A Weekend in the Country

Took a well-needed study break over the weekend to travel up to the wedding of my friends Katie and David. It was held in the beautiful countryside of South Shropshire at Hopton Court and was all right out of a movie! Mother Nature even got in the act and gave us beautiful weather for the day (at last!)

It was my first English wedding so of course I had to buy a hat. Kudos to my friend Nineta, who, after hitting at least 4 other stores with me, spotted a perfect one just as we were about to leave yet another shop. Even more good news? The hat was originally 50 pounds but was on sale for 12! Perfect for the grad school budget!

Pictures of the wedding are now posted online. While I didn’t manage to get a shot of me in the hat, my new young friend Meghan was happy to oblige as she took to borrowing it often. During the speeches part of the reception everyone put on really wacky hats, including the bride who sported a Statue of Liberty crown! More hilarity came with the menu cards on the tables. These were printed inside “Despair.ink” greeting cards. Those are the hilarious spoofs of those cheesy, motivational posters you see in offices that talk about “Leadership” or “Success.” Instead, we had cards like “Defeat – There are only a few winners and many more losers. Odds are you’re one of them.” or the one at my place setting – “Compromise – Let’s agree to respect each other’s views, no matter how wrong yours might be.” Ha! Was just a lovely day which included Pimms Cup on the lawn, delicious duck and a DJ playing great 70s/80s dance music. You all know I loves me some ABBA!

Spent the night at The Crown, which was originally a 16th century coaching inn. Comfortable beds, but thin walls – and you know my Jamie Sommers hearing..lol! Sunday brought a nice leisurely trip back, during which I got to see a bit of Birmingham, a city which I’d written an essay about in the fall. Cultural regeneration is in full swing in Brum! It was then on to the train back to London, during which I, ironically enough, finished reading the latest Harry Potter. Won’t say a thing except Good Stuff! Great way to end the series! Am now working on ending my thesis. 9,500 words down, 6-7,000 to go (past the halfway mark, hurray!). Hope all are well!

I'm Still Here

Just like Carlotta in “Follies,” I’m 'still here' in London, slogging away on thesis and job search. Had a good meeting today with my thesis supervisor who says I’m on the right track, so Pheww! 4,000 words down, 11,000 to go! It’s really been an interesting research process as I’ve talked to and/or met a number theatre directors and critics! I think I confused some folks by my last post when I talked about being at Andrew Lloyd Webber’s office. That was for at thesis interview, not for a job. My last thesis interview was being wined (a nice Pinot Grigio) and dined (tasty mushroom omelette) at lunch by playwright/director Terry Johnson. He directed Kathleen Turner in “The Graduate,” and Christian Slater in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” He’s also written a ton of plays, including “Dead Funny” which was at Woolly Mammoth some years back. He had a lot of good insight (and used the f word a lot! Needless to say I’ll be cleaning up his language for the thesis..lol)

Speaking of that f word, I ended up dropping it on Virgin Trains last week. I was trying to book a train to go to a friend’s wedding later this month. Virgin had cheapest/most convenient fares, but their website was continually down with a message saying try back in a few hours. I gave it two days and then numerous calls to customer service led nowhere (the irony being that while you’re on hold the message says “Do you know you can now book tickets on our website?”) Umm, yeah, not so much! When I finally got through, they quoted me a much higher fare, saying that the cheap ones were only available on their website. Again I say, umm, yeah, you mean the website that’s not working?! Literally must have called and complained to 4 people, each of whom was ruder than the next. Screw you Virgin Trains, I took my business to Chiltern Trains that was a bit more but had much friendlier staff!

Speaking of friendly staff, I had two very positive customer service experiences to make up for the bad Virgin one (ok, that sounds weird..lol). The first was getting my National Insurance Number (kind of like Soc. Security). I had an appt. at 12 and when I first walked in to the office, it looked like the Arlington DMV at 4 on a Friday on the 30th of the month! I thought “uh oh!” However, they called my name right at 12, then went to another waiting area and my rep Jacqueline came to fetch me at about 10 minutes after and was very apologetic that they were running late. How do I describe Jacqueline? Powder blue sparkly suit, bright auburn hair and about 4 feet tall. Anyone picturing that short woman in Poltergeist would not be too far off with that image. However, it was not scary at all. She was very helpful and efficient.

Also helpful? The staff at the Belle Epoque café (aka the best reason for living in Newington Green). I dashed over there for a sandwich and coffee, but then found I’d left my wallet back in my flat. No worries, they said, you’re such a great customer and in all the time, you can just pay us next time you’re in. J’aime Belle Epoque! What else do I aime? The film “Paris Je T’aime!” OMG, run, don’t walk to see it! Best movie I’ve seen this year!

Time To Say Good-bye (to classes that is)

Bowling, Bocelli and Bombs, Oh My!

Woo hoo! I am free from classes! I had my last final exam yesterday so I am 66% done with Grad School (and so far averaging ‘with merit’ grades). I did well on my final essay, which looked at re-branding a theatre. The exam went ok - I will find out my grade in about a month. I even worked in the final quote from “Casablanca” into one of my answers (it was about Customer Relationship Management)! So now it’s just a 15,000-word thesis to go….Had a good interview today with the general manager of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Really Useful Theatre Group. I even saw Sir ALW’s piano! Dan was really helpful and fun to chat with (and a bit of a dead-ringer for our friend Chris Lidy). It was all I could do not to shout out “Hire me, please hire me!”

This past weekend my classmates and I were shouting and celebrating with some of the aforementioned B’s. Friday was spent at Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes, where yours truly had the highest scores of the evening (might have been as I was the only American bowling and it’s in my blood..lol). Saturday a few of us scored tickets to see Andrea Bocelli at the new O2 Arena (the structure formerly known as the Millennium Dome in Greenwich). It was a fantastic concert of “Andrea and Friends” and those friends included Dame Kiri Te Kanawa and James Galway, who brought down the house with his solo of Danny Boy. When Andrea closed the show with all his friends singing “Time to Say Goodbye” there was not a dry eye in the arena (which is a fantastic, gi-normous new facility).

Of course all of this has been overshadowed by the bomb incidents here in London and in Glasgow, but Life Goes On and I’m adopting the British Stiff Upper Lip and going about business as usual.

Hope you all are doing well and wishing you all a Happy, Safe and Wonderful Fourth of July! Have a hot dog for me! And could someone please send some sunshine 'across the pond?' It's now day 314 of cold, rainy weather! So much for English summers and global warming!