Events
Martian
Governor's Ball
9.7.02
Keep Mars British they said.
Well, we did our best and so did they.
The Martian Governor’s Ball
was the best Peers dance they’ve had in awhile. The music was right on.
The location in Palo Alto was great. Good acoustics, nice rest area off
to one side, but not too far from the dance floor if you hear a great waltz
that you just have to dance.
Karen and I both looked marvelous.
Okay, so we pulled random things from different historical periods out
of our closets and wore them because, hey, space theme, anything goes.
Surprisingly, we ended up
dancing with a number of people that we’d never met before. Good dancers
though.
The venue may not be close
to home, but here’s hoping that Peers uses that location again.
Krug Tasting
on the Lawn
9.15.02
Gosh life is hard. Being forced
to go wine tasting in Napa. Go to a special function with wonderful food,
wine specifically paired with the food and a band. Yeah, it’s rough. Especially
when it’s free.
My mother is a member of
the Krug wine club and for the last, five or so years, we’ve made an annual
trip to the Krug Tasting on the Lawn event.
For some reason, I always
remember it being this long afternoon thing and yet it’s only two hours.
Two wonderful hours.
Life am good.
Shakespear
in the Park
9.29.02
On a lovely Sunday morning,
we packed up our picnic stuff, picked up Ken, and headed into the city
for some free Shakespear. We spread our blank under a tree and waited for
the rest of our friends (Gina, Matt, and Jen) to arrive.
Crystal pulled out a book,
Ken pulled out a magazine, and I pulled out a crochet project. It was quite
pleasant and idyllic as we watched the crew finish setting up the stage
(we were absurdly early). Jen was the first to arrive with Matt and Gina
following soon after. We got down to the business of munching and chatting
- we had the obligatory brie and crackers, goat cheese, french bread, gouda,
fried chicken, carrot sticks and even some potato chips.
The park was rapidly filling
up around us by this point and by the time the play started there were
at least 200 people lounging on blankets and little chairs waiting for
a dose of the bard.
The play was The Winter's
Tale - an interesting mix of tragedy and comedy which was very appropriate
for the 20th anniversary of free Shakespear in Golden Gate Park.
The play started with a very
pessimistic song and the tragedy half commenced. The actors were very good
and I really like the way the scenes melted one right into the other with
actors starting a good way back from the stage and playing their parts
right up and onto the stage as the previous scene was played off another
side. Also ingenious was the placement of microphones around the stage
that picked up every word of dialog, but none of the breeze and were so
unobtrusive it took me most of the play to figure out where they were.
The tragedy half ended with a spectacular appearance of the bear (guy in
a very funny and large bear suit) for Shakespear's most famous stage direction
- Exit stage left pursued by a bear.
Our shade had left us about
half way through the first half so we were all scrambling for the shade
necessary for each of us. I was fine with sunglasses and a hat, but Gina
was forced to move to the other side of the tree and full shade. Crystal
and I were also drinking a lovely Chardonnay (split size) from Pezzi King.
(Knew those little bottles would come in handy some day!)
The second half started and
the comedy began. More of the dancing, singing, mistaken identity, rogues,
and reunions that you expect from a Shakespear comedy. It was lots of fun
and I recognized one of the actors (finally) who was in Chris' Shanghai
Pig last year, David Babich. Hi David! You were great.
We all enjoyed the happy
ending (including the surprise bit) and sat around for quite awhile afterwards
chatting some more until we were about to be run over by a truck (as the
manuevered to take down the speakers and other equipment). So we toddled
off in a very leisurely manor and eventually made it back to the street
where we had parked.
Crystal and I parted from
the rest of the gang there as they were going on to a movie and we (more
specifically Crystal) had to work in the morning. It was a halycon day
in the park with great literature and good friends.
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