It Sucks To Be Me

Ok, so it doesn't totally suck, but I am having such a hard time adjusting to the cold and almost blizzard force snow tonight after only being in Florida just yesterday. For those of you who might have forgotten, the reason I've been out of touch is because I've been on a cruise since the 6th. Initially I had intended to post something while I was on the ship, but the wireless internet was $0.55 a minute and the connection was slow, so I just stuck to checking my email and the classrooms that I'm teaching in. I took my new laptop and while it didn't pass with flying colors, it wasn't a disaster either. It kind of passed with washed-out colors, which was the biggest issue. For some reason, and I don't know if it's because it's an LCD screen or if it's Toshiba's Tru-Bright technology, the DVD playback was very low quality, almost like watching a TV show that had been Tivo'd at the lowest quality. I made some adjustments to the brightness and contrast of the screen and that improved it, but then caused the picture to hesitate whenever there was a rapid on-screen motion. I still have to fiddle around with that, and was a little disappointed. The internet connection was also slow, but hopefully that was due to the ship's internet connection and not McAfee still fucking up my connection. Most worryingly, there have been 3 times now that when I've turned it on, some application has crashed during startup, and I've only had it about 3 weeks. Still, there hasn't been a major disaster like there was with my piece of crap Gateway, so maybe just ok is the best you can hope for with laptops. So, back to the cruise, it was wonderful. I'll post some pictures as soon as I scan them. Once we got past Florida into the Caribbean, the weather was gorgeous, although it rained in St. Maarten as I was waiting to begin the zip line/ropes course, so my shoes got all muddy which made it very slick, and everyone that went before me got their mud all over the ropes and wires, making for a precarious experience. Still, I've never done anything like it and it was quite a rush to make it through. There were 32 platforms that we had to get to through a combination of zip lines, rope swings, tightrope wires, bridges, etc. The first 16 went upwards, and then the second 16 brought us back down, each set of which had it's own challenges. Going up I was pulling myself, but going down I was locking my arms to keep me in place. If you're ever in St. Maarten, I highly recommend you try it. I brought back a lot of rum and had some great drinks on the boat. Not only was there a wine bar, there was also a Champagne bar, and I ended up spending more time there. Royal Caribbean definitely deserves their reputation for fabulous service. Everyone on board was very friendly and helpful, it really was service with a smile no matter where we were. Everything went smoothly getting there, but coming back yesterday was nerve wracking. The bus taking us from the pier to the airport stalled 4 times during the hour long drive, and then our flight got delayed at the last minute due to bad weather, it was almost a perfect repeat of what happened coming back from New York in July. Fortunately, it was only an hour delay instead of 2 and a half, and we made up half an hour of that in flight. As soon as I got home I logged on and went to playbill.com to see what I missed during the week. I was worried that something would suddenly close and I wouldn't know about it, like Tarzan did, but it seems like it was an uneventful week. I know I tend to ignore the Golden Globes, but that press conference format really suited them much better given that they're meaningless anyways, and I was pleasantly surprised that Sweeney got Best Picture (although in the less-taken-seriously musical/comedy category) and that Johnny Depp got Best Actor (again in the comedy/musical category). Hopefully these wins will propel Sweeney to multiple Oscar nominations instead of turning it into another Nurse Betty. I would have liked to see Nikki Blonsky win, but from what I've heard, Marion C. would have been tough to beat. So, I believe the nominations come out soon, and you know you'll hear my thoughts as soon as they do. There's not much on the schedule for the immediate future. We have Traviata with Renee on Sunday and Music of the Baroque on Monday, but that's it until early Feburary, and then it will be busy for 2 months with operas, Linda, and Mandy, plus Mika and hopefully at least one of The Little Dog Laughed, Shining City, or Les Miz, and then there's Nine and the Broadway in Chicago Trifecta to look forward to in the spring.