Monthly Archives: April 2011

Six

Yesterday marked exactly six months to the day that I moved away from my childhood home in the Lonestar State and laid eyes on our new home city of Cincinnati for the first time. On Friday I’d hugged goodbye to all my work friends and left my job though those black metal gates in Hemisfair Plaza for the last time, and on Saturday, October 9, 2010 I sniffled goodbye into the fur of my cat who, understandably, had not a clue what was so terrible that warranted the attack of salty tears on his coat and bounded away, annoyed and offended – tail thwacking, as soon as I released him from my clutches. I boarded a San Antonio airplane bound for Chicago, IL in the wee hours of the morning. In my carry-on I had a wedding dress, and in the belly of that airplane, a massive suitcase crammed to oblivion with clothing, shoes, and wedding stuff. Two full boxes of clothing had been shipped ahead and my Buick and the rest of my belongings would be arriving via Mom, Dad and U-Haul at Thanksgiving.

I loved my life in Texas, my home, my job, my friends, and my cat, and I was sad to leave as the airplane took off and ascended into the sky, leaving a teeny tiny, ever shrinking San Antonio behind. It was a sad feeling despite the fact that I was extremely excited to become a wife in 12 days, have a beautiful Door County wedding, and marry a wonderful man surrounded by our dearest family and all my friends who would be traveling so far to be there. I was thrilled to begin our new life together in Cincinnati, excited to find our very first home of our own, overjoyed to not live 1500 miles away from Ted anymore, and jubilant to have new stomping grounds to explore. Leaving was bittersweet, but exciting.

I landed in Chicago and Ted was there to meet me, ready to begin our new life together.

We jumped into Ted’s truck and drove six hours to Cincinnati. And that was that. Has it really been just six months?

There are things I still miss about home. Most of them are food related. Please don’t judge me.

That list includes Blue Bell Ice Cream – the official ice cream of Texas (Dear Moo-llenium Crunch: Please come visit pronto!), authentic, fattening and flavorful Tex-Mex cuisine, strong Texas margaritas done right – on the rocks with a salt-lined brim, sweet tea, enjoying all these delicacies with my friends, toobing the river and the potent stench of sunscreen and burning flesh as the back of your arm singes against the scalding rubber of the inner tube, seeing Texas wildlife like armadillos, deer, roadrunners, and jackrabbits right in my backyard, my mom and dad, and, of course, the great Sancho. However, I can at least be thankful for the things I definitely do not miss about Texas, including scorpions and pavement so hot you could incur third degree burns from walking barefoot to the end of your driveway.

And despite the outrageous occurrence of snow every two minutes for the past four months and the giant flying bugs that like to hang out in our backyard and threaten to devour me in one sitting should I dare to venture outside to pull the trashcan to curb and are so fat that I have no idea how they can possibly stay afloat, Cincinnati does have many redeeming features that I love and am greatly looking forward to for the next six months.

These include opening our windows to let in the nice breeze, the lush, soft and vibrantly green grass from plenty of rainfall, little glowing fireflies littering the summer sky at dusk (which have all but disappeared from Texas over the past few years!), a thriving performance arts community, quick and easy accessibility to neighboring states and all their fun offerings and adventures, people who actually do stuff (gasp!) outside like play lawn games and cook out, go biking or rollerblading, take their dogs for a long walk down the street, and sit on their front porch talking to neighbors (instead of barricading themselves indoors, sufficiently draped over the nearest air conditioning vent), and of course, living with Ted is pretty cool too. ;-)

So, Ohio, thanks for a great first six months and here’s to six fantastic more!

….that is, after I escape to Texas for a weekend to tube the river and wreak havok on society with my girlfriends, drink margaritas on the porch with my parents, swaddle my cat until he can take no more and claws at my face in a desperate attempt to escape, and gobble up all the Blue Bell ice cream, Tex-Mex, and Bill Miller’s sweet tea my little belly can hold and I have to be rolled onto the airplane Violet Beauregarde style. Yes, I am indeed looking forward to that….

…and then coming home again to my sweet husband and our happy life in Cincinnati.

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Things That Bring Me Joy

In the spirit of keeping my spirits up after a ridiculously exhausting day at work and the disappointment of a weekend without Ted, as he is working even more ridiculous hours than I am – 9 a.m. to midnight Saturday and Sunday – which makes me feel terrible for even bothering to complain about how tired I am when he, clearly, takes the cake on this one, I’m going to dwell on things that do make me happy…starting with my tendency for a good obnoxious run-on sentence.

This is what Cincinnati looks like right now. Lush green grass, blobs of daffodils everywhere, and trees bathed in white, yellow and pink blossoms. I’m bummed to be missing the Texas bluebonnets and vivid wildflowers littering the side of I-10, but this is a satisfactory replacement, I suppose. Furthermore, please ignore my excellent photography skills. A thumb and blurry? I don’t know how you got so lucky. It isn’t easy to snap a picture whilst en route, after all. Your welcome.

Tonight I am sharing this bottle of deliciously smooth and sweet Red Raspberry wine from our wedding, with myself. Okay, relax – not the whole bottle. But I am making a dent in it while I watch 500 Days of Summer and Once that we scored super cheap at the Blockbuster that was closing last week. The house is clean, I’ve caught up on all my obligations, and honestly, what else am I supposed to do when my husband’s occupied for the evening and, apparently, “browsing” Nordstrom Rack and Anthropologie when we’re still paying off December’s electric bill (not really, but for real, let’s not forget how truly scarring a $400 electric bill can be) is frowned upon. So, yes. Wine and movies it is.

And finally, there was a wedding today at museum. Though I never ever ever want to plan another totally-DIY wedding again for as long as I live, I’m still kind of obsessed with pretty wedding things because, well, they’re pretty. I also got some sort of sick satisfaction out of the fact that my flowers were way more awesome than hers. Forgive my honesty. Succulents are kind of hard to compete with though, to be fair. I kind of wish I could just relive our wedding day once every six months or so. Seeing how happy that bride and groom looked today was quite endearing. Besides, like any love-struck female, I’d sacrifice my eyelashes to wear my wedding dress again. And who doesn’t love a great party and bonfire with their nearest and dearest beneath a full Wisconsin moon? Dear Wedding: Please re-create yourself (um, without any of our slaving help this time) and we’ll see you in two weeks! Thanks :-)

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Memories of Lansing

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Some things always remind me of our time in Lansing:

This “J” mug was a prop from the Dark Night production of The Early Girl I organized and produced as a Second Company member at the BoarsHead Theatre. It belonged to my character Jean. All the female characters in the show had one with their character’s initial on it. I love this mug. I use it for everything – milk, soda, tea, cider, cocoa. Everything.

All black – I have quite the collection of black shirts of all lengths and varieties, black shoes, and black pants. When you spend 5 nights a week backstage, you learn to embrace the theatre blacks. I can’t wear blacks without feeling like I’m backstage, charging between the green room, shop, and dressing rooms.

Square cut pizza – especially if it’s square cut pepperoni pizza in a pizza box! The theatre’s spring production of All Childish Things called for a pizza. The greasy spoon Arts bar down the street was contracted to provide said pizza. It came hot and delicious nightly, a large circular pepperoni pizza cut into squares. The best part? After the show it was ours. And it was delicious.

Jimmy John’s gourmet subs! If you had 30 minutes between work and show call, this was the go-to chow. They were located like 0.8 miles from the theatre, they delivered fast, and were cheap. The bread is especially tasty. Totally Tuna, California Club, the Italian Vito, and the Vegetarian Sub were my favorites! Someone on staff would round up all the Jimmy John’s orders and we’d all pile onto the floor of the lobby, chow down and gossip. I can’t smell, see, or eat a Jimmy John’s without Lansing flooding my brain. Another helpful tip: set the cookie in the sun – warm and gooey goodness! The grand opening of the Jimmy John’s near our house was today – I scored a Totally Tuna for $1. Mmmmm! It was quite the nostalgic Lansing day.

This picture always makes me smile. Sometimes life in Lansing was a real pain in the ass. Living at the intern house wasn’t cake and we all seldom got along nicely. Too many psychopaths creative minds at play. But it didn’t all suck. I loved the internship itself and there were a handful of happy memories like the WillPower – Shakespeare’s Ladies rehearsals and touring performances, playwriting classes with Kristine, group outings to Baskin Robbins for some ice cream during the workday, piling in the BoarsHead van to see a show at Williamston Theatre, opening night champagne toasts and catered parties, the company heading to Leo’s Outpost for a drink, post-stike beer and pizza onstage after striking 85 stage lights, the fun Permanent Collection cast & crew party we held at the intern house, hanging gels in the living room, and the day we helped Holly clean out the costume shop. That ridiculous red headpiece on the dude? I totally made that.

Tons more things bring Lansing to mind – stain glass windows, reading scripts, coffeeshops, great breakfast, little glass animals, ice cream and the park, billboards, the smell of Home Depot, a bunny running across our yard – so, so many thing. Too many to name.

We love Cincinnati, but some days Ted and I both miss Lansing.

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Carmela’s Babies – An Abstract Poem

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Hello?

Carmela babies? Is that you?

*shake shake shake*

When what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a miniature bell and other bike gear!

Ding ding!

A rockin’ new helmet so lovely and slick, and a black and white bottle that chills extra quick. Safer than Krytponite bike locks have yet to come, and a shiny bottle holder because Carmela ain’t a bum.

(And the world’s most luxurious, exotic face wash, imported directly from eBay)

Now dash away, dash away, dash away all!

 

(Ding ding!)

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Take Me Out to the Ball Game


Not only did we complete the 5k Saturday morning (with minimal whining from yours truly), but we did really well and it was actually….fun. We sped walked most of the way, jogged every now and then, and even ran occasionally. In fact, we’re signing up for more 5k’s in the near future! I know. You’re probably as shocked as I was. But it really felt great and we had a blast! This particular 5k benefited the Catholic school of the parish we attend and also helped the school’s 8th graders fund a special computer for a blind man who ran the race. The weather was beautiful – cool, in the low 40s and sunny. The route snaked through some neighborhoods in our township and was well-marked with cones and police officers at every turn. Families gathered on the sidewalks along the quiet streets with small cups of water for the runners, upbeat music pounding through stereos, kids cheering with pom poms and shouting encouragements, and a couple of teenagers in a band played live rock music in front of their house (at 9 a.m. – much to the grave dismay of their snoozing neighbors, I’m sure) for the race participants as they passed by. There were drawings for free running shoes, free bananas, water, orange juice, coffee, bags of taffy from French Chew, fresh cooked hot dogs, and goody bags full of treats and coupons. Each participant was outfitted with a number pinned to their clothing and a tracking chip fastened to their shoelaces to track their safety, pace, and ranking.

Chip tied on and ready to run!


So, here’s the good stuff:

Ted finished 1st in his age division, 5th overall for male walkers, with a time of 40:34, and a pace of 13:04 per mile. He totally got a medal! :-) Not bad for one month out of knee surgery, eh? If he weren’t having to slow his pace to drag me along behind him, he could have done even better – and probably ran the whole way.

I finished 5th in my age division, 11th overall for female walkers, with a time of 40:41, and a pace of 13:06 per mile. I’m just proud I didn’t pansy out and collapse after mile marker 2, kept my bitching to a near nonexistent level, actually ran part of the time, and am excited to sign up for future 5k’s. Baby steps, people.

Upon our arrival home I made us a full English breakfast, just like the kind the house mother at the B&B we stayed at for a week-and-a-half in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England during the Shakespeare study abroad intensive made for us every morning. I loved the breakfast she made – it was cooked perfectly, and so delicious and filling! I am still a firm believer that America should adopt tea time in the afternoons. Tea time made my soul happy. We had scrambled eggs, Polish sausage or bacon, baked beans, sauteed mushrooms, grilled tomato, a warm buttery croissant, fruit, juice and tea every day. For as much as I prefer pretty much any other county’s cuisine to England’s edible fare, I do love their breakfasts, Indian food, and, of course, the legit fish and chips. Tasty! The English breakfast I made totally paled in comparison to the real deal, but when desperate, a “close enough” imitation will do.

 

After we cleaned up and unwound from the race, we piled in the car and drove to nearby Newport, Kentucky – which is conveniently located directly across the river from downtown Cincinnati. Newport’s entertainment district is great. Located right on the river it boasts beautiful views of the water, riverboats, the Cincy skyline, Mt. Adams, and the 3 arenas/stadiums – home to the Cincinnati Cyclones professional ice hockey team, the Cincinnati Reds major league baseball team, and the Cincinnati Bengals NFL football team – all in one neat little riverfront row in front of the skyscrapers. Newport has walking bridges, comedy clubs, great restaurants, a ritzy movie theatre, a bowling alley, chic shops, sweets & ice cream parlors, a lavish Barnes & Nobles, and the famed Newport Aquarium (which I, for one, cannot wait to visit!). In the summer we’re planning to spend a day at the aquarium (hello penguins and stingrays!) then dine on tasty seafood at the fish market or maybe the sushi bar, both located immediately next to the aquarium (presumably where they dispose of the bad exhibits upon their closure? Just kidding. But it is kind of ironic, isn’t it? I wonder how the fish feel about that.) We’d also like to devote a day to just bumming around Newport, seeing the sights and partaking in the fun attractions Newport has to offer.

I've been waiting for you too, Newport Aquarium.

Found this kitten book at the Newport Barnes & Noble. Please notice that this adorable kitten's name is "Lara." (first page, lower right corner) A cat named Lara! Overjoyed much?

We treated ourselves to an early afternoon matinee showing of The King’s Speech at said ritzy movie theatre. It was an excellent movie – highly enjoyable and funny with a dry sense of humor, especially for a somewhat serious subject matter. Definitely not a girly chick flick or boring period piece (have I mentioned the pretty hats and gorgeous makeup?). Reviewers and average movie goers alike gave it a roughly 95% rating. If you haven’t seen it, I’d encourage you to! Even dudes will like it.

After the film we walked across the bridge that connects Newport and Cincy to the Ohio side where just a short walk led us right to the Great American Ballpark and home of the Cincinnati Reds.

Crossing the bridge between Kentucky and Ohio. In the background you can see the three professional sports arenas. It was crazy windy!

We’d purchased cheap tickets to the 7:10 p.m. MLB opening night baseball game between the Cincinnati Reds and Milwaukee Brewers. As one of the first 2,000 (or maybe it was 20,000?) people in the stadium we each received a free Reds fleece blanket, which came quite in handy as the evening wore on.

The Ballpark itself was great too – clean, spacious, and wide open with a stunning view of the river and Newport and vivid, rich colors all around. It was so nice to watch the game with such a scenic backdrop.

We watched as a team of Budweiser Clydesdales entered the stadium for their ceremonial lap around the field.

At the ballpark we saw some Cirque de Solil dancers performing small dance snippets – drumming up interest for their April Cincinnati tour of Ovo at Coney Island Theme Park, and some really crazy huge Australian bugs brought in for fans to check out in conjunction with the Cirque de Solil’s show theme of bugs and critters. Ted held them; I did not. Apparently they were all too cold to move much, that’s why they’re just sitting there. This did nothing to persuade me to hold them. But I did pet the butterfly.

Did you want a closer look at that?

I know, right!?

Why, yes, those are stick bugs, giant cockroaches, and some mammoth scorpion looking insect. Even more terrifying is that there’s one sitting on top of his head too, which I’ve spared you from seeing. You’re welcome. Okay, they’re gone. You can come out now.

We also filled up on traditional baseball fare – hot dogs, peanuts and Leinenkugel’s Summer Shandy beer (which tastes like lemonade!) – for which we paid approximately $2,746,891.03. At least it was delicious, right? In the interest of keeping America fat, the stadium sells “All You Can Eat” seats for $32. Sadly, this actually is a much better value than a $15 nosebleed seat plus a hot dog, one beer, and a bag of peanuts. So next time we may join in on keeping America fat for a reduced price – which is part of why the obesity rate is so high in America in the first place. I digress. All you need to know is that the hot dogs are tasty and lemonade beer is too.

While Ted is a Brewers fan, I couldn’t decide who to root for – feeling loyal to both the Brewers for being the first MLB baseball game I’d attended and for being from Ted’s home state, and the Reds because I like Cincinnati so much and it’s our home now, so I sufficiently confused everyone by rooting for both teams and wearing a red shirt (Reds), a blue plaid over-shirt (Brewers), and a red baseball cap (Reds) with a W on it for the Wisconsin Badgers (Brewers). HA! Excellent multi-rooting if I do say so myself. We even saw someone in the crowd wearing a golden yellow cheesehead in tribute to Wisconsin. Those darn Packers are everywhere! Much to Ted’s great dismay, the Cincy Reds won. Though I have no idea why these players are paid millions of dollars each because, frankly, I don’t think any of the players on either team played well enough yesterday to earn it. I certainly don’t earn $1 million + smackaroos for a great performance, much less a mediocre one. Ted, ever the smart ass, was sure to point out that my ticket purchase had helped fund their hefty millionaire salary. But whatever. It was still a lot of fun to relax with a bag of peanuts and a beer and watch the ballgame in the warm, windy sunlight as the sun set on the river.

Post-game we were treated to a truly magnificent fireworks show as part of the opening night celebration. It was a 20 minute show to the tune of 4 classic rock songs (Journey’s Don’t Stop Believing being one of them) played by a live band with thousands upon thousands of fireworks, many varieties of which I’ve never seen before, being shot off over the river and in tune with the music. It was pretty awesome and if it’s any indication of the 4th of July fireworks show Cincy puts on, I definitely want to be there! These lame pictures don’t do it justice at all, you’ll be relieved to know.

Needless to say, it was a pretty stellar final weekend together before Ted goes back to working weekends for the next month or so.

Hope you have a great week!

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Here and There

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The Bronx Zoo found their cobra. Disappointed is an understatement. I am crushed. The brilliant vocal life of this cobra was cut short far too soon. Sad day :-( Her last tweet? If you see a bag of peanuts inexplicably moving along the ground at Yankee Stadium today. Just ignore it. It’s probably nothing.

Ted did submit a hilarious vocal audition for Aflac. I was his vocal coach. I gave him some ideas for different emotional inflections to try that would demonstrate his full vocal range and made sure he crisply hit his “k” sound at the end of “Aflac.” But he did all the work and his voices were just plain awesome! Very funny! We had such a fun time sitting in the living room recording them and laughing! Maybe (if he lets me! He won’t.) I’ll post it for you to hear :-)

April Fool’s Day was especially funny for Ted and the other people and students working at CCM in the lights and electrics shop. They have a hand sanitizer machine that automatically pumps hand sanitizing foam into your hand when you put your hand under it. Unfortunately, it is really poorly placed. It’s located on the side of a bookshelf and whenever someone walks too close to it or leans against the bookshelf, it automatically deposits a blob of foam that runs down your shoulder or arm. It’s hilarious to watch the unsuspecting passerby get oozed with sanitizer – as long as it’s not happening to you. Boys, being boys, decided to remove the machine from the bookshelf and rig it above the doorway entrance to the electrics shop. Whenever the door opened the automatic mechanism was triggered and whoever came through the door was treated to a blob of foam on their hair and down their face. They then turned on all the built-in cameras in the Mac computers in the room and video recorded it for 3 hours straight. Nice, right? But really really funny – especially since everyone in that building (me included!) has been foiled by that damn hand sanitizer at least once.

Two nights ago we drove 20 minutes down to Covington, Kentucky to the Carnegie Arts Center for a free preview final dress performance of the musical Carousel. Being an insider in the arts community has some definite perks – I don’t think we’ve paid to see a show since we moved to Cincinnati! The building, an all around arts center, including a library, galleries, and auditorium was opened in 1904. Please read about it and view beautiful pictures of the space here. After scarfing down a pizza tailgate style in the bed of Ted’s truck behind the theatre, we ventured inside to see the art galleries. The theme was food art:

Made entirely of twizzlers candy
A face made of cereals, beans, candy and more
A close up of the food items used to construct the art above
Made entirely of different colored mentos candy
The dome and accompanying art of one of the galleries

We went into the auditorium and I was instantly reminded of the theatres we saw in the castles in Germany – it had the exact same shape, architectural style, carvings and paintings, stage, and even color scheme. It was nearly identical to my favorite castle theatre in Germany, right down to the dark stained wood on the staircases, robin’s egg blue walls, red and gold touches in the seats, paintings and carvings, and the balcony!! The acoustics of the space were a nightmare, but the show was enjoyable. I wasn’t crazy about some of the acting, but the dancers, in particular the ballet scene, were great! And of course, who can really complain for a free night’s entertainment?

Next up I’ll post about our weekend – the 5k walk/run and the Reds v. Brewers MLB baseball game!

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