an interesting weekend

tomorrow's monday. that means the weekend is over....sad.

my family came down on friday to see the cabaret stuff i had been telling them about. just so ya know, i didn't encourage their visit. cabaret is nothing i would want people to travel 2.5 hours to pay $35? to see. it's fun for us, but it's not that good. when all was said and done with cabaret i successfully, however latefully, wrote the ricky martin set, which, i received praise and guff for doing, and played the solo on 'hit me with your best shot' during the 2nd overture. received an equal amount of praise and guff for that one too. i believe the words doc schwartzhoff used were 'taco bell' and 'flatualants.' well, my response to that is that atleast my flatualantly sound stayed in time and on pitch. just kidding...mostly...don't be offended.

seeing the fam and the dog was cool. i didn't get to see my parents much, unfortunately, because they had to take off early on saturday morning for a funeral. i guess one of my dad's friends suddenly dropped dead during a hockey game. man, life is so freaking fragile and unpredictable.

my bro hung around for the weekend, which was cool. he came to phil's surprise party with me after seeing cabaret on friday night. i was happy to make it to phil's party. he's just a sweet guy and we both came to the awesome conclusion that we need to hang out more. congratulations to him for making principal in orchestra too. that's uber cool to be playing principal on mahler 3. good for him.

speaking of phil's party and birthday stuff, i'm reminded of a conversation with someone, i won't name names, who once again put me back in my humble position towards the female race. quick story; we'll call her...um...crazy girl (it's an affectionate term, don't get upset). so i'm talking to phil about what he did on his birthday and he tells me that lauren took him to a dragonetti's. it's an italian place and i've never eaten there, but always wanted to. so i said jokingly, 'man, i need to find a girl who'll take me there on my birthday next friday.' so crazy girl walks up and i propose that she take me there. 'yeah right,' she says 'it's expensive and i don't have a car.' fair enough. 'so i'll give you some money and let you borrow my car,' i say. phil chimes in and says that's a great idea and tries to convince crazy girl to take me up on my offer. she declines, despite much prodding. you know you're a loser when....you can't lend a girl your car and give her money to take you out to a nice restaruant on your birthday. i probably would have been willing to dress up in a suit and everything. her loss right? ok, end of story. and crazy girl, if you happen to read this, you know it's all in good fun and that you're still loved.

so that about sums up my weekend. partied a little too late last night, so i'm gonna shower up and try to get some rest so i can make it to the gym before rehearsal tomorrow.

oh yeah, and if you're interested, i think i'm going to try to get my friends together for a nice lunch or dinner at dragonetti's on saturday sometime. gonna try to make my last birthday in eau claire a classy gathering of my friends.

love,
james