Long Day at Practice

So it was a long day of working towards our big production, and there's the reminder:  "keep it in the hat." We're talking worries, of course.  Don't let that hat leak, either.  Mom has been working hard on costumes, and there are so much going on in so many directions - I'm getting background music, learning a lot of lines, blocking, gathering props, writing material for new segments, and of course we're doing a lot of that for the Spectacular production in a few weeks as well.  It's a lot, and of course there was practice tonight.  It was the final practice before Saturday's all-day event, where we're practicing and leading up to a version of the production to show friends and family.  So tonight's practice went deep into the night.  Maddie was at home tonight, and we hardly saw her at all today.  

One thing I brought in to my office today is a big stack of Christmas VHS movies.  I found these the other day and thought this would be a good season to watch a few of them at work!  Some of these I haven't seen in ages.  If it's a Christmas movie or special available on DVD, I no doubt bought a copy of it.  But some of these have never been transferred, and are really vintage Christmas specials and movies - like "The Night They Saved Christmas."  That's a classic movie with Paul Williams as an elf, trying to stop some Arctic oil drillers from literally blowing up the North Pole.  Art Carney is not a happy Santa in that movie!  There are others, and in fact some that Mom taped off the television set.  Yes, that's what we did back in the day - we'd use our VCR devices to record what was on the television set.  That's why there are also all these dated commercials to look at to, which in some ways are just as entertaining.  In a way, this is like the old record player I have where I can listen to vintage vinyl albums.  But these are VHS tapes, and yes there's that less-than-perfect screen image and the high-pitch sound when the old television set turns on.  But it's nostalgia, and it's fun.

Anyway, it was a long, long day.  We got back in time for reading tonight with Maddie, and read just enough to see that the Wintersmith has some lessons to learn, and Tiffany Aching no doubt will be the one to teach Winter a thing or two.  It's been a good read, and Maddie will probably be wanting to go to book four next, which is likely to be started next week once we find out the conclusion of this story.  Which I don't remember at the moment, but we'll get there!

We had a busy day.  It's stressful, but things are falling into place.  There have been some big casting changes at the last minute, namely me now doing a much bigger role.  But it will all work out in the end.  All my worries are in the hat!