how it went & hopes for how it goes

In my experience as a dancer, this formula has always held true for me:

When my dress rehearsal goes smoothly, I boff-up on the night of the show. Alternately, when the dress rehearsal runs screwy, the show is great.

Now, I am not a dancer in this upcoming show Saturday night. I am the one doing the lighting and the sound, and it's my first time doing so. Let's hope for everyone's sake that the above formula holds true as I perform in this new role, because last night at the dress rehearsal??

I sucked ass.

And I was an EqualOpportunityFuckerUpper, goofing up at least one thing during each and every piece. Nobody was immune.

Now in defense of myself, the only time I have ever touched this lightboard was at last week's tech rehearsal, and most of my time that night was spent taking notes about cues and what levels to set things at. We never ran through the pieces, so I never got to play with the flow of things. It was more of a, "when I put my arms in the air, turn that up (or down). I did not even get to attempt a cue-to-cue (that's where you walk through all of the cues and changes from one to the next rather quickly, just to try them out, but you do not run the pieces in their entirety). As a result of having no actual practice doing my "job", last night I really stunk.

Some of the highlights of my evening were having my finger stick to the sliding dimmer switch that runs the center spot (ie I accidentally turned the spotlight right back off just after turning it on) and having my knuckle bump into the track advance button as I was closing the tray to the CD player (ie I started the piece halfway through the music). Neat-o.

I think I've figured out my flaws though, and I know how to correct them. Let's just hope that there aren't any more out there lurking like tickling little time bombs. Again, I'm hoping that my historic performing formula proves correct that this means Saturday night will be awesome. We shall see.

I did learn one other big thing about myself, and why doing the lights and sound is so hard for me. I have been going to dance class every week for 16 years. Even seeing the floor, or the light of the room...it's like a trigger reminding me that I can turn off the left side of my brain. I can drop into my body and allow my right brain to flow freely into it's creative side.

This is exactly what happened when I walked into the studio last night to run the dress rehearsal.

Not the best mental state for reading linear notes written on graph paper about what sequence to perform tasks in.

I am hoping know this will make a difference. It feels like I need to get my brain in the gear I used to use when catering. I could create and be inspired, but could totally put all the ducks in a row, if you know what I mean.
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In other news: today was just good.
I took the stinky dog a self-service dog wash.
Brooke came over for a visit and I made us a nice brunch while she played with the electric spinner.
I got on top of some paperwork.
I got MyFavoriteKid off to his first middle school dance of the year....and need to leave now to go pick him up!


Tomorrow is going to be a bit bananas. MyFK has an 8:30am dentist appointment, then he has a 2pm audition for the Napa Valley Youth Symphony, and then I need to be at the studio by 5pm to set up for the 8pm show.

Betcha all you get tomorrow here is a photograph (which is good, because today I am rambling!!)...but that's perfect because it's "Snaps on Saturday".