a++ would smuggle into space again

I'm twenty one now! I was twenty-one on November 29th, actually, but I have kind of fallen off the face of my life. It isn't that I'm being particularly antisocial, it's just that I look up and realize that my unfulfilled obligations have become this massive rolling Indiana Jones boulder. I know from past experience that the only way to defeat the boulder is to just start doing things, but somehow it's so much easier to listen to radio plays of Carmilla and fantasize about getting into La Maupin's pants.

Anyway, being twenty-one is pretty okay I think. People sent me some lovely birthday wishes and I went and saw the LA production of Equivocation with a few friends. It wasn't as good as the Ashland one -- they went for modern costumes, which, uh, no, and also Sharpe wasn't John Tufts and Armin wasn't Gregory Linington who are two of my True Loves of Ashland, and Cecil was just bad. But! Shakespeare was Joe Spano, and he was pretty good, and Judith was McGee's Sister Troian Bellisario, and she was pretty good, and my favorite character in the play, Henry Garnet, the Jesuit love of my life not counting robots, was played by the Mayor from Buffy, and he was amazing. Just fantastic. It's hard to do Garnet badly, I guess, but, well, he went so well from the fatherly tension of Garnet and Shakespeare in the cell to the cough 'brotherly' tension of Richard Burbage and Shakespeare having a fight! So wonderful.

It did raise the question in my mind of how to do Cecil right. Cecil is the main villain (if you haven't seen the play you may know him as the son of the guy from this Kate Beaton comic) and he has a severe limp. I was under the impression that this was historical, although I'm not as sure about this now, but let's assume that it is historical and not just a douche move by Bill Cain. It means that you have a political operator, sometimes sympathetic but usually just conniving, with a major physical deformity of the kind usually used for some pretty ablist symbolism. Is there any way to play Cecil as a character with a limp who is also "twisted" instead of Cecil as a character with a limp who is therefore twisted? Should you cut the limp entirely? (Presumably the Richard III resonances wouldn't work quite so well, but his hump was imaginary, too.) Considering his role as a Cheney analogue, does he have to be sick in some fashion to draw the parallel to Cheney's heart disease, or is it superfluous? How would you direct it?

We've arrived in Ashland safe and sound. (Sorry, Shira, that means no hanging out today; I'll be in Oregon till ... Friday, I think.) I feel like I'm here to renew my vows with the town. We're staying in this bed and breakfast that's actually some family's big ol' house and surrounding cottages, in two suites, tasteful flowered wallpaper, copies of the Stories from Shakespeare, framed cat cartoons and all. Also there are no TVs but there are fireplaces. If you know me you know that I am rather ridiculously happy.

I drove part of the way up, very nerve-wracking but also exciting, and when I wasn't driving Eli and I sat in the back of the car and watched "Utopia." For his reactions on that, you'll have to see last night's post, which he insisted on making. It basically sums up mine, except for my parallel squee of "Derek Jacobi! I Claudius!" Also, David Tennant is a fox. But I feel terribly guilty for briefly introducing him to the concept of livejournal. I have this suspicion that he will want to join it, and then I will have to tell him where mine is, and then I will have to friendslock every single piece of slash I have ever written down deep. Or get a new journal.

Then we stayed up until eleven o'clock discussing a) who the Master was and why I thought he was important, b) who Romana was and why I thought she was important, c) if the Doctor had cheated on Rose, d) why the Daleks were such jerks, e) why Merry and Pippin were important to the general flow of the plot (he hasn't read Return of the King yet.)

He may get on my nerves occasionally, but I suspect we're raising him right.

Today we're going river-rafting, and then, I'm guessing, they're going to want to go for a walk around the Plaza, which, been there will do that extensively over the next four days guys, but it means that I may be online some point this evening. We'll see. I'm hoping.

*sings along to Ruddigore* My eyes are fully open to my awful situation! I shall go at once to Roderick and make him an oration -- I shall tell him I've recovered my forgotten moral senses and I don't care tuppence ha'penny for any consequences... (I needs the ha'penny!)

( musings on the past week or two )

For the Storycircle, Radmyr dies! For the Femgenficathon, Antigone and Iphigenia die (to be rewritten so it doesn't suck as much!)

For Harrowdown, not written by me in any way, just heavily fangirled: Paul not-slash Ian, That Caleb In Drag Drabble. Therefore two-thirds of my soul goes to Heidi and the other third to Sares.

I am in Ashland now; the hotel room has wireless but considering that I am up here with winterwolfsong and evil_overlords and ariastar and Henry I am so not ever touching the internet again. EEEEEEEE.

Play schedule: King John, Importance of Being Earnest, Winter's Tale, Cyrano de Bergerac, HOLY FUCKING GOD.

THE WORD SQUEE APPLIES SO HARD.

Will be back on the 20th, possibly the 21st.

*goes off to read Anna's one-act now*

( Cut for ramble about our play. )

In other news, six hours of rehearsal took their toll on my miiiiind. But Abby made this icon for me, so all is better. I like the forlorn little Finn on the end. Hey, a man can hope.

Next up for the friendsmeme is amberdulen. I friended her over her Serpent Society fics, hidden away at the Pit, one of the few gems. She captured JK Rowling's style with grace and less of a blatant Gryffindor bias, always a good thing. I know her primarily now, though, through the community she started: nanomojo. It's a support group for NaNoWriMo. I haven't succeeded either year I've tried it, but dear lord' this group has helped make it fun. She's a great writer, very entertaining, and an Adult without Secret Adult Cooties. <3

Three Fuenteovejuna ship fics. One of them is only applicable to the production I'm in, in which Mengo is a girl instead of a guy as Lope de Vega intended. I WIN. All very subtextual, but I guess the first one could have warnings for implied creepyfuckingbastardhood, NOT THAT ANY OF YOU WILL READ THESE.

( This is more rareslash than I thought possible. )