Well, dear readers, I am sitting here like so much fish, listening once again to a favorite English composer from England by the name of Gerald Finzi, a wonderful composer of the pastoral English school and that’s my favorite kind of music. Currently playing is his wonderful clarinet concerto. Beautiful tunes and just a real beauty. But enough about Finzi because I am beginning these here notes very late due to a telephonic call and the eating of a couple of donuts (shhh). So, I’ll start by saying that prior to dinner and going to a new play reading of a new play that was new, I did watch a motion picture entitled Small Time Crooks, a film of Woody Allen. I saw it in 2000 when it came out and remembered thinking it was a throwback to his funny films and I remember loving Elaine May in it. I haven’t seen it since, until yesterday, and I must say it’s pretty funny and, in fact, the last Allen film that I found the least bit funny. There are several huge laughs in the film and Elaine May is fantastic in it but so is Tracy Ullman. Clearly, the vibe of Allen and Ullman as marrieds is The Honeymooners, with several homages to “to the moon, Alice” and the final line of the film is almost verbatim, “Baby, you’re the greatest.” It was fun to see it again twenty-three years on.
Yesterday was okay, I guess. I got close to eight hours of sleep, got up, answered e-mails, shaved, and got ready for the one o’clock coaching session. At one-ten I went back and checked the e-mail and had I done that I would have seen that the coaching session was today, not yesterday. So, that was annoying because I could have gotten another hour of sleep and the entire day felt very discombobulated, oh, yes, it felt very discombobulated. I had a few telephonic conversations, watched the movie, and then got ready to see the reading of a new play preceded by dinner with our very own Rob Stevens.
I first went to the mail place and picked up a couple of packages (I was out of printer paper), then picked up Rob at the subway station. From there, we went to Miceli’s for dinner. It was pretty empty when we got there at six, but by the time we left at seven it was getting full. Rob had some rigatoni dish, and I had spaghetti Siciliano, which was very good, and a small Caesar salad, also good.
Then we moseyed on over to the nearby theater and saw the reading of a new play in one act. That act, however, was close to two hours long. I had trouble focusing on what the actual intention of the play was, other than to parody gay plays through the ages. I admit to closing my eyes during some of it – I could hear it but I just kind of dozed a bit – I don’t think I was the only one. There were a few amusing things along the way, but it’s too long and too much of it is so inside that I’m not sure what audience would respond to it.
After the play, I took Rob to the subway station and I stopped at K’s Donuts for a couple of donuts – not big ones – small ones – came home and ate them, had the telephonic call and then began the writing of the notes.
Today, I’ll be up by eleven, I’ll do whatever needs doing, I have to have a telephonic conversation about the Sami series, then the coaching session. After that coaching session, I’ll go right to Marshall Harvey’s abode and we’ll make sure all the new leveled out sound is in perfect sync, which I’m sure it is. After that, I’ll eat something, and then perhaps watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow is more of the same and then I’m seeing a college production of La Boheme. It’s in Northridge, so I’ll find some jernt out that way that will be fun for a meal. Not sure what the weekend holds, but if I don’t have a major miracle, it’s not going to hold much and there will be huge hell toupee.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by eleven, do whatever needs doing, have a telephonic conversation, hava a coaching session, listen to the leveled out sound at Marshall’s, eat, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s Ask BK Day, the day in which you get to ask me or any dear reader any old question you like and we get to give any old answer we like. So, let’s have loads of lovely questions and loads of lovely answers and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, hoping for no more discombobulated days.