Birthday Flower Arrangements

Yes, even though there is a mattress in the middle of my living room, I still had to have adequate floral arrangements on my dining room table and in my living room. Call me old fashioned, but some traditions must be honored.
So here is the arrangement on my dining room table...a blend of gladiolus and the bells of Ireland. Two of my favorite cut flowers...
















The living room arrangement is the same, but with purple instead of red.








Luv,
Martha Stewart

Birthday Week Photos

I wanted to post a few pictures from the Birthday night at Cap City...so here they are. I was especially surprised and pleased to see Nehal Joshi attend, since I had not seen him in at least a year. He just closed The Threepenny Opera on Broadway, and is about to jump into the new Les Mis on Broadway. Here he is with me and Matt Deiss (Studio Theatre-Take Me Out).











Here is a cute picture of the girls' dressing room ladies...(Erin Driscoll, Priscilla Cuellar, and Kathy Fuller).













Here is a pic of Ryan, Matt, Eleasha, and Uncle Fred...
















and the obligatory picture of Eleasha and I...













I was also so happy to see that my Disco Belle Hibiscus, a present to me 2 years ago for my birthday, bloomed it's first gorgeous flower on my birthday.















By the next day, it had bloomed many more of the huge and almost fake looking flowers. The first year I had it, I think it bloomed once. Now it is a monster of beauty, blooming out of control!! (I just wanted it to sound a little more dramatic...)

Luv,
SGS

Hinckley goes to the Hilton

2 weeks ago, Matty and I went to the Food and Friends benefit dinner and auction at the Hilton in DC. Yes, the Hinckley Hilton...(where John Hinckley tried to assassinate President Reagan).
This was the day after the initial flood hit the area, and we weren't sure whether we should venture into DC, as it was still raining, and we had a Flash Flood Warning again. But, out of morbid curiosity, we went.


Torrents of rain pelted us as we approached the Hilton. I thought Matt kind of looked like the Morton's Salt Girl in this picture. Hah.
I kept asking him, "Was it here?", or "Was it there?"...he thought that he would know it when he saw it, since he had seen many pictures and video of that fateful day. We gave up trying to find it initially and went inside to eat.

I think that I have made it abundantly clear that I eat like a ten year old boy. I thought, however, that I would be able to find SOMETHING to eat there. Boy was I glad that I ate before I came. Out of the 40-50 stands from different restaurants, there was not one damn thing that I would eat. Not a thing. At least it was free booze.
We stayed for a little bit, but as time passed we began worrying about the state of the roads and of our basement. Scratch that...I was the worried one, as always. So, we said our farewells and left.

When we were outside, Matt took up the quest to find the shooting spot again. He looked down to our left, and recognized the brick pattern of the wall. He took off down to the wall, and said, "This is it!"...I snapped this shot. No pun intended.




It was a cool moment for him, and I am glad he got to touch a little piece of his character's history.

OINK

I have probably gained 10 pounds during this, the birthday week. Ugh. Am I exaggerating? Maybe a little. Maybe.
Whenever I go to my parents' house, or they come to visit, I end up stuffing myself to the hilt. They eat much more than I do, and I follow suit.
Much more Pizza, Cici's, grilling out, birthday cake, cheesecake, ect. Ugh.
Then, this morning, before my parents got on the road to go home, they wanted to go eat breakfast at IHOP.
Ugh.
I did.
Do I order conservatively? No. When in Rome.
I order Pigs in Blankets.
Then, when the waitress brings the food out, after I have a conversation about how I must go on a diet to get over all of the food that I have eaten in the past week, she holds out the plate of food at me and says..."Pigs".
I laughed outloud.
I said, "Of late, yes ma'am".

A Birthday Gift From a Friend...

28 Years Ago...

My mother thought that she was giving birth to a girl named Stephanie. Instead, I came out. In later years, I have told her that I met her halfway.
So yes, today is my birthday. And if I don't get those Cha-Cha heels, there's gonna be hell to pay!

Happy 4th!

Hey all...Quiet day, kind of. Spent a couple of hours at my Aunt's in Oakton, with my Mom, Dad, Aunt and Uncle. Had a fun time swimming, yes, at last-my first swim of the season...and I got fried. Oh yes, fried. Lee Harvey will look like he has been working in the fields. Oh well. Had a few peeps over for a cook out tonight. Fun times.
Buddha has his own perspective on the day, however.
Luv,
SGS

GO SEE IT, IT IS AMAZING!

WHERE WILL YOU STAND WHEN THE FLOOD COMES-PART 2

So, Today, one week from the flood, we still await a cleaning crew. We ripped the carpet off by ourselves Friday afternoon. What a bitch that was.

And the whole time, Buddha watched from a safe distance, very puzzled. He looks like he is in a tard sale in this picture....stuffed in amongst the junk. Matt said that he looks like an old man in a theatre balcony. Funny.


The carpet is now all out, however, we have much work ahead of us. The new tile floor will be laid sometime next week, so back to normal is a little far off right now.
In what can only be described as a desperate need for quality sleep, I carried our matress upstairs, (no, it didn't get wet) and set it up in the living room. I refused to sleep on anything besides my own bed any longer.






I took these next photos of Four Mile Run Creek, which bear further evidence that the creek spilled over. More updates to follow.

I'll take Literary Theatre for $200, Alex...

"The Critics are Raven about the new musical, Nevermore, which is based on the life and work of this poet...
Who is Edgar Allan Poe."


It was a $200 question, but still...prety cool!

Sh*t I Like Right Now-June 06

Ok, I have been in to so many different things recently, that I thought I would throw them all up here, instead of doing 20 different "My Favorite..." posts.
Ok? Deal.

Books...
The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks has been a long time read for me, but I have been re-reading it recently, just to brush up on my readiness, you know-in case the Zombie plague should happen this summer.


Several Different Calvin and Hobbes compilations by Bill Watterson...
I never have gotten over my love affair with these two. Nothing captures the whimsy of Summer more to me than some of these drawings. An essential for the kid at heart.

Rise of the Midnight Sons....a Graphic Novel by Marvel Comics...
I read this crossover saga growing up, and loved it. It involves Dr. Strange, Morbius, Ghost Rider, Johnny Blaze, Blade, and others fighting against Lillith, who is coming back from hell to have her children reborn. Heavy stuff. I loved the darkness of the saga, and the supernatural topic of Lillith. I recently purchased this on Amazon, and poured through it in a day. Loved it.

Desperation by Stephen King...
I want to revisit this novel, and am about 70 pages in. I read it years ago, and want to read it before I FINALLY watch the movie, that is still awaiting my viewing on Ryan's Tivo thingie...

Music...

Barely much music on the list, because I haven't bought much new...except for this...
Sunday in the Park with George-New London Cast Recording.Hmmm.....I do like it, but. Hmmm. I'm such a purist. I always love the origional Cast Recordings so much better. It's ok, I guess. But that's it. Ok.

Movies...

The Shape of Things...
I have never seen or read the play,(by Neil Labute...sp?) nor seen the film until yesterday morning. Wow. I was blown away. It was like Closer meets Cruel Intentions, but still colder. The twist at the end knocked me on my ass. Great film.


The Hills Have Eyes-Unrated...
My first Birthday gift from Matt so far. I was NOT dissapointed. This is the first remake of a 70's horror film that I like. In fact, I like it better than the original. Much more charachter and situation development. Gory as hell, but a well done film.

SO, that's this month's "Sh*t I Like Right Now" list. I did have images to go with every one of these things, but Blogger is ONCE AGAIN not letting me upload. *sigh* More later.
Luv,
SGS

I'll take "Up and Coming Composers" for a thousand, Alex...

So...randomly, Jeopardy will be having a question on tomorrow (Tuesday) evening's show that is related to my hubster's new musical, Nevermore! They called Signature to let them know this, and that it would be on tomorrow's show...
Please set your Tivo's!

WHERE WILL YOU STAND WHEN THE FLOOD COMES?

It all started with a few dark clouds on the horizon. I was smoking my pre-show cigarette with my red bull(what I call my warm-up), and I noticed some ominous clouds moving in. I recall hearing something about a flood watch, but not really registering the fact in my muddled grey matter. As I flicked off my cigarette and looked to the sky once more, I thought..."hmmm...hope we don't lose power...".

It was Pride night on the Sunday evening performance, and the audience was wonderful and very responsive. Towards the "Ford" scene, I started to notice the sound of rain coming down in rivers. There was the rain that those black clouds foretold.
Then I forgot about it until the end of the show, when we all sang the final, "Everybody's got the right..." (there is a silent pause there...and during the pause, all you could hear was what sounded like rivers being dumped on the roof).
After the show, there was a reception, and even though it was pouring out, we all thought little of it. Slowly, people decided to brave the elements and make a run for it...I thought, forget that, I'm staying right here until the rain dies down a little. I am a notoriously bad driver, and when the elements of rain and darkness combine, forget it. Then my friend Caroline left the theatre, only to return 3 minutes later, claiming that she couldn't see 3 feet in front of her. This cemented my decision.
Suddenly, there were about 20 people left, give or take a few, and we started noticing cars stalled out from the high water on Four Mile Run. Then we noticed something much more disturbing...water started rushing in the double doors of the lobby...We ran and grabbed towels and put them down.
The water kept coming.
We started unplugging low electrics and moving important things to higher ground.
I ran back to the lobby to discover the water level had risen to the level of the lobby windows. Unreal. Trash was floating by. The water that got into the theatre was never more than an inch or so deep, but it got pretty far in as we tried to push it back with brooms.
Finally, the water subsided out front, and we made a break for home.
Home, flooded home.
Our basement flooded again. Nothing too bad, just totally soaked carpet. So yet again, as in the great sewage spill of March, we are making our bed on the couch.
We gathered around my NOAA weather radio and listened to the surrounding havoc while enjoying a soothing late night snack of mozzarella sticks and Pizza. Buddha was pleased. And after all of that, we settled down for the night and to comfort myself, I put on the new Mommie Dearest DVD with John Waters commentary.
I have never seen anything like the flood of last night, and I hope I don't see any repeat of that in the next few days.
Bedless...Day one.
Luv, SGS

HITCHCOCK WAS ON TO SOMETHING...

It all started a few days ago. I went for my first walk of the day in Del Ray. I got to the porch and heard an ominous and threatening chirping noise, but thought nothing of it. I went in and got the dog and brought him out of the house.
A bird swoops down at me, dangerously close to my head. I run like Tippy Hedren away from the porch...wow. Scary.




I later describe the bird to our resident bird expert, Donna. She informs me that it is a mocking bird.


When I take the dog back, I dodge several more kamikaze swoops. The owner is home and informs me that I should be careful, because her neighbor got hit by the same bird in the head. Maybe this was the reason that the owner was home, but preferred that I be the one to walk the dog...hmmm.
Yesterday, Matt and I were walking to our car to go to the show, and we saw "Devil-Cat" (the resident evil looking cat of the neighborhood), being dive bombed by a few mocking birds. The birds were on the ground, level with the cat. They started chirping loudly and flapping their wings, trying to ward the cat off. The cat looked mildly irritated as its tail slowly twitched around....then it backed away from the tree that it was close to...but only for a moment. It stopped and looked back for a minute, and then the dive bombing started. It got hit in the side, and didn't really budge. It laid down in the grass, as if to say, "oooooh...you birds are so scary...*yawn*".
When you see birds attacking a cat, you start to wonder if the world is coming to an end.
Then today, I was in a different neighborhood, walking a Doberman. I let the dog into it's own backyard, and it started to get dive bombed by more mocking birds...the Doberman freaked, yelped and ran back inside. I followed suit, taking the dog's instinct as wisdom.
Strange how Hitchcockian Arlington seems of late...

THANKS FOR THE TIP

An audience member from last week's audience tried to help out with her 2 cents.
After Lee Harvey Oswald shoots the big shot at the end of the Assassin's choral pleading, there is total silence...a yente in the front row says outloud, "There were actually 3 shots"...

This in from Will G....

As awful as you heard it was...
So long Connie...who cares?

IT FIGURES

All day Monday, while walking the pooches, I looked forward to a dip in the pool.
The sun was beating down, and I was sweating in rivers. Walk after walk passed...my legs grew more and more weary.
I finally get home and get out of my car..thunder cracks...
no pool.
Ok.. Tuesday hits...same ambitions...pool....by the time I am done walking, I have no desire to dress and swim....If you get what you want and you want what you get, is the getting as good as the wanting, or the wanting as good as the getting? Hmm.
Maybe Saturday, I think.

Image of the Week

Sean and I were driving in Del Ray and saw something written on the van in front of us...We pulled closer...


Hmmm...
We screamed.
Potty humor still gets me everytime.

Here are the pictures that didn't post...guess I'm back in business...

Video of the evening...

This goes out to my gay male lover...;) (He and I were discussing this brilliant video)...enjoy...