So, as expected, I have not had time or energy to blog. This is the lovely morning off we all get (including me). I’ve dropped my laundry at the service, have been assured I can pick it up in plenty of time to get to my afternoon rehearsal, and have been spending the morning in the pub (my B&B is also a pub) drinking a cappucino, going through the score, and making notes. Also doing things like balancing my checkbook (it did!). Looks like a nice day out, quite unusual, the default has been rainy and gross, not that it makes much difference when you’re spending all day in a rehearsal room.

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Rehearsals have been going well from the get-go, and have been a great deal of fun. We did start hitting walls at the end of the day, where people were just announcing they could not learn any more choreo that day, thank you, but we got the big finale on its feet right on the first day, very impressive. We only have a few little bits to stage now, and can start doing runs tomorrow (which we need to do, as the lighting designer is coming to watch).

While the stage director and choreographer are working without music, I sit and clean up the orchestral parts and highlight my full score, and that’s going well, although the highlighting may not be finished and that’s fine.

It’s so lovely to be working with so many old friends, who I did my first show with 20 years ago, and different old friends (Drew, who I went to college with, and his wife, Liz) who are playing in this sandbox for the first time. And getting caught up with others, not directly involved, but who stop in to say hi.

I have been, as I said, monkish. Most people like to go to the evening’s show (or go out to dinner), then go to the Festival club circa 10:00 and drink and carouse. I’ve been, after the typical pub beer-o-clock, finding dinner by myself, usually, or with a couple of friends, then chilling out in my room and reading or knitting and listening to political podcasts (quite a week for it), often falling asleep before 10:00. Mostly sleeping well, not always. My sinuses have been a disaster, but it hasn’t morphed into a cold, so I think it’s mold or pollen.

Other fun things – my buddies are producing an “American cabaret”, which will be given tonight in the Festival Club. I’m singing in the group numbers (“It’s Summertime” and “You’ll Never Walk Alone”), plus got drafted to do the bass in the barbershop quartet for “Lida Rose”, which is total fun. “It’s Summertime” is kinda there because 17 years ago, when we were here for the last Savoynet “Ruddygore”, some of us – including my late friend Vikki, *sniff* – did a “summer” cabaret that started with that – so it’s another layer of ‘it’s good to be home in Buxton’.

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I may not get another chance to blog before it’s done, but I was reminded today how lucky I am to get to do this sort of thing and how blessed to be part of a community that lets me do it with them.