**We interrupt this normally scheduled blog silence to bring you an important update**

I said I was taking a break to make more time in my life. That's still true, though admittedly, I miss my little blog outlet. I especially missed it this morning and, since I have some extra time, I thought I'd share a small rant that's been bouncing around in my head.

My workplace has recently acquired a ridiculous contraption called a K-cup coffee maker. It's such an expensive and grossly wasteful purchase I can't even fathom how it made it into our break room. Recently one of the staff members sent out an email with some information about all of the ways Green Mountain Coffee, the makers of the individually packaged, single-serve coffee grounds, is an environmentally friendly company. Next to the coffee maker, we also have disposable cups and lids. I suppressed the urge to reply to that email with this:

The notion that our new coffee maker is in any way environmentally friendly is ludicrous. The machine is one of the most environmentally unfriendly purchases this establishment could have made, and to say that "it's not as bad is it could be" equates to sustainable is just misguided.

I would like to take a moment to point out that one fifth of Pakistan in now underwater after seeing the worst downpours on record, Russia burns during the longest drought on record, and it United States is blowing up mountain tops, looking for coal, rather than trying to curb energy use. All the while, we sip single cup coffee from wax-coated cardboard cups, topped with plastic lids, and call ourselves environmentally responsible for at least using the Green Mountain brand.

Also, can I direct you attention to this machine, which brews a single cup of coffee, the only waste being coffee grounds and a bio-degradable coffee filter. My grandmother, who watches so much Fox News she probably thinks of the climate crisis as a political farce, has one of these. She's greener than my "forward-thinking" workplace. Way to go people. I guess having to replace a filter, spoon out some coffee grounds and clean your own mug is just waaaaaay too much effort. We could have been composting those grounds.

A mid-winter check in

I recently posted about the mid-winter warmth we've been having in Vermont. All over town and even in my backyard I can see actually grass. Real grass. Not covered in snow. Or at least I could until two days ago. It was as though the sky finally looked at the ground and realized it was looking a little too much like spring and promptly dumped a few inches of snow on us. I really enjoyed the use of the word squall that happened on several occasions at work. At one point we looked outside and saw nothing but white. NOTHING BUT WHITE. OK, OK, I know this is Vermont, but it's not the arctic, this kind of stuff doesn't happen very often.

And now is as good a time as any to check in with those changes I told myself I'd be making in my life.

1. Step up my commitment to the environment. I'm doing a pretty good job of this. I've made a few changes recently that are small, but significant. One of those changes does not include driving less. It's endlessly annoying that I have two jobs and usually work at two locations everyday. This kind of kills any chance of carpooling, because I would need to orchestrate something between three different people who don't share my schedule. However, come spring I plan to bike more. Right now it's not feasible. Not because of the cold, but due to the danger of ice and snow banks in what would be the shoulder of a highway. No thanks.

But here's something fun! I'm going to try and include a fun environmental... something (who knows) at the bottom of my non-book review posts. Starting today.

2. Become a for real Vermont resident. I am officially a Vermont voter! And I have a PO Box! And I applied for health insurance. I don't have a Vermont ID yet, but that's because I don't have time to even think about driving to Bennington for such a trivial thing.

3. Get even more organized. Yeah... about that. I haven't done this.

4. Check!

5. Read more. There isn't enough time to read all of the books on my book list!!! But I'm trying.

6. Make new friends. Um. Well. I think I'm kind of trying. I mean, I've gone out to social events I would normally skip out on, but I also go to the movies alone every week and never even try to have company. Socializing is so much work! I just want to have friends without having to go through the stress of making them. (yes, I said stress. This might explain why change is so difficult for me)

7. Continue my efforts to eat whole, home-made, unprocessed food. I haven't had a single Soy Chai Latte since I wrote that change! I have had several bagels though. Clearly I need to go out and get me some rice cakes, because I'm all out and I'm substituting bagels. Still no blender. Gonna go make a new freecycle post about this.

So... yeah! I'd say I'm chugging along. But I'm gonna go chug along down to the kitchen and make me some rice flour pancakes.

A green idea: I get paid weekly at my internet job. Gordon leaves our paychecks in an envelope by our time sheets. There are 52 weeks in a year. That's 52 envelopes a year! I buy a box of 50 envelopes and it lasts me forever. I don't want my paychecks costing the earth a box of paper envelopes a year. So on Fridays I put my packcheck into my backpack and hand the envelope back to Gordon. He reuses it next week. My little envelope change inspired one of my coworkers as well, so that's a little over two boxes of envelopes a year we're saving for pretty much no effort whatsoever. Woo!

Lemon Amazing!

One of the perks of working at a bookstore is that I can borrow books. If I'm really interested in reading a book, but I don't really want to commit to buying it, I can simply allocate a copy to myself and take it home for a few days. Of course I need to be insanely careful with it and not spill anything on it, or accidentally bend the cover. I NEVER dog ear pages, so that's no problem.

Getting to the point: Monday is The Loggers birthday. And if you are a devoted blog reader (AKA my mother), you'll remember the ridiculous lemon cake I made him last year. This year he said he wanted to be a little more low key and that he wanted cupcakes. Lemon cupcakes. There's been a major change in our lives since last year's cake, and that is veganism. The Logger isn't actually vegan (though he gets closer and closer every day), but since I am, and I do most of the cooking and all of the baking, that means vegan baked goods for birthdays.

I knew I would need to get the recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World, but I didn't want to buy a copy. I was just going to email a recipe to myself while I was at work, but I completely forgot until about 5 seconds before we were shutting down the computers. Shit. So I quickly allocated a copy to myself. It was the last copy. So I'm sorry bookstore, I know I'm not supposed to take books home when there isn't another copy in the store, but I think I'm pretty much 100% of the Manchester vegan market, so I'm not too worried anyone is going to run into the store and demand a copy of the vegan cupcake book. Anyway there's a copy of the vegan cookie book, so whatever.

In order to be as careful as possible (and because I generally make a mess when baking) I copied the recipe onto another piece of paper before attempting to make anything. I transformed the basic vanilla cupcake into a lemon delight. The Logger loved them, and so did I, though I don't especially love lemons. Win.

Maybe I do need a vegan cupcake book after all...

Ice House - Dorset, VT

Yesterday was our first snow storm of the season. I woke up to snow plows driving past our house a few times in the night. When morning finally came it was snowing pretty heavily and the roads looked messy as hell. Of course I insisted on going to work, because I'm crazy. It's not that far away and my boss gets her driveway plowed, so whatever.

I asked The Logger to take me in though, because I don't like driving in bad weather and sliding around in a car that I don't own and don't shift super-well in doesn't sound like fun to me. The Logger is a cautious driver in bad weather, so I knew he would get me to work in one piece. He had a dentist appointment in the afternoon and didn't want to have to drive all the way back out to Sunderland, so I told him I would get a co-worker to drop me off in town where he could get me. It all sounded fine and dandy.

When we finally got to my job we realized the driveway had not been plowed and no one had come in. I went in anyway. My boss was a little shocked to see me.

"Didn't Gordon call you and tell you not to come?"
"Did he call my cell phone?"
"Maybe"
"I don't get cell reception in Dorset"
"Oh... oops."

So I worked for about three hours until the power went out. I called The Logger and asked him to come and get me. At this point he was still at the Wilbuton, which is only 5 minutes away. I told him that if he couldn't make it up the driveway I'd just walk down to the road. We saw him pull up to the driveway and stop so I figured he just couldn't make it up. As I was walking down there I noticed why he had stopped. A tree had fallen across the driveway, but since everything was covered in deep snow we couldn't really see it from the office. The Logger had pulled out a chainsaw and started cutting it up. Because that's what loggers do and if he knows whats good for him he'll earn his damn nickname. I called back up to the office and my boss thought it was quite hilarious. She also said we could have the wood. And because he's a pro, he had the whole tree cut up and either stored in the car or piled to the side in less than 20 minutes. Ultra-sexy!

So now I'm sitting in front of the wood stove, keeping warm, all thanks to a ridiculous series of events. And The Logger.

Ice House - Dorset, VT

I just got home from my bookstore job and the Logger won't be home for a little while longer. I found myself faced with a predicament: How best to spend this time? Do I watch that Netflix movie that's been sitting around for weeks (I just downgraded my account to 2 movies a month, because I never have time to watch them anyway), do I read that Barbara Kingsolver I've been dying to get through (so amazing. words can not describe the love I have for her writing), or do I write in my neglected blog?

I guess the blog won for now. It won't take forever to say what I want to say here. I'll tell you what didn't win, cleaning the kitchen and doing the dishes. Sick of that. Because the reality is, the kitchen is clean (except for the dishes), but a damn mouse keeps pooping on the counter every night. I have no idea what the thing is eating, because we leave no food out, and it's not getting into the sink, because it wouldn't be able to get out. I set a little trap that would catch it in a bucket if it dared to grab the popcorn at the end of the strip of cardboard, but the mouse seems to clever for that at the moment. Anyway I'm tired of cleaning up mouse poop. We're out of clean dish towels. Laundry didn't win either.

Here is my excellent news for the day. Today I scored a signed first edition of Jonathan Safran Foer's latest book caleld "Eating Animals," which is of course a book about why he doesn't. It's the #1 bestseller in independent book stores right now. I can't wait to read it!!! But I've got to finish The Lacuna first, which I'm trying to savor, but it's so hard!

Books are like food to me sometimes. When a book is really good, I want to slow down and really delve in and enjoy, but it's hard to hold myself back from just devouring it all at once. Well Kingsolver's new book is luscious. That's right, luscious. Like The Poisonwood Bible, it is written as a journal, but this one is only the journal of one man. It begins with his childhood and continues as he ages, graduating to different notebooks. He takes a job with Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, but the story is about him, not them. He's a clever little bugger and his writing is not too obvious or on the nose, yet you always know what he's talking about. I often find myself rereading sentences because they are so beautifully written. Kingsolver's writing is so perfect, it almost makes me never want to write another thing again because how could I ever aspire to be that good? Keep reading I guess. Anyway I'm going to be recommending that one at work for the next few weeks. I saw a few people picking the book up today and I almost started harassing them to buy it, but I decided a full on assault is not what people come into bookstores for. A quite suggestion at the register is often enough for them to give it another thought.

Well, it's now time to pick that book up again. I guess writing in my blog made my next activity a little too obvious. Back to The Lacuna.

Ice House - Dorset, VT

Did I mention we got internet at the house? If I didn't, then I'd like to share how awesome that is. If I did, then I'd like to remind you of how awesome it is.

It's staff discount week at the bookstore, so I guess I got hired at just the right time. Yesterday I bought three books: The Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver; Stiches, by David Small; and Vegan Soul Kitchen, by Bryant Terry, which I've been dying to read. Woo!

I have to do a lot of book review type stuff at the bookstore job, so I'll probably start posting them here. I almost feel like reading is my homework, and I feel guilty when I don't have time. I might bring back that little sidebar extra that says what I'm currently reading. But that sounds like work, and I sure do an awful lot of that when I'm not at home. At least today was my last day of going to two jobs in one day.

I've been feeling insanely stressed lately (see last sentence of paragraph above), and I think it's been taking a toll on my body. I've been getting some unexplained aches and pains and they are really annoying. So two days ago I told The Logger he needed to help me out. I couldn't take care of myself, him, and the house all while working two jobs. He told me to make him a list of things to do that would save me some stress, which I did. This means that he did my laundry last night and helped me mulch the garlic. Today he put those clothes away for me and cleaned that bathroom sink. So if you see The Logger on the street, please let him know that he's awesome.

Except for this conversation that took place when my cell phone rang and I was driving from the bookstore to my second job.

Me: Hello?
Logger: Hi, I just saw you
Me: Are you driving into town?
Logger: yeah, I passed you.
Me: OK, well I better go
Logger: OK, I love you be safe.
Me: If you wanted me to be safe, why would you call my cell phone when you know I drive stick?
Logger: Oh yeah. Oops. Sorry.

Snow on the mountain today. I need to charge my camera battery.

The Logger's House- Pawlet, VT

With all of this spare time I'm finally starting to catch up on a bunch of things I had been wanting to do. I made toothpaste. It still needs a little tweaking, but it's close to being good. The Logger likes it. I made it almond flavored, instead of mint, which is a fun change. I'm going to get some aloe vera gel to soften it up a bit and make it more pasty. Right now it's ore of a tooth liquid, rather than a tooth paste. It's pretty simple though, water, baking soda, almond extract, hydrogen peroxide. The trick is making sure you don't overdue the peroxide and also making sure that you have enough water for the soda to dissolve in, but still be effective. But basically it's a cheaper and healthier alternative to store bought toothpaste, which has some pretty nasty ingredients in it. Even some of the all natural and organic brands have Sodium Laurel Sulphate, which is a carcinogen. Bad Bad. It's a pretty good indication not to put something in your mouth that has a warning label stating that it is harmful if swallowed. Check your toothpaste, unless it's an all natural brand, it'll have the warning.

I had an interview the other day for job I think I'd really like. The interview went really well, and I'm supposedly going to be contacted for a second one, but that hasn't happened yet. I'm trying to be patient. For now I'm taking odd jobs in the kitchen at the inn. Last night I washed dishes for 9 hours straight. There was a 200 person wedding. It was a bit crazy in the kitchen, but the guests were very happy, and I think they had no idea of the insane things happening back there, so job well done. I might go in and help Jason a little more with organizing the kitchen as well. We both love to organize.

Working at the inn has its downsides though. Generally if someone is working the dinner shift, it means they'll get fed. It was a really long shift, so Jason was making plates for people. However, pretty much everything was meat. And the veggies all had butter in them. The appetizers were a lot of vegan food, but the leftovers got taken to the big white before I got a chance to eat any. I was snaking on bread most of the night, which I don't like to do, when I finally asked Drew (who came up from New York to help Jason out), if there was anything without dairy. He whipped me up a really yummy salad, which was awesome. However, a side salad isn't really a dinner, so I still pretty hungry. I'm not all frustrated at being vegan. I accept that these things will happen. If I am frustrated, it's because people think they have to load everything with animal products in order for it to be tasty. I know quite well that is not true, and to prove it I'm going to make myself vegan pancakes for breakfast, which I've always preferred over non-vegan, because they taste better. So there. Not to mention the best cupcake I've ever had IN MY LIFE (and I've eaten a lot of cupcakes) was a vegan green tea cupcake. Which Ceora made. Yay.

I'm out of rice flour at the moment and there is no room in this kitchen for me to get more. Thus, wheat flour pancakes for breakfast. At some point I may need to address the fact that The Logger's mother has more dishes than food to put on them. The entire kitchen is full of dishes and bakeware and food storage containers, but no food. Just one little cabinet for food in the whole house. I'm hoping that if I take over the role of cook in the house, I can start to consolidate dishes and make a new food cabinet. I hope I hope.

Anyway I'm getting a haircut tomorrow. It'll be grand.

Colony House - Dorset, VT

OK, I've talked about my computer, now let's talk about my life.

Several things to go over:
1. I love Friday nights
2. Lobsters can cause nightmares, dirty looks, and unexpected reporters
3. A broken computer means hours of podcats which may lead to dietary changes that make your mother roll her eyes and wonder what she did to raise you so wrong.

Friday nights! Dinner! At Teleion! No, Earth, Sky, Time! The Levis clan has moved houses to be closer to their fields and never have to deal with cyber-creeps again! They have moved themselves and their WWOOFers into The Big White House. So Friday dinners are there, which means Slocum and I are there. The Logger can come too. I've had a renewed interest in cooking, even though I hate this kitchen and Slokes and I have been making some freaking yummy thing. Recipes later, I've got far too much to say right now.

There's a WWOOFer there right now who loves to sing, and has a talent for rewriting pop songs. So for the past few weeks I've had TLC's "No Scrubs" stuck in my head (only her version is No Slugs), and other equally irritating things. And I would find this endlessly annoying, except for the two things that make it tolerable: It's fucking genius and I can always go find Slocum and have a sing-along (which is actually more annoying for anyone around us, but somehow makes it better for me).

The lobster. Oh man, the lobster. So... I got this email. Actually, wait. Let me start here: I know that the number one rule of blogging is that you don't write about work. However, I blog about my life and my life tends to be wrapped up in my work and since my boss has the address to my blog (I gave it to him, he was curious, he got bored and never looked at it more than once, I'm sure), and I never say bad things about anyone, I often blog about work. I blogged about Teleion endlessly. Last year I blogged about the theatre. This year I saw no reason to stop. I still don't. Except for the lobster.

OK, I took the post down, so maybe you don't know what I'm talking about. There was an incident at work. It made me unhappy, it made others unhappy, I voiced my opinion, problem was solved. I blogged about my reaction to it, what the main issue was, no names, no finger pointing. It was a problem and we solved it. We were all at fault and we all realized it and changed what we were doing. Well, a reporter saw that post and emailed me. He wanted to write a story about it. He doesn't want to say anything bad about the theatre, he just agrees with what I was saying, and in Vermont, somehow this kind of little thing can become news. I guiltily told my employers, they were not upset and I remain silent on the issue until this all blows over. Meaning, I'm not saying anything more until I can put a link in my blog to the news article. That I started with my blog. Hell yeah. At least I'm not getting fired. It's not like it was a big deal, it's just that businesses don't generally want newspaper articles written about mistakes they may have made.

Fine, on to point three. Dairy and I broke up. When my computer died I still needed something to entertain me at work, so I decided to catch up on all the podcasts I had sitting on my ipod. Replacing aisle lights is not so bad when listening to Vegan Radio, followed by RadioLab (by the way I HIGHLY recommend RadioLab to everyone, as it is an awesome odcast that will make you smarter), followed by Vegan Freak. That's a lot of Vegan, and a little bit of science.

The thing is I haven't really been eating much dairy. Maybe a cookie or two that was lying around, but I never buy it, never cook with it, and wouldn't ever order it in a restaurant. I was eating pizza at changeover because the theatre bought it for us and I had no time to go home and eat anything else. My logic was that I wasn't contributing to the dairy industry because I wasn't buying anything, or causing others to buy things for me. And while I'm fine with the Freegan logic and lifestyle, I have finally become grossed out enough that I just plain don't want to put that crap into my body. Dairy is full of puss. And it causes lots of mucous. Mucous and Puss are gross words and I don't want to eat things associated with it. So there you have it, no more dairy for me. And don't start talking to me about cheese. Who the hell even cares about cheese? Sure it tastes good, but not THAT good. The only food that might actually be a true strugle for me to never eat again, and no way could I go through with it, so if I suddenly develope an allergy could you please just kill me? is chocolate. There I said it. You thought I would say eggplant, but I didn't. It's chocolate. And since Fairtrade dark chocolate doesn't have puss or suffering in it, I'm not going to stop eating it. Eggplant is still a close second though.

So Mom, I know you aren't a big fan of the veganism and maybe Dad and Justin just disowned me, but at least I know what's important in life: chocolate and eggplant.

High cholesterol and Alzheimer's

Colony House - Dorset, VT

I can't believe I'm still in bed at 8:30. Lately I've been going in to the theatre at 8:00 and today I think I will go in at 10. The interns have arrived, as well as the cast of the next two shows, so things have been picking up rapidly. St. Nicholas opens tonight, so the past few days of my life have been spent in the dark, with 10 minutes breaks of sunshine every hour and a half. I was terribly worried about getting my job done on time for this show. I really felt like I just didn't have enough time, but it actually worked out great. Bradford usually ends up needing me to change most of the lights over the course of tech, but that didn't really happen this time. I only spent one night in the theatre until 1am, other than that I've been leaving at a reasonable time. Still after my 9:30 bedtime, but... this is theatre, not farming. We all have to be night people here.


This is the stage last week

Let me try and explain the layout of this show a little. St. Nick is a one man show, in which the one man (The actor's name is Jack Gilpin) is telling the audience a story. It's an intimate kind of story-telling and it needs an intimate setting. So we moved the audience to the stage. They are seated along the back wall of the stage and down the side walls. His playing area is pretty small and he has a chance to really look every person in the audience in the eye. It's so amazing and I think the people of Dorset are a bit shocked and giddy about it when they walk into the theatre. Anyway the backdrop of the whole play is the empty theatre. Bradford designed a bunch of cool effects that light up the theatre in interesting ways. I also got the wonderful project of cutting up Christmas lights and hiding them in the seats. I now know more about christmas lights than I ever really wanted to know and 5 hours of my life are gone forever to this subject. However, when we tuned the lights on the effect was so beautiful. It was exactly what Carl (director of this show) wanted to see.


The stage and its weirdo seating

I'm going to pause for a second here to explain that the average audience member of this theatre is... older. A few years past retirement. They are well educated and maybe a bit old-fashioned, and when they pay good money to see a show, they don't want to be offended. This means we can't have smoking on stage, we have to be careful about loud unexpected noises and, holy crap, we do not want to swear too much. Well, this show is about an Irish alcoholic. He swears a lot. Carl cut about 90% of the swearing out of the show, and though it might throw the rhythm a little, I know the audience appreciates it.

So, after we tried the Christmas lights for the first time, Jack turned to Carl and said "I think this is worth putting at least five 'cunts' back in the show." I would say the five hours of frustrating work I put into this look was all worth it just for that hilarious moment.

Colony House - Dorset, VT

Back in Dorset once again. I miss Teleion so much, but the people here are great too. Slocum is back and Marshall got recruited as the Tech Director. There are only a few other people here right now to start the season up. Everyone else is coming on the 13th. This makes no difference to me, of course, because I am the only person in my department. I only hope more vegetarian/vegan types come up with the interns, as I am the only one so far. Whatever, I'm not eating a single Boca burger this summer, I'm just going to eat before all of the functions.

I've been pretty busy organizing the equipment and fixing lights, which I love doing. I'm back to the basement again, working happily with my headphones on. I found my camera so here are some pictures of my work situation:


My office. It's cozy, but it's pretty far from farming.


Inbox


Outbox


And here's my room in Colony House.

I feel a little backwards right now. I left New York and I left the theatre in order to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. I know I want to farm, but the only way I know how to make money is by doing theatre. It's this annoying back and forth thing. People will pay me to waste electricity, but not to grow healthy food? I say waste because good theatre doesn't need lighting it just wants lighting. It's true, I love doing this job, but I can't do it forever. It's not really where I want to be. If I knew I could have land somewhere and farm it, and then do theatre in the winter once in a while, that would be perfectly fine with me. But, Dorset is a summer job and as much as it disrupts the rest of my life, I would miss it. Theatre gets under your skin. You can only do it for so long, and if you try to spend those years getting away from it, something always pulls you back.

Penn Station - New York, NY

What a trip. I'm so tired I can't focus on my free trashy newspaper. There's no internet in Penn Station, which makes me sad. I haven't had much internet the past few days, so these posts are going up later than when they were written. Oh well.

My train doesn't leave for two hours, but I had to come into Manhattan early to load our rental lights onto a truck to be returned and no one else could really make it without a huge hassle. I guess it's better that I didn't end up going back last night. All the the train ticket prices have gone up so I can't transfer to an earlier train without paying extra money, thus I wait. I haven't spent any money here besides the $7 I spent on a Metrocard.

Last night we were finishing up strike at 8pm, and it looked like we'd be leaving pretty soon. Strike had gone well and we got things done pretty quickly. I called Ceora to tell her I would be staying another night and that I'd probably be leaving in a half hour. Then we all went up to storage to put all of the Keen crap away and realized there wasn't really any room. It ended up taking an hour to get everything away and organized in there. I got on the train at 9pm and I was exhausted. When I got off the train, my feet were killing me and I kept telling myself that I would be there very soon, at which point I would take off my shoes, make dinner and sit on my ass for at least an hour. However, when I got there, no one was home and I couldn't get in. I called Ceora and she said they were in the pita place right next to the train station. It's only 4 blocks to the train, but I swear I almost cried. I didn't want to lug myself and my stuff back where I just came from and I didn't want to buy any food, but I was wicked-hungry.

I left some of my stuff just inside the entryway and went over tot he pita place. Part of me wanted to call her back and tell her I was just going to sit on the front steps and wait, but I knew that I was just being a whiner. When I got there Marcy ended up giving me the rest of her food because she had ordered something massive. So I felt a little better once I was sitting for a few minutes and munching on falafel. Yay for Marcy always ordering more food than she can eat! Then The Logger called, which I had also been pouting about. I had not been able to get through to Teleion all evening and it had gotten too late to try calling again. Turns out the phone was off the hook, so he called me from Oliver's cell.

The theatre was full of pompous musical theatre people this morning, complaining about not being able to get into the theatre before 9:30. I admit that I also got there early, but that was because I wanted to take the train in with Iggy, I didn't expect that they would let me in early. So I hung out and used their free internet for half an hour (yeah didn't fel like getting on blogger, whatever). Keith kind of got a little upset and over-reacted about my being there so early, but I told him that I was happy to wait and that my train had taken less time than I expected. But these freaking musical theatre people were going on about their reading and their Tony Award Winner (apparently he has no name), who would have to come through the back doors. Then the truck driver arrived and didn't know he was supposed to be picking up my lights. And also he's a little high-strung and started ranting about the musical theatre people. But he helped me get everything onto the truck quickly and without hassle, so rant away Hayden truck driver, chances are I agree with you anyway, I'm just not in the talking mood this morning.

So now I'm finally going back to Vermont after the longest one-day trip ever. I love my job, but coming here for a single day just to work and go back is a shock to my system. I have to switch gears so quickly I feel like I've been hit in the head with a book. When I have a few days here I just get into NY mode and I don't feel so sulky. Also, I did not go to Dumpling Man on this trip. Boo.

Amtrak train - Somewhere between Albany and NYC

I'm doing this ridiculous one day trip to NYC to strike Heroes (if you didn't see it, you totally blew it because that show was awesome). I'm hoping that strike ends soon enough for me to leave tomorrow night, because I am, yet again, being a big baby about leaving Vermont. It's funny because I used to be this way about New York. It was always home to me, even when I wasn't living there. Whenever I left I felt really sad about and going back was the best thing ever. Now it just seems like a hassle. I hope my feeling for Vermont don't change like they did for New York.

I talked to my friend Jess on the phone today. She works in Dorset over the summer as well and said she couldn't wait to get back because the city starts to make her feel claustrophobic. I told her that the big difference for me is that in NY I am thinking and worrying about myself all the time; How will I get there? Who is going to harass me? Is that guy gonna try and steal my bag if I fall asleep? Will the train be late? Is that pee that I just stepped in while wearing flip-flops? In Vermont, I don't worry about myself. I'm fine, I'm healthy even when I'm sick, I'm never stuck in traffic and if I step in poop I've planned for it. It's one very huge stress that I no longer have: myself. Even if I don't know what I'm doing with my life after Dorset, I do know that I'll be safe and healthy. I won't be stuck in a terrible situation involving bed bugs and an opera singer, or staying in an apartment long after roommate relations have gone sour because I can't afford to find another place. If I disagree with the people I live with here, it's nothing serious and I don't think we let it carry over to the next day, or even the next hour. With so much space, it's easy to step away from the tension. I think that makes living with anyone easier.


Wonderful Link for today:
Really great and easy tips for healthy eating (no, really, I think you should check this out)

Teleion Holon - Manchester, VT

I've got to go to New York in a few days. For one day. I really, really don't want to. It's just a big stress and I'm only losing money. Basically, my pay for being the Master Electrician for the show I put up also included the day to take it all down. This means I have to spend another $72 to travel back to NY to work for one day, on a job I was already paid for and then travel back to VT. I'm a little grumpy. And I'm taking my food with me, because I am determined to spend no money except for subway rides. Even if that means not eating a meal or five.

Today we're going to visit Jay's land out in Jamaica. I'll try to take pictures. I will leave you with these pictures that Bonnie took. Don't even act like these aren't the cutest kids you've ever seen in a greenhouse.

The Logger's Sister's Apartment- Upper East Side, New York, NY

I can't deal with how well my job is going. Normally the tech is hell and I'm there 9:30am to 11pm everyday. Today I was back at the apartment at 6:30pm. I'm not even convinced this is a real play anymore. Why aren't there more problems? Well, I shouldn't talk about this, it'll bring bad luck. I'm not superstitious in any way, shape, or form, except when it comes to theatre. It's just the nature of the beast.

Anyway I took the Logger up to the SoBro house on Thursday night. It was amazing, as expected. He actually had a good time, which I knew he would. My friends might be a little crazy, but they are wonderful people and they never fail to have a good time. We played this fun card game called Van Huesen. I'm not convinced it's actually a well known card game; I suspect the person who taught it to me made it up. Anyway it's a difficult game to explain, but it's not really a regular card game. There are no winners or losers, no score, no real structure. The cards are simply a way to get random numbers. It's a really great ice-breaker, and it's also fun to play with people you know really well. So anyway after a few rounds of watching us The Logger started to catch on and decided he wanted to take a turn. I couldn't believe it. Especially because one of the stipulations to him going up there was that I would not make him play any games. Anyway he really liked it and told me so on the way home, and then again the next day. If only it was a game that was actually fun to play with two people. But the point is, he liked my friends, they liked him, and he did not have the terrible time he thought he would have. As usual.

Tomorrow is a run-through in the morning and afternoon, then I get out early enough to watch the Oscars, which I probably won't do. Instead I think I'm going to buy a bunch of veggies and make stir fry in a pot (because we have no pans). Somehow this sounds about a thousand times more exciting to me than watching the Oscars. I have not been keeping up with the no gluten thing, though I wish I were. The problem is that I buy many of my meals when I'm at work, and not having gluten is hard when you're on a tight budget and eating out all the time. I've managed to keep the dairy restricted only to pizza though. The funny thing about dairy is that I enjoy it when I have it, but I never miss it when I'm not eating it. I hate being thought of as a picky eater, because I know I am not. Generally my rule is: if it doesn't have an animal product in it, I'll eat it. I'll even put up with a little green chile every now and again if I have to.

Being in New York has felt like a tropical vacation compared to Vermont. The temperature has rarely dropped below freezing and I can honestly say there were even times when I was uncomfortable because my feet were too hot. Serves me right for bringing Vermont winter socks to New York. That being said, I'm ready to get back to clean air and quiet. It's hard to get completely silent moments in New York, but they happen so often in Vermont, I guess I take advantage of them. I also miss my short commute to work in Vermont (going downstairs). However, I'm not at all sorry I came. I love working on top of a ladder; I find I'm most comfortable working perched on a Little Giant(as a side note, that 21' ladder I'm so fond of is $840), focusing Source Fours for Bradford.

The Logger's Sister's Apartment- Upper East Side, New York, NY

This trip has been pretty great so far. I'm so glad that The Logger is here with me because I was so frustrated by not having him around the last time I came here. This time everything is 100% better. The guy who hired my crew for this show got me actual experienced electricians and got himself some real carpenters. This time around we were able to get the whole light plot hung in a day, partly because I had four experienced people in the air(plus the Logger working from the ground) and partly because I didn't need to share my crew with the scenic department. I also didn't need to run around and babysit everyone, I could give them a project and trust that it would get done. This worked for the most part and there were only a few minor things that needed to get fixed on Tuesday. We got out of there at 8pm! This is unheard of! Normally my work days in NY start at 9:30am and I don't leave until about 10:30 or 11pm all week. I also had one electrician come in on Tuesday to help me out with all the little things that needed to get done and we left at 6pm. Today was focus and I had another set of four experienced electricians. We had the whole plot focused in five hours and I was out of there before 4pm. This is crazy! I have now resolved to never have another half-assed crew. I love to teach people about lighting and I'm patient enough to help anyone who has questions, but I don't like slowing down the whole process and then having to stay in the theatre until 11pm fixing things myself because it's the only way I know they'll get done properly. It feels so nice to really love my job this time around. This has been the most successful and well-run hang that I've ever had and I finally found a way to love being the master electrician, instead of being the one on the ladder (although I still miss that).

It was also great to have The Logger there. I asked him if he'd be interested in getting a day or two of work and he never really made up his mind. So I called around and figured out what his pay rate would be and when he would be needed and what he could do and he still didn't make up his mind, so I just booked him. He did not want to get out of bed to come in, but after an unsure hour he settled in and was extremely helpful. If I'm going to have someone there who doesn't know lights, I at least like to have someone I can trust. We always need one or two people on the ground to help the people hanging lights in the air, normally the people we get are not usually the manual labor types, but The Logger obviously is a manual labor type, so I was relieved to have him. Plus it was nice that he got to see what I do, so that he has a picture in his mind when I blab about it. However, I couldn't convince him to come in for another day of work because he didn't want to get up early and he couldn't come in later because he won't get on the train my himself. I offered to give him good walking directions, but he didn't seem very interested in that either. Oh well, at least I know he's not lost in the subway somewhere.

Because I got out so early today I went all the way down to 8th St and 1st Ave to get Dumpling Man and bring it back up for dinner. I have been going on about Dumpling Man since The Logger first told me he would come to NY. I couldn't wait to have dumplings with him. He did not understand why anyone would go so far out of the way just for dumplings. Anyone who has ever had the Dumpling Man dumplings would understand. We had an amazing dinner and The Logger has been successfully assimilated into a Dumpling Man lover. He has looked up suddenly several times tonight to say "mmm, dumplings..." and then rub his belly. Yes.

Tech doesn't start until Friday and I have very little left to do, which means I can go in and work for a few hours tomorrow morning and then I have the rest of the day to get The Logger out of the apartment and out to see the nicer parts of New York. He hates this city, but I think it's because he's gotten into so much trouble here in the past. There are nice, calm, beautiful places in New York, the trick is to not compare it to Vermont, but to appreciate it for what it is. And then later on I'm taking him up to the SoBro house. That should be mildly entertaining: a house full of theatre people, plus one logger.

SoBro House - Bronx, New York

I'm so tired! Why am I even posting? You know how when you get so tired you can't even function enough to get yourself to sleep? That's what I'm doing now.

Today was one of those stupidly long days. I was so proud of myself for having gotten all the lights up and working at the time I said I would have it all done, but then focus took forever. Higgs and I ended up staying and working while everyone else went to dinner and got more work done in that hour than they had gotten done in four hours. It wasn't really their fault, there were too many people there and the wrong people were up on ladders. This should have been a much easier focus than it was.

At some point between last night and this morning one of our rented I-Cues got broken. I feel very certain that it wasn't our crew that did it, but was one of the people who have been passing through the building for the film shoot that's going on. First of all, I'm mad because these film people barge in here and we have to move all of our stuff out of the space we rented. They have infinitely more money and people than we do, yet we have to cut into our time to clear a path for them. Then somehow one of our really fancy expensive instruments gets broken. Luckily the rental guy was cool about it and is bringing a new one in the morning. I don't know who' paying for it and how much it will be though.

I have been doing nothing other than working. I miss VT so much. I miss the logger. This trip would have been 100% better if he were here. My friends are great, I just have so much trouble keeping up with everything because I have no desire to. I need someone else who agreed that faced-paced is not always the best thing ever. SLOW AND STEADY WINS THE RACE PEOPLE!!

OK, enough of this. I'm off to bed.