I won't have a year-end theater wrap-up in the paper. The decision was to take another angle, so the beat writers don't have the annual "best of the year" nominees printed anymore. However, I am going to post mine here. Plus, I can do something I never got to do in the paper: post the worst-of!
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I won't have a year-end theater wrap-up in the paper. The decision was to take another angle, so the beat writers don't have the annual "best of the year" nominees printed anymore. However, I am going to post mine here. Plus, I can do something I never got to do in the paper: post the worst-of!

Let's start with the best:

Best show of the entire 2005: "Urinetown" at the Phoenix Theatre. Great actors, great voices and a hi-larious script. I am not happy, however, that Footlite is going to be doing it in a few months. First, I don't want to see this show get over-done. Second, I fear they won't be able to do it justice. We shall see.

Runners up, in roughly chronological order:

"Running with Scissors" at the Phoenix
"Hairspray," part of the Broadway series
"Frozen," at the Phoenix
"Diaries Adam and Eve" at the IRT
"Cabfare for the Common Man" at the Phoenix
"Oppenheimer" by ShadowApe
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" at Theatre on the Square
"I am My Own Wife" at the Phoenix
"Quills" at the Alley Theatre

And now, the worst.

I think this show was during 2005, but it was so bad I asked to please not write about it because I had nothing positive to say about it.

The winner is ....

"This Is My Body" at the Phoenix Theatre. "I'M CLEAN! I'M CLEAN!" Single most pretentious piece of theater I have EVER seen.

A very close runner up is "Worzel Gummidge" at Theatre on the Square. Wow. Bad. Just ... painfully ... bad.

Merry White Trash Christmas

Snow Globe

I have a friend who works at DD, and I felt sort of bad, gleefully stacking up books at discount -- basically taking so much pleasure from his demise.
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Doubleday bookstore in Circle Centre Mall is going out of business. However, their loss is our gain, as -- something that to my knowledge is unprecedented in the world of bookstores owned by other huge, mega-box bookstores -- they are liquidating their stock: Everything in the store is 50 percent off.

Oh the joy!

I got the news of the bookstore's sale from Steve Hammer yesterday. Of course, I e-mailed all my friends. The sale began Sunday, and by the time Tina got there at 2 p.m. Monday the vultures had decended. At that point I decided I had to get to the store before everything was gone, so my boyfriend Robert and I hit CC after work.

I have a friend who works at DD, and I felt sort of bad, gleefully stacking up books at discount -- basically taking so much pleasure from his demise. However, that did not stop me from combing every shelf and spending almost $80.

I guess the closing was kind of thrown at the staff, because they only found out about this last week. Happy holidays, as of Jan. 7 you will be unemployed. Great timing, combined with the crap economy.

In any case, I scored 3 calendars and a bunch of paperbacks I wanted, plus a box set of The Spiderwick Chronicles. Robert was sweet and bought me a stuffed Hedwig and Son of a Witch.

I had heard about stores that won't put good stock into neighborhoods that are deemed "the hood" but I had never had this problem before.
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So, I look like Mother Hubbard. My fireplace mantel has, oh, maybe 15 stockings hanging on it. These are stockings for my friends who, like me, don't have family here in town -- or don't have family at all. I am the one with the big-ass house (seen "Money Pit"?) and matching mantel, so there the stockings go. With these stockings comes the job os stuffing said stockings.

So yesterday I went to the Family Dollar in my neighborhood to pick up presents for NUVO's "adopted" family and to get some stocking stuffers. I found these awesome little gizmos (I can't say what, because some of the recipients read this blog) that are only $1 each. Well, when I got home and parsed out the gizmos, I was three short. Too many stockings to count. Plus, I bought the wrong size outfit for one of the adopted kids, so I needed to take it back.

So today, I went to the Family Dollar at 38th and Illinois. The people who work there are very nice, but the stock there SUCKS. I needed one more little stocking for a pet, and they had NO STOCKINGS. Like, not even big ones. Plus, they didn't have ANY of the cute little gizmos. Nor did they have any good pet toys. Or any good little stocking-stuffer toys. In fact, they didn't have much of anything, save Cherry Cordial Hershey Kisses, which will be going in the stockings.

I had heard about stores that won't put good stock into neighborhoods that are deemed "the hood" but I had never had this problem before. The Dollar General a block away from NUVO dosen't show as much discrepancy.

So, I am pissed because now I will have to stop at the Family Dollar in my hood on the way home, and I am on a countdown to Yule (being celebrated by my coven this Sunday) and I am still missing a stocking!

What's even better, I discovered that they come in a white chocolate version. Tribute of white choclate Take 5's can be sent to me care of NUVO.
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So I was on my way to work Tuesday -- late, as usual. As I approached 38th Street on College Avenue, I spied a humerous site: Indianapolis' Big Red Arrow was stopped on the side of the street. Broken down? Too tired to go on? Or just humilated by its very existance? The driver of the flat bed the Arrow was perched on was standing by the side of the road, looking confused.

Haven't we all.

In other news ...

I have discovered the PMSed woman's salvation: the Take 5 candy bar.

A combination of sugar and salt -- and that wonderous drug chocolate, without which PMSed women everywhere would go into shock, resulting in mass devastation that no WMD could ever duplicate -- it is instant gratification for what ails you. What's even better, I discovered that they come in a white chocolate version. Tribute of white choclate Take 5's can be sent to me care of NUVO.

Theater of late ...

Last night I got to see "Miss Saigon" at the Murat, part of the Broadway in Indianapolis series. Yes, it was good, and I got teary eyed. But ... well, the night started with some sound issues that garbeled what the people were singing, and gone are the helicopter and the car the Engineer does his "American Dream" number with. Instead, images are projected onto a big screen at the back of the stage. Much less impressive. I was 18 when I first saw "Miss Saigon" in Chicago, and the thing that I came away with was the impression of the helicopter coming down to pick up the Marines. Alas, something was lost from the show with its removal.

My car's electrical system is FUBARed.
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So, to begin, I was going to go see "The Corpse Bride" last night and ended up not feeling well and staying home with the b-friend and watching "The Village." So, Ed, a reviewer I respect and someone I call a friend of mine, panned "The Village." In fact, the first sentence of his review states, "The Village sucked." So, I am going to respectfully disagree. Perhaps it's because the movie is rather old now, so I am far from the hype that surrounded it, being from the guy who did the "I see dead people" movie, but I took it for what it is: another mind f*** -- not a "horror" movie at all. In fact, as a mind f***, it did a pretty reasonable job of f***ing with my mind. If you have not seen it, don't keep reading. I had the fact that the village of people was set in the present, away from modern society, figured out about a third of the way through it, but the fact that it is in a wildlife preserve, owned by the blind chick's dad, was pretty cool, as is the fabricated monsters, and the fact that the blind chick now thinks they are real since Noah stole a costume and attacked her in the forest. Neat.

OK, as for the WTF title: My car's electrical system is FUBARed and this morning I discovered that if I open the ash tray the console clock turns on, as do the heater blowers. WEIRD.