Angela=Tired

This past weekend was Junior Presentation. We are Junior sponsors. This made for much exhaustion. The weekend included Friday night vespers put on by the Juniors, most of the church service put on by the Juniors and a nice meal, auctioning gift baskets, skit selection, song and banner presentation and marching on Saturday night. Michael and I were mostly involved with the skits and song stuff. What added to our nightmare was that last Wednesday three boys who were in six skits between them were suspended. So we had to find people to fill in, sometimes that person filling in was Michael. I mostly did backstage stuff, pulling the curtain, telling people when to go on and off stage, getting props on and off stage, fixing costumes. That stuff. During the meal I also helped get food back and forth. It was ultra stressful. Pratices every night last week. But it all came off really well. One of the girls' deans told me that it was the best one she'd been to since she's been here (11 years). And we've never done this before! So we felt pretty ecstatic. I hurt all over and am still exhausted, but I feel like now I can do anything.

Michael played a bully in a nerds vs. bullies dance off skit, which was the favorite of many people. He danced to Soldier Boy. If we get a video, I'll post it. It was pretty hilarious.

So that's taken up our lives for the last couple of weeks. And two weeks from today begins spring break. I could use it a little sooner, but I'll take what I can get. We'll be in Nashville, hopefully interviewing and applying for more jobs. No serious bites yet, but we're still praying and hoping. How does one know how to make such a huge decision? I feel like maybe this just won't happen for us. Maybe we're supposed to stay here forever. But that makes me sad, so I'm still trying to keep hope alive.

Billy Elliot

Homeleave began Wednesday, and we left a little early to be sure to get to New York in time. We checked into our hotel and then set off for The Daily Show. We got there early, there were only about 15 people in line ahead of us, so I headed off to get some hot chocolate and a newspaper. It was freaking cold. I don't know. Somewhere in the 20s. So the hot chocolate kept us relatively warm for a few minutes. Then I tried to do The New York Time crossword puzzle with gloves on. Much more difficult to write neatly with gloves on. The guy standing next to us in line was pretty impressed with how much of the crossword we completed. I'm a crossword junky, but yeah the NYT is definitely a tough nut to crack. Anyway, we enjoyed the show, and definitely enjoyed being warm for a while. If you want to see the show that we saw live, it was Wednesday, February 4.

So after The Daily Show we hurried on over to Broadway and got a quick bite of mediocre food before going to see Billy Elliot. Which was amazing. Also, I was sitting about 2 feet from the stage. I ordered Orchestra, Partial View, which apparently means that you're off to the side, but so close that the actors spit on you. It was fantastic. Also, they had these little windows beneath the stage so that you could see the people in the orchestra pit. One of the lady trombone players was doing Sudoku on her time between songs. Another guy was reading. It was pretty cool to see them. Anyway, the show was awesome, but sitting that close to the speakers was a bit deafening. But still amazing. Maybe my very favorite. The dancing was fabulous. So if you're ever in New York you should go. For real.

So we stayed in our hotel that night, which was really nice, we booked it on Priceline, by the way. The Wellington, on 7th avenue at 55th street. It was a block down from Carnegie Hall, pretty cool. And across the street from the Park Central Hotel. So the next day we got up and had some nice hummus and crepes at a cute little French-ish restaurant, where our waiter was actually French. Then we decided that it was too cold to enjoy the day, and too cold to want to stay for another play, so we bought some lovely desserts and went home.

Today I'm applying for jobs and relaxing at home. It's a good homeleave. There will be some pictures to follow.