Theatremonkey

I’m guessing that around 50% of readers of this blog have been following the UK version of “The Apprentice” this season – meaning the programme had at least 1 other viewer besides myself.

It was the usual riot of (probably) competent workers bamboozled by a lack of sleep, time, a film crew and common sense. For me, the awarding of cash to inventor Tom seemed the right decision. Helen may have won the tasks most often, but would anybody pay good money to have somebody else make a dental appointment for them? Her last minute thought about a bakery (we had several like that round here, all closed as supermarkets opened) just seemed desperate too – and I’d have fired her for that alone, to be honest.

What caught my attention as a theme for this week, though, was the penultimate episode where Jim was asked to multiply £7 by 60 people and came up with a daft answer. OK, as always, he was under pressure, but just the sheer pattern of the numbers ( six sevens are forty two, then add a zero ) are mental arithmetic.

From where does the British thing of being ‘scared’ of maths come from? It wasn’t my favourite subject at school either – and I needed extra help with it as the teaching was so terrible – but I got there in the end and now use numbers every day in my working life. If I had to get out a calculator every time, I wouldn’t have time to write this blog either… and no, I’m not listening to the barracking from the back… Mr P too enjoys playing with figures all the time – but as always, we won’t go there… and if he’d left some in their original boxes, he could’ve retired by now (and avoided a lot of pain in High School, come to that).

Back on track: what is it about numbers that seems to confuse the Brits? It is true that times-tables are a pain to learn – I was as reluctant as anybody – and fractions are even worse. In fact a survey found that half of all respondents didn’t understand them, and the other three quarters were not sure. Still, those tables, plus the very basic thing of splitting a number in half, and working out 10% by just imagining a decimal point moving one place over to the left are fundamental life skills used every day when shopping or in many workplaces – even if only to share out the biscuits at tea break (mine’s an ‘emergency biscuit,’ thanks Tom – I’ll pass on the bissquit, though, ta).

You can’t always blame the teachers either. Many apparently don’t have maths skills themselves (repeatedly failing the compulsory maths exam during teacher training is a sign) yet are forced to teach the subject – particularly in Junior schools. Even if you have a specialist, it’s no guarantee a person can actually ‘teach’ anyway of course.

I wonder if we should go the route of “Kumon” – long pages of repetitive sums that get tougher the more sheets you do. It teaches numbers the same way I learned English vocabulary and spelling, by pure repetition.

We need to move away from the perception that maths is hard, and it can be done. What about a “Maths Factor” (NOT with Carol Vorderman), with each week teaching 16 contestants a new maths skill along with the audience? TV that actually educates for a change?

I think it would add up, and if we could pitch it to Lord Sugar to put up £250,000 we may just have a winner.

A mention in reviewer Mark Shenton’s blog for the monkey today. Thanks as always, Mark!

The latest cinema experience is, apparently, going to be “theme park style” 4D. You’ll get the smell and feel of scenes thanks to scent and air jet technology – and your seat will even move in time to the car chase. Improving only slightly on your local cinema, you can also expect to get wet and sticky too – though this will be provided by complex computer delivery at appropriate times, rather than the current random “whatever has been spilt by the person next to you” method.

Only two things bug me – how will they deal with those ‘bedroom’ scenes… and is anybody going to want to sit in the front row for the re-make of ‘Saving Private Ryan’ if things are taken to their logical conclusion? On the other hand, would some US movie theatre audiences recognise the difference…

I stopped going to the cinema some years ago. This was largely down to the fact all the local ones have been turned into expensive (and mostly unsellable) apartment blocks, plus the odd (mostly empty except for a few weeks in January) gymnasium. The nearest cinemas are an expensive tube ticket away – and by the time I’ve got there, and paid almost the price of a theatre ticket to get in, I might just as well go to the theatre (where normally I don’t pay anything like as much for a seat). So, modern movies pass me by until they hit the TV screen around Christmas each year.

Quite honestly, though, I’ve never felt I’ve missed much. I’ve always put reading as my number one enjoyment, and I normally find book to screen adaptations a bit of a let down, if I’m being honest.

Sure, I do ‘see’ Radcliffe’s face when reading ‘Harry Potter,’ and same goes for a number of other books and characters. I guess that’s laziness. What I miss in films, though, is the depth of inner dialogue – something film can’t often do. Stage musicals are pretty good with that stuff – the character can burst into song with their thoughts. Films, you can’t even do an ‘aside’ to the audience, mostly – a ‘voice over’ is the closest they get, and they can’t be used too often or you end up with a mime show.

I wish you could, though. One of my least favourite films of all time was “E.T. The Extra Terrestrial.” I guess that I may have been expecting far too much from the ‘hype’ that preceded the initial release, but I just found the whole thing… boring. No more, no less.

Oddly, this was a rare case of a book being written after the film was made. And guess what, the book is infinitely superior! I only read it as it was part of a ‘sci-fi compilation’ book I was given – and I’m so glad I did. E.T’s view that Elliot was, “dumber than a cucumber” was an observation worth waiting for, and the character suddenly became ‘real’ - the intergalactic botanist confined to the closet like an extra from “The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.”

I’m not saying there isn’t a place for films – “Star Wars” (in the same compilation book) plays better on screen than page; but for me, I’m happy with the scent of bath foam as I read – and if I want a water spray while reading a nautical tale, there’s always the shower attachment nearby.

It seems to be fashionable at the moment to live life as an internet list. Obviously, a terminally ill child’s ‘wish list’ isn’t in that category (and if I ever get my turn as ‘Ruler Of The Universe,’ my first action will be making “terminally ill children” a myth) but there is much amusement to be had at what a fiancée shouldn’t do under her prospective mother-in-law’s roof (whether it’s a true email or a stunt), and also in “Things to do before you are 60.”

I was going to take that as my subject for the blog, but realised that I’d never bothered to think about that kind of thing, and wasn’t about to do so now. I’m with Yoda on this one, “Do, or don’t do” – and so I don’t really have a list. In desperation for something to post, I asked Mr P for his list instead…

…It turns out that he has one, but as those who are fans of Mr P on this blog (rather a lot, enough that he is thinking of his own Facebook page for them, apparently) could probably guess, it isn’t suitable for a ‘family blogging site.’ Further, once you’ve taken out the more peculiar, illegal and actually ‘impossible given the limitations of human body design,’ there aren’t any left.

So instead, I thought I’d consider the secret of life. Thinking hard for almost ten minutes while showering, I realised what it was… and it’s this…

“Don’t ever allow the stress of a ringing telephone to interrupt play.”

Not quite as elegant as “42,” but then I’m writing for men* not mice.

For those who require me to show my calculations (and no, that’s not quoting from Mr P’s list – at least, not in the same context), here they are:

At 5 months old, you stress when the telephone rings because you were asleep, dreaming of all the times you can relax and simply play.

At 5 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because it has disturbed your play.

At 15 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because it might be the football team’s captain finally asking you to turn out to play.

At 25 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because it might be the call to say that the band at your wedding can’t play.

At 35 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because it might be somebody cancelling your hope of them having your children over to play.

At 45 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because of what your kids might have done when somebody left them alone to play.

At 55 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because it might be the call to say that the band at your kid’s wedding can’t play.

At 65 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because it might be the golf club captain finally asking you to turn out to play.

At 75 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because they are calling right in the middle of your enjoyment of a play.

At 85 years old, you stress when the telephone rings because you were asleep, remembering all the times you could relax and simply play.

Simple really, isn’t it?

 —————— 

*Women too of course, but it’d spoil a neat literary reference. I’m sure ladies will understand, thank you all.

For the overseas reader who visits this blog (either to read it, or send me emails telling me they can improve both our lives if they link to my ‘highly relevant’ story on their boot and shoe website) the following won’t mean much. For quite a lot of UKreaders, it also won’t – difference is, the UKcohort can do something about it.

I’m talking about “Fool Us,” the one hour Saturday Night TV programme on ITV1 at 8pm. The original 90 minute pilot had me glued to the screen (accident as I repaired the remote control, hot water sorted it) and I was delighted a couple of weeks ago to find it was commissioned as a series.

For those who’ve not seen it… DO. It’s a simple concept: magicians of all types – card tricks to escapologists – perform a short routine in front of the famous magic duo Penn and Teller. If Penn and Teller can’t figure out how the illusion was done, the performer gets a chance to do their act during Penn and Teller’s ownLas Vegas show. A ‘mystery adjudicator’ double checks the action, and Jonathan Ross (sensibly sans phone to any geriatric actor, and with a cleaner mouth than usual) hilariously links the action as compere.

Now, the chances of me visiting Las Vegas during Penn and Teller’s run are pretty remote. Not only can’t I perform an illusion that will baffle them – my limit is the “removing thumb trick” – but I don’t really have the funds.. anyway… The pair have performed in the UK very recently, selling out the Apollo Hammersmith in record time… and my thought is, “why can’t we have them, and other great magic back in the West End?”

Derren Brown at the Shaftesbury is pretty much sold out now for the whole of his month’s run, proving there is an audience for TV appearing magicians. My own old favourite Paul Daniels still tours the country regularly (less magic, more chat now, though) and again effortlessly sold out a short run at the Udderbelly Festival on the South Bank recently. Sure, last time Mr Daniels played the West End (the early 1990s) the theatre burned down just after he left, but it was no criticism of his act, just bad timing. He’d also previously sold out the Prince Of Wales Theatre for more than a year in the 1980s, returning several times thereafter, again to decent ticket sales each time.

Now, I’m not saying bring back the “Magic Castle” experiment – a venue dedicated to magic at the Cambridge Theatre (what a disaster that was!). I’m just asking that this totally entertaining art is given more exposure on the stage. If “X Factor” and “Britain’s Got Talent” can have stage versions (and let’s face it, the lot of ‘Fool Us’ are well up to – if not way beyond – that standard of professional quality), then why not do it for the magicians… please!

Now, just to end on a short plea. A graduate student at King’s College London, currently doing a Master in Cultural and Creative Industries emailed the website the other day to say that they were writing a dissertation about the influence of criticism over theatre audiences.

As part of the research they are conducting questionnaires to members of theatre audiences in London, both at the door of theatre venues and through an online survey device. They asked if I could kindly host a link to the online one in my blog. So here is the link: www.surveymonkey.com. It’s a very short survey – 3 minutes at the most, so do try helping. Also, do note that the hosting website and survey are nothing to do with Theatremonkey.com – the site just has a similar simian name.

A TV advert at the weekend got me thinking. In a factory somewhere, probably China or another country that we only hear about with the word “Disaster” or “Threat” as a prefix (despite the fact they are mostly ordinary folk, just as we are), somebody earns a living making small toy parts to go inside chocolate eggs. Somebody else has mined the basic ingredients that made the plastic, yet another person thought up the mixture to make the plastic and passed it to somebody to brew, somebody made up a design and passed that to somebody to build a machine to make it. And the original somebody sits at the machine, doing so. Then of course you have those who create the chocolate, the labels, ship the egg to the shop and created the advert that got me thinking in the first place.

Then somebody buys the egg, eats the chocolate, looks at the toy for a few minutes, and probably then chucks it into the bin from whence it is probably shipped back to  China or another country that we only hear about with the word “Disaster” or “Threat” as a prefix (despite the fact they are mostly ordinary folk, just as we are) for disposal. Like I said, it just got me thinking.

We can all chuck stuff away; but memories remain forever. Good and bad, like chocolate egg toys they too are created by many other people, often without any recognition or concious thought. That’s why I got a bit upset with some taking a real joy at the closure of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Love Never Dies” in August.

Something like 2000 people will have been involved in the show. From the tiniest ways possible – myself and fellow website owners publicising it and convincing our readers to buy tickets – to those who wrote, designed and staged the show; and of course the 200 plus at the theatre who keep it on stage and the venue going each night.

Yes, there were mistakes made. I felt that the composer possibly fought too valiantly against his personal problems at the time (and you can never blame somebody for that) to get the show on. That February, holding ‘full price’ previews perhaps raised expectations a little too far that the piece was ‘finished;’ thereby providing ammunition to an unexpectedly vociferous negative internet faction waiting to shoot down something still trying to mature before it officially ‘opened.’

For me the most irritating thing though, I referred to last week. Repeating a pattern established with “Sunset Boulevard” (same theatre, same producer), without a group rate at the beginning there were not enough people coming in to create strong positive word-of-mouth to counteract a stream of other less impressed reports. My own party of 20 all loved the show, with 4 instantly re-booking… imagine if I could have taken my usual 50 – that might have been up to 20 more ‘second timer’ tickets sold and countless more to friends based on recommendation.

The good thing is that I saw it, and will always remember much of the second half as some of the best, if not the best, writing and staging I’ve ever seen. In the days before easy piracy of shows for ‘bootleg’ filming, memories were all anybody had to rely on to flesh out a tattered script.
Now, I’m sure the show has been recorded somewhere and may appear on some file sharing site until lawyers find it; but my thought is this: they can close a show, but can’t take away the happy memories of those who enjoy them. It’s another great reason to always value memories over possessions, I think.

Hmm, entry finished for the week. I wonder if my local newsagent has Kinder eggs in… that tiny little neon green vintage car looked quite fun…

A fact I’ve always found interesting is that these days more is generally spent on the marketing budget of a musical than anything else except the odd (sometimes – in fact mostly – very odd) star’s wages.

You’d think that a flying witch / dragon / Minton tea service would consume the big bucks but no – it’s the flashy website, the huge adverts in the Sunday Times Culture section and the TV ones between singer and, er, singer in the “X Factor.”

Then there are endless leaflets, press releases written by sometimes brilliant / hopeless / always expensive press agents, preview CDs and DVDs – stuff that many see and probably ignore unless trying to flog them all later on Ebay.

Finally, some get guest tickets with attached drink coupons (notably only valid before the show and on the most intoxicating beverages, to ensure the recipient is chemically relaxed from the start). 

With all that expense, you can rather see why the internet, that bastion of free pictures of ladies proving they literally have nothing to wear… sorry, bastion of free speech, royally annoys shows when it circulates damaging stories about a new show. The often repeated preview review of “Love Never Dies” by the fantastic WestEndWhingers  bloggers probably represented the pinnacle of their achievements – topping even the accusation that they single-handedly closed another musical the previous year.

My own feeling is that what has really happened is that amid all the cash, the industry marketing professionals have lost sight of the single most important – and easily the oldest – assest of all… simple “word of mouth” by those who have seen the production.

The third most frequently asked question I get when introducing myself* as somebody who ‘is involved in West End Theatre online’ is, “What is worth seeing?” In line with the old research about “you’ll tell more people you are happy with something than annoyed” I’ll sing the praises of “Legally Blonde,” “Wicked,” “Love Never Dies,” and “Shrek The Musical” – and not refer to other shows I may have seen but didn’t much like. Nothing works like face to face conversation, so why the empty seats?

There are companies who specialise in filling unsold seats – The Audience Club being one, and others like ShowFilmFirst who do the same for cinema. The biggest asset, though, is ‘group sales’ – the coach load of visitors, let in on a discount, who fill 50 seats and then tell around 200 more to ‘go see.’ I have a private crowd who love to do just that, and know several others who also convene such visits for love not income. The late, great Harold Fielding pioneered the ‘groups’ concept with “Charlie Girl” at the Adelphi Theatre in 1965, and it is something marketers seem to ignore… now at their peril.

I’m finding it increasingly hard to find anything at a reasonable price to take a group to in the first place. The average group ticket has shot from £29.50 to £39.50 in a year… and one big show didn’t offer a rate at all for the first 6 months. I could have filled 50 seats with folk willing to advertise the show by ‘word of mouth’ afterwards… I ended up taking only 20, who had an amazing time, but couldn’t match what an extra 30 could do in circulating good news. Oddly, the same producer did something similar with another show some 15 years before. The result was similar – unexpected empty seats early in the run and too few folk to drown the tiny minority of detractors.

I guess all I’m saying is, “don’t forget the audience” – and perhaps use the marketing budget to subsidise groups a little more. They’ll at least look at the show for 3 hours, rather than the advert for 3 seconds… that is all.

*I’ll be offering a prize for anybody who can guess correctly what the top 2 are – and also the top 3 questions Mr P is asked when he introduces himself (slurring, usually) as ‘something in publishing.’ Clue for him: the 1^st question is not (usually) ‘Animal, vegetable or mineral?’ Answers on a post card to the North Pole by Christmas 1987, please.

They seem to be the theme at the moment. With the British MI6 Secret Service hacking in to any website that might reveal ‘something better kept secret’ and placing cupcake recipes there instead, this week I really dare not reveal the names of the two actors covered by a super injunction, just in case somebody from ‘spooks’ division is reading this. Still, who’d have thought that take 200 grams of self-raising flour, 2 eggs, 100 grams of sugar. Mix in a bowl and place in small containers in 180 degree oven (pre-heated for 30 minutes) for 20 minutes. Cool and ice using 50 grams icing sugar mixed with 20 drops water would have got together. I never would have seen them as a couple for sure.

Anyway, a couple of other perennially controversial subjects in the theatrical world caught my eye this week.

The first is the old saw of “ticket touting.” Tickets for the 2012 Olympics cannot legally be re-sold outside of the official re-selling website. For those like myself in the 55% who didn’t get any tickets at all (not worried, didn’t expect to, but enjoyed the game), that means a fair and safe place to buy. I was reading an argument in favour of touts somewhere though, and wanted to re-state why I’m so against them. Put simply, it’s a total menace to theatre staff and the public alike. Many theatre box office staff are very young, often female and work late at night. If anybody is going to be threatened into handing over stock, you don’t need to be Ken Clarke to figure out who is at serious risk. I’ve heard many stories… and all true.

Second, the cash difference in value between what is ‘reasonable’ and what is ‘extortionate’ does not get ploughed back into producing. “Premium Seats” are in part about this – if anybody is mad enough to pay £20 more for a ticket, it might as well go to the producer and be used to benefit the theatre world, rather than the money laundering one (where a lot of touting is used to launder money from such delights as drug sales, prostitution and child trafficking). Finally, it means rows of empty seats where unsold touted tickets can’t be re-sold, and more difficulty for genuine fans to get seats at a reasonable price.

The other controversial subject is ‘saving Dress Circle‘ – the showbiz shop that means so much to all musical theatre fans. Many in the industry have come together to help keep the shop going, with offers of everything from time to organising a ‘benefit concert’ for it. Several online message boards – the shop’s own and Whatsonstage.com to name but two – have had readers posting that since the shop is ‘commercial,’ such benefit events should be directed at charity rather than keeping a failing business alive.

My argument is that offers of professionals giving time to raise funds is no different to the usual generosity shown throughout the theatre industry towards commercial ventures in distress. How often do performers, production staff and landlords offer to take a cut / royalty waiver to keep a show going through a sticky patch? It happens more often than you think, always quietly done, in the knowledge that it is helping preserve jobs and keep the flame of a true ‘way of life’ burning a little longer. Those who really are ‘part of the business’ instantly understand all this – which is why they reacted in this way, and I thought I’d mention it to help those who are not to also understand. It isn’t a case of ‘charity begins at home’ – just theatre people doing what they always do in a pinch, banding together. It’s one of the things I love about the industry, and I for one wouldn’t have it any other way.

And just to finish on another controversial note, weren’t all the Simon Cowell  happenings last week interesting. What with him deciding 200 grams of self-raising flour, 2 eggs, 100 grams of sugar. Mix in a bowl and place in small containers in 180 degree oven (pre-heated for 30 minutes) for 20 minutes. Cool and ice using 50 grams icing sugar mixed with 20 drops water, I mean, who’d have thought…

Living as I do near one of London’s less functional tube lines, I’m always suspicious when it’s open at a weekend. It’s usually for a good reason – huge event at Wembley Stadium – and this past weekend was no exception.

For us locals further up the line, it also spells abject misery; crowds of badly behaved and inconsiderate parkers, drunks (hopefully only after parking) and assorted louts and weirdoes invade our quiet neighbourhood before setting off for whatever they intend to see.

Actually, it’s only the drunks that really irritate me. Before this weekend, that was down to observing how local elderly people were intimidated by the chanting and the level of vandalism;  and also at the disrespect shown towards the local community and our facilities in general. The streaks of ‘processed liquids’ on pavements, walls, alleys and tube platforms are disgusting. The football clubs should be billed for the clean up, I’d say – and I’m now quite sangine about the revenge rip off parking charges by a clever opportunist in a local office car park too… Still, though, it’s all actually got me as worried as a Daily Mail features editor about just how alcohol addicted the UK has become.

To explain: on bank holiday Monday I needed to make a dash to a local shopping area. The quickest (and cheapest) way is by tube, with an interchange at Wembley Park (nearest station to the Stadium). Go early, avoid the football crowd, no problems. And there was where it got interesting.

Making the change at WembleyPark to the Metropolitan Line, I was amused to note how many football fans must have followed a previous blog entry about always finding most space in the rear carriage. While the rest of the train was empty as it passed me pulling in to the station, that rear carriage was packed solid with fans, and fans alone.

My first amusement came as the train doors opened. A huge roaring cheer came from the packed carriage. Now, as a commuter, I know that we all sometimes feel like doing that when our train actually makes it as far as Wembley Park… and I guess a few were celebrating they could leave the ‘new fangled electrical railway thingy’ safely… anyway…

I let them out and then had the pleasure of a totally empty carriage for my own journey. All good, except the oddity… even at 10.50am, that carriage stank like a brewery. Not a spilled can anywhere, though, just the stench from consumption…

I’m old enough to remember when alcohol was really expensive – a bottle of spirits was treasured and ‘duty free’ an enviable perk. I also used to subscribe to the idea that it’s better for our own supermarkets to charge less than to give the tax income to the French as ‘booze cruisers’ crossed the channel to save cash in the early 1990s.

Now, I just don’t know any more. This blog often jokes about Mr P’s alcohol habit (Mr P is a fictional character, in fact, the real one doesn’t drink anything like as heavily – so he says) but the reality is that alcohol without control is something that needs another look.

Suddenly that ‘nanny state’ thinking which I hate so much doesn’t seem quite so stupid in the longer term. They say a conservative is just a mugged liberal. Occasionally, I’m now wondering if they may be right… and am I finally getting old???!!!

P.S. On a more positive note, www.dramatalk.co.uk inform me that the interview I did with them last year about my book is now the third most downloaded episode ever! Thanks to all who did so, and to those who have yet to, it’s still there, so feel free.

In London there are now three big musicals running that are aimed mostly at the family market. I’ve seen all three now (the last being ‘Shrek’ last week – opinions on Theatremonkey.com after press night, as I follow the rule of not releasing one beforehand).

Having had a particularly stressed week / month / year / decade / century / life,  I was amazed at how therapeutic a couple of hours of ‘taking my brain off the hook’ and watching somebody else work their gluteus maximus muscles off for a change was. And thus I formed another of my simple rules for survival. Everybody’s are different, of course, but as I have a blog entry to write, I thought I’d make a few notes of my own as it fills up a page and makes Mr P happy that the blog still works.

So:

Mobile (cell if you are a follower of Uncle Sam) phones are for emergencies. We got along perfectly without them for about a billion years. Keep your number private and don’t become a slave to them.

Email beats phones any day for daily communication, as you can leave them until you are ready to deal with them, thus organising your time for yourself rather than being dictated to by ringing bells / bleeps / the Nokia tune etc.

If you are in the bath and the call is that important, they’ll try repeatedly. Soak until at least the fifth call in two minutes. Anything else is probably just advertisers.

Never underestimate the power of hydrotherapy. Your body is mostly water, you first grew in a tank of fluid, and bathrooms are often tiled for maximum acoustic potential – both external noise blocking and voice reverberating. Bathrooms also usually have locking doors.

Singing (however badly) releases stress. Behind a locked door in a bathroom, nobody can raise your stress level as you reduce it by warbling through the complete works of Webber A.L. (see ‘locked door’ note, above).

It’s not worth getting stressed when a tube stops in a tunnel on the way to one of his shows. You can’t do anything to get it moving again. Have ‘customer charter’ forms for a fare refund available, and hand them out to other passengers at the 15 minute mark. Financial revenge on large and lousy organisations with poor customer service is good.

Customer Service departments can be an oxymoron – that is, having to enforce rules made by oxen and morons. Give them one chance to fix your problem, then head for the top – those oxen and morons. Google makes finding info on the bosses (from names and titles to the really personal stuff – outside of a Super Injunction of course) simple. Use it.

Accept that anything “Super” probably is “pretty OK” at best. Buy cheap, buy twice is a great mantra, but ‘Buy expensive without checking just how super it is” can work out even more expensive.

Even if you buy this year’s model today, accept that next year’s will have more features. Don’t worry, though – this year’s will have had all the snags worked out, and will eventually become the “they don’t make ‘em like that any more” of next year.

Last year’s stuff mostly was better because you can forget about the struggle you had learning to use it, but there is one thing worth remembering…

The biggest survival tip of all… and the one most adults forget or have twisted and atrophied over time, and that came back to me last week at “Shrek The Musical”… LAUGH FREELY WITHOUT INHIBITION WHENEVER YOU ARE GIVEN THE CHANCE.