Well, dear readers, I do believe we’re having an anniversary today. Yes, you heard it here dear readers, we are having us an anniversary today – haineshisway.com, the happiest site on all the Internet, turns sixteen. You heard that right – sixteen. YEARS. With no day of notes missed. That makes this the longest-running daily blog in the history of the Internet and I don’t care who knows it. We were born out of a painful situation that turned that painful situation into a beautiful, positive thing – this here site, with these here denizens, the hainsies/kimlets who are the finest of the finest. So, here’s a toast to sixteen MORE years.
we had a good run-through last night – show is running very consistently, time-wise, and the scene shifts are finally getting smoother and I’m going to actually start adding people into them to make it seem like stuff is actually happening rather than just units moving. I worked scenes before we began and people are finding their footing. I find the show very touching and emotional for many reasons, and it’s also very funny at times, which is really the key to success in making the more emotional stuff to work. I’m very anxious to see what Mr. Lighting Man has in store – it’s going to add hugely to this, as will the few projections we’re doing. And of course the band will make a huge difference, too. I’m being very strong in my notes so that they’ll get done swiftly. The vocals are getting stronger from the students. There’s one vocal thing that simply isn’t working at all, a quartet that occurs in the midst of the act two opening. We replaced the one singer who simply could not hear his notes, but it’s still to rough to work and it’s not doing what I’d intended, which was to be funny. If I end up cutting it, which is where I think I’m heading, I’m not sure anyone would be missing it.
Prior to that, it had been a very long day. I was up early with not quite enough sleep, we decided not to do the box run and so I lugged over three more heavy boxes of books around noon, after attending to e-mails and printing out orders. I stopped first at Bed, Bath, and Beyond to get a thing to hold the flatware I have. I then unboxed and shelved this batch o’ books, and now we have twelve empty recycled boxes – I’m hoping we can get the rest of the CDs in them. At around two I headed over the hill via Beverly Glen, which thankfully had no traffic. I got to the Shermans by two-thirty. Richard was actually in good spirits and we had a wonderful visit – I picked up the four books he had for me, we talked a lot about the production, he loved our postcards and he cannot wait to see the show, which I know means a lot to him. As we walked to the door, he hugged me and said, “I love you.” I’m telling you my love for this man knows no bounds. And his I love you was immediately followed by, “What is it, fish?”
There was ridiculous traffic on every street you can take to get across town to LACC – it makes no logical sense, especially at that time of day, but that’s what this city is. The fifteen-minute drive took about forty-five minutes. Once at LACC, I parked, walked across the street to Café 50s, and had “my” sandwich, the turkey, Swiss, cole slaw, and Russian dressing on grilled rye. I do believe I could eat this sandwich every day and be perfectly happy. The waitperson now knows my entire order before I even sit down. Then we worked scenes and did our run-through.
Then I came right home and answered e-mails and listened to our next release, another spectacular classical album that I’m very excited about. And there will be at least five more coming in the first six months of 2018, all extraordinary American classical music releases. I’m so thrilled to have come back full circle to where I began with Bay Cities. I have, in fact, discovered some wonderful composers in the last two weeks who weren’t known to me, whose music is just so beautiful, heartbreakingly so, and some of it simply not known at all.
Today, I’ll be up early again and the helper and her husband are coming by – he’ll take all the rest of the book boxes, and all the CD and Blu-ray boxes over to the new house – the book boxes will go into the bookroom so I can unpack them, and then the rest go into the garage until the rest of the shelving comes in, at which point I’ll unbox and shelve all that stuff. I’ve also got a gal coming to box up the rest of the CDs, which should take about two hours. I’ll meet over at the new house to open up the garage and house so boxes can go where they need to, and I’ll probably unpack another three boxes of books so we can recycle those boxes, then I’ll come back here and make sure everything is packed up. Then I have to be at LACC at two for a paper tech – not sure when I’m actually supposed to eat – I may have to grab a Subway sandwich when I come back to the house here. After the paper tech we’ll work some scenes and scene shifts, then we’ll do our full-out run-through – we only have two more of those until tech and I want it as strong and secure as possible going into tech. After, I may make a quick house run.
Tomorrow if the gal is available again, I may have her come back to box up all the stuff in drawers, the glassware and cups, and I’ll take the majority of my clothes over there, along with the rest of the kitchen stuff. Then we have our final run before tech and we have time to work stuff – we’re scheduled for five hours but I’m hoping we finish in three or four. If we do, I’ll definitely do a house run again. Saturday is tech. I’m there at nine and we work till eleven running cues – just the stage manager, me, and the lighting folks. The cast arrives at eleven and we begin a cue-to-cue, moving as quickly as possible, making easy corrections, but also taking notes for fixes and just moving it along. We’ll break at two, then at three we’ll finish cue-to-cue by four-thirty at the latest, take a small break and do a run-through without stops with lighting and sound. Sunday’s our day off and day one of our two big move days – I think each of those days should last three to four hours, at least that’s my hope – we’re pretty prepared, as the two TVs, stands, and all stereo equipment are going over with the guy who sets all that up for me. So on day one we’ll take the couches, the two remaining coffee tables, end tables, cadenza, and some odds and ends, including the curio cabinet. If we get all that over there and placed, then on Tuesday all that has to go over are the remaining boxes, the garage stuff (that’s huge and we may do some on Sunday), the bed and the dresser. And then I’ll be out of this house completely and sleeping at the new house.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up early, do a box run (all the boxes in the den are going), have the rest of the CDs boxed up and if that goes faster than expected, we’ll start boxing up the stuff in the drawers. I have to grab food at some point, then we do a paper tech and then we rehearse and do our run-through. Today’s topic of discussion: Your haineshisway.com history and cherished memories. Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have had a lovelier than lovely visit with Richard Sherman and seeing him in better spirits, and happy that our show is finding the flow.