Washington
My sister lives in Bellingham and amazingly that was on our itinerary. This meant my parents could drive up from Wenatchee and see the show and I could spend the night in a real house and see my adorable niece! Mike also offered to load in the show by himself, since I had done that in Ft. Collins – so I had 2 days off with shows at night. We later got in a spot of trouble for that scenario but it was worth every minute.
This was also my first experience flying with the company. We got on the bus after our load out of Avon, drove during the night to Denver getting to the airport around 10AM for a 1PM flight. Our bus driver needed the extra time to get up to Washington. We checked in and I had to pay my first overage charges for a suitcase over the weight limit. And this was after 3 days of weeding it down every day! The annoying thing is that if it's .5lb or 10lb over you still pay the same amount. Highly aggravating. 100lbs in 2 suitcases sounds like a lot of stuff until that's all you have. It's hard to live out of 2 suitcases when you have a boot fetish and you like to buy clothes. I'm just saying... I now have to strictly enforce the rule that if I buy something, I get rid of something.
Anyway, we had time to bum around and eat breakfast. I then found a small spot on the floor and watched TV shows on my laptop until boarding call. I have subscriptions to so much stuff on itunes but no time to watch it. The rest of the cast showed up eventually and we all piled onto the plane. It was kind of weird to be with a group that takes up half the plane, interspersed with all the regular Muggles. We got to Seattle and then had a 2 hour bus drive to Bellingham where Bet picked me up. By that time I had spent over 14 hours on one form of transport or another. In fact, the time in the Denver airport felt like an international layover because we were all so tired and grungy and unwashed...
Bet had cooked dinner thinking that I would be tired of restaurants, bless her! Wild salmon, roasted potatoes and wine and then she and I went out for coffee and dessert at Nimbus, a restaurant on the 15th floor of a building right next to the Mount Baker Theatre. I slept great and was awakened by the Pippa alarm at 8AM. Bet and I hung out all day, went for a walk along the bay, had lunch at Ave. Bread in Fairhaven and did a little shopping. And then it was time for work.
Oy, the Mt. Baker Theater. Easily the smallest venue we've played yet. Our gondolas were in the hallway behind the theatre and the load in door was blocked by a rock the size of a small house. I'll see if I can post a picture later. Our crew was mostly good, however, except for my dresser who apparently couldn't count. Does 7 look like 13 to you?? It does to her. We also had no swing outs for the first time in a week. Thank you sea level! Mom and dad, Chris and Bet all came to the show and seemed to like it to varying degrees.
I went home with them and we all had time the next day to hang out. Had breakfast at Old Town Cafe, as we always do, then made a stop at the mall to get me a pair of wicked Doc Martens as a belated birthday present. They have pink and black plaid on the inside and are totally fierce. They are also slightly too big, but I love them, and they mark the 3rd pair of boots I've acquired since coming on tour. It's obvious that I have a problem...
Mom and dad went home and I went to work. It was a little rough to get back into the show after a couple of days out. Made me really wish I could have an actual day off that didn't involve traveling or the bus. Our show was going along as always until the middle of the first act when the fog from our machine drifted into the hallway and confused the smoke alarm. In the middle of Franz cooing to his pigeons the alarm goes off and we have to actually evacuate the building. Everyone, including audience members and actors in costume clutching wigs and robes huddled under shallow eves because, of course, it was pouring rain. A couple of wigs were dumped in puddles, costumes got dragged on the ground and eventually everyone piled back into the theatre and the show went on. Mom and dad came to the right show :)
The load out was everything you would expect working around a huge rock to be. Ramp out of the truck, ramp up to the loading dock area then ramp into the theater. And it poured rain the whole time. But the best part for us was the 2 feet of space we had in our hallway that we needed for baskets and what all and that everyone else needed for crossover with all their scenery and props to get outside.
Every 2 minutes we were diving into our gondolas to avoid decking carts and tanks and whisking baskets off the floor to keep them from getting crushed. I was not sorry to leave. As much as I love Bellingham, I'm not sure I want to play there again...
Then there was Yakima. Friday night in Yakima actually went well. The venue was moderately sized and we had enough space downstairs for dressing rooms and also enough room on deck for our gondolas and dressing space. So yay! We also had a really nice space downstairs with couches for people to hang out in while they weren't in the show. Our crew ranged from very competent to totally clueless but all was going swimmingly until I realized we were missing some major laundry pieces and couldn't find out laundry hamper.
Turns out we couldn't leave things outside and there wasn't room inside so everything not actively in the show had been backloaded willy nilly onto the trucks. And it was pouring rain again. So we had to crawl into the truck, find a light, find the hamper and pull things out of it trying to keep them dry as we run inside.
I finally passed out laundry and our Character Man #1 calls out of the show right about the time of show call. And where oh where was our swing gondola? On the truck. So back into the rain, find the swing gondola, pass clothes down out of the truck, try to keep them under an umbrella and high enough to not drag on the ground. Argh. It was a couple of very damp trips juggling clothes, shoes, baskets and an umbrella. This was also the day I chose to wear a skirt and high heels... Let's just pass over that picture all together.
Then the usual hell of explaining a dresser track and telling people actor #7 is out of the show so don't look for #7, look for #15, except everything else is the same, put them all in the same places, yes, pull that same shirt for 15, etc... But the competent people got it and I spent a lot of time with the clueless people anyway so it's all part of the game.
I was hoping to have some time off on Saturday but we had a matinee. And female singer dancer #2, who has never called out of the show, called out. So it was back to the same routine of finding the swing gondola in the truck and pulling clothes out and yep, pouring rain again! It poured rain the whole time we were in Washington. Fortunately, after so many years in the desert I LOVE the rain. It can rain every day for a year before I get tired of it. But dragging costumes through the puddles gets very old in a hurry. The rest of the show was fine and load out was actually ok as well. I found out, after the fact, that friends of my parents had come to the show and I missed them. Disappointing! So sorry to Rudy and Shirley as I would have loved to at least have seen you and given you a tour of the backstage. Next show, I promise :)
Then it was a 10 hour drive and now we're in Idaho Falls. It's a pretty little spot. I haven't seen our theatre, the Civic Auditorium – where kids go to high school so I'm fully expecting a cafe-gyme-torium type scenario. But don't you know I'll keep you posted??
This was also my first experience flying with the company. We got on the bus after our load out of Avon, drove during the night to Denver getting to the airport around 10AM for a 1PM flight. Our bus driver needed the extra time to get up to Washington. We checked in and I had to pay my first overage charges for a suitcase over the weight limit. And this was after 3 days of weeding it down every day! The annoying thing is that if it's .5lb or 10lb over you still pay the same amount. Highly aggravating. 100lbs in 2 suitcases sounds like a lot of stuff until that's all you have. It's hard to live out of 2 suitcases when you have a boot fetish and you like to buy clothes. I'm just saying... I now have to strictly enforce the rule that if I buy something, I get rid of something.
Anyway, we had time to bum around and eat breakfast. I then found a small spot on the floor and watched TV shows on my laptop until boarding call. I have subscriptions to so much stuff on itunes but no time to watch it. The rest of the cast showed up eventually and we all piled onto the plane. It was kind of weird to be with a group that takes up half the plane, interspersed with all the regular Muggles. We got to Seattle and then had a 2 hour bus drive to Bellingham where Bet picked me up. By that time I had spent over 14 hours on one form of transport or another. In fact, the time in the Denver airport felt like an international layover because we were all so tired and grungy and unwashed...
Bet had cooked dinner thinking that I would be tired of restaurants, bless her! Wild salmon, roasted potatoes and wine and then she and I went out for coffee and dessert at Nimbus, a restaurant on the 15th floor of a building right next to the Mount Baker Theatre. I slept great and was awakened by the Pippa alarm at 8AM. Bet and I hung out all day, went for a walk along the bay, had lunch at Ave. Bread in Fairhaven and did a little shopping. And then it was time for work.
Oy, the Mt. Baker Theater. Easily the smallest venue we've played yet. Our gondolas were in the hallway behind the theatre and the load in door was blocked by a rock the size of a small house. I'll see if I can post a picture later. Our crew was mostly good, however, except for my dresser who apparently couldn't count. Does 7 look like 13 to you?? It does to her. We also had no swing outs for the first time in a week. Thank you sea level! Mom and dad, Chris and Bet all came to the show and seemed to like it to varying degrees.
I went home with them and we all had time the next day to hang out. Had breakfast at Old Town Cafe, as we always do, then made a stop at the mall to get me a pair of wicked Doc Martens as a belated birthday present. They have pink and black plaid on the inside and are totally fierce. They are also slightly too big, but I love them, and they mark the 3rd pair of boots I've acquired since coming on tour. It's obvious that I have a problem...
Mom and dad went home and I went to work. It was a little rough to get back into the show after a couple of days out. Made me really wish I could have an actual day off that didn't involve traveling or the bus. Our show was going along as always until the middle of the first act when the fog from our machine drifted into the hallway and confused the smoke alarm. In the middle of Franz cooing to his pigeons the alarm goes off and we have to actually evacuate the building. Everyone, including audience members and actors in costume clutching wigs and robes huddled under shallow eves because, of course, it was pouring rain. A couple of wigs were dumped in puddles, costumes got dragged on the ground and eventually everyone piled back into the theatre and the show went on. Mom and dad came to the right show :)
The load out was everything you would expect working around a huge rock to be. Ramp out of the truck, ramp up to the loading dock area then ramp into the theater. And it poured rain the whole time. But the best part for us was the 2 feet of space we had in our hallway that we needed for baskets and what all and that everyone else needed for crossover with all their scenery and props to get outside.
Every 2 minutes we were diving into our gondolas to avoid decking carts and tanks and whisking baskets off the floor to keep them from getting crushed. I was not sorry to leave. As much as I love Bellingham, I'm not sure I want to play there again...
Then there was Yakima. Friday night in Yakima actually went well. The venue was moderately sized and we had enough space downstairs for dressing rooms and also enough room on deck for our gondolas and dressing space. So yay! We also had a really nice space downstairs with couches for people to hang out in while they weren't in the show. Our crew ranged from very competent to totally clueless but all was going swimmingly until I realized we were missing some major laundry pieces and couldn't find out laundry hamper.
Turns out we couldn't leave things outside and there wasn't room inside so everything not actively in the show had been backloaded willy nilly onto the trucks. And it was pouring rain again. So we had to crawl into the truck, find a light, find the hamper and pull things out of it trying to keep them dry as we run inside.
I finally passed out laundry and our Character Man #1 calls out of the show right about the time of show call. And where oh where was our swing gondola? On the truck. So back into the rain, find the swing gondola, pass clothes down out of the truck, try to keep them under an umbrella and high enough to not drag on the ground. Argh. It was a couple of very damp trips juggling clothes, shoes, baskets and an umbrella. This was also the day I chose to wear a skirt and high heels... Let's just pass over that picture all together.
Then the usual hell of explaining a dresser track and telling people actor #7 is out of the show so don't look for #7, look for #15, except everything else is the same, put them all in the same places, yes, pull that same shirt for 15, etc... But the competent people got it and I spent a lot of time with the clueless people anyway so it's all part of the game.
I was hoping to have some time off on Saturday but we had a matinee. And female singer dancer #2, who has never called out of the show, called out. So it was back to the same routine of finding the swing gondola in the truck and pulling clothes out and yep, pouring rain again! It poured rain the whole time we were in Washington. Fortunately, after so many years in the desert I LOVE the rain. It can rain every day for a year before I get tired of it. But dragging costumes through the puddles gets very old in a hurry. The rest of the show was fine and load out was actually ok as well. I found out, after the fact, that friends of my parents had come to the show and I missed them. Disappointing! So sorry to Rudy and Shirley as I would have loved to at least have seen you and given you a tour of the backstage. Next show, I promise :)
Then it was a 10 hour drive and now we're in Idaho Falls. It's a pretty little spot. I haven't seen our theatre, the Civic Auditorium – where kids go to high school so I'm fully expecting a cafe-gyme-torium type scenario. But don't you know I'll keep you posted??
posted by KBARRETT at 2:41 PM
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