We knew we had to go to a grocery store, but the ever vague Google Maps did not take us to the correct spot. We arrived at a home with the same last name as the people that owned the grocery store on their mailbox. We eventually found the store downtown only to discover that it had been shut down and gutted some time ago. At this point, we were under the impression that we had agreed to set up outside of an area with 0 foot traffic. Luckily, that was not the case. They had just moved down to another part of the tiny town.

Tuesday night Mike and I taught Disaster Assessment and DAT Orientation to a fairly large group of volunteers in Belk, Alabama. We’re trying our best to get people trained in all eight counties, and we’ve taught classes in half of them so far. It’s definitely a tall order to get people in small rural towns interested in becoming trained volunteers. Our hope is to get the Disaster Action teams set up or expanded in all of the counties. Since I have less than five months left, I guess I should get on that. Hopefully, next week I’ll actually be able to post on Wednesday, so that I can be caught up.

James Quotes of the Week

“You got four pairs of eyes.”

“She getting nasty now. Everybody heard that.”

“She done gone put her foot in her mouth.”