D-Night

Tonight, we open.

It's just in the nick of time. My fatigue has chronic fatigue.

But the show came together, as it should have, 8 months from the day the producer first approached me. It sounds good. It looks good. It runs like a machine. It still has moments that make me laugh, even on the 41st viewing. I've become comfortable with both conducting musicans and wearing a pale yellow unitard and a can-can feather on my head.

It feels like a wedding day. Or a bar mitzvah, except cheaper.

I've done a whole lot of these kinds of shows in my life and, always, when we reach this point I kind of don't believe how much creative and organizational energy must flow from everyone involved in order to reach this point. Kind of take it for granted, really.

It's crucial to remember to be grateful at moments like this. For talent. For connections. For opportunities. For wit. For visions. For passions. For willingness. For human kindness. For grand rallentandos with kick lines.

It'll be a grand night.

Flaky in the city

Yesterday afternoon, I began arguing over e-mail with one of my FWABs re: hatred of the City of Boston's parking rules and the resulting crimp it has put on my checkbook and sanity.

My friend is known to have strong, no-nonsense opinions, I know this, and know how he feels about my war with the meter maids, but was surprised at the vehemence of his practicality: why don't you just pay the tickets and get a sticker and quit blaming others.

When I suggested that I got tired of having to deal with the bureaucratic issues like parking stickers and inconsistency of enforcement, he said: so move, then.

I was furious at both his failure to agree with me and equal lack of empathy. But it was at that moment that I realized, of course, that he is right. Even while I still couldn't disagree more.

It's a larger issue of weariness with the necessity (and yes, it is a necessity) of conforming to relatively arcane, and in many cases arbitrary, processes and rules that keep order in a large population center where, if everyone just did what they wanted ..... chaos. Sometimes you don't want to have to attend to the 50 things you have to always attend to when you have car in a city: registration, excise tax, parking signs with different messages every 10 feet, neighborhood stickers for some hoods and not others, visitor permits, moving vans that might appear the next day, street cleaning schedules with varying frequencies, snow emergency routes that may or may not go into effect when it snows, unposted legacy rules about parking in medians....

Sometimes, when you've got other things to think about -- like friends, and money, and coffee, and pets, and trying to find dates, and remembering to sleep, and doing other things you love -- you just want to have a car. And to drive it when you want to. To park it where you need to. Without being penalized.

In short: you want to be able to be the flaky, occasionally irresponsible, personality you are and live in the city you love without going to the poorhouse because of it.

Maybe this desire and the resulting reality are at dire odds.

I mean, really.

City of Boston. Really.

Are you getting back at me for mocking the Southie Christmas tree stand?

I registered my car to Southie nearly 2 years ago. I have a resident parking sticker from the former car owner that is valid through November 2009. I've parked in resident parking in Southie for nearly 2 years.

When you first gave me a parking ticket last March for parking in resident parking when I didn't "technically" have a resident parking sticker, I paid that ticket. And I didn't want to get another, so I went in to get my own sticker.

But I was in the middle of contesting the infamous St. Patrick's Day no parking zone violation. According to the rules of resident parking stickers, you told me, a resident cannot procure a parking sticker with outstanding tickets. It took until October for you to schedule a hearing on the St. Patty's tickets.

So I was unable to get a new parking sticker. In the meantime, in June, you handed out another groundless ticket: for parking in the median of Columbus Ave on a Sunday afternoon, even with no signs that say "no parking". Again, 5 months to get an appeal hearing, which is coming uip on Friday.

Meaning that I still haven't replaced the sticker ....since I have outstanding tickets.

So, since I have been parking in Southie resident parking, with the borrowed sticker, since December 2007 (I'm guessing about 500 days and nights) and only incurred that one March 2009 ticket -- imagine my surprise that, last night, you would see fit to assign me a No Resident Parking Sticker ticket. Even though the car was on the same spot it had been for the last week ... ay, much of the last year ... without a ticket.

I mean, really, City of Boston. Feeling stingy? Needing that $40 pretty badly?

Are you trying to MAKE me not want to live here anymore?

The bare chest hall of fame

So back on one of the first posts of this blog, I vowed to do my damndest not to mock men who wrote me on dating websites. We're all just mortals in the crazy play ....

Nonetheless.

Recently I vowed that if I got one more online message from a man who uses his cell phone to take a picture of his chest in a bathroom mirror, seeming to believe that naked flesh, no matter in what context or lighting or state of fitness presented, will encourage a response from a woman 14 years older than him (even though age has nothing, really, to do with it), without really understanding what would make a younger man attractive to someone my age, or displaying even a hint that he has previously heard of the word subtlety .....

Yeah.

Sorry, dude.

The cliché of a Monday

Having a hard time getting going this morning. Reasons why, at least in theory, although none very compelling, are:

1) Fatigue. (Don't call me predictable for nothing.)

2) A to-do list from the weekend left primarily unaccomplished. Meaning I've doubled the number of items on the list for the week ahead -- such as booking a Christmas plane ticket as prices flow ever upward (today's cheapest = $428), gathering appropriate evidence to appeal yet another 2 parking tickets and think about what reason I can give for appealing a 3rd, emptying the dishwasher, disassembling the (still blooming!) pots of impatiens on the patio before freeze and my parents' arrival on Saturday, and hand-scrubbing-down the hardwood floors to remove the spots left from the occasional regurgitated cat food stain.

(Actually, that last one is left over from a to-do list of about 2 months ago. Although it will get done this week. Having remnants of regurgitated cat food on one's floor when one's mother is visiting is about as viable as leaving condoms in the nightstand drawer in the bedroom where she is to sleep. So even with rehearsal the next 4 nights until 11 p.m., it will get done, even if I'm on hands and knees at 6 a.m. the next 4 mornings.)

3) Overwhelming guilt at the realization that despite being busy and allowing undone tasks to pile up, I'm hardly busier than almost anyone else I know (i.e. friends that are composing symphonies, running restaurants, raising children) and they aren't griping to me about it, and I want to know why my act is so hard to get together.

So, speaking of getting its act together on a Monday morning, I must shout-out to the City of Boston, no matter the number of parking tickets they foist upon my vehicle. Seems November 9 is the ideal day to pull the neighborhood Christmas tree stand out of storage, pictured here as I stood waiting for the #9 near Perkins Square.

It makes me feel better, despite the proactive get-aheadness of this action, that last year's tree stump is still screwed in place, and that to get rid of it has probably been on someone's to-do list since last December 26.

Scarfing

So I was looking down and assessing today's outfit:

Sleeveless knee-length dress of a fabric covered in navy blue circles

Grey, cropped cardigan sweater

Black Mary Jane pumps

Rust, brown & cream-colored scarf, natch.

I'm not trying to denigrate my sense of style, but rather to point out that it is November and therefore the opening of scarf season. You know, when you walk in from outside and take off your coat, hat and gloves .... but leave the scarf on. Whether it goes with your clothes or not. Ideal for someone like me who frequently hangs in drafty church basements for rehearsals and meetings, or in 52-story office towers that take awhile to efficiently change the HVAC over from AC to heat in transition weather.

I like the one I've got on, because its made of soft, oft-washed yarn and is skinny enough to wrap around several times and a) not have its tails catch in the wheels of my chair; or b) intrude up over my chin.

This scarf has origin of some interest -- an impromptu gift during a date some time ago with a match.com man I called The Editor, at Davio's on a frigid Sunday night. Recalled thusly last summer:

"Perhaps the most polite gentleman alive. Recently relocated from New Jersey, edits reading curriculum textbooks. We made 2 dates in January---both Sunday nights at swanky Davio's for wine and pizza, both three-hour conversations on politics, family, our jobs. There was minimal spark, but it was agreeable talk. During the course of Date #2 the temperature outside dropped 30 degrees and I shivered as we prepared to leave. The Editor took off his lengthy multi-colored scarf and handed it over:

"My mother has made me a dozen of these. Use it. Keep it."

The Editor's bad luck was timing. Those of you in the single world know: dating success comes in waves and droughts. I was under a tsunami.

The same day as Date #1, I had met Another Man in the flesh....who could not have been more different... with whom there was noticeable romantic spark. We e-mailed every day between my dates with The Editor. The same day as Date #2, I had spent the afternoon flirting over lunch and coffee with Another Man. I really wanted to date Another Man.

So after several unsuccessful attempts to get him in person, I broke things off with The Editor via e-mail. He responded, again, with utmost politeness. He rebuffed my offer to return his scarf. "

It's less about remembering The Editor with any great fondness than evaluating that incident of choices. When faced, I took spark instead of the gentility, and where did it get me? Another Man and I eventually crashed and burned and he left without a trace. But I still have the scarf of the man I ditched. It's a favorite possession.

I don't even really know why it feels symbolic. Or what it would symbolize. Why does it seem like it should?

Need for Speed(o) III: Abs of Evil.

Musical ramping up. Work ramping up. And despite the complete lack of a love life, it's been a hectic couple of weeks in Karin-land.

In the manner of an exercise addict, I have not forgotten the inevitable Speedo & Sports Bra & Bare Stomach & Bare Thighs look that I have committed to on Saturday, Dec. 12. Which means that despite the work chaos and rehearsal chaos and never, ever having a free evening between now and Thanksgiving, you'd better believe I am still making sure I get to the gym during the day. Even if a nap would be preferred.

So on Monday I ran 3.75 miles on my lunch hour. No sweat. (Literally, no sweat. It was cold out.)

On Tuesday, noticing that despite the run my midsection drooped gelatinously in a post-Halloween-candy way, I forewent cardio and instead attended this class at the gym:

Body Defined Strength training class that may feature a variety of equipment including free weights, bands or Body Bars. Balance work may also be included in the class. Instructor: Jakki.

On my gym's website, Jakki's bio states that she enjoys challenging participants with a safe but intense workout. "My favorite part of teaching isn’t the music or the exercises, it’s the smile I see when people leave class feeling better about themselves and more confident to take on a new challenge…maybe another class!”

What Jakki's bio didn't say: "I like to stride around the room when you're on the 13th minute of the 15-minute non-stop abdominal workout and shout out, 'I know what I'm asking you to do is evil. Who thinks I'm evil?! I don't hear you! Who thinks I'm evil! You will thank me later! You will!"

I have a propensity to eat candy and full loaves of Iggy's Cranberry Pecan Rolls in one sitting. And full boxes of Kashi Go Lean. It's possible there are parts of me that are not as firm as they could be.

Nonetheless, I consider myself to be relatively in-shape. (You know. That marathon and yoga thing, etc.)

Folks, if I'm going to make a habit of Body Defined, "relatively" will not cut it. After my Tuesday time with Jakki, the muscles of my torso hurt so badly two days later I cannot, literally, stand up straight, and the inner-thigh ache causes me to walk bow-legged as if I'm squeezing an exercise ball between my knees.

The overall effect is that I look and feel like a pecking hen. An old pecking hen, at that. Still deciding if I'll feel like smiling, if I'll feel more confident about myself, and if I feel like I ever want to take on a new challenge, ever again.

Onward! (she whispers)

Damn Yankees

You'd think a man of a certain age would not cancel a date in order to stay in and watch the World Series with his roommate.

Especially when the Red Sox aren't even in it.

Evidently I have met the one who would.

**Update, 11:27 pm: the comments this post inspired via the link on universal hub today are more amusing than the post itself and offer lots of helpful advice. I'm honored.

(And, btw, Pedro got knocked out in the fourth. Just saying.)

Deep Thought: Clean out the Nightstand

Today's math!

(brought to you by pragmatism)

In 12 days, my parents are visiting.

They are staying for 4 nights.

For the first time in 4 years.

(In 4 years I've had a lot of dates.)

With the money I have spent on iced black eyes at Starbucks, Dunkin' and the Diesel Cafe since Labor Day, had I not spent it, I could afford to treat my parents to the comforts of a hotel.

Alas.

So my parents are coming, and we will share my 1-bedroom apartment. I am sleeping on the sofa. They will sleep in my bedroom. With the litter box. And the contents of my nightstand.

Sometime in the next 12 days I need to clean out the contents of my nightstand.

(Please don't let me forget.)

Diesel diary

Welcome to another Sunday night, sports fans, when we're on hour 3 of 6 of Karin's weekly post-rehearsal shift at Diesel Cafe in Davis Square, bonding with the laptop over busy work:

Iced (you'd better believe it!) Decaf Americano and peanut butter cookie? Check.

College-aged couple next to me, deep in symbiosis with a "Transport Modeling for Environmental Engineers and Scientists" textbook? Check.

College-aged lanky male youth behind me, in zipper-front sweater with cappuccino, lounging on a couch, pontificating about Wes Anderson movies loudly enough for entire cafe clientele, perhaps to impress his pretty young date, also with cappuccino, who to her credit is giving him encouraging glances? Check.

(There are about 20 more such couples around me. It is Tufts-land up here, after all.)

Checklist of tasks I came here with the supposed fortitude to complete that is not getting completed because I'm weary and my coffee is decaf and already gone and I would instead rather check Facebook every 7 minutes or be distracted by the most excellent Salon Sex column (today: "How Not to Make Love Like a Porn Star") or go onto OKC and see if the guy (37, actually single, a socially-conscious writer whose "most private thing I’m willing to admit here" is that he "walked away from a fight in the fourth grade, and missed my chance to be in the popular crowd") who I favorited on Friday will re-view my profile a third time, and generally acting like a procrastinating college student when, damn damn damn, I should be more responsible and stop leaning on these endless run-on sentences to fill out blog entries and instead finish my list of church council and music director and parents-are-coming-to-visit-in-2-weeks-and-I-must-find-a-B&B-in-Vermont duties so I can go grocery shopping and make chicken and lentil soup and fold the laundry and still get to bed by midnight so that I can stay rested and on-task this week, much unlike last week's meltdown, and because wow, I am getting way sick of Wes Anderson-pontificating college student's pontificating and it's already after 9....

Check.