The Verdict

Nine screws
and a plate.
Stainless steel.
Lifetime sentence.

Break a Leg!

...and this time I actually did.
I have now officially had my first major stage injury. Who knew theatre could be such a dangerous profession?
Quick recap: Right now I'm touring with the BYU Young Company Shakespeare Troupe--We perform a one hour version of Pericles: Prince of Tyre for elementary schools to give the kids what we hope will be an exciting and entertaining introduction to Shakespeare. For some children it is the first play they will ever see.

For whatever reason, most elementary schools have a set of wide stairs that lead off the front of the stage. We set up a big, colorful curtain at the top of those stairs and use multi-leveled space to perform on.
At the top of the show, I, Pericles am fleeing from the wicked King Antiochus. I burst through the curtain, fly down the stairs and stop just short of barreling into the kids to give the show an energetic and attention grabbing start. Only yesterday, it was perhaps a little more attention grabbing than I would have liked.
I burst through the curtain, flew down the stairs, caught my foot on an edge, and hit the ground with a solid thump. I looked up to see my left foot twisted nearly ninety degrees outwards away from my body. This did not look right. It did not feel right either. It felt loose and wiggly--like it was disconnected. I couldn't move it and the weird angle was putting a lot of strange pressure on things, so I reached down and -griiindCrack- yanked it back to the right angle. Sadly this did not solve the problem.
"Guys, I think we're going to have to stop the show..." I said in front of a crowd of wide eyed grade school kids.

I showed up at the emergency room still in costume. After getting checked in onde of the nurses asked: "So what were you doing?"
"I was performing in a play and..."
"Oh, we were hoping you'd say that. The outfit was a little strange..."

Turns out I fractured three bones near the bottom of my leg and it's going to take a surgery on Monday to put everything back together again. Probably three or four screws and a plate.
Then it will be crutches for the next six to eight weeks until I can get the cast off. Yikes.

I figure after years of well wishers telling me to "Break a Leg!" my body finally obeyed.

Dabblings

While it may seem that I have taken a hiatus from the world of writing, nothing could be further from the truth. I am writing my brains out. There they go--splattered all over the keyboard again. Yuk.
In fact I'm taking a course on writing for stage and screen. And I'm loving it.
I'm forty-six pages into my first play. Take a peek if you'd like. Any suggestions on how it should end?
(But if your attention span isn't that long, you can just tell me how you like the first scene--it's only seven pages)

I've also written a couple of shorter ten minute pieces if you're interested:
A Comedy and a Drama.
I'm really not all that proud of those two, but I'm really too proud to make any sort of formal apology here.

Cheers!

Decision 2008

"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected."

--G.K. Chesterton


My two cents:

Sure, Barack Obama is bound to make a few mistakes as president. Contrary to popular belief, he is only human. He's got my vote all the same.


Also, I'm pretty sure I'd move to Canada if Sarah Palin ever got elected.