SM - Wrap Up

Life got too busy to stick to my blogging plan.

Ultimately, I generally liked stage managing, but the satisfaction it returned wasn't worth the time invested. Once we got into tech week, I would commonly spend up to 8 hours at the theater.

My dedication was appreciated, though. The director claims exclusivity with me for all future productions (I declined to sign that pre-nup). Although I initially butted heads with the sound designer -- she's an experienced theater tech who felt that this show didn't require separate light and sound board operators as well as an in-booth SM calling cues -- I won her over by my eagerness to learn, and to do what I could to insure a smooth, perfect run. Towards the end of the run, she began lobbying me to SM a production for her at a different theater.

Initially, I declared that I wouldn't SM again until I'd retired. But I might consider doing it again, perhaps once a year, under certain conditions:

1. A maximum of 2 acts. The 3+ hour run-time of this show was brutal.
2. Inside the loop. The 40 minute commute to the theater easily doubled during rush hour.
3. Get Michael involved. Rehearsal and performance reduced my interactions with my husband to short, sleepy conversations as I arrived home late and settled into bed, where he already had been dozing.
4. A technical director runs strike, and I don't have to be involved. That was long, hard work, and made a bitter, unpleasant end to the experience. I don't want to do that again.

I enjoyed the satisfaction of learning something new and doing it well. It was fun running the sound board for pickup rehearsals during the run of the play, and one afternoon I ran the light board so the tech could go see a different show. (It was easier, I found, to actually hit the "Go" button myself than to tell someone else to do it.)

Now that it's all over, I expect I'll get a bit restless, but for now, I'm very much enjoying the old routine of meals with Mike and quiet evenings at home in front of the TV.

SM - Rehearsal Space I

I suspect this has been one of the easiest SM gigs out there. Weeks have gone by, and I haven't had anything to blog about. My only job has been to find rehearsal space, and for this show, it's been easy. They're starting rehearsals with "beat work," intensely working short vignettes within the play's act-long scenes to determine each character's objective at the moment, what obstacles are in the way, and what the character is doing to overcome them. It's interesting analytical work, but there's not much for a stage manager to do. They're not up on their feet moving, so my primary responsibility -- record the blocking -- is delayed. The stage manager's opinion of a character motivation and portrayal is irrelevant. Knowing that I'll have opinions that are unwanted and unwelcome, I reasoned that it's best for all involved if I don't attend beat work.

So where are they doing this work? There's no need to book a theater or big rehearsal space, so I've been finding conference rooms in public libraries. Most of the libraries in the county have online reservation systems, so I can quickly find out if a room is available and reserve it for the cast.

Rehearsal is called for Monday, Labor Day, and the libraries won't be open, so I'm abusing my employee privileges to get us into one of my libraries that evening. I'm looking forward to seeing their progress.

SM - Audition Chuckle

I mentioned last post that I enjoyed all the actors' work in auditions. That's true. Not that I'd put anything negative about it here, but I really don't have anything negative to say.

But there is something that struck me as funny.

Some of the actors auditioning for "George" have obviously been influenced by Richard Burton's performance, and would try on the accent. It came through most strongly when addressing Martha.

"Mah-tha."

Late in the evening, my brain flipped it to "Mothra."

I thought it was fitting, Mothra.
Well, why don't you choose, Mothra?
Mothra's going to run things...
Mothra's going to put on some rhythm she understands...

George and Mothra. Interesting premise for a kaiju production of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" I wonder if the Albee estate would object?

SM - Phoning disappointment

The duty fell to me to call the people who were not cast. I wasn't expecting that -- neither of the SM books I read mentioned it.

It suuuuuucked.

If I was lucky, I could leave a voicemail, and rattle off my short message. "This is Don, the stage manager for 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf.'" I want to thank you for auditioning for the show. As you saw, there was a small but very talented group of people vying for the parts, and I'm afraid that you weren't selected. I want to let you know how much I enjoyed watching you audition..." [and I was sincere here: I did enjoy everyone, and I tried to say something quick about an individual, like their character choices, their timing, their instinct for balance in blocking and movement] "...and I wish the best in future auditions and shows."

Of course, this was derailed when anyone actually answered their phone, and I had to stumble through this as a dialogue.

After I'd started calling, I was given some good suggestions for delivering this message. Basically, it was a longer version of what I'd been saying, but with more information about the company, upcoming shows in the season, etc. Too much for a voicemail or a quick phone call. It was good info, but I bet little of it will be retained, given that the thesis of the conversation is "Bad News: You Didn't Get It." Probably even my sympathy and praise got lost in the disappointment. I'd much rather send an email. Not only do I have more careful editorial control of the message, but I can pack extra info. Sure, the recipient gets hit with the rejection and disappointment, but the things I say to try to offset that, which probably get ignored verbally, can be read again later, and the good information can be saved and consulted again.

It seems it's this company's practice to always call. I get it: there's a personal touch. And I seem to have inadvertently rocked a boat by suggesting to a board member that, if I keep with this SM gig, in the future I'll push back on the "call" requirement and insist on emailing. At the very least, I'll do both.

Beard

An interlude.

Facebook tells me that it is the two year anniversary of dying my beard.

Since that initial experiment with indigo, I've gone turquoise...

...ginger...

...and currently it's brown with some auburn tones.

Looks a little scraggly at the moment because I'm seeing how I feel about growing it a bit longer. I've learned over the years that purple and green wash out in a couple days, while turquoise covers well and hangs on. Some of the grays in my beard resist the dyes, but they add highlights that make the earth tones look more natural. The white in my hair, however, sucks up henna and becomes a shiny copper.

Reds mess with my "season," and a lot of the clothes that looked good with my salt-and-pepper-but-mostly-salt hairs clash with the copper browns and auburns. Now that I've got a good base of the brown, I'm thinking next I'll drop some pure indigo on it again to deepen the black and add a touch of blue.

SM - Auditions

Last weekend, I had my first experience being on the other side of auditions. I don't think I did too badly, but I felt like I was scrambling the entire time.

The director asked me to make sure that everyone read at least twice. That was the easy part: a simple grid in my notebook let me track the number of times an actor was called up. Then I began to try keeping closer track of who read with whom. I'm sure I could analyze my notes and pull that information out, but it's not clear at a glance. My task was further complicated by one actor auditioning for both of the female roles. Nor do I have very clear evaluative comments: only some pluses and minuses next to names when I had positive and negative thoughts, only occasionally elucidated by a word or two of explanation.

Consequently, I don't think I was much help in the casting committee discussions. Fortunately, the rest of the committee had good observations with specific notes. I just drew on my experience leading discussions toward decisions, watching for groupthink, logical errors, and un-examined assumptions. A few times I would throw in contrary interpretations and observations to test the strength of emerging decisions.

In the end, I think the casting decisions were strong. I remarked to a friend that, although auditions were lightly attended, the casting decision was difficult, and I believe we could have capably cast the show with 4 completely different individuals.

The auditions hammered home for me an important fact about stage managing: quick, efficient note-taking. I'm a little nervous about this. Luckily, I've recorded blocking in a script before -- albeit from the actor's side - but I'm sure it will take me some time before I feel really comfortable in my note-taking prowess.

SM - Photocopying

My first practical experience as a stage manager suggests that the job is largely about photocopying.

I had two photocopying chores up front: to copy the auditions scenes (simple enough), and to create a rehearsal script.

Knowing it was fruitless, I visited Kinko's to see if they could transform the 5⅛ x 7¾, double-sided pages into full 8½ x 11 single-sided pages. No dice. Same thing at Staples, although there were nice enough to cut the binding off for me so I could do it myself at my work copier. (Employees can do b&w copies for only 2¢ per page.) It took some finagling -- and an email to our copier rental company -- to figure out the enlargement settings (let the copier do it for you automatically) and how to make it turn double-sided into single, but then it was smooth sailing. I stood by the copier, transferring each page from the copier onto a stack face-up, so that my pages were placed in reverse order.

My rehearsal script, with the lines numbered for easy reference.

With the pages in reverse order, I could punch holes on the right side of the page, so that in the binder, the script is on the left, leaving the back of the next page free for me to take notes on.

In The Back Stage Guide to Stage Management, Thomas Kelly mentions entering an entire script on a computer, so that SMs can take advantage of larger and smaller fonts to prepare cueing scripts (i.e., small fonts for when 3 pages go by with no cues; bigger fonts and more spacing to sections dense with cues; etc.). Great idea, but too time consuming for me. I did do some poking around in the sketchier parts of the Internet to see if I could find an existing electronic copy, but Dramatists Play Service and/or the Albee estate seem pretty diligent about crushing any pirated texts out there, and I stopped before my search imperiled by computer's operating system or the security of my credit cards.

SM - Preparation

Back in March, a friend posted on Facebook that he would be stage manager for a community theater show and was looking for an assistant. I thought that might be an interesting thing to learn, and might be a way for me to dip my toe back into community theater, which I haven't done in 16 (!) years.

It was a generally good experience, and I apparently did well enough that I was asked to stage manage this friend's next show. As I've been preparing, I thought I'd dust off my blog and reflect on the process.

I checked out two books to get me started: The back stage guide to stage management and Stage manager: the professional experience--refreshed. Both books are geared toward the professional, though interestingly, the one with "professional experience" in the subtitle does give frequent nods to the amateur reader. They're arming me with a lot of information going in. Overall, stage management looks to be a lot like my job as a library' deputy director: identify the people and their roles, coordinate communications, anticipate needs, handle crises, know things. I'm excited for the challenge.

After diving into the general information, I think next up is to start assembling my tools. I've decided to do most of my record-keeping in the cloud, so I bought a Chromebook. I haven't yet decided whether to coordinate everything through my personal email address or, like the director, to create a production-specific address. I'm leaning toward the former -- I think of email addresses the same as I do of keys: the more that I have, the more problems I carry around with me and the more I have to sort through to find what I need. For the time being, I'm compromising with the Gmail trick of instant, disposable addresses, adding a "+vw" to my regular email handle.

I'll need a bag to keep my Chromebook in, as well as all the stuff I want to have with me. I have this fantasy of being able to pull from this bag anything anyone might need: Sharpie, tweezers, gaffer tape, mints, Starbucks card, etc. (I've always remembered the animated Around the World in 80 Days, each episode beginning with Fogg instructing Passepartout to pack a random assortment of items, each of which would be useful in saving them during the day's adventures.) And of course, the bag will have my rehearsal script. More on that next post.

Gift Card Cozy/Sock Swatch

I'm working on a troublesome design idea that is requiring me to make lots of small swatch experiments. The idea hit me to turn these little test pouches into gift card cozies. Here's my basic recipe:

• Using sock yarn and 2.5mm sock needles,Turkish cast-on 22 loops.
  I originally wrote "24 loops," but that's a bit loose. YMMV.
• Knit across 22 stitches; turn.
  I loop the working yarn around the cable on the opposite side. This makes a wrap that I can use to close the short-row gap by working k2tog-tbl at the end of the first round.
• Knit a few rounds plain.

This creates a little pouch, 22 stitches on each side. I test two variations of my idea, one on each side.


When finished testing, knit a few plain rounds, then bind off.

---

Why do I knit 22 stitches then turn? Because I like a nice, purled turning edge at the bottom of the pouch, but I hate purling the first stitches. Knitting, then turning around to knit the other way makes that nice, sharp bottom. It's extra fussy of me to do the little short-row wrap, because I could easily sew closed any holes with the tail that's hanging there. But are you surprised that I'm extra fussy?

Olympics Day 16

The start was promising, but like many a good athlete, I didn't have the talent, drive, or luck to make it to the medal stand. I finished one sleeve in a good, competitive pace, but by Day 3 my energy was pulled elsewhere, and I began to fall short of Olympic performance.

I began the body using TECHknitter's method with a long tail cast-on rather than provisional. That proved to be a mistake. As TECHknitter warns, a hem that is knitted shut, rather than sewn, tends to flip up. Blocking probably would have corrected it, but I knew it would be a perpetual source of irritation with the finished sweater, and since it was clear by Day 11 that I wouldn't cross the finish line in time, I started over.

I'll keep at it, because I'm excited by my vision of the completed sweater, but I fear without the Olympic focus this may end up like so many of my sweaters -- unfinished at the last stage because I just don't like them well enough to follow through.

Olympics Day 1

...and we're off!

The torch is lit in Rio, and this morning I cast on for my sweater. My goal is to make a seamless, saddle shoulder henley out of Wensleydale wool from Triskelion Yarn and Fiber.

A half-assed gauge swatch shows me at 5.5 stitches per inch, which makes my key number 235. I cast on 20% -- 47 stitches -- while waiting for my oil change and tire rotation this morning. I didn't have a second needle with me to pick up the provisional stitches to close the hem, but discovered it's not too difficult to grab those stitches from the back of the crochet chain.

I've never worked a sweater starting with the sleeves, but it seems like a better plan than starting with the body.

More about this "Rio Sweater" project as the Olympics unfold.

Limoncello Batch #1

So the batch of limoncello I started on New Year's Day is out in the wild.

Alcohol: Everclear 190 (1 1.75l bottle)
Lemons: 20 organic from Fresh Market
Simple Syrup: 10 cups water, 7 cups sugar

The simple syrup was the problematic step. Because the Everclear was 190, instead of 151 from the recipe, I would need much more simple syrup to get the alcohol content down to something drinkable. Ben at limoncelloquest.com recommends going down to 25% alcohol if you're giving it away as a gift, but I was worried that a gallon of simple syrup would make the whole thing much too sweet.

My friend A--- wisely pointed out that you can always put more simple syrup in, but you can't take it out. So I decided to double the "standard" recipe, putting in about 13.5 cups of simple syrup.

I couldn't wait for it to mellow, and tried a shot that night (February 13). The flavor was generally good, but there was a harshness underneath. The harshness did soften a bit over time, but in the end, the alcohol content of this is really too high -- the calculator puts it at about 33%. When you hold a swallow in your mouth, it burns slightly, like Listerine.

I've bottled it up, and am selectively handing out to friends to try, encouraging them to experiment with ways to offset the alcohol. A--- thinks she wants to try mixing in some whipping cream. My best success so far was with a very good Ginger Limoncello Fizz cocktail: a shot of limoncello, a shot of ginger ale, and a couple shots of seltzer.

Prayer Shawl

Mummy dust, to make me old. To shroud my clothes, the black of night. To age my voice, an old hag's cackle. To whiten my hair, a scream of fright. A blast of wind to fan my hate. A thunderbolt to mix it well. Now, begin thy magic spell.

--Queen, "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs"

As a kid who was fascinated with magic and spells, I loved this section of the movie and the idea of sounds and other intangibles made into ingredients. To create a magic potion, you literally mix metaphors.

The knitting project I'm working on brought this scene to mind. My library knitting group wanted to explore shawls for our February meeting, and I decided I was going to sign up for Josh Ryks' latest mystery knit-along. It was a fun evening, and Josh was great. But instead of getting into the new shawl design, my heart was captured by an old one, Urban Survival, which Josh admits is one of his favorites.

So what ingredients are going into my Urban Survival spell? The yarn base is called Fortitude, which seems like a good foundation for survival. The set I bought includes the colors "Slush" (something to be warded against), "Earl Grey" (for comfort), and "Gun Powder." While I personally don't believe that gun powder is necessary or helpful for urban survival, the friend who is the likely recipient of this shawl certainly does. I'm adding from my stash a bit of "Midnight Blue," symbolizing...what? Late night melancholy? Quiet romance?  There's something peaceful and calm--stable, solid, and subtle--about the dark blue worked into the dark gray. And playful too, like the blue in Superman's hair.

I don't believe in magic, and I don't believe my knitting is imbued with the energies of my intentions, but I find I'm enjoying the idea of casting a spell with my yarn.

Prepping for Christmas 2016

I hate shopping, and that makes Christmas an ordeal. I love my friends and family, and I love the feeling of having a gift for someone which is perfect for them. But I hate finding those gifts, and frankly, I'm not really thoughtful enough to come up with a different, perfect gift for every individual.

Arts fairs are cool, and I love supporting the independents who sell there, but it's too easy to find too many options for some people and nothing for others. When we went to Winterfair, I decided to just enjoy it rather than take on the shopping pressure: if I saw something cool, I would buy it, regardless if I had an intended recipient in mind. That's a strategy I may repeat. Perhaps not all the gifts I gave were home-runs, but none of them completely struck out.

You'd think a knitter would be at an advantage here, but I hate the pressure of required knitting almost as much as I hate shopping. (Every year, Yarn Harlot chronicles the escalating stress of her Christmas knitting. I've stopped bothering to read those posts -- she brings it on herself.) Still, knitting is impressive, and at the beginning of 2015, I resolved to knit a Christmas ornament every week, so I'd have a stockpile of little, handmade gifts. I think that resolution held up for 3 weeks, producing only a couple oak leaves.

I also had this idea that my sister and I should make limoncello and give it away in little gift bottles. My plan was to start in August. But when August finally came, I was in an emotionally wretched state from the twin blows of being offered a job I didn't want and then
not being offered the job I did want.

But it's a new year, and I've got 11½ months to prepare. Friends had scored 1.75l of 190 proof Everclear for me in the fall, and my family bought me the Microplane Zester from my Amazon wishlist. I spent the first morning of 2016 zesting 20 organic lemons while running the Everclear through a filter as LimoncelloQuest.com recommends.

As for the knitting, I could take another stab at the "On Sunday We Make Ornaments" resolution, but I know it's doomed to failure. Maybe I could convince myself to do one knitted give-away per month?

IDEAS:

• Ornaments, like felted oak leaf, small sock, or folded Moravian paper star
• Jultomtar
• Wine totes or sweaters
• Gift card sweaters or coffee cup sleeves

Things I Wish I Had More Time to Do

I need a staycation. The list of things I wish I had more time to do is getting out of hand.


Read the 4 books I have by the bed:

• Veiled (Latest in a failing series I haven't quit yet)
• Carter & Lovecraft (Love the author's Johannes Cabal books)
• The Age of Ra (Humans battle the Egyptian gods)
• The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss (I'm a sucker for Girl Detectives)

Crank out the designs in progress:

• That cuff-down thing I blogged about previously
• Instructions for the heel of that sock
• The amazing glove pattern
• The glove class based on that pattern

Make things

• Finish the top-down henley (and while I'm at it, maybe the vest that's been inches from completion for 3 years)
• Knit the gloves I started for Andrea and the fingerless gloves Robin wants
• Make limoncello. My plan was to have this ready for Giftmas; not going to happen.
• Knit this toy rabbit and these slippers.
• The felted mistletoe slippers that Mike fell in love with

Clean stuff

• The bathroom needs rigorous cleaning of all surfaces
• The basement is a disaster

Miscellaneous

• Catch up on the DVR, Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon Prime queues
• Take care of Giftmas in general (decorating, shopping)
• Get some one-on-one social time with my sister 

Cuff Down Detours

I've been struggling off and on all year with a new sock design. The idea first came to me on Christmas: I noticed a picture frame that had a common decorative element I've always liked, and it occurred to me that if I cocked it slightly on the diagonal, I could easily render it in the traveling slipped stitch pattern that I favor in sock designs.

For months I charted and swatched, trying different variations of the idea. All of them were slightly "off," and for a while I thought the design wouldn't work on a sock. It was too big, traveled too quickly in its diagonal spiral to fit around a foot--I was dismayed to realize that it would probably work better on a hat.

Sneak peak

I persevered, and in late June, I saw a way forward, and pretty quickly knit up a really attractive sock, one of the best I've designed. My process is to knit one sock, making notes as I go, then start writing the pattern, making the second sock from these newly drafted instructions. This prototype pair often doesn't completely match, because I make design adjustments and improvements which make the second sock slightly "better."

And it was working. As much as I liked the first sock, the second was fantastic--until I got near the ankle. The changes I'd made to improve the design on the foot caused a problem when it got to the ankle. I couldn't solve it, and in frustration, I set the sock aside.

This morning the answer came to me: it's not a toe-up design. This sock will be so much easier to knit if constructed cuff-down.

I should have realized this earlier. In fact, I kind of did, but I was disappointed, and wanted to push through. It's possible to make this design toe up, and I can pretty easily do it myself, adjusting on the fly to make the design work on any sized foot. But that kind of improvisation doesn't fit in a written pattern. So cuff-down it is.

Back to the drawing board, which has accumulated quite a layer of dust while this design was in time out.

A New Start with Gloves

Two years ago, the father of this gorgeous yarn (go buy some!) declared that he dislikes making socks and prefers gloves. I've made gloves before, but never felt the joy. Still, Caerthan is cool, and my dork reflexes advise me to like the things the cool kids do, so I threw myself into it.

The result was the Evil Genius Glove Recipe, a fingers-down method of making gloves. It served me for awhile, and I enjoyed the process of learning about gloves--different gussets, thoughts about fit and negative ease, ways to manage the fourchettes and inevitable holes--but my joy faded pretty quickly.

What I really wanted was a game-changing trick for gloves, something that took away the annoyance and made it fun. (I once mused on Facebook about how cool it would be if a brilliant innovator like Cat Bordhi would turn her attention to gloves.)

I think I've finally found that trick. It seems to originate with Cathy Scott, who figured out that the "peasant thumb" technique of using waste yarn to create a thumb opening could be used with a gusseted thumb and even with finger connections: no casting off and casting back on. She explained the thumb technique on her blog, but it was her IPOD Gloves pattern that blew my mind. In the past month, I've made 4 pairs of gloves, and each finger teaches me something new about how this trick works.

I hope to put out my own glove pattern--a new recipe--using this technique next year. Before then, I have a lot of testing to do to perfect the fit and instructions. I'm not making any promises, but it's possible that this journey might give me something to write about on this long-dormant blog.

Don't check bags

As I've said before, what good is a blog if you can't bitch impotently about minor inconveniences?

A few weeks ago, Mike and I were flying home from a conference, and to expedite processing at the airport, I checked both of our bags together.  Later, at the gate, they repeatedly announced that they would like to check passenger's bags for free because the flight was full and space in the overhead compartment was limited.  So that was annoying:  I paid for a service they were later offering for free.

Back at work, while I was sorting through my receipts to prepare my reimbursement request, I discovered that when I checked the bags together, I was charged extra for the second bag.  I paid them $60 unnecessarily.

So I submitted a refund request, which they have just denied.

MORAL:  Don't pay to check your bags on United.  They'll probably beg you to let them check them for you for free at the gate.

Thumb Attempt #2

I'm still stewing in disappointment that the Cat Bordhi-inspired afterthought thumb won't work. It was just so clean! The thing I really hate about mittens and gloves is darning all the holes at the base of fingers and thumbs.

Since I need to increase the mitten circumference around the base of the thumb, there are two obvious paths. After knitting the finger portion:

1. Knit a separate, tip-down thumb and join it at that point, then complete the mitten by decreasing down through the palm to the wrist.
2. Cast on extra stitches, and continue working down the palm to the wrist. Work the thumb last by picking up held stitches and knitting to the tip.

For the first option, I like the I-cord technique from Handknitting with Meg Swanson. (nonaKnits also has instructions if you can't get your hands on Swanson's book).

• The thumb circumference is about 33% of the hand circumference. Cast on half the stitches on a DPN.(Example: my mitten is 42 stitches around the hand, so the thumb will be 1/3 of that, or 14 sts; I cast on 7).
• Work 1 row of I-cord.
• In the second row of I-cord, K1, then repeat [M1, K1].
• Work I-cord until thumb is desired length.
• With a crochet hook, find the first horizontal bar at the tip, twist it into a loop, then chain up the ladders to close the gap in your tube.

At this point, you can pop the finger and thumb pieces on your hand to see where the thumb should join and how many stitches meet up. Put the stitches to be joined on holders; you can graft them closed at the end.

Work a decreasing gusset at the base of the thumb stitches as you work down the palm toward the wrist.

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Aside from the I-cord thumb, there's not much I like about this. The grafting is a pain, and there are messy holes to sew up at the end. I think working the thumb last is a better plan.

Mittens Miss the Mark

My friends Jeremy and Joshua have identified a significant flaw in my new mitten recipe. I mistook the decreases that I do below the thumb for a thumb gusset. In fact, my mittens are no wider around the base of the thumb than they are around the fingers. Therefore, they do not represent a perfect fit.

A mitten's success or failure depends almost entirely on the thumb. And while this recipe produces a serviceable mitten, it in no way qualifies me for the title of Evil Mitten Genius.

Back into the lab, then. Wish me luck.