Aaah...

We had officially the WORST Midsummer rehearsal ever. Oberon at one point just threw Shakespeare to the winds and said, "Look, there's a girl who likes a guy that you have to find. Go!" Agh. Wanna know the worst part?


IT WAS VIDEO-TAPED.

Ugh.

"From there to here and here to there, funny things are everywhere!"
~Dr. Seuss, One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

"Only thing to do is jump OVER the MOON!"

Happy RENT day to you
Happy RENT day to you
Happy RENT day to everyone
Happy RENT day to you!

Mark: How do you document real life when real life's getting more like fiction each day? Headlines breadline blow my mind and now this deadline, eviction or pay! RENT!

Roger: How do you write a song when the chords sounds wrong? Though they once sounded right and rare! When the notes are sour where is the power you once had to ignite the air?

Mark: We're hungry and frozen!

Roger: Some life that we've chosen!

Both: How we gonna pay? How we gonna pay? How we gonna pay? Last year's RENT??

Roger: How do you start a fire when there's nothing to burn and it feels like something's stuck in your flue?

Mark: How can you generate heat when you can't feel you feet

Both: And they're turning blue!

Mark: You light up a mean blaze

Roger: With posters!

Mark: And screenplays!

Both: How we gonna pay? How we gonna pay? How we gonna pay? Last year's RENT??

Collins: How do you stay on your feet when on every street it's trick-or-treat (and tonight it's trick)! Welcome back to town, I should lie down, everyhting is brown and oh! I feel sick!

Mark: Where is he?

Collins: Gettin dizzy!

Mark & Roger: How we gonna pay? How we gonna pay? How we gonna pay? Last year's RENT?

Mark: The music ignites tonight with passionate fire!

Roger: The narration crackles and pops with incendiary wit!

Mark: Zoom in as they burn teh past to the ground

Both and Company: And feel the heat of the future's glow! Hoqw do you leave the past behind when it keeps finding ways to get to your heart? It reaches way down deep and tears you inside out 'til you're torn apart RENT! How can you connect in an age where strangers landlords lovers, your own blood cells betray? What binds a fabric together when the raging shifting winds of change keep ripping away!

Benny: Draw a line in the sand and then make a stand

Roger: Use your camera to spar!

Mark: Use your guitar!

Both and Company: When they act tough you call their bluff! We're not gonna pay, we're not gonna pay, we're not gonna pay, last year's rent! This year's rent! Next year's RENT! RENT RENT RENT RENT RENT! We're not gonna pay RENT!

Mark and Roger: 'Cause everything in RENT!




That was the fantastic work of Jonathan Larson. He drew young people back into the theatre! Incredible!

SAdly, he died the night before RENT's first off-Broadway premiere. How tragic that he will never write another song. That is our loss.

Today, mi amigo Vikki and I were the only one to commemorate this fantastic day! Ah well, I have converted at least one of these people. HAHAHA!


"Moo with me!"
"No day but today!"
"La vie boheme!"
"To the stage!"
et cetera! Haha, comment with your fave RENT quote!

"Forget regret, or life is yours to miss!"
"To anyone out of the mainstream, is anyone in the mainstream?"

The Jelly Donut Thing

I am suprised that none of you commented on the "I am a jelly donut," post. That was said by John F. Kennedy in a speech at the Berlin Wall. He was trying to say "I am a Berliner," but the German got a little mangled. Hehe, a Berliner also happens to be a jelly donut, depending on article placement. HAhahhahaah. Ahem.

"Following the light of the sun, we left the Old World."
~Christopher Columbus who incidentally did not discover the Americas thank-you-very-much!

*****To Mamallama*******
Amanda says you are officially COOL!

"The course of true love never did run smooth."

That's from A Midsummer Night's Dream

Get ready for my fabulous list of Shakespearean insults.

10. "You are an ass."
~Much Ado About Nothing

9. "Let's meet as little as we can."
~As You Like It

8. "God made him, therefore let him pass for a man."
~Merchant of Venice

7. "Never came poison from a fouler toad."
~Richard III

6. "Neighbors, you are tedious."
~Much Ado About Nothing

5. Wherein is he good but to taste sack and drink it."
~Henry IV Part 1

4. "The soul of this man is his clothes."
~ All's Well that Ends Well

3. "She sweats, a man may go over shoes in the grime of it."
~ CoE (I don't know what play that is, but that's what it says on my t-shirt)

2. "She would infect to the North Star."
~Much Ado About Nothing

And the NUMBER ONE best insult from the Bard:


"SELL WHEN YOU CAN, YOU ARE NOT FOR ALL MARKETS"
and that would be from the fantastic As You Like It



Happy Day of Shakespeare!!!!!

All Hail the Bard of Avon!

Guess what???? Though his birthday is not actually known to the precise date, the celebrated day of SHAKESPEARE's birhtday is tomorrow, the 24th of April! Are we excited?!?! GOOD! Mr. Klar said we could have a PARTY and he would try to get a cake! English class rocks! And I am going to bring my fantastic Shakespeare doll to class! Fun stuff! I will pelt you with a double whammy of Bard quotes tomorrow. And, not to slight the greatest musical of all time, RENT's 11 year Broadway anniversary is Thursday, the 26th of April! What an exciting week for drama geeks!

So tomorrow, you must say "Sell when you can, you are not for all markets." to at least one person. And on Thursday you must say "La vie boheme," or "Moo with me!" HAha, those are your instructions.

Quote
"He hated hospitals, but they certainly beat aliens harvesting his testicles."
~Angels and Demons by Dan Brown (who incidentally wrote The Da Vinci Code)

"I am a jelly donut."

Is that even how you spell donut? Agh, it's a weekend. Anyway, that quote has no relevance to anything nor is it the quote of the day, but if you can tell me who said it and where and what language and why it was soooo amusing, we can laugh together.

Anywho, last night the fam and I attended a hooplah/shindig to promote helmet wearing. It was...interesting. Great idea, and I'm sure the speeches were awesome, the only problem was that they happened to be in tieng Viet (Vietnamese). Hehe, I had an amusing time trying to fill in what people might be saying. Here's what I came up with for Ms. Vietnam's speech:

Ms. Vietnam: Wear a helmet kids, no excuses!

Host: Not meaning to be rude miss, but why aren't you wearing a helmet?

Ms. Vietnam: Well you see, the massive amounts of hairspray I apply each day form a sort of protective coating around my skull. I can't be touched, adn I look FABULOUS.

Host: Wow, that sounds great, where can I get some of your hairspray?

Ms. Vietnam: Oh I'm sure they have some left at the same place where I got my hips and breasts. They might even have a few inches left, seeing as I took most of them to contribute to my Amazonian height.

Host: Well, thank you for coming this evening.

Ms. Vietnam: My pleasure, wear helmets kids!


Haha, it was a bit on the dull side.

However, earlier in the day Amanda and I went shopping and it was fun. At one store place, I bought a bag for a cousin and paid with a 500,000 dong bill. Haha, it's not that much in US dollars, but still, it's a big bill. The woman gave me change and I walked away. Amanda and I were nearly half way out of the store when the woman came running after me to say that she had accidentally short-changed me. She handed me 100,000 apologizing profusely. I assured her it was okay, and then thanked her.

It's so neat though. Here, you either get people who want to rip you off and take your money, or you get brutally honest. It's a neat juxtaposition.


Quote

"I'm stuck here in this hillbilly hell! I can feel my IQ dropping by the second!"
~Lightning McQueen; Cars

Impromptu Have a Party Day

I, Hillary do hereby declare this day of April 20, 2007 to be the first official Impromptu Have a Party Day. What do you do? Wellllll, you HAVE A PARTY for no reason! OR rather, you come up with a list of reasons.

Here is my list of reasons to party:
1. Kenai's first day of kindergarten
2. It's Friday!
3. Great family
4. Great friends


Any you care to add? Do so! And have your own party!

Quote having nothing to do with parties but fun nonetheless:
"My name's Mater. Like 'tumater' only without the 'tuh'."
~ Mater, fromteh Pixar movie Cars

Lalalala

"No hunter of the sky should end his days as prey. Better to die on the wing than pinned to the ground."
~ Saphira, a character in Christopher Paolini's Eragon

Well, mi vida no es interesante. *My life is not interesting. My weekend plans include lots of hanging out wiht the family. Not bad, but not exactly the work of a thriving social calendar. We had a cool field trip planned with our bio class next week, it even included scuba diving. unfortunately, the rainy season is beginning and teh currents are crazy, so that has been cancelled. Ah well.

A Midsummer Night's Dream is shaping up nicely. Except that some people won't act, and of those who will, half of them have un-intelligable English. It will be interesting to see what comes of our efforts. I am loving Puck though, so to hell with the rest of it! Haha.

Haha

I have missed a few days because of internet problems. agh. So here are the missed quotes;

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle than you."
~Plato

"Don't look at me, it's bad for my skin!"
~Opal Koboi; a character in Eoin Colfer's Artemis Fowl

"No one can make you feel inferior without your permission."
~Eleanor Roosevelt

So there's that. My life has been...ok. I ordered a prom dress from a tailor. Including fabric, it cost a total of $25 US. Crazy cheap. It's going to be FABULOUS! Hmm...Amanda and I went shopping on Friday, lots of fun. Aaannnd, more Midsummer rehearsal. That's about all.

Oh!

It is also reading week and I am celebrating by reading any book I can get my hands on. On Monday I read teh second Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants book again (it's been awhile ok?) Tuesday I read The Seer and the Sword. Don't read it, it's so cliched! Gag. I have started a new Camelot book, should be interesting. It might take me two days. It's thick.

Well, bye for now lovlies!

Late Passover

This is from one of the fantastic Shakespearean Jews.

The Two-Minute Haggadah
A Passover service for the impatient.
By Michael Rubiner

Opening prayers:

Thanks, God, for creating wine. (Drink wine.)

Thanks for creating produce. (Eat parsley.)

Overview: Once we were slaves in Egypt. Now we're free. That's why
we're doing this.

Four questions:
1. What's up with the matzoh?
2. What's the deal with horseradish?
3. What's with the dipping of the herbs?
4. What's this whole slouching at the table business?

Answers:
1. When we left Egypt, we were in a hurry. There was no time for
making decent bread.
2. Life was bitter, like horseradish.
3. It's called symbolism.
4. Free people get to slouch.

A funny story: Once, these five rabbis talked all night, then it was
morning. (Heat soup now.)

The four kinds of children and how to deal with them:
Wise child-explain Passover.
Simple child-explain Passover slowly.
Silent child-explain Passover loudly.
Wicked child-browbeat in front of the relatives.

Speaking of children: We hid some matzoh. Whoever finds it gets five bucks.

The story of Passover: It's a long time ago. We're slaves in Egypt.
Pharaoh is a nightmare. We cry out for help. God brings plagues upon
the Egyptians. We escape, bake some matzoh. God parts the Red Sea. We
make it through; the Egyptians aren't so lucky. We wander 40 years in
the desert, eat manna, get the Torah, wind up in Israel, get a new
temple, enjoy several years without being persecuted again. (Let
brisket cool now.)

The 10 Plagues: Blood, Frogs, Lice-you name it.

The singing of "Dayenu":
If God had gotten us out of Egypt and not punished our enemies, it
would've been enough. If he'd punished our enemies and not parted the
Red Sea, it would've been enough.

If he'd parted the Red Sea-(Remove gefilte fish from refrigerator now.)

Eat matzoh. Drink more wine. Slouch.

Thanks again, God, for everything.

SERVE MEAL.

Quote of the day:

"Shakespeare is gayer than the Ice Capades."
~Menzer Menzer (so great you have to say it twice. Ph.d in Renaissance literature.)

Nothing doin'

Another dull day so far.

"Aerodynamically, the bumble bee shouldn't be able to fly, but the bumble bee doesn't know, so it goes on flying anyway."
~Mary Kay Ash

Today...

"Though most men are ruthless,
Some will still weep
When the gifts we were given are gone."
~So You Say That the Battle is Over; John Denver

Anyway, today started out better than yesterday...we weren't in a huge rush, but Anne was ticked at Sol. Suprise suprise. Quest got a blast of it as well, but not so much. I try to tune out of family disputes, but it is hard first thing in the morning. Hmm...what else?

Nope, that's it.

Boooooring

My life, at this precise moment in time is very, incredibly boring. I have nothing exciting planned until prom dress shopping with Anne this weekend. Oh, and I took the writing test for two hours this morning. Fuuuuun stuff. I wrote about a time capsule. Don't ask. It was not cool. Well, after adding that excitement to your life, I will sign out and leave you to your hopefully more exciting life.
Bye.

Incidentally...

I am going to be writing to you guys much more often if I do a quote of the day. Haha...oh! And FYI, the quotes most likely will have nothing to do with my day since I try to post in the morning. Any alignment would be pure coincidence.

So with that in mind,

"Sell when you can, you are not for all markets."
~As You Like It; William Shakespeare

Okay

I have decided to carry my handy-dandy-quote-book-note-book with me everywhere. Whenever I get a chance to blog, I will have my quotes. SO. Today's:

"Call me but love and I'll be new baptized."
~Romeo and Juliet : William Shakespeare, what a brillian guy!

Spring Holidays

Yesterday, I attended an Easter party and my first ever Baptism (it wasn't my own, no worries).

The church service part happened without my knowledge. I was simply dragged into it. Hehe, I thought that Easter PARTY meant..well...a party. And a party it was...after the church service. LEt me tell you, I think the Jewish Passover is a bit more celebratory than Easter. Jews get to relax and rejoice at their freedom. Christians get to put on stiff dresses and sit in church for two hours plus to listen to a story they all know about death. Even when they get to the rejoicing part, it is in the form of singing old songs that nobody knows. Jews sing "Dayenou" (sp?) which repeats the same word over and over again, and soem song about a kid and a cat that's tons of fun to sing at top speed. Haha, goood stuff. However, Jews have to eat matzah and Christians get Peeps and chocolate bunnies...I guess there are ups and downs to everyhting.

Anyway, the Baptism was interesting. My friend Adam (whose house the party was at) has a swimming pool. The preist(s) got in up to the waist, fully clothed (I guess bathing suits would be scandalous). The person-to-be-Baptized got into the water, the preist asked if they accepted Jesus as their savior beyond a shadow of a doubt, and their reward for saying yes was to get completely dunked into the chlorinated water. Congratulations, you are now saved from Hell. Now get a towel so you don't drip on the floor. Seems strange to me, but hey! I've never done it. Haha.

Bye dahlings!

Quotes

I have decided to attempt to post a quote of the day. However, my quote-book-note-book is at home, so I might not get to that.

Today's quote: "Fortune favors the brave!"
~Radames; Aida

Long Live the King!

Some practical facts about Thailand:

1. The money is called "baht" and there is approximately $3 US to every 100 baht.
2. "Sairung" means rainbow. However, this won't help you much because everything is in Sanskrit anyway.
3. Thailand is a monarchy on the downslide. I don't know the king's name, but he is referred to as "His Majesty the King." no more, no less.
4. Buddhism is the primary religion of Thailand, so DON'T POINT YOUR FEET AT ANYONE! (look it up)
5. Sanskrit is shadily close to the Roman alphabet (aka, the one we use) so it can be deceiving. The first glance at a sign might make you think you can read it, but upon closer inspection, it uses symbols you have likely never seen before.


Haha, don't talk to shady people and look both ways before you cross a street. If possible, avoid crossing.

Love you!

Thai Massage

By the way, you should read these in order. Anyway.

You need two things to be able to give a Thai massage
1. Uncommon strength
2. Devilishly sharp thumbs

The things I do for you guys, honestly. When askedd after a delicious dinner of rice-in-a-pineapple if I wanted to go for a massage, my response (after a bit of hesitation) was, "I'm game." So Pete, Sol, and I linked hands and risked our lives by crossing a Bangkok street and came to the massage place. After removing our shoes (an Asian thing) and leaving them on the steps outside, we went into the building where it smelled like:
"Mint"- Sol
"Vicks"- Me
"Menthol"- Pete
"Oh, I thought it was a type of candy."- Sol
"Not Mentos Sol, Menthol."- Me
"Oh"- Sol

Anyway, after a breif pee break (would you want to be massaged with a full bladder?!) we went down to a curtained off area with three beds. Adventure no. 1: Stripping and donning the massage clothing. This was EXTREMELY amusing for those involved. After removing my stretchy black capris, I unfolded a pair of mint green...well..pants I guess, if you have an ass the size of a circus tent! Sol, Pete, and I could probably all have fit into one of those monsters! Once Pete and I had ours on, we wondered if they were backwards? Or were you supposed to be able to fit twins in there?! In the end we turned them around to we could use the fraying strings as a sort of belt. Sol and I were doubled over laughing. The shirts were no better. Huge. My only quandary was this: bra or no bra? I asked Pete for some odd reason (hey, he's the adult right?) and he told me to ask one of the massage people. Yeah right. I'm going to ask someone with like four words of English who I met about a second ago what I should do with my breats. I made the independent decision to remove the bra.

The massage began with a foot scrubbing. I'm guessing there were two reasons for this.
1. In Buddhism, the feet are the most unholy part of the body. The most incredibly offensive thing you ca do to a Thai person is to point your feet at them.
2. Who wants to rub dirty feet?
Following the foot wash, the real massage began. Flat on my stomach, my face on a cushy pillow, a tiny Thai woman began pressing my feet, calves, and thighs and shoving her devilishly sharp thumbs between my muscles. I tried the whole, relax-get-into-it thing for awhile, but I am not generally a touchy-feely person, so relaxation was not coming easily. I decided to stay alert and come up with descripitve imagery of the whole fandango for you, my dear readers. That maded the whole process more...bearable. Haha. When the lady moved on to my hindquarters, she spent quite a bit of time there. Apparently I am tense there. Well yeah. A stranger is pummeling my rear end! Wouldn't you be tense?

The lower back portion was...not torture, but not exactly fun. I kept wondering, "Does she know there are kidneys in there? I need those! Ouch! Does she KNOW there are kidneys in there?!"

My shoulders were a few minutes of agony. Either my bookbag has done more damage than I thought, or that woman had DEVILISHLY sharp thumbs!

The defining feature of a Thai massage is the stretching. Laying on my stomach, the woman grabbed my wrists and pulled, arching my back more than I thought possible. That's where the uncommon strength comes in. Pete, Sol, and I were in a three bears situation. Pete hardly bent, I was just right, and Sol's shoulders were nearly paralleled to his lower back. Haha.

It was interesting that after each part of my body was done with, I didn't move it for a looong time. At one point, I had an itch on my face. I left it because
1. I didn't want to break the relaxed spell on my arms and
2. I wasn't entirely sure they were under my control anymore.

The massage finished with a rigorous pounding of the shoulders, so I was in a sitting position. This was fortunate since even from there, getting up was a bummer. Finding my way out of those pants again was tricky, but I managed it. Re-bra-ing, re-dressing, and wobbling outside to get my shoes on was no mean feat...but I did it!

What I learned afterward: Thai massages are infamously rough! So my lovelies, if you want to pay extravagant amounts of money to be abused by a small Asian woman for an hour, Go to Thailand!

Firsts

This is a list of things that I did for the very first time in Thailand

1. eating rice out of a pineapple
2. NOT appreciating "civilization"
3. going to a teacher seminar
4. enjoying a fruit smoothie without worrying about "trashies"
5. walking with a tiger (I'll elaborate once I get my pics sorted out)
6. feeling I could actually pass out from dehydration
7. being sick of pizza
8. being so hot I forgot what AC felt like
9. Thai massage (I'll elaborate in a sec)
10. eating a pancake with a chocolate target (yum)
11. riding an elephant bare-back
12. having water squirted at me by an elephant (can you say SNOT?)
13. air drying my hair in the back of a pickup truck
14. seeing a stampede of pigs (we're talking HUNDREDS of pigs)
15. being nibbled by fishies (weird, unpleasant)
16. having to guard my belongings against monkey theft
17. sliding down a waterfall
18. worshipping a giant Buddha
19. riding a bamboo raft
20. jumping off of a bamboo raft
21. being unable to find anything English on TV
22. eating an egg wonton
23. having three taxis not only refuse us a ride, but drive off as soon as we opened
our mouths

I think that might be it...for now anyway.

Impressions...

1st impression of Thailand: I'll tell you once I get out of Bangkok. I am not enamored of the city, to say the least. The phrase that came to mind as we were riding in a taxi through the city was "devoid of life". In HCMC, you always see people on the streets, on bikes, on anything you could devise. In Bangkok, there are mostly cars. This accounts for the SMOG. You have to be careful breathing in that city. I might be scarred permanently. *shudder*

Second Impression of Thailand: Ugh. Misery has been given new meaning. The heat is a pressing, driving, ever-present force that sucks all moisture from the toxic air. I feel unclean from just walking out to breakfast. Granted, I was walking super-slow to keep up with Kenai, but still. By the end of our first day out of the city, I was so thirsty I thought I might pass out. Not fun.

Third Impression of Thailand: Wow! This place has totally redeemed itself! Natural water slides, elephant snot, and praying to a Buddha in a cave are all added to my list of "Firsts" which you will be privy to shortly.

So all in all, not a great trip, but not horrid either. Would I recommend it to tourists? Haha, sure. If you have a death wish. If not, avoid Bangkok. Air and water put aside, the people are rude and crossing the street is a risky endeavor because of it. I got the impression that anyone there would not hestitate to kill a pedestrian in cold blood, then go out to dinner with no regrets. Haha, so don't go there.

Just So You Know

I am going to bombard you with posts. Hold on to your hats.