Paris, France
I was scared once during the night by border guards when they took the man sitting in front of me when they checked tickets to the car behind us and screamed at him. They never came back for me. I slept some before I arrived in Paris. I went straight to the Latin quarter to look for a hotel. I checked out the cheap places in TimeOut Paris, but they were booked up, so I went to Les Argonauts for 260 franks a night for a small double with a shower. They were nice to me there, and had good security, so I stayed. I roamed, first to Notre Dame, then to the Louvre where I found the book shop and a book about perversion in paintings and art. The cover had my Lysistrata poster design on it. Then back to the hotel for a nap.
After my blissful two hour nap, I walked to the Bastille and to the Pierre Latrec cemetery, where I easily found Jim Morrison's grave, somewhere between and behind the mobs of people surrounding it. I could not find Sartes or Balzac or others that I wanted to see. It would have been a great critical theory pilgrimage. There were many beautiful tombs.
I picked Becca up at Gare du l'Est. When she arrived, we brought her things back to our room. From there we searched the street below for dinner, which was a few fabulous crepes and falafel. I walked her past George Pompidou Centre that night while looking for groceries for tomorrow morning's breakfast. There was a brisk wind blowing that night.
1994
I taught my ArTown Acting class this morning at the Spring Grove Cinema, starting at 09:00. Most of the six students arrived around 09:15. I'm glad we had so much time to work with today. We worked on projecting first, and the cinema was a great place to understand this, because we could send one person down to the stage at a time and tell us their story. We worked on a lot of hard plays, just scenes from them.
Rachel and I went to Sara's for dinner, she was having a garden party at her house. I had the spiciest chili ever, probably the spiciest thing I've ever eaten, and ate the whole bowl to prove just how tough I am. Then French Silk pie. Sara is an amazing pie maker.
We returned to the Opera House for our last audition process for "Kiss Me Kate" and after they were gone we cast the show. We have a few more days to ponder the decision, be we felt we'd done a good job.
2010
Cape Coral, Florida
We woke for our first morning in the Florida apartment. I made some Hawaiian coffee. We both did work on our computers, and then hit the tennis courts. Rachel got to hit her first ball into a canal, and then we became more careful. We went to the pool, where Rachel tanned successfully, and I burned while floating on my back in the pool for an hour. I went inside to get some nice drinks for us, which I consumed while learning my first sheet of lines for 9 to 5, and then back in the pool for another 45 minutes. By then we were quite hungry, and went to Bonefish Cafe for a wonderful meal. The Bang-Bang Shrimp were fantastic, and the other fish we ate were perfectly wonderful. The spices on everything were perfect.
We crossed the street to an Eastern European grocery, very small, and owned by a couple who moved here 4 years ago to start a business. Since then, they've picked up lots of customers requests from all of Eastern Europe, and mostly covered the favorite items to make them feel at home. We spent $180, and believe we've got the next 12 days covered with great beer, wine, meats, desserts, and cheeses. There get most everything shipped here from people in New York or Chicago.
We went to the 4-mile Eco Preserve walkway and enjoyed the 55 minutes and about 2 miles of trails towards sunset, leaving at 7pm. We then rushed back to get into the pool again until sunset, when we felt we'd had enough. We took a shower, and then dressed for a night at the Cinema, where we watched the traumatic and visually stunning "Civil War" that just opened. Now it's time to go to bed and get ready for a new day.
2024