DT #1: Blue skies, smiling at me . . .

Well, seeing that DTs are new, I decided to start off with a question that many have asked through the ages, one that has puzzled the greatest thinkers and scientists of many ages:

“Why is the sky blue?”

Of course, I'll immediately have certain people jumping on me, telling me the scientific explanation, which is something like human eyes having only a small range of vision in terms of color, and we see the sun glinting off the water droplets in the Gamma quadrant of sector four as described in the 77th law of thermodynamics, and nuclear fusion in the sun which causes our eyesight to lessen, and so when that happens we're left with the theory of cold fusion to repair our eyesight, and blah blah blah and so on and so forth for hours and hours. I, however, do not believe this explanation to be true.

Well, perhaps it is. But certainly there is either a better way to put it, so that laypeople can understand it, or an alternate explanation for those of us who do not memorize 77 laws of thermodynamics. I shall do my best to locate this explanation and pass it on to you.

“Why is the sky blue?” Well, there is, certainly, one more explanation that immediately pops into mind. “Why is the sky blue? Because it is, that's why.” However, perhaps we should examine the question a bit more.

The question “Why is the sky blue?” immediately implies three things: 1) There is a sky, 2) it is blue, and 3) there is a reason for this. I believe we can all agree that #1 is true. Now, that brings us to number 2. Naturally, one would say, “Ah, but we can also see that number 2 is true. All we need do is look up into the sky.” However, I believe it is also safe to say that our vision is not infallible. Also, the sky is not always blue. We look up at night, we see a blackness, punctured by little spots of light. We look up in mid-January, we may see a gray sky.

“The grayness is not sky,” you will say. “The grayness is clouds.” Ah, but what, then, is sky? Is sky not the expanse that stretches above the earth? If that is true, then clouds fill that expanse, and are therefore not sky. However, if we work with this hypothesis, we could also say that the blueness is not sky, either, but is merely something that fills sky.

If we really want to get right down to it, one could argue that there is no substance nor color that can truly be called “sky.” “Sky” is, then, nothing but an idea, a belief, something that we believe to exist that we cannot explain. “Sky” is not so very unlike the Matrix.

Or maybe it is. Maybe I just totally related a statement to something it does not describe. But I like the Matrix, and so I shall assume that I am right. And if this idea of “Sky” is not unlike this thing we call the Matrix, does that not mean that “Sky” stars Keanu Reeves?
Ah-HA! And therein lies the connection. No, not Keanu Reeves. Stars. Both Sky and the Matrix have stars. Thus they ARE similar. However, we are back to assuming that Sky is the expanse above the earth, which contains stars. But that's okay, because we now have a deeper understanding of it, now that we see its connection to the Matrix.

Now, if we want to get deep into the Matrix to try to discover why the sky is blue, we must naturally inspect the colors of the Matrix. In the Matrix, two colors stand out above all others: black and green. And what do you know? We have already said that the sky is black at night.

Could we not, then, assume that the sky is not, in fact, blue, but green? Perhaps we could, perhaps we couldn't.

At this point, you are no doubt exclaiming “The sky is blue! What is all this crap about the Matrix??” And I say to you that in the Matrix, there is a sky, and this sky is blue. And we see thus that within its very self, the sky is blue. The sky's mental projection of it's digital self is blue.

Therefore, in its own mind, the sky is blue. And we, as mere outside observers, cannot be more reliable then the thing we are observing as far as that goes. And so I trust the sky to tell me that yes, the sky is blue.

“Why is the sky blue?” Because the sky said so. And that oughta be good enough for you.

Of Persia and Princesses

Okay, okay, so I know I went over six days, sorry, sorry, GOSH. I was pretty busy this week. From here on out, it’ll probably get more regular, though, as I begin doing DTs.

Okay. So I left off after Esther orientation, I believe. Firstly, I want to say that I did Esther for three main reasons: 1) I knew that if I wasn’t in it I probably wouldn’t see Jason for a long time, 2) I knew that if I wasn’t in it I probably wouldn’t see Maria for a long time, 3) I knew that if I wasn’t in it Sarah would kill me. So I was happy that I got to be in it because I would be in another show with those three people.

Well, much to my EXTREME HAPPINESS, both Jason and Maria dropped. So now the only remaining reason of the original three that I was in the show is Sarah.

All of this is said to set up a story. Because of both Jason and Maria dropping, I was seriously contemplating dropping myself and risking my death at Sarah’s hand. I’ve wanted to be in Esther for four and a half years (because it’s such a freaking cool show), but it totally ruins the experience for me if I don’t have many friends in it. So I thought, “well, I had the opportunity to be in it, but most of my close friends aren’t in it, and some of my close-ish friends that I was doing the show for dropped, so maybe I’ll just drop myself and audition next time they do Esther.”

And probably, that’s what I would’ve done. Had it not been for the sheer genius of a great man named Dustin.

Dustin is the choreographer and the assistant director, and he’s pretty much without a doubt (for me, anyway) the best choreographer that Lifehouse can possibly hope to get.

So on Monday we had a choreography rehearsal, and we were choreographing the Finale. At this point, I was considering dropping, but I didn’t know for sure if Jason had dropped, so it wasn’t a major issue. So this rehearsal was somewhat fun, and rather tiring. There’s really not much to tell. If you want to see how it looks, come see the show.

Then Tuesday night we had a vocal rehearsal, which are always boring. For the first time in my memory, I’m not singing harmony in this show. It rocks. Because I really have no idea how the songs go. So singing harmony would be rather difficult, since I don’t even know the melody.

Anyway, it was at this rehearsal that I discovered that Jason wasn’t doing it, and so it was Tuesday night into Wednesday that I really began considering dropping. And now I must put this story on hold to tell you of what happened on Wednesday before rehearsal, so mark this story well so that you don’t forget it.

Okay. On Wednesday I had my first debate club meeting. It was informational, not a whole lot happened . . . I think it’s going to be fun, though. Although I’m not sure how many tournaments and stuff I’ll get to do . . . Lifehouse might get in the way, and Lifehouse is a higher priority for me.

So anyway, we had the meeting, and I saw some of my friends from the debate camp I did over the summer. I actually think the chances are rather high that I’ll end up partnering with one of them . . . we’ll have to see. Anyway, it was interesting to see the people who were counselors at the camp as just regular students . . . but some of them are really cool, and I hope to become friends with them . . . and gosh that was kind of an out-of-place sentence there, wasn’t it?

Anyway, after this I got home just in time to eat and go to rehearsal. At this point I was really really really considering dropping, and thought that there was a chance that this was my last rehearsal. (End Cormack Reading — Day 1, if you like cliffhangers)

This rehearsal was for the “13th of Adar” people, aka Haman’s henchmen. Of which I, of course, was one. So I got there, and there was Matt, and Zack, and Jeremy, and Nathan, and Ben standing around outside. Matt asked me what I was doing there. He asked it in a kind of joking way, so as not to offend me, but I think he was actually wondering. ‘Cause since I got in the show after auditions, no one (other than Dustin and [thankfully] me) knew who I was. So that question kind of strengthened my thought of, “I really should drop.” I felt like I was just kind of in the way.

Then we went inside and started rehearsal with prayer (and Dustin telling us scary things about his foot . . . he has some kind of rare skin disease). Then Dustin told us that we were going to choreograph the Thirteenth of Adar and Haman’s Welcome that night. The first one is a song when Haman determines when he’s going to kill all the Jews, and the second one is a fun song at the start of Act 2 where Haman tells the audience that Act 2 is going to rock.

As often happens, we got onstage and started learning choreography, and everything else kind of went out of my mind. Including my thoughts of dropping, for the moment. Again, if you want to see the choreography that we did, you’ll have to come see the show. But it’s freakin’ awesome. All of us guys worked so hard . . . we were all literally dripping at the end of rehearsal. Which I guess isn’t actually all that impressive. But yeah. It was hard.

So anyway, because we were working so hard, and because the choreography was so cool, we were having a blast and really bonding with each other. Then we started doing the second song, and it’s seriously going to be one of the coolest choreographed songs in Lifehouse history, I think. It’s very hard, and very physically taxing, but it’s really fun.

I got home that night, and I took a shower before going to bed. As I was brushing my teeth and getting ready for bed, I remembered that I was considering dropping. I thought back over the rehearsal, over how fun it had been, how hard it had been, how much I’d bonded with the other guys. And I said to myself, “Well, I’ve made up my mind. I’m not dropping.”

Not like any of you really care, but that’s the story. Since the main purpose of this blog is to chronicle the ever-continuing story of my life, I figured I should tell y’all. (End Cormack Reading — Day 2)

Now let’s see, what happened after that . . . well, on Thursday, I woke up, and my leg was so sore from the previous night that I could barely walk . . . that wasn’t fun. Thankfully, I didn’t have rehearsal that night, so I didn’t have to move very much.

I had my second Torrey (Biola program thingy) class on Thursday, and things started to get interesting . . . the first class had basically been spent covering the stuff that the tutor was unable to cover in orientation. We were discussing Genesis on Thursday, and we spent most of the time making a summary of it. He (the tutor) had us each take three or four chapters and try to summarize them in four words or less. It was interesting. Then he was asking us about what Genesis as a book was about, and then what we thought the author’s purpose in writing the book was. So it was interesting, but not overly so.

Which brings us to Friday, yesterday. As usual, there was no rehearsal on Friday night. However, Rachel and Preston and I had arranged to go see Preston in Once Upon a Mattress at Heartland Players, then have a slumber party (if three people can be called that) at Preston’s house afterwards. So Rachel and I went to see the play, and I of course must review it.

I can describe the essence of the play in 8 words: The Most Freakin’ Hilarious Thing I’ve Ever Seen. Basically, it’s the story of the Princess and the pea, but they say that we all hear the fairy tale, but here’s what REALLY happened. It’s awesome . . . the prince is a total wus and idiot . . . the king is under a curse and can’t talk, so he has to pantomime everything, and the princess is from the swamp, and is more manly than the prince.

The main plot is much the same as the fairy tale, only funnier. There’s also a subplot involving a knight (Sir Harry, played by none other than Dustin) and his girlfriend, who can’t get married (by law) until after the prince is married. Which wouldn’t be funny at all were it not for Dustin’s incredible acting ability.

In any case, the king is the best character, and is made even better by the fact that he was played by none other then *snicker* Steve, the director of Oliver. It’s actually probably the most difficult part to play in the show, because he can’t open his mouth when he’s onstage (until the curse is broken at the end). But he’s really funny to watch, because he does all of his lines like a game of Charades with the person he’s talking to. And my favorite part . . . were it not for the king’s being mute, I probably wouldn’t have thought it should even be in the play. But it was sooo funny. The king has to have “the talk” with the prince, but this is made difficult because the king cannot talk. Of course, it would be easy to turn that into a very inappropriate scene. But they didn’t. They had the king trying to speak in examples, which was quite amusing as the prince is a total idiot. “Okay . . . there’s a boy flower, and a girl flower . . . and there’s a seed . . . and it becomes a baby flower . . . I . . . I don’t get it.” (End Cormack Reading — Day 3)

So yeah. It rocked. After the play was over, Rachel and I were hanging out in the lobby talking to people we knew from the show while we waited for Preston. Then finally Preston came out, and his mother arrived, and we went back to his house.

It was a lot of fun, but there’s really not a whole lot to write about. We spent most of the time just talking, or playing video games, or watching movies. We had a few . . . interesting moments . . . Preston needs new blinds in his room now. But hey, that’s what you get for giving me a stick.

I had planned to give a list of funny quotes, but I forget what they all were. I remember only one, and here it is:

“WHEN did I get a dog??”

And even that isn’t really very funny without context. So I shall now move on to comments:

Stephen: Really? You mean that if I wanted to publish a book of all my blog entries, it’s possible that I would get in legal trouble? That really sucks . . . and that’s the only part of your comment that I understood. Advanced science (or whatever it was . . . physics, possibly?) is beyond me.

Rae: Uh-oh . . . well I’d hate for people to come to my blog and end up in smurfville. . . . And what fall retreat are we speaking of, exactly?

Cormack: How can you possibly MISS math????

Megan: Okay, okay, I’ll admit, I’m a hypocrite. So sue me. And if you look closely, you’ll notice that I mentioned the start of school in my last post, just not at length ‘cause I was too depressed about it to write a whole lot on it.

Final Score: 8-4

NOTE TO ALL: Just a warning, this is an even longer post than usual.
NOTE TO CORMACK: This is divided into 6 days, but it may be less than 6 days until I next post, so if you have extra time you might want to double up ;-)

Well, it's been a loooooong weekend, plus four extra days. So I suppose I'd better update and let y'all know what's been going on, huh?

Well, the last time I updated was last Tusday, 10 days ago. Tuesday, nothing happened. Wednesday, nothing happened. Thursday, two things happened.

First of all, we had fencing. Which was, as usual, fun. We had the largest class we've had since I started coming (which is like three times . . . so that's not really saying much). Josh was there, obviously, and me, and David, and Michael came again, and Chris (Michael and Josh's older brother, who is really tall and seems to like picking on me), and Sarah.

They also had two fun new swords (which actually weren't new, but which I'd never used before). Chris immediately decided to be my fencing partner (not unusual or unexpected, I tend to be the tallest person in places that isn't his brother), and offered me one of these swords. I took it, and at first I thought it was cool. It was a lot thicker that the other ones, and it had a cooler-looking hand guard. So I took it and starting fighting with it, and I was thinking, “Wow, this is really cool.” Then, about halfway through the first routine (and only routine I knew at the time), my arm started hurting, and the guard slammed into my hand, rather hard. I suddenly realized that a much thicker blade meant a much heavier sword, and that meant a lot more pain. After we went through the routine a few times, I said, “I don't like these. They're too heavy.” Chris agreed, and said that it was a bit heavy for him (which surprised me . . . I wasn't aware that there was something that would actually make him tired in the physical sense [as opposed to just wanting to sleep]).

In any case, we went on fencing for a while, which was a bit more difficult since there were three pairs this time instead of two. It's amazing how small the stage really is. Chris and I went on the floor, then we were taking a short break and resting our arms and John came in and sat in the front row to watch, so we kind of lost our spot. So we just watched David and Michael working with the belt and a knife. It's really quite amusing. Michael managed at one point to totally tie up David's arm, but still leave his wrist free, so that David just had to do a little flick and the knife went into Michael's head (although he stopped it short, of course, to avoid causing him pain).

Eventually, Chris and I got our spot back, and we starting fighting again, then Michael and David went into the other room to practice flips, and we went back onto the stage with Josh and Sarah. Josh taught us a new routine (in which both combatants die . . . it's awesome). We practiced that for a while, then I went to eat and had a lonely dinner out back. Then I came back and did some more fencing as the Oliver cast came trickling in. Which was my cue to stop fencing and prepare for the Thursday night show. We have one every final weekend.

I don't seem to recall much of what happened during the show, so probably nothing really important or out of the ordinary did. Although before show, our bread vendor announced (as a prayer request, I believe) that she has quite a few relatives who live in New Orleans, which was obviously cause for concern. So we prayed about that, and Wayne also announced that for the last weekend, Lifehouse would be donating one dollar for every ticket sold to hurricane relief. The cast also chipped in a bit, and several audience members also donated to the fund. In the end, Wayne said that Lifehouse donated about $1700 to the Salvation Army for hurricane relief.

On Friday, I don't think much happened, either . . . I mean, we had a show, but nothing really special happened . . . not that I remember, anyway. Oh, wait . . . no, I think that was on Thursday, actually . . . in any case, Steve was telling us about the cast party. He was telling us this stuff, and he said something that terrified me: “I don't want skits.” I was pretty unhappy, since I spent like two or three hours writing a script. And lots more time casting and having cast meetings and talking about it and reading through it and blah-blah-blah. Basically, if he didn't let me do it, it would've meant lots of time wasted that I could've spent just hanging out, rather than trying to maintain control while people like Nick and Melody and Megan are saying stuff and interrupting their director! In any case, he said that he was open to submissions (for him to read and determine whether or not we could do it), but that the answer would most likely be “no.” The reason he gave was that there were very few skits he'd seen that had actually made everyone laugh.

Wayne, however, said, “Well, you should give them a chance, because there are a few people in this cast that I think can pull off something pretty clever.” And people deny it, and I'm not trying to brag, but I swear he was looking right at me when he said that. It made me feel all warm inside. (End Cormack Reading - Day 1. :P)

Anyway, back to Friday. Actually, I think we'll just skip Friday and go straight to Saturday. On Saturday afternoon, when I first got to Lifehouse, Doug was standing in the theater listening to his CD player. Not an uncommon happening. As soon as I walked in, though, he called me over, and put one of his headphone thingies in my ear (he had the new kind where they aren't connected). I asked him what it was, and said it was this one guy's “Musical Tribute to War of the Worlds.” So it wasn't the soundtrack or anything, it was just like what this guy (whose name I can't remember) thought sounded like music for certain scenes. The first one was, I guess, at the beginning, when meteors kept coming from Mars and landing on Earth. It was actually pretty darn cool. And funny at the same time. It started out all spooky and stuff, and there was a guy narrating, and it was all freaky. Then, all of a sudden, the guy stopped talking, and it changed from spooky music into totally cheesy '80s music. It was so random, and so funny, and yet so cool at the same time. And on top of all that, it actually had lyrics, and they were like the worst lyrics ever. It was so funny that it was cool.

Anyway, after that we had our meeting and such. And Steve was there, so right before warm-ups I approached him, clutching a paper. I said to him, “With the knowledge that you will probably say no, I submit this for your consideration.” I handed him the paper. Upon opening it, he discovered that it was my skit script. He said, “Well, you never know. You usually do pretty good stuff, so as long as it isn't too rude to Wayne, I'll probably say yes.” Which was awesome.

So then we commenced with warm-ups, and the show shortly thereafter. And again, I don't remember anything really out of the ordinary happening . . . although Jason danced to the song before the shoe-throwing scene again . . . he actually did every single blighted show after I told him I didn't like it.

Anyway, on to the break. I didn't stay at Lifehouse for once, I went out. Jeremy P. gave me a ride to Togo's . . . that was an adventure. We were riding in his family's “crappy van,” which has no AC. And the middle seat was folded down, and I couldn't figure out how to get it up, so I sat in the very back and had a nice ottoman. Jeremy also got lost . . . so it took us 15 minutes to get there instead of 5. And we went over a crazy dip in the road that has train tracks at the bottom . . . it feels like a roller coaster. It was pretty cool, but unexpected and very scary.

And uh . . . well, no offense meant to anyone, but if you don't already know why I went out to dinner and what happened, you probably aren't going to. It was a serious personal matter. (As a side note, though, I happened to notice that Steve was outside Togo's reading the script for the skit.)

In any case, after dinner and hanging out with some Lifehouse people for a while, Jeremy arrived to take me back to Lifehouse. Megan didn't have a ride, so she came along, too. And since there was a new person in the car, Jeremy had to go over the “roller coaster” again. He told us a story about how he had been in his friend's truck, lying in the back, and his friend had hit the “roller coaster” at 60 MPH, and he flew up into the air. His brother (who was laying in the back, also) grabbed him and pulled him back down (probably saving his life). Fun story.

When we got back to Lifehouse, Rana (who played Nancy) was singing a song . . . which was really cool. I don't remember much about it, but I remember that it was cool. After our meeting we went to warm-ups, and I went up to Steve and said, “So I saw you reading it, what's the verdict?” He said (after a bit more unimportant conversation), “Well, the answer is yes.” Nick happened to be there, and we high-fived.

And I'm totally blanking out on what happened during the show, but I think that something special did. I don't know. Oh, wait, yeah, I remember, but it was just certain conversations. Nothing really important or worth writing about. (End Cormack Reading - Day 2)

Which brings me to Sunday, a very sad day. It was closing day. Mom was working, and Dad was going to the River, so I went to Trinity again. The speaker was different (I managed to catch last time's speaker on his lat day), and he wasn't nearly as good. Because he didn't actually speak. He basically went up, said “You're never alone, God is always with you. Now watch this cool thing we put together so I don't have to be creative and come up with a message!” Okay, maybe I'm being a little harsh on the poor guy. But he didn't actually give a sermon, we just watched a little musical thing about not being alone, and then a clip from The Legend of Bagger Vance that seemed to be a pretty poor example of what he wanted to say, but maybe that's just me. It was pretty cool, though, it made me think that maybe I should watch the movie.

However, while the speaker was better last time, the worship was a lot better this time. I knew a few of the songs this time, and it just seemed to be all-around better this time. This one kid did a solo on his electric guitar before the worship set, and everyone was going crazy over how cool it was . . . I failed to see what was so special about it. It was certainly better than anything I could do, but . . . I wasn't overly impressed. Perhaps I'm just judging by a high standard, but when he played it what went through my mind was “*shrug* AJ could do that without even thinking.” Of course, this kid is considerably younger than AJ, but . . . I don't know. I didn't find it all that impressive.

So in any case, all told, I enjoyed Trinity more the first time I went than this time. It was still good, though. One day I'll probably go back.

After church, Rachel's mom took me home, and I discovered that I had forgotten my key, and Dad was still at the River, and likely to be there for quite some time. So I was in a dilemma as to what to do. So I got out of the car and began looking at the fence. Rachel's mom seemed rather concerned. Rachel seemed to be rather enjoying it. Finally I thought, “Well, I'm tall enough . . . I'll just reach over the gate and undo the lock” (we never actually lock it . . . whoops, shouldn't have said that . . . well, it still works to ward off intruders). So I reached over the gate and began searching for it with my hand. I couldn't find it. I was beginning to feel anger at the stupid lock. Then, as I was withdrawing my hand, I realized why I couldn't find it. It wasn't there. Someone (probably me) had forgotten to put it on. So the gate wasn't even locked. I enjoyed a hearty laugh at my own expense, then calmly pushed the gate open. Rachel's mom finally backed the car up and asked if I could get in. I said yes, and they left. I then spent the next hour or so messing around on the computer (but didn't feel like blogging). Then I ate and went to Lifehouse for the closing show.

It was a sad time . . . it always is. As Steve described it, “You get so depressed about not seeing everyone for a long time, and you decide that you don't want to get depressed again, so you're not going to do a show for a while . . . then you come back a week later and audition, and start the whole thing over again.” How true those words. Wise man.

Anyway, I got there, and as is customary on Sundays, most people weren't there, so I went backstage to see if I could find people to hang out with. I found a group of people huddled around Matt and the electric piano. So I went over. There were five or six people there, and I was hanging out with them singing and such for a few minutes. Then Wayne came back and was walking around. He had asked to see my poem about Lifehouse (if you haven't read it and you wish to, it's on my xanga), and I brought it with me, so I gave it to him to read. He read it, then told me it was really good and asked if he could share it with the cast. I told him that was fine. Then he told all of us to go out into the seats and sit down so we could meet. We did, and it wasn't really anything special, other than the weeping about it being the last day.

Then we did our standard warm-up, and afterwards they told us to stay onstage, because Steve wanted to talk to us about pranks. At Lifehouse, many people enjoy pranks on the last show, because there's no way for Wayne or the director to yell at them. Steve, however, hit us with this: “And although we can't yell at you, we will remember it at future auditions.” So, not surprisingly, there were no pranks. (Although the sound guy did an interesting thing . . . but more on that later.)

After that, Wayne gave his “You're wonderful people and I hope to work with you again” speech. Then he read my poem. Actually, he announced first, “And my friend Mark Harbison wrote a poem about Lifehouse that I'd like to share with you.” Megan and Doug glanced at me inquisitively, basically asking with their faces if it was the poem on my xanga. I nodded. As this was happening, I think Taylor also looked at me, although not so much inquisitively . . . more in an “oh no, what'd he do this time?” kind of way. Then Wayne read it, and afterwards everyone clapped and cheered, which made me feel good. Then Steve said, “And tonight you'll get to see the other side of Mark's writing in his skit at the cast party.” Many people (who have been in shows with me and seen my skits) laughed. Everyone who was in the skit cheered (I had forgotten to tell them that Steve cleared it . . . whoops).

Then we went backstage for the final show. All in all, a pretty normal show. I failed to hit Nick and Megan with the shoes, as I had done all weekend. Final score: Nick: 8, Megan: 4. Hence the title. The really interesting part actually came at the end. You may recall that they're training a new tech guy. Well, he was running sound for us. For those of you who haven't seen it, there are three voiceovers in the show: Oliver's Mother saying “The ways of the Lord are right, remember these words my son, and live by them,” and “The way of the Lord are right, remember these words my son, and know that I love you. Yes, I shall always love you.” And Mr. Brownlow explaining Monks' guilt: “You know of course that your father never made it to Rome. As he was taking Agnes to stay with friends, they were the victims of brutal robbers. He was killed. . . .” It goes on, but basically it's just the story of Oliver and how Miss Monks figures into the story, and why she's evil.

At the end, before the Finale, the one about Oliver's mother loving him is supposed to come on. Well, the sound guy had forgotten to set that up, and so instead we got Mr. Brownlow's. THAT was interesting. Wayne went into his office, closed and locked the door, and didn't come out until after bows. Steve left the theater and went into the lobby and didn't come back. Larry went with him. Eventually, he fixed it, but . . . the finale lost a bit of it's power, I think.

After all that we had a long period of cleaning so that Steve would let us leave to go to the cast party. (End Cormack Reading - Day 3) But finally we did get to go. There was a pool, although I never swam. Many others did. I was standing around talking with people for a while. Then we ate. Ladies were allowed to go first (Taylor suggested, of course, that I should be at the front of the line :P). The annoying part was that all the females got in line, and then all the guys. Then more girls kept arriving, so the line didn't move for the guys for like ten minutes. I was just standing there playing with Jeremy's cheap $5 lightsaber. Which doesn't even have light and sound. It was pretty boring. Eventually, however, the line moved and I got my food. I was walking along the line of people, debating where to sit, and Taylor suggested I sit with her and Justine. So I thought, “hey, why not.” Silly me. Dinner was a long period of Taylor insulting me . . . which I really should've seen coming, I suppose. After that I was just hanging around for a while. Then I was asked when we were doing our skit, and I went to ask Steve, and he said in twenty minutes. So I gathered everyone up for a final rehearsal . . . only to find that Megan was mysteriously missing. As was Rana (although she wasn't in my skit). “No,” I said to myself. “There's no way they're actually doing that . . .” So I went to find them. Turns out my worst feels were realized. They had indeed done it. They baked a cake that looked like a hand and wrist, and had frosted it with stage blood (which is made with chocolate syrup and, I'm told, tastes pretty good). I slapped my forehead, then told Megan that when she was done we were running through the skit.

Eventually she finished (and finished showing it off and grossing everyone out), and we finally were ready to have our rehearsal. And then Zach wouldn't leave our rehearsal spot, so we had to kick him out. Then we finally ran through it, for the first time with all the props and stuff. Melody even found a black feather duster to put in her hair for Miss Monks . . .

Finally we finished, and it was show time. Steve gathered everyone together, and told them we had a skit. The skit began. It's too long to post here, but it went over well (I may post it on my xanga at some point if I'm so inclined). Wayne in particular seemed to like it. Probably because it was a rare skit that didn't make too much fun of him (although we did take one shot at him . . . I just can't let all those reprises go unpunished :P). In any case, it was fun. After the skit, Dave Hurley sang a song (with the help of the cast), then we had a long prayer time.

Then I spent the rest of the night hanging out with Zach, Taylor, Justine, and the Sansonettis out in the front yard. Which would've been fun . . . but Zach wasn't being very nice. Remember how I said he spent most of the opening night party with a napkin in his mouth? Well, he spent most of this time running away from me, because I was trying to shove a volleyball into it. It was alright though. And Taylor finally agreed to do the lifts with me again (I've been wanting to remember how exactly they go for a while). Afterwards, she said “That wasn't as bad as I remembered it . . .” I suggested that perhaps that was because all she remembered was my alleged dropping her . . . which, for the record, only happened twice, and she was about two inches from the ground. Although she'll tell you otherwise.

After that I went home, tired and depressed. (End Cormack Reading - Day 4)

Monday was relatively uneventful . . . until 4:15 or so. At that point, we left to go to Didi's for my dance class' recital. It really wasn't anything special . . . no one messed up too bad, though, so that was good. Then we had a big dinner, then David and Sarah and their family left (claiming to have a “meeting” they had to be at). There was some sitting around talking, then we all left.

However, one other interesting thing happened on Monday. At about 3:30, I got a mysterious phone call from David. It went much as follows:

Mark: “Hello?”
David: “Hi, this is David.”
Mark: “Hi.”
David: “Okay, so my sister wanted me to ask you. If there was a way for you to post-auditionally get into Esther, would you?”
Mark: “Um . . . yeah.”
David: “Okay . . . one moment.”
(barely audible, faces are turned away from the phone)
David: “Okay, so what now?”
Sarah: “Well . . . wait . . .”
David: “What do I tell him now?”
Sarah: “What did he say?”
David: “He said yes.”
Sarah: “Okay, well . . . um . . .”
David: “So what should I say?”
Sarah: “I don't know!! You idiot!!”
(back into the phone)
Mark: “Am I supposed to have any idea what you're talking about?”
David: “No, I don't either. Look, you're gonna see Sarah in like an hour, she can just explain it then, okay?”
Mark: “Okay. Bye.”
David; “Bye.”

So that's pretty much how it happened (although, to be fair, Sarah was a slight bit nicer than that). In the end, it was their father, not Sarah, who explained it to me. I won't go into all the details (mainly because Sarah would probably kill me), but long story short, I'm in Esther! I'm very happy. I wanted to be in it in the first place, but I couldn't audition because of Biola stuff. It had also been indicated that anyone under 16 had a slim chance of getting in. But then for some reason there was a director change, and shazaam, I'm in. How cool is that?

On Tuesday not much happened, although I did start school. So I was majorly bummed. And I also had a math class. Whoop-dee-do. And nothing (other than school) really happened on Wednesday, either. (End Cormack Reading - Day 5)

Thursday (yesterday), however, is a different story. I had my Biola class orientation (online), and Esther orientation. Both were interesting experiences. In the Biola one, the tutor got kicked offline about half-way through it, and couldn't get back on. So he had another tutor come on and apologize for him. But we didn't get everything done we wanted to. So that was fun.

For Esther, they did what they've been doing recently, and sent out scripts to whoever got in before orientation, so they could already be partially memorized. Since I had only discovered that I was in the show a few days before, I had no script. Nor did Sarah, being in the same position. So we got the fun of having no idea who we were, no idea of who was playing who (we had seen the cast list only very briefly), and having to look over someone's shoulder at a script. Fun times.

So now, on page 8, we finally reach the end. I'll probably be starting the DTs within the next week. They'll probably be interspersed between posts about Esther and anything else special happening. Just to let y'all know.

Now, onto comments:
(I'm not going to do comments on “Once more…”)

Rae: Curses . . . why oh why did Megan and Rae have to meet . . . now they're going to be plotting evil things against me, I just know it . . . In any case, didn't you catch my not-so-subtle reference to this worship leader of yours? And no, I've never seen your Yoda shirt . . . you'll have to show it to me sometime.

Megan: Gaah! Crap! I forgot to steal your flip flops! And now it's too late!! Geeraaargh!! There goes the fortune I was to make on eBay! And update your xanga!

David: Non-lethal? Why in the world would they start you off with non-lethal flips? And . . . yeah. I'm out of things to say now.

Rachael: You have a good point . . . who are you to advise me? :P j/k And no, you are not, as of this moment, on my list of people to kill.

Stephen: Who owns the words on my blog? God owns them. Which makes your pitiful ownership of your words far less than my blog's greatness, yet again. (Oh-ho, beat that one!) And Macs are better than PCs. For me, anyway.

(skipping a few)

Cormack and Stephen: Um . . . did I ask about pie? Like, I'm honestly curious as to where the heck those comments came from . . .

AJ: Righto! Pecan beats pumpkin any day. And here you are. A brand-spankin'-new post!

Stephen: Really? Hmm . . . so if something is less than a parsec away, would that be in the same solar system? I really know nothing about lightyears, but I'm curious.

Once again . . .

. . . I feel the need to tell you that a big update is coming. I started school yesterday, so I was unable to get to it yesterday, but probably tomorrow I'll get it out. If not tomorrow, then Friday for sure. But yeah . . . lots of stuff happened, and is happening tomorrow, so it's gonna be a pretty long post, just to warn you. Although I'm sure you were all expecting that anyway.

Also, I'll probably mention this in my long update as well, but I also want to let you know that since I'm often left with no events to write about, I'm going to be introducing a new concept which I call "DT." This stands for "Deep Thoughts." Basically, whenever I feel like updating (or haven't for a few days, or whatever), and don't have anything to write about, I'll take some random and totally pointless question and try to answer it. Keep in mind that these questions may be pointless, but they will lead to Deep Thoughts, hence the name of the section. For example, I may ask, "Why did the chicken cross the road?" and then go into the emotional, spiritual, and social implications and meanings that the answer may contain, and then finally I'll reveal what I believe the answer to truly be. I think that this new concept sums up the spirit of my blog perfectly, and I think I'll enjoy writing them. Whether you all will enjoy reading them, well, that's a different story. We'll just have to see.

Special thanks to Megan for coming up with the idea, and AJ for convincing me that I should do it.

So you can all hold your breath . . . it's coming.