Today was day two of tech weekend (and as an added bonus I went with a few of the other cast members to a choir concert, where we sang the Charity Concert piece between Eva and Peron, and Another Suitcase, as a way of promoting the show). Tomorrow we’ll have a quick change rehearsal so we can be sure everyone knows how to get into their costumes as needed, and on Tuesday we have our first full dress rehearsal (minus a few of the cast members and a bunch of the orchestra, who will be gone for a concert), and then on Wednesday is preview night, and Thursday is officially opening night! Shrieks of panic and excitement! And now here are a few more pictures:

Today was the massive 10am-10pm Cue-to-Cue tech rehearsal for Evita (Opening on Thursday! Get yer tickets!) However, there was a slight change of schedule when it was realized that more than half of the play was without cues to go to. Woops. And so the cast was devided into two shifts - the afternoon shift and the night shift - so they could use us as bodies to test lighting and things to create the cues so that we can go from one to the next later on. So I had the afternoon off, rather than being in the theater straight through to ten. During the morning, I was noticing that with the lights, there were quite a few photo opportunities that I was missing out on by not having my camera, so when I went back for the night shift, I brought my camera with me and took some pictures (in alphabetical order, rather than chronological, because I feel more like going to sleep than arranging them:

Today I am wearing Sad Pants.

But before I get into that, I have an entire week to account for. So you’ll have to wait. But while you wait, you can read about what has happened between last Thursday and This. And to make up for the bah-ness of the day, I’ll tell the tale with some Jolly Drawings.

On Friday we performed our Moliere Scenes in 361. They were all quite good, and when I got my grade that evening, I found out that I had gotten my second A in a row - yippee!

After rehearsal for Evita there was not the usual Cast Party, so I went home and went to bed earlier than usual for a Friday, after playing some Questions Game with Jena and planning a little ice cream date to go on at some point this week.

The lack of party Friday was made up for on Saturday, when Random had his birthday party, which consisted mostly of watching the ladies make out with one another. Can’t complain about that. However, I was not very much in a loud party sort of mood that night, and felt much more like talking or something else in a smaller group, so I did not enjoy the party as much as I normally would have (also because I only had two glasses from my big bottle of wine that I brought, and when I went to get another glass I saw that the whole bottle was empty (and it was quite the giant bottle).)

Sunday was the first time we had an Orchestra at Evita Rehearsal. They are still learning the music, and a few of the instruments were not there, but even with these things, the music sounds pretty awesome. And as a reminder, if you want to hear this awesome music in person, we open one week from tonight (last night, if you’re reading this on Friday, which you are because it is technically Friday as I write it).

After rehearsal I had my audition for Summerstock. I think it went pretty well, although probably not good enough to make it into all three shows. But I sent an e-mail to the guy in charge telling him that I’d still like to do it even if I can’t be in all three, just so long as I can still get housing (without housing, I’d have to find an apartment or some place to live, which would mean I’d need to get a job that pays enough to cover rent and food as well as build up my stockpile of money to use through the school year, which would be difficult if my time is being filled by plays).

This week I had no class (till tomorrow), so Monday I took a much needed day off (although by the end I was rather tired of sitting around watching movies and things).

The only really productive thing I did was draw this picture of Rachae, because it was her birthday:

Tuesday I was a little bit more productive - I got a haircut, did some grocery shopping, worked on my Earnest scene with Nathan, and had Evita rehearsal. But still, mostly sitting. And Wednesday was very much like Tuesday, so I’ll use the same picture for both. Only difference with Wednesday was that I read Importance of Being Earnest and did a little bit of reading for my Play Diaries. And, before heading to bed, Jena and I arranged to meet today (Thursday) at 1:00 to go to Mallards Ice Cream. So that was my thing to look forward to today.

Today wasn’t too exciting in the morning - I got up at 9, got some work done, planned out my class schedule (because today was my registration day, as well), got my override slips taken care of, and chilled in the theater lounge. After a while, it was 1:00 (as it is right now, coincidentally, but now it is 1am instead of pm), and time to meet Jena. The plan was that she was going to call me up and we’d meet depending on where we both were on campus (she still had class this week), so I took out my phone and waited for her to call.

While I waited, I registered for my classes (theatre history, intro to costuming, major dramatists of musical theatre, a dance class that counts for one of the GURs I need, and geology). At 1:30 I decided to call her to see where she was, but it went straight to her voicemail. So I waited. At 2:00 I decided to get some lunch, because I was hungry, and really ice cream should go after lunch anyway. So lunch was had, and I waited.

I knew that she had a class at 3, so when 3:00 rolled around, I had officially been stood up, as opposed to her just being really, really, really late.

Boo to being stood up.

This was a bumming experience, and throughout the rest of the afternoon little things kept going wrong, and by the evening time I was wearing my Sad Pants so much that it requires a less jolly drawing style.

But things have turned brighter since then. Rachae hadn’t seen her drawing by rehearsal the night before, but tonight she had seen it and said she really liked it, and so that was brightening for me. And the orchestra was at rehearsal, which was further brightening, and my shirt got a little pile of compliments (I wore one of my newer shirts so as to look spiffy on my little outing that never happened), and as I looked back over all of the events of the day, I realized it wasn’t such a bad little day - all it needed was a little love and care (to sort of quote Linus).

And that’s what happened to me in the last week.

This was supposed to go up yesterday, but I didn’t get it finished, so here’s a “Raising Hell” Valentine to print out and give to your sweetheart:

I had a decent Valentine’s Day. Nothing very romantic happened, but I got a bunch of Valentine’s Day hugs, and after rehearsal I went over to Crystal’s for a little get-together. For dinner I decided to be fancy and made myself chicken cordon bleu. I also bought Harry Potter valentines to give out at school, but I didn’t end up passing out any of them. But I still do have the box, so if you’re reading this and you’d like a Harry Potter valentine card, I’ve got one for you.

Evita is starting to come along nicely now. Tonight we finished choreographing “the money kept rolling in,” which we’ve been sticking little chunks into for entirely too long. So yay to being one step closer to a complete show! If you don’t have tickets yet, you oughta pick them up. If you’re not within driving distance to Bellingham, then you should remember to pick up some plane tickets, too.

Right now I’m just enjoying relaxing after finishing rehearsal - I’m enjoying it extra, because as of yesterday, I thought that I would be spending this time working feverishly to get my naku tsuru paper finished. I am not working feverishly, however, because the kindness of Deb pushed the deadline back to the Thursday after ACTF. Yay Deb! Yay for later deadlines! Yay for time to lounge about in robe and draw cartoons!

Speaking of cartoons, the “Raising Hell” website has now been built, and it is located here: http://www.nathanieljones.com/raisinghell. Over there, you can see the complete archive of all 7 “Raising Hell” comics in their original larger-than-blog size. So go over there and enjoy the devilish delights of it all.

And that’s about all I have to say for tonight, so I’ll leave you with a picture of me in my sweet, sweet Orgon costume:

Greetings, Fellow Travelers!

Today in the life of Nathaniel Jones, I skipped class and went on a Costume Shopping Adventure! (don’t worry - I only had one class, and in that class you’re allowed to miss a couple without penalty, and this was the first time I’ve missed any of my classes this quarter).

It all began this morning, when the alarm went off to tell me to go to class, and I looked at the alarm in a threatening manner, and it apologized for waking me up, leapt upon the bed to fluff my pillow and pat me on the head, and then I slept for another two hours. Then I awoke with strength and determiniation, as Today was The Day to Buy My Moliere Costume!

I had previously attempted this journey before, on Saturday after working on our scene with Ally. We decided to bring costumes in the next day, and since I had none to wear, I went up to Value Village, but this trip was doomed from the start, for while I knew where the store was, I did not know what to look for once I got there! And so I roamed the aisles endlessly trying to find something that would leap off the shelves and into my arms, but none did. One suit had sort of nuzzled my leg a bit, but it was not exactly right, and it cost $40, so I sent it back on its way, and left Value Village empty handed.

But today before I left, I went to my Field Bag (AKA google) and found some pictures of Orgon (the part I’ll be playing in our scene). Specifically, I found this picture: http://users.wfu.edu/wayne/newpics/Tartuffe/tar41b.jpg, and that is what I used as my basis. I imagined that in a best case scenario, I would find a gold vest, a poofy shirt, tight short pants, and a long coat with buttons on each side. Of course I knew the chances for such things were rather slim, but at least I had something to look for.

When I got to the mall, it was lunch time, so I went to Old Country Buffet for lunch (note: do not go to Old Country Buffet for lunch), and afterwards I continued on through the mall, picking up a microphone adaptor on the way so I could plug a microphone into my mp3 player rather than using the built-in microphone, stopped and talked with Lisette a bit in Macy’s and tried some cologne so that the beasts of the wild would not attack me, and finally I arrived in Value Village.

I didn’t find exactly what I wanted, but I did find a golden-ish shirt, a yellow/green vest the buttons all the way up like the one in the picture, some short tight green pants (womens, hiding in the men’s section), and this meant the only thing left to find was one amazing long coat with buttons to tie the whole costume together. I searched every aisle of the mens section trying to find something, and I searched every aisle of the womens section to find something, but could not find a thing! And just as I was going to give up, I decided to check the farthest little corner in the womens section where I had not been, and there I found the best green coat, which was the perfect length, and had buttons on both sides, and was such a color green as to tie the whole costume together in a lovely color scheme, and with this discovery, I finally had the trophy costume I was looking for:

You can’t see the pants, but imagine that they were there below the vest, instead of hiding on the hanger inside the shirt.

With my trophy in hand, along with a bunch of other shirts I picked up, I paid for them all, and brought my big bags back aboard the bus (what alliteration!) and journeyed back home, where I had dinner, wrote about this expedition, and now I’ll venture onward to Evita rehearsal.

Farewell, Adventurers!

Hello, lovelies. This is Nathaniel Jones, writing just before bed at 3am.

I’ve had a pretty sweet evening - it started out with the 2 hour Arrested Development Finale, which was fantastically brilliant in the way it was able to tie together all three seasons together at the end with a flourish and a thrilling twist (which I won’t reveal here for those that have yet to see it.)

During commercial breaks I worked on “Happy Valentine’s Day, Nathaniel Jones!” (a Valentine’s Day Video, which technically began in the morning, when I used a free song coupon for instasong.com to create a Valentine’s Day Song to me. I think it turned out quite well - right up there with “A Loving Tribute,” even. So watch it, and send it to the ones you love (especially if those people are me).).

Since it is such a lovely song, I also put the mp3 of that online here.

After the A.D. Finale and a bit more work on the video, I walked down to Crystal’s for her party. It was fun while it lasted, but unfortunately not too terribly long after I got there, somebody got sick, and then somebody else called an ambulance for her (she wasn’t so sick as to actually need an ambulance), and when people heard that an ambulance and cops were on the way, everyone scattered to the winds, so I left without having tired myself out.

Since I did not feel like going to sleep, I finished the Valentine’s Day video, set it as the Feature of the Day on NathanielJones.com, and told you about it on here. And now that I’ve done that, I’m going to sleep.

Goodnight, you Princes of Maine - you Kings of New England.

And now it’s time for a mountain of pictures! Pictures from the Fingerpainting Party:








And Pictures from Puppetry (for Naku Tsuru):

Actually the spirits didn’t do anything - I was just mistaken about the day of the Arrested Development 2-hour series finale.

I had thought it was on Monday, but indeed, it is Tomorrow, which is also a day that, coincidentally I don’t have Evita rehearsal!! That was two exclamation marks, because not only did I not miss the final episodes of A.D., but I’ll also be able to be home when they are on! Sweet!
Viewing party, anyone?

I’m going through one of my phases where I can feel myself outgrowing my current shell, but I’m not at the point where I am able to bust through it.

The result of this is that the past couple days I’ve been feeling anxious, unsatisfied, grouchy, and in other respects very bla-hooey and drifty. Apologies to those that know me if I’ve been difficult to be around.

I thought that my Fingerpainting Party would certainly cheer me up. I was so proud of myself with this party - I sent out invitations a full two weeks in advance (rather than the day before), I asked people in person and on the phone rather than just online, and as of 10pm, I had at least 8 or 9 people coming - but then, when I got back to my apartment a little after ten, all but 3 people canceled on me, and of those only 1 actually showed up, so the party was just me, roomie Greg, and Lacy. We had fun with the paints, but I was still rather put down by the lack of people. One of the morals is not to plan a party on Wednesday. Another moral is use high-quality tape when putting up paper (I type as I hear more paper fall off the wall)

Today I got back my grades for my two midterms. I did very well on the history midterm, and very not-well on the women playwrites midterm.

I don’t feel like writing any more, so I won’t.

I’ve always wanted to burst out in a big elaborate musical number in the middle of a class or a lunchroom or other places, but these people actually did it. I bow to their musical goodness.

Guten Tag, meine freunde! Wie geht’s? Meine tag war sehr gut.

Alright, and now time for speaking German is over, because I don’t remember enough words to write much besides that first sentence. This weekend was fun times - Saturday there was a Surprise Birthday Party for Meredith, and Sunday was supposed to be a Superbowl Party with Nathan, but that got canceled when it turned out that I was the only one able to go, so instead I went to a massive superbowl party at Brittni’s. Most years, I only watch the halftime show, if anything at all, so this year was the exact opposite - I watched the opening ceremonies and the game and the commercials - everything EXCEPT the halftime show, because the Matts were performing their own halftime show in the basement.

It was fun hollaring at all the terrible calls (come on - the ball wasn’t over the line! That’s no touchdown! He only got it on the line when he noticed that he hadn’t made it and then tried to sneak it past! Come on!) and trying to send magic football powers to the seahawks and magic ref powers to the refs. Unfortunately even my strong psychic ability wasn’t able to turn the tide of the game, so we lost. Oh well. At least the superbowl party won.

Today was a day to recover from the party and the residual tiredness still leftover from having my internal clock knocked aschew by not sleeping on Thursday. I went to class in the morning, and then went to the apartment to dig around to try and find my food check, followed by depositing said food check and picking up some fruits and vegetables to eat (to balance out Sundays meals of pizza and hot dog and football snacks). I then proceeded back to the apartment and washed all of my clothes, and once they were clean, I put them into the dresser - 4 drawers of it since Greg isn’t using any more of them. Yay to having room to put all of my clothes away instead of in a mountain in the corner!

The rest of the day was changing songs in my mp3 player, watching Arrested Development (which had it’s Series Finale tonight, tho I didn’t see it. So after tonight, there will be no more new arrested development, unless some other network picks it up), going to a short Evita rehearsal, and reading ‘Our Country’s Good’ for Women Playwrites.

Wednesday is the finger painting party!

So today is finally at its end! When last I posted it was 8am, and I was preparing to go take my finals in Theatre History and Contemporary Women’s Playwrites. Since then, I have taken both tests. I was very pleased to find that the History midterm was much less daunting of a test than I had anticipated, and was hardly worth studying from till after 1am for. Unfortunately, this was not the case with the Women Playwrites midterm that we stayed up till 7am studying for. Indeed, almost everything that we spent the most time memorizing never appeared on the test, and all of the things we thought “there’s no way she’d possibly ask us about that” were. This, apparently, was a common problem, for after the test in the theater lounge there was much talk of a revolt against the test, declaring that it should be tortured and flung off the gangplank into shark infested waters (metaphorically, not in those words). And before 361, Maureen asked said that people had been staring daggers at her all afternoon. So I’m hoping that she’ll see the situation and at least curve the grades or something so that not everyone in the class fails the test. For the first half of the day I was struggling to survive my sleepless night and painful midterm, but things brightened up considerably from 361 on. There we were learning about how people would behave in the day of King Louis XIV, and in addition to showing off our calfs and being expressive with handkerchiefs, Maureen brought a little box of real snuff so that we could all experience snorting snuff (because apparently that was the stylish thing to do back in the day), so I tried a pinch. It was rather similar to inhaling some chili or something - not very pleasant, but it sure woke me up quick. And now I know what it’s like to huff snuff, just like Baron Munchausen (the source of the title quote). After that we got our scenes assigned (I’ll be doing a quite humorous scene from Tartuffe with Ally) and got our grades from the 12th Night scenes - I got an A for the first time in a Maureen class! Woot! The closest I’ve gotten before was the A- on my comic combat scene. So that was pretty sweet. Although I did feel a bit sorry for Dom, as pretty much all of his comments were critical and pretty much all of mine were positive (I felt rather “Be More Like Trent”). But still, yay for an A! At least not all of my grades for the day will be horrible. After class I went home and slept for a couple hours, and then Evita rehearsal, where I slept some more, and then I came home, wrote this journal entry, and now it’s time for bed again! But before I sign off, here are a few Slick Deals for you all: If you are hungry, you should go here: http://www.quiznos.com/promotions/business/ for a “buy one get one free” quiznos coupon. If you are in need of cell phone ringtones and you have a samsung phone, go here: https://samsung.moviso.com/base.jsp?type=home for some new free ringtones (including the Fraggle Rock theme! Sweeet!) If you are in need of some web hosting, dreamhost (the people that host my sites) are having a crazy cheap deal on web space - 20GB of storage and 1TB of bandwidth and a bunch of other goodies for $7.95 a month. For that, click here: http://www.dreamhost.com/r.cgi?wisenaboo (or if you just go to dreamhost.com and sign up on there, when you register say that “wisenaboo” referred you so that it’s a Slick Deal for me as well as for you.

Good morning, good morning, I’ve studied the whole night through! Good morning, good morning to you!

Greetings from Thursday (cont’d). I’m currently writing from Jessilee and Random’s computer - Jessilee, Lacy and Jason went to sleep a little bit ago, but I thought that a half hour of sleep might do me more bad than good at this point, so I’m still chugging along, hopefully with enough steam to pull me through two finals, one immediately following the other (Theater History at 9, Contemporary Women Playwrights at 10). For those of you not in the class and thinking “tish pshaw, theater classes, no prob!” I will have to correct you - we’ve been here studying names and dates and themes and Lists of Things to Memorize all night and we still barely covered everything. But I think I now have enough stuff crammed in my head to do well on the tests - as long as I am able to retrieve the information come testing time.

The clock has just ticked on to 8am, which means it is time for me to end my writing and wake up Jessilee. Wish me luck on the tests, all.