Dancing in heaven

We went to see “This Is It” yesterday, the rehearsal footage for the Michael Jackson concert that sadly never came to be.

He danced and sang as good as he ever did. There was no lip-synching while he danced, either.

He was spectacular. Even the night before he died.

It was so enlightening to see how much work went into the preparation
for this show.

The choreography, music, special effects, including 3D, and the music videos.

The note by note, step by step, detail that Michael paid attention to. He was in charge of this show, and he was very excited about it.

It is ironic how much work went into this, how much excitement there was around it. They were close to done rehearsing, and everything was coming together. And then. The horrible shock and sadness.

But this movie does not go there, to the sadness. This movie is pure joy. And love.

Curb takes on the middriff

Last week’s episode of Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, with guest stars Jerry Seinfeld and Julia Louise Dreyfus, had me convulsing in laughter.

Here’s …. the middriff girl…

[watch this until the end - the end is classic!]

My Saturday backyard

A hefty groundhog eats leaves in the backyard. Raises up on its hind legs to glance around between bites.

A gray fuzzy caterpillar wriggles its belly across my screenporch.

2 deer sleep under the trees.

A pair of voices echo through the woods. Boys. Snapping wood. A tree in our forest falls down, dead. The boys cheer. They are stoned out teenage boys knocking down dead trees with sticks.

Butterflies are free to fly

When we decided to go to the “Butterflies Live!” exhibit with friends the other day, I had not exactly registered the “live!” part.

The exhibit was at the botantical gardens in a greenhouse-like room loaded with plants and water-misters and – free-flying butterflies.  

They were so beautiful and so fragile-looking. Some perched on plants and flapped their wings, some nibbled on fruit, some fluttered past my face, some rested on the ground (careful not to step on them, man!).

We spent at least a half-hour with the butterflies that day.

Sad

I didn’t know Warren Schor, the 20 year-old Cornell student that died from swine flu a few days ago.

But – I went to Cornell. So, I have been reading about him, and about the 520 students there that have contracted the H1N1 virus.

He walked and lived in the same places I did at that age, on the beautiful, but sometimes cold, stress-inducing Cornell campus. He lived in the same dorm I did. He majored in the same major I did. Studied in the same buildings I did. He lived in ZBT last, a fraternity where I spent some time. And I cannot imagine that fate befalling this guy as I cannot imagine this happening to any student walking through this 4 years of Cornell life. 

But – he didn’t get 4 years. And, I feel really sad. For him, because he was a nice young man in his prime. For the family and friends who loved him and were worrying about him during the 9 days he was in the hospital and who are now grieving.

For the loss when there should be dreams of the future.

Shoes and booties

I wore my high heel pumps to work one day, and apparently the stress fracture on my cuboid bone is not totally heeled because it was screaming by the end of the day – “get me out of these damn heels!”

So, last weekend, I went to Richie & Co. looking for black mid-heel shoes for work and for tooling around Portsmouth this fall. As in – two pair.

Great finds!

This Beautifeel Kimberly shoe is the most comfortable shoe ever.

The moment I put it on, it fit like a second skin, and I have worn it all day at work with no rubbing or pain at all. Plus, I like how they look – they are made of leather and patent leather and stretchy material on the top edge. Very Mondrian.

I also got these Everybody Monza short booties.

They are black with a gray flap on top, with a stack wood heel. Short boots are in style this season too, which is a plus.

I so love shoe shopping.

Fall shopping

When some friends told me they were going to NYC this weekend, I urged them to go to the Barney’s warehouse sale. I urged them so hard that I almost decided to get in the car and go myself. This is the sale of all sales, the deals of all deals, the best sale ever, not only for the great clothes at incredibly low prices, but for the scene itself. Crazed women undressing in the aisles to try on clothes (there were no fitting rooms for many years – it is in a warehouse building).

Alas, common sense ruled – I am not driving to NYC on Labor Day weekend.

So, we decided to drive an hour to the local outlets. ["We" is myself, my husband, and my mother.]

I hadn’t been lately. New stores!

At Kate Spade, everything was 40% off already marked-down prices. I got the Yardley Serena bag in black textured leather. I like the outside side-pockets – great to slip in cell phones, the BlackBerry, even a pack of smokes.

We hit BCBG Max Azaria, where the trendy clothes got  some husband-frowns but where I bought – anyway – a really long black cardigan sweater with 3/4 sleeves and a black and white silky top with a waist-sash.

And then we stepped into Escada. The original prices here are outrageous, but the sale was up to 90% off. 

This white button-down shirt has a V-neck, but a tie sash on the collar. Some random shopper woman who already bought this shirt showed me how to tie the sash in the back, on the side, and other various ways.  [That kind of sounds odd.] Also, there was a black cashmere sleeveless shell with white stitched edges reduced from over $400 to $29. No brainer.

I did leave behind the $1,100 fuschia safari jacket (on sale for $80) that the saleswoman and other customers kept urging me to buy because “the color looks so good with your black hair!” 

Even the best sale cannot sway me to enter a room in a puffy-sleeved fuschia safari jacket.

“Sudden Ominous Music Heard Across U.S., Nation Panicking”

It’s not real, but it may as well be. These days the “news” is all about fear.

Scattered

You know what my house looks like when I am starting to write a new screenplay?

Little bits of papers with ideas that hit me in the middle of the night.

Big pieces of paper with ideas written on the front, on the back, in diagonal scrawls with arrows pointing everywhere.

PP1 —->
Inciting event —->
A line of dialogue
An image
A whole scene
Several Word docs open at the same time.
This one has just ideas I’ve thrown down
This one has links for research.
This one has a half-finished outline.
This one actually has script pages, half of which have been edited in Final Draft and are sitting in the upstairs computer.

Ahhh….

This is so un feng-shui.

And yet – out of madness comes creativity.

I hope.

American Idols Live

We drove 2 hours to see them.

Our seats were not the greatest, they were in the nose-bleed section, way high, but right in line with the side of the stage, so we brought binoculars.

Before the concert started, there was video, and each time Adam Lambert’s picture – yes, picture – came on screen, the crowd roared and screamed. Definitely an Adam crowd. The husband tried to shush me – it is only a picture, jeez – but I got caught up in the moment.

Right before the concert started, I was focusing the binoculars at the audience directly opposite us – hundreds of feet away across the stadium – and 2 girls started waving at me. Husband says “some people are waving at you?” LOL – they are friends from work who at the exact moment I focused on them - focused on me.  One of them is Tanya, and these are her pictures (below.)

The first set of performers were the top 6, in order of elimination, and I must say, Scott MacIntyre and Matt Giraud were really very good. They both played piano, and even did a piano duet.

Then, the rush for a smoke down 4 floors and out the door during intermission. We missed the first song of Allsion Iraheta’s set [ I  mistakenly thought Danny Gokey was next, and missing him would be fine with me. Oops.] Allison rocked the house. She did Janis Joplin’s “Cry Baby” and Heart’s “Barracuda.”

Had to sit through Gokey. Waiting, waiting, for Adam ….

The screams were deafening….

He comes out singing Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love”….

Then, Muse’s “Starlight.”

“Mad World.”

Duet with Allison – “Slow Ride.” 

Rips off his jacket.

 And prances and grinds to Bowie’s “Life on Mars,” “Fame,” and “Let’s Dance.”

Woa.

 

Kris Allen was pretty good too. His last song was “Hey Jude” and he got the whole audience singing along.

Then, the obligatory group song. Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing.”

We rushed down to wait by the buses afterwards.

Tanya and Karin (the two girls from work), and another girl that was with them, met us at the barricades, and we waited for Adam to come out (the others too) to sign autographs.

For 90 minutes.

There was a 4 year old boy who started getting annoyed, he said “They are wasting my time!”

At 11:30, with 90 minutes in, and we know the garage closes at midnight and is blocks away, things began to get dicey.

And the girls with us – they had taken the metro, which closes at midnight.

Then a security guard announces that those taking the metro should leave, the midnight closing is to reach your destination, not to get on the train – and these girls took off like a bat outta hell, they did not even say good-bye. They were – gone.

We waited 10 more minutes, and had to go get the car.

We forgot exactly what street the garage was on. Ran around looking for the garage, and finally figured it out. 

Got the car with 5 minutes to spare – 11:55.

Decided to ride back  to see if Adam had come out yet.

And saw the bus leaving, the last remnants of the crowd waving.

Damn.

But, still – it was a good time.

Except for getting home at 2 am.