November 2004 Archives
To continue our annual tradition, we went to Madrigal Dinner last night. I had bought tickets for an entire table for my family and Rita, the McLeans, O'Reillys and the Johnsons. It was gonna be fun and Magda's first Madrigal experience.
Buying tickets for Madrigal has become an ordeal, since they sell out so fast. I did not realise that you now seem to be able to buy them online, so Meredith did the usual thing of lining up at the the Erwing Center box office bright and early when they went on sale. It turned out that the line was so long, she called me to try getting the tickets over the phone. So I called the Texas Box Office and after sitting on hold for some 15 minutes I got through.
I put in order for 10 tickets for the best table available on Saturday (this was table "V" - actually fairly far back) to be mailed to my house. After waiting a couple of weeks with no tickets arriving, I called back a week ago to verify everything was OK. They appologized that "somehow" the tickets were marked for "will call" and to pick them up at the Texas Union Ballroom before the show. But when I showed up at the register yesterday, the teller took a look at my name and directed me to the suit in charge. He had my ticktes (yay!), but the were for the night before! And, unlike in years past when we used to accomodate mistakes like this by setting up an extra table, they couldn't set up a table for us due to fire codes, etc.
And apparently I wasn't the only whose tickets got screwed up by the TBO (but the only one holding ten tickets). I was pissed! I felt responsible for ten people, including a guest from Brazil and my mother-in-law who'd just spent the week being very helpful at our home. And half the people in our group had been helping make Madrigal happen for many, many years (two former producers, several former singers, actors and serfs, and I'd been hosting their site for years now). We did get some chairs against the back wall and the Madrigal crew and catering came through for us by serving us entertainment and food (after we had gorged ourselves on Wendy's food from downstairs). So I can't stay mad at them, but I'm still very pissed at the Texas Box Office -- what a bunch of incompetent losers.
I'm curious how much hassle they'll give me about refunding my tickets. I have no qualms about doing a charge-back on my credit card, complaining to the Texas Union management or even taking them to a small claims court. In the future, I'll strongly avoid ordering from the TBO over the phone.
As for the play itself, I wasn't quite able to follow the plot, sitting in the back and dealing with the baby. But they were getting laughs and and seemed to have a good time. And the singers were very enjoyable, both on stage and when wenching around the tables. We even got to hear a new song.
Sometime last winter, Jennifer decided she wanted to see Cirque du Soleil's Varekai on her birthday when it was playing in Dallas. So when tickets became available in February, we got a group together and I ordered nine of them (Jfer and I, Danny and Joanna, Rita, Benny and Diane and Meredith and Michael). We figured that by this time we'd somehow manage to make a road trip.
We did manage to make it to Dallas. Much, much later than anticipated, though. We now know that you have to count on starting out late (you want to hit that perfect time after the baby is fed and asleep) and on stoping a couple of times to nurse. Still, we made it to my cousin's only an hour or so late (by omitting a side trip to Ft. Worth). During the drive north, we decided that staying home for Thanksgiving would be a wonderful idea. So no more road trips for us until Christmas.
We had a great time hanging out at Hanka's and noting how big Martin, her five month old, is compared to M. And he definitely favors his dad's looks -- much more so than his sister. Hanka had offered to take care of Magda while we were at the show, and Jfer had struggled the last few weeks with deciding whether she'd give her up. Eventually we decided to leave Magda at her aunt's. It was strange spending time together away from the baby, but it was a good decision, both for her as well as us. The tent was pretty crowded and loud and Jfer wouldn't have been able to enjoy the show quite as much with Magda there. And now we know that we are able to leave her with a capable baby sitter and still enjoy ourselves.
As for Varekai, we enjoyed it but weren't as impressed as we had hoped. We had watch Bravo's Fire Within last year, so we were really looking forward to the show. However, a lot of the performers have changed and some of the acts had been dropped, so it didn't seem quite as familiar. Overall, we liked Alegria, which we saw in Austin last year, better.
I had another great experience after the show. I got to sleep nine straight uninterrupted hours! How I've missed that...
Well, the announcements are (mostly) in the mail. About a month after the birth -- that's actually not bad when Jfer and I are considered. We are eternaly grateful to Cecily for the wonderful photographs she took -- dispite the bad weather and the fact that my flash can't slave to her flash. And thanks to Sam, too, for being her trusty flasher.
While make the announcements, I once again asked myself why we have to do these things by hand. I'm thinking with the next kid, we'll go the easier route.
I did learn some interesting things about my printer. It's got a straight pass-through, which is great for envelopes. But when it prints on velum, it likes to feed multiple sheets and doesn't really stick the toner to the surface that well. Next time I'll try Kinko's.
I also learned that Word doesn't seem to have an option to insert text that's upside down (no, the "Insert Textbox" feature doesn't support it). So to print the return address on the envelope in the same pass as the mail-merged addresses, I had to create it in Ilustrator and print it as an image. No big deal, by I wonder why the omission in Word.
Magdalena is one month old today. You don't notice the small changes as they happen, by she has changed dramatically over the last few weeks. She's now over 8 pounds and filling out nicely. Although her legs are still skinny, I think she's grown into her feet.
Last night when I came home, she was in her crib, which is unusual, since she's generally nursing when I get home. When I talked to her and picked her up, she gave me a couple of huge smiles!
Her nights are still iffy. Last night she slept for over four solid hours straight. The night before, she was very fussy and I had to spend quite some time walking with her while she was crying, but that's more of an exception. It seems to me that she exercises the most when she's miffed and in one of the moods where you cannot consol her. Then she wriggles around, crawls on you and definitely practices lifting ger head.
I figured I let a couple of days pass before I put down my thoughts on the election. Needless to say, I am very disappointed and am dreading what's going to happen to this country in the next four years.
But the people have spoken, loud and clear. President Bush got the most votes an American presidential candidate has ever received in any election. Why, the closest runner up in history is -- John Kerry in 2004! That's right, if you combine population growth with a good turnout, it's not all that hard to make some new records.
So after crying into my beer (figuratively, since I don't drink beer, nor did I actually cry) and wringing my hands a little (also figuratively, since I'm not quite sure what hand wringing looks like) I decided to enjoy the beautiful fall we are now having and lightening up.
My initial reaction was shock and anger at the red-staters for being suckered into rewarding the president's abysmal performance with four more years. I figured that it serves them right if they get laid off, if they see their kids sent off to the President's wars or they cannot afford their healthcare, at least they'll be secure in their knowledge that the President will make sure that somewhere out there, there are no two guys or gals getting hitched. And to those 9 out of 10 "youth voters" that didn't bother to exercise their suffrage, I sure hope that they'll enjoy their desert uniforms when they get called up.
But things aren't as black and white (or red and blue) as they seem. Taking the selfish view, the current and pending changes won't really affect me all that much: I've got health insurance, I'm too old for the draft (and my daughter is too young), I'm in the upper middle class that has been and is going to be reaping tax benefits and I wasn't really planning on gay-marrying anyone. So I could ignore it or even move out of Jesusistan.
But the fact is, the country does not consist of read and blue states. The country is more of a purple quilt, though according to this election, it's a reddish purple. I happen to be living in what appears to be a blue oasis in a red desert, but the purple map says otherwise. Austin isn't quite as blue and Central Texas quite as red, as people might think.
So I'm still going to care about the jobs and healthcare and draft-status of the people in the red states, 'cause that's what it means to be a bleeding heart Liberal.
If you haven't gone the early or absentee route, today is the day to make your voice heard at the polls. If you don't know where to vote, find out at MyPollingPlace.com. If you have trouble voting, contact Election Protection or call them at 1-866-OURVOTE (1-866-687-8683).
So how's it going to turn out? Who knows! I've been an Electoral-Vote.com junkie and that site predicts Kerry 298 to 231 electoral votes. ElectionProjection.com has Bush winning by 289 to 249. And they both base their predictions on national polls.
It seems to me that all the political junkies have been living in wishful-thinking land. I read through the poll interpretation and reader commentary on a right-wing blog post and it's simply amazing how apart we are. It's like the two sides are in their very own little world. Both sides read bias into polls unfavorable to their candidate (liberal main stream media, etc.) and they both are hoping for the "unkown" voters -- the right for the "solid GOP base" and "people concerned about security" and the left for the "unpolled cell phone voters" and "new voters pissed about 2004".
I think it will be a long day and there are going to be lawsuits aplenty. The vote supression has been going on for a while in swing states and we can expect plenty of voter intimidation at the polls.
Nothing like elections in the bastion of democracy, huh?
