I think you're really gonna like my show. I'm pretty sure it doesn't suck.

Yesterday was the talent show :)

Everything was gonna surprisingly smoothly, I barely had to yell at any of the performers (they just get so loud and then people complain...), until ten minutes before the show started and we realized that our opener had not arrived.

Not happening. No way.

We'd had a lot of controversy over how to start the show, since a bunch of politicans would be talking forever and they wanted to be able to be leave right afterwards. We didn't want to open our show with old people talking, so we decided to use a very strong male vocalist.

I spent a signficant amount of time yesterday describing how the curtains would open, the spotlight would come on all dramatically, the music would start and he would wow the audience.

This really wouldn't actually work unless the singer was there.

I decided we would hold to the show to ten past seven and then ask the DJ to open and introduce the politicians.

At 6:58, the singer shows up and I'm ready to strangle him but instead, we ditched his stuff, handed him a mic, and I ran through the lobby into the house to take my seat.

The curtains opened, the spotlight came up, the music started, and he totally wowed the audience all dramatically.

It was at that point that I realized I was holding my ticket and a list of the order than all us members had to be sitting in. So I folded them up and stuffed down my dress. Classy.

After the first singer, the DJ introduced the politicians and they talked and talked and talked and mispronounced the acronym of our organization. The organization that had created the whole evening. The organization whose members they were honouring. Lame.

So the arts centre is stripping all the seats in the main theatre and replacing them and to do that they need sponsors. At the farthest corners, seats cost something like three hundred and fifty dollars. Well this one guy bought fifteen, a whole row, and then asked that they be named about youth who've done lots in the arts.

So we were all called up, and our bios were read out and I posed like a beauty queen and felt ridiculous. But then the cheque came out.

The massive cardboard cheque that was brought directly in front of me while the people shook hands for two minutes (meaning I'm in every picture).

Then all of the honourees (who had been standing in the back the whole time) were asked to crowd around and more pictures were taken. In the middle of our talent show. Which is about youth. And arts. And not cheques or Olympics.

Once they got kicked off the stage, our next act came out (a super cool dance group although I was kinda peeved 'cause they didn't audition 'cause they're all Olympic-y) and the show continued as usual.

I ran downstairs, got changed, rehearsed in my little dressing room (I'd stolen a small private one rather than the massive girls one) and then came upstairs to find out that one of the bands were bummed 'cause they'd been bumped and it was almost intermission.

We got the bands sorted out (there was an issue with the drum set) and after intermission, I went onstage with my friend who was Chair when I was Vice-Chair. It was kinda cool speaking with her again (on stage, I mean) since we spoke at last year's talent show.

Unfortunately, my mic had not been turned on. I don't know why, I was handed it and told to go so I went and no one could hear me. Kinda embarrassing, but we moved on quickly.

I got my headset on real quick at that. I was the fifth act of the second act. My super mega awesome accompanist was ready to go, so once I bothered the techies some more, they actually took my headset a part and taped it up so it wouldn't fall on me. Hehe.

Finally, it was our turn.

The piano was pushed out and hooked up, my chair was brought out and finally, my bio was read out and we took the stage.

I think it went okay. I know it is definitely not a typical song, and it's not necessarily a piece that people would be comfortable with. But I think the crying went well at the end (I went kinda nuts with the ragged breathing since it sounded really cool in the mic).
One of the musicians stopped me and said, "I can't take you seriously anymore, you got scary."

Hehehe!
For the first time in the three years I've organizing this talent show, the ending went well. Usually it drags on, there's too many speechs, too much clapping (that's not necessarily voluntary) and it just keeps going. I'm kinda thinking next year, we should close the curtains, but this year was good too, the DJ kept it quick.

Afterwards, I ran around, gathered all my stuff and then headed outside to meet everyone. I got lots of compliments, although you can't always trust the words of friends, and then one of the women said I gave her goosebumps, which is probably the best compliment I could have received.

It amused me when my friend's family hugged me and then she came and hugged my parents. I don't think they expected it.
"I think you're really gonna like my show. I'm pretty sure it doesn't suck."

Well, actually...

At the theatre for our dress rehearsal, we were working with one man and one woman for professional techs. I've seen the woman before but the man is a newbie. Is it weird that I know that he's a newbie? That's probably weird.

The shiny grand piano was pushed out along with my chair and then I said I'd need a headset.

"We don't have any headsets."

"Well, actually...you do." I'd used them during last year's performance.
"Oh. I'll ask." He asked on his headset (his is huge and for tech people, very different from the one I wanted.) "The receivers don't work."

"Well, actually..."

I got my headset. Hehe.

The rehearsal went okay, I think I need to practice my movements a bit more though since I can't touch my hair anymore. Or move my neck all that much. Gotta love headsets.
Meanwhile, a hiphop dance group couldn't rehearse because they'd only brought their iPod. I asked why.

"We can't play iPods."

"Well, actually..." When my trio performed last year, we had our track on an iPod but it didn't occur to us until two hours before the show that we didn't have a CD. Our bad. The tech people came to our rescue and played it through the iPod no problem.
At this point, the tech guy was looking at me incredulously, probably imagining just how difficult I was going to make the next hour for him.

Sorry, newbie.

Depending on the time of day, the French go either way

It was five o'clock, my immediate homework was done, I was out of gum and too lazy to cook, so I texted a friend.

Two minutes later the phone rings. Not only is she already half way here (she only lives two minutes away anyway), but she's with another one of our friends.

I have become increasingly awesome at going from lounging-in-pjs-without-makeout to dressed-and-ready in a hundred and twenty seconds. Is there an Olympics for that?

We saw a movie, drove our other friend to his house, and then attempted to return home.
The two of us, since the first time we tried to drive anywhere outside of a ten minute radius, have had issues with directions. So long as I have a map, I'm good. She claims she'd never gotten lost until our first trip together.

But whenever we're together...things happen. Maps fail. Signs fall. Panic sets in.

Our first trip together involved arriving nearly two hours early so we could go somewhere to eat first. We ended up going through a Timmies drive-thru ten minutes before the show started because we'd gotten very, very lost.

And tonight, our plan was very simple: get back onto the highway (which we took to get there in the first place) and just drive. It's doesn't get any easier than that.

We did manage to get onto the highway and for twenty minutes, everything was fine as we belted out Legally Blonde: The Musical. And then, part of the road was closed off.

So we had to detour.

Although we ended up one street over, we thought we were fine. We knew we were going the right way. Until it was decided that we should try to get back onto the highway.

We turned and went far too far, both of us knew that, but then we came upon a highway. That should have meant victory, but it wasn't the RIGHT highway.

We turned onto it anyway.
Suddenly, every lane had a sign above it stating US border.

Oh crap.

Despite our 'Keep It Positive' soundtrack, panic was drowning us so she made a darling little illegal U-turn at an intersection no less, which eventually led us to the freeway (aka our personal doom), which she eventually recognized, which got us back onto another highway but one we know really well and which is close to home.

Thank god for small favours and GPS.

Whatever IS

Last night I glued my fingers together, er, I mean, I put on fake nails so now typing takes twice as long, is twice as loud, and involves ten times as many typos.

Today I had three back-to-back classes, two Timmies coffee, and one awkward run-in with president of my college (who I thought was just some guy who'd rudely stepped directly into my way until the woman on the elevator told me later).

In my English class, we were analyzing "An Essay On Man" by Alexander Pope. I really love "The Rape of the Lock" so I know I was expecting a lot but even by normal standards, this was not cool.

His message is simple: "Whatever IS, is RIGHT" because God made it so.

Firstly, Alex, writing in all capitals is rude.

Secondly (and unrelated to the firstly), I met a hero. He's some punk in my class who scoffed and then very primly said, "this poem offends my sensibilities."

Heh. Score one for the atheists.

I even ate lasagna earlier.

I'm writing a political brief for my PoliSci class right now on Italy. The Italian political system is similar to Canada's in several ways, but whenever the comparison ended, I got kinda lost.

So instead of searching 'Italian politics,' I searched 'Italian politics for kids.'

I get it now.

:)

<3

I love my friends.

The Paper Empire

Today, my first poem got workshopped in my Poetry class.

It's called The Paper Empire and is a freestyle, comedic story of how an office gets conquered by loose leaf paper. Originally, I'd written a sad poem about a sad moment and then read another sad poem someone else had written and decided there is simply too much sad poetry in the world. So instead, the paperclips became POWs and my beloved pen was taken hostage and my office fell at fifteen hundred hours (and I even wrangled in an Ikea reference).

The workshop went well. People called it clever, brilliant and polished (which it's not), and seemed to focus so much on the humour and wit that they forgot about the crappy adjectives and awkward phrasing. So no embarrassment for me!

On a completely unrelated topic, the guy sitting in front of me on the bus today had a half-burnt cigarette tucked behind his ear. I used sheer willpower to revive an ember and have it burn his hair off but it didn't work, so I just sat and tried to ignore the stench. Oh well.

So this one time, I was hit by a skytrain...

Today, a man was hit by a skytrain and lived.

They called it a "medical emergency", stopped all trains for a while, then declared all stations at that end closed, then re-opened them.

I was three stations away (the one day I needed to go out there!), listening to everyone else in the car bitch about how long it was taking and all I could think was, well, probably the time we're waiting is the time it's taking an ambulance to arrive. It's not a technical difficulty, it's not someone's lazy mistake, it's medical. All bets are off.

How cool is it that he was hit and still lives! In all of Canada, how many people can strike up a conversation with, 'So this one time, I was hit by a skytrain...'

He's alive! He's alive! He's alive!

I wonder if he wants to be.

Freestyle Friday

High school Gym class would have been the bane of my existance if it weren't for my teacher, Mr. V. He was really cool.

Quite randomly last night, I was jolted with the image of a game we used to play in class. It was a version of tag, but you could only tag someone with a big red ball and if you had the ball, your feet couldn't move. I loved this game, I nearly always won whenever we played it in class, and usually ended up in the top few people when we played with all four classes at once.

Every time I won, Mr. V would look at me with an expression of wonder, trying to wrap his mind around how I could possibly win at this game when I couldn't run five laps.

It's possible he thought I was cheating, but I wasn't, I was being strategic. There's a difference.

When all four classes played together--that's well over a hundred people--all you had to do was stay alive for the first two minutes and then suddenly half the students playing, the ones that didn't want to play in the first place, would be tagged. And then they'd clump and gossip. And if someone had the ball near them, they would automatically ignore the entire clump because they'd assume that everyone in it or near it had been tagged.

So I just stood there and acted casual and never got tagged and would eventually face Mr. V's expression of wonder.

Sometimes though, a whistle would be blown and everyone who hadn't been tagged yet had to raise and wave their hand. Typically, there'd be one or two jocks left, a teacher, and me.

Everyone would look at the jocks, look at the teacher, and then stare at me.

Then I'd get tagged and that'd be the end of that.

But it's still nice to remember how being smart can trump being physical.

And the expression of wonder it can cause.

take a breath, flip your hair, and sing

Okay. I'm back.

Judging auditions is always interesting. Sometimes you get someone like a 13 year-old break dancer who just blows our minds and makes us remember why we go through all the trouble to organize youth talent shows.

And sometimes you get young girls singing along to Taylor Swift with the vocals still on the CD and staring at their shoes and not moving an inch during the entire four minute song.

Either way, it's entertaining.

people against the gratuitious destruction of musical instruments

I made my goal. I went to bed at 8 (and promptly couldn't sleep), and after waking up several times throughout then night, I was told it was 10 am and I should get up. How'd that happen again?

I'm fine now, I think I'll be okay tomorrow and then it'll be back to school on Monday. At least I got it over with. Mission accomplished.

Also, I found this on MLIA.

Today, while at New Moon, the scene where Edward throws Jasper into the piano occured. Some girl in the front row stood up and screamed, "NO! NOT THE PIANO!" and then began sobbing uncontrollably. Her friends had to take her out. Either than girl is too damn dramatic, or she is awesome. MLIA.

I'm glad I'm not the only who's against the gratuitous destruction of musical instruments.