Saturday night was the last performance of Festival@First.

Yesterday morning I got back to work on the graphics for The Lady's Not for Burning.

Last night was a read-through for a new Red Shift episode, to be recorded this weekend.

Tonight was the first read-through for Bare Bones: A Language of Their Own.  (Which, holy shit.  Powerful play.  Delicious language.  Great characters.  And my castmates are desireearmfeldt , dpolicar , and ladrescher, with the fabulous Judy Yen [who has an LJ but I'm forgetting what it is, sorry] directing us, so this is going to be a wonderful experience for both us and the audience.)

And it looks like I'm going to direct one of the plays for PMRP's The Big Broadcast of 1946 at the Somerville Theatre this fall, assuming we can find a way to work around the fact that I can't be there for auditions.

So, um, yeah... I may be a little busy for the next few months...

Festival@First: Shaken Up Shakespeare opens tonight! This evening's show is already sold out, so go reserve your tickets for the rest of the run now.

Meanwhile, you can check out a photo gallery online at the Somerville Journal. Sadly, the reporter had to leave before the intermission at dress rehearsal to make their deadline so you don't see most of the shows, but that just leaves more of a surprise!

FYI, I just signed up to audition for Bare Bones, T@F's next staged reading. The characters are three gay Asian men and one Caucasian gay man, but right now they don't have a whole lot of people signed up to audition, so really, I stand a much better chance than I suspect I should.

I'd love to work with Judy Yen, the director, so I hate to encourage more competition... but if you've looked at the play info and said "Wow, that sounds great, but it's probably not the right part for me" I encourage you to give it a shot anyway. If nothing else, auditioning is always good experience!

Only 3 days until Festival@First 7 opens this Friday! I'm extremely proud of the work I'm doing in this show -- it's by far the most intense dramatic piece I've ever done, and I'd really love for people to get to see it. And my co-actors in the piece* are amazing, and the show as a whole is really fabulous. A great range of styles and content, and some really great performances.

Also, they're having a contest to see which one-act brings in the most people. Mine only has three actors. Godzilla vs. Macbeth has nine. So please mention my name when you make your reservation :)

There are only 6 shows, and only 80 seats, so please do reserve tickets ahead of time. You can reserve them on-line for free and pay cash at the door, or if you want to use a credit card, go ahead and buy them now for a small fee.

More details than you can shake a stick at here, but here are the important ones:
Performances will take place at The Unity Church of God, 6 William St., Somerville (Davis Square).

Friday, July 16 at 8:00pm
Saturday, July 17 at 8:00pm
Sunday, July 18 at 3:00pm (matinee)
Thursday, July 22 at 8:00pm
Friday, July 23 at 8:00pm
Saturday, July 24 at 8:00pm

Hope to see you there!

*To Be or Not to Be Her — Hamlet's soliloquy, done by three different women at different points in their life. You'll never hear that text the same way again.

In case anyone's interested...

Amanda Palmer will be at the Loeb Drama Center tomorrow (Thursday, July 8th at 4:00pm) to give a one-hour talk to fans, A.R.T. and Harvard students, and the public about the state of the music industry. She will also sing a few songs and hold a Q & A session. Please join us and and spread the word to anyone who you think would be excited to enjoy an hour with Amanda!

I've mentioned before the Mainsail class, which prepares you to take the Helmsman test. I took the class for the fourth time last Wednesday and finally managed to get out to the course without running around, figure out which way I was supposed to sail around the course, and successfully navigated to the buoys without losing them. And all this on a fairly windy day -- they actually had us take out Mercurys with keels, which are more stable than the centerboard ones we usually sail. Anyway, I did well enough that I thought I might be ready to try the Helmsman test, and my instructor agreed. And lots of people have to take the test a few times before they pass, so there's no shame in trying and failing.

They only let you take the test on red flag days, with higher winds, so I've been waiting for that since Wednesday. Today I spent hours checking their web site, watching to see the wind levels. When the winds were gusting to 30 knots, I felt that might be a bit much for me. But they finally settled down to about 9 knots, gusting to 20, and I figured I'd go down there and check it out.

When I got there, I asked the person in the dockhouse "How's it looking for the Helmsman test today?" He said "Grab a sail, let me know the number, and sail out to that motorboat on the river." I said, "Am I going to die?" He gave it a 50-50 chance. I said I'd take those odds. So I went to pick out a sail, carefully choosing a number that seemed lucky, rigged up my boat, taking my time to double-check everything and do everything I know how to de-power the sail a little for heavy winds, and sailed out to the course, taking a slightly longer than necessary path to give myself time to check out the conditions and try to settle my nerves. Honestly, the conditions weren't really much worse than I've been out in before, but knowing I was being tested made me extra nervous.

When I got out to the course, the guy giving the test told me to just go around the course, tacking and jibing as many times as I felt like along the way. Now, tacking is pretty easy; you're sailing as close in to the wind as you can, with the sail pretty tightly in, and you turn the bow of the boat 90 degrees so that the wind is coming from the other side and the sail switches sides. Piece of cake. Jibing, on the other hand... you jibe going downwind, so the sail is way out, nearly at right angles to the boat. You jibe by turned the stern of the boat through the eye of the wind, so that the wind catches the sail and SLAMS it over your head all the way to the other side of the boat. There are a lot of ways for this to go wrong. The most obvious is if you forget to duck; there's a reason it's called a "boom". Also, the weight of the boom hanging out over the boat can capsize you, if you don't get your weight over to the right side in time. And if you don't come out of the turn soon enough, the boat wants to keep turning into the wind, which makes you more unstable and can capsize you. So there's a lot to do very quickly, and it can get a lot more violent with strong winds.

Anyway. I made my tacks, kept close enough to the course, rounded the top buoy, and jibed my way back down. My first jibe was so smooth and controlled that I let out an involuntary "Yes!" I was just starting to turn to go around the course again, when the instructor zoomed up to me on the motorboat and said "You pass! Your tacks were good, your jibes were very VERY good. I don't have any feedback for you. As long as you dock ok, you pass."

Now, I've heard more than one story of someone passing the test only to fail for docking badly, so I was pretty cautious. I was a little worried that I was coming in too fast, thought about circling around and trying it again, but I had just enough space that I let the sail go entirely, came in at just the right angle, barely kissed the dock, and slowed enough that I could jump out and moor my boat.

Then all I had to do was furl my sail, let my legs stop shaking enough that I could walk to the dockhouse, get my card punched for "helmsman", take a picture of the card to post to facebook, and call my dad, from whom I get my sailing genes, to share the news.

So yay! From my first sail on April 4, to passing my Helmsman test on June 28. Not too shabby. Can't wait to start learning how to use a jib!

I discovered garlic scapes for the first time last year at a famer's market. Luckily, I also found a really easy and delicious recipe for them. While mine are simmering on the stove, I thought I'd share, in case anyone else is trying to figure out what the heck you do with them.

garlic scapes
1 t olive oil
soy sauce
2 T rice wine vinegar
sesame oil

Cut the scapes into 2 inch sections, trimming off any dried ends
Heat about 1 tsp olive oil in a skillet until almost smoking. [Yes, I know that's a useless instruction. Sorry. If that means nothing to you, just make it hot and don't burn the oil.]
Add the scapes to the pan and stir them around for a minute or so, then add a few dashes of soy sauce (basically to taste, however salty you'd want) and about 2 T rice wine vinegar.
Turn the heat to med-low, let this cook down until it starts to look caramelized.
Add water if you need it to prevent burning (as I use very little oil, I tend to use more water, which yeah, steams things, but oh well. In this case, it's good becase scapes can be chewy and this makes them softer while still retaining a bit of toothsomeness.)
When they approach a soft but still slightly chewy consistency (taste a few to see where they are), take them off the stove and mix in a dash or two of sesame oil and serve.
[The sauce is really tasty, it might be worth making up some brown rice or something to have them over.]

To the cast and crew of The Margaret Ghost -- break a leg!  I know it's going to be a really special show, and I'm looking forward to seeing it on Sunday and celebrating with you.

To people who are not the cast and crew of The Margaret Ghost -- buy your tickets now!  This is a show you won't want to miss, and it's this weekend only. 

 I tend to use Goodreads to keep track of books I want to read, and then periodically go through and request a bunch from the library.  I'd open up a bunch of tabs with books I want to read, open up a tab for the library, cut and paste titles and request them.

Well, maybe everyone else has already figured this out, but I just discovered that in addition to the links below a title on GoodReads that allow you to find it at Amazon and other booksellers -- you can add links for the BPL and the Minuteman Library Network.  (And Better World Books.  And Project Gutenberg.  And a whole lot of other good sources.)  

One click, the book comes up (well, mostly; some older books don't seem to be listed by the field they're using), I click "request", poof.

I feel like Cat on Red Dwarf.  "Book!  Book!  Book!  Book!  Book!"

It's still probably cheaper to buy a copy at the show if you can, but I just got this offer and figured I'd share in case anyone planned to order a copy online.



The Margaret Ghost
Price: $15.00
Discount: $- 1.50
Discounted Price: $13.50

Disclaimer: Use coupon code SUMMERREAD305 at checkout and receive 10% off The Margaret Ghost. Maximum savings with this promotion is $10. You can only use the code once per account, and you can't use this coupon in combination with other coupon codes. Sorry, self-purchases (buying books that you’ve published) aren’t eligible. This great offer ends on June 30, 2010 at 11:59 PM so try not to procrastinate! While very unlikely we do reserve the right to change or revoke this offer at anytime, and of course we cannot offer this coupon where it is against the law to do so.