Hamilton

I am excited to say: I scored us some tickets to see Hamilton!

Single tickets went on sale this morning at 9am. I almost forgot about it, but I checked in around 9:30. 

For those unaware, Hamilton has been the hottest show on Broadway since last year. Everyone says it is a really great show, and the music is great. It's finally going on tour, and tickets sell quick. The Fox (of which I am on their email list) excitedly announced—what feels like a year ago—they were one of the US cities chosen for the tour. 

This morning was just nuts. I heard there was a line at the box office with well over 400 people that went on for blocks. Trying to buy them online was a chore in and of itself too. 

I was immediately placed in a "virtual waiting room" due to the high demand. It said DO NOT refresh your browser, it would automatically refresh as I moved up. I had no idea where I was at in the queue, I could have been #30 or #800 for all I know. Eventually, I was shown the calendar with the performance times to choose from. The Saturday shows were already sold out (mind you, this was less than an hour after tickets started.) Oh boy...

I picked a show, and picked the cheapest seats available, and then got an error screen of sorts saying "Unable to reserve your seats at this time. Please try again." blah blah blah. I tried, and tried, and tried, with that message coming up every time. The system was just that bogged down. It said to try calling Metrotix too, which I gave a shot, and got a busy signal. No surprise there. While I tried, 3 more shows sold out.

Finally, over an hour and a half later, after trying different dates and different sections, after receiving that message I don't know how many times, I got a screen with two seats on them. I had no idea where they were, but I didn't care at that point. At first, I honestly didn't even know what date I ended up with because I had tried so many different combinations. I clicked to Proceed. Then the countdown began, the god-awful "you must complete your entire order in 8:00 minutes flat or you lose your seats" countdown. I had my wallet next to me, prepared for this. Except, turned out, the password I thought was correct was not working. Aaahh! So, still while the 8:00 minutes is counting down, I had to do a Forgot Password thing. Log into my email I used for this. Get the new password. Sign in. Type in my credit card number. And press send, lest I end up back in the perpetual "unable to reserve your seats at this time" mess. I feel stressed out just remembering it! 

But I did it! Whew. It's weird because it feels like an accomplishment, haha. I bought the tickets, and we are going, and I'm stoked! I told my friend I bet they would be sold out by the afternoon, and I was right on that one. By 2:00 pm, they were gone. 

5 hours to sell out 23 performances. Wow.

Friday Fast 5

1. A new book store opened in Washington yesterday. I wish them the best, but they have a definite uphill battle to fight, it is just impossible to compete with online sites like Amazon. 
2. Jarrod and I went to the Thirty Seconds to Mars & Muse concert on Tuesday. What an awesome show! Jarrod isn't so much a Muse fan, but I am, but we both like "Mars" so he bought me tickets for Valentine's back in February. Thirty Seconds to Mars was really good, although they were just the opener, so they only played for 45ish minutes. The lead singer, Jared Leto, busted his knee in another show two days prior, so I think he was maybe a little less energetic than normal. That's not to say he mailed it in, he definitely didn't, but I would guess it would have been just a tad better if he could have ran around like normal. Then Muse... oh wow. I've read bits and pieces through the years saying that they are one of the absolute best acts to see live, and I'd agree. They put on an awesome show, and even Jarrod was impressed. I'd totally go see them again in a heartbeat if the chance arises. And we both already want to go see Mars again as a headliner, I know it would be an even better show. Luckily, Mars is releasing a new album this year, and Muse announced they will have a new one in 2018, so I think we will probably have our wishes granted in the near future.
3. This upcoming week is the Race Across America bike race. If you never read the story from two years ago when I met the team Love, Sweat, & Gears, I recommend it. It is one of my favorite blogs I've ever written and is still a story that blows me away. I hope I can get a chance to say hello to them again this year.
4. I saw a video yesterday that was interesting... it was in some foreign country, two people were using pitch forks to stir up dirt on their farm, and there was a pack of terriers. As they worked the soil, rats came out—I didn't even know rats lived in the ground like that, like a mole. The dogs went after them, caught them, shook them in the their jaws and killed them. Every time my Josie shakes her head, with a toy in her mouth, so hard it seems like she'd hurt her neck, that's that instinct right there; that's exactly what those dogs were doing to those rats. It was A, kinda gross, the size of some of these rats was disgusting. B, kinda brutal, even though completely natural. And C, kinda neat to see the dogs doing the jobs they were bred to do. Terriers are ratters, they were bred to hunt vermin and protect farms back in the old days, and somewhere in the world they obviously still serve their very useful purpose.
5. While I'm talking terriers, have I ever told you that Josie is left-pawed? She is!

Friday Fast 5

1. I'm so glad those storms on Tuesday didn't amount to much. They kept saying they would likely be severe, and a few places did have some devastating tornadoes, but it missed us. Thank goodness. Josie still woke up once the storm was almost here. I swear, she can feel the air pressure change or something because when it is supposed to storm, she tends to act funny, sometimes a whole day in advance. She did better this time, though, and didn't pee anywhere in the house when she was scared. So that was improvement!
2. I started 2017 off by reading Better Than Before, by Gretchen Rubin, who studies habits and habit formation and how they can help us live happier, better lives. One habit she really believes in is setting a bedtime for yourself. We all have one as kids, but most of us don't have one as adults. I decided to give it a shot, and I made a concerted effort to be in bed by 10:30 during weekdays. Obviously, my nighttime routine is a little different than most. Depending on what we're doing, I may or may not get to bed late because I need to do my vest for 30 minutes, then sometimes an extra neb after it that will take 4-10 minutes. The point is: it takes some planning ahead. Well, more and more lately I've actually been meeting my goal. And most nights this week, I was in bed well ahead of 10:30. It seems to be a little easier for me to fall asleep, but I'm not sure if I'm actually getting more sleep because now I'm having trouble sleeping past 5am. I'm also finding I get tired earlier, which kind of sucks. So yeah... not sure how this is going to pan out for me. I 'feel' good about myself for going to bed earlier, but I'd honestly rather stay up a little later than wake up a little earlier. 
3. I have had Bone Thugs-N-Harmony's song "The Crossroads" stuck in my head for 3 straight days now. It's getting a bit old...
4. Lent really snuck up on me this year (side note: apparently "snuck" is not a word. But to say it sneaked up on me just sounds really weird...) Anyone else? I had no idea what to do for Lent until Wednesday afternoon. 
5. A new season of Survivor starts next week!

Godspell at Church

Did anyone else think of Godspell with the second reading at mass this weekend?

Dearest brothers and sisters: All good giving and every perfect gift is from above,

coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no alteration or shadow caused by change.   James 1:17

It's been a while since I watched the Godspell movie from 1973, and I really forgot how hippy-dippy it is; possibly because the last time I saw it was in grade school... I think. Micki, our music teacher, let us watch it on days when we had a sub or on "popcorn days", which were days we earned to watch a musical movie. This scene, out of context, is laughable. But great music nonetheless! Here's the video (email peeps, YouTube clips don't show up in the email, so you'll have to view the post on the website to see it if you want):

OneRepublic Song "I Lived"

Yesterday the band OneRepublic released their new music video for a song called "I Lived" and they feature a boy with CF. Could this be? Could my less-known disease actually be out there, in a famous band's music video? Yep, it's the official video, not like some lesser secondary video they did just for charity. The kid featured is named Bryan, and he's 15, and he's ridden his bike around Colorado raising money for CFF. He also hopes to be the first person with CF to get into the Olympics playing hockey for the USA. Go Bryan!

It's a nice song, and it might just be my new theme song :). It made me cry so much, but it also made me smile.

Anyways, I've included it here right below this. Watch it, enjoy it, cry like I did, and thanks for reading.

Yopp!

Tonight me, Jarrod, and my mom and dad went to The Muny to see Seussical.

When The Muny announced their 2014 season earlier this year, I was excited to see this show in the lineup. However, I saw it was at the end of July, which meant it would probably be miserably hot so I didn't want to buy tickets until later, maybe even day of, waiting to see how the weather was. We have had some incredible weather, turns out, and tonight was no exception. I meticulously picked which show we would go see based on the forecast on Monday. I think it barely reached 82 today, was cloudy most of the day, with low low humidity. It was an AWESOME night to spend outside!

Seussical is a show near and dear to my heart for many reasons. First of all, it was my last high school theater show. Our school always did a play in the fall, a smaller play during the winter, and a musical in the spring. Throughout my high school theater career, I was in every show in some manner in tech or on stage, but in reality I only was on stage in the musical my Freshman year (and the second time, when we took that show to the State Conference) and my Senior year.

When I was a Freshman, we did Schoolhouse Rock, which was fantastically fun. It is a play full of all of those educational songs I knew from my childhood, which would air promptly at 10:57 am right before Looney Tunes at 11 am on Saturday morning cartoons (don't get me started on how much better those cartoons were than the ones kids are stuck with these days!) I was part of the ensemble and also had my own song as the "Figure Eight" girl.

Senior year we did Seussical, which is also a super fun show. If you're unfamiliar with it, it is many, many Dr. Seuss stories squashed into one musical. And I really mean that... I've discovered more and more stories that are in there since then, even if it's just for one line. It's quite impressive, the writing that went into it. I was cast as Jojo, the boy who thinks too many thinks in Whoville. Yes, I was a boy. I fooled some people, too, into thinking I was a boy (the bonus part is my name could be either a girl or a boy's name, so just reading my name in the program didn't give away my gender either! [best joke on the audience ever.])

Tonight's production also had me excited because it starred John Tartaglia as the Cat in the Hat. I saw him on Broadway in the original cast of Avenue Q back in 2008, and he was so good. Plus he's been on Sesame Street often, and we all know I have a soft spot for anything Sesame Street or Muppets-related.

He didn't disappoint and was superb as the Cat. He worked in so many original little jokes too, about Oprah, about Lindbergh, about The Muny. But the show overall was so much fun, they did a really great job.

I picked out some great seats too because, turns out, they were right underneath the fans. It's been a while since I've been to The Muny, but they replaced the fans there! The new ones don't make any noise like the olds ones did, so these can stay on the entire time. So not only was it cool air, we also had a steady breeze. We had no one sitting beside us, we were on an aisle, no one was in the row directly in front of us, but unfortunately we had a couple noisy ten-year-olds behind us.

They started out being cute. Before the show and during intermission, they were making me almost laugh. During intermission they were talking about time travel, almost word for word: "...It would have to be two times the speed of light! In theory it takes the same amount of energy to go into the future as it does to go in to the past, but in reality it takes more energy to go into the future." Do you remember the nerd kid from Boy Meets World, I think his name was Stewart? That is exactly how this one kid talked. Unfortunately, these two would not shut up even during the show, and the mom gave up trying to quiet them after Act 1. It would have been easier to overlook if they weren't ten, but they were well of the age to know how to act in a theater. So that was unfortunate, because they really ruined some moments of the show that were heartfelt.

But, it was still a great show. It brought back so many memories, and it was really, really hard not to sing along (Jarrod jokingly left open his page of the program that went over theater etiquette, and one of the points said Please do not sing along with the show. Haha!)

Hat's off!

PS—The "Yopp" title is a special word Jojo thinks up to save the Whos. It's a very big moment in the show, and I got to yell that word! It's fun.

Classical

A few years ago, I had to say goodbye to the one classical music station we had around here. I realize classical stations are going the way of the dinosaur, but it was still sad to listen as the last song played.

Thanks to a passionate group effort, another station has begun in it's place. Announced earlier in April this year, it has a small frequency range and unfortunately I live outside of it. But I had the idea today to check online to see A, if it was up and running yet, and B, if they had a way to listen online.

Yes and yes! I bookmarked the link and listened all day long at work.

Pandora does not have enough variety and most other online stations I tried out are too Baroque (Cue joke from Cogsworth...) So far this has been an awesome blend and I'm looking forward to more. I am so ecstatic to find back a good variety of classical music. And I am so happy to hear some of the same DJs that were on the previous station. Tom Sudholt would ease me into my workday as I drove, and it's good to hear his voice and wonderful choice of songs again. Plus, I mean talk about beautiful and calming music (mostly, unless it's like, Night on Bald Mountain [but that might be perfect for today since it's Halloween!])

A letter of farewell

Last night I said goodbye to an old friend. Well, we haven't been friends for that long but it has been a wonderful time. It started about three or four years ago when on a whim I decided to switch my radio over to listen to something different. And that was the beginning to my love of classical music.
Now this obviously wasn't the first time I had ever heard classical music, but it was the start to my love for it. As I listened to it more I began to notice all the different elements, the chords, the harmonious ways each section would mesh together to create this complex, beautiful sound. And noticing all of these elements and taking them in just got better over time.
See, that's the thing about classical music: unless you grew up with it or have a deep emotional connection (as in, your mom plays with the symphony or something like that) it takes a little bit to get used to it. It isn't an immediate thing, or at least it wasn't for me. And I wish more people would give it a chance. The music is a pure expression of emotions translated into an audio format. And some of the pieces are downright beautiful; there is no other way to describe it. I don't find many pop songs that I feel I could call beautiful.
At ten o'clock last night, Classic99 played their final piece, Beethoven's 9th. I sheepishly admit that I did not know it that well (see, I'm still a baby in getting to hear all of these great pieces) but it was wonderful. It was a great piece to go out with. After it was over, there was just… silence. And I gotta tell you, that felt almost like the death of a friend. I was expecting someone to come on and say goodbye for the last time, but they didn't and now I'm glad they didn't. Because at that point, there was no need for words. The piece was finished, the broadcast was finished, and those moments of silence, to me, meant that it was truly over. It really hit me then that this was final.
This morning, since my car radio was left on the station, I caught a few seconds of the new station that bought Classic99 which is a contemporary Christian station called JoyFM. I can't stand JoyFM, which does not make this any easier. I immediately started to find another station to program in its place and settled on 88.1, an independent station that plays an eclectic mix of genres of music. It might turn out to be an okay replacement.
So goodbye Classic99. I don't think anyone I know will quite understand what you meant for me. It was a great time while it lasted and I will truly miss you.