Talent Night

I almost got to sleep in today, but someone rang our doorbell around 7:50 and the dogs went haywire. But then they went back to sleep. It's funny how they've been sleeping through the night every single night since I started blogging. Perhaps they were attempting to wake me in the middle of the night before so that I would get up and write, and now that I'm writing every day they can stop that craziness.

We had a good rehearsal for Alice in Wonderland Jr. today at the theatre. Immediately thereafter, I drove to Berrien Springs to Talent Night at Andrews Academy where my sister is a sophomore. She and her band, Remains of the Day, performed (phenomenally, I must say) their original composition "Child Left Alone". As soon as she sends me a link of their performance, I will put it up right away so everyone can see it. I've been singing all my life and have been told from time to time that I do well, but this girl blows me out of the water and she's only seventeen.

In other news, it's quite a drive from Bristol to Berrien Springs, so I got through a lot of "A Scanner Darkly" on audiobook. I find it funny that, after listening to it for as long as I have, it only occurred to me on Friday, I think, that the language is somewhat outdated for something that's supposed to be futuristic. The copyright on it is 1977, the year I was born. Which explains why they call each other "foxy" and ask one another if they "dig" what's going on.

In my listening adventure today, Paul Giamatti suddenly broke into narrating in German. German is kind of scary when you're driving in the dark all alone and it happens suddenly in the middle of natural dialogue with no segue and you don't speak German, so you imagine that it might be some sort of fluke, and it wasn't supposed to be German, but there's a poltergeist in the back of your vehicle that's stopped the cd and has started speaking in Giamatti's voice, in German, telling you that you're going to die on the way home and maybe it's just me and I've watched entirely too many horror movies in my life but I just found it kind of creepy.

I also read some more of "Under the Tuscan Sun" this morning in the bath. I could probably be done reading it by now if I wanted to hurry through it, but it's so elegantly crafted that I find myself immersed in the beauty of each and every scene that Mayes paints. Chapter by chapter, she has been delineating the reconstruction and refurbishing of Bramasole, the old homestead in Italy that she and her husband purchased. It's very different from the movie, for those of you who have seen it.

I didn't finish either book today, which sort of bums me out because I'd really wanted to say I finished ten books in January, but that's not my challenge anyhow, so it doesn't matter. I said I would read 100 books in a year and blog about them, and I will. Only 91 more to finish by December 31st! Plennnnnty of time.

I hope.

Back to the Daily Grind tomorrow. Pun intended, for those of you who know me.

SJS